I am new to this buisness (as you can tell) My question: How do wholesellers manage to get these “motivated sellers” to put thier property under contract rather then to get an agent? Why would anyone sell thier house at “wholesell value” when they can get even a reduced reatail for it?
that, my friend, is the million dollar question 
Check the marketing section at the bottom of this forum.
Motivated sellers NEED to sell; price is often secondary to the driving need to sell.
Have you ever been in a tenant occupied (or previously occupied) residence and thought to yourself, “How do people live like this?” Sometimes landlords simply do not want to fix up the property…again. They’d rather just sell.
Know anyone getting a divorce where neither party can afford to make the payments?
Ever had a family member or close friend pass away? Or know anyone else who has? Often times the heirs are left holding real estate that nobody needs (or wants) and/or it’s in a different state and/or it’s hard to insure a vacant property (in some jurisdictions), etc. etc. etc.
How many people who are currently facing foreclosure have the time or the money to list with an agent? Many just want to cut their losses, save their credit and get out of dodge.
Think of it this way…have you ever had an old couch or old furniture in your house that you just wanted to get rid of? How about an old car that you would’ve paid someone to get it out of your way?
Real Estate is no different…at times it can be a tremendous burden. What often differentiates a motivated seller from a non-motivated seller is NEED to sell vs. WANT to sell.
Chris
They do it because they want to sell it.
NOT just merely list it with an agent.
Listing it does not guarantee
a sale, especially a retail sale.
Selling it gives them $…
even if it’s @ a wholesale price.
There are costs involved when selling a house.
Given the added costs of going through
an agent (commissions & time
on the market), you’ll most likely net
more by selling it now, as opposed to
waiting it out for an unlikely retail sale.
There is a part of the population who isn’t responsible for anything. They expect other people to do everything for them.
While there are some legitimate reasons to be facing foreclosure, the usual reason is that the homeowner is one of the ones who takes no personal responsibility for anything. (Responsible people facing economic disaster can usually figure out a better option)
Some are in the mess in the first place because they expected other people to find their house, buy their house, arrange their financing for them while they did nothing-- not even read or understand their mortgage documents.
It takes effort to get yourself out of a mess, and they won’t make any effort because they believe it is someone else’s responsibility to take care of them (emotional age of about 6-- waiting for parents to do everything for them)
So along comes the investor and announces he will take care of it, so the homeowner just turns everything over. It apparently is too much effort to actually do anything to get themselves out of their mess. You offer to do it for them, and the house is yours.
Landlords see endless tenants who take responsibility for nothing. The world is full of them, and for some reason, the banks decided to give them subprime mortgages and let them buy houses when they couldn’t take care of a house of figure out how to make a mortgage payment.