What are the best ways to go about finding distressed properites

Bird Dogs, Wholesaling
1

or motivated sellers ???

2

There really isnt a BEST way, but there are lots of good ones. Mailers, bandits, newspapers, tv, billboards etc. They all draw in leads. You just need to figure out which are the most effective and the best cost per lead.

3

Do a search on here there are a ton of threads on how to find deals.

4

Banks are the biggest motivated sellers today.

I think it depends on your market and the amount of foreclosures/REOs that are available.

Some markets might not have that many REOs , so you might have to rely more on doing deals directly with sellers.