Justin B. McClelland

So I decided to start a new series called “WTF! Wednesdays”. This series is going to be based on some of the senseless occurrences that I face in my day-to-day dealings as an investor. No eBook, DVD, or seminar can really prepare you for this. If you’ve got years of experience, then you know what I’m talking about and most likely have a ton more stories than I do. If you’re brand-new or still on the fence, allow me to open your eyes.

So, to kick things off real proper like. I have a voicemail I’d like to share which was received from a lady who received a Yellow Letter from me recently. If this wasn’t 2010 and more like 1990, it would be an answering machine tape that would be worn-out by now. I have played this thing SOOO MANY times….just cuz.  So, click the ‘fitting’ image below to listen in.

I doubt this lady thought I’d find her message entertaining and put her on blast.  She doesn’t know who she’s messing with.  I refuse to take life so seriously.  But anyway, I’m interested to know what other investors run across.  Perhaps, if you have a blog you can participate in this “WTF! Wednesdays” series.  C’mon…it’ll be fun.

- Justin

Random, Real Estate, Series Answering machine, Marketing, WTF Wednesday

Image via CrunchBase

In the following videos, I give a synopsis of how I used the CallFire IVR (interactive voice response) service to dial all of my real estate contacts in an automated fashion.  I’ve used the CallFire voice broadcast service in the past a couple of times, to notify all the respondents to my house ads that the house was no longer available.  But, the IVR service is a bit more complex than just a broadcast as it is a phone-tree that gives the caller multiple prompts to choose from and upon their selection, they’ll hear different audio.

Using the IVR instead of a broadcast allowed for me maximize my efforts of the phone call.  In addition to auto-dialing those who were on my buyers-list, I also added every number that I have recorded over the past few months that had responded to any of my marketing efforts.  This made for a total of approximately 300 unique phone numbers.  So the IVR was advantageous over just a regular broadcast because not only did I supply the call recipient with the property information, I also added a prompt that allowed for the call recipient to leave a message with a property they had for sale.  And the last prompt was for the user to opt-in to my do-not-call list (I set this up wrong, but at least I tried).

So in a nutshell, this is how it went down:

1. Call-recipients’ phone rang
2. They were greeted with the main message
3. This is what they heard when they pressed one
4. This is what they heard when they pressed three
5. This is what they heard when they pressed eight

When the call-recipients left a voice-message, I was able to listen to it in the Admin panel of CallFire.  One mistake I did make though…rather two mistakes….one being that I didn’t change the audio for when an answering machine answered the phone.  No need to give prompts when that happens.  You can actually supply different audio for VoiceMail/Answering machines.  I messed that up.  The other mistake that I made, was that I violated the new DNC law was put into effect by the FTC on September 1, 2009.  I knew about this law change and completely forgot about it.  So technically to be in accordance with the new law, when a user selects a specific prompt, they would be met with a live person to give/take down property info.  This wouldn’t be hard to setup either.  It actually may be the better option anyway.

So here is the video that I put together.  The audio quality on it is horrible, so “my bad”. I think I accidentally changed one of the audio-settings on CamStudio and don’t know which it was.

There are so many other services that CallFire offers it’s ridiculous.  I think these type of services will better allow independent investors such as myself to operate with the scale and efficiency of a Fortune 500 corporation.

- Justin

Marketing, Real Estate, Tutorials CallFire, Interactive voice response, Marketing, Telephony, Voice Broadcast

I’ve started receiving responses from the Capstone Condo owner direct-mail campaign.  These letters went out last Tuesday so it’s still a bit early yet to tabulate all of the results.  Using this yellow-letter method, I was hoping to get a higher than normal (3-4%) response rate.  Yellow-letters typically get a 10-15% response rate.  I’ve only received 4 responses thus far, so that’s about 2% of a response rate since approximately 200 pieces were sent out.  And all 4 of those responses are owners from Illinois.  I need for some of those Cali buyers to give me a call!

Here is the letter that I sent.  I used the same process that I wrote in detail about a few months ago.

Marketing Advertising, Advertising mail, Marketing

It’s official, I’m 29 years old now and I have exactly 1 year left to reach my 7-figure net worth goal. I’ve come a long way from where I was last year, but I still have quite a ways to go. My strategy remains the same as it was a year ago; wholesale properties until I have a positive net worth of approximately 30K and then diversify by investing in short-sales and rentals. In October of 2010, I’ll be investing with a partner in tax lien certificates. I also have an internet marketing company in the works.  So the 1M won’t all come from Real Estate.  I admit, my plan is somewhat vague at the moment, however I realize now that trying to calculate every move is a wasted effort. For me, it’s best that I just have a template of a plan and adapt when necessary.

1 year, 1 million dollars. Sounds like a stretch, but seriously that’s not even that much money. This time next year maybe all of my friends will truly understand why I spent nearly every weekend and weeknight for two years working towards my business. But right now, I don’t think they get it.

So on to current events…I was all excited about my brochures and my flyers until it was pointed out that there is a word redundancy within them. They have the headline, “Need to sell your your house fast”. That was kind of a buzz kill. But oh well, I honestly didn’t notice and the damn things are already printed. I brought it up to the designer and she offered to have them reprinted. But granted that she charged me about 1/3 of what she could’ve charged, I wasn’t going to do that to her. The reprint probably would’ve taken her profit and left her in the red. So we negotiated a company-credit towards the next project. I feel like that was fair.

I also met with owner of the rental property today and made an offer for her property at about 70% of ARV. The house doesn’t really need any repairs and is ready for renters so I felt like it was best to not make her an extreme lowball offer, it’s pretty turn-key. She still felt like the offer was low, but I explained my reasoning. I completely explained that to buy it ‘right now’ I’d have to pick it up at a discount. I also told her that she’d be able to get close to full retail if she listed the house with a Realtor, but I also explained that it may not sell until Spring of 2010. So I was very glad that she was receptive and understood my numbers and motives. I was most nervous about how that would go.  She said that she’d run the offer past her lawyer tomorrow and contact me either way. This should be interesting.

I’m fearful that a 30% discount isn’t as ideal as a 40% or higher discount for my buyers, of course. However, my logic is that the house is ready to go. No exaggerations, renters could move in tomorrow. So, that’s got to count for something. I plan on taking a small spread on this, since I think there’s little room. What are the thoughts that yall have on this? It’s not a smoking HOT deal, but it seems pretty solid to me (that’s if she agrees and signs the contract)

Welp…365 days to go.  The heat has been officially turned up.  It’s time to definitely go harder in all facets of life (like I’m not already going hard).  I’m about to go Lil Wayne on ‘em.  Lil Wayne puts out a mixed-tape with new music almost monthly.  He is one of the best Hip Hop artists to have ever done it.  And he is a self-proclaimed workaholic.  He inspires me…believe it or not.

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• Lil Wayne’s Rebirth Due Out December 15 (mtv.com)
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Real Estate Internet Marketing, Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Net worth, Property

I just got my brochures and flyers in and I am impressed!  I outsourced the design to a friend from college who I mentioned in an earlier post and she knocked this out of the park like I knew she would.  I just basically gave her the creative room to do what she does, she used my website as a reference tool, and she did her thing.  I love it.  If you’d be interested in contacting her for some of your marketing materials, her name is Tabitha Vickers and her company is Spazz Group and she has very good rates.

Here is my 3-fold Brochure (will be inside of plastic sleeves hanging on homeowner doornobs):
- Outside

- Inside

Here is my 11×17 poster (will go on bulletin boards in grocery stores and restaurants and such):

Also, on another note, I spent a great amount of time today restrategizing my marketing plans.  This was incredibly time consuming, believe it or not.  But what I came up with is pretty damn good in my opinion.  There will be various activities and methods put in place to generate more leads, secure properties, and secure cash buyers (I need as many of these as possible).  The tasks listed below are meant to accomplish one or more of the aforementioned.

Direct Offers:
MLS properties
REO properties

Self-procured housing leads:
Yellow Page Ad
Champaign News Gazette Ad
Brochures
Flyers 11×17
Dollar Bill Flyers
Direct Mail To Tax Delinquent Homeowners
Direct Mail To Pre-NOD (Notice of default) Leads
CraigsLists Ads
Bi-fold Neon Business Cards

Virtual Assistant Cold-Calls:
Cash Buyers From MLS
Section 8 Landlords (convert to cash buyer lead)
Members of Central Illinois Apartment Association (convert to cash buyer lead)
FSBO Sellers

I think these tasks will keep me plenty busy.  This is my revised list after much thought and reading my Preston Ely Wholesaling ebook for like the 7th time.  On a tangent, why do people hate on that guy so much?  I happen to like his style and his material.  When you Google his name there are ridiculous reviews to browser through.  Anyways…so that about does it.  I just need to manage my time as best I can and things will start to pop-off.

- Peace Out

P.S.
I meet with a seller tomorrow to present an offer on her rental property that she’s looking to sell.  She’s an older lady and the more I think about it, the less motivated I think she is.  But that ain’t changing my offer amount, hopefully I won’t get shot when I present it to her…should be interesting.

Marketing, Real Estate Bulletin board, For sale by owner, Marketing, Preston Ely, Tabitha Vickers

Okay, so after my post last night, I took immediate action.  I bugged a college friend who is a marketing wiz (MBA) and does graphic design until I finally got in touch with her via phone earlier today.  I ran my concept past her, as far as needing a brochure to put on houses explaining that I buy houses fast.  I’m leaving the graphics and marketing concept completely up to her as I know she’ll knock it out of the park.  She just started her own marketing company and I’m glad I’m getting to her early, because once she’s established she will cost an arm and a leg.  I’ve seen some of her past work and I know she’ll do good with this.  I’ll hopefully be able to outsource some other marketing materials to her too.  I like to find someone who does good work and stick with them.

I also, posted an ad on CraigsList that I needed someone to post those brochures to houses in select Urbana, Illinois neighborhoods.  It took me like 15 minutes to figure out what to offer as far as pay.  I quoted $100 per neighborhood and asked for resume and references.  May have overbid.  I know it’s a low skilled job, but I need someone who isn’t as dumb as a box of rocks and will be accountable, so that’s what I’m willing to pay for.  Because technically, there isn’t a feasible way that I know of to follow up on the work completed.  It’s not like I’m going to drive each neighborhood and check for the door hangers.  I need someone who is trustworthy right off of the bat and it looks like I’ll just have to screen to my best ability to get that person.

The door hanger brochures are just one more facet to my marketing strategy.  In my Preston Ely ebook, he said that nothing is going to start happening until you take MASSIVE action, so that’s the plan from here on out.  No more, half-assness.  Not that I was ever doing that, but it’s full blast from now on.  This advertising is getting expensive, I’ll just have to suck it up and keep living like a college student until things start to pop.

Business, Marketing Graphic design, Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Preston Ely

This past weekend, I spent alot of time behind the computer.  I mentioned a while back that I was going to create another tutorial/video about how to use Mozenda with CraigsList (at least I think I did).  I took a few hours on Sunday and came up with a screen-scrape for CraigsList.  I would’ve created the video then, except I was having an issue with my account.  Stay tuned for this as it might just be something that can replace a virtual assistant of yours.  You know I’m all about that.  I’m a firm believer in the adage, “if you want something done right, you do it yourself”.  Yeah, I know about delegation, time-maximization, blah blah blah.  But if you can get a computer to do what you’d normally have to hire a person to do, you’ve just eliminated a liability from your operation.

Marketing: I’m still working on calling people back who originally responded to my last mailing.  The game of phone tag is on.  I feel like this may be a waste of time as I’m following-up with luke-warm leads.  The Realtor that I had answering my phone calls didn’t have any lead sheets that were fully completed.  Part of this is probably because I just didn’t have any motivated sellers and the other part is that as a Realtor he is pre-occupied with what Realtors do on a daily basis.

Last week, I mentioned an investor who has about 60 properties in town and whom also invests in tax liens.  Well check this out.  He said that he was looking for someone to do some busy work for him to aid in preparation for the Tax Sale next week.  He was offering to pay $15 an hour for someone to manually go through the tax delinquent list and check to see if the tax delinquent parcel numbers have a building attached (he accidentally bought a lien on a pond before).  It’s 2am and I’m too lazy/sleepy to break down the exact detail.  So I’ll just say that I will be able to do exactly what he is looking for with a screen-scrape of the tax assessors website.  Perhaps, I’ll make a video about that too.  So instead of sifting through 2,000 records at a one minute/record pace of 2,000 minutes (33 hours * $15) or $495.  I’ll be able to get him squared away with everything he needs with about 18 hours of labor using Mozenda.  Uhmmmm….yeah, I’ll just have to post again about it when I complete it.  I’m not sure this paragraph makes sense in it’s brief form.  Anyway, my eyelids are heavy. Peace Out.

P.S.
I’m posting this just cuz. One of the funniest comedies of all time.

Marketing, Random, Real Estate Marketing, Mozenda, National Association of Realtors, Tax lien

So it’s been over a week and the calls have drastically tapered off.  I had planned to give some exact call counts, but I kind of screwed that up when I was altering the settings for my Vonage account when setting up my Google Voice accounts (the counts got off).  So I’ll approximate.  After 1 week of the letters being in possession of homeowners, I received about 70 calls with about 12 of those being leads.  Out of the 12 leads about:

4 turned out to have their house listed on the MLS
2 I’ve played phone tag with
2 I’ve yet to call
1 Is in Pre-pre-foreclosure*
1 Plans on moving to ATL in February
2 Will most likely sell retail when ready

* The guy who is in pre-pre-foreclosure is disabled and is soon to be receiving disability checks.  He said he just caught his mortgage up from being 4 months late to 1 month late.  He said that he wants to sell because he doesn’t know how long the disability checks will last and needs to downgrade.  I’ll check back in with this guy in a month or so and see where his motivation is.

The guy who wants to move to Atlanta this winter may turn out to be gold as well.  He didn’t seem too motivated when I spoke with him, but this may change.  I’ll also check back in with this guy next month.

One of my letters hit the property of an investor in town that has over 60 properties.  He responded to the letter just to chat for a bit about investing.  We met in person last Friday and he’s looking to divest his portfolio and needs someone (me!) with a creative mind to market them.  He also invests in Tax Lien certificates and needs someone to perform some follow up with the liens that may soon convert to deeds.  So perhaps we can work out something there, we haven’t negotiated any particulars but I expressed my interest and we may meet later this week.

** One quick note about this guy. I don’t think I mentioned in an earlier post that I went to the County Recorders’ office one day and looked through the judgment books.  I wrote down the information of all the purchasers from the previous years’ tax sale (for buyer’s list building purposes).  I then Google’d each person to see what I’d learn (did I ever mention that I love Google, I could almost be a P.I.).  So when I met with this guy, I already knew a little about him.  But then again, I’m pretty sure he Google’d me before he called me because he mentioned my blog.  So that means he may read this…awkward…

Another letter made its’ way to a Real Estate broker who was a former investor and she called to chat about investing, what she’s doing Real Estate wise and her consulting business.  This lady was cool as a fan.  She was very wise and said that I’m free to call her whenever with questions.

So besides the leads there were many positives to overcome the negativity from early last week.  Sometimes I post my frustrations and speak of slacking and what not, but that’s all part of the experience.  The purpose of this blog is to document it all.  So don’t think that I’m going to give up or get depressed by these suckers who waste their time hating.  I would never lie to you and I honestly think half of what people say is funny.  Now the other half can meet me in the octogan…but I digress.  The point is I’m going to blog about it ALL…give it to you straight, no chaser.

Since I’ve launched my Yellow Letter campaign, I’ve also launched some other marketing.  I’ve got a Sunday classified ad that is going to go in the Champaign News-Gazette, the Savoy Star, and Accent.  I’ve also got an ad that is going to run in the American Classifieds.  And my Yellow Pages Ad prints and should be delivered in November.  I’m going to follow-up to my mailing list in about 6 weeks with a postcard.  I’m also thinking about buying a list from YellowLettersComplete.com, perhaps the pre-foreclosure list.  And the Bandit Signs will go in effect again very soon.  I ordered some more.  This time instead of buyers, I’m going to target sellers.  And I’m going to place them out on Friday and pull them on Sunday.  All of the Realtors do this.  I just needed to cross the line so I knew where it was the first time.  I shouldn’t get any heat for this.  If I do, I have an arguable case.  I also am going to ramp-up my CraigsList activity.  So as you can tell, I’m grinding…but still have a ways to go.

Yesterday, there was a Rich Dad Poor Dad seminar in town.  You know the seminar that gets people amped up about Real Estate investing, and claims that they’ll teach all of the ropes for $500 3-day seminar.  Once you get to that seminar you learn that to really learn all of the ropes, you need to pay $30,000.  I mean, I’m not saying this is a bad deal but DAMN!  At least that’s what the attendees usually say as they leave the hotel banquet room.  I’ve been there done that and so I spontaneously thought of a way to capitalize.  I made up some flyers at the last minute that were aimed towards finding someone to birddog/partner with.  The flyer was folded into a 3-part brochure and in a nut-shell it said

Interested in starting out in Real Estate but can’t afford the training? Call Me! I’m a house-flipper that is looking for partners to work with in Champaign-Urbana.  No experience necessary.

I put those flyers on about 40 cars in the parking lot outside of the entrance to the seminar.  I was scared to death, I didn’t want to get caught and fined.  I almost didn’t do it.  But I did it anyway.  It’s time to start making things happen.  I really don’t care anymore about the rules.  I ask myself, “What’s the worst that can happen?”.  And if the answer doesn’t involve an arrest or bodily harm, then I’m doing it.  So anyway, I did all that and didn’t get one stankin call!  Oh well.  Maybe next time.

Welp, that’s all for now.  I need to kick out a BiggerPockets article for tomorrow.  I think I’ll focus on the features and uses of Google Voice for investors.  Writers’ block, here I come! Peace out.

- Justin

Internet Marketing, Marketing, Real Estate, Tutorials CraigsList, Google, Marketing, Real Estate, Real estate broker, Rich Dad Poor Dad, Vonage

Today wraps up the end of day one of the Yellow Letter campaign.  I received 30 calls in total.  That’s already a 3.75% response rate.  However, there are only two leads (one warm and the other is semi-warm).  This technique is reported to yield a 10 to 15% response rate, so that means I should have another 50 responses or so.  Hopefully, I’ll get some more leads.  I could care less about responses.

Which brings me to my next topic.  I have about 7 voicemail messages that are utterly ridiculous.  These messages were left when my Realtor was occupied with other calls or after 6pm.  And I mean they are pure comedy!  I bet the callers would be infuriated more if they could hear me laughing when listening to their messages.  I’m choosing the top two to share for your listening pleasure.  I worked on my six-pack by listening to these.

“Like I didn’t already know this”

“I’m really tempted on this one…”

The last message really inspires me to make an offer.  He wouldn’t have received a letter if he had a house with a tax assessed value over $150K, in-case you couldn’t smell the sarcasm.

Perhaps I’ll FedEx this guy an offer tomorrow.  The offer would be an option to buy his house in 2 days for $500k.  I’ll include a $100,000 option-consideration check, however there would be an inspection contingency.  He must have heated marble floors throughout, even in the garage!  I would definitely do this if I could hide in the bushes and secretly video tape his reaction when he read the offer.  That would be sooo worth it!  You don’t even know!

I mean seriously…there were many people who called and spoke to my Realtor or left a message pissed-off that I mailed them about buying their house.  If you didn’t care, don’t pick up the phone and waste your breath and my time.  Some people just have way too much free time on their hands and want something to have an opinion about.  Some of these messages remind me of the Family Guy episode with the lonely old widow cut-away.  A few of these ladies got my letter today for sure and called in.

Seriously, these people just don’t know I was making it rain with their letters hours before I sent them. Kick rocks! I’m out.

P.S.
If my CraigsList ad gets flagged one more time, I’m whoopin some ass!

- Justin

Marketing, Real Estate Business, Comedy, Marketing, Real Estate, Realtor, Yellow Letter

I met with the broker today to discuss the possibilities about his new website.  The meeting went fairly well overall.  However, it seemed to lack focus, we were all over the place with our meeting topics.  I like structure and agenda, I’m organized like that.  So when we were discussing things at random, I felt like we were wasting effort that would be better spent focused.  But despite that fact, I think we were able to gain an understanding of each other.  He basically wants a website that has all of the bells and whistles a site that the largest Champaign Property Management company should have.  And I think I was able to successfully convey that I could provide that for him.  I didn’t sleep last-night as the hours were spent drafting a plan for his new website complete with new ideas, comparisons of the competition, etc. Now, I just need to submit a formal bid to get the gig.  I need that gig for mo’ marketing money!

I’m starting to doubt my original plan concerning diversification.  Because I don’t think any of my non-related real estate ventures have even close to the ROI that real estate wholesaling does.  I may be focusing too much of my time in other areas.  However, I need marketing money so that I can focus on real estate.  Kind of a catch-22 I guess.

After the meeting I slept from 10am to 3pm (some of the best sleep I ever had), I had a meeting with my assistant at 3:30pm at the library to pick-up my yellow letters.  On a side-note, what’s with assistants and tardiness!?  We clearly discussed in an email last night that we were to meet at 3:30pm today, apparently somehow she interpreted that as 4:00pm.  But even if she did, she was late for that too as she showed at about 4:15pm!  Stee-rike ONE!

Image via Wikipedia

Hopefully, it was just a mixup on her part.  But if it happens again…”on to the next one”.

I got the letters now, there all stuffed and hand-addressed and ready to go.  All I need to do is buy the stamps for them and send them off.  And wait for the flood of calls.  In a box of 900 letters, surely there is at least 10k floating around in there somewhere.

- Justin

Marketing, Real Estate, Web Development Business, Marketing, Real Estate, Services, website