I ran a ghost ad in a local paper to see how strong the rental market was in a local town that I knew nothing about. The ad ran on Sunday & Monday & I had over 100 calls (OUCH)!! I either called or spoke with most of them & put together a list of “potential tenants”, with info such as how soon they needed the property & the rent that they can afford to pay. Now I’m in business…
I wanted to know if it would be a good idea to run an ad in the paper to start building a buyers lists. I plan to start my heavy marketing that “I buy houses” in three weeks. I thought it might be a smart to run ads now to build a list of potential buyers to choose from. What do you guys thank?
Posted by Scot - SoCal on July 21, 2001 at 21:32:41:
I’ve been running an ad in a couple of papers for the last couple of months. (This ad is the Matt B special.) I get about a call a day from the ad, but many are from buyers (though the ad says nothing about selling homes). Run your ‘We buy homes’ ad and you’ll most likely get your buyers list too.
I agree with Matt, but would add that if you have a list of people you know are looking for a 3 bedroom in xxx town USA, when you find a deal that might seem tight or just doesnt really excite you, you might be more willing to go after the deal knowing you have a buyer/tenant already lined up.
This depends on what type of deals you plan to do. If you plan on doing wholesale flips, this might be a good idea. It would be a good idea to have a list of able buyers, along with their buying criteria ready for your flips. If, however, you plan on doing lease options or owner financed deals, spend your money on advertising for sellers, not buyers. There are tons of buyers for these types of deals and you don’t have to look long for them.