By: John
The only way to move forward is to TAKE ACTION.
I started out like most newbie wholesalers out there. I was working a full time job and doing very little marketing because I had a limited budget. I was afraid to network with “real” investors because I really had no idea what I was talking about… Then my daughter was born.
I realized that 50 hours per week in a cubicle was the last thing I wanted to do. I mean, I knew I hated my job, but up until my first child was born I could handle it. Now, with another life to take care of, the idea of leaving her with another caregiver for 10-12 hours per day just made my heart sink.
I remember the exact day at work everything changed for me. I was being forced to work a weekend (as a salaried employee so no overtime) and my parents were coming to town. Of course, the managers at this $3 Billion dollar corporation I worked for couldn’t care less about that. It was that day I made the decision to make a change.
I did some research on how to wholesale and started my bootstrapped marketing plan.
I bought all the supplies and my wife and I started handwriting 500 yellow letters at a time. I can still remember them like it was yesterday:
“Hi ______,
My name is John and I am a local investor. I am interested in buying your house at _________________. I pay cash and can close as soon as you want. No closing costs or realtor fees.
Please call me at ___________ if you are interested.
Thanks and have a great day!
John
I think I got an 11% response rate on those yellow letters and I learned more than any guru could ever teach by taking those calls and analyzing those properties.
Along with the letters, I setup a free website on Wix.com and started using a Google Pay Per Click campaign. I think I started at $300/month (which, if you have done anything with PPC you know that is almost nothing.)
My first deal came from a submission on my website, JohnBuysHousesOhio.com. I will detail this in a later post, but I made $10,000 on my first wholesale deal and was absolutely ecstatic! I was hooked and needed another one! I did my next deal within the next 2 months, this time it was only $2500, but nothing to cough at.
It turns out the investor I sold my first 2 properties to was looking for a partner like me to find deals. We immediately hit it off!
He had money and experience rehabbing and I had the ability to find deals. That first company was called Core Developments LLC and I was so proud of it!
From there I simply ramped up my marketing. I was constantly spending more and more on web leads and mailing out more and more letters. Along the way we put processes in place to handle the volume like a 24 hour call center to pre-screen our leads. We started using Podio to organize all of our leads.
From the beginning I knew I wanted to quit my day job, but something else had to happen first. My wife and I decided that it was more important for her to go part-time at her nursing job first. She was on a 3 days per week, 12 hours per day schedule and she was required mandatory weekends every other week. She was also working every other major holiday. The thought of her missing out on Thanksgivings or Christmas’s with our kids gave us the motivation to make it work!
With the extra money I was making on the side she had the freedom to reduce her hours and spend more time with our daughter.
Once my wife quit her job, I set a goal that would lead to my resignation: I wanted to save a full years salary in the bank AND have enough deals in my lead flow to potentially create another years salary. It was April of 2015 when I reached both of these goals. I turned in my resignation as soon as I could. It was one of the best days of my life! We got an office in Dublin, Ohio and within weeks our company was already growing bigger then I had been able to grow it sitting in a cube!
I was was astonished at how quickly I was able to grow my company now that I could put 100% of my effort into it. I remember the first thing I did was set up meetings with other investors to start networking. Within 2 weeks after quitting my job I had locked in 2 private lenders, which meant I could bring the money to my deals and split the profit 50/50.
The success that I have had and the speed in which I have achieved it comes down to one thing: Taking Action. Everything that’s worth doing is going to be a challenge at first. There will never be a “good time” to quit your job, but you need to continue on and persevere.
I strongly believe in the saying “There is no such thing as failure, just giving up”. Those who don’t give up become successful. It is true that failure is the key to success. If you can fail more than most and continue on the path, you will be the one that succeeds.
I am not a “book smart” person, but I took action when I knew success was possible and that made all the difference.
Take these steps and you can do the same:
- TAKE ACTION - Either you will succeed, or you will fail forward and learn from your mistakes.
- Burn the boats! I had no idea how much my day job was holding me back until I quit.
- Network - Everyone starts somewhere. You don’t have to pretend like you know everything, just do your research and when you meet with seasoned investors have a list of GOOD questions lined up. It is always frustrating when I take my time to meet with a newer investor and all the questions they ask me could have been answered on BiggerPockets in a matter of minutes.
Let us know in the comments what you would have done differently when you were first starting out!
Happy Investing!
