The Wealthy Widow
We’re starting to get more calls trickling in from our yellow letter campaign. Sometimes when you buy a list, unless you’re REALLY specific, you can end up doing some mailings to homes that you’d never wholesale or use as a rental property.
This has happened to us a couple times because we have zipcodes here in Fort Lauderdale where you can have both million dollar homes and $100K homes. When dealing with these owners you can have mixed results. People who are appalled and offended that you contacted them as well as others who are kind and want to chat it up with you but will still tell you that you’re unlikely to buy their house. LOL!
Anywhoo….this happened again yesterday. We got a call from a woman who was said something like this on the voicemail: “Hi, my name is Liz and I received your yellow letter in the mail. I’m a little confused because I don’t know why you have specifically chosen this house to ask about. I’ve been in real estate for over 30 years and I don’t know if you’re a realtor or what company you represent, but please call me and help me understand why you’ve contacted me with this letter.” Then she read the letter outloud.
She didn’t have an attidude or anything. She just sounded confused. Upon talking to her, we found out some interesting things. First, she’s quite wealthy — she used to deal with luxury residential real estate and dabbled in commercial and she made $1M on her first transaction! Her luxury home is paid off free and clear. Second, her husband passed away 5 months ago and he “made quite a bit of money.” The conversation lasted for about 20 minutes and the bottom line is that she encouraged us to stay in touch with her, gave us her email address, and offered to be of assistance. She was complaining about an issue with her neck, and the massage therapist in Phil came out at that point (he’s been a licensed massage therapist for over 10 years), so you never know…he may end up with another private client. LOL!
Just another fun moment with seller calls. Have a great day!
P.S. Still working on getting short sale leads. I have more cold calls to make to realtors this week. Wish me luck!
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Category: Fun calls with sellers, Marketing
Shae – maybe she’d like to partner with you on some buy and hold deals… she might be tired of dealing with the hassles and ready to let somebody else handle the investments???
I’m with Julie… Maybe the two of you can work on a deal together. Good luck continuing to network and keep in touch with her!
Stephanie Peay´s last blog ..Project “End 2009 With A Bang”
Julie, you’re absolutely right…not sure how much property she’s currently holding (we’ll continue talking to her), but in general, she could end up being a future private lender for us!
Hey Stephanie, good to see you back!
Thanks!
Hi Shae,
I agree with Julie’s comment.
A friend of mine in Ontario had a similar thing happen to him. He got into a conversation with someone who he had sent a yellow letter to. The lady that he spoke to was a real estate investor, who did not want to take the lead anymore with real estate purchases. She has her principal residence free and clear, with substantial equity that can be accessed.
My friend is going to keep in touch with her, and hopefully bring her along as a joint venture partner.
Onwards and Upwards,
Neil.
Very interesting! Glad to hear you are getting some potentials out of your mailers. Everytime you conduct a direct mail campaign, you will be suprised at some of the wonderful networking that will turn out.
Keep in touch with this lady. You will be able to learn alot from someone of her stature and success.
Thanks Neil and James! We followed up with her yesterday and look forward to staying in touch. You never know!
I’ll agree with others, sounds like you may have found a future private money lender. Plus these folks that have been around awhile, want to prove to themselves they still have what it takes. Opportunities come in many shades and flavors.
Jason
Bilgefisher´s last blog ..CEO or Employee of my life?
“Opportunities come in many shades and flavors.”
Thanks for the comments!
So true, pal
1 Mil on her first transaction? Not too shabby.
I made 2k on my first wholesale deal.
Perhaps I’m in the wrong niche.
Stephani´s last blog ..Flip This Book Club- February Edition (The Five Major Pieces to the Life Puzzle, by Jim Rohn))
“Not too shabby” – Steph, that may have been the understatement of the day. LOL!