Tips for finding motivated sellers and speeding up your real estate prospecting

One of the most invaluable skills you need to lean on the job includes finding motivated sellers as a real estate agent. Motivated sellers are property owners looking to dispose of their property for one reason or another. Getting this individual on board is one of the best ways of speeding up your real estate prospecting.

What is real estate prospecting?

This is the process of finding new clients through methods such as outbound communication and active outreach. Instead of waiting for clients to approach you for a real estate deal, you need to be the first to make a move. You can either; call, text, email, or even personal knock on some doors to build a rapport between you and the prospect. In recent years, agents in the real estate industry have been maximizing skip tracing to locate their potential leads effectively. To engage the owners of properties they are interested in, realtors use skip trace to find the owner's name, current address, phone number, and email address. All this information is important in supporting your aggressive approach to finding motivated sellers.

This article is focused on some of the best ways of finding motivated sellers to boost your real estate prospecting.

Finding Motivated Sellers

Every real estate agent needs to equip themselves with the right skills to help them identify motivated sellers. Here are some of the signs the agents need to focus on; Price - when the prospects are willing to go lower than 10-30% of the market value. Terms - look for lucrative terms of the agreement such as 0% interest, financing, and no down payment. Timeline - if the seller wants to finalize the deal as soon as possible.

When using skip trace to find more about your leads, these are some of the telltales that can help you narrow down on motivated sellers.

Relocation happens when seeking greener pastures in a new location or looking for a fresh start. Life situation - a seller may be motivated when faced with situations such as birth/death, divorce, or even separation. Vacancy, extensive repair, and neglect - when a property lies idle for long without bringing in returns can be a motivation to sell. Too much damage to the property can also make the owner sell, especially if they don't want to spend on renovation. The threat of foreclosure - happens when a property owner defaults on their mortgage payments; they may want to sell the property as soon as possible to prevent foreclosure. Inheritance - happens when a seller inherits a piece of property and they are not looking to keep it. They tend to cash out as soon as possible.

A discussed before, finding motivated sellers is one skill any realtor needs to learn. However, some strategies can be employed to increase the chances of scoring leads. These include;

Contacting local attorney

Attorneys, especially family lawyers and business lawyers, are always in tune with property owners looking to sell their homes or commercial buildings. This is mainly because of reasons such as bankruptcy, divorce, and probate. Therefore, you need to establish a close working relationship with the attorneys within your service area. This can be done through visiting their offices or calls and emails—another importance of skip trace.

You can also network with the lawyers during events and local business gatherings. By forging the right connections among lawyers, you can effectively increase your chances of speeding up your real estate prospecting. For your work to be easier, narrow your connections to lawyers specializing in fields such as probates, bankruptcy, real estate law, and family law.

Direct mail marketing

This is one of the oldest forms of marketing with a proven track record. Direct mail marketing has over the years been used by realtors to find motivated sellers effectively. Using skip trace technology, you can browse through public records to develop a list of potential leads. To create your email list, here are a few records you need to look at, • An out-of-state property owner. • Absentee owner. • Death of joint tenant. • Age of the property owner, especially the elderly. • Recent foreclosures.

With your list narrowed down, you can then send emails or even letters to their respective addresses. Inquire if they have any intentions of selling, be sure to follow up after a few weeks in case you don't get any response.

Visit For Sale By Owner websites

Popularly known as FSBO sites, this location is one of the best locations to track down motivated sellers. Some of these websites may include Trulia, Craigslist, and LoopNet. During your search, narrow down on deals that have stayed for long on the site, as this could be an indicator of a motivated seller. Use information such as property type, location, price, and mode of sale to shorten the search. Most of these sites tend to list properties such as single-family homes, multi-family homes, and condos.

Researching for leads online can be time-consuming and strenuous. However, you need to remain focused on increasing your real estate prospecting.

Drive for dollars

Driving for dollars has no profound explanation; it is what it says. This move involves driving around your service area looking for distressed properties, noting down the addresses, and including them in your mail list. To know more about the owner and history, you want to use skip trace. This is one of the best ways to generate leads and capturing prospects that competitors may have overlooked. When generating lists from online platforms, there are high chances your competitors may be using the same list. This makes manually going to look for leads more advantageous. It may look like a time-consuming endeavor; however, this is something you can do in your spare time. All you need to do is pay extra attention when driving around your service area.

Employ skip tracing

Until recently, skip tracing has been used to track down fugitives and debtors and bring them to justice. However, investors in the real estate industry have been employing this technology to find new leads to boost their real estate prospecting. Clear Skip is has partnered with various realtors to obtain information regarding leads, contacts such as addresses, emails, and phone numbers.

Obtaining this information helps the realtors locate potential motivated sellers. This way, they can get a lockdown on new real estate deals, investments, and listings. It is best to leverage skip tracing to find property owners that may difficult to find through conventional means as an investor. Skip tracing has been proven to be an effective way of finding property owners that your competitor may have missed, giving you a chance to secure deals with potential leads. Real estate prospecting is one of the ways to run a successful business in the real estate industry. However, you need to employ the right tools to maximize these opportunities. As a real estate agent, you need to be well informed of all the current happening within your service area, especially those touching real estate. Keep in mind most agents depend highly on referrals to do business. Skip tracing is probably one of the easiest and efficient ways to find motivated sellers.

Clear Skip trace is one of the most popular service-based firms that guarantee you and your team updated and accurate information regarding your potential leads. Make an effort to schedule an appointment to learn more about their services and how they can be of assistance.