From $0 to $9550: How Jarrod Closed His First Wholesale Real Estate Deal

Finding His First Real Estate Deal

Jarrod started by simply driving around neighborhoods and writing down addresses of any houses that looked distressed - broken windows, high grass, vacancy signs, etc.

This was his CRM before he had any fancy software. Jarrod just used a notebook and pen to log each lead.

He was pinpointing only the worst of the worst houses. Why? Because Jarrod figured they would be more motivated to sell at a discount. And he had $0 for repairs or renovations.

For about 3 hours a day, he would catalog addresses and then type them up when he got home. Jarrod then started sending handwritten letters to each homeowner introducing himself and his interest in buying their house.

This was around 300-500 letters per month, all handwritten and mailed. It took him nearly 3 months before he got his first phone call from a seller he had mailed.

Negotiating the Deal

The seller had a triplex that was in bad shape. He wasn't able to get the rent prices he wanted and was overwhelmed with managing it along with his restaurant.

He wanted to walk away and made Jarrod an offer of around $100k. However, after inspecting it Jarrod knew his buyer needed it closer to $30k in order to make a profit.

He showed his buyer the inspection report highlighting issues like the car jacks propping up the foundation. The seller agreed it was worse than expected and agreed to his lower price of $30k.

Jarrod didn't use any special formulas here. He just knew his buyer's threshold and negotiated the price down so he could make his minimum $10k assignment fee.

The seller accepted and they had a deal!

Finding a Buyer

This was before Jarrod even knew about real estate wholesaling. He had planned to buy and hold the property himself.

But through going to local real estate meetups, he had met a few investors in his area. When he put this deal under contract, Jarrod reached out asking what to do next.

One of them ended up being his buyer. He not only bought this first deal from Jarrod but became his top buyer for future deals as well.

Key Takeaways

• It took Jarrod 3 months of consistent daily action to get his first deal
• He made $9550 on his first assignment fee
• Having a buyer lined up is critical before putting a property under contract
• Real estate networking and relationships are hugely valuable

We hope this post demonstrated that with hustle and persistence, you can get your first deal done. It starts with simple actions like driving for dollars and networking with others.