Mike: Like this? My opinion.

David: Welcome back to the Discount Property Investor podcast. I am your host, David Dodge, along with my co-host Mike Slane. We're going live on YouTube today, we'll be recording this as well and it will be a podcast. But we love doing some live streams, so if anybody's watching in real-time and has questions about today's episode, we can actually take those questions live on the podcast. So, if you're not following us on YouTube, this is the new normal guys. Head on over, hit that subscribe button on the Discount Property Investor YouTube podcast channel and we will be bringing you guys episodes every other day. That's what's up. Mike, how are you today buddy?

Mike: I'm good man, I'm good. Not-- haven't had as much coffee as you have, Dave.

David: That's right! I'm all pumped up baby, ready to rock and roll.

Mike: Good deal man, so what are we talking about today? This show? I would like to talk about anyways, I would like to talk about running appointments. I was looking back--.

David: Running appointments.

Mike: Yeah, I was looking back through our catalog and we just, we haven't done many episodes specifically about what to do when you're out there running appointments. So I thought it'd be a good opportunity to talk about that because we can actually-- we can talk about what to do today, during this little pandemic and how to be a little bit extra cautious and just in general. I think just in general is kinda most important because--.

David: Let's jump right in.

Mike: Yeah, we're headed that direction - back to normal. So, let's talk about running an appointment Dave. So what happens? First off, you guys, we're wholesalers, our objective is to buy and re-sell a property right? So we're trying to buy it at a great price, we can re-sell it at a good price - so what happened? You did some marketing, you've spoke to a bunch of sellers, you weeded a bunch of 'em out because they're not a motivator, they told you to get lost, now you're finally-- you've set an appointment with someone you think is a motivated seller, you're going out there--what's next? Alright, so--.

David: So running appointments, that's what we're doing today, running appointments--.

Mike: Exactly--.

David: I love it

Mike: So prior to that, Dave and I are a big fan of preparation. We think that preparation is kinda of a key to success. We actually even have a little, I think a little course on it, we even put it together, inspired one of our podcasts which was about the credibility packet.

David: Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Mike: So, one of our big things is being prepared for your appointments and that means doing everything from preparing a contract to purchase that house ahead of time; running the comps on it ahead of time; putting together a little folder-- so again you can show up with everything, you look prepared.

David: Be prepared--.

Mike: Be prepared for the appointment. You're there to buy the house, so be there able to buy the house. Be there with a contract, we find that very, very important. So again, that's kinda the, the pre-amble to this appointment. So what am I doing when I'm on the appointment Dave? Or what are you doing when you're on the appointment. I've got a list of a few things that I like to do. What do you think? Well where do you start? What's your  objective?

David: You know, I'm all about transparency Mike, so whenever I go on the appointment, I like to be prepared, like you said. I like to have a credibility packet together, which basically means I like to have comps of the property, know a little bit about the neighborhood, the school district, also the house itself. Like, what's the bed-bath? I mean, things I can get online that I don't need to see the house for. I have all that with me. I also bring a contract with me, maybe an option agreement as well. These are all standard things in our credibility packet. And then when I go, my main objective is to just make a friend - that's it. That's the only thing I focus on. Make a friend. What is their problem? How can I solve that problem? Now, I do wanna say one thing, I am very transparent and before I've even gone on this appointment or even set it-- either for myself, Mike, Dennis, anyone on my team-- we try to do our best to let the seller know that we are investors and that we do not pay retail. However, we are here to provide a crazy high level of convenience, in exchange for a discount. I basically lead it with 'Hey, I'm an investor, my name's Dave, ya know. I don't pay retail, however, I can make this so incredibly easy for you. So if you need to sell, I'm gonna be the guy for you. You don't even need to call anybody else. Let's get this done.' But if they just want to sell, I don't really wanna spend 2 hours on that appointment. I try to, I guess you would say, disqualify myself a little bit, ya know, to just let them know 'hey, I can buy'. And I usually will throw in, you know, some of my past experience in my presentation. So, for example I'll say 'Hey, I'm Dave, I'm an investor. You, know, I have purchased, along with my partner Mike or my team, ya know, roughly 100 houses a year for the last two and a half to three years. And, you know, we can do this. We are capable of it. However, you know, I need to be able to get a deal as an investor, this is a business and, ya know, I wanna make some money on this. I'm not looking to take your house, steal your house, get it for half off, anything like that. But I cannot pay retail'. And I just try to really cement that and implement that because, then later when I go to make my offer-- and I'm jumping way ahead, but they're not like you are crazy. Like I prepped for it. So, Mike--.

Mike: So what--.

David: Didn't mean to overpower that.

Mike: No, no, It's perfect. So what Dave started with in his little speech there, was that he is trying to continue making a friend. So that's one of the things we talk about when you’re on the phone with sellers, is you're building rapport. And that's extremely important and it's extremely important to continue that, so you're continuing that, building a rapport or building that relationship up with the seller, because-- like Dave said, he is gonna make a low offer. I mean, I am gonna make a low offer. We're not making offers that sellers are gonna be happy with all the time necessarily.

David: Right

Mike: They are low offers, I mean, that's what we do. We buy properties at a discount. Discount Property Investors, that's what we do. So, it's first and foremost, I'm trying to continue that relationship building, making a friend with that seller. The next thing we're doing when we're on the appointment, I would say, is I'm trying to figure out what is going on with this property, or what is going on with this seller. So what is the real motivation still? Why are they motivated? Because they may not have come out and said it yet. When you are screening people on the phone, you maybe talk to 'em for 15, 20 minutes, maybe tops, ya know, before you go out there and are on the appointments. So you may not really know what their true motivation is, so you're gonna have to again try to find that. So, that's the next thing, is figuring out or determining that motivation. The motivation from the seller.

David: Yep, absolutely. You always wanna get the motivation from the seller. You wanna start also as, with why? You know, why are you selling? If they're not willing to give you that 'why?', ask 'when?' It's always a huge tip too. Ask 'when?' When do they need to sell? Because it will often reveal the 'why?' And really, you know, as wholesalers, our job is very simple - it's to provide liquidity to the marketplace; it's to solve problems; it is to solve, usually, a problem that's not the house, the house helps solve the problem. Usually the problem is death, disease, divorce, job relocation, you name it, right? The house is just in the way, so by buying the house we're typically solving multiple problems but the main one isn't even the house, it's something underlying, something else. I love that.

Mike: That's great, Dave, yeah. Very, very good insight. So, figure out what the problem is. The next thing on the appointment that you're trying to figure out, is what condition this property is in. And that's, you know, the main reason for going out there to look at it - is to determine the condition of the house, right? So you're gonna be walking around and you're going to be either, in your head or if you bring a note pad or a piece of paper with you, you're gonna be taking notes on the condition of the property. So, once you get comfortable doing this-- you probably do it in your head--  but like I said, you're probably gonna start off with a note pad, or - what we like to do is use our phone and you just kind of record memos whilst were walking around, I mean, just make a note, with our phone - of what needs to be repaired on this property.

David: Absolutely, yeah--.

Mike: Next--.

David: – keep it simple though, you know?

Mike: Yeah, go ahead.

David: No just, you know, keep it simple. You don't need to be writing down every single little detail. I like to use the rule of 5s for determining repairs. Just because, you know, it gives you a simple number to determine those repairs and often it over-- over exaggerates those costs. But as a wholesaler and as an investor that's okay. It's okay--.

Mike: Yeah, we rarely over-estimate--. You'll hear that about --

David: Yes!

Mike: You'll hear that about wholesalers--.

David: Yes!

Mike: -- in general.

David: That's true! It's true.

Mike: Is that we rarely over-estimate those repairs. So no, it is good and the rule of 5's Dave, real quickly, you wanna touch on that? Of do you want me to jump in on it?

David: Oh please go ahead man, yeah

Mike: So the rule of 5's, basically what we like to do when we're walking around a house, we see something that needs repair, we throw $5,000 at it. Now that sounds crazy, but again it's like what do we need paint? 5,000. What do we need, lights? 5,000 What do we need, bathroom? 5,000. What do we need,roof? 5,000 5,000. So again, you're maybe gonna double it up on something big like a roof, or big like a kitchen. So you'll jump it up to ten, but that way when you're walking around the house, you don't have to be spending a bunch of time saying 'oh, I need to rebuild a porch, that's gonna cost me, well you know, $500 in concrete, 500 in materials -' yadda, yadda, yadda. You just write five grand for landscaping; five grand for windows. That way you can quickly tally up those 5,000s to figure out the repairs that you need to make on that house.

David: Love it

Mike: Okay, next thing on the appointment - so we're doing a lot of things here on these appointments-- next thing I think that we're doing Dave, is I think we're taking pictures or filming it. A lot of people are filming their property walkthroughs these days. I personally - maybe I'm old school-- I just like pictures. I think they they're easier for people to look at and click through quickly. I know when I'm looking at other people's houses, I don't like watching the whole video. But again that’s just me, personal preference, so I'm taking pictures of everything that I see, so when I see a problem I take a picture. When I see a new room, I'm gonna take at least two pictures of every room, hopefully from different angles and then every, kind of, item in the house too. So it's like, bathroom - I wanna take a picture of the toilet, I wanna take a picture of the shower, I wanna take a picture of the vanity -that way I've got pictures of everything so I can see the condition it was in when I walked through it and as a wholesaler, guess what, if you get that property under contract, I should say 'when'--.

David: Yeah, 'when' - Like it!

Mike: - you get that property under contract - you are going to be marketing this property for sale. So, who's gonna need to see that? Anyone who's interested in buying the house, is gonna wanna see these pictures. Super helpful to have those. So do it on every appointment. Just get in the habit of doing that. Anything I missed, Dave, that is important for taking pictures?

David: You know, the way I look at taking pictures is, you can't take too many. You can always delete these, alright? I mean this is like the most common-sense thing there is, right? You can delete pictures real quick, but going back to a property to get more is a pain in the butt! Okay? So don't do that. So when you're there, I mean when I first started out, I was probably taking 40-50 pictures, I thought that that was a lot. Now, I average at 90-110 pictures per property. I literally get my phone out and I just start snapping. Yeah, it may take 15 minutes to upload to Google Drive or Dropbox after the fact, but so what? I don't care. I would rather have every inch of that property, every angle that I need and therefore, if I only need 10 pictures, guess what? I can go out and I can pick ten of the best ones. So as Mike said, get as many as you can and get different angles - don't just take one picture of a bedroom, go stand in two or three different corners of that bedroom, because you may see something from a different vantage point that you wouldn't have seen elsewhere, right? Maybe you miss, you know, some stains on the ceiling if you don't walk all the way in that room to get those pictures right?

Mike: Dave's great at taking pictures too I must say. When I walk-- when I look back at my pictures, I think I took a lot of pictures and I'm like 'ah shit, I don't even remember-- I can hardly even tell what the house layout is from this one'. Like, Dave's pictures are awesome. He does-- he does take about 100 pictures, but it's-- you need 'em! Like, they really are super handy. So no, definitely take more pictures than you think you're gonna need. They come in handy.

David: They do.

Mike: Love it

David: They come in-- they come in handy. So, take a lot of pictures. Don't necessarily worry about estimates in real-time. You can go over those with the seller, so like one thing that we love to do Mike, and on our appointments is, we have this thing called "The Seller's Net Sheet". And it's available in the Free Wholesale Course, I believe--.

Mike: Oh yeah.

David: - I think I added it in there recently. So if you want a copy of it, go to FreeWholesaleCourse.com and you can get your own copy. Now, what the "Seller's Net Sheet" is, is the coolest thing ever, but what it does is it basically gives the seller multiple options. Now, you probably heard of a lot of investors who make multiple offers - this is not that. It's similar, right? Except for, it's one offer, with other options that aren't you, but they make you look the best. So, you could do the multiple offer in conjunction with this, but this is not multiple offers. "Seller's Net Sheet" basically starts out with the property in mind and it goes into the ARV and then it works itself backwards to get to your MAO essentially, it's very, very clever. But, it's-- it breaks down that calculation much simpler than our typical MAO = ARV x .7 - minus repairs - wholesale fee, if we're wholesaling.

Mike: What--.

David: Instead it's got 15 different things-- go ahead.

Mike: What I was gonna say-- I think that Dave, this one is more-- it's called "The Seller's Net Sheet", because it's from the seller's perspective. So that's the whole idea behind it, is 'Hey Mister Seller, here's what would happen if you sold via listing it on the market. You're gonna encounter $5,000 in commissions and $5,000 in repairs just to get it listed and this and this and then 30 days later it might sell – yadda, yadda, yadda' So again, it just takes all of those factors into consideration before it presents your offer to them. So you're offer is low and you don't have to be ashamed of that. Like Dave said, I'm an investor and I have to make money on this, do you understand that Mister Seller, right? But this puts it in context, that just because they can list their house and they can sell it for, let's throw out a round number, $100,000, doesn't mean that you're offer for 60,000 is $40,000 less than what they would have got-- or would have received. They're gonna have, at 100,000, they're gonna have 10,000 repairs they have to do themselves.

David: Yeah so--.

Mike: So they're gonna have two months in holding costs--.

David: – it calculates in--.

Mike: – they're gonna have--.

David: – opportunity cost and time. That's basically what this does, right? So, it breaks it down in reverse though. Let's say that we think the house will sell for, as Mike stated what -?

Mike: 100,000 - $100,000

David: 100,000, right? Keep it simple, right? Well, it's gonna sell for that, after the repairs. That's the ARV, that's the 'After Repair Value', right?

Mike: And what's great though, is you can agree with them. You're like "I agree; this house will be worth 100,000"

David: It will be worth 100!

Mike: So, it's a great thing that we have--.

David: Betty Sue!  

Mike: Yeah, to have something that we agree with people.

David: Jim! Doesn't matter right? It will be worth 100! We agree! However, ma'am, sir, in order for it to be worth 100 it's gonna need 20. It's gonna need 20-grands worth of repairs. So the first thing that they're gonna think of is 'okay, got it, 80 - 100 minus the 20 that's 80 - you're gonna pay me 80'. Nope, doesn't work that way because, I have additional costs, right? And I'm taking the risk of buying it, adding 20-grand to it just to get my money back I'll break even and really I'll lose once you add these costs in, so no, you have to back it out. So, basically there's three columns on the Sellers Net Sheet, go check it out for yourself on FreeWholesaleCourse, but it shows if they were to do a rehab-- a high end rehab, and then list it; if they were to just do a make-ready rehab and then list it; or if they were to sell it to us today. And it calculates in the amount of cost they'd have to spend them self, to get it to the 100 and in the time; and in the real-estate commissions; and in the holding costs; and in the seller concessions; and in the closing cost, so-on and so-forth. So these factors add up. So, in the Seller's Net Sheet, they may make more money on option 1, right? But, that time frame could be 7/10/12 months. They make more money - may, 'may' make more money - on option 2 as well, with a light-rehabbing agent. But again, that time frame could be 4-10 months. With us, it's usually 3-15, maybe 20, days tops. So we show them their options and most of the time Mike, I think you can agree, most of the time they don't have the money to fix it up anyway.

Mike: Correct

David: So option 1 and 2 isn't even truly an option, it's more of just a yes, this is an option--.

Mike: You could to that--.

David: - you 'could', but is it even a feasible one, right? So it breaks down that offer that may be 50/55-grand on a property that needs 20 and is worth 100 and why that offer makes sense, right? So, one thing that, I think we skipped right over this--.

Mike: Mmmhmm I think; we did--.

David: We're doing five or six things--.

Mike: I was gonna get back--. I was gonna get back to it too--.

David: Yeah, but one thing that I wanna definitely mention, is that it's not 'me-vs-the seller', it's not 'Mike-vs- Betty Sue' or 'Jim' or 'John' or whoever that person is, right? That's never the mind-set that we have, or the approach that we have. So, instead it's "Hey Jim, hey John, I agree that it could be worth 100, but we can both also agree that in order to get there, it's gonna need 20 in repairs, that's just the repairs, I'm gonna have a cost in buying it, I'm gonna have costs in selling it, I'm gonna have costs in--.

Mike: Holding it, just like you do.

David: – holding it, I'm gonna have taxes, I'm gonna have insurance, I'm gonna have utilities, I'm gonna have Seller Concessions - which basically means that, when I go fix it up and sell it and they go get an inspection and there's a 30-page report if little nick-knacks that I'm either gonna have to fix that (time, money) or I'm gonna have to write a check (money) to get them to be okay with that. So you're gonna have Seller Concessions-- and Seller Concessions are often over looked they can be 1, 2 sometimes 3% of the total price, I mean, sometimes more. Then you have real-estate commissions, right? You have to pay 5, 6, sometimes 7% to sell the house itself. Then you have holding costs to hold it, while it sits there and sells. And just because you have an agent and it's-- and you list it, doesn't mean that it's gonna sell, nor does it mean that you're gonna get what you listed it for. These are all risks that you take which really equates to time and time equates to money. So our pitch, when we are dealing with sellers, is so incredibly simple, we can make this easy for you, period! Mike, there's three things that we do, what are those?

Mike: What do you mean?

David: In the pitch. Three simple things.

Mike: I dunno, I'm sorry I phased out. I was gonna go somewhere else--.

David: Okay cool, I'll do it--.

Mike: -- I was gonna go somewhere else.

David: – cash, ease and we'll close quick. So 'Time, Cash and Ease of Use' - those are the 3 thing we have - that's it! That's all we have to provide value to people. So, don't go out and chase deals though and try to give somebody a crazy amount of convenience, when they're not giving you a discount. Right? We quit chasing deals about 3 years ago and our lives got a lot easier and we still do just as many deals as we did when we were chasing, but the cool thing is now, is that the spread of the deal it much bigger. We're not just chasing the 2 and 3,000-dollar deal. Yeah, we still do those guys, I'm not above that, neither is Mike.

Mike: No, no. Those are great paydays.

David: But, you know, it's like if I can't see myself making 6 to 8-grand on a deal, I typically will just push that down the road and follow up later, because they aren't motivated enough. They don't need to sell, they wanna sell. So why would we wanna go provide that crazy level of convenience?

Mike: So all of this is really in the negotiations, or the kitchen table conversation with the seller. And what I was thinking of just a couple seconds ago when Dave was putting me on the spot there - I was thinking about our appointment and how we got to this point. So we didn't really quite cover that. So we talked about how we're on the appointment, we're trying to make a friend, we're trying to determine the repairs, get pictures of the property and then we're gonna start our negotiation. So how does that transition Dave? And in the appointment or on the appointment when we're out there and we're finished taking pictures, we're finished touring the property, how does that shift? And again, there's not always a big shift in the conversation - you could be having it while you're doing this stuff, while you're talking and walking the house. But how does that shift and how do you make that transition to the kitchen-table, deal-making, negotiation-talking, that kinda stuff? I mean, I personally, I'm not--.

David: Oh shit-- go ahead.

Mike: Yeah, I personally, I don't have a huge change in it. I normally just say "okay, so it's looks like you guys wanna go talk numbers?", or something like that and I will invite people to go sit down at the kitchen table, if there is one. A lot of times these houses are cleaned out or they're trash, like you can't even hardly do it. But you try to go to a place where it's comfortable to chat and have a conversation with the seller and often times that is the kitchen-- the kitchen table. So you wanna try to sit down and that’s when we can present the Seller's Net Sheet and work through it for ourselves, like Dave said, you don't have to figure those repairs on the spot. You can do it right there in from of them.

David: Yeah, absolutely

Mike: You can say "hey look, here's what I think it's gonna cost me, here's me offer and here's why"

David: I highly encourage everybody to use the Seller's Net Sheet, as well as at least just understand it. Even if they don't wanna use it, just understand why we would use it - what value it could provide because it doesn't always show your offer as the highest. Typically, it might even show it as the lowest. Sometimes it will be the highest, but what you are providing is convenience, so it makes it so easy to kind of transition in from you and them talking about the numbers to why they would wanna work with you. Again, maybe my offer is 5-grand less than if you spent 20-grand rehabbing it, but also 10 months to sell it, right? Or maybe my offer is even equal to you doing a light rehab and spending 6 months of your time, right? I can provide you convenience by closing it quick, you know-- buying with cash, closing it quick and buying it as-is. No repairs, no cleaning, none of that and often times the time-- the time frame in which you can move, that's the value you are providing them, right? So, sometime we're able to talk a seller down on price, even though they know they may get more later, because the time may be their problem. Here's a perfect example: you're moving for work. Right? They know that the property may not need a ton of work, or it does need some and they can do that work, right? But they would rather just get the money now and that may be less money than if they put a bunch of time and work into it, but we're basically eliminating their risk. And that's the convenience right there. So, let talk about some of the key points of running an appointment: make a friend--.

Mike: Mmmhmm.

David: – I mean it's just simple. Listen to what they're saying. Don't try to sell them on your offer, instead, justify it, right? Show why it is what it is.

Mike: I like that!

David: Yeah!

Mike: I like that, because--.

David: I never like-- I never try to sell people. I'm actually not that great of a sales-person.

Mike: I personally-- I was gonna say the same thing! I'm not!

David: I'm not that good! But you know what I am good at, I'm good at getting people to see my side of this, of the vantage point. Like, see my side. I'm really good at that. I'm really good at making a friend, I'm good at listening and I feel like I'm good at solving people's problems, you know, by helping them sell that property. But I'm never really selling, instead I'm just saying, 'here's where all the other investors are gonna be, I'm one of 'em, here's what I can do for you and I hope to get your business', right? I'm gonna justify why my number is what my number is and I'm gonna do my absolute best to show you why that number, and it's gonna be lower than you would have expected probably 99% of the time, but why it's fair. And once I can show people why it's fair, they no longer look at that offer as a lower offer, instead they look at it as a fair offer.

Mike: I love it. So here's one final thing--.

David: A lot of coffee today guys

Mike: – is we're not-- I think we both just admitted--.

David: Whoo!

Mike: – we're not great sale-people--.

David: You don't have to be though--.

Mike: You don't have to be. But here's what I was getting at, is--.

David: I'm gonna start selling courses on sales and it's just gonna be titled "You Don't Have To Be Great at Sales"

Mike:  I love it

David: It's not about 'sales', that's the wrong word, its 'value'. Go ahead.

Mike: I don't even know what I was talking about.

David: I think that's -

Mike: You sold me Dave -

David: Yeah, I mean that's it -

Mike: I'm interested

David: - you don't have to be crazy, crazy good at it so -

Mike: No, my thing was gonna be on getting contracts signed that day vs going back. So again, you're going out there on an appointment. A lot of people really, really want to get that contract signed that day - I'm one of them. I love it when we can get properties under contract that day. But guess what, it doesn't happen every time and--.

David: Yeah, it doesn't happen every time at all. It's maybe like 1 in 50.

Mike: So, what we like to leave people--.

David: Well maybe not that much but, 1 in 20.

Mike: – what we like to leave people with, is if I'm not the person you're going to go with, could you please give me a call and let me know?

David: Why?

Mike: Why? And what--.

David: Yeah--.

Mike: – offer you're accepting? Yeah.

David: – or gimme the opportunity to at least review their offer and, maybe not beat it but, match it? Like I don't ever wanna over-promise. I never tell somebody I'm gonna beat their offer, because then that makes them think 'well I'm gonna get another offer so he'll beat it'. Like, no, you know, let me at least review it, you know - don't make a decision before you talk to all parties.

Mike: Well I think that it's also, we're here to help, so--.

David: Yeah!

Mike: – I can, I can take a look at an offer and let you know "hey, if I know this-- if I've heard of this company, if it sounds too good to be true -", can give them some insight into it, so again--.

David: I love that. Consult them

Mike: – yeah. We always like to try to leave, if we're not getting a contract signed, with that. With-- and with an email address that we can email them the contract over as well.

David: Yeah, like last but not least guys, I'm not an agent but Mike is-- he's a broker here actually. I encourage everyone to get their license, just because it doesn't hurt to have it. It's only gonna help. But one of the things that we do on our appointments-- now we don't go on these appointments with the mind-set of 'let's get listings', don't do that. We wanna buy. However, a lot of times, people will call individuals like us, you know - the liquidity-makers; the wholesalers; the investors--  to come out and buy their property and they could do better listing it, like they truly could, right? Some scenarios, it works that way. But they may be embarrassed to show it, or they may have kids, or for whatever reason, right? So we always have that tool in our belt-- "hey, you know, you're not gonna like my offer and I'm gonna tell you in advance, here it is. Right? You're wanna throw me outta your house? I get it, I'd want to too. So, maybe that isn't a good solution for you, right? But maybe listing it is". So we can consult them, as Mike was just saying, on some of the ways that they could go about doing better for themselves. Whenever we are on appointments, it's not about 'us' or 'me', right? It's really about 'them'. How can we help them? And sometimes that means that we don't make money helping them, but we're able to do the right thing and help them do what's best for them. Sometimes, that means that our offer is the best, sometimes that means that maybe we'll list that property for them is the best, other times, we may joint venture with that person. They may not like our offer, they don't wanna list it-- we'll use what's called an "Option Agreement" and we'll go market the property, try to find motivation but it's not necessarily "on-market". And we're not required to buy, it's a joint venture and/or an option to purchase. So many tools and tricks. All of this is available in the Free Wholesale Course guys, if you haven't taken that-- you probably have and I hope you have, but if you haven't-- go check that out. But running appointments with sellers, I think that this is something that we should talk about more, Mike. I think people over complicate it, they get scared. Running the appointment too, this is something that's really, really really important. Running the appointment is 25% of this business. I would go out on a limb to say that 25% of it is marketing; 25% is running appointments; and 50% is follow-up. Literally. Maybe, maybe marketing outweighs running the appointments 2:1, give or take, but the point is, is that it's a small piece of the business, you know. Running the appointment helps you build rapport; establish a relationship; make a friend. Right? But you still have to make an offer and a lot of people will come to Mike and I and they'll go run an appointment and they won't make an offer. They won't do it then, they won't do it that night, they won't do it the next day, they might not do it at all. Why would you go run an appointment? Why would you spend money to market; to get a phone to ring you, right, or cold-call-out to get that motivated seller; set up the time to run an appointment; and then not make the offer or follow-up? Right? Our average deal: 4-6 months. Do we get them that come in today and get 'em an appointment tomorrow and get them a contract that same day or the next day and sold that afternoon? Absolutely. 1 in 31/40 deals. But over 5 years of Mike and I being partners, being friends in a wholesaling real-estate together, they average deal takes almost 6 months, because we follow-up consistently. So, do marketing, that's obvious. Don't be afraid to run appointments-- make offers on those appointments. Just go out there, make a friend. You are gonna fail your first couple times, you might make a fool of yourself.

Mike: That's one of the things I was--.

David: But that's okay.

Mike: Yeah, so that's one of the things I wanted to--.

David: Get through that!

Mike: --talk about. Dave, you we're talking about people won't do the appointments, or won't go on the appointments, or it's not that big of a deal. A lot of people get hung up and don't wanna go on the appointment and it, to me, it's kinda like, like you said, it's a very small part of the business, just get out there - meet people. Super easy. Just get out there and meet people. Take pictures. You've gotta start walking properties. I don't have anything else on this topic. Let's go ahead and wrap it up Dave if you guys want--.

David: Yeah! Yeah

Mike: – we'll do, like you said, maybe another couple episodes on running appointments, but yeah, let's wrap this one up.

David: Thanks for watching guys, tuning out - tuning off. Until next time. How we ending this one?

Mike: Sounds good.

David: Thanks for watching. Thanks, guys.