Most real estate investors like Robert and I are busy.  I’m guessing you are busy too.  If you are like us, you have a lot of opportunities to chase, and only a certain amount of hours in a day. 

When it comes to finding deals, I can use all the help I can get.  And one of the most under-rated methods for  finding deals that doesn’t cost you anything until you pay for the property – until you buy the property – is using the bird dog. 

Bird dogs can bring deals to you. They can put tons of thousands of dollars in your pocket. So, the question is, what is a bird dog? A bird dog in hunting is a dog who finds birds for hunters. It points right toward the bird to aid the hunter.  And the hunter will take it from there.  A bird dog in the real estate investing business is essentially the same thing.  He finds the opportunity for the investor and guess what, the investor takes it from there.

Bird dogs typically get paid when you buy the deal.  They don’t get paid just for sending you a list of 250 for sale by own properties.  That’s not the purpose.  The purpose of the bird dog is to find a deal that you actually like, right?  A cash flow property that you would actually buy. 

To put this system to action right away, you basically have to these steps. The first thing is you have to come up with an offer for the bird dogs.  In other words, how does the bird dog get paid?  They always want to know that.  They want to know how they are going to be paid.  The most common system in paying bird dogs is to give them $500 to $1,00 dollars for every  property that you buy. 

Step 2 is to actually go out and look for the bird dog.  By far and away the best way to find a bird dog, or a dog for that matter too, is to go to craigslist.  You know that you can place free ads on craigslist.com.  Go into the miscellaneous employment.  You know people that look in this section of craigslist are looking for ways of making a little bit of extra money. 

When I put up an ad like this, I usually get close to 100 replies within a few days.  You just need to reply back by email. 

Here is an example of an advertising that you can post up there.  You could say "Hi.  I buy houses in where ever you’re from.  I’m looking for someone to help me find more houses to buy.  Here’s the deal, I’ll train you to know what type of properties I’m looking to buy and all you have to do is tell me about houses that looks like that. If I end up buying that property I’ll pay you $___ dollars.  You don’t have to negotiate with the owner or anything like that.  No sales will be required.  All you have to do is find a deal for me, and I’ll take it there.  Call me at 5551212 or whatever your number is for more details."

That’s a simple ad you can put up in craigslist. You put it up there as many times as necessary to find your bird dogs.  And you will get multiple bird dogs from one ad. 

Step three is to put your bird dog to work.  Give them some ideas as to where to look for motivated sellers. 

They can scan the houses for sale on craigslist. One thing to really look for are ads in the real estate section where people are advertising real estate for sale.  Look for ads with all lower case, where people are not very careful about what they are tying. Misspelled words, poor grammar, and no photographs are a plus.  This is a clue that you’ve got a motivated seller there, or certainly someone who’s not very sophisticated.

Avoid properties that are listed by realtors, or ones that are clearly being sold by another investor. That’s  not something that’s going to be useful to you. 

Your bird dog can also  tell you about vacant properties they see. You know, the one with the grass are grown up, or for instance properties that have received a notice of violation from the city.  Give your bird dog a specific list of the types of properties and the types of deals that you’re looking for.  Tell them how they can find those properties. 

Have them email you the leads they get. 

And if you are wondering if this really works, Robert and I had a student in wealth school who started working with the bird dog and she made a real nice profit. Her bird dog brought her a deal that ended up making her $10,500 in seventeen days.  No rehab work was done.

You’ll find more about other ways to find great deals in www.replaceyourpaychecknow.com. 

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