How to Automate & Streamline Most of This Stuff

    So now that you know how to do the Driving For Dollars part of the business properly, it’s now time to learn how to make it super easy by automating most of the things you’ve learned. Sure, I could have just led with this, but if we did it that way, you probably wouldn’t understand the full process of everything you need to know for the big picture of this real estate game.
Besides, what fun would that be, right? Don’t hate me. 🙂

Let me first say that the only way you can properly automate the first part of the business – the part where you drive around neighborhoods to look for those target properties – is actually covered in the next section: Outsourcing, and we’ll get to that part soon.

But for now, let me show you how to properly automate and streamline things. It’s so, so simple, and can easily be done with ONE powerful tool:

The Deal Machine App is a tool that’s been around for several years now. Anyone who’s ever done anything significant in the Driving For Dollars area of real estate investing already knows all about this, and will confess that it’s their secret weapon that puts them head & shoulders above the competition that doesn’t know about this.

Here’s just a few things that this amazing app can do for you:

• List Organization: Help you build and manage your lists of sellers & properties to automate your lead generation with smart lists.
• Marketing Automation: Send Direct Mail pieces to property owners with automated follow-ups!
• Skip Tracing: Look up the contact info for property owners
• Phone Numbers: It will help you get phone numbers anytime, from anywhere. Out in the field and want to see if you can immediately contact that seller while you’re in front of their house? Yup, this will help you do that.
• RUN COMPS! Yes, this app will help you find the ARV of the properties you’re evaluating. Some say this feature alone makes it worth it.
• And a Whole lot MORE!

Now, you should know that this is NOT a free product. There is a cost, but I don’t think it’s too bad at all. And if you’re doing the DFD business, this is practically a must-have product for you.
At the time I’m writing this, the cost starts off at only $59/month, plus the cost of your skip tracing and direct mail pieces.
The great thing is that you get to try it free for 7 days, just to see if you like it and can figure out how it works for you.
I know that technology isn’t for everyone, so if you just can’t get this figured out, then you can opt out of the program & never pay a penny. But if you like it & realize the benefit for you, keep it and use it in good health.
And if you really like it, and eventually choose to use this to scale your business way up, they have you covered as well! They can help you manage field agents & teams, too!

I’ve seen this product/app grow & improve a LOT over the years, and I’m quite confident that it will continue to do so. I really can’t say enough about it, so if you want to check it out for yourself to put it to use in your business, go do so right away! Here are those links for you:
The DealMachine site.  The app for Android phones: DealMachine App!
Use an iPhone? Here you go: For iPhone

So that’s what we have for you in the area of automation. Put that app to work, and you’ll see how easy this will make Driving For Dollars!

I should mention: The Skip Tracing here may not always be 100% accurate, so don’t be surprised if you call someone who is allegedly the owner of a property you found, and they’ve never heard of that house. If/when that happens, just make a note of that property address, then use a different skip tracing service (found HERE) to find the owner, and keep going until you find them.

Remember that the harder it is to find an owner of a property, the less competition you’ll have. And the more profit you may potentially make. So it’s worth it to be organized and follow up.

I should also point out that as awesome as this Deal Machine app is, it’s still not perfect. Nothing is. So don’t think that just because you have this app that your DFD life will forever be without wrinkles, simple and carefree. You should already know that life (and business) just doesn’t work that way. I’m just keeping it real here for you so that you don’t have unreasonable expectations, amigo.

So you see? It’s a good thing that you learned all that stuff I showed you in the first 3 parts of this training! When things break down, you’ll still have the old fashioned processes in place to rely on. Oh yes, you’re welcome. 😉

With that out of the way, it’s now time to cover the real secret to freeing you up: OUTSOURCING

If you learn how to do this next part the right way, you’ll be able to do everything you need from the comfort of your own home, wherever that may be.

Ready? Let’s go…

Outsourcing: How To Get Someone Else to Do All This FOR You!

The whole objective to effective outsourcing is: To find other people to do the stuff that you don’t want to do, can’t do, or that you just *suck* at doing. Especially the last one.

So how do you do that? It’s simple: You always keep your eyes and ears open for good people. Network. Advertise. Or just flap your lips and (God forbid) talk to people.

Where do you find these people, these mythical creatures who will magically make your life amazing by taking all the sucky crap off your plate?

They’re all around you. They’re online: On job sites or free sites (like Craigslist), or in your Community Facebook Pages. (You *have* joined some local Community Pages, right?)
They’re offline: In the real world, posing as Mail Carriers, FEDEX or UPS or Amazon Delivery people. Or meter readers. Cable tv installers or salesmen. The folks who deliver those flyers or newspapers to your door. Food Delivery drivers for Uber Eats/GrubHub/PostMates/or whatever food delivery service you use. Oh, and don’t forget about those great Uber Drivers and Lyft Drivers!

The best ones to talk to are the people who are out & about, already driving all over various neighborhoods every day as part of their livelihood, job, or occupation. Think about it – they’re already in the field. All you need to do is give them an opportunity to make some extra money by taking a couple pictures and noting the addresses of houses they send to you when they see a target house during their day.

When we “recruit” them to work with us in this capacity, they’re known as such things as “Birddogs,” “Field Agents,” or “Ants.” It doesn’t really matter what we call them, just as long as you find them, then show them some love & give them an opportunity to come and work with you.

Personally, I’ve recruited mailmen, meter readers, FedEx and UPS delivery people, Taxi Drivers (when they existed), and even… a policeman! That’s right! Let me share a quick story with you about that one, so you can see how a little creativity can turn a negative into a positive…

How I recruited a Policeman to be My Birddog, instead of getting a ticket: Quick story I’ll share with you. Many years ago, when I was living in my house in University Park, MD, I was pulled over by a policeman who worked for our private police force. Now, he claimed that I didn’t come to a full & complete stop at a stop sign. I don’t recall if he was right or not, but as we were talking, the subject of real estate was somehow brought up. I asked if he had ever thought about investing in it, and he said that he was very interested. So I told him where I lived & to stop by whenever he had time to talk about it. He let me off with a warning.

He also stopped by my house the very next day to get more information about what was needed. I told him exactly what I was looking for, and within a week, he brought me 5 good solid leads that matched the criteria we look for. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I wound up doing 2 of those deals, and paid him well for finding them.

In other words, I went from the unpleasant circumstance of getting pulled over by a cop to making a friend AND making over $40,000 from the deals I made, while at the same time paying him well for working with me! That’s a big win right there.

So just use a little creativity, and you can find these wonderful people everywhere. If you just keep your eyes and ears open, and flap your lips.

How To Find a Field Agent in Another Town, City, or State

If you’re living in one area and want to do deals in another area, whether that’s a city/town, state, or even country. You might need some local people to get out and do some Driving For Dollars in that area. Here are a few ways to do that…

• If you already know someone in that area, contact them and make them an offer. If you’re already familiar with some people who might be a good possible match for you, why not contact them and see if they’d be interested? This works best if you’ve already lived in that area and still know people.
• Go on Craigslist or a Facebook Community Page. There are all kinds of people who are happy to get out and help you out to make some decent side money. Remember, all they need is a car and a smartphone. And a little bit of organization & good communication.
• Find a local Real Estate Meetup Group and recruit someone. It’s not hard to go online and find a local real estate meetup group and contact them to find someone to do this for you.
• If you know how, post an ad on Google or Facebook. This would be a great way to get a TON of people to do some DFD for you. Naturally, you’ll need to know how to do this.

Training and Support

Once you have a few prospects on the team, whether locally or long distance, you’ll want to get them together to provide them some training and support. You can easily do that by hosting an online Conference Call, Zoom Meeting, Google Meet, etc.

When you do this, have a plan and an outline for training and supporting them.
If you have the knowledge & skill, you can also provide a website for this purpose. If you have the DREAMS system, I believe there’s already a system for this pre-built for you.
They should know exactly what to look for and what’s expected of them, as well as how much and how they’ll be compensated for this.

How To Pay Them

If you’re going to have people working with/for you in any capacity, you’ll need to be clear about how they’ll be paid. We usually like to pay our Field Agents a flat fee per lead they submit, and a bonus for any deal we do. The up front amount can be between $5-$15 or as much as $20/lead, and the bonus is $250-$500, with incentives up to $1,000. But those incentives are only paid when someone knows what they’re doing and does it consistently.

The best way to pay them is by electronic payment, such as PayPal, Cash App, Venmo, or Zelle.
When you bring them on to work with you, be sure to get their full info confirmed so that everything is clear.

In order to avoid a logistic nightmare, I suggest you pay them once a week – preferably on Friday, because most people want that weekend money. And as soon as you close a deal they sent you, make sure you pay them after your check/wire transfer clears. I also suggest that you make it a BIG deal to encourage them to do more.

Remember, if you handle this part correctly, you’ll be able to run your empire from anywhere.

Got all that? Ok, let’s move on…

Technology Is Your Friend

Now we come to the part I’ll call “Tony’s Tech Tips,” and this will help make your life so much easier. Let’s keep it real simple here, and just get right to it. I’ll simply give you some of my favorite apps & things I use, and you can check it out for yourself to see if you like it, too.

Podio – This is a Customizable CRM (Customer Relationship Manager) and SO much more. Some people actually run their whole business on this platform. Here’s how they put it on their website: “Podio transforms your project data into one tool to align all content, conversations, and process into one collaboration point.”

That’s some fancy marketing-talk to means that you can do a LOT on this one platform. You’ll create work spaces, design your own apps, and much more. I’ve been using this for years, and am impressed with it. One great thing you can use it for is to keep track of all the leads you talk to. You can set up a “Workspace” and “app” in here to note all the details of your prospects, when to follow up, and you can even assign tasks to members of your team.

The cool thing is that it’s super cheap to use, and the super cool thing is that you can even get started for FREE!! Here’s the link to: Check out Podio

Next App/Program: Evernote
This is a powerful, classic platform that let’s you (in their own words): “Remember everything and tackle any project with your notes, tasks, and schedule all in one place.”

You can use this to take notes or pictures, scan docs, keep yourself organized, set reminders or tasks, and SO much more. Yes, there’s also a great free plan you can use to get started.

Similar app: Google Keep
This is an app that’s just like Evernote, but also does a lot of cool things. Personally, this is my favorite app to use to keep myself organized for tasks, notes, events, To Do lists, etc. I use it ALL the time.
This also works GREAT for using when you do Driving For Dollars. You just start a new note, put the address in there, and take pictures of the property in that note.
The cool thing is that this also automatically synchronizes between your smartphone and your computer, if you use the Google Chrome Browser.
If you have a Google account (which you already do if you have a Gmail account), you can easily use this by going HERE and getting started. Or go HERE if you want to install it on your Android phone.

Oh, did I mention that it’s also Free?! 🙂

Ok, now throughout this training article series, I’ve been promising you a cool & special BONUS.
Since you’re still here reading this, I believe it’s high time I reward you by delivering this bonus!
Most of the DFD technique is focused on UGLY houses, but you don’t have to just use it for THAT.
Check this out…

BONUS: Using the DFD Technique To Find PRETTY Houses

All this time, we’ve been talking about driving around, looking for UGLY houses, right? Well that’s great, but you can also use this technique to find those PRETTY houses, too! How? Simple…

While you’re out looking for those ugly houses, why not keep your eyes open for some FOR SALE BY OWNER signs? These may be sellers who are open to selling on terms! What? You want another tip? Ok, great… Here’s what else you should also keep your eyes open for: FOR RENT BY OWNER signs! Why? Because “Burnt Out Landlords” are one of our favorite targets for deals!

What do you do when you see one of those signs in front of a house?
This should look familiar: STOP the car, get out, and do the exact same thing you do for the ugly houses, starting with taking the pictures using the technique above. The ONLY exception is this: Since there’s a SIGN in front of the house (hopefully with a phone number on it), make THAT your FIRST picture, then take a picture of the front of the house & so on.

SECRET: The Signs that are the UGLIEST and look like they’ve been there are while can be some of the BEST deals you’ll do! Why? Because the seller probably isn’t too sophisticated and most likely doesn’t know how to market their property effectively. And if the sign has been there a while, their motivation to sell is probably getting higher every day that their house just sits there.

Again, remember to also look for: For RENT signs, because landlords may be flexible to do a terms deal (mention why: cashflow without hassle).

So now you know.

Ok, Let’s Wrap This Up!

Quick Recap: Up to this point, you’ve learned WHAT Driving For Dollars is, WHY it’s so useful, and HOW you can get started today with a few simple starting strategies. That was just in part 1.
In part 2, you learned how to find who owns the houses you found using the county tax rolls AND how to get their contact information, as well as the different ways of contacting these people.
In part 3, you learned WHAT to say to sellers and HOW to make an offer, then how to get a property under contract, and what to do right after that.
Finally, here in Part 4, we recapped everything. You learned how to AUTOMATE a lot of this stuff with that awesome Deal Machine App, and you also learned how to OUTSOURCE most of the driving around, plus you learned how to do it from anywhere. You also got some of my killer tech tips for how to keep track of things (leads, etc.), and I finally delivered that BONUS method of how to use this for PRETTY houses (So simple)!

If you simply USE this stuff consistently, you’ll constantly have a nice flow of leads to work with, for super cheap.

As we wrap up Part 4, the final part of this training, let’s update the essential…

Driving For Dollars, Step-by-Step (Final Version)

1. Pick an area.
2. Make a list of what you’re looking for (ugly houses, FSBO signs, etc.)
3. Go out and drive the targeted area.
4. Find the Properties that match your criteria.
5. Take Pictures & Notes. Note the address.
6. When you get home, look up who the owner is on the county Tax Rolls.
7. Skip trace the seller to get their contact info (use the Resources Page on this site)
8. Contact the Seller (Call, Text, or Mail them)
9. Make an Offer!! You can use my Cash Offer Calculator Tool
10. Get property under contract.
11. Start your Due Diligence (check the title, get rehab estimates, etc.)
12. Wholesale the house to a rehabber/landlord. You can use my Assignment Generator
13. OR close on it to rehab & retail yourself (advanced).
14. Get Paid!
15. Rinse & repeat.
16. Apply the secrets of automation.
17. Scale your business by outsourcing as much as possible.
18. Be sure to also look out for those Pretty Houses when you (or your ants) are in the field.

When you look at it that way, it’s pretty simple, right?

And as much as I hate to put two lists back-to-back, I’d be remiss in my duties if I didn’t update this final list of best TIPS for you here…

Best Tips for “Driving for Dollars” (ALL Parts: 1, 2, 3 & 4)

1. Be persistent: “Driving for Dollars” can be time-consuming, so it’s important to be persistent in your efforts. Set aside a specific time each week to go out and drive around.
2. Be strategic: Focus on neighborhoods with a high concentration of older homes, as these are more likely to need repairs.
3. Be organized. Don’t just fly (or drive) by the seat of your pants. Keep track of your potential leads, how they develop, who you made offers to (covered later), and who you need to follow up with and when.
4. Follow up quickly: Once you’ve identified a potential property, it’s important to follow up quickly. Find who owns the property. Get their contact information. Get ready to contact them using one of those methods above. Remember – The longer you wait, the less likely the owner will be motivated to sell.
5. Look to get the owner on the phone. Use the conversation guidelines in this Part 3 training.
6. State your intention for calling and see if they’d be open to talking about selling their house, then gather the essential information you need to…
7. Make an offer! Do the best you can to get THEM to make YOU an offer by using the simple ‘All Cash Buying Script’ (given above).
8. Do your best to get the property under contract. Know your exit strategy before you enter.
9. Send the contract to your attorney/closing agent (fax or scan/email) to check the title asap.
10. Immediately get contractor estimates and put numbers together to market the property to your buyer’s list/We Buy Houses guys.
11. Use the right technology to Automate your business. This will make things so much faster and easier for you.
12. Killer App for Driving For Dollars: The Deal Machine App
13. If you really want to scale and grow, PLUS be able to do business anywhere – FROM anywhere – then you really need to master the art of Outsourcing a lot of the Driving For Dollars tasks.
14. Use Tony’s Tech Tips to get access to some really killer cool apps that will help you stay organized as you automate things.
15. Remember to look for the right properties whenever you or your team are out driving around: UGLY, abandoned houses or PRETTY houses with “For Sale by Owner” signs in front.

The Final Conclusion…

Driving For Dollars is a powerful technique for finding properties to wholesale. You can easily get started for NO cost (except your time & gas money), automate a lot of the work involved, and still scale it up as large as you like by systemizing and outsourcing. By being persistent, strategic, and quick to follow up, you can make the most of this strategy and start making money consistently as a real estate investor.

With all that in mind, what are you waiting for? Why not get started with this strategy today, and use it as long as possible?! And the next time you’re out for a drive, take some different routes on your way to wherever you’re going, because you never know when you’ll find that next deal that will put tens of thousands of dollars in your pocket!

Use this in good health to build wealth, and…

Until Next Time!

Tony Pearl

P.S. How did you like this training? Please tell me what you think about this course. I worked really hard on all this for you. Did you like it? Did you get value from it?
Let me know what you think in the comment section below, and thanks for reading!