How a “Real Estate Bird Dog” Works – Lesson 04

Real Estate-Bird Dogging is one way to get your foot in the door of real estate investing.  It is a great way to use your interest in real estate to gain both experience and income.  And if you do it correctly it’s risk free, requires very little cash, but does require time and effort.

Investors will pay you a fee for finding houses for them to buy! When you find a property that meets their criteria, some investors will have you do some basic research on the property and then provide them with the information that you collect.   The more upfront work you do, the higher the reward you should expect to be paid.

Usually, investors will ask you to find out information about the condition of the property, approximate market value, the current owner(s), what it might cost to fix the property up, etc.  After gathering all of this information, you then submit it to a real estate investor and if they end up purchasing the property, you get paid.

1. You use your spare time and expertise to locate discounted real estate properties that are for sale, from motivated sellers.  (Don’t worry about the ‘expertise’ part.  We’ll cover that later).

2. Concurrently, you have been collecting the names of individuals or companies who want to buy real estate for investment purposes.

3. At this point you have two choices:

• You can prepare a presentation on the property you located to present to a potential buyer
• Enter into a contract with the seller with the intent of “flipping” it before you have to close on it yourself, or have a simultaneous closing with the buyer you found.  (Again, this is explained in detail in my Bird-dogging book).

Note: Flipping for a new investor can be risky.  You do not need to “flip” properties.   You can make money letting a buyer purchase the properties you find for him or her.

4. You collect a “finder’s fee” from the buyer for the legwork and paperwork you did for him or her, but only after he or she closes on the property you presented to them.

Filed under: Basics of Finding Deals • Become a Real Estate Bird Dog • Being a Real Estate Bird Dog • Finding Properties • Property locators • Real estate bird dogging • Real Estate Bird Dogs

Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!