12 Ways to Market Wholesale Real Estate Deals in 2023 to Quickly Dispose of a Contracted Property

As explained in our guide Wholesale Real Estate Investing 101 for Beginners, marketing your wholesale properties is one of the most crucial components of your business. Your success depends on how easy, simple, and efficient your marketing process is. So let’s start with the simplest and most effective channel to try first when looking where to sell a wholesale real estate deal.

It would be great to just list a wholesale property online where cash buyers are looking for wholesale homes and start getting offers. Unfortunately, popular real estate listing websites, such as Zillow, don’t work for marketing specifically wholesale deals. Unlike HouseCashin marketplace.

HouseCashin marketplace was designed as an online tool to connect wholesalers with other types of investors looking for off-market investment properties, including wholesale homes.

By using HouseCashin, you immediately place your contracted property in front of hundreds of cash buyers looking for wholesale deals in your area.

The property search dashboard empowers investors with the ability to quickly locate and analyze properties such as yours available for sale.

Potential wholesale contract buyers can target their search by using filters like:

• Location
• Property type
• Deal type
• Deal status
• Asking price

To facilitate search and selection, the dashboard also provides investors with analytical tools including:

• Rehab estimate
• After repair value
• Profit potential (fix & flip deals)

The property that you put under contract will have a profile page. This page includes information about the property as well as yourself, the contract seller, including your profile and photo.

Investors can save the page to their favorites list, use the analytical tools for comparisons, and contact you directly. This functionality facilitates developing a potential long term business relationship between wholesalers and serial investment property buyers.

There is also a “request funding” button on the profile page that connects investors with hard money lenders in the area. You can use it too to find bridge financing for earnest money deposits.

By focusing on this specific segment of the industry, HouseCashin have built a networking and deal-making environment for real estate investing professionals.

HouseCashin marketplace is an innovative platform designed to be the simplest solution every US wholesaler can use to:

1. wholesale a property as quickly as possible.
2. increase the monthly number of closed deals.
3. save time and money for marketing.

Additionally, you can list your business on our national directory of wholesalers. We created it to help investors looking for real estate wholesalers in their area to easily find local professionals. By listing your business to our directory, you make it visible to your local cash buyers.

Apart from that, you are welcome to look for real estate investors near you in our directory where investing professionals list their businesses.

Websites such as Craigslist look a lot like the old classified ad section of your local newspaper and can be used for wholesale property marketing.

There are three ways you can use these sites:

1. Post an ad for the property you have under contract with photos and specify that it’s a wholesale deal.
2. Create a posting advertising that you sell wholesale properties on a regular basis.
3. Investment property owners post rental ads there. So you can contact the landlords who advertise on classified sites and add them to your list of potential buyers.

Unfortunately, there have been problems with sites like Craigslist being used for rental scams. To make sure that you are contacting legitimate property owners, you should avoid advertisers who:

• Don’t include pictures with their ads
• Ask for personal info
• Have a suspicious email address
• Advertise deals that are too good to be true

Craigslist has begun charging advertising fees. This is partly to make their site less desirable to scammers. When scammers pay fees, they risk being tracked by authorities through their payments.

eBay is the best known online auction site in the world. They also have Fixed Price and Classified Ad formats that let you sell items without going through an auction.

Selling real estate on eBay can be confusing. Unlike other eBay auctions, real estate auction bids are non-binding. This is because real estate laws are different in each state.

eBay has tried to make their site attractive to real estate sellers and buyers while not violating any states’ laws.

Their real estate policy says that auction-style real estate bids “…don’t result in binding agreements to buy and sell real estate; however, they do allow sellers and buyers to use eBay Real Estate as a venue to determine who may be most interested in the property.”

Once a bid for real estate has been made and accepted, the transaction is continued offline. From that point, the transaction has to conform to the real estate laws in the state where the property is located.

eBay charges Insertion Fees when you post your ad and Final Value Fees when the item sells. Insertion Fees for real estate can be from $100 to $300 depending on which listing format you choose.

If you use PayPal to accept payment, you will also have to pay their fees. The other option is to accept a certified check which would have to be mailed or sent by overnight delivery.

There are different opinions about the most effective way to sell contracts on eBay. Some sellers use an option to buy the contract. Then, the actual purchase of the contract is handled offline. If the buyer of the option decides not to purchase the contract, you can advertise the option for sale again.

When you’re advertising a wholesale real estate property disposition on eBay, it’s very important to write your ad carefully. You have to be clear that you are selling a contract and not the property itself. This is especially true if you are not a licensed real estate agent.

eBay does not allow the sale of real estate by non-licensed individuals or third parties.

This type of transaction does have the potential to take longer than those found through other advertising methods.

If you are using eBay Real Estate for the first time, you should research their costs and rules carefully.

Social media advertising provides small businesses with powerful technology that used to be reserved for large corporations. Some of the tools that are available for individuals and small businesses are:

• Targeted outreach to specified customers
• Ongoing management of the ad campaign
• Budget management

The advertising process on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn is similar.

They are all able to target your ads to a particular audience. In the case of Facebook and Instagram, you can select demographics that describe your potential buyers. Since LinkedIn is only used by business people, targeting the audience for wholesale deals works even more effectively.

Social media platforms let you set a budget that they will stick to in placing your ads. The total cost of your ads will not exceed this amount. This may limit how complex your ads can be and how often they will be seen.

Unlike traditional advertising, with online advertising, you are charged by results. Your desired result may be that the reader clicks on your ad, or views your video commercial, or simply sees your ad whether they click on it or not.

In addition to your overall budget, you will also establish your bid. A bid is where you say how much you will pay for each ad based on your desired results.

You can pay every time someone clicks on your ad (CPC meaning “cost per click”), every time a thousand users view it (CPM or “cost per mille”), or every time someone watches your video or at least 30 seconds of it (CPV or “cost per view”).

There are also message ads, or click to messenger ads that are sent from you to the individuals in your target audience. You can pay every time these ads are sent (CPS or “cost per send”).

When selling a wholesale contract, you need a strategy that will make the target take action. These are called conversions. Generally, paying per click on your ad is the best strategy for advertisers who are trying to create conversions.

The time and location of your ads are determined by bids. If other users want their ads to be seen at the same time and place as yours, an auction will automatically be held.

The winning bid will be based on the amount that the bidder is willing to pay and the effectiveness of their previous advertising. The social media platforms are trying to serve both their advertisers and their users who are viewing the ads by rewarding the most effective advertisers.

The winning bid isn’t always the highest one but rather the most relevant one.

During your ad campaign, you will have the ability to review its effectiveness and make changes if needed.

When other users click on your ad or a link in your ad, they are going to be directed to a designated page on your website — a “landing page”. To take advantage of social media marketing, you will need to have an effective online presence already in place.

You will also need to have a complete Facebook page or LinkedIn account. Include as much information about yourself and your experience as possible. Remember that this information is establishing your credibility with people who don’t know you.

The various platforms will help you with your strategy and marketing selections with their advertising management programs. But before you start, take free online courses on advertising provided by the platform you are going to use.

Free online advertising is possible by participating in Social Media groups. Both Facebook and LinkedIn have groups.

Groups are users who have similar interests. A group may be created around a hobby, an interest that users have in common, or similar business pursuits. And there are groups for wholesalers and investors too.

Use the search function to find groups related to your purpose by entering keywords such as:

• real estate wholesalers in [your location]
• real estate investing in [your location]
• house flippers in [your location]

and similar.

Groups are created and managed by individuals, not the platform. The platform does oversee the communication in the groups to make sure that it meets their standards.

One of the things that Facebook protects against is overusing groups for advertising. If you post too many ads, your account may be suspended.

Group members post comments on subjects that may be interesting to other members. This can include promoting their products or services.

Some groups have decided that they don’t want members posting ads. You’ll need to make sure that ads are allowed before posting them in a group. If you properly target the groups that you want to reach, you should be able to avoid those who don’t want advertising. Read group rules before joining.

You can even start your own group that is based on wholesale real estate contracts. This will give you a forum to explain the process and present yourself as an authority on the subject. It could be a good way to develop contacts with potential buyers.

LinkedIn is a favorite source of group participation for business. Users are on LinkedIn because they want to network with other business people and learn about opportunities.

Facebook Marketplace isn’t a good venue for selling an intangible item such as the right to buy a property. But as this resource is something you would likely think of, I decided to cover it here just to save you time. Here is why you should consider it among the last options in your marketing strategy.

The Facebook Help Center specifies the things that cannot be sold on Marketplace. They include:

• Anything that is not a real item: Anything that isn’t a physical product for sale.
• Services: Selling services (example: house cleaning) on Marketplace isn’t allowed.

You could make the argument that you are selling a contract which is a real thing. If this got by the Facebook regulators, Marketplace would probably still not be the most effective way to sell a contract.

Marketplace is broken down into categories. The closest category for your item would be real estate. The process for entering your ad into Marketplace Real Estate requires you to select from predetermined descriptions. None of them would accurately fit a real estate contract.

Other methods of Social Media advertising enable you to target your ad to potential buyers on platforms that were created for that purpose. Compared to this, Marketplace is an ineffective, and possibly inappropriate venue for your ad campaign.

Like anyone else, when real estate investors are looking for deals, they search on the Internet. They “google” it. If you want their business, you need to show up on the Google search results page.

While growing your online presence organically is essential, it takes a lot of time and effort. Selling a wholesale real estate contract is time-sensitive. You’ll need to move more quickly to get in front of buyers.

Buying ad placements on Google is the quickest way to be included in search results and to be there early. 75% of people looking for something on the internet don’t look past the first page of the search results. You need to be as close to the front as possible.

The way you buy ads on Google is similar to the Social Media platforms that we’ve discussed. You pay for results. In this case, you’re paying every time that someone clicks on your ad. This is called Pay Per Click (PPC).

First, you set a budget based on how much you want to spend per day, and how much you want to spend overall. This will impact the frequency of your ads.

Next, you set a maximum bid amount that you are willing to pay per click.

You will also have to learn to incorporate the most effective words and phrases in your ad. These are called “keywords”. Keywords are phrases that searchers enter in Google to find what they need. They can be found in the tool called Google Keyword Planner that comes together with your Google Ads profile.

When a search is made by your potential client, Google’s system finds the ads that are related to that search. It does this by matching keywords and phrases in the search request with the same words and phrases in an ad.

If a buyer’s search includes keywords in your ad, then you may be included in the search. However, there are secondary factors that also determine the likelihood of your ad winning the automatic auction. For example, the quality of your website and particularly landing page.

As mentioned, all the matching ads are compared in an instantaneous “auction”. Each ad is assigned an Ad Rank. The ad with the highest rank shows up first. The one with the next highest rank is shown next and so forth.

Your Ad Rank is calculated by multiplying your maximum bid by your Quality Score.

Your Quality Score is a reflection of how effective you are in your advertising efforts. It includes things like the relevance of your ad to the search request, the quality of your landing page (where the user will be connected if they click), and your click-through rate (CTR).

Your CTR shows how often users click on your ad. It may take some time for you to build up a strong CTR. The sooner you start participating in the Google ad process the better.

However, first you should learn how to use this tool correctly to avoid wasting your budget for ineffective advertising efforts. I recommend that you take Google Ads course by Google. It’s free.

Today, effective and efficient websites are the key to business success. Everything that we’ve discussed here is impacted by the quality of your website.

Advertising online and on Social Media is geared toward getting someone to click on your ad. When that happens, they are directed to your website. It doesn’t do you much good if you direct them to a poorly made website that they will leave right away.

Any time that someone hears about you, they are going to check you out by looking up your website. This could be an investor, a property seller, or someone with whom you want to network.

You’ve seen how the quality of your website can also affect your visibility to online search engines that people use to find your services.

There are three aspects that determine the quality of your website:

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) helping you get free targeted organic traffic from Google Search.
2. Web design making your website look presentable.
3. Usability and user experience (UI and UX) determining how easy it is for users to accomplish what they came to your website for.

You can either buy a website template or order a custom-built website from an IT agency.

If you are not a professional in the aforementioned aspects, you won’t be able to estimate how well the hired IT professionals built your website and request necessary adjustments.

So instead of ordering and paying extra for a custom solution, it may make sense to buy a template. HouseCashin is currently developing such a template designed with all real estate wholesalers’ needs in mind.

Industry websites are an important source of information for business professionals. It allows them to network with others in the industry far beyond their sphere of influence.

Think about the types of professions that belong in your local network:

• Investors clubs and associations
• Real estate attorneys
• Property management firms
• Real estate agents
• Hard money lenders

A quick search will lead you to websites for local, regional, or national associations of these professionals. When you advertise to people who are visiting these sites, you expand your network tremendously.

Try contacting webmasters of such websites and ask them if they would place your ad banners on appropriate webpages for a fee. Some of these websites will even have a section explaining advertising terms.

Some of them might do this even for free because it will benefit them. For example, a hard money lender is interested in helping investors visiting their website to find lucrative wholesale deals that they will need financing for.

You may be surprised to learn that printed ads are an effective way to supplement your online advertising. According to a survey by Marketing Sherpa, 82% of consumers put most trust in print ads.

People of all ages still read magazines, with baby boomers estimated to read 8 to 9 magazines per month. Many of your potential contract buyers are in that age group.

Although newspaper viewership is declining, it’s been estimated that as many as 35% of the population still read printed newspapers.

Magazines and newspapers are often available in waiting rooms such as doctors’ offices and auto service centers. One print ad can be seen by different people over days and weeks.

Professional groups and trade associations often have periodicals that are distributed to their members. This can be a great way to target your message directly to your potential buyers.

The cost of printed advertising can be low compared to other forms of advertising giving you a good return on investment (ROI).

If done properly, signs placed by the road can be an effective way to find a buyer and even add to your buyer list for the future.

There are some definite dos and don’ts for this type of marketing:

• Follow the rules — fines for improper placement of road signs can be hundreds of dollars. Research the rules in your area to make sure you don’t make this mistake.
• Simple signs with minimal words — moving traffic may only have a few seconds to read your sign. Make it easy for them by using fewer words with larger letters.
• Create urgency — let viewers know that this is a good deal: “Must Sell”, “Handyman Special”, etc.
• Location, location, location — your signs should be placed where there is a lot of traffic that is slowing down or stopped. Intersections on busy roads work well. Placement near the entrance to a shopping center is also good. The entrance to a home improvement store is an excellent location to attract residential investors and their contractors.

Experienced road sign advertisers say that it’s best to control the follow-up process. Instead of listing your personal or business phone number, use a number that doesn’t indicate who you are. Use a Google Voice number, call center number, or Skype number instead.

Track your success rate with callers and use this to add to your potential buyer list for future direct contact.

Another tool to enhance your marketing efforts is direct mail.

The percentage of people who respond to direct mail has grown over the past few years. This is partly because direct mail marketing can be targeted more effectively today.

Focused mailing has never been easier or more cost-effective. The US Postal Service has free tools on their website to help you create a target market based on zip codes.

On the USPS website, go to the Advertising heading under the Business tab and click on “Using EDDM” (Every Door Direct Mail). The easy to follow directions will give you access to excellent direct mail marketing tools.

The return on investment (ROI) of your market dollars used on direct mail is comparable to the ROI for Social Media advertising.

Wholesaling doesn’t require much capital, but it’s one of the property investment strategies that rely on marketing the most. Wholesalers who are successful over a long time are the ones who build a presence in the industry.

Here are some effective ways to market yourself and your products for the best long-term results.

#1 Build Your Own Cash Buyers List

Every professional wholesaler should build and maintain a list of active buyers of investment properties to avoid starting the marketing process for every wholesale property from zero. Each method of advertising that is discussed here can yield buyers for your list.

While working on your short term goal of selling existing contracts, it’s important to stay focused on your long term real estate investment exit strategy. Always look for potential future buyers for your list.

You will need to revise your list periodically to account for each buyer’s status:

• Some will have used their available funds for purchases and may be dormant for a time
• Some will increase their activities by bringing in additional investors
• Some will drop out of the business altogether or retire
• Some will have their contact information changed

List update can be done by creating an email campaign once in a while using an email marketing tool such as Mailchimp. The convenience of using such a tool is that you can send an email to multiple people at once rather than messaging each person one by one.

For example, you can create a simple survey containing one or more multiple choice questions and filter out those whose answers show that they are no longer active. And then, call those who haven’t responded to emails.

There are buyers lists available to purchase online. Use caution when considering this option. A lot of the time, these lists are old and have not been maintained or updated recently. You may be buying information on buyers who are no longer active.

Another disadvantage of purchasing email lists is that they list people who don’t know you. It’s more likely and normally easier to sell a property to a person whom you included in your list yourself, after a personal contact.

For more information on this topic, read my guide on how to build a cash buyers list for real estate wholesale deals where I explain 25 ways to do it.

#2 Build Relationships with Professionals Who Serve Investors

Networking is key to any successful sales business. Make a list of professions that investors will use in the course of their business. Those are the people with whom you want to network.

Get in touch with invest0r-friendly real estate agents who assist investors in buying investment rental properties.

Apart from realtors, your list should include (but not limited to):

• Hard money lenders
• Title companies
• Property managers
• Accountants
• Real estate attorneys

Some people make an effort at networking once or twice. If they haven’t gotten a referral right away, then they stop.

You can’t expect to start getting referrals from your networking sources until you have a relationship with them. Remember, they are also looking for referrals from you. Or you can pay for referrals to motivate them.

You should never stop networking.

#3 Join Industry-Specific Organizations

If you haven’t already found a real estate investment club (REI) in your area, then you should start looking for one right away. This is a great chance to learn more about your market and effective sales strategies.

If there isn’t an REI in your market, you should consider starting one.

Self-directed IRAs are a popular tool for passive investing. If you can find meetings for these investors, it will be a great opportunity for you.

Self-directed IRA investors are looking for partners who will manage the ownership of the properties in which they invest. This may be a chance for you to refer them to some of your regular buyers.

Crowdfunding is a growing source of real estate investment funds. The JOBS Act legislation allowed investors with a net worth below $1 million to invest in real estate crowdfunding investments, with some restrictions.

Look for Crowdfunding entities that own the types of properties that you typically handle. You will want to get to know the people who manage the fund and who put together the investments. They are your buyers.

#4 Track and Analyze Your Marketing Efforts

If you track your marketing efforts and their results, you can create an engine that will keep your business moving forward.

Your marketing results may be different from those of others. You need to know which methods of advertising are the most successful for you. Regular analysis of your marketing will show you where to put your money for the best returns.

Tracking your results will also tell you whether or not you’re doing it right. Your analysis may show that you need to revise your ads or adjust your strategy.

Your online presence will be the foundation of your marketing strategy. Fortunately, there are excellent tools available that will help you keep up with your online marketing campaign.

Google Search Console helps you make sure that people can get to your website. Google Analytics will tell you what happens once they get there.

Google Search Console shows you if and how often your website is being found in Google. It tells you how people find your site — through what keywords and what web pages perform best and worst. It also shows if other sites link to your site. Google Search Console will help you maintain a visible website.

Google Analytics is a tool that helps you analyze your website’s traffic. Its features include Real-Time Data, Mobile Device Tracking, Custom Reporting, Advertising ROI, and much more.

Both of these tools are free. There is a premium version of Google Analytics that you have to pay for. I think you’ll find that the features of the free version will meet the needs of most small business owners.

#5 Automate Your Marketing Efforts

If you have to introduce yourself to potential buyers each time you have a contract for sale, you will be starting over with every contract.

If you want to sell your contracts on time, you need to have buyers already lined up and ready. The right marketing strategy, consistently applied, can help you get there.

When you start your business, you will probably have to do your marketing for yourself. As we’ve shown you, there are terrific tools to help you do this. But you still have to carve out the time to do it regularly. You can’t just work on your marketing every once in a while when you happen to think about it.

Your time is better spent on generating income. You need to be finding suitable properties to put under contract and building your buyer list. If you are going to create a consistent income stream, your marketing plan needs to be implemented on an ongoing basis without you.

Most young companies don’t have the capital to hire employees to run their ad campaigns. The most cost-effective way to grow your marketing team will be to outsource the work.

Fortunately, there are people and agencies in just about every size market who specialize in this kind of work.

You will need someone to oversee your marketing program in at least the following areas:

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): your website needs to be created and maintained in a way that will guide buyers to your website.
• Pay Per Click (PPC): your online advertising costs need to be regularly compared to your results for improving efficiency. A PPC specialist will keep up with this before it becomes a problem.
• Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO): you need to convert people who click on your ad to become buyers of your contracts. A CRO expert can oversee this and advise you on how to put the most effective presentation of your product in front of the right viewers.
• Social Media Marketing Manager: you can’t just open a few social media accounts and expect buyers to start pouring in. You need to have an effective social media marketing strategy, and you have to keep it current.

This may take multiple people, or you may find a firm or agency that can handle everything.

Make sure that you find a provider who works with businesses of your size and type. You don’t want to be their smallest customer. You need to be important to them and not get lost in a large list of big clients.

If they are not looking at your online marketing results regularly, without you calling them, then they aren’t giving you the help you need.

#6 Become an Industry Expert

Over the last 20 years, I’ve been involved in the real estate industry as an investor. The most successful people that I’ve seen had one thing in common. They became experts in their field.

They talked to their city planning department, attended City Council meetings, and researched proposed traffic changes.

They took all available industry training courses and achieved the highest designations in their field. They became involved in their industry associations.

The result was strong name recognition in their field. Eventually, they didn’t have much competition in their area of expertise.

If you become a wholesale real estate industry expert you can:

• Gain access to the best-qualified buyers
• Have the top buyers start coming to you
• Negotiate higher assignment fees
• Grow from fee income salesman to investor

To be an expert you need to stay on top of the latest information in all areas that affect your buyers. This can include investment returns on real estate assets, construction costs, hard money lending terms and rates, residential real estate days on market (DOM), and school district reassignments.

You need to be aware of anything that your buyers need to know that will help you sell yourself to them. Create a blog and develop social media accounts with followers. Share valuable information with your audience and highlight your knowledge in regular emails to your list of buyers and other subscribers.

Learn about your buyers’ preferred property types and neighborhoods. Keep a record of their desired level of work that is needed to make the property presentable for sale or rent.

Instead of just throwing deals on the wall to see if they stick, show your buyers properties they will be interested in.

Participate in industry events such as commercial real estate board meetings and conventions. Get involved in the local board. Get yourself placed on the panel when discussions are held on topics that you know about. Start an investment group.

When you’ve established yourself as an expert, the top buyers will see you as a professional who can meet their needs. They will answer your emails and take your calls. They’ll even call you first to find properties. You’ll turn your deals around more quickly and realize more profits.

While this article describes so many ways to market your real estate wholesale deals, you don’t have to use all of them.

Start marketing your wholesale property by listing it on HouseCashin Marketplace. It’s the easiest way to look for cash buyers.

Using our marketplace can make more complicated strategies described in this guide unnecessary.