If you only read the headlines you would have missed the most important piece of the article posted here on the online version of Realtor Magazine.

It’s titled “Foreclosure Filings Went Up Last Month, But…” and the article is fairly positive and lays out the case for why we have such a strong market here in the U.S.

However, wrapping up the article is this little gem:

“Counter to the national trend, there are a handful of markets above prerecession levels, such as Baltimore (189 percent higher); Washington, D.C. (26 percent higher); Philadelphia (20 percent higher); New York (13 percent higher); and Hartford, Conn. (4 percent higher).”

It’s yet another reason we are going to be talking about the entire foreclosure process at WREIA this month.

If you are in real estate here in the DC area you already know that our market is different than the rest of the country.

It’s why some people really struggle with the investing part of our business. National headlines don’t always match what is actually taking place on the ground here locally.

The soup to nuts foreclosure process is lengthy and has many points at which you can step in as an investor and help people who may be facing this tough situation.

We will be discussing a few key points for investors in an interactive WREIA meeting this month.

How will the DC area real estate market respond if we do dip into another national recession?

What should you do as homeowners or renters to prepare?

Are online auctions as good as “real life” auctions?

Let’s cover a few of those questions and more this Monday at our April WREIA meeting.

As always – we will focus on the DC real estate market and how we as investors can best help people and make a profit at the same time.

Come out this Monday, April 15th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy April!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with WREIA members!

We have a friend who is absolutely fanatical about Black Friday sales. She and her sister are PASSIONATE about finding the best deals the day after Thanksgiving.

I used to love Fridays too. Nearly every Friday.

Friday was and is PAYDAY for most people.

I was one of the people that would supply checks to all my vendors and contractors on Friday.

But one of my favorite things to do with a check was to buy property at Auctions. As investors we make our money when we buy property at a discount.

Back when I was a regular on the Auction circuit you would never miss me at an auction on Fridays.

It was one of the best days to go to attend an auction – for one reason:

My favorite lender would almost always “give away” at least one property a month.

Let me explain.

In the foreclosure process when a lender gets to the “disposal” or sale portion, they have the option to offer the property at a local auction. Most of the time, this takes place at a county courthouse.

But not for this particular lender that I would follow.

They would often have the auction at the property – immediately following a quick “open house” where the potential buyers could see the inside of the property. (That’s usually not the case – we hardly ever get to see the inside unless we win the bid.)

Usually there was a week every month when only a couple people would show up for this particular lenders auction. Maybe it was a holiday weekend, bad weather, traffic – who knows.

Every once in a while – I would be the ONLY bidder on the property. The other people would simply be there to watch the process.

Long story short – I bought a lot of property at Auctions, and still do.

But times have changed. We seldom go to a property any longer for an auction.

Shoot, we sometimes just stay home and place our bid online – just like the “Fast Money” late night infomercials say we can.

As the foreclosure rates start to pick up, we will find ourselves placing bids on a lot more properties again.

But……

Auctions are just part of the foreclosure machine. There is a lot to learn about the process and a few people I know have a sharp focus on their favorite niche within foreclosures and have carved out a very nice living for themselves.

Now that I think about it, auctions are a lot like Black Friday sales.

There can be some fantastic deals at auctions, but in your research you may come across another property with potential as well. Sort of like an unadvertised special on Black Friday. Those are the fun ones to tell your friends about.

It’s part of the reason we are going to be talking about the entire foreclosure process at WREIA this month.

The soup to nuts foreclosure process is lengthy and has many points at which you can step in as an investor and help people who may be facing this tough situation.

We will be discussing a few key points for investors in an interactive WREIA meeting this month.

How will the DC area real estate market respond if we do dip into another national recession?

What should you do as homeowners or renters to prepare?

Are online auctions as good as “real life” auctions?

Let’s cover a few of those questions and more this Monday at our April WREIA meeting.

As always – we will focus on the DC real estate market and how we as investors can best help people and make a profit at the same time.

Come out this Monday, April 15th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy April!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with WREIA members!

I have to share this quick article with you today.

First, notice that it’s dated Oct. of 2018. Keep in mind that the context of the article is now 6 months old.

The article is titled “House flippers see their returns drop as the economy strengthens” and is posted at BankRate.com here.

A few take-a-ways from the article.

It’s hard out there for flippers.

Returns for investors are at a trending year-over-year low.

The future looks dim as the economy is improving.

Now – let’s fast forward to today.

The threat of rising interest rates is stalling.

The possibility of foreclosures are starting to rise. (We showed you a few stats in the last post a few days ago.)

The economy is getting hit with questions about it’s strength.

KEY POINT: Uncertainty creates opportunity.

I think the foreclosure rates nationwide may have hit a low over the last year.

It’s part of the reason we are going to be talking about the foreclosure process at WREIA this month.

The foreclosure process is lengthy and has many points at which you can step in as an investor and help people who may be facing this tough spot.

We will be discussing a few key points in an interactive WREIA meeting this month.

How will the DC area real estate market respond if we do dip into another national recession?

What should you do as homeowners or renters to prepare?

Let’s cover a few of those questions and more next Monday at our April WREIA meeting.

As always – we will focus on the DC real estate market and how we as investors can best help people and make a profit at the same time.

Come out on Monday, April 15th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy April!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with WREIA members!

If you like articles with lots of numbers – this article posted on Forbes will be thrilling.

The author makes a strong case for a solid season this spring. Which is good, since it’s almost April already!

One standout fact in the article was about SentriLock. SentriLock is the company behind those fancy electronic lockboxes that some Realtor’s used to struggle with non-stop.

Without giving any solid evidence via numbers, he writes this:

In fact, the number of openings of lockboxes – where a Realtor would access a key before unlocking a home – has been trending up. NAR’s SentriLlock data reading was measurably higher in January and February compared to the second half of 2018.

After a slow fall season, I was starting to get a little concerned. Some of us were wondering “where did everyone go?” But, over the last few weeks, things have certainly picked up again.

Maybe it’s the slightly nicer weather, the time change and a general overall improvement in mood. Whatever it is, it seems to be loosening things up and it’s bringing people out for an afternoon walk-through and the weekend home tours.

It’s important to track the numbers, but it also takes some moments “out in the wild” of the market to see how things are going in real life – today.

Most of those numbers quoted in the article are summaries of what has happened over the last few months. It’s important to notice when things start to turn – you need to be ready for it.

If you are waiting around for “numbers to come out” before you decide to list your latest project, you run a higher risk of missing the season.

It might be me, but it certainly “feels” like the peak of the season is getting shorter and shorter every year.

Way back when, it seemed like you had a few months for the peak of the spring selling season. You could rely on February through the middle of June for a strong set of buyers.

The last few years it seemed like the “peak” only lasted a few weeks.

Don’t get me wrong – maybe that’s a sign that things are returning to “normal”. The chaos of the peak season brings multiple offers after every open house, escalation clauses etc.

Those are great situations when you’re selling a house. It’s not so great when buying a home.

One of the things I don’t want you to miss is the meeting this month at WREIA.

At our March WREIA meeting tomorrow we will talk about unusual lead sources. Most of these sources require you to have the ability to connect with people.

Come out tomorrow, Monday, March 18th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

What’s not working is not having the right people in place to finish a flip project in time for the spring selling season.

What is working is being ready to sell now that the peak season is right around the corner.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy St. Paddy’s Day and see you tomorrow at WREIA!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Oh, and Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with the members!

So I had this conversation a few days ago at my office.

Quite frankly, I hadn’t thought about this particular “deal” in a long time.

“Unusual lead sources. That’s an interesting topic. Have any good stories to share with me before Monday?”

“Sure,” I replied. “The deal I got from a drug dealer in DC was pretty interesting. And, it turned out to be a good deal.”

The story is pretty good, and it was a referral from a drug dealer in DC – who I never met.

When we finished I was told “You have to share that on Monday.”

People are always watching and listening – whether you are paying attention or not.

This is even more true in tough parts of any city.

People from these “tough” areas grow up knowing they have to look over their shoulders for any trouble.

Parents in DC were constantly telling their kids to “stay out of trouble” back when DC was the drug and crime capital of the country.

Back then, it seemed like drug dealers ran the city. You had to be careful in some parts of the city 24 hours a day.

I was younger and some of my friends would quickly add “dumber as well” when this story took place.

The lead on this property happened because I was never afraid to connect with people – no matter their station in life.

If you have left over biases from your childhood, or were raised with hints of racism I would guess you are going to have limited success in our business.

Moving forward, as our county becomes even more diverse – as it always has – you are going to have even more trouble.

Here is a hard truth for some people – DC is already a very diverse city.

Our unique metro area has people from every country in the world. You just never know who you might bump into. Language barriers still exist in some parts of our area.

If we all looked, talked, dressed and acted the same – how boring would that be?

In any group having people that have a weird sense of humor, or are a bit eccentric make any community feel like it’s more alive.

Do you know how to connect with people who are different from you? Can you connect with people who speak different, dress different or have different customs than you are used to? And if they are different, are you still willing to help them?

I hope so.

I see this situation a lot-

I happens to so-called “white-collar” people who say they will never go into some parts of the DC metro area.

On the flip side some people won’t go into “snooty” neighborhoods because “rich people” don’t need help.

Both of these people are crossing out millions of people – because they want to feel comfortable and only deal with people from their neighborhood.

Back to this story at my office.

Had I looked down on people in this particular neighborhood I never would have made a nice profit. Had I looked down on people because they were “drug dealers” or came from “bad” neighborhoods I would have missed out on 100’s of thousands of dollars.

The entire process got started with one simple act.

I’m going to tell you the whole story Monday night at our March WREIA meeting.

At WREIA this month we will talk about unusual lead sources. Most of these sources require you to have the ability to connect with people.

Come out on Monday, March 18th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

What’s not working – looking down your nose at someone because they are different from you.

What is working is connecting with and genuinely trying to help people.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy March and see you soon!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Oh, and Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with the members!

We have had regular WREIA meetings since 2001. So, for 18 years we have put ourselves “out there” in the DC area and tried to share with our community what we see working (and not working) in our area.

A lot has changed in 18 years.

But one thing has never changed.

You need to connect with people to be successful in this business. For that matter, in any business.

I think we are getting smarter. It’s getting easier to spot the “fakes.” Technology is helping us in some ways, and hurting us in other ways.

Sure, we have the ability to “connect” with friends on Facebook at any hour of the day. But, sometimes that “always on” ability can hurt as well.

Here is an article recently posted on CNBC about connecting with people. It’s all about deeply connecting and not just making “small talk”.

The opening paragraph gets your attention:

“”How are you?” These are the three most useless words in the world of communication. The person asking doesn’t really want to know, and the person responding doesn’t tell the truth. What follows is a lost opportunity and meaningless exchange with zero connection.”

If you are guilty of this bland opening line (like I have been) it’s important to find alternatives to this awkward conversation starter.

Having better and deeper conversations is just a small part of what we will be talking about at WREIA this month.

Learning how to get better at connecting with people is crucial to your success in this business. It’s why we have to address it right up front.

At WREIA this month we will talk about unusual lead sources. Most of these sources require you to have the ability to connect with people.

Come out on Monday, March 18th, and hear what is working (and not working) across the DC area.

What’s not working – opening a conversation by asking “How are you?”

What is working is connecting with and genuinely trying to help people.

Join us at WREIA this month and you can learn from REAL PEOPLE having REAL SUCCESS in Real Estate.

Happy March and see you soon!

John Peterson
Founder, Washington Real Estate Investors Association

Oh, and Wholesalers – bring your deals to share with the members!