Flip Houses 3 of 3 Mail Merge Print and Send (CFFL 0173)
Flip Houses 3 of 3 Mail Merge Print and Send
Jack Butala: Flip Houses 3 of 3 Mail Merge Print and Send. Every Single month we give away a property for free. It’s super simple to qualify. Two simple steps. Leave us your feedback for this podcast on iTunes and number two, get the free ebook at landacademy.com, you don’t even have to read it. Thanks for listening.
Jack:
It’s Jack Butella for Land Academy. Welcome to our Cashflow from Land show. We show you how to buy property for half of what it’s worth and resell it the very next day. Great information and instruction from Jack, that’s me.
Jill:
And inspiration from Jill. That’s me.
Jack:
There’s some funny stuff that happened to us recently. Jill, I can’t believe that an Uber driver can tell you their whole life story in 6 minutes flat.
Jill:
Isn’t it hilarious? It’s so funny.
Jack:
We had an Uber driver last night and she was from Germany. She got married to an American and lives here now, lives in California. She told us her whole life story.
Jill:
It’s hilarious.
Jack:
What it ended up being, her whole life story, the differences the way people drive in Europe and the way that people drive in California. I have to say, I think she was right.
Jill:
I totally agree. The whole valet parking thing I thought was really funny, too. I’ll add that.
Jack:
Yeah, go ahead. It’s the pass left thing that’ll stick with me forever.
Jill:
The pass left?
Jack:
The left lane is for passing.
Jill:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jack:
I’m from Detroit, that’s how we learn it there too.
Jill:
Exactly.
Jack:
It’s not for driving on.
Jill:
Exactly.
Jack:
If you have a white minivan and 430 people in your care and you’re driving in the left lane and 45 miles an hour, this is for you.
Jill:
Watch out.
Jack:
Please don’t do that.
Jill:
I love it. Oh my gosh.
Jack:
The Uber driver felt the same way.
Jill:
Right. That’s so funny. Yeah, this was 6 minutes of a lot of laughing. It was hilarious. My favorite story was when she talked about her dad coming over. Her dad was appalled at the valet parking. Wait a minute, you mean I’m coming to your restaurant and I have to pay to leave my car to go to your restaurant? I’m like, “You know, I never really thought about it. I’m just kind of used to it.” The dad was pissed off about that.
Jack:
He was.
Jill:
It was really funny.
Jack:
You know what my response is? I think he’s probably right.
Jill:
I think he’s right, too.
Jack:
Why am I paying to park if I’m coming to your place?
Jill:
Exactly. It was so darn funny. That was just a thing that just got to him. What was so cute too was I kind of felt bad for her, it sounds like her family came out and they visited and they’re not coming back.
Jack:
Yeah. She said, “I think that’s about it.”
Jill:
Yeah, I guess she’s got to go visit them there. For some people, that’s okay.
Jack:
Right. Hey, in this episode, Jill and I talk about flipping houses. This is little mini episode 3 of 3. It’s called Mail, Merge, Print, and Send. It’s a piece of this that I don’t think it’s talked about enough and we don’t get enough questions about it. It seems just, I guess, a mechanical piece. I’m going to try to make this as fun as possible, okay Jill?
Jill:
Got it.
Jack:
Great show. Before we start, let’s take a question posted by one of our members on successplan.com, our free online community.
Jill:
Jason from Michigan called in and asked: I have your Day to Doorstep program and I’m amazed at the amount of data available.
Jack:
I like where this is going.
Jill:
I like this, too. It’s very true. It’s awesome. How to remove the houses with mortgages, is there a place to get an overview on this product? Nice question.
Jack:
How do you move all the houses with mortgages? That’s what we talk about. Where do you get educated specifically by me, I think, is what that means, on how to use this product. Here’s the thing, there’s assessed values. This works for almost all the counties. Day to Doorstep has assessor county database. It’s not a list or anything silly. It’s got current assessor data from 98.5 counties in the country. It’s like 3,300 counties, there’s only a couple missing. They don’t want to work there anyway. It’s got way more data than you’ll ever need, even as a professional real estate investor like us. Way, way, way more. I’m amazed consistently, for decades I’ve been amazed at the amount of data.
Also, Jason, how do you remove the houses with a mortgage? Most places assess your property and the reason they assess it is to send you a tax bill. They like to assess stuff that’s higher. The higher the assessed value, the higher that they can send you a tax bill. There’s two types of assessments, very simply, one for the land and one for the improvements. Then there’s leans associated with both. When the lean value is zero, then there’s a special way to do this inside the data. When the lean value is zero, or the field where the mortgage company is nonexistent, there’s a pretty darn good chance, it’s not 100%, but a pretty darn good chance there’s no mortgage on that property. That’s how you do it.
How do you get an overview on it? There’s several places. The best place is to purchase one of our education programs. If you have about 4,200 hours of time on your hands, you can go to our YouTube channel and peruse that. Jill likes to say this, I heard her say this to some people on the phone one time, yes, every single … All the information that we provide is free, if you have 4,800 hours, or you can purchase our education package where it’s all laid out very neatly and you can do it in one weekend. We spent two decades making mistakes.
Jill:
That’s what I say.
Jack:
You can go spend two decades reviewing all the free information out there.
Jill:
I had a great chat with a guy the other day, that was exactly what I said. I’m like, “Well, it took us 16 years to get here.” If you want to just start like that, you sure can. Now, with the internet too, maybe you cut it down to 10. Good job. Do you want to spend 10 years or do you want to spend 10 days?
Jack:
Well said. I’m going to use that, 10 years or 10 days.
Jill:
10 years or 10 days.
Jack:
It doesn’t get any simpler than that.
Jill:
Exactly. With the internet, it cut off 6 years. Lucky for you.
Jack:
If you have a question or you want to be on the show, call 800-725-8816. Leave your negative personality at home
Jill:
I thought you said, “Leave your negative comment there.” What? Love it.
Jack:
Today’s topic is flip houses 3 of 3. Mail, merge, print, and send.
Jill:
Got it.
Jack:
After you’ve chosen that great data piece and you’ve learned how to scrub data, you got the data, and you watched all of our information and learned, the whole thing about getting and choosing the right areas, all of that, it comes time to get the actual physical letters in the mail. How do you do that? We never talk about it. For some reason, we don’t get the types of questions that we typically get about [inaudible 00:06:46] area and I think it’s because people get along in the education, it’s a logical next step. It turns out, people have sent a letter before so they’re kind of familiar with it.
Here’s a rundown of how it works. You have two documents. You have that Excel spreadsheet that you have so carefully chosen which owners need offers from you for a lower value than you think you can sell it for. That’s one document. Another document is the actual offer, in Microsoft Word, that you’re going to send to the owner. You mail, merge those two documents together and you send them to a professional grade real estate investment oriented printer, which is all part of our group. You want to make sure that the price of the whole thing to get to their doorstep is about the price of a stamp, give or take a few cents. If you send a huge one, it’s going to be less. If you send a little, tiny teaser one, it’s going to be a little bit more. When I say tiny, I mean a few hundred letters or even a few thousand. If you want to get serious about it, send thousands and thousands of letters or offers. It’s going to be a lot cheaper.
Jill:
Can I ask a question?
Jack:
Yeah.
Jill:
What is a good number? Let’s cut to the chase here, Stephen.
Jack:
For houses?
Jill:
Yeah. Let’s say I’m serious. I’m not going to test it. I’m not messing around, but I’m on a budget. What is the minimum number that I need to plan for and send because we’re not messing around here?
Jack:
The minimum number that I would even consider about houses, after you spend the time and energy to scrub data, is 2,000. Jill and I send about … We’re extremely good at this. We’re the experts at it. I would never consider sending out 2,000 letters. I send closer to 10,000 out because I want to ensure my success. Oh my God, that’s an incredible amount of money. How much does it cost? To send 2,000 letters out, it costs about $1,000 between the data. It’s 50 cents a stamp. It’s really postage. The vast majority of it’s postage, which we can’t control. We’ve reduced postage. For our group, our postage numbers are as low as they ever will get. The postage licenses that the federal government has granted us allows us to send mail as inexpensively as anybody on this planet will ever be able to send it. Everything else is cheaper, cheaper, cheaper.
Jill:
I know. That’s how you roll. People don’t get it. People who don’t know us or know you that well, they don’t know that you will beat it up until you get the very, very, very rock bottom best price.
Jack:
Again, it’s like decades. It’s decades of manipulating this stuff.
Jill:
Yeah. Well, it’s interesting, I talk to people … I know that you’ve spent so much time and money and energy, obviously we both have, researching this to get the best price and the best stuff to get this done, but people spend $1, $1.50. Can you imagine? Oh my gosh, you’re sending out 10,000. That’s a lot of money.
Jack:
There’s two companies out there that are pretty large in this space right now. One is called Click2Mail and one is called L Letters. They do some pretty heavy advertising and they’re both very expensive. The one that we use and are an original developer in, that’s included as part of the Day to Doorstep program is way, way, way cheaper and it’s industry-specific. The other two that I mentioned, they print postcards and four color bleed ads. They have very expensive equipment and it’s expensive. You’re paying for all that stuff. We don’t need any of that. We send out a business letter. It’s black and white. It’s very simple and very cheap. It does the job. How do I know it does the job? Because we’re getting millions and millions and millions of dollars getting stuff in the mail and it works.
Jill:
Yeah. The other thing to think about, too, is now we’re at step 3. Now you’re doing your mail margin, printing and sending. You did it all right going up to it. You have the right data. You know that you’re only sending out the right letters to the right people. It’s not a dart board and we’re just throwing a dart and just hoping something happens. You have isolated the exact group. You’ve got the most current data, and now you’re reaching out to them the right way.
Jack:
Yeah, exactly. A lot of people come to us and they say, “I sent a postcard out.” Postcards are cheaper. It’s cheaper to send a postcard out than it is a letter. I sent a postcard out to a current resident and it says, “Please give me a call because I’d like to buy your house.” That’s exactly what happened. The current resident calls you and says, “I would like to sell my house.” Then, the problem starts. How much would you like to sell it for? Well, how much would you like to buy it for? You’ll have a gillion people call you. If so many people call you, you can’t manage it and nothing gets done. You want to send them a letter. That’s what a mail merge is. It makes it look like that letter that the recipient’s getting is exactly only to them. There’s no way they can tell that you’ve sent it out to more than one person. It’s very specific. It gives the details of the house. The person that’s reading it’s going to say, “Man, whoever this Jack and Jill people are, they sent this letter right to me. They know my house. They know how many square feet it is.” It’s really easy to do. It doesn’t take a lot of time. It takes the same amount of time to do 10,000 letters as it does 100.
Jill:
I’m with you.
Jack:
We got it down.
Jill:
You know what’s so funny too, I laugh about this, think about this, when was the last time, other than ordering a pizza, that you acted on a postcard? Totally serious.
Jack:
Not even pizza.
Jill:
Right? Even the pizza ones, I don’t care if you hang it on my front door or you mail it to me, I’m not going to look at it.
Jack:
There’s a lot of people that say postcards work and that’s because they send a lot out, just like I described, or some version of it. They bought a house. They didn’t know what’s really possible, which is what we teach and do every day what’s the right way to do it. Manipulate the data, use professional grade stuff. They don’t know that you only have to send out 2,000-ish units.
Jill:
We need to do that.
Jack:
If you’re new, I would not recommend sending out 2,000.
Jill:
You know what? That would be a good blog, Stephen, for you to write, just to show … Let’s all cut to the chase here. What was your best postcard experience? How many did you send? How much did that cost you? Then we’re going to line it up … How much time did you spend fielding fluffy calls for people that were calling you, thinking their $150,000 house is worth $250,000, or they’re just not willing to sell. That’s the thing, too. Let’s be honest, people. You send out a letter to someone saying, “I want to buy your house,” pretty much everybody’s going to call you back. Unless it’s in the family and they never want to leave, someone’s going to go, “Heck, for the right money, I’ll move anywhere. I don’t really care.” Everybody’s going to call you and you don’t want that.
Jack:
When you do this incorrectly or you get bad information the first time, what it does is it turns you off to the industry.
Jill:
That’s true, too.
Jack:
You want to do this right the first time because if you do what Jill just said, send a gillion cards out, tons of people are calling you back, you can’t manage it. Your cell phone’s blowing up, your wife’s yelling at you because you’re on the phone all the time. All it does is tell you that, over and over again, this doesn’t work. You don’t want that. You want about 25 people to call you back on a 2,000 letter, and a couple of people to sign them and send them back and say, “Yeah, I accept your offer. Please let’s close on Thursday.”
Jill:
That’s perfect. That was absolutely perfect. Thank you, Stephen. I think that explains it really well with that example.
Jack:
This is the if/then portion of the show. If you do X, then Y will happen. If you don’t know how to use Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word at all, then this is your new step number one. Don’t worry, Microsoft prides itself on free education for how to use their products. I’m coming across more and more lately people that are saying, “Stephen, you’re so good at Excel in these videos. I’m really concerned that I can’t do this at all because I’m too behind the learning curve.” Don’t worry, Microsoft has spent millions and millions of dollars in professional grade online education to use these tools in the simplest way. The way we use these, it’s not really that complicated at all. If you’ve ever written a letter or any kind of document in Microsoft Word, you’re 80% of the way there in Microsoft Word. If you’ve ever done a budget in Excel or maybe 10 or 20 or 30 lines of data and you can sort it, you’re 95% of the way there. It’s nothing that you can’t conquer, trust me. It needs to be your new step one.
Jill:
I love it.
Jack:
If you have a question or you want to be on the show, call 800-725-8816. Jill, inspiration, please.
Jill:
Okay. My thing is if you want an ego booster, do the things that challenge you the most first.
Jack:
Gosh, this is brilliant. You’re really good at this, Jill. I’m not joking.
Jill:
Thank you. If you’re thinking you’re not with it, for example, it actually ties into what you just said and I didn’t know what you were going to say there, if/then. Let’s just say you are overwhelmed and afraid of Excel, or even any piece of your business, tackle that first. Get it out of the way. A, you’ve got it out of the way, and B, talk about an ego booster.
Jack:
Yeah, I mean, that’s just so well said. A lot of people would say, Jill, if you need an ego boost, go do something you’re real good at and feel great about yourself. I just think that’s the silliest crap that I ever heard stuff like that. Challenge the heck out of yourself. Do it until you succeed. Maybe it takes a week, maybe it takes a month. Maybe for some of us, Excel, it takes me 30 seconds, but I’ve been doing it for 30 years. Yeah, trying something that’s challenging and then you’re learning some stuff about yourself. I love that, Jill. That’s great. What would you do? Not that you need an ago boost.
Jill:
Okay, so here’s my example. We both are working on books, and there’s a lot that goes into it as far as marketing the right way and getting on the top book lists. There’s a lot of challenge. To me, that’s kind of a challenge. All right, I need to be a pro at this stuff. I need to align myself with the right people. I got to get the right tools. It’s one thing to write a great book, but to appeal and get it out there and market it, there’s a lot that goes into that. As I’m working on these, I’m overcoming this and going to get myself to be an expert. Heck, then maybe I can do it for other people too. I’ll get you on the best sellers list, watch this. There you go. What about you, Stephen?
Jack:
What challenge would I take on that would convince myself, “Wow”?
Jill:
Well, I know one you’ve already done, just recently in the last year.
Jack:
I’d like to hear it.
Jill:
Okay. One that you have done in the last year that I hope you have a huge head about because I think you should is this podcast.
Jack:
Yeah, learning all the software. Yeah, you know what? You’re darn right. I don’t think about that enough.
Jill:
The mics, I mean, all the stuff that goes in.
Jack:
I could’ve hired somebody.
Jill:
I can’t tell you how many times we were in Guitar Center, looking at equipment.
Jack:
We have a friend who owns a manufacturing company, and his wife is an amateur singer. He goes and builds, spends a ton of money on a pro grade studio inside this manufacturing facility for her to sing in, which she never uses. He’s like, “Here’s the keys,” literally. Yeah, we have access to the best software on the planet, all the equipment and stuff. What do I do? I choose to start from zero.
Jill:
Right, exactly. What are you talking about? We don’t use any of that.
Jack:
I think we pulled it off now. Again, same old story, a lot of mistakes, a lot of bad episodes, a lot of bad audio, all that. I think in the end, it worked out pretty well. I mean, our numbers are coming up pretty good. People seem to love the show. People talk about our show more than they do real estate, way more.
Jill:
That’s true. When I get people on the phone, that’s the first thing that we talk about. It’s really fun. It is good.
Jack:
Thanks, Jill. That’s a huge compliment. Now I feel better. I mean, I didn’t feel bad, but …
Jill:
You’re welcome. There’s your ego boost.
Jack:
Join us in another episode where Jack and Jill discuss how to use information, that’s me.
Jill:
And inspiration, that’s me.
Jack:
To get just about anything you want.
Jill:
We use it every day to buy property for half of what it’s worth and sell it immediately.
Jack:
Get there first. Good show, Jill.
Jill:
Thank you. I’m like, I know exactly who you’re talking about and I know about the equipment, but I’m like, was that available to us … How long have you known about all that equipment and why have we not been there using it?
Jack:
You know what? I was just intimidated because he’s so smart. He’s such a good guy. He would spend a whole week in there with us, showing us how to use everything and all that. You know what, Jill? I needed to learn because I know right from the beginning, I have a little history in this, not a lot, and I knew from the beginning after listening to a lot of podcasts that are very popular, I knew that ours would rank up there in no time at all, and it has. Just had to get the technical stuff out of the way.
Jill:
Exactly. I’m glad. It’s just so funny. I think, too, it’s nice because you and I, we travel a lot and last thing I want to do is be lining up studios where we travel and having to deal with all that. We’re a traveling studio.
Jack:
That’s a lot of it. Really, it’s sounding a lot more complicated than it is, and that was my intention. Let’s get the best software. We use Adobe Audition. Get the best software. I don’t think there’s anything better on the market. There might be in Hollywood to make movies. We’ve got good mics. Is it perfect? No, but that’s kind of the charm. I’m glad we did the show about printing. We don’t talk about it ever.
Jill:
Yeah, we talk about [inaudible 00:21:39].
Jack:
If you do stuff wrong, not a lot of people do, but if you skimp on the data, it’s still going to cost 50 cents to send a letter. You never want to send a letter that just because of data … There’s no chance that … They don’t even own the property.
Jill:
Don’t waste the money.
Jack:
Can you imagine?
Jill:
I know.
Jack:
You get a two year old list, half the things that you’re sending out, they’re not even the owner anymore.
Jill:
Exactly. That breaks my heart and I know that that happens.
Jack:
I’m not saying our data’s expensive. It’s not. It’s 5 cents a record right now, at the time of this. It’s 5 cents. Will it go up? Yeah, but not a lot. 5 cents is worth the sense that you’re going to deliver something that’s going to get reviewed. Let’s go buy something for half price today and resell it. Jack and Jill, Information and Inspiration.
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