How To Source Rent to Rent Property Deals FAST (HMO & SA)
Here are my top five ways I know to source Rent-to-Rent deals fast. And the emphasis is on fast - not because achieving this type of deals is easy, or you can do it overnight, and it's certainly not a get rich quick scheme. The emphasis is on fast because you need to take action now.
I know and speak to people every single day who are fearing for their jobs or worse, they've been made redundant, and they now have a sum of money that's only going to last for a certain amount of time. Diversifying your income to achieve multiple streams of income is the way to become financially secure in the future to protect you and your family.
If you didn't listen to last weeks podcast episode "How to set up your Rent-to-Rent business, you can find it here. The content covered to help you build a solid business foundation leads me to the first of five sourcing options.
Marketing, through traditional and digital strategies. Marketing will create awareness around your brand and business. I'm at a point now where landlords and agents are coming directly to me, and that's great because it allows me to create leverage.
You will need to create a quality website, establish your business on Google, Facebook and continue to use traditional methods of marketing such as to-let boards and flyers. It's crucial, especially when trying to generate inbound enquiries to have a solid foundation in place. If you do not have an online presence, a quality website, a google my business page, a ranking on google for your brand it's unlikely you will be able to create the level of trust required to generate organic leads.
Quick note - regardless of how you are generating your property leads its vital that when you do get the opportunity, you are set up and can deliver. It becomes even more critical when dealing with Estate Agents and Landlord referrals. If you can become trusted, it can often create many more opportunities. That's how you can scale your business quickly. Your reputation is key to success in such a competitive market.
Option number four, generate leads through word of mouth. It sounds obvious but tell everyone what you're doing. It's incredible the number of people who own additional properties. I've been surprised so many times. Make sure you shout about your business, tell relatives, friends, colleagues. The same goes for generating investment as well, and you will be equally surprised who wants to get involved.
Listen to podcast episode #08 of the Simon Smith Show to find out the rest of my top 5 ways to source Rent-to-Rent deals....
In this episode, you will learn
Why it's so important to get your business set-up first
My top 5 ways to source Rent-to-Rent deals fast
Why it's important to get the right agencies on board
How one landlord or agent can make your business.
To learn more listen to my new podcast and subscribe! Available on iTunes, Google, Spotify and others or click “play” on the player below!
As always, if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me directly. You can direct message me on Facebook or join and ask me your questions within the Creative Cashflow Community.
Podcast Transcript↓
[00:00:55] Hey, it's Simon here and welcome to another episode of the podcast where we cover all things property, Creative Cashflow and how to be financially independent today, not in 25 years. And today, we've got a massive show lined up for you. I'm going to be covering how to source rent-to-rent deals fast. And the emphasis is on fast. And that's not because this is easy or you can do it overnight or because it's a get rich quick.
[00:01:27] It's because a lot of you need to move now. You know, I speak to people every single day and they're fearing for their jobs or worse still, they've been made redundant and they've got a certain amount of money, a certain amount of time, and they need to make a change now. OK, so the way I'm going to structure this podcast is I'm going to do my top five and I'm going to count down from number five all the way up to number one, which I think is my favourite. And it's the one that you guys should be doing every single day, so make sure you stay tuned to hear my favourite. So in at number five, it's marketing and it's a bit of a curveball. But I've put this in because I think too many people are trying to actively source deals and they're missing the trick.
[00:02:17] The trick is that you're supposed to basically create certain things so that these landlords can find you because that's leverage, do you know what I mean?
[00:02:30] It's getting to the point in my business now where my phone rings and the landlord sought me out and that is the power of marketing. So if you've not already listened to my 12 steps on how to set up your rent to rent business fast, you need to check that out. It's the last episode on the podcast where I break down some of the strategies. I break marketing down to the sort of physical marketing. And then you've also got digital marketing. So examples of how landlords find me is through signs and posters. They find me through searching for HMO management or property management on Google in Derby, they find me, they call my phone. Okay. And that is something that I need you guys to put into place. Don't, you know, don't always work hard. Look at working smart. So at number five, it's get your marketing right. In at number four, it's an oldie, but it's a classic and it never ever gets old and it doesn't cost a penny. And that's word of mouth. Tell everybody what you're doing. So now you're set up and you've got that image and you're looking good. It's time to tell the world what you're doing. I mean, tell relatives, tell friends, tell work buddies, tell people down the pub, neighbours. Tell everybody you know what you're doing. Do you know anybody that's trying to let their property? We can help. I'm working with this company and that company and we're guaranteeing landlords rent for five years. So tell people what you do. It is insane when you actually start talking to people who owns property that you would never know.
[00:04:14] And that goes with finding an investment as well, because I know some of you are going to want to find investment. So talk and tell people what you're doing and you'll be surprised who wants to get involved. In at number three. And it's one of my favourites. I've got deal after deal like this and it's absolutely free. And it can be really, really fast because you potentially could be right in front of the landlord from day one. And that's driving for deals. And basically the premise is you get on the ground, you drive your area and you look for properties that look a bit tired or the properties where builders might be working on. You see vans, open doors, ladders, and you get talking. You go in there and you find out what's what. Is this property going to be available to let? Do you know the plans? Do you know the landlord? Oh, you're the landlord. Great. And I've got countless deals like this. One of my favourite deals was an amazing one. I was driving past this property on the way to a viewing and we had a couple in the area. So I was driving by consistently and I kept seeing the front door wide open and paint pots and ladders and stuff. And one day I decided to park up. I went in, said, hey, and turns out it must have been the landlord's cousin and they were painting. And I asked him what he was up to and he said that they were doing a seven bed HMO conversion. It's going to be four bathrooms on suites, two kitchens, all brand new, fully furnished and ready to go.
[00:05:50] So I must have, you know, got the details, went back and met the landlord, met the landlord's wife and started building rapport, and what had happened was they'd given it to an agent some weeks ago and the agent was struggling to let the property out. So we discussed, we made a plan and I ended up taking the property on, five years, a fully fledged seven bed HMO. And I've guaranteed their rent every single month since all the way through covid. Free lead, didn't cost a penny, and one of the most sort of effortless, natural win-win deals I've ever done. So, guys, and this is, by the way, this is one of the reasons why I always say try and start as close to home as possible. I was speaking to a guy the other day and he said to me, you know, he's in London. And he said, I'm going to be working in Liverpool. I want Liverpool to be my investment area for rent to rent. And I said, no, mate, forget about it. It's hard enough for me. And I'm 15 minutes up the road from my area. You know, you've got viewings, you've got management, you've got tenant issues, you've got viewings with prospective landlords. You can't be driving four, five hours for those things. And if you outsource the management in rent-to-rent, you really get squeezed. So I recommend building your business and then getting staff, systemising and scaling, which we are going to cover on this podcast, because that's something I've been working on over the last few months.
[00:07:24] But yeah, that's number three. Driving for deals. Number two is agents. And yep, that's right.
[00:07:33] Agents. A lot of people turn their back or they get scared to talk rent to rent with agents, and don't get me wrong, there's a way of doing it. There's a way of doing it. However, if you get one or two agents on board, they can be your deal machines. Your deal sourcing machines, because they've already got the marketing machine, they've got the trustability, they've got the client base, they've got the systems even so you can leverage theirs. But the key thing here is to focus on what's in it for them and be easy to work with. I remember one of the agents, the first agents I worked with, it came, you know, it was going back and forth. And it was a little bit hard. We had to keep going back and forth on the agreement because it was the first time we were working together. And when I went down there the day to sign off on the property, the lady said to me, oh yeah, by the way, Simon, this is the first one of these we're doing. And I asked why and she says, well, to be honest with you, you know, we've had a lot of people like you come in and stuff, and they've been hard work, hard to work with. So we've never done it, you know, but what we've liked about you is you've been really easy to work with and transparent from day one. And therefore, we want to build with you. And I've done four or five deals with that one agent since. So really, really powerful stuff.
[00:08:59] Time for number one, the top spot, my favourite form of sourcing rent-to-rent deals fast that everybody needs to be doing, and that is direct to vendor.
[00:09:12] But it's focused, I like to call it focused, direct to vendor work, right, and the premise is you want to target properties are available to let or sometimes properties that have been on the sales market for a while. And you want to get in touch with the landlord direct. You can use land registry to search the ownership information. And then you can use social media. You can use snail mail, although I'm not a big fan of it. And you get in touch and you're direct to the vendor. And if you get this right, it's very, very fast because you can be walking around the property with the vendor the next day, literally, and the following day after that you can sign the agreement. Notice I do stay focused, which is a key word here, because one of my pet hates is the HMO register mail-out method. It's taught on a lot of courses. I was shown it. And my problem with it is it's not focused. It's a scattergun approach because the premise is you will get the HMO list from the council and you will mail out all of these properties or the owners' properties. OK, or should I say the owner's address. The issue is the HMO list does not state whether the property's available or not. It does not give you any insight into if it's a tired landlord or if it's a professional landlord. A lot of the time the tenants pick up the mail, it takes ages. And overall, you're relying on catching the perfect landlord with the perfect property at the perfect time.
[00:11:00] And even then you could go out and the property might not work for you. So I think in order to move fast, you need to focus on properties that you've already qualified through Rightmove, Zoopla, or knowing your area, and you've already pre-qualified as being available because otherwise you're wasting too much time. OK, I know some people might give me some stick for that, but that's just my opinion and my thoughts. I speak to so many people and they say, yep, I've done my mail-out, I've got all my mails, I've sent 200 letters this week. And my whole thing is by the time you've sent those letters out, you could have just found one or two motivated landlords, gone round the properties, put the offer in and done a deal. And the other thing is you've got to be so consistent. I think it's good as a slow burner just to consistently do it. But it should not be the pinnacle of your deal sourcing strategy, because, remember guys, we want to do this today and we want to take control back in our lives. We don't want to wait and hope, that's not what this is about. This is about making stuff happen. So to summarize, number five, get your marketing right. Attract the deals. Don't always go hunting for them. Number four, word of mouth, absolutely key. It's an oldie but word of mouth travels very, very fast, OK. Number three, driving for deals. Get in your area, smell out the deals and build a network of people that will pass you on deals.
[00:12:39] Number two, agents. Get the right agents on board and they can be your deal sourcing machines. I mean, to give you an example, a couple of weeks ago I did four rent to rent deals in one week through two agents, OK. And brand new agents I'd never worked with before. So it can be really, really, really powerful stuff. And finally, the top spot, my favourite form of source of rent to rent deals fast is focused direct to vendor. That means find properties that are available to let or that have been on the sales market for a while and get in touch with the landlord, you know, figure out their pain points, their problems, their long-term plans, and work with them to create a win-win. And guess what, guys? If you get the right landlords, they often own multiple properties. So if you can secure a portfolio landlord, you can scale quickly, very, very quickly. I hear stories of landlords with 100 properties. Imagine if one landlord gave you a hundred properties to control through rent to rent. It would make your whole business. But yeah, that's it for me. I hope you found today's show useful. Please feel free to hit me up. Drop me a line on social media. Let me know what you like. Let me know what you want to hear on future shows and I'll speak to you soon by. Thanks for listening. For more information, check out Simon Smith online dot com. See you next time.