Page 77 - Trump University Commercial Real Estate 101

Ho w to Become a Deal Magnet

Internet

Lazy investors use the Internet as an easy armchair source for deals. The
only problem is the vast majority of deals on the Internet are garbage.
Using the Internet as your only source to fi nd deals is like fi shing
without bait. You might get lucky and snag a fish, but you may die of

hunger fi rst.
Let ’ s say a broker has a new listing for a strip mall. The fi rst thing
he ’ ll do is look at his personal list of buyers to see who buys strip malls.
Then he shows the deal to his top buyers. If they are not interested, he
shows it to his entire list.
If none of his buyers is interested, he ’ ll give the listing to the offi ce

manager to share with everyone in his office. They then show it to eve-
ryone on their lists. If none of their buyers is interested, this deal goes

on the Internet and into the classified sections of the local newspaper.
If you simply take the convenient route of trolling the Internet for
deals, you ’ re pretty much staring at the bottom of the barrel.
There are exceptions, though: I got a commercial property in
Austin, Texas, right from the Internet. I paid $ 8.6 million for it, and it
appraised for $ 10.5 million. It ’ s been a good deal.
Why do good deals occasionally show up on the Internet? It ’ s
because commercial brokers are not the only people who use it to mar-
ket their deals. Property owners sometimes don ’ t know a good broker,
or don ’ t want to work with any brokers. They ’ ll hear that they can list
a property right on the Internet, and that ’ s what they do. The good
deals usually originate in this way. My deal in Austin was from a seller
in Minneapolis.
The granddaddy of all commercial property Internet sites is Loopnet.
com. One of its membership levels is free. Another outfi t is Costar.com.

It is not cheap, so you ’ ll find more serious investors on that site.
Direct Mail

I covered direct mail pretty thoroughly before, but I want to make a
special point: Direct mail will eventually get you in front of many

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