If it seems like great real estate deals are hard to find, you’re probably not looking in the right place.
The secret to successfully investing in real estate is knowing how to find the opportunity that other investors miss. From networking to online real estate marketplaces, and everything in between, here’s an in-depth look at where and how to find great real estate deals in every market today.
Learn more about 7 Tips to Get Started as a Real Estate Investor
Tips to Find Property Deals
1. Begin by identifying your niche
The best real estate investors create a plan for success. They know where they want to go, and the stops along the route.
Your real estate investment niche is the route you’ll follow to help you arrive at your intended destination. While that sounds easy enough, one of the biggest challenges of investing in real estate is that there are countless routes — or niches — to choose from, like:
- Fix and flip
- Turnkey rentals
- Commercial properties
- Crowdfunding
- SIngle family
- Multi-plex
- and more!
Choosing a niche and sticking to it helps you stay focused on the path to success. Once you know what your real estate investment niche is, the next step is to focus on finding those deals that fit your investment strategy.
2. Use online marketplaces for real estate investors
A growing number of new and experienced real estate investors are leveraging the power of online marketplaces to find a rental property. There are two main reasons for this:
Reason #1: Most of the “heavy lifting” of locating and analyzing deals has already been done. All you have to do is choose among the options that are the best match for your real estate investment strategy.
Reason #2: Out-of-market investing is much easier. Geographically diversifying rental property portfolios helps to minimize risk and maximize reward by seizing opportunities that oftentimes can’t be found in your own backyard.
To see it for yourself, look through the listings on an online marketplace like AQRE Home for the great deals you can find.
3. Keep looking – even after you’ve had an offer accepted
It’s no fun to be in a situation where a property falls through and you’ve wasted two months waiting for it to happen. So if you decide to invest, be prepared – so if the property falls through, you already have another one lined up!
4. Get a professional’s opinion on a potential purchase
When you’re considering an investment property, getting a local real estate agent on your team can also give you access to great deals – sometimes, even before they reach the market.
Partnering with a letting agent can also be a great idea. A letting agent will tell you what rent your investment property will achieve and how quickly it’s likely to be snapped up by a tenant.
If you’re honest with the agent about it only being a potential purchase at this stage, they have no motivation to give you anything but honest advice.
5. Don’t be afraid to look outside your local area
It’s natural to want to invest in your local area because it’s where you have the most control over your investment: if anything goes wrong, you can be there in minutes.
But if something goes wrong, do you want to be there in minutes?
If you want to be a hands-on “landlord” and you enjoy fixing things, that’s fine; but if you want to be an “investor”, you can just employ an excellent letting agent and leave it to them. Some investors have properties they’ve never even visited.
Your local area is also where you feel that you know the market best, and it’s true that every area has good streets and bad streets – and often good and bad sections of the same street.
But in reality, that local knowledge can easily be replicated by a few weekend scouting trips plus taking advice from local experts.
The point is that there’s nothing wrong with staying local (many investors build up big local portfolios and do very nicely), but there’s no reason why you have to stay local if the area doesn’t match your strategy.
6. Network to find off-market deals
Off-market property is real estate that’s for sale but isn’t listed on online marketplaces.
One of the biggest advantages to off-market real estate is that there’s less competition. It can keep you one step ahead of the other real estate investors out there.
And of all the ways to find these deals, networking is by far the best.
So, where should you be networking, and with whom?
- Other investors in your area, or a local real estate investment club, who know where to find the best properties.
- Real estate agents who specialize in working with qualified residential rental property investors.
- Wholesalers who know how to find extremely motivated sellers so you can step in and take over the deal.
- Mortgage brokers, employees of title companies, and direct lenders who know who’s actively buying and selling.
- Property managers, handymen, and other tradespeople are also excellent sources for getting the inside track on owners getting ready to sell.
Related post: Buying an Investment Property? This Checklist Will Keep You On Track for Optimal ROI
7. Find the magic mix of yield and fundamentals
Property investors are often chasing the highest yield: they want to buy a property that generates the highest amount of rent for the lowest purchase price.
But this is only part of the picture.
Unlike getting 3% in one savings account rather than 2% in another (with any risks guaranteed by the government), high yield can mean high risk – or might not be so impressive once costs have been taken into account.
What’s more, you’re unlikely to see much capital growth on these cheap, high-yielding properties – again, because demand is low so there are no owner-occupiers driving up the prices. You’ll feel smug while you’re pocketing a 12% return rather than the 7% you could have got a mile down the road, but you’ll feel pretty daft in ten years when the other property has gone up in value by £50,000 while yours has remained static.
The magic combination is yield + fundamentals.
Strong fundamentals – like jobs, shops, and transport links – that keep tenant demand high. This is what will give you long-term growth.
Why Location Matters So Much When Buying A Home? Read to find out!
So by all means maximize the yield you can achieve – but unless it’s part of a specific strategy that you’ve worked out, don’t compromise on the fundamentals to get it.
Start Finding the Best Property Deals on AQRE Home
We hope you’ve learned some useful tips to help you start looking for that perfect real estate deal.
So what are you waiting for? Start finding great investment properties on the AQRE Home platform today.
AQRE Home offers everything you need to make your dream investment a reality. Including:
- hand-picked investment properties
- mortgage broker connections
- a build-in messenger for easy offers
- realtor connections across the U.S. and Canada
- expert guidance from a team with 20 years of combined real estate experience
Get browsing and send offers with the click of a button on AQRE Home.
