5 Signs Your Buyer Leads Are Ready To Buy A New House

In this article, we take a look at 5 signs that your buyer leads are well positioned for buying a home, and are getting ready to pull the trigger on it.

So you’ve been able to build quite a large database of leads, and you’ve kept in touch with some of them for years.

You’ve been sending them general real estate marketing information, but they haven’t bought a house yet. How can you know whether any of your contacts are ready to buy a house or not? What signs should you look for? And once you’ve identified them, what should you do about it?

Let’s take a look at some of them in today’s article.

1. Your Buyer Leads Just Reached A Major Milestone In Life

Becoming a homeowner is a lifetime goal that most of us would love to achieve. And we have all dreamed about how we expect the whole situation to play out. And sure, we would love to have the perfect set of circumstances going for us before jumping into homeownership. But certain life event changes can push us into homeownership much sooner than expected.

Some of these life events include expecting children, family members needing to move into your home, receiving an inheritance, or a new job offer.

So if any of your contacts are experiencing any of these life events, get on their radar and reach out to them. Be tactful, and show genuine interest in them and their new life circumstance. At the same time, remind them that you're a real estate agent and that you can help them meet their new homeownership needs, as well as guide them through the process, and help them protect their interest.

Make sure you also remind them that as home buyers, they're not on the hook for your commission.

2. Your Buyer Leads Are Well-Positioned For Financing

One of the main obstacles to homeownership is financing. Real estate is VERY expensive. And of the publishing of this article, we're seeing a massive real estate boom and housing prices are skyrocketing. While this greatly benefits those that are already homeowners, it also makes it even more difficult for first-time buyers to get into the market.

So if one of your leads is well positioned to qualify for home financing even under the current economic climate, has an excellent credit score, is a disciplined saver, has good job security, and lives well within their means, stay in regular touch with them. Look for homes that have great investment potential, and have them at the ready when reaching out to them.

And if your lead is already shopping around for financing, even better. If they have not spoken to a lender yet, encourage them to get a pre-approval letter. You can refer them to a mortgage lender you trust.

3. Your Buyer Leads Have Lived In The Same Place For Many Years

According to NAR, the median US homeowner lives in the same home for 13 years. This length of time varies from place to place. For example, the median homeowner in Austin, Texas holds on to a home for 8 years, while Pittsburgh, Philadelphia homeowners do so for 16 years.

Do a little research, and see what the median and average homeownership length is in your area of service. And if one of your leads is approaching that length of time, reach out to them and offer your services.

4. Your Buyer Leads Already Know What They Want

As we mentioned in past articles, every buyer (no matter the industry) goes through a cycle called the “buyer’s journey.” This journey has 3 main stages, the awareness stage, the consideration stage, and the decision stage.

The awareness stage is where the buyer becomes aware of a problem, and starts doing research in order to better understand that problem. In real estate, this could be the initial research stage on real estate in general.

The consideration stage happens when the buyer already knows what their problem is, and looking for ways to solve it. This is the stage in which a homebuyer already knows that they want a house, and is now figuring out how big it needs to be, its location, and desired features. They may start looking for financing options but are not quite ready to make a buying decision yet.

Under the decision stage, they already know what their ideal home looks like, their budget, and their desired timeframe. At this point, they are shopping around for real estate professionals, and may already have pre-approval from a lender.

So if your lead has already mentioned that they need a 3 bedroom, 3 bathrooms detached or semi-detached, under $500,000 home, that lead is pretty close to buying

5. They Have A Reasonable Timeline, And Have Demonstrated They Are Serious About Buying

Have you ever heard that work moves to occupy the time allocated for its completion? Well, if your lead only has a vague idea of when to find a home, the whole process is most likely going to drag on and on.

On the other hand, if your led only has a few months to find a house, they will do everything that needs to be done to make sure the process goes through.

Of course, while you have a fiduciary duty to your clients, and you must protect their interests, you also have to make sure you're dealing with a serious client. To do that, it helps to ask qualifying questions.

How to Develop a Growth Mindset: Start from a State of Abundance

My work as a performance coach explores the power of mindset. I teach people how to shift their perspectives to get what they want out of life with more ease and flow.

In my last post, What is the Most Likely Consequence of Setting Unrealistic Goals?,

I discussed the importance of creating an environment that is aligned with success. Your mindset establishes the environment of your reality. By aligning your mindset with success, growth, and expansion, that environment becomes your reality.

Most people go through life believing that we are controlled by reality, but the truth is we control our reality. Yes, we are products of our environment, but, at the same time, our mindset determines the reality we experience.

What is mindset?

Mindset is your perspective. It is created by all your experiences—what you believe, what you’ve been taught, where you live, and endless other factors that establish your identity. Whether you realize it or not, you are always working from a mindset. Ever present, your mindset is your operating system.

You have the power to decide what you believe. By changing your beliefs and shifting your perspective, you can change the reality you experience. One important step to changing your perspective is moving beyond beliefs that are limiting your potential.

You are the creator of your reality. The only thing that limits your potential is you. And the fastest way to remove limitations is by evaluating your beliefs about yourself and consciously shifting your mindset.

What is a fixed mindset?

In coaching, I teach the 7 Levels of Mindset Alignment. The lowest levels of mindset alignment are living in reaction to the past—and being limited by the past.

When you are limited by the past, your mindset is determined by things that have already happened and you are in a fixed mindset. In a fixed mindset, what is possible is determined by what you have already experienced. The truth is anything is possible in the next moment regardless of what has happened in the past.

We all have baggage, and someone may have told you that the way to move beyond your past is to simply let it go. I have discovered that the way to stop being limited by the past is not to ignore it or push it away but to face it.

When we are in reaction to the past, we relive past experiences and let them define our current reality. Let’s say you want to aim for a big target, maybe you want to close ten times the number of deals you closed last year. When you think of this goal, a time when you failed in the past comes to mind, and you relive the emotions you felt during that failure. Feelings like self-doubt arise, and you perpetuate the belief that you will fail because you have failed in the past. If you simply try to let those emotions go, or even worse just push them back down, they will continue to come up and continue to affect your mindset around your big target.

Imagine you are a hot air balloon. You want to rise higher, but you are anchored to the ground by sandbags. Emotions, beliefs, and experiences from the past are your sandbags. You must establish a new perspective and change any beliefs that are limiting growth and expansion to remove those anchors.

If you want to hit that next level of success, but you are allowing past failures to your limit your potential, you are in a fixed mindset. You can remove those sandbags by changing your beliefs about yourself and how life works and stop being limited by the past,

I work with clients to help them face and integrate past beliefs, emotions, and experiences. By integrating instead of ignoring, my coaching methodology guides people from being limited by the past (one of the lowest levels of mindset alignment) to the highest level of alignment—active creation.

When you are limited by the past, your mindset is fixed. You are a hot air balloon anchored to the ground.

What is a growth mindset?

At Jason Drees Coaching, we avoid viewing what life brings us as positive or negative. Life is what it is. If you have failed in the past, life needed to teach you something. Life was stretching you and preparing you for future growth and expansion. When we are stuck in negative emotions from our past, we ignore the fact that one particular failure does not define us. And, most likely, that failure was an important part of our unique path to success.

By accepting ourselves, failures and all, we can begin to work with life and start to change our beliefs about ourselves. When we hit a wall, life is telling us there is something about ourselves we need to accept or integrate. Hitting a wall can seem negative, but it is simply an indicator. Life is trying to get our attention. Life is saying, “Look over here, I am preparing you for amazing growth and expansion.” We must first find out what limits us to move beyond a limitation. We have to hit the wall before we can move past it.

Put failure in proper perspective. Hitting a wall is life bringing you a message. You may not understand the message at the time. Often, only in retrospect can we see how life was bringing us exactly what we needed at that precise moment, even if it was failure.What we learn from falling short is the invaluable knowledge we will need to execute on future opportunities. Face the past, learn from it, and integrate the lessons life is bringing you. Decide to work with life and you will begin to operate in a growth mindset.

In a fixed mindset, failure is negative, and success is positive. In a growth mindset, we accept everything that life brings us and utilize it for growth and expansion. The goal is not to avoid failure but to make a conscious decision to face and accept ourselves and what life brings us.

As a coach, I share my discovery of how life really works and help clients expand their understanding of what and who they are. Together, we explore what they currently hold to be true and how that may be limiting their potential. Throughout this process, the goal is to move into active creation—the highest level of mindset alignment.

We have the power to choose what we believe. To move beyond the past, we should acknowledge the emotions that come up and consciously choose to believe they have nothing to do with what is possible in the future.

Scarcity mindset vs. abundance mindset

If you have been grinding but can’t seem to push past a certain level of success, you may have a limited or fixed financial mindset. My beliefs about money and my relationship with money kept me in a limited financial mindset for many years.

Exploring and unpacking your financial mindset or money mindset is a process that I cannot guide you through via a blog post. But one thing you can do right now is to check if you are in a scarcity mindset or an abundance mindset, and start to consciously change your beliefs around what is available to you and what you deserve.

As discussed in my last post, when we set goals, we want to start from a place of success, which aligns us with success. When we seek growth and expansion, especially financial growth, it is important to start from a place of abundance.

Checking your financial mindset can be as simple as watching the way you think about and discuss money. If you walk around saying and believing, “I don’t have enough money. I am working hard and no matter what I do I can’t close those big deals,” you are asking the universe to continue to deliver that reality. You are starting in a state of lacking or scarcity.

If you switch your approach and begin to say and believe things like, “I have all that I need. I am grateful for the abundance in my life, and I believe life will bring me opportunities to grow my bank account,” you are deciding to live in that reality. You are starting in a state of abundance.

This does not mean you don’t have to put in the work. You still have to take action and close deals to increase your net worth. But by starting from a place of abundance as opposed to a place of scarcity, you are better aligned with your goal of making more money. You are creating a reality that is a match to your target. The life you experience is a result of your internal alignment.

Final thoughts

Operating in a fixed mindset allows the past to limit your future and keeps you in misalignment. Moving into a growth mindset and living in active creation aligns you with growth and expansion.

The way you view the world, whether as a place of scarcity or a place of abundance, determines your reality.

Quit Your Day Job and Find Financial Freedom: Here’s How to Become a Real Estate Investor (Full-Time

Real estate has some tremendous superpowers—not the least of which is its ability to help you find financial freedom and leave your terrible day job. Do you want to travel the world? Dedicate more time to volunteer efforts? Focus on raising your kids? A thriving real estate business providing you with passive income can be the key.

But there’s a catch: To achieve true financial independence, you have to really love real estate. Just because you’re ditching the nine to five paycheck doesn’t mean real estate investors don’t work. In many ways, it’s still a full-time job. You’ll just have more freedom to arrange their lives in the way that best suits them.

Start with the basic elements of financial freedom

Before digging into how you should build your net worth, let’s start with the basics: Getting your finances in order. After all, financial freedom won’t feel that free if you’re still trapped by debt and bad financial habits. Here’s what to look at before you start pursuing real estate.

Credit cards

Credit cards aren’t inherently bad—in fact, utilizing credit card rewards and the purchase protections offered by said cards can be a smart financial strategy! However, many Americans can’t use a credit card without overspending. If you have credit card debt, pay it down as quickly as you can. If you’re prone to impulse buying, consider either getting rid of your cards or pursuing financial counseling. Over time, you can change your mindset toward credit, and eventually can use these cards as intended: As excellent sources of rewards.

Emergency funds

Do you have money set aside in case of an emergency? What would happen if you lost your job—before fully executing your wealth-building strategies, of course—or you have a significant unexpected expense, like a medical bill? Start with a small emergency fund (many experts say $1,000 is a good starting point), then build it over time. Ultimately, you should be able to cover six months of living expenses without your primary income. Consider creating a bank account explicitly for your emergency fund. Keep that money in your savings account until you need it.

Other debt

Do you have student loans or a car loan? A large mortgage? You don’t necessarily need to pay these off before beginning your real estate investment career, but it is important to understand exactly how much debt you have. This will be important for lenders, too: Before lending, they’ll calculate your debt-to-income ratio. Many consider 36% the highest allowable ratio, including a new mortgage, if you need to take one out. Wrangle your debt before investing to ensure your best chances of landing a loan.

Should you quit your job to pursue real estate?

Before we dive into the nitty-gritty of financial freedom through real estate, let’s discuss whether quitting your job is truly the best solution for you.

Ideally, you should find what you love to do in life more than anything else and do that for a career. If that means teaching high school math, teach high school math. If that means traveling the world, then find a job that travels the world.

And if that means investing in real estate for a career… then invest in real estate for a career. Because full-time real estate investors still work—in fact, the job often feels more like a lifestyle. While there are some truly passive investments, such as REITs (or real estate investment trusts), full-time investing usually involves work. You’ll need to:

• Talk with troubled homeowners

• Send out massive amounts of direct mail

• Network with established real estate investors.

Does that sound like something you’d hate? Everyone can, and should, create a real estate portfolio as part of their strategy for retirement and wealth building—and many current millionaires have followed that exact path. But full-time real estate is a full-time commitment.

Ready to dive into real estate investing as a full-time career? Here’s your path to financial freedom.

Educate yourself

If you’re unfamiliar with real estate investing, brush up on your basics. Do this before you even consider dipping a toe in the full-time waters.

Start by deciding which strategy will be your focus. There are a number of different types of real estate, and each type has unique pros and cons.

Wholesaling

This process is where you locate amazing deals, put them under contract, and sell that contract to an investor or house flipper—and make a sizable profit doing so. Wholesalers master the most valuable skill for a real estate investor to possess: how to buy right.

Wholesaling works. However, while wholesaling might be fairly “simple”—it’s not easy or quick. It takes hard work, skill, motivation, and certain personality traits (like the ability to negotiate). Consistently finding deals that are worth pursuing can be a time-consuming job.

House flipping

This can be an exciting and profitable way to earn income. You’ve probably seen flipping TV shows where investors turn a dump into a mansion in three weeks and profit hundreds of thousands of dollars. While this is possible, don’t enter real estate expecting this to happen to you. Make sure you understand both construction and the market before starting a fix and flip business.

Flipping houses is a lot of fun, and fantastic profits can be made. However, there are some important considerations to make before jumping in head-first to your career as a full-time investor:

• How will you fund your flipping business if you don’t have a job?

• How will you make your monthly payments if you don’t have a job?

• Is your location conducive to flipping?

Buy and hold cash flow investing

Buy and hold cash flow investing produces a stable of cash-flowing properties. That can add up quickly to provide significant income. This can be a great option for long-term investing, but keep in mind that you’ll need significant monetary reserves when things go wrong.

Educating yourself goes way beyond simply picking your favorite real estate strategy.

• Sign up for BiggerPockets. If you are reading this blog post but haven’t signed up for a free account, stop what you are doing right now and sign up. Trust me.

• Read the Ultimate Beginner’s Guide to Real Estate Investing. This is a quick, free online training manual that we put together to help you build a solid foundation for your future in real estate. Internalize it. Make it make sense. And if you don’t understand something, go ask about it on the BiggerPockets Forums.

• Fully fill out your BiggerPockets profile. Include a nice picture of your face. Detail your history, your goals, and your wants/desires on your profile. People look at these things! Make it count.

• Introduce yourself to the community in the New Member Introduction Forum.

• Ask questions and offer ideas. If you aren’t an active member of the Forums, you are simply missing out on one of the most powerful tools on the planet for becoming a real estateinvestor. Ask questions, get answers. Answer questions, get smarter. Build your online brand. People will start to follow you and help you out. They will give you honest feedback on your ideas, your plans, your goals, your timelines, and more.

Learn about your local market, too. Are jobs growing? Incomes? What does the population look like? Network with local investors and real estate agents—and make sure to visit homes for sale in your area before you start bidding. Knowing what your market offers in different price ranges is essential knowledge for all real estate investors, regardless of your strategy.