These “Maxims” are beliefs and mindsets I have found to be incremental to success, particularly in the acquisition role. These are maxims that you want to review regularly and consistently bring yourself back to. If you can fully embrace these maxims and then execute the REIGC Acquisition Process, your success will be inevitable.

Maxim 1. Treat Every Lead The Same

It doesn’t matter how proficient you become at marketing and generating leads; the vast majority of the leads you generate will seem “unmotivated” on the surface level. Most sellers are not going to be lay-down sales that just hand over their property for 50 cents on the dollar.

Many times, we actually won’t uncover a seller’s true motivation or true asking price until we spend over an hour with them. This is why we have to treat every lead the same. Treat every single lead as if it were going to be a $100,000 deal and believe that if they are on the phone with you and willing to go through your process, there is some motivation for them to sell.

Maxim 2. Approach Every Deal As If You Were Going To Buy It Yourself

One of the most costly and detrimental issues I see with wholesalers, especially new wholesalers, is that they don’t approach properties as if they were going to actually buy the property themselves. They don’t actually think like investors.

The only reason wholesaling exists is because there are real investors who are risking their hard-earned money and buying investment properties. If you are the one who is putting your money on the line, you had better make sure that the numbers make sense and that the property is a good investment opportunity!

So, if you were the one buying the house, what would you want to know? What questions would you have? What would you want to see before having the certainty to close?

You probably wouldn’t be slinging around offers willy-nilly just to see what sticks.

Think like an actual investor and approach each property as if you were going to buy it.

Maxim 3. Follow The Process EVERY TIME

Every single component of this acquisition process is strategically designed to accomplish one outcome: giving you the absolute highest probability of converting that seller lead into a deal. There's not a single component or aspect of the script that does not serve a purpose.

If you skip steps in the process, the process will not work. This method has been refined through fire. It has been tested on the battlefield and has been proven to convert 30-40% of my team's offers to homeowners into deals. It must be followed the same way, all the way through, on every lead.

Maxim 4. You Are Here To Create A Win-Win Situation

The wholesaling industry has received a bad reputation in many ways. This is largely a result of wholesalers not acting in the best interest of their sellers or buyers. I have a rule in our business, though: If it's not a win-win, we won't do it.

The only type of business or transaction I'm interested in is a true win-win. If we sign a contract with a homeowner, they are fully aware of what they are getting into, what their other options are, and the benefits they are gaining from doing business with us. We tell every lead that we are only interested in creating win-win situations. We also always give sellers multiple “outs” by talking through their other options and explaining why they don’t want to pursue those options.

Business is so much more enjoyable when you operate with a win-win dynamic. Do right by people and yourself by only creating win-wins.

Maxim 5. Never Assume Anything

One of the most common mistakes I see salespeople make is making assumptions on their calls. We never want to assume anything in sales. We don’t want to assume a prospect’s asking price, motivation, property details, who's involved in making a decision, or ANYTHING else!

We want prospects to tell us everything we need to know. If they do not confess it, it does not exist. So, if you ever catch yourself starting to make an assumption, always ask to gain clarification.

Maxim 6. Love The Person In Front Of You

Never forget that the seller you are speaking to is a human being who has emotions, needs, and desires. The more we can connect to the person on a personal and emotional level, the more trust we will build with the person, and the more we will set ourselves apart from the competition.

So many wholesalers in this industry make their conversations all about the transaction and focus solely on the numbers, completely overlooking the human being they are speaking with. This is one of the many reasons many people struggle with inconsistent deal flow and cannot truly scale their businesses.

If you see the person to them, listen to their needs and desires, and empathize with them, you are almost guaranteed to not only close more deals with grateful sellers but have a lot more fun in the process as well.

Maxim 7. Go For The No

Rejection can be a scary thing. Human beings are hardwired to avoid rejection. Avoiding rejection in this industry can not only be costly; it could cost you your business.

The most common scenario where most wholesalers try to avoid rejection is when making an offer to the homeowner. It’s very natural not to want to offer a price that the seller will say no to.

I want to reframe your mindset here and say that our goal is to get the seller to say NO to our first offer. We want our first offer price to be so low that the seller always rejects our first offer price.

If the seller accepts your first offer, then you will never find out what their true bottom dollar price is. The offer has to be lower than what you think they will accept so that you can find out the true number they would be willing to accept.

It is counter-intuitive, but this is one of the top strategies you can use to increase the profitability of your deals.

Maxim 8. Every No Is One Step Closer To A Yes

While we want to get a “No” on our first offer price, most sellers will just not come down on their price to a number we can offer for their property. Even if you have a 40% closing rate on your offers, 60% of the sellers you made an offer to said “No.” If you look at the law of averages, though, if you make enough offers, you WILL eventually get a deal. Whether it’s five offers, ten offers, or 20 offers to get a deal, with each “No” you get, you are one step closer to a "yes." The only way you don’t get the deal is if you stop making offers.

Maxim 9. It’s A Numbers Game

Sales, like Marketing, is a numbers game. The more you know your numbers, the more control you will have over your business. Here are some of the most important metrics to keep track of that will give you clear optics on your acquisition department:

Lead to Booked Appointment Ratio Gives you insight into how many leads you need to generate to schedule one appointment. This will show you what you need to do with your marketing to have control of your appointment volume.Booked Appointment to Attended Appointment Ratio This metric gives you insight into the quality of appointments that are being scheduled and the quality of your appointment-setting process. If a high percentage of your leads do not show up for their appointments, either the lead was not interested, or there are flaws in the appointment setting process. We want at least 70% of the leads we schedule an appointment with to show up.Attended Appointment to Offer Ratio This metric will give you insight into the quality of leads that are being scheduled for an appointment and also insight into how well the acquisition process is being followed. If we are not making offers on 80% or more of our appointments, it is either an indication that the appointment should not have been scheduled or the acquisition process was not followed properlyOffer to Contract Ratio This metric is one of the primary indicators of how effective your acquisition process is. If your acquisition process is dialed in, you should be able to make five offers to homeowners and sign one contract. This would be a 20% close rate on your offers. If you are not able to achieve a 20% closing rate on your offers, it is likely due to being ineffective at the acquisition process, or it could be you are attending appointments with and making offers to leads that just are not interested in selling their property. If you are following the lead management processes I outlined in the previous chapter, then you should mostly be attending qualified appointments. Then, the only variable is practicing and improving your acquisition process.Contract to Close RatioIf you have been in the real estate industry long enough, you know that not every property you get under contract will close. We want to maintain a healthy contract-to-close ratio, though. Our target contract-to-close ratio in my company is a minimum of 75%. That means that, in the worst-case scenario, we are closing 3 out of 4 contracts we sign with homeowners. My company typically averages an 80% contract-to-close ratio, though. This is an important metric because it indicates how healthy your acquisition and disposition processes are. If your contract-to-close ratio is below 75%, it usually means you are signing the contracts at too high of a price, or do not have strong enough disposition processes to sell the deals.

Each of these metrics tells you a story and gives you insight into your acquisition department. Track them and review them regularly to help direct your attention to what areas you need to improve.

Maxim 10. The Fortune Is In The Follow-Up

Typically, 30-40% of the deals we close come from either short-term or long-term follow-up. That means 30-40% of the contracts we sign are being signed more than one week after we make our original offer. Our philosophy is that we will follow up with a lead until they tell us "no" or they sell their house to someone else. Until that happens, though, we don’t stop following up.