There are lot of different ways to do this. I will go over a simple proven method in this blog. You can experiment and let us know what works best for you.

First, what is driving for dollars?  The term diving for dollars came from driving around the area you want to invest in. Another term would be farming the area you are investing in. I prefer to call it driving for dollars.

Things that you will need to do the job.
1.    A mapsco or key map book of your area you can go to http://www.mapsco.com
2.    Note book yellow high lighter
3.    A friend or partner preferable
4.    Digital Camera
5.    Business cards

Ok now that we have all of our material we can get started. You need to pick out 8 to 10 blocks that you want to work in.  Mark it out on your map and choose a starting point. Now take your note book and on the right side and draw a line down the paper about an inch before the side of the paper. In this area you will put a (V for vacant D for distressed R for rental and F for fore sale buy owner) we will get into what all this is for later. Now the reason I like to bring a partner or friend is to write all the info down while you drive and you don’t have to break your neck looking at both sides of the street. The camera is to take a pic of the front of the house to put in to your file so when you  get a hold of the home owner you can look at the pic to give you a better visual of what your talking about.  Business cards are to leave at the vacant properties the owners do come around from time to time.

Now start driving down the street. Make sure you high light all the streets you drive down so you don’t end up back tracking. You are looking for properties that are vacant. How do you tell if they are vacant, if there’s tall grass, gas meter missing , a lot of mail in the mail box , news papers pilled up in the drive way , electric meter missing. These are just a few of the things you can look for. At this point you can take a picture of the front and put your business card in the door. Write the address down and put a V next to it. You might also knock on the two houses next to the house and see if they now were the owner is. You could tell them the first person that can give me the info on the owners and it leads to me buying the property you will give them 250.00 dollars. You are also looking for distressed properties these are properties that have a lot of junk in the yard maybe gutters hanging off property that isn’t taken care of. These properties could be motivated sellers.  You could send them a post card or letter. Which I’ll be going over in another blog.  The properties that have a rental sign in the yards are a hidden gold mind that people over look.. These are sellers and buyers, call the land lords, and ask them if they are in the market to buy or sell. This can help you build your buyers list which we will cover in another blog.  Last but not least the FSBO these properties can be used in a couple ways, you can ask if they will do owner finance in which you could take the property over through owner finance. Or you can match a buyer and seller together and charge a marketing fee.

Make sure you highlight your area you have driven and put your V D R F in the edge of the page to determine which property is what.

Good Luck,

Sean Marmoy
MOKSRealEstate.com