The response data across four channels is telling me something I don't like
I don't have a deal of my own yet. What I've been doing instead is helping a wholesaler I met at a local meetup with his dispo for free, because I wanted to see the buyer side before I ever sign a purchase contract. He gave me one property to distribute four ways and let me keep the logs.
Property is a 1,240 square foot brick ranch in a working class suburb, contracted at 143k, his stated ARV 205k, my own comps say 192k to 198k, rehab I'd call 38k not the 28k on his flyer. He wants 156k, so a 13k assignment.
Channel results over nine days. Email to his 1,900 name list: 41 opens on the second send, 6 replies, 2 showings, no offers. Text blast to 600 numbers: 9 replies, 4 of them asking to be removed, 1 showing. Posting in three local investor groups: 14 comments, mostly other wholesalers asking if it's assignable, no showings. One phone call each to 22 buyers I picked out of his own closed-deal history: 11 conversations, 5 showings, 3 offers, best at 149k.
The 22 calls beat 1,900 emails by a wide margin, which I expected, and the offers all came in under his ask, which he blames on my comps rather than his price. Best offer nets him 6k instead of 13k.
What I'm sitting with is whether the list size everyone brags about is mostly theater, and whether a dispo service is really just 20 to 40 relationships plus a phone. If that's true, the business I was thinking about building looks very different, and much smaller.