David Duckworths Lifestyle Experiments

Hello PropertyNetworkers!

Welcome to another propertynetworker.com newsletter.

I know it’s only been a few days since my last newsletter but finally I am catching up and getting these out again on a Sunday.

Firstly I need to say thanks to all the members and investors who send me emails and call me after every newsletter. Your words of encouragement are gratefully received and bring a big old cheesy grin to my face.

Not much has graced my world of property since my last newsletter, but as I have some air time I thought I would talk about sourcing leads.

I get a couple of emails a week asking about lead sourcing and I got one in particular this week asking some pretty interesting questions and I thought I would share it with you. So here goes.

“Hi David

Many thanks in advance for your time.”

Firstly this was a real direct email which is why it caught my eye. I like people who are direct and to the point and this guy is obviously both. Secondly, to have Deep (Parmdeep Vadesha) recommend me as someone to talk to about leads, pretty much made my whole damn year (now watch me try and get my head through the door).

So the first question.

“do you find the offering of leads for sale to investors a worthwhile enterprise in the sense that you make a decent return from it, or is it just a service that you feel you need to offer in order to appear credible?”

This made me smirk a little as I don’t think he actually meant that I wasn’t credible, and only sold leads to ‘look’ credible. But is it a worth while enterprise to be in?

Sourcing leads via the internet for me has been a bit of a roller coaster ride. I started it about a year ago and with a little help from my chief Google Adwords advisor (the Mrs.) and Robert Clark (former owner of Rapid Property Investment) I got my campaign off the ground and started to sell a few leads. I was living in Switzerland at the time and didn’t need any of the leads I sourced and quickly people started to notice me. Once this happened I began to get investors and portfolio companies contact me and offer to take leads from me, saying they would pay me a commission once they converted a lead, i.e. once an investor bought it. This, I thought (in my naivety), was a great idea. Except it would seem that once I had passed 20 odd leads nothing would ever come of it, and this happened more than once with more than one portfolio building company.

This could have meant a few different things.

1. They actually didn’t sell as many deals as they made out, or were not as active as they said they were.

2. The credit crunch had hit and nobody could get the finance to do anything with the leads.

3. They saw a rooky lead finder and took advantage.

4. All my leads were junk.

I reckoned it was because the market had drastically changed so I stopped sourcing leads and charged straight on into printing leaflets, business cards and the like.

But this year as I started to see the wind change with mortgages starting to make a comeback, the revolution known as lease options unfold and the general glimmer of hope as the recession began to thin, I decided now would be a good time to go back into lead sourcing. I figured that when times came good again (fingers crossed) I would have the systems, the list and the infrastructure in place to build a successful business.

Once again a few unknown portfolio companies approached me and I quickly backed away this time and decided to work with caution, I would only work with individual investors and steer clear of the bulk lead takers. I source leads in bulk for some investors who purchase say ten leads up front, or anything that comes from a certain area and the rest I try and sell through lead-dealer.co.uk. It keeps me in ice cream and red bull and it makes my marketing costs for my own portfolio building minimal.

Just to make it clear though there are a few portfolio companies I still work with and are happy to pass leads onto. Pure Acquisitions are a top company as is Owen’s ‘Buy Houses’ along with Phil Martin’s Rapid Property Investment of course.

So is it a worth while business? Yes I think so, as I mentioned it funds my marketing and yes it gives me a bit of credibility. Happy Days.

“If you do find it worthwhile what kind of percentage of leads that you offer for sale to you find that you actually manage to sell in the end please?”

I used to sell 100% of my leads as I had an investor that would buy everything I couldn’t sell via the regular shop although the leads where heavily discounted of course. It just so happens though that my investor this about 2 weeks ago as he’s decided to take a break from investing. But to answer his question, I currently sell maybe 60% of the leads I source currently.

Sourcing leads is a business like any other that will not grow over night; you need to take each lead, add it to every site you can, build the list and get yourself out there and slowly you will start to get your business off the ground. You’ll need to invest in a shop, or at least a website offering your service, and then invest in developing your capture site and your PPC account. I think in total I’ve so far spent around £10k doing all three.

I’m currently re-developing lead-dealer.co.uk, which should be ready in a couple of weeks. It will offer a fairer way to buy leads and also give investors a chance to buy leads at an even cheaper discount and 24hrs before they’re available to the general public.

The main thing that sets the new site apart from any other lead selling site is how the age of the lead affects the price. As a reaction to my own experiences and posts on forums from other investors, lead-dealer’s leads will decrease in value the longer they are on the site, and will not stay on the site for longer than 5 days. Over the next few weeks I’ll be releasing the new lead-dealer.co.uk site. I’ll keep you posted.

I hope that kind of gives you an insight into the world of selling BMV property leads and gives you a heads up to the downsides as well as the possibility that the upsides can bring a great extra stream of income, as well as a way to help you find bigger and better leads.

PERKS OF A PRIVILEGED MEMBER

So after the last few newsletters I have mentioned such perks as a download section, complimentary access to lead-dealers new VIP area and a FREE subscription to the UK’s most popular property magazine, Your Property Network.

This week I can reveal that in the download section you will get access to sample copies of flyers and business cards used by investors to source BMV and lease option leads, but as well as that Privileged Members will also get 10% off the printing of their own flyers at cheapleafletprint.com the UK’s most popular printer of investor marketing material.

And finally

This week, I will be attending the London Property Meet, hosted by Tony Chad. It should be a great night with special guest Kevin Green (From Channel 4’s Secret Millionaire). If you are planning to attend that or John Corey’s meeting, I will be about so come over and say hello. It would be great to put some names to faces.

Best regards

David Duckworth

Share on Facebook

Hello PropertyNetworkers!

Welcome to another propertynetworker.com newsletter.

In the last email I spoke of the frustration of the law of attraction taking over and that I was in the flow of information being offered deals I couldn’t take. I also mentioned of how I wasn’t unhappy with this, as the deals will keep coming and if I wasn’t in this situation I wouldn’t be getting offered the deals in the first place.

On the day I sent that email I got a phone call from an investor I had met a few weeks before at Vanish Patel’s PNC. He had a deal he couldn’t work with and asked would I be interested in helping a friend of a friend out.

The lady in question is moving to Spain, she is £15k in negative equity and can’t sell because of this. The guy didn’t want a finders fee he just wanted to help her out, he was happy to recommend me in return I would go through the whole lease option process with him so he COULD take the deal next time.

So after this event it had me ponder, I had become an investor whom like everyone else tries to run before he can walk, and instead of being frustrated at not being able to take on the ‘big’ deals, I just needed to be patient and work smart, and turn the deals down that I could not work with and lap up the ones that I could work with. Every property deal gets me closer to ‘the dream’ which I will share with you all at some point. Just a little motivation for you all.

So what else? This week I have been looking at investors who in their spare time call themselves mentors.

I have several people in this industry that I would call a mentor. Such people as Sean Baker from renttobuy.co.uk, who has helped me out no end with lease option paper work and procedure advice. Parmdeep Vadesha and Hanif Khan who if it wasn’t for their guidance I would never even been in property. Phil Martin, who when ever I know I am going to an event and he’ll be attending I have a list of questions to ask. I like to call them tax credits. I am running very low on tax credits with Phil as he has basically walked me through the whole process of how to package a deal and sell it to an investor, I give him the Gestapo style grilling when I get the chance in order to get clear and truthful and honest answers that are real and not wooly chit chat that you would normally receive (and I have) from some people. I bet they don’t even know they are my mentors. But they are.

But guess what? I never paid them a penny. I have attended courses which they have spoken at. Attending courses I think is an essential part of being an investor. But I haven’t handed over a single bean for their help on a one to one level. These are real honest genuine people who know that when you hand out stuff to people for free it comes back to you in ten fold, and when that person stands up at a property meet and gives a talk in a couple of years and they say… I would have never been here if it wasn’t Tony the Property guru… imagine how far you would puff your chest out from that, and how many deals would come your way just in the bar afterwards?

I guess what I’m getting at is there is a clear difference between a mentor and a coach, and I am also beginning to feel that charging people for your time as a mentor could be a little unethical. ( I will now write the rest of this newsletter under my bed in fear of the lynch mob of mentors whom will arrive at my house and attack with their gold plated canes)

You know there is one guy out there whom charges nearly £15k to be a mentor for someone for a year… The price of let’s say two or three years good quality courses.. or add a grand and buy the £1 million lease options portfolio I mentioned in my last email. Even purchase three ready made deals from Hanif Khan or Phil Martin.

If you’re looking at getting into property and feel your need to pay someone thousands of pounds to show you how, all your feeling is the fear, and guess what? It’s normal.

You feel the fear before you buy a lead, you feel the fear before you call the lead, you feel the fear while your negotiating the lead, you feel the fear when they say yes, you feel the fear while you create the paper work, you feel the fear when you send it off, You utterly crap it when they send it back.

Feeling the fear is a human reaction to the unknown and is something no mentor is going to help you get over, not many will actually spend an afternoon with you calling up the vendors… taking it turns to make he call and try and close the deal. Picking each call a part after to find out what the mistakes where. The only person in this whole world that can help you reach that dream of becoming a property millionaire and in turn assist you in becoming financially free is YOU. Why not pay yourself that £15k as a reward for doing your first 5 deals. Taking action is the key, having a mentor to blame for your failure is not.

When I can warrant the title of property expert, I’m going to mentor people for FREE. Yes you heard me FREE. In return the law of attraction will shower me with good fortune and solid gold property deals. Now if there was ever a why… that could be it.

TIP OF THE WEEK

So this is just a small one, but I still love it. For all of you that use creditexpert to keep an eye on your credit file you will now that is costs just under £7 a month. If you call them up and press option 5 for ‘I am think about leaving’. If you have been with them for a year or more, they will slash the subscription by 50%. I know it’s not life changing but it makes all the difference.

SITE UPDATES

This week I finally got the signature feature set up for the forums, you can find it here and it will allow you to add a signature to every post on the forum.

You may have also found the download section but this is still under development and has not files yet. But should be up and running within a week and can be enjoyed by everyone until I get my life together and develop the rest of the site.

PERKS OF A PRIVILEGED MEMBER

So over the last few weeks I mentioned several perks of becoming a privileged member of propertynetworker.com. You will get cheap & exclusive leads, you’ll get access to a file down load section full of MP3’s, audio book, sample leaflets and lots more.

As we move closer and closer to the launch of the privileged membership I am pleased to announce this week that as a privileged member you will also get a complimentary subscription to Your Property Network magazine. Yes it will be free for every privileged member. I just love things that add value my site and helps educate the investor and develop your property business.

As we still cruise to 500 members I am still planning that special treat for you all, hold tight for the big 500 member surprise, and invite everyone you know to become members of propertynetworker.com. If your not a member I think you should defiantly join in order to be one of the first 500 members of the fastest growing online property community on the net!

To your success

David Duckworth

Share on Facebook

Hello PropertyNetworkers!

Welcome to another propertynetworker.com newsletter.

Since my last newsletter I’ve been bopping around my local town visiting possible lease option vendors and today it looks like I’ve bought another property and this one is going be a cool NMD. But more of that in a bit.

One of the things I find in property is you end up spending a lot of your time working on your own and the highs and lows of property happen to all of us, especially if you have spoken to ten vendors that day and you hear the sheer horror stories of where their lives have ended up.

Some mornings I wake up screaming ‘I should have a full time secure job, what am I going to do if the money runs out?’ I then look at the clock and it’s usually about 08:30 and remember that before I took the step of working in property full time, I would have had to leave to get over to the docklands an hour and half ago in order to get into the office on time for the guy who (and I can’t be rude about him/her/them/twats) will never be free. I mean how can you be free when someone tells you when you can go and get lunch?

What I am trying to say to you is in a single hour you may have had a vendor hang up on you because you are a greedy evil company preying on peoples misery (I’ll call you back in a couple of weeks mate) and then you have had the next one cry down the phone at you.

If you are serious about growing a property business, whether sourcing or just buying, you need more than one of you, even if it is just to bounce ideas off, and I’m not talking about your other half. My Mrs. is sick of hearing the words, property, network, vendor, deal and all those other words, cause it is really all I talk about.

Instead get yourself a property buddy or business partner. This is a new concept to me as I loved to sing the songs, ‘nobody does it better’ and ‘I did it my way’ but it has been a most enlightening experience.

I’ve always enjoyed sourcing leads, I love marketing and networking, but I find the calls draining. Turns out my new business partner has such an amazing way with people, damn he can use the phone. On our first vendor calling session I watched my new business partner talk a “no to 25% BMV” into a “yes”, the same day we visited a vendor who was about to throw us out (I think due to my bluntness) when I said I wanted an option to buy the place, and he stepped in and the whole situation changed. So not only do I have someone to share my hair brained ideas with, I’ve found a compadres who compliments my skills. I would defiantly recommend it. He will also play a rather big part in the future of PropertyNetworker.com, which is why the whole partnership began. But more on who he is and how it will all work another time.

So back to the NMD BMV. I got a call from a vendor who saw my newspaper advert yesterday, a lovely woman who was calling on behalf of her friend with whom I arranged a viewing for today. The guy is living in south London, and is working in north London, and originally we went in with the idea that we would lease his property for 5 years and then buy it at the end, pop in a tenant buyer, job done. But the conversion went to buying very quickly, and the vendor turned round and said “What if I just wanted to sell?” I explained that in the current climate that our investors have a lot of property to choose from and they would expect a pretty big discount. To which he replied “That’s fine, just make me an offer”. So along with the Heads of Terms, I will pop an offer letter round tomorrow also. Win – Win . Love it.

No other news really, don’t forget tenant buyer leads are available at lead-dealer.co.uk now.

PURKS OF A PRIVILEGED MEMBER

So in the last newsletter I mentioned a new privileged membership and that I would begin to reveal what you would get as a privileged member of PropertyNetworker.com.

I am in the midst of creating a file sharing section for privileged members. In this section you will get access to literally hundreds of audio downloads from some of the worlds greatest property and wealth experts. Alongside these audios you will find all the documents you need to be a property investor, from Heads of Terms, to cashflow spreadsheets, alldayPA scripts… and so much more. I’ll give a little more away next week.

As we cruise to 500 members, PropertyNetworker is becoming more and more noticed in the property arena. This is going to be massive ladies and gents and you were here from the beginning. So a massive THANKS!

Brace yourselves for the rest of 2010!

Best regards

David Duckworth

Share on Facebook

Hello PropertyNetworkers!

So yes I know I’m running late with this newsletter… You see my chief newsletter checker (The Mrs) is away in New York, which means this newsletter will be filled with spelling mistakes and sentences that don’t make perfect sense. But it is nice to know you’re all reading the newsletters, and of course feedback is always welcome.

Over the last 7 days I have been working on a few little things, the website is coming along nicely and as we cruise towards 500 members you will notice a few changes to the site over the next 10 weeks or so. The People you may know APP is finally finished and you can find it on the What’s New section at the bottom on the right. This will allow you to find people you are not friends with and add them to help grow your network. I am also almost there completing the signature modification so you can add a signature to your forum posts. It’s just a little trickier.

I am also working on a privileged membership scheme which will go live after much testing has taken place, and over the next few weeks I will begin to reveal the different perks you will get as a privileged member. So keep reading and all will be revealed. But don’t forget that I think it’s important that basic membership to propertynetworker.com is free, and it will always be free.

Since I last wrote you all I have been doing the usual rounds and since have visited the London Property Meet – Hosted By Tony C, and the Berkshire Property Meet by of course the Juswant Rai.

London Property Meet first of all, now this as you are all probably aware is my favorite property meeting. I get to go and meet/annoy/network/lecture a whole room of 120 people. There is these days a talk that goes on, but that is not why I’m go, it really is a hardcore networking event, and I am very pleased to be associated with it so much. The speed networking this month was a total experience, and there where times that I tried telepathic powers to draw David Grey from his deep conversation in order to get him to ring the damn bell and get me away from the weirdo sat in front of me. One girl in particular who was from Ukraine, announced that as she was a commercial surveyor she had no use for me and then just sat and stared at me… ring the bell Mr Grey ring the damn bell!

Berkshire was pretty good this week too. Although I have found Berkshire pretty cleaky in the past now as a regular attendee I am starting to see the attraction. I met up with some very good investor friends this time and it was great to catch up. Heidi Sutton, Ed Ling, Paul Galbraith and I had a great time. Definitely one of the better Berkshire meets, Rhys may have thrown a whitey on the way down in car, but he was back on form by the end of night. Both him and Sarah where out to introduce people to their mentor. See the picture here (I now suspect I may be killed for publishing this picture)

Tip of the week? When trying to convince and educate estate agents about lease option, ask them if they have any properties that used to be on the market for sale, but are now for rent as they won’t shift. These guys do not want to be landlords. You’ll need to let the agent know that you’ll pay the fee on exchange rather than complete of course. Remember guys they’re only human.

Anyhow enough waffle from me…spread the word blah blah Blah… You know the drill!

Here comes the rest of 2010, brace your selves!

Best regards

David Duckworth

================================
Up and coming networking Events
================================

Oxford Property Network
Wednesday, March 17, 2010 from 06:00 to 10:00
led by Shelley Nichol
Learn and share new ideas with like minded property entrepreneurs and people that are passionate about property Find out how to invest in property and make money in the current market Grow your property business by meeting people that are active in property Guest speakers will be: Yvonne Emer…

Rick Otton LIVE 2 DAY TRAINING 20/21st March 2010
Saturday, March 20, 2010 08:46 to Sunday, March 21, 2010 08:40
led by Nrinder Singh-Depal
We are preparing our bi-annual gathering of the clan when Rick Otton meets up with us again this March 20th-21st in London. There will be more action takers in the one room, which is what separates from everyone else! To Reserve Your Place NOW go to: www.1poundhouse.co.uk

Property Education Day
Saturday, March 20, 2010 from 09:30 to 03:30
led by Brendan Quinn
Hear Graham Phelps present on top 10 tips for Property Investors (9.30-12.00) Graham Phelps, Director of GR Phelps Ltd, the UK’s fastest growing estate agency networks. Graham is an experienced entrepreneur, property investor, author and presenter and you will find his talk informative and enter…

——————————————————————————-
If you want to see your meeting or conference on this newsletter, contact me.
——————————————————————————-

Ready? 22 more members this week!
A warm welcome to our newest members, without you guys PropertyNetworker.com would be an empty stage.

Ben Callow,Michael Foti,Peter Gibson,Menachem Goldin,Polly Arrowsmith,Daljit Chahal,David Junor,Divian Mistry,Tomasz Kraszewski,Sel Fayyad,Paul Owen,Shareen Sinclair,Terry Brooker,Shazad Chohan,Umit Guner,Steve Hemingway,Nigel Hicks,Dave Page,Mike Osborne,Sharna-Marie Lecointe,Annie Bygrave,Tracey Lunniss

If you would like to invite people to join our community please click here or use the connect via facebook app to invite your Facebook friends.
=========================================

This is a selection of some of the leads on the forums this week.

Overseas Property
I represent a company that specializes in overseas property. Please…

Manchester, M5. 25% + BMV on RICS Value.
Very close to Salford University only 5 minutes walk.I have 1 x 1…

Scotland, 33% BMV With RICS
This is an amazing chance to grab a great investment!It is in…

Lancashire – WN87 – 3 bed Semi – Downsize – Bargai
PERSONAL INFORMATION:First Name: *****Last Name: *****E-mail:…

Tenant Buyer Leads Alert!
Langley – 2 bed – 2000 -…

W. Yorkshire – WF15 – 3 Bed terrace – relocation -
PERSONAL INFORMATION:First Name: ****Last Name: ****E-mail:…

Norfolk – PE33- 4 bed detached- Yes 25% – fraud ch
PERSONAL INFORMATION:First Name: ***Last Name: *****E-mail:…

Good luck to all of you with your Property Business!!!
David Duckworth

Share on Facebook

Hello PropertyNetworkers!

So how has week three been out of the rat race and into property full time? Well let me tell you I’m busier than I have been in a long time.

I visited the London property Mingle on Tuesday evening. Reena Malra let us into some of the secrets of her Lease option success. It was actually a really good evening where I met some top investors and also a few not so savory. You know something that bothers me? Portfolio investment companies that hound you over the phone to get you to invest money in some development in god knows where for a not so impressive 14% ROI. To be honest if I had £30k sitting about I wouldn’t hand it over to a company who is building luxury something or other in Neverland.

So this week I have been working on getting my first all the way through true to life lease option deal. I have had a pretty good response from 3 of the vendors, one I think will sign this week and another one will sign at the end of the month once his term with the estate agents has ran out. This is the one I thought I would share with you, it’s a classic.

The guy has had his £500k house (actually I reckon it’s closer to £400k) on the market for a whole year. He is waiting to move to Cyprus where he owns five properties.

I spoke to him regarding his situation and it went like this.

‘I just want to move to Cyrus, I only need to get rid of this house and I’m gone’

I offered to take the property on a 5 year lease. I would pay him £1280 per month which covers his mortgage and loan payment. I would also run an option to buy along side the deal for £450k which I could exercise any time within the next five years.

The house is a 4/5 bedroom house, with a reception room, down stairs toilet and shared bathroom upstairs.

So what are my options?

-I could put a tenant buyer into the property, paying £13.5k fee and £1960 a month.

-I could multi-let the house for a whopping £2600 a month probably making just under £1k a month after expenses.

-I could let the whole property via LHA for just over £3000 per month.

I’ll decide which strategy to use once he has signed on the dotted line.

I’ve also been working on the upgrades for propertynetworker.com this has been the biggest headache for me over the last couple of weeks. I’ve had to ask myself some serious questions about the site. Where is PN going? What will PN evolve into? How far can I take PN? What value can I add to PN?

I’m not going to tell you the answers to this yet, but what I can say is that there are some very exciting changes happening to propetynetworker.com over the next few months and every single one of our members will benefit from the changes.

This week you’ll find me haunting the floor at The London Property Meet so come and say hi!

I hope you all have a wonderful and successful week.

Best regards

David Duckworth

Share on Facebook