How To Find Great Deals If Housing Inventory Is Low

Q: Gerald, lately I can’t find any property to buy, it seems like there’s nothing out there right now. What should I be doing to find good real estate deals? Carter, Passaic, NJ

A: That’s a great question, Carter. It’s true that housing inventory is very low in many local real estate markets now for several reasons, not the least of which is because there are still many property owners who bought or refinanced at the height of the last real estate market bubble and therefore have little or no equity–these property owners are mostly sitting on the sidelines even if they want to sell because they’d have to reach into their pockets to pay off their underlying mortgage debt if they did sell and in most cases that doesn’t make good financial sense.

To answer your question, the key to finding good real estate deals when housing inventory is low is showing up when and where nobody else does. As I’ve said many times before, if you follow the herd, you’ll end of scraping shit off the bottom of your shoes, so take a different approach. The way to differentiate yourself from other buyers in your real estate market is via marketing. Targeted, compelling marketing allows you to show up alone, positioning yourself uniquely versus all the other lemmings out there looking for property and marketing can allow you to identify off-market real estate deals that other investors are not privy to.

Thanks for your question, Carter. Good luck.

For more real estate tips and information visit my blog at geraldlucas.com.