A real estate bird dog is essentially a match maker, finding real estate deals and a buyer for those properties. Generally the person doing the bird dogging will work for an investors or several investors, receiving either a finder's fee, birddog fee, or an assignment of contract fee.

In the past few years this form of real estate investing has become very popular as people are trying to find a way to make money in real estate without investing their own funds.

Is Bird Dogging illegal?

This question is up for discussion, many "real estate agents" will say that it is illegal to be involved in real estate without a real estate license. Investors say it's legal. In my opinion, and you should consult with a local real estate attorney before you do anything to make sure you know your jurisdiction's laws, real estate bird dogging is NOT illegal as long as you play by the rules -- DISCLOSE, DISCLOSE, DISCLOSE.

In many states you are not allowed to receive a "finder's fee" in real estate. Some other state make might make it illegal to receive compensation for location properties. Well if this is your case, then place the property under contract and assign that contract to the investor. (read about assignment of contract)

How much can you make Bird Dogging?

There is no set fee for bird dogs, the fee or amount you generate totally depends on the numbers involved in the transaction. Some bird dogs can make between $100 and $20,000 on an average property. This really depends on how low the seller is selling and how much the investor is willing to pay to buy the property.

Finding Real Estate Deals

You want to find properties that significantly under priced, otherwise the investor will not be interested in acquiring the property from you. There are several ways of finding these properties.

There are many ways to under-priced properties:

• Direct mail - get a mail list of foreclosure properties and send out flyers. Many times these list can be obtained from your local clerk of courts. There are also several services that can provide mail lists of home owners that are 60-120 lat o on their mortgage payments, for a fee.
• Leads - Many websites advertise the "We Buy Houses" term. In many occasion these websites will sell the leads from those distressed sellers. Our site provides our leads for FREE, here is the link to our real estate investor leads. Yes, they are completely free. When the sellers enter their property information, it is automatically sent to that blog. First come first serve, so save the web address.
• Inside information - Some bird dogs get their information from inside sources, even thought this is unethical. Maybe a secretary who works for a foreclosure attorney, a mortgage company or several other sources who have privilege to distressed home owner's properties by virtue of their employment or position.

Many bird dogs just happened to walk into their newly found profession by means of their regular employment, such as postal carriers, police officers, and even garbage person. The objective is to drive around neighborhoods to find properties that are either abandoned, damage, or in foreclosure. Some signs of a distressed property can be; uncut lawn, broken windows, or other visible damages. Now that you have found these properties, you can knock on the doors and see if the owner is interested in selling, and if the property is a deal.

Contacting the Home owners

You found a great under-priced property, now what?

There are several things you need to find out before you contact the owner, most important is the retail price of the property. YEP you guess it, that is also free with us. Find property values here. Not just do we provide you with property values, but also the properties that have sold in the area, this allows you to establish a good concept of what an investor would be interested in paying for the property. (remember investors want to buy under-priced properties)

Ok, so you have an estimated value for the property. It would probably not hurt to do a google search on the property address to see if the owner has had previous attempts to sell, or maybe even when they purchased the property.

So what else is left? Depending on your local laws you would either receive a fee for finding the property, or assign the contract to an investors. A good way to assign your contract is by listing your property on our wholesale properties database.

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