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Last night @leylasantiago pulled Beto O'Rourke aside in El Paso, where he told her "I'm going to be making an announcement soon," before riding off into the night on his bicycle: pic.twitter.com/Il2X7Dw6bR— DJ Judd (@DJJudd) February 28, 2019
You're an idiot... and you're an idiot... and you're an idiot... pic.twitter.com/r5U6xNEbds— Bike Snob NYC (@bikesnobnyc) February 28, 2019
And I look forward to his announcement as to whether or not he'll run, which I can only assume he'll make at a bike polo match.Beto O'Rourke should have gotten himself photographed doing something responsible, like driving a giant SUV or using a firearm.— Bike Snob NYC (@bikesnobnyc) February 28, 2019
This CBD Citrus Turmeric Elixir is like drinkable sunshine. Drink it hot or cold for the perfect refreshing mid-day drink.
This blog post is sponsored by Azuca. All opinions are my own.
Raise your hand if you’re a health drink junkie? Same. It wasn’t until recently that I made the connection between my first two jobs. My first job was as the social media manager for a healthy beverage company and the second was being a barista on Nantucket. Other clues of my passion for healthy drinks can be found on my table every morning. Usually, I have a line up of at least four different drinks including coffee, warm lemon water with collagen, water and often green juice.
So why the love? I think drinks are an amazing vehicle for nutrition and flavor. Making fun, functional drinks feels like self-care to me. Personally, I love nutrient packed drinks because they’re so efficient. I don’t always feel like eating a giant salad. So when Azuca reached out to share their new CBD simple syrup my first thought was to create a delicious drink with the sweetener.
I landed on a delightful combination of turmeric, citrus, and CBD to create a mood-boosting elixir. Isn’t it so lovely that citrus season is in the winter? It’s like the universe knew us northerners needed that extra boost of sunshine and energy in these darker greyer months.
While I don’t think winter is a death sentence at all, it is really great to be mindful of your mental health this time of year. Winter is a time when I can isolate myself more than normal and I tend to get stuck inside a little more than I’d like. This can be a recipe for seasonal depression. That’s why self-care practices and regular self-reflection matters so much this time of year.
In addition to making friend dates, going outside and moving my body in some way, a big part of my self-care is to make nourishing food and fun drinks to get me through.
Also on a more fun note the vibrant color and flavor honestly put me in the best mood. I absolutely love diffusing citrus oils and this drink just adds a whole other level of citrusy joy.
Azuca is an innovative company that specializes in creating premium CBD infused sweeteners to use in food and beverage.
They have patent-pending technology that has allowed them to create one of the only water-soluble sweeteners which means that you can add their simple syrup to your coffee without all the oil bubbling to the surface. Their products are also precisely measured so you know exactly how much hemp extract you are getting in each serving.
Another amazing thing about Azuca is that you can’t taste the hemp. This is huge when you’re trying to create recipes using CBD, all the benefits without tasting like well… weed.
_
*Feel free to adjust sweetness based on your taste
*If you don’t have the Azuca Sweetener you can also use honey
The post CBD Citrus Turmeric Elixir appeared first on In it for the Long Run.
Over the past few years, I've discovered an endless treasure trove of inspiration, wisdom, and education on YouTube.
Every now and then, I stumble across a clip that rocks my world and helps me see things from a new perspective. Whenever I find these gems, I've made a habit of bookmarking them for such a time as this.
Today I want to share with you 15 of the most powerful, inspiring and important YouTube videos I've come across over the past few years. These have all played a role in shaping my personal and entrepreneurial endeavors – and with any luck, they just might be able to help you along the way too.
What are you doing with your time today? Is it important? How would your schedule change if this was the last day you had to live? If you've never stopped to think about this, the video below will help change your perspective a bit.
What would you like to do if money were no object? If you can answer this question, and figure out how to run after that dream and become a master at it, there's a good chance you'll come out much further ahead. It took me years to figure this out for myself, but once I finally did and decided to steer my life in that direction, it completely changed the trajectory of my life, and I've never looked back.
There's an interesting fact that most of us never stop to recognize – you can fail miserably at a career you hate. As long as it's possible to fail at something you DON'T enjoy, why not take a chance on something you actually love?
The first time I saw this short video clip from Steve Jobs, it was pretty mind-blowing for me. Why? Because I spent many years of my life trying to “fit inside the box” and be defined by everyone else's rules and expectations. While there's certainly some benefit to this, it can also be a huge limitation for those who have the ideas and inspiration to change the world. If you're anything like me, this is definitely worth thinking about.
You may know what you do. You may know how you do it. But do you know why you do what you do? What's your purpose, your cause, your core beliefs? Why do you exist? Why do you get out of bed in the morning? As Simon Sinek explains below, the better you understand your WHY, the more you'll end up change the world.
I don't care who you are or what you do for a living – you are always in the business of persuasion. Whether you're trying to buy or sell a property, find the most talented employees, win the best business partners, or make friends with the right people, it is imperative that you have the ability to persuade others to say YES. This video gives a powerful overview of 6 essential elements of persuasion.
There's one, cold, hard fact that nobody can deny (as much as many of us would like to). If you're not valuable to the marketplace, you're not going to get much money. If you want to increase your earning potential – the shortest path to getting there is to become more valuable. Jim Rohn explains below…
If you're one who tends to think ahead, there's a good chance you're also one who fails to live in the moment. When you constantly live your life stuck in some distant future that hasn't yet arrived, you'll be missing out on a huge part of what life has to offer. As Alan Watts said, “You can't live at all unless you can live fully now.”
If you're an ambitious person, you may often fall into the trap of treating your work life like the most important thing you have to live for – but take it from me, this is a huge mistake. In this video, I'll explain why this is a big misconception, and what you should do instead.
In order to do anything great in life over a long period of time, it's important to love what you do. Steve Jobs knew it, and he explains it eloquently in this video.
Starting a movement require a great leader, but it also requires courageous followers. Someone who will be the first person to follow the leader.
Sometimes life is just hard. Business is hard. Relationships are hard. There's no way to sugarcoat these things, it's just part of the human experience. If you want to endure and push through these inevitable roadblocks in life, you'll save yourself a lot of heartache by simply accepting these truths, and learning to deal with them head-on.
If there's anything I learned from being in school for 20+ years of my life, it's that knowing about a subject, skill or profession is NOT the same thing as truly understanding it (the dynamics at work, the moving pieces that complicate the situation, the hidden pitfalls that nobody tells you about, etc). If you're not familiar with this yet, this video is a perfect illustration.
One of the most spiritually challenging books I've ever read is Crazy Love by Francis Chan. He really calls you to the carpet and challenges a lot of assumptions that keep people in a lukewarm state with their faith. If you're of the Christian persuasion (and even if you're not), this video from his book will get you thinking.
One of the prerequisites to any kind of success is knowing when, who and how to ask for help. Perhaps most importantly, you need to be bold enough to pick up the phone and make the call. This is something I've always been bad at, because I let my fear and “shyness” get in the way – but the bottom line is, if you're not going to ask for help, you can never expect to receive it.
The post 15 Powerful YouTube Videos Every Entrepreneur Needs To See appeared first on REtipster.
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Before you read another sentence, make sure you're sitting down.
In the next few minutes, I’m going to show you some unbelievable things about real estate that will make you question the nature of reality.
1. Cinderella's Castle at the Magic Kingdom was constructed using a set-trick known as forced perspective, which makes the castle appear much larger than it really is.
Fact: Wikipedia via Reddit | Image: Thomas Kelley
2. The domed top of the Seattle Space Needle was built to be perfectly balanced, so the restaurant could be rotated with the help of a tiny 1.5 horsepower motor.
Fact: Wikipedia | Image: Sarah Ferrante Goodrich
3. When the Leaning Tower of Pisa was built, it started shifting on its foundation before construction was completed because of the unusually soft soil it was built on. This same soil is the reason the tower has survived at least four earthquakes since 1280 A.D.
Fact: Wikipedia | Image: Davide Ragusa
4. If you've ever felt lost in an IKEA store, there's a reason for that. IKEA stores are built like mazes so they function like a walk-through catalog (and generate a lot more impulse purchases along the way).
Fact: SmartCompany.com.au | Image: Rodion Kutsaev
5. If you travel in any cardinal direction from the town of Los Algodones, Mexico (north, south, east or west), you will end up in the United States.
Fact: Google Maps | Image: Grafomap
6. Even though Sweden is the second largest paper exporter in the world, the country's forest biomass is growing, because for every one tree they cut down, they plant three in its place.
Fact: SwedishWood | Image: Seth Williams
7. A man named Karl Bernd Esser, who was the chief designer of Saddam Hussein's bunker, was also a grandson of the woman who helped design Hitler's bunker.
8. When the Ancient Pyramids of Giza were originally built, they were white. Unlike how they look today, they were plated with a highly-polished white limestone that reflected the sun’s rays and gold caps on top.
Fact: AncientEgypt.co.uk | Image: Stijn te Strake
9. There is a township in Minnesota that has a population of less than 1,000, but more than 20 zip codes.
Fact: Wikipedia | Image: Samuel Zeller
10. If you're in downtown Detroit and you head directly south, you'll actually travel into Canada.
Fact: Google Earth | Image: Alex Brisbey
11. Termites eat wood twice as fast when they listen to rock music. Apparently, termites are attracted to the harder vibrations from the sound of rock music.
Fact: SnappleFact | Image: Paul Green
12. The highest and lowest points of the continental United States are in the same county. Mount Whitney in California stands at 14,494 feet, while the Badwater Basin, a little under 85 miles away, is 282 feet below sea level. Both are in Inyo County.
Fact: CNTraveler | Image: Pablo GarcÃa Saldaña
13. In Hong Kong, most toilets are flushed with seawater to conserve the city's scarce freshwater resources.
Fact: Chemical & Engineering News | Image: HelpStay.com Team
14. Scotland and Alaska both fall on the same circle of latitude, 57 degrees north of the Earth's equator.
Fact: Wikipedia | Image: Aaron Burden
15. China uses a lot of cement. In fact, China used more cement between 2011 – 2013 than the United States did in all of the 20th century.
Fact: GatesNotes | Image: Mitch Harris
16. Are you sick and tired of your next door neighbors? You might consider moving to the Siberian Sakha Republic. This territory covers about 20% of Russia's land mass and has a population of less than one million (less than one person per square mile). Most of the area still largely unexplored by humans.
Fact: MentalFloss | Image: Dominik Kollau
17. Did you know that the Chicago River flows backward? In 1900, engineers successfully reversed the flow of the Chicago River so that it emptied into the Mississippi River instead of Lake Michigan. The system was named a ‘Civil Engineering Monument of the Millennium' by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).
Fact: Wikipedia | Image: Adrien Casanova
18. Egypt is building a new capital city to replace Cairo. It will feature a “smart traffic system,” a huge green space bigger than New York’s Central Park, a mega-mall and housing for 6.5 million people. An official name for the city hasn't been picked yet.
Fact: NBC News | Image: Sophia Valkova
19. Prior to 1933, the infamous Alcatraz island was owned by the U.S. military and used as a minimum-security prison. Some of the inmates were even employed as babysitters for the children of officers who lived on the island.
Fact: ThoughtCo | Image: Nadine Shaabana
20. There's a town in Texas called Earth. It's the only place on Earth named “Earth”.
21. 30 years ago, you had about 17 minutes to escape a house fire. Today it's down to 3-4 minutes. Why? Because newer homes and furniture burn faster, giving you less time to escape.
Fact: Today.com | Image: Ricardo Gomez Angel
22. There's a Castle in the Czech Republic that has had a ‘Bear Moat' filled with actual bears for the past 300 years.
Fact: castle.ckrumlov.cz via Reddit | Image: Angel Luciano
23. Iranian officials were outraged to learn that the Star of David had been built and displayed on the roof of Iran's largest airport for over 30 years before a Google Earth satellite image revealed it.
Fact: ABC News | Image: Google Earth
24. Edinburgh Castle is so old that by the time of the first known mention of it in ancient literature, its founding was already shrouded in myth and legend.
Fact: Wikipedia via Reddit | Image: Roan Lavery
25. A million people in China live in underground nuclear bunkers constructed in the Cold War era.
Fact: National Geographic | Image: KostkaCZ
26. Since being discovered by the timber industry in the 1850s, 96% of the 2,000,000 acres of old-growth Coast Redwood trees in California have been logged.
Fact: Wikipedia via Reddit | Image: Bruno Wolff
27. The first inflatable “bouncy house” was invented in 1959 by John Scurlock, the same man who invented the safety air cushions used to catch people jumping from tall buildings.
The post 27 Real Estate Facts to Entertain Your Brain appeared first on REtipster.
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Today I’m featuring an interesting piece of history, highlighted just this week on the Pianist Magazine’s excellent blog. The world’s first (or oldest) piano recording took place precisely 131 years ago. During this period, Arthur Sullivan (1842 – 1900) was Britain’s foremost composer, and a piano and cornet version of his song ‘The Lost Chord‘, which had been composed eleven years earlier, was the piece of music recorded to capture this moment.
This event took place at a press conference in 1888, hosted by American Civil War recipient George Gouraud, who was introducing the phonograph, a new device for mechanical recording and reproduction of sound, which was created by American inventor Thomas Edison (1847 – 1931). Invented in 1887, the phonograph was the first device of its kind to be able to record and reproduce sound, and it heralded the beginning of a new age for the music industry. Sullivan commented rather ominously on this subject:
“I can only say that I am astonished and somewhat terrified at the result of this evening’s experiments: astonished at the wonderful power you have developed, and terrified at the thought that so much hideous and bad music may be put on record forever.”
You can read Pianist’s full article and listen to the recording here, but, as might be expected, the sound quality is less than ideal!
Many musicians and composers were quick to explore the phonograph’s possibilities, including Hungarian composer and pianist Béla Bartók. Bartók (1881 – 1945) was renowned for collecting folk music, alongside his colleague and fellow countryman Zoltán Kodály (1882 – 1967).
From 1904, Bartók embarked on an extensive programme of field research, travelling around Hungary and Romania, collecting a substantial selection of folk songs, frequently employing the phonograph to reliably record villagers singing and playing their folk melodies. Often considered the father of ethnomusicology, Bartók went on to write down and arrange many of those recorded tunes, and quickly became known as an expert in this field. His subsequent compositions are full of folk melodies, and this music became a fundamental influence on his work.
You can hear one of Bartók’s recordings using the phonograph by clicking on the link below:
A History of the Phonograph: Image link
The Béla Bartók Memorial House and Museum
My publications:
For much more information about how to practice piano repertoire, take a look at my piano course, Play it again: PIANO (published by Schott Music). Covering a huge array of styles and genres, the course features a large collection of progressive, graded piano repertoire from approximately Grade 1 to advanced diploma level, with copious practice tips for every piece. A convenient and beneficial course for students of any age, with or without a teacher, and it can also be used alongside piano examination syllabuses too.
You can find out more about my other piano publications and compositions here.
If you want to succeed as a real estate investor, you need to know how to find motivated sellers.
That's not just my opinion, that's a fact.
When I first started pursuing my real estate investing career, I wasted a TON of time trying to find these people the wrong way (at one point, I was almost convinced it was impossible). There finally came a point when I was just about ready to throw in the towel – and that's when I discovered the power of direct mail marketing.
But it wasn't just ANY direct mail marketing that did the trick. There were some very specific steps that simply had to be followed – and if I didn't put the time and effort into doing it right, I'd end up throwing a lot of money right out the window.
Bonus: Get a FREE copy of the INVESTOR HACKS e-book when you subscribe!
The market moves fast. Stay ahead with the latest tips in low-risk, high-return real estate investing for your business.
Moving through the process wasn't always fast, convenient or cheap – but when I took my time and carefully went through the right motions, the floodgates opened WIDE and I was inundated with more opportunities than I could handle.
Direct mail was a pivotal discovery in my journey. Knowing how to obtain the right information and use it correctly had EVERYTHING to do with my ability to find unbelievable deals (truth be told – I can't think of any notable success I had prior to this discovery… it was that big of a deal)!
The funny thing is, for most of the world's marketers – direct mail is actually an incredibly ineffective marketing medium (it's the only industry where a 1% response rate is considered “acceptable”).
As real estate professionals, we need to have a higher standard (because let's be honest, most of us can't afford to dump millions into a strategy that isn't consistently working).
Luckily – the answer is simple… the real power behind a successful direct mail campaign is in the data.
When you're working with the right information (i.e. – data that is current, accurate and reliable) and when you understand how to filter it correctly (so the right people are ON your list, and the wrong people are OFF of it), you should expect to have a response rate somewhere in the range of 5% – 20% (and if you're lucky, maybe even higher).
To some, this may seem impossible pull off, but with a basic understanding of where to go for the information and how to filter it properly for the specific types of properties you're looking for – it's not nearly as complicated as it seems.
When I think about the world of real estate data – one word comes to mind:
CHAOS
If you've ever sifted through a list of property owner information directly from the county – you probably know what I'm talking about. In some cases, this information is presented in a crazy, unpredictable and potentially dangerous format, and one misstep can be costly.
The good news is, there are several data companies out there who have managed to bring some semblance of order to this jungle. They've combed through most of the 3,143 counties in the United States (and the wildly different organizational systems they all use), and made it substantially easier to find the information we're looking for.
Bringing order to this quantity of information is a huge undertaking. We're talking about THOUSANDS of extremely complicated assessor files that are changing every single day. Getting this kind of information under control is not a simple task, and if you're a direct mail marketer and/or real estate professional who uses this information for the purpose of direct mail, this kind of organization could definitely be worth paying for.
In this blog post, we'll take an inside look at a few of the major players in real estate data, and we'll examine what each one brings to the table, what their services cost, some of the pros and cons with each one, and what you can expect to see if you decide to work with them.
We're also going to talk about some important aspects of real estate data that can have a big effect on the success of your direct mail marketing efforts.
Of all the data services I've explored to date, DataTree has the most well-designed and easy-to-use interface. Depending on which features you use and how much data you need to pull, it may also be the least expensive option on the market.
If you use DataTree for your direct mail campaigns, this video shows how that process works…
You can also see more of what this program can do in terms of property research in this blog post and this blog post.
Note: We do have an affiliate relationship with DataTree. If you sign up for the service through our affiliate link, you'll get a discount off the regular price of the service, and REtipster.com will get a very small commission if/when you choose to sign up.
The standard pricing for DataTree will vary depending on what you're planning to use it for, and which plan you select.
At the time of this writing, these are the current pricing options (available at a substantial discount, only through the REtipster affiliate link):
If your business works like mine, the line items you'll want to pay attention to are the following:
DataTree uses a “credit system” of sorts, where you agree (on a 12-month contract) to pay a set amount each month for the ability to you use the service. When you pull a Property Detail Report or a Property Characteristics Report (or anything else listed above), each instance will deduct the quoted amount from the monthly credits have you available.
Once you exceed the number of credits you have at your disposal each month, it will continue to charge you above and beyond your monthly commitment, for each time you use it, at the same quoted amount. So, if you know you'll be pulling a TON of data, it obviously makes sense to sign up for the Gold subscription, because the cost of each additional pull will be exponentially less than if you signed up for the Bronze subscription.
What I like about AgentPro247 is that it's fairly easy to use, easy to sign up AND it offers one of the better property research tools I know about. It's not JUST about the lists you can pull (though that's certainly an important aspect of it), it's also about how easy they make the due diligence process, especially for “niche” property types like vacant land.
Here's an overview of how to generate a list with this service:
You can also see more of what this program can do in terms of property research in this blog post and this blog post.
Something I appreciate about AgentPro247 is that their system will show you exactly how current their database is in every county around the country (RealQuest and DataTree were the only other services I found that offers this kind of transparency). With their Geographic Coverage tool, you can verify when the data was last updated in any given county. Here's how it works…
What I found in my research was that ALL data resellers have this issue on some level (it's one of the unfortunate tradeoffs/risks when you're not getting your data directly from the county). The difference with AgentPro247 is that they'll actually tell you about it – which I certainly appreciate.
The standard pricing for AgentPro247 will vary depending on what you're planning to use it for.
AgentPro247 actually increased their prices pretty significantly in mid-2017, which is a bummer… but even with the higher prices, it's still a pretty decent service and the cost is still less than most of the other options mentioned in this blog post.
DISCOUNT: I am an affiliate of AgentPro247 and if you want to use the exact plan I do, follow these instructions and enter Partner ID: CFGRSH at checkout (I recommend either the Profile Package for $27/mo or the Gold Package for $72/mo).
If you intend to use it for pulling direct mail lists, a Gold Package subscription will give you access to all the essential data that most real estate professionals are looking for (Property Types, Demographic Data, Mortgage, Foreclosure). Depending on how many records you need to pull on a monthly basis, the price could range anywhere from $45 – $108 per month. Here's a specific breakdown of what the pricing looks like at the time of this writing:
If you need access to this data solely for the purpose of researching properties, the Profile Package is a great option. Starting at $27 per month (and “pay as you go” dollars if you need more), you can find out all kinds of information about a property – including:
ReboGateway takes a slightly different approach to how they offer data.
Rather than giving you one giant pot of information (i.e. – the entire United States) with a limited number of leads to pull each month, they'll give you access to unlimited data from one county (with additional counties available at a slightly higher cost). If you're a real estate professional consistently working in one or two counties, this could be exactly the kind of solution you're looking for.
Here's how their system works:
ReboGateway also has a product called Investor's Title Toolbox, which does all the same things ReboGateway does, but gives subscribers nationwide access, as well as the ability to search all types of properties including commercial and be able to filter by loan to value.
ReboGateway and Investor's Title Toolbox are a bit different in that they specialize in finding unique situations that create highly motivated sellers. Most data companies will simply provide a filter, where you have to decide what types of leads you want on your list. ReboGateway does this too, but they also offer some pre-selected criteria that aren't available in most data filters from other companies.
With these pre-defined criteria, you'll be able to find certain types of property profiles, such as:
These situations all have one thing in common – there is a higher likelihood that the property owners are in a position where they want out of their property NOW.
To get an even more potent list of motivated sellers, you can also double-up on these items. For example – you can pull a list of properties where the owners have filed for divorce, the property is non-owner occupied AND it's back due on property taxes. With this kind of combination – you're virtually guaranteed to get a list of property owners who desperately need your help.
I think ReboGateway is a great option for some, but not all investors. For the investor or real estate agent who has a business focused in one market or county, it will probably be a very helpful tool in a lot of ways. On the other hand, if you're an investor who is constantly pulling lists and researching properties all over the country, there may be better alternatives out there.
Contact: Todd Holmes
Number: 866-887-0206 Ext 147
Promotion: $399.95 for Annual Subscription with 2 counties, Set Up Fee Waived, VIP List Development, Grandfathered Pricing (Retail Price $795)
PROMO CODE: JH2SW2
ReboGateway also offers the following subscription plans (without the free additional county, waived set up fee, VIP List Development, or grandfathered pricing).
Keep in mind, if you want the promo code discount mentioned above, you'll have to sign up for the annual subscription.
Investor's Title Toolbox is only offered on an annual basis with 3 different options:
RealQuest Professional is a service that can be used for researching properties and generating lists (a similar concept to AgentPro247, but at a much higher price, with information pulled from a completely different database).
Similar to ListSource, RealQuest is a platform by CoreLogic (which means the data for both services is pulled from the same pool of information).
The user interface offers a lot of flexibility and options to meet the needs of most real estate professionals.
Here's an overview of how to generate lists with RealQuest.
And here's an overview of their property research tool.
Something I appreciate about RealQuest is its wide degree of functionality within their system. I also appreciated that (similar to AgentPro247), their service allows users to see the “Latest Recording Date” – so there will never be any question as to the currency and accuracy of the data you're working with (and when it comes to direct mail – this is a big deal).
The only thing that turned me off from RealQuest was the price (which was very high in comparison to the other services on the market). I also wasn't a fan of how their subscriptions are only available with a 12-month commitment. These high barriers to entry made the service a tough sell for someone like myself.
At the time of this writing, there are a few different pricing options available:
Option 1 – Starter Package $150/mo (12 month subscription)
Note: The Starter Package is for one state only.
Option 2 – Growth Package $225/mo (12-month subscription)
Note: The Growth Package covers the entire United States.
Option 3 – Portfolio Package $275/mo (12-month subscription)
Note: The Portfolio Package covers the entire United States.
From what I saw, this service has some very good information and their system works very well (I couldn't detect any glitches or problems in its functionality) and I was very impressed at how the filtering criteria allows users to narrow down the types of properties on each list to some very specific segments.
The only downside I saw was that the service costs 10x more than every other option on the market. RealQuest is not cheap.
But here's the thing… I'm not a heavy data user. I've never been one to send out 10,000 mailers per month, and my business doesn't rely solely on direct mail to find motivated sellers – so even though I could easily fit this into my budget, it would be overkill for my situation (like trying to kill a fly with a canon).
On the flip side, if you are a high volume data user and if you need to get extremely specific about the types of recipients who belong on your lists, this could be precisely the service you need to bring your business to the next level.
ListSource is another service by CoreLogic, and it's one of the more well-known platforms for generating direct mail lists.
This service is extremely popular because of its convenience. It is very easy to generate a one-off list (similar to Melissa Data) with no subscription required.
That being said, ListSource does not have any function available for property research (like RealQuest, AgentPro247, Melissa Data and ReboGateway do), so you'll only find it useful if you're in need of a direct mail list.
That being said, if a quick list is what you're after (e.g. – if it's your first time pulling a list and you're not ready to commit to a subscription) – it's a nice option to have at your disposal.
This video below (taken from a blog post I published last year) will give you an idea for how their system works.
The only downside of ListSource is almost entirely in the price. A common theme I found with CoreLogic brands is that they aren't cheap. However, the service seems to make up for it in convenience and ease of use. The fact that you can use it without any long-term commitment makes it an ideal option for the beginner (and for the long-term user, there are discounts available if you're willing to utilize their bulk pre-pay and/or subscription options).
There are three different ways to purchase lists from ListSource:
Option 1* – ListSource Prepaid Bulk Account (12-month subscription)
| Prepaid Amount | Standard Rate | # of Leads |
| $600 | $0.15 | 4,137 Leads |
| $1,000 | $0.14 | 7,407 Leads |
| $1,725 | $0.13 | 13,800 Leads |
*Rates based on standard property lead filters and output selections.
Option 2* – ListSource Monthly Billed Subscription (12-month subscription)
| Monthly Fee | Standard Rate | # of Monthly Leads |
| $150 | $0.13 | 1,153 Leads |
| $300 | $0.12 | 2,500 Leads |
| $500 | $0.11 | 4,545 Leads |
*Rates based on standard property lead filters and output selections.
Option 3 – Build List (no subscription required)
Without a subscription or prepaid draw account, the average cost for a one-time list will be in the range of .30 – .45 cents per record. In my experience, the lists I've generated were around .18 cents per record – so the price doesn't necessarily have to be quite this high. The cost will vary depending on which filtering criteria you're using.
Note: ListSource requires a $50 minimum purchase through their website and PayPal is the method of payment (however, this not apply to pre-paid purchases).
There are three big players that compile real estate data in the United States today:
When you purchase your farm lists or property reports from a data service like DataTree, AgentPro247 or RealQuest Pro, these services pulling the information from the database they're associated with and then delivering it to you in a usable format.
As you can imagine, there are MANY different uses for this kind of information and as real estate professionals, the most common uses are conducting property research and doing direct mail campaigns.
Just speaking for myself – I've used this information to make some major investment decisions, and I've done some sizable direct mail campaigns with the lists I've generated from them. It goes without saying, with the amount of money we're putting on the line, it is very important that we're able to rely on the currency and accuracy of this data. If the data isn't reliable, the results can be disastrous.
Data companies understand this and make every effort (and generally do a good job) of keeping their databases as accurate and up-to-date as possible. The problem is… some counties (typically, the rural ones with a smaller tax base) aren't great at making this information readily available, and some counties just don't make it available, PERIOD.
As such, you'll find that most of the data from these services are reasonably current (i.e. – within the past 30 days) but occasionally, you'll encounter some counties that aren't.
Since the currency and accuracy of the data is simply a prerequisite to any successful direct mail campaign or research effort, I decided to do a side-by-side comparison of all three databases, to see if any one of them came out better (or worse) than the others.
I took a random sampling of 50 counties around the country – 25 densely populated “Urban” counties and 25 sparsely populated “Rural” counties.
I conducted the test on February 18, 2019 – and got the following results (note: to draw your attention to which counties were older than 30 days, I've shaded those dates in red, and the counties that were older than one year or not available at all were shaded in bold red).
As you'll see from this sampling – most of the densely populated areas were kept very current in all three databases (even the “older” ones weren't much more than 30 days behind).
As I mentioned earlier, my assumption is that these counties are kept current because the governing bodies have a MUCH greater source of tax revenue, thereby allowing them the budget to keep their records current and published for these data compilers.
As you'll see from this sampling – most of the sparsely populated counties were much less predictable. Roughly half of them were over 30 days old in all three databases, but many of them were still dated within the past year (with the exception of a few – which either had no data available or hadn't been updated in a long time).
Since these counties have a MUCH smaller population than the previous list, I can only imagine that these governing bodies are working off a smaller budget and thereby have fewer resources with which to keep their records up to date.
Remember, there are well over 3,000 counties in the United States, and 50 random counties is a VERY small sampling with which we can draw any sweeping conclusions. However, I think it does give us a reasonable idea of how all three databases are doing.
Based on the information I saw, it didn't appear that any single database was notably better or worse than the others. CoreLogic seems to be stronger in some counties, just like Black Knight seems to be stronger in others, and First American offers the best in its own set of counties.
All in all, they all seem to be in the same general place in terms of how current and reliable they are as a whole. None of them are perfect, and as much as I wish I could point you to one obvious choice, I can't say that one of them was the far-and-away the best over the others.
If you want the best possible response rate from your direct mail marketing efforts, it's critical that you're sending your message to the right people – and the only way to do this is to use the right filtering criteria to generate your list.
In order to do this with any success, you need to know EXACTLY who your target audience is – and take special care to specify what types of properties and owners you need to include (and exclude) from your list.
Every service works a little bit differently, so it's impossible for me to tell you exactly which filtering criteria you need to use – but you'll find that most of them have many of the same general filtering options available.
Depending on who your target audience is, here are a few examples of how your list could be filtered…
If my goal is to generate a list of real estate investors who are actively purchasing properties without financing in my target market (i.e. – “cash buyers” who have shown that they're actively looking for opportunities in the area, and they've got the cash available to buy now). My filtering options would look something like this:
If my goal is to generate a list of property owners who currently own vacant land and are motivated to sell, there are SEVERAL potential ways I could filter my data, but these bullet points give a general framework by which to start the process (this is with the assumption that these filtering options were all available in my market and with my data service of choice):
Remember – your filtering criteria may vary depending on the type, size, location (and more) of the vacant lots you're trying to target.
If my goal is to get a list of absentee owners who own single family homes and are highly motivated to sell, this is the criteria I would use to generate my list (assuming these filtering options were all available in my market and with my data service of choice):
Depending on which service you're using and which county you're pulling your list from, there will be times when not all of these filtering criteria are available.
For example – the “Tax Default” option isn't available from all of the services listed above – and of the ones that do make it available, even they can't provide this information everywhere, because this data changes daily and many counties aren't sophisticated enough to publish this information on a daily basis.
That's okay – but it also means your list may be a bit more “watered down” in terms of finding the specific types of property owners you want to talk to. If you're still determined to get the tax delinquent data from these counties (as I usually am), your only alternative option is to get a delinquent tax list directly from the county.
Probably the most effective filtering technique I've ever found is to narrow down the property owners who are currently delinquent on their property taxes.
When someone owes back due property taxes, it's usually a BIG red flag. For one reason or another, the owner and their property are a TOTAL mismatch, which inherently makes them highly motivated to sell.
Some (but not all) of the services above will offer “Tax Default” or “Tax Delinquent” as one of their many a filtering options in some (but not all) counties.
The challenge with this kind of data is that it's very time sensitive. It changes daily, which makes it even more challenging to track. If you find a county that is current and has good information, it can work extremely well, but once the data is more than a few weeks old, there can be some substantial changes to that list – which will cause it to start losing its potency very quickly.
As you can see from the county comparison above, some of these counties are kept very current, but some of them aren't. If the delinquent tax filter is important to you (as it is to me), you'll want to make sure you're only working in a county that is kept current.
The unfortunate truth is – in many counties, there's only one way to do this right. When delinquent tax data is important to me, I skip all of these services and get my lists directly from the county.
Getting this data from the county can be a HUGE pain in the neck for a lot of reasons. Even though the data works very well, most counties won't make it easy. IF you can get their list, it will usually be in a format that is far less organized than the services above provide – but if you can find a few counties that will provide their list in an acceptable format at a reasonable price (0.01 – 0.25 cents per parcel is what I'm accustomed to paying), you'll also find that it works incredibly well, and can only be rivaled by a few data services in a few select counties around the country.
If you're interested in taking the plunge and getting your list from the county, this blog post explains exactly how to do it.
Also note – delinquent taxes are definitely NOT the only cause of seller motivation. I've bought a lot of properties from owners who were not tax delinquent… so keep in mind, while it's certainly an effective filtering criteria when it's available, you can still find PLENTY of opportunities from owners who have their property taxes paid current.
When I was compiling this information and recording these videos from each data service, what I took away from this exercise was that none of them are perfect, and none of them have everything I would want to see.
Some of them are GREAT at certain things (like pulling lists) and TERRIBLE at others (like doing property research). Others are extremely effective at filtering lists to narrow down certain property types and property owners, while being completely incapable of filtering out others.
Some data companies offer a lot of filtering flexibility and powerful data solutions but charge a very high price for access to their database. Others provide a very affordable and easily accessible platform but aren't necessarily the best fit for every real estate professional (and of course, you'll never hear any data company talk about the things they aren't best suited for).
In the end – nobody seems to have it figured out from all angles, but if you know exactly what kinds of properties you're looking for, and if you know that the specific data you need is available in your area AND it's accurate and up-to-date, you should be able to nail down which of these services can best meet your needs.
I can't tell you which one is best for you – but if you have a thorough understanding of what you need and how much you're willing to pay for it, you should be able to find the best option. The most important thing is for YOU to understand what you need, what types of properties you're pursuing, and what kind of information you're going to need to do the job effectively.
Every data company brings some kind of value to the table, but in order to get the right kind of value that fits your needs, there needs to be very little ambiguity about what you're looking for.
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