$45K fee from free county data and patient follow-up

$45K wholesale fee from long-term FTM follow-up strategy. Nurse background, zero paid lists.
About
Jamisha is a nurse who wholesales remotely, working Arizona deals from Hawaii with a local partner. She spent her first two years and at least $40K on paid lists and VAs before switching to free county data. Now she runs a lean two-person operation built on correct numbers and long follow-up.
Operating market
Arizona
Favorite features
The Challenge
Jamisha is a nurse. When she started wholesaling two years ago, she did it the way the YouTube videos said to. Buy big lists, 30,000 records at a time. Hire cold callers and VAs. Stand up Podio and a Slack channel. She worked long hospital shifts in Hawaii while her team called mainland lists across a six hour time difference. The VAs could only do what she showed them, and she had not done the reps herself yet.
At least $40,000 went out the door in those first two years. Lists got dialed two or three times through and shelved. One early contract nearly broke her: bad numbers, a bad area, no buyer, and a seller whose patience ran out while she apologized and canceled. That feeling still haunts her. By the time she took the first to market challenge in January, she had every reason to be skeptical of one more program.
What They Built
Replacing paid lists with free county data
The challenge flipped her model. She pulls her own county records now and sees what the county sees in real time: who is behind on taxes, whose paperwork looks off, which foreclosure notice is really a due on sale clause. She even works death certificates before probate opens, reaching heirs no list provider has touched.
It takes some work to get it, but no one else is doing it. They're not reaching the same people you are, because everyone's just going to download the list.
Chasing correct numbers instead of leads
Her VA has a single job: find correct numbers for the people they are not reaching. Jamisha dropped the dialer, moved to one by one click to call, and answer rates hit about 55%. New exhausted records get her personal deep dive: relatives, other properties owned, liens, and whether buyers are even active in that area.
She's like, Oh, I need to bring in leads. I'm like, Nope, we just need correct numbers. So we need to find the people we're not contacting.
Following up every four to six weeks until the seller was ready
Her biggest deal came from a probate lead with an out-of-state beneficiary. First conversation in February. The seller's husband got sick and the sale went on the back burner. Jamisha called back every four to six weeks, no pressure, nurse-style listening, just staying in front of her. Months later the seller called, two days before Jamisha's next planned touch, ready to move fast.
Once I realized it takes like sometimes 12 to 13 touches for a contract, I was like, oh man, I can relax when I'm on the phone.
Partnering with an operator who had the buyers
Hawaii prices made her home market a bad fit, so she joined forces with an Arizona wholesaler she met in a sub-to community. He had the buyers, the title company, and the local knowledge. She had the data and the KPI discipline he lacked. Their first deal went under contract in March and closed in April, three months after the challenge started.
Before and After

Before DataSift
- A VA Works Every No-Contact Lead in DataSift
- Daily Follow-Ups Run From the Sift Line Tasks
- Nine Deals Under Contract After the Stacked Niche Switch
- Cold Callers Sent KPIs by Hand Outside the System
- Expensive PPC Spend With No Return
- Follow-Up Leads Vanished Into an Abyss in the Old CRM
- 60,000 Records a Quarter Feeding His Bulk Callers
- Four Contracts Signed in 10 Days
- Three Deals a Week, Two Weeks Running
- First Direct to Seller Push in 30 Years of Business
- A $10,000 Mail Campaign That Produced Nothing
- 15 Years Buying Only From the MLS and Wholesalers
- New lender agreed 12 days after the first collapsed
- $105,696 net profit after closing costs
- Nine properties contracted at $360K, sold at $450K
- Hard money lenders would not lend on rural portfolios
- Local title companies refused assignments and passthroughs
- Seller would only sell one house, priced far over appraisal
- Still Runs on a $500 Monthly Budget
- An $85K Deal Off a 50-Name Stacked List
- 13 Contracts in Six Weeks From 250 Prospects
- About $40K Spread Across Six Months, Still Behind
- Five Contracts in a Row Fell Through
- Shotgun Lists Across Too Many Zip Codes
- One Contract Per 25-35 Leads, Half the Typical Ratio
- Each Caller Brings 16-18 Leads a Week
- 50,000 Free County Records Called on a Four-Month Cycle
- Two Partners Dialing Everything Themselves From 2017 to 2019
- VA Cleaned Every County Download by Hand in Excel
- Another Blanket ListSource Pull Whenever the Pipeline Ran Dry
- Same county-data system expanding into Texas and Miami
- $800K in revenue from six or seven deep-research deals
- About 20 people across data, calling, research, and sales
- PropStream tax delinquent lists arrived after owners had already paid
- Two years hunting a golden list that did not exist
- Bandit signs at intersections, cold calling all day from a coffee shop
- Four deals closed faster than his first three
- 8,200 dials and 25 leads in one November
- Four VAs running one calling and texting protocol
- Generic YouTube advice with no sequence to follow
- Back at a sales job four months after going full time
- Spent $35,000 on marketing with zero return
- About 35 Leads Per Deal Across 347 Total Leads
- $253K In Cash And Equity From One Package Deal
- 40 Properties Wholesaled In Under Four Months
- 12-Hour Days And A 45-Minute Commute
- No Deals Found Through Realtors, MLS, Or Craigslist
- Cold Calling From A Printed Spreadsheet In The Parking Lot
- Pulls Nearly All His Data Straight From the County
- Runs Jacksonville Virtually on $1,000 a Month
- Locked a Contract Four Days After His January Restart
- Scattered Across SMS, Facebook Ads, and a Website
- Partner's $2 an Hour Caller Hit a 1% Contact Rate
- Called Lists Three Times Then Trashed Them
- 50,000 sqft warehouses in negotiation, one to two leads daily
- $59,000 spread on his first big wholesale deal
- Every eviction filed in New Jersey, worked daily
- Old CRM buried callers in highlight and right-click drama
- Phenomenal months, then crickets for months
- Overnight pharmacy shifts, 84 hours in a single week
- Knows the playbook works and is replicating it
- First off-market contract four months after starting
- $250,000 assignment fee on deal one
- Weak cash position after funding ground-up projects
- Questioned whether real estate money was even real
- Two years spending on development deals, not making much back
- $40,000 month tracking with fixed costs
- Five first to market deals since April
- Probate filings pulled daily in multiple counties
- Two mail campaigns, response rates he did not like
- Costs fluctuated month to month with list spend
- Custom Podio build, broad absentee and vacant lists
- Owner buried beside her son after two years unclaimed
- Runs every heir search solo now
- Five heirs found, contacted, and signed across Texas
- Needed a specialist for her first deep heir search
- Paper records only, fathers listed by initials
- Probate leads dead-ended with no findable heirs
- Every No Recycled On A Two-Year Rehash Cycle
- Three VAs Clean Data Before A Single Dial
- Three First To Market Niche Filters Worked Daily
- Loose Onboarding And Under-Corrected Bad Hires
- Team Swung From Large To Small To Solo
- Broad Marketing Across Every Niche At Once
- Mornings and evenings back with his family
- 8 person crew handles whole projects in sets of two
- 40+ properties across three portfolios in about six months
- Afraid to take on payroll and a crew
- The bottleneck on his own projects
- Software job eight to five, real estate five to midnight
- 55% Answer Rate On One-By-One Click To Call
- Free County Data Replaced Every Paid List
- $45K Fee Closed One Week After The Callback
- Podio, Slack, And Multiple VAs, No Traction
- 30,000-Record Lists Dialed Two Or Three Times Through
- At Least $40K Wasted On Lists And VAs
- Four Marketing Attempts on a Couple of Lists
- A Three-Person Team at About $1,800 Cost Per Contract
- Almost Two Years Nomadic Across Asia, Europe, and the Middle East
- Behind a Jacksonville Desk 95 Percent of the Time
After DataSift
- No Deep Understanding Of His Own Data
- Gave Up Bulk Dialing And Texting Years Ago
- Relying On Inbound Leads And Bought Deals
- A Contract Per 12-13 Qualified Leads
- 10,000-record Niche Lists, Filtered Monthly In Sift
- Focused Down To Indiana And Ohio
- Owns The Operation Now, 50-50 Split
- $300K In Spreads In His First 90 Days
- Almost $600K In Contracts Ghosted Or Backed Out
- Five States At Once, Spread Too Thin
- All The Profit Going To Someone Else
- Running An Agency For 14-16 US Investors
- Homegrown Closer Converts Over 20% Of Offers
- Text Blasts First, Smaller Call Lists After
- Whole Philadelphia Metro Recycled Through Rehash Campaigns
- Sequences And Lists Fully Dialed In
- Over 50 Deals A Year Across Two Companies
- New Construction Plans Stalled By Rates And Costs
- Deep Prospecting Alone, Before Any System
- Two Cheap College Duplexes, Bought With A Partner
- Everything Done By 6pm
- $1,500-1,800 A Month Total Marketing Spend
- 150 Dials A Day, First To Market
- 200 Probates A Month From Weekly Courthouse Runs
- $800K A Year Running Solo
- No Online County Data In His Market
- Long Hours Getting The Business Started
- Years Of Flips And Contractor Headaches
- Tuesday At 2 Hunts Generate His Own Deals
- 4 Deals And $330K Equity In 30 Days
- Sales Leader Owns Leads, Casey Tunes Systems
- 325,000 County Records, Scrubbed Nightly By VAs
- Full Operation: Acquisitions Agents, Sales Leader, VA Data Team
- Team Waiting On Leads To Come In
- Doing Well, But Knew He Could Do More
- Watching Every Lead Himself, Day To Day
- Callers Grinding Through Manual Data
- Two-man Team: Casey Plus One Acquisitions Guy
- Cutting edge 1-1 sales and marketing integration
- Improved accuracy when making offers and estimating rehab costs
- Leak proof communication between clients, buyers and contractors
- Thorough marketing and acquisitions from anywhere in the world
- Real estate companies that want documented communications with contractors, clients and buyers
- Wholesalers who want to enter into new markets
- Investors looking to have leak proof marketing and acquisitions
- Anyone looking to wholesale virtually
- A significant boost in confidence to create a great life for you and your family.
- Tips and tools to maintain a steady flow of income, regardless of external circumstances.
- Knowledge of how to succeed in any market condition.
- An understanding of how to achieve long-term success with solid marketing processes.
- A big boost in confidence to make a great life for you and your family.
- Tips and tools you can use to get a steady flow of money coming in, no matter what's happening out there.
- Learned how to succeed in any market condition.
- Understanding of how to achieve long-term success with solid marketing processes.
- Anyone, regardless of budget, looking for a strong start to avoid common mistakes.
- Business owners who want to have simple processes for their VA's to follow.
- Investors willing to create a steady monthly income to secure the future of their family.
- Those who tried many ways to succeed but still aren't seeing good results.
- Efficient KPI Tracking
- Enhanced Follow Up Process
- Data Driven Decisions
- Fully Integrated With REISift
- Streamlined Sales & Marketing Flow
- Enhanced lead management
- Unorganized Data
- Expensive/Ineffective Tech Stack
- Basic Marketing Approach
- Poor Data Management
- Unorganized Processes
- Refined Direct Mail Strategy
- Clarity In All Business Operations
- Enhanced Team Management
- Strong Lead Management Flow
- Advanced Data Tracking
- Effective Marketing Flow
- Limited Marketing
- Targeting Constraints
- Poor Lead Management
- Difficult Team Management
- Reactive Marketing
- Ineffective Marketing Flow
- Empowered Data Management
- First to Market Strategy
- Automated Processes
- Strategic Focus
- Improved Lead Prioritization
- Enhanced Data Tracking
- Low Level CRM
- Successful But Hitting a Wall
- Missed Opportunities
- Poor Data Management
- Data Driven Decisions
- Full Data Clarity
- Consistent Deal Flow
- Strong Marketing Flow
- Lacked Marketing Clarity
- Difficult Marketing Flow
- Inconsistent Deal Flow
- Strong Lead Management Flow
- Strong Marketing Flow
What changed
The moment came while she sat with the course videos, running them twice until the concepts stuck. She had spent two years assuming data was something you buy.
I was like, wait a minute, data is free. I don't have to pay for it.
Her question afterward was how she had missed it. Pulling records straight from the county meant seeing what the county sees, ahead of everyone still downloading the same lists. That realization ended her list spending for good and pointed everything at correct numbers and follow-up instead.
The Results
The numbers on the $45,000 deal are simple. The seller signed on a Tuesday. Buyers offered $15,000 to $20,000 under ask, so her partner countered a $5,000 discount to his first choice buyer, who closed the next day. The wire landed within a week of the seller's callback. Split two ways, that is $22,500 a side. She stared at the deposit for two days.
The contrast carries the story. Two years and at least $40,000 in paid lists and VAs produced painful lessons and no momentum. Nine months of free county data, one VA, and patient follow-up produced two closed deals, including her biggest fee to date. Her one regret is skipping mail when it was first recommended; she wants it back in the sequence now.
We're helping the sellers, sellers definitely helping us. Like we just need to like trust the process and do good by people.
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