The biggest problem I see with new investors is that they know the “technical side of the business” but not the closing side of the deal. These investors have dozens of wholesale courses and can tell you everything you want to know about a contract assignment, but they don’t know how to go to a seller’s house and close the deal.

All that knowledge is useless if you can’t walk into a seller’s home and have the self-confidence and sales skills to walk out with a signed contract in 30 minutes or less. Lack of sales skills also means you’re wasting a ton of marketing dollars. He can send 10,000 postcards a month, but if he doesn’t have sales skills, those leads are worthless. I hear all the time from investors who say this business is too hard or they got 100 leads last month but every vendor they met with wouldn’t do a wholesale deal or issue to deal with them (I bet I know because) .

So how do you gain self-confidence and sales skills and stop wasting money? First, you need to invest in your sales education. I highly recommend the following books:

1. Zig Ziglar – Sell 101
2. Brian Tracy – Advanced Selling Strategies
3. Tom Hopkins-Closing sales for……
4. Jeffrey Gitomer – The Little Red Book of Sales
5. Dale Carnegie: How to Win Friends and Influence People

Second, learn your scripts and objections. When you walk into a seller’s home, he will always have many questions and objections. (Why should I work with you? How do I know when you take care of my payments that you are going to make the payments every month? Can you explain what a sale due clause is? What happens if we do? a lease option and tenants destroy the house?) If you can’t immediately answer these questions and allay their concerns, then the sale is lost. You should not hesitate when responding to a seller’s objection. In fact, you’ll love these objections and questions because it means the seller is seriously considering working with you.

All Dealmaker Champions have the following nine traits (if you don’t have any or all of these traits, get to work on them now):

1. High level of self-confidence: All salespeople want to work with self-confident people. They want to feel that you are the right person to help them out of their situation. They also want to feel like you’ve been doing this for years and have helped hundreds of sellers before them.

2. Be Enthusiastic: Enthusiasm shows salespeople that you love their job and will do everything in your power to help them out of their plight. When a salesperson asks you a question you should respond with; Absolutely or with certainty (assuming he can handle your question).

3. Invest a lot of time in education and self-improvement: This is one of the traits that people find most difficult to master. There are areas in your life to be cheap and education is not one of them. Don’t spend $30,000 on a new car and don’t buy a $5,000 flat screen TV (those are depreciating assets and won’t help you make money). You must constantly attend seminars, purchase courses, and work with mentors and coaches. I know that not every investment you make will be worth your money (I think we’ve all been ripped off by an uninformative course), however, in the long run this will shorten your learning curve by several years. Also, all serious investors are always looking for a “slight edge”. If a course or seminar shows you how to buy an extra house this year, or how to fill a house faster with a tenant, it’s worth thousands of dollars over your lifetime.

4. Smile salespeople want to work with friendly, warm people. You must have a big smile when you shake his hand and meet him for the first time.

5. Be Positive: This trait goes along with being enthusiastic. You want to reassure your sellers that you can help them out of their situation and that their difficult rental property (or whatever problem they are facing) will be a thing of the past.

6. Dress well: Image is everything and people judge a book by its cover. When you meet with a salesperson, introduce yourself in attractive business casuals. Never show up in jeans and a ratty T-shirt. Also, when you dress well you feel more confident and better about yourself.

7. Treat everyone with respect: You may not like a seller or tenant, or disagree with their lifestyle. However, treat everyone as if they have 100 houses they want to sell you (you never know, they may not have 100 houses, but your aunt, uncle, or brother does!)

8. Use Showmanship – You should have a deal-closing kit that you give to salespeople when you meet with them. This must include the following:

-Cost of sales worksheet, which shows how much money the seller will save by working with you.
-Testimonials that show how you are the largest real estate investor in the world and how you have helped many people like them.
-Coupons that sellers will receive at closing as a courtesy from their company (such as an expensive dinner or a night’s stay at a fancy hotel).
-Letter describing why you are superior to other real estate investors
-Special reports that show you how you can buy your home fast or take care of your payments right away.

9. Be an excellent listener- There is the old saying that God gave us one mouth and two ears and we should use them proportionately. Listening is very important in this business because you will discover a seller’s true motivation for wanting to sell a home and then you can structure his presentation accordingly.

Every time you prepare to meet with a salesperson, you need to “inflate” yourself so that you have great self-confidence and feel ready to go. On the way to the seller’s house, you should be listening to music that motivates you. I love listening to Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” to get into the deal-closing mood. Then, as I sit in front of the seller’s house, I will repeat to myself “I am the greatest”, “I am going to close this deal”, “I am a deal-closing champion”. (If you think this is gibberish, then I bet you’re not a deal-closing champion and have a long way to go to succeed.)

Once the salesperson opens the door, it’s best to give them a firm handshake and “act as if.” Act like this is your 1000th deal. I know this is not easy to do. When we started in this business we were all terrified. The thought of meeting a salesperson will make your legs tremble and you break out in a cold sweat. It is better for a salesperson not to see this fear or lack of self-confidence. This is because sellers are like wild animals. They can smell fear on you and this will subconsciously make them not want to work with you. I mean, would you want to work with a car salesman who was shaking while he was trying to sell you a car? Or would you even like to work with another investor who could tell that he had no idea what he was doing?

So, after you’ve put together a report and answered all of their objections, how do you close the sale? One of my favorite closures is the “yes or yes” closure. This is where you give the seller multiple offers so they have more options on how they can help you. For example, you might offer a seller a cash offer of $125,000 or an offer subject to offer of $151,000. Then, when you’re getting ready to close the deal, you could say, “Mr. Seller, would you rather have $125,000 in cash now or $151,000 and we’ll take over your payments and give you more cash when the house sells?” You can also use the “yes or yes” closing when setting the terms of the deal. “Mr. Salesperson, would you prefer to close on June 30 or July 10? Which works best for you?” “Mr. Salesman, we can schedule our visit for Thursday at 7:00 or Friday at 6:00, which is better for you?”

Take the time to learn how to become a deal-closing champion. Stop losing thousands and thousands of dollars every month because when you meet with a seller they never seem to come out with a signed contract. Or even worse, your skills are so poor that you can’t even get an appointment and persuade a seller in the first place that you are the person who can help them get rid of their property problems. Becoming a deal-closing champion is one of the most important skills you’ll learn. You’ll be able to walk into a seller’s home and walk out with a signed contract in 30 minutes or less and do this on nine out of ten appointments. If you’re not closing nine out of ten, then you’re either not evaluating properly on the phone or your sales skills need a lot of upgrading.

Remember that practice makes perfect and no one starts out as a champion closing deal. If you invest in your sales education, know their objections, and consistently meet with sellers, you will eventually join the top 5% of real estate investors and close several deals a month.