Direct Mail for Wholesaling and Land Investing- A great ROI, Warmer Leads

What is Direct Mail and Why Should I Use it for Wholesaling Lead Generation?

 

Direct mail is the act of sending letters to property owners and asking them if they’re interested in selling.  Postcards and letters are both used.

There are companies set up to send mail for you, you just need to send them your skip traced list.  You could do it yourself, but it would be a lot of work. Thousands of pieces are needed in order to get decent results.

Why Direct Mail over SMS or cold Calling or Other Channels?

 

• Reach More People- In my experience, Direct mail will reach people who may not respond to cold calls or texts
• Incoming Leads- Direct mail letter recipients are calling you. They are showing you they are motivated right away. It’s not a cold open. This person is interested in selling their property.
• Bonus leads- People hold onto letters. Folks who still deal in paper (not adapted to the digital world) save letters in file cabinets and drawers and call when they are ready. We’ve had people call us from letters we’ve sent up to 2 years prior!
• Authority- By sending these letters with your company letterhead, it often lends an air of authority or of being a “real” business, moreso than someone who is calling or texting.
• Conversion Rate- Direct Mail has historically outperformed other lead generation channels in my business.  Leads, contract rate, close rate and ROI are excellent. Our most recent direct mail campaign is at 10X ROI. Ten per cent of the leads that have come in have resulted in closed deals so far!

How to Get going with Direct Mail

 

1. Pull a list-free list: Propwire.  Paid lists: direct Skip, List Source, Skipify, and many others.
2. Skip Trace the list– get the phone numbers and mailing addresses of the property owners.  For skip tracing there are dozens of companies, including the 3 above.  I recommend Direct Skip. You can get bulk discounts with them.  Expect to pay .06- .11 per skip.
   1. If you have a zero budget, then you can manually skip trace using True People Search ot That’s Them, but it will take a long time.
3. Contact a bulk mailing company. I’ve only tried two, and I like them both. REI Printmail. and Yellow Letter Shop.
4. Send your company your list and choose a letter type.  I’ve used check letters and white letters.  At REI, your rep will share with you data about your area and what is working best.
5. Approve the list and letter- Your company will process your list and give you a quote and a letter proof for approval.
   1. Pro Tip-Make sure that your list is filtered by seller mailing address either by you or the mailing company. You don’t want to send multiple letters to the same seller if they have more than one property.
   2. Pro tip 2– Split your mailer into chunks to manage lead flow. This also helps if you’re on a budget. The mailing company will bill you in advance of each installment.
6.  Sit back and wait for leads to come in!  Normally there is a lag once you’ve approved the list and letter. The mailing company will process your order and then once shipped, it takes a week or so for leads to come in.

How Many Direct Mail Pieces Should I Order?

 

To get a decent sample size you want to order as many as your budget allows.  On my 1st campaign I order 1000 letters. I was nervous- will it work? I ordered smaller campaigns until I gained confidence and closed deals so that i had a bigger budget.

Ideally, you want to send 3000-4000 pieces in order to get a decent sample.   You might get a bunch of leads with 1000, or very few. The more you send, the more percentages average out.

How Much Does Direct Mail Cost?

Each company will be a bit different, but I’d project .60-.90 per mail piece. There’s a range  from postcards to check letters and all of the varieties in between.

Ask for first-timer discounts, or if they have price breaks at certain quantities.

What Sort of Response Rate Should I Expect?

 

If you’re lucky and you pick a good list and your letter format is good, 1% or more is good.  I have had half a percent on some campaigns and even less.  I’ve had as high as 2-3% too, which is considered excellent.

We recently ran a campaign for vacant land and the order was for about 4400 mail pieces.  so far we have 48 leads- a bit better than 1%.

Of those 48 we have closed 4 deals so far and made about $35k.  That’s roughly 10X what we paid for the mailer. A great ROI!

How Does Direct Mail Compare to Other Marketing Channels for ROI?

ROI= return on investment

• Cold Calling– We got a 1.1X ROI from cold calling in 2024. This was a large sample size of 6 months using two prominent calling services. Needless to say we’ve pulled the plug on cold calling in favor of direct mail.
• Text Marketing– Our results were 7X ROI for SMS marketing in 2024. For every dollar spent, we made 7 dollars.  This was our primary channel in 2024 but we’re ramping upi direct mail in 2025.
• Pay Per Lead– not enough data on this for me, but in a small sample size, we closed one out of 12 leads for an ROI of 5X
• Pay per click- PPC- I have not tried it, but my son Jasper has had a large sample size and poor results so far, around 1.5X.  Supposedly you have to be patient for this to build, but he’s got 8 months or so invested I believe.

Is Direct Mail for Me?

 

I’m an introvert. Direct mail saved me from making cold calls to people. I had people calling me. (I say had, because I now have an acquisitions team who handles seller interactions).

If you have a budget, I highly recommend it- inbound warm leads without having to cold call or text people plus a great conversion rate and ROI from my experience.

Have you tried direct mail? Thinking of trying it? Let me know your thoughts, comments, questions below.