Flyers Sell Houses!

This last month I establish myself in the interesting position of having SEVEN vacant rental properties (ouch!). The typical newspaper ads were not pulling adequate calls; any many of the callers were part 8 tenants (barf!).

Nauseous at the though of forking out another $4,500 on available properties next month, I determined to pull out an old, but under–utilized technique… the paper flyer. I made hundreds of flyers on my computer in different colors. I included a map with directions on the flyer. I had them dispersed on car windshields in every shopping mall, supermarket and church parking lot within a mile radius of the rentals.

Did I get some spiteful calls from people who didn’t welcome the flyer on their windshield? Sure, but who gives a hoot? The United States Supreme Court says it’s free talking protected by the First Amendment! Bottom line: every occupant to whom I ended up renting came from a flyer!

Here’s one more bonus about flyers: you can officially discriminate using them. We all know that you cannot promote for families, because it is discriminatory next to single people. We also know that a family with kids is less likely to smash a lease early than a single person (I don’t need statistics to tell me this, for I know that the though of stuffing up my kids’ crap is enough to make me want to NEVER move!).

HERE’S THE POINT: If you place your flyers in places that families visit, your chances of finding a family to rent are improved. Rather than a sightless ad in the newspaper, put flyers on windshields of cars parked at Bennigan’s & Chili’s Restaurants (who else would eat at such horrid places?). Put flyers in church parking lots, schools and Toys ’R Us. The law says you can’t STATE who you want as an occupant in your flyer, but it doesn’t prohibit where you allocate the flyers!