A few years ago, in one week, I was able to locate forty-one Probate Notices in my local newspaper. After researching at the courthouse, I found that twenty-two of these estates had real property (real estate). So on Friday of that week, I mailed out twenty-two letters to each of the Personal Representatives (20-25 is a pretty typical week).

In my letter, I told the Personal Representative I might be interested in buying the property the heirs had inherited. I told them if they were interested in selling to give me a call.

Three weeks later on a Tuesday afternoon, I received a phone call from a lady in New York saying her husband had received my letter and he might be interested in selling the property that he had inherited when his sister passed away. The property happened to be close to where I live in Oregon. She also said she was a very successful real estate agent so she would represent her husband to be certain I didn't "take him to the cleaners."

{sidebar id=6}I said I had no intention of taking anyone to the cleaners, and if my service didn't benefit both of us, we probably wouldn't do any business.

She gave me the address and I went out to view the property, which turned out to be a condominium. Luckily, the exact same model condo next door was for sale at $104,950, so I had a pretty good idea of the fixed up value right from the beginning. Five days later that condo sold for full price, so then I knew what the market would pay for this older, small condo.

When I first walked in, I noticed there was pretty strong nicotine odor. The lady who had passed away was a heavy smoker and had lived there 23 years. Other than that, there was a little fix-up needed (painting, carpet cleaning or replacement, new counter tops, kitchen flooring and some landscaping in her backyard) that I estimated would cost $3500 to take care of.

The next day, I called the lady in New York and told her I was interested and I would pay her $68,000 for the property and could close in three weeks. She told me she thought the offer was "ridiculous" but she would pass it on to her husband.

On Saturday morning, I received a phone call from the husband who happened to be a semi-retired attorney who seemed quite capable of negotiating for himself. He proceeded to tell me the story of his sister's life, how many times he had flown out already to liquidate the estate, how disruptive this was to his life, how the money from the sale of the property meant nothing to him as it was being donated to a college, etc. etc.

Bottom line though --- my offer was too low. So I said, "Well, what would it take for me to buy this property?"

"I won't take less than $70,000!" he said.

After pausing for a few moments, I said, "You know, I think $70,000 is a fair price for both of us. Why don't I write up an Earnest Money Agreement and get it out to you to sign?"

He said "Are you sure we can close this month? My wife and I are going to Europe next month and we have to close before we go."

Now here's the real issue, isn't it?

He didn't really care about the money did he?

He just wanted this deal done so he could go on vacation without this hanging over his head.

The extra $2000 was really about him telling me what he would sell it for, not me telling him.

No problem! "You bet we can," I said.

"I'll open escrow right now, you sign the earnest money which I will overnight to you (by the way, I gave him a check for $100 as an earnest money deposit) and fax it back to me and we will close in 21 days."

Twenty days later, I signed the papers, buying the condo at 1:15 in the afternoon. I immediately sold the condo to an investor friend of mine for $80,000 netting $9300 after closing costs.

By the way, my investor friend, who is an auto mechanic, worked on the property after work and on weekends, spent $2450 plus his labor, and seven weeks later sold the property for $98,500, netting approximately $15,000 after all costs for himself.

He called me a few days after his closing and said, "Bring me all those deals you can find and I can quit working on cars!"

So let's take a moment and analyze this deal.

The Heir - He got rid of the property that was hanging around his neck and got to go on vacation.

Me (this could be you) - I made a nice profit, $9300, for writing a few letters.

My Investor (this could also be you!) - He made a nice profit of $15,000 for fixing up the property.

The Purchaser - They bought a very clean condo that was all fixed up at about $5,000 less than market value.

Talk about a win, win deal --- this was home run for everyone!

And that, folks, is the probate business in a nut shell!

Ron Mead has been a Real Estate Investor for the past 29 years. He has specialized in Probate for the last 12 yrs. For a free report titled: "Probate Real Estate: The Untapped Market," please visit http://BuyProbateProperty.com For more guerrilla financing tips, please visit http://MakeAFlippinFortune.com