Today's track: Big Richard — “The Missing Stair”

This week is different.

Five days, one tool a day, top to bottom. Assignments today. Novations and short sales tomorrow. Seller financing and land contracts Friday. Lease options Monday. Assumable mortgages Tuesday, and that one's the biggest.

Here's why I'm doing it. Inventory in Louisville is over 4,286 and climbing. A year ago multifamily had five and a half months of supply; now it's closer to eight and a half. Rates are sitting around 6.95% and nobody's calling that temporary anymore. And when a market loosens like that, the person who wins isn't the one with the most cash. It's the one with the most solutions.

Right now most people in this market have exactly one. Cash offer, low number, take it or leave it. That works on maybe one seller in twenty — and it fails on the other nineteen for reasons that have nothing to do with price.

A seller isn't a number. A seller is a situation.

Some of them need speed. Some need to stay in the house through Christmas. Some need to not pay taxes on the gain this year. Some need a monthly check more than they need a lump sum. Some need to get out from under a payment they can't make. Those are five different problems and cash solves exactly one of them.

So by next Tuesday I want you to have five tools instead of one. Not because you'll use all five — I've never used all five in a month. But because when you're sitting at a kitchen table and the seller says the thing that kills the cash offer, you'll know there are four more ways to get there instead of standing up and leaving.

Let's start where most people start.

An assignment means you never buy the house.

This trips people up, so let me be precise about it. When you sign a purchase contract with a seller, you don't own anything. What you own is a contract right — the right to buy that property, at that price, on those terms, by that date. Lawyers call it an equitable interest. It's a real thing, it has real value, and like most contract rights it can be sold to somebody else unless the contract says it can't.

That's the whole trick. You're not flipping a house. You're flipping paper.

The structure has three letters and everybody uses them, so learn them now because I'll use them all week. A is the seller. B is you. C is the end buyer. You sign an A-to-B contract. Then you assign your position in that contract to C for a fee. C shows up at closing, pays A, takes the deed. You were never on title. You never owned it, never insured it, never paid a transfer tax on it.

The clause that makes it work is usually five words long.

Either the contract has an explicit assignment paragraph, or you write your name in the buyer line as "Rob Bergeron and/or assigns." That's it. Contracts are assignable by default under common law unless the contract itself says otherwise — and plenty of them say otherwise. MLS deals, bank-owned, HUD, most REO: assignment prohibited, in writing, every time. Read the contract before you plan on assigning it. I've watched people sign a REO addendum and then spend three weeks marketing something they had no right to market.

Your deposit is small. Your buyer's is not.

You put up earnest money — often a token amount. When you assign, C typically replaces or reimburses your deposit, and C's money is the real money in the deal. This is where a lot of the friction lives, and I'll come back to it, because the size of your deposit says something to the seller about whether you're serious.

The inspection period is your exit, and that's exactly the problem.

Every contract has a due-diligence window. If you can't find C in time, you use the inspection contingency and you're out. That is a legitimate, normal contractual right. It's also, used badly, the single thing that has given this business its reputation.

There's a difference between "I inspected it and the numbers don't work" and "I never had any intention or ability to close and I was using your house as a free option while I shopped it." The first is business. The second gets you sued, and in Indiana it can trigger a deceptive-act claim brought by the Attorney General. More on Indiana in a minute.

When the spread gets big, you close twice instead of once.

Assignment is the default. But if the contract bans assignment, or the end buyer's lender wants a clean chain, or the spread is big enough that showing it on one settlement statement blows the deal up, you do a double close instead — A to B, then B to C, back to back, often the same day. You need funding for the first leg, and transactional lenders exist for exactly that. It runs a point or two of purchase price for a loan that lives 24 to 72 hours. On a $280,000 deal that's about $4,200.

That number matters more than people think. A $5,000 fee is a good day on an assignment. A $5,000 spread on a double close is a loss after two sets of closing costs. Pick the structure based on the math, not the vibe.

On an assignment, your fee is visible. That's a feature.

The assignment fee appears on the settlement statement as a disbursement to you. Everybody sees it. I know some people treat that as a problem to be engineered around. I treat it as the reason the deal survives an audit. If you can't say the number out loud to the seller, you don't have a deal — you have a thing that's going to fall apart in the last week.

Now the part nobody on YouTube will tell you, because most of them don't live here.

Kentucky changed the rules in 2023 and almost nobody noticed.

House Bill 62 was signed March 23, 2023. It passed the House 94 to nothing and the Senate 35 to nothing, which tells you how controversial it was. It amended KRS 324.020, and it added a sentence that makes it unlawful for a person who is not licensed as a real estate broker or sales associate to:

"Advertise for sale an equitable interest in a contract for the purchase of real property between a property owner and a prospective purchaser."

Read that twice.

It does not say you can't sign a contract and assign it. Signing and assigning are still lawful. What it says is that publicly marketing that contract, without a license, is brokerage. The Facebook group blast. The buyer-list email. The bandit sign. The "under contract, $14K assignment fee, first come first served" post. That's the regulated act now.

And the penalties escalate in a way people don't expect. Under KRS 324.990, unlicensed brokerage is a Class A misdemeanor the first time and a Class D felony after that, the court adds the amount of any commission paid or received to the fine, and — this is the part — each transaction counts as a separate offense.

So the honest answer to "is wholesaling legal in Kentucky" is neither of the two answers you'll hear. It isn't illegal. And it isn't wide open. Assigning is lawful; advertising the equitable interest without a license is not. Anybody who tells you it's one or the other hasn't read the statute.

Which raises the obvious question, and I'd rather answer it than let you go find a bad answer somewhere else.

If the regulated act is the advertising, then the fix is that a licensee does the advertising.

That's what OffMarket.deals is. It's not a workaround and it's not a loophole — it's the structure the statute points at. A wholesaler brings me a property they have under contract. I'm the licensed party. The marketing goes out under my license, with the brokerage identification on it, the way 201 KAR 11:105 requires — which is why it says that at the bottom of every marketing email we send. The deal goes in front of 400,000-plus buyers. The wholesaler stays a principal on their own contract and doesn't have to go get licensed to move it.

I've been doing it that way for years and it's most of why the platform exists. People ask me what OffMarket.deals is for and the honest answer is: this. Kentucky said the advertising needs a license. I have one. So use it.

Two things I'd want you to hear clearly, because they're the parts people skip.

First, my license covers what I advertise. It does not follow you around. If you send me the deal and then also post it to four Facebook groups and a buyer list under your own name, that second thing is still your own advertising and my license isn't standing behind it. This only works if the marketing actually runs through the licensed channel instead of alongside it.

Second, this is not a referral-fee arrangement and I'm careful about that on purpose, because KRS 324.020(4) bars a broker from splitting fees with or compensating an unlicensed person. You're a principal on your own contract and you keep what your contract earns you. Different thing entirely, and worth understanding the difference rather than blurring it.

If you want the door, it's OffMarket.deals and it's open. And if you'd rather just talk through whether your specific deal fits, book a call and we'll look at it.

Indiana went a different direction, and if you work Clark and Floyd you need both.

Indiana added IC 32-21-16.5 in 2024. It doesn't license the act — it regulates the solicitation. If you're unlicensed and soliciting a single-family homeowner, your solicitation has to say, in those words, "This solicitation is not from a licensed real estate professional," along with your legal name and the legal name of the expected purchaser if it's different. Written, it has to be legible and plainly visible. Spoken, clearly audible.

And if the disclosure is defective, the homeowner gets two days to nullify the agreement in writing — no questions asked. Get the disclosure right and that unwind button never arms. Get it wrong and a violation is also a deceptive act enforceable by the Attorney General.

Same river, two states, two completely different compliance problems. Kentucky regulates the advertising. Indiana regulates the disclosure and hands the seller an unwind button.

If you have a license, the rules get stricter, not looser.

This is the opposite of what most agents assume, and it's the thing I'd put on a poster in every brokerage in town.

KRS 324.160 says that before a licensee becomes a party to a contract to purchase real property, the licensee has to disclose licensee status in writing, on the sales contract or purchase offer, to all parties. Not verbally. Not at closing. In writing, on the paper, before you sign.

The NAR Code of Ethics goes further. Article 4 attaches to a "contemplated interest to purchase" — meaning the duty starts the moment you're thinking about buying it, not the moment you own it.

And KRS 324.020(4) bars a broker from splitting fees with or compensating anyone who isn't licensed. Which means the "bring me a deal and I'll cut you in" arrangement that half this industry runs on is a problem in Kentucky if the finder is unlicensed. I get asked about this constantly and the answer isn't the one people want.

None of this makes it harder to do business. It makes it cleaner.

I've been called the realtor's realtor and I take that seriously, and this is a decent illustration of why. The license is why I can answer "I want to talk to a realtor first" with yes, let's instead of a tap dance. It's why the marketing on OffMarket.deals is compliant instead of hopeful. And it's why other agents send me the deals they don't know what to do with. The rules are stricter on my side of the line. They're also the whole product.

Speaking of which — the objections are always the same five.

"Why is your offer so low?" Stop defending the number and move to net. What they keep, on a date certain, with no commission, no repairs, no showings, no financing contingency. Then show them the comps and the repair math on paper. A lower gross that nets higher is an easy conversation. A lower gross with no explanation is an insult.

"How do I know you'll close?" This is a fair question and most people answer it badly, with enthusiasm instead of evidence. Give them the title company's phone number. Give them two prior settlement statements with the numbers redacted. Give them a reference. Proof beats confidence.

"What if you can't find a buyer?" Tell the truth, in plain words, before they ask. Here's my inspection window, here's what happens to your deposit, here's the date you're free either way, and you can keep taking calls the whole time. Every single person who has blown up a deal in this business blew it up by being vague right here.

"Why don't you just buy it yourself?" Some I do. Some I place with partners who are better suited to that particular rehab. Either way you close on the date on the contract. Say it like that — it's true and it's the whole model.

"How did you get my number?" Public records. I'm a local investor. If you'd rather I not call again, say so and I won't. Honesty defuses this one faster than any script.

Where the deals actually come from.

Absentee owners. Code violation cases. Tax delinquent. Probate. Pre-foreclosure and lis pendens. FSBOs that have been at it 60 days. Expired listings. Vacant properties. Driving for dollars, which still works and which nobody wants to do.

Locally: the Jefferson County PVA site is free to search by address and parcel, though owner and sales searches need a paid subscription — get that right, because people tell you it's all free and it isn't. Louisville Metro's open data portal has building code and permit enforcement cases published as an actual dataset you can download. And Metro's Vacant and Abandoned Property program, plus the Landbank, is a genuine source of distressed property with clear title that most investors here have never once looked at.

Now the part that connects to the rest of the week.

The reason I'm teaching all five of these is not so you can pick a favorite. It's so you can put more than one on the table at the same time.

When I send a letter of intent, it's never one offer. It's two, sometimes three, and the seller picks. Cash at a real discount, closing fast. Or a higher price with terms — more money, spread over time, structured so it actually solves their tax problem or their income problem. Same property, same week, same buyer, two completely different answers to what do you actually need.

Sellers almost never take the cash option when the terms option is priced right. And the ones who do take cash feel good about it, because they chose it instead of having it be the only thing on the table.

That's the whole point of a toolbox. Not that every tool is right. That the seller gets to pick.

What to do with this today.

Pull one contract you've signed in the last year and find the assignment language. Is it there? Does it say "and/or assigns"? Does the addendum kill it? Most people have never checked and half of them are wrong about what their own paperwork says.

Then, if you're unlicensed and you've been posting deals publicly in Kentucky, go read KRS 324.020(1)(b) yourself. Don't take my word for it. It's four lines long.

One more thing before tomorrow. If a morning email isn't enough runway on any of this, I've put the long version on the site — full guide, full citations, no length limit. Today's is Is Wholesaling Real Estate Legal in Kentucky?. And it's not just today's — I've got the same kind of deep dive live for novations, seller financing and land contracts, lease options, and assumable mortgages — so whichever day of this week grabs you hardest, the homework's already written. Worth reading in tandem with this email, not instead of it. And if you want to actually run the numbers on a deal while you're at it, the investment property analyzer and the seller net proceeds calculator are both live and free on the site — no email, no form.

Did a long form video with a prolific wholesaler who is now 20 years old and hitting way above his weight class with his mother Jamie Danielson (such a pro, could sell ice to eskimos, great at deescalating, everyone loves here! Worth a watch!

Tomorrow: novations, how they differ from everything you just read.

Where are you on AI actually showing up in your day-to-day life? Already all in led at 53%, Dipping a toe 32%, Watching, not touching 11%, and “I should book a call with Rob and actually integrate this” 5%. More than half of you are already all in — which is exactly the energy a toolbox week needs, because a tool you don't know how to use isn't a tool yet.

Results in tomorrow's issue.

Every day this week I'm giving away the list that matches the tool.

Today it's the assignment list: Jefferson County absentee owners, open code enforcement cases, and expired listings — the three sources that produce more assignable contracts than everything else combined. Reply "ASSIGN" and I'll send you the list, plus the actual paperwork — the A-to-B and B-to-C contract templates my title company, Borders & Borders, drew up to keep this compliant on the Kentucky side. Same reply, both things, today.

One rule: you have to ask each day. I'm not drip-feeding anybody. If you want Thursday's list, reply DISTRESS.

This one's for my agents, my wholesalers, and honestly anyone on this list who wants to get sharper before they're in front of a seller. Rob's Brain is a live AI trained on everything you're reading this week — every tool, every objection, every rule — and it's on whenever you are. Pull it up on your phone and talk it through out loud: “I've got 45 minutes on a walk, walk me through how assignments actually work so I'm capable by the time I'm back.” It won't guess at anything — if a question is outside what it knows, it says so and points you to me, Colleen, or Lisa instead of making something up. That's the whole idea: a way to take massive, compliant action the second the question hits you, not three days from now when you finally get me on the phone.

Ask Rob’s Brain

Every morning I screen the whole Louisville MLS and rank the five best deals and the five most ripe for a lowball, with the number I'd offer on each. I can't blast other agents' listings to 60,000 people — rules are rules — but I can send them to you personally. Reply "FIVE" and today's is yours.

With Enthusiasm,

Rob Bergeron

Owner–Realtor at Award-Winning Winner Realty
Winner Realty | OffMarket.deals | Property Partner Data Company

Schedule time to discuss your goals, bottlenecks, or whatever’s on your mind — book me here.

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PS: All currently available Winner offerings! Bring us an offer! Winner Realty agents are equipped with different skill sets than traditional agents. We can make something happen! 5+ Bedroom single family properties under $350,000. All currently available multifamily!

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