It’s roadside clutter. We all see it. Flimsy, mangled and bent signs all over the neighborhood. We buy houses. Cash for homes. Sell us your home as/is! Some look printed, but some look like they were made by hand. They are all over the place, especially in this hot real estate market. Most people can’t help but wonder. Are they legit or a scam?
Most areas have rules against posting plastic ‘bandit’ signs on city property, including nailing signs to electrical and telephone poles or spiking them along roadways on city property. More often than not, people who post “we buy houses” signs in Jacksonville use familiar tricks to avoid getting caught for randomly posting “we buy houses” bandit signs.
Some use free temporary phone numbers that go direct to voicemail, so it’s tough for city bylaw enforcement to track them down. Some have special tools to illegally place signs high on telephone poles, making it difficult for the city to remove them. Other “we buy houses” signs in Jacksonville never use their real name or real company on the signs and hiding behind generic wording.
In most cases, placing “we buy houses in Jacksonville” signs beside the road are illegal. Even non-cynical consumers wonder: if a company or person started off breaking the law to advertise, what are they willing to do when buying a house?
The fact is that placing cheap paper or plastic signs by the side of the road is the most inexpensive way for wannabe real estate investors to advertise. Most don’t have the money, experience, or knowledge to actually buy a house. They are doing cheap marketing in the hopes that a homeowner will contact them, they can put the house under contract and then wholesale it to someone else who actually does have the money to buy a house.
Is it a scam? Maybe yes. Maybe not. Because the “we buy houses in Jacksonville” signs are anonymous, cheap, and some scammers use them to trick homeowners into signing fraudulent documents.
There are a lot of novice real estate investors who don’t have money and use this type of flimsy advertising to get their start. It doesn’t necessarily make it a scam, but it should make the smart consumer wonder. If they are not clear about “we buy houses in Jacksonville signs,” they are dishonest and misleading.
Some people are well intentioned and aren’t trying to scam anyone. They just might not have the experience yet to do what they claim and actually do buy houses.
Caution: legit businesses don’t do “we buy houses in Jacksonville” cheap sign advertising. A solid and real company is clear about their business name, their address, their website, and their social media accounts, how long they’ve been in business, who they have worked with before.