Skip Tracing

What is Skip Tracing?

Traditionally, the term Skip Tracing refers to the procedure of finding a borrower who has departed or skipped a town. However, it has taken on new meanings for Real Estate. For the same reason as debt collectors, investors want to get additional contact information such as mailing address, emails and phone numbers.

Getting contact information for the owner of a property of interest

If a real estate investor has found a property they want to buy, there are several ways to get the owner contact information. The first, most obvious is for them to knock on the door. However, the property might be vacant or rented with tenants unable or unwilling to share their landlord’s information. The next logical step is to check with the town records. If information is out of date or incomplete there are additional steps you can take.

There are professional skip tracing businesses that you can send the  property address and any other information you have to. These can be quite pricy and may have minimums. Alternatively, there are quite a ways to track

Who Is a Traditional Skip Tracing Service Beneficial To?

A skip tracking system may help a wide range of people, and anyone can use it. The following people are the most likely to use skip tracing to locate someone:

  • Real Estate Investors
  • Collectors of debts
  • Professionals in the medical finance field
  • Landlords
  • Banks
  • Journalists/Detectives
  • Companies that issue credit cards
  • Private companies
  • Journalists /Detectives

Let’s take a closer look at the more typical reasons for conducting a skip trace search:

Looking for Family or Friends

People frequently employ skip tracing to find missing friends or relatives. Many people engage a private detective to reconnect with someone they’ve lost touch with or are challenging to locate.\

Debt Collection

One of the most used debt collection techniques. To regain and make debt payments, debt collectors can use credit records to locate a person. These employees are either recruited directly or through a debt collecting firm. Skip a slew of other businesses also offer tracing services.

Skip tracing is a technique used by real estate brokers to locate sellers and buyers and reclaim individuals. This lets them expand their business or sell the listed home faster. This also helps focus efforts on a particular client or vendor who will participate in the process.

Bulk Skip Tracing is a Way to Get Additional Information

Businesses like real estate investors or B2C company might have a list of people with their home address. Naturally, they may want to increase the ways that they can contact these prospects or customers. To achieve this, they will use a technique known as Bulk Skip Tracing to add phone numbers and email addresses to a prospect file.

How Does Bulk Skip Tracing Work?

A company like ListAbility has huge databases with email addresses and phone numbers. First you would send or upload your list. Next ListAbility will upload your list to their national database to compare your names and addresses to the ones on their file. When matches are made they will append the available phones and emails to your list. Lastly, your list will be returned to you with all your data plus the new contact data.

Conclusion

Skip tracing is a term used to describe someone hunting for someone who has left town, typically for financial reasons. It’s a method of discovering a missing person that debt collectors, lawyers, or family members frequently use. The process includes verifying submitted information, examining public records, and consulting with people who know the person. While experts usually do it, anyone with access to the internet may skip track another.

ABOUT LISTABILITY

ListAbility provides quality lists

ListAbility has aligned with the nation’s most comprehensive and accurate data compilers. In brief, they have been collecting, analyzing and compiling data from numerous sources for 40 or more years. Indeed, our clients have benefited from the ability to optimize their marketing budget by targeting their best prospects. Unquestionably, the accuracy is top notch with monthly updates. Most of our mailing lists include the National Change of Address (NCOA)

Furthermore, we have joined forces with some newer compilers. While they might not have all the granularity and choices as our primary vendors, but they can include phone and email contact information in addition to the mailing address for your list.

Photo Credit: medium.com

Request a Quote