Virtual wholesaling: how to wholesale a market you have never visited, and what it costs
- Whose law applies
- The property’s state
- Free start
- Propwire, 10¢ a matched owner
- One paid data tool
- $99 to $119 a month
- Who sees the house
- Someone local you pay or know
A wholesale deal in another state, from your desk
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Pick a market by its law and its data
Read the state’s wholesaling law first: twenty states have one, and in Illinois and Virginia repeat wholesaling, and in Pennsylvania any wholesale deal, needs a real estate license (the state law table). Then look at the county’s records: a market where you can pull foreclosure, probate and tax-delinquent lists online works from a distance, one where the records are paper only does not.
What you come away withA market whose rules you know and whose records you can reach.
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Build the list remotely
County sites and a free data tool replace driving the streets. Propwire searches nationwide records for free, and PropStream adds 165+ filters from $99 a month. The off-market properties guide covers each record type and where it sits.
What you come away withA list of owners with a recorded reason to sell, in a city you have not visited.
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Find the owners’ numbers
The free method works from anywhere, one owner at a time. A paid trace runs the whole list: 10¢ a successful match on Propwire. Scrub every number against the national Do Not Call registry before anyone dials (the calling rules guide explains it).
What you come away withNumbers you are allowed to call.
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Reach owners by phone, text and mail
Calls, texts and letters are the same from a thousand miles away. A dialer and a mail service let you work a list in another time zone, and callers you hire can work it for you. Keep the calling hours of the owner’s time zone, not yours.
What you come away withOwners who answer, and a short list of real leads.
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See the house through someone local
You cannot judge repairs from a listing photo. A local agent, an inspector or a contractor can walk it and send photos and a repair estimate. Be careful how you pay a finder: Illinois counts assisting in procuring leads or prospects for a sale among a broker’s activities, so a per-deal fee to an unlicensed helper can raise the licensing question there.
What you come away withA repair number you trust, from someone who saw the house.
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Close by mail or remotely
Choose a title company or closing attorney in the property’s state that closes with out-of-state parties, and ask how signing works for you and for the owner: mailed documents, a mobile notary, or remote online notarization where that state allows it. Send them both contracts early.
What you come away withA closing you never travel for.
Where working from a distance costs you
You do not know the streets. Comparable sales and repair costs are hard to judge from a map, and a block that looks like its neighbours may sell for far less. Pay for a local opinion before you make an offer you cannot keep.
Every step you do not do yourself has a price. Callers, local walkthroughs and a data tool turn a free method into a monthly bill, and the bill arrives before the first fee does. Add one paid piece at a time, when you know which list answers.
The law follows the house. A license rule or a disclosure rule in the property’s state applies to you wherever you live, and Illinois and Virginia count repeat contracts against you within any 12 months.
The first month, remote
- Free start
- $0, plus 10¢ a matched owner on Propwire
- One data tool
- $99 PropStream, $119 DealMachine or BatchLeads
- One system for the deal
- $299 REsimpli Solo
Monthly prices, read November 2026. Local walkthroughs, callers, earnest money and closing costs come on top.
The tools that make it remote
Each line comes from the tool’s own pages. Prices read November 2026.
| Tool | In a remote deal | Price | Pricing |
|---|---|---|---|
 Propwire |
Nationwide records and tracing at 10¢ a match | Free | Try Propwire free |
 Prop |
165+ filters on nationwide county data | $99 a month | See PropStream pricing |
 Batch |
Three users and a cash investor search | $119 a month | See BatchLeads pricing |
 Deal |
Owner lookup and mail from the app | $119 a seat | See DealMachine pricing |
 REsimpli |
CRM, dialer and cash buyer searches in one | $299 a month | See REsimpli pricing |
Paid links. If you subscribe through one we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes our ranking order.
The wholesaling software page prices a full month on each of these by how you find sellers.
Virtual wholesaling: questions people ask
What is virtual wholesaling?
Wholesaling a property in a market where you do not live: you find the owner, sign the contract and find the buyer remotely, with someone local to see the house and a title company to close by mail.
How do I start virtual wholesaling real estate?
Pick a market whose wholesaling law you have read and whose county records are online, build a list from those records with a free tool, trace and contact owners, and line up a local person to see houses and a title company that closes remotely before your first contract.
Can you actually make money wholesaling real estate from home?
The fee is the same as in any wholesale deal: your buyer’s price minus your contract price. What changes is the cost of the people and tools that replace being there. We have no reliable figure for what remote wholesalers earn, so we do not quote one.
Is virtual wholesaling legal?
Where wholesaling is legal, yes, under the law of the state the property is in. Twenty states have a statute we read, some requiring a license or registration: check the property’s state, not yours.
Where to go from here
How we put this together
- The wholesaling statutes of 20 states, on each legislature’s or agency’s own site, and Illinois’s definition of a broker (225 ILCS 454/1-10), read November 2026
- The pricing and feature pages of Propwire, PropStream, BatchLeads, DealMachine and REsimpli, as recorded in our fact sheets, read November 2026
- The pages that rank for “virtual wholesaling real estate” in the US, read November 2026
We have not wholesaled a property remotely. Remote signing rules differ by state, so ask the title company in the property’s state how it closes with out-of-state parties. Nothing here is legal advice.