Ugly House Finder produces real estate investor leads by scoring every residential parcel in a county for visible exterior distress, then ranking them so you work the worst-condition properties first. Coverage runs to more than 1,800 counties across 45 states and over 76 million residential parcels. A lead is an address with a condition score, not a name on a purchased list.
By Rockwell Rutter, founder of Ugly House Finder.
What you actually receive
A county scan returns a CSV alongside access to the web app. Each row is one scoreable residential parcel, ranked by distress score and grouped into tiers.
| Column group | What is in it |
|---|---|
| Identity | Address, parcel identifier, latitude and longitude |
| Owner | Owner name and mailing address, absentee and out-of-state flags |
| Property | Year built, lot and building characteristics from parcel records |
| Condition | Distress score, tier, and each exterior indicator with a severity rating |
| Context | Census tract, and the neighborhood economics behind the context score |
How leads are tiered
Each property receives a distress score from 1 to 5, the average of a visual score read from imagery of that specific address and a context score built from American Community Survey estimates for its Census tract.
| Tier | Score | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Hot | 3.5 and above | Clear, visible distress |
| Warm | 2.5 to 3.5 | Visible neglect, worth a look |
| Cold | Below 2.5 | Ordinary condition |
The full method is on how we score distressed properties.
What the volume looks like in practice
Lead counts depend almost entirely on housing stock, so a single national average would mislead. Carter County, Tennessee gives a concrete example from our published corpus: of 17,924 scored homes, 802 landed in the Hot tier and 8,640 were Warm or above.
Across the whole eight-county corpus of 27,142 scored homes, 1,364 properties, about 5.0%, scored 3.5 or higher. An older rural county will run well above that rate and a newer suburban one well below it. We give you the expected count for your county before you commit to anything.
Why parcels rather than listings
Tools that grade condition from listing photos can only grade properties that are listed. Ugly House Finder scores any parcel where imagery exists, so a property with no agent, no listing and no intention of selling still gets a condition score. That is the entire point: the owner who has not decided to sell yet is the one worth reaching first.
For how this sits alongside records-first tools, we publish side by side comparisons covering PropStream, DealMachine, PropertyRadar and BatchLeads.
The limits worth knowing before you buy
Not every parcel can be scored. In our published corpus, 10,242 parcels, 27.4% of the total, had no usable street-level imagery. Those properties are reported as unscored rather than guessed at.
Scores read the exterior only. Imagery shows what is visible from the street or from above. It does not see interior condition, and a well-kept exterior on a property with serious internal problems will score low.
The numbers are a floor. Across the seven Georgia counties in our corpus, imagery coverage correlated negatively with measured distress, so we most likely undercount distress in exactly the places where it runs highest.
Pricing
Self-serve plans start at $49 per month for Property Scout, $149 for Deal Hunter and $299 for Market Dominator, which cover map search, scoring and skip tracing on a points basis. County-scale scans are priced per county because the parcel count and imagery coverage vary so widely. Request a quote for the county you work. Packages start at $295 for 250 priority leads; see the county lead list packages.
Common questions
What are real estate investor leads?
Addresses worth approaching about an off-market purchase, together with the owner information needed to reach them. What separates a good lead list from a bad one is the reason each address is on it. Ours are there because the property physically shows distress in current imagery.
How current are the leads?
Parcel and owner records are refreshed from the county source, and condition scores reflect the most recent imagery available for that address. Imagery capture dates vary by area, which is the honest limit on how current any condition read can be.
Can I get leads for a specific ZIP code or neighborhood rather than a whole county?
Yes. The self-serve plans let you search and score any area you draw, including a single ZIP or neighborhood. Whole-county scans are the bulk option when you want every parcel ranked at once.
Do the leads include phone numbers?
Owner name and mailing address come from parcel records and are included, which is enough for direct mail. Phone and email come from skip tracing, which runs on points within the paid plans.
Which markets are covered?
More than 1,800 counties across 45 states, covering over 76 million residential parcels. Individual address lookups work anywhere street-level imagery reaches, including counties without a full parcel build.
How do I know the leads are worth what they cost?
Ask for the expected tier counts for your county before committing. If a county returns few Hot properties, that is a finding about the county rather than a reason to buy, and we would rather tell you that up front than sell you a thin list.