Epic Real Estate Investing - Virtual Wholesaling with Greg Helbeck |651

Episode Date: May 13, 2019

The former Epic Intensive participant is with us today. Greg Helbeck is here to share his mistakes and the lessons he learned about competing and winning in virtual and expensive markets. He needed 9 months to close his 1st deal, then they snowballed because he made rewarding real estate moves in high-end New York and Dallas. Listen to his story and duplicate the consistency and perseverance that will set you for success. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From coast to coast, epic investors are doing the most. It's time for another epic field report. So on the phone with me, I invited a participant in our pilot program, Your First Deal, as he completed the program and cashed his first check. And I wanted to come on the show and talk about it. So, J-Ron, welcome to the show. Thanks. Pleasure to be here, man.

Yeah, thanks for participating. Thanks for following through as it paid off for you. Congratulations. So you posted a check inside of the course. course, that's part of the agreement, and you get $300 for that. So how did you find this deal? Actually, with this deal in particular, my dad told me about it. I told him, hey, you know, I'm getting a wholesale and getting into the real estate investing arena. And I just kind of let them know what I do, what I want to do. Somehow, I mean, he heard of a lady who was selling her home.

She wanted to sell it quick. And then the price was shock you that she wanted to sell it for, which was $2,000. And I said, look, I don't buy it. Yeah, send it to me. And so that's basically the half of the deal month is the word of them off to my dad. You got it. So what's the lesson there? The lesson there.

Oh, man, deals can fall in your lap, or you could go out and chase them. You'll hope, you know, you dream to have them come to you. But just the word of them out letting people know what you do could also land your deals. Yep. Don't keep what you do a secret, right? Yeah, that's true. Perfect. So you sold the property. So you wholesale it, right? And you made $1,500. Maybe I just asked this question. The biggest lesson learned in this transaction would be?

The biggest lesson learned in this transaction, I'd say is for me to be a little more confident. With this deal, it was so, it was so crazy. You always want to find out all the information about everything. the lady was wanting to sell her house, but she only owned half of it. So I had to go digging real deep. Then there was a lien holder who I had to get in contact with. And I wholesale it to the lien holder who owned the other half. So he bought his own house back for $3,500. So if any lessons in it, man, just don't give up, find out all the details on the transactions.

Because sometimes when they are too good to be true, they can be. But, you know, I did all of this with no money. Even though I thought I was going to have to pay money for the title, because in Louisiana, you know, they do abstract and all that. They charge like $250. But in this case, the title representative, the title attorney, he said, you know what, this one's on me. So I still didn't have to come out of pocket. I was like, whoa, man, it sounds too good to be true, but it is good and it is true for sure. The deal had a buyer built right into the deal.

Absolutely. That's good. That's good. So what's next? So yeah, I'm just still keeping at it. Nice. Yeah, so if you want to, it's not quite how the course plays out. But I think what the lesson here is or what the evidence is, is that by just doing the activity, it creates opportunity.

Most of the time, it'll create direct opportunity. But sometimes, as J-Rond discovered, it'll create that opportunity indirectly. And if you're in the game and you're doing the activities and your mind, mind is right, then you're in position to actually seize that opportunity. Absolutely. Right? So if you'd like to check out our pilot program, the Your First Deal course, you can go to free real estate investing course.com.

There's all the details right there. Just check it out. And if you like what you see, go ahead and join us. Jayron, thanks for joining us. Keep doing what you're doing and let us know if you need any help, all right? Yes, sir. We'll do. Thank you.

You bet. Take care. Making offers and cashing checks. What's new? What's next with Ashley Montillon. Hey, this is Ash, Matt's assistant. We've got a great episode ahead as Matt's going to show you how to make it rain. But before he gets started, I wanted to give you the scoop on what's new and what's next at Epic Real Estate.

Let's start with What's New. In the Epic Pro Academy, pound for pound, the most successful online community of real estate investors, Sean had a great payday and picked up a $10,000 check for a wholesale deal. Good job, Sean. Ryan, Ryan posted a $15,000. check for a refi. Awesome there, Ryan. Jack. Jack had three cash out refinances and two of his flips are featured in his local design and living magazine. I actually took a look at the link you posted there, Jack, beautiful, beautiful properties. Congratulations to both you and Josh. Amazing stuff. You

guys are doing amazing stuff out there in Fargo. Tim. Tim got a property under contract and has several other offers in the pipeline. Kevin. Kevin also got a seller finance property under contract and he said a couple more of these and I will be free. Chris, Chris had his biggest win to date. His focus has changed from flipping to build a cash balance to flipping to build his portfolio. His new mantra, two holds per month as he continues to execute his RIA Ace game plan put into play back in November. This past week, he also closed on the sell of a turnkey rehab. That got him a nice $25,000 profit, and he hunted down a buy and hold that he'd been targeting in a neighborhood for it to appreciation potential. The cash on cash return for that one is going to be 26.3%. Awesome job, Chris. We're

super, super proud of you. Thank you to all the investors who posted for follow through Friday. We'll be looking out next week to see all the great things you guys accomplish. What's next at Epic Real Estate? Well, the Epic Intensive Lead Machine Workshop. It's going to be July 18th through the 20th in Manhattan Beach, California. I'm sure you've heard Matt mentioned details on this three-day workshop. What he may not have mentioned, little secret actually. I'm actually not sure if I'm supposed to be sharing this on the podcast, but when you're signing up on epicintensive.com, on page two, there's an option to upgrade to VIP. We wanted to take this opportunity to create an unforgettable experience for our VIP guests.

So we convince Matt to charter a yacht. That's all I can say about that for now, but it's going to be a really, really fun event. I mean, dude, who doesn't love a fun boat party? And you get to party with the epic crew. So get your VIP tickets while they're still there. That's all I've got. out for you guys today. See you guys next week for what's new and what's next. Enjoy the show. This is Terrio Media. Yo, yeah, yeah, we got the cash flow. You didn't know, home for us, we got the cash flow. Hello, and welcome, welcome to the epic real estate investing show. This is where everyday people come to get the tips, strategies, and tactics to escape the rat race using real estate, where we

move at the speed of instruction, where we move faster than our doubts, where we have no fear of competition, because we are the competition that they are afraid of. As evidenced by what you've heard so far, the epic investors are making money moves, and I have one of those epic investors on the phone today where we first met, I think was at an epic intensive, probably three years ago or so. And thank you to Ash for letting that out of the bag about the price. I did charter that for some special guests and my team and I've reserved some space for the VIPs. So when you purchase a VIP ticket to the Epic Intensive that automatically puts you on the list, it's going to be a lot of fun. Anyway, our guest, he's been making some serious

money moves of his own and I invited him to share with you exactly how he's doing it. So please help me welcome to the show, Mr. Greg Helbeck. Greg, welcome to Epic Real Estate Investing. Thank you so much for having me, Matt. This is the first real estate podcast I've ever heard. So to be a guest is truly an honor. It's, I guess, a game full circle. Nice. No, and that's that kind of why you're here, because you had shared a story with me or a testimonial with me. Just totally unsolicited. I just got an email from you out of the blue one day. And I have a little bit of it here. Now, go ahead and read it. Why not? It says right around three years ago, I started listening to your podcast. I remember I was at a dead end

job cutting weeds for $10 an hour. You were explaining how to invest in real estate. And it seemed so distant to me because I was a broke 20 year old in the middle of college with no plan or direction. Your podcast planted the seed in me to make the decision to become a full-time real estate investor. And I'm proud to say three years later, that decision has changed my life. And it goes on. And basically the big quote out there was, I'm doing two to four deals per month and netting $25,000 to $30,000 per wholesale deal. You are living in Los Angeles.

You're running your business virtually. And I just wanted to bring you on and, you know, congratulate you in person. and I know we met in person a while back at the Epic Intensive. That was a pleasure. Give me a little bit of how it started. So you listened to a podcast, the seed was planned. You came to the Epic Intensive and boom, I didn't hear from you for a while. But then all of a sudden you start appearing everywhere on social media and you're showing checks and you're standing in front of rooms and you're doing an amazing thing.

So tell me what happened. Thanks, thanks. So yeah, so I got started when I was really young, I was 20 years old. I was coming off a hockey career and I wanted to play professionally and it never worked out. So I had to kind of go to school and then kind of face reality. So I remember I was, I had a summer job. It was kind of like a contracting job. I would go cut weeds like on my own time.

Then the guy would pay me in cash. And I remember, you know, when I was cutting these weeds, I was like, I want to learn how to, you know, make some money. You know, I don't want to have a job my whole life. And I never liked having a job. So I discovered the epic real estate investing show, ironically. And I remember listening to like your first episodes and like you're talking about how to like wholesale and flip contracts and all that.

It just really appealed to me. So I listened to a bunch of podcasts, your show, Sean Terry's show. Then I went to a little like free event, you know, I guess, you know, those seminars they kind of travel around from city to city. Went to one of those joined like the, you know, the low level package or whatever, spent a couple thousand bucks, got my foot in the door, just some high level education. And I just kind of hit the ground running, you know, in the beginning. I was really young at the time, 20 years old, no one would take me seriously.

And then after like nine months, I got my first deal. and then after that it sort of snowballed. I started doing more and more deals consistently, but I still didn't have like that much experience or capital. A year and a half after, actually more like two years after that, I started to get pretty good at marketing and like negotiating. So then I started to, you know, make bigger spreads in my New York market. And then eventually I started to go into other markets and do it remotely.

So I jumped into the Texas market, the Dallas market, to be specific, a couple of years ago and started figuring out how to do it kind of virtually because New York, where I'm from originally, I was running into some problems with attorneys and stuff like that. So I wanted to kind of spread out my strategy and go into some title company state so I don't have to deal with all the BS. So fast forward to today, you know, I'm buying still like two to four properties a month. I'm not only wholesaling now. I'm actually doing some more just kind of closing on them, doing some light renovation and then getting it back on the market. Just some of those markets, we can do that and make more spreads. And then I'm looking more into

rentals. So that's kind of a high level overview for me. Nice. So there, yeah, there's a bunch of stuff that I want to touch on. And, you know, we're running a pilot program right now where we're helping people get their very first deal. And you shared with, just shared with me that it took you nine months to get that first deal. What did those nine months look like and what eventually switched to where it popped? Sure. No, it's great question. So I wasn't very consistent in the beginning and I didn't have the right expectations because I didn't have the experience or, you know, I didn't have a track record or anything. So like the learning curve, was tough in the beginning just because I didn't know what I didn't know. And I could have been much more consistent and I should have tracked my activities better than I did because I was just kind of going out and running around like a chick on my head cut off and I wasn't really like measuring anything or seeing what was working. So I think if I was a little bit more effective, and what I was doing was I was just putting out bandit signs and I was calling on like Craigslist

because that's really all I could do. I was handwriting letters too. I was doing that. That was rough. But, you know, basically, what was the question more time? Was it was it what did I do to get those deals or how did like I stick through it to get to the. Yeah, so you're already answered a little bit. So it took you nine months because you admitted that you weren't, you were inconsistent. You weren't really tracking your, your activities. And then you're working bandit signs, Craigslist, and yellow letters.

So what actually, what popped for you first? It was a bandit sign. So I started to put them out more consistently. And then I got one good call. And I actually partnered up with another investor who was experienced because I was so who I had no buyers or anything. And I said, hey, man, I think I have a deal. he said, yep, you got a deal.

He said, let's partner on it. I'll sell it to my buyers. We'll do a JV agreement and we'll split it. And I'll show you exactly how this works. That was like the key because of the value I got from him showing me what to do was totally worth splitting the deal 50-50. So it was off a ban on a sign, lady call. There was an absentee owner, you know, some tenant issues, vicious dogs in the house.

And she sold it to us. We found a buyer and signed the contract. And it was like crazy because I took action for so long, you know, like nine months and I didn't make any money right away. And so I'm like, you know, when I actually got my first check, I was like, oh, my God, you can make money in this business. That's interesting, you know, and, you know, then from there, kind of snowballed. So, and just from experience of doing this for the past decade and working with people trying to get their first deal, a lot of them quit well before nine months. What was it about you that helped you persevere?

Yeah, so this is something that was key for me, and I didn't share this in the beginning. When I went to that real estate seminar when I, after listening to podcasts, I made the decision that day I was going to be successful, no matter what. what. I said, I'm going to make this work. This is going to work out. It might not. It's not going to be easy. It's not going to be a walk in the park. But I said, I am going to be a real estate investor. This is what I'm going to do because I know from your show, more millionaires have been created in real estate than any other industry like combined. I knew it would work. And I had a, you know, I just, I made the decision. It was going to work out. Like I wasn't wishy-washy about it. I wasn't like, oh, well, I'm going to dabble. I'm going to try. And then if it doesn't work out,

maybe I'll be an internet marketer, I'll be a stock trader. I'm like, no, I'm doing this. I'm going to be a real estate investor, this is going to work out eventually. And, you know, the harder it got, the more I would persist, because the thing is, and this is, I think for new people listening, this will be very helpful. The harder it was in the beginning, the more excited I almost got, because I knew that most people would not persist like me. Because I'm like, okay, if I keep putting these signs out, most people are going to quit. So if I just keep doing this, eventually something will stick. I'll get the check. It'll be worth it. And then it'll get easier as I have more experience. So the harder it got, the more persistent I became because I knew that was almost like the barrier to entry because

most people have the wrong expectations going in and they well said have you read the book the dip oh you talked about that book on yeah it's required reading in the in the follow-through crew and it says exactly that oh man that book you mentioned that book I read it at like the perfect time I remember I was like in my crappy car that I could barely afford reading this thing like oh well I'm in the middle of this thing right now so I figure I might as well get out of it and my goodness it certainly is a powerful book, especially if you're getting any, like, business endeavor when you have no experience. It's like, right?

It's like amazing book. It's so short, too, short and sweet book. Yeah, no, it's great. And it's inspiring because it's kind of like when things get rough and you're experiencing a lot of resistance, you know that's when your competition is quitting. And so you get excited about that because they're quitting, but I'm still going. And it popped for you. So that took nine months or so.

So it's been smooth sailing ever since, right? Yeah. Every day, it's like a home run after home run. No issues ever pop up. Right. So let's make that leap from the first to the second deal. So how did the mindset shift and how did that one happen? Yeah, so it was proof of concept first.

So I saw that it worked because in the beginning, I think a lot of new investors, they struggle because they don't have the track record with themselves or basically with themselves. They don't know what works. So they're like, oh, well, I don't know. Like I've never done this before. Like they think they see people on the internet. They see people, their friends may be doing it.

it. They go to RIA meetings. They see other people doing it, but they still, for some reason, they can't wrap their heads around the fact that they can do it until they actually make the deal happen. So the second deal, I knew that it would work, and I knew that I had to be consistent with my marketing. And you have that daily success report that I used to use. I still use a variation of it now, but I just kind of put my own spin on it. And I just started to get more consistent. And I think that was, it was from another band sign, actually, like in terms of the other deal, I just put another sign out, similar situation. There was actually almost identical. I brought another investor into that one because this was a very expensive area in New York.

I didn't have enough money to put the deposit down. So I basically wholesale it to a guy who does like 10 deals a month. And then he helped me with the deposit and then the assignment agreement. But I brought another investor in, wholesale them in the house, office sign. And then when I got two of them, this was a while ago now, I was like, okay, this is legit. Like, you know, this is real. First one wasn't a fluke. Yeah, it was not a fluke.

And then from there, I just started to become a student of marketing and negotiation and stuff like that. Fantastic. Great story. And I know that's going to resonate with a lot of people because a lot of people were in that position and are in that position. Let's see. Okay, so you were in New York.

And you just mentioned it was kind of an expensive area. And you decided to venture out. So tell me about that transition. Totally, totally. And I like how you brought that up because there's a lot of people who might be in the New York market with Trieste area. And it's definitely a great market,

but it is a little different. I still buy there today, but I buy in different markets as well, the offset. So originally, so in New York, it's an expensive area. And the thing in New York that you have to just watch out for and just know is that when you're doing business in that state, it is an attorney state, which means that you have to use attorneys on the seller side and on the buyer side to facilitate transactions. So the reason that can be an issue sometimes is that if the seller has an attorney and they, you know, are hard to deal with, it makes the whole entire transaction just a little bit more complicated. It still works. It's totally still, you know, legit in New York.

But it slowed down my sales cycle. So the reason I had to venture out is because my sales cycle was very long because it would take us two or three weeks to get a contract in from their attorney. And then I still had marketing going out. And I'm like, oh, my God, like this is not, I can't just contract in the house. I have to have their attorney send the contract. Then they're going to strike through all these things and they're going to get the assignment clause out of there and all this.

So I said, okay, I'm going to have to go into a market where there's a title company state where I don't have to worry about attorneys and where there's enough demand for me to, you know, do enough marketing to get the deal flow I want to get. So I decided to go into Dallas. I just kind of picked it randomly. I knew there was a good area. There's a lot of activity in there, buy and hold, buy. That was a random choice for you. It was pretty like random. Like I didn't, like, I knew it was a good market, but like I wasn't like had it didn't have any like fixations on Dallas. I said, this is a market where I'm going to try it. You know, it seems like it's a good market. I know there's a lot of investors here. I can sell properties if I get, you know,

good deals. And, you know, I just started marketing down there. So I jumped into Dallas, basically to offset my long sales cycle in New York. And the way I was marketing down there is I was doing a lot of, like Larry Higgins style, like skip tracing deals, going after a lot of like tough properties with title issues, like vacant houses, things like that. And I started pursuing properties like that down in Texas. And, you know, I was able to kind of grow that business, that side of my business, sorry. And I get that to, you know, some, you know, two to three properties a month down there and I was doing that all virtually so then I kind of like to rewind the clocks I remember I did my first virtual deal and I never saw the house I never met the seller and it was like a

$30,000 wholesale fee and I you know was like oh my god like this is great I saw this thing and then from there it was like a light bulb went off and I started doing it more and more and more but the main reason I went to Texas is just to get out of the New York lawyer stuff and have a little bit more consistency with my cash flow within my company very good so you picked Dallas and you you did some skip tracing and look for properties with title issues. Did you call them or did you mail them? How did you contact them? Yeah.

So the mailing is good. I still like mail. It's great. But with some of those challenging properties with title issues, it's a lot of the times if you mail them, ironically, they'll get postcards. They don't think they can sell this house.

For some reason, they inherited the house. They don't think they can do anything with it. So you have to, a lot of times pick up the phone and call these people. It's usually the heirs of these people. And you have to say, listen, you know, I identified a property, you know, I'm not sure if you're the owner or not,

but it looks like you might be. There's an opportunity. I can buy this home off you and solve your problem, get you some cash. Usually these properties are in default, which means that either the taxes are delinquent or the mortgage is delinquent. So it's going to get, you know, taken anyway eventually. And then you offer help. You say, hey, listen, I'll work with you. You know, if there's title issues, I'll help you walk through those. So if you're open to selling grade, if not, no sweat. So I was approaching them over the phone because a lot of times they're a little surprise. Sometimes they own this property. They thought the bank took it or the county owns it or my mother's estate was a mess. I can't deal with that anymore. And they just gave up on these

properties. And meanwhile, they're free and clear. And they're just sitting there. And you're like, oh my God, if I can solve this problem. Number one, I can get a good deal. Number two, I can help this person get some money they probably weren't expecting. Nice. Sweet. Okay. So you got the first one and they were like, cool. And you did all of the, all the paperwork, the transaction all through what, the mail, the internet, how'd that go? DocuSign, yeah. So Docs, sign and the title company down in Dallas, they were pretty cool. And yeah, so it was all electronically.

And then the thing, too, going virtual that gives some advice to people, and I'm sure, you know, you're a virtual investor, so you know this, having good boots on the ground is key. I mean, if you don't have boots on the ground, it's obviously possible, but it's a little bit more difficult. So whether that's an employee or whether that's someone you're JVing with, you need to have somebody on the ground who can go to the property, if need be, who can meet with people who maybe aren't familiar with DocuSign, maybe they're elderly and they don't have a computer. So you need to have the boots on the ground in order to be efficient, in my opinion,

when you're working with you. Yeah, I agree. And by the way, if you like the sound of starting a virtual wholesaling business, you might be interested in the virtual wholesaling course. Two of my students put together. It's getting ready to open up shortly. You can take a look over at wholesalingvirtually.com. There's a registration page there that right now it's got some information. If you like what you see, join us. And they've kind of said the same thing. That's what made me think of it, is that the boots on the ground are key. So you did the first deal, and I discovered this too, kind of a hard way, but you did the first deal without boots on the ground. What started to happen where you recognized that you needed boots on the ground? Yeah. So the first one,

the first one really, it was like, I just kind of did everything. And I just, was it not like, you know, like the house was there, but like I wasn't there. So if something went wrong, I was like, oh my God, like if I have to get out of plane or then I have to call somebody, it was just kind of chaos. So I said, you know what, let me find. And the way I did it was I, you know, made a strategic partnership with somebody, right? We're not like formal LLC partners, but we just do deals on a case-by-case basis. So the first one I was just kind of like, it was just overwhelming because there's so many moving parts.

And you're like, that one happened to work out. But if it didn't, I would have cost myself a deal just because I didn't have boots on the ground. So second one, it was like, okay, I think the guy I partnered with, he had to meet the seller in person because she didn't have a computer. So he, you know, signed it up. He did all the logistical stuff, and he sold it. And I just generated a lead, negotiated it on the phone. And then he signed the contract. And I probably had like maybe an hour of my time invested.

And, you know, we made a really good wholesale fee on that one too. And I was like, wow, if I can just focus. And the key for me was like, if I can just focus on what I'm good at, right, which is producing quality leads. And then speaking to people who I can help and making them an offer on the phone and negotiating, which is something I've studied a lot and worked on a lot, you know, I can have someone else do what they're good at, Right? Stuff that I'm not that great at. Logistical transaction coordination, day-to-day stuff. I'm just not that kind of person. I'm not like a systems guy. So I started to realize that the more I can kind of stay in my zone and the more I can do the

revenue-generating activities, I can have someone else do the other end of the business. And then I can live wherever I want and then he can deal with the stuff that he wants to deal with the logistical stuff and it could be a good synergistic partnership. Right. So you're in New York. You got a tough market. You went virtually to look for greener pastures, so to speak. You somewhat found them, but you've continued to branch out. What has caused you to look into other markets? Yeah, so my big thing now, like going back to like doing the virtual thing, I still do that, but I actually kind of shifted a little bit more back into the New York area. I live in California now, but I go back to New York quite often for some real.

Is, you know, as I started wholesaling and getting more, you know, capital and experience, I started to realize that if I can close on some of these properties, especially in New York, I can five X to spread, like hands down five X to spread. And we did it on a couple deals where we made like giant, like very big profits. And I was like, oh my God, like this is insane. Like if I just do like two of these a month, I mean, I can like do two of these a month. That's better than doing like four in Texas. So now I'm starting to shift my business to more of closing on properties and either doing a fix and flip or a wholesale, especially in higher end markets, the higher end area in New York. And another thing that I'm looking into are actually working on a deal right now is actually

getting a little bit more into almost like rezoning kind of deals. So like right now we're buying a property. It's a single family home. It's on a huge lot. And we're actually in the process of wholesaling it to a developer with like a huge spread. And he's going to take that and he's going to subdivide those lots. And the crazy thing about that is we're giving the seller retail. We're giving them what they want for the house because we know we can sell that on the back end. Like for whatever we have in contract for plus like a hundred something thousand dollar spread because we're buying it on one basis and we're selling it on a completely different basis on like a subdivision. deal. So as I get a little bit more experience, I'm starting to do more of those types of,

you know, bigger deals so I can save more capital to then buy more, you know, cash swing properties. Sweet. It's funny, the pattern I started to recognize it because the two students that have put this wholesaling course together, they kind of have a very similar story. And if you want to take a look at that, it's at wholesalingvirtually.com. But they both went virtual because they felt their markets were tough. Yeah. And now they both have returned to their markets. And And now they got two. They've maintained the virtual one, but now they're back in their home land. And it's funny.

There's no place like home, man. It's funny. I move out of the way to San Diego. I love it out here. It's like paradise. But I still go back to New York like once a month because for the business. And then like, it's where my family and friends are. Like, it's like, oh, man, like, it's cool to visit them.

There's no place like home. Right. But the point being is that they thought what they were trying to do didn't work in their home market. And so that's why they went elsewhere. And they realized, hey, wait a minute, there's houses right here right down the street where I live. Right? That's so funny. Yeah, because we had, it's funny you said that because we've done some great properties in Dallas.

I've done pretty well there. But we've also had some just like decent deals, nothing crazy. And in New York, we did like two properties in like two months. And like the margins we made on these things by closing on them were like just way, way bigger than I've ever seen. And I'm just like, it was like a bell was going off in my head. I go, what if I just do like lower volume and just take these to the finish line and I can just do it here? And then I make way more money. And I know the area so well.

And I was just like, wow, look at that. A little bell went off of my head. So it's funny how it all comes around full circle, you know. Totally, totally. What's your best source for off-market deals at the moment? Oh, great question. Two of them. I got three of, can I give three?

Yes. All right. I'm not sure nobody will be mad at you for doing that. So number one is going after these tougher properties. When I say tougher properties, I mean a lot of your return mail. So like when you get postcards back in the mail and they say vacant on them. and obviously like they didn't go to the house for a reason because they're vacant, going after those types of properties,

vacant houses that are on multiple lists. A lot of the times these sellers aren't even alive and they look like they're alive on paper, but when you actually run a skip trace report, they're deceased. So now that's basically a probate lead that no one knows about. And so when you contact those, those airs, there's not that many people speaking to those other sellers,

maybe one or two, but not like 10. So skip tracing, you know, vacant houses is my first one. Second strategy, I still love, and it can get a little expensive,

but it's just consistent as direct mail. Nitch lists to, you know, vacant lists to tax-linkment lists, and then to also lists where I like the area. So like zip codes that I know I can buy and hold or zip codes where it's high-end, direct mail to specific lists. And the third one, I just, it just can't seem to go away is banate signs. I mean, you put those bandit signs out consistently, and I stopped doing them for a while once I moved out here.

But the quality, the type of, the thing I like about banon signs is that they are a little, you know, I guess, I don't know the word. for it. They're a little just kind of maybe ugly to put out or whatever, but the types of leads that you're getting from a bandit sign, you're getting an inbound lead. They're calling you. They're caught, you know what I mean? So you're getting more motivation usually on ban at signs. So it's almost like an SEO lead where they're seeking you out and then they're raising their hands and saying, hey, I need some help. So ban it signs, direct mail and then skip tracing a lot of, you know, lists, you know, vacant lists, tax link. Right. Right. Those are my three. I always thought,

who in the world would call this sign, someone that really needs a solution. Exactly. You get those leads, and you're not going to get as many leads, most likely. Like, I like direct mail because I can say if I sent 10,000 units, I'm going to get a half percent response rate. I'm going to get 30 leads and buy two contracts or whatever. Bannon signs are like, hmm, put out 50 signs. Hopefully I get some calls out of those calls. They're going to get some leads out of those leads. There's going to be some offers, and you know the drill.

So those are my three, man. They're just tried and true. Good. They come up regularly. What trend are you seeing in your business and how is it changing the way you operate? Yeah. So in my business right now, I read a book. I want your listeners to definitely check it out if you haven't listened to or read it to. It's called Confessions of a Real Estate Entrepreneur by Jim Randall. It's probably the best real estate book I've ever read. And really, the theme of that book that I got and it'll go into the trend I'm going to share is that if you can buy properties on one pricing strategy and then sell them on another pricing strategy, you can make a lot of money and a lot of the times you can beat out a lot of your competitors. And an example of that would be like, if you can buy, for example, an apartment building, right? Let's say you buy a three or four family, okay, and it's valued at a three or four family. And then you can take that apartment

building and convert it into condos and then sell those condos as individual units. You're going to sit on a multiple of the square footage. And now you just change the paradigm of the building. So that's stuff that I'm looking more into as I get a little bit more advanced into this business. So I think being a trendsetter, kind of trying to changing the paradigm of buildings, getting into rezones, things like that. I'm just trying to always have my mind open, but at the same time keeping my focus on what's working right now to like, you know, kind of try some different types of deals. And then, you know, some of those deals, you can hit it out of the park.

Like if we pull this land deal off and we sell this big, you know, lot to a builder and we make the spread, I'm going to think, wow, now this is something I can start to target and then I can, you know, start to do this more consistently. So just always being aware of how to really look at deals from different angles. And then sometimes you can look at a deal one way and then all your competitors are looking that at a completely different way. And then if you can, you know, buy that property, add the value and resell it, you can a lot of the times pay more than other people because you're doing a completely different strategy than the other guys were trying to do because they're just trying to offer 50 cents

on the dollar. Absolutely. Key. Get it under contract so you can do that type of due diligence, right? Pied up with a contingency. That's the thing. He has a whole course with a contingency. And yeah, do your homework. Do the more homework, the better. You can't go wrong. Sweet. What has been the biggest win you've had in the last 12 months? like financial win or like just like any business or anything yeah your business win okay um probably hitting a specific uh business like i had a a number i wanted to hit um you know financially and i it was actually it was a little bit higher than i thought like i had it i said it at one number and then my buddy was like dude you got to crank that up a little bit come on me serious and i'm

like all right fine whatever and i did it and i like hit the goal like super early like like three or four months before the year was over. And it just kind of, the reason it was the biggest win, and it wasn't from one specific deal. It was from the consistency of these deals is because it showed me that I can set a goal, get focused on the goal, and then achieve the goal. And then that feedback loop fires back saying, wow, if I can set my goal and do that and I can do that three months early, well, I can set a higher goal next time and I can learn and grow and evolve, and then I can just keep doing that over and over again. So it's probably setting my personal income goal and then achieving it early. and then seeing that, like, realized, because I remember when I was first running it down,

it seemed too good to be true. I'm like, oh, I don't know if I could do that. Like, it's crazy. All the doubt comes in your head. And then when you actually do it and it becomes reality, it's like, oh, my God, like I can do anything, you know, within reason. Right. Well, they say success is a terrible teacher. So what has been your biggest mistake in the last 12 months? It's actually the same thing. So after I hit that goal. That happens. That's funny. I was like smiling when you said that. I'm like, oh, God. So I hit that goal, move to Cal California, and I didn't set any more goals.

Like, I was just like, I thought I was the man. Look at me. I'm in La Jolla, blah, blah, blah. And I was, I was like miserable. Like, it wasn't like depressed or anything, but I was completely miserable. I was so unmotivated. Like, I was like, oh, now what? You know, I could set and achieve these goals.

And I just felt very empty. And the reason I felt empty is because my life was so out of balance. All I cared about with these business goals. And they were good, you know, for a lot of things. But they were really bad because my personal life, my relationships, just just doing the things that matter. like calling my parents consistently and just meeting and network people. It was so out of balance and I was all business and it showed me like no matter how much money I make, like I need to have

other areas of my life be just as important. So I need to be a good person. I need to be a giver. I need to be a contributor. I need to be a good brother, a good son, right? And that goal, you know, financially was good, but it showed me that I had to really get other areas in my life in balance. And now I have like, you know, my weekly checklist. It's like there's other things on there besides business, like, you know, go give back to somebody, go help a new investor out, go call your grandparents, things like that that I was not doing. And it was like, oh my God, dude, what do you want all this money for it, right? Like to just be a miserable dude, achieving goals. So that was a great lesson. It was tough to learn, but now it's like it changed the way I

think about everything. Yeah, it's, it's easy for entrepreneurs to fall into that trap because you become so consumed and it's no longer a 40-hour work week. It's pretty much 24 hours a day because you're always thinking about it. Yeah, exactly. And it's easy to get detached from the things that are outside of the business, right? Exactly. It's like, why do we do all these things? And I like this stuff. I think real estate investing is fun.

So for me, it's not like work. Still, I had to really just shape up the other areas in my life because they were out of balance. And yeah, it was a challenge. And I'm still working on it today. But I think it was definitely a good thing that happened. And I'm really, like, I'm grateful that I was aware of it. Like, I could have been like, oh, whatever.

Like, I don't need that. But I was like, no, I need to make a change. And I made the commitment to make the change. And now a lot of things have improved. That's fantastic. What's in the future that has you, most excited and why. Yeah, definitely just kind of growing my business and getting into more like bigger advanced deals, I'd say, because that confessions of a real estate entrepreneur book

really sparked my interest in a little bit more commercial real estate, bigger stuff, just kind of thinking, thinking, you know, into more advanced deals. So I really want to start to get myself into more bigger deals on my goal this year is to do at least one commercial deal, buy and sell it or buy and hold it. So really I'm looking to scale my business like on the commercial side and get into that that realm of the business. And I just kind of keep learning growing and making sure that my big thing for me is like working on myself, right? Like there's a, that Jim Rone quote.

Like if you work hard at your job, you'll make a living. If you work hard on yourself, you'll make a fortune. Just keep working on myself, increasing my business and also growing my podcast. I just started a podcast a couple weeks ago. Oh, fantastic.

On 10 outs. So, what's the name of the podcast? Called Pave the Way podcast. Pave the way. Doesn't sound like it might be exclusively real estate. Uh, no, yeah. So it's, it's real estate business and entrepreneurship. So, um, you know, over the last couple of years, I was able to, you know, form a pretty cool network, a group of people. And, uh, you know, I, I learned a lot from them. And I, you know, as I grew my network, I started reaching

out and getting interviews going. So I figured I've launched a show. And it's really geared for people who are maybe my age, maybe they're in their young 20s, mid-20s and they, uh, they want to figure out how to do this kind of stuff, right? Because a lot of people my age, they're just in college. They've never heard of this stuff. So I really, I'm using that show as a way to kind of give back. And yeah, that's been fun. You know, the whole. you know, the whole podcasting thing. It was a big learning curve, but now I'm starting to get the hang of it. So, yeah, I've been looking forward to doing those weekly shows.

Sweet. So, yeah, check out Pave the Way podcast, available wherever podcasts are played. Is that right? Yeah, I'd say iTunes is the best go. Totally. Yeah, iTunes, yeah. Totally. Perfect.

All righty. So if anyone wanted to get in touch with you, what would be the best way for them to do that, Greg? Sure, sure. Yeah, they can reach me on Instagram at Grego, G-G-R-E-O, underscore 37. Once again, that's Grego underscore 37. Or they could email me at Greg at velocityhousebuyers.com. That's my real estate company, Greg, G-R-E-G at Velocityhousebuyers.com. We're happy to help them any way I can. Super. And speaking of giving back and helping, I've got this course coming up. I've got two students that both seven-figure earners. I think one of them is about to approach eight. He's really crushing it.

Neither of them have any aspirations to become a guru, but they kind of had this need to give back as well. And they asked me to come and help them put this together and host it for them. It's at wholesalingvirtually.com, we've got a private Facebook group that we're going to set up for it. Would it be cool if I added you to that, Greg, and you could chime in and support the students of that course? Absolutely. I'd love to help many a way I can for sure. Perfect. Yeah, I can tell by the way you're speaking and after talking to them, you guys are really doing it and you've got it down and you've been successful in virtual markets.

And it's something a lot of people look into very much for the same reason that you did. They all have a little bit different reasons for their home market as to why they, why they're looking outside. I've always just tried to discourage people because they always come back home, right? But if they're going to do it, I want to make sure they got good advice and they get it done right. And they don't fall for one of those push button things that you see out there. Like, get on the couch, eat Cheetos and watch your mailbox fill up. Yeah.

Thank you for accepting that invitation. So if you'd like to take a look at that, it's at wholesaling virtually. It's just kind of a coincidence that these two subjects coincide and aligned. So it just seems natural to talk about it. And the whole thing with the virtual is like even like I did it too because I wanted to move to California, right? So I needed to have my business to be virtual. And I'm like, I might as well go into Texas too and not have to worry about these lawyers

for now. But the thing is funny. Like it is cool to be able to do it. It's almost like what's like the, you know, everyone wants to be their own boss so they they can choose to work, not have to work. It's like the virtual thing. It's cool because you can do it remotely if you want to. So if you want to live in Hawaii, you can live in Hawaii and do.

your deals, but then if you don't want it, you can just go back to your own market. So it's kind of like you have to get that it, just scratch that itch. And then once you do it, you're like, all right, should I stay here or should I not do this? So it's kind of like something you have to check off, at least for me it was. Right. Yeah, no, you've got to satisfy your curiosity and scratch that it's right. That's it. Greg, it's been an absolute pleasure. Good luck with your podcast. Everybody go check out Greg's podcast, Pave the Way podcast. Super good dude. I wouldn't have had him on the show unless he was. Let's do this again. Stay in touch. Absolutely, man. It's been an honor to be on your show. It's so funny.

Being a guest on your show, I'm really honored because this is the first podcast I've listened to be a guest three and a half years later. It's like mind-blowing, man, because I remember when I first met you in person, I'm like, oh, my God, it's Matt. Now we're talking. Now we're friends. So it's funny, man. So I really, I'm really grateful for this opportunity for sure. You bet. Thanks, partner.

Good luck to you. All righty. So until next week, God bless to your success. I'm Matt Terrio. Living the Dream. Take care. Yeah, yeah, we got the cash flow. Yeah, yeah, we got the cash flow.

Yeah, yeah, we got the cash flow. You didn't know, home boy, we got the cash flow. This podcast is a part of the C-suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c-sweetradio.com.