The Science of Flipping - Episode 162: Data is King with Jesse Burrell – Real Estate Interview

Episode Date: March 11, 2020

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Welcome to the Science of Flipping podcast. I'm your host, Justin Colby. Yo, yo, what up Science of Flipping Family. What is going on, everybody? I am here with a very special guest. If you are watching this live in the group, make sure to ask questions, comment. If you're listening to this on iTunes, make sure that you are reaching out to me. If you're watching on YouTube, follow me on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and you're going to want to do the same with the gentleman I got on today. He is a competitor of mine here in the Phoenix market. But let me tell you, between him and Brent Daniels and myself and Jamil and Sean

Terry, we're all doing deals and we're all crushing it. And so this is a video and it's a training to talk to you about how he's done it because there is no such thing as competition. I want to introduce a friend of mine and a monster in the business, Jesse Burrell. What up, dude? What is going on? Thank you so much for having me on. I greatly appreciate it, brother. Dude, of course. I had to have you on. You've been around for so long. You've done so many deals. You've done it nationally. You're here still doing deals here in Phoenix. I just want the world to know what's going on with you and some of the systems and tools and strategies you've done over the last

however many years to make this go. And I know you're wholesaling and rehabbing. You're one of my better buyers for the rehab deals that I'm wholesaling too. And so how to give you a big shout out and get you onto this training and, and, um, let people know what's going on with you, dude. Yeah. I mean, do you want me to start with like what's working now or all this stuff I've done? I'd say give everyone a little, little heads up of what you've done over the years and kind of what you're currently doing.

Okay. Well, uh, I've been doing this for about six years now, which feels like 20 years in any other business. I'm sure you get to 12, wait till I'm 13 years, baby. See this lack of hair. There's a reason. I mean, I've probably done it all. We, um, we started, uh, six years ago with mail and then mail got mail and bandit signs. I probably started just like a lot of people did six years ago. And that worked a little bit.

And then Phoenix, Sean Terry blew up Phoenix and everybody had to be a wholesaler in Phoenix. And our return started going away and we pivoted quickly to, uh, PPC before PPC was too popular. But by the way, dude, I'm going to stop you right there because I'm a huge marketing guy.

Like if you, if people are listening and following me, whether it's on YouTube or Instagram, they know all I talk about is marketing. Cause that's all our businesses, bro. Like you think the same way. I think we're in the marketing business.

We're in the sales business. And if we can do good by people, we went on a big way, but you've been always ahead of the curve in a way that you know i always do as well i try to be ahead of the curve and it's incredible because that's the success you've had is because you think that way right like ppc now is almost impossible in the like in phoenix it is very difficult right yeah 100 and so you've been able to take the same mindset and this is again why i wanted you on here is probably people are probably tired of hearing me say marketing,

marketing, marketing. But I'm glad you're saying this. And this is really what cut your teeth. Yeah. And the best advice I can give everybody on here, because I'm going to kind of go through rest of what I've done. It's pivoting, you have to constantly be pivoting. If you're bullish on a marketing method, because it's your comfort zone, you're going to fail or not necessarily fail, but your marketing is going to go through the roof and your margins are going to go way down. So, you know, then it goes to PPC. PPC gets competitive. Next we're into cold calling and then cold calling gets competitive, which we still do. Then I was, I was texting three years

ago when everybody now is just starting to get into it. So, I mean, it was absolutely incredible to where, I mean, I just sent out texts and you had no competition. I mean, we're locking up 10 deals a month off of a $3,000 budget. You're like, holy hell, like this is crazy. And then now texting has gotten more popular. So it's kind of gotten to the point where there's so many resources now. It's just knowing how to do it properly and spending your marketing dollars wisely. So we're currently just texting ringless voicemails and cold calling. That's all our wholesale operation does. We don't do PPC. We don't do mail and we don't do bandit signs i love it because i think and i know you know we're both in phoenix and i'm in your office and we exchange a lot of you know

similar strategies and try to always help each other out but i'm a massive advocate right so i still do ppc i do it in a different model uh it's a lot more like i'm in the rogue areas right where it's not just maricopa county so i'm on the outskirts. But I'm a massive advocate of cold calling, text messaging. And I do kind of voicemail drops, same kind of idea, because you just get to hit everybody all the time. I mean, the volume of the amount of people you can hit, and keeping your costs down, right? So if you're out there, if you're, you know, a beginner, if you're maybe struggling to get your first deal, or maybe you got to figure out how to get more than one deal a month, you know, Jesse and I are not here to tell you to go spend a

bunch of money on PPC or direct mail. We would actually advise you to go the other way, which is going to be cold call, text message, voicemail drop, because the cost is so much cheaper, right? I mean, quite literally, you know, $50, $60 per lead versus $250 a lead. Yeah, but what, like you're, as you're saying, you're doing PPC still, I know people that are successful with mail still PPC, it's just, when you're just getting started, I would say cold calling, texting, and RVM is the best because, as you said, the cheapest lead source. But I'm not saying that don't do those things. I'm saying test, split test, try again. And each market's a little bit different. So something may work in one market that doesn't work in another too. 100%. I'm glad you brought that up because I know

your background. I know you've done deals in 30, 40 states across the nation. I know you've tested a lot and so have I. I would tell you what works for someone in Phoenix or works for us in Phoenix may or may not work for someone in Salt Lake City, Utah or vice versa. I have a private coaching client of mine. I have a handful of private coaching clients that work directly with me. Their success ratio on PPC crushes what I can get in Phoenix. So I can't go out there and say, oh, PPC doesn't work. Because they are working in South Carolina.

That's because there's not as much competition. And that's okay. So I think that point is so valid. Like even though you may follow me and listen to me or Jesse, like if you're in a market and you're finding success in direct mail, keep doing direct mail, right? Absolutely.

For you to get a three X return on your marketing, which is every dollar I spend, I need three back. And if you can get that or close to it, keep the strategy going, right? Just, just add more. Yeah. Just, you could add another strategy too. So it's just kind of crazy because there's just so many different ways to cut your teeth with marketing. And, and even like, so I could be, I tested cold calling in Louisville a couple of years ago. And the problem with that was we were cold calling home and these people

weren't trained to be cold called by wholesalers. So they're like, well, I don't understand my house isn't for sale. And we're like, yeah, but, but we want to buy it. And they're like, yeah, this, this is a scam click. And I was just like, what the hell? So it's like in Phoenix, the thing I love the most is sellers are trained to know if they don't want to put it on the MLS that they could get a cash offer from a real estate investor or wholesaler. And that's why I think that we're able to all succeed is because, uh, you know, we've trained homeowners to sell to us and it's incredible.

It is. I mean, it's a pro and a con, right? Because there's so many of us. So you're hitting them up. Brent's hitting them up. Sean's hitting them up. I mean, it's just like, but they are trained. I mean, I literally had a conversation yesterday with a seller and said, there was a guy here yesterday before you, you're now talking to me. I have open door coming in tomorrow. Like it's just, it's nonstop. And so it's all about the accuracy of your data. You talked about you were cold calling years ago. I started cold calling way before, like I was literally going on, this is 2007, right? So I was going on realtor.com, finding realtors that have listings and calling them one by one on my little old cell phone

saying, Hey, I saw your listing. It's not what I'm looking for. Do you have anything yet to be listed that maybe I can put an offer in on? And nowadays, between, you know, Mojo cells and text messages services and, you know, all the other call tools and everything else that you can go so far and so wide. It's just incredible. And so what were you doing years ago when you were cold calling before all of this incredible services have come to light? I mean, I wasn't doing it back when you were. Are you calling me old, bro? Are you calling me old?

I'm calling you experienced. That's it. My God. So, I mean, we had most of the of the tools. Um, it was just, it wasn't as accessible as it is now with like lists were harder to find, but yeah, I mean, we were using Mojo and, you know, I was pulling tax defaults, absentee lists, vacants lists, and, you know, just cold calling, scripting them through it.

Kind of pretty much similar to what people are doing today, but now it's just, you know, there's so many different tools and features. And like the most important thing now is just when you're cold calling and texting and RVMs, like you're spending money on all these systems and tools, you need the best data and you need accurate data. And that's what's most important is it's not just, you know, people like, oh, it costs more because it's premium data, but you're wasting money on

your cold callers not calling the right people like if you think about it in a big picture you know spending a little an extra 500 bucks to get an extra deal or two a month that's that's 10 20 000 that you're giving up on buying bad data people totally look at it backwards and that's the biggest problem i've seen with a lot of new people investing in the proper data. 100%. I think I talked a lot about it is you get what you pay for, right? And trust me, before I was in a position like I am today, like, I would find the freest way including calling realtors on real time. Yeah, if you are going to spend any amount of money, you might as well get better results meaning like there are services out there god bless them that are selling skip tracing for like two cents

three cents four cents five cents six cents it's nonsense right like your accuracy is like 20 30 percent it's terrible i've used them by the way because i've i've been doing this so long and i needed to buy so much data. At some point you're like, Jesus, I'm buying, you know, a hundred thousand records a month. Yeah. Now there's just costs. So I'm like, how do I get it down? How do I expand this down? Oh, great. This only a hundred thousand cost me two grand. I win. And then you have like your contact ratio is horrible. Your actual lead ratio is even worse. And it's just you get what you pay for in that space.

And I don't care if you're texting. I don't care if you're cold calling. If you're going to get data, get accurate data, pay for good quality. Because if you call Jesse and I say, hey, is this Frank? Well, first of all, he doesn't know I'm calling. So I'm already the bad guy cold calling him. But now I'm saying, is this Frank? And I have cold calling him. But now I'm saying he's just frank and have the wrong data. Now Jesse's like, fuck off, dude.

Like, you don't even have the right data. So talk about a hurdle. It's already a hurdle to cold call and overcome those objections. Now you're giving bad names and bad information. Oh, do you live in 12th and Mid? No, I live in 456, you know, Sunny Street. Like, wrong dude. Right. So important important I can't harp on that enough and I'm glad you brought it up to the end of the day like you found such importance on this that you and a partner actually a while

ago decided to kind of create your own service right I? I mean, this is the importance you found on it. Yeah. I mean, Ivo and Annie are my partners on everything now, but it started off as, is he's always digs and digs and digs. And, you know, we were looking for data a while ago. A lot of people were getting kicked off TLO a few years ago. And I'm like, how can I find accurate data again? And he's like, like hey I have some and pretty much he just started selling me the data like I didn't care about the price I cared about getting a hold of the right people because the the cheap data you're talking about we've actually tested it the stuff that's two three four cents it's actually like eight to twelve percent accurate

so you know you're calling 10 people maybe, you have the right phone number. It's just, I mean, even enlarge that you're calling a thousand people. Eight percent is eight people. That's outrageous. Eight people. You called a thousand to get eight people that are accurate and you need roughly, you know, a hundred leads. Like it's terrible. So I couldn't agree more, dude.

And, and I'll be, you know, what you guys have done over at batch skip tracing.com is incredible. I mean, I've literally for years, this is how I built my business is cold calling. I'm huge on text messaging right now. Every video is about, you gotta be text messaging. It is the new hot strategy is the one that's working. Um, and I'll tell you guys, you guys have the best data. I'm telling you to your face, bro. I paid for it because it's good. And I pay because I want the accuracy. I want either if it's myself or my managers or my, my sales guys, like I want them to call someone or text someone with the right data. Yeah. I appreciate that. And we've worked,

we've worked really hard and where we're able to differentiate ourselves is, you know, we're pulling from multiple sources for top tier data. And most companies, if they're reselling it or even the big companies, it's just one data source. And we're able to aggregate through multiples, which my genius partner was able to figure out how to do.

And then we're getting an accuracy rate in between like 60 and 70%, which is unheard of. And it's just, it's incredible to like see all the success stories of people that hop on the phones or, and are able to get deals quickly because they're getting ahold of the right people. Yeah. The data I use with this is I'm finding that, you know, 90%, um, or I'm sorry, out of all the calls, I'm getting 10% contact, right? So now I'm calling someone picks up, but out of that, I'm getting like, like you said, like seven or 8% of those people, which is that 60 or 70% you're talking about is the right person. That's so valuable to me, right? I can't say there is anything more valuable. I can't harp on this enough, guys. If you're listening to this,

if you're watching this, you need to understand the value of your data because the cheap way is not the best way. I promise you time and time again that it's not. So I'm able to convert more. So I've gotten my conversions to the point on cold calling. I can convert one out of every 67 leads, which means I just need to do the math. How quickly can I get to those leads? So as I told you before, right? A thousand calls, I get 10% contact ratio. 10% is a hundred.

Out of that hundred, I have roughly seven or eight of those people that are now real leads, not contacts, real. Okay. So how quickly do I get those eight to 67 before I can get a deal? Right. And so it's a combination knowing your conversion ratio and what is actually coming in. How many leads are you actually driving in? And that really became a game changer for me, whatever,

about six years ago when i really invested my energy time and effort to build out like a model that was based around data and numbers because that's all it's like all math if you come down to it yeah it's all math like everyone's gonna win if you just put in the work and map out your numbers. Yeah. And then speaking, speaking of that and cold calling and accuracy, it's the same exact thing for text message. If you're putting someone's address in, reaching out to them via text and you have the wrong address, they're not going to talk to you even if they want to sell. So the importance of skip tracing is, is just as much or more important in a text message if you're text marketing.

That's right. Dude, and I really appreciate you being on here to echo what I say. I think, again, I say this all the time just because I'm a massive marketer. I mean, I still do direct mail. I still do PPC, but I continue to cold call and I continue to text message because of how powerful the surrounding of that person is, right? Is I'm hitting those people. Now PPC isn't quite as direct, but direct mail, cold calling and text message is direct to the person. Absolutely. It is about the accuracy of data. It is about finding the motivated seller. It is about, you know, am I talking to Jesse?

And if I am, how do I provide value to Jesse in that accuracy is incredibly valuable. Absolutely. I can't, I can't agree more. I think we're, I mean, that, that attributes to both of our success. Like we know our numbers, we understand the importance of getting the right data, using the right systems and how to track properly. It's marketing and systems and processes. If you can figure those things out, you're going to be very, very successful in this business. There's no doubt. And I know you are wholesaling and you're rehabbing and I know you're not just in Phoenix. And so tell me what's going on a little bit with you, you know, kind of big business wise. I know you're rocking and rolling. Yeah. So the wholesale side side we're actually currently just in phoenix just arizona phoenix

tucson flagstaff you know sedona or whatever and we're flipping mostly in phoenix we just picked up two flips in tucson i think we have you know i don't even know my annie runs the the flipping side i think we have like nine flips maybe. And then we're just doing about 10 deals a month pretty consistently. We're not trying to grow it to be completely honest with you. We're just, we have our, as you said, we know our numbers, we know our spend, we kind of know the return we're going to get. And, you know, having these data companies, our priorities kind of shifted to making sure we can help people get more deals. So we kind of have our wholesale and flipping operation on autopilot and, and kind of my new goal is to, you know,

help inform people on good data, good strategies. We're using good strategies you're using. And I've transitioned just as you have, cause you do some mentoring. I'm not mentoring or coaching, but I'm still able to share with people that use us what's working and what's not working. And that's, what's fun to me now. Oh yeah, dude. I love it. I mean, I love to be able to give back, right? I mean, that's part of my big mission is I genuinely have that as part of my strength, honestly, like my superhuman power is people and communicating and all that.

So I love giving back. So I'm glad that you're doing that as well. Listen, we talked prior to this because I use your data. As always, I try to hook up my listeners, my tribe. You've been gracious enough to give them a discount. The website is batched skip tracing.com. You created a promo code for everyone that comes through TSOF, right? And then we'll get a discount on the skip tracing guys. Again, the whole point of me teaching and training is whatever I'm using that is working. I want you to use because I know it. I can vouch for it. I can sit there and say, this is what to expect. I know the results. And so this is a company that I use to skip trace my data at very high accuracy rates. And so again, dude,

basket tracing.com promo code T S O F. I appreciate that because there's people that don't want to, you know, hook people up or whatever. And yeah, but you guys are the real deal. I mean, quite honestly, I was just in your office, what, two weeks ago, right? Yeah, absolutely. And we, we appreciate it. And you know, people that are great coaches like yourself, we want to make sure that, you know, you're able to give back to your students. And we're always trying to give, you know, give back as much as we can, too. And, you know, you're very protective of, you know, who you use and who you promote. So I appreciate you, you know, putting your trust in us as well. Of course, bro. Of course. It's really important that we give to the people that need it, right?

I mean, that's why I do these podcasts. I mean, I have rookies here, I have people that are aspiring to maybe even just start, then I have people that are looking to scale. And so I constantly go on these trainings and, you know, this podcast to say, guys, here's, you know, if it's operational, if it's a spreadsheet, if it's skip tracing, if it's a service I'm using, I want them to know what works. And so I really appreciate you spending some time with me here to help them understand. And by the way, Jesse and his entire team are great customer service. Like part of the reason why I love it is not just the accuracy, but they're like over the top with trying to help to make sure whatever questions you have.

So I appreciate how you've groomed your organization because it really means the world to someone like me, who's borderline tech, not savvy, right? You know? Yeah. So some of our, you know, it's our account reps or that's what we call them. They actually wholesaled for me. So like all these people are trained on wholesale. They understand our business so they can relay what's working for us to help people that, I mean, every person that skip traces with gets a phone call from them and says, how is your data? Is there anything you need help with? I know great lists to get, and we're not selling these lists.

We're just giving out resources for all the stuff that we do. Like our goal is to make sure these people succeed in our reps are trained and care. We hire the right people because I was like, if these people don't do great that are using our services and they fail, then we all fail. So they fully understand that their success comes first. And that's kind of the mantra that,

that we go by. No doubt. No doubt. Well, dude, I'll let you go. I know we've just chunked out about 30 minutes of your life. So I appreciate spending time with us here.

And keep doing it, dude. I'm sure I'll be back in your office here in the next week or two. And again, keep buying my wholesale deals, man. I love that. So thank you very much, Jesse. All right. Thank you so much for having me on. I appreciate you.

All right, guys. Peace.