Do you know how hard it can be to get started?
Good evening to all. This may not be under the correct topic however. My journey started about a year and a half ago. Back in Jan of 2016. I remember Thinking i needed to make more than $10 an hour. For almost 7 years, I knew i wanted a business, but didnt know where to start. I had a few online websites and even sold a few items on ebay among other places and things.
This is a real life event and a true testament that this type of business is not flip this house nor is it that easy. The game can be very brutal if you do not do your due diligence. I'm still fresh, but I think me telling this story will either define, push, motivate, or scare you into to jumping in or finding another endeavor. So anyways, I woke up randomly one morning at like 3am to hear a fortune builders infomercial and for whatever reason it resonated in my head; on top of that I constantly heard them on the radio. I called for the free workshop, but they where full and would need to wait until June; Hence 1 1/2 years in. The first time, I went by myself and was so intrigued that i went to the second workshop. It was about 7hrs long each day. Having a support system is truly important if you've ever went or read a book about flipping,wholesaling or whatever you want to do. I'm into wholesaling myself. My then girlfriend came with me the first day, but didn't attend the other two days. That was a sort of let down since she said she was interested. Making $10 an hour wasn't an option for the final levels to complete or attend. I don't want to get too personal and stick to topic: bills,child,food, etc all played a part. I bought a few books and found bigger pockets which is where most of my training comes from.
It wouldn't be until this year that i jumped in. the type of work i do consist of me working in the public eye, so i prepped myself by talking with potential sellers. I have my llc, a website, but still no business account. I found a Rei group to go to. in June of this year is where i met my first mentor. He was free and willing. The problem was for me is that I am a visual learner so going over things over the phone didn't work, also everything he told me was the stuff i knew. I still didn't know how to calculate a deal correctly, so even though i'd run my numbers nothing was a deal to him anyways. His way was annoying and he kept saying i was wasting his time by bringing him non deals. That was another let down for me. I stopped advertising and working for a month until he called to check in. By this time i sent out a few direct mail campaigns totaling $150 for about 80 people: two touch campaign. I got one hit
This guy was selling 5 houses and wanted 180 for them and very much motivated. I got him down to 140 total. For my mentor it still wasnt a deal. Each house came to be 28 a piece. and they literally had nothing wrong except one. This brings me to my second mentor. Saw a bandit sign of his and called. He said it sounded like i knew everything i just needed to fine tune what i had learned. I skeptically paid him 200 and set up a meeting with his other "students". we met up a few days later. To my surprise i was the smartest person there and won a few books. Later that night i sent him every last deal i had. From what the asking price was and how he does his comps. none where more than 5-10k off of what the seller wanted. It made me feel like i wasn't dumb at all; the other guy was just older and had an old school approach( and absolutely needed to be sure we had enough to cover our @$$ no matter if it had repairs needed or not). I always needed to add repairs to my comps before hand even though the way I learned was to find a base price match comps and its a deal, so therefore when you see the house you'd figure in repairs at the time of contract including what they may have said was wrong in the first place. a trend is that a lot of people will never return calls either.
I ran my comps on the 5 houses and price dropped about 5k a piece mainly because he adds in closing and your profit is based on other factors. I finally talk him down. The new guy says we're in about 7k a piece. The seller doens't send the contracts over because of complications with his computer and turns around says someone else wants to buy 3 at 28. We agree to it and get contracts done. Now we're at 5k a piece from what my mentor says. we have two weeks. I call toward the end of the week but have been checking in to see where progress is. He never gives a straight answer. Contract expired but There's a clause to which allows it to be extended. Closing was set for friday. My mentor tells me Saturday to tell seller that we we're ready. Come monday i check to see where we're at because now my seller his getting agitated. Mentor says tell him we are waiting on title company. Wednesday comes, I still haven't heard back from him, so i screenshot the messages the seller sent. He says tell him we are waiting on more money for the bigger transaction. I get the seller calmed down because I dont think my mentor ever called. He agrees to wait until he hears back from me. I tell him because of all the confusion we are now looking at early next week. I tell my mentor That I'm having doubts that he can get the job done. The next day my mentor calls me and ask for seller number and that everything is set. I'm truly ecstatic personally, my first deal is being completed with a nice profit at that.
That money would go to bills and the rest into adverts of different types to get way more leads and keep it going. Monday Comes i check in with the seller to see if closing was done. He confirmed. I asked my mentor when could i pick up my check and he says he will check with title co. I had been laid off work for about a week, so that money was truly needed. Since i was off i was up at about 1:30 wednesday when he texts and says we're only getting 2.2. The way the text was worded i'm thinking we're splitting 5. At this point i didn't care I say thats' great when can i get my check. Things turn here. He says the way it was set up the check was wrote in his company's name. After everything i learned and me being on the contract that was totally off. I jump on here and got a few responses by morning and contacted one of my friends who's a title agent to get more clarification. She agreed to call the title co and find out what was the problem.
She calls me back and says you might want to call yourself. I call to find out the issue and why i wasn't written my own separate check. The lady tells me that the seller flipped out ripped up the contracts and that he and the buyer signed a different contract. The buyer was just so nice enough to write my mentor a check. For me it still doesn't add up. Seller told me he sent over final paperwork and everything needed including routing number. So for me why would he even need to come in to the office. For the more experienced people you may have answers I don't as I said I'm still fairly new to this. I called my mentor irate. His response was did i have an anger problem and he's this busy and he works this business and has this many deals going on to where he can't baby me. I told him hiding the truth and not being transparent doesn't excuse you from not being on top of this and if your're that busy you maybe shouldn't be in the business of teaching, just let me know these types of things and i wouldn't have a problem. all in all I only got 1100. Most of it went to bills so i'm back at square one. working new deals and trying to find them.
I hope this clarifies your tough journey in continuing and/or helping you make up your mind about starting. This is one situation. It may not be this hard for you and its easy or vice versa. I can't say which way to go in mentoring as i've had a bad taste left in mouth, and had i known then the software i use gives me buyers from their community (one actually was the new guy how about that), who is interested in your house. It may not have been as bad. All I'm saying is learn from your mistakes and move forward. 1100 is still a profit as proof.
I'd love to hear any feedback you have and i have not spoken to either mentor since if you wondered how'd it work out