How to Get Deals from the #1 Broker in Your Market

If you’re currently active in the real estate market, whether you’re an experienced investor or in the process of doing your first project, you can relate with the fact that it’s extremely difficult to find deals that pencil in.

A great approach to find cash flowing deals in a hot market is to partner with a local brokerage. But not just any brokerage. Good brokers are a dime a dozen. Because of the nature of the current real estate market, you want to partner with the number 1 brokerage in your market. Someone who has an established track record and a market strategy that locates the best deals in the market.

Samer Kuraishi, a broker who manages a team of over 40 agents and has done over $800 million in sales since 2012, is the type of broker you want to partner with. Samer and his team have ranked number one in the extremely competitive Washington, DC market for four years in a row. In our recent conversation, he explained how he qualifies interested investors who want to leverage his team to find deals.

When interviewing a broker, regardless of the current market conditions, it is important to realize that the ensuing relationship will be reciprocal. They are interviewing you as much as you are interviewing them. However, when you are pursuing a relationship with the number one broker in the market, the pendulum swings more to the side of the broker interviewing you. Therefore, with Samer being such a high caliber broker, his investor qualification process can give you a clear understanding of the types of questions you should be prepared to answer when asking for a top broker’s business. Here are the five main questions he asks when qualifying a potential investor as a client.

Question #1 – Have you completed a deal before?

Samer said, “my first question is ‘have you ever done this before?’ You want to kind of gauge who you’re dealing with. Everybody wants to be an investor, everyone watches the HGTV shows and everyone wants to make some type of money.”

If you haven’t done a deal before, you will probably have an issue working with the number one broker in the market. However, you can offset your lack of experience by talking up the expertise of your team – property manager, mentor/advisors, etc. – and their past business success.

Questions #2 – Can you send me examples of what you’ve done?

For investors who’ve completed a deal, Samer said, “I usually ask them to send me some of [their] properties. ‘Can you show me examples of what you’ve done? What did you buy that for? What did you end up making? Were you happy with that investment?’ Because you have to understand what they are used to.”

Since you know these questions are coming, you should proactively address them prior to meeting with the broker. Review the numbers on your previous deals to refresh your memory, or – even better – create a print out that shows the outcome of your deals.

Question #3 – Do you understand the market?

Samer also wants to know the investors knowledge of the market. He said he’ll ask, “Do they even understand this market, or are they coming from a different city that’s across the county and they’re coming here? Do they even understand the price points?”

The number one broker in the market is not going to want to take the time to educate you on the ins and outs of the market. Therefore, performing a market evaluation, and maybe even preparing a market summary, is advised.

Questions #4 – How would you finance a potential deal?

Additionally, Samer will question an investor about their financing situation. “Is it your money that you’re deal with? What type of financing are you doing? Are you getting a loan? Are you paying cash? If you’re paying cash, is it your capital?”

Ultimately, the number one broker will want to confirm that you are capable of financing a deal and that you are the main decision maker. They likely won’t have the patience to work with someone who can’t close or to play the game of telephone to reach the person who call the shots.

Questions #5 – What are your goals?

Lastly, Samer wants to know about the investors goals. This includes their overarching vision, but also their deal criteria. For example, if an investor is looking for distressed properties, Samer wants to know if they have their own contractor and construction crew, or is that something they will be asking Samer to provide? Or, if they want to invest $500,000, do they have realistic expectations for the property type and size and returns from that sized investment?

Conclusion

If you want to find deals in a hot market, partner with the best brokerage in your market. However, unlike your typical broker conversation, the outcome depends heavily on your answers to their questions, rather than the other way around.

Samer Kuraishi, the number one broker in Washington, DC, asks these five questions when interviewing an investor who is interested in becoming a client:

• Have you completed a deal before?
• Can you send me examples of deals you’ve done?
• Do you understand the market?
• How would you finance a potential deal?
• What are your goals?

Expect these questions going into the interview and prepare accordingly.

If you have any comments or questions, leave a comment below.