Episode 44: Talking Shop with Elliott Days
Sep 21, 2022Show Notes
Welcome to the Discount Property Investor Podcast! Today we are joined by Elliott Days a great partner of the Discount Property Investing Team. Elliott had been trying to break into the Real Estate Investing game for a long time with limited success until he focused himself on the things that mattered. Listen as he tells his story and the importance of Focus on taking phone calls and running appointments. Elliott has also partnered with the Team on a number of deals through https://www.LetsCoWholesale.com where he is able to utilize our entire back office to sell deals quickly.
Episode Transcripts
Mike: Alright guys, welcome back to the Discount Property Investor Podcast; your host Mike Slane joined with co-host Ray Bartle today.
Ray: Good morning, good morning.
Mike: And we got a special guest with us Elliott Days, thanks for joining us.
Elliott: No problem, we have been trying to get this together for some time. Mike: We have. <br><br>Ray: You have just been too busy man. Elliott: I am trying to be like you guys. <br><br>Mike: Some days I would rather be like you. <br><br>Ray: Elliott has been doing some great work. How long you been in business? Tell us a little bit about yourself. Your background, how you got into real estate. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah no problem. Well born and raised here in St Louis and... I moved to Florida, went to college in Florida. <br><br>Ray: Really?<br><br> Elliott: Became a teacher and moved down to Palm Beach County Florida. I spend the last 15 years... and if anybody knows about Palm Beach County... that's where all of the bank foreclosures were happening. People were... polishing a turd for lack of a better word. They were making hand over fist money; I was like, "Wow! I got to get in this." So I am a thinker brain, so by the time I got into the game, that's when the bust happened. The banks and everybody was looking for foreclosure. You had... all MLS deals; you were fighting to just get offers in... it was just a mess down there. After that, I don't think I even did a deal down there. <br><br>Ray: Spent a lot of time putting contracts in and...? <br><br>Elliott: I was hooked on [00:02:12.25 - inaudible] with all of the... podcasts and all of the information out there. First it's foreclosures, then it's this, then it's that. So for the very first part I was teaching in the day time, when I came home I would try and do my real estate thing and it just didn't work out. So... my wife wanted to relocate to St Louis... I know... <br><br>Mike: Where are you from? St Louis originally? <br><br>Elliott: I am from St Louis originally. <br><br>Mike: So you came here, you moved to Florida to try and do real estate? Elliott: Well I went to school first [00:02:45.09 - inaudible]. Tallahassee is kind of like southern Georgia so you are not really Florida yet. I said let me get down to the bottom. I went down there and I actually had a... shaved ice business. The idea was, I was going to make some money selling shaved ice, take that money and invest it in real estate. I didn't have to go through all that but it took... three years of that business before I realised that I had to try something else. So... I hooked up with an investor, realtor, I got my real estate licence which was... that was like... in Florida it is really expensive; plus to get the MLS access. I probably spent $1500-2000 going to the classes, it was a nightmare. Plus it was just so highly competitive so... my wife says, "I want to move to St Louis." I got two small children, so we moved back to St Louis... <br><br>Ray: Was she from St Louis too? <br><br>Elliott: No, she is from Fort Lauderdale. <br><br>Ray: So she is a Florida girl? <br><br>Elliott: Yes. So when you move up here for six months, I don't want to hear anything. I don't want to hear the weather; I don't want to hear any complaint, ever. After six months you can complain to me... so I think that first winter, the breaks locked up on, she skidded out onto the road... "Oh my God where am I?" I'm like, "St Louis." Ray: Welcome to St Louis. <br><br>Elliott: It can be 100, then it can be 50. <br><br>Ray: Like this morning; it rained here in St Louis and everyone forgets how to drive or something right? E<br><br>lliott: Right. Ray: So we got some guy down in the middle of [00:04:37.17 - indecipherable] boulevard... 20 cars behind me, gets out the car. I am like, dude you are going to get run over. Elliott: You saw that semi this morning, right? He was like over the ledge; I am like... how do you get that far off the highway? <br><br>Ray: Oh my god. <br><br>Elliott: So the first year I was trying to teach but I couldn't find a job. So I am at home alone, trying to do real estate. The whole year I am just sitting fumbling my thumbs. I got to go back to work because I am not making any money. Before that happened I got a deal off of Craigslist. It was crazy how it happened but... it happened. I didn’t know what I was doing. The guy... I want to put a lockbox on the property; so the guy is like... I am not just going to let you have a key and a lock box. I am like... well what do you need to see? He's like, why don't you call your mother. So I called my mother, put him on the phone... <br><br>Ray: Call her about what? <br><br>Elliott: He says who is this guy? Credibility...<br><br> Ray: Did he know your mother? Elliott: No he didn't know her. He was like if he talked to her he would be okay. So he talked to my mom, I put the lockbox on there... <br><br>Ray: Your mother must have been pretty convincing. <br><br>Elliott: I have no idea; I should have got a testimonial from him. <br><br>Ray: No kidding. <br><br>Elliott: Like $3500... just enough to be like... right and so... but that deal was not enough. I went back teaching... <br><br>Mike: How long did it take before... you were thinking about it in Florida, you moved back to St Louis, how long were you here before you kind of have that first deal? Probably got tired of not making money. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Mike: That was my story to.<br><br> Elliott: I probably would think... it was probably... so let's just say August, September to... maybe June of that next year. Ray: Oh my god, so 9 months maybe? Elliott: What happened was... a lot of people, I don't know what level they invest in but... you got to talk to people. You can do a lot of the peripherals and... you can get your website and all that kind of stuff going good. But until you are actually on the phone with somebody saying... hey I want to set and appointment up... I am thinking about this number, what do you think? Until you do that you are just... you are just spinning wheels. So that whole time I was basically just doing that. <br><br>Ray: Oh I see. <br><br>Elliott: So... <br><br>Mike: I think Ray will confirm that to. <br><br>Ray: Yeah. <br><br>Mike: His big thing is just never stop marketing. <br><br>Ray: I know, keep marketing. I say if you are marketing to get a deal... the best thing about where we are at today... one guy in the basement making calls... Elliott: Right. Ray: ... looking at properties. Then a year and a half ago; Mike and I and a couple of others guys put out team together. It is nice to come to an office where there is somebody you can actually knock ideas off of. That is what has really helped us the past year getting our business going. I know you are in the same spot when you are at home; you are trying to make calls. I always tell people; go forward. I say be a Rhino. That is kind of what I say. If you are a Rhino you just keep charging and charging. A lot of people get so tied up in... what is the contract supposed to look like? They get so caught up in the processes that they don't get a deal like you were saying. Talk to people. <br><br>Mike: We all do it though. It is just our natural tendency to put that... the fear kind of first... I have to learn everything, what do I do? How do I answer that question? You are there with the seller; you put your mom on the phone. <br><br><br><br>Elliott: Yes! <br><br>Ray: That's a new strategy. <br><br>Mike: Exactly, you just do what it takes to get the property under contract... <br><br>Ray: Build credibility, have them call your mom. <br><br>Elliott: Sure did and I was like... so then... I went back to teaching. Mike: Okay, 3500 is not enough to support a wife and kids. Elliott: ... how do I do this, how do I replicate this. While I am doing the teaching thing... I am doing maybe a deal a month.<br><br> Mike: Great, so you are still doing deals? <br><br>Elliott: I am still doing them and... but it is such... to anybody out there that is trying to make that transition... first of all hopefully you have a job where... you have a phone by you... your time is just... when you are teaching you are in front of kids.<br><br> Mike: Oh, man I know. <br><br>Elliott: You can't use the bathroom let alone... make a phone call. There is this point where you are looking at the kids and think I am losing money. People are calling me... I remember one day... I think it was that deal out in Chesterfield. The guy calls me up and says... I have called three or four people; nobody is answering their phone... R<br><br>ay: Really? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah, the one in Chesterfield. So... I am like do you want to go tomorrow? I took that day off, my wife and I took that day off. I said, why don't you come down here with me? Do the property information sheet... we locked that thing up right there... <br><br>Mike: That's awesome. Elliott: ... then... I passed it onto you guys. I didn't have any buyers in that area. So, for me there is a little bit of fear when you go into a new area. You want to get it done quick and make sure you are making a good assessment. Call you guys up, boom! Bam! It's finished. Matter of fact I think I talked to you on that, I go back in and re-negotiate with the seller and say... we need to be a little further down. I want to think it was 10 grand he knocked off. That was a beautiful thing. <br><br>Mike: That's what puts a deal together, there is your profit. So let's talk a little bit about... because I don't think we have talked about our back office or really promoted it much. Ray, I steal it from you Ray; we built the back office for wholesalers. Here in St Louis we have this program set up called 'Let's co-wholesale'. So you got to letscowholesale.com, you enter in some property information, right? <br><br>Ray: Right. <br><br>Mike: Then you send it over to us and we get it sold for you. <br><br>Elliott: Absolutely. <br><br>Ray: We have actually... call it my office manager, just happens to be my daughter. Letscowholesale.com was built because... when you are out there doing your one man show... you are only. Then you have to worry about... okay I got to get it to the title company, I have to get my buyers to the site. We built this office where people call the number, we have people who answer the phone 24 hours a day... we want to go to see this property, we log them in, log them out. Most of the people are on our database so we know who they are. So you don’t have to deal with the other calls, the only other calls you are getting are sellers looking to buy houses. That's the best part. We built it for you and it keeps the wholesaler up to date on what's happening with his account, it will text you when things happen. Eventually the whole goal is we will say, hey Elliott come get your check. <br><br>Mike: We have to co-ordinate a little bit more, but hopefully the idea is you put the property in... again this is... exclusively in our St Louis market right now. We are going to be rolling it out hopefully here... in so other markets pretty soon. <br><br>Elliott: That's a good idea. Mike: You have to have to buyers list built up for people... for it to be a real benefit. We do and that is the part of the reason I was happy to partner with Ray because... he has been in this business for a long time, he can just get stuff sold. <br><br>Ray: You are just saying I’m old. <br><br>Mike: Experienced. <br><br>Elliott: This is crazy but... I don't even know how we met really... I am going to try and put it together, I don't think it's actually right but... I think he drops the check off at my house when I am not there, so my wife meets him. I have never met this guy and he is bringing me checks. I think I was calling up some Craigslist ads or something like that. It looked like an investor so... maybe one of the scripts is... try and get with an investor that is already in there, try to sell their property. I think he was like... why would I use you when I could just sell it myself? But anyway... he was open enough to start a relationship. Once we started a relationship I called him up and... I can't even remember the first one but... boom it was done. I was like... this is nice. Get rid of it... I work on acquiring the properties once I have the contract. Give it to Ray, hand it off to him. Set the fool back in motion, like I’m running through the back field. It was that... I am telling you, it was probably... I want to say 5 or 6... we just did that one on [00:13:31.10 - inaudible]. <br><br>Ray: Oh yeah that's right. That was a tough one. We got through though. <br><br>Elliott: The lady is like... I owe back this and back that, I owe $5000. I got to make a deal for 5 grand. So sign the papers... some of the buyers in St Louis I think are getting a little slow to move. The prices are so cheap here that when you go to someplace else and start talking the numbers we are talking about; they are all over it. So they actually found... you guys actually found an out of State buyer come in lock it up, finish it up, check is on my desk at home. <br><br>Ray: Awesome. Elliott: Yeah. <br><br>Ray: I think they are from New Jersey. But I used to do... when I came over to this group; I brought all the investors I had built a database... I think 165,000 investors. When I first got into this business... I was travelling I had a corporate job. I traveled a lot so I went to REIA's in that particular city. I am still a member at Orange County... they [00:14:35.17 - inaudible] how does that work? But I built my database that way. That is why I always have these national people coming in. [00:14:45.15 - inaudible] hedge funds... best thing... our back office is built but we also have so many buyers that a lot of times... especially in today’s market... it is hard to find a house to [00:14:56.22 - inaudible]. So if you can get one, get it out to the masses and next thing you know we have a offer hopefully at long as the price is right. They are too high sometimes but... as you said; just go back to the seller and say we cannot pay you that but we can pay you this, and hopefully he does that. <br><br>Mike: We have had a great relationship I think; The Discount Property Investor team with <br><br>Elliott. Really happy for him. A lot of the deals and checks we have been able to write him. We do a more favorable split to. When you partner on something you usually do 50:50. But we like to pay out a little bit more; we give 60:40. Again, for us it is a little bit less work. <br><br>Ray: Exactly, I think the other thing... recently we started doing auctions. I think you did an auction with one of our guys, John. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah that was a home run. Let me tell them about it. <br><br>Ray: Yeah give them some background. Elliott: I am working with this guy for six months say... it is a sister and a brother; he has got the guy who is like the quarterback in the deal. I just check in with him monthly; hey how's it going? Finally he was like... we're ready to sell it. We need to sell it by the end of this month. It was like... June 12th or something. He was like... we need to be out of this by the 30th. I'm like... well... okay. Mike: I was following up with you for six months; you could have given me a little more time.<br><br> Elliott: Exactly. <br><br>Ray: That's the way sellers are though. Just get rid of it. Elliott: So I get the contract. I am originally thinking... that this might not work for a wholesale deal because... of the price point. But I know it's a deal somewhere. The comps were like 350 in the neighborhood. I picked it up for like 210. <br><br>Mike: Where was it? E<br><br>lliott: This was in Chesterfield. Mike: So Chesterfield is kind of like West County area, little higher end area here in St Louis. Middle class, upper middle class. <br><br>Ray: 300 is probably the average out there. E<br><br>lliott: Right. So... we tied up... originally I was going to find some money to close the deal. Lipstick, paint, take off the garbage and just put it on the market as retail. But the guy was really needing to be done by the 30th. So it was pressure from a lot of different places. Y <br><br>Mike: You were going to try and get a loan? <br><br>Elliott: Trying hard money. I was asking family members, they were wanting in on this, so on and so forth. I get in touch with Jonathon who is a part of your team. He is big onto this auction thing. So he started the price at like... 190 and... you are watching it just go up and up. I was actually at a Lifeanaire coaching boot camp. It was 'Get a life' boot camp where you do structure and business or whatever. I am watching it on my phone. The guy is like everyone turn off your phone. I can't do that. I am sitting there, it's like 240... I am like okay we can do that, that's great. Ray: You were at 210? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah, 210-240. <br><br>Ray: You made 30 grand right now.<br><br> Elliott: Then the phone locked up, sometimes you have to refresh it or something. So by the time he stops speaking and he said... go take a lunch break; I look down and it is 273. <br><br>Ray: 60 grand? Holy cow. <br><br>Elliott: That is the stuff people talk about on their... these gurus, look at my check. Mike: Exactly, those are the checks you see on the internet. <br><br>Elliott: You don't see them every day but... <br><br>Ray: Especially in St Louis. Numbers are so low. I know... like yesterday we just launched House Sold Easy auction dot com. So we got a website now where we are actually talking to... there are some agencies that have houses that bring them to us. It is so competitive now that sometimes auctions make sense. This one here... my God. Good for you. <br><br>Elliott: You could see it going up. Anytime you are in an auction... the property is secondary to like winning. You want to win first. You are seeing going right after each other. It ended up really nice for me. A little vacation, take the family to Florida. <br><br>Mike: Let's do one of those a month. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah that was a real blessing. The relationship with you guys... where if you are stuck or you might not know what to do next. I think it's a good resource. What can we do, what do you think? You kind of bounce the ideas off. You kind of mentioned earlier coming into the office... my kids are out of school and summer is tough. I am in the house... in fact they left to go to Tennessee on Monday. So usually my wife says... usually when we leave and go out of town you get a deal. I am like... how do you figure that? Because it's quiet, I’m focused; the kids are not running around. You really have to protect your time because it will get away from you. You are looking at the middle of the day and you're like; I haven't done anything. I will just start tomorrow. Ray: Or the wife is like... can you do this? Can you do that? Take out the trash. I am like... I go to make calls. <br><br>Elliott: She comes and she is like, is there anything waiting for us when we get back home? No aren’t you supposed to bring me something from a vacation? <br><br>Mike: That's funny. <br><br>Elliott I think we struggle with a lot of the same things. It's going from being an employee where it's like... you work, then you are done with work and your time is your own... versus being self employed and you just said it very well; you have to defend your time. You have to use your time wisely when you are making that transition. <br><br>Elliott: Absolutely.<br><br> Mike: And it's very difficult because you want to spend the time with your kids and your wife, you want to help them and do little things that make them happy. But you also got to get them deals. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Mike: You got to put the money in the bank to pay the bills, put the food on the table. E<br><br>lliott: That's what I tell her sometimes when she's like... let's just go to Six flags today. I'm like... what did I did say was from 9-12 if you guys will allow me three hours to make my phone calls, follow-up and... things like that, a couple of days a week we might be able to do something but... in the afternoon is usually when I look at properties. I try to schedule the afternoon for that and the evening... it's good to have... I'm telling you, you guys don't know, but maybe you do but... like I said, when I lock something I up I could just... if all else fails I just pass it to one of you guys and let you guys take the ball. <br><br>Mike: Well we don't like to see you fail. We appreciate when you pass it to us. Again, we get a little encumbered too. Hopefully it gets sold real quick. <br><br>Ray: I think the big thing... if you are doing wholesaling or any kind of real estate you got to schedule your time. Especially when you have got a family, you are working out of the house. 9 till noon I am going to make calls; that's great, then I am going to look at houses in the afternoon. So when you get something you give it to letscowholesale.com and we get rid of it for you. So you’re focused on seeing houses. That's where you make money, you talk to sellers, you are at their house. I think another thing great is... you have the perseverance to go nine months before you got paid. Most people in this business; if they don't make money in three months... in my experience, if they don't make money in 90 days they are out doing... <br><br>Mike: What's sad too is that it takes... literally from talking to a seller, if that person is motivated that day and you lock it up; it is still going to take you 30 days most of the time before you get that through the closing table and get your check. <br><br>Ray: Exactly. <br><br>Mike: So 90 days is just nothing in the real estate... <br><br>Ray: I know. <br><br>Mike: ... in the cycle. So you really do have to have that determination and perseverance. Elliott: I will tell you this too. When I was in Florida; my sister in law was telling me about some other teachers that were in the business and were trying to get started. So they paid 40 grand... <br><br>Mike: Yeah that happens a lot. <br><br>Elliott: I was like... oh my God! I am in the wrong business I should be selling information courses. I told her I said listen, they are going to give you three days to re-send. Please take it back, get your money back, give me... five grand, start some marketing, whatever it is you want to and we can put something together. But... again people spend so much money on things that are not going to produce. Everybody... when you see the shiny object and somebody comes out with something new; everybody runs to it. It's natural; it's like a new car or something. There is some basic fundamentals in just real estate, we talking about people and we are talking about properties. And unless you are bringing something to me; either people or properties... everything else can wait. I am kind of embarrassed to say this but... I still put my name on the contract. I don't even have an LLC or... an entity which with this last deal I am going to go ahead and do but... I am like... I got to make phone calls. I barely have time to think about a lot of the other stuff. The tunnel vision is good and bad because you definitely need to structure it properly but... man I put my name down, sign the papers, take it to the bank, the check cashes just like anything else. But as I continue to grow I want to set the foundation up. But because I am an analysis paralysis kind of guy... I just had to say; forget all of this, let's just go forward you know? <br><br>Mike: I think that's great because you don't need an LLC and you don't need a website, and you don't need all these things that you think you need to put together, to give yourself credibility in the sellers eyes. <br><br>Elliott: Like you said; if they are motivated and you solve their problem... <br><br>Mike: That's the truth. <br><br>Elliott: A house yesterday... I mentioned that, right? <br><br>Ray: No. E<br><br>lliott: I found a house vacant. The lady or the man said listen, $500... <br><br>Ray: Yeah you did mention that. For what? What kind of house is 500 bucks? <br><br>Elliott: Does it have a roof? Does it have walls? You go in there and it has a roof it has walls it has a basement. If it has any value; that is yet to be determined. They were so thankful that they would say anything to me. Like they would... they were like... the first time the guy said put a lockbox on; they were like yeah sure, we are not coming back over here, take the key, live here for a while, maybe fix it up. Ray: Maybe move the family in. Elliott: Right, they couldn't care less because this thing has been looming over them and they want to get rid of it. So when you see somebody as motivated... <br><br>Ray: What do you think was it? Was it a rental they had before or family member passed or something? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah a family member had it and passed away. When I tell you the inside is like... you step back into this time zone. You see the tub is one of those single tubs. <br><br>Mike: Those are my favorite; I call them time capsules. Just step back in time. <br><br>Elliott: You go into the basement and you see the octagon... heater system and you are like wow. You are just looking at their furniture and stuff. Wow there is an old washing machine down there. This has got to be worth something. Got to hand crank it. It was... <br><br>Mike: You might have to auction off some of that stuff before you sell the house. <br><br>Elliott: I tell you what; it's funny... I found a guy who does a lot of clean up, I have made him so much money by saying go in there and clean this up... he will charge me $100-200. Then he turns around and sells this stuff. Damn, if I had known... he actually had a magazine that was signed by Neil Armstrong because this guy was in the NASA program back when it first started. So he has these periodicals. He is like yeah this guy is going to give me five grand for them. I am like... this dude was... <br><br>Ray: That's the thing... funny you mention that. My wife does rehabs and she sold something yesterday and makes 80 bucks just on cable that we would have thrown in the dumpster. That is a whole new business though. But the thing about that is you have to focus on one thing. You are focused on houses; let him focus on Neil Armstrong. <br><br>Mike: On the junk. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Ray: Plus you get a pretty good deal on clean ups because you can spend several thousand bucks on dumpsters and labour and what not. Mike: What are you going to do with that house? You put it under contract yesterday for 500. <br><br>Elliott: For 500. <br><br>Mike: Are they leaving all the junk behind?<br><br> Elliott: All the junk left behind so... I know some guys specifically in that area, so what I like to do is... the guys who have been good to me, I like to give them a call and... let them know what I have and... see if it works for them. If it doesn’t then that’s when it is time to put it out on market and that’s when I call you guys and get it done. In the beginning... I used to kind of... certain areas you kind of frown on because the prices are real low. But, you can make a one/two/three thousand dollars and up... on some of the low end areas. That is nothing to sneeze at so... normally when you here Chesterfield or [00:29:17.10 - inaudible] those are the houses that... everybody wants them. But you can make $1000, ten houses that’s $10,000 a month. Ray: There you go. Elliott: Just keep on with the machine. Mike: Yeah, that's great advice. Really just keep on the small ones. That's something on our previous episode we talked about a deal that took us almost a full year to do. Ray: Oh my gosh. <br><br>Mike: Our V.A's, our assistants were calling this person every week for almost a full year before we got it closed and it was an $8000 purchase. So lower end house... it pays. But if we can do a couple of those a month; that pays our office rent, that pays the salaries, pays to keep the lights on. Those things are great. <br><br>Elliott: Then you got some guys... there are a couple of guys on my list... when I... when you see a house and you say... nobody is going to want this; these guys will take it. When I look at this house I felt bad. Do you really want this? The fine to fix and the rent, they had to start at a place too. They start where they can be comfortable and they grow their business. So you never know what cycle they are on. This guy would come in... this one house was a bank owned house. When I walked in the door you went down into the floor. It was horrible... I am actually negotiating with the bank and I get it down to two grand or something. Guy buys it for like 5500 and I am like... it works. If you look at that from the outside and most people would say no. I don't know anybody who would take this. Got a tenant in there now paying rent so. <br><br>Ray: Excellent yeah. That is probably good return on his money too.<br><br> Elliott: He is a one man show so he does most of the work himself. So he is not even... have a crew that is going to come in and do the work, he is doing it himself. <br><br>Ray: My experience on rehab is about 50% labor 50% material. So that is a heck of a deal if you can do it. The problem is you can only do so many. That's good. <br><br>Mike: So what is next in Elliott's plan? Everybody is always looking for the next thing. You are doing some great wholesale deals, just did a home run of a deal with the auction with John here. What are you working on? What's your next...? <br><br>Elliott: What I’m doing now is just... like I said earlier; just trying to fill in those missing steps that sometimes because I am going forward I am leaving behind. So I definitely need an assistant that can handle the mundane things that I don't want to do. <br><br>Mike: Well some of the tedious stuff, those follow up calls you don't feel like making and some of the... yeah. Has your wife any interest in real estate? Elliott: You know it's funny you say that because she did it and she was doing well. The issue is can she do this every day? An hour a day make these phone calls. I find out too, I don't know about you guys but the woman's voice is just so much more soothing than a man's voice. When they hear me they are like... don't ever call me back! But when they hear her it's like... oh wow, no I am not interested but thanks for the call. I am like damn! You got to go through that.<br><br> Mike: Thank you for the call as opposed to... <br><br>Elliott: So I would like for her to get involved. She is a teacher now and I was trying to lay out a plan for her to leave teaching, work with me. There is something about a woman that's different, less intimidating. When I show up sometimes it's like... I feel people back off a little bit. But when a woman's there, when I took her out on that one place in Chesterfield I just let her talk and I was the assistant. Mike: Ray is able to do that too with his wife. Ray: My secret weapon my wife. She is actually a licensed clinical social worker by profession then went into real estate. So when I come onto the job she is upstairs talking with the family. Before it's over they are hugging her... I am saying here's the contract sign here, what happened? I go there by myself and they are like; who's this guy? <br><br>Mike: Ray doesn't realise they are going out to dinner the next night. <br><br>Ray: Seriously you were right though. The female voice and we are not trying to be against guys making phone calls but... you're right. It's a soothing voice and... also the reason we are calling people... the reason they are getting rid of the house is because someone has passed away, divorce. <br><br>Mike: Women are just less threatening on the phone in general. So I think it is easier for people to be less aggressive to... <br><br>Elliott: Right, right. I got to really watch the tone... the question, the sequence. Whereas... I gave her the script and it's nothing fancy and she is killing it. Yeah this guy wants you to call him back, this guy wants you to call him back and I’m like... wow. I'd like her to do it but then you have the husband wife relationship, then you have the business partner relationship. It is kind of hard to know the difference but... I really would like her to do that so... I am in need of her or somebody... <br><br>Mike: Somebody else, trying to expand, that's great. <br><br>Elliott: To make some calls for me so when they siphon through I get the ones that are like... let's go here now. That's where... I will talk to them. In fact there was this lady yesterday and... she used some profanity in the recording. My wife is out of town so I just make the call. This was an older woman, when I explained to her that we are trying to buy your house... she... no this is how I opened up, I said... hello is this so and so? I would like to take you out for lunch. She was like, really? I said, yeah what do you like to eat. She said I love Indian food... so we are just like talking. Because I heard her message and in her message it was about... I don't know what the f**k is going on... before I called back I thought I go to neutralize this up front. So hey where we going to eat? She starts talking and she is like... who are you? I'm like... well you called us yesterday about a house and... and she’s like oh yeah I am so glad you called back. So she is talking for like 15-20 minutes. I got a lunch date with this lady. I told her I want to make it a win:win. The other thing that happens in her conversation is that you find out... different people worry about different things. She was really worried about the environment... so she was worried about the community. The house is sitting there, it's not being used by anybody, it is costing us money so... let's turn this into a win:win situation. I said that is exactly the words I want to hear so... we will do an Indian lunch date. She said she wants to sell everything and go on a cruise. She is like 80 years old, she cursed on the recording like she was 40. But that is where her future is. The phone, you got to be good on the phone and... give good phone. There is a guy called Claude Diamond and he talks about that on some of his videos; give good phone. Got to give good phone. Mike: He is a pretty interesting guy if you haven't checked him out. <br><br>Elliott: He's the trip so. But yeah so if I could get... a good assistant and somebody who... you don't have to tell them everything to do they just kind of know, they figure their way out as they go. I can sit at home and be like, who do I want? I gave myself another task, what exactly do I do? I really wish I could put some cameras on myself then do it and then come back and say okay, I did this I did that and here is a video to see it. If I could get a phone person and hopefully a phone person and somebody that would be able to do some of the clerical things, I could really... <br><br>Mike: Well if you can't convince your wife... we are happy to give out your contact information. Somebody here in St Louis who is interested in helping out Elliott, if you are looking for anything else man or people want to get in touch with you, you can shout it out now. Elliott: I have an office number; 314-445-1054. That rings... if you call it right now it rings my cell phone right now, it relays forward. I hope y'all don't have too many listeners here. <br><br>Ray: This isn't live is it? <br><br>Mike: No. <br><br>Ray: Good, you got time to get home. <br><br>Elliott: I had started... a couple of people wanted to learn some stuff from me so there is a website called learning to wholesale... no that's not it. LearningToFlipHouses.com. I am not a babysitter so it is not a babysitting type of situation. If you have specific questions or something like that we can work together and... I will probably end up taking the deal and finding you guys on it anyway but... for those basic students I am there... I hate to say it like that. I am a teacher so... not to say... probably going to have to edit this part. Mike: If you are interested... <br><br>Elliott: Learning to flip houses you got my number. Let's make money. The thing I love about these guys is... sometimes people say... I want the whole deal, give me all the money but... you got to think; something is way better than nothing. When you start talking about the numbers that we are talking about. We are talking about thousands of dollars. That is like a scratch off game or something you just won. You can make $5-6000 just like that. Mike: I love it, man. That’s what most people don't think of... when you are in the wholesale business too. You start thinking these numbers like 3000 wasn't a great deal. You go back and look at when you were teaching. That's a pay check, that's two weeks pay. Elliott: Exactly. Mike: That's a lot of work. Elliott: Exactly, you are exactly right. It's funny; I think my wife saw a check I hadn't cashed... like 3500. She is like you haven't cashed this. I am like yeah I know I got to do. She is like this is $3500, you did this in a month teaching. Just htink about that; you are talking about a month. So you get your check, that is not what you spend. So the taxes come in there and what you are left with is like $3500 a month, I got it sitting on the table and haven't even deposited it. She is like, look don't disrespect, I want the $10,000 check. Don't disrespect the 3000 because that is good money too. <br><br>Mike: That's a lot of money guys. <br><br>Elliott: That's a vacation, that's... <br><br>Mike: Elliott, I think we are all happy to see you succeeding here in St Louis. We are happy we have been able to partner with you on some of your deals, and one of your best deals I imagine. So thank you so much for coming in and sharing your story. Ray: Yeah, it's great. Mike: Is there anything else you want to wrap up with? <br><br>Elliott: No that's it. Get with these guys, get your phone calls, get your properties under contract and... give it to these guys and let them sell it and then... once you start rolling you can... <br><br>Ray: The website; letscowholesale.com. One word and we built it for guys like Elliott and people in St Louis who are looking to have a back office that is already built for them. Great split 60/40. Most of the time it is 50/50 but we got... we handle the calls, we get the title work done, we do everything for you. So you can focus on making money, meeting sellers, right? Thanks for coming in Elliott, we really appreciate it. <br><br>Mike: Thanks for listening, guys. We are going to go ahead and wrap it up. <br><br>Ray: Thanks.
Ray: Good morning, good morning.
Mike: And we got a special guest with us Elliott Days, thanks for joining us.
Elliott: No problem, we have been trying to get this together for some time. Mike: We have. <br><br>Ray: You have just been too busy man. Elliott: I am trying to be like you guys. <br><br>Mike: Some days I would rather be like you. <br><br>Ray: Elliott has been doing some great work. How long you been in business? Tell us a little bit about yourself. Your background, how you got into real estate. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah no problem. Well born and raised here in St Louis and... I moved to Florida, went to college in Florida. <br><br>Ray: Really?<br><br> Elliott: Became a teacher and moved down to Palm Beach County Florida. I spend the last 15 years... and if anybody knows about Palm Beach County... that's where all of the bank foreclosures were happening. People were... polishing a turd for lack of a better word. They were making hand over fist money; I was like, "Wow! I got to get in this." So I am a thinker brain, so by the time I got into the game, that's when the bust happened. The banks and everybody was looking for foreclosure. You had... all MLS deals; you were fighting to just get offers in... it was just a mess down there. After that, I don't think I even did a deal down there. <br><br>Ray: Spent a lot of time putting contracts in and...? <br><br>Elliott: I was hooked on [00:02:12.25 - inaudible] with all of the... podcasts and all of the information out there. First it's foreclosures, then it's this, then it's that. So for the very first part I was teaching in the day time, when I came home I would try and do my real estate thing and it just didn't work out. So... my wife wanted to relocate to St Louis... I know... <br><br>Mike: Where are you from? St Louis originally? <br><br>Elliott: I am from St Louis originally. <br><br>Mike: So you came here, you moved to Florida to try and do real estate? Elliott: Well I went to school first [00:02:45.09 - inaudible]. Tallahassee is kind of like southern Georgia so you are not really Florida yet. I said let me get down to the bottom. I went down there and I actually had a... shaved ice business. The idea was, I was going to make some money selling shaved ice, take that money and invest it in real estate. I didn't have to go through all that but it took... three years of that business before I realised that I had to try something else. So... I hooked up with an investor, realtor, I got my real estate licence which was... that was like... in Florida it is really expensive; plus to get the MLS access. I probably spent $1500-2000 going to the classes, it was a nightmare. Plus it was just so highly competitive so... my wife says, "I want to move to St Louis." I got two small children, so we moved back to St Louis... <br><br>Ray: Was she from St Louis too? <br><br>Elliott: No, she is from Fort Lauderdale. <br><br>Ray: So she is a Florida girl? <br><br>Elliott: Yes. So when you move up here for six months, I don't want to hear anything. I don't want to hear the weather; I don't want to hear any complaint, ever. After six months you can complain to me... so I think that first winter, the breaks locked up on, she skidded out onto the road... "Oh my God where am I?" I'm like, "St Louis." Ray: Welcome to St Louis. <br><br>Elliott: It can be 100, then it can be 50. <br><br>Ray: Like this morning; it rained here in St Louis and everyone forgets how to drive or something right? E<br><br>lliott: Right. Ray: So we got some guy down in the middle of [00:04:37.17 - indecipherable] boulevard... 20 cars behind me, gets out the car. I am like, dude you are going to get run over. Elliott: You saw that semi this morning, right? He was like over the ledge; I am like... how do you get that far off the highway? <br><br>Ray: Oh my god. <br><br>Elliott: So the first year I was trying to teach but I couldn't find a job. So I am at home alone, trying to do real estate. The whole year I am just sitting fumbling my thumbs. I got to go back to work because I am not making any money. Before that happened I got a deal off of Craigslist. It was crazy how it happened but... it happened. I didn’t know what I was doing. The guy... I want to put a lockbox on the property; so the guy is like... I am not just going to let you have a key and a lock box. I am like... well what do you need to see? He's like, why don't you call your mother. So I called my mother, put him on the phone... <br><br>Ray: Call her about what? <br><br>Elliott: He says who is this guy? Credibility...<br><br> Ray: Did he know your mother? Elliott: No he didn't know her. He was like if he talked to her he would be okay. So he talked to my mom, I put the lockbox on there... <br><br>Ray: Your mother must have been pretty convincing. <br><br>Elliott: I have no idea; I should have got a testimonial from him. <br><br>Ray: No kidding. <br><br>Elliott: Like $3500... just enough to be like... right and so... but that deal was not enough. I went back teaching... <br><br>Mike: How long did it take before... you were thinking about it in Florida, you moved back to St Louis, how long were you here before you kind of have that first deal? Probably got tired of not making money. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Mike: That was my story to.<br><br> Elliott: I probably would think... it was probably... so let's just say August, September to... maybe June of that next year. Ray: Oh my god, so 9 months maybe? Elliott: What happened was... a lot of people, I don't know what level they invest in but... you got to talk to people. You can do a lot of the peripherals and... you can get your website and all that kind of stuff going good. But until you are actually on the phone with somebody saying... hey I want to set and appointment up... I am thinking about this number, what do you think? Until you do that you are just... you are just spinning wheels. So that whole time I was basically just doing that. <br><br>Ray: Oh I see. <br><br>Elliott: So... <br><br>Mike: I think Ray will confirm that to. <br><br>Ray: Yeah. <br><br>Mike: His big thing is just never stop marketing. <br><br>Ray: I know, keep marketing. I say if you are marketing to get a deal... the best thing about where we are at today... one guy in the basement making calls... Elliott: Right. Ray: ... looking at properties. Then a year and a half ago; Mike and I and a couple of others guys put out team together. It is nice to come to an office where there is somebody you can actually knock ideas off of. That is what has really helped us the past year getting our business going. I know you are in the same spot when you are at home; you are trying to make calls. I always tell people; go forward. I say be a Rhino. That is kind of what I say. If you are a Rhino you just keep charging and charging. A lot of people get so tied up in... what is the contract supposed to look like? They get so caught up in the processes that they don't get a deal like you were saying. Talk to people. <br><br>Mike: We all do it though. It is just our natural tendency to put that... the fear kind of first... I have to learn everything, what do I do? How do I answer that question? You are there with the seller; you put your mom on the phone. <br><br><br><br>Elliott: Yes! <br><br>Ray: That's a new strategy. <br><br>Mike: Exactly, you just do what it takes to get the property under contract... <br><br>Ray: Build credibility, have them call your mom. <br><br>Elliott: Sure did and I was like... so then... I went back to teaching. Mike: Okay, 3500 is not enough to support a wife and kids. Elliott: ... how do I do this, how do I replicate this. While I am doing the teaching thing... I am doing maybe a deal a month.<br><br> Mike: Great, so you are still doing deals? <br><br>Elliott: I am still doing them and... but it is such... to anybody out there that is trying to make that transition... first of all hopefully you have a job where... you have a phone by you... your time is just... when you are teaching you are in front of kids.<br><br> Mike: Oh, man I know. <br><br>Elliott: You can't use the bathroom let alone... make a phone call. There is this point where you are looking at the kids and think I am losing money. People are calling me... I remember one day... I think it was that deal out in Chesterfield. The guy calls me up and says... I have called three or four people; nobody is answering their phone... R<br><br>ay: Really? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah, the one in Chesterfield. So... I am like do you want to go tomorrow? I took that day off, my wife and I took that day off. I said, why don't you come down here with me? Do the property information sheet... we locked that thing up right there... <br><br>Mike: That's awesome. Elliott: ... then... I passed it onto you guys. I didn't have any buyers in that area. So, for me there is a little bit of fear when you go into a new area. You want to get it done quick and make sure you are making a good assessment. Call you guys up, boom! Bam! It's finished. Matter of fact I think I talked to you on that, I go back in and re-negotiate with the seller and say... we need to be a little further down. I want to think it was 10 grand he knocked off. That was a beautiful thing. <br><br>Mike: That's what puts a deal together, there is your profit. So let's talk a little bit about... because I don't think we have talked about our back office or really promoted it much. Ray, I steal it from you Ray; we built the back office for wholesalers. Here in St Louis we have this program set up called 'Let's co-wholesale'. So you got to letscowholesale.com, you enter in some property information, right? <br><br>Ray: Right. <br><br>Mike: Then you send it over to us and we get it sold for you. <br><br>Elliott: Absolutely. <br><br>Ray: We have actually... call it my office manager, just happens to be my daughter. Letscowholesale.com was built because... when you are out there doing your one man show... you are only. Then you have to worry about... okay I got to get it to the title company, I have to get my buyers to the site. We built this office where people call the number, we have people who answer the phone 24 hours a day... we want to go to see this property, we log them in, log them out. Most of the people are on our database so we know who they are. So you don’t have to deal with the other calls, the only other calls you are getting are sellers looking to buy houses. That's the best part. We built it for you and it keeps the wholesaler up to date on what's happening with his account, it will text you when things happen. Eventually the whole goal is we will say, hey Elliott come get your check. <br><br>Mike: We have to co-ordinate a little bit more, but hopefully the idea is you put the property in... again this is... exclusively in our St Louis market right now. We are going to be rolling it out hopefully here... in so other markets pretty soon. <br><br>Elliott: That's a good idea. Mike: You have to have to buyers list built up for people... for it to be a real benefit. We do and that is the part of the reason I was happy to partner with Ray because... he has been in this business for a long time, he can just get stuff sold. <br><br>Ray: You are just saying I’m old. <br><br>Mike: Experienced. <br><br>Elliott: This is crazy but... I don't even know how we met really... I am going to try and put it together, I don't think it's actually right but... I think he drops the check off at my house when I am not there, so my wife meets him. I have never met this guy and he is bringing me checks. I think I was calling up some Craigslist ads or something like that. It looked like an investor so... maybe one of the scripts is... try and get with an investor that is already in there, try to sell their property. I think he was like... why would I use you when I could just sell it myself? But anyway... he was open enough to start a relationship. Once we started a relationship I called him up and... I can't even remember the first one but... boom it was done. I was like... this is nice. Get rid of it... I work on acquiring the properties once I have the contract. Give it to Ray, hand it off to him. Set the fool back in motion, like I’m running through the back field. It was that... I am telling you, it was probably... I want to say 5 or 6... we just did that one on [00:13:31.10 - inaudible]. <br><br>Ray: Oh yeah that's right. That was a tough one. We got through though. <br><br>Elliott: The lady is like... I owe back this and back that, I owe $5000. I got to make a deal for 5 grand. So sign the papers... some of the buyers in St Louis I think are getting a little slow to move. The prices are so cheap here that when you go to someplace else and start talking the numbers we are talking about; they are all over it. So they actually found... you guys actually found an out of State buyer come in lock it up, finish it up, check is on my desk at home. <br><br>Ray: Awesome. Elliott: Yeah. <br><br>Ray: I think they are from New Jersey. But I used to do... when I came over to this group; I brought all the investors I had built a database... I think 165,000 investors. When I first got into this business... I was travelling I had a corporate job. I traveled a lot so I went to REIA's in that particular city. I am still a member at Orange County... they [00:14:35.17 - inaudible] how does that work? But I built my database that way. That is why I always have these national people coming in. [00:14:45.15 - inaudible] hedge funds... best thing... our back office is built but we also have so many buyers that a lot of times... especially in today’s market... it is hard to find a house to [00:14:56.22 - inaudible]. So if you can get one, get it out to the masses and next thing you know we have a offer hopefully at long as the price is right. They are too high sometimes but... as you said; just go back to the seller and say we cannot pay you that but we can pay you this, and hopefully he does that. <br><br>Mike: We have had a great relationship I think; The Discount Property Investor team with <br><br>Elliott. Really happy for him. A lot of the deals and checks we have been able to write him. We do a more favorable split to. When you partner on something you usually do 50:50. But we like to pay out a little bit more; we give 60:40. Again, for us it is a little bit less work. <br><br>Ray: Exactly, I think the other thing... recently we started doing auctions. I think you did an auction with one of our guys, John. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah that was a home run. Let me tell them about it. <br><br>Ray: Yeah give them some background. Elliott: I am working with this guy for six months say... it is a sister and a brother; he has got the guy who is like the quarterback in the deal. I just check in with him monthly; hey how's it going? Finally he was like... we're ready to sell it. We need to sell it by the end of this month. It was like... June 12th or something. He was like... we need to be out of this by the 30th. I'm like... well... okay. Mike: I was following up with you for six months; you could have given me a little more time.<br><br> Elliott: Exactly. <br><br>Ray: That's the way sellers are though. Just get rid of it. Elliott: So I get the contract. I am originally thinking... that this might not work for a wholesale deal because... of the price point. But I know it's a deal somewhere. The comps were like 350 in the neighborhood. I picked it up for like 210. <br><br>Mike: Where was it? E<br><br>lliott: This was in Chesterfield. Mike: So Chesterfield is kind of like West County area, little higher end area here in St Louis. Middle class, upper middle class. <br><br>Ray: 300 is probably the average out there. E<br><br>lliott: Right. So... we tied up... originally I was going to find some money to close the deal. Lipstick, paint, take off the garbage and just put it on the market as retail. But the guy was really needing to be done by the 30th. So it was pressure from a lot of different places. Y <br><br>Mike: You were going to try and get a loan? <br><br>Elliott: Trying hard money. I was asking family members, they were wanting in on this, so on and so forth. I get in touch with Jonathon who is a part of your team. He is big onto this auction thing. So he started the price at like... 190 and... you are watching it just go up and up. I was actually at a Lifeanaire coaching boot camp. It was 'Get a life' boot camp where you do structure and business or whatever. I am watching it on my phone. The guy is like everyone turn off your phone. I can't do that. I am sitting there, it's like 240... I am like okay we can do that, that's great. Ray: You were at 210? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah, 210-240. <br><br>Ray: You made 30 grand right now.<br><br> Elliott: Then the phone locked up, sometimes you have to refresh it or something. So by the time he stops speaking and he said... go take a lunch break; I look down and it is 273. <br><br>Ray: 60 grand? Holy cow. <br><br>Elliott: That is the stuff people talk about on their... these gurus, look at my check. Mike: Exactly, those are the checks you see on the internet. <br><br>Elliott: You don't see them every day but... <br><br>Ray: Especially in St Louis. Numbers are so low. I know... like yesterday we just launched House Sold Easy auction dot com. So we got a website now where we are actually talking to... there are some agencies that have houses that bring them to us. It is so competitive now that sometimes auctions make sense. This one here... my God. Good for you. <br><br>Elliott: You could see it going up. Anytime you are in an auction... the property is secondary to like winning. You want to win first. You are seeing going right after each other. It ended up really nice for me. A little vacation, take the family to Florida. <br><br>Mike: Let's do one of those a month. <br><br>Elliott: Yeah that was a real blessing. The relationship with you guys... where if you are stuck or you might not know what to do next. I think it's a good resource. What can we do, what do you think? You kind of bounce the ideas off. You kind of mentioned earlier coming into the office... my kids are out of school and summer is tough. I am in the house... in fact they left to go to Tennessee on Monday. So usually my wife says... usually when we leave and go out of town you get a deal. I am like... how do you figure that? Because it's quiet, I’m focused; the kids are not running around. You really have to protect your time because it will get away from you. You are looking at the middle of the day and you're like; I haven't done anything. I will just start tomorrow. Ray: Or the wife is like... can you do this? Can you do that? Take out the trash. I am like... I go to make calls. <br><br>Elliott: She comes and she is like, is there anything waiting for us when we get back home? No aren’t you supposed to bring me something from a vacation? <br><br>Mike: That's funny. <br><br>Elliott I think we struggle with a lot of the same things. It's going from being an employee where it's like... you work, then you are done with work and your time is your own... versus being self employed and you just said it very well; you have to defend your time. You have to use your time wisely when you are making that transition. <br><br>Elliott: Absolutely.<br><br> Mike: And it's very difficult because you want to spend the time with your kids and your wife, you want to help them and do little things that make them happy. But you also got to get them deals. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Mike: You got to put the money in the bank to pay the bills, put the food on the table. E<br><br>lliott: That's what I tell her sometimes when she's like... let's just go to Six flags today. I'm like... what did I did say was from 9-12 if you guys will allow me three hours to make my phone calls, follow-up and... things like that, a couple of days a week we might be able to do something but... in the afternoon is usually when I look at properties. I try to schedule the afternoon for that and the evening... it's good to have... I'm telling you, you guys don't know, but maybe you do but... like I said, when I lock something I up I could just... if all else fails I just pass it to one of you guys and let you guys take the ball. <br><br>Mike: Well we don't like to see you fail. We appreciate when you pass it to us. Again, we get a little encumbered too. Hopefully it gets sold real quick. <br><br>Ray: I think the big thing... if you are doing wholesaling or any kind of real estate you got to schedule your time. Especially when you have got a family, you are working out of the house. 9 till noon I am going to make calls; that's great, then I am going to look at houses in the afternoon. So when you get something you give it to letscowholesale.com and we get rid of it for you. So you’re focused on seeing houses. That's where you make money, you talk to sellers, you are at their house. I think another thing great is... you have the perseverance to go nine months before you got paid. Most people in this business; if they don't make money in three months... in my experience, if they don't make money in 90 days they are out doing... <br><br>Mike: What's sad too is that it takes... literally from talking to a seller, if that person is motivated that day and you lock it up; it is still going to take you 30 days most of the time before you get that through the closing table and get your check. <br><br>Ray: Exactly. <br><br>Mike: So 90 days is just nothing in the real estate... <br><br>Ray: I know. <br><br>Mike: ... in the cycle. So you really do have to have that determination and perseverance. Elliott: I will tell you this too. When I was in Florida; my sister in law was telling me about some other teachers that were in the business and were trying to get started. So they paid 40 grand... <br><br>Mike: Yeah that happens a lot. <br><br>Elliott: I was like... oh my God! I am in the wrong business I should be selling information courses. I told her I said listen, they are going to give you three days to re-send. Please take it back, get your money back, give me... five grand, start some marketing, whatever it is you want to and we can put something together. But... again people spend so much money on things that are not going to produce. Everybody... when you see the shiny object and somebody comes out with something new; everybody runs to it. It's natural; it's like a new car or something. There is some basic fundamentals in just real estate, we talking about people and we are talking about properties. And unless you are bringing something to me; either people or properties... everything else can wait. I am kind of embarrassed to say this but... I still put my name on the contract. I don't even have an LLC or... an entity which with this last deal I am going to go ahead and do but... I am like... I got to make phone calls. I barely have time to think about a lot of the other stuff. The tunnel vision is good and bad because you definitely need to structure it properly but... man I put my name down, sign the papers, take it to the bank, the check cashes just like anything else. But as I continue to grow I want to set the foundation up. But because I am an analysis paralysis kind of guy... I just had to say; forget all of this, let's just go forward you know? <br><br>Mike: I think that's great because you don't need an LLC and you don't need a website, and you don't need all these things that you think you need to put together, to give yourself credibility in the sellers eyes. <br><br>Elliott: Like you said; if they are motivated and you solve their problem... <br><br>Mike: That's the truth. <br><br>Elliott: A house yesterday... I mentioned that, right? <br><br>Ray: No. E<br><br>lliott: I found a house vacant. The lady or the man said listen, $500... <br><br>Ray: Yeah you did mention that. For what? What kind of house is 500 bucks? <br><br>Elliott: Does it have a roof? Does it have walls? You go in there and it has a roof it has walls it has a basement. If it has any value; that is yet to be determined. They were so thankful that they would say anything to me. Like they would... they were like... the first time the guy said put a lockbox on; they were like yeah sure, we are not coming back over here, take the key, live here for a while, maybe fix it up. Ray: Maybe move the family in. Elliott: Right, they couldn't care less because this thing has been looming over them and they want to get rid of it. So when you see somebody as motivated... <br><br>Ray: What do you think was it? Was it a rental they had before or family member passed or something? <br><br>Elliott: Yeah a family member had it and passed away. When I tell you the inside is like... you step back into this time zone. You see the tub is one of those single tubs. <br><br>Mike: Those are my favorite; I call them time capsules. Just step back in time. <br><br>Elliott: You go into the basement and you see the octagon... heater system and you are like wow. You are just looking at their furniture and stuff. Wow there is an old washing machine down there. This has got to be worth something. Got to hand crank it. It was... <br><br>Mike: You might have to auction off some of that stuff before you sell the house. <br><br>Elliott: I tell you what; it's funny... I found a guy who does a lot of clean up, I have made him so much money by saying go in there and clean this up... he will charge me $100-200. Then he turns around and sells this stuff. Damn, if I had known... he actually had a magazine that was signed by Neil Armstrong because this guy was in the NASA program back when it first started. So he has these periodicals. He is like yeah this guy is going to give me five grand for them. I am like... this dude was... <br><br>Ray: That's the thing... funny you mention that. My wife does rehabs and she sold something yesterday and makes 80 bucks just on cable that we would have thrown in the dumpster. That is a whole new business though. But the thing about that is you have to focus on one thing. You are focused on houses; let him focus on Neil Armstrong. <br><br>Mike: On the junk. <br><br>Elliott: Right. <br><br>Ray: Plus you get a pretty good deal on clean ups because you can spend several thousand bucks on dumpsters and labour and what not. Mike: What are you going to do with that house? You put it under contract yesterday for 500. <br><br>Elliott: For 500. <br><br>Mike: Are they leaving all the junk behind?<br><br> Elliott: All the junk left behind so... I know some guys specifically in that area, so what I like to do is... the guys who have been good to me, I like to give them a call and... let them know what I have and... see if it works for them. If it doesn’t then that’s when it is time to put it out on market and that’s when I call you guys and get it done. In the beginning... I used to kind of... certain areas you kind of frown on because the prices are real low. But, you can make a one/two/three thousand dollars and up... on some of the low end areas. That is nothing to sneeze at so... normally when you here Chesterfield or [00:29:17.10 - inaudible] those are the houses that... everybody wants them. But you can make $1000, ten houses that’s $10,000 a month. Ray: There you go. Elliott: Just keep on with the machine. Mike: Yeah, that's great advice. Really just keep on the small ones. That's something on our previous episode we talked about a deal that took us almost a full year to do. Ray: Oh my gosh. <br><br>Mike: Our V.A's, our assistants were calling this person every week for almost a full year before we got it closed and it was an $8000 purchase. So lower end house... it pays. But if we can do a couple of those a month; that pays our office rent, that pays the salaries, pays to keep the lights on. Those things are great. <br><br>Elliott: Then you got some guys... there are a couple of guys on my list... when I... when you see a house and you say... nobody is going to want this; these guys will take it. When I look at this house I felt bad. Do you really want this? The fine to fix and the rent, they had to start at a place too. They start where they can be comfortable and they grow their business. So you never know what cycle they are on. This guy would come in... this one house was a bank owned house. When I walked in the door you went down into the floor. It was horrible... I am actually negotiating with the bank and I get it down to two grand or something. Guy buys it for like 5500 and I am like... it works. If you look at that from the outside and most people would say no. I don't know anybody who would take this. Got a tenant in there now paying rent so. <br><br>Ray: Excellent yeah. That is probably good return on his money too.<br><br> Elliott: He is a one man show so he does most of the work himself. So he is not even... have a crew that is going to come in and do the work, he is doing it himself. <br><br>Ray: My experience on rehab is about 50% labor 50% material. So that is a heck of a deal if you can do it. The problem is you can only do so many. That's good. <br><br>Mike: So what is next in Elliott's plan? Everybody is always looking for the next thing. You are doing some great wholesale deals, just did a home run of a deal with the auction with John here. What are you working on? What's your next...? <br><br>Elliott: What I’m doing now is just... like I said earlier; just trying to fill in those missing steps that sometimes because I am going forward I am leaving behind. So I definitely need an assistant that can handle the mundane things that I don't want to do. <br><br>Mike: Well some of the tedious stuff, those follow up calls you don't feel like making and some of the... yeah. Has your wife any interest in real estate? Elliott: You know it's funny you say that because she did it and she was doing well. The issue is can she do this every day? An hour a day make these phone calls. I find out too, I don't know about you guys but the woman's voice is just so much more soothing than a man's voice. When they hear me they are like... don't ever call me back! But when they hear her it's like... oh wow, no I am not interested but thanks for the call. I am like damn! You got to go through that.<br><br> Mike: Thank you for the call as opposed to... <br><br>Elliott: So I would like for her to get involved. She is a teacher now and I was trying to lay out a plan for her to leave teaching, work with me. There is something about a woman that's different, less intimidating. When I show up sometimes it's like... I feel people back off a little bit. But when a woman's there, when I took her out on that one place in Chesterfield I just let her talk and I was the assistant. Mike: Ray is able to do that too with his wife. Ray: My secret weapon my wife. She is actually a licensed clinical social worker by profession then went into real estate. So when I come onto the job she is upstairs talking with the family. Before it's over they are hugging her... I am saying here's the contract sign here, what happened? I go there by myself and they are like; who's this guy? <br><br>Mike: Ray doesn't realise they are going out to dinner the next night. <br><br>Ray: Seriously you were right though. The female voice and we are not trying to be against guys making phone calls but... you're right. It's a soothing voice and... also the reason we are calling people... the reason they are getting rid of the house is because someone has passed away, divorce. <br><br>Mike: Women are just less threatening on the phone in general. So I think it is easier for people to be less aggressive to... <br><br>Elliott: Right, right. I got to really watch the tone... the question, the sequence. Whereas... I gave her the script and it's nothing fancy and she is killing it. Yeah this guy wants you to call him back, this guy wants you to call him back and I’m like... wow. I'd like her to do it but then you have the husband wife relationship, then you have the business partner relationship. It is kind of hard to know the difference but... I really would like her to do that so... I am in need of her or somebody... <br><br>Mike: Somebody else, trying to expand, that's great. <br><br>Elliott: To make some calls for me so when they siphon through I get the ones that are like... let's go here now. That's where... I will talk to them. In fact there was this lady yesterday and... she used some profanity in the recording. My wife is out of town so I just make the call. This was an older woman, when I explained to her that we are trying to buy your house... she... no this is how I opened up, I said... hello is this so and so? I would like to take you out for lunch. She was like, really? I said, yeah what do you like to eat. She said I love Indian food... so we are just like talking. Because I heard her message and in her message it was about... I don't know what the f**k is going on... before I called back I thought I go to neutralize this up front. So hey where we going to eat? She starts talking and she is like... who are you? I'm like... well you called us yesterday about a house and... and she’s like oh yeah I am so glad you called back. So she is talking for like 15-20 minutes. I got a lunch date with this lady. I told her I want to make it a win:win. The other thing that happens in her conversation is that you find out... different people worry about different things. She was really worried about the environment... so she was worried about the community. The house is sitting there, it's not being used by anybody, it is costing us money so... let's turn this into a win:win situation. I said that is exactly the words I want to hear so... we will do an Indian lunch date. She said she wants to sell everything and go on a cruise. She is like 80 years old, she cursed on the recording like she was 40. But that is where her future is. The phone, you got to be good on the phone and... give good phone. There is a guy called Claude Diamond and he talks about that on some of his videos; give good phone. Got to give good phone. Mike: He is a pretty interesting guy if you haven't checked him out. <br><br>Elliott: He's the trip so. But yeah so if I could get... a good assistant and somebody who... you don't have to tell them everything to do they just kind of know, they figure their way out as they go. I can sit at home and be like, who do I want? I gave myself another task, what exactly do I do? I really wish I could put some cameras on myself then do it and then come back and say okay, I did this I did that and here is a video to see it. If I could get a phone person and hopefully a phone person and somebody that would be able to do some of the clerical things, I could really... <br><br>Mike: Well if you can't convince your wife... we are happy to give out your contact information. Somebody here in St Louis who is interested in helping out Elliott, if you are looking for anything else man or people want to get in touch with you, you can shout it out now. Elliott: I have an office number; 314-445-1054. That rings... if you call it right now it rings my cell phone right now, it relays forward. I hope y'all don't have too many listeners here. <br><br>Ray: This isn't live is it? <br><br>Mike: No. <br><br>Ray: Good, you got time to get home. <br><br>Elliott: I had started... a couple of people wanted to learn some stuff from me so there is a website called learning to wholesale... no that's not it. LearningToFlipHouses.com. I am not a babysitter so it is not a babysitting type of situation. If you have specific questions or something like that we can work together and... I will probably end up taking the deal and finding you guys on it anyway but... for those basic students I am there... I hate to say it like that. I am a teacher so... not to say... probably going to have to edit this part. Mike: If you are interested... <br><br>Elliott: Learning to flip houses you got my number. Let's make money. The thing I love about these guys is... sometimes people say... I want the whole deal, give me all the money but... you got to think; something is way better than nothing. When you start talking about the numbers that we are talking about. We are talking about thousands of dollars. That is like a scratch off game or something you just won. You can make $5-6000 just like that. Mike: I love it, man. That’s what most people don't think of... when you are in the wholesale business too. You start thinking these numbers like 3000 wasn't a great deal. You go back and look at when you were teaching. That's a pay check, that's two weeks pay. Elliott: Exactly. Mike: That's a lot of work. Elliott: Exactly, you are exactly right. It's funny; I think my wife saw a check I hadn't cashed... like 3500. She is like you haven't cashed this. I am like yeah I know I got to do. She is like this is $3500, you did this in a month teaching. Just htink about that; you are talking about a month. So you get your check, that is not what you spend. So the taxes come in there and what you are left with is like $3500 a month, I got it sitting on the table and haven't even deposited it. She is like, look don't disrespect, I want the $10,000 check. Don't disrespect the 3000 because that is good money too. <br><br>Mike: That's a lot of money guys. <br><br>Elliott: That's a vacation, that's... <br><br>Mike: Elliott, I think we are all happy to see you succeeding here in St Louis. We are happy we have been able to partner with you on some of your deals, and one of your best deals I imagine. So thank you so much for coming in and sharing your story. Ray: Yeah, it's great. Mike: Is there anything else you want to wrap up with? <br><br>Elliott: No that's it. Get with these guys, get your phone calls, get your properties under contract and... give it to these guys and let them sell it and then... once you start rolling you can... <br><br>Ray: The website; letscowholesale.com. One word and we built it for guys like Elliott and people in St Louis who are looking to have a back office that is already built for them. Great split 60/40. Most of the time it is 50/50 but we got... we handle the calls, we get the title work done, we do everything for you. So you can focus on making money, meeting sellers, right? Thanks for coming in Elliott, we really appreciate it. <br><br>Mike: Thanks for listening, guys. We are going to go ahead and wrap it up. <br><br>Ray: Thanks.
