The Titanium Vault hosted by RJ Bates III

The Secret Ingredient For Wholesaling Success

• RJ Bates III • Episode 497

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If you’re new to my channel my name is RJ Bates III. Myself and my partner Cassi DeHaas are the founders of Titanium Investments.

We are nationwide virtual wholesalers and on this channel we share EVERYTHING that we do inside our business. So if you’re looking to close more deals - at higher assignments - anywhere in the country… You’re in the right place.

Who is Titanium Investments and What Have We Accomplished?

Over 10 years in the real estate investing business
Closed deals in all 50 states
​Owned rentals in 12 states
​Flipped houses in 11 states
​Closed on over 2,000 properties
​125 contracts in 50 days (all live on YouTube)
​Back to back Closers Olympics Champion
Trained thousands of wholesalers to close more deals

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With over 2,000 Videos, this is the #1 channel on YouTube for all things Virtual Wholesaling. SUBSCRIBE NOW!    https://www.youtube.com/@RJBatesIII

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RESOURCES FOR YOU:

If you want my team and I to walk you through how to build or scale your virtual wholesaling business from A to Z, click here to learn more about Titanium University: https://www.titaniumu.com

(FREE) If you want to learn how to close deals just like me, The King Closer, then download the free King Closer Formula PDF: https://www.kingclosersformula.com/close

(FREE) Join our exclusive FB group community for real estate investors and wholesalers: https://www.facebook.com/groups/titaniumvault/

(FREE) Click here to grab our Titanium fleet free PDF & training: Our battle tested strategies and tools that we actually use… and are proven to work: https://www.kingclosersformula.com/fleet

Grab the King Closer Blueprint: My Step by Step Sales Process for closing over 2,000 deals (Only $37): https://www.kingclosersformula.com/kcblueprint

Grab Titanium Profits: Our exact system we use to comp and underwrite deals in only 4 minutes. (Only $99) https://www.kingclosersformula.com/titaniumprofits

Want to know what the best markets to wholesale in are? Grab my breakdown of all 50 states here: https://www.titaniumu.com/markets

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Speaker 1:

What is the secret ingredient to wholesaling success? As cliche as it is, it's your network. We're going to go through that. I'm going to talk about the importance of the network that we have built here at Titanium and how it really catapulted us, especially early on, or especially early on, Like yesterday's video. We strategically released that about our first ever wholesale deal. That we did in August of 2014. And then from there, the network of individuals whether it was JV partners, Dispo partners, ended buyers, title companies, lenders the importance of all of that and how it has enabled us to continue to grow as a wholesaling operation and successfully complete transactions and get money in our bank account. But I think sometimes that gets lost in like, hey, this is how we comp and underwrite, this is how we do acquisitions and talk to sellers and all these different little nuances inside of wholesaling. All of that is vitally important, but at the end of the day, the only thing that's truly important is getting results and making sure money enters your bank account faster than it's leaving, and if you continuously do that, you're succeeding. How do you get to do that? Well, make sure you always know when you have a need inside your business. Who are you going to pick up? Who are you going to call? Who's going to answer that question that you have? And so, going back to our early days in 2014 and early 2015,. You know, there's the first deal that we did on 2300 Sunset Lane. That was important, that was the proof of concept that we needed that, hey, wholesaling is a legitimate business and that we can do this. And it will insert a check into our bank account. But then, after that, that's when you start relying on that network of people around you Because, let's be honest, we got extremely lucky on that first wholesale transaction, not really knowing how to comp it under right, Not really knowing how to do dispositions.

Speaker 1:

I mean, we dispo'd the deal off of Craigslist and the end buyer ended up showing up at the property and basically illegally entering it, breaking in and climbing through a window. I mean, we got lucky during that transaction, but through that transaction we developed a relationship with an escrow officer, dana draper, and I talk about her all the time because we still use her for our deals here in the state of Texas to this day. She has been an amazing resource that has helped us through so many different transactions and has enabled us to close deals that otherwise we wouldn't have been able to close. But moving past that first deal, then it became a little bit harder for us to do acquisitions and there was a lull in the business where they just kind of slowed down and I basically abandoned our contracting business and so money started becoming a little bit lighter. Right, that's $7,500 on the first wholesale deal. That went away super fast.

Speaker 1:

And so as we got additional properties under contract and we started moving towards how do we disbill these deals? The first couple ones that we disbilled went to the exact same buyer. Couple ones that we disbowed went to the exact same buyer was 1008 Shady Lane in Keller, Texas, and 4702 Wateca Lane in Dallas, Texas. The way that we disbowed those deals was actually were on net worth realty's buyers list and they forgot to bcc their buyers. They only cc'd them, and so I took all of those email addresses from that email and I just, hey, this is not my buyers list, I'm now sending out my deals to these buyers. And I was able to dispo those two deals Shady Lane and Wateca to an end buyer based out of Idaho. Now, after that it became a lot more difficult for us to dispo, because that was just again, pure luck. There wasn't skill involved.

Speaker 1:

And so the first person that became a monumental part of our success was the next buyer that we found, and we actually found him by posting a deal that we had under contract inside of a Facebook group. His name was Chris and he contacted me and he was like hey, I just paid $60,000 for education to virtually flip. I'm based out of California and I'm going to be flipping houses in the state of Texas. I'm based out of California and I'm going to be flipping houses in the state of Texas, so I'm super interested in this property. Went through the whole process. He needed to get a contractor to come, bought the property, give him a bid. He had to figure out who he was going to use for his hard money loan. And what was I doing? The entire time I was sucking up all of this information that was coming my direction. Who was he using for a hard money lender? What contractors was he getting to come out and want these properties? And I'm getting their contact information because I'm thinking to myself well, if this guy has to figure out how he's going to get money to purchase property a hard money lender this seems like a great resource. Well, it was and it still is to this day.

Speaker 1:

The network of what we built early on is still part of our network. A decade later, he used Wildcat Lending and they were brand new to the industry. On his first several deals, I just took out a loan on a property using Wildcat Lending. 10 years later, so as I was paying attention and looking around and going, okay, how is this guy able to flip this house Hard money, loan this contractor? I remember every time I would meet one of his contractors, hey, if one of my other buyers needs a contractor, can I recommend you to do the rehab for that property? Of course, every single one of them was like yes, so he bought that property. Then the next property I got under contract he bought that one. The third property I got under contract he bought that. This is in the span of about two weeks. We're talking about Junius in Dallas, Swiss Avenue in Dallas, San Fernando in Dallas. I still remember these deals why they were life-changing deals for us.

Speaker 1:

We were still extremely early on in our career, so each one of these was not only proof of concept. But we're building that network and I'm thinking to myself like I don't know how many deals Chris can buy, but I'm going to keep going back to the well until the well is dry. That's what we did. So then we get the fourth property under contract, Lipscomb. I go to him and I say, hey, got another deal. And he says all right, RJ, pump the brakes. I can only do so many deals. All right, fair enough, Makes sense. You're new at this. Now, at this point you've got three properties that you own. I've made my money. He can't buy this one. But he says I am a part of a community of other people that are looking to buy deals. What if I bring you the buyer and we just split the fee, the wholesale fee? I'm sure you've made really good money off of the deals that I bought from you. I was like I absolutely have. He says great, how about this? Let me present this to the people inside of my community and see what happens. Sure enough, buyer. Next deal I get. Send it to Chris. I'm not interested in this one, but I'll send it to the community Buyer.

Speaker 1:

We did this to the tune of probably 100 plus deals when we were getting started. Why? Because I didn't have the skill sets and, quite frankly, at the point in time I wasn't prepared to learn that skill set. I just looked at it and said this is amazing. I'm making more money than I've ever made and I'm only having to do half of the job. Now, mind you, remember I did these deals off of the MLS, so I wasn't even investing money into marketing. I didn't figure out how to have a skill set of how to talk to a seller, I just knew this is a deal. I'm finding discounted properties that are distressed. I'm getting this is a deal. I'm finding discounted properties that are distressed. I'm getting them on a contract. I'm sending them straight to my network, which at the time was small but still effective, and so we were consistently moving deals. Quite frankly, I don't even know how many deals that early on we terminated. I don't even know if it was very many, Because I didn't even know that was really like an option.

Speaker 1:

It was kind of like you get it on a contract, you make sure it's a good deal they were, and then you dispo it and then whatever that end buyer needed along the way we provided we treated our end-buyers like customers. Were we perfect? No, but you need a hard money lender. Here you go, here's Wildcat Lending. Well, eventually it got to the point where we might need somebody else. So we added two, three, four other hard money lenders to the arsenal. Hey, I'm based out of California and I want to flip this house. I don't know how much my budget would be. Well, guess what? Cassie and I were, prior to being wholesalers, we were contractors. So we'll write up a bid for you. Cassie started literally making design templates for the end buyers and we were sending them invoices. Hey, for $250, we'll make you a design packet. Use this tile, Use this color paint, Get this granite countertops. This is where you can get it from Whatever they needed.

Speaker 1:

We were providing to them so we could succeed as wholesalers and over the course of time, we started building up relationships. Now, mind you, I don't know if wholesaling YouTube channels existed, but we didn't know any better. So we were just going around and we were focused on the small little circle of people that we had and we just do. Hey, this is really working. We weren't going to meetups, we weren't further educating ourselves, it was just the daily grind. And over the course of time, the network just continued to grow More lenders, more contractors, more title companies.

Speaker 1:

How did we get more title companies. Well, there'll be times where a seller would say you have to use my title company, it's a probate, it's an inherited property, We've already opened up title. We would have to close the deal with them. We would make a connection with the escrow officer. Well, boom, now we've got two title companies that we can use. Hey, title companies. Do you know any investors that are regularly closing deals? Maybe we should send them more properties? And we just continued to grow.

Speaker 1:

And so ultimately, after about the first year and a half, our wholesale operation was basically we were the acquisitions leg of a joint venture monster. Chris was basically disbowing all of our deals. Now some of you look at that and you say, yeah, but you were sacrificing 50% of the revenue and the profit. Were sacrificing 50% of the revenue and the profit. That's true, we were. I never viewed it that way. I viewed it as we're getting more deals than we would if we were to stop and have to develop the relationships of these end buyers that we would not have known. And so one of the things that is very important and one of the things that we always protected was our relationship with Chris more than anything. So when Chris would bring me a buyer. Let's say the buyer's name was James and I would do a deal with James and Chris. The next time James wanted to buy a deal, I protected Chris and I made sure that Chris still got paid on that. I never took that buyer.

Speaker 1:

Now some people might disagree with this, but at the time the most important thing to my business and my livelihood was that network, and it started with my relationship with Chris. He was the lifeline to new buyers, so I always wanted to make sure that he was taken care of. That was a priority to us, Also because he continued to buy future properties from us. It didn't just stop at the three, it just temporarily stopped with the first three until he got those completed and he was ready for the next projects. So not only was he a partner, but he was also an end buyer for us, and so that was always a huge priority. Make sure that you're taking care of the people that take care of you. This is what strengthens the bond of that network that you have.

Speaker 1:

So early on, what enabled us to get started was that those relationships that we built. And then, through the course of time, it was like I remember the first time a hard money lender ever said hey, you know you're referring a lot of clients to us. You know we could give you an affiliate or referral agreement for this what I get paid. I was just doing that so I could get my wholesale fee. Next thing I know I started getting paid off of referring clients to them. My business just continued to grow and it was through the relationships that we built. So you guys need to constantly be thinking about how can I build relationships inside of this industry, who can I bring value to and then leverage a skillset or something that they have going on in their business to help us grow together?

Speaker 1:

Now, several months ago actually about a year ago and then a couple months ago we did a video about what markets should you do virtually wholesaling in, and inside of that we give you a resource, and inside of that we give you a resource. Now this resource is available on every single one of my videos and you can get it at titaniumucom slash markets. It's about a 50-plus page PDF and it outlines the details of my feelings and our results inside of every state, including what title company we use, the percent of deals that we've done and then, at rate, acquisitions dispositions and overall, your ability to wholesale in that state, based off of our experience. The reason why I'm bringing this up is because, as you download that, it's not just about the information that is provided in there about. Hey, RJ thinks Texas is a great market to wholesaling. Of course I do. I've been based here For the first several years. The majority of our deals were done in the state of Texas, so I'm, of course, going to believe Texas is a great state to wholesaling. The reason why this is important is because one it gives you information on what title companies to use and my feelings, but also, as you're looking at, what markets should I actually wholesale in?

Speaker 1:

This is a question that got brought up inside of Titanium University the other day, and what I told everybody in that call and I want to tell you guys today is, if you're trying to decide what market you want to do wholesaling in, you should base that decision around who do you know in this industry? What does your network look like? Who do you know could be an end buyer? Who do you know that could be a joint venture dispo partner? I feel like that would be a great way for the majority of you guys to get started in wholesaling the exact same way that we did back in 2015. First, I don't even know how many deals I mean at some point in time I'm sure I could count it up, but we'll say 100 plus deals. We literally JV'd the dispo with someone that was entirely based around their entire operation was based around the ability to dispo deals. That enabled us to get really good at identifying what was a deal, what wasn't a deal, and what we now teach is we're where in buyers buy Understanding the web.

Speaker 1:

This is what I think each and every one of you should do If you're deciding what market you want to be in. Who do I know that can help me in my business? A TU member earlier today just asked. He has a job, the busy time of the year is coming up and he's worried that that job is going to consume his time and he's not going to be able to focus on his wholesale operation as much as he desires. So he's thinking about actually going out and working for another wholesale operation, a big box wholesale. My response to him today was why not look internally at the opportunities that exist inside of TU? Why not the network that you have?

Speaker 1:

If you're looking at someone and you're saying that person is really good at dispositions. If I solely focus on acquisitions, where do you have end buyers? I bring all my deals. You disbob, boom. I'm just focused on bringing you deal after deal after deal. Or if you have end buyers and you know someone that's good at acquisitions, If you have end buyers and you know someone that's good at acquisitions, why not do the exact same thing? Hey, I'll disallow all your deals. Go get me deals in Kansas City. Go get me deals in Birmingham, Alabama, wherever it is that you have buyers. This is how you build that network. One, provide value. Two, make sure that the relationship makes sense for both parties. That's why it was successful for us and Chris.

Speaker 1:

Early on, he didn't know how to do acquisitions, he didn't know how to identify deals, he just knew. This is what they taught us, and I know that we have a ton of buyers inside of this community. So we leveraged that. We leveraged the fact that he had that community around him. Why not replicate that and do the exact same thing inside of your wholesaling business? Right now, you guys show up here Every single Tuesday inside the chat For those of you that are inside of Titanium University, why not leverage each other inside of there and work together? Galen in Bayer in Wisconsin. Boom, there you go. You just know that. Why Because I've said it 10 times on Tuesday lives he shows up every single Tuesday. Why not leverage that relationship? Because you don't have it yet. You have to build that network and provide value.

Speaker 1:

First, Now the other things that have come around more recently. Now the other things that have come around. Moreads is a vendor that we've been using for a little bit less than a year. That relationship was established based off of a relationship that I created back in 2017. Eight years ago, I developed a relationship with a gentleman named Matt Andrews. Matt Andrews had nothing to give me at the time I developed that relationship. I had nothing to give Matt Andrews except for friendship and the ability to talk about what we were doing inside of our wholesale operations. He went on to create what's known as Family Mastermind. I joined Family Mastermind and through there, I met the owners of property leads. Through there, we put them through a vetting process to see is this a viable lead source for our community, for you guys, and from that point, we said you guys should use property leads. Several people inside of TU inside of the vault just watching my YouTube channel, have made hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars using property leads. Again, this is leveraging your network to make things better for everyone around. That relationship with Matt was developed prior to this could ever be thought about. There was no PPL, there was no Titanium University, there wasn't even the thought of me having a YouTube channel at that point. But the relationship, that network, was created.

Speaker 1:

Today I got a call from my friend, Jerry Norton. We talked for about an hour on the phone. Was there a purpose behind the conversation on? Was there a purpose behind the conversation? Not really. The whole point was two people talking about what they love to talk about wholesaling. How can we better serve you guys? What can we do to make the wholesaling industry better Content-wise? What can we do? That's what the entire conversation was based around us talking about the different types of content that we have done. A year and a half ago I guess it's longer than that, probably two years now I didn't have Jerry Norton's phone number Again.

Speaker 1:

Putting myself out there and doing the closers olympics yeah, I won some fake wrestling belts, but I also developed some cool relationships and from there, every single time I talked to jerry, I tried to provide jerry the opportunity to build his brand, showcase, showcase his talents, and I provide value to him. Jerry, let's collaborate on something. Sure enough from that conversation we're going to be going live on Thursday to provide value to you guys. That, yes, in return, we hope to benefit from that. But that's not where it comes from. It comes from the place of building that network together, strengthening our voice, our purpose behind creating content on a daily basis. I think Jerry and I probably put out more content than anyone else in this industry combined and we see eye to eye on a lot of different topics, and that was one of the things we talked about today. It's okay to not see everything perfectly, but to be aligned on so much of our message is very rare nowadays. Again, that network. So now on Thursday, not only do I get to provide value to you guys and help you guys and hopefully make you better wholesalers, but also I get to do really cool shit with Jerry Norton Literally a pillar in the wholesaling industry, One of the strongest voices. He wants to do that with me. It's an opportunity. The message that I want to deliver to you guys today is have your eyes open to the opportunities that exist with working with other people in this industry. It doesn't have to be an actual partnership. It can literally just be what Jerry and I do let's collaborate on something. It could be as simple as doing one joint venture deal at a time together. That's okay.

Speaker 1:

Eventually, Chris and I got to the point where we said we're going to go do our own things. Why? Because he developed the skill sets and the desire to want to do acquisitions. I got to the point where I had developed the skills and had the desire to want to do dispositions. So we separated, we went our own way, and that's fine. We made a ton of money together. We had a ton of laughs At one point in time. I consider him one of my best friends. I don't anymore just because we've, like our relationship kind of fizzled out after we stopped making a lot of money together. But I still look back at that time and go, man, I don't know if I make it here without that relationship with Chris. So to you guys moving forward in your business, always keep your eyes peeled for the opportunities.

Speaker 1:

The next thing, I talk about dispositions. It's one of the topics and subjects inside of this industry that I think the majority of people struggle with. There's not enough content out there in regards to dispositions, and part of that is just due to the nature of how difficult it is to show dispositions. It's just a harder, it's a lot easier for us to show the lead generation and the acquisitions than it is to show dispos, so there's less content in regards to it. Now, I do think part of the reason why there's less content around dispositions because maybe, just maybe, some of the people that put content out there aren't necessarily doing some of the business and so maybe it's just hard for them to actually show that. But it's neither here nor there.

Speaker 1:

That being said, when it comes to dispositions, I always talk about building that relationship with your cash buyers. Yeah, Investulift, InvestorBase, DealSpeed they're all extremely vitally important tools and systems to have, but the reality is your ability to know who that end buyer is going to be. Without the system, without the tool and building that relationship and having the buyer pick the phone up when you have a property under contract, that's irreplaceable. That's what takes you to a whole other level. As a wholesaler Justin and Garrett at this point, they have known buyers throughout the country. I think Justin is just south of doing deals in 40 different states. I think Garrett's at like 33 or 34 different states in a two-year time span. That's a lot of different locations with a lot of different buyers that they have developed. So now at this point, when they go to do acquisitions, they sit down and they look at speed to lead, even if it's coupon club. Where do you think they're going to pick their leads? They're going to be basing that directly off of where do I know I have a buyer? Or where do I know I have a buyer texting me right now saying hey, dude, just got done with that other property, Send me your next one, I'm ready to go, I'm ready to buy. That relationship is critical to a wholesaler's long-term success and health.

Speaker 1:

At the end, the initial title to this video prior to us making it a lot more clickbaity and, quite frankly, easier to read on a cell phone the secret ingredient to wholesaling success was the quality of your real estate business is directly proportional to the quality of your relationships, and that is an absolute fact. This whole business is a relationship business. Think about the fact that every single time you get a property under contract, you should have a relationship with your end buyer. You should have a relationship with the title company. If they're using a hard money lender, hopefully you have a relationship with that hard money lender because at some point in time you should know who are the hard money lenders that are good to do business with in this market and who are the ones that are not good to do business with. If you're utilizing a transaction coordinator, you should have a relationship with that business and understand how you're going to do business back and forth, because communication is key there. This whole business is built around those relationships. Why do I get some people that when they get a deal in a certain location, they send me a text or they give me a call because they know, hey, based off of our relationship, I know you've got a buyer there, I know you do deals here, let's do it. That's that long-term relationship that, quite frankly, you can't put dollars and cents to what that's worth to your business. If I bet, if I added up how much money I've actually made over the course of time that came directly from the relationships, it might even exceed what I've spent money on to create revenue. That's how much money I've made off of the relationships that I've established inside my business, One of the things that I wrote down here on my notes.

Speaker 1:

This one's funny. I've actually been asked this numerous times. We'll open this up for Q&A here in a second. But I've actually been asked RJ, should I actually give out my cell phone number when I'm talking to sellers, or on my dispo marketing, or on my voicemails? Listen, I have been giving out my cell phone number for a decade. For the past eight years I've been giving it out live on podcasts, YouTube channel. It doesn't matter. My videos have been seen millions and millions, actually tens of millions of times.

Speaker 1:

At this point in time, my phone gets blown up with spam. It doesn't get blown up with people watching YouTube videos. My cell phone number is 817-915-6860. I want people to know my cell phone number. I can choose to respond to any text message or any phone call. But the opportunity that comes my way, if someone has that need and they know I have the solution, I want that opportunity. I want that person to know that my cell phone number is 817-915-6860. So they can reach me and I can offer the solution if I want to. But if they don't know my cell phone number and they don't know how to get a hold of me and you send me a DM on Facebook or Instagram. Guess what? There's a solid chance that it's just going to get moved to the spam. I'll never even know it exists. I just responded to the guy the other day. He had a property they sent me like three months ago and I'm like, yeah, dude, I could have done something with this, but you messaged me three months ago and it's been sitting in my spam folder. I didn't see it.

Speaker 1:

Guys, build that network, Give yourself as much opportunity as possible, but look around and say who can I provide value and take my business to a whole nother level? I think collectively as an industry. Right now, there's too many people that are trying to get started that are not looking around and saying who can I do this business with? Not a partnership? Let's do some deals together. It's not the end of the world to give up 50% of the deal or 40% of the deal, whatever the arrangement ends up being, Because, as of right now, you're probably not even doing deals. Period. Get a little piece of it. Get some deals under your belt. You'll be able to go to another level.