Ready to crack the code to success in the cutthroat world of real estate? Let the vibrant, new realtor, Tika, guide you through the labyrinth, drawing on her fresh experiences in transitioning from the domains of customer service and IT to this thrilling industry. With a keen eye on her growth and the importance of mentorship, she made the conscious choice of aligning herself with a smaller firm, GPGH. She paints a vivid picture of her journey in our first segment, also shedding light on what drew her to Larry's courses.
In our second part, we shift gears to some indispensable advice on the home-buying process, a landscape dotted with contracts, closings, cash sales, and bank transactions. Steve underscores the absolute need for inspections, warning prospective buyers against the perils of counting their chickens before they hatch. Beyond the technicalities of buying a house, she stresses upon the need to identify the key decision-makers in a deal and to be able to read their motivations for selling.
As we move towards the conclusion, we dwell on some hard-hitting realities of the industry - the competitive market, potential risks for buyers, and the imminent need to stay ahead of the curve. Steve's insights on real estate investment and networking underline the importance of scouting for potential deals and the art of identifying off-market properties. Strap in for some insider knowledge on finding cash buyers, even in unlikely places like tax sales. No matter where you are on your real estate journey, this episode is your treasure map to success. Time to embark!
Ready to crack the code to success in the cutthroat world of real estate? Let the vibrant, new realtor, Tika, guide you through the labyrinth, drawing on her fresh experiences in transitioning from the domains of customer service and IT to this thrilling industry. With a keen eye on her growth and the importance of mentorship, she made the conscious choice of aligning herself with a smaller firm, GPGH. She paints a vivid picture of her journey in our first segment, also shedding light on what drew her to Larry's courses.
In our second part, we shift gears to some indispensable advice on the home-buying process, a landscape dotted with contracts, closings, cash sales, and bank transactions. Steve underscores the absolute need for inspections, warning prospective buyers against the perils of counting their chickens before they hatch. Beyond the technicalities of buying a house, she stresses upon the need to identify the key decision-makers in a deal and to be able to read their motivations for selling.
As we move towards the conclusion, we dwell on some hard-hitting realities of the industry - the competitive market, potential risks for buyers, and the imminent need to stay ahead of the curve. Steve's insights on real estate investment and networking underline the importance of scouting for potential deals and the art of identifying off-market properties. Strap in for some insider knowledge on finding cash buyers, even in unlikely places like tax sales. No matter where you are on your real estate journey, this episode is your treasure map to success. Time to embark!
Hey everyone, this is Mike and Steve from the Real Estate Community Network podcast. Thank you for joining us. Make sure you like us on Facebook. Real Estate Community Network, pa. Join our network. Like I said, it's free to join. So today it's me, steve Tika, and we're just going to talk. She's a brand new realtor, correct?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Oh, she's got the radio voice. That's right. This is one of Steve's and we're just going to pick our brain. Maybe she has some questions for us and all real estate stuff.
Speaker 3:You know, let's go into it, so Steve you take it away, yeah, so I guess, tell us sort of how you got to real estate, because obviously you're not just out of high school saying, oh, I want to sell houses, you're not out of high school. No, I'm not out of high school, you do.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, I'm going to take that as a compliment. Okay, it is a compliment.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Well, my background is customer service. I was in the IT field for a lot of years. I was in sales partly, and the transition into real estate just came because I wanted to be more a mom. Let's just say that I wanted to have my own schedule and I also wanted a professional career and I wanted to be a business woman. So I said everything that I've required over the years customer service, technical support, problem solving all those skills is helping me effectively transition into real estate.
Speaker 1:Well, you'd need those skills. Yeah, those are good skills to have, because a lot of people that jump in don't have that.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:And also I mean as somebody's been in this business for a long time it is a good business for beginners. It is a good business for young people, definitely. But if you have life experience, sometimes it does help, especially when you're dealing with investors and people with more complex challenges. Because if you've never been through life and you're trying to deal with a 50-year-old person who's trying to invest or is at a different stage, you may not be able to relate with what their needs. And with your customer service and technology background you certainly learned the well. There's not always one way to fix a problem. You might have to go the wrong way to get where you're going.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, but nothing's going to scare her Exactly.
Speaker 3:Exactly.
Speaker 1:I mean, if you've been picking up the phone at customer service and people screaming because I know when I call those I'm never and I got to take a deep breath, say I know it has nothing to do with you, you just happen to pick up the phone, yeah, you got to deal with a lot of that stuff. It's the same thing as an investor also. We deal with issues nonstop at least me and Steve do. Every time Steve calls me, I just I take a deep breath and I go hello.
Speaker 1:We're closing the day oh, there's something good. I got happy, but we're minus all this money, okay.
Speaker 3:That damn mortgage company's taking all our money. Yeah, and so now, when you were looking at real estate, what made you choose the training path, what made you choose Larry's courses, what made you choose kind of that direction?
Speaker 2:A lot of people told me I was going to be good at it. I'm going to be honest with you. A lot of people told me, oh my God, tika, I can really see you doing real estate. And I was like really, I'm like okay. And then I just started doing some research on it and just started, you know, was like all right, where do I start? And I just Googled and Larry's class came up. I called him, asked a few questions. It fit my budget and I wasn't going to acquire a lot of, you know, debt Trying to pursue a career. So that was one of the driving factors. Honestly, a lot of people saw my potential for it before I saw my potential for it.
Speaker 3:Right, and you were actually a tenant of Mike Ruinkamp, one of my clients, and that's kind of how you found out about us.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, I reached out to Michael.
Speaker 3:Yes, we should have him on the podcast.
Speaker 2:He'd be a good one yeah we should call him for that yeah. He's an excellent landlord. I have no complaints.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a really great guy. Well, you better not, he might listen.
Speaker 3:I like him. Yeah, he's good.
Speaker 1:When I first met Steve, I wanted to buy this one house. It was a four unit or five unit. Yeah, and I go, steve, I want to buy this house. Come on, let's go. He's like, my other guy is in here now and he just bought it. What, the five unit in?
Speaker 3:Ashley maybe.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was so excited. He's like you wouldn't believe this, Mike, but the guy that bought it is right here right now.
Speaker 3:They just listed it. Yeah, the market's going good. So when you, how did you, how did you decide on GPGH? Reality, like, what made you pick our firm, or whatever.
Speaker 2:Honestly it was I didn't want to go with, I didn't want to go with a huge corporate type of company. I wanted to go. I wanted to go small because I wanted someone that was going to mentor me directly and have the time for me. I feel like these bigger agencies, they have a lot of agents, they have a lot of people under them and I just I wanted I'm selfish what?
Speaker 3:you need to be yeah, so.
Speaker 2:I wanted that. I wanted the attention.
Speaker 1:Sure, he'll give you the attention and scratch your back and it's not like a rotating door. Some of those bigger companies, they don't really care, they're like they want to know how many people you know as you come in, how many people you can bring in right away. Right, you know, and actually Steve's very good teacher.
Speaker 2:So you're good. I wanted that. Mom and pop, you know, ask that. Well, he'll be a pop.
Speaker 1:There's no moms in here.
Speaker 3:It's funny. Larry told me he's he owns some chains, larry Delgrado from Pennsylvania Real Estate Academy but he's really a fan of the mom and pop brokerage firms. He really likes that, even though he owns some brand names. But you know he believes in that mom and pop because, at the end of the day, real estate is very local and certainly nowadays the biggest and I've worked for some biggers but they do a lot of wonderful things. But nowadays, with everything being on the internet, you know what they used to offer in terms of major newspaper advertising major this doesn't doesn't carry as much weight. They offer some wonderful things. I can't, but they it doesn't carry as much weight. So what are you looking to? Sort of learn, explore, get to know what, what, what directions of real estate do you want to help people with?
Speaker 2:I guess I potentially want to help first time home buyers. I also want to help those that are single moms who want, who don't feel like they could acquire the dream of owning their own home. I want to give back per se and I want to invest. I want to, I want to. I want to get to a point where I have investment properties. Right now, I feel like I'm building my legacy and, yeah, I want to be the best at what I do.
Speaker 3:Good, good, that's great, yeah, and we got a good one.
Speaker 1:Exactly. You make me want to sell real estate. I don't want to sell real estate, I just want to sell my own.
Speaker 3:I have a feeling your training's going to expire before you get your life. Yeah, I took Larry's class.
Speaker 2:Okay, larry's the best yeah.
Speaker 1:So I went as an investor to learn I was going to whatever, but I just yeah, I don't need it.
Speaker 2:He had a couple of those in class.
Speaker 1:I told him straight out. I said I'm not going for the test and I just went to visit him the other day. He's like. You don't need to test, mike, forget it, don't worry. I said okay, he's, he's good, larry, larry, nancy. Actually, larry told me he'd come on the show. Okay, let's get him over. Yeah well, he just bought this property in Florida. They're moving there for six months. I said we can go over to phone.
Speaker 3:Or he can bring us to Florida.
Speaker 1:I think we're going to Florida, Steve. I think it's a better plan. Yes, we'll do live from Florida.
Speaker 3:And when Vinny's happens, we're going to Italy.
Speaker 1:I'm going to Italy, for sure. Yes, Definitely.
Speaker 3:One of our other friends does it in Italy, yeah, and I'm glad you're here for a lot of reasons, but also we didn't have yet because we're a very brand new farm only a few agents. Anyone who really wants to focus on the residential? Yes, we're going to have you involved in the multi-family commercial, but it's great to have somebody that actually wants to help that sector. It's not that I don't, it's that I deal mostly with investors, and when you're dealing with the first time home buyers, it's also good because with your life experience you understand a lot of the hurdles.
Speaker 3:You understand I mean, we all understand but if you're again, if you're an 18 year old and you just got your license, you haven't lived what they're trying to do Exactly, and that's really good. And investing, I mean this is a good time to learn investment real estate, because people are buying things crazy. It's a challenging time because I'm going to teach you what they should be buying them at, which is not always what they're paying now, but it's a good way to learn. And most of our not most probably half of our business is investment commercial, and the first clients that I'm handing you at least one, at least two of them are investors looking to do projects and basically what I'm doing there, obviously is I'm still remaining as their major, as their primary, but I'm having you handle a lot of it so you can understand what investors are looking for, and that's because you were not going to know it until someone says to you well, what's the cap rate? What's the cap rate?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because Larry doesn't really teach you that. So when I was there, I'm like you're going to teach them so they know how to work with investors. Because working with investors is important, because a guy like me and Steve will buy 50 houses from you in a year. It's a big difference, you know. Or you could deal with the one-time residential person. They'll move in the next. What? How long do they stay in the house? Usually 20 years.
Speaker 3:Exactly.
Speaker 1:I'll be out of the business by then, you know, yeah, I mean it's tough too, but as long as you put a good team that Steve has already has all the good teams, the finance people and stuff like that, you'll be able to help those, I guess. Residential, oh yeah.
Speaker 3:And the cool thing is, as Mike knows, in the building where we are in Kingston you know there's we're sworn by people.
Speaker 1:Jesse gets, Jesse gets. I was like you can see his face, so Jesse gets. He's done our meetups before he's right in our building. Is he on this floor?
Speaker 3:I think he's upstairs.
Speaker 1:I think he's upstairs next to Betty, but you should probably walk her in and say hello, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I met him at Larry's. He came and spoke at the class and now say hey, I got my license.
Speaker 1:Yes, I'm here. See, hi, now we could talk.
Speaker 2:I heard it was really important to have a really great network. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's important. It's important.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you're required to come to our meetings. At least be there on Zoom, not required to, but yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1:Hey, you're acting like those big companies. Now, steve, you've got to do it Monday mornings.
Speaker 3:Monday morning 9 am no, but basically, although the one thing we will never do and I respect the hell out of the agencies that do we'll never do the Tuesday morning caravans where you drive around to see all the new listings Because that's great for you want to, but I was like no, I'm not driving around to see what I don't want to sell, yep.
Speaker 2:I understand.
Speaker 1:Well, you guys live a whole different life.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so any questions, any you know?
Speaker 1:Yeah, ask anything, anything about real estate.
Speaker 2:My biggest, my biggest, I guess, concern is when you get that first listing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, feels good yeah.
Speaker 2:How long does it normally take to close on it?
Speaker 3:OK, so the first. Ok, so in the normal world you want to go?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I was going to say a listing is a listing. You've got to wait until someone puts a buy on it. Yeah, Well, yeah.
Speaker 3:So I've been in this market, working this real estate industry full time since 08. And what I used to tell my clients because we also wholesale is listen, if I list you, you're on the market for 6, 12, 18 months before we even get a signed offer, if we get an offer at all. So that timeline is totally unknowable Right now. That timeline is a matter of days, usually if you've priced it right. But that timeline is irrelevant when the contract between buyer and seller is signed. If it's a cash. So it all depends what's included. If it's a cash sale, no inspections, it's going straight to title 3 to 4, 3 to 4, 3 to 5 weeks. If it's maybe faster, maybe slower, people say oh, I can close you in 72 hours. Yeah, the chances of Luzern County getting back to you in 72 hours, it don't happen.
Speaker 1:We're doing one today. We had this. We had a house for one hour, we sold it and we sold it. It's four weeks later.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's figure titles and average four weeks.
Speaker 2:Am I on the wrong side?
Speaker 1:No, okay, you're starting at the right place and also. Steve will kill me.
Speaker 3:What do you mean? Wrong side?
Speaker 2:I mean residential. So they, you know, go over to the oh no. Oh no, I thought you were talking about becoming an investor.
Speaker 1:You should always be an investor.
Speaker 2:But you'll be an investor, no matter what.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, and you hang out with investors now.
Speaker 3:Okay, yeah, so really there is no wrong side. When you're a listing agent, though, the cool thing is you have the only one of that house. There might be a 403-bedroom single family, there might be 403-unit, whatever, but you have the only one at whatever that was Main Street, scranton, eustone. You've got the only one of those, so everyone who wants that one has to come to you.
Speaker 2:Got it.
Speaker 3:So the timeline is from signing the contract, the buyer-seller agreement, the actual agreement of sale, not the listing agreement. From that point and it's going to run, an inspection period is going to be 15 days and, other than filing with your title company and filing with your bank, your lender, your buyer is probably not doing anything else. Then, when the inspection's done and we decide we're not going to walk away from each other hating each other, buyer and seller, then you're going to start your title and the bank process is really going to start in earnest. And you figure, if it's a cash sale, you're doing inspections and you're going to title and you're done in four to six weeks. If you're with a bank, figure 60 to 90. I mean, you might get out the door fast.
Speaker 3:Now, if it's a bank bank, if it's a hard money, if it's a private money, that might be a little faster. But every bank and some private monies are going to want an appraisal. Well, the appraisers aren't sitting around twiddling their thumbs, they're a week, two weeks out. You know da-da-da-da. So if it's any kind of a finance deal, you're probably into it for 60 days.
Speaker 1:But it seems like a lot of people are waving inspections. They're waving a lot of things, because there are a lot of influx from New York, new Jersey, bigger cities that have the money to pay cash.
Speaker 3:That's what we're seeing A lot of times, yeah, and more and more people, as we learned from Paul in the last podcast. Paul no Rodriguez. Yes, yeah, sorry, so sorry.
Speaker 1:He's going to be mad. He's going to kill me, Matt Sorry.
Speaker 3:Bill at a post. As we learned from him in the last podcast, he has what I call a light duty inspection package and he can go with buyers to the showings. Yes, your buyer is paying to have them there, whether or not they make an offer, but they can wave inspections. A lot of times Mike and I will go through our house and we'll just make an offer and we might make it, pending someone's seeing it. We might not, but a lot of people are waving everything nowadays which, if you're representing a buyer, especially as your broker, you're going to advise them not to. They can choose not to, but our advice is always hire the professional. I think so.
Speaker 1:On your side. Yeah, mike, and Steve's side is different.
Speaker 3:Well, and I actually had one on the off-market side where we went through the house and there was something funky about the foundation but it had been fixed and it looked okay and I was like, yeah, no big deal. And the investor who was there, there was a wholesale and he's a much more. He's actually a contractor and he's like I'm bringing an inspector. I'm like, well, if you're worried, then I'm now all of a sudden worried about what I wasn't. So anytime you see something not right in a house, it's not square, it's not plumb and yes, this is NEPA, nothing is square. Start considering bringing in an expert. Do you want to swap that out, or Okay?
Speaker 1:There we go.
Speaker 3:All right. So basically always advise your clients that they should bring in a professional. And the other thing is when you're walking through and they pointed that white crap around the, around the pipe, and say is that asbestos? So they look at that furnace, say is that furnace good? Give them whatever. If you carefully give them whatever your opinion might be, but then say I'm not an expert you know, like.
Speaker 3:Is that asbestos? Well, it's white stuff around a pipe and very often white stuff around a pipe was asbestos. But you need an expert to tell you. We are only trained and Larry drilled this into you.
Speaker 1:He absolutely did we buy and sell houses.
Speaker 3:So you just keep it within that. But basically, from the day you sign that, that that that contract for sale best case scenario you're done in four weeks might be two or three months. And what my first broker told me one day I called him up very upset because my three deals had just fallen apart and that was like all my income gone. He said remember, your problem isn't that three deals fell apart, your problem is you only had three deals. If you had 12 deals and three fell apart, you're still going to move forward, but you only had three and they all fell apart. Assume it's the old, don't count your chickens. Assume they're all going to go to crap until you're holding that closing check. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So I don't count on that money that you saw on the screen today until they handed to me. You heard me say that Let me just get the check in my hand and then we'll divide it up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know because it's happened.
Speaker 1:I can go there and it'll be like nah fail, throw yeah and yeah, I'll be mad yeah.
Speaker 3:There can be lawsuits, there can be whatever afterwards. But yeah, but basically until that's done, until you're holding that check, it doesn't count.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 3:Any other questions?
Speaker 1:What scares you? Okay, anything scare you. Me mean people.
Speaker 2:No, no, no. Um. All my years in customer service mean people don't scare me how about like uh fleas in the house, or Bed bugs Order house.
Speaker 1:Yeah, We've got. We've got fleas and.
Speaker 3:Bed bugs no-transcript. You can spray yourself down before you go in the house, but definitely, if it's questionable, spray yourself down after they leave the house. Okay, and you know we've done jobs where it's been like I'm getting naked in the backyard and crawling in the window Like I'm just dumping everything in the window.
Speaker 1:We're leaving our clothes, yeah we're done.
Speaker 3:And there was one house where we stepped in the front door we could feel the fleas up to our ankles and Mike and I are like we'll make you an offer but we're not going in.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:We're just nuts Okay.
Speaker 1:We sold that house and not walking in.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:And the buyer didn't walk in either.
Speaker 1:Wow, it happens. Oh my God, we're just looking through the doorway like storage wars or something.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll take it. Okay, I ain't walking in there.
Speaker 3:The price is low enough, that's fine, and in those situations you just, you just gotta tell your buyers you know when they're coming over. Hey, listen, you know what. I'm not making you any promises about what's in there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and she knows how to market herself. Yeah, you know you're doing all the social media and stuff like that. That's important.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've been doing research.
Speaker 1:So if you keep talking about. You know, give, I would you know give, I guess, seller and buyer tips and stuff like that. Keep yourself out front. Hey, you want to talk to me. I could help you sell your house, buy a house, reach out, that makes a difference.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Social media makes a difference.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Even something stupid like they, the guy from Zillow that did an article, they did a press release on his new real estate company and my comment was, frankly, he's a wonderful entrepreneur, he's a wonderful you know internet investor and whatever, but he's not a realistic guy. He doesn't. You know, if he was a realistic guy, he'd understand buying and selling houses and his estimates wouldn't be wrong. Even a post like that gets people noticing. And there was no real real estate content there other than, hey, look at this. Yeah, but now I'll go to Zillow Right Well.
Speaker 2:I'm going to Zillow.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I guess know your market.
Speaker 2:I was just going to get to that. Yeah, I've been doing a lot of research and that's when I you know?
Speaker 1:start to see what things you know. Just pick out neighborhoods hey, let me see what a three two is or a two one or whatever. Just you know, hey, let me see what new constructions go for, Let me see what land is going for, and just you'll start learning. Okay, you know, I mean, that's pretty big.
Speaker 2:I heard, community involvement is really big.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:Being involved in your community, sure.
Speaker 1:And then you know, yeah, you're out there helping the church or the city and you're at an event and you're like, here's my card.
Speaker 3:You know, I do real estate.
Speaker 1:Okay, always, somebody's always looking, buying, selling. Everybody wants to be a real estate investor. So the more, the more you talk about it, the more you could answer your questions.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and if they know someone off market it's a little bit dicey, or on the on market deals, but if they know someone we can pay finders fees. They're like hey, my aunt just really needs to get out of her house. We can offer them something.
Speaker 1:And you're going to learn that You're going to come across deals and that's why you should be happy to have Steve. I mean it's he'll show you how to handle those those become those are good.
Speaker 3:Any other topics you want to cut, any other things you want to look into or questions you got or whatever.
Speaker 2:I know, I think that's that's pretty much it. I mean, I feel like I'm going to learn so much as I go. Yeah, and I've been, like I said, I've been doing reading, doing research, even though, like, I've been waiting for my license to come through. I've been on my computer day and night and I've been taking notes and I've been watching, you know, trying to figure out what my elevator pitch is going to be, and you know how I'm going to tell someone what I do have for a living, instead of just coming out and saying, hey, I'm a realtor. You know, I don't want to just come out and say I'm a realtor.
Speaker 2:I want to be able to say that in a way where it's going to take their interest, like, oh okay, tell me more about what you do.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and especially nowadays, in a time because, when I was growing up, my mom was was a broker for about a week. She hated it, but back then you needed a realtor to get access to the listings. Nowadays you don't need that, it's everywhere. So you've got to explain them why they want you. So a lot of people will say things like well, I don't want to pay the fees. Well, really, the fees are a lot smaller than the benefits you're going to get. You're going to pay 6%, but you're going to get 30% more.
Speaker 3:And and you're right, you want to find that way to make it interesting to them. Or, if they're an investor, well, what kind of stuff? How do you make my? My favorite question with investors is what? How do you consider a good deal? Well, I want a good deal. How do you consider a good deal? Break it down for me. Is it the money? Is it the look of the house? Is it the location? Is it you only buy? You know strip malls in distressed urban areas. Is it you're looking for federal opportunity zone? What triggers you Cause, first of all, you'll hear answers that you never saw coming and be able to go there, but also they'll feel, and this is your customer service background. They'll feel like you care. Yeah, that's much more of a people thing that I'm good at.
Speaker 1:And always listen, listen, let them talk. You know that's how it is in the distress business anyway. But let them talk first and then answer their question.
Speaker 3:So a couple pieces of advice and you can. This is this is an independent contractor business, it's not an employee business. So I can't tell you 90% of the things, but if they can't give you proof of funds, you're not getting out of here.
Speaker 3:You're not getting your car to drive and show them that. Why waste your time taking someone to Walmart if they didn't bring their wallet? There's no point If they are not clearly the only one on the deed or the only decision maker. All the decision makers have to sign Like it's an LLC, and the title company on this particular deal didn't understand that both Mike and I are authorized to equally sign, and what it was like it was Steve has to sign everything, whatever. So make sure if there's an LLC, we know who owns it. Da, da, da.
Speaker 3:You wanted to make sure that all the decision makers are actually ready for the decision, and you also want to understand why the seller wants to sell, as much as you want to understand why the buyer wants to buy. You know, would they be open to creative financing? Would they be open to this? Would they be open to that? Now they'll shut 90% of the time. They'll shut that down on the first conversation and I'll show you how to have talk more around it, but at least they've had it on their radar. But as much as you can, it's about protecting your time. As I mentioned to you, there's a buyer who's a great guy, but he wants to be the only thing in my world.
Speaker 3:And I had to say to him well, you're not. And right now, in this particular market, the problem is being a buyer's agent. It's wonderful because sales happen a lot at overpriced, your commission goes up, but one seller house, 45 different offers. So the chances of you getting it. You have to be competitive, you have to be first, you have to be all these things. So you just have to be careful and be careful with your buyers and tell them listen, I will do everything I can for you, but this is a tough market for buyers. You're gonna have to step up your game while protecting yourself. I told you he wanted me to.
Speaker 3:This particular guy wanted to buy, wanted me to go look at a condemned house and buy it without an inspection. I said I'm not going to make an offer for a brand new investor on a condemned house. That's crazy Without you bringing your, without you sending your contract, I can't take that liability on me. So you just have to work with them and say listen, I'll be happy to go for you and send you my video and data, but I can't. I. Here's what I'm comfortable with advising you to do. You want to go around my advice? That is fine. We will still do your paperwork. But I've advised you. Here's what I think you should do.
Speaker 3:And like, I had a deal several years ago at off market where I had done title search on the property, I knew the title was complete poo, it was bad. And a buyer came up. I said I told the owner, I said I'm not taking it, but I might know somebody. Buyer came up, took it. Betty Bilbo read him the entire title report telling him all the reasons he should run for the hills and not do this deal, and he bought it anyway. So out comes a piece of paper I had written a it's not our fault, leave us alone. And he signed it. And a year later, when he discovered how bad his situation was, he called up and tried to sue and I said well, here's this.
Speaker 3:Here's the conversation you have with Betty Bilbo, with all of us in the room. Bilbo is my abstract company that I use for a lot of deals and it's a matter of advising them. Hey, listen, you've got some landmines here. Are you sure you're ready for these landmines? If they proceed, fine.
Speaker 3:But you know, be thinking all this says, be thinking about what can go wrong as much as what can go right and making sure you've let the client know both, because we are their real estate expert. Even with an advanced investor like Mike, somebody else whether it's the title company or me or whatever sees something, it's our job to say hey, mike, there's a train over there, it might be on the tracks, it might be heading for you. Are you now if we, as possible, we all miss it find whatever be thrown out there? And here's what could happen. I'm not the expert. Please check with an expert on what actually could happen.
Speaker 3:But I've heard of some things over there and as long as you've made them aware of it, if long as you've said to the seller hey, your mortgage is 140, you're offering to sell the house for 140. That math isn't gonna work because commission's closing costs, whatever. You're coming to the table with money, are you sure about that? You try to give them the best advice. Or it's like hey, I had one guy last week say I'm gonna buy this house, he's gonna appreciate it and he's gonna be worth 30% more in three years. And I stopped and we said no, it's not Before. Covid, stupid. We appreciated 1% a year for the last 40 years. There's no math showing Scranton PA market appreciates, except in this current stupidity. So if you still believe that, that is fine. But I'm telling you as someone who's experienced, there's a flag and that's the biggest thing that we do in our on-market and off-market business, both to help people but also to avoid the liability is.
Speaker 3:Here's the warning. If I've given you the bad news and you still wanna proceed, that's fine, beautiful. But if you proceed and I haven't given you my best input, then it's still buyer beware, it's still. We're doing the best we can. We're not gonna know everything, but if I think of something, if you're walking through a house and remember the whole material fact thing Salos hasn't told us about the cracked beam you see a cracked beam, you've gotta say to the buyer cracked beam. You've gotta say if it's your seller, you gotta put on the thing look at cracked beam. We've gotta let people know what we know. And that's the biggest mistake I've seen agents and wholesalers make. The wholesalers they do it all the time. They just pretend that the missing foundation wasn't there.
Speaker 1:Which it wasn't, but they didn't tell them. Yeah, but you don't have to worry about that. Your license, your license. You passed your test. Do you actually have the paper yet? Oh, wow, you can start selling. Yes, oh, are you hanging it up on a wall in here, Steve?
Speaker 3:It's in the box. Oh it's in the box. It's in the box, yeah.
Speaker 2:I actually have a couple referrals that came through, so I'm gonna be showing some properties. Yeah, I gotta properly do tomorrow and I gotta properly on Monday, I'm gonna be showing.
Speaker 1:Good for you, so I'm excited. Anyone out there listening wanna list, call her.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so how does everyone get in touch with you?
Speaker 2:You can get in touch with me at Tika at goodpeoplegoodhomescom. That is my email and my direct number is 570-846-0028. And I look forward to chatting with you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was awesome. Great good luck.
Speaker 2:Thank you. I will see you here because I have an office here and you can't ask me any questions because I'm not a realtor.
Speaker 3:Okay, but asking me investing questions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I was gonna ask you that. Ask him modular homes.
Speaker 2:He's the modular home developer guy here, so you can take that. What advice do you guys have for a brand new agent on reaching a level of success and generating income? You know because Passive yes.
Speaker 1:Right, you want rental properties. Well, I guess right now you're gonna start seeing what Steve does, because he has property management also. I sold all my rental properties but I'm getting back into it and like people, like your landlord, you know you start asking them questions. Now that you're gonna be in his office, you're gonna see a lot of landlords a lot of landlords coming here and you could start asking questions and when you start, you're gonna start seeing how investors are buying houses. That you're gonna start, I guess you're gonna catch on.
Speaker 1:Hey, that's a good deal. Maybe I'm gonna try to get that. You know, you'll start meeting Steve's people that get loans.
Speaker 3:Yep, yep, I mean, I don't really know how to I think the biggest when you're looking for, okay, so everything on the market and we love on the market, and by on the market I don't mean just the MLS, if it's on the internet in any way and one of our listeners knows who I'm talking to if it's on the internet in any way, if it's got a for sale sign on it, if it is anywhere public, the world is already feeding frenzy on it and it's already up to a maximum price, whether it's still a good price for you and I tell my buyers this all the time I started buying when I was making 12 to 18% returns without even trying. I was starting it there and that was low for me. I was usually 20 to 30. If you're okay with nine, 10, sevens, whatever lower percentage returns, great, that's wonderful. But once something's on the market, it's gonna be bid up really quickly to its maximum level, because people are still in feeding frenzy.
Speaker 3:What we wanna find as investors is those people that don't know they wanna sell yet, those people that are in a situation where they have to sell fast and they're willing to take a haircut for it, or those people who have tried other routes and just, whatever reason didn't work out, got tired of it. I tried for sale by owner. I was tired of crazy people walking through my house and so, as a realtor, expired listings. You wanna set up a search now of everything expired. Get the expired listings if they're not re-listed, because sometimes they pop back up again. So you get the expired listings, you search them, I'll show you this later. They're not back on for a warning column. You wanna be out there doing all the visibility stuff you talked about. Maybe even we set up a property owner workshop event where people can come and meet with you and talk about what they need and what they wanna do.
Speaker 3:You wanna get the people that don't know. They wanna sell you, whether it's single family, multifamily, mobile home park, cell storage, whatever category, anything if it's dirt. The only thing we don't not that we will list your mobile home parks or your mobile homes forever. I actually have a mobile home park listed right now, but your individual mobile homes that don't have any land will list them for you. But those aren't investments, because they're cars, they're vehicles. But if you had anything with dirt, we will. You wanna find those people who are not already listed.
Speaker 1:You wanna find them before anybody else in this room does. And that's by talking, networking. Tell your neighbors, hey, you're having somebody with a distressed property. Let me know, Because even it might not be able to sell to an investor like myself or Steve, but you'll be able to list it. You know cause I come across stuff and I say, Steve, you can probably list this.
Speaker 2:I actually came across one. I took your advice and I went on a Facebook marketplace and there's a house listed there. It's a sell by owner and they're like make your offer now, because in a couple of weeks it's not gonna be by sell by owner anymore. So I reached out and said hey, did you sign with an agent? Yet? She's like no, but it'd be interesting to call this number. Wow, I got the number.
Speaker 3:Cool, that's right, and that's exactly what you wanna do, yeah, so?
Speaker 1:I'm gonna call her and you know, just Feel around, yeah, and you know, and the good thing is you would a company that has that deals with a lot of investors.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean that's part of our network now.
Speaker 3:Right, and that's the biggest thing. That's one of the things you'd be able to tell people when you're talking to investors. Well, you're brand new to this. What do you know? Well, I'm pretty good, but my partner's done this and his partner's done that, and da da, da. Also, you should go down and I just thought of this. Now you should go Luzern County and sign up to be to go to the tax sale On August, 7th August 7th If you're able to go at that time.
Speaker 3:So you gotta go now, before the 28th, to register. It's like an authorization process and whatever, whatever. And the reason you're going is because there's one thing you know about everyone in the room at an auction All the buyers have cash, because there is no financing at an auction. So you're dealing with people who have cash, private money. They can write a check that day and it's good. And so those are the people you're walking up to and saying, hey, I do investing, I do this, I do that, I can help you, I'm a broker. You're not a broker, I'm an agent, you can do all that, and so this is Get their info.
Speaker 1:Get your card, give your info. What are you looking for? If I find something, I'll call you Paying cash. Want to close quick.
Speaker 3:Yep and invite them to our next event down at King's Pizza. Second Wednesday of August, august 10th, I think 9th, whatever that Wednesday is.
Speaker 2:I have it in my calendar actually, so I know it Well me and Steve, since it's ours, we should know and we-.
Speaker 3:I know it's the second Wednesday, it's always the second Wednesday of every month, and I know it's before I leave. I think it's the night and it is, let's see August 9th yes, see.
Speaker 1:She's fast, I'm using iPhone. She opened the book.
Speaker 3:Yes, she's got this. We are done when Invite them. Invite them.
Speaker 1:Invite them there because the wealth of knowledge there and that becomes your knowledge. Hey, this is my team.
Speaker 3:Yes, we've got a role because you've got to run.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I gotta end this. We gotta go to a closing. Get a check from me and Steve. So we can go on vacation, and yeah, that's it, I guess. So let me just wrap this up. Tika, thank you very much.
Speaker 2:Thank you guys for having me Good luck. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Any questions besides? Steve, you wanna ask me? You see me, you can ask me. I'm pretty cool. Find our real estate community network on Facebook. Real estate community network PA on Facebook. Join our group, it's free. We're growing. We're growing, steve.
Speaker 3:I see every day.
Speaker 1:two or three people dead enough Like to be in our podcast? Reach out to us. Also, I will put Tika's information on the bottom of this podcast. So if you guys are looking to buy or sell, you want her as your agent, which I recommend. Reach out to her. Thank you for listening. Good night everybody.
Speaker 3:Bye-bye, bye-bye.