Real Estate Explained

Prepping to Sell, Educating Buyers, & Knowing When to List with Russ Carter

• Nick Bush

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In this episode of Real Estate Explained, host Nick Bush is joined with top-producing DC & Maryland Realtor Russ Carter of the DMV War Team for a deep dive into what it really takes to sell a home in today’s shifting market. From the critical importance of timing to the impact of staging on buyer psychology, Russ shares firsthand insights from the trenches—especially in East of the River neighborhoods. 

He gets honest about pricing strategy, staging impact, and why timing your sale is more important than ever. Plus, we talk about how to prep your home so it stands out to today’s buyers—and what mistakes to avoid that can leave your house sitting. We also talk about how today’s buyers are navigating higher rates, shrinking grant programs, and rising monthly payments.

Whether you're a first-time homebuyer trying to navigate affordability or a seller wondering if it’s the right time to list, this episode is packed with strategy, lessons learned, and advice you won’t find on Google. 

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Real Estate Explained, the podcast that gives you a backstage pass to the ever-evolving world of real estate. I'm your host, nick Bush, a realtor with over a decade of experience helping clients buy, sell and invest with confidence. Whether you're a first-time homebuyer, a seasoned investor or just curious about the market, this show is for you. Each week, we'll dive into trending topics, break down the latest real estate news and bring you expert interviews with the pros so you're prepared for every step of the journey, ready to turn your real estate goals into reality. Keep watching. We in the pod right now, bro, I start the pod cold, like Joe Rogan, you know For sure, because I do an intro video and then. So now we in the pod, For sure. Thanks for coming down, bro. No problem bro, anytime you know what I mean.

Speaker 2:

You, you know what I mean.

Speaker 1:

You came from Bowie just right now.

Speaker 2:

No, I was coming from Anacostia. I was having lunch with some friends over at a new restaurant. It's a Caribbean spot. I can't remember the name, but it's right beside Kitchen Savage Good spot.

Speaker 1:

Okay, yeah, I know, kitchen Savage.

Speaker 2:

Yep, if you're in Anacostia, it's Slovenio's or something like that. Okay, curry chicken, tell them that Russ sent out there. Yeah, my boys, he knows the owner. She was their sweet lady. Great ambiance, good food, affordable prices, all that.

Speaker 1:

Okay, let's talk about that actually, all right, but I'm here with my guy, russ Carter. Introduce yourself, tell the people who you are.

Speaker 2:

Yes sir. Yes sir, my name is Russell Carter, I'm one of the managing partners of the DMV War Team and I'm also a top producer realtor in DC and Maryland. And, lastly, I'm a very good friend of this podcast host, mr Nicholas Bush.

Speaker 1:

Yes, sir, yes, sir, top producer, realtor, you see my man, russ, is out here crushing. What did y'all? What are you? How much business did you do last year, like? What were your numbers? And then, what are you guys?

Speaker 2:

looking to do this year. What's the projection? Absolutely so. As a team, we did slightly over about 23 million last year. Of that, about 14 million was my personal production. My goal every year is about 20 million. I set a big goal for myself. The closest I got to that was about 17 million when the market was really high. But as a team our target is about 40 million.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, 14 million, bro. You're getting money, bro. I'm trying man, trying to be like you dog, you're doing it, I'm trying to be like you. Okay, cool, and do you feel like the team, like do y'all niche down in any area?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, for sure. So we specialize in working with first-time homebuyers, specifically ones that are under like about $500,000 and Prince George's County in the East of the River DC. We also specialize in working with move up buyers as well, so buyers that are looking to sell their current home and buy something a little bit bigger. That has historically been our two niches.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I like the move up buyers a lot. You were at one point where what number two agent or number one agent East of the River?

Speaker 2:

Not that high. I was at one time about number six or number five, east of the river. And my partner, rob, is typically about one or two steps above me. He's like top three and I know at one point in time Keith James is like number one.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. So how did you guys intentionally focus on that market? How did that that end up happening East of the river? How does that happen, you know?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I don't know, bro. I think I just when I linked up with Rob at the end of 2016,. That was already his business model and I kind of inherited it. But if I'm thinking about your question, how that happens is that when you work with first-time homebuyers, especially ones using first-time homebuying programs, historically that has limited them to like under $500,000, $600,000 in purchase price. So if they want to buy a house, typically they're going to be buying east of the river because that's where the market for those type of homes are.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, how do you feel about east? We're going to talk about East. We're going to go into East of the River rabbit hole because obviously we own our house East of the River. I tried to sell it last year.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it did not sell, bro. It's crazy, it's crazy.

Speaker 1:

Barely any showings and I guess I have my own theory for that. Why that happened, I'll tell you. But we have a tenant in there now. We're about to re-sign a lease for another six months with hopes that HPAP comes back towards the end of the year and we can sell it. But how do you feel about East of the River? Just loaded question. What is your East of the River opinion? How are you feeling about the market and everything down there?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's a great question. So right now the market East of the river is relatively soft compared to how I've seen it in previous years. Primarily, I think, that's because of two reasons. One, they changed the HBAP program last year, so it's a lottery process and that's limit the amount of buyers that's in the market east of the river. So that's reason number one. Reason number two is obviously the interest rates. Right, the interest rates has limited a lot of buyers from being able to purchase because typically the folks that are buying east of the river are in a lower to moderate income bracket and they're very affected by the changes in interest rates. So that's why I think the market there is pretty soft but still a great time to buy, bro. There's a lot of good inventory out there and, especially with everything that's been going on in DC and in the market, a lot of buyers have shied away from the market. So, as a buyer, what I'm advising my folks is that this is the perfect time to get in and grab an opportunity. Okay.

Speaker 1:

So you know, when I actually comped out my house last year, I hit you up and I was like Russ, I'm seeing 625. And that's what the math is saying, but I don't know if I believe that. You know, can you comp this out? And you were like nah bro, I think you actually were like I think you go 635, right, yeah, yeah, bro.

Speaker 1:

And I think I listed at 625. And at one point we were just like we want to sell this house, we want to get over it, and we dropped to 550. Right, it still wasn't hitting, you know, it still didn't sell. And so I thought to myself, I said okay, why is this happening, you know? Right, I said, well, one reason is my kitchen is very custom.

Speaker 2:

Hands down. You know Beautiful kitchen, by the way, Nick. Thank you yeah.

Speaker 1:

Thank you, but it's very custom. So maybe a buyer walks in and they say, well, this is not our flavor, so we're going to have to renovate the kitchen. I was getting a lot of feedback about this. Feels like a major renovation, and so I had that feedback. Then I said, well, hpap isn't funding right now and so that $202,000 that somebody can put down on $600,000 is gone. And I hate to feel like this about East of the River, because that's our people and we know it gentrified a little bit. East of the river because that's our people and we know it gentrified a little bit. But I'm like, okay, $625,000 right now is $4,000 a month, right? So I'm like does a couple that makes $4,000 a month that can afford a $4,000 a month mortgage? This is a $300,000 household, basically quarter million dollar household. Do they want to live east of the river? And I felt like maybe they don't, you know, and I think those are some of the reasons we didn't sell yeah.

Speaker 2:

Like and there's a few things that's in that, and I've been dealing with this a lot, especially with my seller clients east of the river. Last year there were two things that I noticed that were very important in terms of selling a home everywhere, but specifically east of the river. One is timing right. The timing is so, so, so, so important, and whether it's peak season or off-peak season, it doesn't matter, but it's just the timing when that right buyer comes around. And what I mean by that is that we had a property that was over in Deanwood that we had listed for, let's say, $450,000, right, set on the market 120 days right.

Speaker 2:

Typically, a seller would have did price adjustments and then, you know, dropped the price and then it probably would have moved. This particular seller kept the price at $450,000 because they didn't have the motivation to drop it, and we end up getting a buyer at $450,000, right. So it was just the right timing. Also, like I mentioned earlier, the motivation right. What's the seller's motivation? So you and your wife may say, hey, we could sit on this price for two years because we have a small mortgage, or whatever the case may be, or you may be in a tough spot where you have to sell it now, which means that you're forced to drop down the price. So now more than ever, specifically east of the river, the timing of when you list a property and the motivation of the seller or the buyer is very, very important.

Speaker 1:

So from a timing standpoint in that market specifically, where do you feel what are the best months? What have you been seeing the best months or the best times of the year to kind of move your property?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. Still, the spring and summer hands down, that's still the best time to sell your property. But you also have these little hyper-local factors that could affect the property selling. For example, east of the river, the HPAP funding typically comes out in October November, so you could see an uptick in transactions after the peak season's over. So in the spring and the summertime it's the best time to sell, but it's also typically when the most inventory is available. So the buyers have a lot more choices in the spring and the summertime and then the fall and the wintertime they may have less choices, but they have more buyers that are out in the market because of programs like HPAP and things like that.

Speaker 1:

And so when we listed our house, we didn't stage Right and I think we should have staged. Do you feel like in that market that staging is important or you can kind of get your property off more as is?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so as a listing agent, I've historically been against staging. Oh really, I've historically been against staging only because I feel like staging is very expensive, right, but over the past six months I've been made a believer because, looking at the data, properties that are staged typically sell like two to three times faster. So I am becoming an advocate of staging. But I am becoming an advocate of staging, but I think it depends on your budget. I also think, like you said to your question, it depends on the market as well. Do the buyers care about staging? Because I've been on property tours, as you have, and some clients are like I hate the fact that this property is staged, I want to see a blank canvas. Or you have other buyers that want to see the property completely stayed so they can kind of see where they would place their furniture and things like that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I was not a big stager from a budget standpoint, because at the beginning of my career, I was working with a lot of first-time homebuyers and my listing sales price was also lower, and so people just didn't have the $3,000 to $5,000 to invest into staging yeah, 100%, and so what I was doing was a lot of digital staging.

Speaker 2:

Virtual yeah.

Speaker 1:

Primarily with condos, but some townhouses also. So I was doing a lot of digital staging and then I met a stager Jen Cook Shouts to her Okay, they do a really great job, Absolutely. And I think her company is Phoenix Staging and Design and I invited her on the podcast and she's like digital staging is BS, oh yeah. And I got her to stage a few houses for me and I'm walking in like, oh, this feels totally different, there's a vibe in here, yeah. And so I sold a condo in Arlington last week and this is a client that we've done like three or four deals with and she's like, hey, you think we can get away without the staging.

Speaker 1:

And I walked in. At first I said yeah, and then I walked back in and I was like we got a stage. So she ended up spending the $3,000 and it went under contract in three days, Wow. And then I walked in eventually to meet the appraiser and I saw it staged totally different vibe, Wow. And so I'm a big believer in staging and I think that the two most important things that a seller can do in their house, aside from like a total renovation not a kitchen bathroom update is paint and stage.

Speaker 2:

Oh yeah, bro.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, but also, just like all agents are not created equally, all stagers aren't created equally as well. So, to Jen and to my stager, giovanni, I think that finding a good quality stager, bro, like you said, can make or break a deal. Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Jen told me that my house didn't sell because she didn't stage, and now I think we're going to sell it at the end of this year maybe. So you was hanging out in Anacostia yesterday Today.

Speaker 2:

Today. Today, you're in Anacostia. Yeah, I'm going to be there tomorrow, like I'm in Anacostia area or east of the river four or five times a week, vibing doing your thing, hands down.

Speaker 1:

So I actually have been down on the development down there from a retail standpoint. But you just, you know, hit a nice restaurant, you vibing yeah.

Speaker 2:

What do you?

Speaker 1:

think about the development. This is what I feel like. I feel like Anacostia got really hot, yeah, and it was popping and there was like so there was development, there was plans, people were moving down there. And then it cooled down a lot.

Speaker 2:

Really.

Speaker 1:

Okay, but I could be wrong. 10 down there. So how do you feel about the development of the retail in Anacostia?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so there's a lot going on, just not in Anacostia, but just east of the river in general.

Speaker 2:

But a lot of these projects are super big projects, nick, and they have to go through a lot of red tape. Just with the hospital that's opening up or just opened up over at St Elizabeth, with the hospital that's opening up or just opened up over at St Elizabeth, the first hotel that's east of the river, they just put a brand new apartment building like right there at the Frederick Douglass Bridge I think they're calling it like the Bridge District or something like that. But there's still a lot of development going on. But these are big, long-term capital projects. Some of them are sponsored by the district as well. But I'm kind of liking the development that I'm seeing currently Still not at the pace that I would like to see it at, especially, like you said, with the retail scene and the grocery store scene and things like that. So I'm definitely looking for the district to invest in that a little bit more. But compared to 2016, when I first got into the business, it's been exponential growth, hands down.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so still solid. So if you were me and Lauren, would you sell this house or would you hold this house?

Speaker 2:

I would probably hold for a little bit longer. I would probably hold for the reasons that we mentioned earlier. The market is still a little soft. We know that the interest rates are kind of depressing a lot of buyers, so I would probably hold until the market picks up.

Speaker 1:

just a little bit more. Yeah, I think if we go to five, I think if HPAP comes back or if rates go to 5%, then we can shoot Hands down. We did a six month lease just to stay flexible.

Speaker 2:

Hands down, bro. And if I could buy a property east of the river, if circumstance were a little bit different I would probably move east of the river, move to Hillcrest, fort DuPont, pembrance, somewhere like that, because you still can benefit from some of the other amenities like at Navy Yard and Capitol Hill and places like that. They got a nice Whole Foods over at Navy Yard now and it's not too far, it's only like 12 minutes away.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so first-time homebuyers you're in that space. Yeah, I'm working with a lot of move-up buyers right now, and so I want to talk to you about that. But why are you still working with first-time homebuyers? I know that you guys do a lot of rentals, yeah, and then I don't know if that's how you parlay into first-time homebuyers or if you're attacking them in a different way, but how did that become so much of the business and why do you feel like that's still something you're working with?

Speaker 2:

I kind of moved away a little bit from the first time homebuyers. Yeah, so I would say probably five years ago, first time homebuyers are like 80% of my business. Now they're probably closer to about 30% of my business and that's primarily because we have a great buyer's agent on our team, jamal. He's a beast yeah, he's a beast, he's a dog. He's been handling a lot of our first-time homebuyer business.

Speaker 2:

But one of our passions and our goals is to educate members of the community and typically people, specifically first-time homebuyers, gravitate towards us because of the education that we provide.

Speaker 2:

So that's how we stayed in that space, even being in year nine, 10 in the business, because we still have that same passion for education. And with a lot of agents, they just don't educate these first-time home buyers well enough on the process and they need a trusted advisor who can hand walk them to the process so they can make an informed and advised decision. So that's why we've purposely chosen to stay in that space. Even my partner, rob he's been in the business 20 or something our years he's still working with first-time homebuyers going through the programs, going through the home buying process and things like that, which is really no different consultation than what you would do with a move-up buyer, because you can't discount the fact that that move-up buyer was educated when they first bought that house. So that's why we kind of like that space and we focus in on that space. We also teach the classes for HPOP as well, so that keeps us grounded, like every third Saturday with Marshall Heights Community Center.

Speaker 2:

We're one of the agents that they bring in and teach folks that are going through the programs about the home buying process, and that's one of the biggest benefits that we can provide to members of the district in Maryland.

Speaker 1:

Okay, that's dope. And then how do you feel like the market, like the climate is for first-time homebuyers right now? In what regard Like are they winning? Is it tough for first-time homebuyers? Is there opportunity for them?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there's a lot of opportunity. My first-time homebuyers have always won. When you work with the war team, you're always going to be in a winning position, except for during that COVID period when it was just super duper.

Speaker 1:

It was hard for everybody, bro. Yeah, it was super duper crazy.

Speaker 2:

But they're winning right now because of the reasons why we mentioned earlier. There's some decent inventory in that under 500 market and if you are actually in the market you'll see that there's some opportunity that's out there, because the media is kind of portraying that it's a bad time to buy. There's a lot of uncertainty and things like that. So a lot of buyers have shied away from the market, but we're motivating people to go into the market and grab those opportunities because so many people are leaving the market.

Speaker 2:

Like I was texting a client earlier today. He sent me a video of I think it was earn your leisure or somebody like that, saying like not to buy a house or is it a good time to buy? And then he asked me was it a good time to buy? I was like yeah, bro, when you look at it was like I have a listing on Savannah and when you look at like a two mile radius of their property, it was like 20 properties Savannah and when you look at a two-mile radius of their property, it was like 20 properties, move-in ready properties on the market under 400,000, right Under 400,000. Between 2020 and 2023, that was unheard of.

Speaker 2:

So now the buyers have the pick of the litter because people are shying away from the market. So I'm telling my guys hey, get in and let's grab an opportunity. So in that regard I think they're winning. In the regard of their monthly mortgage payments, I think a lot of buyers are taking a payment right now that they may be a little bit uncomfortable with. That's higher than what they expected. So the average payment I'm seeing right now for my first time home buyer is going to be between like $2,500 and $3,200. And some of those are single people household, like it's a one person household. So I think they're feeling a lot of that payment pressure right now. But outside of that I think they're still getting good deals.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And do you feel?

Speaker 1:

like have you had any government people? Are you dealing with the government?

Speaker 2:

layoffs at all. We've had at least five people that have been and somehow affected by everything going on in Washington right now. Five people, yeah, five people in at least two listings of people that have lost their jobs.

Speaker 1:

So they're not selling anymore.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, no, they're selling now.

Speaker 1:

They're selling because they lost their job. Okay.

Speaker 2:

Yep, they're selling. They're not from DC, they're from California or Florida. They're going to sell the home that they have here and they're going to move back to wherever they're from. But I think that the impact, the overall impact of the layoffs, is very minimum. I think it's very, very, very, very minimum. But just the people that's contacted us has been about five people or so.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, east of the river, rust on the pie bro.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, bro, east of the river. Rustle in the pod bro, yeah, bro, and and the crazy thing is, is that, like I've historically like focused in east of the river. Yeah, but my business has literally exploded like in the past two years, you know, from, like I said, primarily working with first-time home buyers and being a buyer's agent, always having boots on the ground, to being like 60 40, you know, buyer sellers to honestly now having more listings than I do, buyers now.

Speaker 1:

How does that feel?

Speaker 2:

Bro, it feels so good.

Speaker 1:

Oh, my God bro.

Speaker 2:

You have so much more leverage now because you're not always running. But, as they say, new levels, new devils. Now it's a different set of issues. Yeah. Oh, Bronson's like he likes that yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, new levels, new devils. Now you know Mondays and Black Fridays, I have to, you know, update all these sellers and let them know what's going on with their properties, because I have myself. I got probably close to 10 listings right now. You know five which I've secured in like the past two weeks or so.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

So, and our process is that we either update our sellers on Mondays and Fridays, right, and I don't know, Nick, I know you know, but when you got to call a couple sellers and let them know why their properties are not selling, you know it's typically a tough conversation. Yeah, I update sellers on Tuesdays.

Speaker 1:

Okay, because I let the weekend happen, you know. And then I update on Tuesday Like, hey, this is what went under contract, this is what sold, this is the feedback from all the agents. I try to reach out to agents on Monday and then, if anything pops back on the market Thursday, friday, I'll be like hey, this is new, we're also competing against this right here, so I have a system for that too, but that is way more enjoyable to do than I think. My number one I don't love to show homes anymore.

Speaker 1:

I think there was a time where I was like, yeah, let's go see some houses and I could have that conversation in the house and I felt like I was valuable. And then I, more so, realized I don't really need to be here for this. But if I can get somebody who's high level to show a home and be able to have that conversation, then I'm smooth 100% bro. Yeah, somebody who's high level to show home and be able to have that conversation, right then I'm. Then I'm smooth 100 bro. Yeah, because I'm more on the list side too and it's been beautiful, and because you have more control. Like I always said it like this like the, the from a from, like a pure, just like business, the product is I've, I can I not that I've ever sold drugs?

Speaker 1:

right, but I compare it to the, the dope game right cocaine it's like everybody wants to dope game right Cocaine it's like everybody wants to be the plug, right, and I do not condone this message.

Speaker 1:

But it's like do I want to be like selling the drugs, right? Or do I want people to come buy the drugs for me and then they can go and sell it right? So I look at the real estate market the same way. It's like, well, if the product is the house I people to, I want, I'm the demand, I want people to come, and well, I'm the supply. I want people to come and buy the house for me, right, instead of having to, you know, work, work, work. On the other side of the the the coin, and I really started to feel like that during covid, right, because I was during covid I was like man, I'm 90% buyer and 10% listing, and now we're competing against 20 people. I'm like I would love to get 20 offers on my listing and so I have a very sphere-based business and so, luckily, those people are starting to move up. Is that how you ended up in the move-up buyer space, just staying in touch with your first-time homebuyers who are trying to buy the second property now? 100%?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, and having those conversations with our sphere of influence and asking for referrals as well yeah, they typically refer you people that already own homes. Yeah, but I think that, and being in the business, like you said, for a long period of time for like nine years or so compared to most agents, and staying in touch, we do a very good job at staying in touch with our past clients and sphere of influence. I did the math the other day I think we've represented probably like over 400 people, like over the time, yeah, and we may have lost maybe five percent of those maybe just stay in touch.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you're doing email or just uh calls how you stay in touch all different types of ways, from um, from emails to phone calls, to social media posts, to events, to gifts, all different types of things that we do. But from my very first year in the business, I was always relentless with reaching out to my past clients at least four times a year, right, and two times a year purely just checking in. Hey, how you doing? I'm checking in on you. The other two times we do the check-in as well, but then we ask for the referral right, and also on social media we're always commenting.

Speaker 2:

So even if we're not posting I was telling my boy Jamal this the other day is that people may look at your social media and just because they don't necessarily see you post, they think that you're not active on social media, right, and that can be the furthest from the truth. So if it's my client's birthday, if I see him just got a promotion, if it's their wife's birthday, wedding anniversary, honeymoon, whatever the case may be we're going to comment like, send an emoji, whatever the case may be, and that's the way that we stay engaged, right, because that's a very low energy way to stay top of mind and a lot of people don't realize that they think it has to be a post. It has to be this beautiful content. But if you just like somebody's photo or say I'm sorry that your mom died, happy anniversary like. Whatever the case may be, that's one key way to stay top of mind with your spirit of influence.

Speaker 1:

All right. Well, I want to ask you some rapid fire questions, but I can't think of any Brunson. Do you have any rapid fire real estate questions that you could like? We need like three of them.

Speaker 2:

Sure yeah, you know, because we did this on DancePod one time.

Speaker 1:

We did this on DancePod. What do you think? I have something for Kareem Kareem's out there. You know he's a star out there. You buying any investment?

Speaker 2:

properties Not yet In the future? Yeah, for sure in the future. Where would you buy one? Where would you buy one at? Oh man, If I was to buy a multi-unit building, it would either be east of the river or Baltimore.

Speaker 1:

Baltimore.

Speaker 2:

Baltimore, baltimore, baltimore.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so how do you feel about landlord-friendly states versus tenant-friendly states?

Speaker 2:

Oh, that's a great question. Of course anybody's going to lean towards a more landlord-friendly state. But our secret sauce is to do a very thorough screening process of the tenant right, because the landlord-friendly versus the tenant-friendly state is only applicable when you hit a bad situation for real right. But if you do a good enough job with screening the tenant, like, we have over 92, 93% success rate with our tenants. So it's a very small percentage of tenants that we actually have to evict or kick out of a property or to don't pay or something like that. So as long as you do a thorough screening of the tenants, you typically have a good experience. So I would lean more towards somewhere that's landlord friendly. But if I am in an area that's tenant friendly, we just got to do a better job of screening.

Speaker 1:

Okay. So I was like do you guys property manager?

Speaker 2:

also Because you do a lot of rentals. We do not. That's one area that we're not in. Maybe in the next half a decade, decade or so, we'll start to transition over to property management. We just don't have the manpower for it, right now. And primarily because we're still scaling up the sales business.

Speaker 1:

Okay, that makes sense. Focus on the one thing.

Speaker 2:

Focus on the one thing, bro. Yeah, and the reason why is because our agent business is so hands-off. All we got to do is market the property. As soon as we find a tenant for the landlord, we hand it over to the property manager. But being a property manager that you partner with, right, that we partner with, like you know, columbia Property Management is really good Scott Bloom and those guys over in Uline Arena. Also, out in Maryland, you got Tracy Miller with TLM Properties. She's a dog, been in the business for a very long time. But the thing that I like about property management, bro, is that that's mailbox money. You get that 10% of the rent every single month and if you start managing 50, 100 properties, that starts to add up, I think, when we list our rental.

Speaker 1:

I'm going to let you list it, bro, I'm going to pay for you to list it.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

That's that RFTA packet, bro. Yeah, bro, it was no bueno dog yeah.

Speaker 2:

And there's another guy that I work with. His name is Travis Bonner. Travis is solid In terms of voucher clients, bro, he has a solid process, man.

Speaker 1:

He did. He did do some Bama stuff. He called one of my I was like being slow and he called my seller.

Speaker 2:

What he?

Speaker 1:

like found my seller and called him it was whack. It was whack. But shout out to Travis, I know he does a good job. I know his name, so I know he does a good job.

Speaker 2:

Travis is who probably, if we, we probably find the tenant for maybe, let's say like 60, if it's not us, it's typically going to be him, right? He has a solid process for screening them for the RTA, for the application. He makes our job so much easier, so like. That's why we like working with those type of guys.

Speaker 1:

But yeah, man, if you need us to list it, bro, just give us a call okay, and then I'm going to ask you this question the right way, because I always ask people this question like it was not worded beautifully, and so then I asked ChatGPT to rephrase the question and they crushed.

Speaker 2:

Everybody loves chat.

Speaker 1:

Kareem, I'm going to ask you this question also.

Speaker 2:

Like I actually got the plus service with ChatGPT you got the plus.

Speaker 1:

I think I'm plus yeah.

Speaker 2:

Nick, you know, I was waiting for you to invite me on the pod too, bro, were you? Yeah, I was waiting, bro. I didn't know, bro, I was waiting, I was waiting, I wasn't going to say anything.

Speaker 1:

I was waiting. You were waiting for the invite. Yeah, bro, you know I was going to get you on here, bro.

Speaker 2:

I knew you were. I was waiting for the call. I was waiting.

Speaker 1:

But now we're shooting Fairfax, not DC. So I'm like, is he going?

Speaker 2:

I try to make it convenient.

Speaker 1:

Also, I was sick, bro. All right, so we're wrapping up. This is the last question of the pod. Yes, sir, I'm going to read it straight from ChatGBT. And when I interview Kareem, we got my man, kareem, out there, who's an agent. He's coming on next. I keep referencing him. Sure, this is how ChatGBT wrote it up.

Speaker 2:

Okay.

Speaker 1:

So let's respect the platform. Okay, because I'm supposed to transition into it. You know, up, I can't even be serious. It's similar. As we wrap up, what's the one critical, actionable piece of advice you would offer to homebuyers and sellers navigating today's real estate market? Hold on, because I can read, bro, and that made me look like I can't read. What's the one critical, actionable piece of advice you would offer to homebuyers and sellers navigating today's real estate market?

Speaker 2:

That's a great question. The one critical piece of advice that I would say is just stay current on the market right. Monitor the market. Listen to the news, follow the interest rates, look at the inventory that's in your market. Stay current on the down payment programs, the development that's going on in your communities or your city. You got to stay abreast on the news, whether you're a buyer or a seller, to know what's going on in the market.

Speaker 1:

Solid, solid, all right, man, any last words. You want to get off Anything. You want to tell the people.

Speaker 2:

How can they find you also. Yeah, so you can find me online Any of the online platforms. Yeah, so you can find me online any of the online platforms. You can go to our website, wwwdmvwarteamcom. I'm also on Instagram at RussCarter1. And you can reach out to me directly on my cell at 202-500-5720. Or you can always contact Nick. Nick has a direct line on me. My wife, he's been to my crib and I just want to say that Nick is crushing it with his podcast, one of the best podcasts out there in the area right now. Man, if you're not logged into this podcast, you're definitely losing out A lot of great information, a lot of great guests, and I'm so thankful for him having me today.

Speaker 1:

Appreciate you, bro. And, by the way, russ is my Maryland referral agent. So I don't, I don't, uh, I'm not licensed in Maryland, russ is. Yeah, and any Maryland client I've given to Russ, he's, he's. They've crushed it every time.

Speaker 2:

Slam dunk.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so if you see online I'm licensed DC and VA, you want to buy in Maryland, hit me up Cause. Then Russ is going through the deal.

People on this episode

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Nick Bush

Host