Ekabo Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Podcast
A podcast for those who do not believe they were put on this earth to work 40 to 50 hours per week for 40 to 50 years, to hopefully retire at the age of 65.
Ekabo Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Podcast
107. Unlocking Real Estate Riches: Southeast Boom, Savvy Staging, and Stress-Free Strategies for Financial Mastery
Ever wondered how to navigate the fast-paced race towards financial freedom, especially within the ever-changing real estate market? My co-host Liban and I share our latest insights on property trends across the nation with a special spotlight on the Southeastern boom, where cities like Atlanta are becoming hotspots for investment and growth. Join the conversation as we invite you to share your thoughts and questions, shedding light on how these shifts might influence your own financial strategies.
In the realm of short-term rentals, it's all about the fine details that turn a good listing into a great one. I spill the beans on some nifty pricing tactics that can increase occupancy without sacrificing profit. We also talk about dynamic pricing tools and the importance of guest feedback in refining your service. To top it off, we give a rundown on integrating Hospitable with QuickBooks, making the financial side of things as smooth as your guests' stays.
Rounding out our financial symposium, we welcome Dwayne to the conversation, sharing the game-changing benefits of our mastermind sessions. We also dissect the art of home staging and its impact on sales, along with the strategic timing of property investments. Finally, we embrace the lighter side of investment stresses (including my own hair-loss humor) and give a shout-out to Justin Farhan's upcoming TNT game entertainment. Join us next week as we continue our journey to financial independence with humor and expert advice.
🗓️ Tune in every Wednesday at 7 PM Eastern! Don’t miss out on our journey toward financial freedom through smart investments.
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Our Links
➣ Financial Freedom Mastermind Facebook Group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/53083...
➣ Peer Space Host Referral Link https://www.peerspace.com/referrals/g...
➣ AirBNB Host Referral Link https://www.airbnb.com/r/niyia41
➣ Ekabo Home Network (IG, Youtube, Email) https://linktr.ee/ekabohome
Niyi Adewole is a licensed realtor in Georgia, brokered by EXP Realty. Feel free to reach out at Niyi.Adewole@exprealty.com if you would like to work with an investor friendly real estate agent.
Welcome to the Financial Freedom Mastermind Group Podcast. Here we're all about breaking free from the 40 to 50 year work grind and accelerating our journey towards financial freedom. Join us every Wednesday at 7 pm Eastern as we explore different types of investments that can fast track your path to financial independence. We serve as a hub for connecting with fellow members during our sessions so you can share successes, ask questions and keep the momentum going.
Speaker 2:My name is Nii Ye Adewale, host of the Acaba Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Group, and I'm excited to be joining you here on this Wednesday, May 22nd, and this month and year is flying by, like every single week I mention it, but you really have to be going after your goals each day because you can blink and it can already be the end of the year and you're planning for next year. But joining us with more solid wifi, cause he's not at home, lebon, how you doing?
Speaker 3:I'm doing good, good to be here, good to be back and, to your point, time does fly. Time really does fly. I mean today, like a more long form example. I literally went to my cousin's graduation and he was in my kitchen as a baby saying berry instead of strawberry, because he couldn't pronounce the word. And now he's 18 years old, graduating and I feel old.
Speaker 2:It happens fast man, it happens fast. Legit, I mean, you met my nephew. My nephew's 21 years old and about two inches taller than me. So I'm looking up at him I'm like, wow, this is crazy. So it does happen fast. But welcome back, lebron. I know you were traveling last week, but we are excited to have you back as the co-pilot on this Acapa Home Financial Freedom Mastermind Group, and today is an open session, and so anybody that's joining feel free to click the link below that allows you to join live and or drop any questions or comments you have in the chat and we'll jump right to that. But Liban, what's new?
Speaker 3:in your life, man. I mean, like you mentioned, we did do some traveling and it kind of there's not much that makes you miss home like sleeping out in the woods. And I mean, while I was out there, you know me being realtor, obviously being curious about kind of the stuff around me. As we were going across all the different States, I was kind of looking at all the different houses around us. I was on like Zillow as we were driving in the neighborhoods and it's very fascinating how you know, there's kind of a consistency amongst pricing, I mean, most of your most expensive houses, and this is something, of course, you think about as, oh, this is so obvious. Literally every single city I went through, I tested this as we kind of because we drove from the outskirts to the center, and as you get into the center, there's a consistent theme middle of the city, same things going on, highest prices, most activity, all of that stuff. As we go out to the suburbs and I noticed this as well too there is kind of a common theme, and I think this is more so as America developed kind of the way developers move.
Speaker 3:Everyone was kind of copying each other, because I saw, especially in the South. Everyone was kind of copying each other because I saw, especially in the South, very similar South Carolina, north Carolina. You see the same layout with the highway system looping around a small metro and kind of the outskirts being that high and up and coming price. And as we were stopping at you know local, like if we'd stop at a restaurant, I kind of asked the people oh, you know what's it like here? And they're all saying the same thing it's getting expensive.
Speaker 3:People are moving from the north here and it's very fascinating to see that kind of Atlanta is on the head front in a lot of this development and all the things that are happening here are happening everywhere, just in a smaller scale in terms of a kind of migration towards the southeast in general. So that was kind of very surprising to note. I thought you know it has. Every investor thinks that's only in one market. Oh, it's just here that houses are expensive, but it's quite literally everywhere else. And then when you get into a really expensive market like New York, where I was looking at it like oh my God, what you know, you kind of see how it got to that point through everything else.
Speaker 2:So it's very fast you can see why people in New York and the Bostons and the Californians, when they look at Atlanta, they're like dude, this is cheap. I still remember when I first moved down here back in February of 2021, the house that I bought was $670. Down here For an example what I could get in Boston and I'm not talking downtown Boston, I'm not even talking really Boston proper, I'm talking on the outskirts of Boston, like barely in Boston. It'd be what you consider like Stone Mountain here, right, where it's like. You're not necessarily there, but I was quote unquote technically still in Boston. For this price I'd be able to get a two-bed, two-bath condo, right, a new one, a dope one, but a two-bed, two-bath condo for $660K is what it was when I left there. I don't know what it is now, wow. And I came down here and was able to get a five-bed, four-bath with an in-wall suite for $670K. So I came down here with my eyes wide open like, hey, I can get a lot.
Speaker 2:And so that's what people that are moving from those areas are thinking when they're coming down here, and that's why it's so easy for them to scoop up some of these properties.
Speaker 2:And when you see the Atlanta Metro moving in to become, you know, the sixth largest metro and starting to be mentioned in those names of hey, this is where people are moving to, and when you think about 69,000 people in 2023 moving here, which is a heck of a lot, I think that was the most. Yeah, the nation Behind Texas and Florida Behind Texas, maybe like the second or third most, right? Yeah, no, we're third, we're third, third, yeah, we're third, third, most Thank you for keeping me honest Third, most individuals moving. And when you start to look at these patterns and how they look at the pricing that we have here, compared to where they're coming from, there's still a lot of upside to move up, and so it's what gets me excited about continuing to invest in this market, especially when we have an anchor like the 2026 World Cup, that's going to open even more people's eyes to the beautiful city of Atlanta.
Speaker 3:No, 100%, 100% yeah.
Speaker 2:Justin, welcome. Man. How you doing what's going on, man, how y'all looking, Come on now trying to make it happen. Yes, sir.
Speaker 4:How you doing today.
Speaker 3:A lot better. You know we might start doing them here If we don't get a single drop. We might just every Wednesday get an excuse. I get to see my aunt get to do this. You know works out well.
Speaker 2:Come on, now You're getting ready to send Justin to your crib, to rewire everything, everything we're not getting a chance to know more guys? We're not getting a chance to know more. No, no, justin, anything new in your life, man.
Speaker 4:Nothing new, man. Nothing new right now, currently just getting through these NBA playoffs. Been having a lot of stuff going on with the NBA, but other than that man just making it.
Speaker 2:To that point. I know you just had your baby right, and so are you working mostly from home, or are you going to travel at some point during this?
Speaker 4:I'm working mostly from home. I'm not going to do any travel this year, so I'm just going to produce all the features from remote. So I got a couple guys that are out on the road. They're going to handle the interviews for me. They'll feed it back. Then we'll cut the features from that. We got Carly from New Towns going out tonight. Y'all see that here in a few minutes on the Inside the NBA show. Do you need?
Speaker 2:any of us to fill in for you. Give me a couple playoff tickets and I'll be out there. I'll be out there. All I need is a seat, just one, just one. No, what you do on a day-to-day is pretty awesome, man. I don't know if I say this enough or if we appreciate it enough, but it's pretty cool to be with somebody that's literally creating what we all watch on a day-to-day. So it's pretty cool to see you on a day-to-day, aj, how you doing Not much, man. Hey, we trying to make it happen on a Wednesday. There it goes. Go ahead and show off the hardware, man. What's up? Why didn't I crash because of that Too much? That's awesome. That is awesome, aj. What you got going on, man, oh, hey, I don't got any hardware like that. Hey, I don't got any hard word like that.
Speaker 1:Years I was playing in high school and college we didn't really win anything.
Speaker 2:I don't know if it was because of me or the other guys, but we're going to table that You're on a team sport, that's true. We're going to table that one, AJ. Anything new in your world from investing and real estate standpoint?
Speaker 4:I actually have a caveat. So, since we're talking about listings, the thing I've been running lately is doing a 20% markup on hospitable for Airbnb and then instantly just giving a 20% discount on Airbnb's platform. That way I'm always at the top of the search query and getting that strike through for the listings. So it's like you know, same way they do with the retailer stores right, oh, this is on sale, but it was the same price a week ago. They just increased it by 20% and then they said it's 20% off. So that's what I'm doing right now and it's been working really good for me.
Speaker 4:I noticed, like soon as I do, that I typically get an influx in bookings right there after it. I only do it for the month that we're currently in. So, say, I got 20% higher a month out from now. So if somebody books a month out, they're just going to get hit with the additional 20%. But if you're booking this month, you're going to get the 20%. You're going to get the regular rate because you're getting the 20% off on the Airbnb listing and I actually only do the 20% off on Airbnb. Bookingcom still remains the 20% markup. Vrbo, all those other sites it's just Airbnb. I'm giving that discount because they give you the strikethrough on their platform.
Speaker 2:That is very smart.
Speaker 3:Great strategy.
Speaker 4:I didn't think that Well, no, so you do give the discount on Airbnb, but you're marking up the rate 20% on hospitable because it pulls in price lapse and then your markup if you mark it up 20% on hospitable, it goes 20% higher than that. So when you're slashing it 20% on Airbnb, you're just discounting the markup. You just put in the only caveat to it it pulls your data from like a month or two back on Airbnb to make sure that you're not just slashing your prices. But once you have it set a month out with the 20% markup, it'll all flow correctly because your previous prices in order to set that 20% markup, it'll all flow correctly because they're your previous prices in order to set that 20% discount, because they're averaging that discount that they're giving you on Airbnb. So, as long as you're already built, yeah, because it's not on Price Labs. So Price Labs, you're just sending out your regular rates, right, their dynamic pricing that you have.
Speaker 4:And on Hospitable, where you have the markup feature, you can go inside of there, you can list all four of your accounts and they have the markup tool so you can make sure you're getting the same rate versus the platforms that have the different fees. So I'm using that a little differently. I'm just using it as a true markup tool. So I'm marking up the listing an additional 20% and then I'm turning around and I'm giving a 20% discount on Airbnb. Does that make sense? So it's like it's null. I'm just doing that so I can get the strike through in the promotional things in Airbnb, but I'm not discounting my property any, because I've already marked it up 20% that I'm discounting.
Speaker 3:And you're doing this for the month of May. So, for instance, all your open days on May get filled out, so you aren't already have any people. So it's kind of just to boost that occupancy number.
Speaker 4:Exactly so like a month in advance out from this month. They were just paying the 20% premium, right? Because they're farther in advance, so it could hinder your farther out bookings a little bit. But we've seen in this cycle that we're getting a lot more bookings closer to the date. So I'm like, hey, you know what, I'm just going to go ahead and make sure I'm at the top of those listings when Airbnb is sending out these emails. Airbnb is having travelers come to this area. They're sending my home first. You know, as a buyer we love to think we're getting a good deal. So if you're 20% off, these rates are lower than they typically are on this property. You're going to get less complaints because people feel like they're getting a built-in discount. You kind of think you can run the risk of getting those cheap guests. When people think they're already getting a good deal and you're setting that standard, you're giving them great service. They're going to be good to go.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:That's a good point. That's a great strategy. It's a great point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good point. That's a great strategy. It's a great point. Yeah, it's one that we can definitely start to look into. I can tell you, even just from the switch to Price Labs, that software is incredible. Now I can't stop preaching about it.
Speaker 2:And once a week we do a little bit of what AJ was talking about and then also what Jess is talking about with price optimization. On Fridays I meet with the team and we literally walk through all the reviews that we got from Airbnb and they have a cool insights tab where, when you have more than one listing, it really helps to kind of give you the highlights for that week and you can see are we trending in the right direction? Are we trending down? And you can get and see the reviews from the guests and whether it's a good review or a bad review, we always try to pull something from it.
Speaker 2:And if it makes sense, there's some guests that we're not going to be able to satisfy, like, hey, you guys should have X, fill it with whatever, and we're not going to put that on the property. But some guests will be like, hey, it'd be great if you had some extra throw blankets. Like, okay, we could do that let's put a throw blanket underneath a storage over there and things of that nature, and so we're always reiterating and trying to add more to our properties with the feedback that we get from guests.
Speaker 4:Speaking of, I use Hospitable and QuickBooks Like I have my listing set up separately in QuickBooks.
Speaker 4:I only have two, so I have them set up so I can quickly look at a profit loss statement because all the cleaning fees, all those things are currently tagged. So once those things come out, the bottom line just shows true to what you have and then in a snapshot, in a 30-day period, you can know whether or not you made money or you lost money, because at the end of the day, that's what we're trying to figure out. All the other stuff is important, but once you make sure you're on the right side of making money, then you can start optimizing and figuring out. You know, like your nightly rate and all those things. But you can pretty easily see that on hospitable. I think it is a matter of just utilizing all those tools to kind of get the best insight that you can. But I will say, on hospitable, I've noticed that you have to make sure that you hit the checkbox for accepted bookings, because it'll have some cancellations in your earnings if you don't click that 100% agreed.
Speaker 2:I use on a week-to-week when we're doing our Friday check-ins. I'm using Airbnb because it's a little bit quicker, it's a little bit simpler and I don't have to alter as much. I can just pull up exactly what they have put, the date range and it has all the metrics we're looking for. And then those Friday meetings, I have my guest experience managers. They're doing all the messaging and they have metrics that are tied to them. We have our cleaners and they have the metric that's tied to them, which is cleanliness. And then we have kind of all the other stuff which is just the overall team, right, and operations manager. And then on a month to month, I use exactly what Justin does.
Speaker 2:I pull it from hospitable and I'm actually pulling down an Excel sheet that I can filter, because we've now moved a majority of our cleaning teams and things of that nature and our guest experience team to monthly payments, because if it was anything more frequent than monthly it would drive me crazy because I got too much coming in, and so, with that in mind, I pull it from there and filter it down once a month, usually on the first of the month. So if you ever try to reach me on the first of the month and I'm just MIA. It's because I'm doing all these invoices and stuff and then I send that out so that the whole team can see it, cause you can filter down and you can really get some nice feedback from that. But hospitable does take a little more working and you got to export stuff, whereas Airbnb, if you're going to look at it pretty consistently, you can just just pull that up like door locks door locks and this is that would be a lot.
Speaker 3:You add, this is five dollars per home or five dollars per lock literally, that would be a lot.
Speaker 2:That's a game changer, yeah all right, moving to guesting come on now.
Speaker 2:No, no, I think. Uh, aj, thank you for the heads up. I'm definitely going to join the next session and, um, and maybe reach out to a folks or two if I see the bill change, because that would be. That would be a heck of a lot, man. That's a. That's not not a good way to keep some of the larger folks Right, and I know that's one of the things that they're trying to do or they're looking to. You know, combat and get some like people that have more Cause. When you look at their, their platform, I want to say, like 90% of the hosts they have have less than five properties and they're trying to start to crack into that. The CASA world, where people have hundreds of properties and they're using hospitable, but adding that type of fee, is it definitely kind of deters you from using some of the features. The whole point of having the smart locks linked to there is that it makes it more seamless for you and if you got to pay extra for it, that's tough.
Speaker 4:Yeah, oh, I will say one good thing that I've noticed recently about hospitable. Have you guys seen the like where they give you a snapshot of the type of guests you have now like what they like?
Speaker 4:yeah, you talk about the ai snapshot yeah, like tells you like this guy wants extra coffee or things of that nature. I think that'll be very useful to make sure you're providing the right type of hospitality, because a lot of times we'll be doing things that the guests don't even care about. But, based on the insight they've given the platforms, they're pulling all this data in order to let you know what these people are looking for. That's something that we did at Apple is like we would keep notes on our clients. They came in so we always knew who was who and what type of service they needed, and that was huge.
Speaker 2:They did that they.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so like we, you know, once a guest comes in, like the interaction, it's kind of like a chain of everything that you know working without that guest.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's pretty cool. I got a five. Here we go, here we go. So this is what Justin's talking about, just so everybody can kind of see. So it gives you the AI summary smooth communication with hosts. Detailed information, locations near beaches and places. Hosts that go above and beyond. And then you have all the reviews right here that you can just click through and know whether or not you want to rent to somebody, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 3:How do they get that information, like, how does they get it From the reviews, right?
Speaker 4:Yeah, it seems like it's based on the reviews they've left for for other hosts.
Speaker 3:Oh, I like the fact that this house had a lot of community, good communication. That's what I like, because they're rating the actual host, so they're saying, okay, I get it, I get it, so I was okay I was actually doing that manually before it came in.
Speaker 4:I would always go. Once I got a new booking, I'd go read the reviews and then you know, once you read the reviews you can see who left them reviews. So so then you can go to their profile and a lot of times people had left comments on theirs that you can see, like, is this going to be a guest that's really going to nail me on a review, or are they going to be a stickler about things that they see in the home? So you can kind of make sure that you're taking good care of those people that are pretty shitty to leave a review.
Speaker 2:Yeah, especially when you think about if you start to move into that more luxury space, this could be huge. Right, there's the hotels of the world like the JWs and I'm blanking on the other names of different premium hotels yeah, jw Marriott. Right, hilton has the Signia and things of that nature, where they really keep track of everything that you like, even down to the temperature that you like, when you check into your room and try to make sure it's all set up for you. And so, as you start to move into bigger homes and luxury spaces, this thing's going to come in super handy.
Speaker 2:I'm actually excited because we're going to be closing on a home here Now. It's going to be toward the end of next month. It's just now finishing up and the unit that we're going to turn into a B&B is a four-bed, three-bath and we're planning to make it more luxury and we're definitely going to be utilizing these insights and starting to leave some different types of refreshments and things of that nature to really pull in more guests. Get those five-star reviews and get this thing going, dwayne welcome to your first Financial Freedom Mastermind group meeting.
Speaker 5:Man, how you doing. Oh yeah, all is well. What's going on, guys? I was here trying to log in for a bit so I heard you guys. I heard a discussion. I'm like the magic man in the background.
Speaker 2:And anytime somebody joins for the first time, right, we always like to give you the floor just to introduce yourself and you've already met a couple of these individuals on here, but just to introduce yourself and talk about a little bit of your investments, Sure.
Speaker 5:So I guess it's only AJ I haven't met. So my name is Dwayne Lawrence. I met Nii and Deanna just a month ago and you guys already helped me to find a property. I did a real estate journey, just closed enough quad and looking to invest more. Come on now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, closing your quad and getting after it.
Speaker 5:Exactly, yeah, so I live in Alpharetta at the moment, so I'm here locally and, yeah, I'll look forward to learn more. What were you looking for Like? What was your more?
Speaker 3:And what are you looking for, Like what was your first investment and what are you looking to do kind of in the future?
Speaker 5:Yeah, so start off with a quad. But this is I have a primary residence and then I have one investment property and continue to focus on primarily multifamily. But here in Atlanta I do have some connections up in Philadelphia. I am planning on taking a trip up there, primarily around the universities, to see what kind of opportunities are available. People keep sending me deals, like all the time, but I would really like to see it before I pull the trigger, you know so that is the plan.
Speaker 2:Okay, dwayne, as somebody that lived in North Philly for upwards of five, six years, that's a good idea. You definitely want to go up there and drive the streets and make sure like hey, because it does get street by street around the university, especially if you're thinking around Temple, which is North Philly. You walk a couple blocks off campus and it's a completely different story, but there are some opportunities out there. Those numbers were incredible.
Speaker 2:I still remember back when I was living on campus this is way back when, but I used to be a leasing agent. That was my first foray into real estate and it's kind of funny how I got into it. I'm not even going to get into the story how I got into it, but, long story short, I was leasing up about 100 units around campus right, this is just people that owned multifamilies around the university and, of course, I saved a dope unit for me and my friends and I was actually paying 375 per month and I had all of us paying 375 per month to kind of live in this brand new build dope home. So yeah, long story short, I would drive the neighborhood to make sure, but Philly is a good opportunity. I think PA in general was named one of the most affordable places in the US to continue to invest in.
Speaker 4:What type of tenant were you Nii?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was a good tenant. No, I was a great tenant man. Come on now. Hey, we ain't going to get into that. That being said, be a other unit. Be in his Airbnbs With other units, though. I did make some dumb decisions back then. So I told you I was a leasing agent, but I did get fired after my first year and a half, reason being I had keys to all these units. I had homeboys that was throwing parties, things of that nature, and we thought it'd be a good idea to have a Halloween party in an empty unit because it wasn't rented, and that did not turn out to be a good idea. Uh, we can get an ad story later. But I was shortly fired after. But it was a cool party. A police were called, a lot happened, a lot. Now, yeah, down bad, but we made it, made it. We made it duane. Sorry to kind of just shift the whole thing, but I know welcome and we are excited to have you joining.
Speaker 5:Hey, live and learn right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, this group is part therapy, part investment talk, but no, I'm excited to have you as part of the crew and we meet every Wednesday 7 pm to about 745, just to walk through kind of what's going on in our lives and different opportunities that are popping up. And one thing that Liban and I wanted to cover today a little bit was the other side of real estate. So I know a lot of times we're talking about acquiring and we're talking about you know how do you analyze a deal, how do you make a deal work in this environment? But the other side of it is also getting a home ready to list and getting it sold when that time comes.
Speaker 3:So, liban, you had a couple of things you wanted to cover there. Yeah, I mean, I always say, whenever you are listing your house, a lot of people think that you know all the cute things that you have in your house and this is the big one. I'm going to start with the major, major one All of the cute things that you thought you liked oh, the nice design on the wall that's a unique color or different kind of renovation that you did. I always recommend, when you are about to list your house, make it as bare bones as possible. You want to get rid of as much furniture. That isn't necessary. If you can move out already, highly suggest moving out, because that's going to do two things One, make the home much easier to show. Allow more flexible showings, which is arguably the most important, because when you hit market, moving out because that's going to do two things One, make the home much easier to show. Allow more flexible showings, which is arguably the most important, because when you hit market, the first two weeks are when all the eyes are on that property, because it's the new kid on the block in a lot of sense and everyone wants to figure out what it is about, and so most important thing is have it clean and have it bare with kind of furniture. If you are going to have furniture in it, unless you just bought, unless all the furniture you have is newer. A lot of people have kind of the older furniture because, as I like to say, we treat ourselves worse than we would treat the things that we're selling off right. So if you are going to have furniture in, highly recommend staging.
Speaker 3:I actually home staged versus unstaged sell. I highly recommend staging. Actually, homes staged versus unstaged sell, I think, 10% faster for and I forgot the exact number but they also sell for more money a lot of times staged. When we say staged you don't have to do the whole house, just literally living room and the master bedroom is more than enough because what it allows is for the people who are walking in to envision their life in that home and the furniture kind of lets them say oh, you know, my bed could fit there. You know, I don't know if the couch that they, their couch, is bigger, our couch is smaller, we can move our couch in here. So those two are the major, major ones. Make sure it's ready to show clean. Those two big ones, big, big, big ones. I always say that's the 80 of the 20.
Speaker 2:Agreed, and piggybacking off of that, getting your house correct and removing and kind of taking away the personal effects, that's huge right. I can tell you. I was out with a client We've been out with the same client for the past two and a half weeks looking at a bunch of houses and one of the houses was the perfect layout. It was set up Well, the backyard was nice pool. It was like man, this is going to be the one. But the owner had an affinity for, for I think it's called tax.
Speaker 3:I'm not a hunter. The dead animals, yes, thank you.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, and, and apparently he was pretty good, he literally had killed. Like there was a bear that was stuffed in there, there was like deer, I don't even know what kind of animals were in there, and then there was a whole room that was full of his guns. That was like locked off but you could see them and, long story short, that messed up the whole vibe for the buyer and it's probably going to have that house sitting for a good amount of time. Had he just removed some of those items and just desensitized it to where. Like okay, I don't feel like I'm coming in here after a horror show happened.
Speaker 2:We may have been the buyers for it, right, but the buyer got freaked out by that. They said, hey, you know, the house is great, but we don't want to be moving in after you know animals, things of that nature and so piggybacking off of you. What we try to do anytime we're getting ready to list a home, especially one that was stayed in, is take out all the family pictures, right, take down all the personal effects and really make it look as staged as possible if you still have to stay in that house and, to Levon's point, if you're able to move to another house. That is ideal. Get out of there. We'll just put the bare minimum furniture to where people can feel the open space and have their creativity start working and go from there and you'll get much, much more and get a faster sale.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, even if you're doing an appraisal, same kind of rules apply. You want that house to be clean. You kind of want to get rid of all the weird more so, like me said personality things that might drive someone off because you want this thing to look as blank as possible. So that way it's less emotional or not even emotion, more unlogical thinking of oh, they have this thing or that in the kitchen and so that alone I've seen dramatically raise some of the appraisal values. Friends cleaning especially will raise the appraisal value in a lot of places I've noticed. So those are, I think, the most important, agreed.
Speaker 2:And last tip on that piece when buyers are walking through a house, not every agent is investor-minded like we are right, or investor-minded like our clients are right, where we can see something and say, hey, we could change that this, this paint color doesn't work, but I can paint that, right, the scratch on the wall, we could fix that piece Like we don't really trip over too much, right, unless it's like a major concern. But most buyers are going to walk in there and they're going to visualize the place as it is, as it's going to stay that way. Hey, this wallpaper's here or this color of the paint wall's here. I guess it has to stay that way. I don't like this house and so that's why you want to do as much as you can ahead of time to where there's a lot less blemishes that they're going to see and things of that nature, because what they're seeing in their mind is, hey, this is how the house is Almost like. If you're buying a car, like, hey, the tires popped, I guess I got to buy this with a tire pop it's like, no, we're going to fix that tire beforehand. When you're going to go list that car, that house, you should fix it before you list it.
Speaker 2:Ie, I had this stair where, during the winter time right I think the first winter we were here there was actually a little bit of snow and someone had the bright idea not going to mention any names to throw some salt on top of wood. And if you've ever put salt on top of wood, it will eat that wood apart. And so one of the treads was eaten apart from you know, for like the past two years and I kept looking at it walking up like yeah, I got to fix that. But when we visited our home to sell, I was like, yeah, I actually need to fix that. We got it fixed within like a week. And now I'm thinking like dang, we could have been used this.
Speaker 3:But long story short, you want to get those blemishes fixed and then take the pictures and then get it listed and to add to your point even further about kind of the whole blemishes a lot of the times you even want to fix the blemishes is to avoid spiraling by the client, because a lot of times they'll walk into a house and say and everyone, everyone's house, there's something that needs to be done, but it's kind of getting put off.
Speaker 3:But for some reason, when a buyer walks in even though there's something in their house that definitely needs to be done that they haven't taken care of, they'll see something wrong and go this is wrong, what else? And that, what else that they have in their mind a lot of times can kill a deal before it even starts. And so that's really you want to avoid that situation in the first place, because I'm sure Nii can tell you alone me, the amount of times we've kind of gone into a house and something small is kind of being a real issue for our client when it's not, in the grand scheme of things, going to make or break the house. Agreed, agreed.
Speaker 4:Nick, so you got your personal home listed.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, got it listed. And before this call I was actually on a long call with an individual. A lot of agents are doing more like part-time things of that nature and may not know some of the creative ways that you can get a deal done. And so a client came to go see it maybe a week ago yeah, last Friday and they really liked it. But the interest rates and the price, they're like, hey, this is a bit out of our range. And so I was like, hey, let's hop on a phone. Are you open to us all jumping on a Zoom?
Speaker 2:So I jumped on a Zoom with him and his client and what we talked through was hey, what if we got creative around some seller credits to knock down your interest rate? Would that make it more attainable? And so what we walked through was hey, if we structure a deal this way and you offer above X amount and we give you X amount of credits, we could take your interest rate down from a 7% that the bank's talking about down to closer to a 5%, and that equates to about $1,000 a month in savings. Consider that with the in-law suite. Does that make it more attainable? And he's like yeah, it does. He's like but my bank's saying that potentially can't happen. So I just connected them to our Ricardo talk to these guys. So we're going to figure all that out. But yes, I got the house listed. We're looking to get this thing sold because we have our other house under contract.
Speaker 4:Say again you told Chris, the other agent's job.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but hey, you do whatever you can to make sure the deal goes smooth. A lot of times you can actually bond he's doing the other agent's job too, because they're like, hey, you know, we've never done this before. I think that this new ruling with NAR, which is supposed to now hit in August it got pushed back a little bit it's going to help weed out a lot of those agents, right, a lot of the agents that only do one, two deals. Man, it hurts me. You can't be an expert at something if you only do it once or twice. Right, you've got to continue doing it over time.
Speaker 2:And that's how stuff that you've been giving us about the airbnbs, I'm like, holy crap, like I need to go to justin for these tips. Right, because he's he's hitting us, because he's been doing it with multiple bmbs. Now same with aj and even the turo tips that aj is able to give, it's because he's been doing it for a while. And so same thing with the realtor piece. If you only do one deal as a realtor, it's very hard to know how to work through weird situations, right, or like or like. Hey, the appraisal came in low. Does that mean the deal's dead? No, there's ways around it and we can kind of go there.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I actually been thinking. I'm trying to map out my strategy now, figure out how long I'm gonna hold my home I have in Decatur, whether or not it's time to go ahead and trade up. The only thing that's kind of locking me into it is the. You know I got a 3% rate on that thing. But I'm looking at it like I'd love to get another multifamily, because once I get out of that one I get my zero down back through the VA.
Speaker 4:So it was like I have about a hundred thousand in equity right now, so I could take that money, invest it into the next deal, you know for some furnishings or whatever, and roll into a quadplex or something of that nature. I'm just trying to think do I want to go that one more year because I got within five years that I can hold it and sell it, or do I want to go ahead and move on and get into another property? Or do I buy another home just and put the money down this year, hold the other house for another year, then sell it? Then I'm playing it through my mind. But if you guys got any thoughts or any feedback, what do you think I'm playing it through in my mind, but if you guys got any thoughts or any feedback, what?
Speaker 2:do you think yeah For the Decatur home? If you're able to, I would hang on to it. And it's not about at least for a little bit longer, and it's not necessarily about you getting that entitlement back and things of that nature. I think you should continue down your path of getting one property a year if you're able to. However, that looks like whether it's the 0% down, 5% down or 3.5% down. But the reason I say hang on to that property is if you don't have to sell a property right now, it's not the time right. You want to wait until the Fed actually starts to cut that interest rate and that optimism goes back up and then you throw that thing out there.
Speaker 2:There's so many buyers that are sitting on the sideline right now because millennials is the biggest generation, now they're in the house formation age, but the high interest rates are keeping people on the sideline that when the Fed and it's probably going to be after the election now but once they start to cut those interest rates they're going to flood back into the market and now you can get higher price just because it's cheaper for somebody to buy. So now that person that was priced out at a 7% interest rate at 6.5, they can afford it now, and now you get more competition. So I'd highly recommend that. The only reason I'm selling my personal house right now is because it's really nice. I would not want somebody to destroy that piece and diminish the value, and we have a lot of equity built into it. So I want to sell this, move that into the new house which we're trading up, because we already got that under contract and it's basically getting two units or really getting three units from a quote-unquote two unit. But yeah, that's what I would say.
Speaker 4:The only thing that's hanging me up is if I hold it for an additional year past this year, then I'll be hit with the capital gains sacks. It's not crazy, but the potential that I could make more could be offset with those capital gains. You know, once you get past the five years, you kind of, you kind of out of the day, because you have the two years in it, then within the five years, right. So I lived in the Go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, Sorry, go ahead. You said because you do a little bit.
Speaker 4:You know we're in that freedom period of like you lived in it for two years as a primary risk.
Speaker 2:You have to live in it for two of the last five years and that will give you and Justin get up to 500K in equity for free. And so has it been that long already. I feel like, if one more year, how long has it been so far?
Speaker 4:It doesn't have to be within the five years from the day you purchase, so, like the five years can start the day you move out.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, it's within five years. No, not the day you purchased, it's within the last five years, if you lived in the house two of the last five years. So you can. Essentially you can. Yeah, we're good, you moved out, you've got three years, so, basically, three years to sell it.
Speaker 3:If you, if you bought it in 2019, this would be like I gotta get it gone, yeah okay, yeah okay, cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, okay, cool yeah. Basically, if you like the date that you moved out, you have three years to sell it. So I can move out of this house, right, I bought this house in 21, february 21. I can move out and I'll still have up to three years to sell it. I just want to sell it now because we're using that money to buy the other house and kind of moving it up and things.
Speaker 4:Yeah, last November, so I'm good.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you got time and I was going to say that's what I was going to say, the um I would do if I was in your position. Justin is exactly what he's doing. I would wait until I find the quadplex that says, okay, I like this one, I'm going to have to go after this one, let me go ahead and start the process and then put it on the market and then send out an offer. Hey, contingent upon the sale of my house, you can do it that way, because I would hate for you to sell it, and especially with right now, the way we are at Atlanta doesn't have a lot of multis, and not only does it have a lot of multis, it doesn't have a lot of multis. That makes sense from a cash flowing aspect. I mean, unless you're ready to go up to, like you know, 1.5.
Speaker 3:One point you know the mil plus for a quad, because that's what in atlanta they're going for currently. I'd say, like a quadruplex is, it starts at a mil. So until you basically are at the position where you are, you found the deal or you're now. Okay, I am fully ready. Now, then, because I'd hate for you to just trade out of an already cash-flowing asset into something that you're going to have to redo without having it already set in stone, and then you're kind of caught in the middle ground. But couldn't it.
Speaker 5:Would you suggest he uses equity maybe an ELOC and try to get another property and just keep.
Speaker 4:They could keep that from yeah, the only thing about the heloc it gets really tricky with the va loans because they don't like for you to take an additional uh credit when you have a va loan. There's ways around it, but it's, you know, with the three and a half five percent down, whereas you know, because we're making money right now and we're not basically living for free because I'm house hacking, we'll just roll that money that we're earning into the next property.
Speaker 3:I was going to say can you refinance out of a VA loan?
Speaker 4:You can but I'm at 3% man.
Speaker 2:I don't know you ain't refinancing out of that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a good point. That's a great point. I forgot you had 3%.
Speaker 2:To that point and Dwayne to your point and then we'll wrap for the night. I'm always a bit wary about using a HELOC to buy another property if you don't have a clear way of paying that HELOC off within, call it, six months. Now, if you're going to invest in a flip or something of that nature, absolutely, or you're going to fix up the same property or take a HELOC out on this property and build an ADU on it, I like that because then you have something that's paying it off. But if you take a HELOC out to go buy another property now you got two mortgages. It really puts a lot of pressure on that property and I don't know how many deals are going to work like that in this environment, because HELOCs at least my HELOCs like 10% right now Just crazy.
Speaker 4:So yeah, it's really easy to get cash flow crazy so.
Speaker 3:So yeah, it was really easy to your cash flow. Yep, my heart skipped a percent there. I got. I got a little stressed for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's why I'm bald. This is why it's the heloc. The heloc is what did it? I don't know about duane, but the helocs, what did it for me guys? No, we are gonna wrap through the night. I hope that everybody has an awesome Wednesday. Don't forget to check out the game on TNT, because Justin, our very own Justin Farhan put together videos that you're going to be looking at and it's going to be a great game. We look forward to catching you guys next week and I will see you then.
Speaker 1:Join us every Wednesday at 7 pm Eastern, as we explore different types of investments that can fast-track your path to.
