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REI Wealth Cover Feature: Meet Brandon Cobb from Nashville’s The House Buyin’ Guys!
Article by Tim Houghten
How To Scale Your Real Estate Investments In A Highly Competitive Market
Are you looking for more investments and ways to grow your real estate holdings? What are some of the ways that you can maintain and scale, despite the 2020 mayhem?
Brandon Cobb’s company The House Buyin Guys has been able to successfully sustain and even grow his real estate business by double digits through the pandemic and chaos of 2020.
How has he done it?
The House Buyin Guys
Brandon Cobb and his co-founder, Vagif Seidov, have been wholesaling houses to other investors, rehabbing properties, and creating win win solutions for his investors in the Middle Tennessee Real Estate market for years.
Prior to getting into real estate Brandon sold medical devices. After losing his job in Medical Device Sales, he transitioned over to real estate. Brandon found his unique sales skills sharpened by the world of medical device sales gave him a unique edge in the real estate industry. Brandon built his company based around that sales approach, something the real estate industry lagged.
Since then, he and his partner have done over 100 deals in this space, and during our exclusive interview Brandon shared how business has been picking up through the pandemic.
He says that the local Nashville market has kept blowing up, with growing demand despite the pandemic. As of October 2020 they were still seeing new deals going under contract in one week, if not within one day.
Brandon and his team challenged themselves to complete a $51,000 renovation in just 10 days while filming every day and posting the daily walkthroughs for all to see on his Facebook. After having huge success with that renovation, they challenged themselves to do two 7 day flips simultaneously.
The two 7 day $32,000 flips were a failure because they took 9 days to actually complete but to Brandon and his team they were a huge success because they learned a lot about how to better systemize their rehab processes and become more efficient. He and his team are always pushing the boundaries of what is possible in the Real Estate space.
So how can you compete and win deals in this highly competitive market?
Tips For Winning In This Competitive Market
This has been an interesting year in real estate for investors and business owners. During crisis, manyfold and lose, and few know how to use the opportunity to create new levels of wealth.
Right now, It is an extremely competitive real estate market. Since the birth of the travel roadshow real estate guru’s coming to town and pumping out 200-300 new investors in a weekend it’s become much tougher to find deals.
So, how do you still get the deals?
Here are some of Brandon’s top tips.
Do What Others Won’t
As with any business or career, standing out and blazing a trail for yourself and becoming a valuable go-to resource for your clients is all about doing what other people won’t.
You can put in the extra hard work and hours, be more responsive, and go the extra mile to make customers happy but it starts with identifying what your customer’s want that competitors are not giving them.
Brandon says one of the big challenges his clients face are tenants. Many retiring landlords are willing to sell, but buyers want the property vacant. When there is a tenant, it can leave the property in limbo. Brandon’s competitors make offers based on the house being vacated most of the time so his company started offering tenant relocation services with their offers.
In his recent feature in Forbes, he says this alone can get you a $10,000 to $15,000 discount on the price of the property and win you the deal if your willing and able to help the tenant find a place to live and cover moving expenses.
Review Your Past Deals
When was the last time you went through your past deals and evaluated what went well, what didn’t, and what you could have done better? What about which deals really made the most money? Or what happened to those properties after you exited and sold them off?
You might be surprised at what you find. Brandon certainly was. They found they missed out on a deal that would have made $107,312.
Even more surprising, was the fact that they came across deals like this 2-3 times a year and were completely missing them! So, they adjusted their strategy when they came across these special opportunities, and after acquisition, and rehab costs are now able to sell them for almost double, with around $70,000 – 100,000 in gross profit.
Select Your Customers Carefully
How selective are you being with the customers you take on?
Brandon’s construction company, HBG Construction offers rehab services to others outside his house flipping business. Savvy business owners and independent professionals learn that they can work much more efficiently, profitably, enjoyably and with less risk and stress if they are more selective in who they do business with.
At first, it may seem like a good idea to take on various jobs within your space and Brandon did just this… his company would service builders, home owners, rehabbers, basically anyone who needed work done on their house.. until it became a big headache..
Just trying to work with anybody and everybody can be a big trap. You might feel busier chasing the money, but that doesn’t mean you’ll really net more money.
Brandon suggests figuring out who your ideal customers are, and to fire everyone else. Brandon discovered that his construction company loved working with other rehabbers. Because Brandon is an investor himself, he was able to understand and pinpoint all the pain points rehabbers have when it comes to dealing with contractors.
Brandon’s construction company now works exclusively with other rehabbers on their flips and that moment when he fired all his other customers changed everything. Now, his team deals with customers whose needs they understand and serve best.
Grow Your Referral Business
Referral business Is the best business. Referrals cost the least amount of money to generate, are the easiest to handle, and are the easiest to close! Brandon’s company started their own referral program using hand written thank you cards to all their customers and occasionally following up with a phone call to ask if they know anyone that may want to sell their home.
His company uses email drip campaigns to stay In touch and hands out handsome referral checks every time someone brings in a referral. They broadcast the experience of the person responsible for the referral receiving the check which prompts others to refer business!
This method alone has allowed Brandon’s company to grow by double digits with NO INCREASE IN SPENDING.
Leverage Other People’s Time and Money
In addition to leveraging other people’s money, smart real estate pros and CEOs learn to leverage other people’s time, expertise and exposure.
There are many in your market who have built up a their own network and doing their own marketing. Work with them instead of competing against them. He specifically points to real estate agents as an example of this. While many real estate investors feel they are at odds with Realtors, you can actually help each other and negotiate win-win deals If you understand their needs.
Summary
We are in an interesting period where the real estate business and country is evolving and changing. Many will fail. For some, this year will set them on a completely new trajectory for success and wealth.
These tips can help you protect and grow your real estate investments, regardless of the mayhem happening out there.
If you are interested in learning more about how you can get added on Brandon’s list to receive off market wholesale properties in Middle TN, learn more about how you can receive passive income secured by real estate through Brandon’s company, you can contact Brandon at: [email protected].
For more tips, follow Brandon on his Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/brandon.cobb.3950
3 Pieces of Advice to Overcome Limiting Beliefs in Business
Image by Miguel Á. Padriñán from Pixabay
By Victoria Kennedy
Business is like yin-yang, says Rohan Attravanam, the CEO of Phodun Real Estate. The secret to more closings is to stop focusing on closings. You tend to be emotional but have to be rational and pragmatic business owner in order to succeed. Which beliefs influence success or failure in business?
Running a business is not a full-time job, it’s a lifestyle. Business owners face loads of challenges and obstacles that test not only their professional skills but also their character.
Being nimble and flexible is essential for a business to stay on top of the game, and ahead of the competition. However, constantly shifting from one idea to another and changing strategies can be counterproductive. This means entrepreneurs have to also be persistent with their initial ideas and stay in a single lane longer than they might like.
Combining these two opposites might seem like an impossible task, but it isn’t. That fine line between the two is where all the successful businessmen and moguls are. Flexible, but never straying from their core principles and ideas.
A fine example of how to harmonize these two is the story of Rohan Attravanam, CEO of Phodun Real Estate.
Rohan’s Story
As an young entrepreneur, Rohan started his journey by getting a high-quality education. He enrolled in one of the most prestigious universities in India – BITS Pilani, and has an MBA degree from one of the best marketing colleges in the US – Kelley School of Business, Indiana University.
Packed with knowledge, he dived into the world of business, working with A-listers like Samsung, Whirlpool, and Walmart. Rohan acquired 13 years of experience in marketing, with the last five in real estate.
In January 2020, he left behind a plum job in the Bay Area, CA and started Phodun Real Estate from scratch – a company that provides quality leads to realtors, helping them find prospective homebuyers that fit their customer profile.
So, here are the three pieces of advice Rohan Attravanam can give to all business owners based on his experience as a successful business owner:
Quality Leads are found, when searched in quantity
We all want better leads and better prospects. We frantically try various marketing tactics and try to optimize one over the other. But the reality is no matter which channel or medium you choose, you need to focus on generating a lot of leads.
The first step in achieving a flow of quality leads is to achieve a flow of quantity of leads. You need to generate a lot of leads and vet each of the leads against constraints as defined by your definition of quality. The more leads you have, the better the chances are that you’ll find a good quality lead. In any random 100 leads – you tend to find about 10 quality leads. When you go searching only for quality leads, they are hard to come by.
Its basic economics – Quality leads are not easy to come by and so they are expensive. Everyone knows it’s a numbers game, but rarely do we step back to evaluate what numbers are needed to get to our objectives.
You start closing more when you stop focusing on closings
We as a society are hyper result oriented, goal oriented and it’s good to strive for those results. What’s lost in translation is the process that is needed to achieve those results and urge to take shortcuts to get there.
You’ve heard this a thousand times – “It’s all about the journey and not the destination”. Think about how you want your career to pan out. You can easily retire on the beach – watching sunsets with your family, but the journey to get there need not be obsessed over closings. Instead obsess over process.
When you obsess over the process, you are controlling the inputs – which you can. When you obsess over closings, you try to control the output – which is rarely in your hands. Obsess over client experience, understanding their problems, and earning their trust. The issues your clients face can all be documented and addressed the same way over and over again.
This helps you gain control over your process and the confidence rubs off to your clients – who’ll enjoy working with you and you’ll have more closings eventually!
People who get most approval care about it the least
Think about all the people in your life that you consider successful, wealthy and see in a place you potentially want to be one day. They have your approval. The thing is – They are not seeking your approval. They are grateful for it, but they don’t care for it.
When you start needing money, fame, approval for your life to be meaningful, you are blinded by what’s possible. The minute you stop needing them and instead start providing approval to people around you is when you will see that your self esteem starts to build up. Building other’s confidence, caring about their insecurities and giving them strength gives you a new way of living life that brings you abundance and joy.
Helping others live the lives of their dreams is THE FASTEST WAY to get rich, achieve fame and receive the highest approval.
Rohan Attravanam is the CEO of Phodun Real Estate, an agency that is helping realtors by giving them more and better leads with their new, special program”10-15 Live Transfers Guaranteed”. Click here to learn more: https://phodundigital.com/
Victoria Kennedy
[email protected]
atmanrealestate.com
Nominated as a 2020 Brand Ambassador for Inman, Victoria Kennedy is a well-respected authority in Real Estate marketing and branding. She is the CEO of Atman Real Estate, a marketing & branding agency that is committed to helping top producing Real Estate professionals become the #1 Agents in their area.
She is a highly in demand speaker on all things digital marketing, and has helped many clients boost their visibility and revenue. Because of her expertise in real estate, she has been a trusted speaker and contributor to such organizations as the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, Inman News, and Yahoo Finance.
In addition to running a successful marketing agency, she also has given talks, workshops, and has worked as a trusted consultant for Realties, Title Companies, Investors, and top producing agents. She has been featured in over 175 publications and podcasts both nationally and internationally.
In addition to her marketing expertise, Victoria is a #1 selling classical-crossover singer and has sung with the likes of Andrea Bocelli, as well as toured all over Europe with her music.
She is excited to share with you the power of her Closing Maximization Method and how it can exponentially grow your business.
Find out more here: atmanrealestate.com
The Survivalist Project: Dutch Mendenhall’s Plan B for Middle Class America
Like any American family, Dutch Mendenhall and his wife, Vanessa, are looking toward the future.
“My wife recently said to me, ‘We need a Plan B,'” Dutch said, adding. “I said, ‘What does that mean?'” The couple began to hatch a get-out-of-dodge plan in case of any impending disasters in California, where they live, or the country.
Brandon “Dutch” Mendenhall founded RAD Diversified, a non-traded, public REIT unaffected by the stock market, and is a highly successful real estate educator.
“My wife has not feared a day in her life. So, when she said something like that, I knew it was pretty serious,” Dutch said.
The real estate leader has been busy growing an empire through the years while educating students about increasing their investments. However, during a conversation with Vanessa, he realized that tumultuous events in the world could take away everything they had worked for in one swift move.
Dutch, who grew up in Iowa, maintains that while he grew up around guns, he never owned any until this year. While survivalist culture had never been on his radar before, he installed solar panels on his home this year. He also has a generator, 200 gallons of water, and a year’s food supply in case of an emergency.
Dutch and his family believe that the world is changing and that everyone needs preparation. As a natural businessman, Dutch has begun merging this way of thinking with investments and deals.
The Survival Project allows investors to buy into sustainable farms. Everything from water, food, electricity, and shelter is self-contained in the project. “We create communities that can survive. If things do hit the fan, if stuff is worse, if every apocalyptic video or movie you’ve ever seen in your life, any of that comes anywhere close to real, you’re going to want a place to go,” Dutch said.
While other companies claim to offer protection from the end-of-days for exorbitant prices, Dutch’s project promises consumers an economical alternative that could also serve as a prosperous return-on-investment.
“I’m building a new Plan B for middle class families, for the average American, for the average person. What I think that Plan B is, happens to be a real, sustainable escape plan,” Dutch said. “We want people to live in the now, build their wealth in the present, and have an affordable alternative for the future.”
While the wealthy in the United States have bunkers and bomb shelters scattered throughout the country in nuclear war or other impending disasters, Dutch and his company plan to charge low, monthly fees. Hence, individuals have access to autonomous communities in the case of some armageddon.
“The reality is that I think the scariest things are not going to come from a bomb,” Dutch said, continuing, “but I also think that you need to create communities that are not going to be within two miles of where the bombs are going to hit if they ever do.”
To Dutch, larger threats come from Communist countries like China and Russia who want to undermine the United States government and the economy. He believes that enough forces want to take away Americans’ rights, and as a proud citizen, he wants to take the actions he can to stay safe while keeping others out of harm’s way.
“No matter where you are in America, you want a place to go to be safe and thrive. You also can’t take away from your finances and your livelihoods to do that, so found an economical solution,” Dutch said. “No one has ever created an economically sensible way to do it and created something as sustainable as we have.”
Dutch maintains that the Survival Project is and will always be about family, God, and country. He’s proud of his opportunity to come from a poor upbringing and rise to the top of the country’s real estate market and education sector. “I remember days when we had electricity but no gas, and I remember heating water up in the microwave so we could bathe,” he said.
Now, as a thought leader having broken through the class system, he and his company have grown and invested carefully during these uncertain times. “Twelve months ago, nobody saw COVID coming. You can sit here and say, ‘Well, they plan for pandemics,’ but did you or me as an everyday, average American ever see wearing masks in public everywhere we go, pulling our kids out of school, and everything else that goes along with it?”
Now, Dutch and his team are thriving when other companies are tanking during the coronavirus pandemic. “We’re the first fund I know of that did a coronavirus amendment to the SEC in February,” he said. The team got the paperwork done quickly, which in turn guaranteed their investors money.
Dutch is also fiercely protective of every investor with this company and the select group of close members called the Inner Circle.
He recently had an investor come to him with an emergency whose natural withdrawal was not for another six months. “We sent him a wire this morning because that is what we needed to do for him in that case. He was in a bad situation, and all of a sudden, there was an emergency. That’s how we look at things,” he said.
Dutch and his team continue to prepare for a changing world and the challenges it presents. It’s always good to have a Plan B.
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How to Find Wholesale Deals Other Don’t See
Please join us as the Ventura County Real Estsate Investors Association and the Los Angeles Real Estate Investors Club November meeting, Thursday night, November 12, 2020, 7:30 to 9:30 pm. This will be a virtual meeting and you will need to register at our website:
https://www.accelevents.com/e/NovemberMeeting
GUEST SPEAKER: Our featured speaker will be Jimmy Reed, visiting us from Fort Worth, Texas. Jimmy is an expert on wholesaling and the author of “Fast Track to Wholesaling.“ The title of Jimmy’s presentation to LAREIC is “How to Find Wholesale Deals Others Miss.”
Jimmy Reed has an extensive background in the field of Real Estate Investing having bought, sold and managed over 300 units, all by the age of thirty. Jimmy began his investment career in the late 1980’s while still working full time. As he developed a solid understanding of real estate investing, Jimmy went on to specialize in the areas of Wholesaling, Probate, Owner Financing, Notes, and Cash Flow Rentals, along with other investment strategies including International Investing.
After several years of success in Real Estate Investing (as well as teaching workshops to other investors in the Dallas/Fort Worth area), Jimmy created Wholesale programs. These “trainings” put Jimmy in some of the hottest markets in the world such as Hawaii, New York, Cozumel, Panama and even Costa Rica. Jimmy has presented live seminars to thousands of real estate investors all across the United States.
Jimmy’s newest book, “No Fear Real Estate” discusses how to remove the fear from lack of knowledge that is holding you back, and discusses how to
- Wholesale real estate via Assignments & Double Closings
- Find great deals via Probate
- Buy, Rent, and Hold for long term wealth
- Sell properties with Owner Financing
- Create Notes, and how to hold those notes or sell them
- Use other people’s money instead of your own
- Become wealthy by using IRA’s to do all your buying & selling.
All of these strategies and more provide you with the tools you need to start building your real estate portfolio and take you to a new level of achievement! And it all starts with wholesaling.
Wholesaling topics to be covered include:
• Finding deals others miss
• How to market to motivated sellers
• How to use “Bird Dogs”
• Looking for vacant houses
• Mailing out effective postcards
• Where to look in the MLS
• How to assign your deal to an investor
FREE ADMISSION: Admission to our monthly meetings is always complimentary (free!), but reservations are required.
FREE PARKING: Free parking in YOUR garage!
FREE REFRESHMENTS: Unlimited free refreshments in YOUR refrigerator.
RSVP: please RSVP at our website so that you can receive a login and password for the event:
https://www.accelevents.com/e/NovemberMeeting
VENDOR EXPO. Most importantly, don’t miss our “Vendor Expo,” 6:30 to 7:30 pm (right before the general meeting starts). We’ll have over 40 vendor tables with opportunities for you to “meet and greet” with companies that you’ll want to utilize in your real estate investing.
