Memphis Real Estate Investing Turnkey Rentals & Big ROI
Memphis real estate in 38127 is booming! Learn how investors are flipping, cash flowing, and securing high-ROI rental properties today.
The Memphis real estate market is hotter than ever, especially in the 38127 zip code. Investors are finding high-ROI opportunities in turnkey rentals, flips, and value-add properties. In this episode, we break down what’s happening in the market, share real case studies, and explain why Fraser is the next big investment hotspot. We’ll walk you through the numbers on recent deals, including purchase prices, rehab costs, final sales, and rental income. Plus, we’ll talk about the importance of having a solid team—contractors, agents, property managers, and inspectors—to make sure your investment runs smoothly and profitably.
In this Memphis Real Estate Investing Turnkey Rentals & Big ROI episode:
- 38127 Market Boom – Memphis’ Fraser neighborhood is the new hotspot for high-yield rental investments, following the success of Whitehaven and Raleigh in previous years.
- Turnkey Rental Success – We break down a real-life example of a property purchased for $58K, rehabbed for $47K, and sold for $153K while renting for $1,550/month.
- The Importance of a Strong Team – Having the right agent, contractor, property manager, and inspector is crucial to avoid costly mistakes and maximize returns.
- Financing & Appraisals – Why banks push appraisals low on refis and high on purchases, and how to navigate these valuation challenges.
- Avoiding Contractor Pitfalls – A real investor horror story: paying for a rehab job that wasn’t completed, leading to massive losses and a mold-covered home.
Investing in Memphis real estate, especially in 38127, is a prime opportunity for those who act strategically. The market is shifting, and those who recognize trends early stand to make significant returns. Whether you’re buying turnkey rentals, rehabbing for flips, or placing MHA tenants, having the right team makes all the difference. We’ve walked through real-life deals showing the power of strong investing principles—buying at the right price, managing rehab costs, ensuring appraisals align, and selecting the best property management. Don’t make the mistake of going at it alone. Partnering with an experienced team means avoiding costly errors and maximizing your investment. If you’re ready to jump into the Memphis market and build wealth through real estate, now is the time to take action.
About 5 O’Clock Somewhere Real Estate Investor Podcast
5 O’Clock Somewhere Real Estate Podcast throws out the script, brings common sense back to real estate, and has casual conversations about the one and only market that matters – Memphis! We’re not interested in what some real estate expert from California has to say because we know the truth: Memphis is where the smart investors put their money. Forget about Vegas, Nashville, and the rest of the country, Memphis is the blue-chip stock of the real estate world. We’ll tell you everything you need to know about why Memphis is the safest and hottest place to buy rental real estate, and how you can be a part of a smart investment.
If you would like to join the conversation, participate in an upcoming recording, or just call to bounce ideas off one of our team, you can call or text us at 901-692-7401. Or if you prefer send us a message.
Memphis Real Estate Investing Turnkey Rentals & Big ROI Episode Transcript
Brett
0:00:55 – It is 5 o’clock somewhere Real Estate Investor Podcast time. My name is Brett Bernard with Nick Gibson, Marissa Miller, and our pinhead producer, British prick Richard is here also. He doesn’t have a mic though. You should be sitting over there where you got a mic so you can talk back to me. I’m glad you’re not, but anyway, we are back for another episode and I think today what we want to talk about is what we’re doing in the market as a team, what we’re doing for our investors, the type of properties we’re working on, and give you a couple of stories of projects that we have worked on and have now sold so that you can kind of understand how you need to approach these projects and what kind of team you need to have around you and what’s available to you. So stick around. Okay so we are going to discuss properties that we’ve done. I want to bring up one in particular that I’ve sold. It is in 38127 in Memphis and everybody knows why 38127 is such a hot market currently is because you can still buy reasonably priced house, turnkey, with a tenant in place, producing 1% or better. A lot of these rehabbers are putting warranties on their property, or you can still pick up a $60,000 house, put $15,000, $20,000 into it, and it’s worth 120 grand when you’re done. So 38127, if you’re listening, in Fraser is a great opportunity for new investors to get involved in. Memphis has plenty of those emerging markets. I know seven years ago it was Whitehaven, and about five years ago it was Raleigh. These are not separate cities. These are part of Memphis, they were previously a municipality in their own sometime back in the old days that were annexed in, but we still call them by their previous names for market reasons. Fraser is now on the cusp of doing what Whitehaven and Raleigh did over the last five to seven years and that was five, six years ago in Raleigh you could pick up a $6,000 house, rehab it, rent it for $1,400, $1,300, whatever you get out of it, it was producing well over 1%. And then I can tell you now that the investors that purchase those properties with me back four or five years ago All those homes are valued at between 130 150 today because the market went bonkers in Raleigh. It just went crazy. So Raleigh overcapped it kind of kind of leveled off the prices stopped jumping Investment kind of slowed down and a lot of smart investors rolled to the other side of New Allen Road and started doing the same thing in Fraser. So now Fraser is on an uptick and it’s going to continue to do that for the next three to five years. So getting into Fraser 3127, if you’re a little bit of a riskier investor that wants to ride a wave upwardand you’re not a coat tailor where you’re just going to wait till everybody’s done it and then jump on board. Fraser is where you want to go. And I want to talk about one particular house. I’ve got a builder that builds new construction, he also rehabs. And it’s one on Bitter Creek and 38127. I want to tell you the opportunity from both sides. So my builder picked this house up for $58,000. He needed to rehab it and I think he put close to 47,000 into it. Like new bathrooms, new kitchen, new floors, new roof, new air conditioner, everything. So he finished the work so he’s all in I think he was all in around 85 ish somewhere in that point and I just sold this house for $153,000 look $90,000
Nick
0:04:35 – Do you have your calculator ready?
Brett
0:04:36 – Can you aad that up for me?
Richard
0:04:38 – $105,000.
Brett
0:04:59 – Okay, thank you Richard. Anyway, I’m not stupid stop treating me that way. So, 5332 Bitter Creek. All right, we sold it for 153,000, is what we sold it for. So, the buyer of that property ended up getting, so the builder made a nice chunk of change on that property, flipping it, and the buyer ended up picking up a property for $153,000, which the builder gave him
Brett
0:05:07 – a $5,000 seller credit at closing to help with his out-of-pocket cash so that it benefited the buyer, and they put a tenant in there at $1,550 a month. Look at how that was a winning scenario from the start to the finish. So builder buys it, rehabs it, makes a nice profit on the sale. The person buying it bought a completely turnkey property with everything brand new with a one year build a warranty on it producing $1,550 a month for a net sale of $147,000, $148,000 to them. So that whole scenario was a win-win from start to finish. And those are the types of deals that we’re doing as a team here in Memphis. Our job is not just to take a buyer and sell them whatever the hell it is we want to sell them to get a commission. Our job is to create financial gains for all aspects of that. So because we have a lot of builders we work with, we have the ability to be involved in a property that you may buy as an investor today, turnkey, but we were involved from when that builder first bought that property or that rehabber bought that property. So that’s one of the type of properties I just sold. I sold three of those actually to the same buyer, same kind of scenario, different sales price, different level, but all of them are producing over the 1%, all of them are rehabbed, all of them have a one-year builder warranty on them, which means my buyer is going to you can do in this market compared to what you can do anywhere else.
Nick
0:06:51 – Yeah, so I’ve got a couple properties that I want to discuss briefly, and then I’m going to tie that into kind of what we do as a team and why you should really trust your partnership with an agent that you have on the ground, certainly if you’re an out-of-town buyer. First property, East Frank Avenue, this was a large house for the area, five-bedroom house. five bedroom house, my client purchased it from a wholesaler, rehabbed it, placed an MHA tenant, paying $1,800 a month in a not so good part of town. But due to the size of the house, we used our leasing specialist to find, locate, and place a tenant.
Brett
0:07:32 – Who was that?
Nick
0:07:33 – Amicia. And that house sold for $150,000. And there is absolutely no way that house would have appraised for anywhere close to that had we not met the appraiser out there Gone through you know here’s the rent roll. Here’s what we’re getting through MHA. Here’s what was done to the house
Nick
0:07:48 – So we were able to assist That appraiser with getting you know get the numbers to where they needed to be so that they can move forward with closing I mean, that’s well over 1%.
Brett
0:07:57 – Now your client bought that as a rehab project?
Nick
0:07:58 – Yes, bought it from a wholesaler as a rehab project. Put some money into it.
Brett
0:08:05 – You know what she paid for it versus what she had to put into it?
Nick
0:08:07 – I believe she, I think she paid a little over 60 for the house. Okay. Put about 45 into the house. Okay. So, you know, she made a nice return.
Brett
0:08:24 – ARV was 155 you said?
Nick
0:08:25 – Uh-huh. $150,000 is what it sold for.
Brett
0:08:27 – But the ARV was what, $155,000 when it was done? That was sorted CMA out?
Nick
0:08:29 – No, CMAs would have been actually closer to like $130,000.
Brett
0:08:31 – Oh, okay.
Nick
0:08:32 – Just based on the area.
Brett
0:08:33 – So the sale was a purpose, the sales price was because of the type of rent, it was the cash flow.
Nick
0:08:38 – Right. It was cash flowing and the person that ended up buying it, simply looked at the cash flow and said, hey, these numbers work, I want the house.[
Brett
0:08:44 – Now, is this a cash buyer or was it a mortgage?
Nick
0:08:48 – This was a mortgage because we had to meet the appraiser out there and the appraiser was having a bit of a hard time You know get into that sales price, but we got there.
Brett
0:08:54 – But we got there? And I find that interesting because I’ve got an investor who rehab some houses and we basically RV based on what he’s gonna put into it what he bought him for and we had him pre appraised or pre-numbered and they were coming in like one particular one came in at 115,000 then when he goes to refi it the refi appraiser came in at $95,000. So when you go to refi, understand one thing, the lender’s going to do their best to push that appraisal number as far down as possible so they loan you as least amount of money as possible. If you’re buying a home, that bank’s going to instruct that appraiser to find the price, the contract price, come hell or high water. And that’s what happened there. Even though CMA said it was worth $130, the appraisal came in at $150.
Nick
0:09:36 – But that goes to kind of the next property I’m going to talk about. That’s something that we had to do with our team here. We had to go meet the appraiser out there, walk through and really help that appraiser be able to, you know, get to that number that we needed. But that was a good deal for everybody.
Nick
0:09:52 – The flipper made money on it.The new buyer is going to be cash flowing immediately. So that was a deal that worked out well for everybody. Which brings me to another property that on Millington Street. This is in 38127 38127. Okay. This is where the out-of-town investor, client of mine, purchased a property from a wholesaler, sight unseen, had her own contractor go do the quote-unquote rehab on the property, reached out to me to sell this property now that it was quote-unquote rehabbed andI went out there to take pictures of it, and this property was probably 60% completed, and my client was under the impression it was 100% completed, ready to list, and had already paid the contractor in full.
Brett
0:10:37 – One of the dangers of an out-of-town investor just picking up the phone book and calling contractor, inspector, all these different people that work for them, it’s hard to put
Brett
0:10:46 – a team together when you’re 1,000 miles away.
Nick
0:10:49 – Right. So, I’ve gone to her and said, hey, utilize me. This is what I do. I’m boots on the ground. We’re out there every day inspecting properties, walking properties, looking at properties.
Nick
0:10:58 – I’m also a contractor, so I know what to look for on these properties. And we could have saved a heck of a lot of headache and time.
Brett
0:11:06 – Probably made her more money.
Nick
0:11:07 – 100%.
Brett
0:11:08 – Because if I’m not mistaken, is she paying cash or is she using hard money?
Nick
0:11:11 – A mixture of the two.
Brett
0:11:13 – Okay. So understand this. If you use hard money, you have a heavy interest payment every month, interest only. And every month that goes by, that house isn’t done and sold is costing you more money. So would you rather pay a contractor, you know, can do it in 30 to 45 days for you an extra four or five grand because you’re a little more expensive to do it, to have it on the market in 45 days or would you rather save that five grand and pay an extra six grand in interest payments because your contractor takes six months to do a 30-day job That’s a big question.
Nick
0:11:46 – That’s the big question.
Brett
0:11:48 – People always choose cheap But at the end of the day it ends up being more expensive and that’s a really good point I want to run home to people just because it’s cheap up front doesn’t mean it’s gonna be cheap on that in the long run.
Nick
0:11:59 – But that’s we’re having a good team on the ground comes into play from, we can provide construction services, we can refer you to property managers, we can refer you to local insurance agents, lenders. We know all of these people that go into a successful investment property. Utilize us, let us go out there and look at these properties for you before you buy them. Right. So you know what you’re getting into. Utilize us and our resources here to help you make a better decision on the investment.
Brett
0:12:25 – Because you know what it costs you to pick up the phone and say, hey Brett, I’m thinking about picking up this property to rehab and flip it. I want you to sell it for me when it’s done. You know what’s going to cost you to have me go do that? Zero. Doesn’t cost you anything. We’re not going to charge you fees and money to go out and just check out a property for you. So you should use a team. And that’s the beauty of us is that, yeah, we don’t just refer you to somebody. We were, we refer you and stay involved. So we refer you to a contractor. We’re the ones that are gonna go out and check the job for that contractor and update you on where they’re at. When you get ready to cut a draw check to that contractor, we’re gonna go out and verify it’s actually completed before you. I can’t tell you how many times I had an investor call and say, hey, can you go check this out? Contractor wants us to check. Okay, where are we at? Well, it’s supposed to have the roof on and this is supposed to be done, that’s supposed to be done. I go out there and be like nope. Contractor’s trying to get paid because he used the money for something else. He doesn’t have the money to put the roof on so he’s trying to get the investor to go ahead and give him a draw so he can then buy the roofing material. Once you get into that behind the eight ball scenario, now you’ve got a contractor that’s probably not going to finish that job. He’s going to run out of money and he’s going to bounce on you.
Nick
0:13:32 – The same property that I’m talking about, I go out there to take some pictures when she told me it was ready to list and the back door is wide open. It’s raining outside but the back door is wide open because the contractor lost the keys and had not placed a key box on the property yet. Well I go inside and there’s a frozen pipe during the cold temperatures that we had and there’s three inches of standing water throughout the entire property. So I relay this information to my client and six days later she’s calling me again and I’m telling her hey let me get involved with this. Let me help you navigate this and get through this process. Six days later, the contractor is telling her, okay, everything’s repaired, it’s ready to list. I go out there thinking there’s absolutely no way that everything was dried properly. Well, I go out there, they had sprayed kills all over everything, repainted it, and the whole house was covered in mold.
Brett
0:14:19 – I can’t say this enough. Cheap is not always the best route, especially if you’re investing in real estate. Because what’s your goal in investing in real estate? To turn it and make a profit. So any problems you have currently are going to persist when you go to sell the property
Brett
0:14:35 – and then what happens? Now you’ve got a buyer saying, well, I’ve got a problem with this, so you need to fix this. Now you’re coming out of pocket again to fix something that wasn’t done right the first time.
Marissa
0:14:42 – Quality over quantity.
Brett
0:14:44 – Exactly. Which is why if you’re going to invest in any market, you need to contact a team that has all the tools available to you to be successful. The tools are wide ranging, right? Number one, you got to get an agent who understands what the hell they’re talking about. An agent that knows how to walk a property and tell you what their true opinion of this property is and don’t tell you their opinion simply because they’re hoping you’re closed and they can get a check. I mean, how many times have we told a client,
Nick
0:15:14 – Hey, how many times have we told a client walk away from this one?
Brett
0:15:16 – Many times.
Nick
0:15:16 – This is not a good deal.
Brett
0:15:17 – But there’s a lot of agents out there that just because they have a license doesn’t make them a good agent, nor does it mean they understand what they’re talking about. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of agents that just want to get paid, and they’ll sell you something that deep down inside, they know is not going to work for you based on, hopefully, their good conversation with you to understand what your goals are. So number one, get you a good agent. Number two, make sure that that agent has a team. Not just a team of names, a team, a team that works, right? They have the inspectors, they have the contractors, and that that agent is willing to go out to that property every other day if he has to, or she has to, to make sure what you’re paying for is being taken care of properly and being done properly. Make sure before you write a draw check to the contractor that the job has been completed the way you have agreed for it to be completed. With the management companies, we refer you to management companies that we trust and we work with. Does it mean that they’re always going to be perfect? No, it doesn’t. But when they’re not perfect, what do we do? You call us, we jump in and get involved with the management company and help you fix whatever BS is going on.
Marissa
0:16:19 – We know management company is perfect. You’re never going to find that anywhere.
Nick
0:16:22 – And there’s a lot of management companies that are going to tell you all the things that they can do for you and we’re going to look at it objectively and we know that there might be six different management companies that we work with and each one of them is good in a certain area or a certain part of town. Well, we’re going to take what your property is and give you our opinion of the best person to contact for that particular property.
Brett
0:16:44 – Management company is not one size fits all. Like you said, some management companies work well in 38127, 38109, 38128. And it all comes down to the location of the property, the level of the property, and the type of tenant you’re getting, right? If you’re going to be dealing with MHA tenants, is them your best pick? Are they your best company?
Brett
0:17:04 – No, they’re not, right? They’re not, absolutely not, because they’re not versed in that realm. Companies that work well would be Advantage, right? Amicia, Andre, those are the people that work in those markets day in and day out and understand the tenants, the properties, and how to manage them properly because if you get a manager that doesn’t know what they’re doing, what happens? You get nickeled and dimed into the ground because every little call that comes in they’re sending contractors out to fix stuff and they don’t manage the property they’re just they’re just paying invoices for you.
Marissa
0:17:35 – They’re just the middleman, they’re not actually managing.
Nick
0:17:37 – And adding 20% on it.
Brett
0:17:39 – So that’s another advantage we have based on whatever you’re buying, whatever property you’re getting. If you’re buying it to rehab it, put an MHA tenant in it and keep it, then we’re going to put you in one management company. If you’re buying it, rehabbing it to flip it, we’re not going to put it with a management company, but we may put you with an MHA placement person so you can put a tenant in and increase the sellability of that property. There’s so many aspects to going into this business that a lot of people just don’t get and then they finally figure it out and it’s too late. They’ve lost thousands of dollars on deals that where they could have made a good profit simply because they had an agent didn’t know what they were doing.
Marissa
0:18:15 – So I’m just going to piggy-back off what you all said about having a team. So I’m in this deal currently and when I made this deal or got this contract accepted I was with another firm. I’m just gonna piggyback off of what you all said about like having a team. I’m glad that I switched, you know, multiple reasons, but one really good reason that stood out to me is that you all do have a team. You have reliable references. So this deal that I’m in, you know, we put it under contract for 83,000 bucks and whatever. And I went back today to do a walkthrough, me and the property manager, Amisha. She’s very knowledgeable in her field, knows what to look for, for MHA Section 8 tenants.
Marissa
0:18:52 – She herself can see that the property needs more work than what our client would like to spend.
Brett
0:18:57 – Now, let me ask you, did your client get an inspection?
Marissa
0:19:01 – My client did not get an inspection. He did get an appraisal contingency, however we are out of that window. Now he didn’t get an inspection and it would have been nice to be with Stamps when I got this deal under contract because it would have been great for Nick to be able to come out on the front end, he’s a contractor, to come out on the front end and kind of walk the property so I could have a better idea of what my client may have to come out of pocket to get this house tenant ready. It’s not tenant ready. He’s probably not going to be super interested in moving forward because it’s going to exceed his limit on what he wants to pay He’s more so he likes a turnkey. It’s kind of already ready for you. Maybe small cosmetics. Here’s a $5,000 cap He doesn’t like to go over. Well this property probably needs I Don’t know and don’t quote me. I’m not a contractor but more than 5,000 for sure So now that kind of puts me in a weird space as an agent, you know, because our goal as agents are to keep the deal together. Um, so I’m going to do everything I can to keep it together. However, I’m just saying is to make the point of, it’s great to have a team of people that you can refer and rely on. Nick would have been a great person, you know, to come walk through the property with me where he already, yeah, initially on the front end so that I wouldn’t even waste my time, my clients time, the sellers, you know, all the parties involved. So now I’m in a space where I’m like, man, I wish I had a contractor on my team where I have a relationship and a rapport with that would come out and take their time out of their day and just teach me some things, obviously, so I can kind of know what to look for going forward and also just give me their, you know, input.
Brett
0:20:47 – I know some contractors.
Marissa
0:20:48 – I mean, since you specialize in that, so.
Nick
0:20:50 – Asking you shall receive.
Marissa
0:20:51 – Yeah, I wish I would have knew you then because, whew, this deal.
Brett
0:20:52 – I met some contractors that can walk a property and couldn’t tell you a damn thing about it. Right?
Marissa
0:20:58 – Well, reliable. I would say reliable and, you know, after talking with you, you know, Brent, for these past, you know, few months getting to know you, I know that you’re knowledgeable and you’ve been doing this for some time.
Marissa
0:21:09 – So that makes me as a newer agent feel secure with being on this team and also trusting the other people on this team even if I don’t know them that well. I trust you so much that I’m like okay I’m gonna take his word for it.
Brett
0:21:23 – Well I mean obviously I learned everything I learned it was from trial and error and I made a lot of mistakes in my early days. I also was partnering with Glenn Greene who’s the most analytical person ever on the planet. Everything in his life was spreadsheet and planned out.
Marissa
0:21:36 – I wish I could have got to meet him because that’s how I like to work.
Brett
0:21:40 – He was something, man. He was good at what he did. But he also trained our assistant, Cassidy. But Cassidy, in my book, knows more about the real estate investment industry than Glenn and I combined, because she’s a genius savant. She just absorbs info and just retains it. Once she learns something, she never forgets it.
Marissa
0:21:59 – Even that’s a great asset to the team. Even though we can’t necessarily refer her to go do certain things, she has the knowledge for it.
Brett
0:22:08 – Trust me, I’ve been trying to get her to get her license for three years. I’m still trying.
Nick
0:22:11 – She’s so useful for us because we’re out in the field all the time. Many times we can’t get back to the office immediately and take care of something, but she can help us with that.
Brett
0:22:20 – Call Cassidy, tell her what you need, and she just does it. She’s good at it. That is the advantage of what we have over a lot of these other investment groups, we actually give a s***. That’s the crazy part. As I know a lot of agents, and I’m not trying to disparage any agents, don’t come down on me and fine me for being disparaging about other agents. Let’s face it, most of them are lazy, most of them are uneducated, they don’t do their research, they don’t put the work into creating that relationship, they don’t put the work into making sure that what this client expects happens. We do. We take the time to go out to these properties and spend the time evaluating the properties and spend the time talking to the contractors and then looking the inspection reports and negotiating with the sellers and buyers to make sure our assets are going to perform the way we want them to. Then after it closes and you actually own the property, that’s the other part of it is that we’re still involved in the property. We’re still evaluating. I just did this with Amish yesterday. He’s got 11 properties. He has four of them that are in the negative cashflow for annually. So we sat down each property and went through the entire year to figure out how did that happen? Well, it turned out it happened because of all these stupid maintenance issues that kept coming up. We figured, I figured out that half of them are BS. He was just allowing someone to manage this property and just say, Oh, you need a new this, okay, do it, here’s a check.
Marissa
0:23:38 – It’s so hard for the investor to understand.
Brett
0:23:39 – And not ask the question, well, was that the tenant’s fault and should I be paying for that or is that something that the tenant should pay for? And when I went through all of these four properties with him, line by line, it turned out he would have been in a positive had he taken the time to pay attention to the repairs and the management. And that’s something we did for him. So now that he understands that, Amish now is going to go into 2025 in the green on every property he has.
Marissa
0:24:05 – And then just a side note on the property that I was just talking about, I’m saying this to say, you know, especially for the newer agents, you’re going to mess up. You’re probably going to take losses. You’re probably going to have to come out of your pocket. Sometimes this particular deal that I was speaking of, I had to come out of my pocket because I made a small mess up. Not happy about that, but it was.
Brett
0:24:26 – Well, what you did is you installed, uninstalled, installed, uninstalled, then installed and then uninstalled a condenser like five, six times.
Marissa
0:24:32 – Right. So that was on me. I was jumping the gun, but I say this to say, even investors, they learn from their mistakes. You have to take something away from the mistake in order for you, A, not to do it again, B, to learn and C, to do better. You know better, you do better. So this deal, like I was saying, it would have been great to have a team because Nick could have gave me a quote on the front end. Well, now I’ve came out of pocket because of my mistake. The deal’s probably not going to close. So it is now it’s a loss all the way around the board instead of a win for everyone. But I learned from it and I just want newer agents to know like you’re going to mess up. It’s okay. You just find a way to fix it and move forward.
Brett
0:25:14 – As good as Glenn Greene was, he probably spent 20 times that in his first three years doing the right thing for his client. Most agents would be like, oh, it wasn’t my fault, that was so-and-so’s fault, and try to get out of being responsible for it. Glenn and I both have paid a lot of money because we own up, we make a mistake, we own up to it, and if my client’s going to lose their earnest money, I’ll write them a check, say, look, no harm done, my bad, I apologize, that was my mistake. And if you own up to it, guess what? That inspector is going to, the investor is going to respect you, they’re going to trust you.
Marissa
0:25:44 – They’ll be a little more lenient with you and give you another chance.
Brett
0:25:46 – Well, they understand that you’re going to be honest with them if you screw up. Everybody screws up, everybody. There’s no perfect person on the planet. And if you own up to it, you build respect, you build rapport, you build a good team. So I want our listeners to know that we have a small team, but we have a pretty powerful and solid team. I think we have the best of pretty much anything an investor needs. I think we’ve worked hard to vet the people we work with, and they are all on the same page as we are. They understand one thing. We are here to make sure we build a performing portfolio for our investors. And if you’re going to be our inspector, and you’re going to be our contractor, you have to carry the same goal. And if you don’t, out the door, because there’s 100 guys behind you that we can just pull in and then vet them. And I think that’s brought us into an area where we can be trusted by investors to know I’m not there but I’ve got five, six, ten people on my team that are handling this for me start to finish.
Marissa
0:26:39 – And like you always say, Brett, you know if you do your job right they’re gonna keep coming back. And word of mouth is still a very popular, you know, thing. People don’t probably realize it as much as social media so be but word of mouth you get investors you do your job right they keep on back with their tell you know their body investors hey this is why work with and it’s great to have that one-stop shop I think that’s a really be plus for our team.
Brett
0:27:05 – Well there are two things one conversation I you and I had I was in truck you on your way here about an investor about what’s going on with that investor and how long term that’s going to create problems for you as an agent. Not just with other brokers and other agents that you send offers to. The flip side of that is, here’s a trick. I didn’t realize this until a few years ago. When you do your job right, you get investors and you get volume. When you increase your volume, you know what happens? Other agents out there say, oh, well I got a new investor client. Let me call Brett. Oh, I got another new investor, let me call Brett. Brett’s always got something I can probably sell. And you all of a sudden you start getting calls daily from other agents and brokers in town who know you’re the volume guy or you’re one of the volume guys and you’re going to have something that will fit my client’s needs off market. And now your business just blows up and you don’t get there unless you do the beginning work at the bottom and you do it right. You do it honestly and you do it truthfully and then you’ll just watch your business mushroom.
Nick
0:28:03 – Yeah, I mean, let’s face it, we’re not getting rich off of one $135,000 house. But we want to make that investor happy so that they buy 10 from us next year and then they sell all of their property.
Brett
0:28:13 – Well, eventually, you sell 150 houses a year with the same group of investors and every year you hope to add a couple of new investors, give yourself a raise.
Marissa
0:28:19 – And it’s just recycling.
Brett
0:28:20 – A lot of agents look at it as a daunting task. I can tell you, Glenn’s philosophy was spot on and I used his philosophy and my business blew up. His business blew up.
Marissa
0:28:31 – It’s crazy they would look at it as a daunting task but I suppose you would think that when you’re looking at a short goal instead of looking long term. You know I mean long term there’s nothing daunting about it.
Brett
0:28:42 – Do you know why most agents aren’t good?
Marissa
0:28:43 – Because most realtors want the money so it’s like if you want the money do the work and long term you’ll get the money.
Brett
0:28:49 – Most agents aren’t good at what they do for that very simple reason. They’re chasing the money. The easy money is what they think. I’m going to put a sign in the yard, wait for somebody to buy the house and get my commission check. They don’t want to put in all, they don’t want to dot all the I’s and cross all the T’s that are required to make sure you’re doing your job effectively as the state of Tennessee requires you to do it.
Marissa
0:29:06 – And I get it, you know, yes, as realtors, we are in it, you know, partially for the money. I mean, let’s be real. Everyone needs a career. You got bills, you know, there’s no secret about it but if you go into it with the mindset of it’s not just only about the money and you want to actually provide good customer service you know and all those other things that fall in line with it you will see the money you know on the back end but I guess it’s realtors and in social media you expect to wake up the next day and it’s like oh I’m rich and it’s impossible.
Brett
0:29:38 – As the Japanese always said, do your job right, do the volume, the money will follow. And that’s the reason why.
Marissa
0:29:44 – And that’s true.
Brett
0:29:44 – Yeah, I mean, that’s very true. The Japanese kind of invented that. When I was in college, I sold copiers for a living. That’s what I did. And we sold a copier called KONICA. It was a Japanese-made copier. And the corporate trainers would come in to our office to train us. And they’d be like, look, this little $3,000 machine, it’s like the size of a printer today. We’d rather you sell 100 of these than to sell four of these $50,000 duplicators. Why? Same philosophy with the Toyota cars. They’re cheap, they’re compact, they’re easy to sell, and we make our money on volume versus selling one big machine. Now, most agents want to sell the $50,000 Konica duplicator. I realized right away, I’d rather sell a thousand of these little crappy machines for $3,000 a pop because I made more money.
Marissa
0:30:34 – And especially with investors, like I said, it’s a recycle, rinse, repeat.
Brett
0:30:41 – That’s right. All right, well, we appreciate you listening to this 5 O’Clock Somewhere Real Estate Podcast. You can get in touch with us at 901-692-7401 or go to our website, mymemphisinvestmentproperties.com. Appreciate you listening, have a great one.
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