All Forum Posts by: Samuel Jolicoeur

Quote from @Samuel Jolicoeur:

Quote from @Ke Nan Wang:

Quote from @Samuel Jolicoeur:

Quote from @Ke Nan Wang:

Hi Sam, kudos on doing a open house on Saturday and use your time as productive as you can be. I'm from St. Augustine so we are 3.5 hour away. 

I totally understand your parents' concern. I would be if I was in their shoes. Just like my impression on the stock market. Many people made a fortune owning the right stocks, and I just seem to have okay experience with it. My overall stock portfolio is a net positive but nothing I have to show for. During COVID period my stock portfolio had like a 40% gain and I was happily thinking, yes, I'm doing it right by diversifying something from real estate into stocks. And I continued to putting more money into my stock portfolio, thinking it's the right way to do things, even though there were no reason to support my initial success other than luck and follow the trend. But this new woke culture war hit some of the big name companies really hard and I had a huge lost on them: Meta, Disney, Target, Nike and NIO (this is not so much the woke culture but just the company did not perform as expected). I invested in them at the peak of their performance and now they are all 40%-60% less and essentially broke my portfolio into pretty much even. I think overall I came up $15k ahead out of a over six figure portfolio over 3 years which is pretty sad but I'm fortunate that I didn't lose money. My mom had a similar experience during the dot com bubble crash time and lost her lots of money so she vowed to never touched stock again because she thinks she's bad luck with stock. 

With that perspective, I can imagine someone has a similar experience with real estate investing, if they started with a bad experience, they probably think they are born with bad luck and even though everyone is winning in real estate, they will think they won't be that person. 

I have a great plumber who works for me. Two days ago we just had a conversation, both him and his dad grossed $2M last year, their take home pay was $375k each, that's pretty incredible for a plumber. But he says both him and his dad only put money into CD's and money market after reinvest into their business. His dad advise him to not to play with any investment that has risk, in their mind, they think money in the bank is "safe". 

Life taught me that it's incredibly difficult to change a person's mind through outside persuasion, but it's incredibly easy, if that person just changes their mind themselves. So for these type of people, I just tell them, hey, just watch me. See how I'm doing. If you like what I'm doing and doing better and it's something you are interested in, then maybe I can help you. And I'll just leave it like that. 

My story right now is that I'm trying to work with more investors, providing values to them and help them with their investment. I do not sell, I show them what I have done and what my data is showing, I give them all the pros and cons I know. Slowly but surely, my credibility has grown in my market. I'm a slow but steady kind of a guy. And I put a huge value over networking and relationship and trust building. So I always carry myself with the upmost integrity and always do what I say. 

It's nice to meet you and hope you have some foot traffic at your open house, and better, get an offer. 

Thanks for reaching out to me, Ke! I’d say I’m a slow and steady kind of guy myself. Someone else in my shoes might have already pulled the trigger on an investment property with the capital that I do have, but I believe it’s important to have your nest egg. Networking is so important as I’ve seen, and I’ve been working it however it’s not been a cake walk being a young Realtor in a market locally saturated with more experienced realtors. That being said I am grateful for every small step forward, and at this moment in the aftermath of the NAR lawsuit I’m open to other avenues of moving forward in Real Estate beyond being an agent. I always like to have a backup plan.

I also am looking to work with investors and would like to be included on the BP investor friendly agents list however it is I can do that. To learn from them and see how they operate and negotiate and grow their money. After all, my real goal isn’t being an agent, it’s being an accredited investor. 

I see you’re a developer - do you have your own company?

Seems like you are hustling and that's great. Keep an open mindset and say yes to everything and be everywhere is a great way to build your business. 
Working with investors is a very broad scope because there is no credential for the title "investor," everyone can wear the hat so you just really have to pick the right ones to work for. For the right one, we pour our heart and soul to provide the best value to them, be available to them pretty much 24/7 and earn their trust for them to be our life long customer. My goal is to onboard 2-3 investors a year (I'm working with on and off and on average about 6 right now, all mom and pop super wonderful investors). I know I'm not the Ten-X super scaling business empire type of guy but life is good money is good and no stress. I like it this way.  
We run a family own business, I'm fortunate that both my mom and brother are CPAs so I have an in house accountant right off the bat. I'm basically the person who wears every hat for now and so far I'm leveraging technologies and vendors to run our business. We develop about 10 single family houses (from land to a well built house) a year and we own and operate on and off about 30 rental properties that's 90% LTR and 10% MTR/STR. We currently own and planning ahead about 3-4 small development projects of ourselves in the next 3 years.  
You say your real goal isn't being an agent, same here. But I don't want to be just a LP investor, at least for now or in the foreseeable future. I like to get up and do stuff. Going into the field and see houses coming off the ground and eventually move people in give me purpose and satisfaction. I can pretty much do this all day every day for the rest of my life even I don't need to make a single dime. Right now some of my good investors pay me my share everything upfront (of course with a discount) and I bust my *** for them just as hard if they have not paid me. Money is more of a measurement for self worth to me at this point but it's not a motivational factor to do what I do. 
I'll keep your contact and let's find an opportunity to connect either next time I'm in Tampa or you come visit St. Augustine. 

 It would be awesome to meet you sometime! I drive up to Tampa frequently, and though St. Augustine is far away from me I do love the area.

It sounds like you're doing well for yourself, and good for you! I hope to someday also be at the point where money is no longer a major motivational factor. Development is another aspect of RE that I'm very interested in exploring more, but have not had the chance to. I want to be part of the growth and help to relieve the nation of its housing shortage. How would you describe the developments you produce?

I have that same vision too. In St. Augustine, you can either build to sell or build to rent. Almost all builders here do build to sell (flip) where they buy lot cheap either direct to seller, from wholesalers and sometimes from the MLS. Then they come in with a pre-designed floor plan that fits the lot and they build a house and sell the house. The margin is decent to great depend on what kinda product a builder produce. It can go from as low as $30k to $100k profit based on a number of factors: how good of a deal was the land deal, quality of house, retail market at the time of completion. The good thing about flipping lot vs flipping an old house is that flipping a lot has much less surprises and there is less things can go wrong as long as the builder have done their due diligence on the lot before the purchase. Researching a vacant land is much easier than studying an old house. 

Our business model is pretty exclusively a build to hold model. Similar to the BRRRR method but instead of renovate a old house, we build a new house rent it out and refinance. Since we are our own contractor and PM, in today's market we still aim to achieve the 1% rule. 2021 to 2022 we were achieve 1.5% no problem. For our investors, we help them achieve at least 7% annual COC return (After our GC markup and PM fees, our new constructions are cash built). Obviously it's not for most of the aggressive investor here. Our investors are mostly busy career people and they have $300k cash and where can they park their $300k and still get some healthy returns and ride on top of inflation. If you are building new relationship and finding these type of investors is definitely a slow and steady effort. 

Our business model is to be very flexible and present all the options to investors. We are in the field everyday and it's very easy for me to show investors the house we are building, the house we have built, show them my data on our current rent roll so we are 100% transparent about what we do. I even showed them how much money I make from each of the operation. The money I charge them is very affordable, all of them is either fair market rate below market rate based on what they can find if they have to shop for a GC, a PM and a real estate agent. It helps a lot to build trust.  

In the last few years we were mostly our own customer with the low interest rate. But with the new high interest rate, we dial back our own operations and mostly working with new cash investors this year and going into next year. 

My story 

Hey all, I see so many posts, " I am researching, " I am doing my homework" , I am trying to build my team" "Deciding on which area" So many are TRYING but never do anything, like a hamster on a wheel, A LOT of movement but staying in the same place. What is holding you back? Who needs help, or just some advice.

I started out not know a darn thing. Literally got into RE while at a family BBQ about 15 years ago. My Cuz pulled up in a new SL 500. I said, Joe, I thought you were an extra tech. Well, he was, but he took action and got into RE. So that was my ah ha moment. Within my 1st month I flipped a contract for 19k, yes 19k my 1st month. At that moment I realized there is money in this. All I did was look at a property, run the comps, and got a reno budget, So nothing to intense. My next deal while I was just about to sign the contract on a house in Glenn Cove LI. a truck pulls up. The realtor says, may I help you? Nope says the driver with a lock and chain in is hand. I am here to lock it up, its going into foreclosure. I grabbed the contract and offered 100k less, and got it, Talk about timing. At that point I knew the universe was telling me, RE is my calling. Well, 500 deals later, (about 15 in LI the rest in Cleveland ) there is nothing I have not done. Purchased various sheriff auctions, short sale, and just low balling.

If you are stuck, not knowing where to turn, please feel free to reach out,

All the best

Quote from @Samuel Jolicoeur:

Quote from @Ke Nan Wang:

Hi Sam, kudos on doing a open house on Saturday and use your time as productive as you can be. I'm from St. Augustine so we are 3.5 hour away. 

I totally understand your parents' concern. I would be if I was in their shoes. Just like my impression on the stock market. Many people made a fortune owning the right stocks, and I just seem to have okay experience with it. My overall stock portfolio is a net positive but nothing I have to show for. During COVID period my stock portfolio had like a 40% gain and I was happily thinking, yes, I'm doing it right by diversifying something from real estate into stocks. And I continued to putting more money into my stock portfolio, thinking it's the right way to do things, even though there were no reason to support my initial success other than luck and follow the trend. But this new woke culture war hit some of the big name companies really hard and I had a huge lost on them: Meta, Disney, Target, Nike and NIO (this is not so much the woke culture but just the company did not perform as expected). I invested in them at the peak of their performance and now they are all 40%-60% less and essentially broke my portfolio into pretty much even. I think overall I came up $15k ahead out of a over six figure portfolio over 3 years which is pretty sad but I'm fortunate that I didn't lose money. My mom had a similar experience during the dot com bubble crash time and lost her lots of money so she vowed to never touched stock again because she thinks she's bad luck with stock. 

With that perspective, I can imagine someone has a similar experience with real estate investing, if they started with a bad experience, they probably think they are born with bad luck and even though everyone is winning in real estate, they will think they won't be that person. 

I have a great plumber who works for me. Two days ago we just had a conversation, both him and his dad grossed $2M last year, their take home pay was $375k each, that's pretty incredible for a plumber. But he says both him and his dad only put money into CD's and money market after reinvest into their business. His dad advise him to not to play with any investment that has risk, in their mind, they think money in the bank is "safe". 

Life taught me that it's incredibly difficult to change a person's mind through outside persuasion, but it's incredibly easy, if that person just changes their mind themselves. So for these type of people, I just tell them, hey, just watch me. See how I'm doing. If you like what I'm doing and doing better and it's something you are interested in, then maybe I can help you. And I'll just leave it like that. 

My story right now is that I'm trying to work with more investors, providing values to them and help them with their investment. I do not sell, I show them what I have done and what my data is showing, I give them all the pros and cons I know. Slowly but surely, my credibility has grown in my market. I'm a slow but steady kind of a guy. And I put a huge value over networking and relationship and trust building. So I always carry myself with the upmost integrity and always do what I say. 

It's nice to meet you and hope you have some foot traffic at your open house, and better, get an offer. 

Thanks for reaching out to me, Ke! I’d say I’m a slow and steady kind of guy myself. Someone else in my shoes might have already pulled the trigger on an investment property with the capital that I do have, but I believe it’s important to have your nest egg. Networking is so important as I’ve seen, and I’ve been working it however it’s not been a cake walk being a young Realtor in a market locally saturated with more experienced realtors. That being said I am grateful for every small step forward, and at this moment in the aftermath of the NAR lawsuit I’m open to other avenues of moving forward in Real Estate beyond being an agent. I always like to have a backup plan.

I also am looking to work with investors and would like to be included on the BP investor friendly agents list however it is I can do that. To learn from them and see how they operate and negotiate and grow their money. After all, my real goal isn’t being an agent, it’s being an accredited investor. 

I see you’re a developer - do you have your own company?

Seems like you are hustling and that's great. Keep an open mindset and say yes to everything and be everywhere is a great way to build your business. 
Working with investors is a very broad scope because there is no credential for the title "investor," everyone can wear the hat so you just really have to pick the right ones to work for. For the right one, we pour our heart and soul to provide the best value to them, be available to them pretty much 24/7 and earn their trust for them to be our life long customer. My goal is to onboard 2-3 investors a year (I'm working with on and off and on average about 6 right now, all mom and pop super wonderful investors). I know I'm not the Ten-X super scaling business empire type of guy but life is good money is good and no stress. I like it this way.  
We run a family own business, I'm fortunate that both my mom and brother are CPAs so I have an in house accountant right off the bat. I'm basically the person who wears every hat for now and so far I'm leveraging technologies and vendors to run our business. We develop about 10 single family houses (from land to a well built house) a year and we own and operate on and off about 30 rental properties that's 90% LTR and 10% MTR/STR. We currently own and planning ahead about 3-4 small development projects of ourselves in the next 3 years.  
You say your real goal isn't being an agent, same here. But I don't want to be just a LP investor, at least for now or in the foreseeable future. I like to get up and do stuff. Going into the field and see houses coming off the ground and eventually move people in give me purpose and satisfaction. I can pretty much do this all day every day for the rest of my life even I don't need to make a single dime. Right now some of my good investors pay me my share everything upfront (of course with a discount) and I bust my *** for them just as hard if they have not paid me. Money is more of a measurement for self worth to me at this point but it's not a motivational factor to do what I do. 
I'll keep your contact and let's find an opportunity to connect either next time I'm in Tampa or you come visit St. Augustine. 

Quote from @Samuel Jolicoeur:

Quote from @Steve Vaughan:

Good story @Samuel Jolicoeur and good for you bootstrapping yourself up!

Don't be afraid to go bigger.  Lots of mom and pop tired landlords in the small commercial apt space that are under the radar of larger purchasers and completely ignored by the general public.   

I appreciate the advice. I want to go big. There are old apartments down the street from me that I keep eyeing up, but then I start thinking about it and I recognize that even if I seller-financed it zero dollars down, if something major went wrong I wouldn’t have the reserves to cover it.

 Smart to have reserves, but not absolutely necessary if your deal is good enough.  I wrote many a credit card when needed back in the day for down payments or repairs/ improvements.  

I'd caution you focusing on a guru.  If PM was such a great dude, he'd come on here and clear some basic sub2 confusions up. Simple stuff like how to deal with insurance when you sub2. I am not impressed.  

In Atomic Habits, James Clear makes a great point-  it's our habits that sustain us when motivation fails.  

If 100 doors is your why, (it's not- 100 doors was PFA), you'll need to execute simple daily habits to get you there.   Focus on your why first.  Ask yourself 'why 100 doors' 7 times to help you discover it. 

@Samuel Jolicoeur Many moons ago I bought the Carleton sheets CDs and was bit by the real estate bug. However foolish partnerships and naïveté caused me to quit investing and sell everything.

Fast forward 20 some odd years and with much more experience and knowledge I started over and jumped in again knowing real estate was my only hope at a decent retirement hopefully sooner rather than later and I’m still working towards that goal today.

I’ve got 7 properties 25 doors and a decent amount toward the next down payment. I’m looking to move into real estate full time quit the W-2 and get more control of my life where I had it in my 20s and 30s as a small business owner.

Good story @Samuel Jolicoeur and good for you bootstrapping yourself up!

Briefly since most know my story- I was 30 and 4 years into a cubicle finance job in Denver 2001 looking for a change when I saw a late night Carelton Sheets infomercial.   I'd always wanted residual income so buy and hold rentals intrigued me.  

I studied for a year, read books from the library, books on tape, etc, quit my job, 'sold' my house with a lease option, moved 3 states away closer to family into a trailer park and got busy.  

I was full-time 2002-2022 and sold most on contracts last year.  The great recession was great for my 3 dozen b-class portfolio as owners became renters but I can see how someone's single rental could suffer if your tenants were laid off. 

Buying rentals with no job forced me to learn creative finance.  The bulk of my buys, especially lager 7-10 unit ones 2003-2007 were seller-financed.   I haven't seen this much broad interest in creative financing ever. 

2008-11 short sales primarily,  2012-2013 rates dropped but cash was king. Then low rate conventional through 2021.  Cycles that will probably repeat.

Don't be afraid to go bigger.  Lots of mom and pop tired landlords in the small commercial apt space that are under the radar of larger purchasers and completely ignored by the general public.   

Hi Sam, kudos on doing a open house on Saturday and use your time as productive as you can be. I'm from St. Augustine so we are 3.5 hour away. 

I totally understand your parents' concern. I would be if I was in their shoes. Just like my impression on the stock market. Many people made a fortune owning the right stocks, and I just seem to have okay experience with it. My overall stock portfolio is a net positive but nothing I have to show for. During COVID period my stock portfolio had like a 40% gain and I was happily thinking, yes, I'm doing it right by diversifying something from real estate into stocks. And I continued to putting more money into my stock portfolio, thinking it's the right way to do things, even though there were no reason to support my initial success other than luck and follow the trend. But this new woke culture war hit some of the big name companies really hard and I had a huge lost on them: Meta, Disney, Target, Nike and NIO (this is not so much the woke culture but just the company did not perform as expected). I invested in them at the peak of their performance and now they are all 40%-60% less and essentially broke my portfolio into pretty much even. I think overall I came up $15k ahead out of a over six figure portfolio over 3 years which is pretty sad but I'm fortunate that I didn't lose money. My mom had a similar experience during the dot com bubble crash time and lost her lots of money so she vowed to never touched stock again because she thinks she's bad luck with stock. 

With that perspective, I can imagine someone has a similar experience with real estate investing, if they started with a bad experience, they probably think they are born with bad luck and even though everyone is winning in real estate, they will think they won't be that person. 

I have a great plumber who works for me. Two days ago we just had a conversation, both him and his dad grossed $2M last year, their take home pay was $375k each, that's pretty incredible for a plumber. But he says both him and his dad only put money into CD's and money market after reinvest into their business. His dad advise him to not to play with any investment that has risk, in their mind, they think money in the bank is "safe". 

Life taught me that it's incredibly difficult to change a person's mind through outside persuasion, but it's incredibly easy, if that person just changes their mind themselves. So for these type of people, I just tell them, hey, just watch me. See how I'm doing. If you like what I'm doing and doing better and it's something you are interested in, then maybe I can help you. And I'll just leave it like that. 

My story right now is that I'm trying to work with more investors, providing values to them and help them with their investment. I do not sell, I show them what I have done and what my data is showing, I give them all the pros and cons I know. Slowly but surely, my credibility has grown in my market. I'm a slow but steady kind of a guy. And I put a huge value over networking and relationship and trust building. So I always carry myself with the upmost integrity and always do what I say. 

It's nice to meet you and hope you have some foot traffic at your open house, and better, get an offer.