I write this as encouragement to all that read this and hope that you see that 2019 can be the year that changes your life if you take action. If you are not experiencing the success today that you want it’s because you are still doing the things that got you to where you are. Change your formula and continue to change it until you find what works then execute that formula over and over.
Set goals and don’t compare yourself to others, compare yourself to the bar you set and then go concur it.
In 2017 I was living project to project with our construction company and we were flipping a couple of our own houses but not really gaining any ground. My brother and I were business partners in our construction company and would partner on our flips. We did a total of 12 flips in 2017 and I think just broke even. We were both broke and weren’t gaining any progress towards changing that. We knew there was wealth and financial freedom in real estate, but we didn’t have the right pieces in place to experience it.
We decided we needed to make a change, in November 2017 we put nearly $50,000 in real estate coaching and education on credit and committed to taking action on everything we would learn as quickly as we learned it.
What happened when we started taking action changed our lives and our families lives forever. By the end of January we had done 14 deals using absolutely none of our own money and built up a strong cash position for ourselves. We then decided to start focusing on building a portfolio of properties that would start providing cash flow for us.
Based on our success in January we set a goal to put together a portfolio of at least 100 doors by the end of 2018. With our early success we went to three would be investors and raised some capital to start using with the money we had generated in January to start acquiring buy and hold properties.
The next few single families we purchased we applied our BARRR method (yes the A is necessary for tax purposes), then end of March we purchased our first apartment and mobile home park. Neither of which were in our home state, and both were in different states, I say that to show that there is no room for excuses if you want to be successful.
Our progress then began to train roll. Many people in our network started to take notice of our success. At a real estate event in Dallas in March we met our now business partner who at the time had another multi-family property under contract but was having some difficulty putting the funding together. We decided to partner and use our funds and our investors funds to take down the property. Now within less than 3 months we were gaining major traction towards our goal of 100 doors, we were at 59 not even 3 months into the year. We realized now we needed to first change our goals to 250 doors and start putting some major systems, processes and back office (computer/technology) in place…something not one of the three of us were good at. Our newest partner had a friend that he thought was perfect for what we needed so we brought him in as our 4th partner. Partnerships have been a very vital part of our growth and success. I realized in January that in order to grow I needed to surround myself with people who were smarter than me and more successful than me in areas that I wasn’t good at. We now have a team that each of us focus on what we are good at and have experienced massive success because each of us were willing to give up something in order to obtain something larger that alone we would not be able to do. Leverage at its best.
With our success and the interest we were building, we decided to put together a private equity fund so we could start syndicating our deals as opposed to using a single investor partners to fund each individual project. Based on our progress you can see why this made sense as we were transacting deals so quickly, the time involved to build a JV for each deal was becoming too time consuming. By now we were beginning to build a strong balance sheet and favor with our banks. We started discussions with our banks on what kind of lending power we could get based on the amount of capital we raised. We found that with a $5 million capital raise we would have an additional $20 million in purchasing power with our lenders so we began the steps to set up a fund specifying a $5 million capital raise. Over the next few months we raised the capital and funded our new fund and continued acquiring properties.
At the end of March and the first couple weeks in April we contracted over 100 more doors. With our experience and relationships with the title companies we were working with we built a strong reputation and in turn we were first to know about a couple of portfolio deals that came into probate. By mid-April we reached over 100 doors with 89 total properties and then as we continued to close on those contracts we had we just continued to add to that.
As I sit on a plane writing this on Christmas Eve coming back from taking my family to New York City for Christmas fun and shopping (something that would not have crossed my mind a year ago based on our financial position at the time) we have done 124 deals this year and have another 3 portfolio deals closing next week that will put us over 225 total doors. We will end up a little short of the new goal we set in April of 250 doors but if you don’t push yourself to higher levels you end up settling for less than your capabilities.
I talk to so many people who have excuse after excuse, how they don’t have any money and real estate takes money…I’m prime example that is not true. I also hear, “there’s too much competition in my market”…I live in Dallas/Fort Worth one of the most competitive real estate markets for investors in the US and we have crushed this market starting from zero, but if your still not convinced then jump out of your comfort zone and go to another city or state like we did. I say this just to say, take action, you’re going to have failures and set backs just like I will fail to hit the 250 door mark this year. Keep moving forward, we will have over 500 doors by the end of next year and make up for this year.
At the beginning of the year one of my new business coaches told me that if you have just 50 good days in your business you will be a multi-millionaire, so I started counting and tracking. I now look back and I actually had a few more than 50 good days, we had 74 but I went from a negative $58,000 net worth in January 2018 to now in December 2018 a positive net worth of $3.4 million.
I look back on 2018 seeing what we’ve accomplished, 124 deals, nearly 200 properties, and 231 total doors (after next week), I’ve been to 5 countries and 13 different states this year educating myself, speaking, building partnerships, raising capital and purchasing real estate.
I say this to hopefully bring encouragement, an urgency to take action, and proof that you can be successful in real estate no matter your background, current financial position, or walk of life. Each of the four of us, my partners and myself, came from different places in life…none of which resembled financial success and none of us had put anything in place that would leave our families in a stronger financial position when we pass. Leigh, the last partner I spoke about was recently out of a job when we met. He, his wife and their 2 kids had been in Denver where he had served as the CEO of a large residential real estate brokerage in Denver and when the brokerage sold, he found himself without a position. Remember, I mentioned none of us had anything in place that resembled success…after going through their reserves he moved his family back to Texas with nothing scraping by, offering consulting services to a start-up company. Mack, our 3rdpartner was serving as a full-time police officer working a night beet on his squad living paycheck to paycheck to provide for his wife and 2 kids. Boone and I were partnered as I mentioned, Boone the bachelor of the four of us may could represent the only one who was not necessarily paycheck to paycheck only because he didn’t have a family to support, but broke none the less. And I was trying to support my wife and three kids and failing at it. Now, what we have built has changed our and our families lives and will continue to do so for multiple generations. Mack walked away from his police job back in the summer, Leigh is in the process of relocating his family to central Texas where we are headquartered at and the only construction our construction company does now is for our own projects.
We tweaked and changed our formula until we found what worked. We put goals in place for cash flow numbers that would free each of us and now we have systems in place that help us direct what plan of action we will execute on each property we contract. We are currently contracting an average of over 30 deals a month. We now have a plan for each one of those, some we keep and some we flip to other investors, and some we rehab and sale but regardless we have a plan that moves us further along.
Use this as encouragement to go out and attack 2019 and let it be the year that changes your family for generations to come!
Be Blessed,
Tie Lasater
KeyCity Capital
