How This Real Estate Investor Went From 1 to 37 Rental Property Units in Less Than 1.5 Years!

what's up bigger pockets alex police here today i'm going to introduce you to a rental property investor who's been buying small portfolios because well one at a time just ain't good enough is it [Music] my friend josh and i met at bp con which you absolutely must go to and no they don't pay me to say that although if they did pay me to say that i would absolutely take the money after the conference we stayed friends he actually invited me to speak at one of his ria meetings up here in raleigh and over time we talked more and more about his deals and i became really interested and he's got this great story and i'm really excited to share with you my friend josh ratbun let's go meet him my name is josh i'm going to tell you my story of how i got started in real estate both my wife and i who work full-time jobs and have two kids and how we went from zero doors to a portfolio of 37 doors in less than a year and a half so i started off hating my job just like everybody else i was in i.t i stared at a computer screen all day long going what am i going to do to change my life i tried so many different things trying to understand how to move through life and make money doing it while supplying for my family just like you i started from nothing i started with thirty five thousand dollars in debt trying to find out how is going to change my life i stumbled across bp just randomly typing in google just like everyone else does ways to make money i started listening to the podcast over 320 at that time episode 301 was amazing we started going through the process of learning understanding and reaching out i want to share with you that journey just like so many of you are on and show you that it can happen that you can make a change in your life and it starts with you so to start off let me show you this triplex and kind of how i started in the real estate realm this isn't my first deal but this is my third deal but when i got started i had to fully understand what it is i was getting into just like all of you when you walk into your first deal you're trying to go what am i supposed to do how am i supposed to do this what are the materials that i'm going to be using i started out just like that looking around it was the place was completely destroyed it smelled there was all sorts of bugs and rodents and anything you could possibly imagine my mentor was like yeah smells like money this is how you do it so step by step i was looking at the floors i was looking at the walls i was looking at the cabinets i would look in the bedrooms i was looking at the fixture and the lighting and everything that you could possibly imagine overwhelming just like many of you who go into a property for your first time are completely overwhelmed that is okay it is perfectly normal you don't have to freak out so when i was at my meet up i knew i had to find a mentor because that's what everyone talks about find a mentor find a mentor so that is exactly what i did i went to everyone that i could see shook their hands and said hey my name is josh i found one person who had over a hundred doors in order for me to provide value to him i knew i had to go call a ton of contractors so i cold called finally found one after talking about an hour with that person we sat down in one of my units and i said what can you come up with as far as a project plan a materials list and a labor cost all those things that are incredibly important to finding out how to rehab and remodel your units so after i got this list i took it to my mentor and i said here's how i can provide value to you here is an estimate of labor here's an estimate here's a cost estimate here's how you can go further with me providing that kind of service and i found the contractor i offered it to the mentor and now we both use them you've seen this triplex now let me take you over to some of my other units and show you those as well this is the duplex that i started off with on that purse that first portfolio this is my other duplex and that single family home that i was telling you about this was part of my second package that i had purchased the same rehab process except that's a three bedroom one bath and that's a three bedroom two path so you saw back there the triplex there's a duplex right next to that and then just across the road was another duplex and that single family home so now we're gonna make a right here just around the corner and there's a five unit this is my first five unit commercial building and i gotta tell you it was scary i used the same rehab process though so i knew exactly what i was gonna do on the inside i just didn't know what i was gonna do on the outside it had no gutters it didn't have a paint job had really terrible windows so right up here where all the white rock is it was complete mud there were no gutters up here the roof was falling apart and all that water was spilling off here and just completely completely destroying all of this so this is the other two bedroom one bath apartment building it's very similar if not exactly the same layout as that triplex that you saw so why not do the same thing over and over and over again and create a process around it so come with me and i'll show you what this looks like as you can see the kitchen exact same countertops exact same cabinets exact same flooring why change a good thing so as you can see the paint is exactly the same as well and then if you go into the bathroom as well there's the flooring and you have the same toilet and you have the same layouts you know people really appreciate the quality of the build but you don't have to spend a fortune to do it all right biggerpockets i know what you're all thinking how in the world do you fund these deals well i can tell you how i funded them i use private money and i use bank money i wasn't made of money i didn't just go into my bank account pull out a hundred thousand dollars and say here we go let's go start funding no i went to my inner circle that i knew had private money it so happened to be my father-in-law and i said hey i know you have 401k money to use let me use that money to fund this opportunity you'll make money and i'll make money so that's what i did with these projects all those things that you had seen in the triplex and the duplexes in that five unit i used bank money and private money you can do many different ways to fund the deals just like you read in bigger pockets just like you hear from people like alex felice who use people's money and his own money and bank money to find and fund these projects in order to create the wealth that he's looking for and that i'm looking for and that my father-in-law is looking for that's the whole reason why we get into bigger pockets is so that we can create wealth so that we can fund our why this is why we do it we're all in this together and that's what bigger pockets is about i would not be where i'm at right now without bigger pockets without the information that's there these deals that you see and that i'm building my portfolio with and funding with is all created through knowledge it's created through action there are many struggles i had to go through in order to figure all this out there were times where i thought the deal was definitely gonna fall through i didn't know how to do a rehab sure i had construction experience but i'd never actually done it for myself when you actually take that jump were you doing it for yourself yeah it seems scary and that fear is always going to be there but sometimes that fear guides you it gives you the bumpers that you need in life in order to make sure that you're on the right path so as i was going through the rehabs like i showed you there were times where the subfloor was so bad i didn't know what i was going to do but you find a way through that you push you have the grit in order to get through it and get on to your next deal because just because you fail doesn't mean it's the end of your project it's the beginning success is made of multiple failures strung together and before you know it you're on your way as long as you're learning from those failures you didn't actually fail there were many times i stumbled along just like all of you you need to put yourself out there in front of people and provide opportunity provide value and give where you can give you may not always see the return right away but you need to be always in the state of giving your network is your biggest and most critical factor in all of the things that you're going to be doing because you never know who you're going to talk to who you're going to meet that you can either help or who can help you because that deal that you find could always come from that person that you just talked to it's not about using them it's about creating a lifelong relationship with those people so in order to accomplish those goals put yourself out there be ready to fail be ready to succeed my name is josh rathbun you'll never know what you missed unless you go and try now go try [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: BiggerPockets

Views: 211,251

Keywords: biggerpockets, real estate, real estate investing, investing, rentals, rental property, investing in real estate, bigger pockets, real estate investing success, meet the investor, rental property investing, rental property investor, investing in rental properties, investing in rentals

Id: DAcPM2MstW8

Length: 10min 31sec (631 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 25 2020