In 2010, while talking to a friend in church, she asked me a question that would change my life.
“What do you do?”
Normally, when I am asked this question, I would give my job title or a generally accepted term for my job. At that time, I was still working as an IT professional for Oracle.
But I didn’t tell her I was an IT consultant.
Instead I said, “I buy and sell properties.”
“That looks like a good property to buy…”
She replied, “Oh really? Can you help with a property that I’m trying to sell?”
“Sure, what property is it? Where is it located? Can we visit it this week?”
And that exchange, led me down the road to consider becoming a real estate broker.
I’ve been doing some property flipping using the No Money Down Formula and that experience has given me skills in marketing and selling properties. I can also tell if a property would be easy to sell or not.
But because I often reject a lot of perfectly good properties that I cannot buy because of the price, I would often ask my wife, who is already a licensed broker, if she is willing to sell those properties instead.
The property is an office space for sale in Prestige Tower, Ortigas Center. It is about 150 sqm and it’s been vacant for quite some time. The owner already closed the business and is very motivated to sell. My church friend is the owner’s cousin and office manager. She’s been trying to dispose of the property for a few months already with little success.
The property was in good condition. It was well maintained and actually ready for occupancy. It had nice rooms, the carpet was still intact and just needs cleaning. It was a good buy.
But I didn’t buy it because I was not familiar with the market and I didn’t know the office space market well enough to judge if I can resell it quickly. Also at that time, a lot of offices were vacant so renting it out could be difficult.
But my wife who was with me in the inspection was excited. Although both of us don’t have experience in office spaces, we knew that a property in good condition is always “saleable” as long as it’s offered at a good price.
Because the owner is desperate to sell, we knew that he would be willing to listen to a reasonable offer.
So we decided to take it on as my wife’s listing and proceeded to do what we normally do when selling properties.
That’s when I realized, selling other people’s properties is a perfectly good complement to property flipping.
I already knew how to market and sell properties. I just needed a license to be able to do it legally.
Our marketing efforts produced three buyers within 2 months. Two of them decided to outbid each other for the property. That made the owner happy because he eventually got a higher price.
My friend was happy because she finally was able to dispose the property that was causing her so much headaches.
And we made a good amount of money for 2 months work. In fact, it way much more than what I earned as an IT consultant in 6 months.
The fact that my wife sold 2 more office spaces in that building closed the deal for me. I’m getting my broker’s license on the next exam.
So now, I have a way to buy undervalued properties using the No Money Down Formula and I have a way to still profit from good properties that I don’t buy through real estate brokerage.
Fast forward to today, I’m ready to take it to the next level – sharing my knowledge to other people who would like to explore a career as a a real estate broker or agent.
I’m building a team of professionals who would like to make millions in real estate.
If you would like to join me, reply to this blog post so I can give you more details.
