How To Wholesale Houses From The MLS With Alex Martinez - Thought Leader Interview Series by DealMachine

In this interview, DealMachine speaks with Alex Martinez (CEO & Founder of RealEstateSkills.com) for their Thought Leader Spotlight Series on wholesaling real estate.

Alex Martinez discusses his beginnings in wholesaling & flipping real estate, advice on what marketing methods will work for you as a beginner, the challenges of growing quickly to $1.2M in one year, the MLS Offer System Strategy overview, & how Real Estate Skills coaches thousands of investors across the Nation to wholesale & flip houses consistently and predictably by using the MLS (Multiple Listing Service).

Hope you enjoy the interview!

Timestamps:

• 0:00 - Intro
• 1:48 - Alex's journey in real estate
• 10:29 - Advice on which marketing methods will work best for you
• 17:53 - The challenges Alex faced growing so quickly
• 21:36 - An overview of Alex's playbook wholesaling with the MLS
• 32:53 - Why Alex and his partners created RealEstateSkills.com & the Pro Wholesaler VIP Program
• 36:50 - Outro

If you're interested in joining the #1 Wholesaling Program & Community, then check out the Pro Wholesaler VIP Program here and schedule a One-on-One Call with our team to see if you're the right fit!

-- Thought Leader Spotlight Interview Video Transcription --

Alex Martinez (00:00):

You have to be willing to put yourself out there, hang yourself out to dry. You got to be willing to fail. And if you're not willing to fail, you're never going to get started. And failures do happen. Crap happens, but you just got to learn from it and you got to iterate and you got to use that feedback to get better.

And if you have that mindset, you're going to be successful in this business no matter what. You can't take failure as an option. When I say failure, failure is a myth. Really what just happens when people say, oh, I failed. It didn't work. They really just quit. So, don't mistake quitting with failure. You can be successful at wholesaling. You just need to stick to it.

Matt Kamp (00:42):

Alex. Thanks for joining me on our thought leader spotlight series. I'm your host, Matt Kamp, head of partnerships for DealMachine. On these we really try to shine a spotlight on industry experts like yourself and to hear your inspiring stories and really educate our audience on the lessons that you've learned over the years.

So, today really excited to welcome on our friend, Alex Martinez. Just to little bit about you, I know at age 20, you did your first deal within 45 days of really getting involved in real estate investing. You generated over a million in profit in that first year. So excited to hear about that journey. 

I know you wholesale, fix and flip, buy and hold, you build that whole portfolio now using an entire investment team that you've built and you help other others do that too. And some of your clients I know are on the Inc. 500 fastest growing companies list, have been super successful. And outside of that, you guys put out a ton of education on realestateskills.com. So, I'll make sure we link to that as well, but welcome on Alex. Excited to have you.

Alex Martinez (01:38):

Thanks Matt. Happy to be here with the DealMachine audience and happy to share anything I can today to help out anyone who's getting started. It's what I love doing. It's what we do at Real Estate Skills.

Matt Kamp (01:48):

Love it, man. Well, to start, can you maybe talk a little bit more about your journey, how you got started in real estate? I know it sounds like you hit the ground running, but can you maybe talk about that journey a little bit?

Alex Martinez (02:00):

Totally. Yeah. So like a lot of teenagers growing up, I didn't know exactly what I wanted to be or what I wanted to do growing up. And people ask you that question all the time when you're in high school. And so that was always in the back of my head, right? And I actually, I was born in the San Francisco bay area. I came down to San Diego State for college and I was just trying to figure out my path.

And I was doing a lot of things that my parents and society told me to do, told me to get a job, go to school, work and just learn this in the classroom. And about six months into college, about a year that just kind of started to get old. I was making sandwiches for 10 bucks an hour. I was like 19 at the time doing what I got to do. It was cool, because I got a lot of free food, but when you do that every single day and then you go to class, I was like, there's got to be something more.

Alex Martinez (02:57):

And I didn't want to do that for like another 2, 3, 4 years and then graduate and then get my start. I wanted to hit the ground running and a shift for me when I started out was, I went to college, not to get a degree, not to get a piece of paper, but in my mind I was thinking, let me start a business before I graduate. That was the goal, to start a business. Right?

And so I wanted to go ahead and get started and just started studying why are people wealthy? And so I asked questions like my friends who had big houses and gave communities when I grew up, what did their parents do? And why are they successful? And my parents aren't that successful or wealthy. They divorced when I was young. And so I didn't have mentors in my immediate family to build wealth. Right?

I kind of had to look around and just saw a common path in real estate. That a lot of people build their wealth in real estate or make their money outside of real estate and then put their money into real estate.

Alex Martinez (03:59):

And a book spurred me on when I started around this age, 19. Couple books, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, of course, like a lot of people.

Matt Kamp (04:07):

Yep.

Alex Martinez (04:08):

And that just opened my eyes to real estate. I didn't know what real estate was before reading that book. And then it started to become more real, more tangible, like everything is real estate. Where you're sitting right now, where I'm sitting right now, it's real estate, and that you can build wealth through real estate.

The other book was Think And Grow Rich, just really believing that you can do anything you put your mind to and that there are successful habits and traits that the most successful people have. And if you do these things, you can be successful. So went ahead and got started and start acquiring mentors and started stumbled upon this thing called wholesaling.

So this was 10 years ago, there weren't really all the YouTube videos. And I think that's a good thing. A little different, I didn't fall into a black abyss of YouTube university.

Alex Martinez (04:58):

That probably helped me, but I was able to our mentors and start working with different companies and tried a lot of different things to get that first deal going to the county tax office, pulling records for wholesaling probates, sending them direct mail, cold calls, just networking, banded signs, direct to mail. And a lot of that stuff, it felt kind of weird or awkward.

And nothing was really hitting for me until I stumbled upon the MLS, and kind of realized that, oh, the MLS, the Multiple Listing Service, there's one in every single market, but it's the largest marketplace of houses wherever you're at in the United States. The MLS it's the largest marketplace in houses.

I said, Hey, let me start there. And what I did was I started calling agents who had distressed property on the MLS. I looked at the property, it's going to go to a cash investor. So let me befriend this agent and have him sell it to me. And actually the first call I ever did. I swear first call I ever did. I got the property under contract on the MLS.

Alex Martinez (06:11):

Now that deal it didn't pan out, it didn't work out. But after doing direct mail  and door knocking and cold calling and not getting one wholesale deal under contract and then making one phone call in the MLS and literally getting that deal under contract, I was like, what's possible? Let's see how big we could take this thing until it breaks.

So, started calling a lot of agents, right? And one thing for me is, since I've been 16, I've been working and doing a lot of phone stuff. Like when I was 16, 17, I worked at an automotive accessory car shop and I had to call a lot of people to get them into the car shop, to get their car fixed. =

So I was no stranger talking on the phone. And so match this up with a kid who's hungry, who wants to build wealth for his family, who wants to be very successful. Who's just read Rich Dad, Poor Dad. Who's just read, Think And Grow Rich. I'm going to call every single agent on the MLS, because I just got my first property under contract and let's see what happens.

Alex Martinez (07:10):

So, the next deal I got under contract actually did pan out. It was a $22,000 wholesale. It was under contract at three 28,000. We wholesaled it at $350,000. And just started going from there. So. That first year personally I did 33 deals. I built a team that brought in 55 deals. It was over $1.2 million of profit of wholesaling and fixing & flipping property.

And what was really important here at a young age, I was able to learn that a lot of people don't know what the heck they're talking about. I would have 25 properties under contract, go to a real estate investing association meeting, talk to people who attend every single meeting who are 30 years old, 40 years old. And tell me to my face, the MLS doesn't work. You can't get deals from there while these months are pulling in $100,00 of profit and there's dozens of deals under contract from the MLS right now as we speak.

And at a young age, learn like beware people speak in absolutes and deal in black and whites. Because a lot of the times they don't know what they're talking about.

Alex Martinez (08:10):

That's like saying, saying the MLS doesn't work you can't get deals from there. It's like saying DealMachine doesn't work, which is absolutely absurd. That's like saying cold calling doesn't work. It's absolutely absurd. Door knocking. All these things doesn't work. They all work. It's just what system or what structure, what strategy do you actually want to work?

And I chose the MLS. And so today, about 95% of the deals that we've ever done come through the MLS. Through befriending agents, working with agents. And it's a lot easier to connect the dots, looking backwards as Steve Jobs says, in the beginning, I was just, Hey, this works.

And this works really well. And it matches up with my personality. I know how to speak to agents. I understand how to incentivize them. I understand how they're paid. I can speak their language and just continue to build that out to where today.

Alex Martinez (08:57):

I mean, as of right now, working on about $3 million worth of projects here in San Diego, and we train thousands of people across the United States on how to get deals from the MLS to wholesale, fix and flip, and buy and hold real estate through, just refining this process of really systemizing it.

And we like to call it the MLS Offer System now, but the fun part about this is you can get it to a point where when you understand your market and you're submitting offers and friending agents, you can get it to a point where you understand how many offers you need to send to be able to get one deal under contract to wholesale it.

So the national average we see is like one in 15, Matt, but some people start and they send five offers and get a deal. It's really different upon your market. And I don't care if you're in a "competitive" market or wherever you're at, it works.

Alex Martinez (09:43):

No one should say the MLS doesn't work or competition is a reason why it's not going to work.

Competition is just validation on why your market's a pretty solid market. And so that's kind of the long and short of how it started, but where today at Real Estate Skills, we teach people how to acquire these deals without spending any money on marketing through the MLS.

Matt Kamp (10:05):

Love it. I mean, I think it's really interesting how you said there on any marketing channel that can work. It's people speaking in black and whites. There's a lot of untruths to that of being able to figure out like, Hey, a certain channel might not work for you, or it might not work the way you're approaching it, but it can work if you have that specific expertise or fits your strengths best.

There's a lot of newbies, I think watching this that are trying to find that real estate marketing channel, or trying to figure out like how do I get out there? What do I do? Do you have any advice there on how to navigate that and how to understand your own strengths and how to figure out what real estate marketing methods are going to work best for you?

Alex Martinez (10:46):

Yeah, absolutely. I love this. I mean, this is what I do on a daily basis. So, I just got off a call one-on-one with a client who's never wholesaled his first deal. So, beginner to intermediate people who've never done a deal or are struggling to get consistent deal flow. I work with them all the time.

Now, just like holistically for, if you want to understand your strengths, one thing I really recommend is taking the Myers Briggs. You can just go online type in Myers Briggs, and take that personality test and read it because you're going to understand things about yourself that you never stood before. Why you do certain things or what motivates you? Or are you more introverted versus extroverted? Right? If you're more introverted maybe calling people on a daily basis, isn't [crosstalk 00:11:29] what you want to do.

Alex Martinez (11:31):

Maybe that wastes too much energy. And if you're super analytical as well, maybe once again, calling and being introverted and talking to people ain't your thing, but maybe something on marketing side where you can really dial in the numbers, you don't have to talk to people on a daily basis. That may be something that floats your boat and that works for you. So, one just a personality level.

That's something I do about every six months. Don't worry about taking this personality test and being like, that's me and that's me forever. We all change. And the great thing too is if you want to push yourself, let's say you are introverted and analytical. And so you suffer from paralysis by analysis. You can push yourself, you understand it's a weakness. Hey, this month, this year, let me challenge myself and go with my gut a little bit more.

Alex Martinez (12:17):

Or I'm introverted, let me read the books on sales and persuasion and influence, put myself in these networking events, because guess what? If I keep doing the same darn stuff I'm doing on a daily basis, I'm going to get the same outputs that I'm getting.

And if you want to change your life, you've never done a deal or anything like that. You're going to have to do things differently. And I'm the first one to tell you that. Doing what you're doing right now, and you've never done a deal, you have to do things differently.

You have to learn differently. And Matt, what you were saying in the beginning, when you're starting out, there can feel like there's 100 ways to get deals or 100 things to do. Right? And the most important thing is focus. Focusing on one, maybe two strategies. But I recommend focusing on one. So if you got DealMachine and you're doing that, and you're driving around, or you got a team of drivers, focus on that.

Alex Martinez (13:07):

I don't recommend now putting out bandit signs, then making cold calls, because the person who chases two rabbits catches none. And in the beginning, just focus on that one strategy that you pick.

Now, as far as what strategies should you focus on? Like we mentioned, it all worked. I'm a little biased towards the MLS if you don't want to spend any money in marketing, just because I look at it as, if you want to do 100 cold calls to homeowners who don't know they're calling you, you can do that and maybe one of them works out.

But I'll tell you, if you call 100 agents on the MLS who are listing distressed property right now, these agents are picking up random phone numbers because they only get paid if this deal closes. They want buyers to come. And if you target those agents who are only listing distressed property, it needs to go all cash. It needs to go to a cash investor.

Alex Martinez (13:57):

So if you want a wholesale and spend your time more effectively, if you want a cold call, you can do that. But I recommend making warm calls to real estate agents to where they are as incentivized as you to close deals.

And if you just make 100 calls to agents on the MLS, it's hard to make this guarantee, but a pretty much guarantee, I've never seen anyone make 100 calls to agents on the MLS to distressed property and not get a deal. Tell you that.

Usually it happens within 15, 20 or 30 calls. If you got money for marketing, do DealMachine. If you don't, use the MLS. It's what I recommend.

Matt Kamp (14:32):

So, for Myers Briggs, are you ENTJ? It's my guess. Do you know?

Alex Martinez (14:39):

I float like ENTJ, ENFP. So, I do take it every six months and I'll be like, oh, that's interesting. I'm not sure if you're supposed to take it every six months, but that's just- [crosstalk 00:14:51]

Matt Kamp (14:51):

You're really tired. It's like, okay, maybe I'm a little more than yeah, that's fair.

Alex Martinez (14:56):

And always my, which is really funny. I'm just a little more extroverted than introverted, which is, I think exactly how I am too. I'm not the most out the box person. I'm not that extroverted, just a little bit more. And I think that's been one of my biggest strengths and I've actually toned that down over time.

My extroversion, like that's something that's changed over time where I've taken this Myers Briggs test and sometimes when I was younger, I used to talk a lot more. And then I realized that the people that talk a lot, usually don't know what they're talking about. And usually the smartest ones in the room are a little bit quieter.

And I started to listen a lot more. And age, your time will wisen you up a little bit as you think you know what's right. And then you make mistakes and you have learning lessons. And so that's something that's wisened me up through over the years. But that Myers Briggs test, recommend it for everyone because this game, Matt, it's not just real estate investing. It's not just real estate.

Alex Martinez (15:58):

I believe it's entrepreneurship. And you have to be an entrepreneur.

You have to be willing to put yourself out there, hang yourself out to drive. You got to be willing to fail. And if you're not willing to fail, you're never going to get started. And failures do happen. Crap happens, but you just got to learn from it and you got to iterate and you got to use that feedback to get better. And if you have that mindset, you're going to be successful in this business, no matter what.

You can't take failure as an option. When I say failure, failure is a myth. Really what just happens when people say, oh, I fail. It didn't work. They really just quit. So, don't mistake quitting with failure. You can be successful at wholesaling. You just need to stick to it and have that focus. So whatever strategy you're using, focus with it.

Learn from each deal, iterate, improve, seek out mentors, go to networking events, listen these YouTube videos. But the most important thing is taking consistent action because at the end of the day, that's what gets results.

Alex Martinez (16:59):

It's the execution. All the best ideas are in the graveyard. That's what Steve Jobs said. Most people don't take action and they die with their best ideas or the millions of dollars they could have created.

So as much knowledge as you're taking in, you have to match that or even do more than that with taking action. If you do that, surround yourself with the right people and keep on learning, you'll be successful.

Matt Kamp (17:21):

I mean, I agree. Failure is a temporary state that you can overcome. So, I think in general, the older you get, the more perspective you get. You get to know what you don't know and especially like the extrovert versus introvert. I can identify with that.

Well I mean, I think it just is where your energy comes from, is it from internally or is it from others like that? So, I'm definitely a proponent. We take that over here, the Myers Briggs stuff too, but-

Alex Martinez (17:50):

There we go, see.

Matt Kamp (17:54):

One thing is interesting, hearing how quickly you were able to jump in and find success and have 30 plus deals in that first year.

Were there any challenges that came with finding success that quickly and growing that quickly? And just curious on unexpected challenges you had to overcome because you guys were growing so quickly.

Alex Martinez (18:18):

I'd say the biggest challenges were kind of like the after effect of that. I sacrificed a lot. I sacrificed relationships. I sacrificed sleep. I sacrificed going out with friends and friendships. I sacrificed all of those things, spending time with family to be able to learn this because I saw that real estate was going to be this life changing thing for me.

And it has been, and it was, but I gained 20 pounds that year. I didn't have a girlfriend. I wasn't even thinking about having a girlfriend. I didn't do any vacations. When I say I didn't sleep a lot, I was literally sleeping three to five hours a night. I can't do that anymore.

I'm 29 now, but I was literally, I mean, 19, 20, fresh, you could kind of do that. So, I learned that balance is so important, especially as you get older, but if you want to have that success in one year, that success happened from not shifting my focus on multiple different strategies.

Alex Martinez (19:31):

It was going all in on one and mastering it and bringing in what I call acquisitions associates, who can do exactly what I do. And mirror me and watch me do what I do and say what I say. Create scripts around the specific system and have other people do it. 

believe that if someone's willing, they can be trained to be a particular, they can be a salesperson. They can be an acquisitions associate. They can make it happen. They just need the right training. But no, we had a great team. We built a great team and I wasn't going to let anything get in my way, anything. This was the most important thing.

And so looking back on that now, I'm happy I did what I did, but a lot of people starting out. It's really just people starting out. A lot of people don't have the ability to be able to drop out of school or take one unit and then do this full time. That's what I did to stay in school.

Alex Martinez (20:24):

I was taking one unit from 15, and so for people who want to make this happen, what I really recommend, I work with people all the time who have full-time jobs and want to do this on the side and break free from their full-time job.

It's really about just carving out consistent time for you to do these consistent actions, whatever marketing you're doing, whatever strategy you're using, carving out an hour in the morning, an hour in the afternoon, an hour in the evening. And that can be enough for you to get consistency while still having a full-time job to then be able to do this full-time.

You get three months of consistency of wholesaling property. Let's just say you do one a month, $10,000 will pop. You have $30,000 of income. Now you can leave where you're at as of right now and pursue this full time. Because a lot of people had that dream. A lot of people have that goal a lot. That's probably why a lot of people are listening to this.

Alex Martinez (21:18):

And so, I'm kind of mentioning this because I just dedicated basically 24/7, 365 to making real estate happen and that's not realistic for most people.

So I just want to share what is realistic for most people to go and get started. And that's what I've seen work for a lot of people.

Matt Kamp (21:37):

Can you maybe, I know you talk about, you guys have the, you're helping people use the MLS and agents to wholesale like that.

Can you maybe give us a deeper overview of that process? A little bit around the playbook of that and what makes your approach really unique, doing it on that limited marketing budget?

Alex Martinez (21:55):

Yeah, absolutely. So there's virtually no marketing budget for the MLS. So the MLS once again, it's the Multiple Listing Service, and here's a interesting stat right now from the National Association of Realtors, 91% of sellers listed their home on the Multiple Listing Service in 2020.

So if we go through the National Association of Realtors, which is a pretty reputable source, 91% of houses that were sold in 2020 were sold through the MLS.

And let me relate this to something I like, hopefully this matches with other people, but I love Jujitsu that martial art and about five years ago, the whole entire game of jujitsu was changed in competition because of one quote from a person named Dean Lister.

And he said, so first off a little bit of background. Dean Lister is amazing at leg locks. So attacking like the legs and jujitsu is about submission grappling, putting people in these awkward positions that make them tap or submit.

Alex Martinez (22:59):

And he said something, they said, "Dean, why are you so successful?" And he said, "Well, why would you ignore 50% of the human body?" Attacking the legs, things like that. Because in all jujitsu, people always attack the arms, the neck, things like that. And that that quote revolutionized the jujitsu game.

The best people in the world now in jujitsu attack the legs. They do leg locks and it took the whole entire sport by storm. And so when I think of that, I think of why would you ignore 92% of where all the houses are sold on the market?

If you just think about that particular question, I think that's a powerful question. And that's where a lot of people who come to work with us, that we teach this MLS Offer System too, they heard the hearsay.

They hear you can't get deals from the MLS. There aren't deals on there. You can't get deals below the list price. Agents don't want to work with you. You can't wholesale houses from there, everything, right?

Alex Martinez (23:59):

So just sharing a little bit of this background because what's important to understand is that the list price of pretty much every single house on the MLS, the sales price that's listed for besides REO properties, so bank owned properties, all those prices are flexible. All of those prices are arbitrary.

And the best analogy I can use for someone who's not familiar with the MLS is that think of Craigslist. If you ever want to buy something from Craigslist, you want to buy a couch for $500 and it was listed for $500 this couch, right? Do you have to offer $500 for that couch on Craigslist? No. You can offer $300 and guess what? If there's no offers on the table, do you think that seller will sell to you for $300? Possibly yeah, if they want to. Or maybe they meet you at 350 or 400. Well, you still got it below the list price.

And that's the same thing for any seller, besides a bank, besides an REO because REO prices are very sticky. The bank's selling a house, generally, whatever price they listed at, they're going to be really slow to adjust it.

Alex Martinez (24:59):

But for anyone else, who's listing a house on the market, that's a human being you're dealing with. Just like anything else, everything is negotiable. So once you understand that point and you also understand the principle that we have to go after property that is in a distress condition and where the seller is in a distressed situation.

See why a lot of people say that MLS doesn't work is because they go after retail property, Matt. And they're submitting offers on property that a conventional home buyer or FHA home buyer, someone who's emotional and sees their family living there can put three and a half to 20% down and buy that property. Never ever do you want to compete with that type of buyer? They're going to overpay for the property.

They're not looking to wholesale it, flip it, to buy and hold it as a rental that can cash flow. So once you understand this, that narrows down, I mean, you eliminate 80% of the property on the MLS, which is fine.

Alex Martinez (25:49):

Now focus on the 20% of distressed property that is on there with sellers in distress situation. And what we have to understand Matt too, is this isn't, with our MLS Offer System, some people approach it where, Hey, let me look at every single house on the MLS. And let me just send an offer 30% of the list price. And then if that agent bites and responds back to me, now we're getting somewhere, all right? That's not what we do.

What we do is we scout for these properties on the MLS. I come on here every single day, we call the freshest and newest listings that we can. We try to be the first ones to the punch. We're the first investor, we're the first buyer, the first person that can speak to this particular agent, because guess what?

Speed is the name of the game here. And you want to be the first one there to be able to put it in an offer, to incentivize the agent, to tell them what they want to hear and to be the most trustworthy and reputable buyer that you can be for them.

Alex Martinez (26:46):

And so when we do that on a daily basis, now you're going to start to gain momentum. And what we're doing here is the important thing is we want, the important thing to understand in sales and entrepreneurship is that people work with who they like and trust. It's what we need to understand. All right?

So even if someone is here doing all off market strategies, you've probably got a deal because that seller liked and trusted you. And that's probably why you beat out other offers. So if you understand that's the name of the game here, we're personally calling real estate agents who are the listing agent in charge of the deal. You have to build rapport with them. You have to have them like and trust you. You have to be reputable buyer. You have to be professional.

And that's why our program's called Pro Wholesaler because there's so many amateurs out there who don't understand this. They understand the documents to submit with your offer, that you need a proof of funds with every single offer.

Alex Martinez (27:34):

They don't understand how listing agents are paid or how to incentivize them legally so that they make more money with your offer. They don't understand that it's the little things that matter.

Doing what you say you're going to do and sticking to the things that you say you're going to do as well because when you do that, you automatically, you're a professional. You're doing 99% more of other people, because guess what? If you use the MLS, you may compete with people who've been trying to use it for 10 years or big corporate companies.

But if you're a newcomer, a new kid to the block at any market across the US, and you've talked to that agent three times in one week where that big corporate company is talking to them one time, they're on their high horse. They're being kind of borderline a-holes to that agent, because they're all high and mighty and they don't need to get deals from the MLS. Well, guess what?

That's where we see we're able to get deals all the time from the MLS because you've built rapport with this particular agent, right?

Alex Martinez (28:23):

And we're calling on deals that are going to go to an investor anyway. It's going to go all cash. So, now if someone likes you and if you're basically, if you convince this agent that you're able to close on this deal, it's what a lot of these agents want. Their seller is in distress situation. So even if your offer is 5, 10, 15 grand lower than the next highest offer, but guess what? That person never called the agent. They never talked to them three times. They haven't followed up in the last week. The agent's never worked with this company before, and this is a short sale and the seller's facing foreclosure.

And if it doesn't close in the next two weeks, then the client's going to get foreclosed on. But who's this agent going to pick now? The person they haven't taught to or the person has assured them that they're going to close the deal. They're going to make it happen because the most important thing is that we close this deal for your client.

Alex Martinez (29:12):

So they don't get into foreclosure and they don't ruin their credit. Right? They're going to go with a person that they like and trust. What's what's five, 10, $15,000 of a lower offer to save someone's credit from complete disrepair for seven years? That's chump change really.

And that's the way to look at it here. So we create these conversations and you do this on a daily basis with different types of distress agents. And we submit offers on a daily basis. This is the most important thing, right? People think submitting an offer Matt, is like sending a text message, making a phone call or sending an email saying, Hey, I'll buy it for 150. I mean, it's cute. That's what it is.

But what's real what we call offers and what you want to track are written offers. So, an actual contract where you have the price, the property on there, all the terms that the seller wants to see, and that is in the inbox of the listing agent, because now all that needs to happen is the seller just needs to sign the dotted line. That is the most important thing.

Alex Martinez (30:07):

So, don't count your text message for 150 as an offer, have that actually be a written offer, a contract in the inbox of that real estate agent's, that listing agent's email inbox. All right? Because here's the important thing to understand too. There's always going to be people that are going to offer higher than you on the MLS. Not always, but probably more than 50% of the time. And guess what?

There's a lot of jokers and a lot of amateurs. A lot of people that cannot close, cannot close on deals. And we see it all the time. People who fumble their way through deals, who get a deal under contract and can't wholesale it. They don't buy, whatever reason it is. Well, when that happens and it happens a lot, it happens a lot. Who's the first person the listing agent's going to go to once that buyer backs out of the contract? You think it's the text messages? Do you think it's the one phone call the person had or do you think it's the actual written offers in the email inbox of that listing agent?

Alex Martinez (31:03):

The realest form where this thing is, it could still be eligible where this agent can call you and say, "Hey, does your offer still stand? Does it still work?" Hey, maybe that offer was a little too low, but Hey, maybe you can come up three grand or five grand. We can make it work. Right? That's the important of these offers out.

And so when you do that on a daily basis, you're going to have a successful business. I've never seen anyone not get deals from the MLS, from following these techniques that we're talking about. And it just makes sense, right? These are agents where they get paid to pick up the phone. They want to close the deal.

We're calling on distressed property. And now what I love, the most important thing Matt is, it's up to you now. It's up to you there. There's no excuses. It's can you convince this agent to work with you? Do you have the right buyers lined up as a wholesaler to be able to close this deal?

Alex Martinez (31:52):

Can you speak with confidence to this agent? Can you be a professional? Right? So, do yourself a service, get these things in line and so you can be that professional because if you're just another amateur, you're not analyzing deals the right way, you're getting properties under contract way too out of price. You don't have cash buyers. Guess what?

You are the person that's backing out the contracts and my students and I we're the ones that are right in the second place that are getting the deals. So I've seen this true for 10 years, a decade and it will probably be true forever. And so I wanted to share a lot of these things where maybe it will start to make sense for you.

If you've heard this hearsay and I'm down to dive deeper, like we talked about before. I can go for hours on this, Matt, but hopefully there are some nuggets in there to help a lot of people on the MLS and look at it a little bit differently.

Matt Kamp (32:42):

That's super powerful, man. I mean, I think we will definitely have to have you on one of our live streams to be able to have people come in and ask interactive Q&A on that. Because I love the way that you kind of frame it and think about it, but can you maybe, I know we only have a few more minutes here.

I would love to hear, or maybe just have you share with our audience more about realestateskills.com and why you started it. What gap in knowledge you saw, you could really help people learn about this stuff. Just kind of tell us more about that if it's okay.

Alex Martinez (33:13):

Yeah, of course. So, realestateskills.com what we're about is helping people to achieve financial freedom and our goal to leave no one behind in wealth creation. So as I shared in the beginning of this interview, right? I didn't have anyone to talk to or learn from. There was no one in my family saying, Hey, you should get into real estate. That was something I had to stumble upon and find.

And so, my goal, I just was talking with a client. We're talking about game this first deal in 14 to 30 days. That's my goal for a lot of people here to really restrict that time, constrict that time, where it takes a lot of people. I talk to people who spend, they spend 18 months and 30 grand trying to get a deal. It doesn't happen. So, we want to be the Knight and shining armor that can help people to get deals quicker, faster, and easier.

Alex Martinez (33:58):

And so how we help people is through our Pro Wholesaler VIP Program. And it is all about everything I talked about in the MLS. It's about systemizing that and scaling and growing that. Building a team of acquisitions associates in any market, and you can do this locally in your market, or you can do this virtually as well. All the same principles apply.

And it's about doing this so you can have consistent deal flow from the MLS, for wholesaling, wholetailing, fixing and flipping, and buying and holding real estate without having to spend any money in marketing. So we work with a lot of people that, I mean really honestly, a lot of strugglers who it's taken a long time to get a deal. They don't have the right coaching.

So, we do weekly coaching. We have two, two hour calls every single week. Everyone gets step by step training. All of our contracts, deal calculators, tools, resources get access to a community. So we just constantly help people and analyze deals with them.

Alex Martinez (34:48):

We do real estate comp reviews. So basically we're helping you build your business. We don't get it cut or anything like that. We're helping you build your business and analyzing deals with you.

So you get that second, that third I, and that's why I like to think a lot of our students are so successful and able to get these deals. Because if you just do the work, you're going to get the deals. It's going to work for you.

So we help people through our Pro Wholesaler VIP program. And one thing we love doing, like we talked about a lot. We like the blog a lot in realestateskills.com. We blog every single week, but this is our passion. So we started this company and really, we just love sharing what currently doing too.

We have $3 million worth of projects right now, new builds and basically building two single family houses. And we love sharing that with our community too. What's the cost to build these things? How do you analyze a property now? A single family house that you can build a new house on it. Right?

Alex Martinez (35:37):

Well, it's taken us 10 years to kind of get here. Let's really share that with you so you can get 10 years of knowledge as soon as possible. So, that's what we love doing. It's what we do every single week, no signs of stopping. We have thousands of people that we love to help. And for anyone that needs help, they can just go to realestateskills.com.

We got case studies & reviews on there they can watch, check it out and then they can always schedule a call with us if they want to learn more.

Matt Kamp (36:00):

I was going to say, is that the best way to get in touch with you? After watching this?

Alex Martinez (36:05):

Yeah. The best way to get in touch is go to realestateskills.com. If you like what I've talked about in the MLS, go to realestateskills.com/training. And there's a case study there where I break it down. I go even deeper. And it's only about 39 minutes, so I don't talk your ear off.

And then if you want to, you can schedule a strategy session with myself or a team member after that and we can talk more, see if you're a good fit. We don't accept everyone to the program. Really just want to make sure that it's the right fit for you. You're going to do the work. Because as we're talking about right now, this is entrepreneurship, right?

We do I can only show you the door, I can't open it for you. So if you're willing to wake up when you need to wake up. If you're willing to go to the gym and get fit. If you're willing to put in the work and get deals, then it'll work for you. So, those are the best people we love to work with.

Matt Kamp (36:51):

This has been fan been fantastic, man. I mean, I appreciate the passion you bring to this, the analogy you bring to this, you guys put out fantastic stuff on realestateskills.com. So I highly recommend everybody connect with you afterwards.

Alex Martinez (37:02):

Awesome, Matt. Thanks for having me feel free to reach out guys. I'm on Instagram too, @realestateskills. Also at @alexmartinezatm. Those are my initials. And so go ahead, reach out. Love to chat with you and help anyone out if they need help in real estate.

Matt Kamp (37:18):

Perfect. Well, thanks again, Alex. I really enjoyed the conversation today. Appreciate your time.

Alex Martinez (37:21):

You got it, Matt.

Matt Kamp (37:21):

To everyone watching, this is Matt Kamp with DealMachine and happy deal finding.

-- END of Thought Leader Spotlight Interview Video Transcription --

Hope you enjoyed the interview!