$800k Profit on One Flip? Tucker Merrihew Shares How He’s Flipped 100s of High Profit Deals

Steve Trang: Hey, everybody. Thank you for joining us for today's episode of Real Estate Disruptors. Today, we have Tucker Merihill with TTM Development, and he flew in from Portland, Oregon talk about how he's done hundreds of flips in new construction, property last year. If this is your first time tuning in, I'm Steve Trang, founder of the OfferFast Homes app, the only MLS for off market wholesale properties. And I wanna mission to create 100 millionaires.

If you guys have been following me on social media, then you know that we just finished building out a classroom. We're holding sales training and masterminds there. If you want to close more deals, please apply at disruptors.com to see if the class would be a good fit for you. If you get value today, please tag a friend below. Share this episode right now.

That way, we can all grow together. And this is a live show, so please ask your questions for Tucker to answer. You ready? Let's do it. Alright.

So first question is, what got you into real estate?

Tucker Merrihew: Well, let's dial back that time machine, shall we? Because we just dated ourselves on our pre conversation here. So let's wrap. Let's pretend it was 2002. And if anybody remembers, it was right after this thing called the dot com bust, right?

And there wasn't a whole lot of jobs available for people to get. And I had had an apparel company in college that I I thought for a while that was gonna be, you know, how I get rich. Right? And this apparel company was gonna take off, and it was gonna be the thing we did after college. Well, it didn't.

It imploded, and it wasn't really profitable. So I had to figure out Imploded. Well, everybody kind of drifted away. Right? And I was left with a bank account with a few $100 in it and a little bit of leftover products.

Steve: And so

Tucker: what do you do? Right?

Steve: Right.

Tucker: So initially, I thought about maybe getting a job that didn't really pan out for various reasons. Then there was this thing called a newspaper that we used to have back then. And there was this guy named Robert Allen, I think, that it was, that had an ad in the paper. And I remember my mom sent it to me. She was like, you gotta see this.

The guy says he'll make you a millionaire in a year if you go to this, you know, training. Right? And I was like, well, I mean, sounds like a good idea. Right? I was 22 and broke and, you know, wanted to be a millionaire.

So that was really the beginning. I went to that. But at the same time, that I didn't become a millionaire overnight, and I didn't do deals overnight. So I had to kind of fill the gap with how do I actually generate an income in real estate before this investing thing actually kicks off or works for me. And so I ended up in the mortgage game from there.

But, ultimately, it started with a newspaper clipping that my mom sent me that said

Steve: So you went to a seminar?

Tucker: I went to a seminar.

Steve: Yeah. But then you went and became a loan officer.

Tucker: Then I went and became a dirty, grimy loan officer back in the day.

Steve: What they taught at the seminar.

Tucker: Yeah. That's how they taught seminar. You know what I liked at the seminar, actually, that that caught my attention, but then I realized I couldn't do it were tax liens. Right? But you need money to buy them, and so there was that whole money piece that I didn't have.

But I remember that was the first thing I heard that was like, that's pretty cool. And of course, they they tell you the pie in the sky version. Right? You know, you can make, like, 24% on, like, you know, whatever the tax lien amount is you buy. And I was I remember adding it up in my head.

I was like, man, that seems like a good idea. But Yeah. There was that whole money thing in between. So

Steve: So what compelled you to go into being a loan officer?

Tucker: So the loan officer thing was also a, an ad in the paper. Right? And so there was a place I don't know if I should say the name because it might get me I don't wanna get sued sued putting this out into the world. But there was a place on the boulevard, McLaughlin Boulevard in Portland. It was actually in Milwaukee, and it was a big black building for anybody that's familiar with that area that's watching the show.

And they put an ad out and they basically their model was recruit as many loan officers as they could. Right? And so they thought they they basically ran a, a training facility in the back of their building. Right? And so they train everybody up, and they thought that, you know, everybody would finance basically their friends and family before they failed out of the business.

And so you get, like, under five loans done, but they'd met they'd match you up with a mentor. That mentor would tell you you need to jack your fees up, and then they'd get 50%. So it was like a 50% split for

Steve: your first five years. A very still common business model.

Tucker: Yeah. Yeah. It was. Except for this place was filled with pimps, felons, drugs, all kinds of, you know, early mortgage day stuff. Right?

So it was quite the learning experience on many fronts for me, when I went there. But, basically, what happened is I responded to an ad, I went and got trained there. Hold, I stuck. I did my first five loans, and then I did a bunch more. And it was a challenging time because I was 22, 23.

And I was trying to get people to entrust me to basically finance their biggest assets, right. And so it was a bit of an uphill slug, but I got it to stick. And I kind of made it through there. And eventually, let's see, I stayed there for like a year and a half. And then, one of the good friends that I made there started his own company, which he started because we were kind of sick of what was going on there in terms of just all the extracurricular stuff.

Steve: Well, his Sounds like, Wolf of Wall Street.

Tucker: Yeah, it was very Wolf of Wall Street. I mean, there are so many stories. Like I said, there was one time, there was a guy whose wife was a processor for the company, right? And they were kind processor decided to have a relationship with another loan officer there. And this guy named Larry Capri, who was the soon to be ex husband of the processor, flipped out.

And he got a gun and he sat across the street on this grassy knoll, and he had the high powered rifle pointed at the shop. And I remember walking up front, and somebody grabbed me. They're like, Larry's across to you with a rifle. Dive. And so we all dove on the ground.

Cops came, and Larry went to jail for a long time. But, yeah, it was very Wolf of Wall Street. That's just one of the stories, still it's crazy that, he did But, there there were a lot of other stuff too that was more, you know, drugs and partying and all that. So it was it was an interesting experience. So we let he my buddy John started his own company, and he wanted to kinda leave some of that behind.

Mhmm. Unfortunately, his company ultimately turned into a smaller version of that. And so I was there for a while, and he's a good guy. There's nothing bad to say about him. It just, you know, it was just kinda the nature of the beast back then for those companies.

It's just what they were. Yeah. So then I started my own company, about a year and a half later. And so that was, like, February. And so TTM Finance was my first real estate company that I had of my own.

And that was a mortgage company. We were licensed in Oregon and Washington. And so I had, I don't know, maybe eight or 10 loan officers that worked for me. And I kind of ran this this company. And that was my first adventure into the world of managing people, right?

Before it was just about sales and making money. And it was still about sales and making money. But now I had audits and license and management and overhead and all these things. And so, know, I was in my mid to late 20s and basically just kind of blind man in a dark room trying to figure out how to run this thing called a business Right. While I was in this world of real estate.

So that was that was how I started. And then from there, I always had that that draw towards, the investing side. And when I first got into the mortgage business, I bought my first house within three months. And, back then, it was crazy to think about it. But you could get 100% financing if you had a 700 credit score, right?

I was three months out of college, working out of place for three months, didn't have to stay at length of employment.

Steve: That was when a lot of people don't don't know now. But, I mean, it wasn't till, like, 2008 or '9, you could get your down payment as a concession.

Tucker: Yeah. You could. And there was even, like, real crazy stuff going on where, like I won't even go into it. But, yeah, there was you could do all kinds of things. And so, I mean, now looking at it from a developer perspective, it's like, man, if we could get loans like that now to buy stuff that then we sit on and hold at these, you know, relatively close to market rates before we develop it out.

I mean, it'd be an amazing program, but they don't exist right now. Right. So, but that was back then. So three months into getting into the mortgage game, I bought my first house. And that was kind of my first taste of, like, the actual investment side.

And I I end up selling that house about two and a half years after buying it. And I made about $200. And that was just pure luck, really. I mean, I finished out the basement. I rented out a room down there.

I rented out the Main Floor room. My mortgage payment was like 12 or $1,300 a month. I was bringing in a thousand bucks a month from rent, you know, living for virtually free. It was a great deal.

Steve: Yeah.

Tucker: But then I you know, the market went crazy, you know, end of 'four, 'five, 'six. And so I sold that place in 'six before the market started to collapse. Great timing. Very fortuitous timing. I got lucky there and made about $200.

But that was and then that basically was kind of house money to kind of run with, and kind of, you know, get into more flip stuff eventually moving forward. But that was kind of my my stash, that I could work from.

Steve: And you're I I imagine you were killing it in the mortgage side.

Tucker: Yeah. We were doing good in the mortgage side too. And then And then there was a let's see, a day, August 2007, when Oh,

Steve: it's not traumatic at all. You remember the exact day.

Tucker: Yeah. I still remember the office I was sitting in, in, which had it was, our at our old space, wood paneling all around it. And I was talking to somebody like I was talking to this. My phone kept ringing, kept ringing. And it was all the wholesale banks we were hooked up with.

And it was like call after call. We're freezing your pipeline. We can't fund these loans. Well, do you know when you can? Don't know.

And then, you know, there used to be a site called I think it was, like, mortgageimplosion.com, which showed, like, all the banks that were going out. Like, once New Century went out of business, it was like, oh my god. Because they they own the subprime world, and, like, they had so much money.

Steve: Before Lehman Brothers went down.

Tucker: Before. Yeah. Lehman was after that, I believe. And, so anyway, that day in 2007 changed everything. And so I limped along until early two thousand eight just trying to pick up the pieces and figure out how you close these transactions that most of which couldn't be closed.

But by the time early two thousand eight came around, I was like, man, this business is just not fun anymore, and and for a variety of reasons. And so, ultimately, it was a blessing in disguise because we were doing well on the mortgage side. And so it's as you know, like running multiple businesses, it's hard to step away from one that's paying you to go full bore into another one that's not built out yet. Right? And so it was a although I wanted to, it was very difficult to step away from that and do it and change the heading of the ship and go purely into the house flipping world, which back back then I wasn't gonna be a developer and build houses.

I just want to flip houses. But that that helped make the decision for me. And so by mid two thousand and eight, I just said, you know what, I'm putting all my efforts into actually flipping houses as opposed to originating loans and dealing with, you know, everything that has to do with owning a business and a loan shop. And so that was kind of the beginning of flipping houses. And back then, it was all REOs, short sales, eventually foreclosure auctions.

It was a very different world than it is now.

Steve: Right. So a lot of people that listen to the show, they predominantly fall into one of two. I mean, you got you got your wholesalers, you got your flippers, and we got some people that are also lenders. But predominantly, it's wholesalers and flippers. Now we had talked about this beforehand.

Mhmm. You didn't wholesale. You wanna explain why?

Tucker: Yeah. So let's break down the first deal that I did in 2008, after we kind of changed the heading of the ship, and you'll understand completely. Right? So it was a deal that, your classic REO deal. Right?

Been on the market ninety plus days. They had dropped the price a couple of times. It just looked like a squishy deal. Right? It had checked all the boxes data wise.

It also had some water damage in the crawl space, and there was some mold. And and back then, there was an ebook called Mold is Gold, you know, an REO purchasing guide ebook, which I bought, by the way. And it and I you know, it did have some good information in it. But, it was listed at, like, $1.59 or something like that. And we made an offer at 01:30, and they accepted the offer.

And I was like, oh, okay. Then we did our inspection, and we found a bunch of water under the house, which kinda scared me at the time because

Steve: Water under the house.

Tucker: Water under the house. Remember, we live in Portland. Right? It rains a lot. There was a it needed sump pumps under the house to pump the water out, but there were no sump pumps.

And so that water just sat and pooled under the house because we don't build on slab here. We have crawl spaces underneath. And so that water and moisture created mold under the house. So it it was a big issue, which kinda scared me a little bit back then. So what did I do during my inspection period?

Well, I lowered my offer price. I think it was down to, like, $1.00 1 or something. So big reduction, which was kinda like my out to be like, I'm not gonna buy this house. And then I still remember I was walking out of ClubSport, which is where I'd go play hoops, and I got a text message back then, which it was kind of new, but you could get text messages back then, from my agent. He was like, they took it.

And I was like, excited and kind of scared at the same time. Right? Because it was like, okay, I guess we're we're gonna do this one. Right? And so the first thing that I did This is the first flip.

The first flip post stepping away from the mortgage company. Right? And so the first thing that I did was like, well, we got an amazing deal. I could wholesale it. Right?

So I put up ads, I called everybody I knew. Nobody was buying. Everybody was scared of real estate back then. It was the bottom had yet to be found. We were in almost a freefall.

And I know in Phoenix here, it it fell for a while even after that. But we were in a a freefall in terms of people's perception of the market. And even though in Portland, we didn't really fall much farther than where we were right then, people's perception was that they didn't know where the bottom was. And so nobody wanted to buy. And so that's what we found.

It was like, okay, we have a great product here at a great wholesale price, but the market disappeared. And so that forced, us into or me into basically putting up my own money because, by the way, hard money companies weren't really around back then either in Portland anyway. The first one in Portland is a good friend of mine now, but it didn't start till later in 2009. And so I was like, well, I got $160 in the bank. I'm gonna fund it.

Let's do it.

Steve: You self funded your own deal?

Tucker: Yeah, I self funded my own deal. And we ended up rehabbing it in about two months, I think. Put it on the market at $199 And we ended up selling it, like a week later. And that was proof of concept that the retail market was actually fairly strong for entry level turnkey product when when the wholesale market was non existent.

Steve: Yeah. Got it. So then after that deal, then what?

Tucker: So then after that, it was kind of the proof of concept of, okay, we know how to buy REOs. Right? And so we just started combing the RMLS, or the MLS, whatever you want to call it. And, basically looking for REOs that were beat up, like the people left pissed, right? Punched holes in the walls, ripped doors off.

There was all kinds of stuff that happened back then. It was crazy, right? Yeah. Missing kitchen. Missing kitchens.

Hammer every inch throughout the house. Yeah. Spray painting lovely obscenities all over the walls on the way out. So we'd look for stuff on market that had been sitting for a while. And usually about ninety days was kind of the threshold that we determined where the banks would get pretty squishy.

If you offered before that, you'd play a lot of back and forth, and you'd never really get your price. So we scanned the MLS, and we offered on everything that looked beat up, been on the market ninety plus days. I also got to know every REO agent in town that was like a bigger player. There was some one off people, but there was probably five or six that listed most of the inventory. They never picked up their phone, by the way.

It was, like, getting a hold of them was the hardest thing ever. But, like we're talking about before this, if you could sit down with them, have a beer with them, you know, kind of bro down face to face, it was like game over. They'd call you on everyone moving forward. So we did a lot of that. And that served us well also.

But that's that's where we started kind of going full steam into finding distressed inventory that we could buy, fix up and flip.

Steve: Got it. At that time, did you enjoy flipping? Are you you get good taste? The connections?

Tucker: It was a it was rough. I mean, get it you we talked about way over here. Get building out that side of your business is is not always enjoyable. Like, it's it's like it's herky jerky. It's back and forth.

You're dealing with, you know, jerk off contractors. You're dealing with dealing with GCs that maybe overcharge, under deliver, don't pick up their phone, tell you what you wanna hear. I mean, there there's a lot of that. So, like, we went through, a couple of GCs that kinda ran our jobs initially, and we had that same experience, that it it just wasn't a great one. And so that's when I decided to get my own GC license because at that point, we're just a manager of construction, right?

We'd still call in subcontractors and bring them in to do a lot of the trade work. But I would hold the license. And then I had to hire like a couple of in between labor guys to do all the in between labor stuff, cleanups, demo, things like that. And so, you know, shortly thereafter, I hired, my brother-in-law, who worked for me for a while, and a whole bunch of other people that just kind of cycled through that job. I mean, it's a low level, you know, job.

So it didn't have a lot of longevity. But yeah, we hired a couple of in between labor guys, and I got my GC license. And then that really allowed me to enjoy it more, because we then had control of the process. And then we started to build the relationships with the subcontractors. And that just it just made the business a lot easier.

We weren't beholden or reliant on somebody else and their numbers and their schedule, to get deals done.

Steve: For someone that's listening right now that's interested in in in transitioning from wholesaling to flipping, what advice would you give them as far as, you know, getting the the tradesmen and so on?

Tucker: I think I mean, I think there are good GCs that you can find. I think the biggest hang up that investors have is that we're cheap in by nature. Right? It's just something in our DNA. We wanna be a real estate investor.

We're just cheap assets. That's just the way we are. Only on flips. Only on flips. Yeah.

I mean, that's true.

Steve: They're willing to spend whatever on marketing.

Tucker: Yeah. Yeah. That's true. But then flips, they don't want so like, finding the cheapest GC, you're gonna get cheapest GC problems. Right?

So I mean, but you also don't want the guy that's doing, you know, luxury homeowner remodels either. So I think finding kind of an in between guy, finding somebody that's younger, I think younger is key because, they they're still hungry. Right? They're not burned out and crusty. But you don't want the cheapest guy, you don't want the oldest guy.

There are guys out there like that. You know, one guy that ran project management for my company for years, he went out and started his own GC company and like, you know, a guy like him would be a good fit for kind of a flipper starting out that maybe is going to segue from wholesaling to doing some flips. But you got to find that relationship, because then that gives you the confidence too, right? Because that's one of the main reasons people don't get into flipping from wholesaling is they just don't have the confidence in the support, the numbers, the timeline. It's just all kind of this big gray area.

Right?

Steve: Of, like Well, that's and that's exactly my experience right now. That's the you know, we're we're flipping. I I I shared with you earlier. We're reluctant flippers. We're flipping because there's just more money there.

I'd rather wholesale. Yeah. But it's hard to say no to those margins.

Tucker: It is. I think now, like, we're in such a hot time. Right? Like, what's your inventory here in Phoenix? Like, sub one month?

Or or it's, like, one point two months supply. It's crazy. Right? So, like, now there's this new market called wholetailing. Right?

There's, like, the in between market, which also is very difficult to do in a down market, by the way.

Steve: Oh, yeah.

Tucker: You gotta go all the way or not at all. Right? And not at all is hard sometimes too. But in a super hot market, we have one point three months of inventory in Portland right now. There is this thing where you can buy a dated slightly, you know, beat up looking house, maybe just paint it, carpet it, put it back on the market and sell it at $95.96 cents on the dollar.

That's kind of the path of least resistance. I think for a lot of people that maybe want to make that jump. Not all product can go there. Right? Like some product is just blown out.

You can't do anything with it other than fully rehab it. But if it's livable with paint, carpet and cleaning, you know, maybe just go light. Right? And maybe that's the kind of bridge to flipping, right? You start there.

Because the last thing you wanna do is get into like 100 ks your first flip is 100 ks remodel, right? Where you're moving walls, repiping the whole house, new electrical, you got foundation issues, roof, you're resetting windows, maybe you got to move windows, resetting windows, maybe you got to move windows for you know, there's there's just so much that can go wrong because you don't know what you don't know.

Steve: Yeah. So you're flipping for a while. What was the first business you created in this journey?

Tucker: The first business, I think the day that I opened it was, I don't know, maybe, like, February 2008, something like that. And it was, I initially named it TTM Capital Funding, because I had visions of I was a money guy before. Right? I was in the mortgage game. So I was gonna raise a bunch of money, and we were gonna use that money to deploy it to buy real estate.

And so, you know, I was like, well, that name makes sense. But then, we ended up being more in the, you know, sticks and bricks side than the money side. So eventually, I filed a DBA. So the company now is the same company, but we call it TTM Development. And that was the first company that I started post mortgage company that still is around to this day.

It's our flagship company, that basically buys and and sells houses.

Steve: But then you eventually branched off and built additional businesses. I did. So what's the business next business after that?

Tucker: So next business after that, let's see. When we started a podcast, that was probably the next thing, which, you know, bear in mind, that was 2014. So That's

Steve: really early for podcast.

Tucker: It was. Like, Sean Terry, Bigger Pockets. God. Who else? There was a couple other early adopter guys that have since gone, you know.

Steve: Real estate guys, I think.

Tucker: Yeah. Real estate guys. They're I mean, some of the flagships are still there, but, like, I was, like, the twentieth episode on BP or something like that. And I still remember recording that show with, you know, Josh and Brandon, and they're like, I hope people are listening. You know?

And so it's funny. It's a trip kinda thinking back on all that. But, you know, we started a show, then, and that was, initially, it was just a show. Right? It was kinda giving back.

It cost us money. I hired Dan, who works, in the office with me now, still does seven years later, because I needed somebody to produce it. Like, we're in the studio here. I was like, what? I want a podcast, but I don't know how to produce it.

Steve: Right?

Tucker: I was like, Dan, can you figure out this whole, like, iTunes thing and like, how we, you know, how do we edit the sound and all that?

Steve: I imagine it would've been a lot harder back then too.

Tucker: It was. It was difficult. But he did a great job. And so that was not a business initially, but it it was, us creating content. Right?

And so we did that. And then it basically acted like a business, though, because it costed money and, you know, needed human capital and needed skill sets. And then we created an online mastermind group that was attached to that. And that was our first business, kind of attached to the to the content education side, which was nice because it helped backfill a lot of the costs of production. But then we also, you know, we were able to build that and it's still around today and, you know, it hovers around 125 members, something like that.

So that that was the next business attached to a business. Right?

Steve: It's kind of funny, because we were talking about earlier, three of you people in your program are also in my program. Yeah.

Tucker: There's a lot of cross pollination in this business. A lot.

Steve: Yeah. Okay. So then after that

Tucker: Let's see. After that, so a lot of what we did to find deals post like REO world, was basically driving neighborhoods, right. And that was, you know, we basically drove specific neighborhoods that we wanted to be in and we looked for investment grade product. And we had the yellow pad and the pen and paper, and it was super archaic, right? But it was normal in twenty eleven, twelve, thirteen.

And then in '14, we came up with this idea, which seemed like crazy at the time, could you even do it, which was building out what is now our driving for dollars app, right, which, you know, there's obviously a lot of people in the marketplace that have similar technologies now. But that was 14. So I mean, we had the first idea. We did it. You know, there's obviously guys that, you know, have done it as well and props to them.

But like, that was us actually doing it. Like, this sucks. Like, I gotta hire somebody then to look up these properties and organize them after I do it. So that was a long process back then to figure out the tech side of it, the build out. I mean, we hired some some really terrible developers that we paid a lot of money.

Steve: So this is 2014, though?

Tucker: Fifth '15. Yeah.

Steve: Yeah. So it's great. So you had a drive for dollars app Yeah. In wow.

Tucker: Yeah. We tested it within our mastermind in 2015. And it was, like, herky jerky and, like, I still remember, like, whiteboarding out. Okay. Like, here's the API.

Here's the data place that we gotta pull it from. Here's the request. Here's the calls. And we drew it all out, and they're like, that's pretty wild. But now it's, like, nothing.

Right? Like, it's it's crazy to see how much that data is, you know, or or how that process and technologies change. So then that was kind of a herky jerky process. And eventually we got it to market in '16, for the masses. And then, you know, it's it's been kind of a, you know, progress ever since just improving and making it better and whatnot.

But that was the next, business on top of business on top of business.

Steve: Yeah, and I'm hoping the listeners are bearing with me. I'm asking these questions selfishly, because I'm kind of going through the similar journey.

Tucker: Yeah, it's, and it was challenging, right? Because, you know, I've said this before, we were real estate guys entering a tech world. We weren't tech guys entering a real estate world. And everybody knows real estate guys are not tech savvy, right? I mean, we need help with everything.

And we've gotten way better over over the years, don't get me wrong. But it was really challenging to find the right help, the right people, the right developers, all those things. And so it's been a hell of a journey. I mean, building that from scratch multiple times over to, you know, country now today, and we still use it every month in our own business. I mean, during Corona, when the initial lockdowns, I was like, we got to redo all our lists, right?

We got some idle time here, people were, you know, freaking out, nobody's letting us into their houses. So for a month, we redrove all of our areas, redid all our own lists.

Steve: So yeah. That's awesome. So then after the app?

Tucker: After the app, the next thing that we started was our local show. So I was driving in my car one day, and I was listening to another podcast. And I don't know if many of you guys listening, wherever you kind of have your like, flow moments, right? We're like, I don't usually have them in the office, right? Because you're dealing with putting out fires.

Distractions. Right? Nowadays, whatever it is, right? Social media, employees, whatever. And I was driving and I listened to this guy.

And he was like, you know, he was thinking about doing a local show, but I don't think he ever did it. And I was like, a local show? That's a good idea. Mhmm. And I was thinking to myself, I was like, well, I could do it, but I'm already the host of one show.

Be pretty narcissistic of me to wanna just host two shows completely. But it's also difficult because then I'd be the only one marketing. And I was like, who else is equally narcissistic that could be good behind a microphone that I could get that I know well. Right? And I was like, I got just the guy.

And, anyway, he's a really nice guy. I'm just playing. But, he's been my cohost ever since, and he's one of the biggest realtors, in Portland and one of the owners of the biggest brokerage there in town as well. And he's been a fantastic co host. And so that was our next venture into that world where we basically have built out a community or better brought the community together of real estate investors, agents, title companies, lenders, everybody, right?

And so that's been a really cool platform to do that. And then that, although it doesn't pay us to do the shows, it's furthered our brand similar to a lot of stuff that you do here. And so, you know, everybody knows who we are now. They know TTM in Portland. And they know me because of that, and obviously, the product that we put to market as well.

But that's been a great connector.

Steve: Before we continue, what are the name of the Soup Podcast?

Tucker: The Portland Real Estate Podcast is the local show. And then the national show that we've had, you know, we've had, you know, it's been our flagship show for seven years. It's called The Real Dealz Podcast, and it's deals with a z.

Steve: Yeah. So I think everyone that's listening, there's plenty of opportunity if you're not in Portland to start your own real estate show in your market.

Tucker: I mean, when I had Brandon Turner on my show a few months ago, he was like, I'm starting a Maui one. Right? So, like, if it's passes the sniff test with Brandon, it should pass sniff test for you guys. Right? It's it's a great but beyond that, yeah, it's fantastic because that's, in my opinion, you know, everybody wants wants to start a show because they want it to be huge.

Right? They want the whole world to listen. And that's good. I mean, everybody wants to be the next Joe Rogan. But at the same time, there's a lot of value in the niches.

Right? The niche shows can be very valuable in meeting people, networking, you know, doing business. Right? And so local shows, there's a lot of need for that in a in a lot of markets where you can be the connector, so to speak, of all the different parts of the real estate, equation. Yep.

Steve: And there's a guy in Salt Lake City. I can't remember his name right now. I wanna say Rex or something. Shoot. I feel bad now.

But he's done the same thing in Salt Lake City where he knows, like, the mayor, a lot of the guys in the Utah Jazz have been on the show. Like, it's just

Tucker: Yeah. And we've had connector. We've had, you know, some Timbers players. We've had ex Blazers, all kinds of things. So that was the next thing.

I mean, we piled a few more things on since then.

Steve: Yeah. But before we transition, I'll say anyone's listening. Like, there's no reason not to start it.

Tucker: Like No. Do it.

Steve: Go for it.

Tucker: And the other thing that's cool is, like, this is an awesome studio, and these guys are fantastic in here. But, like, you don't need this to start it. Like, I mean, for the first six years of my show, I had c minus class office space and a microphone. Right? Like and it it worked just fine.

And you could even you know, obviously, you grow into it, you improve it, you make it better, but you can do it. I mean, the biggest advice that I'll give you is just get better at your microphone presence. The rest of it doesn't matter. Like, it really doesn't. Like, you want a good mic eventually.

But like, if you're good on the mic and people like listening to you, like, that's the, like, the major skill set that you can improve without, like, dumping a ton of money into it or, you know, time. Exactly. I mean, time, maybe, but not money.

Steve: Alright. So after real estate podcast or the real estate Portland Real Estate Show.

Tucker: So the next thing was, you know, we had a we've got our Deal Finders Academy, which is our online mastermind group. From there, you know, that's a a one to many type model. Right? Where, you know, I, I work with people as much as I can one on one, but it's it's a one to many model. That's the way it was based.

But we had a lot of people that we realized, because our specialty is basically marketing directly to sellers, right, which is normal now everybody, you know, that's what you have to do. But you know, I've been doing it for ten years, we know what works. We're kind of dinosaurs. In fact, we do this thing called direct mail, right? But we know how all the different layering strategies work.

And we've we've really perfected most of them right in terms of, you know, how to generate leads. And so we started a high end coaching program with myself and one of the guys that was actually one of the original members of our Deal Finders Academy, Justin Silverio, who owns open letter marketing. And so we run, a higher end program, which is called called the REI Deal Generator Program. And so we have, you know, I don't know, 10 or 15 students right now that we're basically hands on every week building their marketing machines for them. So as they step into this world of marketing directly to sellers, it can be a giant bucket, you just waste money, right?

You know? It's it really can. And so the whole idea behind that program is help them pick the right areas, help them pull the right data, and help them spend the money properly. And, and so that program has taken off. And we've helped a lot of people.

It's been cool, though, too, because like we talked about in the car over here, like, you want to be a teacher, right, growing up, and you really enjoy this this teaching thing. Like, I do too, like, I didn't want to be a teacher. I want to be a meteorologist, like I told you. But this teaching thing is cool, especially when they have success, right?

Steve: That is very fulfilling.

Tucker: Then it's very fulfilling. It is. And it's awesome to see like, there's a couple guys that are in the Seattle area that they just locked in an 80 wholesale deal, from, you know, building their marketing machine, marketing, going on appointments, meeting with people, getting them to say yes. And they got 80 ks out of the deal, right? And it's like, that's a life changer.

That's friggin awesome, you know? And then after that, So after that, our last and latest venture is a cold calling and text marketing management company called Call Magic. And so I've got two partners in that, one of which also came from our Deal Finders Academy. So this has been a the Deal Finders Academy has been like a place for me to meet amazing people that are also are equally talented. They're just they weren't as far along on their journey yet.

Right. And then as they get farther along, they have aspirations too. And they're smarter than me in some regards. But I'm good at branding and marketing and just understanding this world of direct to seller. And so, you know, the partnerships work.

And so, Elliot Smith is one of the partners in that. And then Cole Rudd Johnson, who's probably the smartest kid I know that's like 22 years old, and he's got to just, you know, he's doing really well. Let's put it

Steve: that way. So when did your wife start the construction arm?

Tucker: So her, she will will rewind back to when she she entered the equation, because there's there's one last piece to this business too that she basically runs. And so it's important to say that. But in 2009, from 2005 to 2009, and now I should take it back. 02/2006 to 2009, she worked for a big builder in Portland. And she was basically running their custom home division, doing a lot of the plans, just doing a lot of things for them, but it focused around design, floor plans, marketability of homes, things like that, right?

Well, 2009, right before we got married, they said, Hey, we're cutting your hours to like eight hours a week, right? Which I don't blame them because it was the the real estate apocalypse back then. And so she was like, what am I gonna do? And I was like, well, we're going gangbusters trying to buy REOs. Let's try this whole being married and working together thing.

Right? And, which, you know, it's worked out. But by the way, it's not the easiest feat. Right?

Steve: Had some challenges.

Tucker: Yeah. Of course. And, you know, for those people that do it with their wives, you know, virtual high five. Right? Yeah.

It's tough. It it can be a challenge. But we've we've learned what we're both good at, and the best advice I can give you is just figure out what your lane is and just stay in it. And that that really helps. But she then came on and helped with, all of our project management, construction management, and our design.

And so that enabled me to do a lot of the other things we just talked about, but also then focus my time on the sticks and bricks company with acquisition and finance. Right? I line them up, I figure out where the money comes from, make sure that we buy them, I plug them into the machine, and then the machine, you know, on the other end pops out a great realty retail product, which, you know, she gets the majority of the credit for. Alright.

Steve: One of the things that we talked about, earlier on the way here was the difference on a luxury home. It's not dollars per square foot. If you're talking dollars per square foot, you're an amateur.

Tucker: Mhmm.

Steve: Right? There's some things that are really important. You wanna talk about how what those important things are and how your wife plays a part in that?

Tucker: Yeah. It's I mean, most people are kinda scared of the high end market. Right?

Steve: Me included.

Tucker: Yeah. And for good reason. But the things that that really separate a house high end wise is design finishes, floor plan, and the lot. You know, if the lots, it has to be an A plus lot, the floor plan has to be right. And the design has to be, quote, unquote, in vogue.

Right? And you can't have any missteps there. Right? No Uber tube of granite in a new high end house. Like, you do it, you're gonna get punished.

Right? And those dollars per foot, you know, you can have 5,000 square foot house like we talked about all the way over here that sells for 2 and a half million, or you can have a 5,000 square foot house that sells for 5,000,000. And the only difference is the floor plan, the finishes and the lot. That's it. Yeah.

But the appraiser looks at it. And you know, it could be they're like, Well, how is that possible? Right? And so they just they don't understand. Right?

So yeah, there's a lot of missteps that you can make in that high end market. But once you figure that out, it's really not as risky as you think. Because selling our high end product is the easiest product we

Steve: sell. Really?

Tucker: Yeah. Selling our low end product, such a bigger pain in the ass. And and the reason being is because number one, the just the general intelligence level of your buyer

Steve: in

Tucker: terms of real estate, not overall, but just in terms of real estate is lower. Right? So little things freak them out. And the general intelligence level of your agent or of their agent, generally lower. Right?

So you mix a lower intelligent buyer with a lower intelligent agent. When it comes to real estate problems, what do you get?

Steve: Lots of lots of drama.

Tucker: Lots of drama, right? When you start selling to wealthy people with generally the top producing agents

Steve: More sophisticated agents.

Tucker: More sophisticated agents. And they vouch for your product, it's so much easier. It is. And and also I learned, and this was a flip we did in 2010. In Portland in, it was like mid twenty ten.

We bought the house for $4.50. We sold it for like 800. And 800 back then in Portland was like, whew, crazy. Right? Like, it it made me worried.

Like, I can't I can't lie. I was, you know, had some sleepless nights. Like, can we do this thing? And we had to lever up too to get it. Like, I had to go get hard money and, like, we were paying, you know, a lot of money on the money.

And so, you know, that was kind of putting my, you know, what on the table and be like, we're gonna do this thing. And, but on the back end of that, we sold it in an hour to a lady that scratched a check for it. And this was mid twenty ten.

Steve: Yeah.

Tucker: And that was, it was crazy. So that taught me that the right product in the right neighborhood will sell no matter what the price point, no matter what the market.

Steve: Got

Tucker: it. And we took that with us

Steve: to this day. So for someone that's listening, what would you say are the three keys that you've been able to do consistently as far as bringing in high profit on your float? So we're gonna be talking about luxury. But, like, what are some things, like, three things that someone needs to master if they wanna consistently do high profit flips?

Tucker: Number one is gonna be deal sourcing. Right? For sure. It's less of a challenge the higher up in price point you go. It's less competition.

Less competition. Right? But if you're good at deal sourcing, it's easier to find the a plus lots. Right? That's the challenge.

Right? It's finding enough a plus lots that you can do these high end projects on. So that's gonna be, challenge number one, let's say. And that would be taking your wholesaler skills, right, and just overlaying them on to I want to do higher end homes, right? So I need to find properties that would be a good fit for that.

And so you take those same marketing skills, and you just overlay it on to that type of inventory. Yeah. And so that's what we do. Number two is, you know, recognizing, like, what is a good lot. Right?

Understanding the basics behind that. And so, like, a busier road, probably not a good idea. Right? A flag lot, not generally a good idea. Neighbors next door that, you know, have a tarp or something or dogs that bark or external stuff you can't control, probably not a good idea.

Right? You have to pay attention to these things more so. So that would be a big thing. And then lastly, is just, you know, you've got to know what sells, you got to know what the what people are looking for, right? Like, what's the trends, right?

Like, right now, you know, open floor plans are a big thing, right? Like having a great room, you know, kitchen that opens up to a living area. You know, that's a big thing. Right? What kind of finishes design?

I mean, we're not supposed to know all that stuff, though, but you can plug people in that do. Right?

Steve: But, like, is your wife going on, like, broker tours? Is she

Tucker: No. No. Broker tours aren't gonna do anything for you. So, like, what is she doing to be Let's be honest. Realtors don't know anything about design.

Let's just say that right now. So what

Steve: is she doing to say leading edge

Tucker: as far

Steve: as what people want?

Tucker: I mean, she's really plugged in with, like, Instagram, Pinterest. Like these days, you can follow other designers that are like amazing, right, at what they do, or they resonate with you. And so she follows a lot of other people to get inspiration from them. Because that's really all design is, right? It's just taking what you've seen other people do that you like, and then recreating it.

And you just have to pick wisely. But nowadays, like there's so many easy ways to find those things or those people and to just basically review their content and say, Wow, that's cool. And then you start seeing it over and over again, you're like, Okay, that seems like it's it's a hit.

Steve: It's trending.

Tucker: It's trending, right? Like, you know, there's a lot of stuff, you know, like, like, for example, everybody probably knows the waterfall edge that people put on islands. Right? In a kitchen. Right?

Well, that was a trending thing a few years ago. Right? And then everybody did it. And so that's just an example.

Steve: Got it. Yeah. My wife follows this lady. She's like, oh, we should do it like this. I was like, what are we even looking at right now?

Tucker: Yeah. It's and it's trust me. It's an expensive rabbit hole. So you might wanna go delete that app on her phone real quick. Yeah.

Yeah. Unsubscribe. Yeah.

Steve: So then I think the the other part too, the key to doing these flips, we don't really talk a lot about on this show, but you just brought up, is you gotta be highly leveraged Yeah. Or leveraged. So, a, a lot of people don't wanna do high end flips. B, a lot of people don't wanna fund high end flips. This is true.

So let's talk about that challenge.

Tucker: Yeah. That's a challenge. I will say this, like, we were gonna do a deal before corona hit, and funding got pulled. And we were gonna lever up. I went raised $3,000,000 from, you know, not private money, but kind of, you know, an in between hard money and market rate company, which now rates are starting to come back down, but that market disappeared.

Right? Like, it just they were gone. Right? And so they just said we can't fund that loan anymore. Right.

But that was going to be a lender that that that loaned on it was gonna be a 6 and a half million dollars out. That was what our exit out was gonna be, we were gonna be 3,000,000, 3.2 in six and a half out.

Steve: Wow.

Tucker: We're gonna spend about 1,000,002 million And it was on a lake it was gonna be it was on Lake Oswego, it was gonna be amazing house. But you know, I got nervous too, because I didn't think that 6 and a half market would exist. And, you know, we didn't have money. So that made that decision for us. But in terms of like, raising money, it's different because building versus rehabbing rehabbing, you can go to hard money lenders, you can go to those in between lenders.

If you build, generally out of the gate, you've got two options. One is, you know, construction financing from a bank and banks do lend more on new construction than they do rehabs. They don't like rehabs because they don't understand the idea of forcing appreciation through construction. They do understand creating value through construction building homes, but not through rehabbing. And it's this weird dynamic that I've never been able to wrap my head around, but it's just the way that it is.

Steve: You got banking guidelines. Yeah.

Tucker: It's all it is. Exactly. So there's that option. But let's face it, most guys aren't bankable starting out, right? And you know, banks, but definitely not going to give you high end money, you know, starting out.

So you're left with private money more than likely, but you can't just jump to the high end. And I wouldn't tell anybody to do that. I think that's where you can make your misstep. That's where you can have $100,000 oopsie, right, that, you know, you end up losing a lot of money on a project, you have to look at the high end is like climbing, I always say this climbing the real estate ladder, right? You start out with wholesaling, maybe you go to wholesaling, then you start light flips, then you get into moving walls, replumbing, re electric, you know, new electrical, you know, lots of permits.

And then from there, maybe you get into an add on, right, or punching out dormers. And then from there, you jump into new construction. So you kind of you get comfortable right in that area. And then if you're comfortable there, I can tell you raising money to do high end stuff becomes a lot easier. Because now you have a track record.

Like, if you're just a wholesaler and you're like, hey, I found this amazing lot in Paradise Valley. I wanna build a $4,000,000 house. Nobody's gonna lend

Steve: you money.

Tucker: They're just not gonna do it. Right? It's just I mean, unless you've got a sugar daddy or family member or somebody that's equally, you know, excited, right? And the excitement blinds them to the opportunity, what it really is, then, you know, but that's not very likely. So, you know, you got to climb

Steve: that ladder. So how are you like, who are you contacting? You know, someone have I someone you're talking to someone like, man, I want to circle start go finding money.

Tucker: So I'll tell you what, it circles back to our local show. And my national show, There's a guy that, you know, I won't say who he is, but he doesn't live in our city. Heard one of those shows, reached out to me and I and I nurtured this. This is how I do this is I say, I don't want to take money from people right away, because I want them to kind of follow the business a little more, watch one of our prod our projects from beginning to end. And then by the time they do that, they're willing to fund whatever.

And so a podcast the podcast has been an amazing tool to raise money for our business. It really has.

Steve: And, you know, going back, we've been pushing earlier about you guys need to start a local podcast. That's something that, RJ Bates, you know, he's talked about. He's raised way more money than he even knew what to do with Mhmm. Just from having that show.

Tucker: Yeah. It's an amazing form of media. It really is.

Steve: So let's talk about, you had a not as kinda like a side hustle, something that's come come about because you're flipped that you did not expect to happen.

Tucker: Yeah. So we talked about this on the car right over. You know, for years, I swore off ever doing homeowner work because my wife did it when she worked for that builder. And she'd always come home just bitching and moaning about these people. I'm like, oh, my god.

They're giant pain in the ass. And, like, they, you know, they pick something out and they change it 13 times. And and those are the worst stories. Right? Those are the things you hear.

But she was also, you know, she was earlier on in her career as well. And so she wasn't as good at, kind of controlling people, and making sure they don't do things to just get in their own way.

Steve: Managing expectations.

Tucker: Yeah, managing expectations, things like that. And so now, you know, we built an amazing brand in Portland, and specifically in Lake Oswego with our high end product. And so we've got people coming out of the woodwork that are like, we want you to do this work for our house, we want you to build a house for us. You know, the people that bought a project that we did last year for $3,200,000 they want to move back to the lake where they live before. They sold their house on the lake for 7 and a half million, moved to our house for 3,200,000.0.

So it's a big downsize, right? Now they want to move back to the lake, but who do they want to have build their house, they want us to build a house. And so we've had a lot of people like that very wealthy people, that that love our design. And this, my wife gets full credit for this because I haven't done anything to further that part of the brand. But she has an Instagram, it's called TTM home design.

And so that medium has been a great way for her to daily put out content that's just purely the design side of our business, right? Nothing else, just the design side of our business. And so that's allowed people to not only see our stuff in person or hear about us through realtors in town, but then to see her on Instagram as well. So people that are moving to Portland, I mean, she's a lineup of people now reaching out to us saying, Hey, we want you to do our work. And of course, we'll do the work for the stuff that's, you know, higher margin, higher price point.

Just easier people to deal with, right, like we talked about before.

Steve: And I think, you know, we were talking about high end flips, luxury, this and that. But I would say, like, for everyone who's listening, the easiest thing to do, the podcast from you and the Instagram from your wife. It just comes down to content as far as lead gen.

Tucker: Super easy. Right?

Steve: It's crazy.

Tucker: I mean, it's not it's easy to say it's harder to do.

Steve: It's hard to execute. Yeah. Harder to execute, but, like, you don't need money No. To start a podcast. You don't need money to start posting design ideas on Instagram.

No. Right?

Tucker: Yeah. It's crazy. Now I will say this. You have to have stick to itiveness, just like in this podcast game. Right?

Like, you know, what are you? A 130 episodes in about today? Yeah. Roughly. Like, we're 300 and whatever episodes in, and, like, I've seen a lot of guys fall off along the way.

A lot

Steve: of people start.

Tucker: Yeah. They start, and they don't finish. You're one of those guys that you're still you'll be going for a long time. I just know. Right?

But you you've got that stick to it. And it's you have to have that. So, like, if you're gonna do it, just tell yourself you're gonna stick to it. Right? Direct mail.

Don't start unless you're gonna keep doing it. Yeah. Exactly. Right? Don't stop.

Don't stop.

Steve: Alright. So then let's talk about the big one, eight hundred k. Yeah. What was that deal?

Tucker: So that was a direct mail deal. Mhmm. We will break it down to how we found it because I think think it goes back to what we talked about here. We marketed an area that was the highest value area, around Portland, an area called Dunthorpe. And we basically targeted vacant land in Dunthorpe.

And then we sent a direct mail campaign to them. Now we sent the direct mail campaign a year and a half before we got a phone call, by the way. And so the individual that owned this lot, which there weren't many of them, so it wasn't an expensive campaign, but we did some specialty mailers, some things to kind of stand out and be memorable. The guy held on to the letter, and he died. And his son pulled the letter called us, said, I want $750,000 for this dirt, I'm gonna, you know, take it to market if we can't sell it before market.

I went and drove it, called him, I said, Let's do it. And we ended up buying the dirt. And we had to clear it. It was there was quite a bit of site work there. But it was about an acre and a half in the most expensive part of Portland.

And we ended up building a home there. And we sold the home for $3,200,000 And we had about $800,000 margin attached to it. But it started with direct mail, and us targeting an area that we wanted to be in to build that high end product. And then it just went from there.

Steve: Yeah, I'm hearing a lot of intention in there.

Tucker: Tons. Everything. Everything we do is with intent, right? Like we don't none of the marketing that we do, none of the areas that we are in doesn't have complete intention behind it. Like, literally, our our areas, our farm areas are like etched in stone.

Like the it's and what we market within those farm areas are etched in stone. Like, we know exactly what we're going after. And, like, in Lake Oswego, where we do most of our stuff, we have created a list of every piece of either dividable land, bare land, or investment grade product intentional about who we go after and why. Yeah.

Steve: But that's key. Right? Because a lot of people, you know, like, life just kinda happens to you. Yeah. And you can't let that happen.

You have to be intentional.

Tucker: You have

Steve: to control your destiny. Let's see. Got some questions here. Quelduche, I don't know if you know who that is, wants to know what's the name of your intro song for the Portland podcast?

Tucker: Hold On. On. I'm Coming.

Steve: I

Tucker: don't know who sings that. I forget. I picked it, but I should know the name. But,

Steve: Yeah. And then, Isaac Abalos, you already talked about it, but what part of Oregon do you buy in again?

Tucker: So we we used to buy, as we talked about, all over the Portland Metro Area. And we've since trimmed it down. We're really just in Lake Oswego and Westland. Now that's where we do, I'd say everything.

Steve: Got it. And John Robson is asking a question. Maybe the million dollar question is what qualifies as an A plus lot?

Tucker: It's tough to give you like an in the box answer for that, because it takes time to recognize that. I can give you some general pointers, right? Like, busier road, like we talked about is a no fly zone, right? Maybe even like an entry corner into a neighborhood where you get a lot of traffic, no flies on flag lots. Generally, people are gonna pay less for a flag lot.

So a flag lot is like, let's say you've got road frontage, right? And then you've got a house that sits right on the road frontage. And then there's a lot behind that house, right? Mhmm. A lot houses are or lots are deep, and you can divide off the back part of that lot.

But then you gotta put a driveway to the left or right

Steve: of the house. Easements.

Tucker: Yeah. And so they either have an easement or they deed that dirt to that to the lot behind them. Right? Generally, it's an but a lot of people don't like to drive by another house to get to their house. Right.

So you could look at a lot that's in a high end area and be like, Oh, we could build a house here and sell it for this, but you're gonna have to probably take 10% off the price, maybe even a little more, depending on how bad that flag lot is.

Steve: Got it. Got it. Alright. Guys, keep, you know, firing away. Please ask your questions.

So we also talked about when we were talking earlier, you know, wholesaling versus flipping. You also like to flip because there's multiple people that you get to feed Yeah. Along the way.

Tucker: I mean, I think that's an important point. Because we've vertically integrated a lot of businesses into, the start of it is is the marketing machine, right, and the marketing for deals. And a lot of people, they build that machine or they start marketing and then they want to take the first exit ramp, which is like get the deal under contract, sell it right away. Right. And that's the end of the business with nothing wrong with that.

But for us, we have the marketing machine that starts it. And then from there, we have lending. Right? So people make money, lending us money. And the more money you make for people, by the way, the more money they want to lend you.

Right? So you have to nurture those relationships and allow them to put money at play in play. And if you do that, they eventually put more money in play. And it's a way to kind of build your war chest of, you know, private capital. We have my wife, who does all of our construction management design.

So she has her own company that you know, on the books anyway that we pay, but she operates under TTM Home Design. We have a built in real estate company that sells all of our stuff, which is TTM Realty. Chris, who's our we always joke he's, you know, the top agent at TTM Realty because he's the only agent at TTM Realty. But, you know, he sells most of our stuff. So, you know, he benefits from everything that runs through the system.

We've got, you know, multiple laborers that, you know, we carry full time for kind of in between labor and things like that. So they're jobs that we keep and retain, by putting pushing stuff all the way through the system. So we've kind of built this this vertically integrated machine.

Steve: It's a mini economy.

Tucker: Yeah, it's a mini economy. I mean, and that's what a rehab is, right? You do a rehab and like, even if you hire a GC, you have all these people working on it. It is a miniature economy. But we have that plus, you know, under one roof, kind of

Steve: our miniature economy as well. And so to run your business, like, what kind of overhead do you have?

Tucker: It's let's see. We've got rent. Right? We got a new space. I don't think we're paying as much as you, but we're paying, you know, more than we were before.

We were in the same space before we were paying, like guy never raised rent on us. We were paying, like, dollars 1,200 a month. Oh, man. And it was but, you know, c minus class office space. But we had enough, you know, room and it worked out well.

And when we were buying in Portland, it made sense. So we moved to, Lake Oswego, and what are we paying? Like, dollars 2,200 a month now for rent. But it's a great it's a minute for my house. And it overlooks the main drag that it's like, and we got two billboards out of the deal.

Right? So like, we're the Top Floor. And so there's the building faces two ways when traffic comes and goes. And so they let me put up a big TTM sign on both things. So I'm like, I got office space and a billboard, which you know, can't complain about that.

So we have that. Chris, who's our office manager, basically, you know, a lot of people have like lead intake people and they have acquisitions people, right? Chris Dubbs is both of those. Plus, he's our agent on the other end. So he, you know, there's built in costs for him every month.

You know, then we have, you know, the whole other side of the business as well, which Dan, you know, he's a full time guy for me, that, you know, he helps with the app, he helps with our online mastermind group. He helps with all of our video. I mean, any videos you watch of us, any, you know, audio you hear, Dan has to touch it and buzz it and make it pretty before it goes out. You know, so there's a there's a fair bit of overhead, for sure. But we've also got a lot of continuity that we've built into the businesses, you know, that we built to kind of help offset the call it the stress of overhead.

Right?

Steve: Yeah.

Tucker: But we're generally pretty low overhead operation. Like overall, like ballpark? Ballpark, you know, $10.

Steve: Oh, that's really hard.

Tucker: Yeah, but but that's before we're spending marketing costs. Right?

Steve: So what are you in marketing?

Tucker: So marketing, we're our universe of people that we can market to is fairly small now, but we're probably in the $2,000 to $3,000 a month range. Wow.

Steve: Also really low.

Tucker: Yeah. Also really low.

Steve: Yeah. So let's talk about, you know, I see some stuff that you post. There there's a lake, some trees. What's that? What's going on there?

Tucker: So that's Lake Oswego. Right? Okay. Waterfront real estate, baby. That's, I mean, that's water and views is a great way to insulate prices from, you know, major declines or, you know, less demand.

Right?

Steve: But that's for you. That's a plan.

Tucker: Well, we live I live in Lake Oswego. I have for, you know, and that's something we haven't touched on. But like, you know, I've built the last three houses we lived in. We find the land, we build the house, I buy it from the business at cost, we move into it for two or three years, and then we sell it. And then we move into the next one.

And we do that over and over again. And those are my favorite years, because you make up to half $1,000,000 tax free, which is basically like making a million bucks in Oregon, you know, and being taxed.

Steve: Yeah.

Tucker: But we've been doing that and kind of moving around like Oswego for the last. I mean, I've been in there for twelve

Steve: years now. So that's awesome. Another way to build wealth tax free.

Tucker: Yeah. It's the house hack before the house hack, except we build them now because the margins are bigger on the other end when

Steve: you sell. That's incredible. Yeah. Let's see what else is there. How does a how does a wholesaler find a developer like you to to get your buy box?

Like, how well, how would a wholesaler find someone like you?

Tucker: Well, here's the thing. Most developers and builders need you. Right? Most of them don't have a marketing machine. I'd say virtually all of them.

I mean, we're a very niche hybrid company and that we have a marketing machine, most of them don't, they need you as bad as you need them. So I mean, we're pretty easy to find, right? We have a big brand and online presence. If you're doing D4D or driving for dollars, you know, you go drive around these neighborhoods, you're gonna see who's building in those neighborhoods, right? Just, I don't know, call them up, talk to them, they'll tell you exactly like how much they're buying lots for in those areas.

And then all you got to do is go find the crappy houses that you can pay them market value for the square footage of that house. And it's really undervalued compared to the value of the dirt. Make the money in the middle, connect the dots.

Steve: There you go. So Claudio wants to know, at what kind of discount does it make sense to acquire a wholesale day for a home in the million dollar plus range? So I guess probably question is, you know, maybe an ARV, some sort of formula.

Tucker: Cost of capital is such a big part of that, as you go up. But, it it really depends on how much work is gonna be it's It's such a very, it varies so much. But you know, generally you want to have we try and hold at least a 20% margin on the sell. Right? So whatever we're in it by, you know, construction, selling costs, you know, we try and hold at least a 20% margin.

And most of our stuff is closer to 30. But, you know, 20 is a minimum for us.

Steve: It's really big.

Tucker: Yeah. But there's less people playing in that world. Right? And that's why we're there.

Steve: I know. But it's 20% of a bigger number.

Tucker: It is. Like we talked about car over. 20% of a lot is is a

Steve: lot. Right?

Tucker: You know? Yeah.

Steve: And most guys are shooting for, like, 9% of a smaller number.

Tucker: Yeah. Which is crazy to me. But, eventually, everybody kinda graduates to wanting to do more Yeah. Bigger numbers.

Steve: And Isaac wants to know how's the market in Bend and Tigard?

Tucker: So Bend is like I love Bend. It's been if I was gonna move from Portland, which I may, Bend is very high on the list. Paradise Valley is also very high on the list. You know, I've spent some time there in probably parts of Scottsdale. But, Bend is it's an awesome place.

It but it got hit real hard, just like Phoenix in the real estate apocalypse.

Steve: Yeah.

Tucker: And the reason being is because it didn't have it didn't have enough economy. Right? It was based on tourism. There wasn't a lot of real jobs. There are a lot of real high paying jobs.

Now it's changed a lot. There's a lot of companies that have hubs there that have remote workers there that are much higher paid people that love the market cycle market will soften. I don't think it's gonna soften there nearly as much as it did before. So I I think it's a pretty well protected market. And if you ever go there, it's it's an amazing place.

I mean, it's 20 to Mount Bachelor, and it's high desert. It's sunshine and snow. I mean, it's and you got the Deschutes River. It runs right through downtown, tons of breweries. It's tough to say you don't like Bend.

That's for sure.

Steve: Yeah. Very cool. And then Bernard Mac wants to know, he bought your flipping teardown product. Do you think that strategy still works in this market? If not, what tweaks would you need to make?

Tucker: It works. When we first came out with that, it was probably three or four years ago, Bernard. And the only difference was there was just less competition. Right? That that's really what it comes down to.

And the other thing was, is back then, owners of property weren't quite as privy to what their dirt was worth. They only knew what their house was worth. And so the biggest opportunity zones, with flipping tear downs, I always equate it to like a baseball game, right? What inning is that market in? Right?

And as you get closer to seven, eight, nine, the owners realize that the value of the dirt has eclipsed the value of their structure. When you're in the earlier innings, which is basically gentrification improvement of areas, a lot of owners don't know that. And so if you can buy based on the structure value, not on the dirt value, that's where the most opportunity is. And so to answer your question, it's more difficult than it was, across the board. No question.

But if you can identify those areas that are in the earlier innings, because there's always areas in those earlier innings, that's where the most opportunity is

Steve: for

Tucker: you to market for those types of

Steve: product. Justin Baker says hi.

Tucker: What's up,

Steve: Justin? So along your journey, do you have a favorite, best or most interesting failure?

Tucker: Oh, yeah. I probably got a lot of them. Let's see. Most interesting failure. Getting to know this tech world building out, app has been like, I don't even know if it's interesting.

But I mean, we dropped $70 on a real shithead developer that it was like, oh, my god. We just spent $70,000 and this guy delivered us crap. Like, that was a that one hurt. Like, it was I still remember where I mean, yeah. You remember moments in life.

Right? And that was one of the moments that I was like, we gotta rebuild this whole thing. Right? And,

Steve: It's like getting a building a a a really nice kitchen with a crappy contractor.

Tucker: Yeah.

Steve: You have to tear it all down. Yeah. You can't

Tucker: Same thing. Yeah. Same thing. You know, there there was another failure that I had that, it turned into a a good moment. Right?

Which I think is important to say those too. You know, the first new construction home we ever did, I bought a house that we were gonna rehab. And the foundation, it had major foundation problems. And we got a bid to fix the foundation problems. And we had to put like 18 piers in the ground.

And this was like twenty ten, twenty eleven. And I was thinking myself, I was like, well, besides the fact that the bid was just egregiously priced, I mean, it was like, oh, my god, like, there goes all our profit, and we're losing money, right? I was like, now we got to sell a house that has 18 piers in the ground in 2010, 2011. Like, that seems like a tall order. Like, that might be tough to get somebody to sign off on that and say, I'm, you know, it's okay.

Nowadays, it's a little different. But then, you know, it's challenging. So I made the decision back that I basically failed at buying the house, right? I paid too much for the house. And so I was like, Well, what can we do?

I was like, Well, we could knock it down. And we could try and build a new house there. But But now we're going to be trying to enter the market at a whole new price point. And so I, I failed at not buying that house for cheap enough to flip that house. But it ended up being kind of a great inflection point in the company because it forced me then to go down the path of building new construction.

And so we put that we ended up putting that house out, I think, at like $650,000 $700,000 which then again, it was super expensive for that area, that same household for like $900,000 two years ago. So the area has changed a lot lot since then. But that was a failure moment that actually, you know, they say you learn or you earn, right? And so that one I actually earned and I learned. But that was a failure moment that I turned into something positive.

Steve: What's your biggest struggle right now?

Tucker: Biggest struggle right now is probably how do you have six different balls in the air? Right? How do you run multiple businesses? I mean, we talked about this on the way over to like, you know, we had a lot of really good conversation. But one of them was, you know, people wanna get into the coaching model.

Right? Because it sounds it sounds great. Yeah. And we can make all this money and, you know, gurus have Lambos and, you know, all that. Right?

Which I drive a Tacoma and I love it. Right? But, you know, some guys can. They can afford it. But here's the thing.

You start that business, you have to make sure it's a good business. Right? You have to

Steve: service it.

Tucker: And you have to have client retention and client success. And that's a lot of work. Like, you know, you can't just you can be good at the marketing side of it. And some guy I've seen a lot of guys come and go, right, in the coaching game, because they're really good marketers, terrible business owners, or terrible, you know, at client retention and client servicing. And so and then they get a bad rap, and then they, you know, disappear, you know, and that's the way it works.

And so the challenge is, for me right now, how do we actually be really good at real estate and also be really good at coaching? Right? And running an education and content business. And we're doing it, but it's gonna be forever a challenge because they both take so much from you.

Steve: You. Yeah. Yeah. It's they're both full time businesses. Yeah.

And then on the flip side of that, what is your superpower?

Tucker: The fact that I can do a lot of things. You know, I I've I've learned this about myself and, you know, you've probably done the same, you know, as we as you get farther into this journey of, you know, life, but also entrepreneurship, you start to know what makes you tick, right? And like, what makes you happy, what makes you unhappy. And and the moment that I realized that, like, number one, I can only go on vacation for, like, a week, because after that, I'm just like, I gotta do something. Right?

Like, you know, and that's a normal entrepreneur.

Steve: Yeah. My wife hates that above me. Yeah. Like, three days max.

Tucker: Yeah. Three and, really, it's three days. Right? Three days in Cabo and, like, I wanna get back home. You know?

Like, it's it's been fun. I had a good time, but, like, it's time to get back and do something. And so I'm a builder. Right? I have to be building something, whatever that is.

I can't just sit idle. And so my happiest time to for me to be the happiest and I think there's a good life lesson for everybody. Right? I think I think the most unhappy people are idle people. Right?

And so building something, whatever it is, is what makes me happy. And so that's why we've piled on all these other businesses, but I I am good at juggling them and putting adequate time in all of them and and making them all good businesses. But that also gives me a lot of enjoyment. Right? Like like, that's that's where I get my most happiness from, you know, at least on the professional side.

Steve: Yeah. We need to get you, like, a master builder shirt, from, like, the LEGO movie.

Tucker: Yeah. Although I know what you could scratch it out and write something else on there if you really want it to be funny. But yeah.

Steve: Is there a book you've gifted more than any other?

Tucker: Yeah, there's one that I always talk about, which I think is super important. I, it gets said a lot. But it's really the secret to the real estate business. It's a secret to life, really, which is how to win friends and influence people, right? It's especially in the real estate business if you're going direct to seller, right?

Because we're in a world if you have agents in the middle, it removes the human element, right? It's just purely numbers. And, you know, getting to know somebody is irrelevant. But as you go meet with people, and you put deals together directly with homeowners, the human element is very much alive. And so figuring out how to connect with people, how to get them to know I can trust you, like, for example, before I left here to come, you know, the last phone call that I had Monday night before I

Steve: hopped on the plane Tuesday morning

Tucker: was with a gal who owns a piece of property on Lake Oswego. She's owned it for sixty years, right? And like to buy property on the water is like, they rarely ever come up for sale, right? Especially these old time ones that are redevelopment plays, like, everybody will buy them, nobody can, and you just wait for people to die. And that's when the opportunity comes up.

Right? But I went and met with this woman a couple weeks ago, I knew she wasn't quite ready to sell. But I went and met with her myself, because I knew she wanted to meet with somebody that knew more about the property than just an acquisitions person I could send, right? Knew more about values, redevelopment, all that, which which came through, but she had a problem. She didn't know, you know, they were building a house next door to her and she had a property line issue.

And she also didn't know if she had easement for the driveway that came to her house. And so I helped her solve those problems, right, and basically come to the conclusion she was wrong about the property line, which I knew she was, and that she didn't have an easement for the driveway. Right? Both of which confirmed the fact that she wants to sell. But she called on Monday before I left, and she's like, Look, I've got, you know, all these agents that want to come over.

They say they got people that want to buy it. But she's like, I talked to you. I like you. You seem to make this business really simple. You know, do you want to buy this house?

And I was like, Look, I'm going to see Steve. I'm going to Phoenix. I'll be back on Friday. I'll call you. We'll come sit down and we'll do it or try and put something together.

Right? And, you know, that just goes back to the point of it's just it's a people business. Right? And so just knowing how to I mean, this lady's 93. Like, I like, she's in my friendship circle and, like, we hang out and, you know, row down.

Like Yeah. But the the skill set is just, you know, making people feel comfortable with you across the spectrum. Right? And so I think that's the most important book because it's just an overarching skill set of of how to be good with people.

Steve: Yeah. Awesome. If anyone's got any teenage daughters, don't buy the one for teenage girls or at least younger than teenage. I bought that one for my daughter. Yeah.

That was a bad idea. No bueno, No. That's not a good one. Okay. Okay.

So I'm gonna make a few quick announcements to let you think about some last thoughts. Guys, if you guys get value, please like, subscribe, share, or comment. That helps me get these videos in front of more people, right, is the algorithms. I wouldn't ask you guys to do it if it didn't help more people. And like I said, we got that classroom built out.

Tucker got to check it out a moment ago. If you guys wanna come to our next class, apply at disruptors.com. And next week, we've got Tyler Austin coming in from Florida. So tune in same time, Wednesday, 02:00, Pacific, 05:00 eastern. Last thoughts.

Tucker: Last thoughts. It's a weird world we live in this year.

Steve: It's a weird world. It's a weird world. And I feel like, you know, with Billy May, it's like, but wait.

Tucker: But wait. There's more. There's more. Yeah. Just wait.

We're not done yet, folks. Yeah. Keep an eye on that news. Watch Portland.

Steve: Yeah. But, and if someone wanted to get a hold of you, what's the best way for them to do that?

Tucker: Let's see. Best way, obviously, you can check out my show, or the Real Deal podcast for most of the people that are listening. If you're local, you can check out the the local show, which is the Portland Real Estate podcast. You can find me on social. That's a good way also.

You know, I'm, you know, I I answer most people that message me just because, you know, you're nice enough to send me a message and you watch this content or whatever. I'll try and answer you. Yeah. Facebook, Instagram, just search my name. You can find me.

But I'm pretty easy to find. You can track me down if you want to.

Steve: Awesome. Very cool. And then Tucker didn't say this, but he probably meant to say this is that the episode that we did together is probably his best episode.

Tucker: Absolutely. I think it had the most downloads.

Steve: Alright. Thank you guys for watching. Thank you. It was a pleasure.

Tucker: Appreciate you having me.

Steve: Yeah. See, we real estate disrupt us. Can't nobody touch us. And yet we about to give you gains. Shout out to Steve Trane.

Will it say disrupt us? They cannot touch us. And, yeah, we about to give you game. Shout out to to Steve Train. Jump on the Steve Train.

We about to give you game. Already ass flowing through my veins. And you don't

Tucker: Yeah.

Steve: See, we real estate disruptors.