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Why Your Lender Is Competing With ChatGPT w/ Aaron Marsh · Real Estate Investing with RealDealCrew

0:00
Every deal your lender sees now has a third party in the room,
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and it's not another buyer, it's ChatGPT.
0:06
In this episode, you'll learn why that 15% down DSCR pitch almost always costs
0:12
you more than it looks. The exact down payment number that actually moves your rate
0:18
And why waiting on rates to drop further might already be the wrong bet.
0:23
Aaron Marsh runs a boutique lending shop built for investor banks,
0:27
don't know how to underwrite. and he's watched deal after deal get
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run through a chat bot before it ever gets to him.
0:35
He'll tell you what actually works instead.
0:37
Learn more about his team at marshlending.com.
0:41
And if you're looking for help with your operations,
0:44
head over to RealDealCrew.com.
0:47
Let's get started.
0:53
Aaron Marsh joins me here today,
0:54
and you can learn what his team can help you with by heading over
0:58
to marshlending.com. And if the name doesn't give it away,
1:02
I don't know what will. We are going to be talking about lending,
1:05
mortgages, and funding your real estate investing.
1:08
In fact, if you take advantage of heading over to his website
1:11
and submitting your contact information,
1:14
he has an investor playbook.
1:16
that he's willing to give you a s snapshot of.
1:18
really appreciate your time here today,
1:20
Aaron.
1:21
Well thanks. I appreciate you having me on,
1:22
Jack, and I'm looking forward to a good conversation today.
1:26
you were about to say whether this was an a accidental occupation.
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You said you were thirty years from your corporate life.
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Yeah, and I dated myself, but the it was accidental.
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It was during the pandemic. we had a family friend that had a boutique firm
1:42
in the Dallas area. And so then,
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you know, while we're all sitting around at the house,
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the he contacted me and said, Hey,
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you know
1:50
mortgage rates just dropped. Why don't you go get your mortgage license through
1:53
an online class during the pandemic and then and then that way you
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can start doing mortgages for your family and friends on refines.
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That's how I started. I wasn't I wasn't,
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you know, actively going out and growing a book of business.
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I wasn't meeting with realtors.
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I wasn't sending any direct to consumer it was just strictly referral family
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and friends who had a you know a higher mortgage rate.
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And then when they hit the twos and threes and fours,
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you know, they all
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Wanted, you know, so I kind of did that on the side while I was still doing
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my corporate job as well. So I do that like nights and weekends,
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and you know, it was interesting to me.
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I have a real estate background through my family.
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my my grandmother and my mom were in the real estate business way back
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in the early to mid-70s and then later 70s,
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80s, and that was pre-internet days.
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So if you had a contract.
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you know, on a Tuesday night you'd drive over to the buyer's house
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and get it signed, then you put the all the paperwork in your in your
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car and you drive over to the seller's house and have it signed,
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you know. So I would ride along on some of those trips and and then obviously around
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the house I would hear about real estate.
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So, it's something that I was kind of all,
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you know, dovetailing and woven through,
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but
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But didn't get at it serious until I wanted to make the jump from corporate America
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to doing something that I was more passionately involved in.
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Mm-hmm. Yeah, it it's it's kind of interesting how we kind of fall even even later
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in our careers, things kind of take a take a turn,
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right? And then you've
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Right.
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found that this might be more profitable or a better situation than your your
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day job.
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Yes, very much so, right? And plus it's something like we had started in the past,
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like our own our own kind of online companies and stuff.
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So I dabbled into entrepreneurship along the way.
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I always felt like it was something that I wanted to pursue.
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And you know, I kind of made the next day
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the day instead of someday I'll do that.
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Right. I said, I'm doing it. This is what we're doing.
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I'm committed to it. Let's grow this thing.
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Let's start it. Let's go.
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Well, and then eventually you started working with investors.
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Like how did you how did you niche down into into that?
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Like we couldn't couldn't ask for a crazier
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Well, there there's a couple of things.
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group of people to work with probably.
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Yeah. But it's more interesting,
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right? 'Cause I get something that comes every day,
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just it it's it's we wanna build,
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a marina that's completely automated and and you know we wanna build
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you know high-rise condos and we wanna build flex warehouse space
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and we wanna build, you know, so it's all kinds of different things,
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right? We want to buy rehab centers,
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we wanna, you know, build a spec home,
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you know, that sleeps 25 and we're gonna turn it into an Airbnb on the beach.
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You know, so we really we really kind of found that because we were starting
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in that investor game. So when our last one
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ones were getting out of high school and college and going into college.
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We we sold our our house and we there's a place in Florida where
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we had been vacationing all the time and we bought an investment house there
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and ran it on the short-term rental program with a property management company.
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So we've seen all sides of it.
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So for 15 or 20 years we had been visiting using a property management company
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for a week at the beach and staying in one to owning one to running one to
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eventually we decided to take it off the short-term rental market and then just come
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down and live full time and in you know the area that I'm in really lends itself
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to a large amount of short-term rental properties right so a
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lot of the neighborhoods it's 50 60 70 80% short-term rental the condo units
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are 90% short-term rental right so everybody wants to come for their weeks
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at the beach
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And I just really started researching in and building a portfolio
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of lenders and private banks and family offices that can really get
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at stuff banks and credit unions have a hard time getting at,
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whether it's higher price points,
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where it's someone that walks in and they got 17 LLCs and a bank throws
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up all over that because they don't want to have to deal with all those
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tax returns and all that kind of stuff.
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So we really fit ourselves in kind of that upper right quadrant.
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And that's the niche that I go after.
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You know, we're really not in a in a race to the bottom to fight for,
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you know, the lowest, you know,
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rate with seven credit unions and nine banks and three online bot people,
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right? But, you know, people who are serious,
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people who, you know, have investigated us,
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got referred to us, same thing.
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We investigated them. We really work well and give them the the true,
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you know, white glove service.
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So you kinda like some of the bigger projects.
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Well we'll take all projects, but yes,
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you know, that because that's where we can fit.
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A lot of lenders, especially in the wholesale marketplace,
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banks as well, credit unions, they like to tap out at three,
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three and a half million, four million,
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but make it a sixty-five percent LTV,
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right? Those kind of things. And,
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you know, some of the houses on the beach are double digit millions higher,
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right? So so you know, trying to get the max leverage.
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So that keeps this investment or investor group,
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you know, liquid and still in the market and able to go after other things
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is what we really kind of are skilled at.
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So what are the biggest misconceptions that some real estate investors might have
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when they when they come and visit you regarding a project?
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I think a lot of people watch a lot of YouTube and TikToks,
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which is great. It's a great way to do information.
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but one of the things we kind of get into is an AI circle loop.
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So it used to be, you know
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We'll take a taking a a case in point.
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So here here's a testimonial. So,
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you know, we have clients that we work with down here.
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Most of the most of the investors in this area live in either Atlanta,
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Nashville, St. Louis, Chicago,
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Dallas, Houston, New Orleans kind of areas,
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right? They don't live here. So they try and go with their local bank first,
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and then their local bank has kind of problems.
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their their our referral partner the lender or the realtor here will like give them
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our name we'll start working with them but there's always a third person that's
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introduced and that third person is Mr.
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Chat GPT so what will they come and they'll we'll do a lot of work on the backside.
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We'll give them great information.
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Here's like I always give them one or two options,
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three options if we have it. No more than that because I get menu fatigue,
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right? We call it the Cheesecake Factory syndrome.
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You gave me too many options so I'm choosing none,
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right?
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But they'll take everything that we have,
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they throw it into GPT, and then they'll say,
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can we get something better? Well,
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it wasn't the right kind of prompt,
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right? It wasn't like how much are you putting down?
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You want to close in an LLC? They just don't know how to prompt and
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ask the thing the right questions.
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So it'll always come back every single time.
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Yeah, you can get a better deal.
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Go to bankrate.com, you can get it for four percent and and you know,
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whatever, right? They'll they'll say,
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We'll close you in an FHA deal,
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but it's gonna be a non-warble condo on the beach.
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So we have to
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kind of work with them and fight through some of that stuff.
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So a lot of times Chat GPT is a good starter for information,
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but you really gotta talk to somebody,
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like develop that personal rapport to really get at the right answers.
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and I think that's the biggest misconception that's current in
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the marketplace is everything that we give to anybody,
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they immediately throw it in their chat and their chat throws back some sort
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of cooking recipe of go somewhere else.
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So
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Well, you probably see saw what I do.
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I help real estate investors adopt AI in in their real estate investing.
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And
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Yeah.
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there is a false sense of acceptance with some of these tools.
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And now Chat GPT is even gonna start inserting ads.
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So we've gotta take some of that with a grain of salt.
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You know, it's it's gonna get worse.
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Yeah, yeah. I know you're very familiar with like DSCR loans.
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We do a ton of them, right? Close in an LLC.
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There's a lot of stuff out there and it's a great hook in terms of like,
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hey, you only have to put fifteen percent down.
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Okay. Yeah, you can do that. If it's a rental horse,
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if the the property
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value is low, your price point is low,
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so you can make enough rental at only putting and have an 85% leverage.
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And all of those 15% programs that are on the market right now.
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They come at a high interest rate.
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So sometimes you kind of we always do the math.
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Entry level for what we do is really around 20%.
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But if you wanna be smart, the sweet spot is 25% because the rate drop between
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20 and 25% is significant enough most times that it makes sense to
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do that extra 5% into the deal.
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The rate drop between twenty five and thirty or thirty-five percent,
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unless the lender requires it because it's a ten million dollar property
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or something. they, you know, they they don't you don't get the rate drops,
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right? It kinda floors out, right?
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So really I I say 20 to get in the game,
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let's see if the DSCR works. And then if it does work,
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let's kind of go there if you're happy with that rate.
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But if you want the sweet spot,
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let's look at 25% down.
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check the DCR, D S Cr, make sure the ratio works,
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and then we'll just go from there.
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And and that's gonna give you like your kind of,
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you know, wheelhouse of of kind of rate versus cost to get into it trade-off.
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I was gonna it kinda leads me to the the next question there.
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Well, two things that come to mind.
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One of them is that you mentioned the the list of opportunities or a list
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of of choices, and that just points back to z the concept that a confused mind just
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isn't capable of making a decision.
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Yeah, one of the things that we do is we try and really kind of help
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on the front end of the process because the front end the process is
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is the best part, right? That's the part that we get everybody in sync,
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singing off the same page, reading down the same playbook,
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and then we execute from there.
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And we have a pretty good operations team to help us execute through all that.
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but
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What I do is I make it clean. A lot of times there are these long emails with links
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and graphs and all kinds of stuff.
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And what I do is I just make it clean.
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I go, here's option one. This is what it is.
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And then, you know, three or four bullet points.
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Rate, you know, each of the rates,
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what does it cost to get in there?
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Here's your P and I on that. And a lot of times people kind of get hung
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up and they think like six point seven five,
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that's a super high rate. Well,
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yeah, but that's no income verification.
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We're using it as a DSCR loan.
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You only have twenty-five percent skin in the game.
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And you know, the difference between
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You can see it. The difference between six point seven five and six point
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one two five or five point nine nine will cost you this much in discount points
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to get there, but your monthly trade-off isn't as big as what you think.
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It's maybe a hundred, two hundred.
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$300, right? But you gotta own it for nine years to make you know,
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cause the only people in the whole world that know what your rate is,
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is you and the bank. Your neighbors don't know unless you tell them.
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So if anybody asks you, you got screwed on that rate.
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No, you didn't, right? I mean,
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it's kind of like, hey, this worked out great.
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It fits everything that we're trying to do.
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And I got a great rate. That's just how I tell people to kind of,
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you know, work on that. Because anybody you ask.
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Especially in today's society because the only question that invest most entry level
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investors or first time investors know to ask for is rate,
12:57
right? But they don't ask all the great questions,
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which is, you know, what does it cost to get that rate?
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W you know
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What are the options? Can I do cool stuff with this?
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Is it a HELOC that I can use for 10 years on the front end?
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And then I can use it up and down as a credit line.
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You know, there's all kinds of pro product out there that,
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you know, we have access to. It's like a different playbook than they're used to.
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They're used to just going in,
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asking a bank, what's the rate?
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Talking about playbook, you should take advantage of getting
13:23
the investor playbook from Aaron and his team.
13:25
Head over to marshlending.com.
13:28
That's going to be a clickable link in the show notes.
13:30
If you found some value in what we're chatting about so far,
13:33
do us a favor, share this with one of your investor friends.
13:35
If you're watching us on YouTube,
13:37
give us a like and subscribe. So,
13:39
Aaron, you know, one of the things that I wanted to talk about
13:42
is that some investors, whether they're new or or seasoned,
13:46
There's kind of a bit of a struggle associated with getting some of this lending
13:50
and that in place. And I'd like to arm them a little bit by giving them some some
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guidance on what ducks did they have to get in a row and what kind of packet
14:00
is is strong that they can maybe even present to you and your team to
14:04
hit the ground running.
14:05
Yeah, that it's great question.
14:06
So really to to get the ground running,
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we like to be up front in the process and help you with a really strong offer with
14:14
a really good pre-approval letter.
14:16
Right, depending on the product that you when we come in after the fact,
14:20
then that crunches our time window to try and get the deal done.
14:23
But then also we don't have all the necessary paperwork,
14:26
so it takes a while to put that together.
14:28
So the package that you're talking about is perfect.
14:30
So if you're gonna close in an LLC,
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then
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We need, you know, the LLC documentation,
14:35
right? So that would be great.
14:36
If you haven't set up the LLC but you're going to close in an LLC,
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then you need to close it in that state.
14:43
That works the best. If it's a foreign LLC,
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meaning it was in a different state,
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then you'll need to get it naturalized or s or or available in the state that you're
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trying to do this in. the next thing is if you have a PFS or an updated PFS,
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you know, get that over to us.
14:57
If you don't have one, you know,
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just make sure that
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you know, you can show proof of funds with your
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Ameritrade, Fidelity, Vanguard,
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whatever account that, you know,
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down payment is there. Cause then those will be the first questions that ask.
15:09
Okay, this is great. It looks like this property is gonna DSCR.
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We're not gonna see any tax returns or any of that kind of stuff.
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Now, where is the down payment coming from and closing costs?
15:18
And so if you already have that updated and ready to go or in one account,
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that'd be great. If it's in multiple accounts,
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that's fine. Just give us the you know the statements for that.
15:26
just that whole prelim up front,
15:29
you know, get your IDs ready. So
15:31
So you know, some some lenders just need a driver's license.
15:34
Some need two forms. So driver's license and passport.
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Just make sure they're not expired,
15:38
those kind of things. So you get all that pre-work up front,
15:41
it smooths out the process.
15:43
I'm also hoping you could give people like a a few questions in which
15:47
we should be asking, like just to make sure that our lender or that partner
15:51
is is a good fit.
15:52
I think I think the main thing is
15:55
Is your all is your LLC if you're going to close in that all up to date
15:58
and the in the paperwork correct,
16:00
right? So people haven't fell off of it,
16:02
you haven't added new people on,
16:04
or it's in good standing in the state that you're trying to do it.
16:07
So that's that's really kind of key if you're gonna close in an LLC.
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If you're not gonna close in an LLC,
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you're gonna close in your personal name,
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then you know, what is your what is your employment look like?
16:18
Are you a W-2 earner? That's one set of products that we can.
16:22
offer are you self-employed or a business owner that's a different
16:26
set of products that we can you know we can offer are you gonna close it
16:30
in a trust that has its own little idiosyncrasy so really you know how
16:35
do you make your income where's the proof of funds are and how you're gonna vest
16:40
it or close it personally and or as an LLC that really that really helps
16:46
us down the road
16:47
Yeah, I probably didn't ask that properly.
16:49
So the what I was trying to get at is
16:50
Yes, minus one.
16:51
is is is like as as a person who's seeking funding and we're talking to lenders,
16:57
what what questions should as as people trying to get funding,
17:02
what questions should we be asking to make sure that the that the lender is
17:06
a is a good fit for us?
17:08
what kind of leverage you're looking for?
17:09
So are you looking for eighty percent leverage?
17:13
If it's a primary home, are you looking for like,
17:15
you know, ninety plus leverage?
17:18
Can this lender lend up to the loan amount that you're looking for?
17:21
Does a lender can the lender loan lend in the area that you're looking for?
17:26
And then the other thing is what is the what does the close process look like,
17:30
right? You know, how many days to close?
17:33
How tough, you know, what's the underwriting gonna look like?
17:36
That's a lot of stuff, because we work with a good number of them
17:39
on a repeat business that we kind of know,
17:42
hey, these guys are underwriter heavy.
17:44
So get ready, we're digging in under the hood,
17:46
right?
17:46
These guys are underwriting light.
17:48
They're more on the property value and and what your PFS looks like and that kind
17:53
of stuff. So those are some things that you know that we can prep
17:57
our our clients for.
17:59
Sure. You know, based on what you're saying there,
18:01
it must sound, it sounds like you have a you develop a pretty strong relationship
18:06
with the people that that come to you,
18:08
especially if they are repeat customers.
18:11
Yeah. We do. We we we kind of pride ourselves on that.
18:14
That's one of the things that that you know I make sure our whole team does
18:18
is like treat every single client like it's your one and only client,
18:22
right? Just make sure you give the service,
18:24
you answer those questions. Cause a lot of these,
18:26
Y you know, a lot of the business that we have is,
18:28
you know, maybe it's their first,
18:30
second, maybe third time through,
18:32
or it could be an active person that has eighty houses under portfolio,
18:36
right? So, you know, but you always treat just make sure you answer
18:40
all their questions. make sure you get back to at the the real thing is feedback.
18:44
Just get back in a timely manner,
18:45
right? Because if you have one deal with me,
18:48
but I have I have ten deals with ten people,
18:51
right? You're always gonna be on me to make sure
18:54
because you have a one-to-one relationship and I always gotta make sure that
18:56
I respect that and I get back to you in a timely manner.
18:59
I I've read the documentation that you've given me.
19:02
I've given you back what you need.
19:04
Have you digested that? And so we can really review it.
19:07
Well, I want you to look into the future here now.
19:09
Like what does the outlook look like regarding mortgage rates?
19:13
Anything that you can guess upon?
19:14
Yeah, obviously
19:15
yeah, that's that's a great question.
19:17
I get it a lot. So obviously you you know,
19:20
with the Fed changeover, what is the new person gonna do?
19:24
What kind of thumbprint is he gonna put on it?
19:26
How is gas prices and the war affecting things?
19:29
So kind of unlike banks and credit unions who who
19:33
really are kind of rigid in their rate changes.
19:36
Where we are on the wholesale market and on the private market,
19:40
our rates can change every day.
19:41
In fact, they'll change multiple times in one day,
19:43
right? So I think rates have held steady.
19:46
There's like little ticks up, little ticks down.
19:48
But on the grand scheme of things,
19:50
you know, they're can they're uniformly down than they have been
19:54
the prior two years, right? So 2004,
19:58
we were doing investment properties.
19:59
I was quoting non-warn
20:01
Condos in like high eights, low nines,
20:04
right? Just to try and get the deal done.
20:06
last year it was kind of like mid to high sevens.
20:09
We did a couple of them on the on the low eights side because they wanted
20:13
max leverage or you know, they weren't willing to buy down the rate
20:17
or or or whatever. We're kind of in the
20:19
Like we have some products that that are skipping in the the high fives
20:24
to low to mid sixes, right? So so net net all the people that quote unquote were
20:30
waiting on rates to come down in two thousand and four twenty-four,
20:33
you should be buying now because you're down like you know,
20:36
two plus points. And so will we see another over the next two years,
20:40
twenty-seven, twenty-eight? Are we gonna see
20:43
That go down another two points into the fours for an investment product.
20:47
I don't know. It it just seems far-fetched to me,
20:49
right? I I I kind of been I I I don't want to be too conservative.
20:53
I wanna be forward thinking, but but I think if you're waiting on rates,
20:57
your waiting time is kind of over,
20:59
like you felt that big wave from 04 to now.
21:02
Now it may be small jumps you know,
21:05
down and up between now and
21:08
you know, twenty seven, twenty eight.
21:09
I I just
21:10
I just don't see it in in the cards for you know me quoting high threes,
21:15
low fours, you know, another 200 basis point drop.
21:19
So I think if you're kind of waiting on rates,
21:20
then I ask, what it what rate do you want?
21:23
If I can get you 6.25 on a DSCR product today or 6.5,
21:28
depending on creditworthiness,
21:30
then had to throw the disclaimer in.
21:32
Then
21:32
Mm-hmm.
21:33
then, you know.
21:34
I'll show you the difference in payment.
21:36
If you're talking, you know, fifty,
21:37
seventy-five bucks, get the property.
21:39
You wanna be in the market, not waiting on the market,
21:41
right? So that's the key.
21:43
Yeah, it's it's kind of an interesting time,
21:45
right? I and I didn't know if we were ever gonna start to see the the rates
21:50
dip a little bit, but thankfully we're we have started to see something happen.
21:55
Yeah, yeah. I mean and again, I think a sweet spot.
21:58
I think you get too low and this is weird,
22:02
but
22:02
You get too low and you kind of get into when we bought our investment house.
22:06
Every house that we walked into,
22:07
the realtor would turn and look at us go,
22:09
look right now, because I gotta text them.
22:11
They already got three offers on this house,
22:13
right? And we go to the next house,
22:14
look right now. They got four offers.
22:16
Look right now. It just came on today.
22:18
You'd be the first offer, but you know,
22:20
it's there's gonna be more by the end of today.
22:22
So I think anytime you start skirting with like,
22:25
I don't know, low.
22:26
If you think about low fives, mid fives,
22:28
like five five, I would say there's gonna be at least twenty-five
22:33
to thirty percent of people are gonna come and jump into the game they've been
22:36
waiting on the sideline. So now you've added all that demand in,
22:39
so house prices go up, right? So you wanna get it now.
22:43
That way you get that organic appreciation when that rate does come down.
22:46
Now your house is worth more. You can refi,
22:49
get the lower rate, you can take some cash out because you built in equity,
22:52
invest in something else, buy another one.
22:54
Right? That that's kind of the the little short speech that I give clients when they
22:58
say, Well, I don't know, the rate's kind of high.
23:00
I go, Well, think about it. Get in now,
23:02
rates go low, your house price goes way up,
23:04
right? Demand's there. So
23:06
Mm-hmm.
23:06
So you kind of have a track record then of of finding creative ways
23:10
and get to getting some of this financing done.
23:13
Do you have any stories that you could share that maybe you rescued
23:16
a deal because of it?
23:17
Yeah, yeah, there's a there's a couple of deals that we had that that
23:21
we rescued just recently. So one of this is always a feel good story for us.
23:25
It wasn't one of our bigger deals.
23:27
In fact it was like one of our very smaller deals.
23:29
But where we are is in a in a very seasonal place.
23:33
And so there's a lot of hospitality here,
23:34
right? So there's hotels, restaurants,
23:36
you know,
23:37
You know, all of the the tourist attractions,
23:40
fishing boats, that kind of stuff,
23:41
you know, and so you know, they they make a lot of money in season,
23:44
they don't make too much money out.
23:45
So there was a family that came to us and said,
23:49
Hey, our son is a server here,
23:50
he's been here like two years,
23:52
and and he wants to buy his first home,
23:56
right, as a primary home.
23:57
Every single bank, every single credit union,
24:00
every single person we talk to online has declined them because two things.
24:04
One, he transferred
24:05
You know, he was w a year and a half at this restaurant.
24:08
He switched this restaurant. He'd been there like a half a year.
24:11
he was also doing Ubering at night,
24:13
you know, you know, he was trying to make ends meet a lot of gig work,
24:16
right? And and he was and he was heavily reliant on tips and then tips within
24:20
the season. So we worked with some lenders that we have a really good rapport with
24:25
and we got him in that first house,
24:26
right? So check when. Was it our biggest deal?
24:29
No. Was it a sexy investor deal?
24:31
No. But it made us feel good and we celebrated with him and all that kind of thing.
24:34
stuff because here's a young kid everybody talks about affordability like can't
24:39
buy their first house so he bought his first house as a server and you know
24:43
I feel like we had a big portion of lending into our network of people
24:49
to get it done for him and you know that made us very happy.
24:52
You mentioned stoiism associated with leadership.
24:56
Like could you
24:56
Yeah.
24:56
talk a little bit about that mindset and w what caused you to embrace that
25:01
as as part of your leadership methodology?
25:04
Yeah. so I you know I'd always heard about Stoicism and it's kind of
25:09
on a revival right now, right?
25:10
So the so it it was it's it seems like it's big in different decades or eras,
25:16
right? But right now stoicism's on a revival.
25:18
and I was doing like some reading because we had had like three or four deals
25:23
for whatever reason, you know.
25:25
They went with a different bank,
25:27
or they decided to not pull the trigger yet,
25:29
or or whatever. And so, you know,
25:32
instead of our whole group getting testy over,
25:35
man, I spent five weeks with this client trying to get all their LLCs right
25:41
and all this kind of stuff, and then then for them just to decide,
25:43
well, it may be too much, we're gonna wait,
25:45
right? Well, you should have kind of thought about that ahead of time.
25:48
So
25:48
What I look at it is, hey, that was their decision,
25:51
not yours. You put in the effort to make it happen.
25:54
You're stronger because you went through all that process.
25:56
Did you get paid? No. Did you learn a lot?
25:59
Yes. Did you create like there's a lot of times we'd we'd get a new family office
26:04
or private equity?
26:05
network person just trying to get this deal done.
26:08
Didn't happen for them or us, right?
26:10
But now we have a bond and then now we've worked on new deals down the road that
26:14
I would never met this person,
26:16
right? Or this team. And so I always tell our team,
26:19
you know, really kind of keep it inside.
26:21
Control your emotions, right? You know,
26:23
stoicism isn't of all the books that I've read on it,
26:26
it's not really more about being apathetic,
26:29
like I don't care if you do this deal or not.
26:30
No, you really care. But
26:32
You don't live and die on the deal.
26:34
You know what I'm saying? You don't get super emotional about it.
26:37
You don't burn bridges because of it.
26:39
you know, all those things, right?
26:41
And so it's really kind of helped us out in another way because I always
26:45
try and keep stoicism in every single thing that I'm doing,
26:48
but you know
26:49
I'll have referral partners that'll call me and go,
26:52
hey, I got this client, they're down here,
26:53
I'm showing them. They're going with their Wells Fargo guy or their JC Penney,
26:57
I mean JC Penney, JC Morgan private lender or private banker.
27:01
But can you help them? They got some questions about how does this work.
27:05
So I'd get on the phone with them right there while they're in the car.
27:07
I'll walk them through everything.
27:09
They're I have no part in their deal.
27:11
I'm not getting paid on their deal.
27:13
But because I helped that realtor close a deal,
27:16
Then maybe down the road, she'll like,
27:18
you know what, martial lending really helped me out on that.
27:21
I close that. I'm gonna add them to the bottom of my list of referrals,
27:24
right? Or I'm gonna make sure that,
27:26
you know, I say nice things about them or give them a good review
27:29
or something like that. And so,
27:30
you know, that's just me saying,
27:32
Okay, you know, I'm in control of all this.
27:34
I could have easily said, No, I'm not helping you on your deal.
27:36
I'm not part of the deal, right?
27:37
But no, I'd get on the phone with them and would take care of it.
27:40
Yeah, that's really that go giver mentality,
27:43
right? The and
27:44
Yeah.
27:44
and maintain that your personal integrity and lead with value.
27:49
Yeah.
27:49
Yeah, I mean that's those are those are really like one of the things that
27:53
we did that I made sure is if I'm gonna be new to this area,
27:57
full time resident, long term Texan,
27:59
but now I'm here, I'm establishing my business,
28:02
I'm trying to we we joined right away we joined the Chamber of Commerce here locally
28:07
plus a bunch of other ones up and down,
28:09
you know, the coastline. And then we now I'm a b I'm an ambassador
28:13
for the Chamber of Commerce here.
28:15
I go to a lot of the ribbon cutting events,
28:17
I do a lot of
28:18
you know, volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity and all that kind of stuff.
28:21
Then I do it because I feel like,
28:24
you know, if they see us out there trying to do this kind of stuff,
28:26
then they'd be more apt to, yeah,
28:28
they were at this event, you know,
28:30
refer them. And that that's kind of,
28:32
you know, you gotta get some you got to give something of value before
28:35
you can even think about asking of value,
28:38
right? That's the way I feel about it.
28:39
Like I'm I tell all of our people the last thing I want you to do
28:43
is within 10 minutes of the first conversation that
28:46
you have with anybody that may be a referral partner or an investor go give
28:50
us all your deals. You know, everybody says that.
28:52
Yeah, you'll be unique, be different.
28:54
Win using your brain somehow more so than,
28:57
you know, asking for something from them before you've even given them anything,
29:01
you know.
29:02
Mm. So w what is your service area?
29:05
Are you restricted to any particular areas of the country?
29:07
So we are full service in Texas,
29:11
Alabama, and Florida. And then we do commercial and investment properties
29:15
in like 38, 39 states.
29:16
And you can find more of that information,
29:18
head over to marshlending.com and take advantage of getting that investor playbook.
29:23
before we dive into the rapid fire questions,
29:26
Aaron, is there anything else we should have tried to hit on here today?
29:29
yeah, I would say that, you know,
29:31
one of the things that that I hear about and you can maybe help me,
29:35
I'll ask you the question, and you know,
29:37
because you do, you know, so many of these and you're you're
29:40
so well connected within the the universe of investment real estate investors,
29:45
is I hear a lot about dry powder.
29:47
There's like you'll see you'll see everything on your LinkedIn feed
29:52
or your Instagram feed and and it'll say,
29:55
you know, the commercial real estate is sitting on 2.4 million of dry powder,
30:00
or you know, these 10 investment groups are just waiting to lend.
30:04
Have you heard anything about that?
30:06
And do you feel like there's some pent up dollars out there ready to
30:10
go for people that are ready to pull the trigger?
30:13
Yeah, it it does seem like that is the case.
30:16
Like and I'm not sure exactly what people everybody's waiting on.
30:19
I think there is the there's just some uncertainty,
30:22
especially regarding the job market.
30:25
Now we're in the another war. we have the the economy with you mentioned the Fed.
30:31
There's just some of this uncertainty right now,
30:33
and I think there's people are waiting to to see kind of a little stability.
30:37
Anytime we turn turn around, it's like something new happens.
30:41
You know, like it feels like I don't know about you,
30:43
but it feels like to me that gas prices,
30:45
for example, in my area doubled in price if it felt like almost overnight.
30:50
So it just kind of any kind of economic movement kind of slammed on the brakes.
30:55
Yeah, it's kind of that one step forward,
30:57
that feels good, two steps back,
30:59
now we're gotta start again, right?
31:01
And maybe that's what or two steps forward,
31:04
one step back, you know, it's not as dramatic as that.
31:07
So
31:07
Yeah. I I think I don't know. I I kind of th this is just me.
31:11
Maybe I'm dating myself a little bit,
31:14
but we have the fourth of July coming up and the midterms coming up.
31:18
We usually see some kind of movement towards the the better to try to support
31:24
or in you know help with the ruling c party.
31:28
to stay that
31:28
Right.
31:29
way. So we might see some positive movements over the next few months.
31:32
Yeah, this should be a highly patriotic event.
31:35
So I feel like there should be like some sort of groundswell
31:38
or movement around around
31:40
You know, the 250th celebration,
31:42
and and you know, maybe you'll start to see a little bit of that more engagement of,
31:46
yeah, I believe in the economy,
31:48
or yeah, I'm feeling stronger about this.
31:50
And so, you know, and I always say this too,
31:52
because a lot of people I'll talk to,
31:54
you know, my referral partners like the the the high volume brokers
31:58
or even the first-time brokers and and realtors around here,
32:01
or even my counterparts within the business,
32:03
and and they'll say, Yeah, there's a lot of cash deals going on.
32:07
And I go, That's great.
32:08
And they're like, why that great?
32:09
I go, I just need transactions,
32:11
right? Transactions mean something's happened.
32:14
That movement is being caused,
32:16
and then a movement will now create inertia,
32:19
right? And so maybe other deals will start to fall out just because
32:23
you know they're starting to see some of these deals move.
32:25
And a lot of it is someone's had their eye on a property,
32:28
their house, a multi-family, a multi,
32:31
a mixed purpose, you know, any of those kind of things.
32:34
And then it gets taken and they're like,
32:36
whoa.
32:36
I better get in the game because I've been sitting around waiting
32:39
on rates and someone came in and bought that for cash.
32:41
Now I gotta look at something else,
32:43
right? So it's just all of that.
32:45
You know, I I'm just happy to hear any kind of movement,
32:47
whether it's it's one that requires financing or one that's cash only,
32:51
right? You know, I mean I just like to see it.
32:54
Well, Aaron, this has just been a great conversation.
32:57
I think we'll drive into the rapid fire and close out this episode.
33:00
All right, thank you. It's been fun for me for sure.
33:02
What
33:04
well if you're ready, what lie do real estate investors often tell themselves?
33:07
do they often tell themselves?
33:09
I think a lot of times,
33:11
They they feel like they may jump into too big a project without really taking
33:16
a look at the cost, do I have enough money for the down payment,
33:20
all of those kind of things. I I think I think they really should
33:23
be realistic about what size projects or what bites of that elephant that they take.
33:28
If you could go back in time and give your younger self a piece of advice,
33:31
what would it be?
33:31
Starting this business twenty years ago.
33:33
That's probably one of the number one answers I get regarding,
33:37
Yeah. Like you said,
33:37
you know
33:39
so many people do not get up in the morning,
33:41
you know, when they graduate high school or college and go,
33:44
I'm going into the mortgage business,
33:45
they kind of fall into it. But now that I'm here
33:47
Right.
33:47
I like it. So I should have started earlier.
33:49
Do you have a book recommendation or what are you reading right now?
33:52
So book rec recommendation, I do recommend books on you know leadership
33:57
and stoicism. There's some really good ones out there.
33:59
The other one I recommend is anything in the Benjamin Hardy series.
34:04
the one the big one that everybody knows is 10X is easier than 2X,
34:08
right? I mean it's it's an easy,
34:10
quick read. There's a lot of information in there where they where they track
34:14
a Keller Williams group all through the book.
34:17
That's good. And then what I'm reading currently is something else on EOS,
34:22
which is called traction. And and I'm I'm reading on traction right now.
34:26
Yeah, I think traction's becoming a classic.
34:28
You know, it's just like I'm I'm seeing a it's been around for a while,
34:32
but I mean you can even engage expertise on in a in engaging
34:37
and and implementing that type of strategy in your in your business.
34:40
Yeah, it's definitely flipped my thinking.
34:42
And s you know, instead of thinking transactionally and deals and volume,
34:47
you know, whether I got a beat last quarter or last quarter last year
34:51
or those kind of things, I think more in partnership building and then
34:55
and then the whole enterprise as a as a whole.
34:57
Like like what are we trying to get to?
34:59
How do we put everything into a gat glass pipeline so we can see
35:03
all the the progressions in the per you know in in the process?
35:08
And you know, I think that
35:09
That helps, you know, constantly oil the machine and make us A more attractive
35:14
to the people that want to come and work with us,
35:16
and then B you know, makes us,
35:18
you know, a better run organization.
35:20
So when, you know, every every client journey,
35:23
every mortgage process has like one or two potholes in it,
35:26
right? But it's how you handle those.
35:29
you know, s get around or smoothly go over you know,
35:32
that that's key. And so traction is kind of helping with that.
35:36
And then finally, what single tool or process have you implemented that
35:39
has had the biggest time saving impact?
35:41
Okay, this is something I never thought I would be talking about,
35:45
but we just implemented we tested it a month ago,
35:48
we implemented it about two weeks ago.
35:50
and we're already getting leads off of it and some really good deals both on
35:54
a on a from a residential single family.
35:57
residents and also on the commercial side.
36:00
But so we use we we we've kind of contracted with someone and and we
36:06
use like kind of like an amalgamation of Sky Lead with HubSpot with Zapier
36:12
and then some of our back end CRM Excel database right stuff and and
36:18
it really kind of
36:19
snipers on LinkedIn and kind of identifies investors,
36:24
the investor community without having to go through all their filters and then,
36:28
you know, chat GPTing one one
36:31
one or two responses and then copy pasting it to all those people
36:35
and sending the LinkedIn mails.
36:37
This is all running on the backside every night,
36:39
you know, and it's a huge time saver for us because we're just getting
36:44
raw connections where people say,
36:46
No, I'm not interested right now,
36:47
you know, check with me later,
36:49
all that kind of stuff. And then we can just turn it on to just automate
36:52
and check back with them in six months,
36:54
you know, a year.
36:55
And then,
36:56
Mm-hmm.
36:56
but it has a bunch of automated responses.
36:58
So it's our way of using AI to go after a platform like LinkedIn and then allows us,
37:05
because we're lean and mean, very boutique,
37:07
to concentrate on working with our current clients,
37:10
our pipeline, our current leads and giving that white glove service.
37:13
So we're not just spending all of our time,
37:15
you know, filtering, reporting,
37:17
filtering, reporting on LinkedIn or Instagram or any of the other socials.
37:23
Was that you know, you you mentioned that if if I was even asking
37:27
you about this like a year ago,
37:28
this wouldn't have been something you would have even thought about talking about.
37:31
No.
37:32
Like what
37:33
did did that person that im implemented this for you,
37:36
did they out did a cold outreach?
37:38
How did how did you get to the point of even considering this?
37:41
That's a great story.
37:44
They had this whole program running for an economic development group here
37:50
in in the state of Florida and they used it to get to me.
37:54
And so that's so
37:56
I saw the proof and the pudding right there.
37:57
They got me and you know, they contacted me and I responded back and then they sent
38:03
some good information and then I set I signed up for a Zoom call and then
38:07
we started talking and I signed up for the you know to help them on deals
38:11
on the on with their economic development community.
38:14
And then, you know, I'm like, tell me how you got all this and then that's
38:18
how it started. So, you know, I was a customer,
38:21
I guess you would say, or I was a target.
38:24
And and and it led to a positive outcome.
38:26
So
38:27
Yeah, this is this is a perfect example of what I like,
38:30
you're gonna get me on my soapbox because w what I
38:32
Go for it.
38:33
really focused on is the f is the concept that people that implement these solutions
38:39
for for investors, what we can do is like 10x your productivity or free
38:44
up the time to to make those personal connections or foster those relationships that
38:50
are really important.
38:51
And what we're trying to do is is getting those initial people to raise their hands
38:55
so you can focus on the people,
38:56
focus on those activities that you really need to to spend that quality time on.
39:01
Yeah. No, I agree. I mean, that that's the AI that's intriguing
39:06
to me and exciting. Like I don't I write my own and y everybody in
39:11
the world can call me old or stupid or whatever,
39:14
but I just like how clean, crisp,
39:16
just I need to ask you two or three questions.
39:18
I don't need a whole long chat GPT.
39:20
So so many people use I'm using AI,
39:23
but you're just
39:23
You're just having you to write an email or a response or a reply back to someone,
39:28
whether it's a text message, it's a it's a newsletter,
39:31
it's something like that. And I think this is a different way of using
39:34
AI that's more intelligent, so to speak,
39:37
right? So it
39:37
Yeah.
39:38
definitely I mean, for me to figure out how to do what all of these three
39:43
or four things combined together are doing,
39:45
it would it would take me, you know.
39:47
Two or three weeks of just surfing through all of my contacts in LinkedIn,
39:52
trying to come up with new contacts with LinkedIn,
39:54
trying to come up with the right questions to ask.
39:57
I mean it's all there for you.
39:58
So that's great.
39:59
Yeah. Well, Aaron, this was a fantastic.
40:01
I appreciate you sharing, especially that last bit.
40:04
But one more time you can learn more at marshlending dot com.
40:08
Take advantage of getting a hands on that investor playbook.
40:11
And but I hope you consider coming back again sometime.
40:14
It was great to meet you.
40:15
All right. Well thanks Jack. I I those are great questions,
40:18
had a great time, so I appreciate you.