People are overwhelmed with a lot of stuff to do, like attending so many workshops and subscribing to people they think will help them what to do in their lives. However, in reality, they just create confusion in your mind. It is vital for everyone to focus on the game plan since this will align to where our path will be. Learn to remove distractions, eliminate the noise, and work out on the blocking and tackling. Know your goals and have confidence in your abilities. These are some of the basic elements we usually forget. In this episode, Scott reminds us to focus on the basics.

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Listen to the podcast here:

Calling Your Game

We’ve got some great stuff for this episode. These are things that you are going to need to focus on for yourself. Thank you for joining us for the show. Calling Your Game is the title of this episode. I see a lot of people struggling, not in charge of their own actions. If this is your first time on the show, we are honored to have you. I’m jacked up that everybody takes time out of their time to be with us. I’d like to ask you to make sure you subscribe. If you’re on YouTube or have a Vimeo account, hit the subscribe button. That way you’re notified of any new videos we upload on there for you, new training stuff. You can always listen to these episodes on iTunes as well or the Note Night In America podcast. Please check out The Note Closers Show Podcast with over 400-plus episodes and over 230,000 downloads. I’d love for you to review and subscribe. If you’re listening to the podcast, thank you so much. Please take a few minutes and leave a five-star review. We’ve got lots of great content, interviews with the experts, students and also guests that are doing an amazing job in the note space along with plenty of vendors to help you on your note path.

We have our Fast Track Training March 15th to 17th in Austin. It’s basically a sellout out as well for three days with me one-on-one. We have our Note Mastermind in April. As always, I want to let you know I’ve started my interviews for our Loan Tales book. We want you to get your story told. Fifty note investors with case studies. We’re going to be marketing this everywhere to asset managers, hedge funds and real estate clubs all across the country, BiggerPockets. Every author will have a session on The Note Closers Show Podcast. I’ll give you an example. Some of our guests have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars being on the podcast. Imagine having a chapter talking about a case study, a deal that you closed, good or bad. I don’t care, I want them all whether it’s owner finance, a Sub To, a partial, a first, a second, a residential, commercial deal, performing, nonperforming. We’re all open to all types of deals. This is the book that we’re putting together similar to The Millionaire Real Estate Investor that Gary Keller put together. We want to put this together talking about you. If you’ve got a case study, got a deal you closed on, we would love to tell the story. I’d love to have it out in front of thousands of other people. Including asset managers and as a way to share with your potential private investors too. We’d love to have you. It’s $599 per chapter. I only have a couple of chapters left. You can go to LoanTales.com and get signed up and then a link will be sent out to you.

People are like, “Do I have to write a chapter?” We’re going to schedule an interview with you via Zoom. I’m going to talk with you like, “Tell me about your past. What are you focused on? Why do you like notes? Let’s talk about this deal. Are you a full-time investor? Are you a part-time investor? What are your long-term goals? Tell us about this deal? Let’s work through the numbers on it.” We’ve got some cool stuff that we’re doing with this. We’re looking forward to this. We’ve got some great stories from everybody. We plan on doing this up. We’ve got a team to help us edit it. I’ve got a team that’s going to get this distributed, published. I’ve been a part of different books in the past where I’m paying anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 to have a chapter in something and it wasn’t as focused as this. This is something you’ll be able to use wherever you go, “I’m part of this book,” and why not? Why won’t you want to have 49 other stories also helping to lead traffic to you as well? We have a private Facebook group that we’re throwing everybody into as well.

Calling Your Game

Let’s talk about calling your game. What does that mean? I’m sure many of you watched the Super Bowl LIII. The thing that stood out was the Rams coach Sean McVay getting outcoached in his view like, “I’m stunned.” The Rams could not do anything. One thing is that they didn’t get their running back involved. The number one running back in the league besides Ezekiel Elliot, he was second or third in rushing. He’s been one of the big focal points. He signed the largest contract for running back and the guy barely got any touches because they’re busy trying to throw the ball. It was three and three. They had more punts than first down the first half. They had more punts than first downs the entire game. This view of Sean McVay being gunshot and like a deer in the headlights like, “What is going on here?” It tells you one thing. They got away from their game. He went away from calling his game plan. He went away and basically got outcoached by Bill Belichick.

The game came down to one major drive. It was in the second half and it was the Patriots running the same play four to five times in a row. They ran it a little bit different with different emotions, different people. There was a pass to Edelman, a pass to Burkhead, a pass back to Edelman, a pass to Gronk and then they ran it in with Burkhead. That was the same play over and over. A lot of their stuff didn’t work for the Patriots either. They punt a lot of times and stuff like that was not the most inspiring offensive output for 13-3. The thing you got to keep in mind, Coach of the Year was outcoached by Bill Belichick who sticks to his basics. The thing I want you to think about is are you getting outcoached?

I talk to people all day long. I talk to people via Facebook or via text messages or people will call me or I’ll jump on a webinar with somebody. I see what a lot of people go to. I am amazed that people are getting outcoached. This is not a question. It’s a reality. People are jumping on planes, they’re going all across the country, but they’re not pulling the trigger on stuff. I want you to be honest with yourself because that’s the only way we will achieve greater results. It’s the only way I want these calls to go is for you to be honest with yourselves. The reason I say this is because I’m honest with myself. What real estate investment events are you attending? Are you going to your local Meetup group? Is it a note focus group? It’s general stuff. It doesn’t matter. What real estate events are you attending? Here in Austin, I don’t go to a local Meetup group. We started one for podcasting here for us, one night a month because it needed one during the week. I don’t really go there, but we have free real estate clubs too that are small. Phil and Shenoah Grove had the Austin one, which is basically focused on them. It’s not anything to do with notes so it doesn’t help me to attend.

What’s Your Focus?

I talked to this great couple about multifamily deals and they dropped $30,000 or $40,000 on multifamily coaches and trying to buy stuff here in Austin and San Antonio. I had to chuckle with them. I’ve seen people pay for $20,000 in coaching to fill out business cards for other people. There’s that whole debacle with the Armando Montelongo. I saw him in the lounge down in the Bahamas as we were getting ready to fly out. He was sitting there with somebody else and I was cracking back then, “How many people pay for him to coach them that wasn’t good?” We’ve all paid for coaching. We’ve all paid for workshops. We’ve all paid for things. What’s your focus? Many people are off doing things that aren’t in their focus. It’s outside of your strike zone. They’re swinging away things over their head. They’re doing stupid plays that have no outcome. It’s not going to help them. Why? It’s because they want to listen to somebody. It’s not anything where they’re focused. The number one thing that you have to ask yourself, “What are you looking to accomplish long-term? What are you looking to accomplish in your note business?”

This is going to determine how you call your game. How you are calling your game is going to determine your outcome. If you aren’t in stride with what you want to do, I’ll give an example. If you’re not a running team, you shouldn’t be calling pass plays all the time like the Baltimore Ravens. They figured out they got a quarterback that’s got a weird chicken wing, Lamar Jackson who’s a great running quarterback. They changed their whole offense up, got rid of Flacco, put him on the bench and started running the ball. They won seven out of eight games. They stuck to their game plan because they were looking to accomplish. The thing I have to ask you because I see a lot of this as well too. This is frustrating not just for me, but a lot of people out there as well.

Are you a tryer but never a finisher? “I’m going to try something but I’m never going to finish it. I’m only going to give it a try. I got paid for something to learn about this advanced strategy, but I never get around to finishing it.” A lot of people, that’s how we scratch our itch. I saw this for years when I was traveling all around the Grand Circuit as a mortgage broker with Bob and Jamie. I’d see all these people sign up for this coaching program or his Masters of Real Estate program and go from workshop to workshop, but never finish anything. “I’d send out a mail campaign but I would never make the phone calls back because I was too busy going to another workshop.” You can’t do that. What happens is most investors are chasing their own tail. If you’re one of those, it’s okay. “I’m chasing my own tail. I feel like I’m running in circles. I feel like I got a migraine because I’m still stuck in where I am and I don’t know where to go.” A confused mind is no mind. It’s one of the basic things they teach you in sales. If you’re confusing your clients or potential clients, they’re going to tell you no out of confusion. A lot of us are confused in your brains. What is your focus? What are you looking to accomplish in the year?

The first thing you need to look at first and foremost is who are you listening to? If you’ve got a confused mind, let’s break it down. A couple of years ago, I had a big a-ha moment I’m going to share with you. It’s Grant Cardone’s 10X. He had a big conference. All these people were like, “It was great.” I’m like, “Really? Okay. Fine.” Are you listening to Gary Vaynerchuk? Gary Vaynerchuk has been an idol of mine for years. Are you listening to me? Are you listening to other note gurus? Are you out there not only listening to me and other note gurus but also going out and listening to other real estate investor educators? Are you listening to wholesalers trying to be a wholesaler? Are you trying to be a fix and flipper or a landlord or trying to be multifamily? The thing that I want to get to is if you answered yes to more than two of these, you are confusing your own self.

A few years ago, I was an avid listener to Gary Vaynerchuk. It was one of the things I would come into the morning. I make sure I was here so I can listen to #AskGaryVee. I would listen to it over and by the time I’m like, “I already lost an hour or two hours listening to Gary Vee rant. I can’t do this anymore. I’m losing time because I’m listening to this guy. What he’s saying is great, but he’s repeating the same stuff over and over again.” I started looking at who will I listen to. I would listen to Grant Cardone and I’m like, “I can’t listen to this guy anymore.” If you love him, more power to you. That guy is full of it, it’s not funny.

 

Gary Vaynerchuk, he’s still my idol. I’ve spoken at a couple of stages with him. He’s a great guy. I don’t listen to him all the time. I agree with his messages but he’s over the top. That Scott Carson guy, he’s got a lot of stuff at work too. I don’t listen to other note gurus. It’s nice to listen occasionally to a thing like Grant Kemp and Eddie Speed about the Texas 100. I was in town when Mitch Stephen spoke. I’m not running out other real estate investor educators. I’m not going out to Ron LeGrand events. I’m not going to Distressed Mortgage Expo. I’m not going to the NoteWorthy Investors Summit. I’m not going to IMN. If you’re brand new, it’s not bad to go every once a while. Honestly, if you’re going to these things over, you’re constantly going to different events, constantly going to different things, you’re confusing your own brain. You’re diluting, watering down your focus and that’s a problem.

If you don’t like Scott Carson, that’s fine. I’m glad. Unsubscribe, be gone. If you want to focus on apartment investing or you want to focus on being a landlord, that’s totally fine. I will give you some great names to talk to. What you have to realize is look at your schedule. What are you focusing on? What’s coming into the ears, into the eyes? That’s what’s programming you. What you listen to, what your eyes take in and what you breathe in, what you’re digesting eventually becomes a part of you. If you’re running all over the place trying to do a multitude of things, you’re not going to have any success because you’re not going to be focused on any of it. You’re going to be drifting.

You have to learn to remove the distractions and unsubscribe is what I did. Gary Vee, I love you but I’m unsubscribing. I’m unfollowing you. Grant Cardone, I’m unsubscribing. You have to eliminate the noise. Somebody that runs a national investment thing, they have different conferences across the country. They’ve been wanting to begin with and they reached out, “We’d love to have you back.” I’m like, “No, it’s a distraction. Your events aren’t what we’re looking to do.” I had to eliminate the noise and eliminate the distractions. You all have to do that.

80/20 Pareto Principle

The thing that you have to focus on is you’ve got to focus on something and give it 100% of your attention. You’ve heard the 80/20 Pareto Principle where 80% of your income comes from 20% of your focus. If you were to focus on one thing and one thing only, you would have four to five times the amount of success because you were focused. You have to quit signing up for education. I love Walter Wofford. I love Quincy Long. Those are great stuff but I’m cracking up. There are some people that probably flew down to their event. I’m like, “How many deals have you closed on?” They’re not the only ones. They seem like flying all over the country going to note events and I’m like, “How many deals are you going to make a bid on? None?” Are you a note investor versus just a glorified student? At some point, you’ve got to deliver.

At some point, you’ve got to close deals. You’ve got to quit adding tools to your tool belt. Many people are brainwashed like, “I want to add another tool to my tool belt.” Why? I talk to investors all the time, “We want to add tools to our tool belt.” When are you going to use that tool? Why are you wasting the weekend? Why are you taking that time from your marketing, your capital, raising your focus to add another tool to your tool belt? We all think of education, to begin with, because you don’t know what you don’t know. I understand that. Many people out there aren’t calling their own game because they’re too busy showing up to somebody else’s game.

They’re too busy focused on other stuff versus focusing on their stuff. You got to quit being an educated idiot. I see people all the time. I’ve had people come to my office, “I signed up for this coaching program and they didn’t give me what I wanted.” I’m like, “What did you do?” They said, “I didn’t do any of it.” I’m like, “That’s your fault. It’s not the bad educator or the bad coaching. It’s because you failed to follow through.” I’ve had people reach out to me religiously like, “I got a problem.” I’m like, “Did you watch the videos?” They’re like, “I haven’t watched the videos.” I’m like, “Quit asking me questions and quit trying to jump to Z. You’ve got to go through A, B, C. It’s not Z, then Y, then C. It’s A, B, C you’ve got to listen to. You’ve got to go through that first.”

You’ve got to quit wasting your time with stupid stuff. We all struggle with this even myself. I only say this because I called myself on this. I was like, “I’m spending way too much time on this other stuff. I need to focus more on this. I need to get my focus back on some more deals.” Sixty-four bids out the door. Sixty-four bids accepted or countered and working through due diligence. I’m not saying 64 or something. Maybe you want to buy five. Maybe you want to buy ten. I’m going to tell people don’t buy my stuff. If you’re not focused on notes 100%, I would rather you hit the unsubscribe button. I would rather you hit log off and go enjoy your time with your family. Unsubscribe from my emails.

If you’re getting a text message reminder for Note Night In America, but you’re not going to pull the trigger, you’re not going to be 100% focused. I’m not talking if you’ve got a full-time job like the Wolf Man, Jeffrey Wolfe. He makes a big chunk of his money doing it with his prints and his artwork. That’s his focus and he has done that for years. His notes hustle is a side hustle. There’s nothing wrong with having a side hustle. You’ve got a full-time job that pays the bills and done for years. You’ve got some passion. Ron Lambert still works full-time and loves his job. His notes are a side hustle.

Quit Chasing Your Tail

I’m talking about the people out there that want to be full-time real estate investors. Quit chasing your tail. Quit running around trying to be an educator, trying to go to everything. Quit wasting your time with stupid stuff and focus on something that you want to do. Quit drifting. This business is all about basics. You talk about football. Football comes down to two things: blocking and tackling. Not who’s going to throw the best pass or who’s going to be the best runner or who’s going to execute the onside kick or the Philly Special or the Play of the Year. It’s all about the best blockers and tacklers. That’s the game of football. That’s the game of life. What’s blocking and tackling the note business? It’s breaking down the simplest of things.

If you’re more worried about how to try to structure your IRAs you’re going to pay tax on but you’ve not closed on twenty deals, you’re wasting time. If you’re a project guy but don’t want to fall through anything then quit being a project guy or hire somebody to be a business guy. You can’t delegate the learning of specific things to others. I’ll give an example like, “I’m going to have them take notes for me.” I’m like, “Who’s the one that’s going to be looking at the assets?” They’re like, “I am.” I’m like, “Do you think you should know this stuff or you should start looking at?” I’m not joking. I’ve had ten people reach out to me. I counted it up and my text messages and my emails. Ten different people have been calling me about advice about a deal and I’m like, “What’s the price of the deal?” They’re like, “We don’t know.” I’m like, “Why are we wasting our time? What’s the price of the asset? What’s the offer that the seller is looking for?”

Outsource

If I was going to take a class and I was brand new, I want to try to learn something to implement it within 24 to 72 hours. If it wasn’t going to help me in my existing business, my bread and butter, it was going to be a bigger distraction. I wouldn’t waste my time with it. I turn down things all the time. I turn down speaking gigs all the time because I need to be focused. I need to have 100% of my focus going in one direction. I’m going to outsource that to somebody. If you don’t know what you’re talking about, you can’t outsource it to somebody. This is one thing with virtual assistants, people are like, “That virtual assistant was horrible.” I’m like, “Why were they horrible?” They’re like, “They didn’t come through when I trained them.” I said, “How much time did you spend training them? Did you tell them that they didn’t do a good job or did you spend more time training them?” You’ve got to spend time with people. You’ve got to spend time training people. If you don’t spend the time training them, they don’t have ESP. They don’t know exactly what you’re thinking.

 

When I spend time with Shannon or Hazel or other people or Stephanie, I spend time with them like, “Here’s exactly what I’m looking for. Here’s what I’m doing. It looks great but let’s tweak this a little bit.” A lot of times, I got to show them exactly the first time around to do it. If you’re not going to take the time to do that and you’re not going to take the time to understand what you’re trying to teach, it’s hard to outsource. I know a lot of people are outsourcing their social media marketing or things like that. You still have to dictate like, “Here’s how often I want you to post. Here’s what I’d like for you to be focused on and go that route.” A lot of people want to do it the cheapest and that doesn’t work.

Block And Tackle

Everybody out there, are you working on your blocking, tackling? This is a skill every day we do and when I was in football. The same thing if you’re a basketball player. You think about the great teams of UCLA back in the day. Coach Wooden, they had the same drills they did every day. Same drills to practice every day. The games were the same way. That’s what it comes down to. What are you blocking and tackling? Are you working on due diligence? Are you working on raising capital or raising on marketing? Those are your basic things. Contacting banks is a blocking and tackling thing. It’s basic. That’s where the notes are, not from a wholesaler. You’re contacting banks whether you’re doing it one of a variety of ways. It’s blocking and tackling drill. It’s a nuts-and-bolts-based business.

Are you raising private capital? Are you talking to investors? Are you networking? I know that’s going to real estate clubs trying to find stuff. If you’re going there with a purpose in mind to meet investors, that’s great. Are you going where investors hang out? Are you getting in tapes and breaking down and buying assets? Are you breaking down and making offers? I should put making offers, but I see people getting tapes in. They don’t make it or make an offer or they make an offer and they run screaming to the hills to get away from it because they don’t want to deal with it.

Rinse And Repeat

Another thing that’s important is this business is doing the same things over and over, rinse and repeat. I’m marketing on a regular basis and breaking down assets on a regular basis. I’m working through these assets. It’s the same old thing. It’s not the most exciting of things sometimes, but it’s a lot of the same things over and over again. I see many people that are off like, “I’ve got to itch that itch. I’ve got to chase under squirrel.” I’m like, “If you’re chasing that squirrel two miles down the road, what’s happening to the cows here at home and this other squirrel you were chasing a minute ago?” Remember the Russian proverb says, “The man who chases two rabbits catches neither.”

Offer Deals

What I’m trying to get at is I want you to start thinking about the stuff you’re doing on a regular basis, the blocking and tackling. What are you doing? Are you constantly doing a lot of other things? Are you sitting here scared? You have to ask yourself this too. You’ve got to be honest with yourself because I do this on a regular basis. How many offers did I make in 2018? Think to yourself. If you’re brand new, don’t worry about 2018. How many offers did you make or did I make in 2018? I made several hundred bids. That’s my business. What’s your business? How many deals did you close in 2018? I only say this because you have to look at that. How many deals did you close is going to be directly proportional to how many deals you made offers on? If you didn’t make a lot of offers, you sure didn’t close a lot of deals. I had somebody like, “I’m all excited about this deal and closing and brokering this deal.” I’m like, “How much are you going to make on them?” They’re like, “I’m not going to make anything.” I’m like, “Why are you wasting your time?”

They’re like, “I’m doing it for the expertise of helping.” I’m like, “No offense, screw that. Why are you wasting time advertising that as a great deal, but you’re not making any money? All you did was set yourself back. All you do was waste your time. How many deals did you close last year?” They’re like, “I only closed three.” I’m like, “You’ve been a student for a couple of years. You’re all over the place. What’s wrong with those three?” They’re like, “I overpaid and did the right due diligence.” I’m like, “You make your focus on that versus going out trying to broker something for somebody and not make any money.”

The thing I want you to think about here is you look at, “Was my goal just to close on three deals?” If that was your goal or four deals or whatever, kudos. If that wasn’t your goal to close, I’m going to go a big offer because you need offer deals. You have to think about what’s your goal for the year. What’s your goal for the year and are you doing the same things that you did the previous year? If your goal is to lose 50 pounds, are you going to the gym? “No, I’m going to stay at home and starve myself.” That’s not going to help you lose weight. It’s only going to make you sick. Are you walking 30 minutes a day? Are you eating healthy foods? You think about this main goal. I want to speak more. Are you reaching out to people that have events or are you out speaking on podcasts? I need to raise more capital. Are you talking to any people? Are you going out where the wealthy are? Are you going to events where there’s going to be wealthy at, not a waste of time?

Somebody asked me about the IMN Convention. I’m like, “Go to it if you want. If you get the list of people that are there, they tell you who’s with whom.” Pick up the phone and start dialing for dollars. Don’t waste your time with $1,500, $1,600 to go basically watch panels all day. Honestly, IMN is the biggest crock of garbage when it comes to note investing, although there are some high-level people there. Those high-level other people are going to deal with people that are trying to buy their first, second, third, fourth, fifth or tenth asset. You, the small guy, are paying $1,600 for people to show up and spend ten minutes on a panel. You don’t learn anything by a panel of three or four people speaking for ten minutes. That’s a waste of time. That’s what I look at it in an event. When I look at an event, who’s speaking and what is it? It’s all panels. It’s not worth my time. I could spend time at home. I could watch a video online of somebody, a webinar, a recorded thing and get more content out of that than a ten-minute panel session.

You’ve got to realize what are you doing differently to achieve different results? A great example is I cut out basically about speaking in other people’s platforms unless it was someplace I wanted to. I spoke at Mr. Landlord’s platform because there are 150 great quality people, plus it was also in the Bahamas. I’m not speaking at most of the note events because it’s not worth my time. It’s not saying it’s not worth my time to meet with you, but you already know me. Those in our audience know me. When I could spend time at home and I could do a webinar, I get 200, 300, 400, 1,000 people. That’s valuable and you have to look at your time. If you lose a day traveling, that’s the thing I’m looking at. It’s a day to travel and I’m away from the office for a few days. I got to get back to the office. A lot of you do not have a team. A lot of that $2,000, $3,000 you’re spending on travel, airfare, food. That adds up to a lot. You’re burning through your savings. You’re burning through your funds. Is that an effective way for you to achieve different results?

Get Out And Talk To People

If it’s in your backyard, that’s different. It gives you the opportunity to be home, but if you’re going to fly all the way across the country, you better be sure you get something out of that event. You can’t be a wallflower. You’ve got to get out and talk to people. You’ve got to go up, shake some hands and talk to some vendors. You’ve got to do that stuff if that makes sense for you. You’ve got to make sure, “What am I going to learn this weekend?” and then implement it. If you’re not going to implement something, then it’s a waste of time. If you’re doing the same stuff you were doing last time, you’re not going to have different results by not doing the same things. You’ve got to do things differently. You’ve got to start blocking and tackling, putting the basics in place versus trying these Hail Mary things and make things. We don’t want to eat garbage. We sure don’t want garbage out there. We all agree to that. We want great results. We don’t want garbage results. You’ve got to look at what you did. Did it work? If it didn’t work, you’ve got to change something.

I talk to people and many people are like, “I’m still doing it.” The question I ask is, “What’s holding you back?” I get sick and tired of people asking me the same questions three, four, five, six times and they want a different answer. If I gave you an answer, it is what it is. It’s not going to change or people asking me questions. I get this all the time too. They ask me some generic question, I’m like, “It depends. What’s the asset? Where’s it at? Has foreclosure started? What’re the numbers behind it?” I get tired. When I ask a question and I don’t get a direct answer, “That’s great, but that’s not what I asked you.” Answer the question. What’s holding you back? Is it lack of deals? Go make some more offers. Get out and market more. What’s holding you back? Is it a lack of funding? Get out and send some more emails to your database. Talk about some case studies that others have done. There are many ways to raise capital. Go to Quest Trust event. Email out to IRA investors with postcards as we do.

 

Lack of marketing, “I don’t know how to market.” Do you know why you don’t know how to do it? It’s because you haven’t tried it. You can’t teach marketing to somebody who have never done it before. Get out there. Do you know how you get better at marketing? By doing it and failing. Send an email out to your database. Practice it. Do a YouTube video and upload it, “I can’t do it.” Yeah, you can. One of the great things we do at Fast Track is we had several people get in front of their camera and I held it. They did the videos. I have students of all ages from young to seasoned, they’re doing videos and there’s no excuse for you not to do a video, or do you have a lack of faith? Do you have a lack of faith in your business, in your abilities?

Your marketing is going to suck at first. You have to understand that. When I talk to them and they can’t look me in the eye, they’re constantly looking around. It’s not the lack of faith in what they’re doing. It’s a lack of faith in themselves. Besides the lack of faith is probably because you have a lack of game plan. You don’t know where to be in because you’re inundated with all these crazy messages, all these different things that are being mean to you. They’re confusing you, “Should I make offer off of ARV?” which I see people do. “I need to make an offer at 75% on the dollar.” I’m like, “Why are you making an offer on that high?” Walk away. Why are you running around there trying to get shot? Is it a lack of focus? “I’m trying to do everything. I want to be a jack of all trades.”

Know Where You’re Going And Where You Want To Be

The thing is lack of deals, lack of funding, lack of marketing, lack of faith, lack of game plan, lack of focus. You have to have some focus to get where you want to be. You have to know where you’re going and the types of deals you are going to be doing so you can raise capital. You need to know where you’re going so you can share your marketing plan. If you don’t have any faith in your own business to do some of the things I’m going to tell you to do, you should probably go ahead and keep working or go find something else. If you have your own money, buy a couple of things, but you probably are not going to be buying stuff on a regular basis. I want you to pull out a sheet of paper or a notepad or something next to you. I want you to write one thing down. What’s that one thing that you want to accomplish? I want to make $100,000. I want to make $250,000. First thing I’m going to ask you if you want to make $250,000, have you made $100,000 before. If you’ve never made $100,000 before, then we got to start with $100,000. I want to close on 100 deals. Have you closed on one? I want to put a fund together. Have you raised $1 million in product capital before? No? Then don’t put a fund together.

Let’s talk about it. What do you want to accomplish? A number of deals or dollar amount of profits, that’s usually what it comes down to. Those two things lead and feed everything else. The number deals, the dollar amount of profits. It’s going to be one of those two things for the most part. It’s all going to be generated by that. “I want to retire my wife.” What’s that going to take? Is that $60,000 on average? “I want to leave my job.” What do you need to make? It all comes down to dollar profits or the number of deals. The next question is what are you doing to make this happen? That comes down to how many hours a week you are focused on this thing.

I don’t want what people say, “I’m a real estate investor.” I’m like, “How many hours a week are you focused on your note business?” They’re like, “I go to my real estate investing club. I’m a realtor. I’m also a mobile notary running around.” I’m like, “It’s not what I said. If you’re going to your realtor training, that’s not being focused on the real estate investor. That’s your job.” They’re like, “I’m going to go get trained on NLP law and stuff.” I’m like, “That’s not on your note business.” They’re like, “I’m going to learn all of these great strategies from Walter Wofford.” I’m like, “I love Walter but that’s not your business.” No offense, Walter’s great in Jackson, Mississippi. They got some cheap deals there. A lot of those strategies are not going to work in Austin, Texas. They’re not going to work in Detroit, Michigan. They’re not going to work in Lubbock, Ohio, Florida, wherever you’re at.

You’ve got to know what your market is all about. How many hours a week are you focused? Let’s be honest with yourself. I’ve got some accounting friends they’re slammed the first quarter of the year. Their focus is their accounting business. They focus on the real estate stuff the second half of the year. How many hours a week are you focused on what you want to get? If you’re focused, how many hours are you marketing and bidding on a deal? By marketing, that means reaching out to the asset managers and sending an email out to your database. You don’t have to have a lot of hours.

Cody Cox spends several hours a week on his business because he’s busy with his full-time thing. You’ve got to be honest. How many hours are you marketing and bidding on deals? Are you wasting your time with stupid stuff? You have to be realistic with yourself. Look at your time. Look at your schedule. What are you doing in the downtime? If you’ve got a job, that comes first. That’s your 40 hours, 50 hours. If you want to get away, you’ve got to spend some time in your off hours from work to do it. That doesn’t mean doing a live. Let’s talk about the focus on some things. There are some things too that you don’t need to spend a lot of time depending on what your focus is, what your game plan is if you’re calling your game. For example, if you want REOs like, “I want to buy REOs,” go somewhere else. If you want to be a fix and flipper, this is not the show for you. We’ll see you later. Go somewhere else. Don’t waste your time here.

If you wanted REOs, this is not what you’re looking for. You’re going to be chasing ugly properties. You’re not going to find that beautiful REO that you’re getting a discount. It doesn’t exist these days and you don’t want to be in the fix and flip. If you want rentals, we’ve got some landlords looking for cashflow long-term. I would go after the contract for deeds. Why? Easy to evict, cancel those out and you’ve got somebody living in them. You can rinse and repeat a little bit. I would focus on CFDs, especially in the shorter foreclosure or shorter eviction states. I’m trying to help you with your game plan. I’m trying to give you a little bit of focus on where you want to be.

Let’s talk about funding sources. If you want performing notes on your portfolio, I’d be focusing on occupied assets, which aren’t going to be turning to REOs. They’re going to turn to cashflow. If you’re using your own funds and you want to make a 10% to 15% ROI on your money, focus on performing notes. If that’s what you call success. If that’s what you believe, 10% to 15%, and don’t be greedy. You’re going to use your own funds. You’re not going to go out and market, that’s totally fine. Focus on performing. You’ll be a lot happier. If you want to close on some bigger deals because at some point you’re probably going to be in this business and you’re going to see some deals. If you only use your own funds, you’re going to be out of money.

Second point, if you focus on BK Chapter 13 loans, those are performing. You pay a little bit more for those, but it should still be a good yield. Start marketing so you don’t miss deals. What happens when people have their own money and they don’t market? They get the leftover stuff. They’re dependent on guys like me or other people out there to provide them lists. When they run out of money, they’ll wait around oftentimes. They won’t go out and market, “I can’t do that because I got my money tied up in that.” That’s 10% to 15% of your money, that’s good. Rule of 72, your money will probably double every few years.

If you don’t have your own funds and you’re going to be using other people’s money, here’s what I would focus on. Focus on NPNs, nonperforming notes or nonperforming CFDs. We often get those at a cheaper price, which is going to return in a higher return and it allows you to split that with your funding partners. You can get cheap returns. Somebody asked, “What does a good return do to offer up to an investor’s money sitting there?” I’d say 6%. They’re like, “12%, 15%.” I’m like, no. If someone’s got money sitting there, have they not done anything in the last few months? 6% is phenomenal. 8% is phenomenal. You can find some performing notes if you’ve got cheap money, if you’ve marketed, but you’re going to have to start marketing. The whole arbitrage thing and breaking down a deal with my WCN Crew membership. People loved it.

 

You can still keep looking for deals. The thing is you’ve got to have some focus. If you’re looking for cashflow, you want to go find some nonperforming notes or occupied, rent rates are higher. I’ve gone through this. You can go watch the $250,000 in 2019 video that’s out there on my YouTube and Vimeo channel. I’ve redone it almost every year. If you’re scared, here are some questions you have to ask yourself and I want you to be honest. If you’re scared to send an email out to your database monthly, does that hit you? Say yes. Write on your piece of paper. Are you scared to post to Facebook about your note business? Write yes. Are you scared to make an offer on an asset? Say yes. Are you scared to talk about funding because you need to prove the concept? Say yes. Do you bounce from one person’s training to another’s training? Say yes. Would you rather take a job? These questions, if you’re saying yes to these, do us both a favor and unsubscribe. I don’t mean that harshly. I mean it in a straightforward, direct to the point, no BS thing.

If you’re scared to send an email out to your database monthly, you probably should not be in real estate. You should probably save your money, invest it in something that’s going to make you 6% to 10% and be gone. If you’re scared to share what you’re doing on Facebook about your note business or on LinkedIn, then this is not for you. You’re being your own boss and calling your own game, this isn’t for you. If you’re scared to make an offering on an asset when there are many ways to leave the deal and walk away from the deal through due diligence, this is not for you. If you need to prove the concept before you raise capital, the concepts have been proven many a time. If you’d rather call up and try to take a job, this is probably not for you. You have so many opportunities in this space. Don’t have faith in everybody because the people that have been around for a while haven’t done anything. I don’t believe you’re going to do anything anyway. There are plenty of people that I have faith in because they’ve gone out, they’re doing it and they’re embracing the suck. They’re going forward. They’re making things happen.

Eliminate Time Wasters In Your Schedule

If you’re brand new, I’m not talking about you. I’m talking about the people that are sitting there running around from event to event. They’re professional time wasters. The time has come that you either have got to get off. You’ve got to take action and do something or you’ve got to go somewhere else. I don’t have faith for you and I do not have time for those that are going to be time wasters. I do not have time and neither should anybody in our audience have time for anybody who’s not going to take the action. You have to eliminate the time wasters in your schedule and nobody’s going to value your time until you start valuing it yourself. I’m always glad to help those out that need some help like, “I’ve got a question.” I’m like, “Let’s talk. Pick up the phone. Deals are great. I will always talk with you.”

We have a question, “Where is a viable source of CFDs? Are they not rarely advertised or referred to occasionally?” There are plenty of companies out there that have CFDs available or some sources. I don’t give those names out. My coaching students get those but there are plenty of CFD, contract for deeds. If you’ve googled contract for deed, you’ll probably be able to find some of the bigger companies out there. If you’re going to be in a game plan, you’re going to be doing something. Here are the numbers you’ve got to look at. This is not complicated. This is simple blocking and tackling. The first one, you’ve got to realize that most people have a 10% closing ratio when they start. You make ten offers, you might get one accepted that you close on. If you’re not making ten offers to get one, if you need to close ten deals that means you need to make 100 offers.

It’s a true story. That’s the law of the land. You might get to 30%, 40%. Orange numbers are running a little bit higher than that. There’s another thing, people would rather fund a deal and not a concept. The first of those out there that are running around like, “I need to raise capital before making any offers,” you’re wasting your time. Sal Buscemi talks about, “Commercial deals you need to have funding in place,” most of you aren’t going to be doing commercial deals. Most of you think you’re going to be a commercial investor, but you’re not making enough money to put food on the table. Residential is where you need to be with. Residential funding, let’s talk about the real deal. Let’s talk about numbers. Let’s talk about what you got. Let’s quit talking about theory. Here’s another truth. Here’s the truth in the numbers. You are going to fail straight up, so get up and do it again.

You are going to screw up and that’s okay. Nobody’s going to come and hold a gun to your head. Nobody’s going to come to take your money. You’re going to fail. Do you know how you solve that? You should get up and do it again. You get up and make more offers. I talked to a guy and he’s like, “I’ve got these three deals I’m upside down with.” I’m like, “Go make some more deals. Focus on all your energy on those three bad deals. Go out and close some more deals so that you can pay off that deal and walk away from it.” Here’s another truth in the numbers. Success is not an overnight process. A lot of people out there are like, “I want success. I want success immediately.” This is work. Work is a four-letter word. It is not going to happen overnight. You have to take action. You’ve got to get up and make offers. You’ve got to get up in marketing. 80% of sales are made after the fifth contact, so expect that.

I made 55 phone calls to banks before I got my first yes back in 2007. I can remember sitting in the office of the 620 not too far from here, about two miles down the road in our mortgage office. I was in one office. My assistant was outside my office. My buddy was in the office next to me. I was talking to myself in front of a mirror before I called. I was nervous. I hung up probably five times before I let it go through. I got my yes at the end of that first day. I had somebody reached out to me, Kim something of Aegis Mortgage out of Houston, Texas. They were going out of business. She was the last employee except for the president of the company. Once she sold the portfolio that they were on, she was out of business. She was not in a good mood. I need you to realize is this is not, “I’m going to make one phone call. I’m going to have it sent to me.” It doesn’t work that way. You’ve got to do numbers.

Let’s talk about where you should be wasting your time and I want you to look at your calendar. Hopefully, you’ve got a calendar up somewhere with things marked on it. Look at your calendar and look at what is your schedule. If you’re working full-time, you’ve got stuff that’s lined up Monday through Fridays, 7:00 to 7:00 or whatever. What did you do daily with your breaks, your lunch hour or your 7:00 PM to 2:00 AM? I’m not saying do it every day, but block out some time to get it done one day, two days a week, 7:00 PM to 2:00 AM. There are many things you can do. Email out to your asset manager, jump in on LinkedIn and connect with them. What did you do on the weekends? You have to look at what you do on the weekends. What’d you do on Saturday and Sundays? Did you put some stuff to work? Did you get done what you couldn’t get done during the week?

If you’ve got goals but you’ve never shared that with your family or friends, they don’t know what your goals are and that’s part of the problem. Share your goals with your family and friends. “Here’s what I want to accomplish, here’s what I want to get done.” Most importantly, besides sharing, you have to take the action behind it. I’ve seen people that were posting deals from a few years ago from a class. They were like, “I never got to those. I was too busy.” Nobody’s too busy to get stuff done. If it’s something that’s a priority, you’ll find the time to get it done.

Formula For Success

The thing is you don’t even know what you want. You don’t know what your focus is, then that’s a problem. That goes back to what do you want to accomplish? Here’s a simple formula for success. It’s stuff that happens all the time. Here’s what you have to do. If you send two emails to asset managers, one on a Tuesday and then the other one on that Thursday, to those who didn’t open it you do it twice a month. Two Tuesdays and two weeks later I sent it to the group. I send it on Tuesday at 11:00 AM. I send it on Tuesday at 3:00. I send it on Thursday at 11:00 AM. I’m going to send it at 3:00 PM and I’m going to send it at 11:00 AM. You swap your time.

That’s four emails that you can write. It’s basically copying the same thing for the most part. That’s the first thing. Know your asset manager, making 50 phone calls per week to asset managers. That’s ten a day or 25 in two days. You’re not going to do it five days a week. It’s a waste of time to Monday and Friday. Don’t do it then. You can knock out twenty phone calls Tuesdays and Thursdays. Twenty-five phone calls, you do that four times a week. Send the first Tuesday your email goes out and you start making phone calls. Start talking to people. That’s talking to 200 people in a month, you can do that. Sending one email out per week to your network and you do that four times, four weeks. It’s not hard to do.

 

You post one thing per day to your larger social network, whether it’s LinkedIn or Twitter or Facebook. I cracked out because I see a lot of people post to the WCN Crew with 900 members there, but they don’t post their own database. I’m like, “Why are you posting this? Our database is all full of 900 note sharks. It doesn’t make sense for you to post it here. You need to be posting that somewhere else. You’re not going to get a deal funded in the WCN Crew. Most people are funding their own deals there.” One post per day, it’s 30 days. It’s not hard to do. You can go with one simple piece of content. All in all, that’s 238 items per month. For 200, it’s 208, 238. That’s eight items per day if you think about it on average.

Your phone calls, your Tuesday, Thursday we will be more stuff but that’s not difficult. It’s roughly eleven items per day if you can do it on the work days. If you get out of this, I guarantee if you make 50 phone calls per week and you do it for a full month and you do it for a second month, you’re going to get tapes sent to you. You’re going to see tapes that come across your board that nobody else sees. If you make ten offers per month, you’re going to get at least one approved. That at times twelve months, that’s twelve assets. If you’ve got twelve assets that end up being performing and are feeding you $500 a month, that’s $6,000 a month in cashflow at the end of the year. That’s $72,000 a year in income off of that.

Nobody’s talking about fixing and flipping, none of that stuff. You can do this. That’s the basic thing. What are you doing? Two emails to asset managers first Tuesday, first on Thursday then you’re sending it in two weeks later. In between that time, you’re making phone calls to asset managers. 50 in the first week, 50 the second week, 50 the third week, 50 the fourth week. That’s 25 on Tuesday, 25 on Thursday. One email on Sunday night or Monday morning to your network, your warm connections. Posting one thing per day to your social network. Some of you have a barren social network. You have to start posting now. Nobody’s going to know you out of the blue unless you start doing something.

You’ve got to start planting those seeds. That’s the game plan. That’s calling your game. It’s not exciting and a lot of people can do this, but the good old thing is there are not a lot of crossovers. I want you to do better. I want you to do more. I don’t do these Monday nights from my own health. I do it to help you. I do it to help you get you some feedback to help you with some things. I encourage you all to do things. I’m not telling you anything that is going to kill you but you’ve got to have a little faith in me that there are a lot of people that are doing this.

They’re having success and continue to have success because they listened to me and vice versa. We keep doing this. We send emails out to asset managers. I may not make any phone calls. I don’t need to because I have a big enough database. I still email out to my database, to my network all the time. We post regularly to social networks. You can go out and have success if you do the simple things. Blocking and tackling is not the sexiest thing. We want to catch that long bomb or we want to break a tackle that went from 100 yards. You’ve got to realize everybody you have to do this. We all got to face what’s going to pay the bills. What’s paying the bills? Focus on that.

I only tell you the things that I do. I get sidetracked as anybody else does. There are days that go by. Now was a hectic day. I got in here. I filmed a quick episode fast. That’s my marketing every day. I had a conference call with somebody fast. I was a guest on somebody’s show that ran a little bit long. We were on the Quest Trust thing. Between my hour workout, I ran home fast, shower, change, came up here, jumped on something. A goal of mine is beyond 100 podcasts as a guest. We’re knocking those out. I’m working through due diligence.

We’re hiring an acquisitions guy or gal. I have some interviews lined up for people to bring them on because we want to do some bigger things. I got 64 bids I spent on. 64 bids under contract I’m working through. I control a tape, performing assets that we’re working through. If you have some money and want to put it to work, I got some performing deals for you. I can put you in. You’re not going to make 12%, but you’ll make an above average return. If you’re interested, drop me an email. We can talk about it. Seriously, we’re here to help you.

If you’ve not taken my workshop, do this. Sign up for it on WeCloseNotes.com under Training. Our next one is not going to be until the first weekend of May 2019. A few months will be the next Virtual Workshop. March is basically busy the entire month. April’s okay but we’re going to have the Mastermind. You have the tools. That’s the thing. you have to start taking action. You want to do something different, take action and be different to receive different results. Thank you so much. If you could do me a favor, go out there and leave a review. Let me know. I’d love to hear from you. It’s a big goal to get the reviews up on that as well. We’re here to help any way we can. Otherwise, go out and make something happen. We’ll see you at the top.

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