← Real Estate Investing School Podcast
Real Estate Investing School Podcast
230. REAL DEAL: Breaking Down Cam's $150K Payday
00:33:20
Welcome to the Real Estate Investing School Podcast! Have you ever heard of someone making $150,000 on a single deal and thought, “How do they do that?” Well, this episode is all about breaking down exactly how it’s done. We’re sitting...
Loading summary
Transcript66 lines
- [00:00]
Brody Fawcett
What's up, guys? Welcome back to another Real Deal episode. I'm Brody Fawcett, your host, and I'm stoked for today. We have Cam Bam in the house. Cameron actually lives on Maui right now, and we became friends from him moving out here hanging out. And for them, it was going to be part time, and now it's sounds like it's going to be a lifelong thing.
- [00:23]
Cameron Cathcart
I don't know.
- [00:23]
Brody Fawcett
How long are you guys here for?
- [00:25]
Cameron Cathcart
We're going to be neighbors. I mean, for the foreseeable future. Getting our daughter in kindergarten here. So we'll be here for a while.
- [00:36]
Brody Fawcett
How many people told you when you came out here and you said, oh, I'm only coming out for a few months? And they're like, yeah, you're gonna stay a lot longer than that.
- [00:45]
Cameron Cathcart
Everybody. And we kind of knew that when we started. Like, we knew that we were gonna fall in love with it. But I also, there's the select few people that are like, you know, you get on there, get on the island, and then you have island fever. And yeah, like, I can never get tired of waking up and looking at the ocean. Like, this morning I went on a run along the beach and then had coffee at a coffee shop overlooking the ocean. Like, you can't get tired of that.
- [01:10]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, I don't think 100, dude. Yeah, I haven't. I haven't even gotten close to the island fever stuff that everyone talks about. I'm like, if anything, there's so much to do and I just. I haven't like, been able to explore the island enough. That's the problem.
- [01:24]
Cameron Cathcart
That's what we feel like we have. There's so many things we haven't done yet, and there's so many hobbies that I want to pick up. Like, I want to get really good at surfing. I want to start canoeing. Like, indar and indoors got me into that. Like, I want to start doing that. There's so many hobbies. I want to start spear fishing. Like, I could be here forever and not. Not do everything, dude, it's.
- [01:48]
Brody Fawcett
It's so fun. It's. It's just a different vibe. But now the reason I asked that is because everyone said the exact same thing to me. We're like, yeah, we're just going out for. For six months. And they're like, yeah, right? And I'm like, no, like legit. Only six months. And I don't know how long it's been now, but it's been past six. Six months. We passed that mark. We're still here, but, dude, I'm forever. I'm excited to jam today. You know, I'm hanging out a little later tonight with our, our families. You got kids about the same age as mine, so it's been really fun getting to know you. But, dude, you, you have a really cool story. We don't have time to dive into all of it, but you've only been investing for about three years now. You and your wife, you kind of are a tag team. And some cool things with what you've done so far is you've done over 350 transactions worth about a hundred plus million dollars of deals that you've done. Now you don't own all of that, but you do own about $10 million worth of real estate.
- [02:48]
Cameron Cathcart
It's a sexy number though. So we don't. It's a sexy number to say we don't know. A lot of that has been wholesale deals. So it's honestly just flipping paper where, you know, I buy a $200,000 house, I wholesale for $230,000. But that goes, you know, I count that as my, like how much I've done in transactions.
- [03:07]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah. So, yeah, absolutely, man. Yeah. And what's cool about what you guys have done though is, is even though you're doing that, a lot of people will do that and they'll just live off of that. And that's kind of like, I mean, I say this all the time, but there's a lot of people with high net worth that live paycheck to paycheck. And how many recovering flippers do we know? They're just like, man, I gotta, I gotta get some like, buying holds. I gotta get some buying holds. And they're flipping a lot of houses, but it's not necessarily putting them ahead aside from they got a good paycheck, but now they have to go back to work tomorrow. And that's what's cool about you and Lexi. What you guys have done is you're actually buying real estate along the way and kind of probably cherry picking the ones that you want to keep. Is that right?
- [03:48]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah, 100%. Like how I word it is flipping and wholesaling gets got us into the industry to where we could exit our full time jobs, but that is our tomorrow money and our buying holds are our forever money. So, you know, we'll keep adding probably, you know, four to five million dollars a year to our rental portfolio. And, you know, I'm young, you know, I think, I think we're the same age. I might be a little. I'm 31. And so, like, if.
- [04:17]
Brody Fawcett
31 tomorrow.
- [04:19]
Cameron Cathcart
31. Yeah. So. But if I keep adding, you know, five. Five million bucks a year to our rental portfolio, by the time I'm 40, we'll have. Not even counting appreciation, we'll have, you know, probably 60. $60 million, you know, that we own. And then you extrapolate that over the next 20 years, that's going to be worth, you know, a couple hundred million and it's going to be paid off. So. Yeah, so that's our. That's our forever money. That's like our legacy money. Once we get there, we can, you know, we already will, but, like, we can take care of, like, our entire families. We can give to organizations that we want to give to. And so that's. That's like our legacy money. And then our flipping and wholesaling does provide a really great income for us to. To. To live off of.
- [05:06]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, dude. No, I love the philosophy there, and I think it's. A lot of people hear that, and it's scary. It's overwhelming. And I think it's important to point out that you've only been doing this three years, and before that, like, you were in a spot. I don't know how much detail, you know, you usually go into, but, like, you weren't. You weren't necessarily crushing it and having all this money. And you didn't know anything about real estate either.
- [05:31]
Cameron Cathcart
Nothing about real estate. I will say, like, the. Where I was at, I still. I was a. I was a pastor, so I was making 40 grand a year. But I still. That was an amazing point in my life because I still had a lot of responsibility. I had multiple employees under me that I was the direct manager of. And so I. Through that, I learned a ton of leadership, you know, abilities. And I was running a. I mean, essentially running a church that had, you know, a thousand people at it, you know, a hundred plus, like, we call them community groups or life groups. And managing all the organizational side of that, and so still had a lot of, I guess, leadership experience, but monetarily was not doing well at all. So.
- [06:18]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah. Cool, man. That's. That's awesome. Yeah. And I. The cool thing about stuff like that is you learn so much, and they're just these different stepping stones and you apply all these things. And like, I did door to our sales for about eight years. And I mean, everything that I learned in that job, from overcoming rejection to, you know, managing teams, recruiting people, and just selling in general, it applies to life and I. I served. Yeah. Like, I. I did the. You know, I served a mission for. For two years for my church and. Same kind of concept, right? You're in these leadership positions and these roles, and you have people looking up to you, and you have responsibility for the first time and, you know, from being a high school kid. And so I love that. Cool, man. I'm glad you brought that up. Just. It's fun pointing that stuff out, because a lot of people think that, oh, $60 million in. In real estate in a couple of years, like, that's impossible. Like, I can't ever get there. It's easy for Cam to say that. It's easy, Brody, to have those conversations, but I'm here, and I'm only making $40,000 a year. And so I just love leveling the playing field to be like, hey, anybody can do that. And you're a great example of that, man.
- [07:31]
Cameron Cathcart
I think, yeah, anybody can do that. And then one of the things that I would say to add on top of that is, like, for. For anybody that's listening is like, the small beginnings. That's, like, where the. The growth comes from is like, if I had not been a pastor and been paycheck to. I mean, I loved. I loved what I did, so I'm not knocking at all. I just wasn't making money. But I would not be where I was today if I didn't every day, like, know, like, hey, this is, you know, I'm. I'm religious, but, like, this is God preparing me for something. I didn't know what that was, but, like, this is God preparing me for something. And because of that, like, the conversations that I was having, the leadership that I was getting, the, like, even the deal that I'm going to talk about today, I probably wouldn't have bought it if it wasn't for the way that I learned how to deal with people in my, you know, as a pastor, like, having, you know, conversations where I had to be empathetic, I had to be understanding. I had to, like, you know, so that's. That was. It was so important to the process of where I'm today. And so I think for a lot of people, like, whatever you're doing, there are. There are parts of it that are. You're growing in that will lead you to something bigger and better at some point.
- [08:39]
Brody Fawcett
Yes, dude, I love it. Speaking my language. You're inspiring the people. Well, dude, let's dive into your deal. The. The purpose of this show, we try and keep it just real raw, straight to the point cut out a lot of the fluff. Like, how do we learn from one deal you did so that someone can go out and build more freedom for their family, kind of like you've done. But give us kind of a quick summary of that deal and then we'll dive into how you found it, how you funded it, and how you forced it.
- [09:08]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah. So quick overview. And it's our, it's our best flip ever. It's. We made, we netted $150,000 on it. So obviously. Want to talk about my best deal ever? You know, but it's our best deal ever. And there's a couple things I love about it. One, we managed, we did the entire. I was back in St. Louis when we bought the house, so I negotiated direct with seller, but we didn't close on it or rehab it till we were here in Maui. So like we did the entire, you know, renovation and like listing it, selling it, negotiating like the inspections and whatnot. We did that all, you know, thousands of miles away, which I think is really cool, that it was our best flip ever. And it was one there. I have not, I did not see it once other than the time that I went there like at the, in the middle of December to purchase it.
- [10:00]
Brody Fawcett
That's cool. Yeah, I love that. Once, once again, like, it just proves all these myths that, you know, hey, my market's bad. Can't do real estate unless you're, you know, overseeing it and watching it and all those things. So talk about how you found it. Let's dive into that.
- [10:18]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah. So it was, it was from a direct mail campaign, but I, I did not do the direct mail campaign. So I've, I've. What I have done in like the St. Louis area is I have became like a, a wholesaler for wholesalers in a sense where there's a lot of wholesalers that they know how to market, but they don't know how to analyze a deal. They don't know how to negotiate with sellers. They don't know how to put together a rehab budget, any of that stuff. And so even like, you know, the 300 plus transactions, a lot of those I have bought from wholesalers and then re wholesaled it. And so this one was, I had a friend who's a little bit newer to real estate and he saw social media posts about how much money you can make in wholesaling. And so he did a direct mail campaign, got this deal. But outside of that, he was like, here's the address. Cameron, you run the lead. And I trust you. You're gonna get me a split was kind of what it was. And so that's how we found it.
- [11:23]
Brody Fawcett
That's awesome. And we could go into. Now we need a full show just on your strategies to find off market deals because you're really, really good at it. But that's one of like your tricks that you have up your sleeve is you're actually training these troops of, of wholesalers to go out and deploy and then they just wholesale them to you basically before anybody else. Which is, which is way cool. And I know you do a lot of stuff with agents too.
- [11:49]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah. And the great thing is like the wholesalers don't even necessarily wholesale them to me. Where I, they, they send me, they give me the lead and then they just trust me to, you know, come up with my max allowable offer and then work in a split for them, you know, and if it's, if my last max level offers 250 and I can only get it for 249, then they trust me to know, like I'm gonna, you know, that's all Cameron could get it for. But if I can get it for 230, they're gonna get a 20 case split, you know, and so it is a cool strategy. It's worked really well for me in the past.
- [12:21]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, that's awesome. That's cool. There's that level of trust. So that's how you found it off market. You put in some work there, which, which personally I love. And you've talked in the past like you'll go find these wholesalers that are struggling or they're newer and you're like, A lot of times I can tell because I'll join a Facebook group and based on the language they use, you know, and you're just like, hey, let me teach you, I'll train you. And, and on the flip side, like also, you know, buy these deals from you type thing.
- [12:49]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah, I would say is like, is somebody that specializes in acquisitions. And for somebody that buys the volume of houses that I buy, my marketing budget is probably lower than just about anybody's that buys the volume that I have. But the, on the flip side, I'm putting in a ton of hours in networking and building relationships, which is what I love to do. So I'm fine with that. But I'm taking, you know, people out to coffee, to lunch, talking on the phone, and I love that. So it's like, what am I best at? What I'm best at is, is building relationships. I'm not Best at, like, coming up with marketing strategies and, you know, the systems behind that. So, yeah, it's cool.
- [13:29]
Brody Fawcett
That's your superpower. No doubt. It's funny, I asked you the other day, I was like, hey, Saturday morning, your boss calls you and says, hey, like, if you can come into work today, I'll pay you, you know, double. But it's also, all your friends are snowboarding. Like, which one are you doing? And you're like, snowboarding?
- [13:48]
Cameron Cathcart
No, it's not even. I'm not even thinking about it.
- [13:51]
Brody Fawcett
Thinking about it. And it's funny because, like, for me, I'm like, ah, like, I'll probably cancel my friends to. To go get ahead in that. It's just so funny. We're all. We're all different, right? But how did you. How did you fund this deal, man?
- [14:04]
Cameron Cathcart
So can I talk for a second about the negotiation of the deal? Because I think that's exciting. And again, it's kind of my superpower. But I bought this deal for much lower than anybody else in the market was she had some other offers, quite a bit higher than me. But what I realized really quickly in the negotiation process was she didn't care about money. She's in her 80s. And what she kept saying was, like, it's going to be so hard to part with this home. Like, this is where I raise my kids. You know, you open up the door and you see, like, from 1963, like, her kids growing up, you know, or three different kids, and, you know, the marks as they're getting taller and taller. And I knew, like, this is this house. Buying this house isn't about money. Buying this house is about honoring this lady's legacy is really what it was. And so we sat down at the dinner table, and she was crying because she knew that she had to get rid of it, but she didn't. She didn't necessarily want to, but she knew that she had to. And she was crying, like, it's just going to be so hard to part with this. And so I negotiated based on that. And I wasn't. You know, it sounds weird. I wasn't taking advantage, like, emotional manipulation or anything like that. It was just. I was. I was showing her why I was probably the best option to sell to. And so I pulled up, you know, my phone. Me and my wife, we flip houses together, we run our business together and explain, like, hey, we're a local family business. The house is probably 20 minutes from where. Where I grew up and lived. And, like, we're a local family business. But I casted a vision for of like you selling this house. This is not like parting with your legacy. You know what, what my wife and I are going to do is we're going to come in and she knew that the house was outdated. We're going to update this house and, and we're going to sell it to somebody that's going to have the exact same experiences as you and your family have had in this house. And so like not only have you built this legacy here at your house with your family, but you get to be a part in somebody else's legacy. And so, and it was around Christmas time and so she was, she was crying, talking about like she had a tree up, about how like she remembers, you know, in the 60s, her kids sitting in that corner, like celebrating Christmas. And I was like, there's gonna be another family living in this house next year around Christmas time that are gonna be having those exact same experiences and you get to be a part of that. And like selling, selling to us, we're going to make sure that happens. Like we do amazing rehabs and we're going to find a perfect fit for this house to sell it to that is going to not like steal from your legacy, but you get to be a part of it. And she, she loved, she was so excited to sell to us. She told us, like, I would have sold to you with whatever number you gave me because I was, I was so excited about that. And then when we finished it, we brought her over, had her walk through it and she was crying the whole time. And so, so just excited that, that she sold to us. And so I think that was exciting for me, just the conversations with the seller. And one of the things is like, you know, and I tell this all the time to newer wholesalers is like it very rarely is it about the number. It's about like figuring out what, what does this person want and how do I solve that problem. And what this seller wanted was she wanted this house to go to good hands because she had so much sentimental value wrapped up around the house. It wasn't about the number where she told me, I had a guy who came in who didn't give me the time today. His number was 40 grand higher than mine. But she was like, he came in and he made the offer and didn't talk to me and didn't care to hear my story. And he left. And I sat down at the dinner table with her and had a three hour long conversation about her kids and her family and raising them in this house. And so, um, so I just. I think that's cool and important point to. To. To point out.
- [17:58]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, man, that's awesome. I'm glad you shared all that. That's cool. And I love that you brought her back. That's even. That's. Yeah. That's nice of you guys. Awesome. So how did you. You negotiated, you locked it up. And I think that's cool too, because a lot of times these sellers, they'll. They'll go with you. Not because you're the highest offer. I just helped. I'll tell you who it is after this, this call, but one of my buddies just here on Maui just put a house under contract, and he wasn't the highest. And it gets really competitive here, and it wasn't the highest offer, which you would think is like, oh, that's crazy. But some of the things he did, like he used the listing agent, you know, so she's making double commission. He waived all the contingencies, you know, and even though it was 20, $40,000 lower than the. The next price, like, they felt good about his offer because. Just doing a few different things, you know, so it's not always about the highest offer that. That wins. I think that's a good nugget to kind of point out. So.
- [18:55]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah.
- [18:57]
Brody Fawcett
Cool, dude. So once you got it all, all under contract, what. What. What did you do to fund it?
- [19:03]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah, so we just. Over the course of time, we've built up a really great network of private lenders. And so we use a private lender, we pay him 12%. We've kind of negotiated that where there's no, you know, we're not paying an origination fee or anything like that. We just pay 12% annualized. So on this one, I think we bought it for 240 and then we put about 115 into it. So we were all in right around 350. We held it for three months. So we were paying them three grand a month or so, 3, 500 bucks a month on that. And we, we just paid him at closing his, you know, the, the 350 back, plus an extra, you know, what would it be? 12,000 or whatever it was. So.
- [19:49]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah. Cool, man. That's great. And I mean, that's like. Real estate's all about these win, win, win, win, win scenarios. You know, it's like. And that you've described it perfectly. It's the person that loaned you the money, like it was a win for them. You know, most people listening to this, if they had money Sitting aside, they would probably. Knowing they would get that return in that amount of months, they'd probably be like, yeah, I'm going to put my money there. It's a good return, you know. So it's a win for the lender. It was a win for you guys. Obviously it was a win for the lady that sold it. Like she was so happy. Right. It was a win for the wholesaler that you trained that brought it to you. I'm sure you paid him out, right? How much money did he make?
- [20:28]
Cameron Cathcart
Yes. So I got him a 15k wholesale on the front end. So I think I locked it up at 225 and I bought it for 240 or wrote him a write a consulting fee for 15k because I'm actually locking it up in my name. And then I wrote him a 15k consulting fee. But then, and this is another tactic of like going back to just negotiating with wholesalers because we made so much money on that one. I called him and I was like, hey man, I want to give you an extra 10k on this. And that was not. He, that was not expected. That's not like something like we, it was just, we made 150k on it. And I'm like, you only got 15k, I want to give you an extra 10k. And part of that is strategic in the sense that I, he'll always come to me with a deal, you know, where it's like I'm losing, not losing 10k, but I'm essentially paying 10k for 10 more deals like this. You know, if I can pay 10k and make a million dollars off of that because he, he's bringing me the, the deal every time first, then it's a complete, you know, it's worth it. It's a win for me.
- [21:30]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah.
- [21:31]
Cameron Cathcart
So he made 20 total.
- [21:33]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah. That's awesome. That's so cool. That's nice of you guys. But it's also like you said, strategic in the world. Yeah, but, but I know you guys have good hearts. It, it reminds me of this, this story. This is my first year selling alarm systems door to door and I got home and like, you know, there's like, you get different deductions and you know, all said and done and, and there's like a few things on there. I still made amazing money and I was happy and I was stoked. But I remember one of. One of like the regional managers was down and, and he was like, how, how was your back end check? And was it everything you kind of Expected. I'm like, no, it was great. It was awesome. Like, super worth it. I'm going to do it again next year. Yada, yada, yada. And we just got talking, and he's. I was like, yeah, there's a couple things, but, like, nothing big, you know, he's like, well, what. What were they? And I just kind of started explaining, like, oh, there's probably like this. There's like 50 bucks here. You know, like, as a college kid, all of it, all of it, you know, it made. It made a difference. And this. This here. And then, you know, there was this thing and probably would have maybe hit this pay level. I'm like, but it's. It's fine. Like, it was still good. It was still worth it. And he's like, no. I was like, no, let's add it up. And we sat there and like, you know, and he rounded them up and all these different things, and he wrote me a check right then and there. And it was that. It was his money, you know, not the company's money. It was his money. Obviously, he's making an override from me, but it was like 3800 bucks or something like that. And, dude, I still remember it to this day, because now it's like that. It. That's not that big of a deal to me, but at that time, it was a huge deal. And it's just crazy because he's been my mentor ever since. Like, I. I send, you know, him, people that want to invest in his deals all the time. Like, it's all because of. At that time, it was a big deal for me, and he did something that he didn't have to do. And. And now, like, you know, the thing.
- [23:28]
Cameron Cathcart
Is, like, I guarantee after that happened, like, you would have went to war for that guy. Like, he calls you for anything and you're. You're all in. And that's kind of what I want with the wholesalers is like, hey, I want you guys to trust me and know, like, I'm going to take care of you. And hopefully that's reciprocated. And sometimes it won't be, but, you know, I 100% believe, like, in the long run, doing the right thing and making sure that people are taken care of pays off dividends.
- [23:57]
Brody Fawcett
So. Good, man. Yeah. Hopefully people are taking that, writing that down, applying that. The last kind of piece of this we like to talk about is how you forced it. And I like to point this out because we've already talked about. I want to. You can add to it if there's anything else you want to add to it. But part of forcing is just getting creative. And you've already touched on a few of those things, like how you found the wholesaler, which is why you got the deal in the first place, and how you've kind of trained them up. You touched on, you know, with this lady and you taking the time to understand like what value was to her. You know, it wasn't always dollars, it was something different. You took the time to understand that. Like, to me, that's part of getting creative and kind of forcing the deal and probably one of the main things that made the deal as lucrative as it was. But any other ways that you feel like you, you forced the deal?
- [24:43]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah, no, I think great question. And we did take a risk on this. And so when I originally ran my numbers on it, I, I ran my numbers in the ARV was, was 440. That was my original ARV. And that's probably typical. Like I was expecting to make, you know, about 50k net, you know, so be all in at 350, you know, sell it for 440 after, you know, holding costs, realtor fees and whatnot. We'd probably be around a 50k net. But there was, because all the comps showed 440. And actually my original rehab budget was like 70, 70, 75. There was one comp in the neighborhood though that had sold at 5:50. And it was just so much better than every other house where it's like, you know, in St. Louis you can get away with like, you know, just gray vinyl plank flooring, repo repros, repose, gray walls, you know, white shaker cabinets, and just, you know, the typical like make ready, still nice rehab. But there were, and that's, that's kind of when I ran that 440 comp, that's what I was thinking. But there was that one 550 comp. But it, it had, you know, had obviously been a better rehab than everything else. And so it was nicer cabinets, it was nicer flooring, nicer bathrooms. And so we as a team decided, you know what, we're going to go for this, you know, 500 plus number and we're going to add an extra 40k to our rehab and just do like small things that add a lot like doing taking out a wall, adding an island, putting in a wine cooler. You know, they're really, it's not that much more money. You know, we, I think we added 40k to our, our rehab budget. And I think it added 100 grand of value to the house. And so which it was a risk because I didn't know there was only one comp that sold. Had sold for over 500 plus. And I didn't know if that area really would call for that. And, and we, we did take that risk. And so we forced this value in the house and we ended it for. For 530. We had a 555 offer. But again, going back to. There's only one comp. I didn't know if it would appraise anywhere near that. And the 530 was a cash offer. No contingencies, no appraisal. Right. Or anything like that. So we took a 530 offer cash and closed in 14 days. So I ended up adding 90k worth of. You know, my original ARV was 440. We sold it for 530. So I added 90k worth of value in that.
- [27:18]
Brody Fawcett
That's awesome, dude. Yeah, yeah, it's a great way to get, get creative on it, man. Such a cool, cool deal. Cool story. Like, it's fun talking about, you know, the ones that went really well because there's obviously things that we can pull out of that, you know, to go recreate these good quality deals. So.
- [27:36]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah. And we can do another one of one that didn't go well and everything I did wrong on it. So.
- [27:40]
Brody Fawcett
You have any of those?
- [27:41]
Cameron Cathcart
Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. So fortunately.
- [27:44]
Brody Fawcett
Well, dude. What?
- [27:45]
Cameron Cathcart
Not a ton, but. No, I was going to say fortunately. We've. We've gotten pretty fortunate that we don't have a ton of those, but we definitely have those for sure.
- [27:53]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah. Yeah. Good. No, I think we were doing it. The level you're doing it and the volume you're doing it. There's. You just got to accept there's going to be some that don't go as well. And the good makes up for the bad.
- [28:03]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah.
- [28:04]
Brody Fawcett
Any day of the week.
- [28:05]
Cameron Cathcart
So I think out of, you know, 300 plus deals closing on 350, we've had probably 10 losses. So the, the odds work out. You know, if I. And our biggest loss ever is like 35 grand, which sucked at the time. But at the same time, if, you know, 10 out of 300 plus is not a bad, bad margin.
- [28:28]
Brody Fawcett
No, no, that's not bad at all, dude. Lexi probably just didn't let you go golf for a.
- [28:35]
Cameron Cathcart
Golf.
- [28:36]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, exactly, dude. So what just kind of in closing, wrapping this thing up, what would you say, aside from all the, all the nuggets that you've dropped so far, anything that you learn from this deal that somebody else could learn from, slash somebody else that wants to go replicate this same type of deal. Like any advice you have for them?
- [29:01]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah, I would say just going back to the negotiation with the seller.
- [29:08]
Brody Fawcett
I.
- [29:09]
Cameron Cathcart
Always want it to be a win, win, win situation. So I want to make money on it. I want the wholesaler to make money. I want the owner to feel like they're cared and valued for private money. Lender made money. So it was a win, win, win, win. You know, across the board. The people that bought it, they loved the house, you know, so I feel like everybody won. So there was a part of it in that, like create win, win situations for everybody. If there's a loser in the entire process, that then it's not a deal anymore. Even if I make a lot of money, but the wholesaler feels like they didn't get their spread, or if I make a lot of money but the homeowner feels like they were taken advantage of, then it's not a deal anymore. So creating win, win scenarios, but specifically with the seller, for somebody that is wanting to go out and find a deal, you have to really figure out what's the seller's needs. And sometimes when they're super analytical, their needs are going to be like, hey, I'm just looking for the highest offer. And I tell people, like, if you're looking for the highest offer, that's not me most of the time because I'm an investor. But if you're looking for somebody that you can trust, somebody that is going to do what they say they're going to do, that's going to make this the easiest process you've ever went through. Like, then I am your guy. And so for people that are out there, like, looking for deals, I think that's so important is it's not always the highest offer that wins. It's the person that can solve the problem for the seller, whatever that is. And so in this particular deal, the problem with the seller was she loved this house, had a ton of sentimental value. And I was able to cast this vision of like, hey, you're not like selling your house and done with it. You get to be a part of another family's legacy, you know, moving forward. And so that was the problem with the seller. And I was able to solve that for which she had a much higher offer who was just like, you know, here's the number and I'm out. So I think that's like the nugget that I want people to walk away with is like, there's houses out there all day long that anybody can buy. You just have to be somebody that solves problems.
- [31:15]
Brody Fawcett
Love that, dude. And it's hard to solve a problem if you don't know what the problem is. And the best way to understand the problem is ask questions. Right?
- [31:24]
Cameron Cathcart
Ask questions. And, you know, my goal with every house that I've ever walked is like, I want to sit down at the dinner table. If I can sit down at the dinner table. I, I, I love people. So for me, it does come naturally. With some people, it is a little bit tougher, but I love people. So, like, I can sit there at the dinner table for hours and just talk about life. But during that, I'm also like, so what? What do they want out of this transaction? And if it is money, I will be straight up honest with them. Like, there's probably people out there that will give you more money for this house, and then I'll point them in the direction of those people. But what I find out, most of the times, it's not about money.
- [32:02]
Brody Fawcett
Yeah, that's cool, dude. Well, Cam, if people want to connect with you, follow your journey.
- [32:09]
Cameron Cathcart
Yeah.
- [32:09]
Brody Fawcett
Where is the best place for them to do that?
- [32:11]
Cameron Cathcart
I would say, I would say Instagram. And it's just Cam. C A M Cathcart. C A T H C C A R T. I'd love to, to connect with anybody that wants to connect.
- [32:23]
Brody Fawcett
Awesome, brother. Well, dude, I appreciate your friendship. Thanks for the time today. Thanks for hopping on. Thanks, you guys, for, for tuning in, for listening. Go give Cam a follow. And just another reminder, just take some action on the stuff that you're learning. Go out, get it done. The whole purpose of this podcast, these Real Deal episodes, is to take a real deal and go replicate it, go turn it into something. And then, as always, if you guys need help with that, that's, that's what we do at real estate investing school is we hold your hand through that entire process and help you set those goals, hold you accountable, give you the education, the motivation, and all the good stuff. And so you can always book a free call with us@realestateadvisorschool.com with all that. We will see you guys next time.
- [33:14]
Cameron Cathcart
Sam.