\n<\/p>\n
Lindsay Barrientos didn\u2019t start <\/strong>buying rentals<\/a> after the 2008 crash or<\/strong> ride the low-interest-rate wave<\/strong> in 2021. She started<\/strong> in late 2022, after home prices and interest rates had already spiked<\/strong>. But she knew<\/em> about the long-term potential of real estate and trusted the process\u2014buying one house at a time<\/strong> and banking the rental income for the next down payment<\/a>.<\/p>\n Now, just four years later<\/strong>, Lindsay\u2019s 12-property portfolio has given her the flexibility to<\/strong> go back to school, quit her grueling W-2 job<\/strong>, and start her own business<\/strong>. And she didn\u2019t do anything the average investor can\u2019t do today. She lives in a high-cost-of-living area, so she invests in a <\/strong>real estate market<\/strong><\/a> where her money goes further<\/strong>. Her properties are 2,000 miles away, so she leans into her <\/strong>investing team<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n No \u201cperfect\u201d timing. No big bank account. Just<\/strong> a plan and simple, consistent action<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Whatever\u2019s keeping you on the sidelines\u2014prices, rates, the economy\u2014Lindsay\u2019s story may be the push you need to get started today.<\/p>\n Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Dave: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Dave: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Henry: Dave: Henry: Dave: Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Henry: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: Lindsay: Dave: \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Help us reach new listeners on iTunes by leaving us a rating and review! It takes just 30 seconds and instructions can be found here<\/a>. Thanks! We really appreciate it!<\/p>\n Interested in learning more about today\u2019s sponsors or becoming a BiggerPockets partner yourself? Email <\/em>[email\u00a0protected]<\/span><\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n
Have you ever thought that maybe real estate investing isn\u2019t worth it anymore? Well, Lindsay Barrientos didn\u2019t start buying rentals after the 2008 crash or ride the low interest wave in 2021. She started in late 2022 after home prices and interest rates had already spiked, but she knew about the long-term potential of real estate and trusted the process, buying one house at a time and banking the rental income for the next down payment. Now, just four years later, Lindsay\u2019s 12 property portfolio has given her the flexibility to go back to school, quit her grueling W-2 job and start her own business. Also, she didn\u2019t do anything the average investor can\u2019t do today. She lives in a high cost of living area, so she invests in a market where her money goes further. Her properties are 2,000 miles away, so she leans into her investing team. There\u2019s no perfect timing, no big bank account, just plain and simple, consistent action.
Whatever\u2019s keeping you on the sidelines, prices, rates, the economy, Lindsay\u2019s story may be the push you need to get started today. What\u2019s going on everybody? I am Henry Washington, co-host of the BiggerPockets Podcast. Dave Meyers here too, and our guest today is Lindsay Barrientos from Los Angeles. Dave, let\u2019s get to it.<\/p>\n
Lindsay Barrientos, welcome to the BiggerPockets Podcast. Thank you for joining us today.<\/p>\n
Thank you for having me. This is an honor.<\/p>\n
Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you joining us from today and what\u2019s your story with real estate so far?<\/p>\n
Yes, so I live in LA. I\u2019m a nurse and I\u2019ve been working as a nurse for 14, 16 years now. And I\u2019ve been investing in Rosto for the last four, and I also invest in a city that\u2019s not popular, out of state investor in Gary, Indiana.<\/p>\n
As a nurse living in a very expensive market, what influenced you to not just invest, but to invest halfway across the country?<\/p>\n
So I actually was a pretty happy nurse in the beginning. It wasn\u2019t until 2020 during COVID times that I became a front care worker. So I had to deal with a lot of COVID cases, a lot of deaths, a lot of tragedy and a lot of depression actually. A lot of nurses left the workforce during those times and I came with the realization that maybe nursing is not for me. Maybe nursing is not what I want to do for the rest of my life. And I was just 30. I\u2019m like, okay, I\u2019ve been doing nursing for the last 10 years. What else is there? How am I going to be supporting myself and making this income? At the time, I already purchased a single family home in Los Angeles for myself. I had multiple nursing friends and I was renting out rooms to traveling nurses because I was single and I had a four bedroom house and I could just live with my friends, the single girl life.
But when I became extremely distressed and depressed and rich for therapy and medication and got out of that hump, I decided I have to find something else that\u2019s going to be income producing that\u2019s going to either take me away from nursing part-time or take over completely. So I went to Google and I was just like, okay, what do rich people do? How do they make money?<\/p>\n
I also Googled that when I was looking for extra ways to make money.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s Henry\u2019s story too. Yeah.<\/p>\n
Absolutely.<\/p>\n
And Google said, \u201cWell, you can start a business.\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cWell, I don\u2019t know how to start a business or you can invest in real estate.\u201d And at the time I was already renting out rooms in my house, so I was just kind of doing real estate. I\u2019m offsetting my mortgage here in LA by renting out rooms. So let me see what else. Can I buy an additional house in LA? And they were like, \u201cOkay, well, if you\u2019re going to buy an additional house and do a conventional loan, you\u2019re going to have to<\/p>\n
Put<\/p>\n
20% down.\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201c20% down at a million dollars, that\u2019s $200,000. I don\u2019t have the kind of money. I\u2019m a nurse. So I\u2019m just going to see where else can I invest, maybe out of state, maybe whatever.\u201d And then that came with also another realization that the rest of the country is less expensive than Los Angeles, California.<\/p>\n
How about that?<\/p>\n
Yeah. So I started doing my market research and then obviously Google told me, \u201cListen to BiggerPockets, listen to podcasts, read these books.\u201d So I ended up reading a lot of Brandon Turner\u2019s books initially, and then I turned into BiggerPockets and learn about market indicators and what do you want to look at? Cash flow, cash and cash return, reserves, repairs. So for my situation at the time, I decided I need to be in a state that is landlord friendly and a market on lease that has a high cash on cash return. So the first market that ended up investing is in Northwestern Indiana, Hammond. And that\u2019s when I found a network of investors already investor in Northwestern Indiana. And I was introduced to many property managers and realtors and actually a network of investors there.<\/p>\n
I want to call out that you\u2019re selling yourself a little bit short, Lindsay, because you were an investor and you did start a business. Even buying a single family home and renting it out to your friend is a successful business in itself. I guess you just never even saw yourself as an investor when you were doing that.<\/p>\n
Yeah, I didn\u2019t. And even after I got A properties, I was going to real estate meetups around my area and I was like, \u201cI guess I\u2019m an investor. I\u2019m not sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s very humble of you and the opposite of what you hear on social media all the time. But investing in Indiana, it could be scary to do that. We\u2019ve never been to the area, but you at least look back on your time renting out rooms in your home and see the potential for it. Did that give you some confidence at least?<\/p>\n
It gave me confidence in terms of like, okay, I have this much income and I have this much expenses by house hacking at the time I didn\u2019t know I was doing that. I was decreasing the expenses that I had. So I had the extra amount of income to deploy it in an investment. So I was like, \u201cI\u2019m saving this much money and I can just funnel it into this investment that\u2019s also going to bring me more money.\u201d So I was just like, \u201cOkay, I can see how that can compound over time.\u201d Even though at the time I wasn\u2019t looking like, \u201cOh, I\u2019m going to get 10 houses or 12 houses.\u201d I\u2019m just like, \u201cTwo or three houses.\u201d<\/p>\n
Right.<\/p>\n
So many new investors or even seasoned investors struggle with the idea of where should I invest? Can you give just a little more context as to how you got comfortable with the decision you made?<\/p>\n
Yeah. Initially I was ready to take a traveling nursing job and I was like, okay, I have to go to a city that it\u2019s going to be competitive for me to get a contract so I could possibly house hack. And I\u2019m like, okay, I could go to New York. And I\u2019m like, what am I going to invest in New York? I could go to Chicago, I can maybe house hack a condo there and I can start renting out rooms like I\u2019m doing in Los Angeles. And I was like, but if I\u2019m going to be in Chicago, let me see what\u2019s near there. Driving distance. And Northwestern Indiana is 30 minutes down south from Chicago. So that\u2019s when I started looking at that. And then I was just like, well, who else is investing there? Let me find out. So BiggerPockets, blogs, podcasts, all of those, reaching out to people online that had a small YouTube channels and small followings that were investing, that were putting their numbers, all social media and being very transparent about their journey.
That\u2019s who I connected with, especially two people, Millennial, Mike, and Masky Finance. And because they were smaller creators, they were willing to talk to me or interact with me via comments or emails or even phone calls at times, like voice audio chats on Instagram that were going on for three minutes at a time. I\u2019m just like, I\u2019m just so happy that I was able to tag into this type of a small community starting. And then so when I looked at Hammond, Indiana, Norwest Indiana, there was already a WhatsApp group chat of investors that had 40 investors at the time. They were sharing tips about realtors, property managers, contractors, and stuff like that. So I felt comfortable because there were vetted people, not just by me, not just out of state. Some people were local. So that\u2019s where I felt, okay, if these people are doing it, then maybe I\u2019m okay to start dipping my toes in it.<\/p>\n
These were gems. I hope people were listening to this and taking notes. I love that you said, look, I knew I\u2019m going to be in Chicago, so what\u2019s in driving distance? Because if it\u2019s not easy to get to your out-of-state market when you need to get there because something\u2019s going to happen, you\u2019re going to need to get there and it\u2019s going to interrupt your life. And the harder it is to get there, the less likely you are to do it. So including some of these real world scenarios in your market selection is a big deal. The second tier of choices you have to make is very personal. The first tier of choices is about the numbers. You want a market that has a good cash on cash return, that has good jobs, that has enough demand. All the numbers make sense. But once you get past that, the rest is vibes and feelings and are you actually going to go?<\/p>\n
Also, the people you surround yourself with in that market, that is just so incredibly important. I always tell people, get it down to three to five cities that you like. The vibes are good, the numbers are good. And then where do you have the best people? Because that is going to make a much bigger impact on the performance of your investments than macroeconomics. It really is. Macro, you have to just kind of not screw up, is kind of the way I see it. It\u2019s just find something that\u2019s pretty good. But as anyone will tell you, two investors can invest in the same market. One can be incredibly successful and one can completely fail because they\u2019re not good at it. And so investing out of state is so much about finding people who are good at it.<\/p>\n
I though that was such a brilliant thing. You said you specifically picked smaller creators. That\u2019s a great niche, a great thing to target. Smaller creators investing in a market that you like, you know they have a tracker, or you at least think they do, and you can do enough research, they can probably have the time to answer you. That\u2019s super smart. Great thing to do.<\/p>\n
Nichingin is definitely whatever market you\u2019re looking at, if it\u2019s Columbus, Ohio, Facebook groups, meetups, whatever you can do to reach out to them and then start talking to maybe not the person that\u2019s a host, but everybody that\u2019s submitting comments or liking or doing anything like, \u201cOh, have you actually checked out the area? Do you live around it?\u201d Just making conversation and people, especially in Facebook, people going through deep, deep conversations in the comments.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s great. And I think what you\u2019re showing here, Lindsay, is that this common perception that real estate is really competitive is false. People generally want to help each other. People want to tell you about what they\u2019re doing and want to bring you along. I really love that about real estate, that it\u2019s not this zero sum mentality that if you win, I can\u2019t win. It\u2019s kind of this collective approach. So Lindsay, I want to hear about how specifically you leveraged this community to get your first deal, but we got to take a quick break. We\u2019ll be right back. Welcome back to the BiggerPockets Podcast. I\u2019m here with Henry and investor Lindsay Barrientos talking about how she found a community across the country that helped her buy her first conventional rental out of state. So Lindsay, how did you use the community that you found to identify and ultimately buy your first deal and what did it look like?<\/p>\n
Yeah, and the first step was vetting the people. There\u2019s 40 investors, 40 investors are using about three or four property managers, three or four realtors, different realtors. So you start talking to them and trying to see what they know about the market. And every time, because you don\u2019t know much about the market other than what you find on Google, but the more that you talk to somebody, the more the property manager\u2019s going to be like, \u201cI\u2019m not going to go into that pocket.\u201d And the realtor is going to be like, \u201cWell, most of,\u201d because they can\u2019t really say it, \u201cThis zip code doesn\u2019t work for you. Most of my transactions happen in this zip code, right? So you get information from different people, not just the \u201cexperts\u201d like property managers, realtors, whatever, but the other investors like, \u201cOh, this is where a new gymnasium was built.
This is where the casino is coming to be built.\u201d The more data that you have, the better it\u2019s going to be for you.<\/p>\n
And let me just ask, in this group, were there multiple realtors and property managers or was there just one you knew?<\/p>\n
There was multiple.<\/p>\n
And how did you decide? Because it sounds like a great group of people. How did you pick which person to work with?<\/p>\n
I think that you have an affinity for certain people when you start talking to them. And then I don\u2019t know about you, Dave, but I feel like I\u2019d like to see more action than talking. You can talk to me on the phone.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a good way to put it. Yeah.<\/p>\n
You can talk to me on the phone for two hours, but let me see how many transactions you closed in the last month. What actually are you willing to negotiate for myself? Really test your boundaries a little bit.<\/p>\n
So Lindsay, what I hear you saying is that you\u2019ve got a good bullshitter, and as you started to talk to people, you could tell who was full of crap and who was actually about their business.<\/p>\n
I would like to think so.<\/p>\n
I like that. All right, so tell us about this deal. What did you buy?<\/p>\n
Yeah, I did buy a three bedroom, two bath, single family home, 25% down conventional loan. And like I mentioned, I rented the next week that I closed the home and it was rented for $1,400 a month.<\/p>\n
Wow.<\/p>\n
135, 25% down. So yeah, 25% of 135 is substantially less than 25% of one million in California. So you did the right math there.<\/p>\n
Yeah.<\/p>\n
No renovation. Sounds like it was turnkey and you got a decent amount of rent for it. That\u2019s pretty awesome. So just a conventional loan, nothing fancy.<\/p>\n
Nothing fancy. And I think the debt service was 880 at that time because the interest rate had gone up. My interest rate on that first property was 6.01.<\/p>\n
What was the cash flow at the end of the month?<\/p>\n
1,400 minus 880 plus the property manager is like $400 a month.<\/p>\n
Wow. Okay, great. And did you have any issues or was it as turnkey as you were expecting?<\/p>\n
It was turnkey. I think I talked to the property manager once in six months about something else. Then after one year, I was trying to make that my proof of concept. So I didn\u2019t want to look at even real estate after that. I bought it. I wanted to be like, \u201cIs this going to work out for me? This is a new venture for me. I\u2019ve never done this.\u201d So let it run for one year. I took it like it was an additional bill, so I just pocketed whatever income I had from the property. And after one year I had $16,000 save and I was like, \u201cOkay, maybe I can look at this Gary Indiana market that my investor friends keep telling me about. They keep buying things over there.\u201d So I\u2019m like, \u201cOkay, maybe I can do that now since I am seasoned. I have one year under my belt of having one rental property.\u201d So I took a look at Gary Indiana and the house was priceless in 2023 when I was looking at it were like 50, 70, 80,000 for a single family home.
So I was just like, \u201cOkay, that\u2019s a significantly less down payment that I have.\u201d But I was like, \u201cLet me try this add value things that BiggerPockets keeps talking about. Buy something that needs a little<\/p>\n
Bit<\/p>\n
Of work.\u201d So I bought a second home for $55,000 that needed a new roof and new floors, small house, 800 square feet, two bedroom, one bath. And I bought it for 55. I think I put maybe 16 into the house and I rented out for $1,100 to a Section eight voucher holder. So I was just like, \u201cOh wow, that\u2019s like the 2% rule.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yeah, you got way better numbers on that deal.<\/p>\n
Yeah. And obviously I\u2019m learning this new market because I did move from Hammonton Gary, which is 15 minutes apart probably by driving, but it is a rougher market and it\u2019s actually according to Business Insider in 2019, one of those most miserable cities in the United States.<\/p>\n
And you were like, \u201cI want that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yeah, I want that. There is so much upside.<\/p>\n
Well, I\u2019m curious. That would scare me.<\/p>\n
So I know that coming into this new market was risky, but the potential for cash flow was higher. And a lot of people think when they look at the tenant pool also there, they think that\u2019s going to be a lot of work. But from my investment strategy, I have a property manager. So majority of the things that I do are through property management because I work a full-time. At the time I was also going to school full-time. So I really needed to see what my set of skill was going to be and my risk tolerance. Am I able to risk more, I guess, headaches for the cash flow? But when I closed on that second property and I rented it right away and I was like, okay, well then my debt service is $388 a month and this is rented for 1,100. Even if the house is empty for a couple months, I\u2019m still pretty much very good about this.
And then the potential for add value was there. So I\u2019m like, okay, let\u2019s do what happens with these two properties. Then the next property, I attempted to do the burn. I attempted to do the burn. And this is a story that\u2019s probably going to, people are going to think I\u2019m crazy, but I bought this house for $33,000.<\/p>\n
33,000?<\/p>\n
Yes. And I needed to be a whole bird, so I had to put another 30,000 into the house, but my ARB was at 85. So I was like, \u201cWell, I can get most of the money out of this.\u201d And then one of the beauty things about scaling, when you are doing burrs, you can recycle that money. So I was like, \u201cOkay, I don\u2019t have to penny pinch every single paycheck that I have if I\u2019m able to do this successfully or even semi-successfully.\u201d So when I did that burr, I finished, I was getting my refinance done, and I think I had my appraisal scheduled on a Tuesday, and my property manager calls me on a Monday and then tells me there\u2019s been a fire on the house.<\/p>\n
Oh, no.<\/p>\n
Yeah. So I got on the phone with her. She was like, \u201cI don\u2019t have many details. Let me call you back in two hours. I\u2019m dealing with it right now. The fire department is there.\u201d The house was not occupied at the moment, so that was great. So that already was a relief. Okay, there\u2019s nobody inside the house, but I just finished rehabbing this house last week, and I\u2019m waiting for that refinance. So by the time she comes back, she\u2019s like, \u201cThere\u2019s been a faulty lighting on the kitchen that basically burned.\u201d And because it burned, most of the damage that came was from the fire department bolting their way into the door and putting the high pressure hose, right?<\/p>\n
That\u2019s it.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what they sell. I know that came.<\/p>\n
Very nice new drywall painted and everything blown by the pressure of the hose. So that came with the second rehab. At the time I was like, \u201cOh, maybe I shouldn\u2019t invest in real estate anymore. I don\u2019t know what this looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a fair though to have. I have that moment every week, but go ahead.<\/p>\n
I was talking to Jesus and saying, \u201cOh, let me just get through this. Maybe I try to do more than I can handle.\u201d Anyways, I talked to my lender and my lender said, \u201cOh, no worries. Let me know when the house is ready.\u201d Because it ended up being a very small fire. So I was just, okay, I guess I\u2019m going to rehab it again and leave the money that I rehab for the second time into the deal. So I put an additional, I want to say $11,000 into the house to rehab it a second time, obviously going over my ARB, and I was just like, \u201cOh, I\u2019m just going to leave money behind on the deal.\u201d Refinance the appraisal came back at 160,000 for the house that I bought. So I told myself, \u201cYou\u2019re just very bad at comping, comping houses.\u201d<\/p>\n
You comping way too low.<\/p>\n
Yeah, I did comp it way too low. So I was able to get all my money back from the first rehab, from the second rehab. And then so I did a successful burr and I got the money back. At the time, the money came from a HELOC I leveraged on my single primary residence, so it wasn\u2019t even money I had saved. It was leverage money from the HELOC. So I was like, \u201cI can do this again.\u201d So I did many more times. I ended up racking up 12 properties over the last four years.<\/p>\n
Wow.<\/p>\n
And the last five had been creative seller financing, and the last one was a 0% down deal.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s unbelievable. Wow.<\/p>\n
Yeah, I like those.<\/p>\n
So I want to hear what you bought. You just casually were like, \u201cOh, I just bought 12 units,\u201d which is a story in itself that we want to hear about. We do have to take one more quick break though. Stick with us. We\u2019ll be right back. Welcome back to the BiggerPocket Podcast. Me and Henry are here with investor Lindsay Barrientos talking about how she has been scaling up long distance in Indiana. You\u2019ve had some good ones, you had a tough one, but you kept going. What have you been buying?<\/p>\n
Yes, so 12 total now. All of them are single family. I only have one duplex. So the more that I learn about real estate, the more that I talk into wholesalers, but direct front seller, learning about creative financing. When I learned about creative financing throughpocket sales, I was like, \u201cI need to get a house that is creative basically. I got the bug.\u201d So I started telling my realtor to put cash offers and creative offers, and obviously make the creative offer more appealing than the cash offer. So everybody will be determined. But anyways, and that same network that I had, for example, Facebook people that I would talk to online and the WhatsApp group that I would also talk to different investors. There were other investors there that were offloading some of the properties, so that\u2019s where we got connected. That\u2019s how I started getting creative.
I also started a personal brand on YouTube. I opened up a YouTube channel after I think the bird that I did. I felt like maybe this information would be better to be put on videos so people can connect with me or even see what I\u2019m doing or see how the cashflow is possible, even though this was 2024, 2025 with the rates being at seven, eight, you guys have seen it. So I started putting a lot of content out there and then people were offering me deals from Gary Indiana after a while, and that\u2019s how I was able to get creative.<\/p>\n
You said you had your agent mention that you were willing to do a creative offer. So how did you pitch seller financing or how did you get your agent to pitch it to people as an option for you?<\/p>\n
Yeah, so when you\u2019re a realtor, you can just send a regular offer or you can set an addendum offer, like a regular cash offer or conventional offer or an addendum offers, which if the seller is open to seller finances, they will be able to reply or negotiate the price back. But my experience has been the majority of people that do seller finances because they\u2019ve been investors themself at one point. And so they bought the house a few years ago, so they already had some kind of knowledge. I never been able to convince somebody that\u2019s never heard about seller finance to do a seller finance deal.<\/p>\n
So you were going out looking for these seller finance deals, and you said you were making cash offers at the same time.<\/p>\n
Yes.<\/p>\n
You had enough cash to go out and buy these deals, whatever your offer was, if you wanted to, but you gave them two offers at the same time. Can you tell us a little bit more about why you did that?<\/p>\n
Yeah, I heard from Michael Subert, this is something that he used as a technique in the past of when he was buying houses in Fresno. He would present two offers to the seller, especially during these last years where transactions have been low. If you find a motivated seller, you present those two offers. Let\u2019s say it\u2019s a house that I\u2019m buying cash at $60,000. My cash value would be I\u2019m going to offer you $50,000 for the house, but my seller finance deal is going to say, \u201cI will pay you $60,000 for this house, but with my terms.\u201d So that could be lowering the interest rate, that could be a lower down payment, whatever is more preferable to me that also works for the seller. So I would submit those two offers to everybody basically.<\/p>\n
Wow. I love that. It\u2019s so brilliant. And I think this goes to the exact environment we\u2019re in right now in real estate where sellers, you don\u2019t really know what\u2019s motivating them right now. There are more and more things coming on the market and there\u2019s better opportunities to negotiate, but you don\u2019t necessarily know what they want. Some people want cash and to get out as quickly as possible. Other people, as Lindsay, you stated, if they\u2019ve been an investor before, they might say, \u201cHey, I\u2019ll take a six or 7% payment well into the future. That\u2019s passive income for me.\u201d And by offering two offers, one, you\u2019re showing the seller that you are willing to understand what they\u2019re looking for and to work with them. And two, it sounds like you can kind of steer them in the direction that you want because you say, \u201cHey, I could pay cash, that\u2019s probably tempting, but I could pay you less.\u201d And you can sort of orchestrate it so that sellers see the mutual benefit in the seller financing offer.
Curious, how effective is it? How often does that work?<\/p>\n
It works when the market is like this and the sellers are motivated. I was able to get out of the 12, five of them are these seller finance.<\/p>\n
Yeah, I love that. I mean, that\u2019s better than regular offers, that offers so much better. And how are you identifying people? Because if you\u2019re going 50%, you must have really targeted list of people that you\u2019re approaching for seller financing.<\/p>\n
Yeah, my zip codes are very narrow, so I only invest on three zip codes. And then single family, I know a lot of people like to do multifamily, but in my area, because there\u2019s more supply than renters, I feel that people do want to rent a single family more so than a small rental unit. So that is where basically I\u2019m concentrated. And then it might be a small market, but in Gary, there is a turnkey company that sells houses that flips houses. They also have a podcast. They also are currently posting a lot of content about Gary Indiana and possibly even coming, we have the bears coming to Hammond, Indiana. So just having more information about that. That\u2019s<\/p>\n
Awesome.<\/p>\n
Yeah. Having more information about that just tells you to exactly reinforces what you invest in already or where you want to be investing.<\/p>\n
So what\u2019s next for you, Lindsay? I mean, you\u2019ve been scaling up, you\u2019ve been doing a lot, you\u2019re getting the Chicago Bears in Indiana, which is hilarious. What comes next for you?<\/p>\n
Yeah, I also built an ADU in my single family residence. Nice.<\/p>\n
Are you still in LA?<\/p>\n
Yes. So I did that. I put it as a midterm that\u2019s now rented for $2,000 a month, and I have enough space to put an additional ADU that is in the process of permitting three bedroom, two bath. That will be a small house basically. So hopefully to do a midterm or Airbnb, we\u2019ll see what I can do with it.<\/p>\n
That strategy in California is just called how to live in California. How to be able to afford to live in California.<\/p>\n
The good thing is that they are allowing these kinds of developments, right? Because obviously not everyone can do it, but if you can, you are providing housing in a community that really needs it and you are able to make your own cost of living go down. It really is a win-win if you can pull it off. So Lindsay, now that you\u2019ve done this, you\u2019ve done a lot of cool stuff, but your original goal was to get out of nursing. Have you done that yet?<\/p>\n
Not fully, but I\u2019m on my way. So I had two plans. One was to invest in real estate and the other one was to go back to school and get my nurse practitioner license and work outside of the hospital setting. So I achieved that. I worked for the last three years as a nurse practitioner. And since I have the income coming from real estate and I\u2019m house hacking, I decided this is the perfect time to leave my W-2 and start my own business, be a nurse practitioner. So now I\u2019m a psychiatric nurse practitioner.<\/p>\n
Oh, that\u2019s amazing.<\/p>\n
So cool.<\/p>\n
Yes, I like it.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s<\/p>\n
So<\/p>\n
Cool.<\/p>\n
That is unreal. That is so cool. I\u2019m very happy for you. Wow, what a great story.<\/p>\n
Full circle, right? The Google search in the beginning, invest in real estate, open your own business. That\u2019s basically what I ended up \u2013<\/p>\n
That\u2019s exactly what you did. That\u2019s exactly what you did.<\/p>\n
I love it because I mean, you must have been working your butt off the last couple of years. Going to school to become a nurse practitioner is no joke, and investing long distance is no joke, but you did it all. And I imagine you\u2019re feeling like this investment in time and effort has been worth it.<\/p>\n
Yes. And this year it was a whole year plan to quit my W-2. So I had to set myself up for being able to have no paycheck technically, and then it\u2019s still 12 houses, and I still have a house in LA, and I just built an ADU and I\u2019m building another EDU. So I had to set myself up financially to be able to take this big step, and finally the time that I put in my mind has reached, so now I\u2019m fully off W2 being my own boss.<\/p>\n
So you\u2019re just crushing it is what you\u2019re talking about. You\u2019re just absolutely crushing every part of your life.<\/p>\n
It looks like that from the outside, but in the inside it\u2019s a lot of lack of sleep, I feel like.<\/p>\n
That does come with it, but there are times to grind, there\u2019s times to enjoy the fruits of your labor, and it seems like you\u2019ve grinded really hard for a couple of years, and now you are reaching your goals. It\u2019s incredible, and you\u2019ve done it in a really fast timeline. I should say that doing it in a couple of years is amazing. And hopefully between having your existing homes, having your own practice, having these ADUs, you can continue to grow in multiple ways. You can be a nurse practitioner, you can grow your practice, and you can grow real estate at the same time. It\u2019s super cool.<\/p>\n
Thank you, thank you. And I also, I built a podcast called Real Estate Chisme, and then this is where we have a free school community online. Anybody can come and check it out. Our goal, I have a co-host, Bileta Sandoval, and we are trying to encourage women, people of color to come and check us out and talk about real estate if that\u2019s something that you want to look at, invest in, or even learn about.<\/p>\n
Awesome. Thank you so much, Lindsay, for sharing your story and these resources with us. We really appreciate it. And we\u2019d love to have you back soon. We would really like to hear how your story progresses from here.<\/p>\n
Thank you so much.<\/p>\n
And thank you all for listening and watching this episode of the BiggerPockets Podcast. I\u2019m Dave Meyer. He\u2019s Henry Washington, and we\u2019ll see you all next time.<\/p>\n