\n<\/p>\n
When Obi Johns<\/strong> was a teenager, he saw his parents do something remarkable<\/strong>: they sold their home<\/strong> and made $150,000<\/strong> from market appreciation<\/a> alone. But then, months later<\/strong>, the investor who bought his <\/strong>childhood home sold it AGAIN for <\/strong>nearly $400,000 profit<\/strong>. Obi looked at his family and thought, \u201cThat should have been us.\u201d<\/p>\n So, after graduating college with a degree he had little interest in, he quickly decided to get into the real estate game\u2014but as an agent<\/strong>. As he grew, he saw his clients <\/strong>flipping houses<\/strong><\/a> and knew he<\/em> wanted to do it, too, not just to make money, but to understand the buyer and<\/em> seller in the transaction. Obi had zero experience<\/strong>, but he documented his first house flip on Instagram<\/strong><\/a>, which went viral overnight<\/strong> and led to 26 showings in a single day<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The best part? Obi didn\u2019t use the copy-and-paste flipper finishes most buyers are tired<\/em> of; he let his audience decide the design<\/strong>\u2014and it worked. Obi walked away from that flip with a $40,000+ profit<\/strong>, and the next one was even<\/em> bigger. Obi details his entire \u201cvibe flipping\u201d<\/strong> model to get over-asking offers in a matter of days, and how you can test as you invest<\/strong> in your first deals, too.<\/p>\n Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Obi: Henry: Obi: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Dave: Obi: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Dave: Henry: Obi: Henry: Obi: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Henry: Dave: Obi: Dave: Henry: Dave: Henry: Dave: Obi: Henry: Obi: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Dave: Henry: Obi: Dave: Henry: Dave: Henry: Obi: Henry: Dave: Henry: Obi: Henry: Dave: Obi: Dave: Obi: Henry: Obi: Henry: Dave: Henry: \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
When Obie Johns was a teenager, he saw his parents do something remarkable. They sold their home and made $150,000 just from appreciation. But then the same investor who bought his childhood home sold it again for nearly $400,000 more. Obi looked at his family and though, \u201cThat should have been us.\u201d As soon as he graduated college, he knew what he wanted to do, real estate. And at just 21 years old, Obi became an agent. He bought his first duplex with 5% down and he house hacked it. But after that, he went in a very different direction. Obi saw his clients flipping and though, \u201cI can do that too.\u201d Zoe bought his first flip for $153,000 with zero experience, and he documented every step of the journey on his Instagram. And from that, he went viral and got 26 showings in a single day. And the best part, he let his followers decide the finishes and the design for the house.
He calls it vibe flipping. He made over $40,000 on his first vibe flip and even more on more recent ones. So how did someone starting at 21 with zero experience beat out all the experienced investors in the market? Today, Obi is showing you how.
What\u2019s going on everybody? I\u2019m Henry Washington. I am the co-host of the BiggerPockets Podcast and my co-host Dave Meyer is here as well. And we\u2019ve got an investor story today with Obie Johns from Columbus, Ohio. So let\u2019s bring on Obi. Mr. Obi Johns, welcome to the BiggerPockets Podcast. I hear congratulations are in order, man.<\/p>\n
Congrats to you.<\/p>\n
Yeah. Expectant father.<\/p>\n
We are excited. Yeah, we\u2019re about 12 weeks in.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s awesome.<\/p>\n
So we should be finding out if it\u2019s a boy or girl pretty soon. We\u2019re pumped either way. I\u2019m feeling like it\u2019s a boy, so we\u2019ll have to come back and see.<\/p>\n
All right. We got a couple girl dads here though.<\/p>\n
Okay. All right. I\u2019ll be reaching out for some real estate advice and maybe some fathering advice.<\/p>\n
Awesome. Well, now we can get started. Why don\u2019t you tell us about how you got into real estate and give us a little bit of your background.<\/p>\n
Yeah. My name\u2019s Obi Johns. I am a realtor of five going on six years now. I went to Ohio State. I was majoring in political science and it took me about four years and a college degree to realize that I didn\u2019t love politics and a little bit of money as well that I gave them to figure that out. And so I graduated into COVID, real estate was booming, 3% rates. Everyone\u2019s talking about investment properties and I was looking at a career pivot. And so I figured, you know what? Now\u2019s the time to figure out if this real estate thing works for me. I hear stuff about passive income, financial freedom from pages like BiggerPockets. So I started getting my real estate license. While I was getting licensed, I dabbled in a little bit of wholesaling, got licensed, bought my first rental property, did a house hack, dabbled in flipping.
I tried everything that I learned from podcasts and books. I wanted to make sure that I knew what the full extent of real estate investing looked like. And so I\u2019ve basically tried every way to real estate invest. I\u2019m actually sitting in what is going to be our first short-term rental. I think that was maybe the last box that I needed to check. And it\u2019s been a good five years.<\/p>\n
And I\u2019ve heard you say a few times that you knew you wanted to be an investor. I knew I wanted to be an investor. Where did that seed get planted? Because that sounds like more than just I watched a podcast.<\/p>\n
Yeah. Well, right before I went to college, my parents sold our childhood home. They bought it for $80,000 in the late \u201990s. And we ended up selling it as a fixer-upper about 20 years later for, I want to say like $230,000. And to me, I just though that was crazy that we got to live in that house for 20 years and my dad got paid to live there. We didn\u2019t really do a whole lot of improvements to it. It was just a good location that appreciated. But what surprised me even more and what got me really intrigued in real estate is when the investor who bought it from us put it back on the market three months later for $600,000 and he got it. He sold it pretty quickly.<\/p>\n
Wow.<\/p>\n
And I just couldn\u2019t help but think, why couldn\u2019t that have been us? Why couldn\u2019t we have taken it to $80,000 purchase, $600,000 sale? Him doing it so quickly just made me think this is something I need to figure out.<\/p>\n
So you were an agent before you did your first deal?<\/p>\n
That\u2019s correct. My first deal was helping someone sell their first house actually. I did retail and investor business for about a year or two until I bought my first property, which is a duplex. Everyone\u2019s saying house hacking, great way to get into real estate. I was able to buy a house and spend half what other people are spending to live in a home. And I got to ride appreciation on a property that someone else is paying half the payment for.<\/p>\n
You\u2019re an agent, so did you just find this deal on the MLS? What was your buy box like when you went out to buy this house hack?<\/p>\n
So I actually found it, I want to say somewhat off market. I was going to real estate meetups in my city and I met an investor who flips 50, 60 houses a year. He keeps a lot his rentals. So we met, I followed him on social media and I see on his story one day that he is taking a video of a duplex that he\u2019s almost done renovating and he was going to rent it out. And it was at a very small buy box when I was looking for our first house. I was actually looking in my childhood neighborhood that we sold our first home. And so there\u2019s not a lot of inventory. There\u2019s probably 100 duplexes in the entire area that I was looking. Most are rented out. They\u2019ve been rented for 15 years and they don\u2019t hit the market very often. So I saw his story.
I asked him where that duplex was. He gave me the address. It was three blocks from my childhood home.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s crazy.<\/p>\n
Awesome.<\/p>\n
Perfect. And I said, \u201cCan I please come see it? I will be there in 20 minutes.\u201d And so I went over, I looked at it. It was 90% done. He was just doing the finishing touches. I loved it right away. My wife and I, we had been renting a one bedroom apartment and we had been thinking about \u2013<\/p>\n
Oh, you would\u2019ve loved anything you saw then is what I meant.<\/p>\n
Well, yeah. So we just needed space. We needed out of the bedroom\/office that we were working out of.<\/p>\n
This is exactly how you convince people to house hack. Henry and I talk about this all the time. Everyone\u2019s like, \u201cOh, house hacking, it\u2019s so inconvenient.\u201d But if you\u2019re coming from a studio apartment that you\u2019re sharing \u2013<\/p>\n
Yeah, you\u2019re in a one bedroom, anything is more convenient.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a Taj Mahal.<\/p>\n
Everything\u2019s better.<\/p>\n
So we toured the house. I needed to get my wife on board. She lived in newer homes mostly growing up. And in Columbus, our zoning code is a bit strict. So most of the duplexes are going to be a hundred years old because in the 50s, 60s, I kind of stopped zoning for multifamily. So a hundred-year-old duplex was our only option. And this one was fully renovated. It had an open layout kitchen, everything that my wife was expecting in her first home. And so we ended up making our compromises. I don\u2019t think that she thought our first home would also inherit renters or we would rent out half of it. And I didn\u2019t necessarily need to have the flashy open layout and everything.<\/p>\n
So<\/p>\n
It<\/p>\n
Just<\/p>\n
Really worked out for us.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s perfect. And how\u2019d you finance this deal?<\/p>\n
We went conventional. I want to say it was a low down payment, maybe 5% down just with a lender that I worked with a lot on referring to my clients as a realtor. So it was pretty smooth.<\/p>\n
Were you able to cash flow right away?<\/p>\n
So I want to say that we were probably about breaking even when we first moved in. It was a lot cheaper than other rentals would be. I think we were looking at 2,200 for a two bedroom apartment at the time.<\/p>\n
Oh, Columbus got expensive,<\/p>\n
Right?<\/p>\n
Columbus got pretty pricey and post \u2013 COVID, and we\u2019re not far from OSU campus. There\u2019s just a lot of people moving here for college, and so there\u2019s a lot of demand. I\u2019d say between 2000 and 2200 would get you an updated two bedroom apartment. Our mortgage on the duplex was about 3,400 and we rented one side out for 18, so that left us with maybe 1,600 that we were paying ourselves. So we looked at it as a win that we were getting an extra bedroom for $600 less than the market would\u2019ve allowed us.<\/p>\n
Huge win.<\/p>\n
And once we move out of here and get both sides rented, we should cash flow, I want to say about $500.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve got to take a pause, but we\u2019ll be right back with more from agent and investor Obi John\u2019s right after the break.<\/p>\n
Before we go to break, if you\u2019re someone who\u2019s bought a couple of deals and you\u2019re looking to scale up your portfolio into something bigger, I have a really exciting announcement for you. BiggerPockets is hosting its first ever conference focused just on scaling up. It\u2019s this December, it\u2019s coming up soon, this December, 5th through 7th in Phoenix, Arizona. We\u2019re going to have a full day of programming with speakers like myself, James Daynard, Kathy Fecke, and Devon Kinard talking about how to scale up and build a sustainable business. Tickets are on sale now, but there are only 100 tickets. So go to biggerpockets.com\/conferences now and get your ticket today.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s going on everybody? We are back on the BiggerPockets podcast. We\u2019re talking with agent and investor Obi Johns. Let\u2019s dive back in. You did a house hack and you were like, \u201cThis is pretty cool.\u201d Then you said you were looking at doing a flip. So I\u2019m very curious, were you trying to do a flip in that same childhood neighborhood too, like you were trying to get back what you lost on the first house?<\/p>\n
Somewhat. So I worked with a lot of flippers and I knew the process from underwriting the deals to what people want in a finished product when it\u2019s time to sell the house. I knew the full beginning and I knew the full ending, and I wanted to know everything that my clients go through when they\u2019re flipping a house, like working with contractors and financing the project. And so I figured this would be great experience to flip a house that way when I speak, it\u2019s from personal experience and not just I\u2019ve seen this work, this is what worked for me. And I think it made me a lot more confident as an agent because there just wasn\u2019t any question anymore on what you had to do to successfully flip a house. So I decided I\u2019m going to give this a shot. Part of the inspiration was when we bought this duplex, and we loved the house, we\u2019re so happy how it worked out, but a couple months into closing, our sewer line collapsed.<\/p>\n
Been there, buddy.<\/p>\n
And so you know what that situation looks like and smells like. It\u2019s not a pleasant position to be in. And it cost us about $7,000 to get it excavated.<\/p>\n
Oh, you got off light.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re right next to the city line, so they didn\u2019t have to dig very far and they didn\u2019t have to put in a whole lot more. But seven grand was a lot for us when we just put down our down payment and we\u2019re furnishing two extra bedrooms that we didn\u2019t have. And we had, I want to say a month or two of vacancy just as we did all the final touches to the property. So it definitely hurt a little bit. And so I said, \u201cYou know what? I\u2019m going all in on real estate. I\u2019m not going to let this deter me.\u201d And so I wanted to buy another property and I figured if I make a profit on this flip, I can pay myself back for what we just had to spend on our sewer line, all that money we just buried in the ground and I would get my confidence back to keep pushing in real estate.
We actually found it off market for, I want to say $153,000. It was about 10 minutes away from where we lived, so not quite the same neighborhood, but I was familiar with the area. It didn\u2019t need a whole lot of work. It was mostly cosmetics. We finished the basement, painted, did some roof work, gutters, not a whole lot. It was a pretty simple project. We put in, let\u2019s say around $40,000. I documented the whole flip day by day on Instagram. This is actually how I kind of started doing social media a bit more. I made a series about flipping my first house. Episode one, I went in there and they left a bunch of stuff behind. They weren\u2019t supposed to leave it, and so we had to clear out the house.<\/p>\n
In there, yeah.<\/p>\n
And then we find things that we didn\u2019t see on our initial walkthrough. And so it was just day by day, problem by problem, ended up going very viral on social media. I want to say the series got over seven million views. Whoa. A lot of offers from the videos that I was posting because we started posting it on the day that we started. That\u2019s great. And so I was getting comments halfway through of people saying, \u201cWhere\u2019s this house? It looks like it\u2019s something that my clients are into.\u201d And so when we listed it, we actually set a record in the zip code for most single day showings. What? We had, I want to say 26 showings in that first day, which this is 2024. This isn\u2019t COVID like 2020. It was the most in the whole zip code. We ended up getting 10 offers on the first day.
I want to say three or four came from agents who either their clients were following the series online or they were following it and they recommended it to their clients. We ended up going 25,000 over the list price and ended up making 44 grand on that first flip.<\/p>\n
Unbelievable. That\u2019s amazing. Congratulations.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s awesome.<\/p>\n
And so why aren\u2019t you doing it again?<\/p>\n
I mean, it was stressful. It was awesome and it was a great experience, but I\u2019ve learned to tolerate the stress of being an agent and flipping a house is just a different kind of stress. Once you go through it, you kind of figure it out, but it just wasn\u2019t the stress that I chose. I didn\u2019t feel the reward. I mean, it was very profitable and I loved that about it, but it wasn\u2019t as rewarding as helping my clients get their wins or helping people into their first homes. And so it didn\u2019t feel like the stress was outweighed by all the benefit of the project.<\/p>\n
Obi, I am so glad you just said that. I think this is the most overlooked part of being a real estate investor because there\u2019s so many things that you can do, but the only way you make money in real estate is if you could stay in it for the long game. That\u2019s how you do it. And if you don\u2019t like doing something, it doesn\u2019t matter how profitable it is. You\u2019re going to burn out at some point. That\u2019s why I don\u2019t flip. I\u2019ve passively invested in flips, made some good money, but it\u2019s just not for me. And I think the way you described it is perfect because every job has stress, everything has stress, but you can tolerate the stress of being an agent. It\u2019s such a perfect way to say it. That\u2019s something you can live with and that you feel like that stress is balanced with the reward that you personally feel from helping people get into a home or to sell their home.
And that just the flipping doesn\u2019t do it for you. Henry, you\u2019re probably just the opposite, right? You\u2019ve never wanted to be an agent and you love flipping homes.<\/p>\n
Absolutely.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s why you\u2019ve been able to sustain your business for 10 years.<\/p>\n
Wholeheartedly agree with you. I loved everything about that answer and the previous answer in saying, \u201cHey, I had to make a choice. Do I want to flip houses or do I want to be a good agent?\u201d Because when people ask me, should I get my license, my response to them is, \u201cI don\u2019t know. Do you want to be a really good real estate agent and help people buy and sell homes?\u201d And if the answer\u2019s yeah, then heck yeah, go get your license. But if it\u2019s not, then I would probably wait, do a couple of deals and then figure out if your license makes sense for the kind of investor you want to be. Dave, you\u2019re absolutely right. Being an agent sounds like my nightmare. I don\u2019t want anything to do with that at all, but I understand the warm fuzzies of helping someone. I get mine a different way.
I get mine through flipping houses and providing good rental properties and teaching people how to do this business. But it\u2019s all hard, y\u2019all. It\u2019s all hard. Yeah, exactly. Not doing real estate and just working a day job until you retire is hard too. You got to pick the hard that makes sense for you and it\u2019s going to be different for each person. What a great answer.<\/p>\n
So Obi, I wanted to ask you, you brought up social media because you have a great social media account. Did you expect your series to catch on in the way it did?<\/p>\n
I thought it was interesting. I would\u2019ve been interested in following it. The quantity of views and interactions and everything surprised me. I didn\u2019t know that it would be that crazy, but I did know that it was a cool story. I framed it as me buying my first house and us running into a huge repair that made me wonder if real estate was even the right thing to do. And flipping this house was supposed to be the hero story of like, yeah, we made it back. We got a big win. But the scary part was I started filming and posting before I had sold the flip. We were still working on it. And I sat down with my wife after the first video went viral, millions of views. I got a hundred thousand followers in a span of maybe a few days. And I told her, \u201cWhat happens if we don\u2019t profit?
What happens if we lose it on this house too? And what happens as my reputation as an agent if I just put myself out there and it doesn\u2019t work?\u201d And we talked about it and the conclusion we came to was I think that people will feel inspired that you tried and this isn\u2019t going to be your last try. You\u2019re not going to stop if this doesn\u2019t work out well. And so I started off a little bit nervous and then I just felt really comforted by the support that I was getting online. People saying, \u201cI don\u2019t know you. I just met you, but I believe in you. You got this.\u201d And I needed that. It was good to hear at the moment. So it did a lot for my career. It did a lot for my confidence as well.<\/p>\n
This is really cool, man. There\u2019s tons of people who want to share their story on social media. What advice do you have to those people and what experience? We talked a little bit about the positives, how it\u2019s impacted you. Has there been any downside to you having a social media presence in your business or personal life?<\/p>\n
For me, coming from the angle of I\u2019m just going to give things a go and document it, I think that\u2019s what works really well right now on social media. There\u2019s a lot of people who have all the answers, but \u2013<\/p>\n
They think they do.<\/p>\n
A lot of people who say that they\u2019ve got all the answers and there\u2019s less people who admit that they don\u2019t and are willing to be vulnerable and take you through the experience with you.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what people resonate with is it\u2019s hard to connect with someone who pretends they know all the answers. No one does. And so you\u2019re actually connecting with how other people really feel.<\/p>\n
I agree with that. You asked have there been any downsides? It takes a lot of time to do social media. And right now I\u2019m a one-man team. Hopefully by the time this airs, I\u2019ve got some assistance because it\u2019s something that I\u2019ve been looking to do, but I love making the videos. I love telling the stories, and so it\u2019s been hard for me to hand some of that over. And I would say it took about a few years before I really started getting a great return on that time spent. This year, about 80% of my business came from social media, and I\u2019m probably three years into doing social media. Even when I did that series and I got a bunch of followers, it didn\u2019t immediately turn into a bunch of deals. It turned into a lot of support and it turned into my name being out there.
But then people are like, \u201cHey, you\u2019re the guy who flipped your first house. My cousin wants to do their first flip.\u201d And it just kind of started to\u2026 We pushed the snowball and it took a little while before things really picked up, but now I\u2019m spending less time in content and getting more results from social media than I was a couple years ago.<\/p>\n
All right. We\u2019ve got to take a quick break, but we\u2019ll be right back right after the break. All right, we are back on the BiggerPockets podcast. Let\u2019s jump back in. So what happened? Did you do more flips? Have you pivoted into rentals?What came next and how would you define yourself as an investor?<\/p>\n
Yeah, so after that first flip, I took a pause on buying properties for a little bit. Part of me almost thought maybe I got lucky with how everything turned out, and I didn\u2019t want to prove to myself that maybe it was luck. So I just focused on helping other people buy their properties and I got a little antsy. I did purchase another property. I got into partnering with some other investors. Don\u2019t know if I\u2019m the one to coin this term, but I got into what I like to call vibe flipping. Have you heard of vibe coding?<\/p>\n
Yes.<\/p>\n
So I think that a lot of flippers, they have a list of all the finishes that they\u2019ll do. They\u2019ll do Greek villa or agreeable gray on all the walls, and you\u2019ve got the same white shaker cabinets. And through my first flip, I actually put a lot of the design choices on my Instagram as polls and let people pick what we should do. And it turned into a really unique product on the market that stood out from other properties. And if I\u2019m posting an option that gets 80% of the vote, I\u2019m going to assume that buyers will also agree that 80% of buyers would prefer that over something else. And so it actually was a weight lifted off of me having to figure out what design choices I had to make, and I let my audience do that, and it turned out really well. We had a unique property that we put on the market, unique colors that we put in different rooms.
We flipped the mid-century modern house earlier this year.<\/p>\n
They\u2019re the best.<\/p>\n
And that one was really fun to design. We left a lot of the design up to our audience, and we ended up getting a buyer from Oregon who found it on Zillow, and they just though it was the coolest house that they\u2019ve ever seen and they wanted to move to Ohio. And so maybe my advice to people who want to get into flipping is use your own creative taste on your project because I think that your product will stand out. And across the flips that we\u2019ve done, I\u2019ve averaged five days on market when Columbus\u2019s average days on market is maybe 30 or 40.<\/p>\n
Wow. Dude, it\u2019s so good because so much of the advice about real estate investing is build a system. And you do need some systems, but taste and design is hard to systematize when you\u2019re trying to apply them to homes that are inherently different. And if you took those gray colors you named and the luxury vinyl plank and put that in a mid-century home, that\u2019s a travesty. You shouldn\u2019t do that. And everyone would hate it. And I look at Zillow, everyone knows when you walk into a flipped house, especially in your neighborhood or in your market, because they all copy each other too. And so you\u2019re like, \u201cOkay, I know these exact floors. I know these pendant lights, and I\u2019m already skeptical of the quality of this home because it was probably someone who was mailing it in and didn\u2019t spend the time to actually think about how to make this house great.\u201d And I think a lot of that, just rinse and repeating, gives flipped homes a bad name and people don\u2019t want to buy them.
And if you actually demonstrate that you care about the finished product and that the people are going to enjoy living there, lo and behold, you find people who actually want to live there. It makes so much sense to me.<\/p>\n
When I first got into flipping, our first few flips just sold so fast, and it was because we cared about the design and each one of them were different. And I wanted them to cater to who that buyer is in that specific neighborhood for that specific house. And that isn\u2019t a copy paste on finishes per house. So I just love giving people something that they aren\u2019t expecting in a home and that helps them to sell faster. Now, is that harder to systematize? Absolutely. But can you create systems around that? Yeah, you can do that as well. And especially now in a market where eyeballs are limited, the better your design, the more eyeballs you\u2019re going to get. And in every single market, there\u2019s a number of how many eyeballs it takes to get an offer. So the more eyeballs you can get into your property because your design is unique and amazing and shows you care, the more offers that you\u2019re going to get.
So it\u2019s vibe flipping, but it\u2019s also profitable.<\/p>\n
Definitely. The most recent flip that I did, it made $57,000 and it followed that same process of how do I make this feel like it\u2019s going to be someone\u2019s home, not just how do I turn this from an ugly house into something that is inhabitable, but how do I make it feel cozy? Totally. And I think that\u2019s what leads to properties increasing your margin on a flip is yes, someone can live here now, but why will someone want to live here?<\/p>\n
That makes you feel good when you sell a home too. It\u2019s like it\u2019s profitable, but because you created something of value, not just because you were able to pawn it off to the next person. I also just want to shout out and say, because Henry and I talk about this all the time, this also matters for rental property investing.<\/p>\n
Absolutely.<\/p>\n
People love to just turn their rental properties with the same crappy cabinets and countertops and luxury vinyl plank floors, and no one wants to live there or they will, but they\u2019re going to leave at the soonest opportunity that they can because you don\u2019t make it feel like a comfortable place to live. It\u2019s not valuable. You\u2019re not making something that is a great place for your tenants to live. It\u2019s not a good customer experience. And so vibe flipping, Obi, you got to brand this one for us. I\u2019m terrible at this, but something where you also create a vibe also applies for rental property investing as well.<\/p>\n
Well, this has been really cool, Obi. I appreciate you coming on the show, being super transparent about your journey. And I think it\u2019s such a practical episode because of your age. There\u2019s a lot of people who are your age who are right now trying to navigate all of these same decisions, and you kind of did it all. You became the agent, you listed houses, you house hagged, did some flips. You said you\u2019re sitting in a short-term rental right now. And so for the investors who are listening, who are curious and cautiously considering jumping in right now, given the state of the market, what path would you recommend somebody in a very similar position take?<\/p>\n
For me, at the end of the day, I wanted to do something that I enjoyed, and so I didn\u2019t want to leave any options on the table. I wanted to experiment with each of these different ways to invest in real estate to see what really felt good because if you don\u2019t like it, you\u2019re not going to want to wake up and do it first thing in the morning. And so I think it\u2019s obviously in real estate there\u2019s risk, but if you\u2019re an intelligent person, you can navigate that risk and you can attempt any of these approaches relatively new without much experience. My most recent flip, it was 100% financed. I didn\u2019t use any of my own money to flip that house that we made $57,000 on. You don\u2019t need to use your own money. There\u2019s first time home buyer loans, like our duplex, we only had to put 5% down.
There\u2019s a lot of ways to get started. I think you just have to give it a go and don\u2019t convince yourself that you\u2019ve got to get it right the first time when you pick maybe the first way that you want to get into real estate. It\u2019s the experience that you\u2019ll get from that can transfer into other forms of real estate investing. And so that\u2019s something I learned pretty early on when I dabbled in wholesaling and then I got my license and became a realtor. I was having the same conversations on the phone with sellers who needed to put their house on the market. I was just able to offer them different ways to get the job done. So I would say there\u2019s really no barrier. All the information is online. It\u2019s on podcasts like this. There\u2019s so many resources out there and money is not a barrier.
You don\u2019t need a lot of money to get started and you don\u2019t have to pick the best way to start. You just have to give it a go. And from there, the momentum will take you into wherever you really want to end up being.<\/p>\n
I like that because if you\u2019re going to start with a single family home, the risk is a whole lot lower, right? A house very rarely goes from worth something to worth nothing. So even if you\u2019re not as profitable as you want to be, or maybe you don\u2019t even make a profit on your first deal, if you start with the smaller single family home, what you\u2019re doing is exactly what you said. You were like, \u201cI am learning what I want to be as an investor. I don\u2019t know yet.\u201d And I think a lot of people want to decide what kind of investor they want to be before they\u2019ve ever done a deal, and you will learn so much through your first real estate You\u2019re going to learn what you want to do again. You\u2019re going to absolutely learn what you never want to do again. You might learn you never even want to do real estate again.<\/p>\n
Also fine, if you\u2019ve tried it.<\/p>\n
Yes, if you\u2019ve tried it. There\u2019s a difference between getting the bug and then actually defining yourself as a real estate investor, and it takes some experience before you can actually do that. And so I like the concept of let\u2019s put some skin in the game, let\u2019s get started with something lower risk, and let\u2019s learn about who we want to be, what we want to buy, where we want to buy, how we want to buy. There\u2019s too many things to learn on the front side and be able to apply without never having done it. Now, can you leave us just with a little bit on where are you now as an investor? And then knowing what you know now about the market, you just left BP Con, what are your future goals for real estate?<\/p>\n
So right now it\u2019s still just the duplex that we house hacked. I mean, with rates being higher, I am seeing a lot of my clients pivot towards flipping homes and having a lot of success in flips. Properties that will cash flow a couple hundred dollars might make you 40,000 on a flip, 45,000 on a flip. In my market, Columbus, there\u2019s still a lot of buyer demand even in other places in Ohio. I hear Cincinnati is a really great market. Even the smaller cities like Dayton are performing really well. So I am hoping to guide more clients through their flips, changing their life off of their first flip is something I did myself and it\u2019s something that I think other people should do as well. I like being an investor friendly agent. I love also just helping people get into their first home. So I\u2019d say from here, it\u2019s spending 90% of my time being a realtor and helping people accomplish their real estate goals.
I might flip a house a year just to make sure I keep up with the trends and what the market looks like. I\u2019ve already had my fun in it and now I like to share some of those good deals with the clients that reach out to me looking to get into flipping. So hopefully level up my transactions. We hit, I want to say top 5% and the brokerage last year. I don\u2019t know how far I am from top 1%, but that\u2019s something that I got to keep pushing until we see that number. So it\u2019s just scaling my agent business, doing more transactions and helping people let real estate change their lives.<\/p>\n
This is cool. You\u2019re wise beyond your years, my man. You\u2019ve learned a lot of lessons that a lot of people in their 40s haven\u2019t learned yet.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s true. How old are you? Can I ask that?<\/p>\n
I\u2019m 28. I\u2019m 28.<\/p>\n
Oh, wow. Yeah, you are wise beyond your years. Well, congrats on all your success, Obi. It\u2019s awesome to hear your story, to hear all the things you\u2019re doing in real estate. Congrats on the social media and most importantly on your growing family. It\u2019s super exciting.<\/p>\n
I appreciate it. Thanks, Dave. Thanks Henry for letting me share.<\/p>\n
Well, you can\u2019t get out of here just yet. You got to let people know where they can find you or follow you or learn more about what you do.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m probably the only guy named Obi that will come up when you do a Google search. So you can search me online, Obie Johns. I\u2019m on Instagram @soldby. Obi, and I\u2019m sure my email or something will be in the description. You can reach out to me directly if you\u2019re looking to invest in Ohio, Central Ohio.<\/p>\n
Boom.<\/p>\n
Thanks again.<\/p>\n
All right everybody. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the BiggerPockets Podcast. As always, we\u2019ll see you on the next episode.<\/p>\n