Ep. 72 Wholesaling Your First Deal To Scaling Your Real Estate Business To $1M In Profit With Chris Craddock

Welcome to the Next Level of Income show where it's our goal to raise your income, your investments and your life to the next level. I'm your host, Chris Larsen. Go to our website, NextLevelIncome.com to get a free copy of our book as well as to find out how to invest in our upcoming offerings. Click on the Invest link and you can get access to our latest Self Storage fund as well as our upcoming Institutional Quality Investments in Real Estate. On today's show, you're not going to want to miss Chris Craddock. This high energy guest is is going to tell you how he grew 11 businesses, how he grossed over nine figures last year as a real estate agent, and his special leadership tips not only from his PhD in leadership, but also what he did in building his 11 businesses. Stay tuned. On today's show, we have Chris Craddock. Chris is a nationally certified life coach in leadership and one of the top real estate professionals in the world, closing 30 to 65 deals a month. He's also the host of the Uncommon Real Estate Podcast, a Realtor entrepreneur who runs multiple successful businesses in the Washington, D.C. metro area. And his companies consistently bring in 10 million in revenue or more year after year. His team, the Redux Group, sold over $165 million in volume in 2020. In addition, Chris has been married for 21 years and is the proud father to six beautiful children. Today's show is sponsored by the Airbnb Kickstart course. My wife and I started our first Airbnb here in the last year and we've come to love the ability to earn more money than we would if we had a long term rental. If you're interested in starting your Airbnb business with little money, scaling your Airbnb business, or just learning tricks about the industry in general, check out our airbnb course at nextlevelincome.com/airbnb. That's Air the Letters BNB and you'll get a 20% discount code. Chris Craddock, welcome to the show.

Hey. Hey. Thanks for having me here. Excited to be here with you.

Absolutely, man. I had a great little conversation with you here. We're going to have to tell that story about your daughter in the car at some point here in the show. It cracks me up as a parent. I got a few more years. My oldest is 11. But Chris, you have really an amazing story, I think an amazing background and I'd love for you to share a little bit of that with the audience before we dive in here.

Sure. Yeah. So I graduated from college in 2000, went on staff with an organization called Young Life. Loved Young Life.

I was a member when I was younger myself.

Yeah.

So great.

But the problem was I made $20,000 a year from in. Life was a little rough. So 2003, when my wife got pregnant, I need to make more money to support the family. And so I went to the library every book on real estate investing and honestly just went out and started knocking on doors of distressed properties. And so somehow I ended up making 12 times what I made in a year in the next four months. So I continued doing ministry, and then down the road a little bit, I always led large groups of people. So I went back to school and ended up getting a doctorate in leadership. My kids always joke that I'm a doctor that can't do anything. I'm like, great, okay. So, yeah, I got a doctorate in leadership. And then the money started running out again in the early 2010s, and so I started flipping houses again and ended up getting my real estate license. Most of the houses were short sales at that point in time. And then I read Gary Keller's millionaire real estate agent book, where it just laid out a path to, like, a color by numbers path of how to net a million dollars in real estate through having a retail team. And I'd always led people. I loved leeple. And so I was like, all right, that makes sense. And so I started a retail team. And it took us five years to get there, but we did in five years at a million mark. And through that time, we started building other synergistic businesses like title and insurance and construction and all these other synergistic businesses that kind of float off that flywheel of the. Of the real estate team. And so last year, we did 500 transactions, 167 million, and have 11 other businesses that we're running as well, or 10 other businesses that we're running.

That is awesome, man. I want to dive into all that because you got so much stuff here that we can talk about. But we started off our conversation here. I think one of the things, one of your businesses is wholesaling, and this is a topic that we haven't really dove into on this show in over two years. But I remember going to real estate meetings actually not too far from you in the D.C. area. I drive up from college, I'd be visiting my parents in a park near Annapolis. I go to these meetings, and I'm like, oh, I'm trying to get some capital to invest because I already had a couple properties at the time. I was 21, 22. And I was like, oh, wholesaling. So do you mind talking about the wholesaling concept, Chris, and what you guys teach there?

I'm one of the coaches with Wholesaling Inc. And they teach wholesaling and then a number of other things through that. But the basic concept behind wholesaling is the idea that you buy a property, you find distressed sellers that are looking to sell a property. Let's say properties would sell for, let's say, 300,000. Right now, let's just use that number. And the seller is willing to sell to you for 225. So basically, you get it under contract for 225,000 and then you sell the contract to somebody else. Let's say you sell a contract for 75 and it's worth 300. So that buyer buys it for 275. They're getting a discount. The seller gets what they want, the 225, and you make $50,000 to sell the contract. So that's kind of the gist of what wholesaling is. Is. Is you're going out and finding people that want to sell, and you're kind of making that deal happen. And you're pretty much the middleman, finding, Connecting those people. And you get paid to connect those people.

Yeah. And I know some people listen thinking, like, well, that's too good to be true. You know, like, people are going to go list it with the real estate agent. That's not going to work. I mean, but I've seen this. I have a friend, he actually lives right here on the other side of the mountain from our house, and he's made a whole business of this. So how does that work? Walk us through the process, Chris. If somebody says, hey, I'm getting started. I get these calls every week, right? Chris. I'm getting Chris Larsen. That's why I introduced you as Chris Craddock. Chris Larson. I'm getting started. I'd love to invest in $100,000 in a real estate deal, but. But I don't have $10,000 yet. Like, this sounds like a great concept from them. What's the business look like?

Yeah. So here's what I would say immediately if you want to start on something like that, something called Driving for Dollars, Right. And you download the app. It's called Deal Machine. You download the Deal Machine app, you use the promo code, and you'll get a free month free. And they'll give you. I think it's $200 with a free marketing material as well. So you find people that want to sell and you literally can send $200 worth of like door hangers and mailers out for free. But driving for dollars is the easiest way to start with nothing. And you go out and what you do is it'll give you a map. You drive around the map and you can lay a filter out saying, hey, I only want absentee landlords because absentee landlords tend to sell at a higher rate than other people. Or I only want people that are in distress for whatever reason because they tend to sell at a higher rate than other people. They call it data stacking. You can even put all those together. And so literally you drive down a street and it'll show you the houses that fit that data criteria. And if you look at the house run down, I'll tell you, any house that's run down is more likely to sell than a house that's not run down. There's your pro tip right there. And so you just click on the deal machine app where it is and it'll give you their information. You can literally click something right there and it'll send them a basically saying you're wanting to buy their house, all of the other stuff and people are willing to sell for convenience. So if you say, hey, that's not true, just tell you this story. I could have made probably an extra $2,500 when I traded in my last car if I sold it on Craigslist. I didn't want people come to my house, test driving my car, going through the hassle of it. It wasn't worth it to me. I was willing to pay that money for convenience to trade it and get the truck. Like I literally thought about my truck that I wanted, right? I've always wanted a Ford Raptor. And so I ended up trading it in get my Ford Raptor. I wanted to from my old car to the Raptor, and that was it. So I'm like, I'll pay for the convenience to turn it in. That's the whole deal. When you think about why do these distressed sellers do that one. They want to avoid real estate agent commissions. Maybe they think their house is too messed up to go on the mls. Maybe they don't want their neighbors to know that it's a hoarder condition and so they don't want it to be publicly out there. Maybe they don't want people coming through their house all hours of the day or night. People are willing to sell or maybe they're in distress. Like they need to move fast. Like their job changed and they're not getting paid relocation, they're getting foreclosed on or whatever the reason is. So there's all these reasons why people are willing to sell fast and want to sell, are willing to sell at a discount because they just want to get it done.

No, it's true. I did the same thing with my last car. And I will tell you, my wife and I, we were building spec homes. So she was sending out cards to people all over our city that had lots adjacent to their house. And this was over five years ago. Last year she got a response back from one of those people that was looking to sell and said, hey, we're looking to sell her house. Middle of the pandemic. And we weren't looking to buy it at that time. We moved on to different stuff. So no, I think it's fantastic. And the cool thing is, Chris, everything that you just mentioned, you could say, hey, I'm looking for a house for myself. I can't maybe afford in this neighborhood in the city. I want to save $50,000 when I'm buying. You can use this strategy. You could say, hey, I want to buy a house with a lot that's attached to it. You can use this strategy. You can use it to buy a rental, you can use it for wholesaling like you were talking about. I think it's a great strategy that can be used and expanded over multiple different things. So again, that was the deal machine app and what was the code again that people can use? We'll put that in the show Notes.

Uncommon.

Uncommon. Awesome and uncommon. You get that from one of your, what, three podcasts that you do, Chris?

The whole idea behind it is I think common people do common. They get common results. And like, and I know this isn't politically correct, but like the 1% of the 1% oftentimes because they're willing to do what the 99% aren't willing to do. So I want to live my life uncommon. I want to do uncommon things and I want uncommon results. And frankly, if you do that, you'll get that. And so that's what I think people should do if they want to find their first off market real estate deal. Just download the app, drive around, you'll find properties that are dilapidated. Here's the other thing. Don't think that if you find three properties, you're going to get one out of the three. Get 50, get 100. I think the average in like low dollar areas is something like 80 properties to get a really good deal. And in a high dollar area like mine, the DC market, I think it's 150 properties to get a really good deal where somebody's doing. That's the average. But maybe you're uncommon. You can do it in half that.

Yeah, there you go. I mean, it's a numbers game. Apartments, numbers game. We make a lot of offers, look at a lot of deals, and we don't get a lot of signed offers in return. But that one good deal that you get every month, every quarter, every year can make it all worth it. All right, so you've built a multimillion dollar $167 million real estate practice last year. Let's talk about some of your other businesses, Chris. Sure.

Yeah. So the coaching business, REI revive. I teach people, investors that are bringing in leads, monetize their dead leads. Right. For a wholesaler, if you're not buying at 65 or 70 cents on the dollar, you can't wholesale. So when people say, hey, I want to sell 90 cents on the dollar, well, what happens there? They usually go to the CRM and die a slow, painful death. Some real estate agent monetizes it and it gets done. So what do you do? You partner with a real estate agent and let the real estate agent do that. Well, this like a new thing. People have been trying it for years, but they just have not had much success because most real estate agents don't know the scripting. They talk to them like they're just a regular seller looking to sell. But the reality is they don't want to talk to a real estate agent. Their brother's uncle is a real estate agent. There's more real estate agents than there are active listings right now. They don't want to talk to an agent. So you need to have somebody that can come in and hear their problem, know that their problem is one of those things that I mentioned earlier, why people sell to an investor and if that agent can solve that problem for them, then they are going to get paid to solve the problem. Because if you make the most money are the people that solve the most problems. And so if they solve that problem, then they can make money on it. And then you as an investor can work to get referral fees on those deals.

I love it. People that make the most money solve the most problems. I used to tell my sales reps that they'd be complaining about something. I said, sounds like that's a problem you need to solve. And they said, yeah, but well, if we didn't have problems, you wouldn't have a job. And that's the great thing. If you go out there and you look for problems to solve, you can do it. So you have REI Revive. So you got 11 businesses, you got six kids, you got three podcasts, you have a doctorate in leadership. So, Chris, what are some tips for people? Because we have a lot of people that are listening. They're very successful in their careers, and they're looking to make that next step. And, I mean, I transitioned from sales to leadership, and it's really hard. I think it's one thing if you're dealing with yourself every day and clients, but when you have to deal with people and you're leading them, it's a whole different ball game. What are some tips that you can give to the audience that you've learned in your time, not just with your doctorate, but really actually growing and leading people in these businesses?

If you are a great salesperson, the reason you're a great salesperson is because you know how to listen to what they want, right? If you listen, you, everybody will tell you how to sell them. But most of the time, if you don't know, you haven't asked a good question and you haven't listened well, right? The reason why we don't remember people's names is because we're too busy thinking about the next thing we're going to say rather than actually listening to their name and caring about them. So stop, get over yourself and start thinking about them. Like, that is how you do it. So that's one. Number two is this. You make a lot of money in sales because Zig Ziglar says you can have everything you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want in life.

Another great quote.

You need to now go from being the actual person that you're selling to to your client needs to be the people you're leading, right? And the way you do that is you think with them, right? The same thing you do when you're working with a client. What's in it for me? So every morning, if you're leading people, every morning, you should wake up and you think, I'm a Christian guy. So I pray for the people that I lead, right? Like, that's one of the things I do. I pray for them. I also think, how can I make world bigger? How can I allow them to grow into something that they want to grow into? I also think, what is it that they want? Like, what don't they see for Themselves. How can I lead them to see a life that's bigger than they may even see for themselves? And I'll tell you, when you add value, that kind of value to people that are following you, they'll follow you forever. You don't want people that are going to just be, like, there because they get a paycheck. You want people that are going to be loyal to you, people that are going to. Literally, if you were to go into battle, they'd say, I would follow that man or that woman into battle. I want to be with them. And the only way to do that is to know that you're willing to speak into their life and help them see a bigger life than they may even see for themselves. And when you can help people accomplish that and dream bigger and feel bigger. And there was this story. When Jesus rose from the dead, people didn't recognize him, and he was walking. It's called the Road to Emmaus. He was walking with him. And after he left, the people said, man, we're with him. Did our hearts not come alive, did not burn? And so that's. That whole idea is you may not be, like, massively charismatic, and you have to be. What you got to be is somebody that helps people dream bigger than they need. And you don't have to say that loud or emphatically. You just have to be able to help them. And then they're willing to do. They're willing to go beyond what they were willing to do before, because you help them see that vision for their own life that they may not have seen for themselves.

Man, pure gold. I love that. I hope we can get that quote, like that whole clip there, Chris, because that was just awesome. And it's true. I think, to summarize what you just said, if you're leading people, you need to find out what matters to them. You need to step onto their stage, find out what they're going through in their life. Help them. I love what you said there. Dream bigger, think bigger, have a bigger future for them, and then help them get there. And that's how you lead people and ultimately provide them value. I hope I did a good job summarizing that.

Yeah, I did a great job. One of the things. So there was this story. I'm not a great swimmer, but there was this girl that swam the English Channel, right, which is a massively hard swim. Well, then she swam from Catalina island to the mainland of San Diego. Well, the crazy thing is, halfway through that swim, the fog descended and literally, she couldn't see More than three feet in front of her and her whole body just started cramping up. They had to pull her out because she was going drown. So what it tells us is what couldn't see the goal. When she couldn't see it physiologically, her whole body started cramping up because it just felt like it was so far away. Well, the people that work for us, why do they get this malaise? Why do they feel slow? Why do they feel sluggish, like, not do the things? It's because they can't see, taste and touch the goals that they have. And so your job as a leader is to remind them of. Of why they do what they do. Simon Sinek's books start with why. Like, get them feeling the why, like understanding the why interact with those goals. Otherwise they're going to feel like their goals are far away. And honestly, what that swimmer taught us is it's not just in your head. Your head dictates how your body feels. So you're going to have less energy, you're going to have less excitement, you're going to have less enthusiasm. Brendan Burchard, in his book High Performance Habits, says that a great leader creates energy. Right? And I know that I'm a little bit more energetic than most people. I think that's one of my.

You're getting me fired up, dude. Keep it coming.

But that's. That whole idea is what can you do to create energy and impart energy? You can't say, oh, well, he's just got more energy. I'm a little bit more subdued by nature. That's not it. I'm telling you, that's not it. You need to read the people in your life and figure out how can you impart energy and vision and focus into their life.

That is awesome. And two awesome books. Start with why High Performance Habits. Two great authors. You can check out Simon Sinek. He has a great YouTube video. Start with why. And Brendan Burchard has a ton out there as well. But no, I believe it. Chris. It's something I experienced in my own life when I was leaving my career in the past year, actually, I was anxious and I was almost a little depressed because I didn't really know what my future was because I had this big goal that I was always working towards. And we finished a house, got to a couple things financially and I was almost depressed. And when we don't have a bigger future, that we're helping people and have a bigger importance, it sucks the energy out of us. And I think that's so important. So if you're at that point in your life, you got to dream big, you got to think big, and you got to surround yourself with the right people that can help you get there as well. So, Chris, you've learned businesses, you got a lot of stuff going on. Gary Keller has the book the One Thing. Right. So I'd like to know, like, what's the one thing? What's the big thing you're working on right now in your life?

Yeah, so the big thing that I'm looking at is how to expand the footprint. So we built all these businesses that are really great, and now I really want to work to help other people build great, massively big lives.

Right.

And exciting lives. It doesn't have to be big. Right. But exciting lives. And I think a lot of people have these goals and dreams and they're hitting these glass ceilings because they don't know how to go to the next level. And so for me, that's what I want to help people do is go to that next level. And I feel like as I become a better leader and a better communicator and help more people, every single other business that I'm a part of will get better.

Yeah, I love that.

And the definition of the one thing is if you do this thing, everything else will become easier or unnecessary. And so I think if I become a better leader and a better communicator, then all of my business partners, all of the people that work for me will be. It'll make it easier or unnecessary for some of the stuff that we're doing.

No, that's fantastic. I actually have that at the top of my quarterly goals. I always write that down like what my one thing is every quarter. And even if everything else doesn't work out or anything else doesn't work out on that list, I find if I get that one thing done, I mean, my whole life changes over that 60 or 90 days, which is big you mentioned. I kind of want to wrap back around to Gary Keller because you mentioned you walk through his step by step process to build a million dollar business. Net profit, I think is what you said over five years. What did you learn over that process? And what does he say? For those that maybe aren't familiar with Gary Keller or what he teaches, the.

Goal is to get to a net profit in a 12 month period of over a million dollars. So now they're coming up with a millionaire real estate agent. Part two. So in part one, the whole goal was first think a million. Right. Think about it your reticular activating system will bring the right things into your life to do it. Then gross a million, right? Like you bring in net revenue, top line revenue of $1 million in your business, then net a million, which is you keep. You take home a million dollars and create two millionaire real estate agent two you is then give a million, right? Learn how to take home a million every year, but now learn how to give a million. I do have a goal that in a 12 month period I'll give over a million dollars away. And that's that whole idea behind it is how do you do that? And so a lot of people look at education. Well, education is more of a hobby, I think for people. They listen to podcasts and don't do anything about it, right. They listen to books, don't do anything about it. But the reality is it needs to not be a hobby. It needs to become a right. So if you just tell people about stuff and they listen and they say, oh, that was cool, I'm glad I heard it. Like, who cares, right? It needs to be life changing. And so that's the thing I love about the millionaire real estate agent was it's like, here's your first step, here's your second step, here's your third step. Color by numbers. And one of the things that I've learned in life is many people that are entrepreneurs, they get so creative that they try to innovate way too early. And so what I've learned is imitate. And then so he gives you the path. So imitate that and then put your own flare into it.

Yeah, no, I think it's terrific. I mean, I follow a lot of different things and why recreate the wheel? So if somebody, Chris, they're looking, they're saying, hey, I want to learn how to wholesale or I'm a realtor, I want to learn to grow my business. Maybe they're a business owner, they want to learn leadership. What is the best way to work with you? How do you work with clients? How can they find you?

Yeah. So when I first started as an entrepreneur, I would reach out to people. If I liked their vibe on podcasts, I would reach out to them. And I couldn't believe they actually talked to me. I was like, what? This is crazy. Like you make how much money and you chatting with me, this is nuts. So yeah, that was just really cool. So I want to give back the same way people me. So what I've said is I will answer any direct message that I'm sent on instagram. So it's Radrock. Not my last name, but an old cheesy high school nickname. So forgive me for that. C R A D D R O C K. And I'll answer any direct message on there. Now it may not be right away because I did get a bunch of them now, so it may take a couple days, but I'll answer anything on that front. If you are a wholesaler or a fix and flipper or have leads come in and you want to learn how to monetize them, you can go to my website, Chris Craddock.com, that is my name.com and get in there and just click apply. And either me or somebody from our team will take a look and see if your business is right for the coaching business. I do do some coaching, like personal, like development, scaling your business. I say no to more people than I say yes to on that. Like I only have a couple of clients on that. One, because I charge a lot of money for it. And two, I only want to work with that has like massively, massively big goals because that's just where I am in my life and I get to choose where I am. And I'm sorry if that sounds douchey, I don't mean to be that way. I'm just at a point right now where I only want to spend one on one coaching time with people that think massively, massively big.

I love that. No, that's fantastic. All right, so before we get to the story about your daughter's green car, if you go back to 25 year old self, I imagine that was right around the time that your first child was born, what piece of advice would you give yourself back then, Chris?

Well, here's the funny thing I keep asking people and let me flip the script on you and ask you a quick question here. If you bring it all to 25 and everything you know, now you take a pill and you could know everything you know today. How much money would you pay to take that pill?

Everything I had, Everything you have right now. Everything I'd pay everything I had. Yeah, whatever, you know. Yeah. If I had to pay, borrow, steal, yeah, it'd be worth at least eight figures. Yeah. @ a minimum. At a minimum.

Look at that. So the thing I would probably tell myself is I was always doing education, I was always learning. Well, I did pay for a doctorate. Right. But I wasn't paying for individual one on one coaches. Right. I would say pay for that because if you can compress decades into days, stealing from Tony Robbins like originality is forgetting who you stole it from. Right? So compress those decades into days. I mean, honestly, like, think about the millions and millions of dollars all of us would make if we could go back and just know everything we know now. And the whole way to do that faster is to get people that know the path and, and can say, hey, don't make that stupid mistake. Don't make that stupid mistake. Wisdom is to learn from others. Wisdom is to walk the path that other people can say, hey, this is where it's at. Instead of just like I always joke I. The stupid tax. Like, who wants to pay the stupid tax? Right? The stupid tax keeps you from learning fast.

Absolutely. No, I mean that's. It's like, find somebody who's emulated the success that you want, reach out to them, and if you can, hire them to help you get there as fast as possible, I think that's phenomenal advice. Chris, so you got six kids. How old's your oldest?

My oldest is 17.

Is that the one getting the car? Who's getting the car?

He is the one getting the car.

I want to see a picture of this green thing.

So I am going to pull it up here. Let me see if I can find it. So, yeah, the story is. So we went over today to get a car for my daughter and it's this nice little red whatever. I don't even remember what it was, but it's not going to be ready till tomorrow because it was just traded in and they're cleaning it out and changing the tires and everything else on it. And so we found the ugliest, nastiest green car. And somebody's going to hate me for.

Saying this because I have that car.

I'm so sorry. If you have this car, let me see if I can get it on there.

I saw. We got a clip. We got a little clip of it. We got a little clip of it.

It's a puke green Nissan or Kia Soul.

Right, There you go.

So with it, we sent the picture to my daughter and said, hey, the car's not available. What do you think about this one? She was so upset. And then the funny thing is, so you. Chris went over to check a message right before we started recording. I just looked at my text messages and I had this massive stream. My son, my daughter and my wife and my son jumps in. He's like, don't get that car. That's going to be passed down to me. I don't want that car. Like my daughters. I really hate that car. And they're just so upset about it right now. Out. I love practical jokes.

They're fortunate kids to have that problem today, certainly. But I love it. I can't wait to World problems, right? Exactly. Can't wait to play a joke. But Chris, I've loved your energy. I mean, man, I took more notes on this podcast than I perhaps ever have. We're going to link all of those topics, all of those tidbits that you put here with the audience. Thank you so much for everything that you're doing out there helping other people. Thanks for sharing your story with our audience today as well.

This was awesome having me, brother.

Absolutely, Chris. Thanks so much. Hey Chris, here again. I hope you found this episode valuable. Now I have one more thing to gift you. We have a page for my coaching clients where you can get a free copy of my book as well as much more from previous guests on the show. Just check out nextlevelincome.com coaching to get a free copy of my book, audiobook and much more. I'll send you a copy of my book and cover all the shipping costs as a thank you for listening to the podcast. Also, please like share and take just 90 seconds to give us a rating on Apple Podcasts.