In this Deal Structure Sunday episode, Chris Prefontaine warns viewers about the flood of get‑rich‑quick real‑estate marketing that offers flashy promises but no real support. Drawing on his own experience surviving the 2008 crash and building a cash‑now‑cash‑over‑time business model, he explains why most programs lack backend assistance. Out of frustration he created an associate program that partners with students on actual deals, providing real‑time mentorship and hands‑on experience. He then outlines three concrete strategies for sustainable success: (1) pick a niche—he favors creative real estate but stresses any niche that aligns with the learner’s values; (2) join an experienced mentor or community that has weathered multiple market cycles and demonstrates balanced personal success; (3) commit to the path with “blinders on” for three to seven years, a timeline informed by a conversation with Brian Tracy that breaks the period into learning, skill‑building, and wealth‑creation phases. He concludes by offering two of his bestselling books for free via wickedsmartbooks.com/youtube, encouraging viewers to test the niche and, if it fits, embark on a multi‑year journey together.
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All right. Welcome to this week's Deal Structure Sunday. I'm going to mix it up a little bit for you this week. Instead of putting a whiteboard and, and, and/or deal structure in front of you, what I want to do is scream as loud as I possibly can and have you hear the fact that I'd like you to stop watching and listening to nonsense real estate program marketing out there right now. I don't care if it's on Facebook or other social media or TV. It's— there's a bunch of crap being marketed. And what sparked me to want to talk about this on a Deal Structure Sunday is I was on a couple podcasts, actually 5 podcasts yesterday, but on 2 or 3 of them, the host brought up the same thing. They asked me to comment because they were angry about what was being marketed in real estate. And here's why we were both talking about this on 2 or 3 different shows. It's because there's a lot of stuff out there telling you get rich quick. Telling you, you can learn this tomorrow. And I realized after coming out of the crash that I had to live through in 2008 and took 3 or 4 years to get out of that, post-crash I decided, okay, I'm going to engineer the type of business that I want to live in and live by. And that meant no banks. That meant no to limited cash in a deal because I didn't have credit to to go to a bank and I didn't have cash, but I also didn't want to jeopardize myself or my family with going through banks. And it also was designed to produce cash for me now, which I was used to in real estate, transactional cash, but I didn't want to be on that treadmill. So I wanted to have continuous cash also and long-term cash and wealth at the same time. And that's sort of that business model of cash now, cash over time, and long-term. That's an ideal business model. I don't care what business you're in. If you own a restaurant, that's cool. And then I noticed, to my conversation earlier with the podcast host, I noticed I literally could not find anyone doing deals in the trenches with their students after their marketing effort. Okay, so I just want to come back so you know why I started that way. A lot of marketing, a lot of marketing, a lot of marketing, no backend support. None. So out of that frustration, and I shared that with the host just yesterday, Was born sort of the associate program whereby we do deals with the associates in the trenches, meaning like literally during this filming, I got a message from one of our high 6 associates who said, can you speak with a seller of mine that has 5 properties tonight at 4 o'clock? This is the type of thing that we do. The nuances that go on in these deals, like even after you've done 20 of these deals, The nuances that I promise you will come at you. Curveballs. It's real estate. It's going to happen. They're bound to come. And you'll notice on this PlayStation, Deal Structure Sundays, you'll notice nowhere in these videos do I say, or did I ever say, yep, you can make a million and yep, this is easy. I've said it's simple once you learn the skill set, but nowhere have I said that or guaranteed that. What I do say to you is 3 things. Find a niche, number one. If it's creative real estate, great. I happen to be biased to it. It happens to thrive in any market. But if it's not, it's not. Find a niche that you can get behind. Ours tends to lend itself to people, if this is you, that like to help others. It takes a win-win. It takes helping the seller, helping the buyer, and you craft this win-win. So find the niche that you can get behind. Number 2. Find someone or a group or a community or a local meetup, whatever it is, that has experience, meaning they've been through market cycles. I want to caution you, if you don't find that, number 2, in a sense that they've gone through experienced markets economically, you're asking for trouble because you are going to be in a changing market if you're in real estate for any time period. It's one constant in real estate, it changes all the time. So if you know that's going to happen and you're with someone that got in the business since the last downturn, let's say, or since COVID or since the last crash, you're asking for trouble. Who are you going to go to when it changes? It's going to change. So just be ready for it. Okay? It's seasonal. Real estate is seasonal somewhat. All right. Also, that mentor should be someone that is where you want to be, right? Financially, success-wise, but also with their family and other things they do on a day-to-day basis. Why is this important on step number 2? Why is this so important? Look, I know a lot of people, without mentioning names, who have experienced success financially who screwed their life up royally, whether it's with their kids or their spouse or their health. And you probably do too. So why would you follow that? So one, pick a niche. 2, experience, mentor, or community that you can get behind in every way. And 3, super important, blinders on for 3 to 7 years. Why do I say that for step 3? Why is this so important? Well, there are a lot of shiny objects in the industry. There are a lot of great marketers marketing to you on a constant, continuous basis. Great marketers. We suck at marketing, but we're really good at getting you to a deal. So you got to put the blinders on for 3 to 7 years. I used to say 3. Why do I say 3 to 7 now? I had Brian Tracy on my podcast about a year ago now, I think. Brian's in his 80s. At that time, he was 82, I think. And he's been through a lot in real estate. You've probably read one of his 40, 50, 60 books he's written. And I said to him my 3-year theory. And he said, no, no, no. He's the first person on my podcast who said, no, no, no, it's not 3 years, Chris. He said, I'm 82. I think it was exactly that. And I've been through bankruptcies. I've been through huge successes. And I'll tell you that it's 7 years because for the first 2 years, 2 to 3, you're going to suck at whatever it is you're doing. He said, I don't care if it's real estate or whatever it is. For the next 2 or 3, you're going to get really good at it. And then for the last 2 or 3, whatever it works out to be, that's where you're going to create your wealth and make your money. And it made a lot of sense. So I say 3 to 7 with blinders on. Now, if you do those 3 steps, you won't get tripped up in all the fancy marketing. You won't get tripped up in all the promises. You won't get tripped up by the real estate guru who's sitting on his Lamborghini that he rented for the weekend to do the ad. You won't get tripped up on any of that crap. You're going to be in a laser-focused mode and have a great run at success. Now, I'm not so naive to think that creative real estate is for everyone. I'm biased to it, but I'm not so naive. But if you're interested in seeing it and seeing if we're a fit, grab your books that are for free with the link I'm going to give you right now. Free books. I want you— instead of marketing to you to sell you stuff, I want to give you At least 2 of our 4 bestselling books, Real Estate on Your Terms and Deal Structure Overtime. Just go to wickedsmartbooks.com/youtube. You will not be asked for 10 cents. You won't be asked for shipping. We're going to get those out to you for free. Enjoy the books. Enjoy the Deal Structure Sundays. That's enough free material for you to go, this niche is for me or it's not. And if it's for you, we're going to make a great run together for 3 to 7 years. We'll see you soon.
