How to Flip Houses with No Money: Toby Potter’s $1.8B Strategy

That's right. What's your last name?

Potter, like Harry Potter.

Did you write those books?

I know, but I do get royalties by accident.

I really like your pencil, Brad. You really— the two of you have great personalities.

Thanks.

Are we recording?

Yeah, we are recording. See, we're 22 seconds in.

Okay.

What's up, Big Bob?

Today we have a very, very special guest. I know that I say that every single time, but this time we have a very special guest. But before we start, we have a tradition, uh, acknowledgement of our executive producer, uh, Brenda Ringwood, and, uh, who's also the executive director of the Becoming the Better You Foundation. That both of us are now committed to. Absolutely. So my brother, in becoming a better you, yep, uh, you can help me become a better me.

I got my work cut out, don't I?

Yes, sir. Where in Texas do you live?

Uh, McKinney, Texas.

Where's that?

So that is 34 miles north of Dallas.

34 miles. Okay, but you're part of the Dallas Metroplex?

Yeah, you could say that. We're— it's just right on the edge of the true metro, uh, to suburban area, but it's population 400,000, so it's kind of its own.

So most people, you tell them you're just from Dallas.

Yeah. When we're—

why don't we start all over? Brenda, cut this off.

Where are you from?

Dallas. All right. Um, have you always been in Dallas?

I have not. I grew up in Oklahoma.

That's another suburb of Dallas.

That is now. Absolutely. It's only a place that they still have land.

Toby Potter.

Yes, sir.

How did you make your billions of dollars?

Real estate investing.

Flipping?

Yes. So we started the company in 1994 as a mortgage company, and at that time was doing buying houses, renovating, and doing owner finance.

So you're doing the general contracting, you're doing, you're doing everything yourself.

That's correct. That's correct. Jack of all trades at that time. Grew up on a ranch, grew up on a dairy farm. So they really— you learned how to use your hands and learn how to—

well, you weren't actually doing the plumbing, you weren't actually doing the carpentry. You were?

Yes, sir.

Wow. Yeah, I can understand. I can understand. Yeah, doing some of it if it's in your wheelhouse, but I mean, just be able to walk the property and understand what everybody else is supposed to be doing, uh, that's a tremendous advantage you have of almost all other flippers.

So when we started in '94, we didn't have any money. So when we started this company, we had to do it on a shoestring budget and self-teach, self-taught. So yes, we did the plumbing, we did the foundation, we did electrical, we did the roof, we did everything. Myself, and then I had hired laborers and guided and directed them through that.

But you're also doing the financing?

At that time, yes.

How do you do the financing if you have no money?

So we had the ability through our banks that we had alliances with to be able to get the loans through.

So it's all smoke and mirrors?

It was. You can cut that part out.

Wait a second, you had no—

I'm not a magician.

Wait, wait, you had no money?

Yeah.

But you got the banks. Yeah, back your play. Yeah, you, you couldn't afford a general contractor to do the jobs or independent, uh, carpenter to hang the sheetrock.

Yep.

So you're doing all that. I'd say that's smoke and mirrors.

Well, hard work, you, you could call it smoke and mirrors. It was being able to convince somebody we had a clue what we're doing enough to to do it once and then it was easy to do it 100 times, right? Yeah.

Rotate one, two.

I had to find somebody that believed in me for one deal.

Okay.

And once we did the one and showed them the profitability and the success, then it was Katie bar the door after that.

All right. So would you buy land or vacant land or you buy somebody's dilapidated houses? Dilapidated house?

Yes, sir.

So let's walk through an example. Okay. How, how much money would you spend on a lapidated house?

Average purchase price in the '90s, in the mid-'90s, was about $130,000 to $140,000 purchase as is.

As is. Uh, just so you— we can get a vision of it, what do you think it was worth brand new? Uh, $200,000. Okay. So was there a mortgage left on it when we bought it?

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

So you assume the mortgage Or got a new loan with construction.

That's correct.

How much you put into it?

We tried to stay less than $50,000.

So now you got $175,000 into it or so. What would you sell it for?

So we, we could owner finance it at $220,000.

Owner finance it? Yeah, that's another profit margin. That's right.

Wow. Because owner finance, if I retailed it, I could only retail it at $200,000, $205,000, but I could owner finance it at 210, 215.

So they didn't have to go to the bank. I couldn't go to the bank because you were going to people who might not be able to get a loan from the bank. How much down would they put?

They would put 10% down.

So even if they walk away, you got something, something, something, and can sell it again.

All right, so we had the asset, we had the money.

How many were you doing a year?

So the first year we only did about 6 or 8.

Uh, that's busy.

And we were also doing about 50 loans a month as a mortgage company.

As a mortgage company, homes only, primary residence only.

So you have to remember, in mid-'90s, Clinton took office. Interest rates come out of the '80s where Clinton— or Carter had jumped into 16, 18%. So the refi boom was through the roof.

So what were you borrowing? What were you buying your money for and what were you reselling your money for?

So we were buying our money at that time around 4.25%, reselling it about 6%.

Everything you touch, you make money on.

We did then.

Everything.

Yes, sir.

You didn't lose money on anything. You buy a bucket of nails, you made money on it.

Yeah.

Okay. So in the beginning, you're doing 6 houses a year.

Yep.

What's your big year?

We did 42, 40, 42 houses.

How many of them did you sell outright? How many did you rent?

So every one of those was owner financed for a, for a 6-month to 12-month plan. So you came to us.

Well, let me understand this. It was owner financed for 12 months, 6 to 12 months. So they had to pay you. And if they couldn't find a traditional loan, This is where it gets better. We were the traditional loan, and you'd say yes or no before you moved in. I already knew you foreclosed on the people you're selling. Mother—

no, sir. No, sir. Let me, let me, let me tell the audience before the audience gets and jumps in all these conclusions. So you came to me, this is an example, you came to me voluntarily, voluntarily through my advertisement. You came and said, hey, I can't get a mortgage.

No, I'm not.

It's hotter than hell in here. And so I'd say, all right, Bob, let's look at your credit. We pull your credit, we'd say, okay, Bob, I can get you—

you don't have very good credit.

You didn't have very good credit. You had issues, okay? Not bad credit, just not great credit.

Would you like a beautiful home?

Would you like a beautiful home?

What color walls would you like?

You'd be able to customize it. You tell me what carpet, what cabinetry, what paint, wallpaper, all that. And you're going to be able to— and I know because I have the mortgage company— in 6 months you're going to pay me off because I'm going to work on your credit over the next 6 months to get you traditional financing.

How much you charge to work on their credit?

Not a dime.

So not a dime. You were such a good guy.

I absolutely gave that away for free because I—

service—

you're making me out like a bad guy. I changed lives. I made the American dream come true.

Loan sharks are not bad guys. They're misunderstood.

Holy shit. Uh, no, no, no loan sharking. But we had a plan to enhance the American dream of homeownership.

All right.

And we implemented it. All right.

So how many homes did you do altogether?

I think we did— I think on record was a little over 70-some houses was done in that 10-year, 12-year span.

And so there's 70 people who have a home now because you took a, a shot on a crappy piece of real estate. You put your own money into it, you fixed it up, you specialized it to their specifications, you helped them out with finance, you gave a deal that no bank would give them, right? Because you were generous and you, you were helping to serve the community. And you put these 70 families into their dream homes. Congratulations.

Oh, we did more than that. Yeah, you made a lot of money because there's a lot of people that didn't want to use house, they wanted a brand new house. So the real trick, Bob, was that if your credit was just a little bit tarnished, I could take you over to US Homes or Pulte Homes, get you a brand new contract on a brand new house, and in 90 days they would build those houses in the '90s.

Right.

And so you had 90 days to do what I needed you to do to get your credit cleaned up. And then, and then you close on a brand new house. We did probably 200, 300 of those.

So you're building brand new homes too?

We didn't build them.

Oh, you financed.

We financed the— yeah, we would give a proof of funds letter to US or to Pulte Homes. They would contract you and you. And then my realtor, because I had a RE/MAX franchise, each week would take you, your spouse, your kids to that house. So that you see the foundation, the frame. You saw your dream coming true. So when I called and said, hey Bob, I need this, you got it to me immediately.

So do you own porn shops also?

I do. I do not. I do not. It was all about real estate and financing. That's how we made our money.

I understand you are a professional speaker.

Yes, sir.

You go out and you speak as to this aspect of the industry.

That's correct.

That you have become an expert on.

That's correct.

That it is something that is guerrilla marketing, um, start from nothing, build an empire. Is it duplicatable?

Yes.

How?

It's systemized. So when you have a system and all you have to do is plug and play, then the results are almost absolutely guaranteed.

How How do you sell your message?

How do I sell my message? I'm a loan shark. Everybody knows who I am, right? We already accepted. Stop, stop, stop.

I'm busting your chops. I mean, if you have developed a system, yep, as to how to turn this into a, a industry, yep, are you writing books about it? Are you speaking about it? How are you getting your message out?

So yeah, so we have webinars. We have—

do people sign up and do your webinars?

Yes. How? Through social media marketing. Tell them. So if you go to—

Brenda, make sure we put the contact for his webinars out here so people who might be interested in becoming loan sharks and doing what—

so, so go to— yeah, legal loan shark. So, so speaking of— so, so back in the day we had a boat, a 50-foot yacht, right?

That's what it was named, Long Shark.

Yep, it was, it was. Yeah. So go to, go to Toby Potter Official. So if you go to Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, go to Toby Potter Official, or go to theunshakableinvestor.com. Those are the places to see how we're promoting, how we're pushing the courses, the training, All the education that you need to take your real estate career from zero to hero.

So for the 44 people who might be watching this, please understand, the more I bust somebody's chops, the more he likes this, the more affection I have for him. Uh, I, I would not be so disrespectful to somebody I didn't have great affection for. So, uh, Toby's an absolute superstar, and Yes, he climbed the top of the mountain and there's some lots of stories, but what I really want to focus on is what have you done since then?

So since then, we, um, as you mentioned, have written some books.

What are the name of the books?

So the primary book is called The Unshakeable Self, and that is all about— through all the— so, so as we talked about, had built all this up with the mortgage company, the owner finance, and then they had the crash of 2008. You went through it. Yes, we went through it. I lost millions and had to rebound and was able to rebound and then founded a company called Global Integrity Finance, which is another hard money lender, which is a true loan shark company, real estate investing. But then, of course, we built that up. We were ranked, we were voted number one private lender of the year in 2000.

I didn't know loan sharking had their own vote.

We do. We have our own association called National Private Lenders Association. So we have our own legal association that fights the government all the time. But so I got voted number one lender of the year. We hit Inc. 5000 top 100 fastest growing company in '22. But during all that, COVID hit and we lost it all again because our industry is all banked on Wall Street.

Wait a second. You climbed to the top of the mountain again. You had the mountain, you had the ladder kicked out.

Yeah.

You fall off the mountain.

Yep.

You build another ladder, you climb another mountain, you get to the top of that mountain again and again. The ladder's kicked out, you're thrown off the top of the mountain. You should write a book. I did, really.

And I wrote a book on why we are— why we had success, and that is The Unshakeable Self, meaning that no matter what life throws at us, throws at me, I'm unshakable because I have a foundation of spiritual, mental, and physical that guarantees—

let's talk about that.

Guarantees that I am solid in my foundation and I can overcome anything that's thrown at me because I'm not worried. I, I have faith over fear. I have a higher authority, a higher power that guides and directs and knows my destiny. And it's written in the Bible that says, I know the plans I have for you, the plans to prosper, not to harm you. So it doesn't matter what this world throws at me. Somebody who created this world says, I have plans for you. I have a destiny for you, so it doesn't matter.

You should get yourself on a speaking tour.

I would love that.

You have a passion and an intellect and experience I think you'd be sharing with more people.

I would think that it would— I can't get that message out fast enough.

I think you should give up this long shot.

So we did go in and change the name from, from loan shark on the boat to, to now we loan money out. Uh, no, just kidding. Uh, we lost the boat, you know, during that crash of 2008. I lost everything. Uh, it was— it was— I am married to an amazing, wonderful icon of, of, of—

is this your trophy wife?

She is more than a trophy wife, buddy.

So how long you been married?

32 years.

Wait a second. You've been married for 32 years to a trophy wife?

Yes, sir. Wow. Yep. Wow.

That's more impressive than anything else I've heard so far.

Gets better.

Okay.

She's not only my wife for 32 years, but she's been my partner in all my businesses for 31 years.

Does she get a veto?

No, not really.

She ever said, this doesn't feel right, pass?

Every day.

No, I'm not talking about you.

So you got to flip that. She never tells me no. She never tells me no. But she, she is the most conservative. One of, one of the best things and the worst things about her is that she sees all the problems when I present an idea. But it pisses me off, Bob.

You don't trust her, do you?

I do, but I don't like that she's always right. I listened. Why do you think it was successful? Because I listened to her, right? But I don't like it. She's always right.

My brother and I are partners. Hi, Adam. My brother and I are partners.

Yeah.

Without my brother Adam, I would have bankrupted my business 50 times.

Why?

I'm a risk taker.

And he reeled you back in.

He is an accountant and he's risk adverse. Without me, he might never have grown the business to be what it is today. But without him, there's no chance we've ever been successful. Maybe your wife has helped you.

Oh, I would never tell you. I will tell you this, and I say it more times than just twice.

You only failed twice.

I only failed twice, and it had nothing to do with my decision, her decision. There's things beyond the control.

Okay.

I will tell you this, and I say this, and I preach this, and I teach this, and everybody else does too. Behind every successful man is an amazing, solid partner. Oh, good catch, good catch. But it's true.

You're woke.

I get it.

Are you a Democrat?

I am not. I am a Trump fan all day long, and I don't care if all 14 of your listeners just got off.

16.

16. Okay, well, I forgot that might be down to 14 now. Yeah, no, I'm, I'm a Republican. I'm all about the, the country. I'm all about the American dream. I'm all about empowering individuals to become the absolute best they choose to be.

Brenda, why don't we get him to speak at one of your conventions? He's on the docket. Whoa, whoa, whoa, when is the docket? I'm sorry, September 10th, 11th, and 12th. September 10th, 11th, 12th, here in Kansas City.

Yeah.

Hopefully you'll put that across the, the, the— so all 14 of the people watching will, will come.

I'll do one better. So for the 14 people on here, if you'll DM Big Bob here, Financial Freedom, and you come to the event, I will personally autograph and give you books. So there's 9 books that have been written.

You wrote 9 books?

9 books.

How many ghostwritten? None. Autobiographies?

No, I can't do— I've tried. That's why I got started. I can't.

That's why you can't go into politics.

Yeah, I can't get past chapter 7. I've written to chapter 7 5 times and said I'm done writing my biography.

What happens in chapter 7?

Life. Not even, not even this. I'm still in childhood shit.

There's something you're ashamed of?

No, something that—

did you go to jail?

Oh, I've been in jail, uh, a dozen times, but nothing. I mean, Oh, for fighting, fighting, fighting. Well, and one time I bootlegged— I had a 22 keg party and I bootlegged the alcohol out of Missouri to Oklahoma, and they didn't like that.

I saw that movie.

But see, I was always an entrepreneur. I needed money to go to college. I had finished up my junior college in Miami, Oklahoma. I needed to go to Edmond, Oklahoma to advance my— I didn't have the money, so I had a 22 keg party. We made over $3,000 in t-shirt uh, tank top and ball cap and pre-ticket sales. So we were selling all that in advance. We bought— I sent my buddies the cash to go get the kegs. The guy that I had pre-ordered the kegs forgot to place the order, so they had to go across the line, get them, brought them in. And when the, uh, ATF showed up—

so I saw a picture of your ride, I was pretty impressed.

Which, uh, motorhome?

Yeah, yeah. No, see, some people—

how did you see that?

You showed up.

Are you stalking me, Bob?

No, no, no, you're showing off. Pictures of your wife when she was young and the motorhome you got now. You're showing off.

Did you— but I did show you the picture of myself and Patrick Mahomes.

You have a picture of you and Pat Mahomes?

I have a picture of me and Pat Mahomes.

How much that cost you?

Didn't cost me a dime.

How did you get it?

Uh, I know people—

he plays here for the Chiefs.

He's, he's probably the next GOAT, in my opinion. You know, he's probably the next GOAT.

We're gonna diverse. If you were building a fantasy football team, yeah, of all-time greats, you can go back to the '50s, '60s, all the way up to today, and you're building your team and it comes to quarterback, what quarterback would you draft to be on your team? And by the way, for me, yeah, Tom Brady's not in the top 5.

No, I agree with you. I agree with you.

He might have been— he might be the greatest quarterback of all time now because of, of Belichick, because of the defense, because of timing, right? But I don't think he's the greatest quarterback of all time. Give me your top 3.

I'm gonna go with Roger Starbuck. I'm gonna go with—

geez, you are a Cowboy fan.

Yeah, and, and I didn't like him then.

Of course you did.

I was a Steelers fan then.

Oh, you— Bradshaw wasn't in the game.

Yeah, yeah, go ahead. Uh, so Starbuck, Bradshaw, and probably, probably Brett Favre.

See, my top 3, I'd go Mahomes, Elway, L.A. and probably Marina.

Now, Marino and Joe—

and by the way, Joe Montana, I think he was one of the greatest receivers of all time.

Amazing guy, amazing guy. But you have so many different eras there. If you take those guys that I named off, and today with all the protection and all the bullshit and all that, they would, they would tear Tom Brady's record a new ass, because those guys played when you had to be tough. You had to play when you were hurt. You had to play without all the microphones in your ear. You had to be so smart to be able to make split decisions and read a defense beyond.

Okay, let's not talk about football because you don't know enough about it. I thought, I thought maybe you knew something about football.

I know a lot about football. Yeah. So anyways, um, quarterbacks today have it too easy, and they're still great, don't get me wrong. I'm just going to put that out there for that. Now you're down to 12. I see you went out down to 12 listeners, so we pissed 2 other people off.

Probably my sister canceled. Uh, um, real estate, what's next on your agenda?

So, so what's next is, um, we are joining up with, uh, Be the Better You— Be the Best You, I'm sorry, not Be the Better, Be the Best You. Better You. Becoming the Better You. I'll get it eventually. I'm brand new to this.

Just write a big check. I don't—

just write a big check. You don't care. But we're, we're joining up with that. We want to take the life skills, life scars, and be able to—

I love that. The life scars.

Life scars. And be able to tell somebody else who's facing difficulties that, you know what, you have the opportunity, you have the skill set, You have the right to succeed.

So for me, becoming the best you, it's not about the problems you've had, the speed bumps that cause you to trip and fall, all the excuses of why you failed, right? To me, becoming the better, the best you can possibly be is what did you do to overcome it? How did you pick yourself up? How did you have personal fortitude to challenge yourself? Did you need the community? Did you do it by yourself? How? The story of not what happened to you. Everybody's telling me the story about how their life was so miserable. I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in the recovery. I'm interested in, is that duplicatable? And is that message of how you recovered inspirational enough to help somebody else recover.

And that's what I want to do, right?

I think that message is powerful. I think the message of service, giving back, is powerful. I applaud you. Thank you for your new mission.

Thank you.

It's easy to make money. It's easy to fail. It's easy to recover and be successful. But you are at a point now in life that I tremendously admire and respect, because you don't have to, right? You don't have to give back. You don't have to care. I mean, you're a loan shark, for Pete's sakes. You don't have a heart. You don't have— you don't have a giving personality. You have reinvented yourself.

I'm paying pittance.

Yes, you're paying it forward. You're giving back.

I'm trying to get my spot back in heaven by doing good.

Look, I think, I think you are on a wonderful mission.

Thank you.

I really, really do.

Thank you.

I, I want to support it.

Thank you.

How can I support your mission?

You know what, if you can just get these 12, 13 people to show up to our, our event, then we can, we can, through your messaging, through your community. And I want to say, you know what, what you're doing here is impactful, it's powerful. And the more you and I partner up to share that message, the more lives we change. So continue doing what you're doing, continue allowing people like me to be a part of it, and then we can collaborate in transformation of lives.

Toby, I'm going to make you an offer because I busted your chops unnecessarily rough right now. I really have.

I'm thick-skinned and I'm a grown man.

I'm going to ask Brenda to show it to you for your approval before we release it to the 14 people. I want to make sure that there's nothing said or implied that you find offensive, that, that rubs you the wrong way. I want to make sure you're okay with it, and I want to make sure that we give the 14 people— I think we're really up to over 100, but we're— yeah, those people, the opportunity to contact you because they agree in what your mission is, right? They want to participate also. So how do we get ahold of you?

So you can, like I mentioned earlier, go to Toby Potter Official on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, or go to our website, theunshakeableinvestor.com. You can contact me there. You can set up and schedule. But I want to, I want to go back to what you just said and I want to, I want to rechallenge you. I think we would have a better attendance response if you didn't edit this. Because people like authentic, they like real, they like the banter.

Well, I have no problem with it.

I don't want to edit it. You're not protecting me because I— I'm here.

The 14 people know you.

That's right, that's right. And I've already told them that, you know what, either way, I don't— I don't want it. I hate when they edit these. I want them to be real. I love doing live shows. I actually love when we go live because people then can see the real you and I, not something that's been cut, chopped, and all this and cleaned up.

You guys don't know this— Angie, Mrs. Potter, is sitting here, and I want to acknowledge her because she is—

come over here—

angelic, gorgeous, great big personality. Come around, make sure you smile, make sure you're happy. Is there anything you want to add to this?

Oh no, come on.

No, no, seriously, we have 14 people. You gotta— you want to say hi?

Hi. She's, she's, uh, she's one of those amazing behind-the-scenes orchestrators that ensures that everything goes perfect.

What is the best thing in your life so far? Tell me. Your children? My grandkids. Grandchildren. How many you got?

I have two.

How old?

Uh, 6 months and 2 and a half.

Yeah, so you must have started when you were 14 and they started when they were 19. So look, because you're about 35 now, right?

She's been 35 twice. Not doubled, just twice. So now she's 37.

All right. Um, I really enjoy your company, really do. Uh, we're, we're gonna spend, uh, Toby's up here from Dallas. We're gonna spend the evening together having dinner. It's his treat. I can't wait to see what restaurant he picks out. I'm thinking it's going to be an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet.

My favorite, my favorite. Asian buffet is my favorite place to go. How did I know? Yeah, it is, because I be in and out in 7 and a half minutes.

We have one of those here.

I love them.

In-N-Out.

No, I hate In-N-Out. I hate In-N-Out Burgers. It's a California thing. Yeah, I'm not a fan.

Thank you very much. Really enjoyed it.

Yep.

Till next time, what's up, Big Bob? Be careful, stay good.