Mastering Creative Real Estate with Jesse Mills: Creative Deal Structuring and How to Transform Y...

self-education, how do you buy properties without the banks? Because at the time my credit was shot because I went through, right, the short sale and bankruptcy in 2008, 2009. And so I'm like, how can I get in the game and start actually investing? Because as a lender, if you're a lender or you're an agent, you're just trading dollars for hours. And sure, it's maybe better dollars for hours and maybe it's from your car to parking lot.

That's cool.

Versus an office, but you're still right. You're still trading, trading and swapping. And I want to start building cash flow. I want to start building financial freedom. And I didn't want to be the same person that everyone else is.

Welcome to the She's Got Assets Real Estate Investing Podcast. I'm the host, Shona Leppis. Follow along as we unpack and demystify real estate investment strategies through expert interviews and personal experience. From how to find off-market deals to creative financing to long-term and midterm rentals. We aim to educate and inspire others to gain financial freedom and generational wealth through real estate. And as always, please subscribe so you never miss an episode. We really appreciate reviews. It helps others find us and it just helps us get found.

Oh, I'm here. Can you hear me?

Oh yeah. I just lost your camera though.

Oh, you know what? I'm switching over to the app. This is two 85-year-olds to do a livestream consistently. Like, what is going on? Are we doing this from Senior Pines?

I'll send you a fax.

Yeah, could you fax me the log?

It's in the mail, Jilcy. It's always something. Just gotta roll with it.

I'm gonna take the night off. I'm good. Maybe I'll ask the people at Subway if they have some real support. Or the furniture store. Right.

Just some, we'll just do random like polls on the street if people are interested in real estate.

We're at the tobacco and e-cig store and you got some real estate questions.

Oh, you're a twice.

I'm in here twice. Ooh, we have a panel. Yeah.

Okay. We're just gonna pretend. Welcome everyone to the She's Got Assets Funky Podcast. Quasi-live stream. If anyone's actually there, let us know. Sorry about the technical things. It's gonna be a great chat. I have Jesse Mills here. He's awesome. We met in a mastermind, just really cool entrepreneur, real estate investor, has some fun stuff going on. So I'm excited, Jesse, for you to join us and just talk a little bit about yourself, what you're up to. Oh yeah, you're good. You're there. The fax came in.

We're on the interweb and you've Oh my God. Thank God we can do real estate better than we can do live streaming.

We'd be in serious trouble.

We really know what we're talking about. We're pros.

Jesse, just introduce yourself, a little bit of your backstory and what you're up to and how you help real estate investors go full-time.

Love it. Love it. Thank you so much for having me on the show. I apologize to anyone who sat through 8 minutes and 47 7 seconds of this shit show. I hope you like the bloopers. We did the bloopers up front. You're welcome. Give it for you guys instead of at the end, trying to do something different. Let's see. My name is Jesse Mills. I'm out of Minnesota. I have spent 20 years in the real estate and mortgage business. Spent about 15 years as a mortgage lender and about 14 years as a real estate investor. I'm also an agent. I'm a realtor. I'm a, I'm an investor. I'm a coach. And really a lot of my background has been the fun creative real estate. So a lot of lease-to-own, seller financing, contract for deed, land contract, no money down deals, right? Collaborations, partnerships. I've got Airbnbs in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Florida, and a bunch of rent-to-owns is my thing because I spent 15 years in the mortgage world, and so I'm always trying to see how I can help more people without having to deal with all the normal rules and guidelines and stuff like that.

Yeah, definitely a lot of hats. I think as entrepreneurs we have a little bit of shiny object thing, but I think the creative side of investing, we don't hear a lot about that and there's a lot of terms like thrown out. So I'd love to unpack that a little bit more, but I know you're specifically, your audience is people in real estate that are maybe just part-time dabbling. And with all the changes with NARS, I probably said that wrong. It's definitely interesting times and I think you have a lot to offer. So I'd love to hear you speak to like how if someone's in the industry with the current changes and how you could help them or what you suggest if someone's wondering what to do.

Yeah. There's a lot going on. There's a lot going on. I started out in the mortgage business in my 20s. Okay. So I'm 44. In my 20s, so about 15 years or so of doing mortgages. And I realized when I was doing that, number one, I went through 2008. So if anyone's actually watching this live with us, drop a comment. Were you in the storm in 2008? Are you doing this? Were you in lending? Were you in real estate? In 2008, were you flipping houses and you got burnt? I'd love to know. I'd love to know who the heck is having enough fun to join us and watching and listening right now, what you're doing or what's your background and where you're at. But yeah, so I realized in 2008, holy cow, things can change really quick. And I want to be better prepared. I did my first short sale on my own house. I had bankruptcy myself. And I realized I went from making very good money and living, working from home to overnight it was gone. And I'm not afraid to say that. That's, uh, there's billion-dollar banks that were going under, right? Billion-dollar banks. So a little mom-and-pop folks, it was tough and I just wasn't ready for it. So I'm like, okay, I'm never going to be caught in that position again. But I also started really diving into education, right? Self-education. How do you buy properties without the banks? Because at the time my credit was shot because I went through, right, the short sale and bankruptcy in 2008, 2009. And so I'm like, how can I get in the game and start actually investing? Because as a lender, if you're a lender or you're an agent, you're just trading dollars for hours. And sure, it's maybe better dollars for hours and maybe it's from your car in a parking lot.

That's cool.

Versus an office. but you're still right. You're still trading, trading and swapping. And I want to start building cash flow. I want to start building financial freedom. And I didn't want to be the same person that everyone else is. Have you read the book? I think we've talked about this maybe before, Shona. Have you talked to, read the book, Blue Ocean Strategy?

I think I've heard of it. I get the gist of it, but no, I don't think I'm going to put it on my list. Thank you.

Put that on your list. Put that in your book list. Blue Ocean Strategy, you could, being an agent right now, even especially right now, being a realtor, being an agent, being a lender, right? You're in a red bloody ocean. You're either the cheapest, the fastest, right? But you gotta beat everybody. It's like a race. Everyone's doing the same thing. Everyone's going after the same thing. It's just a red bloody ocean, right? Instead of going after the same FSBOs and cancels and expireds, And, or if you're a lender, like, hey, I've got the best rate and best fees. Okay. Everybody says that, right? You're in the same red ocean. You can do something different and swim over to a blue ocean where people are not, it's not bloody. There's not blood in the water. There's no one else over there. And your pricing can be almost whatever you want it to be because there's no one there. You set the market, you make it right. And this week alone, I've had 3 referrals that have been dumped in my lap from other realtors that, hey, I've got this lead, but I don't really know what to do with it. And I'm like, oh cool, I do, because I do the weird stuff and I'm happy and proud to do the weird stuff because there's always creative solutions if you know what to do. So a lot of it's having a system, it's having a framework. It's knowing when someone doesn't see any options, there might be 3 or 4 or 5 options. I actually just put together a tool that kind of shows 7 different ways And I do deals that I get all the time as referrals from other people that they don't know what to do. It's like a dead lead. It's a junk lead. Right. So anyways, it's, I got really into this business of, okay, there's ways to buy with like lease-to-own, contract for deed, wrap note, sub-to, right. And then we can do rehabs, but I don't like to fix houses. So can I rehab with somebody who does like to fix houses? Yeah. And so I'm big on partnerships, collaborations. And having people work in their strengths and doing what's fun. Cause I like to have fun. I don't like to do the things I don't want to do. And so there's enough people that are good at those things or they like it better. And so how do we do that? I have a few calls on the way home from my 4-hour Airbnb drive. Let's go. Let's rock.

Entrepreneur. I love that because I think in general housing is very challenging and it feels really unattainable, right? We all look back when we first started and there's ways to do it, but walk us through, I'd love to know, like one of those leads, like how did you solve that and what creative thing were you doing with one of those leads that was it an agent? Yeah. I think that'd be really interesting.

Yeah. So one of them was a divorced couple that is going through divorce. They don't really have the money or just the bandwidth, the time. They don't want to deal with fixing up the house and it needs work. I'm not talking tons of work, right? But it needs work. It needs updating. A normal agent, if you take 5 normal agents, would say, you need to paint the whole thing and redo this and redo that and update the plan. And they're like, I don't want to do it. I don't have the money. I don't want to. And right. So this isn't a normal listing and it's not going to show well. And they got my name from someone else at their brokerage. Because we had just done a deal with this other person, right? Like a couple months ago. And so they called up and said, hey, do you, are you a cash investor? And I hate even just saying yes, because I am a cash investor, but that's one of the ways that I buy, right? Doesn't mean it's the only way. And so I talked with this couple and it's right. It's, I was just on a coaching call before this. So I was telling someone, I'm like, it's not about us at all. Zero. It's about them and the seller or the buyer and their situation. What is their goal? What are their, what are they trying to get out of? What's their pain point and where are they trying to get to? Right. And if you could wave the magic wand and just poof, you get everything you want, what would that look like? And so they wanted to move quick, but they didn't want to give it to a greedy investor at 70 or 80 cents on the dollar. Okay. So we start getting into the nuts and bolts. What do you owe on the property? What do we think it's worth? What's your balance? What's your payment?

Right?

How much money do you actually need right now? Interestingly enough, one of the people in the couple needs a little bit more money right now to get to where they're going to go, but the other person doesn't really need a lot of money. And so they liked the idea of getting a monthly income stream a little bit more than all at once, which of course I proposed because no one They won't just come to that on their own. And so anyways, we're going over numbers now and it might be something where they'll get more money than they even thought they would, but in time. And they get their needs met right now and they get to make it happen quick and easy and painless, just like they want, just like they asked for. I'll still have enough money to pay the agent a full commission for referring it to me. Maybe even more frankly. Than they would've made if they would've just listed it and would've sat on the market forever because it doesn't show well and we're getting it done. So that's one couple, one example, and that was out of 3 leads this week from a couple different agents. And yeah, it's just, if you've never been exposed to this stuff, you don't listen to podcasts, you're not in masterminds, you don't coaching, you don't hang out with people who aren't just doing cookie cutter realty, you're not going to know this stuff.

Yeah. I think it's so important to really, as Jeff Stevens would say, or, you know, solve the seller, understand what their needs are because every situation is so different and having all of the tools in the toolbox, there's so many of them and you think you have all of them and you probably don't.

Can you get the job done with the wrench every time?

No.

Sometimes it won't be pretty, but you can get it done. But there's 5 other tools or 10 other tools. You could just go get that, but you need to know what they are and how to use them and when to use them.

Exactly. Yeah. And if all you have is the hammer, you're just going to make, frankly, crappy cash offers. And sometimes that's not even appropriate or they may not even want cash for a lot of reasons.

So yeah, they don't need it. They don't want it. Whatever.

Yeah. I think lease options are awesome. I don't think they were talked about or really impact super well. And I know that you've been, you're an expert on that. So I'd love to hear you talk more about lease options. And I learned it, it's marketed as rent-to-own, but it's really a sandwich lease option. I think it's one of the most creative things that we don't hear a lot about, and it's really a win-win. So I'd love to hear your two cents on that.

Sure. I'll give you four cents on that.

What deal?

I think the first 10 minutes, like, I want my money back. If you're just hopping on now, please go back to the first 12 minutes.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Yeah. That we're not normally.

Have a blast. Good stuff. Yeah, the lease options are an incredible tool. I've done hundreds of them in different various ways, shapes, and forms. I've sold on a lease option. I've bought on a lease option. I've started on a lease option and converted to seller financing. I've done sandwich lease options. I've done wholesale lease options. That's really how I got into this. I got to give props to one of my original mentors, Mr. Joe McCall. Who has some amazing courses and coaching on wholesaling lease options and sandwich lease options. And that's what I learned from him. And then like people like Wendy Patton and, uh, what's Romley Rand, the OG. And it's a cool tool, right? But a lot of people, Sonny, this, they care about their credit. They care about their next move. They're going to make getting a mortgage. Or what that might look like, but they need to move on. And if you could lease their property from them and take care of their payment, so take care of their payment every month and then buy the home from them in the future, whether that's a year or 3 or 5 or 10, right? At a price that they like, that works for them and take care of all the headaches and hassles. Right? All the utilities and the maintenance and everything on the house. They just forget about it. A lot of times that's someone's problem is they just want to move on. They want to move forward. Maybe they've already moved out. Maybe it's a vacant house, right? Maybe they got to move for a job or it's a divorce situation. Like, we're moving. This is what's happening. Or they bought and they don't have a ton of equity, especially if they bought recently. Maybe it's like a new build or a construction where, you know, and actually, why would I get this house? I could go get a brand new one for almost the same price. Shoot, I'm trapped. So it's a pretty cool tool. And one of my companies, Unbankable, we help buyers that can't buy. So we essentially have almost like a reverse lease option program. We allow— I don't market for properties and then go I just sell those properties on a rent-to-own or a lease option, I guess I should say. I used to do a lot of that, then I stopped, but I'm starting again. But we have buyers that come to us, like from an agent or from a mortgage broker, and they're like, hey, I can't qualify. I need another year. I need 2 more years, but I've got $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 in the bank and I've got a good job. I've got a good business. I just can't qualify. And we say, great, go pick out whatever home you want. We'll buy it for you. And then you can lease to own it back from us 3 to 5 years. We'll give you a plan and a path to get bankable again, from unbankable to bankable. And it's a really cool thing. So we have people all over the country doing this. It's one of the, one of the spokes in our wheel of the Deal Creator Academy, which is our program that basically teaches you how to be a full-time real estate investor. Working from your car in front of Subway. Who doesn't want to do that on a Tuesday? Am I right? But yeah, it's a, it's a pretty cool, pretty cool thing.

That, yeah. And just to unpack that a little more, because I think if you haven't heard of this, it's a really, the way this is usually spoken about or marketed to is you find a property, you put a lease option on it, you find a tenant buyer, and then you're leasing it to them. But this is really reversing that. It's really, I think it's really interesting. And you're also working with an investor who's actually buying the property, right? So they're making a profit. The homeowners are on, or tenant buyers are on a path to purchasing. I think it's really unique.

Yeah. And, and it's what's cool about that. And I appreciate that for our investors, right? We call it hybrid investing. So for our hybrid investors, they're people not like us. They're not, in the trenches doing weird creative stuff every day, right? They're not doing all the things, the bandit signs and the bird letters and mailers and Facebook ads, and they don't have a network. They're pilots, they're pilots and they're business owners. They have their engineers and they just want cash flow and they want to grow well and they want to create financial freedom and a legacy. But they just want a good deal. And so I'm like, if you want, you could do the normal way again, the red bloody ocean, and hop on over and go buy a property with 20% down and then inherit a tenant, which let's hope they're good, but they might not be, or find a vacant property. And then you have to go find a tenant and screen them and do all that fun stuff. And then you've got somebody who never thinks of this house like theirs. It won't be there. They have one month's rent, maybe two. And there you go. Congrats. Welcome. Welcome to the club. You're a landlord. You could do that. Or we have people lining up that have 10 to 20% to put down upfront that will agree to pay a higher price for a house. You're going to buy it for $300,000. They're going to buy it from you at $330,000, $340,000 in the future. You already know what your cash flow is upfront. And they're going to put down $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 non-refundable, but credited towards the house when they buy it, if they buy it. And so now instead of putting 20% down as an investor, you put down maybe 10%, maybe 5%, and then you could go do that twice or maybe even 3 times with the same money. And they're fixing and repairing a lot of the items of the house, or maybe all of them. If we do seller financing, they might be doing everything. So it's like almost like a triple net lease. So it's a pretty cool deal for investors to do. And we have some investors that are, they're doing their 5th, 6th property this year that they might have only been doing 2 the normal way.

Yeah. You've got cash flow, you're building not necessarily equity, but you're right. You've got a good return. It's, it's a fairly really secure, secured by an asset, right? It's, that's hard to do. Yeah.

And you're not going to cast, otherwise you don't buy it. It's not like you guess, right? Like, I'm going to buy the house and then I hope I get this because Zillow says that. And then if the right person says yes, it's not like there's a Subway. Let me give you, there's a good example. There's a Subway. If I'm going to, if I'm, if you'd say, Jesse, I would love a sandwich right now, but I don't have my purse. I left it at home. Okay. And I say, cool. Show me what you got. I don't know. I want like a turkey, maybe a tuna fish. I don't care. Get whatever you want. Get whatever you want. Okay. But I can see the menu and the menu says all those sandwiches are $6. Okay. So your price is $9. You can get whatever you want, but your price is $9. And you give me the $3 that are in your pocket right now. Now you got $3 in there, but you don't have all of it. And then you can give me the other $6 down the road. Cool? You say, dang it. All right, that's fine. I'm hungry. Let's do it. And so I get your $3 and I go to the cashier with my $3 instead of $6. And I don't care what the fuck you buy, because whatever you buy, you're going to pay me $9 and I'm only buying it for $6. And then I'll get some cash flow in the middle, which would be like cheese and pickles. And it's weird when you make analogy, but you see it like, you know what you're getting.

Yeah. And, and there's just, I hate the word skin in the game, but like a normal tenant, like They're not, it's their home. Yes. But they're not invested when you put that much money down and you are on a path to home ownership. I imagine the, just the level of tenant that you're getting, the tenant buyer is pretty amazing.

Yeah, absolutely. They're taking care of the property cuz it's gonna be their property and they're not calling you for every little thing left and right, like a landlord and just saying, oh, you fix this, you do that. Right. Like they take care of it like it's their house. We've had people fix up the houses and, right. I had somebody like redo the whole kitchen and add a bathroom or redo the bathroom, add a deck. And I'm like, okay, well, the house is in better shape now. And God forbid it doesn't work out. I get back a better house than what I even bought. There's no way they're going to let that go. And that was one of the first deals I did and they loved it. I worked out big for them.

That is so cool. And it just makes, because I think a lot of times when people are self-employed or they maybe have a new job or whatever it is, they just do not qualify. Like I've been in that position. Like I have a bucket of money and that's how I found DSCR loans. Cause I'm like, I have the money. I just don't qualify.

Yes. A lot of people don't qualify on paper. That is a lot of our, that's a lot of our clients that we work with. And investors. So here's the cool thing. So I've got a couple of investors who like on paper, I don't qualify. They couldn't even do like a bank statement loan, right? Or they had the 20% down, but their credit was like 20 points off, right? There was something, there's always just one. Doesn't have to be a whole bag of things. There's one thing. And the answer was no from the bank. And I'm like, let's go get you an Airbnb. So we went and bought them what they wanted. Of course, we bought it at our market price, they bought it at the higher price or agreed to buy it at the higher price. They put down their 15 to 20% down, and then they got their foot in the door. They got in the ballgame and they got a property. Now they're paying a little bit higher payments, of course. So it's not as good as it's going to be once they pay it off, but they still got it going and now they got rental history, right? And, or in a couple of people who've done that for like 15% down or Boy, I don't know, sometimes 12, 13%. Heck, you can almost go get again, 2 properties maybe instead of 1. So, because there's ways to make it happen.

Yeah. The investor can just recoup their down payment because they're getting that option fee. So it's, you really, am I right? Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah.

Yeah. So the investor comes in with their, let's say a $300,000 house. Investor comes in, puts $60,000 down, right? 20%. But then we've already got somebody lined up. It's like the subway analogy. Like, oh, I'll go put down $30 grand. And then bam, you just got $30,000 back out of your $60,000. Or you could just go get one month's rent and have a tenant. Your call.

I just think—

sounds good.

I love that. And the person is like choosing a house they love. They're not just like, hey, because normally lease options are just, they're not like necessarily something that you're picking out. It's more of Hey, this is an option.

Yeah.

But do you market it as rent-to-own? What do you call it? I know you branded it like when you're talking to tenant buyers.

Our company name is Unbankable, right? So we're just doing an unbankable program, but yeah, we do lease-to-own and we do contract for deed, AKA land contract or agreement for deed, depending on the state you're in.

Yeah.

So we do, we'll do seller financing. We'll do land contract, CD. Or at least so.

Okay.

It's really dependent upon the scenario, right? Depends on the state that we're in, depends on the investor we're working with because we work with investors all over the country. So we have investors that like come to us and say, hey, I heard about this. This is pretty cool. I get paid upfront, in the middle, and at the end. How does that work? I can do more deals with less headaches and hassles. And And so usually once somebody does a deal or two and, okay, it's been a few months, it's just really not a pain in the butt. It's really, it's working out. I'm like, I know it usually does. I can't guarantee, can't promise. Then they want to do more. Yeah, it's a cool thing. And again, I think one of the big differences with us is having 15+ years in the lending world and we work with lenders like right now, we are the good guys. We want it to work out. We want them to buy, right? We don't want their money. We don't want the property back. We do everything we possibly can. We're underwriting the files, right? So we're doing, we're basically doing like a full underwriting review of their credit, their taxes, their W-2s, pay stubs. We're just— if you didn't have a 618 score, you'd be good. Or if you didn't have that 1 or 2 30-day late on your mortgage, but right now you're screwed for a year. But once Pass that, you're good to go.

Well, I love that because you're really vetting them. So you're not, if someone isn't really on the right path, I assume they're not gonna qualify for Unbankable, right? You're really helping them and aiding them, not just like taking their option fee and just, it doesn't work out. You're really, no, seems like a very thoughtful approach. And I, no one else may get that kind of counseling or that guidance, I would assume.

Many don't. They just say, okay, here we go. Here's your place. Good luck. And, uh, you know, talk to you in a few years. What we're doing is we're almost like overly, annoyingly thorough upfront. Some people, because some people like, hey, this seems like I'm getting a bank loan. I'm like, a bank is going to make you do all these things and a bank is shooting you down. So, yes, bank is shooting you down.

Yeah.

We're going to ask you to do similar. Checks, right? And we want to make sure you can afford it. We want to make sure you can afford it now and down the road because we want it to work out. And the cool thing is a lot of our business, a majority of it is referral business. I shouldn't say a majority, almost all of it, because we don't really do public paid marketing. It's almost all referrals, right? So we have a ton of agents that know about us and send us leads, loan officers, right? Financial advisors. People in that world that know we can take care of them, get them into something. So cool thing is anybody can do this, right? But again, there's good ways to do it and better ways. And there's things to know when to do it this way, when to do it that way. And so that's why I started teaching this a few years ago. I was like, there's no way I can do all this on my own. I want to show other people how to do this in their market and be like the local unbankable in their town and their state.

Yeah. I, and I think we hear of all these really cool strategies and sometimes it's like, oh yeah, you just, it's not just watching a video. You need someone to really walk you through it. And it, it's, there's nuance to it, I'm sure. And if you do this wrong, it, it's just, there's a really helpful to have like a coach, someone like yourself that's an expert. When you think you know everything and then I don't know, I'm so grateful for the mentoring that I've had. I know you're really good at it. So I think for anyone listening, this has piqued your interest. Reach out to Jesse because he has a formula and you have a system and you have a team and it's not a YouTube university.

No, you know what? And it's funny, I was at a event like a month or two ago and we were talking about all the things that YouTube is good for, like how to bake a pie. It's pretty good. Maybe how to self-diagnose your illness. Ah, that's where a doctor comes in. The professional, right?

Totally.

How to do your own hair. And I know many barbers and stylists would say that's ridiculous, right? But you could, you're not gonna die. Hopefully.

Might not look—

probably wear a hat for a while, but you could do it.

Yeah.

But then like how to set up your own real estate contracts and do financing. Like, no, you can't. Like you need to be able to look over the shoulder of someone or say, hey, What do you think here? Why do you think we should do it this way?

And, uh, yeah. And the nuance of deal structure and all the things that you need to put in and just the extra lettuce and tomatoes or whatever you wanna call it. And just to protect everyone and really look out for people. Okay. So to kind of bring this full circle, we're in a very interesting time with NARS, like for an agent or broker that's listening, that's definitely in the thick of this. I'm not an agent. I just see a lot of content about it. What would you tell someone? How can they pivot? Or what would you say? It's a weird time right now.

Yeah. I think regardless of NAR, even pre this whole situation, even a year ago, 2 years ago, when it wasn't even on the radar, I think it's so important if you're a real estate agent or a lender, you're in the world of Financing and real estate and properties, right? And you, again, you're, you can only do so much. You can get very rich in this business, right? You can make a lot of money and you can even build a really big team. But at the end of the day, don't you want to be, have more time, right? Like the older we get, it's about time. It's about options. It's about flexibility. And Again, we have the chance to create a career and I've literally made a career, right? Like a very good career every year from situations that other people like, I got this puzzle and I don't know what to do. Here you go. This Rubik's Cube. Here you go. I'm moving on. I'm going to go chase some more FISBOs. Okay. Have fun with that. And I'll just go bloop, bloop, bloop, bloop with the Rubik's Cube and have it figure it out and I'll make 2 or 3 times the amount of money. That they would have made on a listing or God forbid, like just commission on a mortgage deal. And I'm not knocking anyone doing that, by the way. I'm not saying, you know, I'm not saying, I'm not saying I'm better, cooler, nothing like that at all. There's a lot of agents that crush what I do as agents. But what I'm saying is, wouldn't it be great to start creating your own financial freedom, start creating your own cash flow, start growing your own net worth, right? So you can be at the point you can take a month off. And everything's fine and it keeps coming there, right? Or you're building a legacy for your family, for your kids and your kids. And then you can do whatever the heck you want. And if you love doing real estate, you love driving buyers around nights and weekends. I have some fun. A lot of people get into this game because it's freedom. And then you realize it really isn't freedom. It's nights and weekends and it's doing a lot of things I don't necessarily love to do. And You're set, you're capped. So for me, I think if I can help teach people there's another way, right? And you can start growing a portfolio. Here's the thing, you don't need a lot of money or even any money, and you don't need to have good credit. There are no money down deals. I do them, right? I bought a house for $500,000 in Florida, made an Airbnb with hardly any of my own money, right? There's ways you can partner, there's ways you can collaborate. There's people who have the money. There's people who don't know how to find deals. There's people who don't know how to deal structure. Right. And I've got friends that I can't fix like anything to save my life. Anything. I'm not good with tools. Not like real tools, not like manly tools. I'm good with the weird financial tools, like lease options and contract for deed and right. And stuff like that. But I've got people who want to flip houses. And then I'll work with them, but they're like, hey, I'm not really bankable. I can't go to the bank right now. Don't let that stop you. We can make it work together. Your skills, my skills together, we're doing stuff. So I think for anyone who's in the business right now as an agent and/or a lender, because it's tough too on that side, you start looking at, hey, how do you be the bank? How do you grow your own portfolio? How do you get cash flow coming in? And how do you see opportunities? Opportunities again that other people just throw away. And this could be a, you know, 4, 5, 6-figure opportunity. You know what to do, but again, you have to know what you're looking at. You need to know what to do with it. And a lot of time that takes investing in yourself, in education, in your network, in your system, in your tools, and who you're around.

Yeah, no, I know. But I think you, but you have the kind of basics, right? You understand the structure, the basic structure, and then you get these extra tools and then you're like, I have a full toolbox now. Right? Right. You can like really deal structure and how, and ultimately I think like we're really helping more people that would normally not be able to get that homeownership path or do whatever. So I think that's the beautiful thing about the creative stuff. And there is, and not working with a bank, look, I love my mortgage broker, but it's a beautiful thing when it's like an owner carry deal. Like it really, I do too. It's just, yeah. Magical.

I mean, I was doing the math the other day because I was running through a PowerPoint presentation and I was putting together some deals I've done and I guess in my head, never really tallied it up. I'm like, wow, I have a multi-million dollar portfolio. I'm not saying to be cool or anything like that. That's impressive. Whatever. Lots of people have more zeros than that, but what's cool about it was I think I spent less than $48,000 to get a multi-million dollar vacation rental portfolio, less than $48,000, right? Yeah. One I bought $8,000 down. One I bought for $14,000 down. One I bought for zero down. And then I put 15 grand into rehabbing it, doing a private money loan with someone else. So none of my money to fix it, none of my money to buy it. Then I went to the bank and I pulled up $15,000, right? One was a collaboration. So I bought a property with partners of mine. That had helped grow their portfolio 5 or 6 deep. And then they're like, hey, we'd like to have a vacation rental, but we don't really know how to do all that Airbnb stuff. And we don't want to deal with guests and cleaners and stuff, but you know how to do it, right? And I'm like, yeah, like, do you want to, can you help us with that? I'm cool. So you put the down payment down and then I'll do all the paperwork as the realtor and then I'll manage it and we'll do 50/50, right? And they're like, okay, sounds great. Awesome. So I went and bought a property with no money down. I actually got paid because I'm a realtor. So I got paid to go buy something and own half the cash flow and half the equity. Now I do all the work, but it's not a big deal to me because I know how to do it. And I've got an awesome team of VAs that are just fantastic and they're helping me get done. I've got boots on the ground. I've got a system, right? So it's just cool learning this stuff again. Being around other investors, masterminds, coaching, having a mentor that can teach you this kind of stuff that we have, you realize, oh my Lord, there's all these other tools and ways to do things. I thought it was just this one way and it's not.

Yeah. And I think, I just want to put this out there. I think there are a lot of courses and there are a lot of masterminds and we often feel like we're being sold to, but I think every successful investor has invested in their growth and their mindset. It's rare the person that has not had some kind of a mentor, like I'd be shocked if we— it's really important. So I just wanna stress that, like I've done multiple courses and, and the people you meet and the, and also just mindset in general, like understanding what's possible. 'Cause if you've only been exposed to very traditional tools or whatnot, you're not even gonna understand what's out there and then you're not gonna find those deals too. And that's a big part of investing, right?

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And literally we wouldn't be having this livestream right now. We wouldn't know each other had you and I not chosen, because it's not like someone made us, we chose to invest in ourselves, in our business, get out of our comfort zone, right? Spend money, spend time, go to a different destination. Met through amazing event called Power Players. Through, through one of our mentors, Mr. Greg Pinho. And here we are. Had we not done that, we wouldn't be talking right now.

Yeah, it's, yeah, so true. And that it's such a powerful thing to have a good network and yeah. Okay. So much to talk about. So if someone's in the boat, and I think just if you're, you're a mortgage broker or you're an agent, you're not really in the investor hat and what broadening your scope to think, hey, think about owning assets or think about the future. And I think that's, you understand those kind of niches and I think that's really amazing that you're especially going after helping those people that maybe to think bigger.

Absolutely. Yeah. I think there's, and, and again, I guess here's the thing too, sometimes I get caught up like I'm not telling somebody, I'm not that guy like W-2 sucks, go leave your job, right? There's a lot of people out there like, you gotta be a business owner. And, and I guess I feel like I used to maybe be kind of that guy, but as you get older and more mature, it's just about happiness. It's about happiness. If you love your job, I've here, I've got a coaching student and she's on the West Coast and she makes $300,000 a year plus at her W-2 job. And she said, I like it. I like what I do. I make good money. I'm like, yeah, but don't you wanna be a full-time real estate investor? She's like, I don't know, not really. I like what I do and I make good money. And like, okay, like I'm not going to talk her out of it. I'm not going to argue her. Like she's a baller. She's kicking ass in her day job and she's doing real estate. Right. But she's in a position to do more of like hybrid investing. And so she's not going to go be the deal creator, deal finder, deal maker. She's going to be the investor saying, I'm ready to rock and roll. Give me a good deal and I'll buy it. And that's awesome. So. It's about whatever makes you happy. But for me, I just like freedom. I like to travel. I love to meet new people. I love to help people. I love excitement. I like, I want to have a vacation home wherever I like to go and hang out. And I want to work from a parking lot at 8 o'clock at night if I want to. You know? There you go.

Yeah, but you, I think You have to be intentional about and know what you want and invest in that. Cuz it is not an easy path. I think we can both, it's definitely, you have to take, you have to take, invest and have a vision and have a why.

Absolutely. Yeah. You gotta have a why and you gotta, momentum's powerful. That's one of the things that we were talking on a call the other day is how powerful momentum is and it can be your friend and it can be your enemy. Right? Because it's very rare I have a day where I got nothing going on, but even if there's a day where I go, I only have 2 appointments today. What the heck? I'm like, oh, it's easy to just get distracted and this and that. But I get so jam-packed with my own momentum of things that are moving. Like, it's good and it's a snowball, but yeah, it's not for everybody. It's not. But the cool thing is there's so many ingredients in the kitchen of real estate. And investing that you don't need to know it all to do it all.

Hmm.

It's just knowing what do you got and what do you need? That's one of the things that we go through in the Deal Creator Academy, right? Is we got people who have very good jobs and/or businesses, got great credit, but like, I don't know how to find a deal, analyze a deal, negotiate a deal. I can go buy it all day. And then we've got other people like, I don't have good credit and I don't have a lot of money right now, but I can hustle and I can go me boots on the ground and I can go lock up deals. But so it's where do we all fit in together and taking you from where you're at, getting started, and then going from there. Right? Because everybody has to start somewhere.

It's so true. Yeah. And I think you, again, need to invest in yourself and that might just be an ed— it can be books or whatever it is, but I think there's something about accountability and masterminds and groups that will get you so much farther. All right. Is there anything else that we didn't cover about the current state of things or if how to work with you or what you kind of— Jesse.

Boy, I would say a couple things. So number one, we work with agents all over the country. If you're an agent and you're like, eh, now is not the time. Now is not the re— I don't know, whatever. Right. You don't want to take that next step into becoming an investor. Get started being an investor. If you are an investor and you're not ready to go to the next level, that's fine. We pay referral fees as licensed agents to anyone all over the country for your leads. So if you have, I say, buyers that can't buy and sellers that can't sell, we can help you with that. But if you want to learn how to not just throw them to us and get a regular commission, because we're going to go make maybe 2 to 3, 4 times that. By having the answers, we can show you how to do the same thing. And then we can collaborate and, you know, join our community and be doing this all over, which is pretty fun. I did put together a tool because of the fact that I get these leads thrown to me and agents asking me like, how are you doing some of this stuff? So I put together a tool. It's completely free. It's a mind map. It's pretty dope. It's a mind map. It's the 7 7 different types of leads that are other people's dead leads, other agents' dead leads that I convert, that I turn into money and I get deals done. 7 different things I see all the time and a mind map on it and a downloadable PDF so you can scan it. If you're talking to a client, you go, oh, here's what I could do. Because you think you got nothing. They're like, no, you have 7 options. Did you know that? You have 7 options. You think it's destiny. And so if you want that. If I can, I share the link. Is that cool?

Yeah, totally. I'll put it in the show notes too. Yeah, go ahead. Of course. Cool.

It's just dealcreatorsecrets.com. So go to dealcreatorsecrets.com and you'll have it. Bam. And again, I get to feel like almost an hour-long video that goes through 3 different ways you can make money from sellers, buyers, and investors that you think are dead leads and that people just throw away and right? Me and my team turn into deals. So it's pretty cool. I love to just see people's eyes light up with different ways to get things done. This could be a frustrating business, scary business, right? I know you're not an agent, but you probably know agents that are like, all right, gonna go get a job because it's weird. It's a weird world out there right now. And no, the ocean is so blue and such a good opportunity, but we Yeah, for sure.

No, I definitely, I, yeah, check it out everyone. I, it's a great resource. I've looked at it. I think especially just, it's really, if you haven't been exposed to a lot of these strategies, there's a lot of powerful things. And I think again, we're really helping people, right? If that homeowner that does not qualify, that's gotta be just like the absolute best feeling. I can only imagine they get to live in a, they're gonna on a path to homeownership because it's a, I forget how scary it is. Like I talked to you, I even get renters and they're, oh, we need a place for a few months. I talked to someone yesterday and she just was so overwhelmed by the idea of buying. I was just like, oh, I don't want to say I'm cavalier, but it's not, you know, I remember my first house was scary, but we get used to like, oh, we're investors, right? We're always wheeling and dealing. But for a lot of people, it's like the biggest financial thing of their lives.

Absolutely. Yeah, completely. And they've done this once ever, or like twice in 10, 15 years, and it's completely foreign to them. And yeah, we just, I actually just posted on my Facebook this morning, or one of my friends and colleagues tagged me on it. And we just helped a couple get into a brand new construction home in Florida that was not able to get bank financing for whatever reason right now. And they were just really scared they're going to have to rent some crappy place and move multiple times and uproot their kids. Went different school districts and like we made it happen. They literally got to pick it out, new construction and get it done. And for our investor who came in, he feels amazing that he got to help be a part of this and making a better return than he would in that crazy stock market or his IRA and helping somebody get home ownership, which is super, super cool.

It's so cliché, but it's really a win-win.

No, it's win. I'm going to lay it out. Okay. The tenant buyer got the house and the investor got an awesome cash flowing deal on a silver platter. Cause we just said, here you go. It's all negotiated. You just got to say yes or no. Right. Then the realtor got paid a commission. They would have made zip, but they got a commission still. So they won. The lender that denied this person is still going to get a loan. They're still going to get paid commission just in a year, probably from now, a year and a half. but they're still going to get paid versus zero. So that's, is that 4?

I think so. Yeah.

The seller got the deal done. Now they probably would have sold to somebody, right? I think that's 5. So it's 5 points. So it's pretty dope. All the parties that benefit from these creative transactions, when you can, again, take ingredients and go, oh, I think we could do this or this and this instead of just going, oh, sorry, I can't help you. Good luck. And move on.

Yeah. And I, I think also people, they just, they hear no and they just don't know they have options. Right. Because you're supposed to have X amount of money and your credit and they just, I, it's a scary thing to be like, what do you know? I think as entrepreneurs, we're always like looking for ways, but for the average, maybe first-time home buyer, it's don't check all the boxes. So I'll see you later. Yeah. So if someone hears this, right, and they're unbankable, they can reach out to you and do they apply? Or I know we're on another tangent. Sorry. I'm just curious. How does that work? If someone is in that position?

I love Tangent City. Let's go. So if somebody's unbankable and they want to get into a home, absolutely. So I would encourage you to go to unbankable.homes, www.unbankable, un, unbankable. Homes, not.com,.homes, and not.homes.com,.com.home. People get confused. I thought it was cool. That was a cool marketing thing. And then more people get confused. I'm like, there's no.com anywhere. It's just.homes. That's it. So bankable.homes, go there. And, uh, and we've got, uh, we've got some really good FAQs for agents. How does it work? How do you get paid? This, that. For lenders, right? And for our buyers. And we've got some videos in there, but yeah, go there. And again, we have amazing students and an amazing community all over the country that's doing this. Putting together, I think, 2 or 3 deals in Mississippi and Georgia this week. One in Florida we just locked up and one in Wisconsin we're closing in a couple days. And so it's pretty cool to show people this kind of new option and new way of doing it. That's new for most people.

That's so I have to ask it, the unbankable, the person applying is, there's an underwriting process, but is it just like a form they fill out or how does that work from that perspective? Like how do you qualify them to be a good candidate?

Yeah, good question. If they were working with a lender, we want to talk with that lender. And again, I could put on my mortgage hat and they got the mortgage hat. I was like, all right, what's the DTI? What's the credit score? What's the deal? Is there one thing that's stopping them? Is it 2 or 3 things, right? Hey, they're late on the mortgage twice. So you got 2 30-day late. So that means, and you got a big X and then they have a new business that hasn't been 2 years and they've got a 519 credit score. Okay. We have 3 things we have to work on. And so one of them's like a, I call it like a clock spinning and then there's another clock spinning and there's other clocks. So then we look at what needs to change. So it's really diagnosing what is the issue and what needs to change. Now, another important thing is, will it change? Right? For example, I'll tell you an example of a situation that we probably couldn't work with that I, it pains me to say no to anybody. Uh, cause I want to help and I want to make a deal happen. But if someone is saying, I can't afford this house and I'm on a fixed income. Or even my credit's bad or not just not great, but I'm, you know, on a fixed income, for example, can you get it done? Sure. It's our rules. We can make it be whatever we want, but if you can't afford a house at a 7% interest rate, you're not going to afford it at a higher rate or higher payment. And if your income is not going to change in the next 2 to 3 years, then what's going to change? So there has to be an exit strategy. We have to say, okay, well, if you do A and B or A, B, C, or A in a year or 2 or 3, usually 3 is the most, you're going to be good to go. Right? But if nothing's going to change, we don't want to set somebody up for failure. Because again, I make that kind of cheesy joke. Like we have an A rating with the Better Business Bureau. I say cheesy because they pay or they charge you, right? Charge you to give you a rate. If we're taking people's houses or down payments and option fees, we wouldn't have an A rating. So we do everything in our power. We're reviewing the credit reports, we're reviewing taxes, pay stubs, W-2s, bank statements. We're reviewing everything upfront as if we're getting a mortgage. We just know there's something that they're saying no to and we're okay with because we know the story, right? We know the fact they were laid off for 6 months. We know they went through a crappy divorce and somebody stopped paying bills and screwed the other person over and it looks really bad for a year, but now they're fine. Now they're back on their feet. Or we know they were in COVID and not working, right? And it dominoed. So if there's a good reason, a good story, we're game all day, right? If it's a bad story and it makes no sense and you just don't like to pay things, we might not be your solution right now. So.

That's, but I, I love that cuz it's really protecting everyone. You're not setting someone up to take their option fee and then be like, okay, rinse and repeat. Cause I think there are, that is a strategy that I've heard. I think it's really unethical. Right. But you're very ethical in this process.

Yeah.

And yeah, just understanding the nuance.

We lost business because we're so thorough.

Yeah. That's interesting.

I know a couple of my competitors that, not that there's really many, uh, uh, of them that do what we do. They'll take anybody's money and go buy 'em a house. And it's okay. Ash might be drug money. It could be terrorist money. You don't know. You ain't up to work. Like, good luck when this happens in 2 years because everyone's happy today and then it's gonna blow up in 2 years.

Yeah.

I don't wanna see that happen. I want all of the agents that send us business and get paid when they would've made nothing to keep sending us business over and over and saying, hey, and they get to get the limelight too, which is cool. Like we're not trying to steal their thunder. Like, hey, you connected with us. We got you the house. Everybody wins. Good deal.

Yeah, they're really the hero. Okay. So I have to ask, maybe it's a silly question, but they're getting paid out of the option fee, right? That's how they're getting their commission, the agent, if they are the ones.

No, so they're. So we become the buyer.

Okay.

Because we are the actual buyer buying the property because their client can't buy.

Mm-hmm.

So we're the buyer and then us being the agent for our buyers get that commission.

Oh, got it. Okay. Okay.

Investor's gonna go buy, uh, maybe I'm the investor, maybe it's one of my investors in our community. They go buy and I'm their agent. I just got all the buyer's commission. But I wouldn't have this deal if it wasn't for the agent bringing me the person who can't qualify. So then I take that commission and I will, you know, legally pay the agent. Here you go. You get all my money. It's mine, but really I'll give it to you because you brought in your client.

So, so is it, and again, I'm not an agent. Is it like a referral fee? Is that like essentially what it's— okay. Okay.

Basically a referral fee for—

okay. Awesome. Okay. One more time. I want you to say how people can reach you, Jesse. And it's been so fun, but I can see it getting darker and darker.

I'm like a freaky haunted, like floating head right now. Like, does this get any jankier? Now it looks like it's Steve from Yodelay. So, and I'm gonna rob a Subway. Watch this.

That's hilarious. You're gonna go eat something, a sandwich.

I should be eating a sandwich while I talk about a sandwich we robbed.

Yeah.

That's good. If you want to go get the, my tool, my Deal Creator Cheat Sheet, it's free. You should absolutely look at that, whether you're an investor or an agent or a lender, help you close more deals, be more valuable in your business and help more people, right? That's free. So go to Deal Creator Secrets and you can download that free cheat sheet. And then you can basically find me on any platform @thejesse mills. So the Jesse Mills Facebook, the TikTok, YouTube, all the stuff.

Everywhere. Awesome. Put it in the notes. This has been really fun. I hope people got inspired or had their minds open to all the creative possibilities because there's a lot of really cool stuff and it's, yeah, it's mind-blowing once you dive in. And if I know we touched on a lot of strategies, there's a lot of nuance to this stuff, right? So. Reach out to Jesse.

And things are always changing too. Sorry, I don't want to cut you off, but things are always changing. And that's why I'm going to have you on my podcast, The Creative Cashflow Show with Jesse Mills. And you're going to be on there talking about transitioning from short-term rentals to midterm rentals and why you should and when you should. And what does that look like? And I think it's perfect timing right now to talk about that. And so I'm excited to have you on our show. Time about that, right? So it's whatever you're doing, guys, just take action. If you're listening and watching this, you're already ahead of the crowd, right? I love you just for being here because you're taking action and, right, growing your own toolset and your skillset and, and connecting. Didn't meet, but we met. And so now, re—

Awesome. All right. Yes. And I'll leave everything in the show notes if you didn't catch anything. For anyone that's been here for a while, Thank you. Leave a comment. And if you're watching the replay, just skip, just fast forward a little bit.

It's a little bit. Oh no, a little. Watch every minute of it and laugh your butt off.

Yeah, Justin, I can't wait to be on your podcast. I'm obsessed with midterms and I think definitely there's a lot of strategy and a lot of nuance to it. But I, it's my fav— one of my favorite topics.

Yeah. You are the go-to, so I'm excited to have you on and talk about that. And, uh, yeah, thank you so much for having me on the show. I appreciate it.

Yeah, well, a safe travel.

I've got like teenagers on bikes roaming around in the car right now. Like, what is going on in there?

Thanks for making that work. Awesome. All right, I'll catch you soon.

All right. Hey, thank you so much. Have a great night.

Thank you too.

Thank you so much for having me.

Yeah, thanks for listening everyone.

Bye-bye.