Amy Profits $160k on 12-Month Slow Flip

Unknown Speaker  0:01  
You're listening to the flip houses like a girl podcast where we educate, empower and celebrate everyday women who are facing their fears, juggling family and business, embracing their awesomeness and wholeheartedly chasing their dream of flipping houses. Each episode delivers honest to goodness tools, tips and strategies you can implement today to get closer to your first or next successful house flip. Here's your spiky haired breakfast taco loving host house flipping Coach Debbie DeBerry.

Debbie DeBerry  0:40  
Hey, thanks for hanging out with me today, I'm excited to share this conversation that I got to have with one of our flip sisters. So one of the members of our coaching program and community, her name is Amy, she's in North Carolina, and I love the way she is combining her businesses and just being super smart about things. Something I preach over and over again, is please, please, please, whether you are buying a house to live in, or buying a house to flip and sell or buying a house to flip and rent, always buy a property, you can add value to live in a house that you are updating, all right, slow flip that puppy, because you are missing out on an amazing wealth building opportunity. If you're buying a house that's already been done, alright, if you're buying a house that you cannot add value to. Okay, so regardless of the end use of the property, do yourself a huge financial favor and buy a property you can add value to cool, okay, now that that's out of the way, so that is what Amy's doing right. So in this episode, we're going to talk about a couple of her slow flips. So that's what I call live in flips. I call them a slow flip. And we're going to talk about those. And we're also going to talk about how she is helping her real estate clients. So she's also a real estate agent. And she's helping her clients buy investment properties, and flip them and turn them into really nice rentals and helping them build wealth that way. So she also has a staging company. And she's just got her hands Oh, and a property management company. She has all these little businesses that work perfectly in combination with each other. And she's just doing it. She's just doing it. So excited to talk to her about her journey and share her story with you. All right, here we go. Okay, awesome. So how about we start with you introducing yourself, letting us know where you are a little bit about you and what you are up to in the world in all your business?

Unknown Speaker  3:10  
Sure, yeah. So I'm Amy Frazier, I am located just north of Charlotte, in the Cornelius Davidson area of North Carolina, we often call it Lake Norman, North Carolina. So there's this big lake just north of Charlotte. And it's basically residential all the way around it. So that's where we live, work and play. And yeah, so I've been in real estate for about eight years now. previous life, I worked in higher ed as a career counselor, and that was fun. But there's definitely a glass ceiling there that you can't break. So when I was transitioning to back to North Carolina, I've lived in a couple different places had the opportunity to kind of start something new. And I had taken the real estate course when I was 18, with my dad, and at the time, I wasn't serious about real estate, you know, I was going to a four year school. And so that was just something I didn't really need. I was interested, but I wasn't focused. And so I guess a little over eight years ago, now I took the real estate course and I loved it. And so I started on this journey, starting as just a real estate broker here in North Carolina. And at the same time, I started a staging company with hopes that that might help leverage my real estate business, or at least give me the opportunity to get more houses by partnering with other real estate brokers. And so that has really morphed and taken all kinds of, you know, turns and dips and all that in the past eight years, but it's been a fun journey. So now we own a real estate firm, we own a property management company. And we do flips and we also do buy and hold most of ours are buying holds. And we've really found that we really enjoy the design aspect. The project management piece we're really good at and we're able to really stay in our little micro suburb towns and not have to go outside because we are running multiple different companies so it's easier if we can just stay in a really small radius.

Debbie DeBerry  4:58  
Yeah, yeah. That's it. lot going on. Um, that's awesome. And the beauty is that they all feed into each other. So it's super super really do. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so let's talk about how you have been investing. And I think it's really important because I think regardless of what kind of property we buy, we should be buying a property that we can add value to you. Yeah, you guys have really nailed the live in flip. Right? So let's talk about how, how many of those have you guys done?

Unknown Speaker  5:38  
We've done four of those now. Okay. Okay.

Debbie DeBerry  5:41  
And let's walk through the most recent one. So you've got a well, I guess you have two recent ones, were both renovating at the same time being renovated at the same time they were. Okay. All right. So you just sold a house that you live in for a year you updated, and you're moving into another house that you renovated? And that's what you're gonna that's where you're gonna live for a little bit. Is that right? Okay, let's talk about how you let's talk about the deal. Like, let's talk about how you found this most recent house that you lived in, that you'll did the live in flip, and what the numbers were and how that looked and what that was like living through a space that you're renovating? And after

Unknown Speaker  6:31  
all of that, yeah. So you know, I think even before that, just as sort of an aside, you know, like, I don't think I ever I unconsciously, I think have been doing this for much longer with every property that I've owned, you know, own seven houses in 11 years. And every one of them I put my personal spin on. And you know, when you're first starting out, you just start thinking about, like, Oh, I can do paint and hardware. And then as you get more confidence to flex that muscle that you're always working to build, you see that you can actually accomplish a whole lot more. So yes, these last two have been our biggest two of our biggest for sure, but so the property that we call the hidden garden house, we bought, we actually made our offer on the Fourth of July weekend. And it was one of those that have just been on the market. And let me also say, as a real estate broker, you know, all our deals are basically through the MLS, which I know is a bit unconventional. But again, we're in a really small market that we work, I know that market really well I can pretty much see a deal, even if it is on MLS, I really have kind of gotten pretty good at that. So this was a property that we call brown and beige, we call it the yellow grandma house in the sense that it was like, oh, gee, from the early 90s. You know, one owner, you know, meticulously maintained, right? But was definitely Oh, gee, and needed some love. And you know, we I think all of us live in places where everyone wants HGTV perfect, right? And this definitely didn't and the worst offense in there was this oak cabinet kitchen with these horrible Yeah, it's hard to forget that in your mind it kind of in blazes in your brain and never goes away. And it was just horrible. And I knew that's why it wasn't selling and it only been on the market like six days, right. And in today's market, you think that's a really long time. But so yeah, so we've purchased that for 385, which it was listed at 400. So that 15k off right off the bat. So that was a win. And yeah, because we do live in flips because we're those crazy people you know, we're able to do a 5% down conventional loan, which is like a huge win. So and I think our interest rate was like the low threes. So we we bought that and basically in the same week that we bought that we had to vacate the other property that we had just finished our pink door cottage project and have renter's move into that as a furnished rental and move into this new one and immediately demo the kitchen because again, it was horrendous and didn't need to have any longer have a lifespan.

Debbie DeBerry  8:57  
So thank you. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  9:01  
Yeah, so it was done. And so we started demoing like that night. And so the kitchen was our biggest transformation in that house. We did other things you know, like had a green like quartz or maybe granite fireplace surround and of course we did that with quartzsite instead and rebuilt above the mantel and did a really beautiful design and we changed out the powder room. And we did a lot of like work on like the balusters and the stairwell and repainted the entire house. And the exterior we repainted all the exterior trim our go to color is pure white, so we just use that in as many places as we could. Yeah. Yeah, so I mean, it was a big project, but not our biggest but it probably had one of the biggest returns in a shorter period of time that we've seen.

Debbie DeBerry  9:49  
Okay, so you paid 385 for it. How much did you end up putting into the renovation,

Unknown Speaker  9:56  
we put about 40,000 Okay, most of that was Kitchen and with the kitchen Of course, you know plumbing and electrical work, we reconfigured the kitchen and, you know, gas range instead of electric and choosing to do a pot filler and those sorts of things that all add up. But honestly, this one was it felt at times more like a cosmetic flip in the sense other than the kitchen, we very much and I think every house right has kind of an identity and you can definitely like tweak the identity, but sometimes like you can't, the core cannot be transformed completely. So this was a very traditional home. It's not It's not our normal style, but we had to kind of pay homage to it. So yeah, I mean, 40k doesn't sound like a lot. But it really did transform it enough to give that wow factor that we were looking forward to put it back on the

Debbie DeBerry  10:43  
market. That's super impressive that you could do that with 40k. Like, really? That's super impressive. Okay, so 385 40 grand into it for the renovation? And how long did you? When did you guys close on the sale of that?

Unknown Speaker  11:01  
So we purchased it in August of 2020. And we sold it in August of 2021.

Debbie DeBerry  11:08  
Got it? Okay. And what did you guys end up profiting on that?

Unknown Speaker  11:14  
165,000

Debbie DeBerry  11:16  
bananas,

Unknown Speaker  11:18  
it is we never expected it, you know, we bought this house thinking it was gonna be a long term hold for a rental, that maybe we get 4000 a month for. And just seeing what the market, you know, did. And that's why I think it's so important for us all to stay on the pulse of what our local market is because it can change day to day, it can change it to week, and you just got to see because sometimes you buy a property and you have one intention for it. And then you know the market changes, and you have to be able to pivot. And so in this sense, we actually like really made out a whole lot better than we ever expected. And so we're so thankful for that. Yeah,

Debbie DeBerry  11:51  
yeah, no, that's so true. And it's, first of all, it's great to have, it's, it's a good problem to have, if you have multiple exit strategies that you can write, like, that's a great problem. So the fact that you were able to, yes, monitor the data, Oh, my gosh, if we're not watching our local markets, like we're speculating, right, so I love that you were watching and you knew, yeah, this is we need to sell this like this is we rode this pony. As far as it's gonna take us and we can't like you can't take us any farther holding this is right.

Unknown Speaker  12:26  
Yeah. And I would say to like, as you're seeing other houses in your neighborhood, go on the market. You know, let them creep up a little bit more like let them sort of prolong you know, we initially thought we wanted to get this on the market in June, July, we kind of waited till mid July, actually beginning of August. And that really served us because that actually probably got us another 20 30k in profit just by waiting a little bit, which I know there's risk or reward with that. But that definitely served in our

Debbie DeBerry  12:52  
favor. Yeah. And you were watching. So you it's not that you weren't necessarily guessing you were making decisions based on what you were saying. Absolutely. That's awesome. So smart. Okay, so that's huge. Do you? This is more personal question. Like big profits like that. How does that How does it feel to you? Like Do you ever feel a little bit like, oh, gosh, it's like hard to even say that number because it's so crazy.

Unknown Speaker  13:20  
I mean, I never expected to be able to make that much in a year on on one thing, right? I mean, we all work on many things throughout the year, and hopefully, cumulatively, hopefully, we're making six figures or whatever your number is, and we all have different numbers. But for me to be able to run that net sheet on myself and be like, Damn, like, that's, that's good. Like, I'm proud of that. It definitely fuels the fire to to be like, Alright, let's do this again.

Debbie DeBerry  13:43  
Yes, yes, absolutely. like okay, I just proved to myself that I can do this, and let's keep that going. Awesome. All right. So that's the hidden garden house, right? Yeah. Okay, so while you're flipping while you're renovating that house while you're living in that house, you bought another house? And what was the intention of that house gonna be?

Unknown Speaker  14:06  
So I think one thing, I don't think we're alone in this but like, when you get in this business, you're like, Oh, yeah, you know, like, I'll be ready for something like once I have the proceeds right from hitting garden house, then I'll be ready to reinvest in do something else. But no, no, that's not how the universe works. You know, it was right after Christmas. And this property came on the MLS and it had one photo and it was in a neighborhood that we'd been watching. And it was, you know, had been tenant occupied for like 10 plus years, you know, seller will make no repairs and we're like, let's just go see it. We you know, we went out the first day, and it was horrible. I mean, it was like a foreclosure in our market. We don't really see properties in this bad of condition, but it was disgusting. Wow. So we were like, Huh, really good neighborhood. Let's just throw our hat in the ring and see what happens. You know, like there were a ton of investors like in a line waiting to see it. And you know, we just kind of like that. In our car we're kind of crunching numbers and we're like if we don't do it we'll never know you know just let's just see what happens. And yeah so we actually won out in a multiple offer and we only paid 1k over list price which shocked me.

Debbie DeBerry  15:16  
Okay, so you buy that house well what was your intention?

Unknown Speaker  15:20  
The intention on that one was just get our hands on it right and like figure out the details later because sometimes you just know something's a really good deal and you're like, you know what, whether it's a rental for us as a buy and hold or if we decide to move in here you know, we'll make it work we just can't pass up this opportunity. So I think by that point, you know, we were five months into owning the hidden garden house and we were realizing maybe this would be better you know, as a flip long term flip you know, versus a buy and hold long term. So I think for us we were initially thinking let's just get it and then we were like actually this could be a good next

Debbie DeBerry  16:00  
house for us. And see like that's just another thing and you mentioned earlier that you got it on the MLS and how that's unusual and I think it's unusual because people aren't comfortable with their market data. Like if you know your market you know a good deal and you can act quickly. And that's the hard part is getting beginners to act quickly. And to just jump like the MLS is full of deals like so many of these conversations that I have with you guys it's a fan out on the MLS found it on the MLS, it's like wow, so yes, there are deals on MLS, you just have to act quickly. And that's where understanding your market and really knowing your market data. That's that's the whole point. Make you feel confident. So okay, so you jump on it and in January, and do you start renovating it pretty soon after,

Unknown Speaker  16:50  
it was so disgusting inside, we had to just start demoing so yeah, we got the dumpsters and started so it's actually considered a condo, it's a two story townhome. So you know there's only so much we can do to the exterior, we cannot work in the interior. So yes, our goal was just to get out as much as we get out as much funk as we could and be able to start with a fresh slate and I tend to have like visions that come to me with all our projects. And so as soon as I could get in there and not be only in there for like five minutes because of the smell, then I could really let it come to life in my head and start to get these visions of ideas for design and such so so yes, we're doing the tandem projects of finishing up the hidden garden house. And thankfully by that point the kitchen was done but we're working on all the other smaller projects to then be able to pivot over and kind of be project managing both property or both properties at the same time with our trades guys to to get the naughty by the lake house up and running.

Debbie DeBerry  17:46  
I didn't realize it was a townhouse. Do we see exterior pictures? I

Unknown Speaker  17:49  
can't recall. No, no.

Debbie DeBerry  17:51  
Okay, your your interior does not look townhouse. Like that's not the townhouses around here at all?

Unknown Speaker  17:57  
Well, and again, it did not look like that.

Debbie DeBerry  17:59  
I'm sure I'm sure I'm sure that's all you like. It's stunning. It's truly stunning. Okay, so what did you guys end up? How much money did you end up putting into the renovation of that one?

Unknown Speaker  18:12  
So we've put about 70k in and that's without doing the backyard yet, because we do actually have a backyard even though it's a townhome, and it's fully fenced privacy. It's really nice. It looks like the Sahara right now. But it will be beautiful when we can work on it. Yeah, so we're getting there. The 70k so far,

Debbie DeBerry  18:30  
what did you end up paying for it?

Unknown Speaker  18:33  
We paid 215. Okay. And I ran comps before this podcast and you know, we'd be able to sell it. You know, today for 400.

Debbie DeBerry  18:46  
Yeah. Okay, so you're gonna hang on to it. You're moving into this one. You have you left? Oh, you did? Because you closed on the other one in August, right?

Unknown Speaker  18:54  
Yes. Okay. And then there for about three weeks.

Debbie DeBerry  18:57  
Okay. Okay. I love moving. I love Yeah, I love being in new spaces. I love it so much. And so when that and I just haven't been able to, it's hard. My son does not like moving. He does not like change. And so it's like, oh man, but I just want to move like I'll see a house. I'm like, Oh my God, give me this. Oh, awesome. Let's move no, yes. So I'm going to live vicariously through you. Okay, so the plan is to live in this one for a year,

Unknown Speaker  19:29  
for at least a year. Yes. And of course, the moment will actually we've never stopped looking for the next deal either. So we'll see kind of what happens but what we're seeing is that, you know, it takes like us typically, you know, four to six months to finish your property like will turn so we work with investors also and design their projects and turn those for them. And most times we can finish those in three to four weeks should again build the level of detail and care that we're putting into the ones that we're doing which are usually a little bit higher price point, when they're all said and done or what they'll appraise for definitely take a little bit longer and, you know, sometimes choose different vendors and tradesmen and tradeswomen for different projects. Yeah. And so the people that we keep on for our personal projects sometimes are a little bit harder to get on the schedule quickly. Yeah, yeah.

Debbie DeBerry  20:15  
And when you're when you are living in a space, you it's not that you don't renovate, flip and sell to the same level. But when you're living in the space in your, in your thinking about it in that sense, and you are taking a little bit longer, it like gives more time for more ideas and more things to flourish, I think and more Oh, we shouldn't know. Now we can do this. And now we can do that easily.

Unknown Speaker  20:38  
It's like the layering effect and kind of layering in the ideas. The initial thoughts kind of are like part one, and you get to part 234. Before you get to the final version. Yeah.

Debbie DeBerry  20:48  
Right. And it's so it's such a fluid process, because you can do one thing and think it's going to have whatever effect and you do it and you're like, oh, man, well, now that kind of changes what I want to do over here. And so yeah, I love all of that part of it. Is the design piece, your favorite part.

Unknown Speaker  21:08  
It totally is. I mean, I, it's been interesting for me, because I don't have any formal training and design, I don't have a background in any of that, you know, I've taken, you know, a staging training, you know, 10 plus years ago now, and it was more on the business side versus the design side. And so this all just it's sort of cool to see this evolution of myself to have like, I can come up with these things, you know, certainly you still reference Pinterest, right. And like other things, like I'm not saying that I'm the almighty designer, right. But I can take ideas, and then kind of translate them or morph them into what we want. And you know, I'm really fortunate to be with a partner who can bring a lot of my ideas to life, and we can, you know, come together and be like, Alright, let's like sketch out like that fireplace, in this most recent project. Like, that was a monstrosity that took up way too much space was horrible. And we just sort of started sketching on cardboard and came up with this great idea. And he was able to bring it to life, you know, so. So yeah, that's definitely like our secret sauce to is being able to. Yeah, this thing.

Debbie DeBerry  22:11  
Is your partner's name. Is it Marty? It is? Yeah, right? Okay. Um, what's his role? He's the he's the bringer to lifer. He is

Unknown Speaker  22:20  
so he's a great project manager. You know, we're in the south, right. So like, there is still some of that stigma of like, the guys can get things done in the girls, you know, from the north. And so sometimes I'm, you know, a little too direct I've learned here in the south, but we're still working on, you know, working that fat out. But yeah, so Marty is excellent at project management. He, he does all our millwork. So any of the millwork that you see in our projects, that's all how you see a fireplace redesign. That's all him, he installs all our kitchen cabinetry. He you know, so he can do a lot of like, finished stuff for us. And he just worked so well with our vendors. They all really like him. They like me to write, but like, he's more easy going to work with. And I'm more like, demanding. I'm like, No, really, when are you going to be done with this? Like, I don't not like in a few weeks? Like I need it now.

Debbie DeBerry  23:11  
Right? It's a good value, a good balance?

Unknown Speaker  23:14  
In Yang, so yes, he runs our property management company. And so when we do have projects that go into the portfolio, then he's the manager for that.

Debbie DeBerry  23:23  
Okay, got it. Um, how many properties are are you guys managing in your property management company, or how many doors

Unknown Speaker  23:31  
30 doors and so we really focused on mostly long term rentals, but mostly like high end. And when I say high end, I don't mean they have to be million dollar houses, they can be a 200k house that we then improve. But all our rentals right now are anywhere from 2000 to 4000 per month. And that's our sweet spot. Awesome.

Debbie DeBerry  23:49  
Is there a certain number of doors you want to be managing? Are you trying to, like grow that, you know, sometimes, like society tells us we have to keep growing and growing and growing, when sometimes we're okay with where things are. And we feel really good because the more we grow, right, oftentimes that means more of our time is taken. Oh, absolutely. Uh huh. So do you guys have a certain number of doors you're trying to stay under?

Unknown Speaker  24:15  
I mean, I think for us initially it was doors, you know, let's, let's grow to 50. Right, right. But I think one thing we've really learned this past year is like cash flow is king from working with our own investors, you know, and cash flowing. So all of our investors if they work with us to acquire a property and then improve it, and then put it out on the rental market, everybody's cash flowing 500 to $1,000 per month. That's sort of the minimum. Yeah, so that's kind of what we focus on. And then with our own properties, I mean, I would rather have one or you know, call it five properties we own that are cash flowing, let's call it a cumulative, I don't know. 10,000 a month, then have you know, 10 doors, each bringing me you know, 1000 a month. I'm much more I don't really care about the number I care about the quality and the quality translates for me into cash flow, a lot of times

Debbie DeBerry  25:00  
Same Yeah, that makes perfect sense I, in all of my businesses, I try to be very lean, I try to be as lean as possible. And in order to generate whatever revenue, so lean feels good to me. And that's kind of what I'm hearing from you too.

Unknown Speaker  25:17  
It totally is. And I think a lot of people will fall to you and say, well, gosh, you should have an admin and you should have all these things. And you should have that. And it's just like, at the end of the day, like, if you don't mind doing some of these things, I totally get leveraged, right, and I'm not opposed to leverage. And there's a time and a place for it. But at the same time, I think you have to know what your business is doing and know all the facets of it. Yeah, and kind of wrap your arms around it. And I to 100% would rather be lean. And I also think it also keeps you real with yourself, right? Because I think when you build something so big that needs so many additional players, you can sometimes almost feel like it's it's less of your identity anymore. And you know, been there done that right? And don't want to do that anymore. So absolutely, keeping lean is super crucial. And I'd say we apply that also to our renovations, because we very much like I'm that person who will shop it like the clearance or the discount or the open box or whatever. And so that helps us be able to do these really great designs and finishes, but maybe not cost as much as it normally would

Debbie DeBerry  26:18  
they go hand in hand. I totally agree. Okay, so Nadi by the lake is currently like around valued at like 400k. Yes. You're gonna hold on to that for a year if at a pending? Yeah. Yeah. And you're currently looking for another one, I'm sure.

Unknown Speaker  26:35  
Yes, yeah, we are. We'd like to get into the short term rental game in a certain in a couple of different markets just just because, but definitely, you know where we are, there's so many ways that restrict rental usage. And so even if we can find some more mid term rentals around here, that's one of the goal. And long term

Debbie DeBerry  26:55  
holds. But I'm sure you're like me and you prefer midterm over long term because the cash flow? Oh, absolutely. Right. If you have a property and you can generate more cash flow from it doing one thing, again, it's Yeah, generate cash flow. Okay, so tell me I want to I'm curious about how you work how you guys work as a real estate brokerage? How you guys work with investors? Yeah, because it sounds like you're doing some really cool stuff over there. For people

Unknown Speaker  27:25  
we're trying I mean, you know, it's, it's been an interesting journey, you know, we've probably been focused on investors really started about three years ago, and really finding that majority of our business now is right, so we still do residential, you know, traditional brokerage. But what we've found is that by helping the public get educated, like our current client base, or other agents, clients who work in our firm, like, there's money that everybody a lot of people have, who work in, you know, corporate America, for example, in 401k, or whatever it might be, where it's untapped. And they have an opportunity to use it, but they don't know how to use it. And so we, most of our investors, they own one to five properties. So usually they start out and they only have one or zero, and then we help them acquire that one. And then that kind of starts to snowball effect. And so helping them just a general education, but then also being able to be project managers and be able to handle all that because so many of them are so interested in getting into real estate, but they still want to be hands off. They don't want to be any portion other than the money person, right? They don't want to be slinging a hammer.

Debbie DeBerry  28:29  
Thank you. It does exist. People does exist. People have money, and they want to be in real estate, but they don't want to do anything. They don't want to do any of the things. They just want to give the money to the person.

Unknown Speaker  28:41  
Yeah. And that's the norm of what we find, like Yes, yeah, it might like we just finished one, we helped an investor. He's 27 years old by his first one his family as a VIP clients of ours that we've worked with many times. And he, we sought out a property, we turned it in three weeks, put a renter in there. He's cash flowing really well. And but his mom wanted to be part of the rehab. And so she got involved, she got to do it. But he very much was like completely hands off to the point where we're like, are you really certain you don't want any hands? Unless he's like, No, none. Like, I'll just be the money guy. And all future flips, I will only be the money guy, whether it's buy and hold or flip. And we're like, okay, so yeah, they totally do exist. And I would say that's the majority is if they have the money, they don't necessarily want they want to keep their regular job and just do that and be able to give you this money to manage and deal with and give them great returns.

Debbie DeBerry  29:33  
Right? Yeah. That's amazing. Do you guys end up managing all of those typically?

Unknown Speaker  29:39  
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And that's part of the caveat, right? We found that if people buy properties with other real estate brokers who don't look at it the same way as we do, sure enough of backfire. And sometimes those properties come into our portfolio and then we sort of have to reevaluate the property and really kind of rebranded if you will, to be able to market it for the high dollar that we do. Yeah, we don't we don't put our rentals on the MLS because the prices that we're asking are ridiculously different than what you'd see on the MLS Yeah. But we are able to attract, you know, a luxury tenant, right? People who are able to pay this type of money, they want a really nice place to live. And so, you know, oftentimes i'll be showing a property and they'll visit ours first, because we're super responsive. And we get in there and show it super fast. And we'll be standing there and they're gonna be like, Well, why is your house $1,000 more per month than the neighbor down the street that I'm gonna go look at after this. I was like, well go down the street, and then get back with me. Yeah. And they always do if they can afford the price. Yep. They will come back, because the level of luxury living that we give them as a tenant far surpasses any of our competition.

Debbie DeBerry  30:48  
Yeah, absolutely. Go look at that. And then give me a call and answer your own question. And we can go from there. Yeah. Got it. Okay, so are you managing the renovation and picking out all the pieces? And then like, picking out the furnishings as well? Are these typically for your property management clients? Are the properties typically mid term rentals or short term rentals or long term? Or what are you seeing?

Unknown Speaker  31:14  
Most of them are long term rentals. However, like this week, we just finished a mid term rental, we have investors who they're on their third house, to which they purchased with us. And they bought a two bedroom, two bath, waterfront condo, and it could have been rented as a long term. But we saw value in a midterm. And so we were able to offer it as the 90 day furnished rental. And so you know, we have a warehouse because again, I used to do staging, so we used to be able to, you know, furnish about six houses at a time and through COVID, we ended up selling off some stuff, but I still have just as much as seems there's no difference. There's no dents in the warehouse. I

Debbie DeBerry  31:49  
don't know how that math works. But I underwrite it would receive boxes

Unknown Speaker  31:53  
at my house just happening from wayfair. Right? Need to appear? That's my issue, right? Um, so yeah, we furnished it. And we were able to make it a win win win, right? So our investor now has a tenant in there paying a supreme price, a property management company is getting paid, and our staging and design company is getting paid for the rental of the furnishings every month. So we I love that we're able to give people this diverse, we can kind of like, tailor it to whatever they want, right? Or tailor it to whatever they need, because we have this vast array of services that we can provide. And not everybody needs every service and that's okay. But when they do you know, we're able to pivot and kind of shift and provide whatever's needed. Yeah.

Debbie DeBerry  32:37  
So I love what you're doing. I love all of the different things that you were all of the business pieces, and how they all fit together is super smart. Like you're just super smart about it all. Thank you. Let's see, Did we leave anything out? Was there something you wanted to touch on that we didn't?

Unknown Speaker  32:55  
I think sometimes we get in our own way. And I think we just have to kind of embrace the idea of like, we can do this, I think you just have to be okay with like starting small. And I think also like getting uncomfortable for a little bit. I think a lot of people don't want the discomfort, but the amount of financial gain and opportunity that can come from that, like you've got to start somewhere. And I think also when it comes to like financing for investments and such, like, you've got to start building your portfolio, and your portfolio can include a house that you're living in, you know, or that you know, multiple houses that you've lived in. And so you just have to start somewhere. And I you know, we work with so many people who you know, they're all looking for that forever perfect house, you can make any house really great, right? I don't I don't believe there's any perfect house. And maybe I'm a cynical realtor, but I just don't think they exist. And so I'm very much No, I think that we have to be able to help people articulate vision or see vision. And I think that that's a lot of my job, too, when I'm out there with clients, but yeah, I mean, I think you just have to dig in and like figure out a way. I mean, I sat on the sidelines for many years, thinking that I couldn't do this, and that I didn't have the skill set. And yeah, I'm not the one that's you know, swinging the hammer on these projects, or, you know, doing the heavy lifting, but I'm the one sourcing everything. And I think that's so let me back up. I think that that's the other piece is like, you build a team around you. And that team takes different identities for every person. So my, my team structure may look very different than yours. And they're very different than someone else, and figure out what your strengths are. And once you figure it out, you know, for me, it's sourcing and it's designed and if somebody else can bring it to life, then that's then I've done my job right or if I've found materials for a better price than if we had just used the bidding system at whatever big box store or whatever it was. And yeah, I just think we have to remember we don't have to be a jack of all trades. And you know, whatever our strength is like we need to own that strength and then find people to fill in the gaps

Debbie DeBerry  34:52  
a men like I want to put that on repeat. I'm just going to loop that over and over for five minutes. Because, especially as women, we feel the need to wear all the hats, do all the things be all the people. And that slows us down. Oh, yeah, we aren't meant to do all the things, we have our zones of genius, and we get to let other people shine in their zones of genius. Like, it's awesome. And

Unknown Speaker  35:20  
you're so much happier to write, like, when you don't have to gripe and be like, Oh my gosh, I've got to figure out how to do this. And I don't like this like, No, no, like, what do you enjoy doing? and find a way to be able to spend your time doing those things?

Debbie DeBerry  35:31  
Exactly. Exactly, exactly. Amen. I love that, that and just starting, like those two things, build your team, and then just start, like, those are two really, really important messages. So definitely, you're awesome. I'm so glad that we got to have this conversation. And I'm so glad that you are in our community. And we love your designs, we love everything you're up to. So keep sharing. I will letting keep taking us on that journey with you.

Unknown Speaker  36:08  
I need to get better about that. But I will and I'm so happy to be here. I mean, I can't even remember honestly how we first got connected. Now you know how that all started. But I am so appreciative for the opportunity and to have found this tribe that's so encouraging and supporting of each other. And you know, Debbie, you're just a rock star. So I'm super happy to be here. Hope to be here for a long time and just continue the journey.

Debbie DeBerry  36:29  
I appreciate it. I think you're awesome. And honestly, I think I want to invest there. So we'll be talking. Thanks so much for your time, Amy. I know you're welcome. I appreciate it. Alright, see in the group. Bye. Bye. Loved it. Love that conversation with you, Amy. Thanks for hanging out with me. Thanks for sharing your story. It's going to inspire people to go take action. So yay, awesome. All right. And here's the thing. You don't have to figure all of this out on your own. Okay. While obviously we show you the steps, we tell you the exact steps to take. Those are what is missing. If you aren't doing the thing you want to be doing. If you aren't out there flipping houses. It's not because you don't know the steps. Alright, that's not the only thing missing. You're missing support. You're missing a team behind you telling you yes you can when you have a hard day, or when a challenge comes up or you hear no or a rejection or whatever. The support is what gets people to the finish line. It's not just the step by step processes, although those are important, and we can help you save a lot of money and a lot of mistakes. That's not the only thing. All right, we're here to help. We have done this many times. It's our specialty and we love it. So go to her first flip comm schedule a call with us. And let's see if we're a fit. We are ready to go now. Are you alright? Her first flip calm. Okay, you guys. Until next time, go out there flip houses like a girl lead people in places better than you find them and make it a great day. Bye, y'all.