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HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PODCAST: 0:30 - Introduction 1:30 - How did Frank get into real estate? 7:16 - Mindset 11:47 - Was there fear in quitting his corporate job to do this full time? 20:37 - Franks buy-box 29:37 - Why does Frank like helping other investors? FULL TRANSCRIPT OF THE PODCAST AUDIO: Frank Iglesias: ... so you might have some new wholesaler, who has no idea what they're doing with numbers, no idea how to negotiate. Quite frankly, no idea about too much, because all their training is YouTube, but they still are able to get a deal closed. What they are doing is the thing that matters most, and that's their doing. Spencer Sutton: All right, everybody, welcome back to another episode of The Atlanta Real Estate Investor Podcast. I am your host, Spencer Sutton, and I have got a great guest today. I think everybody's going to enjoy meeting Frank Iglesias. Frank, welcome to the show. Frank Iglesias: Thank you Spencer, I appreciate the opportunity to be here. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, no, we're excited about it. I'm excited to learn from you, to hear what you've been doing. Now Frank is the founder of... He's got a few businesses, but I'll just give you a couple of them. One of them is called Working With Houses. This is his business that is actively buying properties, buying and selling properties in the Atlanta Area. He has another company called Skywalk Homes. This is related to what you were telling me Frank, is new construction deals. Is that correct? Frank Iglesias: Yeah. It's where we publicly market our new-builds and also our remodels as well. Spencer Sutton: Great, great. Well, let's get in, I always love to hear how people got into Real Estate, because there's a lot of different paths, a lot of different ways people get into Real Estate. I'd love to hear Frank, you tell your story, why Real Estate, how did you get in it, what's your story? Then, how long have you been doing it? Frank Iglesias: Sure. Many years ago, I was an IT professional for 15 years. I had a great run in that industry, met a lot of great people, learned a lot of great things. We did both corporate work, and consulting work. The consulting work was maybe some of the most fun, because you got to get out and meet other people. When you consulted, you were like, "The guy." Which, that carried its own stereotype sometimes in some organizations, but somewhere in the middle of that... Frank Iglesias: Really, it was back, I couldn't even tell you how many years, I remember when I was young my uncle had an interest in Real Estate that I heard about. I was probably a teenager, or young adult when I was hearing this. It was a long time ago. It was just sort of an idea back then, but it sounded cool. Fast forward several years, and my business partner, she started tinkering around with things. She started working after she graduated, she started working at apartment complexes. Frank Iglesias: Just working with rent and leasing, and all the stuff that goes along with that world. Then she bought her first home which was a foreclosure and they fixed it up. They just fixed it for themselves, but that was sort of maybe the first dabble into it. Then somewhere around the time that was going on, I heard about a Rich Dad, Poor Dad Seminar. To this day, I don't remember how I found out about that- Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: ... or learned it, who knows. Spencer Sutton: What is this, maybe what year is this? Frank Iglesias: This is back in 2008. Spencer Sutton: Okay, perfect, yeah. Just right in the best time to get into Real Estate. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. Summer of '08 I go to this two or three-hour thing. Of course, like it's designed to do, it gets the brain turning and you're like- Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: ... I've never heard any of this before. This is very fascinating. It sounded very compelling, and long story short, we drank the cool aide that were Rich Dad Classes, which were very helpful. In retrospect, were they the best value? I don't know if they were, but they were good enough because they got us going. It did the job. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, they laid a foundation. Frank Iglesias: Exactly. It laid a foundation, we bought our first property January of '09 and to this day we still own it. Spencer Sutton: Right, awesome. Frank Iglesias: I call it the rehab we have never finished, and we still haven't finished it. Spencer Sutton: Now, is it a rental? Frank Iglesias: Yeah, it's a rental. Spencer Sutton: A rental for you, got you. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. Obviously, a much better equity position today than- Spencer Sutton: Sure. Frank Iglesias: ... 12 years ago, but a good house, and I was still working IT. Then I was introduced to wholesaling probably in 2010-ish. That was interesting, but what I think what really got me to really start thinking about the transition was, there's a gentleman out of Tampa, Leek Herny who I can never give enough credit to. An incredibly smart guy. He had a course called, REO Rockstar, and I took that. That was like, the whole idea was buy and flip properties and wholesale them. Frank Iglesias: I marvel at it even more now, how successful he was at it. Thinking about how easy it was to get RDO's. Spencer Sutton: Sure. Frank Iglesias: ... and yet he was still wholesale. I was like, man, that's pretty remarkable the more I think about it. I think that was the one that really got us thinking, "Hey, we could really do this, and just be Real Estate." Coincidentally... Again, non of this was planned, it was coincidental. My corporate world job was going really well, I had a great team, great company, great manager, everything was great. The pay was great, everything was great, but I was bored. Frank Iglesias: I'll never forget when I left, I had told my manager, I said, "I'm not leaving the company, I'm leaving IT, because I'm just bored." We were very good at what we did, it was a very good team. Really great group of people, you couldn't really ask for more. I'm like, "Well, if you... All of this, this is good, and you're bored," that was a sign. In July 2011, we left, and we began the crash course of entrepreneurship. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that is a crash course. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. It took about six months just to actually realize what I'd just decided. It took some time, but we did a lot of wholesaling after that. We always did a few flips, but then we took a deeper dive in the new construction and then huge projects. That was about '14, '15, and now we've done all these things quite a bit. What we've really decided what we enjoy the most is actually the wholesale deals, the rentals, because you get paid a lot sooner. We're still okay with flips, we're still okay with new construction, but really not trying to go crazy with that stuff. Spencer Sutton: Right, yeah. Frank Iglesias: It is very resource-intensive and time intensive. Spencer Sutton: It is, yeah, resource-intensive, time-intensive, capital-intensive. It just takes more of your time and energy, as well as your money. Talk about, I want to go back a little bit, there is this thought, because a lot of people do get bored in their work. They do reach a point where they're like, "You know what, I don't want to necessarily work in the corporate world for the rest of my life. I've started buying some rentals, I've started doing this, I really want to make that transition." Spencer Sutton: Tell me about the mindset, how did you make that decision? Did you say, "Hey, I want to get up to a certain amount of income in the bank, and I want to have six months of runway in the bank?" What was your mindset, what were some of the fears, some of the things that you had to think through and wrestle through before you actually turned in your notice and left a very comfortable, well-paying job? Frank Iglesias: Of course as I mentioned, I was bored with the work. I would say the last... I remember one of the things I said to my manager was, "Hey, when I started IT, Windows 95 was still cool." Can you remember back that far? When I started IT Windows 98 was coming soon, but it wasn't out yet. Back then you had to know how computers work, like physically how did they work, and what part... You didn't have to be a coder, but you had to know some basic understanding of what- why computers operate the way they do. Frank Iglesias: By the time I left, you didn't have to know any of that, but today most people were... I don't want to say most, but if you're coming into IT today, you have to know how a computer works. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: It's so well tuned now, it's like a light switch, you don't have to know how a light switch works, you just know it does- Spencer Sutton: Right, yeah. Frank Iglesias: ... because it's so well tuned, but that wasn't the case in the late '90s. You still had to know how these things worked if you were gonna be a professional in IT. I was in the infrastructure side, I wasn't a coder or a developer. By the time I left, everything was becoming automation-driven. The idea of the Cloud... The Cloud today is just... Everyone knows what the Cloud is. Spencer Sutton: A given, right. Frank Iglesias: In 2011, the Cloud was like, RIT driven. We would almost mock people for fun like, "Oh my gosh, they're gonna sell us on The Cloud. It was like a marketing buzz word but nobody really understood it. It wasn't mainstream- Spencer Sutton: Sure. People didn't trust it. Frank Iglesias: ... they didn't trust it. Yeah, it just wasn't quite proven, this idea of software as a service was still very new. Back then, it was download everything to your desktop computer, because that's just what you did. "Now you're saying you want me to release that control?" Even in the midst of all that, I would say technology... This is 2011, technology is so powerful now, that we all have a super computer in our pocket. We just call it an iPhone. Frank Iglesias: We're talking an iPhone, whatever it was then, a 3GS or something like that. Nothing like what it is today. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: In the midst of all of that, it just felt like the challenge was no longer there. We were very good. We had a joke internally, "If we get any better at this, we're going to automate ourselves out of a job." Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: There was an element, not necessarily truth to the position, but truth to the emotion of, "Man, because so many things are automated, what are we going to do next?" That kind of thing. That was a real emotion, so there was also an element that yes, I was looking for a new challenge. One that also had more... Obviously, when you're in a job, there's a ceiling to what you can do, unless you transfer somewhere else in the company, or your boss steps away. Frank Iglesias: Whereas, with investing it was like, there is no ceiling, except the ones we impose on ourselves. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, you're the ceiling at that point. Frank Iglesias: Correct. I think most investors will tell you, and I'll be first to tell you, that we all have PhD's in putting ceilings on ourselves. Spencer Sutton: Good, yeah there's no doubt. Frank Iglesias: We have to learn how to reconfigure our own minds to get past that. Quite frankly, that's probably been the hardest challenge. Spencer Sutton: Was there a fear going from your corporate job to hey, I'm going full time into this? Frank Iglesias: Not really, because I didn't know enough to be scared. Spencer Sutton: Got you, yeah. Frank Iglesias: That's just, you don't know what you don't know. Maybe there should have been, but- Spencer Sutton: No, that's good. That's good. When I started- when I left my job, this was 2004, end of 2003, 2004, I didn't know enough to know what to be scared of. We had actually bought a Home Investor franchise. We were like, "Hey, we've got money to dump into this marketing machine, back in those days, and they will produce leads." We just needed to trust the system, and it worked out fine. That's good to hear. Frank Iglesias: ... Well, and those words, "Trust the system," that was probably one of the hardest lessons. Spencer Sutton: Yeah. Frank Iglesias: It was just trusting, and I think most people dabble too much. Now from a coaching perspective, the number one thing I see is people taking tiny amounts of action, yet expecting massive results. Spencer Sutton: Hmm, so what do you mean by that? You see people just kind of timidly, like trying one little thing over here, and doing maybe putting their toe in the water. Then, they're like, "Well, that didn't really work," and then they go try to do something else. Is that what you're saying? Frank Iglesias: That's it exactly. I'll give you two contrasting positions. One is, most people what they'll do, is they'll try... Again, it's the fear of losing money, the fear of losing the deal, the fear of just losing. It's the fear of losing, fill in the blank. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, right. Frank Iglesias: "Hey, let's try a marketing campaign." A very common example. "I'm gonna do direct mail, or maybe I'll cold call or whatever technique you want to use." I'll do a list of maybe 300, 400, or 500, and I'll do it one time maybe twice, because I'm ambitious, and they don't get results. "Well, I guess that doesn't work." Or maybe they still want to believe it works but now they're even more afraid of it, because they did it once or twice and it still didn't produce a result. Frank Iglesias: That's a very common thing people get hung up on, they just don't take enough action. On the flip side, you will sometimes get wholesalers... Wholesalers as you know, get a bad rap by a lot of people. The reality is, some of them do a good job, and some of the wholesalers I'm actually the most impressed with are not the guys who do the most. They're not necessarily the smartest guys, it's just the guys that take action. Frank Iglesias: You might have some new wholesaler, who has no idea what they're doing with numbers, no idea how to negotiate. Quite frankly, no idea about too much because all their training is YouTube, but they still are able to get a deal closed. Just because what they are doing is the thing that matters most, and that's their doing. They're taking action. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, they're taking action, right. Frank Iglesias: We're going through a little bit of a credit card on training now in the world of sales with my team. He says it right there, "The most important work in sales is, 'Do.'" That's it, D-O, do. I love seeing wholesalers, really just investors in general, that they do. If they mess up that they don't make... They might be a little bent out of shape about it, but at the end of the day, they're doing. I make sure I tell them, I'm like, "Look, the fact that you just did it, is fantastic." Spencer Sutton: Yeah.Frank Iglesias: For everyone that does, there's plenty that don't. Spencer Sutton: That's right, there's definitely more that don't. Frank Iglesias: 10 to one, I would say, 10 to one. Spencer Sutton: Yeah.Frank Iglesias: I run a wholesale meeting and we've tracked all the people coming to our meetings over, we're going on eight years now. 90% of them are no longer involved. If I meet 10 wholesalers, I know better than numbers, one in 10 will stick around for a while. Spencer Sutton: This is a huge lesson. I think this is great for anybody who's listening, and it really applies to all aspects, if you're in flip business, if you're looking for rentals, or if you're trying to wholesale. Really, learning with a bias for action, you have to be willing to actually, just what Frank is say, "Do." A lot of times we just want to gather so much information, that it paralyzes us and we aren't able to make a decision. We don't take the next step. I like to say, information without implementation, is just another form of sedation. Spencer Sutton: Right, so we can just sedate and think we're doing something, but in reality we're not really doing anything at all. We think, hey, if I go to a years worth of meetings with Frank and learn more about wholesaling, that I'm going to be a wholesaler. But it's really the people who take action. You learn from taking action. You mentioned a PhD earlier, you get some good lessons from trial and error out there. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. One of the biggest lessons I learned early on, and I've never forgotten it, was I heard someone say, "If you're not making offers, you're not doing anything." Spencer Sutton: Wow. Frank Iglesias: You see, there's plenty of rules and you know the courses out there... By the way, it's all good information, but that's all it is, is information. Get your website, get your business card, get your social media profile, build your team. I was just on a clubhouse call last night, and literally, the guys was a real nice guy. He's like, "Well you know, the market..." He's up in DC, and he's like, "The DC market's just super competitive and it's expensive da-da-da-da-da. I'm just thinking of holding back and building my team more. What do you think?" Frank Iglesias: I said, "I would throw everything you just said away. I'd say, you need to do, do, do, do, do." I said, "What you need to become is a master of acquisitions, because if you can acquire, you can do everything else." Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: He didn't have the understanding of how to be good at acquisitions. See, it's not about being a wholesaler, or a rehab, or a builder, or a landlord, it's about acquisitions. Spencer Sutton: Right, yeah. Frank Iglesias: The better you are at that, then the better you can be at the exit strategies. Spencer Sutton: Exactly. Frank Iglesias: That was a great example, and I coached him on that. I said, "That's a great picture of what commonly happens. There's low inventory, let me go build my team, let me go get the business..." You don't need business cards, you need to make offers. Make offers, make offers, and make offers. Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: If you're not making offers... That statement has become really true. When you make offers, momentum happens. Spencer Sutton: That's right, it does. Frank Iglesias: Yeah, you might make too many offers and get too many yes' and create problems for yourself, but those are way better problems than... Spencer Sutton: I would rather have a deal under contract and then have to figure out what to do with it, then not have a deal under contract, right? Frank Iglesias: Absolutely. Absolutely. That's really what we come across now in those, I find now that it's not hard to get a lot of deals under contract. What's hard is going through all the extra stuff to get them to closing. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, right. Frank Iglesias: There's just so many little things that come up along the way that may or may not be within your control. The seller this, the attorney that. I have one right now, where the surveyor, the legal description doesn't match the site plan, and right now, closing's delayed. It's a minor issue, but instead of closing last Friday, now we're hoping to close, not a week from, but maybe this coming Monday. Spencer Sutton: Yeah. Well, it's really interesting, and I think you bring up a great point Frank. That is that we can so easily get in the trap of convincing ourselves we're making progress when we're really not making progress at all. Right, we can convince ourselves that ordering the business cards is exactly what we need to do. Then in our mind we think, I need to have something to hand somebody when I meet them at their house, or meet them at their property. That's not really moving you towards making an acquisition. Spencer Sutton: We convince ourselves that all these little things, these activities that we're doing are actually making progress, but they're not making progress at all. I think that's a great point, take action. Frank, tell us a little bit about when you're looking for properties, do you have a specific area of Atlanta that you love to invest in, or that you see as up and coming? Then, what is a good deal to you? Do you have a buy-box? I know that most of the time you're not holding on though them, you're doing wholesale deals, but what does that look like? Frank Iglesias: The first part is with regards to our primary market being Atlanta, we've done deals in, I like to say, all four quadrants. Northeast, northwest, and forth, it's two-fold. In an ideal world, most of the deals I'd do would be close to home, that's everyone's ideal world. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: The reality is the majority of deals done are closer to the city, because that's really where the lower hanging fruit is. Spencer Sutton: Got you. Frank Iglesias: There's just more opportunities there, it's more densely populated, there's more beat up properties, there're more sellers to work with, there's just more. Spencer Sutton: Got you. Frank Iglesias: It's a menace, we also want to do stuff closer to home, but the reality is, ultimately we'll go to where the deal is. Really, where we want to go is where all the buyers are. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's what I was going to ask you. Over the years, you've built up a buyers list for pretty much any area in Atlanta, that you want to purchase in. You definitely know who they are for the most part? Frank Iglesias: Yeah. By in large, we know who a lot of the very legit buyers are that we've sold to over the years. There's always new buyers coming in as well, so it's a never-ending process. Right now we have a campaign going where we're really networking heavy with agents. Here's an example of an action task. Now, this is something that one of my assistants did. We said, we want to target all the agents, and here's where free marketing tip for everyone listening. Frank Iglesias: We want to target all the agents that were involved in an all-cash transaction below a price point. Let's say 200,000.00, we'll just pick a number. I want to talk to every buyers' agent and listing agent on that transaction. We want to just simply be a resource for them. "Hey, can you add us... There's two reasons we're contacting you. One, hey, if you come across a property that needs a buyer, we'd love to take a look. We don't even have to be your primary buyer." Frank Iglesias: Some of these people already have those, "We just want to be an additional resource to have in your back pocket. If your main person says no, or group, no propo besides us, maybe we'll say it. Then by the same token, hey when we get off-market properties, if you have buyers, we'd like to just present them to you and you get paid your full commission and hey, we can do business that way." Frank Iglesias: My assistant called, it took her around a month to do it, but she just did a few hours every day, called something like 2,755 agents, I think it was. Spencer Sutton: Oh my goodness, that's a lot. Frank Iglesias: 2,755 agents, of that, and I don't have it in front of me, but about 30 to 40% somewhere in there, answered the phone, and\or called back, texted. Now think about that, over half we still haven't even spoken with. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: Which, that screams a lot about communication, how it could be improved. Of that roughly 30 or 40% that answered the phone, we came up a list of, I want to say, it's just under 700 agents that are now on our list to communicate with. Spencer Sutton: Wow. Frank Iglesias: Now, that is a list of agents that I can present a new deal to at any given moment, that we'd get a deal. We can constantly tell them, "Hey, we're still here, just kind of keep us in mind." The other thing we're going to do is we're going to provide them a value ad. "Hey, here's a resource we have if it can help you with your world doing the agent thing, great. Use this person, use this... Because agents are always looking for this. What are they always looking for? Who's a good mortgage broker, who's a good contractor- Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's right. Frank Iglesias: ... who's a good inspector. Just like we shuffle and are always looking for new buyers to speak with because people come in and out, it's the same thing with them. Spencer Sutton: Now, I think that's a great marketing tip for anybody listening. We interviewed, we have a gentleman on the show, our Birmingham Show named Matthew Gregory. I was asking him, "How are you finding deals?" He did 90 deals last year, 90 flips, these are flips not wholesales. I asked him, "How did you find so many deals?" He said, "I haven't spent a dollar on marketing, it is literally, I have build relationships with realtors over the years. Spencer Sutton: Just realtors, realtors, realtors, they know who they can call, they know who will buy their house. That's in a small market like Birmingham. Just imagine Atlanta, there's so many more realtors, and so many more opportunities. I think that's a great action tip somebody can take. Frank Iglesias: Well, just FYI, we're also in a secondary market, and we are executing this now in there. Spencer Sutton: Hmm, great.
Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: Atlanta's hyper competitive. Secondary market, not quite as much. One thing I learned in this particular market, is no shortage of opportunity. There's no shortage, and so there're deals everywhere. You're right, whether it cost me at the end of the day, it just cost me, for me, it was paying my assistant to make 2,000 plus for what, 2700 phone calls. Just a little each time, but if I close just one deal, with one agent, I've... Let's say it's just a simple five, 10 thousand-dollar wholesale flip. I've covered my assistants stalls, 10 times over. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, 100%. I think going back to what you were saying earlier Frank, about the people that you see, that often don't find success and don't stick with it, the temptation will be, for somebody to say, "Well, I called 50 realtors, and 45 of them didn't pick up their phone and five of them said they weren't interested. This isn't working," and they're done at 50. As opposed to saying, "I'm going to go for 500. I'm going to give it my all at 500." I think that's a good number to start with. Frank Iglesias: You trap the math, again. Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: Approximately 60% of these people, we're going to have to do another round. The search party is still out, we haven't found them yet. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's right. Hopefully they're still in the business. Frank Iglesias: Well, and that's true. To that point, we actually called our entire buyers list, and what we learned was two things. One, approximately 40%, give or take pick up the phone, or text, or whatever, so again, the majority we're still looking for them. Here was the interesting thing, of the 40% that answered the phone, 80% of them were no longer in Real Estate. Spencer Sutton: Wow. Did you get any kind of data on why they're out of Real Estate? I'm sure there's a number of reasons, but anything stick out to you in those conversations? Frank Iglesias: Yeah. The number one reason, too hard to get a deal, too time consuming, too competitive, not enough money. The same things you hear from the people that are in it. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, but they're still in it. Frank Iglesias: My assistant, it took about a month for her to do it. There were no revolutionary reasons, the people that were no long in it share. Spencer Sutton: Right, yeah, very interesting. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. I guessed maybe even half give or take, but 80%. I said, "Well, that explains why the open rate's really low. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's right. Frank Iglesias: No emails. We don't wonder that anymore, we know exactly why that open rate is low. Spencer Sutton: Right, they're not in the business anymore. Well, something I noticed as I was doing some research and reading about you Frank, is obviously, you're a very successful Real Estate Investor. You're finding deals in this very competitive market, you're battling for deals with a lot of other investors, plus institutions that are obviously in Atlanta looking for these deals. You're also very passionate about help people, and coaching people. Spencer Sutton: You mentioned earlier, "Hey, I've got this wholesale group that meets, and have been meeting for several years." Why are you passionate about... Why do you look to help other investors? Can you tell me little bit about what's driving that and what that even looks like? Frank Iglesias: Yeah. I used to teach before I got into Real Estate. Even when I was fresh out of high school, my high school music teacher asked me to come back and help assist him teach some of the other kids in the band program. I was a percussionist. Even since I was 18 I've been asked to help, and I was actually a music major in school. While I was doing IT I also taught music for 15 years as well. I actually started teaching music before I was even 19. I've always been around that education space. Frank Iglesias: My wife also is a music major, she got her Master's and so forth and she had an education degree. She actually did work in schools for three years before our first child was born. Then, my mother-in-law has also been a music educator. My father-in-law, he was an educator, not in music but in math, so there's a lot of education running around here. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, it's in your blood. Frank Iglesias: It's just been really a natural outlet to help others, and that's where I can do it best. Back in music I called it teaching, when I was in IT, I mentioned earlier, I really enjoyed the consulting, because when you consult, you're educating. They're looking at you like the big gun, so-to-speak, but that was really what made that fun. Was you got to travel to places, and you got to educate. You solved their problem and you educated them, so it was very fulfilling. Frank Iglesias: I always said, if I ever did IT again, I would want to be a consultant, because that was where you really got to be a big value ad to people. In Real Estate, we don't call it consulting, we call it coaching or mentoring but it's the same thing. What I do today is I have a few coaching clients. It's a side thing I do, it's not my primary business. I'll coach people one-on-one. I've thought about maybe opening up a group coaching type thing, just to be able to help more people. Frank Iglesias: At the end of the day, I'm first and foremost an active investor. I don't ever want to be that person that's like, "Oh, he does all this education but he doesn't even do deals," you've heard that out there. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: Which is true. Spencer Sutton: Those who can't do teach, I think is what people have said in the past, right? Frank Iglesias: Exactly. Yeah, we teach, but we do. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, those are the best teachers. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. I always tell people, I love coaching, I always tell them, "Hey, when you find a coach, don't just find someone who's uber successful, find someone whose also been an uber failure. When you run into a hard time, if they've never failed, how are they going to help you- Spencer Sutton: Yeah. Frank Iglesias: ... if they've never walked through the fire themselves? Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: I didn't learn that in Real Estate by the way, I learned that from my business coach. What I learned was, it was very fascinating to go to an event where there was a lot of ultra successful people. The comments that I heard from all these uber successful people was, before they were uber successful they had to go through a very dark period. They're glad they did because now they could appreciate what they had. Frank Iglesias: We've been through some very challenging times, so at the beginning of it, it's like, "Oh my gosh, the sky is falling," and it feels like the sky is falling.When you're getting towards the tail end of it, you're like, "Okay, we're going to be fine." There's a few bumps, a few headaches- Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: ... but now the scary monster, you realize that idea of fear was a false evidence appearing real. Spencer Sutton: That's right, yeah. Frank Iglesias: ... has a whole new meaning. You realize that those last two words appearing real, those are two very big words. They can be two very scary words, but the reality is there's far worse problems in the world than a real estate transaction. Spencer Sutton: Yeah. No, I agree, and I think that's so true. We have another podcast that we just... It's called 300 to 3,000. And we're talking to property management companies, we're talking to owners and leaders in property management companies. One of the things that we can definitely say is, "Hey, we have been through, since 2008 when we started, we have been through a lot of challenges, a lot of setbacks, a lot of failures, a lot of things didn't work. Those are some of the best things to share, is like, "Hey, here is what you can avoid, take our advice. Spencer Sutton: You're right, you do think that it's the end of the world in some instances, some respects, but ultimately, it gives you the opportunity to become stronger, to course-correct, to overcome obstacles. You really develop grit and you develop perseverance when you just keep going and don't ever stop. Frank Iglesias: You know what's interesting is, obviously when somebody has success we want to celebrate that. Let's face it, when people post, "Hey, I did this thing, I did this, I made money, I did this." It's only exciting for so long. Spencer Sutton: Right. Frank Iglesias: At the end of the day, it's the same message over and over. It's a good message there's nothing wrong with it, but the stories that truly inspire us are when we... I just think it's human nature. When we see that person that appeared down and out, they appeared like, There's no way they're going to solve that, or they can't overcome it. "Oh, all these people are upset with us," whatever, fill in the blank, but they made it through. Frank Iglesias: Those I think, are the stories that are openly the most inspiring. They went through the challenges. One of my favorite people is Michael Jordan for example. Everybody remembers six titles in eight years and all that, and greatest athlete, and so on and so forth. While all that is in my opinion true, the most fascinating parts of the documentary sometimes are the years before he even won the first one. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, 100%. Frank Iglesias: Especially the last two before the first one when they were playing Detroit, and they lost, what was it, 89 and 90 I think it was. They lost, that's like, man, you were at the finish line not once, but twice, and you- Spencer Sutton: Twice. Frank Iglesias: ... didn't close the deal. You, your team, your coach, at the end of the day you didn't close the deal. Yet you were still the number one athlete, regarded as number one, but you couldn't close the deal, but in '91 you finally did. Spencer Sutton: That's right. Frank Iglesias: Then he went on a war path. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, exactly. Frank Iglesias: That's the real journey, and I find those stories are the most motivating because you just keep on going. You keep on going. Spencer Sutton: Yeah. No, I think that's a great analogy there, just because you saw Michael Jordan just get so beat down, beat down, beat down, but he never gave up. That's the thing, he never gave up, he just kept going, he kept going, and he used those losses to fuel him to go win. Then even when he retired the first time, and came back three quarters of the way through the season, he lost in the finals, or no, he lost in the playoffs to Orlando. That fueled him to dig deeper and they came back and won three more in a row. We love the underdog story, we really do. Even the greatest athlete in the world can sometimes be an underdog, and we want to cheer for him to win. Frank Iglesias: You know what's interesting... You mentioned it, and I didn't even think of this til you just said it. The two years before he won the first one, not only did they not use the word, "He got beat up," well he was physically beat up. I was like man, that's a good analogy. The closer you get to the first one, that first true pinnacle, man, everybody was beating him up. He had the book written about him, people were physically beating him up. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's right. Frank Iglesias: He actually realized after the second time it happened, I need to go get physically stronger, because these people are physically beating me up. Spencer Sutton: Yeah, that's right, 100%. Frank Iglesias: What a great analogy. Spencer Sutton: The closer you get to breaking through, you're going to meet all kind of resistance, just know that. There's going to be all Kind of stuff resistance before you finally break through. Well Frank, thanks so much for your time. This has been great for our listeners. We didn't talk about this before the podcast, but I want to ask you, hey, how can people connect with you? How can our listeners connect with you? Do you have a place for them to go, or email or whatever you want to share. Frank Iglesias: Sure. We're all over the place. Our phone number's 678-408-2228. Our email is [email protected]. Of course, we have social media, Facebook and Instagram in particular is where you'll see us. I'm also on LinkedIn as well, but now with the advent of club house, I've been on Instagram quite a bit more. We have a show on Wednesday, not a show but we have a room, Wednesday nights from six to eight to nine o'clock. Frank Iglesias: Where it's basically one big free group coaching time of anything related to Real Estate, but with a focus on construction rehab and new builds, contractors, that sort of thing. We're on Club House, you can check me out there. It's cool because out of Club House, we've been able to do some personal one-on-one to help some people get through some stuff. In fact, last night we had our Club House success story, where someone met us about a month ago, and they had some challenges and we ended up doing some coaching after that call. Frank Iglesias: They just shot me a note this past weekend saying, "It's on the market!" They have four offers per day- Spencer Sutton: That's awesome. Frank Iglesias: ... and it's their first deal, so they're like... Spencer Sutton: Oh yeah, they're super excited. Yeah. Frank Iglesias: Yeah. We're just glad, without using Club House, that would never have happened, so that was cool. Spencer Sutton: Yeah. Very cool, well good. Well, this has been a great episode for me. Anytime I get to talk about Michael Jordan with a fellow enthusiast, it's good news. Frank Iglesias: Sure. Spencer Sutton: Thank you Frank, for sharing with us and hopefully people will reach out to you, if they need some help, if they want to be encouraged. All right everybody, if you haven't already subscribed to the podcast, please go ahead and do that. You can share this episode with your friends. I'd love for you to, if you're on Apple iTunes, I'd love for you to leave us a review, if you found value in any of these interviews, that's what we're hoping to do. We will see you next week with a new episode of the Atlanta Real Estate Investor.
