Fearless Wholesaling: How Stephan Roberts Finds Motivated Sellers w/ Old-School Leads, AI & Networking

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Show Summary

In this conversation, Stephan Roberts discusses the challenges of balancing personal life with business commitments, particularly in the real estate sector. He emphasizes the importance of understanding individual circumstances and making necessary adjustments to achieve success. The conversation highlights the significance of consistency and effort in making progress, regardless of the pace.

Resources and Links from this show:

• • • Investor Fuel Real Estate Mastermind
    • Investor Machine Real Estate Lead Generation
    • Mike on Facebook
    • Mike on Instagram
    • Mike on LinkedIn
    • Stephan Roberts’ Website
    • Stephan Roberts on Youtube
    • Stephan Roberts on Facebook
    • Stephan Roberts’ Form
    • Stephan Roberts’ Email: [email protected]
    • Stephan Roberts’ Phone Number: (678) 909-1951

  Listen to the Audio Version of this Episode

  Investor Fuel Show Transcript:

  Stephan Roberts (00:00)
  There’s the old saying, fake it till you make it. I’m like, no, don’t do that. Because the moment you do that, you’re going to get caught in a lie or in a statement that you can’t back up. And then now you’ve lost all credibility. And in this business, you really want to make sure you maintain your credibility and you operate with integrity.

  Erika (01:54)
  Hello everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Erika. And today I’m excited to be joined by Steph Roberts. He is shaking up the wholesaling space with his company, Stepreg Properties. Steph, it’s awesome to have you on the show today.

  Stephan Roberts (02:10)
  Thank you so much. Pleasure to be here and thank you for having me, Erika.

  Erika (02:14)
  I think our listeners are going to have a lot to learn with how you have scaled with wholesaling. So let’s jump on in. First, let’s start with your story. Can you share more about how you got interested in the real estate world, how you landed in wholesaling?

  Stephan Roberts (02:32)
  Yes, ⁓ I’ve been interested in real estate investing for years. Back in my college days, I was interested in it and to kind of date myself. That was pre-internet time. So I really kind of had to network with folks and read books and things like that. ⁓ But I didn’t really have anybody to kind of mentor me at that time. And so I found it a little challenging. And like many people, I allowed life to kind of just drag me.

  on with it. So I got into the corporate arena and kind of put real estate on the back burner. But years later, after visiting with some friends and someone asking me, you know, I was at an event and networking with folks and made the comment. yeah, at the time I was managing hotels and I said, yeah, I manage hotels, but I’ve always wanted to get into real estate investing. And they said, well, why aren’t you in real estate investing? And I didn’t have a good answer for them. And so that was kind of my first

  nudge back into the real estate market. And so I jumped into the business with both feet. You know, I tell people I recommend doing it that way and don’t recommend doing it that way because it can be very stressful. However, ⁓ it’s very motivating. If you jump in and there is no plan B, there is no backup plan. You hustle and you make sure you get things done because you have to.

  I would say if you get hungry enough, you will make it work. So I jumped in, this was about 10 years ago, and never looked back. And so I’ve been doing real estate investing, primarily wholesaling for the past 10 years, mainly here in the Atlanta market. And have met some wonderful people, have networked heavily, have some great connections. And because of the success I’ve had in the business, I also started focusing on…

  Trying to be a blessing to other folks. I had made a promise to myself because of the struggles I had of finding someone to help me in this business, that once I learned this business, I wanted to be the person that I was looking for when I first started. So I’ve started mentoring and help people out and I do that right now in addition to my wholesale investing business.

  Erika (04:50)
  ⁓ That’s really, really awesome. And I have a feeling this kind of ties into the mentorship that you have now. But if you look back on those earlier stuff when you were first starting out, and there were probably some challenging moments there, if you could start that journey over in the beginning, what would you do differently?

  Stephan Roberts (06:03)
  ⁓ I think one of the biggest things is ⁓ not let fear prevent me from moving forward. I think most new investors start off and are like, I don’t want to make a mistake. Well, guess what? You’re going to make some mistakes. It’s going to happen. know veteran ⁓ investors that still make mistakes as part of the business. The goal is just to try not to make any catastrophic mistakes.

  but you are actually absolutely going to make some mistakes. ⁓ I just try to push a lot faster. ⁓ think early on I was hesitant with like a lot of new investors because I was like, okay, am I saying this right? Am I doing that right? Instead of just going for it, know, trying it out. Now, as I’ve been in the business a lot longer, my confidence obviously has increased. So I’ll take chances in a lot of areas now a lot quicker.

  because of my confidence, but that’s also why having a mentor helps you out. The joke that I’ve often said many times is between me and Michael Jordan, we’ve won six NBA championships. And so I was like, that’s a true statement, but it doesn’t mean that you have to do all the heavy lifting. When you have a mentor that has the experience out there, then you’ve got the ability to lean on somebody and lean on their experience. And you don’t have to…

  try to pretend like you know something that you don’t.

  There’s the old saying, fake it till you make it. I’m like, no, don’t do that. Because the moment you do that, you’re going to get caught in a lie or in a statement that you can’t back up. And then now you’ve lost all credibility. And in this business, you really want to make sure you maintain your credibility and you operate with integrity. Your name is everything in

  And the moment you show that you’re willing to cut corners or not do things properly,

  then your bad reputation will get out there. And when you focus on doing things right, your good name will get out there. And so I’ve had people approach me for business opportunities strictly because of my work ethic and what they’ve seen from other people that have said how I operate in business. So, and I hold onto that very strongly.

  Erika (08:22)
  Yeah, yeah, that’s a that’s really awesome. Well, you know, I kind of want to get really get into this wholesaling with you. ⁓ Steph, when it comes to finding motivated sellers, what kind of strategies do you use for your deals?

  Stephan Roberts (08:40)
  Yeah, I do. As I mentioned to other folks, I kind of do a combination, both old school and new school is what I focus on. I feel like a lot of the old school strategies are kind of coming back and are being more effective because a lot of people are shifting away from them. So having those there and what I mean by old school is bandit signs, driving for dollars, ⁓ probate listings that you have to physically go to the courthouse to get the information to. ⁓

  approach these leads. ⁓ These are some of the old school methods that I feel and even mailers, postcard mailers or ⁓ mail out letters that are in envelopes. These are all strategies that I feel are picking back up as far as their effectiveness. But I also use modern techniques as well. ⁓ AI is something that you have to find a way to integrate into your business. If you’re not using AI in this day and age for your business, you’re behind the curve.

  And so you really want to make sure you learn more about it. And it’s not as daunting as a lot of people may think. Some people say, Hey, I don’t know anything about all this new technology. There’s plenty of ways to learn it. There’s a lot of even seen free classes at my local library that you can go to, to learn some of the basics of these things. So there’s opportunities out there, but you really got to find ways to reach people in general, because as you mentioned,

  What I’m looking for are motivated sellers. Well, the motivated sellers, there’s motivated sellers every single day. The challenge is they don’t know me and I don’t know them. So I got to get in front of them. I’ve got to market. I’ve got to advertise. I’ve got to reach out to people. And I always tell people the strategy that works is the strategy that works. And so whatever is working for you, implement that more. ⁓ I know a guy that does door knocking ⁓ and he’s been real effective with it. ⁓

  Door knocking is not really my ideal strategy. It’s not suitable for my ⁓ personality. But I can’t sit up here and tell him, you shouldn’t door knock when he’s having success with it. And so whatever works for you is what works for you. So you want to make sure you find out what strategies fit your personality the best and that are in effect.

  Erika (11:34)
  Yeah, that’s a really solid advice. I was thinking about what you were saying with the old school strategies that are working, because a lot of that, it’s that relationship building instead of relying on the tech. Have there been any network groups or other things that have helped level up your business in making connections that way?

  Stephan Roberts (11:59)
  Absolutely. believe in networking. Again, you hear me quote a lot of sayings all the time, but they say that your network is your net worth. And so that’s really the truth. You have to talk to as many people as possible. ⁓ And in the real estate investing arena, I tell people that there’s really kind of two networking events that you’re usually going to focus on. ⁓ There are real estate investing networking events.

  And in there, you’re usually trying to, in my opinion, your main focus should be on learning best practices, what to do, what ways to amplify your business. But you can also attend just general business networking events that might not be real estate related. And a lot of times in those, you may find additional resources or people that you can connect to, or possibly even business sellers and things like that can be at those.

  types of events. And so you want to understand what do you, before you go to a networking event, you should know what you’re trying to get out of it when you go there. And so, but attend as many networking events as you possibly can because those connections can be invaluable. I had a deal that the property ended up coming out of a short sale.

  It was ⁓ a situation where the lender put a deed restriction on it, which basically means the folks that had the loan on the property, they said, all right, you can sell it and you can sell it for this price, but we’ve clouded the title. And so you can’t resell this property for at least 30 days. Well, as a wholesaler, I usually buy and sell it the same day. It’s normally it’s a clean transaction. It’s normally not a pause. So I had to get the funds to actually close on the property, sit and wait, and then

  Resell it in 30 days. Well, I had a buyer in place But they my first thought was like you’re buying it anyway loan me the money to buy it on the front end But they said we’re not set up to do alone But we will wait we’ll wait to 30 days for whenever you get it done But you’re gonna have to find the money somewhere else Well, I reached out to somebody I had networked with at one of the local Rias and she looked over the deal and she said this was great and she would normally do it but her funds were tied up in another

  project, but she knew of somebody else that would probably help me. I reached out to him and he’s like, yeah, this looks great. I can do it. And so we ended up doing a transaction. He loaned me the money. This was over a hundred thousand dollars. Of course he didn’t write me a check. This all went to the closing attorney and ⁓ but he loaned me the money and told me the fee that he was going to charge. We did it, did the front closing, held the property, you know, we had insurance and paid the closing costs and all of that. And then 30 days later,

  closed and paid him back and took care of everything. But to this day, I still have never met that guy in person. And so he could walk past me in the grocery store. I wouldn’t know who he was, you know, but everything was done by the telephone and by email. But it happened because of the networking that had occurred and because of how I did business. so this woman was willing to refer me to him because she trusted how I do business and

  We made that connection and the deal got done.

  Erika (16:05)
  Wow. Yeah, that’s a, that’s a really crazy, crazy story. You know, when I think about people who are, are new to wholesaling and they’re thinking, I don’t have this, I don’t have that. And you know, it’s something as simple as, know, just building your network and meeting people that you can make those deals happen. So, you know, that’s, that’s a, that’s a happy story. I want to pivot a bit and you know, not.

  Stephan Roberts (16:22)
  little bit.

  Thank

  Erika (16:32)
  You know, not all moments in real estate are easy. I’m sure you know, you might have a deal that goes sideways. You might have to completely pivot with your plan. Can you share one of those moments from your journey and what you learned from it?

  Stephan Roberts (16:37)
  Absolutely.

  ⁓ I’ve had a few moments. It’s never a shortage of adventures in this business. ⁓ I can ⁓ truthfully say that I have never lost money in a real estate ⁓ adventure. ⁓ However, that doesn’t mean that I have not had a shortage of challenges that have come out. ⁓ Let’s see, one that comes to mind in particular, because I always like the story in the sense that I say,

  It’s not something you’re going to read in any of the guru books or see on video, but, ⁓ had a property. It’s startup. have a rule of thumb when I’m, wholesaling a property. My, this, this particular rule is that if there is anyone living in the house, whether it’s the owner or tenant, I don’t allow an in buyer to go by that property without either me or somebody on my team being there.

  Cause you never know what might be said, what might be communicated, even not even in a malicious situation, just by off the cuff conversation that can cause somebody to pause or throw off something. But in this particular situation, I was heading out of town and so I was like, what’s the worst that could happen? And I let this particular buyer go by the property with the owner being in the property and this particular buyer tried to go around me.

  on the deal. Now I had the deal locked up in a manner that they couldn’t do it, but just because they can’t legally do it doesn’t mean they can’t cause problems with communicating with the seller. So this threw everything off. I had since kicked that buyer to the curb and like, I’m not doing business with you anymore if that’s how you’re operating. But I was able to find a new buyer and was actually going to make more money with the new buyer and

  was able to go through with the deal. And since I was making more money with the new buyer, I took some of that money and gave it to the seller. So it’s kind of an inconvenient, know, kind of helping with the inconvenience. And I didn’t have to, but I just felt like it was good business. And so I made sure there was more money in the seller’s pocket and I still made more money than I was originally going to make. But when that buyer went out to the property, of course I went with them this time.

  And when we went to the property, he’s walking the property. And at the end of the walkthrough, this was a split level home. He was coming down the stairs and fell down the stairs onto the foyer and really hurt his arm. We weren’t sure if it was broken or not. And so I had to take the guy to the hospital and so he couldn’t drive himself. So I drove his car with him in it to the hospital so he could get checked out. His brother-in-law actually worked at the hospital. So

  He was going to get checked out. while we were in the car, he called his wife and daughter to meet him out there. And as I was helping him to the car in there, he’s talking to the seller like, we’re still buying the house. We’re still buying it. So he was real reassuring him, but went to the hospital and then his wife and daughter showed up. And then his wife had to drive me back to the house to pick up my car. And so I’m there.

  at the property and then after she dropped me off, I went in and talked to the homeowner because he’s nervous. He’s like, is this guy going to try to sue me? I was like, no, everything’s fine. We’re good to go. But I just needed to kind of talk them down off the ledge and let them know everything was good. We ended up doing the closing. Everything was fine. But I have yet to read the real estate book that talks about somebody falling down the steps and having to take them to the hospital. Like these are the types of things that happen in real life and not just in theory.

  in the book. So that’s why you have to have somebody that can kind of help walk you through some of these different scenarios. And I’ve seen all kinds of crazy things, but it was something I was nervous. I wasn’t sure if the deal was going to go through yet, but I already had dealt with dealing with a buyer that was less than, ⁓ you know, ⁓ great, you know, with trying to go around me and then having a buyer fall down the steps. I was like, I’m ready to get this transaction over and done with so we can move on to the next one.

  So you’re going to have challenges. That’s life. And so you can’t go into this thinking that, ⁓ yes, if I just make the offer, make the, know, send in the contracts, everything goes smoothly. So no, that’s not how this works. And so you have to be able to adapt, as I mentioned before, and be able to pay attention to what’s going on and just have ⁓ endurance and perseverance and discipline. And so.

  Having someone in your corner to help you, like a mentor in those areas, can be very beneficial so you don’t have to feel like you’re in it by yourself. Because whether you try to operate kind of on your own or not, this is very much a relationship business. And you’re never doing this all by yourself, whether it’s the closing attorneys or title company or an agent that’s helping you out. You’ve got to have people that are in your corner that can help you.

  on this, still add people into my overall team and my network all the time. There’s regular events that I, networking events that I go to to make sure I continue to build my network.

  Erika (22:16)
  Yeah, that’s awesome. And it’s great that you’re mentoring and helping others with their own struggles and their own journey too. you share more about that and ⁓ what’s on the horizon in that regard?

  Stephan Roberts (22:34)
  yeah, I love it. ⁓ One of the greatest feelings in the world is ⁓ cutting a check to one of my students. ⁓ The deal that closed a few weeks ago. This was a guy that ⁓ he’s tried a lot of different strategies and stuff and never could quite get his foot. He actually has some decent skills already in what he was doing, but he had been trying for about a year to get something that had never done a deal. And then

  We worked together, we still work together, he’s still one of my students, but we were working together on some of his strategies, the best way to kind of do stuff. And he was actually using bandit signs on his and came up with a lead that we worked. ⁓ We talked to the seller together. I help ⁓ negotiate stuff with my students so they don’t have to feel like they’re doing it on their own. And ⁓ we made 20K on this particular deal. And so being able to cut him a check.

  $10,000. I was like, hey, you want some money? And he’s like, yeah, he said the wire came through. said, yep, wires in. So I’m ready to wire you your funds. And he was excited. And because of the fact that this happened through Bandit Signs, oh, one of the first things he did was buy a big ton of Bandit Signs with some of the money to go out and put out more signs. So he’s got a few more leads that we’re working as well. But being able to be that

  positive influence and help people get to the finish line and see results from their efforts. it’s amazing. It’s invaluable. And I love being able to, I told people it’s kind of like lots of times people will say stuff like they don’t like paying bills. It’s not a fun thing. I actually love paying bills because if I’m paying the bill, that means I got the money to pay the bill. So that means I’ve got money in the bank. And so when I’m cutting checks to people, ⁓ that’s…

  Great feeling I’d love being especially when it’s my students and I’ve seen them work hard and put in the effort ⁓ In this business I would say the key thing is being hungry the folks that are hungry See the results if you’re kind of doing it as a hobby and kind of you know, haphazardly doing anything you’ll get haphazard results But if you’re truly hungry and you won’t be denied in making this happen You’ll see the results. I can’t tell you exactly when but

  It’s an inevitability. It will happen. And so I love ⁓ being a blessing to others. That’s one of my biggest things that I really focus on. So I’m building my business also with additional wholesaling and building my systems in place. But I also want some, I’ve had some rental properties. I’ve sold them off since then, and I’m looking to get some additional rental properties to have a reoccurring cashflow.

  also eventually looking to get into commercial deals and things like that. But ⁓ I always keep my options open, but I also try to make sure I stay focused. ⁓ This industry is not with a shortage of shiny objects. And I tell people you can get in the shiny object syndrome and think, I can do this, I can do that. Every strategy can work, but every strategy has to be worked. And if you’re not going to put in the effort to really try to work that straight, because every strategy has its pros and cons.

  And so you’ve got to know that strategy to be able to maximize the results. And so that’s what I teach my students. Even though I focus primarily on real estate mentoring and wholesaling, I would tell people this is a life journey. So to a certain degree, I’m kind of even a life coach because I need to know what’s going on with you because I can’t hold you accountable to be putting in 10 hours a week, you know, in the business. If you got

  two jobs, a family with kids and the kids have events and okay, you’re have to make some adjustments with when you put time in into the real estate business and how you do it so that you can maximize it. And you may go a little slower, but moving forward is moving forward. So I don’t care if it’s one step a day or a mile a day, you you’re still moving forward. So if you stay hungry, keep putting in the effort, then you will see the results. And so I love being a part of that for people.

  Erika (26:52)
  Yeah, yeah, wow. really shows. You said earlier that you want to be a blessing to others. And I know this podcast, you’ve been a blessing to our listeners here today. If someone wants to connect, reach out, you know, maybe they need some mentoring and wholesaling. What’s the best way for them to reach you?

  Stephan Roberts (27:12)
  Awesome, awesome. Well, thank you. Yeah, they can always give me a call. You can give me a call at 678-909-1951. That’s 678-909-1951. But you can also, if you want to look at a little bit more about my mentoring, you can go to HelpMeLearnRealEstateInvesting.com. So just HelpMeLearnRealEstateInvesting.com.

  and you’ll go to one of my pages and it’ll show you a little bit more about my mentoring process. You can book a call with me. The call is free. It’s like a 30 minute call. And so if you want to just kind of tell me your story and let me know what ⁓ you’re needing, ⁓ then we can talk it over and I can let you know what I can help with, what I can’t help with. I may not be a great fit for everybody, but I can always give you some advice and you can see how it fits for you. You can also email me.

  at [email protected] that’s s-r-o-b-e-r-t-s at s-t-e-p-r-e-g dot com. You can email me, we can always connect and I operate ⁓ all over even though I focus primarily in the Atlanta area right now. Like I said, I have students, I’ve got a student in Kentucky, one in Tennessee and one up in Virginia, but I operate all over the country. So don’t care where you are, whether it’s Alaska or

  Puerto Rico or Idaho. It doesn’t matter. We can still evaluate the market together and ⁓ work on getting some business done and partnering on it. So you don’t have to feel like you’re all alone in it.

  Erika (28:52)
  Yeah, yeah. Well, gosh, the advice you gave today was ⁓ was so great. think you’ve encouraged a lot of a lot of people today. We need ⁓ more people doing things the way you are in a wholesaling. Thanks for being on the show, Steph.

  Stephan Roberts (29:06)
  Thank you for having me Erika, it’s been a pleasure.

  Erika (29:09)
  for our listeners. If you got value from this episode, which I know you did, make sure that you’re subscribed to the Real Estate Pros podcast. We’ve got more conversations coming up with experts like Steph who are building a fantastic real estate businesses. We’ll see you on the next episode.

  Stephan Roberts (29:28)
  Have a great one everybody.