Beginner’s Guide to Buying Your First Rental Property Without Wholesaling

Martine Richardson (00:00)
A lot of people think that if you’re just starting out, you have to wholesale. I gotta flip.

why not prove yourself with rental

Wholesaling and flipping does not do that. If you want freedom, you need assets that’s going to do the work for you.

So that’s why I’m so passionate about people buying rental properties, buying and keeping properties.

Quentin (01:51)
hello everyone. Listen, welcome to the real estate, pros podcast. Y’all know what I say. I say I’m excited and I told this person, I say this all the time and she’s gonna see me say it. Y’all know I’m excited, but I’m telling you, I’m excited that I have somebody who may be more excited than me. And y’all know it’s not easy to out-excite me, but today we have somebody here, listen.

Martine Richardson (02:15)
you

Quentin (02:17)
She’s a coach. She’s an investor. Listen, she believes in service above self. Like this person is a true gem to the space that we in. And I am so excited, so happy, so elated. See now I gotta use different words because I already used excited so much. But I am so elated to introduce you guys to Miss Martine Richardson. Now, how are you today? Tell us how you really feel.

Martine Richardson (02:24)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm

I am glad that I made you pull out that the source and use other words other than excited today I’m excited. We’re gonna have a great time today. I got some gems to give the folks listening today. Let’s get it

Quentin (02:59)
when I tell y’all, y’all see this? Now y’all know that’s normally me, right? But what can I say? I’ma lay back and I’ma let Marteen do the heavy lifting today, So listen, I know our listeners are gonna get so much value from your lens, from your particular lens, from your experience. Like I am so ready for them to hear your heart about what you do and why you do what you do. So Ms. Marteen, listen.

Martine Richardson (03:14)
Mm-hmm.

Quentin (03:23)
We want to dive right in. I want you to bring people into your world, bring people into your perspective. So if you don’t mind, tell people, what is your main focus these days? And also tell them what markets you’re operating in.

Martine Richardson (03:35)
Sure. So my main focus is rental properties, buy and hold investing all the way. If you come and you talk to me, I’m going to brainwash you to be a buy and hold investor. And as I continue to talk, you’re going to see why I want you to be a buy and hold investor. Because that is the only way to get to the wealthy side of things. If you’re flipping, if you’re wholesaling, it’s cool. But that’s not how you get wealthy. That’s a high paying job.

and I want you to let these assets work for you. So, I focus on buying whole and I’m in Richmond, Virginia.

Quentin (04:08)
Absolutely. I love it. Listen, I love one of the things you said, listen, I’m trying to help new investors buy even with no money down. I love that about you. I love that you’re trying to coach people up. tell me, cause I mean, cause of course, you know, it’s not always easy in this climate. So tell me like, what keeps you motivated? What keeps you running smoothly? Like with your coaching and with your investing, what keeps you focused?

Martine Richardson (04:25)
Mm-hmm.

To be honest, results. I love results. So for people that don’t know who I am, I help people buy their first rental property with no money to them. And I have a coaching program where I teach people exactly that.

A lot of people think that if you’re just starting out, you have to wholesale. I gotta flip.

You know, I gotta prove myself. Well,

why not prove yourself with rental

properties?

I just remember when I first started out, I’ve been doing this for 11 years now. I’ve done over a hundred houses. I’ve done a ton.

So when I first started out, started with wholesaling because that’s all I knew. I thought I had to wholesale, but I quickly realized I did not have to wholesale. And if you realize that, cause like a lot of people, why do you get into this? You get into this because you want financial freedom. You want time freedom. You want money freedom. Guess what?

Wholesaling and flipping does not do that.

If you want freedom, you need assets that’s going to do the work for you.

So that’s why I’m so passionate about people buying rental properties, buying and keeping

The longer I keep the property, if I know how to structure it, I can make money off the house forever. I’ve done this to build my financial freedom guys. And I want the same for you. And just having people in the coaching program with success, hitting the ground running, man, that keeps me motivated, keeps me excited. It’s more fulfilling than me doing it for myself. Like, you know, you have a little party piece up like, woo.

great but you see somebody else take what you gave them and they did it that it’s nothing better than it it’s nothing better than it

Quentin (06:50)
Well, that’s how y’all like, I told y’all she’s gonna bring the energy. I love it. I love it. Thank you so much. Now listen, like, you know, so I love your energy. So I know you’re going to attack this question with that same energy, but there’s a lot of people, you know, they went into roadblocks, right? Business can be hard. Things don’t always go the way we desire them to go. And so their moment when things get real, maybe like a deal goes sideways or a time when you had to pivot fast.

Martine Richardson (06:52)
you

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Quentin (07:18)
Like Ms. Martine, you have any stories that you can share, overcoming stories that you can share with the audience today?

Martine Richardson (07:19)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I’m tell you about one thing I regretted. I regretted it and I’m gonna tell you the entire story of how that worked. So I bought a property and I bought this property with the intention to keep it. I wanted, I mean, to be honest, I’d say 99 % of the properties I buy, I buy it with the intention to keep it because look, I got me another little asset that’s gonna work for me. I work one time and get paid forever.

Quentin (07:28)
Mmm.

Take your time.

Martine Richardson (07:51)
So I bought this property. I bought this property and I fixed it up to where it needed to be. I got a tenant in there. And when I got the tenant in there, it was time for me to refinance. So just to, I guess, break down the process of how I do this with No Money Down, because I want to give people some context so they can know like, how in the world she buying stuff No Money Down? So when I’m buying a property, right,

I want to make sure that my purchase price plus fixing it up, any holding costs, closing costs, whatever, I’m all in 70 % of what it’s going to be worth once it’s fixed up. So if you’ve mastered that skill, especially the wholesalers, if you’ve mastered getting stuff at a discount, you need to be holding some properties because you can get into this with no money down. So I’ll get into a property and then I will borrow the money from a private lender.

The private lender will give me all the money to buy the house, the closing costs, they’ll give me the money to fix it up, all of that. And the reason they’re gonna do that is because I’m giving them a great return. And then also I’m putting their money in a safe position. I’m not borrowing at 100 % of what it’s gonna be worth. That’s not a safe position. 70 % and under is safe. So I bought this house, I fixed it up, I got a tenant in there, I’m cash flowing, because people are paying their rent.

and it’s time to refinance. When I refinance these, I usually use a DSCR loan, which stands for a Debt Service Coverage Ratio Loan. And all they care about is your credit score, and they care about if the asset can support itself. And if you need a guy, hit me up. I got the best guy in town to do it. He can do it in all 50 states. He’s amazing. The best mortgage broker I’ve ever worked with in my life. But anyway, so we get to the part where it’s time to refinance this property.

Quentin (09:28)
Yeah.

Martine Richardson (10:11)
And this particular property is in an up-and-coming area. This city was very stagnant for a long time because all the jobs left. Nothing was really appraising for more than $50,000 until recently. Now things are finally going up and stuff like that. So we get to the appraisal part of the process. And when it appraises,

It doesn’t appraise for what I think it’s worth. It appraised like $20,000 lower than what I thought it was worth. And just to let you guys know, when I’m running comps and stuff on things, I’m very conservative. I’m not saying, oh well, we have one house on the block that sold for $350, so mine is worth $350. I’m probably gonna go for the lowest.

nicest house on the block because I want to be conservative right? I want to make sure my exit strategy is going to work. So we get to the point where it’s time to get the house appraised so can get the loan. It appraised for $20,000 lower. When I’m doing these DSCR loans you get 75 % of what the house is worth. So by it being $20,000 lower

Now, it’s the price of the house or the value of the house is not even enough for me to pay my private lender back. And I’m looking at the comps, the appraisers using houses that are boarded up. wasn’t truly confident with other things. And what I regret about this is I thought to myself, well, I want to keep my private lender happy. I don’t want to have to extend this loan.

Quentin (11:48)
Yeah.

Martine Richardson (11:50)
I’m just gonna sell the house. I regret that so much. What I should have done, and if you run into something like that, I should have just either went with another company to do my DSCR loan or waited the six months so could get a new appraisal. Because that appraisal was not the true value of the house and he screwed me. So that I, you know, I went straight for let me sell. I should have just talked to my lender and asked them.

Quentin (11:54)
Mmm.

Mmm!

Martine Richardson (12:15)
Hey, would you be okay with going a little bit longer on this loan? I mean, you’re gonna make more money. Would you be okay with going a little bit longer on this loan because I need to get this place reappraised so that I can refinance it the way that I want. And let’s say you talk to your lender, your lender is like, no, I don’t want to be in it. That’s fine. Refinance them with another private lender, but don’t sell the house. Learn from my mistake. That baby was a cash flowing machine and I sold the house.

Quentin (12:37)
Mmm.

OOOO

Martine Richardson (12:44)
And I regret doing that and it was because the appraisal did not come the way I thought it would come. And I really just, I don’t know, I kind of think I went into kind of like panic. I was like, I just want everybody to be happy. Let me sell it. But I was making everybody else happy at the expense of myself when I should have just had those tough conversations.

Quentin (13:01)
Yeah.

Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing. Thank you for the gift of your vulnerability. Thank you for your honesty. Like a lot of folks, don’t, you know, they don’t want to share this part of it, right? They don’t want to share a time where they had to, in a sense, live in regret. But like you said, you’re dropping gems. You learn from that and you move on. And so for me, this shows me your staying power, right? People, you’re different than people that just dabble, right? You’re like, no, I’m in this for the longterm.

Martine Richardson (13:10)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Quentin (13:31)
I will learn, pivot, and move on. And so now I know you making the same mistakes that you didn’t, that making that mistake again, you know? And so absolutely. I appreciate you sharing.

Martine Richardson (13:33)
Right.

Right, right, I’m at the closing table, you know,

signing the deed. I’m like, oh, I don’t want to do this. But I learned from that, I learned from that.

Quentin (13:47)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Absolutely. Thank you so much, Ms. Martine. So listen, let me ask you this. What are you most focused on solving or scaling next? Like what’s the next real goal?

Martine Richardson (13:58)
My next real goal is to scale the coaching. I want more people to learn how to buy properties like this. I know how to do it. I still do it. It’s still fun. And when it’s not fun anymore, I won’t do it anymore, but it is still fun. And I just want to help open other people’s eyes. Like a lot of people, I just want to give you some of the excuses I hear where people are not holding properties. They’ll be like, well my credit score is not where it needs to be.

Well guess what? You don’t need to have a high credit score when you’re buying the property. You need it when you’re gonna get to the refinance portion, but if you structured your private money so that your credit is where it needs to be, then you can fix your credit. I mean, my credit was bad at one time. I didn’t share my story on this podcast, but I didn’t get excited or serious about real estate until my car got repossessed.

Quentin (15:11)
Mmm.

Martine Richardson (15:29)
So you can just think of what my credit score was. It won’t good. So that’s one thing I hear, my credit not where it need to be. I can’t hold rental properties. Yes you can. You just have to structure the money so that it makes sense for you to do it that way. I hear, I need to build a huge reserve to own rental properties. What if I told you, could buy a reserve, you could build your reserves into the deal. If you got the property low enough,

Quentin (15:33)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mmm.

Martine Richardson (15:54)
when you refinance it, you’re gonna get some money back. So when you get some money back, use that as your reserves. Problem solved. And you don’t have to wait, kicking the can down the road, or why, you know, I’m gonna give rental properties tomorrow. No, get them today! You got into real estate because you wanted freedom. What creates freedom? Buying the rental properties. So, I would say I’m really focused on helping people.

you know, challenging their limiting beliefs. A lot of people are like, there’s no way you could buy properties with no money down. Let me prove you otherwise. Let me show you how you can do that. So, it’s very fulfilling to me. And I’d say probably one of the biggest things that kind of holds people back is belief. Like, they just don’t believe that certain things are possible, because they never seen those things happen for themselves. But then once it happens for themselves, they’re like,

she was like she wasn’t BSing me. She was telling the truth. I was like I told you. But yeah, I really just want to grow the family, the culture and business family and it’s just it’s very rewarding to me to see people’s lives change through buying rental properties.

Quentin (16:51)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I have asked that question I don’t even know how many times and I’ve never quite heard the response. I want to scale the culture.

Martine Richardson (17:15)
Mm. Mm.

Quentin (17:15)
What a

line, I wanna scale the culture? Oh my goodness, like, ah, ah, I love your lens, I love your perspective, I love, I wrote it down before, you know, I know you saw it your clothes, but I know it’s just what you embody. I love the service above self. Like when you said that, I wrote it down and I see that gleaning through you in what you do, in the way that you serve people and wanna educate people like, listen.

Martine Richardson (17:30)
Mm-hmm. Mmm.

Quentin (17:39)
Let me prove you wrong. Let me show you what we can do. I love that. And so I think your next moves are big. And of course, the next move can either compound things or create chaos, depending on how you play it. But to me, you’re playing it all the right way. And so I’m ask you this, because I hear the connector in you. I hear you wanna link up with people. So I know people, listening, they’re early in their journey, they looking to level up.

Martine Richardson (17:40)
Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Quentin (18:07)
but I think they’ll benefit hearing this from you, somebody like you, in your perspective on this. When it comes to building relationships and growing your network, what has made the biggest difference for you, Ms. Martín?

Martine Richardson (18:11)
Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

say if you want longevity in this business, you definitely need to continuously build relationships, you need to build your network, you need to make sure that you are intentional about that. Not just I went to a meeting, I saw somebody, no. You need to be intentional. Help people. Ask people what they’re trying to accomplish. If you know somebody that can connect them, like that you can connect to them to help them get to where they’re going, connect them.

This is so, one thing that I live and breathe is I love helping people, right? And the way that this works is all the deals that we get, everybody in the fam, all the deals that we get is from relationships. We don’t do any cold marketing. None of that cold calling, none of that send direct mail. I’ve been there, done that, been cursed out more than enough. So.

When you come from a relationship standpoint and you people truly know that you’re there to help them. You’re here to consult them to the best solution for them. You really reduce the barriers that people normally have to overcome because they think they’re going to sell them. And it’s like, no, I’m really here to try to help you. So if you want longevity in this business, I would say, you know, be intentional about your relationships. Take people to lunch.

Have coffee with folks. Find out what their real goals are. See how you can help them. See if your goals align and y’all can help each other. Because that’s gonna take you very far. That’s gonna allow you to be in this business for a very long time.

Quentin (19:48)
Absolutely. Now relationships are everything in this space. And like the more you talk, the more I’m kind of going to go off script. Cause you know, I got my questions there, I’m locked and loaded, but just hearing you, hearing your lens, hearing your heart, hearing your servant’s heart, I want to give you a chance. I want to give you the floor to kind of speak on whatever you want to speak on, right? Like are any kind of inspiration, encouragement? You already been dropping nuggets, but is there any further message that you want to get out there?

Martine Richardson (20:07)
Okay.

Quentin (20:15)
I know encouraging people, motivating people, listen, you’re a coach. is what you do. And so I just want to give you the floor now to see if there’s any words you want to give to our listeners.

Martine Richardson (20:25)
Okay, well, I know it’s only but so much we can get done in a podcast episode, right? So if you’re liking what I’m saying, you wanna hear more, feel free to follow me on all the socials. You can go to martinericherson.com and it has all my social media info on there. You can follow me on everything, cause this is like, this is what I live and breathe. I’m not a different person on this podcast. I also, I love connecting people.

So I have an event that’s coming up. It’s on September the 11th. It’s called Margarita Mix and Mingle. It’s completely free. If you’re one of the first 50 people to show up, you’re gonna get a margarita on me. We’re gonna have food, door prizes, and we give to charity. This charity that we’re giving to this time is Project Homes. And if anybody knows anything about Project Homes, they specialize in affordable housing. I feel like it’s very fitting for what we do.

because you know, we’re landlords, like we rent properties out and we want to give people the best possible deals that we can, but we have to make the numbers work. So it helps to be able to pour into these different organizations that can really help the community. Like I think Project Homes, they fix things in people’s houses for free. Like I don’t, who does that? Like that’s amazing. I would love.

would love if all of us could get together, come to Margarita Mix and Mingle, donate a lot of nice big hefty check to Project Homes so they can go further on their mission. yeah, I would say that’s probably the best ways to hear more encouraging words from me.

Quentin (22:03)
Absolutely.

I love it. I love it. Listen, we got somebody trying to scale the culture, y’all. Like, get connected with her. She’s doing it, man. And I appreciate you. I appreciate your story. I appreciate your perspective. I just appreciate your time. You’ve been here today. I guess my final question is, so are you going to be drinking a margarita at the mixer? That’s my question.

Martine Richardson (22:23)
definitely will be drinking a margarita

at the mixer for sure. like I have just to let you guys know, I have events every quarter. So four times a year. The last event we had at the park. So we couldn’t drink at least not in front of people. So this one you can drink. You can have a margarita. So I want y’all to come out, have a good time. If you don’t drink, that’s fine. No pressure. You don’t have to drink. That’s a little bit less money for me. I appreciate that, but come on.

Quentin (22:26)
Listen.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Martine Richardson (22:51)
meet some good people, some people that’s gonna help you scale to the next level in your business. Let’s go y’all, it’s gonna be a good time, it’s gonna be a good time.

Quentin (22:57)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Listen, I know it’s gonna be a good time, and reason why I ask, if you got the energy just, this is your natural energy, I can only imagine. When the park is for you.

Martine Richardson (23:02)
He

So my husband tells me all the time, like, if it is six to eight, I’m pretty sure we gonna still be there after eight. He be like, don’t know when to leave.

Quentin (23:12)
YAH!

He r-

Like, I know he right. But listen, like, yeah. Yes, exactly. Well, listen, again, I thank you for being here. I thank you for what you’re doing. You are building business the right way. We need more people like you in this space. So again, Ms. Martine Richardson, I thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure, my dear.

Martine Richardson (23:21)
I was like, I love it, the energy in here is amazing.

Thank you for having me on here and it’s just one last thing I want to leave people with. If you are trying to buy rental properties, you feel stuck, you need help, I want to invite anybody that’s listening to this to text me. My number is 804-495-1333. Just text me, I’ll help you through whatever situation you’re going through and let’s make it happen. To you and your family getting more wealth.

Quentin (24:04)
There she go, y’all. Mike dropped this. Martine Richardson, y’all heard how to get in contact with her. Make sure you reach out and get connected. And for all of you that’s watching this, I’m gonna say this slowly, you’re watching this, you got a ton of value from this. You can’t tell me you didn’t. So please just subscribe, people. Make sure you are subscribed. We want, come on, right? We want that alert to go off. We want to let you know when we drop.

Martine Richardson (24:06)
you

I’m only young.

They need, y’all need to subscribe to this.

If his energy is like this all the time, y’all need to be subscribing to this.

Quentin (24:31)
Everybody, Ms. Marti, Ms. Marti Richardson. Ms. Marti Richardson, I told y’all, I love it. I appreciate you so much, ma’am. So everybody, we’ll see you on the next time.