Colorado Real Estate Broker Expands to Texas | Megan Bello’s Journey

Megan Bello (00:00)
And so I moved us into a commercial lease that was zoned, live work without a shower and without a kitchen. And I moved my two babies to the back of my office.

And everybody’s like, what are you doing? And I’m like, I’ll add a shower. They’re like, you don’t know how to do that. I’m like, I’ll find people. And I sit before you. I have a fully functional apartment behind me today. I have a washer, I have a dryer, I have a sink, I have, I have everything. So I if you want to do it, it’ll do it. And you actually don’t need permission from anybody.

Joseph Crooms (02:03)
Hey everyone, welcome to Investor Fuel Real Estate Pros Podcast. ⁓ I’m your host, Joseph Crooms, and today I’m joined by someone I’ve been looking forward to chatting with. And she is such a nice person, beautiful smile. Her name is Megan and she Bello ⁓ Bello and she is going to talk about her real estate business, ⁓ her market fears and her concerns.

From a real life basis. So, ⁓ and she’s making some serious moves, especially seem like she’s developing relationship with the government. So and listen, glad to have you here, Megan. Say hello. So I think our listers are really going to take something away from how you’re approaching ⁓ the real estate industry. So let’s dive right into it. So first off, for people who may not be familiar with your world, give us the short version. What’s your main

Megan Bello (02:42)
Hello.

Joseph Crooms (02:59)
Focus this days. What markets are you operating in?

Megan Bello (03:02)
So I am right now in Colorado. I am in a small rural area, but I have agents all over the state. So I can help ⁓ with anything kind of in Colorado. I like Colorado just because it is ⁓ there’s lots of different areas like inside for for opportunity. You have your metro area, obviously Denver and stuff, but it’s a huge state. So these small little mountain rural communities and and there’s there’s a lot of different opportunity for every sort of budget developer out there, you know.

Joseph Crooms (03:30)
Do you ⁓ can you share

What’s moved the needle for you and how how long have you been in business, Maggie? As a real

Megan Bello (03:38)
got into real estate 11 years ago. I have had my own company for six years now. I opened Motion Homes Group ⁓ right right before COVID. It was like October 2019 when I became an independent and then I started adding agents in the middle of COVID. So ⁓ yeah I’ve been doing this for 11 years and when I got in if you wanted a house you had to give up your life savings, your kidney, your child, the last four of your social security number, all of that good things. And so now seeing this

market the opportunity for buyers to kind of come back around has been really great because I remember getting in and having a lot of frustrations in the market that are different now. now we have other frustrations, but the ones in the beginning seem to have sort of switched around.

Joseph Crooms (04:17)
How did you get w when did you make the decision to I’m making money, but when did you make the decision that you know what, let me start my own company?

Megan Bello (04:25)
I always knew I wanted to open my own brokerage. When I was in real estate school, the instructor said to our class, just so you know, two of two or three of you will be in the business in two years. That’s just statistically how it works. 98% of licenses or 92% of licenses don’t renew at their three year and way less than that, we’re you know, you’re not even gonna be in the business, but way less than that if you will open your own brokerage. That’s what everyone says they want to do. ⁓ and I looked around and I was like, sorry guys, one of those spots is mine.

Why?

Joseph Crooms (04:55)
Gotcha. What constituted you making that that actual ⁓ decision? What what what what what was your finance level? What was and how much volume of business did you have to have before you make that decision? Or was that part of your thought part process?

Megan Bello (05:14)
So my and this might sound a little counterprodu productive with like what I’m on, my favorite thing about real estate is it’s motivation driven. So I’ve always done well. When I was in production, I was always in the top ten of my brokerage of like 70 agents. ⁓ I’ve always made a career, it’s always been my full-time gig for ⁓ the last eleven years of my life. ⁓ but to to to make it it

The state, I’m trying to remember and forgive me for sort of stumbling right now. I think it was only you needed to have a decent production, right? And they just recently changed their standards. But it wasn’t I didn’t need to have a bunch of stuff. I just wanted to have a heart to to to lead and to go take the classes and to switch my license from an from an in from an employee to an employer. ⁓ and, you know, pay the pay the government.

Joseph Crooms (06:50)
Actually, what is your revenue and volume level at now?

Megan Bello (06:56)
⁓ so right now I should know numbers, but we’ve done twenty five sales across the co the the state so far this year.

Joseph Crooms (07:02)
All right, and that translates to volume twenty five sales, ⁓ roughly how much revenue would that break then say bring you on a on a monthly or or yearly basis?

Megan Bello (07:13)
⁓ as far as like what we’ve paid out to all the agents, ⁓

Joseph Crooms (07:17)
Well you can do you can do maths, either way you want to do it.

Megan Bello (07:19)
Yeah, ⁓ I’m so sorry. I should have known these numbers. I’m glad this is pre recorded and not live because I would be like trying to fall off the

Joseph Crooms (07:26)
But estimate, can you give us an estimate?

Megan Bello (07:28)
Yeah, I mean so total commissions paid has probably been over t like two hundred to two hundred and fifty thousand this year.

Joseph Crooms (07:36)
Okay, okay. And how l how long have you been operating at this level since you’ve been a broker?

Megan Bello (07:42)
Been very thankful. I’ve been growing pretty steadily. So I haven’t like shot up. And then the interesting thing is so I if you want to make money in real estate, you want to be in production. You don’t want to sit where I’m at. You don’t get into management for anything, I think, for that, because I went from all my sales and my volume and my company is doing better and growing, because I don’t take my agents commission splits, they’re the ones keeping the income in their pocket.

⁓ so when I used to go from selling three of my own to now my company will do eight in a month, you know, I’m probably making the same, but I have more, you know. So that hasn’t I haven’t have not a story yet of massive gains, but mostly a story of staying in the game and using that as leverage because I’m able to get

⁓ SBA loans and and do all these sorts of things because I’ve been in business, you know, when you’ve been in business for eleven years, especially in real estate solo by yourself, you have a little bit more you know what I mean? You can go into the bank with your tax returns and be yep, give me the you know what I mean, versus when you’re you’re coming out and new. So ⁓ while I I’m sure it will come the next time we meet Joseph, I’ll be like, Yes, I have eight million in the bank account right now because I developed all this and I changed, but we’ll not

Alas, right now I’ve I’ve been thankfully and fortunate to be steadily growing year after year, no matter what craziness the market’s been bringing.

Joseph Crooms (09:00)
Let me ask you this question also. ⁓ and I think our listeners are going to take something away from this. For people who may not ⁓ I asked you that question. What caught my attention was the way that you were able to insert your business and express your concern. Did you used to flip a lot of homes?

Megan Bello (09:16)
⁓ no, I’ve worked with I’ve worked with a lot of flippers, especially in the beginning. There were a lot of new flippers when I was a new agent. So I would be their agent on like the the purchase, the acquisition, and then the listing on the afterwards. ⁓ and you do, man, you learn a lot. That is a tough that is a tough gig. That is a tough industry. I have been on flip where everybody makes money, and I have been on flips where they make no money and it forecloses back. And you know what I mean? Like there’s there’s

The I’ve I’ve noticed a lot, but I thankfully have not been doing the flips myself. ⁓ personally. I think that’s very cool. People with a construction background, I love to partner with them because like to me that could be like magic, all right? You put plumbing where there wasn’t plumbing, there was no water, now there’s hot water here, like that’s amazing.

Joseph Crooms (10:00)
How what does production mean to you when you said that term that you know and you you were relating things but I’m not into the production field. What what does that mean to you?

Megan Bello (10:11)
like a sales, I I help manage and I’m there for my agents. I don’t do any deals solo anymore. Any personal business I get, I split with my agents. ⁓ and I’m foc on the last year and a half I’ve been focusing on helping my agents grow their business and how I can help each bus agent individually grow into what they want to become to help real estate overall grow. And it and it’s I think it’s so funny because we’re so competitive in this industry. Every real estate agent is always so competitive, and that’s kind of what has been sold to us. But I don’t think

That that’s true. So ⁓ I I try to take a collaborative approach and not I I don’t do my own production and sales. My job is my logo and helping people change their lives through real estate, whether that be through a career, whether that be through learning how to develop, whether that be through fixing building homes, wh whatever you need ⁓ to do, we’ll do it. We’ll do it collaboratively and we we can do it together. Because we don’t need to be competing. We’re all so different. Like every even if I took 30 agents in a room, they’re not even gonna they’re not gonna be lead generating the same places. You know what I mean? Like everybody’s like,

man, they got a deal. Yeah, because they go to roller skating club on Thursday and you go to hiking club on Friday. You both have different people, different businesses. Work on your people and who you are and being an anchor and a help and a light in your community and the business will continue to come to you.

Joseph Crooms (11:22)
That’s not easy ⁓ in this climate and so you have to have a unique personality skill to to manage that, to to bring out the best. What’s been keeping your machine running smoothly?

Megan Bello (12:09)
Grit and Tedacity. I and I might get a little personal here for a minute. I ⁓ I suddenly became a single mom last April. And I kind of really had to ⁓ face fa face the music. And so what kept me going recently were my two young children. I had a one year old and a two year old. They’re now two and three. and I was in I had to just he kind of walked away from everything. He’s gone. Have not seen him since last April.

And so ⁓ I kind of was at a crossroads, you know, like go you gotta go all in and do what’s crazy. And I don’t do they they were little, I’ve been primarily with them at home.

And so I moved us into a commercial lease that was zoned, live work without a shower and without a kitchen. And I moved my two babies to the back of my office.

And everybody’s like, what are you doing? And I’m like, I’ll add a shower. They’re like, you don’t know how to do that. I’m like, I’ll find people. And I sit before you. I have a fully functional apartment behind me today. I have a washer, I have a dryer, I have a sink, I have, I have everything. So I if you want to do it, it’ll do it. And you actually don’t need permission from anybody.

Joseph Crooms (13:18)
Wow. Was it one a p a piece of real estate property that you owned or that you helped or?

Megan Bello (13:23)
Yeah, so I yes, this is it’s the it’s the Motion Homes Group office. ⁓ I am obviously I did not grow up as a little girl and want to be living in the back of my office was in my dream. ⁓ so I’m I’m fortunate ’cause now I have a space that’s really flexible that can help. If you’re in real estate, you know clothes get accepted or whatever. Now I have a fully functional apartment for people to use if they need to use it, my agents if they have to. ⁓ but I was able to acquire my actual commercial building by doing some crazy

things and just believing in it. And for nine weeks I took my kids to the gym to shower and we ate my daughter loves pizza rolls, she found out, because we did not have a kitchen and so we were pizza rolling it up.

Joseph Crooms (14:02)
Y y you know, Megan, my next question was going to be, ⁓ tell me a deal that went sideways or time that you had to pivot fast. You you beat me to the punch. You had to pivot fast. And so is there another moment that you had to pivot fast as well, in your actual as you were working, other than life experience that caught up to you?

Megan Bello (14:24)
I mean you’re always having to pivot. We just had a deal that was clear to close on the second that ⁓ the gift they were getting gift money from a friend or from a family member and then the family member has moved all their assets into a trust, so now it’s frozen for two weeks. ⁓ there’s there’s a huge element to pivoting and and I like to remind my agents of that because they like to get agents like to get real emotional. They’re like, my god, the deal’s falling apart because we kinda like it. We don’t say that, but we do. We like to be stressed out and busy. That’s what people eat, you know? ⁓

And I just you just try to keep focused on the on on the name of the game and the more it pivots and the harder of the conversations that you can have with people is directly correlated to how much money you can

Joseph Crooms (15:01)
So w and s sort of going back a little bit, what is your total volume of business that you have in the last five years? How how would you say it is?

Megan Bello (15:11)
I mean the last five years I’ve probably sold

Gosh, I’ve sold a few. I’ve probably sold, I mean, probably 25. So over a hundred homes. That’s over a hundred sides, right? Wow. ⁓ yeah, I I would say that I’m probably about a hundred a hundred sides in. I should I should go through and count because I do have a list. I bet you I’m getting close. I should celebrate.

Joseph Crooms (15:31)
and and how many is it all residential and commercial? Or

Megan Bello (15:35)
⁓

majority residential. I do a little bit of commercial in these small rural areas where it’s kind of weird. And it’s been a huge learning experience to go from Denver where you get licensed in the big city. You don’t touch anything. You get licensed, you meet a deal, you call, you know, you get on the MLS. Like you’re basically just paying a lot of different systems that have this pretty easy way to jump in and do real estate. my gosh, I came out here into rural Colorado. I’m installing my own signs.

Like nobody knows how no one knows a sign maker. Like there’s just it it’s just a different it’s a different world. So I’m glad I started in the city because I got to kind of like learn a little bit about the ⁓ the how much nicer and it it just feels maybe organize isn’t the right term, but I do commercial, but I don’t typically do like big, I’m not like your big commercial Denver gal, but out here in these rural small areas where you’re acquiring businesses or you’re in these small that’s that’s where I definitely do the commercial. That’s where we have the experience with my team.

Joseph Crooms (17:09)
Thank you. ⁓ that’s the kind of stuff that people don’t, you know, talk about enough, you know, my experience level, your learning experience. What separates and it’s what separate folks who are just dabbling to the ones who stay in for the long term? So let me ask you this. What are you focused on scaling or solving next? What’s the next real big goal?

Megan Bello (17:30)
So for Motion Homes Group, I am like I said, working on a a small development project. I would like to do work. I’m in the really beginning stages of that. ⁓ and then I haven’t officially announced it yet, but I am in classes to open my brokerage in Texas as well. So thank you. I’ll be expanding from Colorado to Texas. ⁓ and then I’ll be able to offer sort of I’ll I’ll do the same thing, just obviously with the Texas laws and licenses.

And then kind of go from there. And I’m I’m excited to have the two different states because there are two different you you’ve got two different sorts of political climates with those two states. You have a lot of land in those two states. And like as I’m learning about Texas, Texas has some fabulous programs to help vets get into like land and purchase land and construction loans. So I think being able to see the differences and the similarities between those two will help me be able to grow and develop more housing.

in the future just as we continue to go on because the housing crisis is everywhere and anyone can Google wherever you live and find a housing study and it will tell you right there how many units you need to g be where you’re at. News flash, we’re all frickin’ behind. So I

Joseph Crooms (18:39)
Let me ask you. Maggie,

The next move can either compound things or create chaos, especially doing a state, you know, move to open up a business in your experience. Now I know a lot of people listening are are either early in their journey looking to level up, and I think they’ll benefit from hearing this. What comes what when it comes to building relationships, especially out of state, if you could talk about that a little bit, and growing your network, what’s made the biggest difference for you?

Megan Bello (19:08)
Hm, ⁓

Consistently, consistency is probably always gonna be an answer that I have consistently showing up and following up. ⁓ I think a lot of this is less business advice and more personal advice. ⁓ just just show up and serve people. Like that that’s it. You will make money. Wealth comes to those who help people. If you it’s a lot of reciprocity, if you’re helping and serving others, it’s got it has no reason to come back to you. So if you’re in that space of collaboration and connection.

And you’re going and you’re meeting with people, not only are you gonna have better conversations, but you’re also gonna have better connections and like actual like long serve versus like, well, you do this and I’ll do that. You know? ⁓ so I I very much because my background is all sales, I was in commission sales before I got into real estate. When I got into business, I actually made thirty thousand cold calls in four months on the phone to build my sphere because I was twenty one when I got licensed. I was very young. So ⁓

Rather than what because I know how to do that, I know how to beat the hell out of people and follow up and all that stuff. And while you do need those, I think there is also an element of refining who you are so you can meet your people. You know what I mean?

Joseph Crooms (20:15)
Mm-hmm. Megan ⁓ before we wrap this up and and ⁓ and I ask this, you how to get in touch you. Describe collaboration in your business ethics. What does collaboration mean to you, especially in building relationships?

Megan Bello (20:32)
We’re all playing on the same team. There is no me versus you. We’re either getting the deal to the table or we’re terminating it. We are you’re learning something from me. I’m learning something from you. Neither of us have taken from each other. You showing up doesn’t take deals from me. Me showing up doesn’t take deals from you. We we all bring a unique and different perspective. And yes, it comes down like because you get all these data people are like, well, the data says are there so many deals. Okay. Yeah. But like at the end of the day, there’s business. If you’re supposed to be here.

And you’re motivated to come, show up. You know what I mean? Like I think that there’s so much opportunity in real estate and it’s missed because people look at the the failure and the success rate. And I don’t know any other job in the world where they just give you a license and they’re like, bye you know? So like it’s tough. It’s tough if you gotta but if you’re willing to do the work and figure it out, you can you can create you can change the whole trajectory of your bloodline by just being in real estate.

Joseph Crooms (21:24)
Well, thank you for sharing that, ⁓ Megan. ⁓ all right, before we wrap, if someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, may maybe collaborate or learn more about what you’re doing,

Megan Bello (21:34)
Perfect. Perfect. You can find me. My name is Megan Bello. I am on Facebook. I post every day. There’s a real every day I post 60 seconds and just kind of what I’m thinking about. ⁓ I love to connect on there on my socials. My website is motionhomesgroup.com Like I said, my name is Megan Bello. I’m in real estate, guys. You can definitely find my cell phone. But if you can’t, it is 720-393-0673. But I’m telling you, I’ve been in real estate 11 years. You will find me. It will be easy. Connect. ⁓

Joseph Crooms (22:04)
Perfect. Well listen, I appreciate your time, Megan, your story, your your your glow. It really it it really comes through and your perspective and your philosophy, and I wish you all the best going forward. We need more people in this space who are doing the right thing. Thanks for again for being here. For those of you tuning in, I know you got some value for this. Make sure you’re subscribed. We got more conversations coming from people just like Megan Bello and you can you gotta be here.

So until our next episode Investor Fuel Real Estate Pros podcast.