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Show Summary
In this episode of the Investor Fuel podcast, host Skyler Byrd interviews Marco Epifani, a young real estate professional who transitioned from being an agent to a successful investor and brokerage owner. Marco shares his journey into real estate, the importance of training agents, and his investment strategies. He discusses current market trends, the impact of government regulations, and offers insights into the future of real estate in New England.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Marco Epifani (00:00)
Do you know how many people moved into Connecticut last year?Skyler (00:02)
I have no idea.Marco Epifani (00:03)
It was around $230,000.Skyler (00:05)
Wow, okay. Yeah.Marco Epifani (00:05)
Surprise, right? Populationgrew 230,000. Do you know how many new construction permits were pulled?
Skyler (00:11)
I’m assuming a lot less. Yeah. Yeah.Marco Epifani (00:12)
a lot less, 23,000 roughly.So when you look at that number, then it just becomes supply and demand. Like 230,000 people moved in, 23,000 permits were pulled. There’s not enough inventory to support the population
Skyler (00:18)
Mm-hmm.Hi everybody, my name is Skyler Byrd. I am your host today for the Investor Fuel podcast. And I am really excited right here to speak to ⁓ Marco. He has got a lot of years in the real estate industry, both on the agent side of things and in the investment side. So he’s going to bring a lot of knowledge to us today. So Marco, it’s great to have you.
Marco Epifani (02:18)
Thank you, Skyler. Thank you for having me.Skyler (02:20)
Absolutely. Marco, you came into the industry when you were really young, so to start us off, you tell our listeners here just how you got started and when?Marco Epifani (02:30)
Yeah, so I got started early like 2018, I believe I was licensed and I got started Skyler for a very simple reason. I wanted to get rich. At 19, I had already failed my first business, which was a nightmare because I was 18 when I started and didn’t know anything. And then I remember talking to some of my friends. I was like, what’s the best way to get rich? Like I tried to get rich quick thing and it didn’t work. And I was like, okay, is there a get rich for sure thing? AndOne of my wealthier friends was like, Marco, you should get into real estate. And I was like, that’s a great idea. I love real estate. ⁓
Skyler (03:03)
There you go. So theget rich quick thing didn’t work for you either, huh? It’s kind of crazy how that happens. Yeah. Awesome.
Marco Epifani (03:05)
No, it didn’t work. Who would have guessed? Right? So thenI got licensed in 2018 and then I started selling real estate then.
Skyler (03:14)
Nice, okay. And how long in total were you just focusing on being an agent?Marco Epifani (03:19)
So I got into being an agent, not because I wanted to be an agent, but because I thought high ticket sales was going to be one of the best ways to make enough money to buy real estate. Because the end goal was to buy real estate. So I think I sold like maybe six or seven homes until I had enough money to put a down payment on my first deal. So like maybe a year and a half until I actually got into the game, started buying stuff.Skyler (03:41)
Nice, nice. And at this point, so you’re focusing mostly on the investment side. I know you’re starting your own brokerage, you’re in the process of hiring agents. Let me ask you, what do you focus on now on the investment side?Marco Epifani (03:53)
So the investment side is interesting. I do it, Scott, not because I love doing it, but because sometimes the deals are too good to pass up.Skyler (04:02)
Okay. Yeah.Marco Epifani (04:02)
If that makes any sense. Interms of the real estate side, I’m actually more focused on recruiting agents and building the brokerage, but the investing is just paying me so much money that I feel bad stopping it. And it’s like I have a goose that lays golden eggs and I want to work on building a much more profitable business, but I have to do both in the interim. This year I had told myself I was going to buy zero properties and I think right now I’m on title for seven new flips.
So like, I failed. But real estate’s kinda like that. You know, it’s like a drug. And I feel like a junkie. I’m like, okay, no more, no more. I’m clean. I’m not gonna buy anything. And then I start buying stuff and I’m like, ⁓ I relapsed.
Skyler (04:28)
chat.Well, you know, I find it funny that when you actually know what you’re doing, it’s hard to stop, right? As much as you’d like to. And on the brokerage side of things, what do you plan on focusing on there?
Marco Epifani (05:37)
So, two things I plan on focusing on, okay? I can sell a lot on my own, there is no doubt about it. But I wanna create an opportunity, I wanna teach people how they can sell as well. Because I’m noticing the biggest issue in real estate is most agents aren’t trained.And when I say untrained, mean, most agents don’t really know how to use their MLS. They don’t really know how to underwrite deals. You know, they’re looking at estimates and thinking that’s good for a CMA, the price of property. So like, I really want to focus on the training. And I also want to focus on creating more opportunity. Because the opportunity is not limited in real estate. I see a lot of brokerages and I’ve worked in some brokerages that are super competitive within each other and other brokerages.
Whereas other brokerages and other people in your brokerage already have the clients that you need to close the transactions you’re working on. So I think it’s going to be big on training, hard work and collaboration. Those are the big things I’m going to be working on.
Skyler (06:29)
That makes sense, absolutely. And that was interesting, actually, that you said it’s a lot of training on the underwriting kind of technical side of things. Usually in these type of industries myself, I come from the finance industry, both personal and business. So usually there’s a huge emphasis put on sales training more than anything instead of the actual technical side. What do you feel about that? Do you feel like in real estate, do you find agents need help on selling and marketing more? is it really like, hey, they’re coming out there pretty weak in the…actual technical parts of
Marco Epifani (06:58)
So I created a training course for my agents. Does that make sense? So it’s not a course that’s marketed, that’s sold. It’s like you join the brokerage, you get access to the course. The course is broken down into many different things. The first one and the most important one in my head, in my mind is the technical side. And the reason I say that is the marketing and sales is easy.Like if you understand marketing and sales and you know how to reproduce your system in other markets and you can do it at scale, which I’ve done, that part is easy. But what if I fill your calendar with a ton of appointments and you don’t know how to handle them? You know, so like that’s why I put a big emphasis on the technical. Like you should understand how to use the MLS. You should understand how to use your CRM. You should understand the sales and marketing. Those are all important. No doubt. I don’t think one ranks higher than the other.
Skyler (07:30)
Yeah.Marco Epifani (07:42)
You know, let’s say you were, and I know a lot of people like this, they are super skilled technically. Your pipeline is cooked. They have nothing in their pipeline. They’re not making any money. And then I know other people who their pipeline absolutely stunning and they have no idea what they’re doing. You know? So like, I think it’s important to work on both scales, but if you have to put one before the other, a technical skill needs to come first. And if you already have a technical skill, when you join the brokerage and we can just talk about sales and marketing, that’s my conversation. That’s what I’m really good at.Skyler (08:11)
Yeah, no, that’s awesome. Actually, I like that. I think it gives, you know, people that are new to the industry kind of just getting in, I think it gives them a lot more confidence that they actually know what they’re talking about. And in my opinion, that’s half of sales anyway, right? If you don’t feel like you’re faking it too much that you actually know what you’re doing. That’s huge. Like that instills a lot of confidence. SoMarco Epifani (08:28)
Scott, you’rean agent as well, You’re not.
Skyler (08:31)
I am not. I am not.No, I come from the finance world.
Marco Epifani (08:36)
Alright, awesome. I rememberas an agent, Skyler, the first time I had to put together the paperwork, I had no training. So like, as a 19 year old, these people were trusting me with the biggest decision of their life and nobody taught me how to fill out the purchase and sale agreement or the buyer broker agreement. And I was like, my God, I hope I don’t get arrested.
Skyler (08:42)
Yeah.Yeah, absolutely. you have somebody you could kind of, you know, could help mentor you through that or were you just out there on your own?
Marco Epifani (09:01)
⁓I reached out to my broker at the time and they gave me some vague general direction that was not useful.
Skyler (09:44)
Wow, okay, yeah, I can definitely tell you, because again, you kind of run into a lot of the same type of things in the finance world with the paperwork and everything, and there’s no way I could do it if I didn’t have people to lean on, so I give you a lot of credit for that. That’s awesome. ⁓Marco Epifani (09:57)
I wish Ihad a mentor doing this industry, but for me it’s been trial by fire. You know, so it’s been like moving really fast, trying a bunch of things, failing onto the next one, trying really hard, failing, and then eventually it got some wins, you know, there were some breaks.
Skyler (10:02)
Okay.Absolutely. No, that’s awesome. That shows a lot of perseverance that you’ve got lot of internal drive. So again, I really admire that. Absolutely. And what would you say right now is your biggest focus on the brokerage side?
Marco Epifani (10:24)
So definitely, that’s a good question, Skyler. Definitely streamlining operations for the agents. I would say that. Like agents, their job, they are real estate salespeople. They are meant to sell. They are not meant to sit behind their computer for 11 hours a day.Skyler (10:31)
Okay.Marco Epifani (10:40)
You know, so creating the automations for the agents is what I’ve been working on a lot. So you get a lead, it comes into your CRM, okay, the automatic 52 week follow up is in there. You know?those kind of automations that way agents can really scale and build wealth through selling real estate. It happens to be that most of my like my target audience for the brokerage is investors and high net worth people, you know, and those people like, I mean, you’re an investor, you know, what’s important. You want to know what the market is, you know, you want to know if FMR is one up, if your market went up, you know, those are the type of communications that we’re going to do. So provide value and, and still take, stay top of mind.
Skyler (11:15)
Nice. That’s awesome. So you’re going to be essentially taking care of the agents that are coming in to work for you. I think that’s huge. Again, there’s a ton of similarity there between the real estate world and the finance world just in the operational aspect. So I absolutely appreciate that. The more that you can give your salespeople on the operation side and let them go out and do what they do, go out there and do revenue producing activities, the more successful everybody’s going to be.So that’s awesome. And remind me, what area of the country are you kind of focusing on right now?
Marco Epifani (11:45)
I’m in New England, I do Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. So those are my major markets. I go all the way up to Boston, all the way down to Greenwich, all the way down to Newport. Like that’s Triangle.Skyler (11:55)
Nice, okay. And with the brokerage, are you searching for agents all across the country? Are you trying to keep them local to keep them kind of ⁓ in-house? What do you think?Marco Epifani (12:05)
So because a brokerage is new, I want the first 100 agents to be near me because I want to have the time to sit down with them and like have the trainings, have the meetings, help them build their business, you know, and then after after we train the first 100 and they’re producing and they know exactly what’s going on, then I think I’m to look to expand in other markets like Florida, the Carolinas, California, New York.Skyler (12:28)
Yeah, and I kind of reach out to the major markets on the East Coast here. Nice, I like that, absolutely. So let me ask you, mean, on the investment side of the house for you, obviously we talked about the brokerage, what are you, I know it’s hard for you to kind of get out of it, but are you looking for properties that you’re still trying to flip? Are you trying to buy them, hold them, a landlord, have an income stream? What does that look like?Marco Epifani (12:32)
Yep.Yeah, so I’m still buying properties. ⁓ Last week I closed on two. So buying two properties in a week is still like a lot for me. You know, it’s a lot of money out of pocket. It’s a lot of management. ⁓ I’m looking for three types of opportunities right now. I’m a developer as well. I don’t know if I mentioned that some building houses from the ground up.
You know, so we just need the land cost to be like 10 % of the after build value. That’s what we’re looking at there. And then we build it up and resell it. I’m looking for single families that I can flip. I used to do really intensive projects and I still can if the numbers are right, but I’m looking for more cosmetic flips. Like I don’t want to get the whole place. I don’t want to do all that. And then I’m looking for value add multifamily.
So a multifamily building where the rents are depressed, where it needs some work, stuff like that. Those ones I will buy and rent. The other two I’ll sell.
Skyler (14:22)
Okay, there you go. And again, is it something that you’re, are you really trying to kind of get out of that side and really just focus on the brokerage or do you think that’s always gonna be a part of what you’re doing just because, you know, it’s in you now?Marco Epifani (14:32)
I mean.It’s so tough, right? Because as a broker, it’s rare that you still get deals where you make like 100, 200,000 per deal, but they’re rare. Whereas with the flips, it’s been relatively easy for me to find those opportunities and get them.
So it’s really interesting that you asked me that question, because I don’t know if I want to get out of it. I might want to get out of the role that I’m in. Like I’ve been doing this for seven years now. I’ve seen some of the properties that I bought, fixed up and sold. Then they get resold for like 200 grand more, 150 grand more, you know, a few years after I sold them to the buyer. So like, it would be cool to hold more stuff.
Skyler (15:12)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.Marco Epifani (15:13)
You know,I wouldn’t mind doing that kind of business. The flips are, the flips are a job. They’re like a super high paying job. It’s like, invest 15, 20 hours managing a site. I get 80, 220 grand. You know, so it’s like hard to like.
Just be like, you know what, I’m not going to do this anymore because like, ⁓ and it’s also kind of fun. Like when you’re flipping a property, you’re essentially getting this super ugly rundown place that people have neglected usually for a long time and you’re fixing it up and you’re polishing it. And at the end of it, you know, you’re going to sell it to a family who’s going to move in there and make memories. You know, that’s like kind of the American dream. So like being able to provide the American dream to like residential people is really cool. Really, really cool. So I don’t necessarily hate.
Skyler (15:49)
Yeah.Marco Epifani (15:56)
doing that but we’ll see if I get out of it. 50-50.Skyler (15:58)
Fair enough. that’s a really good answer, actually. I like that a lot. actually, I think you’re going to have a really unique insight onto this, given your background and what you’re doing now. But what do you see in terms of what the market’s doing currently and where you see it’s going?Marco Epifani (16:15)
The market’s crazy right now. The market is so crazy right now. I find it very, very interesting. So on one hand, prices have skyrocketed over the last three, four years. know, like COVID was a thing and they were literally giving out free money, like 2 % interest rates. I’ve seen them. You know, on the other hand, now you have a lot of people that can’t afford to sell their home. You know, so like even though there’s significantly more cash in the economy because the values are up, affordability has changed.So it’s interesting. And now there’s like a slight pullback, especially in the single family residential market, because the rates are still relatively, they’re not high. Like if you look at the historic, you know, now people forget about the historical. Like when I started rates were in the six and now they’re still in the six, but you had three or four years where the rates were in the twos and the threes and now the six seems like double. So it’s interesting. I think it really depends.
Skyler (16:48)
Not historically. Yeah.⁓ Yeah.
Marco Epifani (17:04)
And it kind of sucks that the people in the administration have all the power over us, but the rates are going to determine what the market does at the end of the day. And then there are some, some areas that like, I’ll give you a crazy statistics gather. Okay.Skyler (17:16)
Yeah, please.Marco Epifani (17:17)
Do you know how many people moved into Connecticut last year?Skyler (17:19)
I have no idea.Marco Epifani (17:20)
It was around $230,000.Skyler (17:22)
Wow, okay. Yeah.Marco Epifani (17:23)
Surprise, right? Populationgrew 230,000. Do you know how many new construction permits were pulled?
Skyler (17:28)
I’m assuming a lot less. Yeah. Yeah.Marco Epifani (17:29)
a lot less, 23,000 roughly.So when you look at that number, then it just becomes supply and demand. Like 230,000 people moved in, 23,000 permits were pulled. There’s not enough inventory to support the population
Skyler (17:35)
Mm-hmm.Marco Epifani (17:43)
on that, it looks like it’s gonna go up in price, but at the same time, the rates are kind of curbing that because they’re bringing all the prices to an affordability standpoint.So overall, think 20 years from now, real estate’s gonna be up. No doubt about it. 10 years from now, real estate’s gonna be up. But in the meantime, there might be some waves going on. That’s what I think.
Skyler (18:04)
Yeah, Somethingthat you just got to kind of ride out there, I guess. But you know what’s funny actually, now that you mentioned people moving into Connecticut, and I don’t know, maybe you have more insight into this, but do you think it’s a lot of them coming from the New York City area, kind of with everything going on since COVID, if they want to kind get out of the city, do you think it’s that?
Marco Epifani (18:25)
So I think that’s a big part of it. I also think a lot of people from Massachusetts are fleeing Massachusetts now, the same way people are fleeing New York. So for some perspective, the last five flips that I sold, they’re all from people from Massachusetts or Rhode Island, and the flips were in Connecticut.Skyler (18:40)
Okay.Marco Epifani (18:40)
So likethat’s a really small sample data, but like affordability is much better in my area in Connecticut. And I know a lot of people have mixed feelings about the government of Massachusetts. So there’s been like a big push of people from Massachusetts moving down.
Skyler (18:53)
That’s interesting. Yeah, I wouldn’t have thought that. I would have figured Massachusetts and Connecticut kind of would have been fairly similar with everything, but I’m actually very surprised to hear that there’s a lot of people from Massachusetts heading down south there. That’s interesting. Okay.Marco Epifani (18:57)
Yeah.Yeah, and it’s growing like
crazy like Hartford Connecticut. Have you ever been to Hartford? Right, it’s nothing super crazy like you go to Miami. Wow, Miami is crazy. You go to Vegas. Wow, Vegas is crazy. You know, Hartford is used to be the insurance capital. Nothing spectacular about Hartford, but Hartford was in the top 10 best real estate markets in the country for growth.
Skyler (19:12)
I have, yes.Marco Epifani (19:29)
And that is crazy, right? Because it’s not a depressed market. It’s not like in the Midwest where the units are trading for $20,000. It’s still expensive. But the rents are strong. The economy is strong. Connecticut’s going up.Skyler (19:29)
Okay.Yeah, no, it’s, I mean, it is like a good for lack of a better term like middle city, right in between New York and Boston, it’s still, you know, it’s still urban enough to, to give you what you want. And you’ve got, you know, really good suburbs around. So, I mean, again, not something I would be thinking of, but as you as you say it, it does make a lot of sense. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Marco Epifani (20:00)
People are sleeping on it. It’s great for me, right?I’m a lot of stuff before like these big investors come in, which is great.
Skyler (20:07)
Thereyou go, very nice. And just real quick, I know you had mentioned too that you kind of work in Rhode Island as well. Have you seen the same type of growth in Rhode Island? Can you add any insight there?
Marco Epifani (20:18)
Rhode Island is certainly growing as well. Rhode Island is a great great market. The prices are high, the rent is strong. Rhode Island also has this very interesting culture about it. You know, it’s such a small state that it’s interesting. It’s like the whole state is a small city. You never know who you’re gonna run into. You know, it’s got tons of beaches, it’s got tons of, you know, natural beautiful things and Providence and Newport, you know, Placan. It’s a really good place to invest as well. Some of the legislations in Rhode Islandcan be little bit tricky. I know they just passed a new lead law that requires landlords to get certificates and whatnot, which is, you know, a little bit of red tape. In my personal opinion, Skyler, government should be like a referee. And when you’re watching a sports event, a good referee you won’t notice.
He’s not gonna call fouls outside of things. So I feel like the less red line, the less we notice the government, it would be better. But you can definitely notice the government in Rhode Island, if that makes sense. And in Massachusetts, the presence for landlords, how they impact us, it’s real.
Skyler (21:15)
Yeah. No?That’s understandable. And I, again, being from New Hampshire, I understand what you mean there. Absolutely. And yeah, Rhode Island, I love that state. I think on the Rhode Island coast is beautiful. I almost went to school there. And ⁓ yeah, that’s excellent. And now, yeah, Marco, we’re kind of coming up on our time here. So before we head out, can you?
go ahead, tell people where they can reach out to you, especially any agents around the Connecticut area that might be interested in joining the brokerage. Where can they find you?
Marco Epifani (21:48)
Yeah, Instagram is probably going to be your best bet. It’s at Marco Epifanii with two I’s, so my full name.Skyler (21:54)
Perfect. Excellent. Well, Marco, I really thank you for joining the podcast. I know I got a lot out of this. And if you’re one of our listeners and you’ve got some good knowledge from this podcast, please hit Subscribe. We’ve got a lot more interviews like this coming down the road for you. So we will see you on the next one. All right. Thank you, Marco.Marco Epifani (22:11)
Alright, thank you. You have a good one.Bye.
