How a House Flip Led to a Bigger Commercial Real Estate Deal | Roger Real

Roger Real (00:00)
Land is same thing, same prospecting. The land just looking around and networking also and just activity. I’ll tell you how my land deal that I’m working on right now, I represented the buyer and it came from my listing of the last flip that I did. I was just listed that flip for sale and somebody saw that I listed that flip for sale and offered me.

some lots, residential lots, and they sent me the opportunity. I saw the opportunity, but I saw the commercial part of it. And I have a couple of buyers that I’m working with. So I saw that opportunity and presented it to my buyer. We ended up doing the deal and now I’m representing him to sell it.

 

Michelle Kesil (02:14)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil Today I’m joined by someone I’m looking forward to chatting with, Roger Real who is a commercial real estate broker. So excited to have you here today, Roger.

Roger Real (02:29)
thank you for having me. Excited as well.

Michelle Kesil (02:31)
course, let’s dive in. First off, for those not familiar with you and your work, can you share what your main focus is?

Roger Real (02:38)
Right now, I’m focusing on, I’m a broker with a wood my company in Fort Worth and I’m doing investment sales, leasing, commercial leasing, land sales, as long as it’s commercial. I’m not really focusing on residential right now, but I mean, I do flip from time to time. I also do business brokerage so I can help people buy or sell their business. That’s the main thing that I’m focusing right now.

Michelle Kesil (03:00)
Awesome and is this just within the Fort Worth area?

Roger Real (03:03)
Right now, yes. Anywhere in DFW. As far as leasing or investment sales, I mean, it can be anywhere in the country. My broker, my main broker, the Woodman Company, they have a national presence, so it can be pretty much anywhere.

Michelle Kesil (03:16)
Awesome. And how did you get into real estate?

Roger Real (03:18)
Well, before real estate, was an entrepreneur mainly. I had a couple of businesses that I started in 2004 and just became basically a businessman for about 16 years. Grew two companies in the auto transport business to, know, multi-million kind of like generating companies and just burned out by after 16 years. ⁓

at the top of the, I did speak on one of the companies I had about 40 employees. So it just burned out on that kind of business, that kind of industry. And I always had an interest in real estate and fitness. And prior to COVID, I just decided to exit that industry and pivot into something else. And I was going to go into fitness and then COVID pretty much kind of like shot me down. I actually opened a gym and I was ready to operate right at the time where they, you know, they shut everything down. So.

And then that’s when I decided, okay, let me pursue real estate and started, I actually started flipping a house in 2020 that led to me getting my license and being a businessman. I didn’t want to really go into residential except for maybe wholesaling and flipping. then I flipped my first house, got my license and then I just decided I wanted to do commercial, know, just being a businessman. And I used to also own my own property for my business.

which was a commercial property and I was already leasing to some tenants and everything. So I already had a little bit of a taste of commercial handling, commercial property and I liked it. So I was like, let me just pursue commercial real estate. So that’s a brief, brief story. Can go into a lot more detail. So.

Michelle Kesil (04:56)
Awesome. And so what does your role look like as a commercial broker?

Roger Real (05:48)
As a commercial broker, it’s, I mean, it’s, you know, same as almost pretty much every industry. I you have to, you have to find the people that want to either lease their space, you have to find landlords. Just like residential, I mean, you got to find either the person that’s trying to lease their center to help them. You got to find the tenants that want to lease the spaces if you’re dealing with a commercial shopping center.

If you’re dealing with investment sales, I mean, you’ve got to find the person that wants to sell it or the person that wants to buy it, depending on which side you are on. it’s still at the end of the day, still finding the leads, it’s still sales, it’s still trying to find that buyer, that seller, that person that’s going to lease. In the business brokerage side, you got to find that person that’s wanting to exit their business. So a lot of lead generation, a lot of effort.

whatever you have to do, call, call in marketing to find the right person that you can help. So pretty much a lot of calling, a lot of networking, a lot of talking to people. And that’s why figured I’ll do this, maybe attract some customers, somebody to help.

Michelle Kesil (00:00)
is your line of work mostly business to business?

Roger Real (00:04)
⁓

You could say ⁓ yes, but not necessarily business. Business is really more for the business brokering, obviously, because I’m dealing with nothing but business owners. But on the commercial side, I am dealing with the businesses when they’re leasing. But on the ⁓ investment side, it is investors, but commercial. It’s just people that own.

land that wants to it or that want a commercial shopping center that want to sell it. So it’s just different. So it’s combination, you know, but mostly, yes, you could say. But individuals obviously can also buy, know, individual investors can buy or sell whatever, know, combination.

Michelle Kesil (00:47)
So are you mostly connecting with investors then?

Roger Real (00:51)
⁓ yes, on the commercial side, yes, the owners of the shopping centers ⁓ are sellers or buyers. So on that end, yes. Developers too, you know, like a lot of, ⁓ like on the land side, you know, the developers, the one that’s going to buy the land to develop whatever their business is, whether it’s a restaurant. I’m actually in talks right now on a land that I have for sale with, ⁓

Tesla, the company to do a data, like a data center. There are potential buyers for a data center. So it just depends, know, it could be, I’m representing a restaurant operator also that owns about seven restaurants right now. He’s wanting to expand, so I’m helping him look for either ⁓ second generation spaces to lease, or he’s willing to also build from the ground up. So I can look for.

Michelle Kesil (01:21)
Mm-hmm.

Michelle Kesil (00:34)
And what do you feel have been some of the main keys that have allowed your business to be able to grow and run successfully?

Roger Real (00:41)
Um, I would say, um, just, I mean, uh, always, uh, just, just keep working, you know, keep hustling, whatever it is. Like, um, this work ethic is hustle is, uh, like this is a whole new industry for me. And, uh, you just gotta work at it. You gotta learn, not be afraid to learn. mean, just, uh, to me, it’s, it’s hustle work ethic. Uh,

Don’t be afraid to transition or learn something new. I started this transition pretty late. ⁓ COVID did derail me a little bit, but ⁓ it’s just keep working, keep learning, ⁓ do whatever it takes. If it’s being on phone, cold calling for customers, just whatever it takes for whatever industry you’re getting into. And I think in the beginning,

you had started, usually you had started at the bottom, you know, in any new industry. And you just gotta be also humble and, and put in the work and I’ll be, you know, just. Those are a few little things. I don’t know if you want more specifics, but that’s the general idea.

Michelle Kesil (01:51)
Yeah, awesome. And so what have been some of the challenges and obstacles that you’ve overcome?

Roger Real (01:57)
The, ⁓ well, as you’re aware, even though it’s been a few years, but the biggest one was the pandemic. ⁓ When I exited my businesses, I exited with the purpose of going to another level, to get into the next level. I felt I had done everything in that industry. And as soon as I’m ready to to another level and the pandemic happens.

So it kind of derails all my plans, everything that I had, you was planning to do. And in a way it forced me into a retirement. kind of, you since I couldn’t work, I took a little bit time off and some distractions happened. I took a, ⁓ I got distracted. I got, you know, complacent and I got comfortable and I kind of just, you know, stopped working and took it almost like as a little mini retirement

That was a big challenge for me. had to kind of like get back into that hustle mode, that work mode, that get out of like kind of like semi-retirement mode. And it’s been six years, you know, now finally.

got really going about two years ago. So it distracted me for a few years. Those are some of the challenges I faced. And then starting in a new industry, ⁓ not knowing a lot about the industry, you’re having to learn all the basics from scratch. I it’s a whole new industry, but I know business, so I leveraged my expertise from running two businesses for 16 years.

And that’s why I wanted to be in commercial because in commercial I’m dealing with people like me, entrepreneurs, business owners. I can relate, I can talk to them. A lot of them, they’re starting out. already got 16 years in. Some of them I end up helping, coaching, walking through the whole process. So it’s been a good transition, cool transition for me.

Michelle Kesil (03:48)
Yeah, amazing. And so how do you find like the leads for the buildings or your clients?

Roger Real (03:55)
I do, I like networking and marketing, social media marketing. So I enjoy marketing and I enjoy design. So I’m like a self-taught web designer, graphic designer. So I actually enjoyed that process. So I do a lot of, I do social media, quite a bit of social media and campaigns, you know, to attract for the business brokering mainly for the

Commercial broker is a lot of calling. Just basically figure out who some good prospects are just through the research. We have the programs at Woodmont to figure out who you can target and just basically reach out to them. Try to get them on the phone and you know, if they don’t have somebody that’s helping them or representing them and just you know, try to get them ⁓ to onboard with you and your company too so you’re able to help them. So combination.

And then networking, referrals, friends that know what you do. My multi restaurant operator came from a referral from a good friend. So just a combination.

Michelle Kesil (05:02)
Yeah, amazing. And so what are you most focused on solving or scaling to next?

Roger Real (05:48)
Right now, wanna grow the, my business broker inside, I enjoy helping people, you know, either exit if they’re wanting to exit or buy. That’s one of the main things that I enjoy and I wanna do. So I’m doing a little bit more marketing for that right now, but you know, I also enjoy the leasing part of it, of the commercial broker side. just leasing, helping people lease, find spaces and I mean,

Anything any opportunity that comes my way I just and to be honest, I just like being part of the deal helping people and then closing deals I like I like chasing the deal finding a deal getting on a contract I like doing the process and I like getting to the closing table and You know everybody walks away happy. Hopefully, you know, so just right now it overall growing everything over hugs in some in commercial

three, four years, you’re still, it’s being, there’s so much to know and learn in commercial. Even a few years in, you’re a beginner, you’re a rookie. There’s just so much to learn. There’s so many branches in it. So ⁓ I just want to grow pretty much everything as far as investment sales, land sales, leasing, business broken, just pretty much all of that. So I’m not focused on just one thing. It’s hard to focus on just one thing for me.

I gotta be doing a lot of different things. That’s how my brain works.

Michelle Kesil (07:14)
How do you find the land?

Roger Real (07:15)
Land is same thing, same prospecting. The land just looking around and networking also and just activity. I’ll tell you how my land deal that I’m working on right now, I represented the buyer and it came from my listing of the last flip that I did. I was just listed that flip for sale and somebody saw that I listed that flip for sale and offered me.

some lots, residential lots, and they sent me the opportunity. I saw the opportunity, but I saw the commercial part of it. And I have a couple of buyers that I’m working with. So I saw that opportunity and presented it to my buyer. We ended up doing the deal and now I’m representing him to sell it. And that’s the line I have for Tesla. So it’s just activity. You gotta be doing something, know, whatever deal you have will attract, you know, some kind of opportunity. So that came from me getting back into flipping.

last year, so I had paused my flipping and then I decided you know, there was not a lot of commercial opportunities I was finding and I decided you know what, me flip another house again, let me partner up with somebody and that flip led to this like that could be a multi-million dollar land deal. just activity, activity also. Yeah.

Network and yeah, and that came from Facebook ⁓ activity. So and they reached out to me from Facebook presented opportunity for me. And that’s kind of what you do if you have something you’re you’re selling you present opportunity you reach out to other brokers to other buyers. It’s just what do I have and how do I get it moved? You know who’s my potential buyer and then just either emails phone calls ⁓ text, you know, just.

Roger Real (08:55)
what do you have and what do you need to

do? if I have a, like right now I have the land that I’m marketing, so I’m doing everything that I can. We’re doing e-blast, we’re calling developers where, know, Tesla who’s interested right now came from an e-blast that we just send out to a lot of different brokers or agents or potential developers. it’s just activity, whatever you have at your disposal.

Michelle Kesil (08:59)
Good luck.

Roger Real (09:21)
⁓ I mainly use Facebook and Instagram. Those are my main platforms and ⁓ my handles is just my name Roger Real and DFW for Dallas Fort Worth. So Roger Real, DFW, ⁓ Instagram, that’s my Instagram handle, that’s my Facebook handle as well. And ⁓ the woodmont.com that’s the website for my broker. they could also find my contact information there.