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How Maurice Watkins Built Real Estate Freedom by Buying Properties Cash

By January 30, 2026Real Estate Pros Show

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Show Summary

In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Micah Johnson welcomes Maurice Watkins, a seasoned real estate investor and broker with a decade of experience. Maurice shares his journey from being an active duty Marine to becoming a successful real estate professional. He discusses his focus on real estate investing across multiple states, including California, Louisiana, Michigan, and Alabama, and highlights the importance of taking action in the industry. Maurice also emphasizes his commitment to helping veterans navigate the home-buying process through his company, the Warriors Group, and his passion for teaching classes to empower others.

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    Maurice Watkins (00:00)
    I sleep better at night knowing stuff is paid off. And sometimes, you you get those tenants that don’t pay the bills and now you’re stuck with the mortgage. I just didn’t want to be that guy that stuck with that. I just can’t sleep at night when that happens. And I feel like my cashflow got a lot heavier, faster.

    And I don’t have to buy a hundred houses to cash flow, you know, 20 grand, right? can, I can buy 10 houses and cash flow, you know, 20 grand

    Micah Johnson (01:56)
    Hey everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Micah Johnson. And today I’m joined by Maurice Watkins, who’s been making some serious moves in real estate for about 10 years now. Maurice, welcome in, man. Glad to have you.

    Maurice Watkins (02:09)
    Thank you, I appreciate you guys having me.

    Micah Johnson (02:11)
    Absolutely, man. I’m excited for our talk today. I think our listeners are really going to take something away from one, your real estate journey in general. And two, again, something I love showcasing is how many ways there are to be successful in real estate and build your own path in this industry to live that life that you’re after. So let’s dive in, for people who may not know you yet. What’s your main focus right now and what markets do you operate in?

    Maurice Watkins (02:33)
    My main focus is real estate investing. I operate in California, Louisiana, Michigan, and Alabama.

    Micah Johnson (02:40)
    Awesome, man. So give us a little history. What led you to real estate? How’d you end up in the industry?

    Maurice Watkins (02:46)
    Basically, when I was active duty Marine, I saw people buying homes and I saw the passive income they were receiving. And someone told me, hey man, you you probably would be a good real estate agent. You were a successful recruiter in the Marine Corps, you know, pretty decent salesman. So you should try it. So when I jumped in the industry, luckily I jumped in and I saw some other people that were investing and my, my soon to be wife, had five houses already. And I’m like, Hey, how do you do that? I want to do that. And so I just jumped right in.

    Micah Johnson (03:12)
    I love that man action is what breeds success in this industry for sure. You got to get in there and then start doing something. So how long were you a realtor before you started getting that investing bug and getting that journey going?

    Maurice Watkins (03:25)
    I was a realtor about four years. ⁓ And then I bought my first property for a really low price. People would say, don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it. You’re wasting your money. And I say, you know what? think I’ll be OK. So four years.

    Micah Johnson (03:38)
    Right. And then you added another layer to your business. So you do real estate investing, but there’s a couple other parts you do as well, don’t you?

    Maurice Watkins (03:45)
    Correct. So I’m also a real estate broker. run a company called the Warriors Group. We’re all veteran group and we teach veterans how to buy homes, how to get their loans and whatnot. So that’s one sector is the Warriors Group real estate. And then my other sector is I do mortgages in all 50 states.

    Micah Johnson (04:01)
    Man, there we go. Okay. I like how you’re touching all the, I call it the spider web. In buying a home, there’s all these little things that touch into there. And again, real estate’s a big umbrella. There’s all these little ways that you can earn your income in doing this along with investing. So I like how you’re doing that.

    Maurice Watkins (04:03)
    Yeah.

    Right.

    Micah Johnson (04:20)
    Demon nine agents. I like men. I love your mission on helping veterans there. A friend of mine I used to work with, he wrote a book about the

    for veterans, same kind of thing of teaching them how to buy that first investment property when he got out, how to use their VA loan to do it with a duplex. when I met him, was like, man, that’s fascinating. What a mission it is. Because I mean, it’s already hard enough to buy a house not knowing what to do, but specifically that community, it’s a heck of a one to serve,

    Maurice Watkins (04:49)
    Yeah, yeah, definitely.

    It’s an honor and that’s why I do it for free. Yeah, Yeah, yeah, I teach classes. I teach about two classes a month. I do one webinar and I do one in-person seminar.

    Micah Johnson (04:53)
    Mmm, that’s beautiful, man, because you teach classes too, don’t you?

    Maurice Watkins (05:49)
    Sometimes I’m called on military installations around the United States. They’ll call me out off-line and I go do it there. So yeah, so it’s a labor of love.

    Micah Johnson (05:58)
    I heard that man, that’s awesome. Again, thanks for doing that. Thanks for providing that support to folks. Real estate is one of those things that can change your life forever. And it’s one we have access to in a way that we don’t really have access to everything that can be that successful. Not everybody can. And so the power of getting into it, man, building that life, changing not just your life, your kid’s life, your grandkids life. That’s why I love seeing it. It’s truly, it changes things forever.

    Maurice Watkins (06:06)
    Yeah.

    It’s really amazing, man. mean, when I tell you my life has completely changed since I started doing this, I was like, I don’t even need to do any real estate mortgages anymore. I can just do this. And it’s just freedom and it just feels great.

    Micah Johnson (06:35)
    So take me into your day-to-day now. What’s your approach, or what’s your investing strategy? What kind of houses are you targeting? How do you take them down? are you buying and holding? Take us through there. What’s your method?

    Maurice Watkins (06:50)
    Okay, so I started off doing, great question. I started off doing single family homes. ⁓ Sometimes I would get conventional loans where I would put down 25 % and at other times I would just buy them cash because in Michigan, I mean, it was like hundred grand, 50 grand here, a hundred grand there. And then I got into multifamily, the duplexes and the fourplexes, I got into that. So now I’m doing the apartment complexes, right? But it’s been the same strategy. I’ll save my money from real estate. I save my money from loans. also save, you know, due to snowball effect with all the rents that I receive every month.

    At the end of every year when the market is a little slow around October, November, December, that’s when I try to buy everything I can with the cash that I saved up.

    Micah Johnson (07:28)
    Interesting. And what about that method is important to you?

    Maurice Watkins (07:31)
    What about a snowball method?

    Micah Johnson (07:33)
    Well, buying in cash. A lot of folks leverage and do different things. So it’s like, I’m always interested in what makes people choose a certain one. Because again, there’s no right or wrong answer. There’s just what we all want to do and how we want to do it.

    Maurice Watkins (07:35)
    ⁓ yeah. Yeah, I mean, I mean.

    I know my wife hates it. She wants me to use leverage and I’m just like,

    I sleep better at night knowing stuff is paid off. And sometimes, you you get those tenants that don’t pay the bills and now you’re stuck with the mortgage. I just didn’t want to be that guy that stuck with that. I just can’t sleep at night when that happens. And I feel like my cashflow got a lot heavier, faster.

    And I don’t have to buy a hundred houses to cash flow, you know, 20 grand, right? can, I can buy 10 houses and cash flow, you know, 20

    you know? So for me, I want less liability, less houses, less tenants, the better, because I can function with my day and still carry on with my life. So that’s why I like to just buy them cash.

    Micah Johnson (08:28)
    And again, man, that’s why another reason I love real estate, that ability to choose your own way to do it. Cause you said it, you got to go home and sleep at night. none of us humans get to escape that. You can either lay down there with your head spinning with a thousand things you’re thinking about and your heart beating out of your chest. You don’t really get to go to sleep or you can do it the way you want to do it, whichever way that is that gives you that piece. Ultimately, that’s why we all get into real estate anyways, is to be able to go to sleep at night the way that we want to go to sleep at night.

    Maurice Watkins (08:53)
    Yeah.

    and where we want to sleep at.

    Micah Johnson (08:59)
    That’s right. That’s right, man. It gives you

    that ability to travel, especially post COVID. You can do so many things in real estate mobile now. I was talking to somebody the other day, now you’ve got online notaries. That’s kind of, I feel like the last one that we used to struggle with was getting mobile notaries to you, but now you can do it online. Okay, deal. Yeah, right. Someone signed out in Mexico. I guess I was talking to, I was like, wow, we really solve some problems now. Cause it does, it opens that door.

    Maurice Watkins (09:07)
    Yeah.

    Wow. ⁓

    What?

    Yeah.

    Micah Johnson (09:29)
    Now for you, like you said, what is it that keeps you driving still? You got the rentals, you got them paid off, you’re doing well each month, and yet you’re still being a broker, you’re still doing mortgage lending. What keeps that fire burning for you?

    Maurice Watkins (09:42)
    That’s a great question.

    I told myself I was retiring last August once I hit my financial freedom number and I hit that financial freedom number in August and I tried the four hour a day thing, you know, and I hit the reset button. I’m a little older, but I got a seven year old and I just got tired of going to the gym and going to play golf. said, man, I got to do something with my life. I still have all these people calling me.

    I might as well, you know, start working for my grandkids at this point. So right now it’s just generation of wealth, freedom and charity. You know, I like to give back to fraternities, boys and girls clubs. So pretty much, you know, I made the money to give it away.

    Micah Johnson (10:50)
    Man, that’s so cool. And I think you hit it something hard, especially in the entrepreneur world and real estate investors. lot of them I talk to, retirement is a funny word because it’s, all want something to do. Like, okay, I might not be doing this particular thing anymore, but stopping doing something, that doesn’t make sense to me until I just can’t do it anymore, right? Like you can maybe enjoy the gym and golf for a month, you know, have a great sabbatical.

    Maurice Watkins (11:15)
    That’s it.

    Micah Johnson (11:17)
    But like there gets to a point where you’re just kind of sitting there. And for men especially, yeah, men especially, we like to feel useful. That does it for us, right? Like that feeling of you’re doing something, whether it’s for yourself or for somebody else, but that feeling of being useful, it gives me drive. I enjoy it. It’s one of the things I try to make sure is in the work that I do that at the end of it, I’m not just getting paid financially. I can sleep at night. I feel good about what I’m doing. I feel…

    Maurice Watkins (11:20)
    That’s how long it lasts.

    Micah Johnson (11:45)
    I get my, I call it the emotional paycheck pay too. And it’s really important.

    Maurice Watkins (11:51)
    Yeah, yeah, I mean,

    it’s really just part of who we are. You know, we’re made to give. That’s what I think, you know, we’re made to give and give out gifts to the world. So once you get where you need to be, you know, my philosophy is, hey, give it back and help other people.

    Micah Johnson (12:05)
    Man, it’s a good one too, because it’s, there’s the story about Howard Hughes was an interesting one to me. If you studied his life at all, where at the end of it, he was kind of a pretty tweet guy. And if you read his journals, what he was going through, and if you get to the part where it all changed for him, he gave away his money. It’s literally what healed him.

    Maurice Watkins (12:25)
    Yeah.

    Micah Johnson (12:26)
    is giving away his money. The thing that was driving him crazy was this obsession with how do I hold onto it? How do I keep it from taking it from me, messing with me? And that spirit of giving, it literally creates peace. It will pour back into your life in a way that you’ll still make a bunch of money. It won’t keep that from happening. But it’s, yeah, man, I love meeting folks like that.

    Maurice Watkins (12:40)
    Yes.

    You get more, you

    get more peace giving away money than you do getting money. Getting money is, a lot of stress and confusion and everything else. But when you start giving it back, that intrinsic reward that you receive from that is priceless.

    Micah Johnson (13:02)
    I couldn’t agree more. And that’s where it’s where doing good, it does pay you back. Not that you only do it to do that, but it’s guaranteed. You will feel incredible after. There’s nothing like that true service heart where you go do something for somebody else, not wanting anything in return, and you will get stuff in return. You’re not even asking for it it will show up first in that, just how you feel about yourself. It truly changes you from the inside out. Then you start looking, okay, where’s that next chance?

    Maurice Watkins (13:32)
    See with the next one.

    Micah Johnson (13:32)
    I remember some of times

    I’ve made my most money in my life was when I was also given the most of it away. It directly correlated, right? Where it was like a conduit to life is how I try to think about it. Don’t block it up. Let it keep flowing. The more I try to pinch and hold on to it, it don’t work. It doesn’t help at all.

    Maurice Watkins (13:37)
    Yeah, that’s how it works.

    Yes.

    You gotta be a human

    Santa Claus, man. That’s why he has endless gifts wherever he goes to do a fold. You gotta be a human Santa Claus. Just keep giving it away,

    Micah Johnson (13:57)
    Love that, man. Human Santa Claus all year long.

    Why wait for one day? We got this. Get the other 364. Well, what’s your big opportunity for 2026, Maurice? What are you excited about?

    Maurice Watkins (14:02)
    Man, yep.

    ⁓ so I just really learned like the tax thing with houses and whatnot. I really learned that. ⁓ I’m excited to scale cause initially last year was like, I’m not scaling, I’m retiring or whatever, but for some reason I’ve got this globe and I’m like, you know what? I’m really enjoying this ride and this journey. So I just want to scale my team, make it bigger. I just signed a deal with a new opportunity to, you know, to even help my team out. so just scale the team, you know, help everybody else win. That’s my goal to help everybody else win.

    Micah Johnson (14:37)
    Who do you look for on your team? Who’s your ideal candidate?

    Maurice Watkins (14:40)
    ⁓ Somebody that’s motivated, somebody that’s got time, know, because a lot of people don’t have time, somebody that’s got time, somebody that is not greedy, you know, ⁓ and people that come to give and not take.

    Micah Johnson (14:53)
    And I love all those factors because they’re all the things before the other skills that you have that make you good at sales that make you good at real estate. They’re all the soft skills because this is a people business.

    You can make some sales doing the opposite of the four of those you chose, but it ruined your name and your everything in the industry. Quicker, you can shake stick at it where that person you just described again, your

    Maurice Watkins (15:55)
    Thanks. ⁓

    Micah Johnson (16:00)
    They’re helping with the largest financial transaction that most people go through in a lifetime. It’s a huge deal. Being a good person is a big part of it. I was surprised when I got into real estate learning. Real estate in America has the oldest written code of ethics. It’s the oldest one. No industry has an older one than ours because we’ve known for a long time. This is a big deal. It’s a huge deal selling property and houses. People can lose a lot, gain a lot, and the folks that are in the middle, we got to be upstanding.

    Maurice Watkins (16:21)
    Yeah.

    Micah Johnson (16:29)
    I used get frustrated with him. I remember telling one person, he was complaining about how people were saying realtors are like used car salesmen. just asked him, said, you acting like one? People don’t just say that stuff, Something’s happening if we’re getting that reputation. Are you participating or are you helping? Because if you’re just complaining about it, that ain’t gonna do us any good. How are we gonna change the situation?

    Maurice Watkins (16:41)
    Yeah.

    Yeah. Right.

    Take some action.

    Micah Johnson (16:58)
    Right, right.

    Go be the good out in the world. That’s the guy who taught me real estate, he said one my favorite things. He Michael, there’s no competition in this industry. You’ll just show up every day and work. You do not have to worry about it because most people in real estate don’t. Very few do deals. It is, man. Very few. He’s like, if you look at the statistics of those who have licenses and those who do deals, very few of them do anything, man. If you just show up every day and go,

    Maurice Watkins (17:13)
    Mmm, that’s powerful. Yeah, that’s powerful.

    Micah Johnson (17:28)
    You’re unstoppable. Don’t worry about anybody else selling houses around you. You will always have your own houses to buy and sell. And he was 100 % right. I’m so glad he told me.

    Maurice Watkins (17:36)
    Man, I’ll tell you.

    Yeah, I’ll tell you, he’s exactly right, man, because when I started out, I would see people mimicking and copying me on social media and all these different things. And I had to realize, oh, you know, this is my gift. This is what God gave me. They need to operate inside of their gift. So they were operating in something else. They didn’t have the work ethic, the hustle. They didn’t have any of that. And I watched all of them do this. You know, I’m just like, I didn’t wish for anybody to fail, but I really learned to just look at my lane and not look at anybody else and just show up like you just said.

    Micah Johnson (18:05)
    Just it’s in the end, I was talking with someone the other day on the show, and they’re, they run a consulting group where they’re talking about ⁓ using real estate to create the life of purpose that you’re trying to live. And I love their viewpoint on it, because again, it lines up with that thing behind it, right? Real estate is a tool. It’s not an end all be all it creates the life you want to live. And when you if you really are into it, then there’s purpose involved. How are you using it layering that way into your life, you know, because it

    Maurice Watkins (18:19)
    Yeah.

    Micah Johnson (18:35)
    Man, you get to show up when you quit worrying about everybody around you. Don’t chase the shiny object part. You get, you’re free in your life. You find the freedom that you’re always saying you were actually looking for. Cause if you do it the opposite way, now I’m just looking at Maurice and I, what’s he doing? Why ain’t it working for me? What’s he doing? Why ain’t it working for me versus the do your thing? Which way do you want to do it? Do you like to do it? I learned most folks don’t do it the way they want when they first get in. So pivot real estate’s huge. That’s the beauty of it.

    Maurice Watkins (18:47)
    You’re

    Right.

    Micah Johnson (19:05)
    You can do different aspects and still keep it in your life.

    Maurice Watkins (19:09)
    Yep, yep, do you at the end of the day, whatever you looks like do that. But work hard.

    Micah Johnson (19:13)
    That’s right. It lines up with my,

    another quote, your vibe attracts your tribe. When you just do you and just man, unapologetically being yourself, doing your thing, loving what you do, it just boom, it attracts people to you. It will pull everybody you could want to you. Cause that’s what we’re all after anyways. In the end, man, I’m 40. I’ve been sold to my whole life.

    Maurice Watkins (19:31)
    Bob Attraction Trial.

    Micah Johnson (19:40)
    There’s been PhDs in sales now for 80 years. So we have all been professionally sold to for a very long time. So when someone shows up, not selling anything, just being themselves, it cuts right through the noise. And usually you’ll buy anything from them because they’re just being straight with you. They’re telling you the truth. They’ll tell you, hey, you don’t need this, right? I’ve learned telling no to people felt way better than saying yes sometimes because you really didn’t need this.

    Maurice Watkins (19:53)
    Yeah.

    real person.

    yeah.

    Micah Johnson (20:09)
    This is

    Maurice Watkins (20:09)
    Yeah.

    Micah Johnson (20:10)
    not what you need to do based on your goals and what you told me. I don’t think this is right versus, okay, let’s do it. And I’ll make some money. like, but I don’t want to just make money one time. I want to do it a bunch of times. Right.

    Maurice Watkins (20:16)
    Yeah.

    Yeah. Yeah. I want to help you and you’re to

    help. You’re to refer me people because I helped you, you know, so that makes sense. Your Bible is actually a tribe. I’m going keep that one. I’m that one down.

    Micah Johnson (20:28)
    Exactly,

    use it, man. Say it everywhere. I love it. I took it from someone else. So just keep on borrowing. It’s good. And you get to travel around and speak too. So I want to start hearing that more and more. It’s going to be coming out. it’s spreading the word. Well, man, I’ve really enjoyed our conversation today. I love meeting real authentic people in the business that are doing it their way, sharing their gift. Like you said earlier with the world, literally just being you.

    Maurice Watkins (20:38)
    Pass it down. Yeah.

    okay. That is it.

    Micah Johnson (20:58)
    and having that effect, not just your own family, but your team members, your customers, just it’s reverberating out, man. So thanks for doing that. If someone wanted to find out more about, go ahead.

    Maurice Watkins (21:06)
    No problem. Thank you for having me.

    no, I said thank you for having me.

    Micah Johnson (21:12)
    absolutely, man. So glad you were

    here. If someone wanted to find out more about you, learn what you got going on. What’s the best way for them to find you?

    Maurice Watkins (21:18)
    Okay, so I’m Maurice Watkins on Facebook, on Instagram, I’m Maurice the Marine Broker, on TikTok, I’m Maurice the Marine Investor, and you can reach out to me at 760-207-8719 is my number.

    Micah Johnson (21:30)
    Excellent man. Thanks for sharing that for those of you watching and listening you’ll be able to for sure find Maurice’s information in the show notes Reach out to him say you could be a good fit joining that team. He’s trying to grow again Maurice Thanks so much for joining us appreciate you today for those that are listening if you got value out of today’s episode Please like this episode share it with someone else that you think you get value out of it. Please don’t forget to subscribe We appreciate appreciate everybody who follows along with us. We’ve got more conversations coming up with operators Just like Maurice who are out there

    building real businesses, living life on their own terms. So thanks again. We’ll see you on the next episode.

    Maurice Watkins (22:05)
    All right, take care.

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