How to Find Foreclosure Deals in Today’s Real Estate Market with Ray Contee

Ray Contee (00:00)
She was selling the house or whatever. Right. So I say, well, I know somebody that’ll take them bunnies. Right. So I called them up. They came over, took the bunnies. Right. And I just told her, I said, well, you know, let me know if anything else I can do for you. You know, I’m interested in buying your house. Right. And this is what I can pay for it. And she said that she can get something a little higher than that. I said, well,

Lisa got rid of your bunnies for you, right? Do you know that lady called me back a month later and said, I want you to buy my house because you’re the only one to actually listen to what my issue was. Those bunnies. ⁓

Micah Johnson (02:08)
Hello everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Micah Johnson. And today, joined by Ray, who’s been making some serious moves in real estate investing now for the last 25 years. Ray, welcome in, man. Glad to have you.

Ray Contee (02:19)
Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much. I’m over here in the DMV area. I’m just trying to kill it the best I can with these foreclosures.

Micah Johnson (02:27)
I heard that man. heard that well welcome in I’m excited to talk about it today one thing I I say on this show a lot is learn from people who are doing the business you want to be in Real estate change is quick. You got to be on top of it. So I’m pumped to learn about it, man You’ve been doing foreclosures for a long time. So ⁓ let’s dig in for folks who aren’t familiar with you yet You know tell us a little more about yourself and what your main focus is right now

Ray Contee (02:50)
Okay, I’ve been doing real estate for about 25 years. I’m also a real estate broker and I’ve been like I said, I’ve been doing real estate a while. I remember my first wife. had bought this course. There’s no money down course from this guy named Ed Beckley and she started laughing.

She said, you might as well go out there on Expressway and just throw $400 out the window. You’re going to get the same result. Right. But what happened was I stuck with it. And then eventually I had wholesale my first property. Right. Then I went from wholesaling to fix and flip. Then I went from fix and flip to the courthouse auctions.

Right. And I’m known as the guy that bought a house from the auction and it had a dead man in the house. I’m known as that guy that bought the house in the, but anyway, and then I got into a subject to finance and owner finance and tax sales and estate sales. But my main focus is the day is foreclosures, right? How to help people keep their house.

or help them if they can’t keep their house or I buy it at the auction or I buy it as an REO or I help them get the surplus funds. That’s my main focus today.

Micah Johnson (04:11)
interesting man. I love the journey and there was one thing you said there I want to you know hit on for a second for the listeners and viewers out there. It was a simple statement but you said you know I stuck with it. Your wife said you’re going to throw it you might as well throw four hundred dollars in the expressway and all the things but the key part man for especially for real estate is just sticking with it. Keep doing the little things and it will happen. That’s I grew up farming.

And it’s kind of handy to grow up that way because you start to understand how I call it, how time works, how to farm time, right? We didn’t, we don’t go plant the seed and then moan and yell and scream about it for the next three months. That it wouldn’t do any good. doesn’t make it grow. It’s just got to do its thing, but we got jobs to do. We got to do the little things. Well, right. You got to water it, tend it, keep the things out. And that’s what folks in real estate.

They want, they just want to get that deal so fast. want this so fast and everything so fast and real estate’s just not fast. It’s a, it’s a lifetime endeavor. Like be, be willing to do it for a long time and everything you want to come from it. And that’s what man, just sticking with it does look at this 25 years later.

Ray Contee (05:21)
yeah,

yeah, because I know a lot now like versus like when I first got into this, I would never imagine the things that I’m doing right now, you know, to help people keep their house and help them get rid of it if they need to get rid of it. Right. And actually buying houses from the auction. I thought I’d never do that because I always help guys.

You know at the auction they will get me to list the house right but they never taught me they never wanted me to learn how to actually bid at the auction right and now I can do all of that stuff now it’s just patience like you say it takes time to learn and you just gotta become a person.

Micah Johnson (06:48)
I could do it. You said it too. You do things now you never thought you would do. Same, man. It’s weird too. I was actually on a walk thinking about it the other day that there’s stuff I do now that years ago I wasn’t even open to doing it. I never would have guessed I would have done it. If you’d have told me, I’d have been like, no, I’m not going to do that. And it’s just, it’s a really, real estate requires you to become the person who can do the things.

You want to do a foreclosure deal? Okay, go become the guy who understands how to do foreclosure deals. Learn the process of it, the nuts and bolts, how to find it, how to get through it. And then you’ll get a foreclosure deal, right? And results are easy. It’s just action times time. But when you do the action long enough, that’s the part that most people fail at. And just how many times you heard the story of the guy digging the mine, right? And he stopped a foot before the goal and the other guy comes in, goes right in. It’s the same concept. It’s the same point.

Right?

Ray Contee (07:38)
Mm-hmm. Because what I realized is that instead of jumping all over the place, like, I’m going to do subject to, I’m going to do owner finance. I’m going to do multifamily. I’m going to do RV parks. I’m going to do mobile home parks. I found out you just stick with one thing, like foreclosures. But and just and just learn, you know, develop your skill set. Right. Take the time and learn all the stuff.

that you don’t know. Go from A to Z and that’s the way I think for anybody to be successful. Just start with one thing and learn that 100 % and then move on. That’s how you do things.

Micah Johnson (08:20)
There’s a reason Amazon only sold us books for nine years. And it’s one of my favorite examples of that same principle. if it’s easy to want everyone to be your customer, but if everyone’s your customer, no one’s your customer, especially in real estate. Cause each method, it’s a different business, right? Fixing flipping and wholesaling are two completely different strategies. They’re not the same. And that’s where you come in. I couldn’t agree more.

Pick a lane doesn’t mean you have to stay there forever. I don’t do now what I got started in real estate doing. And that is so completely normal because we keep finding our way, especially as we keep learning and finding that, least that superpower, that thing about us that brings us back to real estate that also makes us really good at it. ⁓ I’ve noticed a trend. If you’ll stay in real estate longer than two years, you got the bug. But two years is like the cutoff at two years, either hate it or you love it.

It either washes you out or you’re in it forever. That’s what it showed me.

Ray Contee (09:20)
That’s

the same thing like with real estate agents. Most of them are hanging around a year and a half to two years, but right around that two year itch, that’s when they gone.

Micah Johnson (09:29)
Gone, gone. And when I switched into real estate investing and this side, what I noticed is I change, I, over the years I’ve changed strategy about every two years. And that’s what’s beautiful about real estate is when you really dig in and get good, if you’ve gone, I got ADHD and I don’t say, and it’s fine with me, but ADHD lets me do my, or real estate lets me do that.

It lets me like be myself, get really good at something, build a system around it, get a process rolling. Now, okay, what’s next? This is the machine that’s rolling. Cause that’s, you’re a coach, man. You know what we’re trying to all do. You build it in a machine that trades in real estate. It’s not, ⁓ it’s not random. Like we don’t do deals by accident.

Ray Contee (10:13)
Yeah. And you know what I found out too? Like I paid for a lot of coaching programs. I’ve had a lot of mentors and what I found out is that you need a mentor. There’s nowhere around it. I mean, you could try to do everything yourself and it might take you five years to learn. But when you had a mentor, you can learn less than a year, right? And the mentor will

guide you around all these pitfalls and land mines and you know so you don’t lose a lot of money. No. Right. And. Right. But the flaw that I noticed with a lot of these mentorships and these coaches is that they give you all of this information and then when you go to try to try to do it then you realize it’s missing pieces to that puzzle and then you might have a deal

But you can’t reach them until next week on the next coaching call. see, and then that deal would be gone by then. That’s what I realized. The big flaw is with coaching. That’s why I try to help people with a one on one thing instead of group coaching. I just like to do one on one to make sure it is successful, you know, and I can help them from A to Z.

Micah Johnson (11:04)
Hmm.

Cuz that’s just-

Ray Contee (11:25)
and all these programs and I know what the flaw is.

Micah Johnson (12:02)
And you nailed the man. It’s a to Z. It’s, not a mystery how to get a closed deal. It’s a series of steps, about 26 of them. If you were really going to break it down into how many there are, right? Like it’s, it’s learning how to find the, do you find the deal upfront? Then how do you make the offer? Then you have no good negotiations. Anyhow do you put under contract? And it’s like step by step by step. when I used to train people and that’s how I wanted to show them is look,

Once you see the process complete itself once, this is all going to click. But the win right now is just getting to the next step. That’s it. It’s not getting the closing. Can you make the phone call just to ask them if they want to sell their house? Can you go to an appointment? What are the little things that create them? Because if you’ll go get good at those, you won’t have an issue with closings. You have built the machine that creates the closing. That’s what does it.

They do. you like, but working with somebody is the key. Real estate’s a team sport. I’ll expand it. Life’s a team sport. I love having mentors and not just for business, for life. It’s weird to be human. It’s a bizarre thing to wake up each day on this earth and do what we do. Anybody letting you know what’s coming around the corner is handy information, especially when they’re credible people who have put the work in and can show it because

Here’s something I learned a long time ago from folks that won’t pay for a good mentor or invest in themselves. They know how much money they’re saving, but they have no idea how much money they’re losing.

Ray Contee (13:33)
That’s right. Oh, it says.

Micah Johnson (13:34)
because I

Ray Contee (13:36)
It’s old saying this is education. You pay you pay for it once. But ignorance you pay a lifetime.

Micah Johnson (13:44)
Amen. Amen. Because it is expensive to be ignorant and it costs you massive amounts of time. that’s real estate’s already a long game. takes nothing in it goes fast. It always cracked me up. People running around in real estate being in a rush. Like, where are you rushing to? There’s nowhere to go. There’s like eight of us involved in this process and it’s not your turn to do anything right now. Like, what are you freaking out about? Right?

Ray Contee (14:11)
And

see another thing too, what I realized is this depends on your financial situation because a lot of these coaches they teach outbound marketing but they don’t talk about the inbound. You know how you see the people running the ads on TV, I buy houses, ⁓ all cash, no closing costs, we pay for you moving expenses.

And if you notice, they just keep running that ad because they make it money. That’s why I was saying it depends on how much money you’re working with because you could come right out the gate and get a boatload of seller leads. That’s good. If you can pay for like advertising for their inbound, having the seller call you versus you going out and trying to track down the people in foreclosure or the tax sales or whatever your endeavor is.

Micah Johnson (14:41)
Exactly.

That’s the beauty of money upfront, right? If you don’t have resources, you got to be resourceful. But if resources are available, it’s a major part of your machine, right? The four main parts of a business or five, we got marketing, sales, operations, financials, four, right? We got to get them all locked down and you have to especially control your supply. I was just on a conversation earlier with somebody who’s dealing with the fact that

Their strategy worked at a time where it was easy to buy properties from wholesalers and agents. Guess what? It’s not right now. It’s hard to get deals from wholesalers. They’re tighter and tighter and aren’t dealing with them. So his whole business model is starting to go down because, you don’t have the lead gen. That’s how important that part is.

Ray Contee (15:45)
yeah!

Yeah, yeah, a lot of them. ⁓

Yeah, a lot of them are seeing you deals, right? It’s like they’re looking for the greater fool or something, right? They’re seeing you a deal and they’ll tell you it’s worth 500 and it only needs $60,000 in work. But then when you go look at the cops and stuff, it’s only worth 400 and it needs 100 grand in work.

Micah Johnson (16:56)
Yeah, yeah, they most of them now have currently bought into the idea that 70 % of ARV minus repairs is all you got to do. And it’s just not it just isn’t. There you’re missing all your holding costs you’re missing and it’s consistent you’re off by 25 to $35,000 every time because you’re missing these same things that we have.

Ray Contee (17:10)
More to it than that.

their

entry fee and then and you know the cost of selling the house you know because the national average you know to sell a house with the relatives commission that’s like 10 % now

Micah Johnson (17:30)
You’re getting there, hard money costs, all the things. It’s building. it’s not random. This is not a, and that’s where there’s a big difference in real estate, especially about what you’re talking about. They’re the number one style of investor in America is I call them the mom and pop. They’ll do one deal every few years as it comes along, usually their neighbor’s house, but you don’t need a system or a process around it. It’s just random.

Ray Contee (17:34)
The point of

Micah Johnson (17:56)
That next layer where we’re at, the world we live, it can’t be random. It can’t be, because you don’t have a business then. If you’re trying to build a business, if you’re trying to build a business, every business trades in its commodity. What do you need to do? You got to set it up or it’s just not going to work. And a lot of folks get stuck on that roller coaster, right? You get that deal, but then you can’t prospect anymore. And then you get it closed. And now what? You got no more deals. So now you got to start farming again.

Ray Contee (18:24)
Yeah, that’s why I always try to keep five lines in the water at one time. know, yeah. So, you know, if one of them slows down and I’ll the one to pick up, you know, like I said, with the foreclosures, right? You you, you know, you got, you know, you got the part where you helping the people keep their house or sell a house, right? That’s one. And then you can buy them at the courthouse auction. That’s two. You can buy the REOs. That’s three.

Micah Johnson (18:29)
Right.

Ray Contee (18:50)
right? And then four, you got the surplus funds, right? And then on top of that, with the tax sales, you can use the same strategy as you do with foreclosures, right? They have surplus funds too and in my area, when a tax sale, when they had a tax sale, the owners got six months to pay those taxes. So, you got six months to get that seller to sell it to you because I always tell them, hey, I’ll pay your taxes. That’s better than you letting them

foreclosed on you and giving you a tax lien. Right. You know, but but that’s my thing is to have so many lines in the water. So if one slows down, the other one to pick up. Exactly. That’s how I always have constant deal flow.

Micah Johnson (19:31)
And you have to do it that way because we all participate in a market cycle. What real estate revolves, it’s always on the move. One channel is going to slow down. Foreclosure sells slow down in the boom. I got it started in 2014 on a foreclosure team in real estate. We had them coming out of our ears. About four years later, there was barely any. It wasn’t even a foreclosure team.

Ray Contee (19:55)
That’s

right. remember that. Yeah. It goes out. Yeah. It’ll slow down and you jump on something else. Exactly. You you got expired listings. You got long days on market. It’s a whole lot of stuff you can do.

Micah Johnson (20:05)
It bounces and that’s what you got to be prepared for as a business owner is if you’re to play real estate, it’s going to change. What’s the adjustment? Cause that’s what you’re wearing out. What’s beautiful is it just goes in your back pocket. Once you learn how to do it, you know how to do it. Next time it comes around, maybe a couple of things have changed, but you know the process. ⁓ okay. Like you’re back into a high foreclosure environment. Boom. Pull it back out of your back pocket. Let’s wear them out.

Ray Contee (20:31)
Yeah. And then they say they used to say, well, you can only get 10 houses and then here comes the DSCR loan. You don’t even have to have a job to get a DSCR loan. But the property that you buy has to be an investment property and your rent has to be more than what your mortgage is. Right. But all you need is a six forty credit score and

They have about 15 to 20 percent down your employment history and taxes don’t matter.

Micah Johnson (21:01)
All kind of ways now.

Ray Contee (21:03)
It is a way access is there

Micah Johnson (21:05)
That’s the thing. And you got to stick with it. Are you willing to go solve the problem of what you’re doing? And that’s really what it is. It’s just like unwinding a big knot. Can I unwind this knot? And if I’ll just keep going at the end, it’ll be undone. And then now we’re getting somewhere. Because that’s just nature real estate.

Ray Contee (21:24)
Yeah, but that’s funny what you just said. That’s the truth. I don’t care how many techniques you know. If you can’t solve the seller’s problem or really listen to why they really selling, you really just spinning your wheels. Cause once you find out like,

This guy, this guy I know he used to say you got to find out what the bunnies are. Right. The real reason why the seller is selling and then you just address that and then you got to sell. Right.

Micah Johnson (21:52)
And that’s what works. It’s such an interesting thing because folks get into it and try to make it not human and it’s an incredibly human process. when you’re playing the single family residential game and you’re buying direct to seller, there’s a reason why they’re selling their house at a discount. There’s a reason. Like life’s not being nice to them. They’re going through a hard time and that’s why.

Ray Contee (22:12)
All

Micah Johnson (22:16)
Yeah, and that’s why the value of solving that problem becomes so high. I’m sure you’ve experienced too. You really solve someone’s problem. They thank you and are happy for you at how much money you made. Great job. Like, because that’s really the benefit of it. It’s not taking from anybody. It’s solving a problem that they really have. Do you know how to dig it out? Can you find out? Because it’s also the most embarrassing thing they’re dealing with.

Ray Contee (22:27)
I’m proud of

Micah Johnson (22:40)
Right? It’s all of these little emotional things. And that’s where it’s so funny for single family. It’s a math problem and it’s a people problem. You got to do both. Well, it better. The math problem simple. The people problem becomes one of the hardest.

Ray Contee (22:53)
⁓ because I remember this one lady. She had these big bunnies. I forgot the name of them. In her backyard, she had two of them. They was big, big like pit bulls. Right? And she was trying to sell her house, right? But her problem, her issue was she didn’t have a home for them big bunnies when she moved. Right? So.

She was selling the house or whatever. Right. So I say, well, I know somebody that’ll take them bunnies. Right. So I called them up. They came over, took the bunnies. Right. And I just told her, I said, well, you know, let me know if anything else I can do for you. You know, I’m interested in buying your house. Right. And this is what I can pay for it. And she said that she can get something a little higher than that. I said, well,

Lisa got rid of your bunnies for you, right? Do you know that lady called me back a month later and said, I want you to buy my house because you’re the only one to actually listen to what my issue was. Those bunnies. ⁓

Micah Johnson (23:53)
Love it, man. Love it. And that’s where it’s so incredibly simple. You just need to know the structure of the conversation of how to talk to someone. in the end, you just need to ask questions and shut up. And how to get them to open up. And they will tell you everything they want you to know, everything you need. And you can use it effectively, like you said. And close the deal.

Ray Contee (24:06)
And shut up, yo.

Micah Johnson (24:17)
What’s really going on? And the fact that it happened a month later, I want to point that out too. It doesn’t always just happen right then either. It’s the fact that you did it and what it does. Cause she went home knowing I got a deal. Okay. I want to get a little more. We all want that. But as time does its thing and she was never going to get a little more because it’s like our offers are offers for a reason. We’re not making them up either. You know I’m saying? Like it’s very intentional. So she comes back and there she is.

And I’ve had that my career. How many people have come back later? Cause you treated him right that first time you were just square with them, helped them out. Whether you, it was you buying the house or not. Heck man. I’ve come through properties. They couldn’t have given me their house and I could have made a deal on it, but I’ll still here’s what you could do. Here’s one solution. Here’s something like it’s not me, but here’s something. And that’s what folks appreciate is they just want a solution. If you’re the solution, amazing, amazing. If you’re not.

No problem. Keep them moving. Spend that stuff in a circle. goes back to the relationships and knowing people and being able to do things. Cause you were saying you’ve got multiple things. You invest, you’ve got a brokerage side, you’ve got, there’s a lot of things going on and that’s how you just help more people is okay. I can’t, you don’t need me to buy in cash. I can list it for you. I can do this for you. I can do this next step. I can do this next step. And man, you build these little integrations into your business and

All you do is help people and you become known as that thing.

Ray Contee (25:44)
Yeah. And then they said, well, I don’t know you from Adam. Then I say, well, you ever heard of Zillow? They said, yeah, I’ve heard of Zillow. I said, well, I got over 103 reviews on there and I got a five star rating. I said, go in there right now while I’m going Zillow right now while I’m sitting here and put Ray Contee in and you can see I got five stars, four point nine five, right?

And I got over 103 reviews. Right. And I helped numerous people in coaching, get deals and stuff. Right. And, you know, it’s just that’s just something that I always wanted to do and doing right now was just help people. Right. Because I remember when I was coming through the rings, didn’t nobody want to help me. Did nobody want to tell me anything. Right.

That’s just like on my YouTube channel right now. I put a whole lot of information on there about how to find foreclosures, how to talk to the people, you know, how to get the deal, how to flip the deal, how to get the money, you know, how to wash, rinse and repeat.

Micah Johnson (26:47)
Right. The nuts and bolts. Like the real nitty gritty of what you I call them your activities the day of the living. The things you just if you’re going to do it. It’s what you get up and do each day. And I love it because you’re cutting. They don’t even realize how much time you’re cutting off of their process if they’ll just listen. That’s it. The shortcut is learn how to do it. And the only way to learn that faster is with other people.

Ray Contee (27:11)
But you know what though? It’s something inside of me that keeps pushing me. Right? It’s like, you know how they say you were born with a gift? And a lot of people, they got an old saying about this too. It was this guy on his death bed, right? And you know how they say you in transition?

Right. And he’s seen all these people around his bed. Right. He was like, who are all of you all. Right. And you know what one I’m saying. We are all opportunities that you fail to act on. Right. And he was like what he said. Yep. And and everybody was born with a gift. And I think this what my gift is is helping people with real estate because I have a lot of people tell me that.

Micah Johnson (28:01)
Love that.

It is in real estate especially handy for that you can find the area that you just excel and work. We can only do something so long for money is humans until drive is crazy will blow up our lives because it and our financial paycheck yes is very important but if you’re not figured out how to pay your emotional paycheck and it’s not going to last it’s just it’s if you’re doing stuff you hate all the time you’re on a very rough road to a pain you get.

Ray Contee (28:27)
that

right.

Micah Johnson (28:28)
Real

estate allows you to do that and that’s what attracts people to you. One of my favorite quotes is your vibe attracts your tribe. Where when you just show up each day and be yourself and literally work in the things that allows you to be you, it can’t help but be successful because it pulls your people to you.

Ray Contee (28:44)
It gathers them!

Micah Johnson (28:46)
Yeah, it just gathers them to you because it’s that’s what they’re after. There was a book out there called a thousand true fans. And this guy was writing about, know, everybody’s trying to you want this huge following online and all these things. But if you had a thousand people paying you ten dollars a month, you got ten thousand a month. And that’s not that hard. But you just got to be very intentional. Everyone’s not your customer. Like we were talking about earlier. It’s one thing. What are you going to be known for? What are you going to dig deeper? Where are you going to go?

and then you can sprout wherever you want after that.

Ray Contee (29:16)
Right, right. Because I hear a lot of people say, well, I haven’t got my first deal yet. I haven’t got my deal. Instead of them saying I haven’t done the work to get my deal. You see, most people don’t want to put the work in, you know, it’s like.

Micah Johnson (29:29)
right? It’s

hard for them to see it because they put it as just the deal where it’s the win is did you make five calls today? That’s your win. Not the deal. Not the result. Like let go of that.

Ray Contee (29:42)
Yeah, because you know, all of these little tasks at the end of the day, if you consistent over a period of time, the deal will come, the money will come. Right. But most people not consistent.

Micah Johnson (29:56)
No, no. honestly, man, the ones that I see make it the furthest nine times out of 10 are the ones that went through it to get their first deal that it didn’t happen fast. It didn’t happen because they weren’t just after one. Right. They wanted to do it for a long time. And you build the when you when it takes you a while, you build the machine that starts creating it. So when they do start coming in, it’s usually not one at a time. Like it’s a lot of things start popping when you do the work creates it.

Ray Contee (30:23)
That’s what.

Micah Johnson (30:24)
Where I’ve seen a lot of other folks, they hit that six figure deal really easy out of the gate and they’re not in the game anymore.

Ray Contee (30:30)
Right. They’d be fat and happy for a little while.

Micah Johnson (30:32)
Yeah, they thought they solved it, figured it out, and it was just luck. You just happened to be right there at that time. Very few use that effectively to create a real business later. Very few. Where there’s value in learning things. There’s value in hard work. Here’s what I’ve learned. Everything I’ve ever wanted was on the other side of hard, if it was worth something. And it doesn’t make it bad. I teach my kids this. Hard equals good, unless you’re making it hard on yourself for no reason. ⁓

Ray Contee (30:52)
You got that right.

Micah Johnson (31:00)
Don’t do that. It’s pointless to struggle for no reason, but most of the things you want is life’s going to require you to become the person that can do it. You’re not until you’re doing it. ⁓

Ray Contee (31:08)
That’s right.

everybody be doing it.

Micah Johnson (31:13)
And that’s why consistency is hard. It’s boring. Right. And that’s where, you know, in the higher level entrepreneur world, when you get some success and you’ve been going for years, a lot of guys get stuck in the high paid job, but not a real business because you’re just so good at doing. Right. Just good at it. that, doesn’t create what you’re after. doesn’t create the business that we want, the life that we want little consistency does.

Ray Contee (31:34)
Yeah.

Micah Johnson (31:40)
tiny little things for a long time. That’s what does it.

Ray Contee (31:44)
Yeah, because I remember when I had my job, I’ve been self-employed doing real estate full time for about 15 years now. But I remember I came to a point because I started doing real estate and kept my job. That’s what I recommend everybody do until you you build up your funds and then you can roll out like I did. I had enough money in the bank and I just had to see it. Right. I’m out of here.

Micah Johnson (32:10)
That’s it

Ray Contee (32:11)
But

you know, you don’t want to just quit your job and just, you you want to build up some cash first and then quit.

Micah Johnson (32:17)
You don’t want to put pressure on a dream too soon, especially financial pressure. You don’t need your back against the wall. We don’t do our best work from there, no matter how much you want to believe it, because you need runway. You have to have it. I love that you’re saying that. The time to go full time will become glaringly obvious. It is not a mystery. If you’re questioning it, it’s not time yet.

Ray Contee (32:38)
Hi.

Micah Johnson (32:43)
It is without a doubt when that moment shifts because you realize, wow, one, I have the money. I don’t need to be here. And two, my time is worth way more doing those things than these things. And now we’ve got the spot where when you leave, you got confidence, you got wind in your sails, you’re in motion. You’re not.

struggling every night to go to sleep because your chest weighs a million pounds because you’re worried about all your stuff and it breaks my heart seeing folks go through it.

Ray Contee (33:12)
like that too. When I had my job, would wake up three, four o’clock in the morning thinking about that job. Right? Right. But but now I can go exotic places. You know, I can do what I want. I can live the way I want and I can help people. Right. I couldn’t do that with my job. I couldn’t even go. couldn’t even take a vacation and go to Florida with my job that I had. But now, you know, I can go to

I can go to Brazil. I can go to Africa. know, I can go to England. Russia. There’s some big people in Russia. And I’m like six six. I’m like six six. Two hundred and fifty pounds. Right. Them people are big in Russia. They are huge. I said, I don’t know what they feed them jokers.

Micah Johnson (33:50)
Okay.

Woo hoo! Woo Woo Woo hoo! Woo hoo! Woo

Ray Contee (33:56)
But that’s what I realized is when I jumped out there, when it was time, you know, I could, you know, do what I want. I can help people. I can help my family and stuff. And it’s, you know, it’s really nice.

Micah Johnson (34:09)
It is, it’s already hard enough. Don’t make it harder than it is. And the majority of the folks that are successful did it exactly like you’re talking about. There’s this obsession with burn the boats, the old Greek story of burn the boats. it’s like, guys, one, that was the solution to a problem about 2000 years ago. And they were fighting each other. You know why they burn those boats? So no one would run away. Okay. We’re not going to die.

on the hills we’re playing these games in do not burn the boats. Don’t do it. You don’t have to. If it worked for you great but you don’t have to do it that way. It just adds so much stress to your life that’s unnecessary. And the point of getting into real estate is create the life you want right. And you’ve done it man. I love to tell folks congratulations because entrepreneurs we don’t hear that that much. It’s either you were always going to or I told you so when we fail.

And but man good job. You’ve got into it. You stuck with it. You’ve created the life you want, which is amazing way to

Ray Contee (35:10)
Yeah, I had one guy tell me one time he owned a mortgage company and he was flipping VA foreclosures. At that time you could you could get a VA contract on a VA property and then you could just assign it to somebody and get the difference. But he was telling me over and over. Right. But he had a horrible customer service. I noticed that. But he was telling me, man, you should never quit your job. You should never quit your job. Right.

But you know, some people, they just wrong when they say that to you because they can’t predict their future. Right. And that same guy that told me that he lost his house and now he’s living in an apartment. He don’t have his mortgage company no more. But not that I wish bad on him. But, you know, you got to have good customer service. That’s how you get referrals and stuff. You see?

Micah Johnson (36:00)
everything is a people business. It’s all a people business, especially houses. It’s not just about the money, but it’s one of the few businesses that pay you incredibly well for extremely good customer service. If you’re willing to go in there and empathize, solve the problem, show up for folks, you don’t have any competition. Just show up each day. mean, that was one of my favorite things. Go ahead.

Ray Contee (36:25)
Just like my wife, right? She goes to the courthouse all the time and buy houses. Cause she said, she said to me ⁓ a few months ago, right? I gotta find another house. I didn’t say, well, go down to courthouse and get one. Right. Let’s go down there. Cause I’ve showed her the process and I even go down there with her, right? And make sure she get one. You know, we might not get one the first day. We might not get one the second day, but on the third day,

We’re to get one. That’s right. Sometimes you get it the first day. Sometimes you get it the third day, but you always get one long as you put the work in. Like you said, you got to put the work in. You got to learn the system.

Micah Johnson (37:00)
That’s it, man. That’s it. Well, Ray, these are kind of conversations, man, I can have for quite some time.

Ray Contee (37:06)
I

see. I see.

Micah Johnson (37:09)
For folks out there listening in and tuning in that want to learn more about you, see what you have going on, what’s the best way for them to find you?

Ray Contee (37:16)
Well, they can go on my YouTube channel, Ray Contee That’s one way to find or you can go to my website, which is statewiderealestatediscllc.com Actually take the data out and it’s LLC.com. statewiderealestatediscllc.com That’s the best way to reach me.

Micah Johnson (37:43)
Excellent. We’ll have those links for Ray in the show notes. Like you hear me say all the time on the show, go check them out. If what you listen to today hits a nerve with you, go work with professionals, talk with professionals who are out there doing the business every single day. They’re living it and breathing it. That’s who you want to learn from. Ray, man, I really appreciate you being here. Thanks for your time, your story, your perspective. I think we need more folks out there doing it like you’re doing it, man, actually creating the life you want. So.

Appreciate you being here today.

Ray Contee (38:13)
Yeah, thanks for having me on. Thanks a lot.

Micah Johnson (38:14)
Absolutely. If you’re listening and watching in out there, you got value out of today’s episode, please like this episode. If you know someone else who think get value out of it, share it with them. And if you’re not a subscriber yet, you know what to do. Click the button, follow along. We’ve got more conversations coming up with operators just like Ray. Folks out there building a real business in the industry. Thanks for being with us today. We’ll see you all in next episode.