How to Find Real Estate Deals Before the Market Moves | Path of Progress Investing

Carlos White (00:00)
So I look at the path of progress, right? So I look at city plans, I go to the city council meetings, a lot I feel like other investors, it might be some doing that, but it’s not the norm, right? So I try to get in the path of progress, I try to buy in the path of progress, even if it’s just a plot of land to that can eventually be converted into a multifamily a zone into a multifamily lot.

That is my pivot and that’s my trying to get ahead of it.

Scott Bursey (01:57)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros Podcast, powered by Investor Fuel. I’m your host, Scott Bursey. Glad you’re with us. And today we have Carlos White, managing partner of CRW Holdings, joining us straight out of Alabama. Carlos brings over a decade of hands-on job site and residential renovation experience, leading a family-run acquisitions company that purchases single-family and small multifamily homes directly from owners, wholesalers,

and agents as is with cash. Listeners, you can expect to learn how to leverage deep renovation knowledge into building consistent off-market deal flow. Carlos, welcome to the show.

Carlos White (02:37)
Yeah. Glad to be here. Glad to be here. Glad to be on. Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Scott Bursey (02:40)
It’s awesome having you on here, Carlos. And to help our listeners get up to speed, please give us the ninety-second highlight reel of how your career ignited and where you’re pouring your fuel now.

Carlos White (02:51)
So 2019, started wholesaling, trying to trying to get a little extra income, learn the ins and outs of the real estate game. Been doing it since. got more into my hands-on and wanted more rentals, long-term rentals. got into Airbnb pretty heavy. built my doors up to around seven to eight Airbnbs at one time. then I kind of started concentrating more on my more on my career.

and kind of so I dialed on down on the S short-term rentals and kind of pivoted more into midterms and long-term rentals, right? So, the duplexes, the quadplexes, trying to get more, bang for my buck as well. So that’s one of the that’s one of the key things I’ve been working on. Just putting getting more bang for my buck. Mostly families, small, multifamilies, but don’t forget about the single family single family home runs. if they’re home run deals, don’t make them work.

Don’t try to force them work, but dial more into the multi the smaller mostly family. Yep.

Scott Bursey (03:43)
Carlos, thank you for laying that out for us. And you know what really caught my attention about you was the way you’ve been able to transition over 10 years of hands-on renovation grit into a streamlined family cash buying operation across Alabama. And building off that, curious to know what would you say is the biggest internal strength that gives CRW Holdings an edge when securing off-market properties directly from sellers.

And wholesalers.

Carlos White (04:12)
Right. So one thing I haven’t mentioned, I’m an operations manager for Amazon. So I look into their operational efficiency, right? I look at the data. I make my decision off the data, but I also go and put my hands on the property, get a feel for it, right? Go with the gut. And that’s one of the strengths of the company. especially I started wholesaling. So I kind of know what sells in what market. I try to stick to the market I know. And

That works. Efficiency operational efficiency compared with just knowing the market, knowing what feels right to the buyers and or to the possible tenants.

Scott Bursey (04:43)
Efficiency, absolutely. And how has that specific strength helped you close cash transactions faster than competing buyers?

Carlos White (04:51)
I remove the headache. I remove the headaches that sellers typically are going through with other buyers. I remove the headaches. I know what their woes are. I know what their pain points are. I’ve been a seller as well. So I know pretty much all I try to keep it as easy as possible. If I can’t close within 45 days, I don’t want it. I don’t want to drag it out 60, 90, 120 days, anything like that. I just want to keep it easy, as possible for you.

Scott Bursey (05:16)
Thank you for highlighting that. And digging into this. What internal operational bottleneck or weakness is scaling? the family operation and the renovations in scaling have you actively had to refine recently, I guess?

Carlos White (05:31)
like the financing aspect. Financing, with the economy and things like that, it’s getting it’s getting a little harder. but that’s when you have to pivot more into the creative financing and lean more into that versus traditional conventional loans or and things of that nature. Right. So I’ve been leaning more into the creative financing, the owner financing thing, just making the deal work what best for the seller, and well what we well, we both can win and not just one-sided, not a one-sided deal. Right. So

Just making deals, work with financing and creative financing is like my go to right now.

Scott Bursey (06:03)
Looking at the landscape, Carlos, where do you see the greatest market opportunity right now in the Alabama small multifamily space?

Carlos White (06:11)
like this growing we don’t build as much smaller multifamily as other markets do. We kind of concentrate on the condos and you see those popping up every corner almost. But the smaller multifamily is kind of a underserved niche that I I’ve I hope to explore further as I get further into my investment journey.

Scott Bursey (06:31)
How you positioning your acquisition pipeline to capture condos and things of that nature before your competition does?

Carlos White (07:27)
So I look at the path of progress, right? So I look at city plans, I go to the city council meetings, a lot I feel like other investors, it might be some doing that, but it’s not, it’s not the norm, right? So I try to get in the path of progress, I try to buy in the path of progress, even if it’s just a plot of land to that can eventually be converted into a multifamily a zone into a multifamily lot.

That is that’s my pivot and that’s my trying to get ahead of it. Like it might not happen for another year, two years, three years, but that’s me trying to get ahead of it. So when it when I do have the funds or the financing secured to break ground on that, I have it. That’s ready to go. I already have the land, I’m just getting the permits.

Scott Bursey (08:08)
Spotting emerging shifts early really fuels long term portfolio growth. And let’s just shift gears here a little bit, Carlos. What external market threat or economic shift keeps you most vigilant when evaluating property rehabs today?

Carlos White (08:24)
Just gotta you gotta keep in mind that everything is rising, even the labor cost, right? So that you have the product, the equipment cost compared with the labor cost. But you also don’t want us, you don’t want your contractor to feel cheated when they when they finish a deal, right? You don’t want cause you there’s your partners as well, right? So you have to keep your eye on that ball. And it’s ever changing, right? And you have to have the backup to the backup to the backup contractor because

If you don’t keep them busy, especially in this economy, they will find another job more consistent, and you won’t be able to call them that guy. Or he might have, he might give you the, he might was giving you a 20% haircut before now he’s charging an extra 10% on top of what he used to charge and things of that, of that nature. So you have to kind of keep your keep that ever moving and shop, go put your eyes in supply the.

warehouses, plumbing warehouses, things but wholesale to kind of keep your eye on the ball is it continues to move the price the price in the needle continues to move.

Scott Bursey (09:23)
those relationships with the contractors are key. And what risk mitigation strategy do you rely on to protect your profit margins?

Carlos White (09:33)
So I’m hands on. I’m very hands-on when I’m not in this environment. I’m very hands-on. my contractors might see me two, three times a day. One time in the morning, one time in the evening, maybe in the middle, to bring them lunch or something like that. I just try to keep them keep them engaged, right? Keep them, let them know I actually care about not just the job being done, but also the well-being. I won’t you’re my you’re my partner on this job, not you work for me.

No, you’re my partner. You’re helping me get this done to feed my family, to enrich my family. So I’m helping you provide for your family as well. So I just continue to knock it, knock it out on it, build on the relationships, making sure they can trust on me and rely on me to do the right thing at that and not just for my benefit, but for the whole team’s benefit.

Scott Bursey (10:17)
Thank you for bringing that up. Protecting your downside risk is essential for longevity. And Carlos, for those listening that would like to find out more information that are telling themselves, hey, this is somebody I really like. What’s the first thing that you would like them to know about CRW Holdings?

Carlos White (10:36)
So you can come to me. I’m on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, everywhere, right? So I’m really I’ve got many hats. I have a lot of jobs. CRWHolding.com is where you can reach me directly. can book a consultation. I even I have like three businesses as well on the side. So they all kind of revolve around real estate. have property management.

software company, have you can come you can pretty much get in touch with me anyway, anywhere. Carlos at CRW Holding dot com and I’m always available. I’m always on my phone. I’m always handling some type of business or giving advice. That’s just that’s one of my passions, giving people advice, helping them along the process as well, trying to help them avoid the headaches that I I’ve had myself.

Scott Bursey (11:21)
that’s awesome, Carlos. And love to understand how do you combine your hands-on construction expertise with your cash buying model to navigate shifting inventory levels?

Carlos White (12:12)
So where we can cut or some jobs I know I can kind of pivot or do myself, that’s where I kinda pivot. Hey, we don’t we don’t need that. We can cut the timeline on that down from two weeks to down to three days, right? So I can do that myself if it’s whether it’s painting, building a deck, increasing the square footage or replacing a beam, replacing putting up drywall, anything like that.

Things like that I can do and I have the time, whether it might take a contractor a week, week and a half or something like that. I can probably cut it down to three, four days, just take a solid, hey, I have a couple off days coming up. I need to I work I work a little harder for myself than other people work for you. So I kind of put myself in into that and can see that before it happens and then setting up units and basically I’m hands on I’m probably more hands-on than normal people at my level.

So I like that I kind of implore that and I love that.

Scott Bursey (13:02)
I guess the big question is what primary indicator tells you a distressed deal is worth taking on versus passing on?

Carlos White (13:10)
So I tend to look for three ones, right? Where I can add another extra bedroom, bathroom. It’s kind of my sweet spot. I love that, love that spot, or a two one with an unusually large square footage, right? So you get a two-one that’s like 1500 square foot. There’s wiggle room in there to probably add a closet or add a bed bathroom to make it a two-two or a three-one, anything like that. Just trying to add that something in the code that you can do that’s simple.

You know, it might be an extra five, ten grand, but it increases the value of the property by tenfold with that the added closet or the added bathroom, full bath, making a half bath, full bath, things of that. Right. That’s my that’s kind of my niche and I and I and I look for that now. I kinda stick to that. I don’t go outside of it. If it doesn’t fit that buy box, I kinda leave it alone. those are distracting. Yeah.

Scott Bursey (14:00)
That makes total sense. And want to ask you, what does your professional network look like right now, Carlos?

Carlos White (14:07)
So my professional network has a lot of people all over the place. So our real estate agents, lawyers. I’ve started law school next year. So I’m out I’m kind of all over the place. I have inspector friends that own their own business. I have finance gurus that help me on the financing side. I have real estate agent for the MLS contacts. Also helping me with property management.

I also have a couple guys that I can call for anything, right? So if like I’m not there now, they can go like I had a problem yesterday. one of I just finished this house, they have plumbing or something was leaking down into the garage. It’s just every time the you let up the stopper, it just flood in the garage, right? So having a guy that can call and I know he’s gonna go do the job and he’s gonna do it right the first time.

I don’t even to double check or guess that he’s gonna do it right. He’s gonna take care of me because I take care of him.

Scott Bursey (15:01)
Thank you for detailing that. Strong relationships are truly the backbone of consistent deal flow. And Carlos, you have given us just a tremendous amount of great advice today on your market. But is there any other additional words of wisdom or knowledge bombs that you could drop for our listeners here today?

Carlos White (15:21)
Yeah, so continue to go. Like you if you knew

The 100 no’s, the 101 would be where you win. Where, why would you stop? Why would you stop at 99? Right? Just keep going. Keep going, right? Just continue, Just get knocked down, get up again, right? You get knocked down five times, get up, get up at the six, right? If you, if you knew, you’ll get told no a hundred times before the hundred, the 101st time you will be told that yes.

You’ll keep going. Like changing your mindset. Don’t say, hey, I got to get up and go take care of this property. I get to get up and go take care of this property. Some people are not fortunate enough to go have the same wherewithal that you might have. So looking at everything as a blessing and being able to get up and do it and is it’s the best blessing within itself. So that’s the biggest advice I would give to anybody. Just keep doing it.

might you might seem like you’re lonely by yourself. Just keep doing it, right? If it was easy, everybody would do it. So it’s it might be hard, but so is chipping away a concrete or breaking boulders. Everything’s hard. Everything’s relatively hard. but I choose talking to people and making relationships, building relationships as my heart. and I like doing it, right? So

Might be hard, uncomfortable at first, but eventually you get into a rhythm and you make it natural, make it kind of your thing you’re born to do, feel like almost right. I have somebody else that I kind of look up to. He’s like a natural relationship builder. He just makes it seem he can he can find the good side on everybody. So I kinda aspire to be like that. And I hope everybody else kinda looks toward people that can in their life like that and they kinda aspire to be like that as well.

Scott Bursey (16:56)
That’s some high-octane fuel right there. Thank you for sharing that, Carlos. And once again, for those of our listeners that would like to keep this conversation moving, you know, stay in your lane, perhaps collaborate with you on future deals. What is the best way for them to plug into your pipeline and reach you directly?

Carlos White (17:15)
[email protected]. I’m always on the emails. They’re I keep looking off now because I’m getting emails now. So I’m always on my emails. I’m always building something. have a couple great businesses in the pipeline that are finished, ready to market. I am actively hands-on founder as well. So I am growing those their real estate. I’m also willing to give your listeners

a high level discount. All they to do is email me investor fuel in and somewhere in the message and I would know they came from your podcast and I’ll make sure they’re took care of, right? So that’s pretty much it. [email protected]. I’m available all the time, right? I am on a time difference because I’m deployed, but I’m only deployed for two more months.

I’ll be back eventually.

Scott Bursey (18:00)
Carlos, thank you so much for joining us today on the Real Estate Pros Podcast.

Carlos White (18:04)
Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Scott Bursey (18:06)
It has been a pleasure.

Carlos White (18:08)
It has been a pleasure. Same here. Thank you.

Scott Bursey (18:10)
And to our listeners, we appreciate you. If you receive value from today’s episode, please subscribe. We’ll be filling your tanks with a lineup of elite guest, just like Carlos White, who are accelerating and setting the pace for the rest of the industry. Until next time, keep your standards high and your vision clear. We’ll see you in the next episode, everyone.