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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Erika speaks with Sharif Refaie, a real estate agent and entrepreneur who has successfully merged technology with real estate through his platform, Sell by Owner. Sharif shares his journey from becoming a real estate agent to launching his own brokerage and innovative services that prioritize customer experience. He discusses the importance of networking, transparency in transactions, and the role of AI in enhancing technology solutions in the real estate market. The conversation also touches on marketing strategies and future plans for growth in a competitive landscape.
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Sharif (00:00)
Yeah, mean, you know, I started, but when I started buying investment properties, there was a lot of people, distressed sellers or sellers that just didn’t want to use agents. They either had bad experiences, maybe like I did, or they were just trying to save money because they were trying to just like sell the home and not pay a significant fee up to 6%, you know, in commissions. So I had a light bulb moment. like,You know, everything that’s out there today for sell by owner or for sale by owner is not the best.
being from the technology
the experience is subpar.
It literally just slapped your property on their platform. That is it. So I wanted to do something that was meaningful.
protect users
users through the whole transaction from listing to getting offers to getting to requests to accepting an offer and walking them through that whole process
Erika (02:22)
everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Erika. And today I’m joined by someone that I’ve been looking forward to chat with, Sharif Refaie. He’s been making serious moves in the real estate world. Sharif, I’m glad to have you on the show today.Sharif (02:39)
Erika pleasure to be on big fan of the podcast.Erika (02:43)
Well, I’m so excited to dive in. Sharif 4, our listeners who aren’t familiar with your world, tell us about your journey. How did you get started in real estate?Sharif (02:56)
Yeah, I’ll try to shorten the story. It’s a little bit of a long one, but ⁓ I’ve been a real estate agent for a little over seven years now. And it really started from me just looking for my personal residential home. When I moved to Chicago from Florida, that’s where I’m originally ⁓ from. I was looking for a property here to purchase. I was newly engaged and we were kind of planning the home buying process. And, you know, I did what anybody did, which is go online and try to find an agent.I found one and I honestly didn’t have a great experience. They weren’t really able to be flexible with my time schedule. So I got this idea of like, let me just knock out and get my real estate license. And I was able to acquire it within like six weeks, I believe it was. And after I got my license, I obviously had full access to all the homes and was able to go see them pretty much anytime that worked for me. yeah, ⁓ since then I bought my property 30 days later.
and been helping people within the real estate world. I also have a background in technology. Obviously, I work with a company ⁓ that builds technology solutions in the financial space. ⁓ that’s a passion of mine. So really merging technology and real estate together has kind of been my passion since.
Erika (04:13)
That’s really cool. the agent side, was there kind of ⁓ a moment with you that you were like, hey, doing this wasn’t just for me and just to buy my house. What was that like?Sharif (04:24)
Yeah, I enjoy working with people. As a younger kid, I always grew up in the service industry, helping my family. They had a convenience store and restaurants and kind of having that service side of thing. I’ve always loved working with people. ever since I got my license and purchased my home, like, this is not that bad. And I actually enjoy it. So I’ll do it on my free time. as friends and family were starting to look for real estate,That’s kind how I started. Your network is your net worth, as they say. really it was, ⁓ and even till today, for residential real estate, I focus primarily on people that I’ve met or networked with or friends and family. ⁓ Obviously if somebody finds me online or whatnot, I do work with them as well. ⁓ I have started a brokerage as well and have a couple of agents that primarily full-time just do the real estate residential side and I’ve been able to…
work with them and train them and make sure they have the best ⁓ experience and provide the best experience for individuals looking for homes and investment properties.
Erika (05:33)
You were talking about how you merged real estate and technology together. Was there kind of a moment that you noticed a theme when it came to, you know, ⁓ there being a lack in the market that you were going to fill? What was that like?Sharif (06:37)
Yeah, mean, you know, I started, but when I started buying investment properties, there was a lot of people, distressed sellers or sellers that just didn’t want to use agents. They either had bad experiences, maybe like I did, or they were just trying to save money because they were trying to just like sell the home and not pay a significant fee up to 6%, you know, in commissions. So I had a light bulb moment. like,You know, everything that’s out there today for sell by owner or for sale by owner is not the best.
know, if you go to like some of the, I don’t want to mention any names, but if you go to some of the ones that have been doing it for a long time,
the experience is subpar.
I mean,
being from the technology
and understanding customer experiences, which are very close to in the tech world, ⁓ it wasn’t the best and it didn’t really provide a lot of guidance.
It literally just slapped your property on their platform. That is it. So I wanted to do something that was meaningful.
that was going to
protect users
with ID verification that was going to
users through the whole transaction from listing to getting offers to getting to requests to accepting an offer and walking them through that whole
So, that’s what we’ve created today with Sell by Owner. It’s a full end-to-end platform and it also has a network of connections within it. So, if you need an attorney, you get a legal referral service that’s built within the app.
It basically sends you out to, I would say, similar to Angie’s list for attorneys. You put in your address and it finds attorneys in the area with reviews, ⁓ title companies, ⁓ property inspection companies for a buyer. We basically connect you with any service you need within the real estate world. And this allows you to save money and it allows you to walk through these steps, which I thought was critical. Not saying the agents useless, there are properties maybe especially like
luxury properties or sometimes some commercial properties may require an agent to kind of assist with that process. There is a little bit more complexities, but I’ve built it all. I’ve even built it for investment properties as well where users could go in there, see the cash flow, see the returns on the property and be able to make an offer on it directly through the app.
Erika (08:48)
You know, sell by owner, you are blending two competitive industries, real estate and tech. What’s been key to launching that and keeping that machine running so smoothly for you so far?Sharif (09:01)
⁓ So I officially launched it this year. I would say AI really sped up the technology process. What I built usually would have taken, in my typical world with project managing and kind of looking at timelines and whatnot, it would have taken probably almost close to two years. With AI and working with the right partners, I was able to build it, obviously, within 12 months, almost. ⁓Obviously, there’s been lot of back and forth analysis paralysis to figure out like, should we build this or that? And just prioritizing that, I think took more time than actually building the solution itself. But I would say AI really sped up the process. And not to say AI is all over the app, right? There’s some AI solutions within the app, but it was built on the basis of being able to speed up the… ⁓
the process of building the app and building the features within there.
Erika (10:02)
And you know, your model is a little bit different in some other ways. How does it stand out from other platforms for sellers?Sharif (10:11)
Yeah, so mean, today anybody could list a property on any social media, Craigslist, ⁓ you know, Facebook or sell by owner like the sales, sell by owner.com. ⁓ The difference is, again, we focus on the customer experience, walking them through the journey, pulling data for them. So as you put in your address, we pull primary data from from a real estate API to basically fill in your bedrooms and bathrooms. So making the experience much better.We have a built-in AVM model so you could actually get an estimate pricing of your home and look at the comps in the area to make sure that you’re pricing it correctly or we connect you with an appraisal, ⁓ you know, appraiser so that way you could get an appraisal on the property and be more comfortable with the price. ⁓ And then the magic happens when you receive the offer. When you receive the offer is where we have a whole checklist that walks you both as a buyer and a seller through all the steps needed to closing and we connect you with
real estate professionals if needed. Again, like I mentioned earlier, attorneys, property inspection companies, title companies, ⁓ you know, the list goes on. So making sure that end-to-end transaction, every step of the way, you have help if you need it. These services are optional. ⁓ Obviously, they’re third-party affiliates, but if you choose or need help or get stuck, ⁓ that’s where you’ll be able to get assistance. And then we also have, you know,
huge repository of ⁓ FAQs and an AI chat bot within the app that basically could answer a majority of questions. And if not, it goes to one of our professionals that are well-trained to help you in any piece of the process that you’re stuck in. And then also the pricing, sorry, finally. That’s where we also are different. It’s a flat fee versus a percentage, and you only pay at closing. So it’s free to list the property, you get the traction.
You get the offer and once it’s accepted and closed, that’s the only point you pay. Currently it’s priced at $499. That’s it.
Erika (12:49)
I love how well-rounded the sell by owner I.O. approaches. That’s really exciting. And you personally took things kind of a step further in the wide range of services that you offer because you now have a brokerage too. Tell me about what’s that been like that got started up this year, right?Sharif (13:10)
Yeah, yeah, so ⁓ originally I was part of ⁓ a broker that I was pretty happy with but ⁓ I wanted to do things my way and it was completely different. Obviously they focus on like the flat fee for agents so agents don’t pay a percentage of their commission they just pay a flat fee per transaction. For me I wanted to kind of give that to the buyers as well or sellers so I have a 1 % flat fee ⁓ for the full listing service. I have a $89flat fee for just listing your property in the MLS. Obviously with that, you would have to work on your own, know, any, my fiduciary duties to make sure I get you the offer or anybody that wants to see the property, but really it’s just ⁓ me putting it in the MLS is what you’re getting. ⁓ I had an idea to pair that with Sell-By-Owners. Sell-By-Owners is its own platform, right? It’s a marketplace, technology marketplace for real estate, but with Smart Properties, could…
do a flat fee listing as well. So you could kind of get it on the platform or on the app and you could also have it on the MLS to get more eyeballs on your property. So, and it’s a cheaper alternative because it’s only $89. I also came up with the cash back rebate program. So, you know, if, and it’s tiered based on how many times I show you the property. So if you already know the property you want and just want an agent to help with the transaction,
or like the contractual piece or writing the contract or whatnot or just ask any questions, we basically have it tiered. So if it’s zero to one times, for example, we give you a certain percentage ⁓ cash back from our commission. So ⁓ that’s been really popular lately. We have gotten a good uptick on that. ⁓ And we do the same for rentals. I do have a couple of agents in my brokerage that focus on rentals. So, you know, obviously it’s a little bit less than purchasing a property.
but you do also get cash back if we’re getting a commission on the rental ⁓ as we find you the property and it’s based on that tier of like, if we go one day with you and spend the day and we find the property of your dreams or the one that you want to rent, we give you a percentage back, which is the highest and then it just windows down. Obviously when you get to like five plus days, it goes down to the lowest tier, but you still get something back. So for me, it’s providing something to the users depending on how much effort and time we’re putting into it versus today it’s like,
⁓ Hey, 3 % for our seller fee, 3 % for our buyer fee. We want to make sure that it’s tiered based on the level of effort and time we’re spending with you.
Erika (16:25)
Sharif, you said you wanted to provide something there, which is great. Now for the podcast. I’m hoping you can provide us a story here. know, every real estate pro has a moment where things go sideways. Maybe you had to completely pivot on a deal. Maybe, you know, there was something that went wrong with the listing. Sharif, can you share one of those moments on your journey and what you learned from that?Sharif (16:52)
⁓ Sure. Man, there’s so many. mean, real estate is never a smooth transaction sometimes, depending on the property and the individuals involved. ⁓ I would say the craziest deal I had was, ⁓ I think I mentioned this earlier, and if not, I’m also an investor, a real estate investor. So I invest heavily in ⁓ buy and hold specifically in the state of Illinois here. And there was a property that…especially in the hot market, it was listed for a great price and it was off market. ⁓ It was kind of a pocket listing, sort of, with an agent that I knew. And the numbers all vetted out, everything looked great, ⁓ and we put an offer on it. Now, usually I don’t like to not do an inspection before ⁓ closing on the property. Unfortunately, this one, there was like a very small timeline to close on it or else you lose the deal.
and we had to take the risk of closing on it before doing an actual inspection. It was literally like a six-day turnaround time. ⁓ After we closed on the property, ⁓ I sent my crew out there to immediately start rehabbing. And ⁓ let’s just say the basement was a hot mess. mean, the foundation was basically in very terrible shape. The pictures inside were great, but the foundation of the property within the basement was not.
So that was a lesson learned. As good as the deal was, I still made money off the property just to kind of caveat that. But the repair expenses, I did budget because I did see the condition of the basement. But obviously when the walls are bending this way, you can’t really tell sometimes in the pictures if they’re bending a little bit out. So that was the one deal that I think that it was a lesson learned. And this was earlier on in my investing. ⁓ You know, when I was starting out investing, it was like any good deal.
especially during like a little before COVID or during COVID. Any good deal that come out, you want to try to grab it right away. So, you know, again, we made money off of it, not as much as I anticipated because there was a lot of foundation work that needed to be done. But yeah, always do your due diligence. Don’t don’t don’t rush it to a deal right away.
Erika (19:07)
Did that experience shape anything about the platform that you have with Sell-By-Owner.io?Sharif (19:13)
Yeah, I mean, for me it was transparency. So again, when you’re looking at an investment property or selling an investment property at Sell by Owner, I asked the seller to be transparent, meaning that I need to look at your cash flow. Like today, even in investment platforms, I don’t want to mention names, but you go out there, you see a cap rate, you see some basic information, but like, hey, I need the P &L, need like, what are your expenses? In Sell by Owner, we require you to put those things up front. I mean,you know, there’s no secret sauce. I don’t need an NDA to like kind of look at your cashflow to make a decision whether or not I want the property. So that was the idea here is like transparency is key and making sure you’re as transparent as possible, both with the financials and in the description of the property.
Erika (20:00)
for our listeners here who are either earlier in their journey or are looking the level up. I think they benefit hearing this from you when it comes to building your network. What’s made the biggest difference for you and what kind of advice would you give to someone who’s looking the level up in real estate?Sharif (20:20)
Yeah, I mean, I’ve been very, ⁓ very, you know, privileged to be able to meet the real estate individuals or personalities ⁓ in my journey. You know, I started on podcasts, YouTube videos. You know, after I got my license, I wanted to kind of dive a little bit and understand how to be a good investor, because I know that was the best way to create wealth or one of the best ways in the US to create wealth or maybe even anywhere in the world.So for me, was really getting that education. So YouTube University was my best friend. I really dove into that and listened to different big YouTubers on the topic. And from there, was starting to create network connections. Look at your local community. There’s usually meetups for real estate. I would start diving into those and asking questions and listening and absorbing. You got to become a sponge in the beginning. And then from there, you could start taking action. That is the key. That is the most important thing.
With Sell-By-Owner is a good example. This idea was just eating me alive. And I was like, I gotta just pull the trigger on it. So I put my money where my mouth is and I ended up investing in my own platform. Didn’t raise no money. So I could just focus on building this experience. I don’t regret it. We have about a thousand, a little over a thousand users since the beginning of the year. We have some properties that are listed all over the US.
And ⁓ my next step is to keep getting feedback from the customers or the users and building upon them.
Erika (21:54)
Yeah, you know, that’s really cool. Do you see any challenges with that growth or, you know, how do you, you know, plan to expand responsibly with, you know, how much technology can change?Sharif (22:09)
Yeah, mean, obviously, competitors are going to keep coming up and whatnot. I think for me, the key is the user experience and keeping on top of that. I know AI is like a hot keyword right now. Everybody’s talking about AI. Obviously, that’s very important to me. I want to stay at the cusp of like all the different solutions that we could provide to users. So we are looking at some AI integrations that potentially would help take…this app and make it even more user friendly or provide more services to the user. you know, competition is good, it’s healthy, keeps me on my toes and it keeps the juices going and ideating and creating.
Erika (22:49)
Yeah, absolutely. those new features will help draw people in too. And also, what kind of marketing do you do to help expand that user adoption too?Sharif (23:00)
Yeah, right now, know, we’ve obviously being on podcast is important. This is actually my official first podcast, but ⁓ I focus a lot on social media, you know, paid search. ⁓ We’ve done some direct mail marketing, which, you know, it’s a lot of testing right now. It’s just figuring out what the right ⁓ messaging and marketing it needs to be. Should it be digital? Should it be print?print we didn’t have too much success in. It’s not the same as seeing a picture of an agent on a little postcard that says like, hey, I just sold the property next door. So it does have a little different, ⁓ it is a little different when it comes to like the direct mail or print. So digital is where we’re focusing on. That’s originally where we started is it’s a digital solution. So we are looking at different ways to advertise this. We’re going to be doing more shows and podcasts ⁓ and conferences hopefully in the near future to get more of the word out.
Erika (23:56)
Well, before we end, if someone wants to reach out, connect with you, or learn more about what you’re doing, what’s the best way for them to reach you, Sharif?Sharif (24:05)
Yeah, it’s sellbyowner.io is the website. ⁓ I could be directly reached at Instagram, always be the letter investing. ⁓ So you could find me on Instagram and you know, feel free to reach out if you have any questions or if you’d like to get a demo of the platform, I’m happy to show you.Erika (24:28)
Sharif, I appreciate your time, your story, your perspective. We need more people in this space who are innovating like you.Sharif (24:35)
Thank you so much, Erika. It was a pleasure being on.Erika (24:38)
And for our listeners, if you got value from this episode, make sure that you’re subscribed to the Real Estate Pros Podcast. We’ve got more conversations lined up with operators like Sharif who are out there building fantastic real estate businesses. We’ll see you on the next episode.
