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Show Summary
In this episode of the Investor Fuel Podcast, host Michelle Kesil speaks with Maria Perry, an expert in creative financing and affordable housing. Maria shares her journey as a military spouse and immigrant, her focus on mobile homes, and the importance of networking and relationship building in real estate. She discusses the challenges of the market and how creative financing strategies can provide solutions, ultimately leading to impactful investments that benefit communities.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Maria Perry (00:00)
So what happened? We just like changed our plan and did a full gut renovation after all, which is what honestly, secretly what I wanted to do anyways, but it was just more time consuming.Um, and the moral of the story is that even the worst case scenario can turn into a triple digit flip. I, I wholeheartedly believe that we sold that house the way we sold it at a triple digit margin because we did the full gut runoff. We would have been in a good position just doing the, the cosmetics, but again, growth opportunity, don’t drown on it, swim on it.
Michelle Kesil (02:13)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Investor Fuel Podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil, and today I’m joined by someone I’m looking forward to chatting with, Maria Perry, who has been making serious moves in the investing space, working a lot with creative financing projects, so excited to have you here today, Maria.Maria Perry (02:35)
Thank you. Thank you so much for welcoming me to this space. I’m excited to chat with you,Michelle Kesil (02:41)
Of course, think our listeners are really going to take something away from how you’re working with creative transactions and affordable housing projects. let’s dive in. Just first off, for those that are not familiar with you and your world, can you give the short version of what your main focus is?Maria Perry (03:03)
So we are focusing right now on affordable housing. We are heavily investing in mobile homes, not just parks, but land home packages. So we can put safe, clean, brand new housing in the hands of people that is in the market at a different price point that not the market offers. We also have a sizable portfolio of single family homes. They’re all rental that we acquire 100 % using creative financing or the BIRD method.do quite a bit of fix and flips that we’re redirecting now to the manufacturer housing. We do transaction coordinating and I’m also an agent in North Carolina.
Michelle Kesil (03:45)
Amazing. So, are you operating solely in North Carolina, or is your business more spread out in other states nationwide?Maria Perry (03:56)
We operate anywhere nationwide. Our niche is about 20 miles out of any military base. The military has a special space in our heart as we were a military family for over 20 years. My husband retired after 22 years of service. So about 20 miles out of every gate is our niche, but we heavily invest in North Carolina and Texas, but basically anywhere that there is a base that we can help.Michelle Kesil (04:25)
Absolutely, I love that. So what have been some of the main keys to keeping your business running smoothly?Maria Perry (04:35)
think the definitely is to get the right partnerships and the right information to what is coming. We are always thinking three, four months ahead. So we always have more than one exit strategy for everything we do. We relate heavily on private lenders. So we always want to make sure that we can get back to them on time. ⁓ So we’re always looking tonot predict, but keep up close.
eye on to what’s coming. ⁓ We’re trying to stay abreast of the changes of the market rather than just do our predictable air, view your time on the market and stuff like that. So we’re just trying to be more prepared than usual.
Michelle Kesil (06:09)
Amazing that is so important to having the right people on your side So what got you started with this business?Maria Perry (06:14)
Mm-hmm.⁓ So being a military spouse, had to reinvent myself every four years or so. I’m also an immigrant. I came from Paraguay. I was born and raised there. I come from banking. So I was eventually a bank manager. I worked for the prime of state a little bit while we were posted overseas. And then eventually I realized that two things, I wanted to create something that I could take with me.
that it was portable, that I can do wherever I was, so I didn’t have to like leave it where I was. And second, I wanted to do something meaningful. I wanted to do something that would actually ⁓ create an impact and leave its footprint in my immediate society. housing is a big issue around military bases always. It’s either not enough.
or is not suitable. we very rarely have a luxury to have plenty full of it. So I decided that that was a niche I wanted to tackle and so far so good.
Michelle Kesil (07:27)
Amazing. Yeah, that is such a beautiful story that you used your military background and are now supporting so many people. So, I know when we were connecting before our podcast, you mentioned a lot about creative financing. Can you maybe expand onto that for the audience? How that has been something that you have used in your business and yeah, like just ways that you have used that modality.Maria Perry (07:57)
So for Creative Finance, we were able to go around some of the challenges that the market presented with the high interest rates or maybe how difficult it would come to apply for a loan, even an investor loan, right? We encountered a lot of people that had an amazing interest rate, but it was completely upside down in price. For example, we have a house that we bought about 350, but it has a one.1.9 interest rate and maybe the house is not the most interesting thing in the market maybe ⁓ The purchase price is not that important in the sense that if I can absorb the 1.9 interest rate That’s the one thing I can probably never get again, right? So we have people that are stuck at the market at the price point not to be upside down or
being forced to have a short sale or maybe even face foreclosure at some point, you ⁓ where we approach him and we use this Amidality called subject to where we kind of wrap that ⁓ Mortgage into our new Agreement and we take over if there is any equity to be paid we pay it out of me make an agreement as to how
and then we use them as rentals. ⁓ It becomes a win-win situation because it kind of like removes a problem from the person that is in a market that is not flowing as it was flowing a couple years ago. And it’s a win situation for us because we, again, we can’t get a 1.9 interest rate anymore, you know? ⁓ So it kind of creates that win-win situation that we work in partnership with this. ⁓
sellers and we absorbed quite a bit of them. The other piece of it is done by burrs. So we either took them over and sell their finance
or we did a cash purchase but mostly on seller finance because you know private money cost a little bit more than regular bank loans right. So if we’re able to pay the mortgage and absorb the cost for a while for the owner
While we renovate the house, raise the equity and then are able to refinance, we’re able to pay the seller a little bit more in the other side. So it has been very beneficial for us and the sellers that we interacted with.
Michelle Kesil (11:06)
Yeah, absolutely. Can you expand a little bit more on like some of the specific ways that you are ⁓ getting those creative transactions going?Maria Perry (11:19)
So usually it starts ⁓ with an agent that can move the house in the market and it’s starting to become a burden for the homeowner, right? ⁓ What usually happens is the average family that puts their house for sale, it’s there only for a month or so. They have a reason to sell it, right? So it creates a pain point for them to have to maintain two households or potentially two rentals orSomething like that right to have to pay for two homes even though one of them is empty So usually it starts with a realtor ⁓ Or it starts with somebody who’s asking for a cash offer now this properties that were acquired between 2020-2021 as we all know the prices went up quite a bit, so they have Maybe not enough equity in it. So what we
do is from there we start. We look at the loan, we see sometimes we have to cut up some of the payments to save and confirm for closure and reestablish the loan. ⁓ And then from there, we kind of create the agreement that protects both of us. ⁓ The common question, and I’m going to answer right away, is like, how do I know that this is safe for me and the seller, right? Well, these agreements usually protect the seller even more than the buyer. And I will tell you why.
Michelle Kesil (12:38)
youMaria Perry (12:46)
Because for whatever reason I stop making payments for it, I lose the improvements and payments I already made. Everything that I have put into the property, it goes back to the owner. They would say, well, I don’t know if I want any more and that will put me in the same situation. Well, in the average transaction, we normally put already three months of payments into a servicing company. So if for whatever reason we stop making the payments, will be like their portion of thetransaction, it would already be reaching default before the bank is in default. You know what I mean? So that creates a barrier or protection that the seller can not be in a situation that from one day to another, they are like, you’re late in your bank payment. ⁓ It is completely legal to do that. ⁓ It is called subject to many of a ⁓ state contracts actually.
⁓ have it laid out in their own, in their state mandated forms. ⁓ But yeah, it usually starts like that. ⁓ Or with somebody asking for a cash offer and the cash offer is not sufficient. This is the two main ways that we get people reach out to us, either an agent or a wholesaler who calls me to tell me I can’t reach their price because they owe too much. How can we help them? So then we start looking at the loan and see if we can turn it into a rental.
Michelle Kesil (14:11)
Amazing. you for sharing that process. think that’s going to be so helpful and valuable for people to have these other solutions for growing their investment business. Awesome. So what are some things that you are really focusing right now ⁓ on scaling or solving in your business?Maria Perry (14:33)
So we are scaling drastically ⁓ with mobile homes. Why mobile homes? Because when you’re in the single family home business, ⁓ it gets to a point that you’re like, OK, what’s next? Usually people move into multifamily, right? For people that sits in the seat, like we do in the driver’s seat of our investment, it is not necessarily a syndication. Our way out is like, what are we going to do next?like solidify all the single family individual home investments that we have.
And we found that mobile homes are an affordable tier and also addresses a lot of the social markers where we want to move a needle a little bit. We did research of course, and it looks like the mobile home industry is set to grow about 6 % in the next year or so. That is double what the American economy is.
projected to grow. That alone just tells me that the mobile home space is the right room to be in. ⁓ But also we’re creating line packages that allows the opportunity for home ownership for some people that maybe the bank just doesn’t fit their box. Maybe they are entrepreneurs, maybe they do have documents but they’re not.
here in the US for long enough to have enough taxes, but they have excellent rent payments, you know, it will put home ownership in the hands of people that need it. And more importantly, it depends on the market to talk about a number, but it allows you to do, ⁓ to actually put rentals in the market that are brand new, everything is functional, it’s clean. You can leave there with dignity at the price point that you were trying to fight for a section eight.
somewhere else, you know. ⁓ And it just creates the impact that we want. As I was sharing a little bit before when we were connecting, ⁓ when a family or an individual moves into a home that it is safe, it’s clean, it makes them feel that they are living there with dignity, that their work is actually doing something, you increase their productivity for like 40%.
The chances to succeed for their children that living at home like that, they go to the roof after that. So these are things that it’s not just creating a stream of income for us. It is actually moving the needle in where do we want this society to be, the world that we want to leave for our children, you know, when they actually are in, it’s their time to take command, right? We want to put them all in the same we can do it mindset.
And we feel strongly that this is one of the ways we can do it.
Michelle Kesil (18:12)
Definitely, think that’s a really beautiful initiative that you’re focusing on that’s going to create a difference, is so important.So, when it comes to growing your business, growing your network, creating new relationships, what are some things that have made the biggest difference for you?
Maria Perry (18:38)
I think it’s a go-giver mentality. When I enter a room that I don’t know anybody or ⁓ a new group of people that maybe we have similar interests, I walk into that room thinking, how can I be of service more than what do they have that I could use to grow my business? And it has allowed me to make the right kind of connections, healthy connections that ⁓ it has helped us expand in the right direction.Michelle Kesil (19:09)
Yeah, are there specific networking groups or strategies that you are using?Maria Perry (19:17)
So ⁓ I’m usually a speaker in events that ⁓ takes us to all the way from retail because I usually volunteer to teach agents how to read and identify creative finance offers that can be interesting and safe for their clients. ⁓ And then I usually also talk to other investors about how to create wealth a little bit. My favorite group to be in though, I have to admit.is the people who has identified real estate as a space they want to be in, but they haven’t either made that jump or that jump is just not there yet for them. Like they may have dedicated their life to a different career, which is we need them, right? ⁓ But they have identified as a focal point of interest. So I love being able to interact with them to tell them how can they passively start investing in real estate and
in a way also already start learning what they are still doing, what they are doing. So that’s usually my favorite crowd. ⁓ But in general, ⁓ I try to go to any networking group to physically orient it. It’s where I am interested on investing or to grow in our market. Or I also try to go to different networking events, whether it’s here or in North Carolina or in different states. I put myself
purposely in those rooms so I can learn from them.
Michelle Kesil (20:50)
Amazing. Yeah, relationship building is so important in this industry.Maria Perry (20:55)
Mm-hmm.Michelle Kesil (20:56)
Awesome. So let me ask you this, every business owner has those moments where things get more real, maybe deals go sideways, or you have to pivot fast. ⁓ Would you mind sharing one of those moments that you’ve experienced and how you overcame it?Maria Perry (21:15)
So I think every business owner has that situation, but I also feel like what it makes 100 % of a difference in my world is that I love what I do. So I don’t have Sunday, Saturdays, like a Saturdays like, ⁓ it’s Monday tomorrow. I can’t, I don’t want to go to work. You know, like that doesn’t happen for me. So.When a challenge comes my way and things are not moving as fast as I want them to happen or as I actually plan them to happen, I immediately start thinking about this is not a roadblock, it’s a growth opportunity. So how are we gonna do this? How are we gonna do this? And I obviously just took the first, I took my regular path and it didn’t work. So.
Let me think about who else is here and maybe I’ll create that conversation space. Funny enough, sometimes you just have to say it out loud talking to somebody else that we’re all mentors to our peers sometimes, you know, I cannot tell you how many times I had the opportunity to interact with my peers or even people that I was mentoring that they gave me answers that I needed. ⁓ So in that sense, ⁓ if I have to give you a specific one.
we had a flip in Kerry, North Carolina. We were supposed to buy the house. It came from an agent. We bought it. We went in and we were supposed to do a cosmetic renovation, super hot area. Third fastest growing city in America and that’s the cream of it. So we were supposed to go in and out. They did the demo. Our partner was there because about two hours away from me. And the people who did the demo nicked a pipe.
So when they went to pressure wash the property the next day, the house flooded from the upstairs bathroom. So what happened, our renovation budget nearly tripled. To think about it, to have to fix all of that, change all of that. So I know that this, and this is a pivotal moment because that’s when you go from newbie investor
to seize an investor when you don’t lose your mind that this is happening. First, because you already know where to get your funds to figure this out. Maybe they are yours or you have people backing you up. And second, because you know exactly how to handle that situation,
So what happened? We just like changed our plan and did a full gut renovation after all, which is what honestly, secretly what I wanted to do anyways, but it was just more time consuming.
Um, and the moral of the story is that even the worst case scenario can turn into a triple digit flip. I, I wholeheartedly believe that we sold that house the way we sold it at a triple digit margin because we did the full gut runoff. We would have been in a good position just doing the, the cosmetics, but again, growth opportunity, don’t drown on it, swim on it.
Michelle Kesil (24:30)
I love that, thank you so much for sharing, that’s such good example. So before we wrap up here, someone wants to reach out, connect, learn more, where can people find you?Maria Perry (24:41)
⁓ Find us on our website, quickandeasysell.com. And I’m also happy to go whenever this is posted and put my phone number there. ⁓ We’re just like one click away. Happy to connect. Also, Maria at quickandeasysell.com, sorry.Michelle Kesil (24:57)
Perfect, I’ll listen. Good?Yeah, of course. Perfect. I really appreciate your time, your story, and your perspective. So thank you for being here.
Maria Perry (25:10)
Well, thank you. Thank you so much for the time. I’m looking forward to see what connections come out of this. I’m always excited to meet new people, to learn a little bit of what they are doing in their area. ⁓ If anything, it could just be a meaningful conversation and maybe we’ll collaborate in the future, but I’m always excited to make new connections. Thank you so much, Michelle.Michelle Kesil (25:31)
Yeah, of course, I love that. And for the listeners that are tuning in, if you got value from this, make sure that you’ve subscribed. We’ve got more conversations coming with operators just like Maria, who are building real businesses. And we’ll see you on our next episode.
