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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Michelle Kesil interviews Ken Turk, a seasoned real estate investor and coach. Ken shares his journey in real estate, emphasizing the importance of perseverance and realistic expectations in the industry. He discusses common mistakes new investors make, particularly in property evaluation, and offers strategies for accurate valuation. Ken highlights the significance of mentorship and coaching in navigating the complexities of real estate investing, encouraging listeners to seek guidance and not give up on their goals.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
ken turk (00:00)
Thank you very much and I’m excited to talk to people and possibly open up some opportunities that people have not thought about and lay out a foundation for solid sound investing that’ll actually help people succeed, which is the ultimate goal. Remember that sign right there. This is the key to the whole thing. Never give up. You cannot give up because most new investors do give up and that’s what really hurts them. They expect success immediately and that’s what I’m here for.to cut through all the hype and help these people understand it’s not about making a million tomorrow. This is a marathon. This is not a sprint.
Michelle Kesil (02:10)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil. Today I’m joined by someone I’m looking forward to chatting with, Ken Turk, who is a real estate investor and a real estate investing coach. excited to have you here today, Ken.ken turk (02:27)
Thank you very much and I’m excited to talk to people and possibly open up some opportunities that people have not thought about and lay out a foundation for solid sound investing that’ll actually help people succeed, which is the ultimate goal. Remember that sign right there. This is the key to the whole thing. Never give up. You cannot give up because most new investors do give up and that’s what really hurts them. They expect success immediately and that’s what I’m here for.to cut through all the hype and help these people understand it’s not about making a million tomorrow. This is a marathon. This is not a sprint.
So we have to be in it for the long game. It’s great. It’s wonderful. Real estate is a fantastic ⁓ avenue for anyone to become successful, but we have to be realistic. And that’s what I’m here for, to help people understand that.
Michelle Kesil (03:18)
Yeah.Awesome. So let’s dive in. First off, for those not familiar with you and your work yet, can you share what your main focus is?
ken turk (03:31)
My main focus in my business, let me back up just a second. I’ve done my first deal in 2006, okay ⁓ guys? And this is all I have left of my first deal was this one picture that I took standing on the porch, you in the address 1302 Neva Street. And I kept that on the wall of my office for many, many years, you know? But my focus for my business is to show people that I was where you are right now. I was there one time. And what made the difference for me?and how it made the difference and how I can help make the difference for you because I know where you’re at. know where you want to go. And I understand what it takes to get there through a proven system that actually works for people and cuts it ABC one, two, three, very simple. I see this challenge for a lot of people. I get a lot of feedback, you know, communication on Facebook groups and things, you know, that people are talking to me and I can just see it. And that’s what made me start this coaching.
and mentoring businesses because I know the difference that it makes in the success and the speed at which someone will succeed in this business to cut out the hype and to actually get to what works. That’s the focus. What really works and what worked for me. Now, is there one way to do everything? No, everything has multiple ways to do it, but I can show them a clear, concise path to get from point A to point B and succeed doing it.
And that’s, that’s really important to me. You know, I won’t start with that, but I will say this.
Michelle Kesil (04:58)
Yeah, absolutely.ken turk (05:49)
I can help people that have been successful to go further, but my focus and my main goal is the new people coming in because I see all the hype. I see all of the noise out there and that’s what I call it. The noise is so many, we did this. We did that. We made a million dollars this month, you know, and people are all jacked up. But as I said earlier, this is a, this is a marathon.This is not a sprint. Real estate investing is not a get rich quick scheme. And I would hope that anyone watching this or watching any podcast would understand if someone tells you this is a get rich quick scheme run. This is work. This requires effort. This requires a lot of talking to people, lot of evaluating properties. You you have to make offers to succeed. But the thing is I want to show them how to get there from point A to point B with a very simple, concise method.
to all the way, it’s a five part system and it’s all the way from learning what a deal is, it actually is, to evaluating that deal, to making your offers, to writing your contracts, to finding the money if you wanna close the deal, pick your exit strategy, are you fixing flip, you wholesaling, are you buying whole, whichever one you wanna do, and trying to show them how to get started. My focus is on their first, second and third deal.
Beyond that, you know, they may not even need me after that because they may have figured it out. Some people can watch the internet, watch videos and pick up on it really, really easy. They can. I mean, some people can do that, but some people because of the noise and I was one of them, I was the person watching this. If you’re brand new, I was you. That’s my whole goal behind this is to show you that this can be done. Everybody starts out at the beginning, the most successful real estate investor out there. Now he may have had some money or he may not have.
But he started at the beginning, just like the people watching this podcast are doing. They’re starting out at the beginning. So I’m trying to show you from the beginning, some of the mistakes that I made. And that’s, that’s really what my course is about to show you not to make the mistakes that I made, not to waste the time, not to waste the money, but remember it’s a marathon, not a sprint, and it will take time, but it’s easy to be successful in real estate if you know what you’re doing. And if you have a clear and concise method.
Michelle Kesil (08:07)
Yeah, definitely. What do you think are some of the most common mistakes that you see people make and how do you resolve them?ken turk (08:15)
One of the absolute most common mistakes that I see people make without any fathom of a doubt is evaluation of the properties. You know, they’re making offers that are too low. There’s other people out there selling courses telling people, well, you make a $2,000 profit, you know, or a $5,000 profit. And that’s wonderful if you do. mean, hey, kudos to you. But with my method of teaching, that’s a market fluctuation. $5,000, because I’m in Florida.Okay. Now our market is different than it is in a lot of the country and our market does go up and down on a fairly rapid basis. Sometimes in 2006, when I started, it was a collapse at 2008. It was a train wreck. So I’ve experienced the highs. I’ve experienced the lows. You know, when you lose that teaches you something winning, winning, winning teaches you something, but when you lose, it brings a new perspective to things. So I’ve won, I’ve lost. see.
that the new people coming in are not being told maybe some of the things that are real and the possibilities that are real, like we could step into a recession. A lot of investors will be hurt when 2008 happened. Most everybody I knew that was a real estate investor went out of business because it just, in Florida, it just bottomed out. So, I’m trying to help people avoid that because I see the new people coming in.
Dealing with the noise, you know, they’re listening to all this in 30 days, be successful at this and this and this and you know, three weeks and everybody’s trying to cut the time back. The truth is real estate, as I said, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. And this takes time, you know, to do one deal, yeah, you can do one deal. I closed my first deal, found the house in 31 days. I closed my first deal and made $22,000, which is that picture I was talking about. That’s 1302 Neva Street, Jacksonville, Florida. You can look it up. That’s what was back in 2006.
And I actually sold it to another guy that sold it to somebody else. So, you know, I know that there’s success to be made and it can be made quickly. But when I found my mentor and the man that actually showed me the truth, cut out all that noise, gave me a step-by-step system to work and to be able to succeed. I made, I mean, I made the deal happen. I closed the deal. I made the quote unquote assignment fee, the check, the cash, which is what everybody’s looking for.
Before that, man, I was listening to this, listening to that, going to seminars, spending my money, spending my wheels. You know, and I see a lot of people right now, I get questions all the time asking me, especially about evaluation, but a lot of people don’t know how to find properties. They really don’t know exactly what they’re looking for. That’s why I laid out what I laid out in my course, you know, exactly what you’re looking for. You gotta know what you’re looking for to find it, first of all. Then you gotta know where you’re looking. And then once you find it,
You got know what to do with it. And that’s how I lay it out for one, two, three, four, five. This is what you do. And in between one, two, three, four, and five, there’s ABC that you need to be doing. And I see the lack of that in the industry because everybody just wants to get money. I get it. We’re all in business to make money. The real estate investors in business, the core sellers in business to make money. And there’s great information out there, but not all information is good. And not all information comes from people with experience that have actually failed.
I’m what you call a safer investor. I’m not the guy that speculates on this and speculates on that and just throws deals out here and there. You know, I’ve done that stuff in the past and I’ve realized how it has actually hurt me. So that’s not what I’m teaching. I’m teaching people solid sound principles because I just don’t see that in the marketplace today. A lot of the principles that we have are not solid. They’re not sound. You know, a market can fluctuate 10%.
in literally a few days. And that right there wipes the investor out if you’re running on very, very thin margins, which is what a lot of people are teaching today. So I see that as the biggest problem, evaluating their properties correctly and getting to the right number. Because without that true number in real estate, you don’t have anything because real estate is about the numbers, flat out. You got to know where you’re at, what you can do with it, and where you’re going.
Michelle Kesil (13:06)
Yeah, definitely. I think that’s very important. Can you give an example of what would be a solid and sound strategy that you would support your clients with?ken turk (13:17)
Sure. Yeah. Okay. So, and there’s a lot to go into. So I’m going to try to be real, try to condense this down, but you know, they have to know where to find the numbers. So when I give an example of this, a lot of people don’t even know where to find true numbers. They look on Zillow and Zillow, the Zestimate they call it, you know, says 247 and they think the house is really with ARV or retail, whatever at 247. So they make their offer based upon that. And the truth of the matter is that’s not how you find cons, you know,That’s not how you find the real number because that may be what Zillow thinks it’s worth But when somebody sells that property it may sell for ten twenty thousand thirty thousand dollars less depending upon the market and the fluctuation and the other properties that have sold I Use more of what’s called the appraisal method, which is what appraisal is taught. I’m and I am a licensed real estate agent too I mean, I don’t practice anymore I don’t I’ve do maybe one or two deals a year to try to help some people that when I have a friend that is looking for something or whatever but
That, is a weakness that I see. Um, and one of the things that I try to go through with people is to teach them, Hey, this is how you really find your numbers. Because when you try to sell, even if you’re a fix and flipper, let’s just use that as an example. When you try to sell, you have to know that true ARV. So let’s just say you’re a wholesaler because a lot of people are coming in focusing on wholesaling. I show them, you know, how to find the numbers for your rehabs. Cause every area is different. Like here, let’s say a drywall job might cost me
you know, a couple thousand bucks or whatever. Well, if you’re in another state, cause this is national nowadays. mean, everybody is, is national. So the numbers do vary up and down. try to show them, Hey, in your area, that may be $5,000 instead of two. So getting the numbers correctly. And, and
to me that of course, as I said, in real estate is the most important thing, but that is what I try to teach them to make a solid sound price.
On their property how to really find your numbers that are your ARVs and not just go off with the Zestimate I’ve had people call me I’ve had houses for sale I mean this has happened recently to me. Well, Zestimate says blah blah blah and I’m like I Don’t want to say it to him because I don’t want to insult people, you know I’m like just take my course you really you’re gonna show you how to get the true numbers because the Zestimate doesn’t mean anything. You know, I had a house I give you a perfect example
I sold a house, this is last year, 2025, I sold a house right there in Lake City. I’m between Jacksonville and Lake City, okay? So I’m between, I live in the country, love the country life. But, and most of you can tell from my accent that I live in the country, but that’s okay. You know, I still know what’s going on and I still understand. Most of my business was done in Jacksonville early on. So now I do a lot of business in Lake City and surrounding areas because I see opportunity there. But this particular house I sold in Lake City,
You know, the Zillow thing come up around 315. Well, whenever the check was written and the deal was closed, I started out at 315 because of course I wanted as much as I could get, but whenever the deal was done, 282. That’s what the house sold for. You know, after everything was done, all of my rehab was done, everything, and I borrowed hard money on that one too. I go into that in my course, teach people how to find the right kind of hard money, how to find the money for their deals if they want to do the deals. So, excuse me.
So that house, I got a check written out to me for $100,000 and some change after everything was paid. Took us a long time. It was a major deal. But my point in this is don’t just simply think because Zillow says something or realtor.com or anybody else says something, find the numbers, the real numbers. And that’s a real example that happened to me was someone called me and said, your house is worth 3.15, the realtor, the other person did not. No.
It’s really not going to sell for that. It’s so for, and I it wouldn’t sell for 315, but I did what they recommended because I do use realtors to sell. am a licensed real estate agent. I’m not practicing. I’m not a member of the board where my house was sold at. So I used a realtor. I use realtors to sell, not to buy. You know, that’s another thing I teach in my course there. Their goal is to make the most money they can on the house so that they can get the best commission and understand that that’s the job that they have. That’s what they do. So.
I use them to sell because I know they’re going to try to get me the most money they can for my home. And therefore I can get the best check. But that particular example is just one of many. I bought another house about six months ago. I bought another little house that we’re fixing to do a major rehab on. I’ve been just sitting on it and it’s going to be a rental. So I had to establish my rental. I had to establish my cost for repair. I have to establish if I wanted to sell it an actual retail price and see if my retail price matched up with my rental numbers.
See, lot of people aren’t teaching these things. Your numbers, everything has to line up. If your purchase price, your rehab price, and your retail price don’t line up with a rental number and what you can actually rent it for, pay your taxes, your insurance, your debt service, and these things that you have to pay, and your vacancies, then no matter how good the deal is, you’re not gonna be able to rent it. That’s not a rental property. That’s maybe a fix and flip. That’s maybe a wholesale. And going back to the numbers again, and another issue with people.
trying to wholesale is a lot of people are getting in and getting started is that they look at the Zillow estimate, the Zestimate, a lot of people go by that. I keep saying that, but honestly, a lot of people are going by that and that’s not really how you find your numbers. But going by those numbers, ⁓ when you are wholesaling a property, you make your offer, you calculate your costs, you’re selling it to a rehabber. You’re not selling it to an in-buyer.
You’re not selling it to a retail customer because the property is not ready for retail. It’s not at its highest and best use. It’s not repaired. So they’re making their offers based upon some of these things that are not real numbers. And I’ve had them call me, you know, I just had a lady call me not a couple months ago and she has this nice, lovely home and it doesn’t need very much. And she wants, and I said, and she’s a wholesaler. tells me she, they tell me on the phone a lot of time, I’m wholesaling the property, blah, blah, blah. And I’m like, there’s nothing there.
I mean, there’s a difference between what you want with your assignment fee versus what the property would retail out at. And the house has nowhere to add value. So the wholesalers bear in mind when you’re selling that property, you’re selling it to a rehabber that’s going to fix it for an in buyer. You’re not selling it to the in buyer. So it all goes back to the numbers. The biggest problem that I see in the industry, everything that I’m talking about goes back to that one thing.
that the problems that we’re seeing in the industry with new people coming in that really don’t understand, you know, how to find the money, how to find the numbers, how to find the deal, what an actual deal is, what type of people you should be talking to. A lot of people do cold calling myself. hate cold calling for me. That’s like one of the worst things for me. Cause I just don’t like it. And some people are great at it. I like to advertise and have people call me because when a person calls you, their frame of mind is different. When you call them, I get up.
And I get multiple spam calls every day. had to turn my phone, of course, on, do not disturb for this, but I bet I’ve gotten three or four spam calls since we’ve already been talking. I get so many per day. People have become turned off to that. And that’s, you know, that’s why I try to teach people different methods, be a little more creative, you know, turn people in a different direction, look for that right seller and your numbers are going to work out if you know how to run them and your deal is going to work out and you’re not going to have any trouble selling your deal.
If you build your little buyers list of people that actually are buyers and not other wholesalers daisy-chaining your deal, you you will have no problem selling your deal if you run your numbers correctly because you are selling it to a rehabber. You’re not selling it to an in-buyer. And that’s something that they really need to understand also.
Michelle Kesil (21:51)
Yeah, definitely. Thank you for clarifying that. I think that is some great advice. So before we begin to wrap up here, I know that you are coaching people. Can you share a little bit about how people can work with you or who you’re working with?ken turk (22:10)
I actually talk to people, I’ll give you another example, I talk to people all the time. I talked to a guy in Egypt. Now he is buying in the American market, he’s wholesaling, he’s not buying anything. I talked to him, gave him some great advice. He took the advice, bam, immediately had success. I’m showing people and I use different ways to talk to people because like Facebook groups, a lot of times I just give basic advice for free. Somebody asks me, hey man, what about this? I just tell them, I don’t.not here to sell you, you know, on every single thing. If you want to learn how to do this, you want to learn how to do it the right way. And you want to have somebody holding your hand. That’ll help you because I do offer a hand holding mentorship, which is what I got whenever I started because of all the noise and the confusion. I need somebody to show me clear, concise, and I could call them and say, Hey, hey, how does this work? And they’re like, no, that don’t work. You can’t do that. So that’s what I offer to people, you know,
I have multiple avenues for them to get, get ahold of me right here. You can see that, you know, that’s me. And I’ll tell you real quick, it’s my support. It’s I got a Facebook group that right there, never give up. And this is the most important part for you beginners. You don’t give up because don’t let the noise, don’t let the family, don’t let people distract you till you can’t do something. If they can be successful, you can be successful too. You just need a system. You just need someone to help you.
So I have my Facebook group, never give up. I have a YouTube channel and I just started it. I have a YouTube channel that I’ve also started. It’s a youtube.com at coach Ken R E I master. And my name is Ken Turk. You know, if you just looked me up, phone number, 904-625-2242, very simple phone number. And my email and the name of my coaching company is firm foundation.
REI Mentorship and Coaching. So it’s firmfoundationrei.com. We’re working on our website right now. I just had to take it back over from another hosting company and we’re working on making some changes to it that I didn’t really like what they’ve done with my website. So those are ways that they can get a hold of me. They can easily get some easy advice. If you just post on my group, I’ll answer your question. You know, go on my YouTube channel and ask a question. There’s some videos on there and I’m continuing to upload them.
I just don’t want to upload too many at one time, but you can comment on the video and say, Hey, well, what about this? And I’ll be glad to help you. I offer encouraging videos. I offer factual videos to show them exactly how to do something and what to do. And when I answer your questions, I’m not vague. I’m not hiding anything. I’m telling you from my experience, what works and how I can help you with that. And if you would like the hand holding mentorship, I’ll be glad to do that. You know, offer three, six and 12 months.
You know, it’s up to you. If you want to succeed, the mentor will make all the difference, whether it’s me, whether it’s somebody else, find someone you can trust, find someone that you feel like communicates with you well, whoever it may be, and get that person to help you succeed because the learning curve, they will cut off of what you’re going to do and the loss they will cut off of what you got going on is going to be tremendous. If they are really a good real estate investor, they’re going to help you a lot, a lot.
Michelle Kesil (25:28)
Perfect, well thank you for sharing. Appreciate your time and coming on here.ken turk (25:33)
man, this is great. I’m just so, I’m so thankful for you guys to interview me. I’m hoping that someone will do this. Never give up. This is the key to the whole thing. Don’t give up. If you need something, just call me. Just text me, email me, whatever. It’s all there. You can get a hold of me. I’m the guy that can’t hardly stand the phone to ring. I have to answer even the spammers. So, you know, give me a holler. I’d be glad to help you any way I can.Michelle Kesil (25:59)
Awesome, Ken, thank you. And for the listeners tuning in, if you got value, make sure you’ve subscribed. We have more conversations with operators like Ken who are building real businesses and we’ll see you on the next episode.
