254 – From Military to Real Estate Millionaire with Dave Pere

Synopsis

David Pere is popularly known as the “Military Millionaire.” He served in the Marine Corps for 13 years, and in the last six years, he began purchasing rental properties, which have now expanded to around 102 rental homes, with a handful of properties in limbo between flip and wholesale.

In this episode, David will share his story on how he successfully transitioned from working in the military to becoming a real estate millionaire.

Key points

How He Started

David said that Robert Kiyosaki’s book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” sparked his interest in real estate investing. Interestingly, he had just released episode 150 of his podcast, in which he interviewed Robert Kiyosaki, the same guy who had inspired him to step outside of his comfort zone.

While researching about real estate, he came across Brandon Turner’s books and podcasts, which inspired him to try house hacking. Later on, he bought a duplex and stayed in one-half of the property while renting out the other half through the FHA loan. He reduced his living expenditures with this method and lived nearly for free.

After some time, the Marine Corps sent him to Hawaii for three years. While he was on duty there, he noticed how much money he was making from his duplex and decided to explore real estate more.

Finding deals

When asked how he finds deals, David mentioned Ballpoint Marketing. He sends out a lot of direct mails, such as letters and postcards. Previously, David tried texting as a marketing approach, but he didn’t find messaging people for deals appealing since it takes more time and effort than direct mailing. To reach out to potential clients, he also decided to pursue cold-calling. Finally, with everything that needs to be done, he decided to hire an acquisitions partner who manages the negotiations on his behalf.

According to David, he is now averaging roughly 4,000 to 5,000 mailers per month. On the cold call side, they typically make 10,000 phone calls per month, with the goal of eventually increasing to 20,000 calls monthly. In all these marketing strategies, David said he is more focused on a specific asset class.

He retrieves every record in his area with 30% equity or more, indicating that these individuals have the ability to sell. With these people, you can negotiate a discount on a property to make a win-win situation for both of you.  Apart from this method, David said that he is dealing with other types of lists.

During the first of every month, he reviews every death certificate, federal tax lien, state tax lien, power of attorneys that were pulled, and lis pendens in his county. He uploads all of these separate listings into REISift. After that, they select absentee homeowners, out-of-state absentee homeowners, balloon mortgages due within the next two years, interest rates over 7%, pre-probate, probate, and pre-foreclosure. To gain a better picture of possible deals, they stack all of the data together and then sort it. After the data has been cleaned up, it is up to the cold callers and direct mailers to contact prospective clients.

Finding Data

The data used to evaluate the real estate market is obtained by looking at county websites. He outsources this task to a Fiverr freelancer who specializes in data scraping. Another method he’d want to try but hasn’t been successful with is hunting for utilities that have been shut off. The Freedom of Information Act requires your city utilities to share data on persons who have had their utilities shut off. Still, David claimed he had no success obtaining any data, which is unfortunate since such information would help determine whether or not a property is vacant.

Response Rate

David receives roughly a 1.5% response rate from his direct mails, which is about 80 to 120 leads. He then aims to meet with at least 60 of them. In the end, he’ll close four to five deals out of the 60 properties he had at the start. Even if this may not seem to be a large sum, David claims that this number is enough to cover the cost of marketing for the following month and so on.

Biggest Challenge in Hotel Deal

Before leaving the service, David worked on a Hotel Deal, which they have now been running since April 5. When asked about the most difficult challenge he has experienced in this process, he said that it would be training the personnel. Being in the service industry, the staff would have to be transferred from one building to another, so they would need to be well-versed in the roles and responsibilities of each sector. Aside from being lengthy, training the personnel also necessitates a significant amount of time and work.

Benefits of Content Creation

For David, the most significant benefit of creating online content is that it allows him to network with a large number of individuals who want to invest with him. People are prepared to invest in his ventures or put money into his deals.

References

More from our guest

• You can learn more about David by reading his new book, “The No B.S. Guide to Military Life: How to Build Wealth, Get Promoted, and Achieve Greatness.”
• He gives some financial advice in the book, such as real estate investment and personal growth. He originally wrote it for someone thinking about entering the military who would want to leave on the right foot.
• You can also find him on YouTube by searching for “From Military to Millionaire.”