How to Beat Your Competition in Real Estate Investing

Mike:This is the flipnerd.com “Expert Real Estate Investing Show,” the show for real estate investors, whether you’re a veteran or brand new. I’m your host, Mike Hambright, and each week, I bring you a new expert guest that will share their knowledge and lessons with you. If you’re excited about real estate investing, believe in personal responsibility and taking control of your life and financial destiny, you’re in the right place.
This is episode number 408 and my guest today is Nasar El-Arabi. He’s a Charlotte-based real estate investor. It’s no mistake that we’re in a more challenging market for real estate investors these days than in the years past. But also, make no mistake, there are plenty of people absolutely crushing it in markets all across the country. Don’t make excuses. You can still be successful.
Today, Nasar shares some of the key things and some of the key takeaways he has on what it takes to be successful to be a real estate investor in today’s market. You’ve got to be willing to work harder than your competition, stay sharp so you can outsmart your competition and, sometimes, you’ve just got to flat-out outspend your competition. More than anything, you’ve got to stay focused on why you became a real estate investor in the first place. If you have a strong vision for why you do what you do, nobody can take that away from you. Please help me welcome Nasar to the show. Hey, Nasar, welcome to the show.
Nasar: Hey, man. Thank you for having me on, Mike.
Mike: Yeah, it’s good to see you. It’s good to see you. We haven’t talked for a little while so I know you’ve been cranking. You’re in the Charlotte market, right?
Nasar: That’s correct. Charlotte, North Carolina, home of the Carolina Panthers and the Charlotte Hornets.
Mike: Yeah. You must be a fan.
Nasar: Yeah. I’m kind of a Giants fan, but I love the Charlotte Hornets and we’re not doing too swell, man.
Mike: Yeah. Well, man, I grew up in Illinois so I’ve either been a Cubs fan, which hasn’t been too bad the past couple of years, a Bears fan, maybe not great. Now I’m in Cowboy country. So that hasn’t been great for a long time either, though. Fans are still loyal. So hey, man, I’m excited to talk about this today because you and I have known each other for several years and I know that you just grind and you just kind of do whatever it takes to be successful, which is really important for everybody in this business. And we’re just going to talk about what it takes to thrive in today’s market. But before we get started, for those that don’t know you, why don’t you tell us a little bit about you and your background?
Nasar: All right. Well, I am Nasar El-Arabi in the Charlotte, North Carolina market. I’ve been involved with real estate for about 11 years now. I didn’t start off on the right foot and ended up losing…I talked about that the first time you had me on. I ended up losing $7,000 a piece, me and my partner, on my first fix-and-flip. And I thought it was easy.
And you probably get these students, Mike, all the time. They think it was easy because back then, pre-crash, when you watched the flipping house shows, all you had to do was buy an ugly house, yell at a bunch of contractors and make a bunch of money. So, unfortunately, I yelled at the contractor, but we lost money.
So with that being said, I found out about creative real estate in 2010 and I found out a niche about wholesaling. I did my first wholesale deal in 2011 and have been full-time since I got fired from my job in September of 2012. I used to record a lot of YouTube videos. You guys can find me at Real Estate Doru. I’m not a guru, I’m a doru because I actually do this business. So doru is D-O-R-U.
We’ve got a lot of content out there that’s still relevant to today. But yeah, man. That’s basically my background. My last job was in September 2012. College graduate, man. And I kind of always knew the corporate world wasn’t for me, but I guess the corporate world decided that I wasn’t for them either.
Mike: It was mutual, right?
Nasar: Exactly.
Mike: Hey, I feel the same way. The same thing happened to me. Yeah. Cool, man. So now you’re doing around 60 deals a year or so. So is that right?
Nasar: Yes.
Mike: Yeah, yeah. Awesome. And so what we’re going to talk about today is this is a different market. You’ve got to be smarter, you’ve got to work harder, you’ve got to do whatever it takes. And so let’s talk about . . . maybe before we kind of dive into these things, just talk about how the market’s changed. There’s obviously still a lot of opportunity. I have people on the show every week where there are people that have only been investors, sometimes, for a couple of years and they’re doing 50, 100, 150 houses or more. So that’s just a sign to tell people that the old dogs kind of come in and say, “Oh, it’s not like it used to be. It’s hard to be successful now.”
And then you’ve got the new bucks that come in and they just crush it. Which you were there once. I was there once when people said you couldn’t do it, right? So we proved people wrong in our time when we came in. there are people still proving us wrong whenever we think the market is tough here right now. But just maybe share your thoughts, high-level, before we kind of dive in as to why you’ve got to be better now than in the past.
Nasar: Well, right now, the market is hot. Real estate education is very . . . you can find it everywhere, literally. Any social media platform you go on, any listening device you use, infomercials, listening to the radio, the real estate education is everywhere. And you always have new investors getting in. And these days, everybody’s teaching to buy the absentee owner lists, do the direct mail. So the off-market deals are starting to shrink up.
Sellers know we are in a hot market. So they know they have the upper hand. So they’re saying things like, “Hey, let me give you 15 . . . well, your offer’s $100,000. Let me call these other 15 to see what they’ve got to say. Then I’ll get back to you.” Those are responses that we’re getting on average a lot now. Or, “Let me talk to my attorney,” and we’re waiting for them to get back. We’re constantly calling them and they’re not picking up the phone.
And then they finally pick up the phone and say, “Oh, I signed a contract yesterday.” Wait, you said you were going to talk to your attorney. So right now, the way the market is, it’s so hot. Still a bunch of opportunity out there. I still made six figures the first quarter. So there’s still money to be made.
Mike: Yeah. You’re still not stuck in corporate America.
Nasar: Right. Yeah. I haven’t updated my resume on indeed.com. Yeah. So with that being said, yeah, still a bunch of opportunities out there. It’s just that now to get in front of those sellers and to maximize your opportunity, you have to go harder than everyone else.
Mike: If you’re an active real estate investor already doing deals and looking to double or triple your business, you should consider joining the Investor Fuel Real Estate Investor Mastermind. We’re a small group of investors that share our best practices, tips and tricks with one another in an effort to all win. We limit our membership to only one to two members per market so everyone shares their knowledge, tips and tricks openly and honestly.

Our members include some buying one to two houses a month, up to some of the most respected investors and leaders in the real estate investing industry, some of which have personally done over 1000 deals. If you’d like to be considered for our invitation-only, world-class mastermind, please visit investorfuel.com to request your personal invitation. Our next meeting is coming up quickly. Go to investorfuel.com now to learn more.
Nasar: . . . my attorney and we’re waiting for them to get back. We’re constantly calling them and they’re not picking up the phone. And then they finally pick up the phone and say, “Oh, I signed a contract yesterday.” Wait, you said you were going to talk to your attorney. So right now, the way the market is, it’s so hot. Still a bunch of opportunity out there. I still made six figures the first quarter. So there’s still money to be made.
Mike: Yeah. You’re still not stuck in corporate America.
Nasar: Right. Yeah. I haven’t updated my resume on indeed.com. Yeah. So with that being said, yeah, still a bunch of opportunities out there. It’s just that now to get in front of those sellers and to maximize your opportunity, you have to go harder than everyone else.
Mike: Yeah. So let’s break this down. We’re going to talk about a few things you and I kind of discussed upfront. You might have to outspend your competition sometimes. You’ve got to outsmart your competition. You’ve got to stay sharp on your game and you’ve got to outwork your competition, like kind of hustle. So let’s kind of jump into the outspend part. I mean, you find yourself having to spend more now than in years past, right?
Nasar: Absolutely. I have to spend more and I’m doing about 25,000 postcards a month. I’m only spending about $13,000 to $15,000 a month here in Charlotte markets with just direct mail, one channel. And yeah, I know probably about one, two other guys that probably spend as much as me. And one of those guys is in the same mastermind with me and you, Mike.
So we’re pretty much like the . . . well, I’m the 500-pound gorilla and the other guy’s like the 800-pound gorilla. But for us to beat the competition, what you have to do is just have to be willing to outspend your competition for your market and get in front of those sellers to maximize their opportunities.
Mike: Yeah. So what happens sometimes is, in a market like this, if someone’s willing to work really hard and hustle and door-knock and cold call and all that stuff, they’re always limited by their time, right? It’s hard to do 60 deals a year that way so you’ve got to be willing to step up and spend some money on advertising. In your situation, you’re willing to step up and spend more than you did in the past. And the people that were dabbling and spending $1,000, $2,000, $3,000 a month in your market have either gotten wiped out or they’ve had to figure something else out, right?
Nasar: Absolutely. I’ve known investors when me and you started, Mike, on the investment side, the recession was in. I know a few investors that they were around then. They were full-time and they didn’t progress or transgress. And what happened was they had to go get jobs.
Mike: Yep. Yeah, there is a bunch of people. And when I think back to when I first started, there is a bunch of people that were all over the place. I’m on their wholesale list, they’re wholesaling lots of deals. I haven’t heard from those guys in years now. Now, other things happen, too. Health issues. I don’t know what their situations are, but yeah, a lot of people that used to just scrounge some stuff up here and there and do okay in the down market, unless they stepped up their game, they’re gone now, right?
Nasar: Yeah. Gone.
Mike: For the most part. Yep. So let’s talk about outsmarting your competition. So there are a lot of people that keep doing things the way that they’ve been doing them for a long time. I was just talking about some new bucks that come in. I know a few people that I’ve had on the show lately that are here in the Dallas market. Jamie Wooley, we have RJ Bates coming up here.
They weren’t even investing more than a couple of years and now they’re doing more than 100 deals a year in what we think is one of the most competitive markets in the country. Certainly top five or 10, for sure, Dallas. But they just came in and figured it out. So talk a little bit about why it’s important to be smarter. Like your shirt says there, you’ve got to know the game.
Nasar: I know the game. Know the game. So yeah, basically, in this market, you want to out-beat your competition. You want to be able to build a better rapport with the seller. You want to be able to know how to properly sell because you’re selling . . . what we do, we have a service as wholesalers. But we’re selling the seller on dealing with us. So we have to sharpen up our sales skills. Don’t be afraid to go to those seller training classes and such to out-beat the competition. Know when and where to say the right things.
I have gotten houses because some guys go in there and beat up the house verbally in front of the seller. The seller’s already feeling bad. And meanwhile, I’m just understanding. “Hey, man, we go into stuff like this all the time. I’ve seen worse.” I don’t beat up the house with the sellers. You know what I mean? They know they’ve got a messed up house. So you just want to be better than your competition in order . . . because if there’s a situation where as they’re showing five investors, ideally, you want to be that one investor that gets the contract.
Mike: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And by the time this show airs here, we’re recording this a week or two in advance of when it actually comes out, but, for example, I’ve been an investor 10 years and I’m going to a John Martinez’s sales training boot camp, REI Sales Academy, coming up here in the third week of April. And so, yeah, it’s important to just stay on top of your game and to continue to educate yourselves.
Can you share some things that you do to kind of stay sharp or stay ahead of the game? Because, truthfully, let’s be honest. I know you agree with this too. For folks listening, this is very much a mental game. There are people who have been doing this for 8, 10, 20 years, whatever and they give up and throw the towel in sometimes because they say, “This just doesn’t work.”
But it doesn’t work the way it used to work. Nothing works the way it used to work. We’ve got cell phones now. We don’t have rotary dial phones. Things advance, right? And it’s not just technology. It’s your mindset and your skillset. So from a mindset standpoint, what’s some advice you could give to people to kind of stay sharp? Or what are some things that you do to try to stay sharp and stay ahead?
Nasar: I listen to a lot of podcasts. Lately, I’ve been listening to mental toughening podcasts because that mentality of me shifting my mental, that’s what got me out of corporate America and I was able to succeed. So just having that mental shift. So I listen to a lot of podcasts, man. When I’m working, doing back-end stuff in my home office, what I do is I go on YouTube, put different motivational videos on or them interviewing a very successful person.
If the successful person is genuine, most of the time, if the interview, they’re genuine, they’ll tell you about their failures, the things they had to overcome. Some things that I think I went through were pretty tough are nothing compared to what . . . you know? So I just put myself around those people and just seeing, “Hey, well, if they overcame that, I definitely can overcome my little, small problem.”
Mike: Yeah, no doubt. It’s always eye-opening to me. Of course, with social media, you see people posting videos. I’ve seen this one lately where it’s like a bricklayer with one arm and no legs. And it’s just cranking out a brick wall. Stuff like that, you’re like, “Man, I’ve got . . . my back’s a little sore today, but I’ve got to stop complaining.” But, yeah, that stuff happens all the time. That’s what, hopefully, even with our podcast, people get some inspiration out of hearing some of these people that are new to the game that just come in and crush it when everybody else is squealing about how bad the market is or how hard it is. Not that it’s a bad market, a competitive market.
But, yeah. I think it’s pretty much a universal truth, almost. Sometimes, we forget how good we have it. We kind of complain a little bit. But, man, my problems aren’t nearly as bad as this other person. Especially when it comes to health issues, right? But I think with success, man, I think that’s one of the things that I love about this business and that I love about doing this podcast is I talk to people that just . . . they don’t have all these preconceived notions about how it used to be. They’re like, “Well, that’s how it used to be. But that’s now how it is anymore. Here’s how I’m going to keep moving forward.”
Some of it is getting around masterminds, too, right? Just getting around people that get you out of your shell. And you kind of see how people that are doing something bigger and better than you and how they’re doing it. And you can kind of learn from one another, right?
Nasar: Absolutely. Yes.
Mike: Yeah. Awesome. So let’s talk about the out-work part. Sometimes, you’ve just got to hustle. This is like a hustle business, right? So I know a lot of people and, truthfully, that’s probably one of the things that some people have tried to do. All the things we’ve mentioned here, outspend and outsmart, none of them individually work by themselves. You can outspend, people but if you’re not willing to work harder then, sometimes, just spending more money isn’t always the answer, right?
So let’s talk about the hustle side of this. Because I think what’s happened is in years past, some people were willing to work hard. Now they’re like, “Eh, I don’t really want to work that hard anymore.” But what’s happened, really, is they’ve just gotten a bit lazy. So let’s talk about the importance of out-working your competition.
Nasar: All right. Yeah. It’s extremely important these days because you have everybody wanting to be an investor. So you have to beat a lot of people so that you can get that paycheck. Ultimately, what a lot of us want is the paycheck. Of course, we want to do things like serve people properly and serve God and things like that, but we want to get a paycheck. So you just have to be willing to out-work.
Like me, I’m not doing the 2,000 to 3,000 postcards. I go after the bigger lists. So somebody sends me a list, I mail everything on that particular list when I have a request to list. Whereas the guys who are mailing 1,000 postcards these days, they’re probably getting two calls out of the 1,000. Meanwhile, I increase my chances. So that’s why I do what I do.
Mike: Yeah. And would you say . . . I mean, I know when you came in, you hustled a lot harder because you had to, right? You had to prove yourself. Especially after doing a deal where you didn’t make money. A lot of people give up, then, right? They just do that and, “Oh, this doesn’t work.” But you didn’t give up. You just went out and made it happen. So talk about the hustle side of this business, in terms of lead generation, whether it’s driving for dollars . . . a lot of people that are doing cold calling tactics now. Just things like that, the importance of being willing to do that.
I know sometimes when you have a business that’s ramped up like yours, you don’t have to do it as much. But for people that are trying to get in this business, maybe talk to them about willingness to do whatever it takes from a hustle standpoint. Jump in the car, drive across town to talk to somebody that doesn’t sound like they’re that motivated just because you never know, stuff like that.
Nasar: That, man, that’s going to come down to why you’re doing this business. It’s going to come down to your why because, see, for me, it took me eight months for me to get my first wholesale deal. And, Mike, you’ve seen way more people than I have that gave up, being that you run an education business. So you’ve seen way more.
But during that process of eight months, I could have given up the second month, the third month, the fourth month, the fifth month, the sixth, the seventh, etc. I just knew I was for certain that, at the time, I was back in my 20s so I looked at some people that were 10, 20, 30 years older than me and I just knew I did not want to be them. I did not want . . . and when I say, “be them,” meaning in 10, 20, 30 years, I’m here at that particular job. I did not want to be them. I did not want the life they had. I knew what I wanted. I just had to go out and make it happen.
So it kind of boils down to let’s say, Mike, you get somebody and you take on a new student. A new student might have a job and they might be making excuses of, “Well, you know, I don’t have enough time because I’ve got to work 40 hours. Then I’ve got to drive home.” Man, you have to learn time management. But you have to . . . Mike can’t make you do it. You have to want to do it. You have to want to do it.
So those new people, man, it’s just . . . I would say to think about why you’re doing this business. If you’re serious about it, then block out your schedule and make those 100 calls that you had to make, cold calls. Drive around town. Think about why you’re doing it, man. If you’re serious, you’re going to do it. If you’re not serious, it was just another get-rich-quick scheme that you thought you could get a quick check and you found out it wasn’t.
Mike: Not at all. Not at all, man. Yeah, there’s no doubt about it. There are a lot of people that make excuses. People just get comfortable. They say they hate their job, but it’s just comfortable to collect that check, right? Of course, they could lose that tomorrow or next month or next year. Nobody’s safe anymore, right? Not when you’re working for somebody else.
Nasar: Yeah. I remember, and this is back in my 20s, that last recession, which was the worst recession since the Great Depression. But there were jobs that people would consider secure jobs. Like working for the government, working for this department. “Oh, that job is secure. You’re good.”
During that time, man, people were getting laid off on these so-called secure jobs. We’re in a new day and age. There’s nothing secure no more. If upper . . . if the boss or whoever needs to trim some fat, well, then some departments just got to go or some people just have to get laid off. That’s just the name of the game now.
I know. I have an associate, a guy that I know who was working at probably a Fortune 50 company. Been there 10-plus years, making about probably $35 an hour and got laid off due to they eliminated that department and outsourced it. So now, he had to go find a job and couldn’t find that $35-an-hour starting pay job. He had to get something that’s probably 50% less than his salary. But just to go with what Mike said, nothing is secure these days, man. Just yeah. It’s not secure anymore.
Mike: Yeah. You’ve got to take responsibility for yourself, man, because nobody else is looking at it the way you do. Yep. Awesome, man. Well, what advice would you give for . . . we talked a little bit about it here. But for, let’s just say, new people that are getting started, that are trying to get started in a market that is more challenging than it has been in the past, plenty of opportunity, though, we know that, if you have your mindset right.
But what kind of advice would you give to people that are new or newer or were like you and me before, where we just got started? We’ve maybe done a deal or two, but we’re realizing it’s a little bit harder than we thought. What advice would you give to that person?
Nasar: Man, focus. Focus, focus. Put yourself around positivity. Put yourself around positivity when you’re in your car. Listen to podcasts, audiobooks. Mike has 400-plus episodes. So you have a lot of content right there. That’s 400-plus testimonials so, you know, you can listen to the FlipNerd podcast. Listen in the car. Listen to audiobooks. When you get home, what I did when I first got started in this business, man, I cut out cable to focus just on real estate. Cut out cable. I stopped listening to music in my car. Listening to podcasts. I had to make it happen.
Your social media. I know we’ve got these friends we grew up with. But now, we have to grow mentally. So try to . . . you want to start having positivity come down your newsfeed. In my 20s, I had some wild stuff coming down my newsfeed. Now, I’ve got people posting checks, positive things. Happiness, love coming down. I’ve still got a little bit of ratchet coming down my timeline, but the positivity outweighs the negativity, outweighs the ratchet stuff, I would say. So even on your social media, we can’t control that, man. If somebody’s always complaining about life and you’re always seeing that stuff, maybe just delete them.
Look for a FlipNerd-type page, a fan page, etc. because if you like enough positive fan pages, Facebook is going to start suggesting some to you. And you could have that and you could have that and be able to connect with like-minded people. Especially, I mean, man, we’ve got Facebook groups and everything. Multiple. Millions of Facebook groups on any given topic that you can join.
I remember, man, when I first got started on the creative real estate side in 2010, as far as podcasts, there were probably fewer than five real estate podcasts and maybe two or three of those guys were active and they didn’t quit the business because of the recession. Now, you’ve got 100-plus podcasts. If you’re in a major city, you’ve got about 500 meet-ups going on in your particular city. I didn’t have those things when I was getting started on the creative side back in 2010. It was only a few meet-ups, etc. So there are options out there, guys. You’ve got to put yourself around the right people.
Mike: Yeah, absolutely. There’s no doubt. I think sometimes I tell people two things. Well, a lot of things. But a couple things. One is to block off time to focus on this. Just block time. Because sometimes, we’re like, “I’m going to get to it.” You just need to say, “No, man. From 7:00 to 9:00, I’m working on this.” Or you’ve got kids? Put them to bed. From 9:00 to 11:00, I’m going to work on this. Whatever it is, if you want it bad enough, make that time all about this.
Don’t put the kids to bed or get home late from work and turn on the news or something that’s going to bring you down, that’s not going to add any value and is going to be the same thing they’ve been talking about for years anyway. But you’re right, though. Just getting yourself around people with the same mindset that have the same interests as you.
So there are a ton of real estate groups and Facebook groups and lots of other things out there. Just constantly putting that in your mind, you’ll start to see. The interesting thing about this business is . . . and probably other businesses too. But, obviously, this is what we do is I don’t know anybody that came out of the womb flipping houses. We all had challenges of some sort and learned how to do this. So everybody learned this. This is not some innate skill that we were born with. We all figured this out because we wanted this bad enough, right?
Nasar: That’s correct.
Mike: Yeah, yeah. Cool, man. Well, that’s great information. That’s some great takeaways there. So, Nasar, if folks want to learn more about you, where can they go to learn more?
Nasar: Man, realestatedoru.com. I’m going to be honest with you guys, I haven’t updated it in years.
Mike: Because you’re focused on your real estate business. There’s nothing wrong with that.
Nasar: Yeah. I’m focused on my real estate business. But any social media, realestatedoru. You’ll find me. If you want, I’m a little bit more active on Instagram, @realestatedoru. But, yeah. Oh, yeah. And if you want some content, you can go to YouTube and I have over 100-plus videos on that particular channel. So something to keep you busy for a few months.
Mike: A few months. Sounds good, man. We’ll track down some links and add them down in the show notes down below here on flipnerd.com. So good to see you, my friend.
Nasar: All right. You, too, Mike. And thanks for everything.
Mike: Yeah. Everybody, this is episode number 408 with Nasar. He’s got a great story. He’s started off and made it happen, just like you can, too, if you’re not already doing it. So I appreciate you guys being here. If you could, if you haven’t already, give us a positive rating on iTunes, Stitcher Radio. You can subscribe to us out there. Subscribe to us on YouTube. Anywhere.
You can find us in a million places. We put our content everywhere. Of course, on flipnerd.com. So keep those positive ratings coming in and share our show with your friends. That’s what keeps us moving forward is more people listening and trying to impact more lives. So we appreciate everybody. Have a great day. We’ll see you on the next episode.
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