Maui Millionaires

There are nine steps of every commercial real estate deal. These nine steps need to happen regardless if you're buying an apartment complex, or a shopping center, or an office building. These are the core steps to do any big deal--profitably and safely.

I want to walk you through each of these nine steps, in order, right now. Then at the end of this special report I will give a lucky few of you private access to get the complete recordings of this private 3-day, invitation only workshop--and best of all, you'll learn about how you'll get a very special bonus if you act fast enough.

But first, on to step one!

Step One: Finding profitable commercial real estate deals.

When we started our workshop we spent several hours talking through exactly how we found our best commercial deals. What surprised me was the consistency with which three techniques out of all the hundreds of ways to find deals kept coming up again and again.

Sure, each of us applied these techniques in subtly different ways. That was a great deal of the fun, picking my guest teacher's brains for exactly how they found their best deals. But there was a remarkable consistency for how we all found our deals.

One of the most compelling factors was how we each tapped into our relationships to find great deals. One of my co-teachers used his network of commercial real estate brokers to bring him potential deals to sort through, but what was amazing was the way he did it. He didn't just call up random agents and ask for their listings. He was able to create relationships with brokers around the country so that they felt on fire to search to find him winning deals.

If you want to succeed with your commercial investing you are going to need to learn to become an expert at working with and through commercial brokers. What are their hot buttons? Their dreams? Their fears? Their strengths? And their limitations?

For example, Nate, a partner of mine with whom I've bought millions of dollars of commercial real estate, joined us over the three days as a guest teacher. Nate, who is by nature one of the best deal sleuths I know, shared the mechanics of how he is able to maintain his relationship with the broker while still working directly with the seller him or herself. Those of you who have been in the commercial real estate game for any length of time recognize this as no mean feat. And you also understand the immense advantage this would give to your in your investing.

Nate is consistently able to get the listing broker to relax and feel comfortable setting up direct meetings with Nate and the seller of the project. This in turn gives Nate a huge advantage in negotiating a winning deal. It also has led to one of Nate's most important deal finding techniques as he's refined his questioning ability to get these sellers to go off the record and tell him about other projects that they own that they might be willing to sell that aren't even on the market yet! (As you can imagine, we were all blown away by how simple Nate made this as he role played through the languaging at the workshop.)

While I could go on and on about step one (finding the best commercial real estate deals), lest this special report turn into a book I need to move on to step two...

Step Two: Analyzing the deal.

Why is it that seasoned commercial pros can move so quickly on great deals, with such confidence and focus? Because they have done the work they needed to analyze the deal, run the numbers backwards and forwards, and know they have a great deal.

But can I let you in on a little-known secret? While inexperienced newbies spend weeks and weeks pouring over the numbers, the real pros know how to look at a deal in a layered approach that conserves their time and focuses their full energies on the best potential deals, while quickly sorting out the dogs.

I call it the "Three Layered Approach to Deal Analysis" and it's something we spent hours on at the workshop. In the first pass you only care about three variables to see if the deal is worth taking a closer look at. That's it--three questions to ask.

What does the average investor do? He overwhelms himself with spreadsheets and data points. He literally drowns in the information he's gathered.

My advice to you is to instead use the first pass to sort for the potentially strong deals and eliminate the obvious dogs.

The best way to learn to do that fast is by playing a game I developed four years ago at the first Maui Mastermind™ event called, "Deal or Dog". I wish you could have been there as we broke into teams and raced to find the deals and dump the dogs in 18 potential deals we examined. At the end we went through all 18 deals as a group with myself and my co-teachers sharing what were the clues that let us know which ones were dogs (we could spot them in less than 30 seconds usually) and which ones merited further evaluation.

The most important thing I am trying to share with you is that it isn't magic. Anybody, and I do mean anybody, with a little coaching and practice, can get to be a solid deal analysis player. The key is knowing which information to ignore and which information you must focus on.

In case you're wondering, did we "make up" the deals we used in the game, we most certainly did not. All of the deals were actual deals that we were looking through to potentially buy. In fact, of the 18 portfolios we examined there that weekend, I actually ended up buying one of them four months later for approximately $8 million. (Why would I want to "make up" deals when I could get double duty out of the weekend and make it a much better experience for my clients by using real deals and make a few million bucks!)

In the second "layer", this is when sit down with your computer and run the real numbers. Every successful investor eventually learns the shortcuts of running the numbers so that that develop a nose for winning deals. These shortcuts are the fruits of dozens of deals and much painful trial and error. For most investors their accumulated experience and shortcuts are more valuable than gold. My clients got lucky. We just gave them the shortcuts we use. (After all, why reinvent the wheel right?)

For example, there are 17 expenses that must be factored in for every commercial real estate deal, and invariably the seller will skip two or three of them in the numbers they give to you.

It's your job to fit in the standard numbers that you know must be accounted for so that you have an accurate assessment of two things: the real "Net Operating Income" (often referred to as the NOI) of the project and how honest the seller is being with you in the process. Both are required information for you to know how to proceed.

The third layer of analysis is during the deep due diligence phase, but I'll talk about that a little later in this special report.

Once you've completed your second layer you actually know enough that you can intelligently move on to step three...

Step Three: Structuring the deal.

Every deal has to be crafted two ways.

First, you have to create the external structure to the deal. What is the offer you are going to present to the seller? What are the key deal points you need to negotiate? What are the pieces you can live without?

Most investors mistakenly focus on one variable--price--to the exclusion of all else. What we taught our 14 participants that weekend was that there are dozens of variables you can use to shape a winning offer.

Oh, and here's the best part, most of the offers can be set up so that they minimize or eliminate you needing to personally bring any money to the table! Crazy as it seems it's actually easier to do a commercial deal with nothing down than it is to buy a single family house with nothing down.

The big players know this. People like Donald Trump and Trammel Crow did their best deals using other people's money. (We'll talk more about how to raise this outside money in Step Six.)

According to one participant there that weekend, this section, when as a team of experts we brainstormed out all the variables to work with in structuring a deal, was life-changing.

There are certain core ways to structure deals, from master-lease options, to cash purchases, to owner carries, to equity splits, to hybrid equity splits.

By combining these core patterns with the variables in the specific deal, you're able to craft your "Letter of Intent" or initial offer. This is the starting point for your negotiating.

But this is only half of the "structuring" that needs to go on in your deal. The other half is the internal structuring of the deal. Which of your team members gets paid what percentage of the deal. How much will you pay your money partners and how will you structure that key part?

While every deal is different, we gave a "cheat-cheat" card to each of the participants of how to value each piece in the deal so that they had a starting point of knowing who should get what from the deal.

What do most investors do? They delay talking about the internal structure of the deal for too long because they are intimidated or uncomfortable with it. This is a big mistake. The time to work through this is at the front end of the deal, not later.

Okay, I'll get off my soap-box now and move to the next step...

Step Four: Negotiate a winning deal.

Once you know your options as to how you want to structure the deal it's time to arrange a meeting with the seller to negotiate the deal. Many times this will initially take place over the phone, with a later face-to-face meeting if the deal warrants it.

Other times you will simply submit your LOI or initial offer through your broker or the listing broker, and see if you get a nibble. And that's exactly how I look at my initial offer, as a bit of enticement to see if the seller is ready to sit down and really talk in earnest.

I'm not one for spending weeks and weeks researching a deal to make your perfect offer because chances are, you won't really have all the facts until you complete your due diligence anyway. Plus, why spend all that time and energy only to discover that the seller isn't at all motivated or flexible?

Instead, I urge you to put out multiple offers, like fishing with several rods at once, and when you get a nibble, work that offer to see if you have a deal worth reeling in.

Once you do, then you will be best served by sitting down and talking directly with the owner of the property.

And if you are able to find a good fit, then once you've got the deal under contract, then and only then, is it time for you to move on to the next step...

Step Five: Complete your due diligence.

Imagine you have a property under contract. Maybe it's a 300,000 square foot office complex, or maybe it's a 275-unit apartment building. But whatever type of property it is, the clock is ticking and you have 60 days to complete your due diligence before your earnest money deposit "goes hard". That is to say, you have 60 days before the earnest money deposit becomes non-refundable.

It's amazing what a ticking clock does to focus your thinking and energize you into action!

Let me let you in on one of the best kept secrets in commercial real estate. It's what allows the pros to examine ten times the number of deals of the amateur in a fraction of the time. It's what let's me save hundreds of hours of time and tens of thousands of dollars of wasted expenses.

Have I got your attention? Good. The secret is this: not all due diligence items are equal. Sound too simple? It's not. In every deal there are one or two elements around which the whole deal hinges. These "800 pound gorillas" are the items you must check out first before you waste time inspecting everything else.

Yet what do most investors do? They work down their due diligence checklist (if in fact they even have one) from top to bottom as if all items were created equal. But I'm here to tell you that all items are most assuredly NOT created equal.

For example, one of the deals we looked at was a portfolio of office buildings in Raleigh, North Carolina. The single greatest "800 pound gorilla" in that deal was what exactly where the market conditions for those buildings. In other words, what were the market rents and market demand (both current and expected)? If these were out of line with the deal we had agreed on I would either have needed to renegotiate the deal, or walked away from it. (In case you're curious, this was the deal we did out of the 18 properties, and the market conditions turned out to be very favorable for us.)

Once you have assured yourself that the BIG items are checked out, then and only then is it time to finish your entire Due Diligence Checklist.

And while we're on the topic of checklists, please make sure you follow a proven process in your deals. Making it up or improvising on the fly is a sure way to go broke in this business. That's why we spent so much time going item by item through the due diligence checklist we use in our deals with the participants there that weekend. We didn't want them to miss anything in their investing.

Once you've checked out the big items on your list, you need to do Step Six in parallel with the remainder of your due diligence.

Step Six: Funding your deal.

I guess you could say that we had an insider advantage because one of the guest teachers who joined us there was a friend of mine named Morgan who owns a mortgage brokerage company with over 200 branches nationwide! As a personal favor to me he brought his top commercial loan guy with him from his company, Mark, who shared the behind the scenes view of getting the money you need from your deals.

It was incredible to hear Morgan and Mark share from their unique perspective about the loan process for commercial loans. As they talked about things like "Debt Service Coverage Ratios" and other industry concepts, I got a whole new perspective on securing conventional financing, and I had been doing this for quite some time!

As for the private money part, we had that covered too. In fact, not only had my guest teachers and I raised tens of millions of dollars, but we've done it in a very systematic and repeatable way that we shared with the participants.

The highlight of course, was a very special evening session we did where we put them into four teams, and each of them had 5 minutes to pitch the deal to a panel of prospective money people who might fund it for them.

You'll be amazed to listen to the feedback we gave them because we know what money people need to hear. Remember, not only do we do our own deals, but most of us have invested LOTS of money in other people's deals over the years.

You see there is a formula you must follow when it comes to pitching your deal to money people. The formula has been around for many years, but sadly, most investors simply don't know it and rush to reformulate things in isolation. Is it any wonder that for most investors the lack of money is their single greatest stumbling point?

For example, there are three questions that every money person has at the front of his mind when someone approaches him about funding for a deal. If you don't answer these three questions in the first 120 seconds you won't ever have a second chance with him. I know it's harsh, but you can't say it's unfair because they treat every perspective deal promoter the same exact way. Of course, if you don't fundamentally understand those three questions, and how you must sculpt your presentation to quickly answer all three of them within the first 2 minutes, then you will be met with a wall of frustration and disappointment when it comes to raising money.

But the good news is that when you understand a few of the fundamentals, and follow the formula, it becomes much easier for you to capture the attention of the money people you approach. And that my friend is the victory that comes before the victory.

Once you have their attention you can present your deal. If the deal is a strong one and your plan shows you have the competence between you and your team, then the money is easy, at that point. But the key phrase is "at that point".

You've got to use strategy and technique to get your foot in the money door. Once there, then and only then, will your deal and your plan and your team have the opportunity to secure the private funding you need to do your big deals.

Once you've secured your funding it's time for you to move on to the next step...

Step 7: Closing the deal.

The next step in the deal once you've completed your deep due diligence and secured your financing is for you to actually close on the property.

We actually covered the "closing" step from two perspectives. First we covered it from the active investor's perspective. This included things like what exactly a commercial closing is like and what are the main pitfalls to look out for. The way I look at it is that you've brought yourself right up to the final two minutes of the game and now it's crunch time.

I've closed on a LOT of properties over the past decade, and in almost every deal there is some last minute "emergency" that has to be dealt with. The best advice I can give you, and it was echoed by the panel discussion we had on this very subject at the workshop, is to expect a few last minute challenges and trust you'll be able to deal with them.

The second perspective we looked at this step was that of the passive "money" investor. It's important if you are considering putting money in a deal that you first look to see how that deal fits into your strategic plan for investing your total net worth across a portfolio of investments. Next you need to look at the specific deal and see how it measures up on your personal investment criteria. And finally, you have to do your due diligence before you invest any money.

While the main focus of the three days was on how to put together and do commercial real estate deals, I felt it was too important to skip over the skill of investing your money in other people's deals, so we spent a good many hours on this skill. Besides, what better way is there to learn how to make your deal attractive enough to raise money than for me to train you to think like a passive money investor yourself!

Now, while most investors think that closing on the deal is the end game, it isn't. It's the starting gun for the next game. Which leads us on to the next step...

Step Eight: Transitioning into owning the new property.

While some of the projects you will take on will have turn-key management in place so that the transition is effortless and easy, most will not. Why? Because if the properties you buy are all exceptionally well run that means that they are fully leased up (or close to it) with quality tenants who are paying market rental rates, and the properties have smoothly functioning management systems in place with reliable dash boards that give proper warning for any hotspots.

I have one question for you: how many "deals of the century" do you think you're likely to find that have all of the above? Zero, or pretty darn close to it. If the property was perfectly well run to begin with it then the price would reflect that, which would mean your profit potential would be limited.

Now there might be a day when you are willing to invest for lower returns of a fully stabilized property that is well run, that day isn't today probably. And even on deals like this you'll still want some upside to the deal, which will most likely come from below market rents that can be raised in waves to increase cash flow and increase your total returns.

Most of the projects you'll take on, at least for those of you hungry for the big profits, will involve some kind of upgrade, completion, or turn around to the project.

Step eight is the step when you implement your post closing plan. If you're smart you won't wait until closing to start implementing your plan. You'll begin as soon as you've done your due diligence and know you have a deal that you want to close on. This gives you a running start for when you've closed on the deal.

At the workshop we spent hours focusing on the poster child turn around project that Nate and I were in the process of completing at that time--a 322-unit apartment complex that we had purchased from the estate of a local investor that was completely mismanaged when we bought it 12 months earlier.

When we bought the complex it was hovering at a 45-50 percent vacancy factor and lots of unrentable units. We had worked with various contractors and staff to turn around the project. We had fixed up most of the units and were in the process of leasing the buildings up. At the time of the workshop we were up to 78-80 percent occupied and climbing.

For that project we had chosen the option of building our own management team to turn around the project, and in fact, I brought Brian, our property manager overseeing the project, to the workshop to share his insights and practical experiences.

It was amazing! We spent time talking about the do's and don'ts of hiring professional management companies. What was most incredible was hearing the inside scoop of what to look out for in management companies from a guy who had spent his career working for several of them!

As you can imagine his insights sparked a host of focused comments and techniques to protect yourself and best leverage your management company from the rest of us.

Now at a certain point you'll have the property stabilized and be ready to either own it over time, or to turn to sell the project. Which brings us to the final step of the process...

Step Nine: Selling the project for top dollar.

Different investors have different timelines for what they want from their eventual exit strategy. Some investors want to take on a project, and in 24-36 months turn it around and resell it for a multi-million profit.

Other investors prefer to hold on to the properties they buy for long term cash flow, appreciation, amortization, and tax benefits.

Actually, most investors use a mixture of exit strategies depending on a particular deal and their financial needs at the time.

For example, take that apartment complex that Nate and I were in the final stages of turning around. We bought it for approximately $7.6 million. We knew within six months of owning it that we didn't want to hold on to it long term--it was at best a C-grade property. So instead we were in the process of prepping it to sell. Our exit strategy called for us to exchange our profits from that property into one or more other properties.

In fact, the one of the reasons for the timing for the 3-day private workshop was that since we were in the process of looking for some replacement properties to trade up into I thought what better opportunity would there ever be to teach my top clients the inside game of commercial investing than by using real deals with very high stakes.

In the end, we sold that apartment complex for $9.6 million, and exchanged the proceeds into the purchase of four office buildings, which as I have already shared with you, were one of the 18 portfolios we analyzed over the three days!

I must admit that telling you about it now almost feels like I'm on one of those cooking shows where the chef describes the recipe, mixes up a batch, puts it in the oven, and then magically pulls a completely cooked dish out of another oven.

Of course at the time I couldn't have known it would work so seamlessly. But I had faith. I had faith that if I put a small handful of my elite clients together with four of the best commercial real estate experts in the country for three days magic would happen. And it did.

But let's get back to the final step of selling for top dollar. Did you know that there are dozens of proven techniques to dramatically increase the money you get paid for your properties? Techniques that work time and time again?

For example, most prospective sellers make the major mistake of spending on capital expenditures in order to "prep" their property for sale. MISTAKE!

It just lowers the value. While a capital expenditure shows up on the balance sheet and not as an "expense", it still lowers your cash flow. Plus, buyers will rarely value the improvement even close to the money you spent on the improvement. In fact, some of them will think you're capital expense is really your way of hiding a repair and so they'll offset that amount from your cash flow figures which means a lower price for you.

Where then should you focus your energies? Ah, that my friend would take me hours to share with you (in fact that's exactly how long it took at the workshop!) But let me share with you three quick tips on leveraged way to increase the value of your property:

One: Focus on lowering your verifiable expenses. Buyers will count a lowered verifiable expense like your utility bills ten times more than you telling them that you've lowered unverifiable expenses like maintenance costs. Why? Because they can check this from third party sources.

Two: Focus on leasing your building up to market occupancy. Don't bother pushing to fill it further; any knowledgeable buyer will still factor in a vacancy percentage as they evaluate the deal. But make sure you do push to lease the project up to market occupancy. This is a huge leverage point as it increases your cash flow.

Three: Focus on increasing all your rents to market rental rates. Occupancy and lease rates are two of the highest leverage ways to increase cash flow, which in turn increases net operating income, which increases value!

On and on the list could go.

Remember, when you are selling your property is really the time you harvest the profits you already earned when you found, closed on, and took over the project to begin with.

I really wish there was a way for you to have joined us at that once-in-a-lifetime 3-day session. I've taught hundreds of thousands of investors over the past decade and I've never done a multi-day session like that before, and things being what they are, I probably won't ever again.

I also wish I had more time to share with you about the insights, strategies, lessons we covered in depth over those three days, but this report is fast approaching 6,000 words and I fear you're attention is stretched pretty thin.