Ask Us Anything #2: Scaling, Wholesalers, Auctions & Foreclosure Sites, and Roofstock Market Selections

In our second Ask Us Anything, Tom and Michael bring on guest host, Mark Woodling to tackle listener submitted questions on buying from wholesalers, the difference between auction and foreclosure sites, preferences between umbrella policies and LLCs, tax liens, how Roofstock selects markets and more.    --- Transcript     Tom: Greetings and welcome to The Remote Real Estate Investor. And today's episode, we're doing another ask me anything. And on today's episode, we have myself, Tom Schneider. We also have one of our hosts, Michael. Michael, say hello.   Michael: Hey everybody, how's it going?   Tom: And we also have a guest host today with some special expertise in the auction world, as well as some experience on tax liens of wholesales and all that good stuff. So we have Mark with us today. Mark Woodling say hello.   Mark: Hey, thanks for having me on.   Tom: All right, let's do it.   Theme Song ♫   Tom: Welcome back. We have another ask me anything episode, super excited about it and let's jump right into it. So, as we mentioned before, with some of these questions that we saw, you know, they might not be in our wheelhouse, so we wanted to bring in experts and that's why we are fortunate to have Mark Woodling on today. So, Mark, do you want to give the 32nd kind of pitch on all the interesting stuff that you've done in the real estate space to give a little bit of background? Uh, you've been on an episode before, but maybe a brief reminder to folks who haven't listened to that episode.   Mark: Sure, sure. Thanks for having me on guys. I work as the director of local market growth for Roofstock. So really it's a unique role where I work on opening up new markets and how we can really bring new supply into those markets, but it's kind of a unique role. So having a unique background was really why they picked me for this cause I used to go around the country, traveling to tax lien, auctions. I would go and bid for a private equity firm around the country about 26 different States every single year. So a young buck out of college really had no limits, I guess you could say, but learning the real estate game, I've also worked at Fannie Mae in the recession. I was there in their auction group. So we're selling about 18,000 properties a year, just through auction in all 50 States in DC. And then after that worked at a company called Xome X-O-M-E and was their chief auctioneer and with selling glide, the Countrywide portfolio that was kind of leftover toxic asset group after the recession. So, you know, became licensed as an auctioneer in 27 different States and it was doing everything online. So have a bit of a marketplace background as well as just a ton of unique kind of distress real estate background.   Tom: Awesome. Love it. Well, well, let's jump right into it. So our first question we have came in from LinkedIn. This is from Dave and Dave asks, what's the best way to scale your portfolio in the smallest amount of time. And let's see, Michael, do you want to take the first pass at this one? Or do you want me to lead the way?   Michael: Yeah, I would say just get a bunch of money.   Tom: Honestly. The way that I was thinking about this question is kind of twofold. It's like if you have a bunch of money, that's a different answer, right? So if you have a lot of money already, like, okay, getting into portfolios, just buying portfolios outright, or, you know, building a fund with an actual like employment of like acquisition folks like that works really well, but let's go ahead and assume this question is if you don't have a money machine in your basement and you're just scaling and scrapping, what would be your feedback on the quickest way to scale in the shortest amount of time with the limitation on funds?   Michael: I think that there's going to be no quicker way to scale than by partnering with people that have what you don't have. And so if money is tight, you don't have the money go out and make a name for yourself as someone who can put deals together and acquire doors. And I would rather there's this very famous, I don't know how famous it is, but a lot of people say, you know, I'd rather have 50% of one deal than a 100% of no deals. And so if acquisition scaling is the name of the game, go find people that don't have the time or the knowhow or the ability to put deals together and bring them to those people who are looking to get into the real estate game and have the money to do so. That would be my advice. Mark, what do you think?   Mark: I think you're right in line where going to portfolio route really is the easiest way, because then again, you're dealing with one property manager in one city, you know, if you're spreading yourself too thin, you can buy a lot of properties in different markets, but then again, you're having to manage all these property managers and that takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of resources of your own. So I think if you're going to get right to it, you really need to focus on a concentrated area of figuring out diversity, maybe within one market or a few markets, and really figuring out, you know, how to leverage your time when you only have so much time.   Tom: My last little tidbit I'll add on this is the best way to scale your portfolio. My recommendation is really tapping into your, any appreciation and equity that you have in ramping up your leverage as much as possible. Now there's some downsides and risks. If values go the opposite way. And you're only planning on holding these a short period of time. There's some risks for getting under water where the loan is worth more than the property. But if you're trying to squeeze as much dollar as you can into scaling and building acquisitions, it would be basically getting the most leverage that you can. So every single dollar of equity you can have, you're using to scale scale scale. So excellent. Let's go on to the next question. And we have a shout out to Michael on this question, Michael, why don't you read this question?   Michael: This next question comes to us from Ricardo from Walnut Creek and Ricardo is a good buddy of mine. So the question is what's up Roofstock, shout out to my boy, Michael Albaum. This question has to do with working with wholesalers, from what I've seen, you can get some pretty spectacular deals with less competition, but it seems you assume much more risk as far as condition of the property, as well as constraints with financing. What has been your experience working with wholesalers? And what advice would you tell to a new investor who are the wholesalers and what do they do? How do they make money and how do you find them? So, Mark, do you want to take a stab at this one with your background?   Mark: Yeah, absolutely. I go to a lot of mastermind groups and you know, these mastermind groups are really for more advanced real estate investors and many of them are actually wholesalers, but they also and hold. And then, you know, they have their fix and flip models and so forth, but wholesaling could be a very lucrative business because when you put a property under contract, right, you're tying up the contract, that buyer who tied it up under contract is then going to sell their equitable interest, right. They're selling that contract and assigning it to someone else. So they really don't have a specific range of, you know, how much they can make and they don't need to be a real estate licensee. So anybody could be a wholesaler. Really so if you want to get to really who the wholesalers are and what they do, you need to go find guys that are doing this for a living. They go really find great properties that are going to be marketable to the masses. And they will tie up that property. They'll sit down, visit the property, take pictures, you know, run some after repair value type values.   And then they present it to the market as off market deals. So, you know, their job is really go out there when I call bird dog, right? They're the boots on the ground. They're spending a lot of money on marketing and then tying up these opportunities to then sell it without having have any risk or money down besides a small earnest money deposit. So it's not that they own the property ever. They only have it under contract and how they make money. So they'll say at closing, I'm going to make a certain amount of money or they can say, Hey, you're going to have to put $5,000 down and I'll give you my contract. And so they're going to make money one way or the other. And the thing is, you're never connected to the person actually selling the property at the beginning. So, you know, things go a different direction, you know, it can get kind of sticky.   So you really need to know who you're dealing with and really have some trust and not just chase after deals because the property may not be in great condition. And you may never even see the property before you tie it up under contract by how you find them. I'll just finish up on that. You know, the interesting part about that is you can go to Facebook and get on investment groups and say, Hey, I am a qualified buyer. I have cash rate of spend in a specific market. And here's my email address, put me on your buyer list. So you're kind of putting yourself out there and into the worldwide web a little bit and exposing yourself, but that's a great way just to get on these lists and see what kind of flow comes through. But again, these don't sit on the market for very long. So you really need to be able to act quickly in order to take advantage of those opportunities. But yeah, wholesaling's a wild West game. So, you know, proceed with caution.   Tom: Sure. I'm going to paraphrase a little bit. So at a super high level wholesalers, they're out looking for distressed or people need to sell right away. That's right. And they basically get it in contract this wholesaler, and then they sell that contract and never actually take ownership. Right. They almost, it's almost like an arbitrage position. Am I accurately depicting that?   Mark: Exactly. That's exactly the way to put it.   Tom: Awesome.   Michael: Tom, have you ever bought a wholesale deal, a deal from a wholesaler?   Tom: I have not. You know, I definitely have been approached to sell to wholesalers. Their marketing is relentless.   Michael: We buy homes for cash!   Tom: We buy ugly homes. Those guys are all the wholesaler ecosystem. And it's funny, the list of people that they're looking to potentially buy from. It's a kind of a rough list. They're like looking for death divorce, like whatever, kind of like quickly to sell. So, you know, as an investor, there's some potential to buy some off market deals from wholesalers, but you know, to Mark's point, you know, you got to still have a really good diligence process and know the deal. Yeah, no, your buy box. Awesome. All right. So this next question we have is from Andy Dobbs in New Jersey. So Andy asks, does Roofstock provide property management or do we need to find one ourselves? Mark, do you want to take the lead on this guy?   Mark: Sure. So Roofstock doesn't actually provide the property management, but we do guide you through the process of how to find really qualified property management companies. So we take a significant amount of time when we bring on what we call our preferred property managers, we certify them and vet them to make sure that they really do work well with outside investors. So, you know, being an investor from out of state, you do have a different level of expectation with property managers because you will never see that property. You, you may not even be able to drive by it, right? So they can really be your eyes and ears. So we establish that network. So that really transitions to investors, having higher levels of confidence. So we will always guide you in that direction and have great profiles on our website, but you are always free to manage with an outside vendor, but you know, these are always great vendors that we're dealing with on a massive scale. So we do see, you know, how they're acting around other investors and that's great data to make sure that we're always working with the best.   Tom: Yeah. And you know, I think it's great that Roofstock does this initial diligence, but I highly recommend as an investor doing that extra step and giving them a call and asking for some references and making that decision and you don't have to use one of Roofstock's property managers that has gone through this process. It's just available for you as a resource. And if you want to, you can self manage or you can find a different third party, property manager, you have options. It's just kind of giving you a step ahead in that process. Excellent. So this next question we have is from Steve in St. Louis. So Steve asks, so he's seen auction sites, auction.com, an example Xome where Mark used to work at are these sites like actual foreclosure sites and how do they different? What are considerations if I were to buy on one of these auction site, could I use financing? Is there contingencies? What are some of the unique risks? So Mark, this is right in your wheelhouse. So do you want to spiel for a little bit on some of these different auction platforms?   Mark: Absolutely. This is an area that I stumbled into my first job, right out of college back in 2001. So, you know, there there's a lot of different types of auctions in the sense of there's tax lien, auctions. There's an actual foreclosure auction, which is what most people will understand what the courthouse steps. And then there's also REO options that even retail auctions. So kind of walking through, you know, the foreclosure and the REO, meaning real estate owned. That means the property has already been foreclosed on when it's an REO, it's typically bank owned, but what's happened in the last, last real decade is that, you know, after the recession that banks were realizing that there was less inventory available. And there earlier on in the process of buyer can kind of get the edge to buy that property the quicker they can get it off their books.   So again, if a property has been foreclosed upon it, typically in certain States will go to the courthouse steps and you can buy it as a foreclosure. The actual auction is like the final step of the foreclosure process, but in this instance that it doesn't matter there. Then it would go back to the bank and then they can sell it with full ownership. So let's just go into, you know, the foreclosure aspect. If you want to go to the courthouse steps and buy, I mean, it's a great time to be able to buy, but typically you're buying sight unseen. So you really don't know what's on the other side of that door and you cannot use financing. So there may be some really creative ways to get financing, but you're going to need to pay for that property, either at the courthouse step with a cashier's check or you put a certain amount down and then pay the rest soon after.   So that part you're going to have to be really buttoned up for. And these are nowadays being conducted even by auction.com, Xome or Hubzu, which are actually at the courthouse steps and working as a third party to really replace the attorneys who are doing these foreclosure auctions before. So you may see like the full on auction going on, where there's a big tent, big TVs, you know, there's a level of organization that's happened in the last, I would say five, six years to really make those more friend link to anybody coming in from the outside so that they actually have customer service representatives there to answer questions. So if you're really curious about those, I always suggest go, it is fun. It is really exciting. And there may be multiple auctions, like I'm in Dallas. So in Texas, they have what they call super Tuesday and you go to the courthouse steps.   There could be four different companies out there doing four different auctions. So it's really something that you need to get comfortable with and ask a bunch of questions that you'll meet people there they're wholesaling, you'll meet people there they're buying for their own. And then you'll have major institutions that are there and they probably won't talk to you about their strategy. That's kind of holding the cards close to the vest, but I would just say coming from an auction background, the risks, that's really something that you need to understand your own risk appetite because there's online auction portals, where you could go in and bid on properties that may have either been foreclosed upon or are just about to get foreclosed upon. And they're trying to sell it before it goes to foreclosure. So if you are going to take the risk, really understand, you know, what kind of websites you can go to and dig in deep, because if it's going to foreclosure, there may be other liens, whether it's federal liens or just other kind of sticky liens that you may have to navigate through.   So you really need to be prepared for that. But most of the time at the foreclosure, you know, any other liens are wiped out. So study, study, study, understand your risk, understand buying sight unseen, you know, have numbers in mind, don't get caught up in the auction. Cause that's something a lot of people get caught up in because it's that active bidding. It's a lot of energy. That's what the auctioneers do. I come from that background. I only have done online, but I have watched and studied the live auctions and they are entertainers. They want to squeeze money out of you. So go in, know your numbers, understand your risk, understand your rehab, know your numbers, know your numbers, know your numbers, and then proceed with that strategy that you've been putting together.   Michael: Mark, I've got a question. Did I hear you right in saying that the banks might want to get these things at auction before the final step of foreclosure, but did I miss hear you?   Mark: Yeah, well the banks have a few different plays sometimes. So if they bring it to foreclosure auction, they get to set a bid and they are the ones that say here's the amount that I would be owed and that I would set as the reserve. And so if they're going to go in and they are there and somebody is going to bid on that property, they need to meet that certain amount. And if that amount is not met and they can foreclose at that point on the property and then bring it to sell any other way that they would want, they could put it into a retail platform like MLS, or they could bring it to another auction site and try the auction again, because typically these are properties in distress situations, but the bank's goal is typically to sell the property as early on in the process. So they don't need to do all of these asset management post foreclosure, which means they have to have staff. You know, they have a lot of costs to get the property cleaned up and presented and ready for market. So they typically want to dispose of that as early in the process. And some of them don't even let it go to foreclosure auction. They'll sell alone in a 90 day delinquency just to say, Hey, I'd rather sell this off to someone else rather than have to go through this longer timeline, even though they could potentially make more money. It just makes more sense to them to take the money and, you know, let somebody else take care of the risk.   Michael: Got it. Thanks.   Tom: All right. This next question, I think is a good one for Michael here. Gilbert, from LinkedIn asked, what parts of the team should in can be local and what doesn't really matter in your, in your own state, or just thinking about locations of that real estate team that you have, where they should sit.   Michael: Yeah, that's a great question, Gilbert. So I'll just share kind of how my team looks on a personal level. And so I've got property managers and agents and insurance agents local to the property out where the property is physically located and my CPA and my attorney are in California. And so that's kind of how I've set up shop. Now. I was chatting with an attorney, uh, excuse me, with a CPA. We had Joel Jensen on from Tax Sentry on the podcast a few episodes ago, and he's out in Utah and prepares returns in all 50 States for investors. And so I'm realizing now that you know, more and more of your team can likely be remote. I think having an attorney local to where you live in your state, because you're going to be subject to local laws. If you're setting up LLCs in your state, I think it's important to have an attorney locally, but it could also be beneficial to have a local attorney to where the property is since if you are going to get pulled into a lawsuit resulting from that property, the local laws to where the property are, are the ones that are going to be applicable. So understanding how to cover your bases in that state is I think important as well.   Tom: I think an interesting point you make is having the insurance agent be local to the property. I'd love your thoughts on that. It's just, you know, being able to squeeze out the best deal on insurance or   Michael: Yeah just having access to local markets, which isn't the case across the board. So for example, I work with a company in California that doesn't write that, that doesn't write insurance in the Midwest. And so the, a lot of the Midwest insurance agents just have access to different carriers and these carriers are gonna know the markets inside and out. There's a reason why the California insurance companies aren't participating in the Midwest because they don't know the market. And so very similar to having a local lender to the property. They can often be more creative because they know the market better allows them to be more competitive. So again, that's another part, a team member that I left off is lenders. So I have lenders local to the property in which the property is located. I also have lenders that work on the national level and I give them both a shot at it and whoever can come up with the best terms and financing usually gets the cake. So I think it's important. Your property manager obviously should be local. Your real estate agent, I think should also be local, pretty much everybody else. It could go either way. I think it's very beneficial to have local people to the, so at least you can ask those questions as a comparison to the folks that you have locally to where you live.   Tom: That makes sense. You know, one of the markets that Roofstock operates in, in Florida and for properties that go through our certification process, we come up with an insurance quote that is an insurance quote. That will be, that is bindable, right? That a company is willing to agree to. But oftentimes we found that Florida, the national provider that we use is rates are a little bit higher than some of the local ones. So I guess in markets work and be a little bit more tricky and there's more potential liability on the insurance side really worth going in and getting the local quotes. And even if it's not that tricky, I like that. That's a great point. This goes in very nicely to the next question that Corey from Austin is asking. So, Hey, Roofstock a long time listener. First time caller. I'm about to acquire my third SFR with you guys. Awesome. Congrats Corey. And I'm wondering when is hazard insurance enough versus getting an umbrella policy, a related question that we got from somebody else as well, a good umbrella policy help replace the LLC. And I think kind of the hardest question is, you know, at what point do you start kind of bundling properties into umbrella versus like individual? So Michael this is right in your wheelhouse. What are your thoughts on this?   Michael: Yeah, I would say Corey again. Great question. We just recorded a podcast with actually my California attorney and we asked this exact question. So I would say, definitely give that episode of listen. That episode should be released in about two weeks or so, but so again, I'll just share kind of my personal anecdote. When I first started investing in single family homes, there was a couple thousand dollars in cashflow a year coming off each property and to have an LLC in California, it costs $800 a year just simply to have it. So that expense wasn't justified given the amount of cashflow these properties were generating. So I bought three properties prior to opening up an LLC and then put everything, wrapped, everything up, did a quick claim deed and transferred everything to the LLC. Now there's two very distinct camps. There's the pro LLC camp and the no LLC camp.   And the pro LLC camp argues that, Hey, if you can bundle everything, put it into a silo and segregate your assets from your personal stuff. That's really great. The no LOC camp argues that you can get that same type of coverage, that same type of asset protection with a high liability insurance policy and an umbrella policy. Who's right, will only be determined once there's a lawsuit. And so it's all comes down to your comfort level, your comfortability, you can get very high liability insurance limits on the underlying policy itself on each specific property policy itself. And couple that with an umbrella policy and umbrella policies are very inexpensive for the amount of coverage that you're getting. And so you've just got to decide for yourself, Hey, how much do I have personally? And how much am I going to be putting at risk with this investment property that will often lead you down the right decision path to what makes the most sense for you? But I think a lot of people really hung up on is, Oh, I need an LLC though, they’re pro LLC camp. And they think I need an LLC before I ever start investing. I would say that soften backwards. And I would say focus on getting the property first, making sure that the property is a good fit, then look to see how that LLC plays into the picture. And what's important to note here on this long soapbox rant is that a lot of lenders won't lend to LLCs if they're purchasing single family homes. So have a conversation with your lender, have a conversation with an attorney about what's involved with setting up and maintaining an LLC in your state. And just look to understand what the implications are of having one and have not having one. And then look to make your decision because it's really not a one size fits all approach Michael out.   Tom: Well, you know that the benefit of the LLC is you can name it something. Cool. Did you name yourself a cool LLC Michael?   Michael: I named… no. I just, well, it's tough because a lot of the cool names are already taken. And so you've got to make sure that it's not a, you know, that name is available. All the cool ones like surfer dude23 was already taken. I was pretty bummed.   Tom: Sounds like your AOL chat bot.   Michael: That's how I got my inspiration from.   Tom: Awesome. Our next question is from front of the show, Bobby from Seattle asks, I've heard of investors making money, buying tax lien. What does this really mean? And is this a viable strategy for investing in real estate? Mark Mr. Tax lien? What are your thoughts there?   Mark: Yeah. Right up my alley. Gosh, you've teed up these questions very nicely. I'm going to sound like the smartest guy. Well, here's really what it comes down to a tax lien is, you know, a municipal tax lien means that you owe money to the government. And that's really what when tax liens are purchased, it's typically because somebody didn't pay their County taxes. Right. And what's interesting about tax liens is a tax lien is a municipal tax lien sits in front of any other liens, like a mortgage. Okay. Now, you know, there's a caveat to that. Like federal tax lien, that's a whole nother story, but most properties don't have a federal tax lien if they have delinquent County taxes. So really what happens is every single state has different state statutes of what they're supposed to do with delinquent taxes, right? Because the County needs money to pay for schools, to pay for police officers, to pay for so many more things.   So they need that money and they sell off those tax liens just like at the County courthouse. And the person that buys them basically is paying the delinquent taxes on behalf of that homeowner. And in turn, they're going to earn a percentage of interest off of those tax liens. And so when you buy a tax lien, you don't just buy the property, but you're sitting in that first position, even beyond a mortgage. So in the event, let's say the, what they call redemption period. It's typically one, two or three years when that redemption period goes by. And if you're still the tax lien holder, you have the right to foreclose on that property and own the property. So when you used to hear about all these old infomercials about buying properties for pennies on the dollar, I guess they would say that's what the tax lien buying was all about.   So what people don't realize is that probably 99.5% of the time, somebody has got to pay off those tax liens. And you can earn anywhere typically between eight to 24% on that investment. And so look at it as almost like buying a note where you're very passively investing in real estate, but the kicker is you may have the ability to foreclose on that property, take ownership and own that property for potentially pennies on the dollar. But again, those stories are the rare ones it's like watching Storage Wars and finding that, you know, old school Bronco sitting in, you know, if the storage unit, you're the guy that bought that yeah. That is made for TV, but it does have, so the tax lien industry, um, it can be safe in some ways, if you're doing your due diligence and really understanding, Hey, if this property takes two years to what they called redeem, or when that redemption period expires, is it going to be in good enough condition where they're still valuing the property? And if you feel comfortable, you can invest knowing they're going to probably get that interest. If not, you could potentially foreclose on that property and own it for very little.   Michael: So we should have a new segment on the show called confessional corner.   Tom: Yeah.   Michael: So I did this, I purchased tax liens, read a book and thought, Oh, this is easy. So I've purchased some tax liens out in Arizona. And the auction is while it was an online auction. And so I did some due diligence and understood, okay, what counties and, and Arizona, what States I should be looking at. So I decided on Arizona. And so I ended up purchasing a bunch. I ended up winning a bunch of these tax lanes and probably 80% of them paid us. And I was like, this is the easiest money I've ever made. This is so awesome. But so what I'm wondering Mark is, so the 20% that haven't paid off, this was probably three, three and a half years ago that I did this. The ones that haven't paid off, I think the redemption period in this County, Arizona is two years. What should I go do now? Because my understanding is that if I decide to for clothes in order to, for clothes, you need to pay off all the existing liens on the property. And so if someone had purchased the tax liens from four, five and six years prior to me, there are still these existing liens on the property that I would need to pay off in order to foreclose on the property. Is that accurate? Or do you know, what do I do now?   Mark: Yeah. So two things I would do. Number one, I would send somebody out there to look at the property. Number two, I would, you know, really understand what the timeline looks like and understand if it's a judicial or administrative state where, you know, when the foreclosure happens, you know, like let's say you can actually file to get the tax deed. You need to know, you know, what all those steps are. And sometimes it's an admitted straight of approach. It's just paperwork. But if you have to go to the judicial approach, it means that you would have to actually have to go before a judge in order to earn those rights and earn the tax deed, where did that person would lose the property? So for you, you just need to understand what positions are out there, where do you fit in? And so a title search would show what other liens are out there.   Or you could go to potentially, yeah, I would say run a simple type of report, but also understand the condition of the property because it's something that you're like, man, I do not want that property. I want to I'll even pay my own taxes off. You can get yourself out of that position. If you happen to be the front runner, I would say, or if you happen to be in a position kind of buried in the middle, you may end up getting paid off at somebody ends up foreclosing and taking ownership of that property plus the interest, of course. So I would just understand your position and then if you need to spend some money to go out there and take a look at the property, because there's a chance you may get it. I would know what you actually are holding the golden ticket to.   Michael: Sure, sure. And let's just say as a thought experiment that I'm in first position that they paid their taxes prior to when I purchased them. And, you know, I decided that I don't want to foreclose on the property. It's a mess. It's something I don't want to get involved in. Is there any risk to me having paid those taxes and kind of being that first position lien holder that I need to then do something or pay additional fees as a result of being that first lien holder?   Mark: Yeah. Every state's going to be so different. I mean, these are state statues written back in like, you know, this 17, 18, 19 hundreds, like early, like way back when, so..   Michael: Four score and seven years ago..   Mark: It doesn't hurt to pick up and review on your own and really get to know, Hey, if I am the first lien holder, you know, and there's no other mortgages and this thing is clear to go, you know, what do I need to do? Do I want this? So there's a lot of questions that come with it. But I mean, if 80% of paid off, you'll probably find as it gets closer to actually redeeming during that period where you could potentially take the property, most of the delinquencies get paid off. Right, right. At the very end. So it may turn into that 99% kind of statistic that I gave you before.   So there's a lot of who knows at this point, but as you get closer, I would definitely want to know more information about, you know, what the condition is, where you fit in, in the front runner position. And it could be something that you could be that a half a percentile that ends up really good. So you never know. I mean, the story I used to tell people was we ended up doing a tax lien in Hilton Head, South Carolina. And it was a condo sitting on the water. I think we had 35 into it with this private equity firm and the kids that they have just lost a father who owned the property. None of them wanted to pay the property taxes there. They were just had a fight. Well, it went all the way through the foreclosure process. We ended up with a tax deed to that property and had 50, I think it was 58,000 into a $700,000 property. It happens, but don't expect it to happen.   Michael: Right, right, right. I think there's a, I just had a couple aha moments. And the vast majority of them is that I had no idea what I was doing and for those listeners, but go get educated. Good. Don't do what I did.   Tom: What is it like, ready shoot aim?   Michael: That's right. That's right. Yeah. That was a good learning experience.   Tom: Gosh, love this tangent right here. All right. Well, we're going to jump into the question.   Michael: Great question. Bobby.   Tom: Bobby K the man. Last question we have from Jessica out of Boston is how does Roofstock choose their markets and a related question, why is restock not available in all States? Mark, do you wanna take a quick pass at this guy?   Mark: Yeah, absolutely. This is a kind of what I work on every day, just for those listeners out there. Uh, you, but Roofstock when we started, they really went to markets with a specific intention and that was around cashflow. Right? That's what most of our investors are always chasing is really quality cashflow. But what we're realizing is that, you know, appreciation may be a different play that other investors are more interested in and, or maybe even a blend of the two. So as Roofstock went to markets from like the st Louis is to the Cleveland's to Memphis and Birmingham, kind of the typical suspects, right? Those are just very highly demanded markets because investors require a certain amount of cash flow. You can get 10% plus cap rates in some of those markets. But what we're trying to do is really balance out different investment strategies for all the different, uh, investors out there. So when it comes to, how do we choose our markets? We want to go to markets where we feel the real estate economy is definitely going in the right direction. That not only from a macro level, but also from a micro level, that there's really healthy local markets where the risk and return really feels good from, you know, the areas compared to what you can make in that cashflow. But we're also looking at kind of expanding that logic where we're saying, Hey, let's just make sure we're going to markets where there's enough supply. Right. And there's some affordability because certain markets like here in Dallas, I mean, it's gotten really tight.   And so there's just not much supply that we can source because there's so many other exit strategies that I would say are more geared towards owner occupants, right? So fix and flippers are sourcing properties and going towards those exit strategies rather than investors, because they think they can get more money. So being a marketplace, we have to really grant it, we have to react to the market and let it ebb and flow where we're trying to be the guys in the middle where supply and demand meet. Right? So that just goes to the whole, whole logic of it. You know, we're not available in every state, you know, Washington state, Oregon, California. Those are very much appreciation markets and you're just not going to have the same level of demand from investors. So we're always trying to cater to our network, but please reach out, be vocal, tell us where you want to go. And it really is a conversation point between what Tom and I talk about all the time. And he gives me a lot of feedback where the demand is. So if there's enough demand, the markets make sense. Like we're about to open up and De Moines, Iowa in Richmond, Virginia. And we feel really good about these markets. They're kind of economics. Those are areas we want to go to, but we want to hear your feedback so we can open up in more States and cities like that.   Tom: Love it, love it. And opening up new markets all the time. Excellent guys. Well, thanks for the questions that everybody's been sending in and please continue to fire them in and don't be shy on how either advanced or how novice the question is. We're going to bring in the right folks. If we can't answer the questions ourselves, I think that's a fun thing about this network that we have. And Mark, thank you very much for joining us today.   Mark: Thanks for having me on always a pleasure.   Michael: No, the pleasure is ours.   Tom: The pleasure is ours. Storage Wars. That was such a great show. My favorite part is when they, that one guy Darren. Yeah. And he's like, Oh, that's a $3 bill or, Oh, that's a $50 bill or a nonsensical bill. $50 is a real bill, like a $45 bill. Anyways. Okay. Enough of that. All right.   Mark: I'll leave you with a good story if you wouldn't mind. So talking about storage Wars. So I had to go to auction school to become an auctioneer, right? And they actually have an auction school where you show up and for eight, you have to do 80 hours in Texas. And for two hours every day, we had to do tongue twisters and we had to do, you know, counting up, counting down five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 to 35, 40. What do you do around the rough and rugged rock, the ragged rascal ran, right. And do it all day long. And I'm just scratching my head like, teacher, I'm going to be an online option that really make a difference. So funny enough, but they always did a charity auction at the very end. And guess who walks into my auction school in Texas? It was Walt Cade of Texas storage Wars. I'm like, get out. This is, this is like living in a weird world, but the auctioneer world is really interesting, different real estate to watches, to tobacco and cattle. And there's all kinds of things you learn. But again, I kind of raised my hand, like I'm just here for the real estate online course. We don't have that. Get back to your tongue twisters Mark. So if you really want to talk about some funny stories, it's a great world. Auctioneer's are fun, but you know, there's kind of a new regime coming through more online auctions, which is a fun way for people to kind of get comfortable with, you know, buying from anywhere in the world. Very much like what Roofstock is doing with our marketplace. So yeah. Full of fun stories, but had to share that one.   Tom: Awesome.   Michael: So cool.   Michael: Alrighty, everybody. That was our episode for today. Thank you so much for listening in a big, big, big, thank you to Mark Woodling. Always a real pleasure to have him on as always. If you liked the episode, feel free to give us a rating or review, or even if you didn't like the episode. No, don't give us a rating review if you didn't like the episode, wherever you listen to your podcasts, we look forward to seeing you on the next one.   Tom: Happy investing.   Michael: Happy investing.