I Bought My First Rental in 2021, Now I Have 19 and Replaced My Salary!

This high school football coachThis investor bought his first property just a few years ago in 2021, working with two partners to find the cash he needed, but by the end of 2024, he’d accumulated a portfolio of cash flowing rental properties in Mobile, Alabama, and he had flipped five houses in a single year On the show Today, we’ll hear just how he did it. What’s going on everybody? Welcome back to the BiggerPockets podcast, where we teach you how to achieve financial freedom through real estate investing. I am Henry Washington filling in for Dave Meyer. Today’s guest in the show is Lamonts Gardner. He’s a formal college football player who started his investing career by buying a single rental property in his first year. Over the next two years, he bought four more rentals and flipped a house. By 2024, he was able to do 14 deals, including five flips. We’re going to hear from Lamonts on how he’s been able to scale up his business sustainably and without taking on too much risk, how he found and finance deals in the mobile Alabama market, and what motivates him to continue growing his real estate business while working a full-time W2 as a teacher and coach.
It’s a great story. I’m sure you’ll be able to learn from. So here’s me speaking with Lamontis Gardner Lamonts, welcome to the show, my man.Thank you. I’m grateful to be here.Awesome man. So give us a little bit of background. What were you doing before you got into real estate?I was coaching actually right after I finished playing ball in college. I went straight into coaching, did that up until about 2020. The Covid shutdown season got canceled and eventually the school shut down with a lack of income and a lot of time on my hands. I just decided to journey into real estate. I just dove into every podcast I could, every book I could get my hands on, and even the BiggerPockets webinars that were weekly.Okay, so 2020 hit, your income just stopped because the school shut down and that kind of made you realize you needed something that you could depend on versus just depending on somebody else for your income?Yeah, I just realized I was under control of my job and I no longer wanted that. So just wanted a differentLifestyle. I think a lot of people face that challenge. In 2020, they realized that they really weren’t in control, but not a lot of people just decided to jump into real estate. So why did real estate become the thing? I mean, a lot of people were selling stuff online. They moved to investing in the stock market. It was all pretty easy to do from home. Why real estate?So prior to then, maybe about two years earlier, I read Rich Dad, poor Dad.There it is.That sparked that light in me to eventually want to get into it and 2020 was just the perfect time.Okay, so you kind of had the seed planted from when you read Rich Dad, poor Dad, and you were like, all right, this is the time. So when did you buy your first deal?I bought my first deal in 2021. I decided I wanted to invest in my hometown,Which is whereMobile, Alabama. So we eventually moved from Atlanta and came back home where I took a local job here at a high school where I’m still currently working, which provided me a more stable income to be able to invest.Okay. Well let’s talk about that. What was your first deal? How’d you find it? How did you end up financing it?Prior to my first deal, I made an offer on a duplex. I lost out on that duplex due to a cash buy investor. So at that point it’s kind of like, well, I’m not going to be able to compete. So what I did was this particular street is full of duplexes, so I pulled up a map and I wrote down every address on that street and I skipped, traced every owner and called and I ran into a guy who actually had three, he had three duplexes on this street in particular and took that down. I couldn’t do it by myself, so I had to bring in a partner, but we used a local bank, had to put 20% down and been going ever since.Man, I mean that’s cool. That’s just straight hustling, like a straight hustle lead. So you looked up every owner, skip traced them and then started making phone calls. How many phone calls did you make before you found this owner?Probably would be about 25 to 30 calls.I mean, that’s really not that many before you actually land a deal, that’s pretty cool. But I like that style and that hustle because I think a lot of investors want to get into this business, but they don’t really want to put in the work. They want to just find a deal online. And you went and you just made the calls until you found one. Now I’m not saying everybody’s going to make 30 calls and get a deal, but you don’t know that until you put in the work. So you got on the phone with the seller, he wanted to sell three duplexes and you realized you didn’t have enough money. So the bank said you needed to put 20% down. About how much money was that 20% that you had to put down?It was about 76,000.Okay. So the total purchase price was how much?It was 380,000,Three 80 for three duplexes. How much of that 76,000 did you actually have?I had about 28,000.Okay, so you had a little less than half, right? So you had to raise the rest and you decided to do that through a partnership. How’d you find that partner?He was actually my college football coach, my position coach. So prior to bringing him on, I was trying to talk to the owners like, Hey, could you just allow me to buy one duplex or maybe two? And he was like, no, you got to take all three or I have to sell to someone else. So I was talking to my coach one day and I ran a deal by him and he was like, Hey, does he still have it? I’m like, sure. And we worked out a deal from there.Okay. Did you guys 50 50 partners since he was putting down more money or how’d you structure that?Well, we actually split it three ways with someone that he’s close to. We all went in three ways and took that deal down.So essentially you all kind of got a property out of it?Yeah, essentially. And the good thing about that deal was we bought it for three 80 and it appraised for four 70.Oh, nice. And did you have to renovate these properties or were they all rent ready in good shape?No, they were all rent ready in good shape and cash flowing.Oh man, that sounds like a great deal. So hustled and found your first deal. And what I like about this deal story is a lot of people would have stopped, they would’ve quit. They would’ve said, I can’t afford three properties, I can only afford one.
Or they would’ve said, I can’t afford to do this deal. But instead of you saying that, you said, how can I go get this deal done? And you were able to find a partner who then brought in another partner and you split the deal three ways. So I like that hustle. I think a lot of people talk themselves out of wealth. I think people oftentimes will just decide that they can’t do something given whatever circumstances are directly in front of them. But with real estate, what’s so powerful is there’s a whole lot of ways to get a deal done and you have to remain open-minded and you have to keep trying to structure something that makes sense. And I’m not saying everybody should just take on random partners, but I am saying that there are ways to take deals down and you have to have a mindset of how can I get this done versus I can’t get this done, which is one of the principles in rich step for that.And that deal got even better. So that next year we got and they appraised for 5 25 at that time, I refi it and I was able to pull the down payment back out, which set me up to continue to invest.Oh, so you did a whole burr on that property.It wasn’t planned, but that’s how it happened. And that’s been a foundation to my investment journey for sure.That’s amazing, man. So now that you had that experience buying that long-term rental, what did you do next? How did that deal help you transition into doing more deals?So that was in 2021. My next deal was in January of 22, so I guess I took the time off, but I did a flip in January of 22. I partnered on that as well with a local partner here. We bought a home for 1 38 and we put about 70 ish in there and we sold that for two 90. I think we netted about 70 k if I’m not mistaken. So we split it two ways by 35 a piece.I mean, that’s a fantastic flip in terms of numbers. How did you find that deal? You said you took some time off. So it’s not like you had just deals cookingAnd at the time I was still trying to search on the market for everything. I wasn’t as experienced, but this house in particular was sitting on the market for months, but the thing about it was listed as a two one, but it was 1700 square feet.I love this.And so I kept hearing about these type of deals and I’m like, Hey, well let’s go see it. Went to see it and it was basically a three bedroom and all you had to do was add a closet to make it the third bedroom. And we added a bathroom in one of the bedrooms. It was a crawl space home. So it was pretty easy to do. And basically we had a three two,Which obviously increased the a RV of the property, which allowed you to make more profit. Man, this is one of my favorite strategies for finding opportunities to make money. This is something like you guys can be doing, people can be doing this right now. You can look on the market, this exact strategy, look on the market for properties that have been sitting for longer than the average days on market in your market. So if the average days on market is 30 days, look for things that have been sitting longer than 30 days. But what you really want to look for is houses that the square footage number is bigger than what the bedroom and bathroom count would suggest. So if you have a two one that’s 1800, 1500, 2000 square feet, there’s space in there where you can add a bedroom and a bathroom fairly inexpensively, especially just like you said, if that house is on a crawlspace because the cost to add a plumbing in a bathroom on a crawlspace house is significantly less expensive than having to add plumbing to a house that’s on a concrete foundation. Now you don’t have to tear up concrete and floors.
And so you can literally put this criteria into the MLS or into Zillow or into Redfin, and you could have a list of potential opportunities. And why you want to do it for houses that are on the market longer than the average days on market is because those sellers might be motivated to take a lower offer. And so if you can find a property that’s been sitting for 30, 60, 90 days, 120 days, that has you look for a three two with 2000 plus square feet, a two one with 1500 plus square feet, that lets you know that there’s potential value that you can add there and then go look at those properties and make offers, you could potentially find yourself a deal where you know can add value. I love that strategy, man.Right? I still have that search criteria set until this day I got it set at two bedrooms that are more than 1200 square feet. So anytime I see a house that fits that criteria, it’s something that I definitely check out.Alright, we have to take a quick break, but when we come back, we’ll talk to Latis about how he started to accelerate his portfolio growth. We’ll be back.Peak rental season is around the corner. Are you prepared for success? Avail is the go-to solution for do it yourself landlords. Sign up for free to list your property on top sites, screen tenants and collect rent at no cost to you for just $9 per month per unit. Upgrade to the premium plan for customizable applications and leases, waived rent collection fees and priority support, plus access rent analysis reports to set the right price and promote listings for added exposure on partner sites. Sign up for free [email protected]. That’s aav ail.co to get started for free.Alright, we’re back with Lamonts. Alright, so you did your first buy and hold deal, you did your first flip. So how did you start to shape or accelerate your business from that point?During that 2023 year, I just started to study marketing and direct mail and I started to incorporate that into my business and that’s when I kind of took off. I was able to produce my own leads and my own deals versus waiting on something to hit the MLS and competing with everyone on that. So it just kind of took off from there.Okay, cool. So I think a lot of people find themselves in this boat where you do a deal or two and then you realize you get the bug right? You realize you want to increase that volume, and in order to do that you need some sort of systems, processes and procedures. And what you’re saying is you chose the route of focusing on lead generation that you can control and the more leads you can generate, the more deals you can do. But typically to do deals, you need leads and you need money. So how did you find the money to buy the deals that you were findingFinancially? Personally, I tried to set myself up because I was working my W2 the whole time. So I was saving up money and I met a local hard money lender. He would lend to me at a hundred percent of the renovation and purchase price. So that significantly took my investing to another level just because I was able to take down deals without putting any money down.I mean, obviously finding a lender that’ll lend to you at a hundred percent is great. I assume it’s like a hundred percent as long as your LTV is at a certain point, right?For sure. Yeah. So I typically try to stay under 70% loan toValueOf that after repair value.In other words, what Lamont is saying is that as long as he is all in at 70% of the after repair value, meaning if you’re buying a property for ease of number sake, if you’re buying a property and the ARV is a hundred thousand dollars, his lender was willing to loan him up to $70,000. So Lamont would then know as long as I’m buying that property and the money I need to renovate, it falls at 70 grand or less and he wouldn’t have to bring any money. So if he was buying a property for 50 and he needed 20 to renovate it, he’s all in at 70, therefore he can get a hundred percent financing. If you were going to buy a property for 50 and you needed 30, you’d be all in at 80. That would probably mean you need to bring 10 grand to closing. Correct? Correct. Awesome. So finding a lender like that is amazing and a lot of people are going to say that’s cool for you. But how did you find that lender?Through a buddy that I have here that is a local investor as well. He introduced me to the guy and I sat down with him. I took him a folder of deals that I’ve done, showed him some before and after pictures, went over the numbers with him and just got to the point where he felt like he could trust me and felt like I was experienced enough and he decided he wanted to lend to me. Man, this is like the playbook for real estateInvesting. What’s cool about this is really something anybody can do, right? You hustled to find your first deal. So you didn’t use money to find the lead, you just hustled, skip trace, called a bunch of people, you found your first deal, you then found your second deal on the MLS through the means that we talked about by looking for opportunity on the MLS, and you were able to be profitable there. And then you kind of documented each deal to show that you had some track record. And then when you were ready to start expanding your business, you were networking, looking for resources, and when you found a resource that might be interested in lending, you were able to basically show him, Hey, this is the kinds of deals that I’ve done. These are the kinds of returns I’ve been able to produce, so I have opportunities for you if you are looking to make a return on your investment. These are things that literally anyone can do. And I love how you have been able to kind of execute this, and I’m sure it was scary, the idea of talking to somebody and asking for money is probably scary, but how do you feel like that went for you?It went well. It was definitely scary, but it was something I knew I needed to do. I needed to find another lender if I wanted to accelerate and move at a faster rate. Before that, I was just using local banks, which is okay, but you have to bring money and it’s a slower process. So once I met with him, now I could take deals down cash.Man, that’s super cool. So the marketing was generating the leads, you knew you had the money coming in, so it was really just a matter of how many leads could you generate. So kind of tell us about where you are now. Tell us about your last year with investing. What does your business look like? Because it sounds like you put the pieces in place to level up. So what did that turn into for you?So the last year, I think I did 12 deals, just flips or rentals, both. I kept more than I sold. I mainly tried to buy and hold, but I started realizing fast that I couldn’t live off of that cash flow. So as of late, I got into more flipping.Yeah, man, a lot of the time this business is portrayed in a way that lets people believe I’m going to buy a bunch of rental properties and then I’m going to live off the cashflow and I’m going to quit my job. That can be done. It just takes a long time and a lot of properties because when you have debt on these properties, your net cashflow isn’t always super great and it depends on your market. There are some markets where you can get amazing net cashflow even now, but in most markets a hundred to $200 net cashflow per property, it’s going to take you a whole lot of properties before you can do that. And then we all realize that sometimes that gets blown out of the water when an HVAC goes out for the year or something like that. And so if you’ve got a property producing five to $7,000 a year net cashflow and then you have an unexpected expense that wasn’t budgeted for, your cashflow is gone. And so I think we all at some point realize, okay, the cashflow is great, but I don’t want to depend on that to live off of. I would much rather depend on something like flipping. And I think that’s why I got into flipping houses. And so you started doing some flips, you did about 12 deals last year. Give us a breakdown. What’s your portfolio look like?Right now? I’m at, I want to say 19 total units.And then about how many flips a year are you doing?I think last year I did five flips this year. I’m trying to up that to at least 10.Okay. So it sounds like you really did scale your business and start to level up from just doing onesie twosie deals to where now you have a consistent lead flow. Is there a deal that stands out in the last year that was kind of especially good for you?Definitely. So that was this deal that is actually in the neighborhood that I live in. And it’s something I had my eye on for a while and probably for about two years, man, I was communicating with the owner. He had a renter in there, but I would probably occasionally just pop up on his porch maybe once a month. Once a month. And he finally let me take that deal down. I purchased it at 55,000, put about 75,000 in there, and I sold that for 230,000 bucks.So you were all in for 1 25 and you sold it for two 30?Yes.Man. So what’s that about 50, 60 net profit?It was actually a little bit more because I didn’t have to put out any closing costs to the seller. It was just pure deal. I just had to pay the agent. So I actually came out around like 80,000.Man. I mean, that’s a solid flip folks. I mean, I’m averaging on my flips. I average about 40 to $50,000 net profit, which is pretty good. Most people are averaging around $30,000 net profit on a flip. So to make 80 plus man, lemme borrow $20, man.Yeah, man, that was my best deal. I haven’t ran into one like it since, but that was my best deal last year. And I have one more that was very similar. I purchased it for 53 and I put about 47 in there and I sold that one for 190,000 bucks.Okay, so the one you made 80 on that one you found just because you had been in this neighborhood seeing this guy and been working on him for a while. The second deal you talked about, was that a mail deal or was that another hustle lead?It was a mailer and it actually took me a little bit longer to take that deal down. There was some probate issues, so we had to go through court to get the deal approved. So it took us about two to three months to get it, but at the end of the day, it was worth it. It was worth the time and I was able to help her out a lot. She just wanted to be able to get off of it. So I was able to help her out a lot and it worked out for us. Bo.All right. We have to take another quick break, but when we come back, I’ve got some questions for Latis about other marketing strategies he’s using to find deals and how he decides if he’s going to flip a property or keep it as a rental. We’ll be right back. All right, we’re back with Latis. Let’s jump back in. Alright, so a lot of people are always interested in knowing when you get a lead, how do you determine if you’re going to keep that lead as a rental property or if you’re going to flip that property? Because that internal debate can sometimes be challenging.Sometimes that can be one of the hardest decisions to make, but ultimately it just came down to the spread that I would make if I was to flip it. Plus things like the layout of the house and the neighborhood that it’s in. So if it has a iffy layout or the neighborhood is iffy, I would just keep that. I would keep it and I would just refile out of it and just put that on the rental market. But if it say just a slam dunk and the layout is good or I could knock out a wall or just add a bedroom or bathroom or something like that, I probably would flip it.So essentially what you’re saying is properties that have unusual layouts, they’re harder to sell and when they do sell, sometimes you don’t sell it for as much money, but they’re not necessarily harder to rent. So sometimes it makes more sense for you to keep them when they have an unusual layout. And then the properties where you feel like you can create big value, you can maximize your profits, then you flip those because that’ll give you more cash to buy more rentals down the road.For sure, for sure. And I love the rentals because I look at those as wealth builders down the road and I’m still working. So in the beginning I wasn’t as focused on flipping and I do a lot of section eight rentals. I wanted to do something that fulfilled me and gave me purpose in this investing journey. I focus on single parents. My mom was a single mother, so these rentals, man, they just a step down from the flips that I’m doing, not the same finishes and everything, but I’m going in and I’m putting new roofs, gutting the bathrooms and renovating those new flooring and everything. So just providing a quality place to stay for those moms.Man, I love that man. I’m passionate about the same thing. I call it revitalization instead of gentrification. So being able to fix something up nice and provide a place with maybe nicer finishes than they would expect to have from another landlord because it gives them pride, a sense of pride living there, pride of ownership. People deserve nice finishes. Just because you’re in section eight, it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to have a beautiful place to live. Man, I love thatAnd I think it works. It is a win-win for me and the tenants, just providing ’em a quality place to live, someone that they’re proud of, I think it minimizes my turnover. The renovation on the front end also minimizes my repair, so I don’t have a lot of late nights maintenance calls just due to the time I took to renovate it on the front end. And also my tenants take pride in the units that they’re renting. So it is a win-win for us both.Man, that’s super cool, man. That’s super cool. I’m super proud of you for doing that. And a lot of people have a bad impression of section eight and a lot of the times it’s just unjust. They’ve never really done it themselves, it’s just what they hear. So I love to hear when somebody is doing it and is taking care of the tenants because I don’t care who you are, man, there are bad tenants at every price point. It’s not just that there’s bad tenants. I’ve had terrible tenants that were paying me $2,000 a month. There’s this stigma that Section eight has bad tenants. It’s not that Section eight has bad tenants, is that landlords are bad at tenant selection. And if you can get good at tenant selection, no matter what price point your rental is at, then you can have quality tenants who take care of your properties and you can provide great housing to great people,Right? Right. Yes. And that’s one thing that I studied before getting into the rental world. I wanted to know how to screen to find the best tenants possible. So I have a detailed screening process from background to credit check, income verification, even driving by and talking to old landlords. So I’m just making sure that I put the right person in there, but once they’re in there, I make sure I take care of them and the unit.Awesome, man. It sounds like you do a lot of direct mail. Are there any other marketing sources you’re using that seem to be working that people could take a look at?Not right now. I mainly do direct mail. In the beginning I did some cold calling just due to the lack of funds, but I figured out really quick that don’t like cold calling. The cold calling, it increases the chances of me getting cursed out or what haveYou. Yeah, that’sFair. So I like the direct mail because it doesn’t take a lot of time and I just bring the leads to me and majority of the people that call me actually want to sell their home. So that’s my favorite B marketing.So it looks like you’ve been able to build a really impressive business over the last few years, and that’s inspiring for many people. So what’s driving you now? What are you moving your business towards in the next year? Are you keeping things kind of the way they’re going? What’s the future look like for you?I’m just trying to keep it around 20 deals a year. So like I said, last year I did 12, but I want to up that into 20, and that’s something that I want to do from year to year moving forward. That’s kind of around hover around that 20 point. And right now what keeps me going, like I said, is providing quality place to live for the tenants and also my family. I want to just be able to provide a quality lifestyle for my wife and my kids. So those two things right now driving. But I would also say as far as the business goes, I think right now it’s just kind of focused on the stabilization of it and just becoming more organized and developing more systems. Hired a va, so been helpful for me tremendously. So that’s kind of where I’m at, just stabilizing it, getting a grip on everything and just maintaining the amount of deals that I’m doing year to year.Yeah, that’s cool, man. One thing I learned this past year in 2024 was that I didn’t want to have some massive flipping business doing 50 to a hundred flips a year. I kind of realized I like the spot of about 20 flips a year, plus acquiring enough rentals to help me offset my capital gains. And that’s what I need and want just for me and my family. And I think it’s good because scaling is great, but you got to figure out how far you want to scale because big portfolios have big portfolio problems. And if you’re not prepared to handle those big portfolio problems, then this business goes from being fun to being terrifying real fast.For sure, man, I’m big on being purposeful with what I do. I like to have a purpose and I like to be fulfilled. So I knew a while ago that I didn’t just want to have this a hundred flips a year business because I didn’t want to create another job for myself. I wanted something that was manageable and that I enjoy doing on a day-to-day basis.And speaking of jobs, I heard you say that you still work your W2. Is that something you plan to continue to do? Are you looking to get out of it?Yeah, I’m looking to get out of it. I think this probably would be my last year there. I think I’ve gotten to the point where my cashflow from my rentals has exceeded my W2 month to month income. So along with that and the flipping, I think I’m able to pull away after this school year.Okay, that’s awesome. Well, I hope they’re not listening toBiggerPocketsBefore you get to tell. But no, I mean it’s super cool that you kind of took the time to build your business the right way and it gives you the opportunity, the freedom to be able to choose to leave at the right time because I’m sure having the job helps you stay bankable, which helps you be able to continue to grow your business. One last question. I heard you say you have a va. What does your team look like if you’re doing 10 flips, you want to scale to 20, do you have a big team around you?It is mainly just me. I made that one hire in the va, but I have a pretty decent construction crew that does most of my houses. So just having those and not having to search for contractors from deal to deal, man, they’ve been really, really good. If I had to get the MVP to anybody within my business, it would be thoseGuys. You tell ’em a good contracting crew is literally the missing link in this. If you have that, you can go pretty far. So I assume that these contractors are third party, so they’re on a contract basis, they’re not hired.No, no, no. They’re 10 99. And so that’s another thing that motivates you as well, because when you have these contractors, you have to keep them busy. Yes, you do. So I’m having to make sure I’m keeping deals constantly coming, because if not, they’re going to go find work elsewhere. So that’s another thing that just motivates me to keep buying. Man, that’s amazing.Well, Lamont is, I think your story is truly inspiring. I love what you’re doing for your family. I love that you’ve created a business that fits your lifestyle. I think that’s important for people to see because I think sometimes people feel like they need to build this business and just scale it to the moon, and that’s not necessary. You can build a business that fits and provides the lifestyle that you want and you can just try to maintain that going forward. So I love how you’ve done that. I love how you’ve done it fairly quickly, and thank you so much for sharing this inspiring journey with people.No, I appreciate you for having me, man. Just grateful again to be here.Thank you, Latis for joining the show today. If you think the BiggerPockets audience could learn from your own investing journey, you can apply to share your story just like Lamont did at biggerpockets.com/guest. I’m Henry Washington, and we’ll be back with another episode of the BiggerPockets podcast in just a few days. Thanks for listening.