Top Real Estate Agent and Experienced Home Flipper: Mercedes St. George

[00:00:00] Mercedes St. George: we partner with people a lot on a lot of our flips And I think when you're initially getting into the business, that's the best way to do it because it's very low risk You've got some people looking out behind your back and you're probably partnering with people that have done it way more frequently than So my first two years in the business, I only partnered on flips.

So those 80 flips that I did was always with partners. I didn't have the capital right out of college to be flipping houses. I didn't have the experience. So learning from, you know, the three best guys in Jacksonville, how to do it was a phenomenal opportunity for me to have.

And I would recommend anyone kind of just getting started to. Partner with someone. 

[00:01:13] Tracy Hayes: Welcome back to the real estate excellence podcast today based on her LinkedIn resume. I've one of the most interesting guests I've ever had on the show. She's not only an amazing real estate agent and top producer, she's also a real estate investor. It's been involved in over 80 home flips. On top of that, she's a certified flight instructor.

I hope this is accurate because this is going to make for a great show. Let's welcome the amazing young entrepreneur to the show, Mercedes St. George of the Kello Williams Atlantic Partners. 

[00:01:41] Mercedes St. George: Thanks for having me. 

[00:01:42] Tracy Hayes: Thank you for coming on. And want to, want to throw out there that you and I guess you want to call your partner, Jana, are.

You know, when you went over to Keller Williams this summer, started the flight group. So we'll be talking about that as well. But I want to welcome you to the show and, and Mercedes, tell us a little bit about young Mercedes prior to JU. Okay. What were you, you know, in high school, what were you thinking and kind of what?

on on your initial choices, obviously getting involved in in flight and that sort of thing was something in the family. What tell us a little about young Mercedes. 

[00:02:12] Mercedes St. George: Awesome. Young Mercedes. She grew up in Northern Virginia. So I was there all 17 years. Mom and dad went there. there. I mean, you know, we kind of just stuck close.

My mom and dad both had experience in the aviation industry. So my dad previously owned a jet charter company. He was retired my whole childhood though, but always had that interest in airplanes. We're going to air shows all the time, things like that. And then my mom worked for United Airlines. I think she's hit 37 years now.

She's an old timer. So that's kind of where 

[00:02:42] Tracy Hayes: she gets to pick her routes.

[00:02:44] Mercedes St. George: She's got full reign. She's kicking everybody off the plane. 

[00:02:48] Tracy Hayes: Yeah, the seniors, you know, they choose whatever their their their routes, whatever, you know, it's just some of them like to do the international travel, right? I mean, some of them like that just, hey, we'll fly over to London, spend the night and then fly back 

[00:02:58] Mercedes St. George: the next day, right?

Exactly. Yeah. Some people love that. Some people want to be home every night and they just want to go New York to Dulles back and forth. So it's really, yeah, you get to kind of pick and choose from there. Yeah. So you grew up in an aviation family? Yes very much focused toward, I mean my dad loves old cars, you know, that's where I got my name, Mercedes.

Yeah, 1956 Gullwing, that's his favorite car. So kind of always around cars, airplanes, all the things. 

[00:03:25] Tracy Hayes: So, what leads you to JU? And obviously, you were a business major, if I read that correctly, on your LinkedIn, but I know JU has the flight program as well. Is that one of the reasons going there?

[00:03:36] Mercedes St. George: Yes. So, I decided that that was the route I wanted to go. Obviously, that was what I was around my whole childhood. So, it kind of just naturally fell into that. 

[00:03:44] Tracy Hayes: Over Emory Earl?

[00:03:46] Mercedes St. George: I applied to Embry Riddle. I applied to all the big schools. I got into Embry Riddle. JU ended up offering the most scholarship money.

So, got a, got a good little check from them and that's what decided that. 

[00:03:57] Tracy Hayes: So, was your thought maybe at 17, 18 years old? commercial pilot or anything? Was that? 

[00:04:05] Mercedes St. George: Oh, yeah, I mean, that was the goal. So went to J U. The aviation program is within the school of business there at J U. Phenomenal program. Loved everyone there.

Loved the school. All good things to say about it. But ended up. Picking that specifically because of the scholarship money, specifically because I toured Jacksonville and I actually really, really loved it. You know, that was one of the few schools besides Embry Riddle that was at the beach and when you're from Northern Virginia, you can't beat that, you know, it was kind of, kind of nice.

coming down here, I ended up doing all four years graduating with a business aviation degree and all of my flight ratings. So you're not wrong that I do have my certified flight instructor license. We fly for fun now, just just just for fun just for fun. 

[00:04:48] Tracy Hayes: We're about to Northern Virginia. We're in 

[00:04:49] Mercedes St. George: Springfield.

[00:04:50] Tracy Hayes: Yeah. Yeah. My, my, my aunt still lives there today. She's been there since the early sixties. She's her first school. She's taught for over 30 years in Fairfax County. 

[00:04:58] Mercedes St. George: Very cool. 

[00:04:59] Tracy Hayes: She's taught at West Springfield high. And then when Thomas Jefferson science and tech became the magnet school, that's the big boy.

Yeah. She went over there when that opened as a, The she's biology and genetics was her area of good for her expertise. But yeah, she's a, still lives in Springfield, so I put some time in in Centerville in the nineties. Nice. And my, my cousin still lives there, but yeah, we we go up and wanna visit Washington, DC We we're in Springfield.

[00:05:22] Mercedes St. George: Yeah. Yeah. It is a good spot. I'm going up for Christmas, see my mom and dad in a few days, so Yeah. It'll be nice to go back. 

[00:05:27] Tracy Hayes: So you graduate from ju Mm-Hmm. , we're spring of 21. Mm-Hmm. . What's going on in your mind? Yeah, what happens when you walk into Yellowbird? Where does the real estate license come in here?

[00:05:37] Mercedes St. George: I know. So pretty much I had finished everything and at that point it was time for me to go get a flight instructing job. And basically what that is, is before you can actually go to the airlines you need to build time. So I graduated JU with probably 275, 300 hours, roughly, to actually be able to go to the airlines you need 1, 500 500, depending on the licenses you have.

So I graduated, I had interviews lined up, everything ready to go, and then I actually ended up going on a double date. And, and the guy who I was not on the date with, but good friend of mine now, very good friend of mine. Her boyfriend. Yeah, her boyfriend. We ended up getting on the topic of real estate and he worked at Yellowbird, had all great things to say about it and just.

what it is, what it does. They were around since I believe 2017 to up until last year. In their top years they bought, you know, 400 single family houses, renovated, flipped them. And that's, that's what they were. They were the number one investor here in Jacksonville, truly. So got on with them in.

May of 2021. So right when I graduated a week later, I ended up getting in with yellow bird and really it was just the draw of, okay, well, I still want to be a pilot, but if I ever want to build my own portfolio, if I want to own a hundred rental properties, I don't actually know how to do that. How do I do that?

And so that's what I wanted to learn from those guys. I would just took a part time job. I answered the phones. I set appointments for the agents to go out on the appointments. And I ended up just falling absolutely in love with it and was like, I think I want to try this for a year. So I ended up giving it a year.

I said, I'm going to take one year off, one year off of flying. Won't kill me. Like I can always go back to it. Right. And that was the plan. That was the plan. I promise. But ended up taking a year. I went full time into the agent role and that's kind of where my real estate really started is I was going on three to four.

Cash homebuyer appointments every single day Buying houses and that's where all of those flips came from 

[00:07:42] Tracy Hayes: just three or four a day. Mm hmm. I mean You know and just so everyone kind of has a picture of you, you know Correct me if I'm wrong and I kind of give a generalization what you what yellow bird is doing and you can clear it up I mean, obviously they have investors that pooled Money together to go out and pay cash for homes.

Mm-Hmm. , they've got renovation crews, obviously. They probably try to keep, as, you know, consistently going from one house to the other. Yep. Because they don't want to lose them by not having business to send them to. Mm-Hmm. or work to send them to. you're aggressively out there where, and clarify that if that's anything's off or add anything to that.

And then where are they finding. 

[00:08:21] Mercedes St. George: Where are all these deals coming from? 

[00:08:24] Tracy Hayes: Where are they digging them up? 

[00:08:25] Mercedes St. George: Yeah. So, keep in mind, the three main owners of was Pat, Steve, and Kyle. Kyle just recently sold his rental portfolio for 120 million to Progress Residential. Probably two years ago now, close to that.

So he had spent his entire career building that portfolio. Pat kind of got into the real estate business similar to me, like the hustle, the grind side of it. Going out on appointments, purchasing properties for cash, flipping homes like that. A little sweat equity in there. Yeah, to say the least. Nasty, but fun stuff.

And I mean, Steve's just been in the business since forever. He's done it all. So, they, the three of them pulled their, you know, brains together, pulled their money together, ended up coming up with yellow bird. And I mean, we were spending anywhere from 250 to 350, 000 a month on marketing. So marketing was being pumped out at an extremely high rate, hitting every single distress property in.

The local four counties. 

[00:09:25] Tracy Hayes: Are you looking up you know, what's coming on the courthouse steps and that sort of thing? 

[00:09:28] Mercedes St. George: Absolutely. So that's also kind of the hustle side of it. So as agents with Yellowbird, you would go, you would have marketing appointments set for you, which was phenomenal, but your real money maker and where as a 1099 employee where you really wanted to make your money was on your self sourced hustle.

So that's anything that you're, you know, door knocking foreclosures, tax deeds divorce. 

[00:09:50] Tracy Hayes: Where you're finding this property of opportunity?

[00:09:53] Mercedes St. George: Yes. And that's what we were doing on the side, hustling those leads as well. Individual agents doing that. 

[00:09:59] Tracy Hayes: Interesting. So, alright, so you, you come in part time, you're answering the phone, you go get your real estate license, I would imagine.

[00:10:05] Mercedes St. George: I actually waited about a year until I got my license. Because at that point, you know, I was still very new to the whole thing. And I also was planning on only taking a year. So I was like, I don't need a real estate license, right? I just want to really learn the investment side of it. I want to know what are the right numbers to buy properties for?

How much does it cost? What is the process? How do I get money? What are the connections? I mean, I just had so many questions that I knew if this is what I want to do, like down the line, I want to build this portfolio, kind of like Kyle, but on a very small scale. How do I do it? And, and that's kind of where it came from.

So that first year, I was just hustling. 

[00:10:42] Tracy Hayes: What do you think and instead I call it an entrepreneurial spirit that you had, because you asked how, why, how is this happening, right? Where the typical 22 year old probably isn't digging in that deep. They're, they're still trying to save the world with, you know, whatever the yeah, whatever their whatever their passion that they have it all of a sudden you like, oh, hold on a second.

Mm hmm. There's this whole other thing over here. And I'd love the patty catching my head around a few weeks ago. She's everybody wants to live under a roof. I mean, that was you were talking about that. real estate commission in our lawsuit and all that stuff. But anyway, everyone wants to live under a roof and all something went off in your head, something and you said, Oh, I need to learn about this part right here.

And then the, the you're, you said something earlier too, but you wanted drone portfolio. Did your parents have rental property or anything like that? 

[00:11:41] Mercedes St. George: My dad had a few. So keep in mind my whole childhood, he was retired. So, I mean, he always kind of tinkered and hustled too, if you will. It's not like he had like a 401k like that he had coming in every month, his money that what he lives off of every month is off a couple of rental properties up in Northern Virginia.

I had a little bit of experience to that as well but not on a large scale by any means. I also never saw his process with them. When I was a kid, he already had them like they were just there. Like I didn't see how he actually acquired them or, or manage them or anything like that. But you knew he was making money off them.

[00:12:16] Tracy Hayes: Yes. Yeah. All right. We've jumped way ahead. So we're going to stick a slight step back in the, in the chronological order here. Cause I wrote some, I wrote a few things down. You were attending L3 Airline Academy as well as JU and graduating JU with honors. Tell us a little bit what was your?

Like, 

[00:12:35] Mercedes St. George: what was that like? Yeah, that was busy too. Like I said, aviation program over there in the school of business at J J U really is phenomenal. I loved it because it was a small school. Like, I mean, it's not a big party school at all, but it's a small school to where if you actually want to put in the time and the work, your teachers will notice that and they'll pour back into you.

So I had a lot of people over there that really poured into me and they gave me a lot of opportunities that I'm still very, very grateful for. But. What a typical day looked like is you're not only going to your typical classes. So we still had to go to English class and, you know, literature and biology.

We still had to hit all of those on top of the business courses because you're graduating technically with a business degree as well as in a flight block. So L3 Airline Academy, has multiple locations all over the United States and they're basically a flight school. And they the location for JU is at Craig Airport.

So we would basically have flight blocks three to four times a week and you would go drive to Craig, take a little plane up for about two hours, do your lesson, come back, land, and then you go on to your next class. 

[00:13:42] Tracy Hayes: If a young person's looking, even just to fly as a hobby, or something like that, to attend a school like JU versus being an older person like me and having to, you know, go hire somebody and, and, and take it to have it just like blended into your regular school day.

That's pretty cool. 

[00:14:01] Mercedes St. George: Oh yeah. Yeah. It's also like, you're going to make sure your butt is there, right? Yeah. Like you're getting graded on it. 

[00:14:08] Tracy Hayes: So you, you graduated with honors. This girl, she, she does her work. I want to roll off some organizations that you belong to that I think are, are worth naming here.

Okay. Thank you. Women in aviation. You were VP of that organization? I was for a bit of time. National Society of Leadership and Success, I guess. Is that a ju U thing or a national? It's 

[00:14:26] Mercedes St. George: At quite a few different colleges around the country. Mm-Hmm. . But you basically get initiated into it. Alright. 

[00:14:31] Tracy Hayes: The flight team. Mm-Hmm. is that just jus all the pilot. All the pilot. 

[00:14:36] Mercedes St. George: It really is like a team. So you go and compete at different competitions across the country and you do different. 

[00:14:43] Tracy Hayes: Is it all actually physical flying or some more technical 

[00:14:46] Mercedes St. George: there's some on the ground Yeah, there's some hard math ones that are on the ground.

I didn't compete in those But there's some fun ones, that are actually in the plane, 

[00:14:55] Tracy Hayes: Department of aviation safety committee student rep. 

[00:14:58] Mercedes St. George: Yes, basically, I was the liaison between our school ju school of business and l3 basically being the student representative and letting and I'm just trying to let the faculty know of how things are going safety wise.

[00:15:12] Tracy Hayes: Changes in FAA requirements or whatever that kind of thing. This one here I want a story on. Women's Air Race Classic. 

[00:15:20] Mercedes St. George: Oh, that was a fun one. 

[00:15:21] Tracy Hayes: Flying across the country. Tell us about that. 

[00:15:24] Mercedes St. George: That was a very, very cool opportunity for me. A professor basically has to nominate you for it.

So I had a couple professors nominate me for it. One of the highlights of my time at JU by far. Unfortunately we trained, we did it two years in a row, both years that I had the opportunity to do it, they were canceled for COVID. We got a few test races. Me and another girl, Haley, we were able to do like a a six stop race, a very short, you're supposed to go all the way across the country.

I mean, one of them, I think we were supposed to finish going all through the Southeast through Texas and then up and land and actually finish in like Kansas city. That's where you're supposed to finish. But. COVID, we didn't get to do it, which was no fun. 

[00:16:12] Tracy Hayes: If you were to run the race, just you find solo, just you?

[00:16:16] Mercedes St. George: you may have one other partner, you may have two partners, it really depends. And it's not just for college girls or anything like that. Really, anyone can go and apply and, if you have a plane and you have a number on the side of your plane. 

[00:16:29] Tracy Hayes: You all start from the same airport, or? 

[00:16:30] Mercedes St. George: Everyone starts from the same airport you take off. You go, and it's basically your time between the two points, is how they test you, or how they time you. 

[00:16:39] Tracy Hayes: They have designated spots you're supposed to land at, or? 

[00:16:42] Mercedes St. George: Designated spots you're supposed to land at, but then also pass over, and that's how they do it. So you do a pass, and you get your time, and then you come around and land.

[00:16:52] Tracy Hayes: Much like the I'm thinking just a tour de France, right? They record the leg, right? They're recording 

[00:16:58] Mercedes St. George: the leg 

[00:16:58] Tracy Hayes: and then who comes in later, that start later to the next leg. I've, I'm trying to remember who told me this it was another hobby pilot, but there are places around the country that like, You know, there's little restaurants, little places, where people just, they're just like fly ins.

[00:17:14] Mercedes St. George: Oh, yeah. 

[00:17:15] Tracy Hayes: Yeah, and I don't think a lot of people realize, like, down in, you may know of others, I'm sure you do like down in Daytona or south of Daytona, they have that community that's totally built around. 

[00:17:26] Mercedes St. George: Oh, yes. 

[00:17:27] Tracy Hayes: An airstrip. And people have hangers.

[00:17:29] Mercedes St. George: I would love to own a home on an airstrip like that. That's a one day someday maybe. Great barbecue up in Brunswick, Georgia if you ever fly up there. There's a little barbecue spot not too far from the airport. 

[00:17:40] Tracy Hayes: It just has it's own airstrip or, 

[00:17:41] Mercedes St. George: Yep. Yep. It's right nearby it. You can walk to it. Flagler's got a good little spot. Naples has a good little spot.

Yeah. But, I mean. There's even books that people have to where you can, like, stamp every single airport in the United States that you go to and you try and, like, write off every, every airport in the state. I mean, there's a lot. 

[00:18:03] Tracy Hayes: Actually, this one, I know this story came to me a long time ago. A friend of mine in high school, he was with the what do they call it, the civilian 

[00:18:09] Mercedes St. George: Civil Air Patrol?

[00:18:09] Tracy Hayes: Civil Air Patrol, yeah, he was, he was part of that. And I get, some of these really small, Rural airports, right you there's nobody in the tower. There's no one there Yeah, you might be fine and that you could actually click the radio and the lights. Come on. 

[00:18:22] Mercedes St. George: Yes Yeah, so I mean there's no one in the tower to actually turn them on turn them off So depending on how many clicks you do it will initially turn it on and then what it will adjust the brightness of them The more clicks you go.

Well, yeah. 

[00:18:34] Tracy Hayes: Well, RV years for like 10 years. That's like a whole little It's a whole little community itself, RVing. I just imagine small hobbyists playing. That's a whole, yeah, you've got your, you know, you got your website, you got people telling you story, Hey, you need to go check out this.

This is how you get there. You know, or whatever little treasures. It's fun. Yeah, for sure. Well we, we, so we jumped into my next thing on my list was, was, we were talking about yellow bird. Let's go back to that a little bit in What are some hardcore things, I mean, I imagine the list is endless, but some of the most important things, because I imagine, one, as a young person, you probably have a lot of friends who ask you about, hey, is real estate a career to get into, but also, the fact that you're flipping, That I think everyone who thinks about real estate is a dream.

It's just, you know, taking that first step and actually, you know, learning, you know, how to, how to do it and what's important and how to do it. So what are some of, you know, when you're doing a flip in today, doing it yourself or you you in general, or just, you have a little investor group that you've started or how do you.

[00:19:41] Mercedes St. George: So Jana and I Number one we partner with people a lot on a lot of our flips And I think when you're initially getting into the business, that's the best way to do it because it's very low risk You've got some people looking out behind your back and you're probably partnering with people that have done it way more frequently than So my first two years in the business, I only partnered on flips.

So those 80 flips that I did was always with partners. I didn't have the capital right out of college to be flipping houses. I didn't have the experience. I didn't know who to call for the cruise. I didn't know how to sell it. I didn't even have my license on the back end yet. Right. So learning from, you know, the three best guys in Jacksonville, how to do it was a phenomenal opportunity for me to have.

And I would recommend anyone kind of just getting started to. Partner with someone. Jana and I partner with people all the time. We've got lots of other investors that will partner with you if you're looking to start getting into that and basically what the term, the technical term of that is called is JVing joint venture.

And I highly recommend starting with that. It wasn't until this year specifically that I started to do a few of them on my own. And it's a lot more scary on your own. 

[00:20:51] Tracy Hayes: And I mean, I Pigs get fed, hogs get slaughtered, and I'm saying that because a lot of people go look at a possible flip, and maybe, maybe there's a possibility of, of netting out twenty or thirty thousand dollars, but you've never done one before.

Yeah. And the mess they can be. my wife and I did one when we first got married. Yeah. Great learning experience, luckily we didn't lose any money. That's the best kind. But we look back, we look back and, You know, there was opportunity, there was a HUD home that had been foreclosed on the I've told this story before on the show, but there was a leak in the slab.

Oh. Well, we went in, the carpet was just nasty, so obviously the first thing we did was tore up all the carpet. We could see where they patched the slab. Mm hmm. You know, so nothing was going on. Well, one day we went over there, we hadn't put new flooring down yet, Mm hmm. and all of a sudden there's a puddle of water there.

I'm like, what is that? Luckily, one of her friends were there. And we there was a bathroom at the other end of the house. It was just, there was no basement, it was just on a slab. This was in Arkansas. And what it was, it was the, I think, I believe it was the hot water line. What we discovered was the hot water line.

Because we shut off the cold water line. You know, we found it was the hot water line. So we just re ran it. You know, boom, because the master bedroom was at the other end of the house and, you know, it was a small house type situation. We got lucky, because you start drilling into a slab and oh my god, you don't know where the money pit will go with that.

So, when you, just when you first get started, to do a handful, you know, I imagine you work with some people now, but, Get connected with the contractors. Yes. Obviously, I think the one biggest fear, right, is going in and evaluating the property. Tell, dig in a little bit. Like, you know, what are, what are some things you look at?

You know, maybe someone's listening, might be one of those people who might partner up. Maybe they say, well, geez, there's a few houses down the street. Maybe, you know, Mercedes might be interested in these. Yeah. What are things that you're looking for? Doing an initial valuation. 

[00:22:42] Mercedes St. George: So you're always looking for the ugly house, right? Honestly, the the better, you know, more weeds, the truly, you know, the more sweat equity there is within it. But getting started really important to partner with someone who's. Already done it before already has the experience already has the connections when you're able to partner with them 

[00:23:01] Tracy Hayes: They've already made the mistakes.

[00:23:02] Mercedes St. George: I've already made the mistakes and some bread is better than no bread, right? You know, I'd rather get some than none 

[00:23:08] Tracy Hayes: a lot less stressful.

[00:23:09] Mercedes St. George: Yes so When I'm looking at houses when I'm first walking through, you know, The big things, the most expensive things are the big four points of a house, right?

Roof, AC, plumbing, electrical. Those are the big four. Those are going to be your most expensive things to replace, to fix. And, you know, kind of as you're walking through, you're just totaling in your head. I mean, I have rough ranges now, like light, medium, heavy. renovation levels. Rough numbers of that.

If it's kind of a light renovation, you're probably, you know, under 25, 000, you're talking just paint, carpet, landscaping, staging, and kind of like just making sure that everything's been deep cleaned. Like, in other words, you're able to save a lot on that. Medium renovation, you're starting to add in a kitchen, a bathroom, maybe you have to replace the AC.

A few more things like that. When you start getting into heavy, you're probably over 60 grand. There's probably a pool. You're doing a full gut job. I mean, it's a big house. That's when you're starting to get anywhere from you know, like 60 to 85 roughly 

[00:24:09] Tracy Hayes: I think, you know, and I've talked to people, I know you've talked to people, they're looking at that, that big one that, where they can hit this home run, that they think is a home run.

Yeah. They're looking at the fence, and they haven't even actually hit a ball yet. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. That type of thing. And, that maybe some of these little ones, and would you agree or disagree, some of these little ones where maybe you, yeah, you make, 15, 20, 000 after you can make great money off little ones.

[00:24:32] Mercedes St. George: The other thing too is, you know, lot of people who are just starting to get their foot wet on this, this is not their full time gig. This is a part time things where if they make an extra 20 grand, that's amazing. I mean, that's a phenomenal year for a lot of people that is. So you might as well learn 

[00:24:47] Tracy Hayes: great part time.

[00:24:49] Mercedes St. George: Great part time gig, right? I don't know any other part time gig that pays like that. You know, over the course of, what, three, four, five months? So, get a few little ones under your belt and then go for the big, big money maker. The big, big money maker has a lot of things hidden underneath as well. 

[00:25:04] Tracy Hayes: Right. Well, in talking about Greater Jacksonville in general, in the gems, because I think also, The fear of partner up it's like well if I partner up only make like five grand off of this Maybe if everything goes right and I'm partnered up and almost like thinking that's the only Dance in town really Jacksonville has a lot of opportunity 

[00:25:26] Mercedes St. George: Yeah a ton. Kind of the way I partner with people So if I'm JVing with you, you bring me a deal. You've already got contract signed. It's ready to go. I like the house We've got it signed on a certain number. Whatever you got it agreed upon for is what we'll purchase it for. So I'm supplying hard money Then we're going in we're going to do all of the construction You don't have to fuss with it at all If you'd like to be there and learn how we're doing it what the step by steps are who my people are so that way you have Them as contacts later on amazing.

You're totally welcome to be there But at the same time a lot of these people have typical nine to fives and they don't have that Right. Kind of time to be managing a project nonstop. Right. So we're taking care of purchasing the home, supplying money doing the construction on the home, and then also going ahead rehabbing it, getting it staged and selling it as well.

So we're basically taking care of everything. Once everything is closed and funded, we pay you a third of the profit. So if the net profit was 10, 000, you're going to make three grand just for to me basically. Yes. 

[00:26:29] Tracy Hayes: Well, you said under contract, so basically you're, taking over the contract, basically.

I may, 

[00:26:33] Mercedes St. George: we would be the end buyer on it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I would put my LOC so, 

[00:26:36] Tracy Hayes: uh, play that through. So if anyone Mm-Hmm. on here doesn't quite understand. So you see a, I see a house. Yep. So I, I see a house and, but I may not know if there's great opportunity or not. Mm-Hmm. , can I call you in at that time for you to come over and take a look at and say Of course. Yeah. There's opportunity. Are you gonna push me out or are you. 

[00:26:52] Mercedes St. George: Because I don't have time to push you out. I don't have time to go around you to the seller. I'm not into all that. It's also, you know, bad karma down the line, right? You know, no way. No way. Not in this 

[00:27:01] Tracy Hayes: because that would be an obvious fear. People like, Oh, Mercedes is gonna come over and she's gonna throw cash down on it and she's gonna steal it out. So I don't want to call it. 

[00:27:07] Mercedes St. George: No, I'm more interested in keeping the long term relationship. If you bring me one and I do a good job on making you money on the one, chances are you're gonna bring me more in the future and we're gonna keep getting paid together, right?

I don't have the time to go around you. I'm not interested in it. But yeah. With that being said, yeah, if you've never done this before, you just have an idea, oh, at the end of my street there's a really ugly house, like, I wonder if I could figure that out. I kind of know the old lady that lives there. I think she was ready to move into a nursing home.

And you've never been on an appointment before, you've never purchased a house for cash before, you don't know what a contract looks like, what to offer, anything like that, yes, call me. I've gone on plenty of appointments with people, locked it up. And we make sure that you and I have a separate JV agreement on the side to where you, you are absolutely locked into that.

[00:27:52] Tracy Hayes: You know, I think it probably happens, you probably, I'm sure you dealt with this before the older person passes away, family doesn't even live here or maybe they do. Yeah. They inherit the house. It's totally, you know, needs to be rehabbed. 

[00:28:03] Mercedes St. George: Where do you come? What's the process there? Yeah, so at that point then you've gotta get it through probate probate week.

Well, it's, yeah, 

[00:28:09] Tracy Hayes: it's advanced that, so it's that person now the son or whatever daughter they properly 

[00:28:13] Mercedes St. George: Oh. How are we finding those people? 

[00:28:14] Tracy Hayes: Well, just, I mean, how would you handle that? Just 'cause they're listening right now. Mm-Hmm. , you know, I, I inherit my parents' house and I've, I've gone through probate.

It's mine and, and I've got control of it, but I don't have the money to rehab it and get it. If I'm gonna sell it, I gotta sell it for. And so you're, you're well below market or what it could be. Can someone call you to come over and evaluate that and look, how would you handle that? 

[00:28:38] Mercedes St. George: Absolutely. Those are a lot of the leads that I'm going on appointments for right now.

And really what that looks like on the appointment itself is once you've established that connection with the person who just inherited that house, you're walking through what it would look like either for them to go ahead and completely renovate this thing, walk them through what this really looks like.

Okay. Okay. You're going to take. Two to three months of your life, you're going to spend 50, 000. You're going to hire all of these people. Then you're going to hire a realtor to sell it. It's a very involved process that a lot of people don't have time for. You know, they have families, they have jobs, they live out of state.

They don't have time to be doing all that. Or, I'll walk through it, I'll tell you a real number of what I can purchase it for, I'll tell you what I'm going to put into the property, and I'll tell you what I'm going to sell it for down the line. I'm very open with people that I'm in this business to make money.

[00:29:27] Tracy Hayes: Well, if I'm in, I inherited that property let's just say it's paid off for, just for the example's sake. Sure. Maybe the value right now, you go in there and look, you say, yeah, you're, at this condition, you're best at 150. If it was up to speed, you know, the kitchen was redone, this and that and the other thing, Yeah.

we could probably get 250 for it. Mm hmm. Are you cutting, are you working the deal to cut them back a third? Okay. So what's 

[00:29:50] Mercedes St. George: The homeowner 

[00:29:51] Tracy Hayes: would be that extra hundred thousand dollars. 

[00:29:53] Mercedes St. George: No, I'm not paying the homeowner profit on it. I'm paying them the initial offer itself, you know, so they're making 150 grand.

That's my offer. Now if someone was to bring me that lead that whatever we profit off a non homeowner, a non homeowner, you know, the person that's working directly with me on the transaction, they're getting paid the third. 

[00:30:11] Tracy Hayes: Okay. Yes. There are a lot of treasures around.

There are a lot of people who know where these treasures are and you know, obviously they're like, they're thinking of just of that themselves and that, and I know you're not the only one in town. You know, you're the person sitting in front of me that's educating me right now, and educating anyone that's listening right now.

There are people there, they can call you and you can come over and evaluate, and, hey, for literally a referral, and you've got all the contractors and everything else that you've been working for, and other, with other, and other flips, to bring them right in, because I think the next fear is is, you know, who do you hire to come in and do these things?

And they're actually going to show up. 

[00:30:51] Mercedes St. George: Actually going to show up, not just going to take, you know, the initial 50 percent deposit and then walk away and you never hear from them again. I mean, there's so many stories. Horror stories. 

[00:30:59] Tracy Hayes: Horror stories. Or these, these, the painters that come in and I'll tell you more offline, but my wife and I are flipping a condo right now.

Which I'm, you're making me spin and I'm like, you know, there might be others in there that we might want to talk about and bring you in on in this place that we're talking about. But anyway, yeah, I mean, it's the, the inconsistent work and you know, I understand we have some of our contractors, they have employees who don't speak English or whatever.

You can go in there and tell them all you want. We do, do all the prep work so they, they just come in and paint and they still paint over. Yeah. And cause a headache later. And you're like, do I call them back or is it worth that headache and yeah, that right there, the stress people, I'm telling you, if you're listening to this and thinking about flipping.

Yeah. I think that's one of the, one of the biggest things, not only obviously finding the treasure, but also, you know, being able to call. Your contractors come in because is that the next step 

[00:31:53] Mercedes St. George: and you're going to get done yeah. 

[00:31:54] Tracy Hayes: So the next step in your process you found the house You've you've done your evaluation or I assume sometimes you actually call your contractor in to kind of give you some more hard numbers 

[00:32:03] Mercedes St. George: So typically the process is we walk the house we get it under contract we close it Then I'm having my guys actually go in and start working on it We're kind of at the point now where I can walk in and I've got a rough idea of what it's gonna cost 

[00:32:15] Tracy Hayes: you've gotten so many yeah, right. Yeah. That right there,

[00:32:19] Mercedes St. George: taking them on appointments with me, that would take them off time that they can be working on current flips. We have in the pipeline. 

[00:32:24] Tracy Hayes: Have you ever had one though? We're, first thing that pops in my head is like a pool situation because right when you're renovating, you got a pool situation, something might be hidden, which you might recommend calling in that expert to kind of poke that owner.

[00:32:37] Mercedes St. George: The funky things are like pools, septic, Wonky stucco wonky foundation. Those are things that you know, it could be five grand. It could be 20 grand Right. Those are kind of the ones where you have an inspection period 

[00:32:52] Tracy Hayes: Or you're filling in the pool 

[00:32:53] Mercedes St. George: Yeah, we're done with that, never again Right, right Yes, absolutely

[00:33:02] Tracy Hayes: That is such valuable, you know, and we, we may want to, you know, maybe in next month or something is one of the things I'm doing now with some, with some of the agents is not doing, cause this will go out to Apple and Spotify and all that stuff. It's just come on for, for 30 minutes and we're just talking about.

Some recent renovation opportunities and some stories. 

[00:33:20] Mercedes St. George: Oh, I got some stories. I just closed a bad one. 

[00:33:23] Tracy Hayes: Yeah. Well, go go go. 

[00:33:25] Mercedes St. George: Well, not bad in the sense. We made money But it was a 10 month long renovation project and 

[00:33:30] Tracy Hayes: because what's your goal? What is your ideal goal a turn time? Because you say 10 months and this was a was 

[00:33:36] Mercedes St. George: it's really if it's a moderate rehab if we can have it sold Close sold done in four months. That's a good time. 

[00:33:46] Tracy Hayes: Touchdown. Yeah. Okay. 

[00:33:48] Mercedes St. George: And that's moderate. If it's light, it should be two to three. 

[00:33:51] Tracy Hayes: Okay. Yeah. So 90 120 days you want it off your books. 

[00:33:54] Mercedes St. George: Yes. Cause you got to think , you're buying the deal. That's typically 30 days to close. You're renovating it. That's 45 days roughly. Right. And then you're closing it again.

It's going to sit on the market for nowadays. It used to be three days. Now it's, you know, Two weeks to 30 days if you price it right. Mm-Hmm, . And then it's got another 30 days to actually close get to the closing table. So you're looking, you know, right about, 

[00:34:16] Tracy Hayes: alright, I'm gonna write down another, another question, but I want you to go on.

So tell me about the 10 months. Because you learned stuff from this, tell us what you learned from this experience. 

[00:34:23] Mercedes St. George: I did learn from this one. I've had plenty of nightmare horror flip stories, you know, just. For a multitude of different reasons, this one almost hit every single one of them.

So the situation was the woman who lived there had inherited the home from her mother. Mother had passed away. This woman who lived there had three other siblings. Those three other siblings were all out of state. So now we're dealing with the probate situation first off, right? It's almost done with probate, not completely.

But she's already living there and then you've got three other siblings. This is a big house. It's got a pool. It's got a big corner lot. It's probably just under 2, 000 square feet. So it's relatively big. And not only is four siblings involved, you've also got a daycare being run out of this house.

So you're talking about Lots of pets, lots of kids, lots of people. I mean, there's just all kinds of stuff going on in this house that you're about to disrupt. Right. And the reason we're disrupting it is number one, it's needs to go through probate and she has not paid the mortgage for the last year.

So she's starting to be issued pre foreclosure notices. 

[00:35:31] Tracy Hayes: We got some little bit of time. 

[00:35:33] Mercedes St. George: We got a time crunch and the three other siblings had no clue this mortgage was not being paid. They were under the impression it was. 

[00:35:41] Tracy Hayes: Because their sister or whatever was living there. 

[00:35:44] Mercedes St. George: She was living there and they're all out of state.

They're not. They have no idea what's happening. 

[00:35:47] Tracy Hayes: They're assuming she's paying the mortgage. 

[00:35:48] Mercedes St. George: Yes. She's not. So ended up, you know, long story short, they find out she's not because they're getting served these pre foreclosure notices. I have to then make contact with every single person and get them on the same page.

Everyone. doesn't like each other. All four of them will not speak to one another. So getting them all on the same page to agree to one thing is a nightmare in itself. 

[00:36:09] Tracy Hayes: Oh yes, this happens. 

[00:36:11] Mercedes St. George: It happens when 

[00:36:11] Tracy Hayes: there's money involved the blood runs thin

[00:36:16] Mercedes St. George: Yeah, and I've seen that plenty of times but this was by far the worst in addition to this I'm also not the only investor working this trying to buy this house I mean, there's probably five other investors in the city that are trying to buy it.

So now I'm being bid up right for a house That's in terrible condition We end up 

[00:36:35] Tracy Hayes: obviously initial valuation is the mortgage to what it could be. There's equity there 

[00:36:40] Mercedes St. George: There is equity there. I do know they all walked away with some money. I forget exactly how much I bought this in February of this year.

It just closed last week. So it was a full 10 month renovation. You know, I mean we, and we borrowed hard money on it. So we paid about 27, 000 in hard money. So it was expensive to say the least, but anyway, so we ended up finally getting it under contract. 

[00:37:04] Tracy Hayes: You're saying that's what your interest, that was what it cost you to borrow the money to buy it.

[00:37:07] Mercedes St. George: Yes. 

[00:37:08] Tracy Hayes: Is that, is 27. 

[00:37:09] Mercedes St. George: 27 just to pay interest. 

[00:37:11] Tracy Hayes: Right, so you, you're working that in your budget. You know, hey, I got to do all these things, but then what did it cost me to hold that money? 

[00:37:17] Mercedes St. George: Just to hold it for 10 months. And keep in mind, I didn't plan on holding it for 10 months. We'll get to that. Anyway, so, I ended up getting it, getting them all on the same page, getting it under contract.

She was supposed to move out at closing 30 days later. So we, she was supposed to move out, you know, like, March, roughly. And she didn't move out. She just never moved out. So then we had to go and file the eviction process. So, you know, we serve her the letter, but the time that that takes, I think it was another month and a half until we were actually able to get her out of there.

And then we're left with the project itself. I mean, it was a huge project. I mean, probably 80, 000, roughly 80 to 90. And then finally we got it settled and done, but I mean, that was,

[00:38:01] Tracy Hayes: What are a couple of key points that you learned from this, that entering a similar situation again, you do differently.

I would imagine the first thing is her living in the house. 

[00:38:09] Mercedes St. George: Oh yeah. Getting her out. I would get her out immediately. That's number one. I would have handled things a little bit differently with the siblings. Some of them, I mean, we tried to like get them to, work together and like bring each other in and say oh well so and so agreed to this you should agree to this should have never said that ever because the second you tell one of them that they now are oh well he said yes to that well I say no to that because I don't want him to have any money I mean it was a situation like that so I would have kept them all completely separate 

[00:38:39] Tracy Hayes: it just amazes me but I go back to the parent Do your will and put it in stone that that's the way it's gonna happen.

Yeah, whatever you like it or not But they're jealous because they're their siblings get they might get 20, 000. They're getting 20, 000. Well, you both get 20, 

[00:38:57] Mercedes St. George: 000. Yeah You would 

[00:38:59] Tracy Hayes: think whether they blow it on a weekend in Vegas or not. That's not your problem. 

[00:39:03] Mercedes St. George: I know What do you care? Yeah, if your money's your money, but they do Yeah, it's crazy.

Yeah, that one was rough 

[00:39:10] Tracy Hayes: that certainly can happen and I mean, I just, anyone listening right now, if you're listening what Mercedes is telling you, she's done this enough times now. I mean, obviously you probably still learn something on every flip, it's just we learn something every day. The sun comes up.

[00:39:25] Mercedes St. George: Every appointment, every flip, all of them, but I learned something new. 

[00:39:28] Tracy Hayes: But the stress levels down because when that curve ball is thrown at you, you go, well, this is how we handled. Something similar to that the last time is that we're gonna handle it this time Yeah, and the other thing is you probably knew who to call when you had that woman in there.

What do I do? Right, what what cuz that might be something that was that something new you or have you ever dealt with that situation before where they? Bought the house you're there. So 

[00:39:53] Mercedes St. George: normally I've been able, you know, if we close on the property and they're still there I've typically been able to like Be empathetic with them and get them out and offer, Hey, I'll help you move this stuff.

I've got a truck. Yeah, I've, I've, I've actually done that before. Yeah. Yeah. But I've been, 

[00:40:06] Tracy Hayes: you might just do that as a realtor, not just a flipper, but us .

[00:40:08] Mercedes St. George: I mean, a lot, lots of us in this industry do that. Right. I've done that before and I've been able to get them out at least within less than a week.

This woman was camped out there for over a month. So, I mean, that was something I had never experienced before. 

[00:40:21] Tracy Hayes: Yeah, so that delays you 30, 45 days. Because by the time she does move out and then you get everyone scheduled to get in there, it's still another couple of weeks before you can get on their schedule, hopefully.

Yeah. You know, and that's because you're sending them business. talked about pre show since we're in a Joining in on flips. We talked a little bit about that. You're on, you're on face. So this, this podcast will have in the show notes, your contact information, but like you said, one third of the profits.

And even if you, if you make three or 4, 000 off a referral and didn't have to do anything, Mercedes took it basically from literally the one yard line. The referral would say is the first yard. You're taking it the other 99 yards you know, and taking it all away and handling all the issues.

some of the people you've teamed up with, you know, do they, obviously they probably want to learn is why they're working with you and you're educating them in every, but like you said, some people are busy. They like looking at real estate and find these treasures and take a third of the profit.

I mean, we're not exactly, we're 

[00:41:15] Mercedes St. George: just, if you want to start getting your feet wet in this business and you know, maybe you've got a few things under your belt, but you really want to start getting to the big leagues with flipping. Don't do your first one by yourself. Do it with a partner. Do it with someone who's done it plenty of times before and kind of can help you through the process.

Working with me, I'll go on the appointment with you, get it under contract together. If you don't feel like we can, if you bring me a signed contract, amazing. 

[00:41:37] Tracy Hayes: So you're giving them a third just for the referral, which is huge. I mean, the real estate agent doesn't get that, you know, in a, you know, so, so.

You're giving them a third. How can they graduate up with the, if they, maybe they have some cash, right? Or like for myself, I own a couple of properties. I have some rollover 401ks put in a IRA with equity trust out of Ohio. And I bought a couple of condos that way you can use those for flips. I know some, that's actually the guy who referred me to them was an alumni brother who was using.

His Rollover IRA the Buy real estate flip it and you know who obviously was building up his IRA Because that's where the money has to go, but look Yo, if they start getting a little bit involved with you, I don't know if you Maybe gotten any of these people who kind of graduated up if they're investing some of their money What are what can they do where they can they get the 50 50 with you and start to graduate to where that maybe?

After they've done 15 20 of these with you can kind of spin off on their own 

[00:42:32] Mercedes St. George: Yeah I mean if you want to start putting some of your own cash into the deal I'm willing to look into giving you a bigger chunk of the deal another thing to you know being in this business It's a really, really valuable way to make a very safe return on your money.

Lend it out, lend it out to investors. I mean, we all need money all the time, right? We're constantly turning and burning. I mean, you can lend your cash out at 10 percent for six months and get a good little return right there. If you're ready to really get your feet wet and you got some cash, I mean, do one yourself.

Call me. I'm happy to look at a deal for you. I'm happy to look at numbers, make sure you're not getting into a sticky situation. 

[00:43:08] Tracy Hayes: you get the below, the house needs rehab, you buy it for 150, 000. Yep. It needs 30, 000, 40, 000 in rehab work. Maybe there's, you know, obviously you're always building in a contingency for the Unforeseen.

Yeah, right type thing where so you've got an investor who is funding the 150 you use a different investor or sometimes the same investor to fund the actual rehab Or is that more coming or out of your pocket sending how big it is? What how do you work that 

[00:43:35] Mercedes St. George: so the way hard money kind of works is?

hard money is wonderful because All different people in Jacksonville have different terms. One that I use frequently is 90 percent of the initial purchase price. So you have to come up with 10 percent of your own cash. Keeps you a little skin in the game. Right, 

[00:43:53] Tracy Hayes: because they don't want to deal with the contractors.

They've got to put you in the game. 

[00:43:57] Mercedes St. George: You've got to have a little something in the deal. So 90 10 and then the rehab itself, 50 50. Now, obviously all of that is negotiable depending on how juicy the deal is, 

[00:44:08] Tracy Hayes: how fast you turn it over 

[00:44:09] Mercedes St. George: that too. Yeah. And then on top of that, you're typically paying interest.

You know, there's some out there that are getting pretty high, you know, 14 and three, there's some that are still 12 and two. It really just depends on who you're working with, but that's, Typically, what hard money is going for nowadays. 

[00:44:24] Tracy Hayes: Do they evaluate Are they adjusting their terms as, as a mortgage lender, the more money you spend, yet technically you're, you might get a little bit better interest rate, but you are borrowing more money.

You are borrowing more money. When they, are they evaluating the property or are you just presenting the project to them and saying, Hey, this is, this is what we've got. 

[00:44:40] Mercedes St. George: It depends on who you work with. So there's big, big hard money institutions that will do a full blown appraisal on the property. I mean, they want to walk it, they want to see it.

I mean, you know, they'll go really in depth because it's their money. Right. I mean, It's a lot on the line. You also got guys here in Jacksonville who can look at the address and a picture real quick and then be like, yeah, I'll lend two on it, no problem. And that's it. 

[00:44:59] Tracy Hayes: Cause you throw them some comps and say, this is where it could be.

[00:45:01] Mercedes St. George: Exactly. Just depends on who you're working 

with. Yeah. 

[00:45:04] Tracy Hayes: And that's another thing. The fact that you've done it enough times now. That you're presenting them saying hey, I could get this much out of this property right now 

[00:45:10] Mercedes St. George: Exactly and a lot of people actually want to see that they want to see a flip done in your name So if you're jving with someone make sure that your name is somewhere on that that you can take credit for that flip Because if you're a brand new investor, you've never done a flip before what's the likelihood?

Someone's going to lend to you on it unless it's a screaming deal if it's anywhere teetering chances are they won't

[00:45:30] Tracy Hayes: well you know, I immediately looked at, you know, I'm looking at your headline on your LinkedIn and it said 80 plus flips. I'm like, well, and then I scan down, I see Yellowbird. I said, okay, there's where she, so, you know, to be involved in, even at just an infancy level, but you gotta take those baby steps.

And by the time you do get to 80, you could be considered an expert because there's very few people have gone that many flips. 

[00:45:50] Mercedes St. George: Yes. And keep in mind all of my time at Yellowbird, I was partnering. Right. I was partnering with those people who already had the connection. So I was just able to You know, make money off of what I was doing, but also go out and get the next one.

I was always hustling for the next one and I was keeping my pipeline completely full because I didn't have to worry about managing the project then and there. I was already onto the next contract signed great onto the next and that's what I was able to do for those first two years. Now this, this last year I've really been able to do it.

Start to finish on my own and that's been a whole different ball game, but it's been really fun. 

[00:46:25] Tracy Hayes: Well, you know that, that time you got to know people. Mm-Hmm. . That's because, I mean, the key thing is you cannot do this alone. You're not a plumber, you're not an electrician. No, you're not. All these other things.

[00:46:35] Mercedes St. George: I don't know how to do any of it. 

[00:46:36] Tracy Hayes: Yeah, yeah. you're not, you're, you know, you eventually, you know, if you're, you're already funding some of your projects eventually. Mm-Hmm. , you'll be at the point where you do have this pool of money where you could, 

[00:46:44] Mercedes St. George: or I'm lending it out, right? 

[00:46:45] Tracy Hayes: Yeah. When you're lending it out, or you're able to just, you know, stroke your own, you know.

Save the interest on it because it's your money, right? That type of thing and you got it to get started. It started with the first referral. I thought it's God. It's just that's just awesome Let's talk a little bit Because you and Jana formed I was told by Tom Lieber I should have Jana on to you absolutely wait a month or so So I don't have you guys I do have a lot of people from Keller Williams Atlantic partners that I've been on the show We'll have definitely a gin on but tell us a little bit about the flight group Yes, 

why did you what attracted you to Keller Williams? Because I think there's some agents out there who You know may not be with Keller Williams or maybe someone thinking about getting in the real estate. What was it there? You know based on the stage where you're at yet all this experience at yellow bird and so forth He said, you know, I think Williams Link Partners is going to be the place, the value where I need to go.

[00:47:34] Mercedes St. George: Right. Keller Williams has been great to us. A Jana had been with them prior to Yellowbird starting a brokerage. So when I first got my license, that is where I initially held my license with Yellowbird Realty. And I mean, we were just. You know, Cowboys. We were not doing much by the compliance book, if you will.

So that has been a learning curve for me, but Keller Williams has been great in teaching me that learning curve. There's definitely a sense of community. There's also, you know, a name behind it. Going on listing appointments and being able to say that I'm with Keller Williams, not, who the heck is Yellowbird Realty?

What do you mean? I mean, that adds a lot of value to my listing presentations. 

[00:48:12] Tracy Hayes: Well, let me ask you this because you're a young person. that right now is important. in just my evaluation, having interviewed 145 plus top producers or whatever in the area when you're a little more senior, they generally, you, they're looking, looking, Like, oh, you're seasoned, right?

You're, you know your stuff where you're a little younger or do you get that where they're like, Does she know what she's talking about? You know, it's the type of things where obviously Keller Williams props you up a little bit 

[00:48:39] Mercedes St. George: gives you a little something You know, I think it really comes down to Your actual listing presentation and how you're delivering yourself.

I mean confidence is everything, you know I'm not afraid to walk into any house and present something But if you know your stuff, you know You can be young and be extremely successful in this business if you know your stuff and you're confident about it Why wouldn't someone work with you? I just had a A million dollar listing closed yesterday.

Right. 

[00:49:04] Tracy Hayes: Yeah. Right. Well, I mean, the the confidence came with your at bats. You have, you know, Yellowbird gave you a lot of at bats. Oh, 

[00:49:10] Mercedes St. George: absolutely. You build confidence by doing. Yeah. 

[00:49:12] Tracy Hayes: Yeah. Yeah. For someone coming new in the industry, you know, not getting into a Yellowbird situation where you were seeing all these transactions going on and learning about the flipping and all that, you know, learning more about the business because real estate is, is an endless thing.

Yeah. You gotta find your, your little niche, right? type of thing. But joining at Kiskeller Wombs is very good. Providing the value and training. Yes the mentors and all that kind of stuff 

[00:49:38] Mercedes St. George: Phenomenal training. All of the girls on the team right now. We have going to a lot of the keller williams classes They rave about them.

I mean, they'll do open houses or they'll do classes on open houses They'll do classes on listing presentations on different kinds of loans on home inspections I mean, they really really dive deep and that's phenomenal. I mean, that's not something i've ever 

[00:49:57] Tracy Hayes: had a contract, right? 

[00:49:58] Mercedes St. George: Got to know the contract It's great, right?

It really is. Yeah, 

[00:50:02] Tracy Hayes: how important is it for someone getting, you know, has been in the business just starting less than a year to really get their their schedule in, in, in attending as many that's offered at NIFAR that's offered in the office at Atlantic Partners, how important is it for them to get just constant, constant, You know, I've heard numerous times you've got to take the contract class two or three times from two or three different people because you learn something every time.

But to, to understand that this stuff is being provided at a Keller Williams you know, not all Keller Williams franchises are the same, right? We're talking about Atlantic partners. There are others not saying anyone else in town is bad or anything, but you need to do your due diligence. Right. And researching the brokerage.

If you were out there, you got a new agent. Or you were a new agent looking in, what are some of the questions you would ask and who would you ask them are to find out really about a brokerage versus just signing up because your girlfriend works there? 

[00:50:58] Mercedes St. George: Oh, yeah. You know, you kind of hit on it previously.

I think the biggest reason I had a lot of success is because I was seeing so many transactions go on. I was seeing so much turn and burn. Like, I was exposed to all of it very, very early on.  I was in a place where it was safe to ask questions, too. It's like, yeah, like, these are my people. Of course I'm able to ask them.

[00:51:16] Tracy Hayes: Because you weren't butting into the business because that was the business. 

[00:51:18] Mercedes St. George: Exactly. Right. Right. So, I would really emphasize Making sure that you're at a place where you feel comfortable being able to do that and you're able to really just like soak it in I mean that first year you're sponge.

I'm really the first it for for life. You're sponge right in this business. Truly But you're you're constantly just wanting to learn more and more and more and you'll hear it from different people You'll see it, you know, if you can get with people who will let you go on appointments with them Oh my gosh, that's that's the biggest thing, you know seeing seeing it in action.

I mean, that's the best 

[00:51:50] Tracy Hayes: I think you would agree with this 'cause it obviously what you just said, but I, I think I, I like to say it so be clear to, to those new agents or someone else. Maybe you've been doing it for a little while now. Mm-Hmm. , you've got to find that senior agent. Mm-Hmm. who has enough at bats.

They've done enough transactions and obviously want mo I think most of the people I've had on, I. Can't think of anyone that I would say that person wouldn't help you. They all want to help you oh, yeah, and to team up with that person and really, you know, obviously the Grace you give them is obviously when they tell you to do something you do it or if they say hey We're going on this appointment.

You want to go? Yes, and you actually show up five minutes early or whatever, you know You don't they're not with the client and you show up late and it looks bad, you know It just doesn't look you know, you don't make them look bad But if they're willing to pour into you to you know, be willing to take it be coachable, right?

That's The athletic term would be someone someone's coaching you. You try what they're telling you to do. Now, ultimately, what do you do? You mold it into yourself, right? Yeah, every every agent's different, but you've got to take those ideas and get it in But to find that senior agent or you know Keller Williams is known you've got some great teams over there Which brings us to the flight group.

Yes. Tell us about the breakdown You've noticed the pictures are like five or six of you there, right? Yeah. Tell us about the flight group What's the benefits? What are you and Janet trying to grow there and the value that you would give someone who wants to talk to you or join your team? 

[00:53:15] Mercedes St. George: Absolutely. We're really excited about the flight group.

We just started it July 1st, moved over to Keller Williams. We've really enjoyed Keller Williams so far. Things that we're doing at the flight group that kind of differentiates us just from other real estate teams I mean, there's a ton of them right especially Keller Williams We number one partner with every single major investor here in Northeast, Florida So I can rattle you a list of all 

[00:53:36] Tracy Hayes: you're bringing that flipping that whole yellow bird 

[00:53:40] Mercedes St. George: That's our core, right? We know it. We know it. That's our bread and butter, so we might as well capitalize on it. We know the numbers. We know how to flip it. We know how to sell it. We know how to sell it for top dollar because that's all these investors are interested in. Of course, we go to direct to seller a lot and that's probably still 70 percent of my business.

Buyer and seller wise still direct to seller but we right now partner with probably the top seven investors in northeast florida and we sell all of their flips. So that is constant Volume, constant accounts, constant you know, business coming in for us. In addition to that, because we were on the investment side previously for so long, we have connections with all of the major hedge funds here.

So a lot of them have kind of taken a step back just with the turn in the market, but with that being said, we still have two that are actively selling and buying that we're submitting offers for on properties that were listing their houses all over. Jacksonville, Orlando, and Tampa. Additionally, the reason we're called Flight Group is because we are sister companies with flight builders.

So, Pat 

[00:54:43] Tracy Hayes: Oh, I thought it was something else. 

[00:54:44] Mercedes St. George: No, no, no, no. It's not my flying related at all. Nothing, nothing to that point. 

[00:54:49] Tracy Hayes: Ironically

[00:54:50] Mercedes St. George: kind of cool that it worked out that way I love the name. 

[00:54:54] Tracy Hayes: That's where I thought it came from. 

[00:54:55] Mercedes St. George: I love the name. I really do No, but flight builders is owned by pat flynn.

He has How many gosh he's already got 14 in the works right now. He just started in march. He'll probably have 50 done by the end of next year 150 done by 2025 We are going to be selling all of his affordable new construction as well. So we've got a lot of partners. We've got all of the flippers, we've got new construction and we've got hedge funds as well as, you know, listings that we're able to make sure that you get all of the buyers off of.

So we're really able to pour into you. We're so small. We have Is it six now? 

[00:55:30] Tracy Hayes: The picture had five or six in the picture. 

[00:55:31] Mercedes St. George: Yeah, I think we're up to six now. So, yeah, Jana and I, we have four others with us. They're all killing it. They're all doing great. 

[00:55:37] Tracy Hayes: Support from transaction coordinator type stuff?

[00:55:41] Mercedes St. George: We do have a transaction coordinator. Yes, she's awesome. So you have that. You have marketing behind you. You have accountability as well. I mean, we run a 9 a. m. huddle every morning kind of just to go over wins from yesterday. Do you need help with anything? And what are your top three things that you're focused on?

We have a sales meeting on Monday morning, basically going through metrics because the biggest thing when you're first getting started is you could easily. Get your license and then sit at a desk and say, okay, now what do I do? If you have no idea what to do, you need someone to kind of propped you into the position to know what to do.

So we have goals of how many open houses you need to host every week, how many calls you need to make every week, how many leads need to be inputted, different things like that that are going to basically set you up for success. If you do all of the items, there's no way you're not going to get. 

[00:56:32] Tracy Hayes: What interests me after learning more about you in depth and your knowledge level you know, you said you're roughly 70, 30, basically 70 percent for me, you know, your leads or natural referrals, whatever that type of thing.

But that other 30% is a differentiator. And, you know, the fact that you're, you're training him what to hunt for, what to, and, cause I think anyone who gets in the business, they get in the business because, They just, they just find real estate interesting. Don't we all? I mean, I think if we interviewed every new agent ever, you know, have they ever thought about flipping a home?

I guarantee they all have of course. How do you renovate? 

[00:57:10] Mercedes St. George: I'm sure everyone is interested in owning a rental one day, you know And that's stuff that we teach these people. I mean not only so when you're first coming onto the team Not only are you obviously going on listing appointments buyer presentations?

You're doing all of The traditional retail agent stuff, you're also following me to the houses that are really, really ugly and we're, you know, offering 

[00:57:33] Tracy Hayes: your experience. Keller Williams backed with the training because obviously you can't do all the trainings. I mean, you don't know everything 

[00:57:39] Mercedes St. George: and we're really the accountability piece of it.

You know, a couple times a week to where we're checking in with you. But the, the actually training classes. I mean, Keller Williams does a phenomenal job of that. 

[00:57:48] Tracy Hayes: Right? So you've got that corporate structure in all the other teams that are there and you're bringing in a lot of knowledge into the into the offices that top people that are there, but that for in, correct me if I'm wrong, someone's again an agent looking maybe to move over or new agent getting started and they go, well, this is something different because I personally again, I've interviewed a lot of the top team, not all of them, but a lot of the top team, no one.

It's talking the flipping side because to me that's almost self creation, right? You're not you may be farming a neighborhood. You may be buying Zillow, whatever it is that you're getting those traditional type sales. But when you're driving around or a friend of you tells you about, Oh, you know, there's this house over here.

The mother passed away. You know, I know my wife had one recently where and we were over there doing some tea, like picking the weeds and make sure the pool was clean all because no one's living there, right? And those houses needs that you actually, you could self create another handful of deals just for, From that, because you're keeping your eyes open, you've been trained 

[00:58:55] Mercedes St. George: to look for diversified, that's the biggest thing.

Like you're not just going fully retail. You can, if you want. I mean, we have girls that just focus retail good for them, but you also have the ability to learn how to buy rentals. What numbers do I buy them at? You learn how to flip properties. You, you have people that you can JV with immediately. You have investors that is a constant turn of business, right?

I mean, They're, they're constantly wanting to buy three, four, five, six, seven a month. Those have to be sold. Those have to be turned. Hedge funds. I mean, they're not going anywhere. They're going to keep coming for, 

[00:59:27] Tracy Hayes: well, they're buying, they're buying up property, right? These, these big guys, 

[00:59:29] Mercedes St. George: they're buying and they're selling.

The one that we work with really frequently in Tampa and Orlando, they're actually selling a lot of their portfolio off right now because the 

[00:59:37] Tracy Hayes: equity growth they feel is there to give a term, but then they're turning it back in and probably putting that money in there and buying the next round.

Right. if that is your angle and you're listening to this, I mean, Mercedes and gentlemen, you guys got something, it's different. Different, you're still bringing the general knowledge there, but you're adding this other level that the average team does not have there. And I get calls occasionally that people, yeah, they're, that's what they're looking to do.

But when you, when you're about flipping a house, right, but you're okay, well you need all this money down. Well now I know, right, I know who, Hey, you need to call Mercedes. She she'll go over there and evaluate that problem because they've never flipped before or if they flipped one house, maybe they got lucky.

Now, cause I think. They all want to kill the whale, right? They all want to go after that big whale. They all want to get that 700, 000. Instead of going somewhere in here and finding that 100, 000 to 200, 000. 

[01:00:27] Mercedes St. George: That's where the money is made. When you start getting, especially here in our market, Very top tier properties are probably like 450 and up, right?

That's where you start getting into a price range where that's not necessarily like the median of Jacksonville Where the true money 

[01:00:42] Tracy Hayes: first time homebuyers is gonna have a tough time right now at the interest rates at 450 and really 350 and up 

[01:00:48] Mercedes St. George: Oh, yeah there's I mean There's no way but where the real money is made and flipping is staying in that median price range because you're opening up that buyers Pool, right?

So I mean if you're flipping properties and you're able to keep that sold price Under 300, you're in a very, very, very happy place. Cause keep in mind you're sell overnight because there's such an overnight. There's more demand. You're paying less than interest. You know, I mean, it just, it's a combination domino effect.

You don't have to put as high finishes on it. You, when you start getting 500 plus, you got to put a lot nicer stuff into it than just, you know, build or grow. Yeah. 

[01:01:20] Tracy Hayes: A hundred percent. Cause that was one of the things I wrote down was price point, the home run price point. You feel as a house that you could retail under 150 to 300.

150 to 300, retailing at 150 to 300. So you may be buying it for 100 to 200, tending it and evaluating it. What would you say, because I think this is the HGTV question, what is the most important, if you're evaluating a house that needs to be re renovated, when you go in there and look and say, what needs to be redone to bring this up to speed?

Is it the kitchens the bathrooms floor? 

[01:01:54] Mercedes St. George: This is the hGTV. It's got to be clean. It's got to be pretty right? The other way that we really do it is when we're pricing stuff We don't price it the most expensive thing in the neighborhood. I never want to be that I I always want to be going to be the white elephant.

Yeah, I probably want to be five to ten grand off of sold. That way I know I'm not going to sit for 30 days. I'm going to sell immediately because someone's getting a deal, right? So we price it really aggressively too, but biggest things that get it sold. I mean, honestly, it's just gotta be clean and pretty.

So kitchens, baths, I mean, they've got to look good. Floor paint done. 

[01:02:33] Tracy Hayes: Someone buying in this price range that we're talking about typically doesn't have a lot of cash. First time home buyers are just people that just have, you know, Just the everyday 9 to 5 job, they're being paid hourly or whatever. How important is it, you know, like to go in there?

The appliances are new or newer, so they're not going to have something blow up on them six months in. 

[01:02:55] Mercedes St. George: We never want that. Of course we're doing, you know, repair requests, anything that's like safety, insurance, anything like that, of course we're completing them. The other thing we're doing a lot more than we were doing in previous years is we're paying a lot of closing costs.

I mean, that's almost standard where we're basically factoring it into all of our offers. Well, I mean, that's, 

[01:03:12] Tracy Hayes: and we're coaching your town back. I mean, we're, we're talking to agents, you know, to go in with the buy down, go in when you go to your listing appointment, you're telling them, Hey, you need to build in the buy down now advertise that because who knows in three weeks or 90 days, you're dropping the price when you could have just put the buy down in there and that's where it'd be.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent. Current market it looked like from some of the, you know, I only see the social media posts and stuff like you had, you had the highlight reel.  you had a decent year. with the current market, what do you think you're doing differently now?

That's keeping you on top. If you can, if you, I've, I've assumed you've probably you know, differently say 18 months ago, definitely 24 months ago, what are you doing differently now to stay on top and keep your production, your pipeline, as you've mentioned. 

[01:04:00] Mercedes St. George: Yeah. You know, I think if you're constantly watching the news and listening to the gurus, you can get scared really quick right now.

Not even just only on the real estate front. I feel like every open house I have, I have mom and dad walk in and say, how you doing? You selling anything? How are these interest rates, you know, doing? And the truth of the matter is, is it's your reality. It's what you make of it. The more hands you shake, the more calls you make, the more business you're going to have.

Of course, there's been a shift in pricing and marketing and how to get stuff sold. That's a given. But truly, if you stuck with your goal, From all of these last years, everything kind of coming into one another, if you kept going with it, you're gonna be fine. I mean, there's plenty of business out there right now still.

There's no doubt. 

[01:04:48] Tracy Hayes: You might not be selling three houses, maybe you're only selling two a month right now. But I wanted to look at the content of that, because I've always liked your that whole dynamic of, of the house flipping and so forth brings up a whole other area of conversation to have with people to you know, type of thing, but yeah, that was his main point was how many people are you continuing?

If you do get down, you're not making as many phone calls because you're using that as an excuse. While they're not going to be interested, rates are high. They're not going to want to buy, but reality is we don't know what's going on in anybody's life. 

[01:05:29] Mercedes St. George: You have no idea what's going on. And that's. The biggest thing is turn the news off.

Stop listening to the sad stories like it. We're still turning. We're still burning. We're still going. You just got to keep putting in the work to do it and it will still come. 

[01:05:43] Tracy Hayes: Would you agree 

the real underlying Factor is the demand in Northeast Florida is still there. 

[01:05:48] Mercedes St. George: Oh 

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's plenty of people still moving here.

Right. Every day. There's plenty of business. 

[01:05:53] Tracy Hayes: The business, the pro business attitude of Florida, but Jacksonville is pro business, St. Augustine is pro business. We're in a very good spot. People are being moved in, but also corporations are moving people out because that happens too. They move them to other locations or whatever.

So you've got that constant. And obviously our, our You know, NAS Jacks and Mayport and so forth. The military is constantly moving in and out. Just that basic level right there, because I think one of the things here we don't, we don't, not seeing here recently because of the raids is the The local move, like, hey, I live over here, but I wanna move to Naati.

Yeah. Right. 

[01:06:24] Mercedes St. George: And because it's, I wanna downsize, I wanna upsize. Yeah, 

[01:06:27] Tracy Hayes: yeah, yeah. They're, my friends live over there, so I'm gonna move over over there. And, and when you had 3% interest rates, it was like, well, I, it's free, free money, I'm just gonna do it. Free money. My payment's not gonna change. I got some equity now in this home.

I could use the down payment and my payment's not gonna change that much. But we don't really have that going on in right 

[01:06:41] Mercedes St. George: now. Not as much of that. Yeah. Not as much. Yeah. Still a little bit here and there, but not like it used to be. No. Yeah. 

[01:06:47] Tracy Hayes: Alright. We are talking about what's working for you right now.

Give your sales pitch, I mean we talked about it a little bit, but give me your elevator pitch as we basically close out here of why someone should come join the flight group. 

[01:07:01] Mercedes St. George: Why they should join the flight group? Joining the flight group you're gonna be in a spot where we're tight. You united group.

We're really really excited about it. We just got started, you know, I mean we Are absolutely enthusiastic about everyone that's coming on and everything that they're doing. I want to pour into you I had people pour into me and I know what that feels like and I know how much success can come from just one person really basically believing in you both in college and in real estate and I know what that can set you up for with that being said, coming onto the flight group, you're going to have so many more opportunities than you would have anywhere else.

Not just for business wise, but also knowledge, long term, what you're going to do, you know, 10 years down the road, what you're going to learn from what we're able to offer you. It's going to be completely different. And we're going to pour into you. 

[01:07:48] Tracy Hayes: What would you say to someone cause I've heard this out there cause when you're, when you're a team leader at Keller Williams You're not the broker.

There's the, you know, Tufts is the broker, but you, you kind of take that role to those on your team as if a broker would being over a real estate office, right? And the fact that you were actually still producing your own stuff. Some of the people have this attitude, oh, are you competing against the broker?

Like the broker has some inside, Yeah, they just have more experience. Yeah, explain, you know, how, when someone approaches you, like, well, you know, hey, well, if I go over there, you know, Mercedes, she's young and hungry, and she's, she's gonna just take my stuff or, you know, not share with me or, you know, what, what's going on.

How do you handle that, Gunna? 

[01:08:35] Mercedes St. George: Competition is a good thing. Keep that, keep that in the back of your mind. Because when we, when I was at Yellowbird, I was on a sales team of 12 people. And you're talking about very, I mean, the sales team was not just retail focused. You're talking about, you know, walking through very, very distressed properties.

So it's a different sell. It's much more aggressive, so the competition was a lot higher there. So that's what I come from, and I know what that propped me up to do. It really, it pushes you. It makes you better if you're in a team like that. The other thing is, where I currently am with the flight group is, I'm the one kind of helping you hit your metrics each week.

So, you know, if you commit to make 150 calls every week, I'm gonna make sure that, number one, you have the data to be able to hit that, but also that you're hitting it. And if you're not, well, we need to have a conversation why we're not hitting it. But I'm doing the same thing, right? So I'm not just preaching, Oh, you need to do this, you need to do that.

Like, look at my numbers too. Tell, you know, I'm doing the same thing. there's so much business to go around, I don't necessarily think that it's like Oh, well, she got this, I didn't get this. There's so much business just in our 

[01:09:43] Tracy Hayes: team. What you're bringing to the table and correct me if I've heard in our conversation, you've got this relationship with the builder which is huge, huge.

The fact that, you know, again, as a, What, how long you been, two years now, three years, is going three years, three years of being an agent and you're 25, 26, I assume just by my evaluation of your age, you've got a relationship like that. So somebody has confidence in you. And, and obviously your resume shows the, the vast experience you have and why they should.

your experience, obviously in the flipping, which less than I, I would guess less than 1 percent of the real estate agents have that. Cause again, I've had. A lot of the top people on them, there's a couple of head on that done some flipping, but not to say they've been involved in 80 transactions at any level, you know, type of thing.

And that you are, you are able to pour into them, but you're able to expose them to much vast, You know a vaster area of real estate than just hey I'm taking Zillow leads is what I'm getting from my team because that's a lot of the teams That's what they're doing It leads coming in from whatever and they're in there pounding the phones and you know, 

[01:10:51] Mercedes St. George: it works and that's good yeah, you've just taken something completely different model because that is what We have that's what we currently have available to us.

We have builders. We have hedge funds. We have investors So we're gonna pour into that. I mean between jenna and I we typically have anywhere from 25 to 30 active listings at any one time So with that those are all houses that can be worked. We're getting calls off the signs. We're doing open houses We're marketing those to the community.

So I mean we're constantly just with just 

[01:11:18] Tracy Hayes: five or six of you having 20 20 to 30 The transactions going on at any one time. That's that's huge. So what if someone's looking at and say, oh Mercedes is just gonna you know You know, she's a dominator and she I'm gonna compete with her. The reality is you're you're Plates full.

[01:11:36] Mercedes St. George: Yeah, I want you to have as much opportunity as you can possibly have because I had that gifted to me when I first started and I know what comes from that, but I also am going to make sure that you're hitting those measurables to be able to have your own stuff coming in. You want those coming in too, you know, cause that's truly how you build your business longterm.

You know, 

[01:11:55] Tracy Hayes: as a lender, we often, you know, talk about what products we don't have. And you just, when you were talking about, you know, the investors and the contacts that you have to make some things happen in, in real estate. It makes me think, you know, a lot of guys will always tell you, you know, mortgage loan officers will tell you that they know the products they don't have.

It's easier for me to tell you what I don't have because there's, there's only a few things we don't do and every lender has a reason for not doing them for whatever purpose. But the fact that, you know, you're opening up your life, if I gave the analogy as from the mortgage mortgage lending side. The fact that you have all these contacts that just open a whole, you know, it's not the whole thing of real estate, but a whole other piece of the pie of real estate that most teams are not even tapping into, because they just don't have the experience.

Agreed. Completely. Do you have anything you want to add? 

[01:12:48] Mercedes St. George: I'm excited to be here. 

[01:12:49] Tracy Hayes: We could definitely go on. What I really would love to set up is like once a month we do just virtually right from the day. Just go 30 minutes we stream it on Facebook or whatever and of course I could tag it over to your page and just talk about hey this is what I, you know, this is what I've got flipping right now.

This is, you know, a new experience. 

[01:13:06] Mercedes St. George: Do you have any buyers? This is going to go live soon, this flip. One other thing I will add before we log off. If you are A real estate agent and you don't necessarily want to jv with me jv does take time to get paid, right? I said three to four months roughly if you want to get paid immediately and you've got that lead already i'll pay your commission So we'll pay your two and a half three percent commission, whatever it is.

So I mean I've had agents that I mean prefer that just because it's quick right? So that's another another option too 

[01:13:36] Tracy Hayes: That's a home run That's great. yeah, if you don't want to wait the three or four months, you need cash now, maybe you don't have a sale this month. Yeah. Boom, find a house that needs to be reno'd.

Awesome. The fact that they could just call you and you can come in with this, this help in your, in your reachable there's, there's, there's other people that do it, but we don't know who they are. You, you probably know, cause you run into them at the house, but the fact that you're out there in your front, obviously on, on the podcast, hopefully we give you some exposure, but I'd love to give you exposure every month for about 30 minutes.

We go on and just do a virtual thing, tell some stories and say, Hey, yeah. You know, obviously, continue putting the word out there that, hey, if you've got something, because one of the problems we have in Northeast Florida is affordable housing. I know. And if you can be one of those people who make a difference and get some of these houses up to speed where someone, where a young family doesn't have money to do it, they have a place and then their kids have a place to sleep at night.

Exactly. You know, that's nice and, and, I enjoyed this conversation. I knew it was going to be a good one. We could talk for another couple hours. We probably will. Appreciate you coming on Mercedes. Thank you. Everyone, her information, she's on Facebook, Mercedes St. George, which makes, I mean, makes me think of an island somewhere.

Sounds like it. Yes. Actually, I was thinking, with a name like that, I mean, That's like a supermodel's name. I mean, it's like Mercedes St. George. It's like an actress's 

[01:14:51] Mercedes St. George: name. I can never change it. I'm stuck with it for life. 

[01:14:54] Tracy Hayes: Thanks for coming on. 

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