Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ian Ratliff. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Ian, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about one of the craziest things you’ve experienced in your journey so far.
Not only is this the story of make or break for my business, it’s also what took me and my business from just another Realtor to someone credible; with success in investing and real estate speculation. In 2018, early April, I purchased my first home. I was working for an IT distribution company at the time in a sales role that put me in the position to buy that first home. I was making around $47,000/year on salary and for someone in their mid twenties, felt like that was good, but knew I always wanted to work for myself.
The day I bought the home, if anyone wanted to look it up, 3119 Hillside Road Nashville, TN 37207, it was a rough house in a neighborhood that hadn’t seen much improvement at the time. I started by tearing all of the carpet out, of which I discovered all sorts of what looked like dust, but as I began to mop, realized it was congealed animal feces. Not the most appealing thing to find in your first home that you only had 45 days to make livable. During the coming weeks, I worked my corporate sales job from 8-5, or 9-6 Monday-Friday and worked on the house from around 7 to 1 or 2am. During this I installed central heat and air, refinished hardwood floors myself, fixed drywall, and was able to get one room in the house to the point I could put 6mm plastic over the door and a mattress on the floor to sleep.
Working daily like this for almost 8 weeks before moving in is what started my journey to start my own business. I was exhausted, wasn’t sleeping much, and over the previous year had grown more dissatisfied with the work I was doing and felt stuck. I had a typical “performance review”, of which I had just had the best sales month of my year (though that wasn’t a part of the review). I was told I was only 98% of plan year to date, though I was more than on track to hit our sales goals and metrics for the year. I remember going back to my desk and looking outside. It was one of those absolutely beautiful Tennessee, May days… bright, sunny, and perfectly warm. I was so frustrated by the conversation I went home and wrote up my notice. That Friday I turned it in. Through the home buying process I had taken my real estate licensing courses online just to learn about it. Never intended on getting licensed or selling real estate, but that day is when I decided to get my license. Drove Uber/Lyft at nights from June-December that year. I got my license in August of 2018 and sold a little over 600k in December and have never looked back.
The following year, I lived in the property I bought and improved everything I could with the help of a friends dad who’d been a sub contractor for decades. I’d shower at planet fitness or my girlfriend at the time’s house, cooked on a hot plate and lived essentially the entire year without a bathroom, kitchen, or internet at the house. Most people wouldn’t believe me, but a few close friends saw it first hand haha.
Finishing the house and spending all the money I was making in real estate sales that year to fix it, I got into quite the bind with credit card debt (although I learned a lot about maneuvering money and rewards points in the process) and came as close to down to the wire as possible when I listed it. I put all my things in storage during this time, and through the process lost 2 contracts until one finally stuck. I was fully prepared to go back to driving Uber/Lyft as I was 9 days away from not having my mortgage payment on time. The day I sold the house, I had $63.21 in my checking (only $62.16 available, only $1.00 available in my savings, and owed $141,807.40 on the house. The next day I woke up with $84,413.09… more money than I’d certainly ever seen in my bank account. IT WORKED… from there on out I’ve continued to reinvest, flip, develop, sell, and partner with other individuals in the industry.
This is what took me from just another new Realtor or agent, to an investor, which I advise a lot of clients and other people on the intricacies of speculative real estate now. This is also what made my business a success. Haven’t ever looked back.
Ian, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I got into the business by happenstance, if you read about how I got started and my first flip, that’s all you need to know. Long story short, I quit my corporate job on a whim in 2018, got my license to sell real estate, flipped my first house, and never looked back.
Currently The Ratliff Group offers a range of services for our clients. We offer consulting to first time home buyers, investors, and those looking to upgrade or downgrade their lifestyle through housing. In addition to this, we also just expanded into property management to offer a broader scope of services to our investor clients, though at this time we do not offer short term rental management.
I have an eclectic team with strong backgrounds in logistics, sales, marketing, and customer service. What sets us apart is we are working to build a truly full service resource for those looking to buy, sell, or invest in real estate. We will soon also be able to offer repair and development services for those looking to upgrade a current home, or build new.
What I’m most proud of is the heart and care my team has for their clients no matter how big or small. I don’t want to say too much yet, but I think people will have a hard time not noticing the Ratliff… brand soon.
How do you keep your team’s morale high?
As a business owner this can always be a challenge. I’d say when managing a team, to make sure you’re taking the time to check in with your employees and teammates, just like you would your clients. Everyone has ups and downs in life, so I find it helpful (as well as I’m lucky enough right now) to see how they’re doing in life, not just the business. Outside of that, finding what motivates them. Is it a trip? A nice dinner? Recognition? Time off? Every person is different and needs to recharge somehow. Finding out what that something is, is how you keep your team excited about work and about their future with the company.
Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?
I don’t let anyone come work for me without reading “How an Economy Grows and Why it Crashes?” by Peter Schiff. He’s one of my favorite economists and although he can be a doomsayer at times, this book significantly impacted my business by helping me understand how people make decisions individually as well as a collective. It provides simple insight into the complicated economic machine that is our world. There’s plenty of others I could mention, but this one sticks out as a staple in my life, business, and endeavors.
Contact Info:
- Website: Ratliffrealestate.com
- Instagram: therealeskateagent
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/therealeskateagent/
- Twitter: realeskateagent
Image Credits
– Radpine Collective – Tyre Granneman