Rafael has been wholesaling for over a decade and he now owns several companies, including a wholesaling and consulting company. Born and raised in Yuma, AZ, Rafael is a second-generation entrepreneur. He began his career in corporate before transitioning to entrepreneurship. Rafael saw an opportunity and began working on his first entrepreneurial project, a non-emergency medical transportation business, at age 21 but later sold the company and dove into real estate. He is currently an organizational psychologist and real estate professional holding ownership in multiple companies in various verticals, whose base of operations is in Phoenix, AZ.

We begin the episode with Rafael sharing his background story and how he started his journey in real estate. He shares that he started as a firefighter before getting to the business space. Rafael's first business was a medical transportation company that he sold a few years later. He also invested in industrial psychology to become a better entrepreneur before diving into real estate, which has been rewarding in his journey. He owns multiple companies, including a consulting company, a wholesale company where they do flips, and a real estate brokerage firm. He is an organizational psychologist and does business coaching and consulting to help people build profitable businesses and scale to the next level of growth. 

We then talk about Rafael’s first company and what inspired him to sell it. Rafael shares that he went through a lot in his 20s trying to figure out how to build a company. Rafael was so much in the hustle stage that he didn’t have the brain bandwidth to think of his business five or ten years down the road. His company was expanding, and he was more focused on how to make payrolls, hire people, buy vehicles, and how to scale. When Rafael realized that he was suffering from burnout and that what he was doing was not enjoyable, the thought of selling the company seemed ideal. He started planning his exit strategy by running the business in a way it could eventually sell. 

Next, we talk about how you can build systems and processes to help you create wealth and time freedom in your business. According to Rafael, as entrepreneurs, we have the ability to empower, and we can assign the right people within our team to offer value in things that we're not interested in becoming experts. In his company, Rafael has three managers, a lead manager, acquisition manager, and disposition manager, and each has their own team. They keep everything on track through different checks and measures to keep the level of accountability and performance high.  Rafael shares that as an entrepreneur seeing the result of an empowered team is very satisfying.

We then talk about systems that Rafael has found to be most valuable and holds as the reason for his success. He shares that understanding the stages of deals and being able to create a systematic approach is what has helped him stay ahead. According to him, psychologically, we are not wired to think linearly but developing the ability to put things together in a linear fashion is a game-changer. When this hit him, he changed the way he ran his business into six stages: outsourcing, converting, acquisition, disposition, measuring, and improvement sessions. This strategy has helped him level up in delegation, hiring, accountability, and finding the bottleneck for the business.  

Lastly, we discuss the wholesale market and why it’s easy to find deals. Rafael shares that he is in the most competitive market in Phoenix and they still get an average of twelve deals a month. The deals are out there, and you can get them in any market. It’s all about taking action and giving it enough time to work. Raphael says that real estate is not a get-rich-quick scheme. 

Make sure you don’t miss another fantastic episode of the Just Start Real Estate Podcast with Rafael Cortez and get valuable information on how you can create wealth and time freedom through systems and processes in your business!

“We have to build systems in our businesses to get to a point where it’s delegatable. We can’t hustle forever.”

“As entrepreneurs, we have the ability to empower, and we can empower the right people within our team to offer value in things that we're not interested in becoming experts.”

“Investing in real estate is all about taking action and giving it enough time to work. It is not a get-rich-quick scheme.“

“You can invest in any market. Stop using the market as an excuse.”

“Wholesaling can be passive just like any other form of investing if you build your team.”

REI Wholesaling

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