Creating Our Own Narrative: Suzanne and Sarah’s Real Estate Investing Podcast

Real estate investing can create wealth—but it also introduces additional liability and risk.

In this episode of The Real Deal Podcast, Sarah and Suzanne explore one of the less glamorous but incredibly important parts of building a real estate portfolio: protecting the assets you've worked so hard to acquire.

As investors acquire more properties, questions around liability protection, ownership structure, estate planning, and risk management become increasingly important.

Sarah and Suzanne discuss how investors often start by creating an LLC through their state's business registry and obtaining an EIN. But they emphasize that simply forming an LLC doesn't automatically mean your assets are properly protected. The operating agreement, ownership structure, and actual placement of assets can all matter.

Home sales have reportedly dropped to their lowest level in nearly two years—but does that mean the housing market is crashing?

In this episode of The Real Deal Podcast, Sarah Willis and Suzanne Moore break down the latest national real estate headlines and compare them to what they're actually seeing on the ground in Bend and Central Oregon.

While some markets, including parts of Texas and Seattle, are experiencing more significant declines, Central Oregon is telling a different story. Buyers are taking longer to make decisions, homes are spending more time on the market, and sellers may be more open to negotiation. That means there are opportunities for buyers who are ready to act strategically.

Sarah and Suzanne share a recent example of helping a buyer negotiate close to $100,000 below asking on a $1.1 million property through a combination of price and credits—with no counteroffer.

But here's the interesting part: while some properties are sitting, the right home can still attract multiple offers, cash buyers, and aggressive competition.

Buying an investment property is only the beginning.

The real work starts after closing—collecting rent, tracking expenses, managing bank accounts, screening tenants, preparing for taxes, and keeping accurate financial records.

In this episode, Suzanne and Sarah discuss why operational systems are just as important as finding great investment deals. They share the lessons they've learned managing their own rental portfolios and explain how simplifying backend operations can help landlords scale with confidence.

Many investors have retirement accounts sitting in traditional investment funds without realizing they may be able to use those dollars to purchase real estate, fund private loans, or diversify outside of Wall Street.

In this episode, Suzanne and Sarah preview their upcoming investor meetup with Amanda Holbrook, an expert in self-directed retirement accounts. They discuss how self-directed IRAs and self-directed 401(k)s can provide investors with additional funding sources for investment properties and private lending opportunities.

In Episode 32 of The Real Deal Podcast, Suzanne Moore and Sarah Willis explore one of the hottest topics in real estate investing today: Can AI replace your property manager? After hosting a live investor meetup featuring property management expert Colby Knickerbocker of Legacy Property Management, they share their biggest takeaways on how artificial intelligence is transforming property management.

While the answer isn't a simple yes or no, the discussion reveals how AI is already helping property managers automate repetitive tasks, improve communication, streamline maintenance requests, analyze investment portfolios, and make smarter data-driven decisions.

Suzanne and Sarah discuss how AI can handle maintenance reminders, tenant communication triage, rental pricing analysis, portfolio optimization, and operational workflows—allowing property managers to focus on what matters most: relationships, service, and strategic decision-making.

If you're a real estate investor, landlord, property manager, or someone curious about the future of AI in real estate, this episode offers practical insights into where technology is heading and how investors can use it to save time, reduce costs, and improve returns.

In Episode 31 of The Real Deal Podcast, Suzanne Moore and Sarah Willis pull back the curtain on real estate transactions and the honest conversations they have with clients behind the scenes.

This episode dives into why the best real estate advice isn’t always about buying or selling—it’s about helping people make the smartest decision for their long-term goals. Suzanne shares stories of clients who initially wanted to sell their homes, only to discover alternative strategies like renting, using a HELOC, or leveraging low-interest-rate mortgages to build wealth instead of giving up valuable assets.

Sarah and Suzanne also discuss the importance of working with trusted lending professionals, sharing a candid story about a buyer who switched lenders mid-transaction and quickly realized the difference between creative, relationship-based lending and traditional banking systems.

The episode also highlights:

In Episode 30 of The Real Deal Podcast, Suzanne Moore and Sarah Willis share the exciting next chapter of their real estate journey: expanding their team and transitioning to a brokerage platform that aligns with their long-term vision of freedom, collaboration, and sustainable growth.

The duo opens up about why they intentionally moved brokerages, how they evolved from casually mentoring agents into building a fully integrated real estate team, and what makes their approach different from the traditional “hustle until burnout” model common in the industry.

They discuss the systems, marketing strategies, mentorship structure, and support tools they’ve built to help agents create true businesses—not just jobs. From CRM systems and transaction coordination to branding support and lead generation, Suzanne and Sarah explain how they’re helping agents create predictable income while still maintaining personal boundaries, weekends, vacations, and quality of life.

In this episode of The Real Deal Podcast, Sarah Willis and Suzanne Moore break down a powerful mortgage strategy that challenges everything most people believe about home loans.

After hosting a recent investor meetup, they’re sharing how using a HELOC-based system instead of a traditional mortgage could help homeowners:

✔ Pay off debt faster

This isn’t about making extra payments.

You’ll learn:

In this episode of The Real Deal Podcast, Sarah Willis and Suzanne Moore—investor-minded real estate agents based in Central Oregon—introduce the creative real estate strategy known as lease options, also called rent-to-own agreements.

They preview their upcoming March 19 investor meetup (12–1 PM PT) featuring lease-option expert Andrew Schlag, founder of Truca RE, who will teach investors how to sell properties using this creative financing strategy.

Sarah and Suzanne explain how lease options work: a tenant-buyer pays a negotiable, typically non-refundable option deposit for the right to purchase a property at a pre-negotiated price in the future. During the lease period, the tenant pays rent and often assumes responsibility for maintenance, repairs, and insurance.

Meetup Event Link: https://www.meetup.com/bend-real-estate-investing-meetup/events/313561120/?eventOrigin=group_events_list

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Infinite Banking for Real Estate Investors: How Whole Life Policies Can Fund Deals and Build Long-Term Wealth

In this episode of The Real Deal Podcast, Suzanne and Sarah explain the investing strategy known as Infinite Banking and how properly structured whole life insurance policies can be used as a funding tool for real estate deals.

If you’ve heard investors talk about “borrowing from yourself,” uninterrupted compounding, or using policies to fund down payments, this episode breaks down how the strategy actually works in practice — and when it makes sense.

Inside this episode:

✔ How Infinite Banking works step-by-step

This episode is designed for education — to help you understand another potential financial tool for long-term investing.