Brett: 

Excellent. Yeah, no, that's all makes sense. So lumber is expensive to build. It's also hard to find a good tradesman. And we're actually building right. Interest rates are low, and people want some more space, the home office, I couldn't agree with you more, we're seeing the same thing here in California. And lots of challenges with housing. And so yeah, 53 offers and is pretty wild, and it's kind of unheard of, but it's happening and prices are through the roof. That being said, what's the one thing to help you, your buyer stand out if you're trying to win a deal?

Dante:

Yeah, so you know, being aggressive with everyone else. So things I tell him is you have to remove all contingencies, or the most of my contingencies, the more contingencies you have the farther down the list, you're gonna go home inspections, not existing radon reports, not existing contingent upon home sale nonexistent, you can't have those, you got to be aggressive with pricing, even your deposit. So that means you know, that deposit you have whatever that is, it has to be large, you know, usually, we take $2,000 deposits on a residential home. Now we're pushing up to $10,000 to $20,000 telling those clients as well to make it non-refundable on day one, meaning if they back out day two, that money does not come back to them that the seller is going to keep that money, but we have to be aggressive, quick-close, fast-close, take care of some of the sellers closing costs, so to speak. And then obviously a big one price got to be super aggressive on price right now. So you know, where how the home is for 185. You know, we're going up to as high as 230,000, which is insane. I don't know how these appraisals are hitting, but they are. But these people want these homes, and I just tell them, Listen, the price you're paying for these homes right now you need to plan on staying for them, you know, in them for 3, 10, you know, 15 years, you have to stay in at least three years because the column and call me in less than three years and asked me to sell that home, you're gonna take a loss. So I'm also telling them they need to plan on staying in the home for a while, or else they're gonna have negative equity or a short sell.

Brett:

Yeah, I think that's the very summary, well said. What's the biggest challenge facing real estate agents right now?

Dante:

It’s finding a deal. So you know, my father, he's a real estate agent and my brokerage as well. And we were talking about it yesterday that we feel as if a lot of agents are going to leave the market fairly soon. And the reason being, you know, a lot of them are weekend warriors. There are some agents that just practice on the weekend or after five o'clock because they already have a job. And you know, before, they're thinking, “I wrote one offer, and I got a $5,000 commission, bonus, bonus…” you know, but now they're thinking, “I'm taking up all my time. I'm not working all my evening, all my weekends, showing these houses, writing up offers, and I'm not getting anything accepted.” So I think that the biggest challenge right now is just finding inventory for clients. You know, if their inventory was out there, I'd have, you know, probably 25 more sales at this point in the year than I would usually.

Brett:

Yeah, inventory. Absolutely. So not having listings or not controlling inventory. And then just you know, everyone has buyers and cash, right, the key would be is controlling the inventory. So what are the biggest opportunities that you see in the future for real estate agents?

Dante:

I think as far as opportunities go, once a lot of those agents move out, that frees up a lot more deals for the agents that do this full time or take it seriously and use it every day. So as a lot of those agents progress out, you know, let's say those agents are doing three to four deals a year and there's 1000 of them, do the math, that's three to 4000 deals that open up in this particular market each year. you distribute that through the top 200, 300 agents, you're talking more deal flow for them. So there's an opportunity there if some of these part-time agents do plan on moving out.

Brett:

Excellent. So now let's shift gears a little bit. Let's talk about capital gains tax, you've been able to do some 1031 exchanges, right? You're familiar with those. But what's the biggest frustration, Dante, for yourself or for your clients when it comes to capital gains tax deferral and or the 1031 exchange?

Dante:

Yeah, so it's kind of funny. I was just emailing one of my buddies. We're looking for a little bit more capital for a deal we're coming up with and he said, you know, I've got someone that has, would have said got it right here. I can just pull it up. And he was saying, you know, a great guy to attend 1031 exchange, he has to name assets within 10 days. So he's kind of coming down to that position where I believe if I don't try to memorize the dates because they're all over the place, but I believe it's 45 days, you have to identify a property through the 1031 exchange. And this gentleman only has 10 days left. It's a very competitive market right now, it's very hard to find those deals. And once you identify him, you typically have to close on a three or four, whatever the number is. So that's difficult. And then another one is, you know, we're looking at an 18 unit up in this market actually to purchase on our acquisition. And then you know, the seller keeps saying it's contingent upon me finding a 1031 exchange for a condo in Florida. It's contingent upon he keeps saying it. And you know, it makes us a little bit nervous. We put in all this money, we put in all this effort and due diligence and inspection reports and moving forward on this asset just for it’s possibly not happened, you know, 30-40 days down the road if this gentleman can't find a 1031 exchange to defer those taxes.

Brett:

Yeah, exactly. Call it the shotgun wedding, right? You can get engaged for 45 days, and you have to get married within 180 and too often overpay for properties and or they don't list properties, because the exact reasons say, “Hey, Dante, I'd love to sell my property, but I need to have my exchange lined up or love to sell my property, but go finding that, that perfect deal to move into” and then you got the listing, right. That becomes one of the biggest challenges for real estate agents because guess what, there's next to no inventory. And or even if we found you that perfect deal, guess what the seller doesn't want to wait around for you to sell your property.

Dante:

On sale or something.

Brett:

So it's like it doesn't ever really work right. So especially in a seller's hot market like this, now we have a solution for that, by the way, I learned is that Marcus and Millichap in the hard way back in ‘06, things are going great, things where you know, think it was 1031. And giving high fives, the market crashed. And people went from, you know, feeling good about buying properties to like, oh, no, I shouldn't have taken on so much debt, I certainly have overpaid in that 1031 exchange. And in fact, you can now use something called a deferred sales trust, which is an alternative to a 1031 exchange that can save a sale 1031 exchange, we just got a deal out of Georgia actually was a 128 unit apartment complex. And that particular cell seller was passing 45 days and had not identified had already identified deals weren't making sense. And so he used the deferred sales trust and not a Delaware not a traditional DST, it's actually a deferred sales trust to save a sale 1031 exchange. And by the way that you might want to bring that up to that seller who's going to be in that place. And because oftentimes, if you can provide an alternative, they'll sell the day, knowing that they can defer the tax so you can go to capitalgainstaxsolutions.com for those who are listening to learn more about that. So the next question is this. What are some potential questions clients should be asking you Dante, but then they maybe sometimes forget to ask?

Dante:

Are you referring to the sales or the investment section?

Brett:

Both? Okay.

Dante:

I'm sorry. repeat that question. One more time.

Brett:

Yeah, maybe questions that clients sometimes don't ask you. But they should be asking you.

Dante:

Yeah, I mean, there's, there's a whole pool of them. I mean, on the sales side, you know, they should be asking about timelines, they really don't understand the timelines as much they kind of just think it's gonna happen quickly. And I still, even if they don't ask a question, I always mentioned it to him, I always talking about them with timelines of where the sale is, in New York State, it takes a little bit longer, it's 45 to 60 days to close on a transaction here. It's one of the longer states and some people don't understand that. So that's something I have to kind of work through with them and to give them basically that the path of the sale, what's going to happen and what steps and people don't know what they don't know, you know, you don't know what questions to ask if you really aren't thinking.

Brett:

It’s fair, because they may have sold the property in 10 years or 5 years or ever. Right? So first time.

Dante:

Exactly.

Brett:

They're excited. And they're seeing the markets and they're thinking if my neighbor's houses are selling so fast, and they don't realize all the work that's going maybe into that to get to that point, but right, so it's understandable for clients to feel that way at times. That being said, you ready for the lightning round?

Dante:

Yeah, let's do it.

Brett:

Alright. Knowing what you know now if you go back to your 25-year-old self, what's the one Golden Nugget you'd make sure to tell yourself to do?

Dante:

I'm 23. So I'm going to push that back to 18. There's something I could have done earlier. It was really just get started earlier. I started at about 21. I would have got started a few years earlier, and I would have jumped into commercial real estate a little bit quicker.

Brett:

Awesome. Love it. What's the one book you've recommended or gifted the most in the past year?

Dante:

Probably the Hands-off Investor by Brian Burke. It's a phenomenal book. I've read it twice. I really enjoy it. Another one I'm gonna kind of throw in there as a bonus is The Go-Giver. I forget who wrote it. But that was gifted to me and I have recommended it to many people. It's more of a mindset book that told me a story rather than just like an investment book or you know, a sales book so to speak.

Brett:

Love it. By the way Brian Burke of Praxis Capital, they're one of our strategic alliances and they're phenomenal. Brian Burke is one of the smartest guys in commercial real estate I've ever met. Yes, Hands-off Investor and then The Go-Giver is just an amazing book. You can read that over and over and over again. It's such a great reminder to serve and give first with no strings attached and things do work great when you do that. So favorite leadership quote or theme that you strive to live by Dante?

Dante:

Oh, geez. Put me on the spot on that when I might not even have an answer for it. Quote or theme, I mean, you honestly said it, you know, giving back without expecting anything back and that's so true, just adding value like every day, I have probably a dozen phone calls scheduled with potential clients or people looking to reach out to sell their home or learn how to invest and it's really just filling them with knowledge and adding value to them and not looking for anything in return.

Brett:

Love it. What are you curious about right now?

Dante:

I'm curious how these people are buying these deals that they're buying at the moment. I'm curious how they're making the numbers work and how people are able to do ground-up development right now where prices where they're at and make the numbers work. Very curious if someone knows, let me know.

Brett:

By the way, we're talking with Dante Belmonte, which is kind of a really cool name by the way you're even talking about that. Yeah, we will in a minute. Victorycapgroup.com, you can learn about him. He is a real estate professional broker in the upstate New York, Syracuse area, check them out at victorycapgroup.com. So Dante Belmonte, growing up, tell me the coolest things that your friends would either tease you or what's your Twitter name because it is a cool name.

Dante:

Yeah, so I always get that and I've actually had people call me out of the blue and was like, I saw you online. I liked your name. I want to work with you. And that's actually benefited me but like, kids, you know, kids in school, they'd make jokes. They'd be like, Dante Del Monte, Del Russo toys, Rodriguez guys like they just make this really random name. And I just rolled at it. It was hilarious.

Brett:

It's hilarious. I love that. Yeah. So my last name is Swarts. Right? And so random people, they'd see a Swarts and they see the movie called Spaceballs. They go, “May the Swarts be with you?” Like people will just don't say this to me and, and some other things too, but it's really a pretty, pretty cool to have a cool last name that people can get a kick out of.

Dante:

Just like a movie star, but I ended up in the real estate, but I'll take it.

Brett:

Yeah, absolutely. I'm thinking of Zorro you don't I mean, seems like that would have been a name and men would be like that. One more question: After your 23 years of life, helping people with real estate learning so much, launching your podcast doing the stuff that you do for your clients, how do you stay centered Dante, and your values? And how do you stay encouraged to reach for new heights?

Dante:

Oh, so it's really just, I am the end goal is what I'd say. And Ryan Serhant says in one of his books is, “Balls in the air... balls in the air.” The more balls you have near, the more opportunity you have at catching someone so it's having those opportunities out there. You always want to have opportunities to float so you can capture one if you need it and have some backup on to it.

Brett:

Excellent. So, balls in the air, get multiple opportunities, diversify your income streams, investment properties and get multiple listings or buying opportunities. Yes, I love it. I love it. That being said, Dante, for our listeners who want to learn more about you. Remind them one more time where they can find you.

Dante:

Yes, they can head over to our website at victorycapgroup.com or my personal website dantebelmonte.com. I'm all over Facebook, Instagram @dantebelmonte. I'm the only one out there that I know of.

Brett:

Yeah, excellent. And I want to thank you for being on the show, Dante. Thank you for sharing a part of your story. I want to encourage you to keep being outgoing and quote coaching others, to help others achieve their real estate investment needs and goals. And I also want to thank our listeners for listening to another episode of the Expert CRE secrets Podcast, where we believe most commercial real estate brokers, agents, and luxury agents, they struggle with clarifying their passive income options, not having a clear plan, and considering the eXp commercial model and purchasing investment real estate is the best way for you to grow your business. If you want to hear more about how the eXp commercial model is hands down the best way to grow your real estate, business, and wealth, you can go to expertcresecrets.com. That's expertcresecrets.com and by the way, if you want to learn more about deferred sales trust and how it can help your clients save a failed 1031 exchange. You've got capitalgainstaxsolutions.com. That's capitalgainstaxsolutions.com. Please rate, review, and Subscribe. Check out our YouTube channel. By the way, we're doing this on a video as well for those who are listening on iTunes, so you can check out me and Dante on YouTube right now. Thanks so much for listening. Have a great day, everybody.