Episode 163 Transcript: Christian Braun
On this episode of The Brad and Taylor Show, we sat down with Christian Braun from Re/MAX!
To watch the full episode, check it out on YouTube below. To listen, head over to Apple Podcasts. In the meantime, here’s a transcript of the conversation…
Here’s what you missed from Christian Braun…
00:00:00:10 –> 00:00:15:13
Brad: You’re listening to the Brad and Taylor Show, a podcast that inspires entrepreneurs to pursue their passions. We’re sitting down with some of the best to learn how they got started and some lessons they learned along the way.
Taylor: Hi, how’s it going?
00:00:16:05 –> 00:00:20:08
Christian: Good, yourself?
Taylor: We’re good. Doing good.
Christian: Thanks for having me on today. Really appreciate it.
00:00:21:15 –> 00:00:25:04
Brad: Awesome. Yeah, no problem. Well, let’s get started. Tell us a little bit about you. What do you do?
00:00:26:08 –> 00:00:39:23
Christian: ‘m a realtor with Remax Real Estate Professionals and over here in East Lansing and I have a team of agents. We have three agents and an office manager over here that works every day, every single day, helping people buy and sell.
00:00:40:02 –> 00:00:43:15
Brad: That’s awesome. So when you were younger, is this what you planned for the future?
00:00:45:28 –> 00:00:55:21
Christian: It’s actually a funny story. My mom likes to share this one, so I have to give her a shout-out on this one. Actually, when I was a little boy, I wanted to be a garbage truck.
00:00:57:23 –> 00:00:58:07
Taylor: A garbage truck, not the driver, the truck?
00:00:58:15 –> 00:01:31:15
Christian: Not a driver, the garbage truck itself, and I was actually tongue-tied. I had a little bit of a list. If you could only imagine how that would be pronounced, being a little two, three-year-old boy, they would always constantly go run to see the garbage truck every day over a colonial village. It was quite interesting but other than that realistic, I started a landscape company when I was about eight years old, snow blowing people’s driveways before I’d hit the elementary school bus. I went on the path of being a contractor for 20 some years.
00:01:32:13 –> 00:01:33:04
Brad: That’s awesome.
00:01:33:27 –> 00:01:36:12
Christian: Got a long, long story before I got into real estate.
00:01:37:12 –> 00:01:41:16
Brad: So where did you decide that, Hey, I’m going to do real estate. When did that happen?
00:01:43:21 –> 00:02:23:06
Christian: My company used to work for quite a few realtors that are very, very successful names currently right now, still in our association and definitely around the area. With my company, we would go in and help them fix up properties because it’s all about curb appeal and you know that you have eight seconds to get to that property. If the property doesn’t have that curb appeal, it’s no go, but it also dramatically affects the price of the property as well. So what we used to do is we’d have these agents call them like, Hey, Chris, we really need you to help us figure out how to get this property to sell. It’s not selling. We go, okay, well, how much money do you have or are you trying to get a return?
00:02:24:05 –> 00:03:11:05
For about 20 years, I was told to become an agent. I said, no, I never wanted to, had zero interest. I’m a guy that will sit there and get dirty down at a crawlspace work on tractors, equipment, whatever it needs to be. And then I sold my company about 10 years ago. The day that I see a couple of people, realtors that had found out that I had sold the company, they started showing up at my door and I said, Nope, not doing it absolutely will not. I was a project manager working on the pipeline, land restoration with legal tracks, and stuff like that on the road for about a year and a half. And boy, it was about five years ago getting into the winter. I was bidding on jobs for new work and stuff like that.
00:03:11:05 –> 00:04:04:14
I hit a couple of family members and friends and said, Hey, we need to buy a house. I was like, okay I’ll go get that license. It’s a piece of cake. I was going to do it just as a hobby. And then once people found out that I had my license, you know, my previous clients and stuff like that, I mean, within the first month I was working 60, 70 hours a week. I said I would never, ever, ever do it. I can’t say enough about what the industry has done for me and helped me, but it was also some of the previous background knowledge that I had that really helped me out in it. Understanding what it takes to sell a property or, you know, you’ve got a structural defect or, Hey, we got a little bit of water is coming in a basement. So like, okay, let’s take care of the gutters, downspouts. It’s probably going to solve the problem. I guess five years go by and here we are, I’m at the Brad and Taylor show talking with you guys.
00:04:04:29 –> 00:04:10:28
Brad: I like it. I like it. That’s great. I get asked the same thing all the time, too. When are you going to be an agent?
00:04:11:24 –> 00:04:12:17
Christian: Why don’t you get into it?
00:04:15:21 –> 00:04:37:14
Brad: I actually used to fly to the upper peninsula all the time for work just flying up there. And then I was like, ah, let’s just, how could a business survive? And then we ended up just starting. I was like, I like taking pictures of houses, so let’s do it. So we just went that route, but I get asked all the time, Hey, why don’t you be an agent? I understand that will completely, so maybe I better watch out. I ended up being the same thing.
00:04:38:22 –> 00:04:41:27
Christian: You know, you gotta fight it off for 20 years.
00:04:42:26 –> 00:04:45:03
Taylor: How many years do you have left? Brad? How many years have you been putting?
00:04:46:28 –> 00:04:47:22
Brad: Got 14 more.
00:04:49:04 –> 00:04:51:28
Christian: Okay. Well, Hey, you know, that’s better than the 20 years.
00:04:52:09 –> 00:04:55:21
Brad: Yeah. That’s funny.
00:04:56:08 –> 00:05:07:23
Taylor: I know your background, like you kind of mentioned, giving you knowledge going into what you do currently. Did you get any advice from anybody maybe who was already in the business of real estate that kind of just stuck with you throughout the years?
00:05:08:25 –> 00:06:02:23
Christian: I had one client that, well, we had multiple clients that we worked for, personally as is realtors. They asked one person and it might’ve not have been the right person. He goes, just work hard, Chris, you’ll get it. I’m like, wow, that was pretty solid advice. I was actually inside of our East Lansing office here over at Remax, everybody’s very willing to help. I did have a lot of contract background, stuff like that. There are purchase agreements and the contract stuff. It wasn’t terribly difficult to understand. It’s just all the fine print. I had some mentors over here that anytime I needed to ask any questions, Bob Pleasure, my broker was absolutely amazing, very supportive of everything. I remember giving my first purchase agreement over to Adrian Mount, who does a wonderful job with her team.
00:06:03:06 –> 00:07:03:07
I remember going into her office and I was like, hey Adrian, is there any way I might be able to buy you lunch just to quickly look over this purchase agreement. She looked over and she said, “Yep, looks good.” Getting into the industry, You really need some help with mentors and stuff like that to really be able to be successful because there’s a lot of things. If you don’t cross your T’s and dot your I’s on these purchase agreements could really affect the buyer or seller in either way costs a lot of money. So my biggest piece of advice is if you’re not on a team and you’re on your own, try to find a mentor, never hesitate to ask. There’s a lot of very phenomenal agents out there that really want to help other agents, because like I say, in any industry, there’s obviously competition but a lot of the competition actually wants to make you better because it makes it easier transaction for all parties.
00:07:03:26 –> 00:07:04:25
Brad: Yeah, for sure.
00:07:05:19 –> 00:07:19:10
Taylor: I know we kind of mentioned the market and how that’s transitioning before we started recording, can we touch back on that? What do you think is going to happen?
00:07:21:19 –> 00:08:19:21
Christian: Well, we definitely have some foreclosures coming that we haven’t seen in eight, over 18 months with the Memorial being removed for the tax foreclosures and the mortgage foreclosures. We’re starting to see them get to the share sale, which is the first step in a foreclosure where they’ve actually had the opportunity to buy it out for cash from third parties. So we’re starting to see those come, but they’re at a really high price as we predict just because of the inventory shortage, we’re still underneath, even though we’ve doubled inventory since March, April, May, or in part in June of last year or of this past year, we really started seeing them come in, and then there’s the forbearance that’s coming up in at the end of October. With that being said, if anybody’s in forbearance and just double-check, and even if you have clients that, you know, I always ask every single appointment now, did you miss any payments?
00:08:20:04 –> 00:09:21:26
Well, that was a standard now it’s did you miss any payments or did you take the forbearance and double-check with your bank? A lot of people don’t realize it was up to the banks to apply through the CDC to get that the poor parents put onto the back end of the loan, but if you did take it and you got to pay it back, get it refinanced. That way you don’t lose it because I’ve talked to so many people, they have, you know, a hundred thousand or even it doesn’t matter if you have 20,000 or 10,000 or $5,000 equity, you know, you don’t want to be in a situation, you may lose your house, but we’re going to see where a lot of them are really going to start coming through. I presume that it’s going to be somewhere in between, you know, really starting December, January, February of next year, and the prices will come down, and then it takes typically six months for mortgage foreclosure with the redemption period for the person to be able to buy the property back before you even go into the property and tax deeds there, as soon as that’s done, it’s done.
00:09:22:12 –> 00:10:46:08
But that takes three years, you know, for a tax deed to go through on a share sale. It’s inevitable. People always ask me, well, you know, the expensive homes, they’ll never go, getting into mortgage foreclosure and stuff like that. It doesn’t matter what the price of the property is. Everybody’s subject to it. It’s a scary thing. Everything that we’ve gone through over the past couple of years, it’s just like with any market, it’s got to go up and down and down a little bit. But the biggest factor is what the feds are going to do with the interest rates. We were expecting that the interest rates would start sneaking up right about now because the feds are lending out at 0%, which gets us into those 2.8 and depending on whether it’s a 30-year or 15-year mortgage, but if they start increasing those, typically the buyers will start backing out of the market then we really start gaining inventory. Hopefully, that won’t happen. I don’t presume that the interest rates are going to really start climbing until the middle of next year now, but you never know, it’s always still a good time to buy. You just have to be buying smart. There are still investments out there. You just have to watch MLS. You gotta be on top of it. You’ve got to talk. Find a deal because you worked really hard and diligently to find it.
00:10:46:16 –> 00:10:56:29
Taylor: I know speaking of those investment properties in the foreclosures, what is the worst property that you’ve been to over the years? I’m sure you’ve seen some, was there a property that sticks out?
00:10:58:06 –> 00:12:02:12
Christian: One was in a spot that I knew was, and I didn’t know if I was going to fall through the floor. I went down to the basement and I got halfway down, decided I’m not going down there just knowing the structural integrity of buildings. But probably the one that sticks out to me the most, cause I always look at if we’re supposed to add this, owner’s disclosures up online before the listing process and stuff like that. This one, it was a foreclosure about ready to, I think it was actually a short sale. I looked at the disclosures and it says, you know, no plumbing issues, no water in the basement. The exterior of the house, a little rough. I get it. No big deal. Went upstairs, broken windows. It’s not a huge deal, no plumbing issues let me put it this way. Walk down to the basement, turned to the right, there’s a full bath there, and there was a sewage explosion. It has been there for a minute. It was horrible.
00:12:02:12 –> 00:12:03:25
Taylor: That must have came with a smell.
00:12:04:23 –> 00:12:31:25
Christian: Oh yeah. I don’t know how they could have not known there were issues with plumbing. I mean, it was on the ceiling and everything and just about to gag. And I got a pretty strong stomach. Just being curious, I got to look around and then there were boxes of animal feces. And I was like, oh, I went home and immediately took a shower after that one. I won’t disclose the location or anything like that, but that was something we were not expecting.
00:12:33:05 –> 00:12:36:16
Taylor: Wow, what do you call those ones, Brad? The scratch and sniff homes?
Brad: Yeah, the scratch and sniff homes.
00:12:38:27 –> 00:13:00:26
Christian: Well, yeah, that’s what I always tell people. I was just like, pictures can look great. I mean, you guys always do an amazing job, but you guys also portray what the home actually looks like, which is an amazing thing with your guys’ company. I always tell people, you need to see it and you need to smell it. Scratch and sniff. There were no photos of the basement, for obvious reasons.
00:13:01:29 –> 00:13:18:03
Taylor: Of course. Yeah. If you could start over today with all the knowledge that you’ve gained over the years, what’s one thing that you would do differently? Would you start real estate earlier? I know that over the years you kind of had it in the back of your mind, would you go for it or would you keep it?
00:13:18:05 –> 00:13:59:22
Christian: I had it in the back of my mind, never to do it. Yeah, no. If I did, I always tell people this and it’s probably the honest truth. If I would go back and did anything, it probably would’ve been a school teacher for high school. I’ve said it a million million million times. And you know, when in high school, it’s realistically trying to train people to be financially smart. In my class, I always said is life in the real world. Nobody knows what a checkbook is anymore. I bring a checkbook and people are like, what are you doing with that? But it’s just realistically, it’s as far as investments and stuff like that, real estate is the biggest investment and the biggest purchase you’ll ever make.
00:13:59:24 –> 00:15:02:29
But if I were to have any advice to anybody that would be getting into real estate. That is number one, hands down, have six months in reserve and save every penny because you have good times and you have bad times. You have to plan ahead because what we see is a lot of agents, they’ll make the first couple of sales are like, oh my God, I got all this money. And it’s like, okay, you gotta save for taxes. And then what I always tell agents, it’s all about having a level. You have your highs and lows, highs and lows, and the biggest thing, and I teach this all the time is when you’re working, you got five, six deals or 10 deals or 15 deals going on, you’re working literally to the ends of your width, just truck forward. As soon as you get all through all those, you have a month that’s dead and then you start freaking out, and then you’re busy again. It’s all about level and time management but taking time for yourself as well, which I struggled with.
00:15:03:18 –> 00:15:15:20
Taylor: I know we talked about that before we started recording too, Taking time for yourself. If you’re not busy, then book a vacation.
00:15:15:20 –> 00:15:54:26
Christian: Book a vacation. Your phone is guaranteed to go off, that or even just say, Hey, I’m going to take this day off, and then you’ll get a call. And you’re like, Ugh. But at the end of the day, realistically, it’s feast or famine. I don’t see the market doing what we saw, realistically, a starting to 2006, 7, 8, 9, 10. But you know, the market over the next year, year and a half is, I think it’s going to change, which is really good for buyers and also a little bit for sellers, even though they’re not going to like it but I don’t think that the pricing is really gonna have a huge effect on it.
00:15:56:01 –> 00:16:04:04
Taylor: Yeah. Do you have any business books that you could recommend to anybody starting out or what’s your favorite book in general? If you don’t have a business one?
00:16:06:20 –> 00:16:57:12
Christian: I don’t read. I may be dead guys. I’m one of those guys who were on the history channel or watching documentaries for like investments and stuff like that. It’s just I wake up, out of bed, and in my truck within five minutes. That’s just the way I had been my entire life and just programmed myself that way, that the 12 hour day is absolutely nothing. What I do instead of reading is I am constantly talking to other entrepreneurs, other business owners, also employees of different companies, and stuff like that. Just trying to learn all the different facets of business and understanding other businesses because realistically real estate, is a business. You have to manage the money and stuff like that.
00:16:58:13 –> 00:17:03:12
Taylor: Awesome. Well, thanks for coming on and sharing your story with us today, before we go, how can people get ahold of you?
00:17:04:10 –> 00:18:08:18
Christian: You can reach me in numerous ways. My cell phone number is (517) 643-2600. Also, you can email me at any given point, it’s [email protected]. You can also go to the christianbraungroup.com and that’ll take you into being able to view any property that’s active in the MLS, whether it’s the west side of the state, which we do work over there. That’s Kristin Frickey. If you’re looking at properties over in Grand Haven, Muskegon, North Muskegon, and Holland, she’s can be reached at (231) 750-4884. So we don’t just serve the Lansing area, west side, we also go down into the Jackson area and have an agent done in that area too.
00:18:09:12 –> 00:18:11:17
Brad: Awesome. Well, thanks for coming on and sharing your story today.
00:18:12:05 –> 00:18:14:03
Christian: Yeah, not a problem. You guys have a wonderful day, okay?
00:18:17:14 –> 00:18:35:16
Hello. Hello. Are you there? Hey guys, we just wanted to thank you for listening on either a podcast or on the YouTube video here. If you guys wanted to subscribe, that would be awesome. That would mean a lot to us. If you guys could give us a five-star review as well, that would be amazing. And we’ll see you on the next one.
Check out Christian Braun:
christianbraun.remax-michigan.com
Facebook: @christian.braun.50951
If you loved this episode, subscribe so you never miss one. Want more Brad and Taylor content? Head over to our blog!