Supercharge Real Estate Success Using Credit

Aviva (00:00)
This week's listener of the week is Singing Praises CRE. Singing Praises CRE.

Thank you so much for leaving us a five star review. And for those of you listening, if you'll leave us a five star review below, you might be next week's listener of the week, week, week. This week on Commercial Real Estate Secrets, we have Brandon Elliott. Brandon is the CEO and boss. I always say CEO and founder, and I was trying to switch it up, of Credit Council Elite.

Brandon Elliott (00:34)
Okay.

Aviva (00:36)
Brandon, thank you for being on the show today.

Brandon Elliott (00:38)
What's going on? Thanks for having me, I appreciate it.

Aviva (00:41)
Hey, it's a beautiful Friday afternoon here in Denver. And I'm excited for the value that you're about to bring to the listeners. So Brandon, if you could tell the listeners who you are, what you do, you have an epic story. And yeah, I'm excited. Let's start there.

Brandon Elliott (01:04)
Yeah, of course. So I am actually in, I normally say sunny San Diego, California today. It's a little gloomy. It's, you know, it's the May gloom. But I've been out here for 12 plus years. I'm from New Jersey Originally, I grew up quote unquote American poor. So still very blessed. But I grew up with a single parent mother who was diagnosed manic depressive bipolar. I met my father when I was 18 years old in court so he could stop paying child support.

I got two sisters and we lived off of food stamps, help from local churches, schools, and about $1 ,000 a month off of Social Security. So at a young age, I realized I needed to work. I got my first job at age 12. I tried from nine trying to get my first job and I was doing odd things in the neighborhood, cutting grass, picking weeds, stuff like that. But...

But long and behold, I found myself getting addicted to marijuana. So this is where the story kinda comes into play. Just a high level view. Found myself getting addicted to marijuana. I used it for all the good times, bad times, everything in between. And in September 2013, I had an explosion in my apartment making hash oil. So I was literally on fire. I burnt 40 % of my body. I was induced into a coma for a week.

I had to learn how to walk again. I had court stuff over my head. And so two years later, fighting it in court, I got house arrest, probation for several years, and two felonies and a misdemeanor. So it wasn't the most sexiest thing, but that was what I needed to be able to, if I would have just got a slap on the wrist with my personality type, I wouldn't have changed. So I needed that correction.

Aviva (02:32)
Wow.

Brandon Elliott (02:58)
fiercely and literally to be on fire and have an explosion to change my life. But since then, it's been amazing because I found my purpose, I found my passion, and I was able to start utilizing real estate as like my baby, right? Real estate, I always say, has changed my life. Credit was the catalyst to do it. And so now we have 8 .5 million and well, actually,

Aviva (03:03)
Wow.

Brandon Elliott (03:24)
We just closed on a deal yesterday. So we have $10 million in real estate assets and we collect roughly about $48 ,000 a month, quote unquote passively. There's nothing passive about it, but it is a blessing. We have no money into any of our deals. We love doing the BRRRR strategy. We're in four different states, New Jersey, Ohio, Arizona, and California. And yeah, we've been teaching people within Credit Council Elite how to do exactly the same thing for...

Aviva (03:35)
haha

Brandon Elliott (03:53)
five, six, seven years now.

Aviva (03:55)
Can you explain to the listeners what the brrrr strategy is?

Brandon Elliott (04:00)
Yeah, of course. So the first strategy, it's B and then four Rs. The acronym basically just stands for a value add proposition to your real estate. So it's buy, renovate, rent, refinance, repeat. So the whole goal is kind of like a fix and flip, except instead of selling it for a one time profit, you're actually just taking it back to the bank with that new value and refinancing, getting all your money back and then paying off the credit cards.

that's what we use, right? Or private money loans or your own capital that you put into it, paying that off and then repeat the process. So you have a small mortgage on it, but it cash flows, brings in more than that per month.

Aviva (04:40)
You hear a lot about the BRRRR strategy and it's very intricate. So can you explain that's intricate? I think, you know, it is intricate. I should not downplay how intricate it is. But so explain to me credit and how credit comes into play here.

Brandon Elliott (05:02)
For me, how it came into play was I fell in love with real estate. I was actually I was doing door to door Kirby sales, like selling vacuum cleaners that were $3 ,500 door to door. I got good at it and I knocked on somebody's door and this was before my explosion that they recruited me into a real estate investment firm. And that was when there was a lot of notice of foreclosures, a lot of, you know, notice of defaults and ODs.

and a lot of pre -foreclosures, right? So I saw the systems in place within this office, the impact we were making and the money that was being generated. And I was just in awe. I was so wowed that I fell in love with real estate. I wanted nothing else but to do real estate after my explosion. And I acknowledged that was the path. I got a hell of a lot more motivation in that company, less education, but what I did...

was I went down this rabbit hole of all the books, podcasts just like this, YouTube, university, and I just soaked up as much as I could. I literally did four hours a day for two years to get that proper education that I needed to be able to implement into real estate. And I had no money at the time. I just exploded my apartment. I was the first time in my life in $11 ,000 worth of debt, and that scared the heck out of me. So what I did was work my butt off in two restaurants.

Aviva (06:13)
Wow.

Brandon Elliott (06:24)
like nonstop for two years paying that off as well as saved up thirty five thousand and I build up big credit lines to be able to jump into real estate. And that is how credit came into play for me.

Aviva (06:36)
Okay, so explain the utilization of credit cards because credit cards are a fascinating thing that can go very, very wrong if utilized improperly.

Brandon Elliott (06:50)
Yep. Yeah, it's a great question. So when it comes down to credit or really anything that you do in life, you want to be educated on it, right? Like you don't want to start playing with a saw if you don't know how to use it properly. Right. It could be dangerous. So the same thing with credit and financial literacy. Unfortunately, they're not teaching it in school. So if you want to figure out exactly what the rich do, which I encourage, you know, success leaves clues. And so I noticed that a lot of

high level, you know, people that are billionaires or even people that are making hundreds of millions per year, how they utilize finances and how they leverage credit. There's a big difference between good debt and bad debt. And once I acknowledged that, I was like, hey, I need to actually understand this at a deeper level and figure out how to implement it myself into my strategies. Because for real estate investors, a lot of us think about OPM, other people's money, and they think about

you know, raising capital. Well, I grew up poor. I didn't I didn't even that didn't even come across my mind of like, OK, who has money? First off, I didn't know it wasn't in my circle. And then second, it definitely wasn't getting it for my family. They didn't have it. And I didn't think anybody in their right mind would ever trust me. Some, you know, some misfit from New Jersey that just blew himself up. You know, I didn't think anybody would ever trust me with any money. And rightfully so.

So I figured if it was meant to be, it was up to me type of approach. And I had to figure out how to utilize this credit to be able to get credit cards, liquidate it in the cash, and then actually use it for real estate. But intelligently have it have backup plans. And I was very cheap for the longest time. So I was desperately looking for those 0 % interest, introductory's so that I could take advantage of it and not pay a premium.

Aviva (08:44)
Wow, okay, so the strategy is to get a 0 % APR credit card with a high, what's it called? A high limit. And so what do you do from there?

Brandon Elliott (08:58)
limits. Yep.

Yeah, it's a great question. So at Credit Council Elite, we teach business owners nationwide how to be able to get up to $500 ,000 in new capital. And in many cases, it's 0 % interest, as low as 0 % interest. This is two, three, four, or even $500 ,000. We've had people get $600 ,000. And you can do this every six months. The 0 % interest...

is anywhere from six months to 24 months. But on average, typically it's about 18 months. So every six months you can, you have the ability to go out there and get more funding. But, you know, these are opportunities that you get this new capital, 0 % interest, and then you can put it to work in your own business, grow, scale, or diversify. We're doing a fix and flip right now. Like a couple houses down the street, I was just visiting. And it's gonna take 90 days to be able to complete.

Aviva (09:56)
That's nice.

Brandon Elliott (09:58)
You know, within 90 days, if I have a 0 % interest credit card similar to these that I could actually just liquidate and I have 0 % interest for 18 months, that gives me a lot of time with a lot of backup plans that I can knock out in that 90 days to remodel, get great return and then do it again.

Aviva (10:20)
How do you mitigate your risk when doing this?

Brandon Elliott (10:24)
Yeah. So I don't look at it as a risk. When you get properly educated on the actual difference between good debt and bad debt, I rather borrow from myself, from the banks, from my credit versus borrowing from grandma or raising hard money, like good money from people that work their butt off for it. You know, that to me, that sounds risky.

Aviva (10:40)
Mm.

Brandon Elliott (10:49)
But again, people do it all the time and I do it as well. As a real estate investor, it's very common to raise capital. I've raised millions. It comes down to looking at the deal itself and having backup plans. I only go after real estate deals that I'm, it would be a very, it would be catastrophic if something happened that I didn't make a quarter million off of it. So this deal in particular,

a lot of upside will probably make at least half a million off of it. Our last one that we did, we netted $475 ,000. So I don't do this all the time. I pick, I cherry pick one or two of these deals throughout the year that are going to be just a home run.

Aviva (11:31)
Yeah, I think in real estate, people think finding that deal is easy. I don't think people realize how much work and effort it takes to find that killer deal. You're probably underwriting dozens, if not more, hundreds of properties to find the deal that pencils properly for your strategy.

Brandon Elliott (11:59)
So for me personally, I would say yes and no. Me, I'm a very favorite, like I acknowledge I have a lot of blessings in my life. I don't want to discount that. I worked hard to get to where I'm at, but I also understand I do have a lot of favor in my life. Where I live in California, I don't think making a half a million dollars on a deal would necessarily work in some other parts of the country. I then again, I do pay higher taxes over here.

I have a crazy political stuff over here. We have some other wild things going on. So, you know, pros and cons. But within this area that I live, I do have the opportunity that if I can get a off -market deal, and it really just comes down to my brand. Like, the deals that I get, it kinda, like, people brought them to me because they know what I do. I've built up my personal brand. And so people are sending me opportunities regularly.

And then I just cherry pick. Like this was an off -market deal. Same thing with the one previously. I know what it takes to close a deal and get the seller on my side.

Aviva (13:06)
Yeah.

So how did you build your personal brand up?

Brandon Elliott (13:13)
Yeah, I think consistency is really the name of the game. On social media, it's one of those things like I'm not a huge fan of social media at all. But then again, it's a love hate relationship because I get a lot of money from social media. I get the exposure needed to be impactful and I get a lot of fulfillment by having that opportunity to bless other people with the knowledge that I have now. But what I would say is there's a lot of nasty stuff on social media. There's a lot of hate. You know, everybody's shouting out scam or.

not getting therapy like they need and they jump on social media and do it there. But what it has taken is really just being like showing up, being consistent and doing it regularly. People will naturally give you respect. And then if you can get in front of a million people at which we pay ads, you know, I pay $50 ,000 a month on ads and so forth. I speak on stages. We have a book podcast ourselves, things like that.

Aviva (13:47)
That's fair.

Brandon Elliott (14:12)
Over time, I've been doing this for 10 plus years, but over time it adds value. And when you get in front of a million people, for example, say 100 ,000 of that million actually likes you, you get a million to know you, 100 ,000 that like you, then you get 10 ,000 out of that that actually trust you. Now you got 10 ,000 people that are willing to pay you money for whatever your services are.

And so that know, like, and trust factor, it really does. People give it to you over time. People are naturally just going to like you or not. And that's just what it is. But you got to give them that opportunity by showing up, being consistent, and doing the things that most other people will make excuses for.

Aviva (14:57)
Yeah, I like to draw a parallel between creating a brand and real estate in that they're both long games. And it's that consistency over a long period of time is when you can extract the most value in both real estate and in, but this isn't rocket science. That's literally how to build a business.

How to become successful, how to build wealth. It's the same play, just a different field.

Brandon Elliott (15:34)
Yeah. And so many of us, unfortunately, we get spoiled or like we have that millennial mentality and it's like we want something yesterday or we're looking on social media and we see somebody just made all this success. It's like as if it's overnight. If you are just starting to follow me today, trust me, it might look like an overnight success, which looks cool. But I've been doing this for a very long time and there was nothing easy about it. And it's.

you know, yesterday was a bad day or, you know, whatever it may be, for example, it's like there's, it's a hell of a roller coaster being, you know, your own boss and building up something that, that does leave a legacy.

Aviva (16:17)
Hey, risk and reward. And I wouldn't trade up. I wouldn't trade a minute. I love it. So tell me about Credit Council Elite, what it is, what it looks like. Yeah, and then some.

Brandon Elliott (16:19)
That's right. Trade it for anything.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah, the best thing that I could explain is it's really the financial literacy that our school system should have been teaching for a very long time. We teach basically how the banks and lenders are judging you so you know how to play the game. At the end of the day, we are literally teaching business owners nationwide how to be able to flip the script on the banks and get massive amounts of funding, two, three, four, even five hundred thousand dollars every six months at within 30 to 90 days. You can implement these strategies.

And so we want to get people the 90 % approval odds and actually the highest limits with the best terms and conditions possible.

Aviva (17:14)
I could talk all day about how ridiculous it is that the school systems don't teach financial literacy, but I would bore everybody because we all know it's, we all know.

Brandon Elliott (17:25)
We all know. It's a broken system. And so it takes somebody to step up and actually put that stuff into place. And so I'm very blessed. Like I look at flipping the script on the banks just like this. At the end of the day, we, us, we give all of our money to the banks, right? We have all of our money there, unless you're selling drugs or something and it's underneath the mattress. But you know, we have it all in the banks. They give us point.

Aviva (17:29)
It's, yeah.

Brandon Elliott (17:52)
zero, zero percent back, literally nothing basically. And then they put it to work nine times over and they're averaging anywhere from five hundred to three thousand percent. This is what people don't realize. And because they're lending it out back to us and other individuals on, you know, personal loans, auto loans, mortgages, credit cards, you know, they get a huge ROI off of this stuff. And so I look at it is it's time to flip the script on the banks. Let's get the OPM.

other people's money from the banks at 0 % interest for 18 -24 months. And let's put it to work and make those infinite returns just like they do.

Aviva (18:32)
It's like the banks take advantage of us. You can educate yourself and work the system in the same way that they just work society. That's interesting.

Brandon Elliott (18:46)
They've already given us the roadmap. It's what they do. They've already given us the roadmap. We just need to acknowledge that that is the roadmap. And then how do we flip the script? How do we start taking small little chunks of that and doing it to ourselves and giving us the alley -oop? And so this has allowed me to start and scale multiple businesses and to be able to really make the impact that I have, but also get the financial freedom.

Aviva (18:52)
Wow.

Brandon Elliott (19:16)
that I've always desired and then be able to buy homes for my family members and like really start setting up ourselves for generational wealth.

Aviva (19:25)
Hey,

You don't have to sell me on it. The adversity you had is clearly the key to your success. I just love hearing different success stories from people all over the country and the world because I think this world is abundant and unlocking literally the door to real estate.

is very, very, very impactful and very powerful when it comes to creating legacy, like you said, generational wealth and financial freedom. So Brandon, before we let you tell the viewers where they can find you and Credit Council Elite online, what makes you happy about what you do day to day in real estate?

Brandon Elliott (20:20)
that's easy. I think it's more in the for real estate. I think as a as a guy in general, I don't know, maybe women as well. But I think it feels really good to take something nasty like a beat up property and then make it brand new and just make it like, you know, bring some sexy back to it and then have everybody, you know, fighting to live there or wanting to own it as well. Right. That feels good to transform things.

As far as Credit Council Elite goes, I get so, so, so fulfilled by seeing some of my members that are in Credit Council Elite get better results than myself and within a heck of a lot shorter timeframe than I could have ever imagined. And so just by taking the advice and the guidance that I'm giving them, because I've already been there and done it. And so we've worked our butts off to come up with the 40.

five plus moving pieces on how the banks and lenders are judging you. And when you implement these strategies, you can get the 90 % approval odds with the best terms and conditions. And that is, it's really fulfilling, even more than like helping myself, which I know that sounds crazy because I used to be very selfish of like, I need to make myself successful first. Once I started giving and helping out more people, I did it parallel. And it just feels better to like,

Aviva (21:38)
Yeah.

Brandon Elliott (21:41)
see somebody else and the transformation that it takes not just in their life, but their family, their circle. It's awesome.

Aviva (21:47)
The more you give, the more you get.

Brandon Elliott (21:49)
Love it. So good.

Aviva (21:52)
So Brandon, where can the listeners find you, follow you, and then some?

Brandon Elliott (21:58)
Yeah, I appreciate it. So check us out on Instagram. It's Brandon Elliott Investments or even just go to our page on Instagram. It's Credit Council Elite. And then if you want to get a hold of me, I do encourage you to like if you want just a little better understanding of what the heck I'm talking about here with Credit Council Elite, check out our website. It's www .creditcouncilelite .com. That's creditcouncilelite .com. You can go to that. There's a quick 10 minute video on there that explains more about what the heck we do.

and how it could potentially bless you. Afterwards, you'll have way better questions to ask and you can jump on a one -on -one call with either myself or somebody on our team to go over your particular situation, where you're looking to go, and if it's a good fit on how to get there. If it's not, then we will just gift you 10 banks that we use to be able to get up to 50 ,000 from each one.

Aviva (22:54)
Brandon, thank you so much for sharing your experience and your knowledge with the listeners and for everybody listening. We'll see you next week.

Brandon Elliott (23:03)
Thanks so much. God bless.