Lessons Learned on Taking Over and Growing an Established Real Estate Company with Adam Whitney

I am thrilled to welcome my friend Adam Whitney to the podcast today! Adam is a co-owner and the CEO of Blackjack Real Estate and has served in the Marine Corps since 2004 and remains on active duty. He is a specialist in managing teams and possesses accountability traits learned in the military which are absolutely pivotal to being a successful entrepreneur. Adam utilizes laser-focused marketing techniques in order to achieve his current level of success.

We begin the episode with Adam sharing his background story and how he ended up in real estate. He shares that he has served 17 years in active duty in the Marine Corps. He started investing in real estate in 2017 in rental properties but later got into a partnership in private welding. Adam realized he needed to develop the very important skills of marketing and sales in order to grow his business. By following flipping communities he ended up learning a ton in sales, finding marketing deals, and ultimately ended up as the CEO for Blackjack Real Estate.

We then talk about how Bill Allen approached Adam when he wanted to pitch him the idea of buying Blackjack. He shares that it was less divine interaction than people usually think. He was on a podcast and a trip with Bill and that is where they started building their friendship. Adam was just working hard, trying to be a good person, and executing a game plan that the flipping group gave him. However, after the trip, Bill offered him an opportunity to be the majority owner of the company. Adam was shocked, but he was up for the task, and he knew he could help build and grow the company.

Next, we talk about Adam’s transition and what surprised him when he took the wheel. Adam shares that there were some assumptions that he made that were not true. One of the amazing things was that the company was without leadership or strategic guidance, but it was functioning well. According to Adam, when you take over something that is so successful, you tend to make assumptions that everything is being done for the right reasons. For him, he assumed that the people were in positions for the right reasons, but some of the people weren’t a good fit for the company. They didn’t meet the core values and did not execute in their roles. They had to let some employees go, which was a surprise to him, but it worked, and they stabilized.

We then talk about Blackjack Real Estate company and where it stands at the moment. According to Adam, they are getting to that point where they’re getting the right people in the right seats. Adam says their big goal in the first quarter of 2022 is to get their leadership and their vision in place and to figure out who's going to lead their departments effectively. This should be the goal of every business. They also have a projection to hit $1.6 million this year and eventually go back to being a three million dollar company.

Next, we discuss the marketing and lead-generating strategies that are working best for Adam and his team. He shares that they are primarily doing direct mail, cold calling, and SEO for their business. Almost every business uses direct mail as the primary lead source, and they have been using the same postcards they have been using for a long time. However, in real estate, marketing, especially with direct mail, is all about timing. Your message has to hit the hand of a person who is in a position to sell or buy a property from you. Timing is everything, and if you want to get to the right hands at the right time, drop the production cost and do it more often.

Lastly, we talk about KPI metrics role in growth. Adam shares that he looks at his metrics weekly. According to him, if you don’t have KPIs, it’s equivalent to driving in a foreign place without a GPS, and you are incapable of understanding your business. There are a lot of metrics that you can track in your business, such as your average contracts, calls, sales, and so on. Tracking these baseline numbers will help you understand your business, where things are going wrong, and what you need to address. The bottom line is that you have to know what is going on in your company, so tracking your KPIs is essential.

Make sure you don’t miss another amazing episode of the Just Start Real Estate Podcast! This interview with Adam Whitney was awesome and he provides so much valuable information on how you can establish yourself and thrive in real estate!

Notable Quotes:

“When we take over something that is so successful, we tend to make assumptions that everything is being done for the right reasons, which might not be the case.”

Adam Whitney

“Timing is everything, and if you want to get to the right hands at the right time, drop your production cost and do it more often.”

Mike Simmons

“Who you spend time with is who you become. Maximize your exposure to the people that are doing the things you want to be doing.”

Adam Whitney

"If you don’t have KPIs that you are tracking, it’s the equivalent to driving in a foreign place without a GPS, and you will be incapable of understanding your business.”