Creating a 7 Figure Business While Working a Full-Time Job

In this episode, I am excited to welcome on fellow 7 Figure Flipping member, William Morgan. Will is the owner and founder of Penny Lane Equity, a rapidly growing Real Estate flipping and wholesaling company in California’s Central Coast. Will grew what was once a hobby into a thriving business with 7 figure revenue while also having a full-time job. Will has since “cut the cord” and now leads a team of 10 talented professionals as they provide some of the most attractive Real Estate opportunities found anywhere in the region. Once an adrenaline junkie, Will now tempers his thrill-seeking by sharing his love for surfing, the mountains, and travel with his 2 young kids.

We got started as we normally do with Will sharing his background with us and how he got into real estate. He began his corporate career working in the nuclear power industry at the age of eighteen. He worked short contracts in this business and then would take the money he earned to travel and surf. After living this ideal lifestyle for about ten years, he figured he had to grow up, and took on a full-time job in nuclear operations. Real estate got on his radar when a neighbor bought a house through a sheriff’s auction and rehabbed that Will ended up buying in 2003 for his primary residence. Will was fascinated by the whole process and that propelled him into learning about investing on his own.

Will did a lot of research on how to find his first investment property and ended up buying his first in 2004 using conventional financing. The guy he bought his primary residence from turned out to be a mentor in the fix and flip process, helping Will to avoid a lot of rookie mistakes. I asked some questions about this deal and Will shared details about the rehab work and how the numbers worked out.

Will said he approached real estate investing as a hobby because he had a full-time job, so he was happy with picking up one or two properties a year. He was also investing in other ways with stocks and bonds, always studying and learning about different passive income models. Because he had a sense that real estate was part of the impending market disruption, he sold all five of his rentals and his primary residence in 2007.

I asked Will about what systems and processes he had in place in the very beginning of his investing business. He said he didn’t initially, but having very little profit margin in his first deal made it necessary to establish when he started getting back into real estate investing around 2012. He said documenting his work processes was really out of necessity because he had a full-time job and knew there were times he was going to need help, and also to maximize his efficiency.

I wanted Will to tell me what he thought were some of the biggest challenges to trying to scale a business while having a full-time job. He said time was his obstacle, as you have to grow the business in what would normally be your spare time, so you have to schedule time to do this. It may take away from sleep, or leisure time, or family time, but he prioritized the sacrifice. He found that because he was drawing a regular salary, it freed up the investment income to hire help to manage everything. We discussed the details of how Will scaled up responsibly.

Because we met through the 7 Figure Flipping Mastermind group, I wanted Will to talk about how he thought this has affected his business. Very much like me, he said he was very skeptical initially, having never paid for training of any kind. He said he cannot believe how valuable it is to have the ability to call or text, at any time, other investors in order to shorten the learning curve and avoid mistakes.

We talked about marketing, the specifics of making offers, how Will’s team divides up responsibilities, the impact of the pandemic on his business, and so much more! Join me and Will as we discuss the in and outs of real estate investing in the latest episode of Just Start Real Estate!

Notable Quotes:

“I like to call myself a genius because I sold my real estate investments in 2007, but there was definitely some luck involved.”