Finding deals
Can't Find Deals in Your Market? Expand the Radius, Not the Map
Two fixes for the 'there are no deals in my market' problem: a mindset drill you can do today, and the radius strategy that built my portfolio.
"I chose a real estate market. I cannot find any deals. All the deals are gone here."
I hear that constantly: on our YouTube lives, from new mentees in the mentorship, from people who are genuinely putting in the work. So let's solve it. I've got two fixes. One is more of a mindset fix, and it'll put the whole thing in perspective for you. The other is tactical: an actual way to accelerate. Sometimes the timing just isn't perfect in your market. That doesn't mean abandon the market. It means you need to know what to do, and more importantly what not to do.
I've bought deals in Seattle, in Moses Lake, in central Washington, on the coast in Bremerton, and in Union, Washington. I've bought in Houston, and outside of Dallas in Stephenville and Abilene. Red states, blue states, big markets, small markets. I have over 600 rental units. I've run this experiment enough times to know the answer to this particular question.
Fix One: Go Drive the Market
Before anything tactical, do this drill. If it's a mindset problem, it'll fix it instantly.
Hop in your car and drive around your target market: assuming it's within driving distance of where you live. If it isn't, hop on Google Maps and drive it in street view. Just go down the streets.
What I want you to be conscious of is this: how many buildings do you see?
Someone owns every single one of those buildings. And they're probably not all losing money. You are not the only person who wants to own real estate. It is entirely possible that many other people in your market are already doing it, and buildings are transacting right now. There is a way. There is nothing those people are doing that makes them special and that you cannot do. You can play this game with or without money. If you find the opportunities, you can break through in your market.
Related reading: The Hub Strategy: How to Find Rental Deals in Any U.S. Market
That's the context most people are missing. If you're struggling with that piece, get out there and do it.
Fix Two: The Market Where I Went Nine Months Without a Deal
Now, there are markets where the timing is genuinely not right. Here's a practical example from my own portfolio.
When I started, I selected Kitsap County. Bremerton is in Kitsap County: it's on the coast of Washington on the Puget Sound. Wonderful market. Pricing at the time was actually pretty good compared to the rest of Seattle. Decent market, high population growth, beautiful area, decent pricing.
I found a duplex. I knocked it out of the park. Fantastic deal. So I said, I'm going to double, triple, quadruple down here and go up, which has been my exact strategy through most of my investing career.
Then nothing happened. I hunted for about nine months and found zero other deals. I made an attempt at a 9-unit. I made an attempt at a 24-unit. We got close, but nothing broke through.
Had I just kept focusing and hammering Bremerton for another year or two, I probably would have bought another deal: somewhere in the 4- to 25-unit range. That's not moving particularly fast, and it gets frustrating. In multifamily, if you do one, two, three, four deals a year, you move forward very quickly, because you're adding a lot of rental income to the business. Zero deals in nine months is a different story.
So here's how I fixed it, and you can do exactly the same thing.
I looked at more markets. But I want to be precise about what that means, because I've seen people shotgun it: "I'm going to look in Michigan, and Indiana, and Missouri, and all these low-cost markets, and try to find something." That is not what I did.
Related reading: How I Find the Best Rental Property Markets in Under 10 Minutes
I went to the other side of the mountains. Bremerton was about an hour from where I lived. This was three hours: a town called Moses Lake.
What One Deal in a New Market Unlocked
I had a friend buying properties in Moses Lake. Cody: he actually co-founded this channel with me years and years ago. Cody had 24 rentals at the time and was about to close on a sixplex that would bring him to 30. There were two duplexes across the street from that sixplex. I bought one of them, and his friend bought the other. About $100,000, needed $35,000 of renovation. I later sold it for well over $200,000. Great deal.
But look at what one transaction in central Washington opened up next.
There was the 38-plex we talk about all the time on this channel: that first seller finance deal. We knocked that out. Two weeks later, three side-by-side duplexes. Six months later, two triplexes. Then a 12-plex and a 10-plex. We moved up to Ephrata and got a five, a nine, and a twelve.
We took over central Washington. I've got over a hundred units there. I started in my late 20s, and by 31 I had over a hundred rental units and had retired my wife from teaching. All I did was expand.
And I still only looked at three total markets. I went one county south of Kitsap and started looking at Shelton. I went over to central Washington and started looking at Grant County. And I expanded my search into King County, where I lived, which I had assumed was impossible. I found a sevenplex there that we knocked out of the park, tripled our initial investment on in less than two years, and we did it $50,000 down on an over-million-dollar purchase for seven units just outside Seattle. Core King County. Big city. We had more success once we expanded a little.
What you don't want to do is set up all over the place: one in Bremerton, one in Seattle, one in Moses Lake, one up north in Everett, one down south in Tacoma. Now you need different property managers, different systems, different processes. When you find a deal, try to double, triple, quadruple down in that market. Only when you're getting too much resistance do you expand, and only a little.
The Same Playbook in Texas
I copied this exact approach when I moved to Texas, and you can too.
I was moving to the DFW area, so I drew a two-and-a-half-hour radius around Dallas–Fort Worth. I actually used AI to do it: I said, literally draw a circle of a two-and-a-half-hour driving radius, what markets are in there?
Tyler. Stephenville. Granbury. Waco. Abilene. Sherman. Wichita Falls. Larger cities outside the main metroplex. They're small towns, but they're not tiny towns, and they're all easy to access within driving distance.
I looked at all of them, and Stephenville is where we found that first 25-plex. I did the owner meeting, and we bought it direct from the owner, seller financed. Then I doubled down in Stephenville: a 26, a 44, a 76.
Around that time I stopped getting momentum in Stephenville. I'd cleared what there was to clear that was obvious for me to buy. I'd met the other owners. I have leads on other properties there, but it's just not the time yet.
And because that market slowed down, Abilene finally came online: a market I'd been pushing for from the beginning. We bought 144 units there, and within two months of closing on the 144 we bought an 80-unit. That's 225 units, and Abilene is now the most significant market in my portfolio.
Take them out one at a time, but expand your radius a little.
Key Takeaways
- Drive your target market (or street-view it) and count the buildings. Someone owns every one of them, and they're not all losing money.
- Nine months of hunting in Bremerton produced zero deals for me. Three hours away in Moses Lake, one duplex purchase snowballed into over a hundred units.
- Expand to two to six submarkets inside a two-and-a-half to three-hour radius. Do not shotgun across five states: you'll need different managers, systems, and processes in each.
- Once you break through in a market, double, triple, and quadruple down there until momentum genuinely stops.
- If you're not calling owners and brokers, you're not buying real estate. One or two calls a day, every day, is enough: it's a 10-minute project.
- When one market cools, the next one in your radius usually opens. Stephenville slowing down is what let Abilene become my biggest market.
Too many people focus on just that one town, that one market. You can absolutely succeed there, but it might not be the right timing. Expand a little, not everywhere, but two to six small markets in the area you want to invest in. You're going to find a lot more opportunity. And once you get that breakthrough and the momentum starts, it typically doesn't take long to get over 100 units in a specific town. You just have to push for it.
If you're in a genuinely difficult market (I have mentees buying in San Diego, which is super competitive) and you're not finding anything within the radius, then look out of state and run the same project. Pick the markets you're interested in, draw the radius, choose the submarkets inside it, and start learning the rents, getting comfortable with the area, meeting owners and brokers, and submitting offers. Magically, you're going to go under contract.
I have never seen an exception to this. When people expand their horizons correctly, there are deals to be had, and there's nothing preventing you from getting them. As long as you know how to underwrite a deal, buy it where it cash flows, and close it, you now own more real estate.
Watch the full video above for the whole walkthrough, market by market. If you want the structure behind these deals, there's a free course on getting started in multifamily at multifamilystrategy.com/get-free-training, and you can learn about my mentorship at mentorship overview. Our free community on Skool (with a free calculator) is where a lot of these questions get worked out in public.
Read the episode transcript
0:00 All right. Today we are solving some 0:02 problems. A common problem that a lot of 0:04 people have. I've chose a real estate 0:06 market. I cannot find any deals. All the 0:08 deals are gone here. Well, I'm going to 0:10 give you two fixes. One of them is more 0:12 of a mindset fix, but it's going to 0:13 really help you put this in perspective. 0:14 The other one is like a tactical way 0:16 that you can actually accelerate this. 0:17 Sometimes the timing is not perfect for 0:20 your market to find that deal. It 0:22 doesn't mean abandon the market, but I'm 0:23 going to show you exactly what to do and 0:25 I think more importantly, what not to do 0:27 to fix this problem. 0:29 [music] 0:37 [music] 0:43 All right, guys. Welcome back to Multif 0:45 Family Strategy. I'm Christian, your 0:46 channel host. Now, I've bought deals in 0:48 Seattle, in Moses Lake, Washington, over 0:50 in central Washington, on the coast, in 0:52 Breton, Washington, and in Union, 0:54 Washington. I've bought in Houston, 0:56 Texas, outside of Dallas, Texas, in 0:58 Stevenville, and Abene. I've done this 0:59 in red states, blue states, big markets, 1:01 small markets. I have over 600 rental 1:04 units. I've done this a couple times, 1:06 and I have the answer for this 1:08 particular question. There's a lot of 1:09 people I'll be like, "Hey, I've been 1:10 looking at my market. All the deals are 1:12 overpriced. I just can't get a foothold. 1:14 How do you get the momentum?" So, first, 1:16 I want you to do a quick drill because 1:18 if it's a mindset problem, this will fix 1:19 it for you instantly. And I'm going to 1:21 talk to you about like the tactical. 1:22 These are the pieces that you need to 1:24 do. So, first of all, hop in your car 1:26 and drive around the target market, 1:28 assuming this target market is within 1:30 driving distance of where you live. If 1:32 not, hop on Google Maps and drive it in 1:35 street view. Literally, just go down. 1:37 What I want you to be aware of, just be 1:38 conscious of, how many buildings do you 1:41 see? Someone owns every single one of 1:43 those buildings. They're probably not 1:45 all losing money. You are not the only 1:48 person who wants to own real estate. It 1:49 is possible many other people in your 1:52 market are doing it. and buildings are 1:54 transacting. There is a way. There's 1:57 nothing those people are doing that make 1:58 them special that you cannot do. You can 2:00 play this game with or without money. 2:02 So, if you find the opportunities, you 2:04 can break through in your market. 2:05 However, there are certain markets where 2:07 the timing is not quite right. So, I'm 2:09 going to give you a practical example 2:10 from my portfolio. When I started, I 2:13 selected Kitap County. Breton is in 2:15 Kitap County. This is on the coast of 2:17 Washington State. It's on the water on 2:19 the Puet Sound. Wonderful market. 2:21 Pricing at the time was actually pretty 2:23 good there compared to the rest of 2:24 Seattle. You had a decent market, high 2:27 population growth, beautiful area, 2:29 decent pricing. 2:31 I found a duplex. I knocked it out of 2:34 the park with this duplex. Fantastic 2:36 deal. And I was like, I'm going to 2:37 double, triple, quadruple down and get 2:38 up, which has been my exact strategy 2:41 through most of my investing career. 2:43 Well, now I have this duplex. I've been 2:45 hunting for at the time it was about 2:47 nine months. I found zero other deals. I 2:49 made an attempt at a 9-unit. I made 2:51 attempt at a 24 unit. We got close, but 2:54 nothing broke through. Now, had I just 2:57 kept focusing and hammering a Breton 2:59 within another year or two, I probably 3:01 would have bought another deal, and 3:02 we'll say it would have been 4 to 25 3:03 units, somewhere in that range. That's 3:05 not moving particularly fast, and it 3:07 does get frustrating. Now, in multif 3:09 family, if you do one, two, three, four 3:10 deals a year, you move forward very 3:12 quickly because you're adding a lot of 3:14 rental income to your business. That 3:16 being said, if you're in a market where 3:18 you're just not seeing traction and it's 3:21 you're legitimately putting in the 3:23 effort, meeting owners, meeting brokers, 3:25 here's how I fixed it, and you can do 3:27 the same thing. I looked at more 3:29 markets. I didn't look everywhere. I've 3:32 seen people shotgun like, I'm going to 3:33 look in Michigan. I'm going to look in 3:34 Indiana. I'm going to look in Missouri. 3:35 I'm going to look in these lowcost 3:36 markets, try to find something. That's 3:38 not what I did. I went to the other side 3:40 of the mountains, three hours from where 3:42 I live. Breton was about an hour. Three 3:45 hours from where I live. town called 3:46 Moses Lake. I had a friend who was 3:47 buying properties there, Cody. He 3:49 actually co-founded this channel with me 3:50 years and years ago. 3:53 Cody had 24 rentals at the time. He was 3:56 about to close on a sixplex, bringing 3:57 him to 30 rentals. There's a duplex 3:59 across the street from that sixplex he 4:01 was closing on. There's actually two 4:03 duplexes. I bought one of them. His 4:05 friend bought the other one. Excellent 4:07 purchase. About $100,000. Needed $35,000 4:09 of Rena. Uh I sold it for well over 4:12 $200,000. A great deal. 4:15 But I did one transaction in central 4:17 Washington and what opened up next? 4:19 There was that 38 plex that we talk 4:20 about all the time on the channel. That 4:22 first seller finance deal. We knocked 4:24 that out. 2 weeks later, three 4:26 sidebyside duplexes. 6 months later, two 4:29 triplexes. Then I bought a 12plex, a 4:31 10plex. We moved up to a freight and got 4:34 a five, a 9, a 12. We took over central 4:38 Washington. I got over a hundred units 4:40 in central Washington. I started in my 4:42 late 20s. By my early 30s, by 31 I had 4:45 over a hundred rental units. I had 4:47 retired my wife from teaching. All I did 4:49 was expand and I started looking at 4:51 three total markets. I started looking 4:54 at a uh town called Shelton. So I went 4:56 one county south of Kids Sap and I was 4:59 looking down there. I went over to 5:04 central Washington, Grant County. 5:05 Started looking at Grant County and I 5:07 expanded my search into King County 5:09 where I lived. I thought it was 5:10 impossible there, but I found a 5:11 sevenplex that we knocked out of the 5:12 park as well. We had a huge profit on 5:14 it, tripled our initial investment in 5:17 less than two years, and we were able to 5:18 do that. Uh, we actually did that really 5:21 low down. We did that $50,000 down on 5:23 over a million dollar purchase for seven 5:25 units in uh just outside of Seattle. So, 5:28 this like core, King County, big city. 5:30 Uh, we had more success when we expanded 5:33 a little bit. Now, what you don't want 5:34 to do is set up all over the place and 5:36 buy one in Breton and one in Seattle and 5:37 one in Moses Lake and one up north in 5:39 Everett and one down south in Tacoma 5:41 because now you need different property 5:42 managers, different systems, different 5:44 processes. But 5:47 when you find that deal, try to double, 5:48 triple, quadruple down in that market. 5:50 If you're getting too much resistance, 5:52 expand a little bit. Now, I copied this 5:54 when I went to Texas and you do the same 5:55 thing. I was moving to the DFW area, 5:57 Dallas for Worth. I drew a 2 and a half 6:00 hour radius around that and actually 6:02 used AI to do it. I said, "Hey, 6:03 literally draw a circle of 2 and a half 6:05 hour driving radius." 6:08 Markets in there. Tyler, Texas, 6:10 Steamville, Texas, Granberry, Texas, 6:13 Waco, Texas, Abalene, Texas, Sherman, 6:17 Texas. Uh what else do I look at? 6:19 Witchah Falls. Larger cities outside of 6:22 the main metroplex. They're small towns, 6:24 but they're not tiny towns. And they're 6:27 easy to access. They're all within 6:28 driving distance. I looked at all of 6:31 them and Stevenville is where we found 6:32 that first 25 plex. I did that owner 6:34 meeting. We bought it direct from the 6:35 owner, seller financed. Then I doubled 6:37 down in Stevenville, bought a 26, a 44, 6:40 uh, a 76. 6:42 And around that time, I stopped getting 6:45 momentum in Stevenville. I cleared what 6:47 there was to clear that was obvious for 6:49 me to buy. I'd met the other owners. I 6:52 have leads for other properties, but 6:54 it's not the time yet. So since that 6:56 market slowed down, Abalene finally 7:00 finally came online. I was trying to 7:01 push for that market from the beginning. 7:04 We bought 144 there and within 2 months 7:06 of closing 144, we bought an 80 unit. 7:08 Went up to 225 units. It's now the most 7:10 significant market in my portfolio. 7:14 Take them out one at a time, but expand 7:16 your radius a little bit. I think too 7:17 many people focus on just that one town, 7:19 that one market. You can absolutely 7:22 succeed there, but it might not be the 7:24 perfect timing. Expand a little bit. Not 7:26 everywhere, but I would say two to six 7:29 small markets within the area that you 7:31 want to invest in. You're going to find 7:33 a lot more opportunity. And once you 7:34 have that breakthrough, you start 7:35 getting that momentum. It typically 7:37 doesn't take that long to get over 100 7:39 units in a specific town. You just have 7:40 to push for that momentum. So, the two 7:43 pieces of advice here, and this this 7:44 will fix the problem for you. I 7:45 guarantee you, whatever market you're 7:46 in, this will fix the problem. First of 7:48 all, get your mindset right. go just 7:50 drive that market and realize how much 7:53 there actually is to own there. You can 7:56 do it, too. Other people have gone 7:58 before you. You need to get that 7:59 context. So, if if you're struggling 8:00 with that piece, just get out there and 8:02 do it. If you're not making phone calls 8:04 to owners and brokers, you're not going 8:06 to buy any real estate. You don't have 8:07 to blow up the phones. Make one or two 8:09 calls a day and do it every day. Easy to 8:11 do. Just add it that you have a 8:13 10-minute project to your day. It takes 8:15 10 minutes to acquire real estate. 8:17 Lastly, 8:18 you may be a little bit too specific. 8:20 Don't look at just one market. Expand 8:22 your horizons. Do that 2 and 1 half hour 8:25 radius or even a three-hour radius from 8:27 where you're at. And if there's just 8:29 nothing in that market or you're in a 8:30 really difficult market, you know, I 8:32 have mentees who are in buying in San 8:34 Diego, which is super competitive. But 8:36 if you're in San Diego and you're like, 8:37 I'm not finding anything, look out of 8:40 state and do the same project. Hey, I'm 8:42 interested in this market and this 8:43 market. Let's draw that radius. 8:46 Choose some subm markets in there and 8:48 let's start learning the rents there, 8:49 getting comfortable with the subm 8:50 market, meeting owners and brokers, 8:52 submitting offers and magically you're 8:53 going to go under contract for a deal. I 8:55 have never seen an exception to this. 8:57 When people expand their horizons 8:58 correctly, there are deals to be had. 9:01 There's nothing preventing you from 9:02 getting them. As long as you know how to 9:03 underwrite a deal, buy it where it cash 9:05 flows. Close it. You now own more real 9:07 estate. That is the simple simple 9:09 answer. But it comes up all the time on 9:11 our YouTube lives. It comes up all the 9:12 time for new mentees in my mentorship. 9:15 Like I'm just not finding anything 9:16 exactly in my market. 9:19 Six markets at max. And these aren't 9:22 like 9:24 Chicago, New York, California. I'm 9:26 talking subm markets. Do that 2 and 1 9:28 half hour radius. Choose six markets 9:29 within there. Focus in those areas. You 9:32 will find deals. Absolutely guarantee 9:35 you it will happen. I've done this all 9:37 over the country. So have a lot of my 9:39 students have a huge track record of 9:41 this working. But that is the answer 9:42 you're looking for if you're struggling 9:43 to find deals in your market. Hope this 9:45 helped.
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