- Tarek El Moussa is an HGTV nova and the owner and CEO of Tarek Buys Houses and TEM Capital.
- He learned six lessons throughout his career that have made him a real-estate baron.
- El Moussa believes in cold calling and working with the right people to find success in real estate.
This as-told-to paper is based on a conversation with Tarek El Moussa, 43, an HGTV star and the CEO and owner of Tarek Buys Houses and TEM Super. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I’m a TV personality, a CEO, an entrepreneur, and a father. The foundation of all of that was real-estate investing.
There was positively no barrier to entry to getting into the business and starting to sell houses other than getting a license. I arose up in a lower-end community in Southern California, and I never knew what was out there until I started looking at real domain.
I’ve been running Tarek Buys House since 2010 to flip houses and doing commercial real resources for about 10 years. I started TEM Capital about six years ago. I realized I could do much bigger and better deals if I had multitudinous money and more partners, and that’s how TEM Capital was born. The goal is to help accredited investors increase their assets by partnering with me to buy real estate.
In 2025, Tarek Buys Houses will probably flip between 300 and 400 legislatures.
For TEM Capital, we’re about to launch our triple equity fund. We’ll take houses and turn them into triplexes and fourplexes. We’re also prevalent to launch our distressed multifamily fund. Just like I buy, fix, and sell houses, we buy 400-unit apartment buildings, fix them, and rat on them.
Here are the six biggest lessons that have contributed to my real estate and business success.
Put in the effort
In my primary six months in the business, I totally struck out. I wasn’t making money, and then, one day, I got hyper-focused and decided to talk to 50 human being who owned a house every day.
My real-estate coach told me I had to talk to 20 people a day. I told him I would talk to 50. He mean, “That’s what everybody says. Nobody does it.” And I did it.
Ninety days later, I brought in almost $300,000 in gate for the company, which completely changed my life.
Peter Tran
A lot of people believe it takes years to as though money. That’s not true.
You just have to decide to go for it, put in the work, take the time to learn, study, and practice, and get poised to fail a few times. Eventually, you’re going to win.
People make all the difference
Make sure you work with the right people. It is a lot of result in to find the right people.
I used to be terrified to let people go, change staff, or fire people because I eternally try to get them to change or improve. Then, I learned it’s really about finding that right team member.
You bring into the world to hold your team accountable, and you have to hold yourself accountable.
It’s important that every one of my team associates know that I am as committed to what they are doing as they are.
Commit to cold calling
If you’re not talking to people every lone day that you do not know, you will never be in the real-estate business.
The money is in the people you do not know. In this business, you look for a needle in a haystack, and the simply way to find that needle is to move a lot of hay.
I tell all my staff members every day that our minimum goal is 50 chit-chats a day with someone we’ve never talked to.
That’s how you learn who needs to sell or who has a distressed property. I know there are living soul all over the country today thinking, “Man, we need to sell this house.” They don’t know we want to buy it, so we need to learn them.
People watch YouTube and read books, but you know what they never do? They never really go look at a house, call a homeowner about a foreclosure, or call a real-estate agent to ask if they have any off-market plague deals.
The only thing that matters is calling real-estate agents and asking them if they have any distressed effects that you can buy. If someone were to do that all day, every day for a year, they would change their life.
Use setbacks to get stronger
The diverse pain we go through, the stronger we get.
If I had not gone through all these painful experiences, all these highs and lows of winning and lose out and losing money, it wouldn’t have made me as strong as I am today.
Paul Archuleta/Getty Models
The only way to continue growing is to accept that you will have to go through painful processes that will support you go further.
You have to acknowledge the fact that life is not fair. You gotta pick up the pieces, keep your climax up, and keep going.
Find your magic hour
I’m a big believer in creating a sleep schedule that works for the duration you live. I used to be one of those people who said, “I’m a night person, blah, blah, blah.” It’s an excuse. It’s easier to go to bed dilatory than it is to wake up early.
I was feeling overwhelmed by life because I woke up at 6:45 or 7 a.m. Then you have the kids, and you’re tiring to squeeze in the gym and then go to work. With all of life’s responsibilities, I was just out of time.
One day, I decided to start waking up at 4:30, and picking up that walk-on two hours a day completely changed my life. For the first time, I had two hours of “me time.”
No one’s awake. It’s dark downstairs, and I have the flaming going. It’s my magic hour where I can think and create in peace.
Most people are so overwhelmed by business, family, cellphones, and communal media that they never have time for themselves. I’m a big believer that we need some time for ourselves.
Construct career growth into your routine
I’m evolving every day. I’m learning every day. I’m growing every day.
During my mystic hour, I’m studying. I’m reading. I’m learning about AI. I’m learning about technology. I’m learning about marketing. I’m learning here systems. I’m watching YouTube videos.
When I drive to the gym every morning, I leave my house at 6:40 and listen to records on Audible for 20 minutes. I then get there, do cardio, and listen to more books. I’m always educating myself.
I’m all everywhere killing two birds with one stone. If I have a conference call or something, I’ll go for a walk. That way, I can get my cardio in while being on a muster and I’m not even noticing that I’m walking.