Stephen McKee

By Christina Suter on Sep 26, 2015 at 04:14 PM in Real Estate Issues
Stephen McKee

Stephen McKee COO at The Rehab Loan Group

The Rehab Loan Group is the only hard money lender in the United States that does 100% financing without taking a piece of the deal. If you finish a project faster, you make more money. Because they’re a debt only lender, they’re able to offer investors the highest rate in the industry. In 2003 Stephen was working at a title company and after a year and a half he had a baby on the way and needed to earn more money. He began working with a real estate agent who did a lot of low-income sales and one day a lady came in and said she needed someone to buy her house and he said yes. He locked up that deal, called people to get the money for it, and he called his brother’s baseball coach who’d done 55 flips and told him he didn’t need money and reworked the contract and made the deal. His confidence after that led him to buying more properties he did ok on some, but hen the market fell and he lost his 7-figure income by the age of 25. He took the knowledge he learned from that and started over. He slowly bounced back and started selling properties for old clients from the title company.

Major institutions pay 6-8% returns to their investors and we pay substantially more. But they have over-documented and over-researched the process because they want to do lending from a desk and it’s a boots on the ground industry. In the end we make about 1/3 of the total profit and the bar makes about 2/3 and that varies depending on the amount of time we keep the money out. In exchange for the interest we charge, we are very hands on and involved in the process. Make sure your broker is in it for the long haul so you can make sure they have everyone’s best interest at heart.

Stephens' tips:

  • The deals are outside. Make it a point to walk the neighborhoods.
  • 100 properties= 50 opportunities = 20 conversations = 5 negotiations = 1 deal. It takes a lot of leg work. They are worth it, but they aren't easy.
  • Follow up, follow up, follow up. 
  • Always come from a good place because you never know the weight you're lifting from a person by buying their property.
  • Mold your mind on days you don't want to get out of bed. Remember your why and set yourself up ahead of time with things that motivate you.
  • Take care of yourself.

To contact Stephen at the Rehab Loan Group, he can be reached at 951.684.2553 or email [email protected]

If you have a deal and want to see if it's a good one, check out rehabcalc.com and iereic.org is where you can find their meetup.