House Talk: Fix & Flip Homes For Retirement

Episode Summary

In this episode, Jeff Scofield welcomes real estate investor Deb Cleveland, who has nearly four decades of experience and over 400 renovations completed. Deb shares how she went from a single parent with no money or experience to building a $2 million renovation company. The conversation covers how to start investing with no capital, the difference between flipping and building rental wealth, how to find off-market distressed properties, financing strategies using personal trust, how many rental properties you need to retire in Rochester, renovation mistakes that kill profits, and budget design techniques that create a high-end look.

Key Discussion Points:

How Deb started with no money, no experience, and a $9,000 first flip in Maplewood
The difference between fix-and-flip (active income) and rental wealth building (passive income)
Networking strategy: funeral directors, attorneys, utility workers, insurance agents
Financing the first deal: borrowing $62,000 at 15% from a former employer
Six to seven single-family homes on 15-year mortgages = $1M portfolio in 18 years
Why Geneva, NY became Deb's primary market (129 renovations in 13 years)
Renovation design: tonal painting, two hardware finishes max, warm neutral colors
Recent acquisition: church and two houses in Rochester for $117,000
Coaching programs: GPS course, "Just Do One for Fun," and "Millionaires in the Making"

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Full Transcript

[0:00:02] Announcer: Welcome to House Talk on News Radio WHAM 1180. This show is a weekly conversation about all the things you should know when buying, selling, or maintaining your home. Join in with your comments or questions. Call or text 222-1180 or 1-800-295-1180. Now live from the News Radio WHAM 1180 Studio in Downtown Rochester. Here are your hosts, Jeff Scofield, Mike Reed, and real estate attorney John Marchioni.

[0:00:34] Jeff Scofield: Welcome back, everyone. This is Jeff Scofield with House Talk. With me, I've got Mike Reed. And we've got a special guest, Deb Cleveland. Deb, are you there?

[0:00:44] Deb Cleveland: I am. Hey, Jeff.

[0:00:46] Jeff Scofield: I appreciate your calling in. And John's in Florida. I feel bad for him. Well, actually, I think Deb's in Florida too.

[0:00:59] Mike Reed: I don't feel bad.

[0:01:01] Deb Cleveland: Smart investors head to Florida.

[0:01:02] Jeff Scofield: That's right. Well, what I wanna do is ask folks, if you have questions, you're welcome to text me, 605333. That's area code 585-600-5333. I wanna get through some material with Deb. And just to give a prelude, I've known Deb for a while now, and she basically went into real estate after having another business and just decided she wanted to do real estate. And Deb is a monster at the fix and flip and fix and keep. And I mean that all in a positive way. She's not doing one or two. It's a business for her, and she's been very good at it, very successful. Deb, why don't you tell us a little bit about how you got into it?

[0:01:58] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. Wow. It's a great question. It's long, so I've been a real estate investor and fixer and flipper for almost four decades. And when I started — the reason I'm so passionate about talking about this, Jeff, is that hopefully there's people, listeners on this call that are saying, "I don't have the money. I don't have the experience. I don't know how to hire contractors." I didn't know any of that either. I was a single parent, no money, no education, and I started a tiny business out of my spare bedroom. I bought a rundown row house in the Maplewood area, hired my dad, Norm, for $8 an hour, and we fixed it up, sold it, and I made $9,000. I thought I was the richest woman in the world. And that small business that I started out of my spare bedroom, within a five year period, it grew into a $2,000,000 company. And I did that while single parenting and raising my son and also working a straight commission job. So it was a commitment. It was a lot of work. But I can say the foundation for me was when you are a straight commission salesperson, you really are in business for yourself. So I really encourage people — if they really want to know what it's like to be an entrepreneur before they're an entrepreneur, find a product or a company or a service that you really love and work straight commission for them. It will give you a solid foundation to start your business.

[0:03:35] Mike Reed: Hey, Deb. This is Mike with All County Inspection Services, and I had that conversation with my wife just yesterday. We were just talking about where we're going, careers, and things like that. And I said, I think my favorite part about this job in owning a company is waking up unemployed every day, feeling like every day I have to go out and make something happen today. I never felt that way when I worked in the corporate world. I felt like I was working really hard, but I never felt like I was making something happen. And this way, I feel like I gotta do this thing for me and my family. And it's absolutely amazing to get involved in a place where it's a straight commission thing. If you don't work and you aren't successful, you don't get paid. It's an amazing feeling.

[0:04:17] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. I agree. It's there's nothing like it. It's so meaningful, and it's very gratifying, and it's incredibly profitable. I mean, I was able to retire from the real estate investing business, which I planned, and that's something that I teach clients — put together a solid foundation of information and have a solid plan in place before you begin. If you wanna retire in the next eighteen years and you wanna do it with rental properties, then how many units do you need to purchase? How many homes do you need to buy? Within what time period? It only takes fifteen year mortgages. So when you look eighteen years out, because if it takes three years to accumulate that inventory, now you're sitting on millions of dollars that's paid off, and then you can write your own life. What do you wanna do now? What do you wanna do next? That's what I did. That's why I retired so young.

[0:05:13] Jeff Scofield: Well, one of the things that I like about this show is we talk about different things for investments. I mean, every time I go to Wegmans or you stop at a store and you see somebody who's obviously in their mid to late seventies, even early eighties, pushing shopping carts in the parking lot of Wegmans. And everybody is so ill prepared for retirement now because all the big companies have given up their retirement plans. And I think just everybody under saves. So this is really a nice way to — even if you're not building your own wealth, you can build an income stream. If you take the average person that's working at ABC company and they're doing minimum wage for, what is it, $16 an hour now, and they're able to orchestrate a flip — buy a house, flip it, make $10,000 on it — I mean, it's the equivalent of them working twenty hours a week for thirty one weeks. And sometimes you ring the bell and you make over $10,000.

[0:06:20] Deb Cleveland: And it's interesting, the segue into that — how do you start — because that is the number one question I get when I interview someone for potentially working with me. They don't know where to begin. They don't know how to finance a property. They don't know how to get the money to finance a property, and I did not have any money when I started in the business, so I'm a really good person to talk to about that. The first thing I tell people is, are you a trustworthy person? Do people trust you? Because if you don't have that inside of you, I would say almost any business is difficult to do, but especially in real estate. Because what I did was I went to my old boss, Bill Shaver, and I said, "Hey, Bill. I wanna buy this building," and it was my first investment property on the corner of Comfort and South Avenue. Because I'd worked for him, he knew me. He knew that I was responsible. I was committed. I was dedicated, and he lent me the money. He wrote me a check for $62,000. It was 15% interest, and I had to pay it back in five years. The numbers were really tight on that acquisition because the cash flow wasn't up to covering the full amount, but it didn't matter because I would never have been able to buy it otherwise. And I heard some people say to me, the interest rate is too high. I said, okay, so are you breaking even on this rental? Because if you're building wealth, yes, it's great to make cash flow, and you need to make enough cash flow to maintain the property. But if you're working another job or you're fixing and flipping houses for cash flow, you don't necessarily need to get it out of the property until you retire. So that's another whole strategy. And, Jeff, they don't really need that many properties. One of my courses is called Millionaires in the Making, A Sacred Path to Riches, and that's about women who want to build at least a million dollar real estate portfolio. And in Upstate New York, which is really nice, in some of these smaller fringe markets, you only really have to buy like six or seven single family houses, take care of them, take care of your tenant, and you'll end up with a million dollar real estate portfolio or more at the end of that fifteenth year if you pay off the mortgage.

[0:08:41] Jeff Scofield: Nice.

[0:08:43] Jeff Scofield: Deb, you've done — I mean, you've used the fix — this is what I did thirty five years ago. I would buy properties, I'd fix and flip, and not to the remotely to the extent that you or even Mike have done. And then I would buy rental properties. And eventually, I just gravitated away from that until recently I've gravitated back to doing it a little bit more. How do you find the properties that you're buying?

[0:09:12] Deb Cleveland: That's a great question. So you network like crazy. It's again, it's the mindset of the business owner or straight commission salesperson. I, at the time, made up a stack of 250 business cards, and I know it sounds very old fashioned, but some of the old fashioned things still work. And my whole game was I'm gonna give all these away this week, and then I'm gonna get 250 more cards. And every time I talk to someone, I'm gonna say, "Remember me if you run into someone or you hear of somebody that's in trouble with their property." And it just gets the wheel going. People start calling you.

And then I go really rogue. I talk to funeral directors. I really just about talk to anyone — attorneys, insurance agents, and the utility guys are great ones because they're the first ones almost the first ones in when somebody's in trouble. They haven't paid their bill, and they're there to turn off the utility. So if you become friendly with the utility person and say, "Hey, could you let me know if you know of a property in distress? You've gone in, you've turned off the gas, the electric, and the water." Because that's the person that's gonna call me to say, "Hey, this person is in distress. Can you help them out?"

At this point, Jeff, I call them mercy runs. I get calls almost every week from somebody that says, "Are you that girl?" And I say, "I think so. What's going on?" So they tell me what's going on, the challenges they're in. They've lost their job. Many of these folks won't list these properties with real estate agents because they're so embarrassed. They're embarrassed that they either got ill, they got old, they have deferred maintenance. And this way, they can quietly sell the property.

[0:11:02] Jeff Scofield: Deb, when you hear that music — Deb, you back?

[0:11:07] Deb Cleveland: I'm still here, I sure am. Yeah. I kinda wanna segue, Jeff, if I can, into more or less focusing on the fixing and flipping business. How does that sound?

[0:11:17] Jeff Scofield: Yeah, perfect.

[0:11:21] Mike Reed: First question I have — because I've got a couple of houses for myself and I've done a few and I'm toying with the idea of some more right now — the first question I've always had is the dynamic between buying a house in those nicer areas of the city, not quite nice, maybe North Winton Village, something off of Park Ave, or even going to a higher end, something in Victor, Pittsford, Mendon, Bloomfield. Where have you found the most success and the most luck?

[0:12:03] Deb Cleveland: Great question. So I tried different things, and I became masterful at flipping multi units, which is kind of a specialty. But where my heart really is — what I really love to do is fixing and flipping to the first time homebuyer market. So I focus on that market. And when I buy the house, I think about the woman that's gonna walk through the kitchen of this house. I give her and her family the nicest house I can at the most affordable price that's warm and welcoming and completely renovated.

So I used to do a lot in Rochester. I've done over 400 renovations, so I've done several fix and flips to say the least. And after I had retired, I really wanna talk to the lone wolves out there — the retired lone wolves, which are women that are really responsible, really independent. And when retirement hits for these gals, it's like a truck hit them because they didn't realize how much they really enjoyed their work family. It was such a huge extension and part of their lives, and now during retirement, they're suffering. A lot of them are do-it-yourselfers, so they would be a perfect fit for this program I have coming up. It's called Just Do One for Fun.

And when I work with them, I have them focus on the first time homebuyer's market as well. No matter what market you go into, you're going to find that first time homebuyer market section of that town, that city, that community. So you just have to look around at demographics. Like in Rochester, the first time homebuyer market kind of dried up because there were so many real estate investors. This is about twenty years ago. So I started looking and studying — what are the outlier communities where investors aren't looking right now? And I ended up after the 2008 crash in Geneva, New York. I focused on it and — that's what I tell people. When you become an expert in an area and a specific demographic, stay in it. Stay in your lane. Become masterful at it. I stayed in Geneva, New York, and I did over 129 renovations there within thirteen years.

[0:14:27] Mike Reed: Wow. That's a lot of renovations in a town that size.

[0:14:32] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. I mean, there's only 12,000 people. And what I noticed there is that when I got there, there were a lot of slumlords. There was poor landlording going on. There wasn't a lot of good community environment. And especially after the crash, there was so much going on. What they really needed was to stabilize that community. And what they did in Geneva, New York — it would be beautiful if it got replicated in other smaller towns and cities — because we had great government that came in. They went to Cornell, and they hired some students that were doing their theses on urban renewal. And collectively, there were really only five investors — myself and four others — that really put our heads down. We put our heads together. We put our hearts, our backs into it, and our money into it as well. And I would say collectively between the five of us, we did over 400 units in that city.

[0:15:36] Mike Reed: Wow. That's a lot.

[0:15:39] Deb Cleveland: We recognized that we were losing two demographics. We were losing retirees because they no longer wanted to maintain a house. And in Geneva, New York, there was no condo they could buy and they did not wanna be a renter. So we lost those folks to Canandaigua where there were condos they could purchase. But the issue we were able to amend was we had a lot of first time homebuyers that wanted to invest and buy houses in Geneva, and the inventory was so old and dated that these young couples that had college tuitions and usually one or two kids in tow wanted to live there, but they didn't have the talent or the funds or the interest in fixing up a house. And as an investor, if you really get educated in this business, you can spot those areas. You can spot how you can really make a difference, and how it can be meaningful for you. It's not just about making money, it's really about making a difference.

[0:16:44] Mike Reed: Yeah. I've had a thought in my head for a long time. I see a lot of people who want to move out of their houses as an inspector. They wanna move out of their homes, but there's really nowhere for them to go. They're in the Fairports, the Perintons, parts of Greece, North Greece, and they've got that four bedroom on a cul-de-sac that they moved into in 1990, and they're ready to move out. Their kids have aged out. Their grandkids, they're looking for that one or two bedroom small house. And I have wanted to find some of these smaller communities — like we have some small houses in Irondequoit where I live, a thousand square feet, 1,200 square feet — and meet with people and say, "Look, I'll secure the property. I'll buy it, but you contract out with me to remodel it the way you want it remodeled, and we'll work through that together working off of my initial investment, and then it gets refinanced through that process into their name." Because I see a lot of flips where you go into a house and two weeks later, you drive by and those brand new cupboards are coming out and they're in the dumpster. People bought that house because they needed to secure the property, but they didn't like what was in the house. Do you think that's a crazy idea?

[0:18:36] Deb Cleveland: I think you're working too hard.

[0:18:39] Jeff Scofield: I'm kind of in that ballpark. I would just —

[0:18:42] Deb Cleveland: Go and do it.

[0:18:42] Jeff Scofield: Do it yourself. Do it and sell it.

[0:18:45] Deb Cleveland: People approach me all the time to do what you're saying, Mike, and I would never renovate for somebody else. I've got really good taste and a really good eye for decor, so I feel like I give them a high end decorator look. And I don't see that — I've never seen anybody tear out what I've done. They might repaint a color, but I'm very neutral. I don't do trendy things because I want the investment they make to be kind of timeless looking. They can add some of their own things to bring their personality into it. I would just run from that. It's not as profitable. It's a lot more work. You're dealing with now a buyer that you're kind of held hostage by.

[0:19:32] Mike Reed: Okay. And I guess we'll talk a little more about that when we come back from this commercial break.

[0:19:42] Jeff Scofield: And we're back. House Talk with a special guest, Deb Cleveland. Deb, quick question — well, none of these are quick questions. Actually, I don't have a question. What I want you to do is — I wish — I mean, I started forty years ago with no direction, just kind of winging it. I think I read a couple books on buying properties, but you were nice enough to send me a pre-copy of the book that you're gonna have coming out. And I wish I had known you forty years ago. I love that book. I'll be buying this to give to clients that are doing it. And you do offer coaching, your book, your training, and we can get back on the air when your book is actually published and let people know how to get ahold of it. But tell us a little bit about the coaching services and you had mentioned to me off air about a master class that you've got going on.

[0:20:45] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. So I have a few things. I have a foundation course called the GPS course, which stands for Greatness Potentiation System. That's a six-week course. It is a really meaty course. It's about 24 hours of coursework. And that course is going to give you the entire foundation. If you've never done anything in real estate, if you've never purchased a house for yourself, you are going to get 24 hours of solid information from someone who literally started with nothing. I mean I was a self-taught real estate investor. Everything I've done has been on my own. So it's been a long road, but it's because of that, it's a really robust course.

And then the Just Do One for Fun — that is a program for women who are retired, who identify as lone wolves, who are do-it-yourselfers, and I walk them through a flip from start to finish. They're not going to be sitting in their recliner in their pajamas learning how to do this. They are going to be hands-on in a property, and they love it. There's such a camaraderie with these gals. I mean, it's so meaningful to them to know that they can fix and flip a house and understand the business and have a whole new group of women that are just like them. Independent, capable, smart, they just needed someone to kind of orchestrate the whole thing. And that's what that is.

And then the Millionaires in the Making course is specifically for women who wanna build at least a million dollar real estate portfolio. Now that doesn't mean that they start with a million dollars. You could start this literally with $10,000 in your bank account. But what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna walk you through how to get there. And the secret is it's just 15-year mortgages. You accumulate what you need to accumulate as far as the number of properties, and then you just wait it out. If you take care of the properties and you take care of the tenants, there's really no there's no mystery to it.

[0:22:57] Jeff Scofield: So in the Rochester market, this gets me fired up. Because, you know, if you're in the suburbs and you can't find a nice house in the suburbs, it's not there, or it's too expensive. I would encourage buyers to look at our first-ring suburbs. Look at Irondequoit, look at some of the areas in Greece, parts of the city. There's some absolutely gorgeous areas. You know, the South Wedge has been hot for a long time. Maplewood's coming back. And then of course when you go across Lake Ontario, you get into Geneva and Canandaigua and those areas. So there's really opportunity all over the place here. But Deb, what markets are you focused on right now?

[0:23:45] Deb Cleveland: Well, I have two markets. My very first market that I started in is DuPage County in Illinois. So it's just west of Chicago. I lived there for a few years before I came to Rochester. So my market there includes Oak Brook, Naperville, Wheaton — those are kind of the higher end suburbs of Chicago. And then Rochester is my other market. I've been doing Rochester, Geneva, and the surrounding areas.

[0:24:15] Jeff Scofield: And so what — let's talk about what you're working on right now, because I know you've got some projects going on in Rochester.

[0:24:22] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. So I've got the — I'm working on the church property that I mentioned. That's a fun one. And I've been looking at a few more things. The thing about Rochester that I really like right now is the inventory is just so affordable compared to some of the other markets I work in. You can still get into a deal for under $100,000 if you know where to look. And when you can get in for under $100,000, the margins are really good on the flip side, and the cash flow is really good on the rental side. So I'm actively looking right now.

[0:25:00] Mike Reed: So Deb, what are you — on the renovation side of things, because that's where we spend a lot of our time looking at renovations and inspecting renovations, what is your take on what's hot right now in terms of finishes, design, colors? What are you seeing?

[0:25:20] Deb Cleveland: So I would say a couple of things. Number one, I've been saying this for three years — gray is going away. Gray is going away. I really — the gray everything, the gray floors, the gray walls, the gray cabinets — that's over. What you're seeing now is a shift towards warm. Warmer tones. And the way I do my floors — I use vinyl plank — and I will not do a gray floor. I will look for a plank that has a mixture of tones in it. So you'll see some cinnamon, some nutmeg, some blonde, mixed in together. I won't do a totally blonde floor because those date really fast. And I won't do gray because those are already dated. So you want that warmth.

As far as wall colors, I use a color called Whitetail. It's a really nice warm off-white. It's got a little cream to it. And I paint the entire house in Whitetail flat. Flat sheen. And then the doors — I will not put a six panel door in a flip. Those days are gone. If you want an elevated look, go with a two-panel door. It's so simple, but it changes the entire look of the house.

[0:26:45] Mike Reed: And the cost difference between a six-panel and a two-panel door?

[0:26:48] Deb Cleveland: Almost nothing. It's maybe $5 to $10 more per door. But the look difference is significant. And then I also do some fun things with ceilings. I'll paint a ceiling in a hallway a dark navy blue, or I'll use a color called Silver Strand, which is a beautiful bluish-gray. And it creates this wow factor. People walk in and they're like, "Oh my gosh." It's unexpected. Nobody expects a colored ceiling, and it creates such a high-end look.

[0:27:15] Jeff Scofield: I love that. And it's these little things that don't cost a lot of money but make a huge difference in how the house feels when you walk through it.

[0:27:25] Deb Cleveland: Exactly. And light fixtures are another one. People leave the old, ugly, builder-grade light fixtures in. For a very small investment, you can change every light fixture in the house and it transforms the space. And door pulls on kitchen cabinets — that's a very inexpensive upgrade that makes a big difference.

[0:28:00] Jeff Scofield: Great. So when we come back, I've got a couple more questions about the renovation side. We'll be right back on House Talk Radio.

[0:28:48] Mike Reed: And we're back. Deb, we want to continue talking about the design and renovation tips.

[0:31:48] Mike Reed: When we were going on, you were talking about your colors, the different things like that. We're redesigning my house. We did a bunch of stuff. I never can move into a place and leave it alone. And we cannot figure out color schemes. My wife and I have been investigating — what were they calling it now — not color washing, but basically everything is the same color, just different sheens. Is that look —

[0:32:16] Deb Cleveland: I love that look.

[0:32:17] Mike Reed: I was gonna say, it looks good on my computer screen and on my phone. You pick a color and the ceiling is the same color as the trim, just eggshell on the walls, semi-gloss on the trim, and flat on the ceiling. Does it look good in real life?

[0:32:36] Deb Cleveland: Yes. That's a very bespoke look. It's a very subtle, high-end look. That's a fabulous way to really add value without really adding cost. That's what I teach people because you wanna create a high-end look on a budget. When I work with first time homebuyers, the budget is smaller than if I was working on a luxury fix and flip. So that tiny thing you just said is not that tiny. That will really increase the value of any property because it looks so rich.

[0:33:09] Mike Reed: Look at that. Now I have an expert telling me we should do this. Our floor has been OSB for a year with throw carpets over it because she just can't decide the colors.

[0:33:31] Jeff Scofield: As long as she's listening to this show, your problems might be over soon.

[0:33:44] Mike Reed: We have a house that we took the entire center wall out of, up on the Irondequoit Bay. You walk through the front door, you look through the house, and it looks out into some big picture windows we put on the back. And now we just can't seem to pull the trigger on finalizing everything because it's paralysis by analysis.

[0:34:06] Jeff Scofield: Well, you just keep waiting and what you have will probably come back into style soon.

[0:34:17] Jeff Scofield: Deb, do you have some stuff that you'd really like to get out there and tell people about? Any more key decorating renovation tips? Because everything you share would help anybody getting their house ready to sell.

[0:34:34] Deb Cleveland: I would say that if you're getting a house ready to sell, paint it. Neutralize the inside. If you're living in the house and you went with your colors that you like, I would say use the Whitetail flat and paint the whole house. Really neutralize it. Declutter your house. And the smallest things that make a big difference, again, are light fixtures — they're not that much money. A small budget would really elevate the look. Putting door pulls on kitchen cabinets.

And I wanna mention this — it's so important — I just bought a fix and flip from a fixer flipper that failed. And when I walked in, I could immediately see why this person failed, because they didn't have a plan in place. The door pulls were black matte. The doorknobs for the doors themselves were brushed nickel. They had some brushed — so if you want a high-end look, you stick with two finishes. You're gonna do chrome and black matte. That's all you use throughout the whole house — on your light fixtures, your door pulls, your doorknobs, anything that has a finish, your faucet. If you wanna do that yummy brushed gold, maybe you pair that with a black matte, or maybe you pair that with nickel, but just stay with two finishes. The only exception is if you bring something in like a light fixture that has rattan or some sort of wood element — you can get away with that. But to really create the elevated decorator look, just stay with two finishes throughout.

[0:36:30] Jeff Scofield: When Deb's talking about decoration, I feel like for her and me, it's a men-are-from-Mars, women-are-from-Venus thing.

[0:36:39] Mike Reed: I hear the words, but I don't know what they mean.

[0:36:41] Jeff Scofield: Note yourself. Google this later.

[0:36:44] Mike Reed: My wife will ask me, "What do you think about this color?" And my response quite often is, "Honey, I try not to think about colors." I just don't have a thought on them. I can put it on the wall. It's kind of like art. You know what you like, and you have no idea why you don't like what you don't like.

[0:37:05] Jeff Scofield: But I will tell you, Deb, I've seen — I haven't seen one in person in quite a while, I don't get down to Geneva all that often — but some of the flips you do, they look wonderful.

[0:37:18] Deb Cleveland: Yeah. I wanna say this — this is the challenge. One of the challenges is that there are mostly men in the fixing and flipping business, and they do have challenges putting together a soft, warm, high-end decorator look. So for those guys, I would say hire a decorator for $300 or $400. Have her put together your whole signature look that you're gonna use on all your flips. You don't have to change it every time. Just stick with this look, and then you'll be solid with it. Don't try to guess. Don't go buying stuff on sale and mix-matching things together because you're trying to save yourself $500. It's a really bad idea. Hire someone. Or even go to Sherwin Williams — they'll help you pull colors together. I would hire a decorator and then you might end up with two or three different schemes if you get bored of just using the same one over and over again.

[0:38:19] Mike Reed: Do you know of any good decorators in the Rochester area?

[0:38:26] Deb Cleveland: I'm actually doing a flip right now in Rochester. I'm doing a repurposing of a church and two houses on the same lot. I wanna mention — networking is so important. I was literally sitting with an agent, and I said, "Hey, do you know anyone that's in trouble that needs help?" She goes, "Oh my god. I can't believe I didn't think of you. There's a church that's trying to evict a pastor." And I've never heard of that in my life — who evicts a pastor? She said they're really in trouble with this property, and there's two more houses on it. I said, well, I'm not interested in evicting a pastor, but we'll get it done. So I was able to pick up two houses and the church for $117,000.

[0:39:14] Mike Reed: Wow.

[0:39:16] Deb Cleveland: And I'm working on those right now. I don't know a decorator to answer your question, Mike. But they're easy to find.

[0:39:25] Jeff Scofield: Yeah. I've got somebody. See me after the show.

[0:39:27] Mike Reed: Because we retained one and their vision just wasn't very good. So now we're looking.

[0:39:39] Jeff Scofield: We're wrapping it up. Deb, once again, how can people get ahold of you?

[0:39:45] Deb Cleveland: W-W-W dot debcleveland dot com, just like my name, debcleveland.com. You can follow me on Facebook, and I'm also on YouTube.

[0:39:53] Mike Reed: Excellent. Thank you very much for the call, and I appreciate you being on the show.

[0:39:57] Jeff Scofield: Alright. We'll see you all next week.

House Talk Radio airs every Sunday from noon to 1pm on WHAM 1180. Hosted by Jeff Scofield (RE/MAX Plus), with co-hosts Mike Reed (All County Home Inspections) and real estate attorney John Marchioni. Call or text during the show: 222-1180 or 1-800-295-1180. Text Jeff directly at (585) 600-5333.

Posted by Jeff Scofield on February 24th, 2026

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