Mastering the Market | Barbara Isabel

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Episode Topics:

• Discover the real secrets to succeeding in the high-stakes Beverly Hills real estate market.
• Learn how Barbara Isabelle transformed her career path from law to leading a top real estate agency.
• Gain actionable advice on navigating market challenges and capitalizing on opportunities.
• Hear firsthand how personal drive and strategic branding can elevate your career.
• Be inspired by Barbara’s journey and motivational insights to propel your own success.

 

Rick Jordan  

Hey, what’s shakin, hey, I’m Rick Jordan today, we’re going all in. Today, this is gonna be a blast. Because real estate is always up and down, people think that they can make a lot of money from it. And I’ve known many, many agents who have gotten into the business and have just sucked. They just had they never made any money or a lot of people do it as a side hustle. But this is truly an awesome story today from someone who has really built a lot of wealth. A lot of good names for herself and has her own agency. It’s awesome. So I am welcoming Barbara Isabel to the show. What’s shakin,

 

Barbara Isabel  

Hey, hey, hey, guys, how are you?

 

Rick Jordan  

Oh, my gosh, I’m so excited to have you on because you have your own group. Right? That’s part of Keller Williams, you have your own group. And it’s of all places, Beverly Hills, which is pretty awesome to begin with.

 

Barbara Isabel  

It’s a it’s a good brand to have. I could have chosen any office, but I just think it shows the shows better. Oh,

 

Rick Jordan  

for sure. I mean, everybody equates Beverly Hills with like, the rich and famous, right? Yeah,

 

Barbara Isabel  

it’s like the dream for everybody to like me and live in Beverly Hills. It’s you know, it’s far from the truth. Like, you know, there’s a lot of things to like, and a lot of things about Beverly Hills, and I guess every other city. But if I was going to join any office I had to have the Beverly Hills fine because that’s kind of a little bit of a hybrid for my business. So you know, even though I specialize as I’m sure we will discuss in lands, multifamily, affordable housing, and maybe like Roundup development, that definitely happened at all, in the city of Beverly Hills, is also a very good hybrid to have, you know, the Beverly Hills zip code on my resume, because it obviously gives me a lot of liquid referrals.

 

Rick Jordan  

Does no doubt, you know, and what’s interesting is you mentioned something in there. And I know we were talking a little pre-show that you’re going to talk to the community and event I think it’s the Chamber of Commerce event. Is that what you said?

 

Barbara Isabel  

It’s the town hall,

 

Rick Jordan  

the town hall. That’s it cool. And it’s interesting. It’s it’s a big dichotomy, you know, because you’re in Beverly Hills, and yet, you’re going to go there and talk about multifamily affordable housing, which is pretty interesting. 

 

Barbara Isabel  

Like if you’ve been around in real estate, again, I haven’t been running real estate that long, even though I grew up in their business model was developed in Spain. My dad never even made it to this space. He never traveled to the States. When I was you know, a few years ago, I don’t need to say how that was back then. I’m getting I’m getting to that phase of my life, where when I moved here, I moved to LA to do my master’s degree, I went to law school. I went to Pepperdine. And that’s my background. That’s, you know, what I thought I wanted to do that was like what my dad always wanted me to do. I was, you know, raised very conservatively. And, you know, little did I know that I was gonna end up doing real estate, which, to me, the concept I had of real estate, especially here in LA was like, the reality TV shows. And I was like, I don’t know, that’s for me. You know, he’s like, too much exposure too much going on. Like, you know, I didn’t feel I had the personality for it. Until I realized that everything was really bullshit. It wasn’t like, you know, it wasn’t it wasn’t what they show.

 

Rick Jordan  

Oh, for sure. It’s a lot of masks. It’s a lot of, you know, playing life, so to speak, that you probably found, right? And that’s a complete contrast to what’s actually going on saying

 

Barbara Isabel  

That I’m sure applies probably to every other state. But there’s a saying that goes, you know, 5% of agents do 90% of their business, I could probably say 3% of pages 95% of their business.

 

Rick Jordan  

Wow, that’s so interesting. Because today’s your birthday, I won’t say how old you are, even though you look a lot younger than what you actually are. It’s so cool. Because you say you haven’t been in real estate really long. But yet you have your own group already. Which is quite an accomplishment. That’s fantastic.

 

Barbara Isabel  

When I first started the like in real estate, about five and a half years ago, I was cold calling. I had a strong accent. I looked very young. When I would go to my listing appointments. I always closed every single listing appointment, I had thrown my first two years in real estate. And I was competing against big agents. 

 

Rick Jordan  

How did you do that? How did you close every appointment?

 

Barbara Isabel  

I think they saw through me. Okay. There is something also I will say there is something that will cultural, you know, I’m from Spain and the way I was phrased, I’m just very genuine and passionate about everything I do. And I think they saw the passion in me. I was saying yes, do we need to see what he’s going like, after, you know, dedicating my life and eight years of my life, especially at that point to law, it was a big change for me. So I just needed I just needed to make up for it. You know, when I told my parents I was transitioning to real estate. I mean, it was terrible. They were like, Oh, you mean like where are you? What are you saying? And they will say Well, I think I can make it I said an a law flow is extremely helpful for my career. But there’s there’s a ceiling there’s a cap as to what I can make doing this. Like I get paid hourly I get paid a certain way that you know, it’s not going to allow me to like get to where I want to be. And my goal was always to honestly my I’m united and need to be super rich. I hope I get there and I think I will but my goal has always been to just live good believe that the way I was raised the same Same way I was raised. So you know, until I moved to LA, I never looked at prices and restaurants, you know, my parents wanted to travel, you know, everything in Europe is really close. So, you know, we went overseas five times a year. Like, to me, that was life. And that’s just what I want to do. But right now life is way more expensive than it was back then. So you just have to make up for all those things. If you wouldn’t believe that same lifestyle. Yeah,

 

Rick Jordan  

you can see your passion coming out. I love what you said a little bit ago, when you said, you saw the limitations with being a lawyer, you know, at least that whatever specific type of law you were billing for time, right, because time is a limited commodity. But now, I mean, I love it, that you have your own group, because you figured out how to amplify your time. You know,

 

Barbara Isabel  

when I got when I got into real estate, I started cold calling and got a few leads, you know, trying to sell some multimillion-dollar houses like everybody else, you know, does. And then I found a common pattern, which was every single client who had over a three to $5 million house, I’m not even going into the you know, 1015 $20 million range, which is right away very common in LA. Even in that at that price point. They all owned apartment complexes, some of them 20 units, some of them are 30 units. Some of them we’re working on, you know, a couple projects, and as I Okay, why are you doing this? Like, what is the benefit of investing in multifamily real estate? Then I learned about depreciation, then I learned about, you know, the cash flow would have refinances. I learned about all these beautiful things on top of the pretty, you know, it’s time their appreciation we get in LA in real estate. And I was like, Wait a second. So you can buy a property that will allow you to depreciate over 27 years. Okay, so that means when some of the money that I make is tax-free, which of course you know, we can get into detail if you want to, but all the benefits that come with investing in multifamily real estate, which by the way, this is not something that I just like dig into, like, this is something that I think like if you’re curious enough to know how you can legally save money on your taxes.

 

Rick Jordan  

 It’s going to come up in your mind for sure. Yeah. It’s never about paying anything. Taxation is never about paying nothing. It’s about paying the little possible that you actually legally owe. not overpaying. not overpaying. 

 

Barbara Isabel  

You got it? And obviously, I don’t want to get political because I don’t discuss politics. You know, I want to obviously, just talk yesterday about my business and what I do, and you know who

 

Rick Jordan  

I am, especially in California,

 

Barbara Isabel  

political. I was gonna say like, like a lot of people say like, oh like Trump does this, he does that. He doesn’t pay taxes. He’s not stealing money from anybody. The way he’s doing it is he owns apartment complexes, 50 of them in every city. So with a huge depreciation, he gets through that he can live tax-free the next day, the ones coming after him and the five generations after those. Yeah, it’s a very smart business plan. It’s you know, and again, it’s nothing like it’s not a secret, for sure. You know, I mean, so that was something that always caught my attention. And eventually, I feel that the logical path, if you go from, you know, trying to sell multimillion-dollar houses, they’re learning about multifamily. You learn about depreciation, and you obviously don’t want to buy retail most of the time, we better not have to pay, you know, three and a half million for something. But what if you, you know, get into the deal of fraud? What if you like, you know, partner with us, or, you know, with some of my clients, that’s what I did, and you’re getting from the beginning. So, you know, that’s, that’s, that’s the way it works out better, I think over time, but

 

Rick Jordan  

that’s really awesome.

 

Barbara Isabel  

Is this a benefit?

 

Rick Jordan  

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I’ve looked at the tax code before, and I’ve read things with the tax code, specifically that it’s, you know, two pages of the tax code are the taxes that you owe, you know, what I mean? And then it’s like the entire, like, rest of it, which is like 170-something pages how not to pay those taxes? I heard about that. Yep. And it’s so true, because it’s like, what what you’re talking about with Trump, it doesn’t matter about politics whatsoever. Not when did you know, it’s just its business plans, and then you can reinvest things. And it’s really cool, because a lot of the multifamily affordable housing, you’re actually doing a good thing for people too while you’re benefiting as a businesswoman, you’re doing a good thing by providing affordable housing to a lot of other people who might not generally get it instead, we have

 

Barbara Isabel  

We have a term here that I don’t even think he said probably our term whatsoever. Yes. So you know, in a case like, you know, this is how we call it meaning me, my partners, and the clients that I work with in the affordable housing world. It’s called Impact investing. So that’s what we’re doing. That’s all so yeah. Are we making money? Yes, absolutely. Otherwise, we wouldn’t do it. You know, we are not a nonprofit organization. And there are nonprofit organizations out there. We’re just not one of those. Yeah, you know, we want to provide a service we want to especially here in the city of LA we have a huge problem with housing. And the homeless situation is completely out of control. You know, I don’t know what the new show or doesn’t show because I don’t really watch the news that often. But the situation with the homeless is Sastre anyway.

 

Rick Jordan  

Yeah. San Francisco is both of those two cities in California. I

 

Barbara Isabel  

think it’s even worse. I think it’s even worse, but I hear I mean, it’s and then we’re paying like, you know, million dollars for pieces of dirt that are just like so. only buy up where you stand. And you know, it’s just, it’s really crazy. But again, if it makes money, it makes sense. So

 

Rick Jordan  

yeah, for sure. That’s so cool. How long did it take you to from getting into real estate to having your own group?

 

Barbara Isabel  

Five years?

 

Rick Jordan  

That’s, that’s fast. That’s a really quick, five years,

 

Barbara Isabel  

right, five years. So 2018 2018 I got my group in December of 23. So yeah, like, I would say it was the summer of summer of 2018., I started doing real estate, and I got in on December 23. So over five, just over five years. 

 

Rick Jordan  

Yeah, that’s awesome. That’s really, really quick. Congratulations, by the way. That’s fantastic. Yeah. Bad. Yeah. Well, you’re your own boss. You know, there are a lot of other people by doing it. Let’s, let’s talk about the event a little bit. Is that cool? It’s absolutely, you’re invited to talk about this event, which is tonight, you know, about multifamily, affordable housing? Why did the tone Why did the community invite you to speak about this? Why is it such a priority for him?

 

Barbara Isabel  

Well, I think I think my story is a good story overall. Like if you look at my background, you know, where I come from obviously I’ve made a lot, a lot of questions. You know, I’m relatively young. You know, I have a very strong accent, but you know, I made a thing in the city of LA. But yes, really being passionate about what I do.

 

Rick Jordan  

Because I’m 44 and I’m young, you’re relatively you are young.

 

Barbara Isabel  

noticed that lately, the fairies crisis? I don’t know if there’s such a thing. But um, yes, yes. 

 

Rick Jordan  

Making your thing is yes. But I

 

Barbara Isabel  

think that, you know, I’m, I’m not really I don’t really do any marketing. I don’t know, if you guys have had a chance to, you know, look at my Instagram, look at my website, like, I don’t really like, you know, spend any time on social media, very little tuna. But I think the number speaks for themselves, like, the more you encounter, like, as I say, you know, very few people in this business actually do business. And if you encounter somebody multiple times, I think that’s something that, you know, people appreciate. They started to, like, give you credibility, and you know, they’re like, oh, okay, so you know, even though she looks this way, she looks younger, she has an accent. And you can tell she wasn’t raised here. Even though all of that, like she’s actually doing business. So you know, to close, I don’t know what I chose today, maybe 100 deals? Who says maybe somewhere between 75 and 100? I’m not sure. Yeah, that’s incredible. But somewhere around there. Yeah. Yeah. You just city overlay, which is extremely competitive. Okay, so she’s been through quite a few transactions. Yeah, you’re a result of that. They look at my background, again, I am not the agent selling, you know, to $40 million houses a year and made 80 million a year on sales. But they look at my numbers, and I do a lot of volume. You know, so my sales are anywhere from like, you know, 500,000 to like two and a half. Most of them. That’s fine. We’ll say it like a sweet spot. But just a lot of them. Yeah. So I think that they were like curious to know, you know, how did I get to where I’m at today? How can I inspire other people to get involved in what I’m doing? Beverly Hills at the end of the day, they really like taking care of their community, but also they like, you know, people who make money. Yeah, yeah. You know, so I think if, you know, they know that what I’m doing makes money. So I think they also want to learn about it and be a little, you know, pick my brain for sure to see how we see that they can get involved or maybe take a part of it. 

 

Rick Jordan  

Yeah, well, that is a lot of transactions for just one day. That’s that’s a lot of transactions for one day. That’s when you talk about volume. I think that’s an understatement. 

 

Barbara Isabel  

It’s the number of transactions that I’ve done since I started, like five and a half, five and a half years ago now. 

 

Rick Jordan  

Yeah, that’s fantastic. You’ve got to have a pretty good-sized team to have it. But I think most importantly, you probably have this systematized at this point.

 

Barbara Isabel  

I didn’t have it system. Or sorry, I didn’t have a team until three months ago. Yeah. So free December 25. It was me and I

 

Rick Jordan  

Yep. Did you have a system that was absolutely it was like,

 

Barbara Isabel  

I had a girl that I tried to like to work with. But basically what I would do is I have a transaction coordinator, which is someone that handles the paperwork in the transactions, and I will pay her double her fee in every transaction. Yes to like, make sure that she went the extra mile on all of my files. So that’s fantastic. You know what I mean? If I send her all my client’s information, just have them deal with it. DocuSign this and that, obviously, she always sends me the paperwork first so I can approve it before she sends it out. Yeah, that’s what I did that was saying and then uniting the most transactions I had in escrow Tambu 11 That’s awesome. Yeah, and that’s gross. Yeah, yeah, that’s tender. I was like, Okay, I need some competent people, which is very difficult to find. Almost impossible. Almost.

 

Rick Jordan  

Sounds like you’ve been through some bad ones. A little bit. We all have, like,

 

Barbara Isabel  

I tried six different people last year. Wow. And it’s difficult because they think, okay, you know, they think that you’re going to hand them the business, and they’re going to start making money like, three weeks later. You know, if anyone would have given me the opportunity I’m giving any of these mentees? Yeah, I mean, I would have that would have made my life so much easier. I have accomplished what I might like, way faster. Yeah, I don’t have anybody.

 

Rick Jordan  

I like how you call them mentees also, because they’re not just employees, right, they’re coming underneath, 

 

Barbara Isabel  

You know, there’s an opportunity for growth. They don’t just get paid well, they get paid, I give them bonuses, and if I close a deal, they make money too nice. Nice. In my very first grade, something that nobody really offered, on my call was to listen, if I made them happy, they would make me money. And eventually, if they want to fly solo, they will fly solo, there is really no competition with what I do. I you know, I’m a very, I’m really a land expert consultant, you know, specialized in expediting and stuff with the city of LA and the housing department, I have great relationships with them, that I will through the years, there’s no way to compete with that, at the end of the day, like I put the house in apartment, and I’m like this, and this process that is taking them literally about 16 to 18 weeks, I can get it done in five weeks. There’s no one that can do that. Because because they know how I operate. For sure. That’s the value that I provide to the developers that I work with. So as a result of that, I also opened in our company last year, when I’m doing basically Lam consulting, and I’m just helping expedite all city paperwork for anyone who wants to, you know, to use my services. So far I signed, like my fourth client, like two weeks ago. It’s nice.

 

Rick Jordan  

That’s awesome. extra cash flow. For sure. I have a question regarding your mentee’s day when you bring them on. Right. Because it’s, it’s only been a few months. My guess is that you have some kind of speech that you give to them, you know, ahead of time, because it’s, you’ve gone through some bad people. So how do you frame it up for them to be like, Hey, this is what it’s going to be like with me?

 

Barbara Isabel  

I say very simply, you want to work and make money, you’re going to make money, but you have to work, it’s not just gonna come to you. Now, if I see consistency, if you follow what I’m telling you to do, and if you do what I’m asking you to do, you will be making money in less than two months. Like know just what you’re making, you will get a bonus in less than two months, because some of the stuff that we buy, we don’t only do affordable multifamily, we do a lot of flipping. That’s how we, you know, pay our payroll. So you know, flip site, we can close in 1014 days, it’s all cash transactions. Those are easy. So you know, if I close a deal, and I make 1000, I will give them a third, I will give them 2500 Whatever it is, yeah, like, it’s not for me, it’s not about like, even if I have someone who like really wants to learn, like I want to teach them like I’m excited to teach

 

Rick Jordan  

I want to teach them like I’m excited to teach people. I love that. That’s awesome. People

 

Barbara Isabel  

feel like oh, there’s no competition with what I do even know that people the way I do you know what I mean? And I had somebody that I was teaching last year decided to try to go solo. And she actually closed one deal with one of my, you know, one of my many clients, let’s put it that way. But they weren’t, they weren’t exclusive to me. They said, Okay, no problem. I say, now you want me to know, I got it. I got it. problems arose after they closed the transaction, which I could have foreseen, you know because he didn’t have the expertise that I have. And they can run into me both. That’s so cool. And I said, Listen, I said, I will help you as much as I can help you I say, but I want X amount of money. That’s what I want.

 

Rick Jordan  

You want. It’s only fair. Yeah, you give them you give them

 

Barbara Isabel  

one use in the past without asking for anything hoping that case, I’m getting you out of this mess. But then you realize people really listen, everything works both ways. It cannot work one way and I am given opportunities to do it that way and then receive nothing. So I’m not doing that anymore. I used to be, I used to be a lot more naive, you know, a lot nicer. Like all this. Now there is no halfway for me like we’re talking about something. First of all, my work means everything to me. And if I say something, I mean it. And then if that’s not good enough, we’re putting it in writing. Then then I don’t have a reason to do business with you. I’m sure there are not 100 People who sign it. So absolutely. We need to understand that this company is not willing to do that. There is a reason for it. Yeah, right on.

 

Rick Jordan  

Right. A lot of time just laziness. I really think because it just thinks it’s going to come to them.

 

Barbara Isabel  

Yeah, yeah, whatever it is, like I’m not I don’t want to be a part of it. Yeah.

 

Rick Jordan  

I’m with you. Know, Oh, I love it. Well, I’m excited for you to talk about this stuff tonight. I wish I could be there myself. To hear you talk about this.

 

Barbara Isabel  

My friends are gonna think of videos.

 

Rick Jordan  

Please, I want to see those. It’s awesome. I’m impressed. It’s been only five years from just starting in the business to having your own group and you’ve got everything ready to go. I appreciate your heart. I appreciate your spirit. I appreciate your fire. All right. So we’ve got to send everybody somewhere I know you don’t do a lot of marketing. But where can everybody find you?

 

Barbara Isabel  

Instagram, Barbara Isabel, our elite real estate. That’s my Instagram if you want to reach out To me, my email address is pretty much the same as you know gmail.com. And I will say that’s the best way to find me. You can you know, DM me, you can email me, you can call me my cell phone, my actual cell phone. I’m not one of those who has three different cell phones. I only have one is in there. I’m very open. You know, I’m very open about everything I do. I’m very passionate about what I do. I’m starting my own fund now. We’re looking to raise about 20 million to Oh, deep into, you know, affordable housing, and a bunch of other funny stuff. So I just pretty much you know, you can find me there but I also was there anybody out there especially in the city of LA to compete with what I can offer?

 

Rick Jordan  

That’s awesome. From lawyer to real estate agent to real estate group owner and now to impact investor. Barbara, thank you for coming on today and just making us all smile.

 

Barbara Isabel  

Thank you so much, Rick, thank you so much for having me.