{"id":5354,"date":"2023-07-20T16:28:18","date_gmt":"2023-07-20T20:28:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/?p=5354"},"modified":"2023-07-20T16:30:41","modified_gmt":"2023-07-20T20:30:41","slug":"interview-with-marki-lemons-ryhal-the-queen-of-foreclosures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/interview-with-marki-lemons-ryhal-the-queen-of-foreclosures\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Marki Lemons-Ryhal – the Queen of Foreclosures"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Marki Lemons-Ryhal is a top real estate broker, educator, and speaker. As an agent in Chicago, she became an expert in foreclosures and short sales. Today, she focuses on teaching other real estate professionals how to improve their business with social media marketing and AI tools like ChatGPT<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We recently sat down with Lemons-Ryhal<\/a> to get her take on the U.S. housing market and what first-time investors should focus on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for a potential housing recession, Lemons-Ryhal doesn\u2019t see one in the near future.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Forecasts on U.S. Foreclosures and a Potential Recession<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

U.S. foreclosure activity dropped to an all-time low in 2021<\/a>. This has many wondering whether foreclosures will continue to increase in 2023.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lemons-Ryhal pointed out that we aren\u2019t seeing a current uptick in foreclosures in every market. However, we should be seeing an increase, especially in the fourth quarter of this year. Why? Because many struggling homeowners received forbearances on their mortgages during the COVID-19 pandemic but haven\u2019t returned to repayment status. This means there\u2019s a backlog of foreclosures waiting to happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMost of us actually thought that we were going to see them in 2022,\u201d Lemons-Ryhal said. \u201cSo, it’s kind of like we’re waiting on them to come. There are a lot of indicators that show that we should have them, but they have not hit the market.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for a potential housing recession, Lemons-Ryhal doesn\u2019t see one in the near future. She cites the fact that many markets are still seeing multiple bid offers and even price increases as an indication that buyer demand is up. Plus, if interest rates cool down, as many expect they will<\/a>, \u201cwe\u2019re going to see a lot of buyers come back into the market.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You should direct your social media followers to your website, where you can collect their contact information. That way, your relationships with them aren\u2019t dependent on a platform.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Why Every Real Estate Investor Should Leverage AI and Social Media<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lemons-Ryhal thinks leveraging AI is a natural move for investors. \u201cInvestors have always been focused on numbers in business,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd so, if they want to increase their return on investment and their return on time invested, AI will allow them to be more efficient over time thereby earning more money.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How exactly does AI do this? By helping investors run custom reports, generate spreadsheet formulas, and reach out to business partners faster. Some AI tools, for example, let you customize a single message to many different homeowners based on their personalities. According to Ryhal, this could potentially increase your productivity by 13%, \u201cwhich is a large margin for an investor,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked for her biggest tip on implementing an AI strategy as an investor, Ryhal-Lemons said, \u201cI just want them to go back and look at any redundant tasks that they don’t like.\u201d From there, investors can identify ways AI can help. For example, ChatGPT can help<\/a> create HTML code for PowerPoint presentations or VBA code for spreadsheets. The goal is to accelerate \u201call forms of communication.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for social media, Ryhal-Lemons credits it with allowing her to build a global presence. But she also warned that it\u2019s not enough to just post updates about your life. \u201cYou have to be a content creator,<\/a>\u201d she said. \u201cThere are so many agents who don’t have any true content that benefits people long term.\u201d Additionally, you should direct your social media followers to your website, where you can collect their contact information. That way, your relationships with them aren\u2019t dependent on a platform, and \u201cyou can follow up with them in your desired communication style moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy goal is to get people to six figures in twelve months, leveraging social media and technology,\u201d Lemons-Ryhal said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

How to Get Started as a First-Time Real Estate Investor<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Lemons-Ryhal, first-time investors<\/a> should look for communities with the fastest rate of sale, at the highest price point, and with the fewest barriers to entry. To do this, they need to have access to local multiple listing services (MLSs) and study different markets. Then, \u201cthey can see a return on their time and their money faster.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lemons-Ryhal also suggested leaning into current consumer needs. For example, housing affordability is down right now, which means investing in tiny homes and other accessory dwelling units (ADUs) or finding ways to repurpose commercial property into residential units could be good areas to focus your investments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The point is that first-time investors<\/a> should seek out not only profitable markets but also markets where they can differentiate themselves and supply a real need. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf we’re not leveraging ChatGPT for those purposes, we’re missing out on a business game changer,\u201d she said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Lemons-Ryhal\u2019s Mentoring Success, Retirement Plans, and Final Advice<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lemons-Ryhal has about 315 agents under her brokerage and four offices in Chicago. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked about her top mentoring success story, she told us about her agent Nicole Wheatly<\/a>, with whom she started working in 2018. \u201cOur first year selling real estate, she closed $142,000 in gross closed income working part-time,\u201d Lemons-Ryhal said. By the end of her second year, Wheatly was making over $200,000 in gross closed income. Now Ryhal-Lemons is helping her implement systems to free up more of her time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy goal is to get people<\/a> to six figures in twelve months, leveraging social media and technology,\u201d Lemons-Ryhal said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We also asked Lemons-Ryahl whether she ever sees herself retiring. \u201cI’m going to be financially eligible to retire on July 31st, 2033,\u201d she said. \u201cI’m not sure if I am going to physically retire, but I will have enough money to retire and maintain my lifestyle because I am planning with the end in mind, and I want the opportunity to retire if I desire. I really want to be able to see if I love real estate that much.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, Lemons-Ryhal left us with some parting advice regarding recent social media trends: \u201cI’m seeing today everybody’s talking about trying out Threads<\/a>, but they don’t have a written business plan. They haven’t tried ChatGPT. They don’t know who their target audience is. What I would encourage people to do is to leverage AI<\/a> in their businesses before they go to try another social platform.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf we’re not leveraging ChatGPT for those purposes, we’re missing out on a business game changer,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marki Lemons-Ryhal is a top real estate broker, educator, and speaker. As an agent in Chicago, she became an expert in foreclosures and short sales. Today, she focuses on teaching other real estate professionals how…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":5364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[413,666,619,217,704,11,181,150,430,703],"class_list":["post-5354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-real-estate-investing-articles","tag-2023-forecast","tag-ai","tag-chatgpt","tag-covid-19","tag-first-time-investor","tag-foreclosure","tag-newbie","tag-real-estate-agent","tag-recession","tag-social-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/41"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5354"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5366,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354\/revisions\/5366"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propertyonion.com\/education\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}