Our Introduction Charlie and Randy France Nine years ago, Randy told me we were going to a seminar. Ugh! How totally boring. In fact it sounded like school, and I hated school. All I could remember from my school days was sitting in a chair for hours listening to some boring lecture or lesson on something I could have cared less about. After all, I was going to be a housewife and mother. Why in the world would a housewife need to know how to speak French or need to know about the fall of the Roman Empire? So I went along and I don’t think I heard a word of what was said by Charles Givens. But oh Randy loved it. He has always had a thirst for knowledge. When we were first married his favorite television station was the Discovery Channel. Mine was M.T.V. So you can see how different we were. Let me tell you a little about where we were in our lives. He had two kids; I had three, now we have five. We both went through tough divorces and were thousands and thousands of dollars in debt when we married. We had to borrow his sister’s car to go get married and we were both working full time and more. We had our share of “Kleenex” stories but we knew that better times had to be ahead. As time went by I was the good little wife and attended a number of seminars with him. I soon started to realize that all of these people were so happy and had such a positive attitude about everything. Before I knew what was happening we got into real estate. Actually it happened by accident. Randy’s brother needed a place and Randy financed it for him, and later had it as a rental property. It worked out pretty good so we stumbled around and purchased a few more. It was kind of fun. With the five kids and a lot of debt any extra income we could come up with was great. We really didn’t know what we were doing but we knew it could make us a little money so we kept playing around with it. We also knew we were tired of just getting by. We answered an ad in the paper about a local group here in Indianapolis and started going to their meetings. It was getting pretty interesting. Then we were invited to a Mark O. Haroldsen’s fifteenth Convention in Florida. Wow! I had only been to Florida once before for an Amway Convention. I was excited. Maybe we would go sight seeing. If I could get Randy out of that seminar we could even have some sort of vacation. While we were at that Convention we met Mark O. Haroldsen, Carlton Sheets, and some guy named Ron LeGrand. In fact I distinctly remember a picture on an overhead of a house with a tree that had fallen through the middle of it. He asked, “Would anyone buy this house?” Then he answered his own question. “I did and I made twenty thousand dollars.” That’s when I started listening. I couldn’t believe this guy. He was just a guy. Just like us. But according to him he was making thousands and thousands of dollars. It certainly was something to think about. I wondered if he was really making that much money. He sure didn’t look like he was rich. But that’s what I liked about the guy. Then Randy broke the news to me. He wanted to buy some “Kit” Ron LeGrand was selling. So that was how this LeGrand guy was making his money! $1,000.00 for a book and some tapes. That was like a million dollars to me. Randy could see the future. I could only see myself clipping coupons forever to pay for this so called kit. So we left Florida without a kit. We just didn’t have the money to spend. It was all we could do to pay for our trip down there. During that year we didn’t buy any more houses but we kept busy taking care of the properties we did have. I think in the back of our minds there was a reminder that maybe we could change our lives. The next year we went to the convention again. This time the seminar seemed different. Randy would say it was because I listened. He is probably right. But we did buy Ron LeGrand’s books and tapes this time. That was in 1993. In 1995 we went to a Ron LeGrand Wholesale Retail Boot camp. That’s when our life started to change. The live boot camps gave us the confidence to do what they said was being done. I also think the people we met at the boot camps and talked to were just as important to us. It was good to hear that other people were doing the same things we were doing and what they were doing differently in their business compared to ours. We started seriously buying and rehabbing houses. In 1997 we attended our first Multiple Offer Strategy Boot camp. Wow! There was this concept of buying pretty houses and getting them deeded to you. This caught my attention. I was so tired of using charge cards to buy houses and taking money out of my pocket. I was tired of dirty houses that needed repairs and tenants who didn’t have a checking account let alone a down payment. If I could get free houses and not have to do repairs it would be great. The rest is as they say history. We decided to start “getting the deed”. From then on that was the only way we purchased houses. To date we have fifty-seven homes and forty-six of them we have purchased “Subject To” by getting them deeded to us. **”Subject To” means purchasing the home subject to the existing mortgage. We do not get a new loan on the home. Actually it means we own the home, they (the seller) owns the loan. The other eleven homes we own are homes we purchased when we first started. We have probably purchased over one hundred homes Subject To and that is the only way we buy houses. If you asked me why our life changed I would say that we were truly looking for a way to make a change. We saw the difference in the attitude of the people we met at those conventions. They weren’t sitting around waiting for Publisher’s Clearing House to knock on their door and make them rich. If you asked me how our life has changed I would tell you that I love this business and how it has brought Randy and I closer as a couple. The shows Randy watches on Discovery Channel are now the ideas for trips we take. No more just seeing it on television. I still love music but now I can go to live concerts wherever they are. We’ve helped so many other people change their lives. From the people we buy houses from to the people we sell houses to. We have been able to help our kids and our families more that we ever would have been able to. And we are rich with friendships that are positive and rewarding. Retire? Our idea of retirement is buying houses as we travel the country. We will never get tired of this business because every deal is different just like every seller or buyer is different. We love the challenge of creating the deal and making it work for all involved. I am sure once you get started you will too. Charlie and Randy France | 
