John Collins - Buy a Home With $0 Down
John Collins is on a mission to help renters break the rent cycle and achieve homeownership with little to no money down. With nearly four decades of experience in real estate and sales, John found his true calling in homebuyer education, teaching everyday renters how to use grants and down payment assistance programs to buy homes they never thought were possible. Through his initiative, Own The Roof, he’s helped thousands of families move from renting to owning by closing the “possibility gap” and showing that you don’t need perfect credit, 20% down, or insider knowledge—just the right strategy. John now reaches renters nationwide through free webinars, practical education, and tools like NoDownPayment.app, where you can search over 2,500 homebuyer assistance programs available across the U.S.
In this episode, you will be able to learn:
- How renters can qualify for zero-down homeownership using down payment assistance (DPA) programs and grants.
- Where to find over 2,500 national and local homebuyer assistance programs tailored to your financial profile.
- How to stack multiple grants and assistance programs to significantly reduce (or eliminate) out-of-pocket costs.
- Creative ways to structure transactions—including lender credits, CRA funds, and premium pricing—to get deals across the finish line.
- Strategies to increase credit scores quickly and qualify for more favorable homebuyer programs.
- How first-time buyers can use Down Payment Assistance programs to purchase small multifamily properties (1–4 units) and begin investing.
- Why current housing policy trends and government initiatives may expand opportunities for first-time homebuyers in the near future.
The key moments in this episode are:
3:44 John’s Path Through Real Estate And Finance
8:12 Collapse, Recovery, And Discovering DPA
11:28 The Landscape Of Grants And Forgivable Seconds
14:50 How Own The Roof Helps Buyers
18:15 House Hacking With 1–4 Units
21:40 Stacking Programs For Maximum Benefit
25:10 Rent Trends And The Case For Buying
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Full transcript here:
John Collins
We were able to rebuild and qualify for down payment assistance programs and grants. And oddly enough, at the 11th hour, when my wife and I were buying a home, the loan officer switched gears and never really submitted it for the DPA programs because we still had a few thousand dollars sitting in a straight IRA. As a result, I still actually thank them today because it pushed me on this path where I decided that, you know what, I'm going to get back into real estate. I'm going to educate people on these programs that a lot of lenders are aware of, but never make they they just never offer them as an option.
Mike Swenson
Welcome to the Real Freedom Show. We inspire you to pursue your passion to gain time and financial freedom through opportunities in real estate. I'm your host, Mike Swenson. Let's get some real freedom together. I'm your host, Mike Swenson. If you want to get started on your real estate journey, check out our website freedomthroughrealestate.com. That's freedomthroughrealestate.com. That's where we put all of our content, all of our episodes, articles, really with the goal to inspire you. If you're considering a career in real estate, looking to do something in real estate, we want to help provide education and inspiration for you. So we tell great stories and interview great people and talk about their backgrounds as a way to show you that uh real estate's possible and uh exciting and fun. And so I've been in real estate full time for the last 12 years now and really enjoy it and want other people to do that as well. So today we're gonna talk a lot about home ownership. And so we've got John Collins here from Own the Roof. He's working on helping renters achieve home ownership with zero down, lots of down payment assistant programs and helping people. And so, with 37 years of experience in real estate and sales, you discovered your true calling, which is home buyer education. And so, really, your goal is to bridge the possibility gap, the belief that home ownership is out of reach versus the reality that assistance programs make it possible. And so, super excited to talk about this as a topic we don't cover a whole lot. And so, John, we're excited to have you on the show and share with us today.
John Collins
Yeah, thank you very much, Mike. Appreciate it.
Mike Swenson
So, start us off a little bit, talk about your background and kind of what got you into where you're at today with Own the Roof.
John Collins
So, uh background, I mean, I got real estate back in 1987, by the way of just a young kid watching an infomercial one day and uh being at college and uh lo and behold, got my real estate license. I think I was 21 or 22 years old. Really enjoyed it. Amazing to see where things were back then and where they are now. It's almost barbaric to look back to the 80s and think that real estate was done that way. But that being said, real estate really didn't work for me as I got married and started raising a family. So I exited that to the finance world and spent over 20, probably close to 25 years in the finance world. From there, worked at a company that we had some really explosive growth. So had a really nice ride there. The refinances treated everybody quite well and actually still even do today to some degree, but uh decided that I could build a better mousetrap. My business was based on going out and you know, calling on realtors, builders, things like that. So I didn't really align with the refi world as much. So I thought I could build a better mousetrap, opened my own mortgage company. Um, we kind of evolved into a uh hard money company over time. And we at the same time we had some investors that popped in and liked what we were doing, didn't steal a deal there, but we opened a title company together. And that title company actually exploded. We jumped into refinance, not refinances, but more foreclosures. So we aligned with joint ventures with all the foreclosure law firms in the Detroit metropolitan area, you know, 2005 and on. And it was just it was a nice ride until it wasn't, until one day somebody came to me with a check and we didn't realize how much our bookkeeper was embezzling. So the next dip down, it was it was a tough, uh, tough ride. Uh good learning lesson. Uh my father always tells me it was an MBA for uh for financial services and meltdowns, that's for sure. From there, the mortgage company was one step away. We had our warehouse line through Chase Bank. And this is one thing I always caution people. Uh one day my wife calls me and says, Hey, you know, there's no money in the checking account. Can you transfer some? No big deal. Call Chase, you know, hey, I need to transfer money in personal accounts. Um, sorry, your account has zero. So I go up to Chase and realize that Chase not only shut down our warehouse line in every single contract in the fine print, all these banks have the ability to jump into your personal account and grab all the funds. So it was a really hard. So I I share that with people because don't keep all your eggs in one basket with any lending institution. So that was those two things were a really hard financial meltdown for me. Um and bankruptcy, foreclosure, you name it. That was around the 2012 mark. I exited real estate and then decided it was actually in the automotive finance area. Something I actually detested. It's amazing the products that they try to push on people in those rooms. But at that point in time, we were able to rebuild and qualify for down payment assistance programs and grants. And oddly enough, at the 11th hour, when my wife and I were buying a home, the loan officer switched gears and never really submitted it for the DPA programs because we still had a few thousand dollars in a straight IRA. As a result, I still actually thank them today because it pushed me on this path where I decided that, you know what, I'm gonna get back into real estate. I'm gonna educate people on these programs that a lot of lenders are aware of, but never make they they just never offer them as an option. And it's their byproduct, in my opinion, of maybe limited funding, limited sources. Nobody wants to get people's hopes up and not be able to deliver. So as I started to peel back on that about gosh, it would be about 12 years ago now, I discovered there are so many grants and down payment assistance programs out there for first-time home buyers. Uh, right now, the database that we tap into have over 2,500 programs and grants across the country. So people are getting crazy amounts of money right now. Just to kind of give you uh an idea, right now, some anybody buying in New York in the five boroughs,$200,000 available. Actually, it was$261. California was$160,000. Miami, oddly enough,$200,000 available for down payment assistance programs. So these are forgivable seconds that are out there. And I feel like a lot of the mortgage world kind of beats these programs up a little bit because they they're just they don't always have the funding that a lot of people would hope for. They might be an additional hoop to jump through, but uh the way things are going right now with the average first-time home buyer about to hit 40 years old in this country, I feel like we need to look at all the different paths that are out there. So I've made it my mission to educate people on all of these DPA programs and grants that are out there. So I do it through free webinars, uh tools, wrote a book on it. Happy to share that with your uh your listeners as well. Um and uh so I found that the biggest piece that's missing in this arena is education. People just don't know, they just don't have a reliable source. And once I stepped back into the industry 12 years ago and started going down this, it's all I call it a rabbit hole because it just doesn't end. It keeps giving. And I found that the man that I used to be chasing numbers to define success now is defined by how many people can I educate in successful stories? Can I get across the finish line? And then those numbers that I used to strive for to be the leader on the sales board, now it's just a byproduct of how many people, and I find that I'm actually a happier man and a better man for it. So sorry for that long-winded uh bio there, but uh that's my story.
Mike Swenson:
No, that's great, and that's exactly why we love people sharing, because you know, I talk about how in real estate there's different paths that people can take, different journeys, different things within the industry that people bounce around to, and and so you gain some education, some experience in one area, and you hop over somewhere else, and you hop over somewhere else. And so I always tell people, you know, it's an it's an entrepreneurial playground inside of real estate. There's a lot of things that you can do with it, and uh, and a lot of ways to help people. And so excited to see that that was similar for you, jumping around in a few different spots and doing a few different things inside of real estate, and and now you're in a spot where you're you know helping people out and educating people and and making the dream of of home ownership come true. Talk a little bit about own the roof and you know what what you're doing and how that works and the education programs that you have. And and two, for people listening that are looking, you know, for home ownership, you've stumbled across the podcast here somehow, and we we know that home ownership rates are falling. And so um, there's a lot of programs out there to help people. So kind of walk us through if if if I was coming to you and saying, hey John, help me, um, what are some things that we should be thinking about and knowing about?
John Collins
So the first thing in, in my opinion, is we want to identify what programs are out there. And people can go to my website and there's actually a link where you can click on it, and it's owntheroof.com. If you go there and click on the link to take you to the program search, enter your information. And it really is catered to what you are looking for. If you're looking to be a single family owner, uh just for single family residence, great, enter your information. It'll spit out all of the programs that qualify. There are actually right now, I see a growing segment of the uh Y's and Z that are actually looking for the investment component. And these programs actually pay, uh they actually play well on that side too. So if you're looking for, if you're looking to be a wannabe investor, let's say, looking one to four units, these programs can be used on one multifamily properties up to four units. So what a great way to cut your teeth on the investment side. Now, you are gonna live in one of those units in order to qualify. But you know, if you're young and starting out and you have that entrepreneurial spirit and want to be that investor, oh my gosh, why not try why not try that out? Especially if they're forgivable loans. So you don't have to be in these things too long. Uh most of them I find have a forgivable component to it, whether you're there three, four, five years. Uh, myself, I always tell people, let's gravitate to the free grant money first. And then if we can stack other programs on top, we certainly want to do it. And that's another conversation. If your credit is in a decent spot, typically above 680, it's not uncommon to stack two or three programs on top of each other. So, for example, I just had a lady that closed last Friday. She get she basically received a$75,000 DPA program that she has to pay back, 100%, no payments, no interest, no nothing. But whenever she sells the house, they want that money back. But we were able to stack on top of it a$7,500 uh closing cost grant, free money to cover her closing cost, uh, a$5,000 grant, and a$500 appraisal grant. So she just she hit a home run. So um some areas of the country that doesn't work well, but I'm located just outside of Detroit, and I will tell you that amount of money goes a long way on the house here.
Mike Swenson
Yeah, for sure. That's great. And yeah, I think it it starts with not knowing what's out there because even me, so I err more on the investment side now. I'm located in Minnesota. I'm I'm a realtor. Um, I don't specialize in working with first-time home buyers anymore. We have some people on our team that do, but I don't necessarily know where where those programs are or what's available out there. Now I can do a little research, but I think people probably don't understand that there's there's a lot out there for people. And so it probably starts with that as what's out there for me instead of is there anything out there for me?
John Collins
I I really from an investment standpoint, I have a few investors that love working with it just for the fact that most of these renters that are going to end up buying the homes that they're living in, they tend to pay a little bit more, okay, because they're tapping into all of this free money. And more often than not, they're able to get into it with less of a payment than what they're paying in rent. Now, some areas of the country that becomes a little bit trickier conversation. So, uh, but in my mind, it's all about locking in. Because right now, uh, regardless of what people say about rents, I do not see them going down anytime soon. So uh, worst case, they may hold for a year or two. But uh, I do hear some reports where people say the rents are sliding. I don't see it in my market, and I don't see it with most of the first-time home buyers that I work with across the country. I find if the rents are sliding, they're sliding on the high end. Okay, the people that the, you know, the people that least afford it. It's the people that need it the least are typically getting that little bit of a breather from rents, not the people that need it.
Mike Swenson
I was gonna say to your point, too, with the small multifamily investment opportunities. I just had a conversation here yesterday with somebody looking to purchase a property and and maybe do it as a four-plex, you know, triplex type thing and live in one of the units. And I I tell people if I could go back in time, that would be where I would start if it was the right situation for me. And you know, because that's a great way to get that home ownership, start that equity train, if it works out for you, and be able to have the low Dow payment on a house. Because otherwise, yeah, if you're not living in it, you're probably paying 25% down on a loan. But if you are living in it, it's it's significantly lower. And so that's a great way to get the home ownership piece and the investment piece in one.
John Collins
Oh, absolutely. I think if I had same thing, like if I had a do-over, I would definitely look in some of those higher-end markets. You do you, you know, you take one of these programs, you get in with just a few thousand. You basically, you could get a million-dollar four-plex with very little money out of pocket, and then throw a cost seg on top of it. If you're in a high income era, oh my gosh, the benefits are huge. So um, yeah, it's uh a lot of tools at people's fingertips right now, they just don't realize it's out there.
Mike Swenson
So, kind of step one, going out, seeing what programs are out there, where do people go from there?
John Collins
So, from there, I you want to see where your credit is. That's the next thing. Um, income, obviously, we need to be able to support the payments. Okay. Uh many times on a lot of these DPA programs, if you go into the multi-units, they will use the they will use the future income from all of those units and add that to your income. So don't be afraid of those. I I know it's a little intimidating when you start looking how big those payments are, but when if your income isn't there and we start, we have to add that income from those other units, whether they're rented out or not, a lot of these programs are very forgiving on that side right now, without any vacancy factors, too, which is odd. It's so everything is in that small investor favor right now. So I think if there's anybody out there looking, you're foolish not to go down that road.
Mike Swenson
And so for people, you know, kind of understanding their credit or maybe their credit isn't the best. What can they do, or how do you kind of work through them or give them resources to help them?
John Collins
Great question. So that's the typically the two biggest things that I run into is you know, people think that they're held back by money. Obviously, money is the easy part for me. I know that sounds odd, but uh the next thing is credit. And as a result, I do do credit repair webinars to teach people some quick fixes, how to get your scores up 60 points in 60 days. We almost have to do that in order to be that full circle, um, because there are a lot of people that are just a couple little maneuvers away from a quick spike in their score. Now, with that being said, some of these programs are very forgiving. They go deep on credit. I mean, for the most part, you can typically find something as long as your credit scores are above a 580, where we can get you in with zero down. Now, if we are lower than that, you have to keep an eye open for grant money. Grant money is typically running out, especially this time of year. We're gonna start to see, you know, hopefully we don't run into some type of shutdown, but because I feel like the last shutdown is pushing some of those grant funds out a little bit. So um, a lot of grant money has no uh credit score requirements tied to it. So, for example, I'm waiting for one right now. Uh I'm just outside of Detroit. Last the past three years, we had a$25,000 grant that hits beginning of the year, no credit score requirement. So imagine this you tend you put that on top of an FHA. So$25,000 on an FHA, that takes us 10% down on a$250,000 house. You can get credit scores done in the deep$500, all the way down to, I would say comfortably$540. I have got some people with down as low as$520, but that was isolated. Okay. That's it's a little tougher when we start navigating. But we have to align ourselves with lenders that you know don't have those overlays that a lot of mortgage companies and banks do, where they stop at a hard 580.
Mike Swenson
Great. So you're helping people find the programs, you're helping people figure out their credit. What else? Are you looking to get started or scale in real estate investing but don't know your next step? Are you overwhelmed thinking about finding deals, analyzing deals, doing due diligence, and managing properties on top of it? Go ahead and push the easy button and invest with us. Real estate investing is what we do full time. We've done dozens of deals with hundreds of doors. We have the knowledge and experience to handpick the best deals that most investors can't find. We've at large off-market deals all the time where you can hopefully find returns and economies of scale that you just can't find on your own. The best thing is it's 100% passive to you for less capital than you put down trying to acquire a property on your own. Don't let this year go by where you don't make the leap, add to your portfolio, or you just did an analysis by paralysis. To find out more, visit Freedom Throughrealestate.com and click on invest. You can book a call and learn more there. So get to scaling your portfolio now with us by your side. That's freedomthroughrealestate.com and click on invest.
John Collins
Structuring the transactions. Oddly, that's that's one of the things that I think a lot of people forget about. Okay. Um, we can get you the money and get your credit up, but we need to structure the transactions so we're working within your pocketbook. Okay. So um, because what we don't want to do is set anybody up for failure. In addition, we want to make sure that we align you with professionals that know how to get these deals done. Most agents, when you put a deal in front of them and say, okay, this person's approved for a zero-down FHA, but I need you to get some concessions from the seller. Most realtors roll their eyes. I can't get concessions. They're, you know, in I'm telling you, concessions are out there. They are on the horizon, too. Okay. The market that we have seen for the past 10 to 12 years, that's an anomaly. We are way overdue for a correction. Now, do I think that correction is going to uh compromise values? Probably not. And the reason I say that is the rental market is in such disheartening shape right now that that drives that entry level in every market. So I feel like those values may not appreciate at the rate that we've seen over the past, you know, five, 10 years, of course, but I feel like they'll hold. And they're going to hold because that rental community is going to be wising up. And I also think the floodgates are going to be open up in Washington. Um, I don't know how many of uh your listeners caught uh U.S. Secretary Bissent, which in my mind is Trump's financial man. That's it. He did an interview on Labor Day stating that there is a housing emergency. And he used the word crisis. So they uh he came out and said, we are not pulling any programs off the table, no grants, no DPAs, we're leaving those alone. We're actually trying to come up with a plan to add to that, whether it's going to be a tax credit issued, you know, on your taxes or at the time of closing, that's I think what's in question. And I think if it wasn't for the fact that they had the shutdown for 40 days, I think we might be talking about it already. So he actually used the words don't be surprised if the president issues an executive order to combat this, because we as a country, we cannot let our first time homebuyer age combat. Continue to increase. I mean, 40 years old, that's I mean, that's a that's a pretty high age to be the first-time home buyer. So that's the number that I think most people should be concerned with and get in there. And I feel like the people that get out in front of this and have all of their ducks in a row, when all of this money comes out in the next month or two, uh, I think they're going to be prepared to actually do well. Hopefully they'll have the inventory levels where they need to be. I think that that's a concern. I don't want to repeat of what happened with COVID, where the money was out there and the inventory levels just watched prices skyrocket.
Mike Swenson
Yeah, I agree with your point in terms of the market being softer to where you can negotiate with sellers on some of this stuff. And so that's got to be at the right time. And we are at a time where it's it's yeah, it's it's significantly different than it was a couple years ago. Now, what happens for people that you know you had mentioned beginning of the year, some of these programs come out, maybe they run out of money. If I'm talking to you late in the year, is is the plan okay, we're just gonna sit and wait until the next year happens and maybe there's some new money available? I mean, imagine for some people it's the difference between, you know, getting the property they want and not. So waiting probably helps in those situations. And so kind of the two-part question there, that was one. Two is then are you kind of directly talking with their agent or whoever they're working with on the purchases to make sure that it is structured correctly? Because you said how important that is to make sure that the the deal is structured correctly, considering the financial parameters that that those clients are working in.
John Collins
Right. So great question. So, first and foremost, I am always a bird in the hand, okay? To sit here and wait for money that may or may not come, we don't know. We're one black swan event away from something dramatic. Yeah, who knows? I mean, COVID kind of reset things. So a bird in the hand. If things change and you miss out because something's there, I mean, hard to say. As far as structuring the transactions, I am always open for that. There are so many ways to structure a transaction beyond seller concessions. A lot of the times when I structure a transaction, I'll actually look for premium pricing. I'll go to the lender and say, hey, do you have any premium pricing available on this so we can get some lender credits to cover closing costs? Uh sometimes um I will intentionally make sure that we hit some of the mid-level or regional banks. A lot of these regional banks, especially the first of the year, they have what they call Community Reinvestment Act money that they have to deploy every year. So if you time it right, you can hit that CRA money, couple that with a grant and maybe a down payment assistance. And I call that just running the table. When you can stack three or four programs together, and every now and then I'll have somebody that you know is on a tight budget, and I'll have, you know, they're$500 off or something. Uh, I mean, it happens if deals get that skinny sometimes. So just call the loan officer. Hey, what bank are you with? How much do they get for opening a checking account? Great. They go up, throw$25 and they get a$500 credit for opening a checking account, and that$500 used for their closing. So there's a lot of ways to get these things across the finish line. But it's one of those things where each situation is just a little bit different. So um, but I'm always happy to have those conversations with agents and actually the consumers, because I feel like they want to be in on it. They want the education, they want the knowledge, they want to feel like they're a part of it and making the decisions. Um, especially in today's world, I feel like there's so many scams out there, especially with what I do. People oh all I hear it all the time that I'm a scam. But these programs are real. You can see them on my website, owntheroof.com. So I've been doing it a long time. But uh, that's probably the biggest thing that I combat is whether or not uh people believe that these things are legit or not.
Mike Swenson
You kind of share with us the basic points here, helping people get in. What else do people need to know? Or you mentioned own the roof.com. Anything else in terms of uh connecting with you and finding other resources?
John Collins
Boy, you know, I have a lot of resources on my website. We offer free webinars teaching people about these programs. We offer the tool where you can see, just go in. Uh I think it's no downpayment.ap is the website that our the application is tied to. There you can put any address in the country, your financial situation, and it will tell you how many programs are out there. From there, just enter your email address and phone number, and you'll be sent a list instantly of all the programs you qualify for. So just keep in mind we just we just use that data to send people invites to our webinars. We don't sell any data or anything like that. So from there, um, we do offer the credit repair webinar for people that might just miss on certain programs to try and coach them up as much as possible. And right now we're making a commitment to just reach out on LinkedIn a little bit more so we can get this word out with a lot of agents. One thing I do run into is there are a lot of people across the country that qualify for these programs, and I don't have agents in those markets that are willing to work with them. Okay. And ones that I can hand off with a high degree of certainty that they're going to get that quality representation that everyone deserves.
Mike Swenson
Awesome. Well, thank you, John, so much for coming on and sharing your story and sharing your program and how you guys are helping people. Check out own the roof.com, learn more about John, and best of luck to you in the future and excited to see how you continue to grow this and help more people.
