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Action Academy | Millionaire Mentorship For Your Life & Business
How To Hit Financial Freedom Through Mobile Home Park Investing w/ "The Lifestyle Investor" Justin Donald
00:51:14
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- [00:00]
Justin Donald
It's hard to figure out what it is that you really want to do and what the cadence of work is like. I didn't know what that would look like until I truly had financial freedom because I had to solve the financial equation. But once I solved the financial equation, I had all this clarity about what I wanted to do, how many hours I wanted to work, who I wanted to spend time with, the activities in the business that brought me energy and joy and the ones that didn't that I need to outsource, but I need to find the right people to outsource to.
- [00:33]
Brian Lubin
Welcome to the Action Academy podcast. Stand back while I celebrate freedom, the.
- [00:39]
Justin Donald
Show where we help you achieve financial.
- [00:42]
Brian Lubin
Independence with the mindsets, methods, and actionable.
- [00:46]
Justin Donald
Steps from guests who've already earned their freedom.
- [00:49]
Brian Lubin
The flags of freedom fly. Choose to do what you want, what.
- [00:55]
Justin Donald
You want with who you want with.
- [00:57]
Brian Lubin
Who you want, when you want, when you want with another episode today. Now, here's your host, Brian Lubin. All right. Justin Donald. Long time coming, brother. I'm so excited to have you, man. You've been, you've been recommended and requested over and over again for this podcast. It's finally the merging of the lifestyle guys and you wrote the book on it, man. So I'm excited to have you here.
- [01:28]
Justin Donald
Thanks, Brian. I'm excited to be here, excited to hang and. But it's fun. We got a chance to connect in person a couple of times. We threw our. Brad Wymer and I have invest, invested in some businesses and some office buildings together. And one of them, we throw an annual south by Southwest party that you tend to come to. I think you enjoy that. We love having you there, and it's good to connect always.
- [01:49]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, man. As always. So, yeah. And that's one of the reasons I moved to Austin, right? Because it's like you want to be. It's cool to be doing these calls, but it's even cooler to be in person doing the stuff, attending the same events together, wake surfing together, stuff like that. That's why it's so important. Proximity is power. So for people that are unfamiliar with Justin Donald, how do you pitch yourself to brand new people that have never heard of you before?
- [02:11]
Justin Donald
Well, that's a great question. Usually I just tell my story, and for me, I can sum it up pretty simply and just say I coined the term lifestyle investor and it's because it's what. It's who and what I want to embody. It's who I constantly aspire to be in that I want to buy my time back. I want to be living a purposeful life with intentionality, doing the things that I desire my family desires to do, spending time with people that matter most and doing the things that bring the most joy and fulfillment and passion. So that's it. That's the whole purpose of the brand. It's the whole reason that I even put any of this content out into the world is number one, it is a great reminder. It helps hold me accountable to how I want to show up. And number two, it's a great guiding, lighter principle for others looking to make that move and pivot.
- [03:06]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. And you have a couple of brands associated with that. You have the Lifestyle Investor podcast, you have the best selling book Lifestyle Investor and you have your own community as well. So you, you're very vertically branded there and I absolutely love it, man. So before we get into the asset portfolio and all this good stuff, was there a before and an after or was this always the guiding North Star for you? Because a lot of guys that we run in the circles with, they really had a before where maybe economically they crushed it and then there was a pivot point or multiple friction points where they realized this is not the way to happiness like I thought it would be.
- [03:42]
Justin Donald
Yeah, there's definitely a before and after. And I think sometimes it's that struggle. We were talking off air where the struggle can help define who you are. It can help you have the perspective when things are going better that how good it can be versus where it was. Any entrepreneur is going to struggle at some point in time. And so for me, it showed up as a young entrepreneur working long hours, working hard at the beginning, putting in the time, just myself, no team, I'm doing everything. I'm a one man show to eventually hiring people, but still wanting to perform at a high level and willing to make the sacrifice of time early on. But I do remember sitting in my office in one of my earlier businesses thinking it's the weekend, I'm here, it's a Friday night at 10pm and I'm like trying to wrap things up and I'm going to be in super early on a Saturday morning. My friends are sending me texts like let's hang out, let's meet up. And. And I just knew that this is a season for now, but I didn't want it to be the season always. I knew that I wanted to figure out systems to scale that didn't involve me as the bottleneck. I knew that I wanted to eventually buy my time back because if you're in business, there's always a certain amount of responsibility or a certain amount of vision or guidance. As an owner, you're always on the hook for something. But if you own assets, and by the way, businesses of course can be assets, but if you look at them differently and instead of it being a primary business, you look at these assets that you can purchase that are income generating, they could fall into business, they could fall into real estate, they could fall into private credit. There's a lot of different ways that you can look at releases. You, even if you do syndicated deals where you're. You have institutional level management and people that actually run the assets, you don't have to do it, it's really a cool thing to buy that time back, produce income and live life on your terms instead of what most people do and what I used to do, which is just living a reactionary life where I went from thing to thing, my schedule's full, put out this fire, solve that problem, do all these things. And then at the end of the day, it's like, where'd the day go? This wasn't a day that was full of intentionality. This was a day that was full of response.
- [06:10]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. It's the difference between being proactive and reactive, right?
- [06:13]
Justin Donald
Totally.
- [06:13]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. Yeah. And the quote comes to mind, it's vision without action is a daydream and action without vision is a nightmare.
- [06:20]
Justin Donald
Yeah.
- [06:20]
Brian Lubin
So it goes back to that where, and candidly, I'm in it, to be honest, because I had some cash flow in real estate, I sold that to go all in on my business, to have enough of a cash cushion in the back so that I don't have as much stress when I'm operating the business. I don't have to sell a customer to make sure that I make payroll. I have the money sitting over to the side so that I can be able to grow this thing from a baby into a teenager into an adult. And I just recently got my labs done and my baseline cortisol is through the freaking roof. And I'm over here wondering, I'm like, where did the six pack go? I'm eating healthy. Seriously, this is a relevant conversation. Where'd the six pack go? I'm eating healthy. I go to the gym daily. I'm sleeping. Where is all this going is because my body is so freaking stressed out even when my mind isn't. Do you have any advice for, like, people that are at that point? And I have a team. I've got a team of six and I do a pretty Good job of delegating, I think, at least. But now there's so many people that listen to this podcast that are exactly where I am right now, where economically things are going well. But they're like, emotionally and mentally, even when I have margin, Justin, and even when I have a Saturday to myself, I feel massive, overwhelming levels of anxiety because I'm not working. And it feels weird. Do you have any advice for that?
- [07:44]
Justin Donald
Most certainly. Because I've lived that life and I've lived the life where it's. There's almost this obsessive behavior where it's. I've got to get more, we've got to do better, we've got to produce more revenue. We've got it, whatever it is, we need another client, we need another this, we need the next level of that. So for me, it really happened. Part of this was forced on me, and then part of this was I opted in. I was really creating the guardrails and setting the boundaries of when I'm working, when I'm not working, and what I'm doing when I'm not working, and giving myself permission to let go. And by the way, to give permission to let go in the beginning meant I actually have to turn my phone off or put it on airplane mode. So I'm not tempted to see what's coming in. Because if I'm off, there can be a cadence that can be set up. There can be other ways that you can have a bat phone if there's a super urgent emergency going on in the business where people can actually reach you. But I think to create the boundaries of when you're working, when you're not, what are the things you do when you're not creating a healthy cadence of what you need to do physically to be in a good place, to not have the cortisol stresses and the spikes where it's up high, high intensity, high markers. And more than anything, it wasn't external, it was internal. I had to allow that for myself. Other people would understand that. And it was funny. Early on, I felt like I had to be the hardest working person in order for my team to respect the work I'm doing. For them to want to show up, for them to know that I'm all in it with them. But I realized later that actually doesn't paint a wonderful picture for them on what it looks like down the road. Actually, what paints a nice picture for them is, wow, you've built this great business, but you take time for yourself and you take time with your family and you do these hobbies and activities that you love and you're not always working. That paints a much healthier picture, better picture. And I have found when I live that life and show my team that's possible, they aspire to do that and know in the future that can be theirs as well. They might have to grind for a little bit, just like I had to grind for a little bit. But if they know the light at the end of the tunnel is a pretty epic life with a lot of choices, and for them to not have the same high levels of cortisol working all the time, that's gonna really enhance retention.
- [10:25]
Brian Lubin
That's a really interesting point. And it's like this interesting dichotomy because what we talk about. So you talk about lifestyle investing, and I talk about what we call passionate income. So it's like when you're doing. You're getting paid to do what you would happily do for free. And so that's my dichotomy right now is I freaking love it. I love what I do so much, and I'm so passionate about it that I can't. Like, whenever my mind stops thinking, I can't stop thinking about the thing. I can't stop thinking about the business. But are you friends with Pasha's fondiary? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [10:59]
Justin Donald
In the lifestyle investor Mastermind.
- [11:01]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. So I was in Singapore with him New Year's of 2021, going into 2022. And as I was with him, he asked me a really important question, and it literally changed my life. I need to give him credit for this. And I'm curious about you too. When you were going through this, he asked, so what are your hobbies? I was like, what? What? He goes, yeah, outside of your business? We've had a great business conversation, but who are you outside of your business? And I didn't have an answer for him. And I'm the guy that's traveling around the world and I'm doing this stuff, but I love my business. I was like, hobbies? Why would I have hobbies? Like, it's my business. I love it. And that changed my life because I was like, how one dimensional am I? There's a lot more to life than just working the business. That's why I think your message is so freaking important, man. You're talking to me and you're talking to a lot of people here. What's the first step from going from that? When you do love what you do and you're obsessed with it, but there do need to be boundaries what's the first process of creating these boundaries and self imposing the bumpers?
- [12:06]
Justin Donald
Keep in mind in the early stages and especially younger in years, for those of you that are or earlier in your entrepreneurial journey, you can be all in on this business, have no hobbies, have just that thing and feel like I don't need boundaries, I love what I do. But there's going to come a time that's going to change and if the behavior and the habits are that extreme, all in burnout will happen. Right. It's just a matter of time that is starting right. And so it's good to identify that putting the right habits into place early are going to prevent that. So it's not that I created Lifestyle Investor and had all this passive income so I don't have to do anything that actually sounds really boring and really miserable to me. I just want to have flexibility and choice in how I work, what the cadence of work is. Can I get really inspired and go all in on a project where I work morning to night? Because I, I'm, I'm so love it. But at the same time, the next week, take the whole week off and go travel somewhere without stuff piling up. And it's being able to work the schedule in a way that is sustainable. So I think that's what prevents and really burnout is more up here. It's more a mindset thing than anything else. But if that's all that you do, it's just a matter of time until that's how someone's going to feel. So I think to premeditate and to really think through what that's going to look like down the road, we can create some frameworks, some boundaries, some processes if you will, in, in personal life, not just in the business, but in our own lives. And for me, like for most people and for I'm one of these people, it's hard to figure out what it is that you really want to do and what the cadence of work is like. I didn't know what that would look like until I truly had financial freedom because I had to solve the financial equation. But once I solved the financial equation, I had all this clarity about what I wanted to do, how many hours I wanted to work, who I wanted to spend time with, the activities in the business that brought me energy and joy and the ones that didn't, that I need to outsource, but I need to find the right people to outsource to. And you get to a point where you think you're so good, but if you find best in class, they should outperform you. You should be trying to find people that eventually can be better than you at the things that you're doing. Maybe no one is ever better than you at casting the vision, but you'd be surprised at who's out there and what is possible.
- [14:46]
Brian Lubin
So let's use that point to pivot to the opposite end of the equation. Because I've been both sides, and so now I've also been the side where I'm like, okay, so we optimate. Like, we optimize sales, we optimize marketing. We got all that. We got everything automated, systematized, delegated, elevated. Now what do I do in the business? And that's a whole other problem. And I was at a Keller Williams seminar, and the CEO, Mark Willis, now he even mentioned that he goes, there's a point where then you do what you're supposed to do. You read the books, you implement the frameworks, you do the processes, and you get everything delegated. And then what's your clarity on what do you do in your own business now once everyone else is operating? And I thought that was such an interesting point that I've never heard before, and it threw me through a fricking loop.
- [15:35]
Justin Donald
Yeah, I think it's a great question. And I think it's important because it's going to be different for everyone. It's finding clarity in what really fills you up the most. What is fulfilling work for me, and probably for you too. I think strategic relationships could be it spending time getting to know people that can, you know, really help move the needle. I get a lot of energy from that. There are other people that probably wouldn't bring them the same type of satisfaction or energy that it would bring us. And they've got to get clarity on what it is that they want to do. But for me, I've always said I don't ever want to be done with the business. I want to be an artist in my business. So what are the ways that I can express my art that really fill me up, that I'm actually good at as well, that's good for the business. So that's how I look at it. My goal, my job. I don't want to run the day to day. I've done it before, I've done it many times in many different businesses. But today, in this season of life, I don't want to run the day to day. I want to be an artist doing the things that bring joy to me, bring joy to others that I Think I'm, you know, leaps and bounds better at than the next person or the things that I would just frankly do for free because I like them so much.
- [16:48]
Brian Lubin
So you, you say artists and I find that very interesting because a lot of these frameworks that we talk about on the podcast aren't like one or one to zero, zero to one night and day. One week is over and they're done. It's like chiseling away at marble until it's eventually like a sculpture. And now if people see you and you're just like polishing the eyes after like decades of work. So can you talk about that process of chiseling away Justin, as the one man show thinking like where your ego saying I'm the best at all this. I have to have my hand in all this pot to one by one delegating and elevating yourself out of that because it's a process. Can you walk us through the process that you followed?
- [17:29]
Justin Donald
Sure. Are you calling me old? You said decades of work, dude.
- [17:33]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, man. I can see the gray. Seasoned, man. Seasoned.
- [17:37]
Justin Donald
I like it. George Clooney keeps looking better with old age. Think that's good? Yeah, I just think it's a process and I think you get the right people around you that you. I learned this early on, don't hire people just because on paper they're great. They need to have that, they need to have some core skills. But I really look for people that are impressionable, that are hungry to learn that I just like to be around. If I like them, I'm going to pour into them. If we have a chemistry, I'm going to go the extra mile for them versus someone that that isn't that way. And so if I can continue to a team and an organization around those people and help them become good at the different things. And keep in mind they don't actually have to be better than me. Can they be 60 or 70% as good as I am at whatever the thing is? Because even There you get 5, 6, 7, 10 people that are 60 to 70% as good as me, but now they're doing infinitely more because I can't juggle all those things. So they don't actually have to be better than us, but in time they likely will be better than us. So that's it. I just, I always want to build around people that I enjoy that are very. I want the work ethic to be there, but I want the drive and the desire to learn and grow and improve like that achievement drive. That's a Little bit more innate than, than a learned skill. And so that to me is like how you can level up and tier up. And on the financial side you can do it that way where you can chip away. So you talk about chipping away at the business to the point that you're just polishing the last parts of the face and whatever that looks like. But on the financial side you can chip away it as well. Where you say, hey, why don't I start instead of redirecting 100% of the profits back into the business, what If I took 20 or 30% of those profits and redirected into other assets that I'm investing in. And each time I'm investing in some of these, they can be cash flow producing and they can then cover another portion of the income that I need covered my lifestyle expenses. And so maybe at the beginning it's just most people in one fail swoop don't cover their income, but they might make an investment that covers their utility payments and make another investment that covers their car payments and another investment that covers their mortgage. And it adds up over time. But you redirect some of those dollars from your business. It's a lot of people are like no, I have to put everything in. They're, they're extremists for absolute. The business isn't going to change much if you carve part of that out and you start buying some assets outside to. So you don't have as much concentration in a high risk asset.
- [20:20]
Brian Lubin
Correct. Okay, awesome. Two more questions on business, then we'll pivot to assets and, and the truly like passive income to achieve the lifestyle investor status here. So the first question is for these people, for these hires, do you begin with the org chart and then find the person or do you begin with the person and then go retroactively try to find them a place on the org chart?
- [20:41]
Justin Donald
I think the. You've got great scholars and educators on each side of the aisle. You've got the good to great Jim Collins amazing book that basically is find the best people and get them on the bus and figure out the seats later. But you have other people that are a lot more maybe tactical and say Gina Wickman. Yeah, let's fill for these positions. We know the hierarchy, we know the EOS model if you will. So I don't know that one is superior to the other. I would say get great people in your organization and great things are going to happen as long as you do a good job leading those people and creating a great culture and having Strong relationships with them. The strong relationships creates the retention. The culture really creates the desire to be there. And it can be a kind of self propelling culture of whatever it might be. Firsts, getting all the firsts out of the way and becoming great at your craft. So I don't subscribe to one side or the other side. And by the way, I've done it both ways. I don't think that one is better than the other. But what I will say emphatically is that if you have the right people in your organization, great things are going to happen.
- [21:59]
Brian Lubin
I love that. Now, final question on business and then we'll pivot to assets. I just, I love talking business now on this podcast. What's a perfect week for you? And then what's a perfect day?
- [22:10]
Justin Donald
Yeah, my perfect week. I, I do generally live it most weeks. I like working. I, I like having my Mondays and Fridays open, whether it be for creativity or just to hang out with friends. Generally Mondays I just, if I have an extended weekend, I feel like I've got just a great mental space that I live in. I like to be creative and if I have ideas on content, then that's a Monday activity. If I don't and I just want to chill, then that's great too. Fridays is I do a date day with my wife and then I ha with some friends or I try to at least have one new meeting, one new person I can learn from via meal or coffee or something. Which I've been doing that for over 20 years now. So that compounding of hours from an education standpoint, I think I've met now with over a thousand people. So over 2,000 hours just in one on ones, which is crazy to think about. And then Tuesday or Thursday I like to get into projects. I like to, I like to do work, I like to do podcast work on Tuesdays and I do Lifestyle Investor Mastermind on Thursdays and Wednesdays. I'll often look at deals, do one on one calls. So yeah, that's my cadence. I like to get all my personal stuff done. I like to get my workouts in and you know, get some, some steps, be outside, breathe some fresh air, get some sunlight. And I do that in the mornings. I try not to start work before 11am every now and again I might start at 10 and often I don't start until noon. And so if I can put in a good 15 to 20 hour work week, that for me is an incredible cadence. That's how I feel like I'm at my best. And if Something's really inspiring. Then I have the ability to dive in on Monday as well. But that is like setting myself up for success. I don't have to, but I get to.
- [23:59]
Brian Lubin
I love that. And as time has progressed, you've gotten really good at unplugging and turning it off and compartmentalizing. Do you have any tips on that? For somebody that's just now beginning the process of unplugging and being like, okay, I can take a Friday, I can take a Saturday and a Sunday, but just because I can physically on the calendar, can I mentally. So can you give any advice? Because I know hundreds of mutual friends of ours that maybe they have the ability to have that time freedom, but not the mental freedom.
- [24:29]
Justin Donald
Yeah, some people are addicted. They're addicted to success, they're addicted to status, they're addicted to more growth, whatever it is. So to a certain degree, the people that really can't let go, I do think that they're, you know, you can look at it as a bit of a disease. And by the way, I've had the disease. I think it's. I don't think that we should be. People can live their life however they want to. I think it's dangerous long term to be obsessed or so in this mode or this role of always maximizing, always working, always optimizing, always just on the go. I think long term we'll see that people will pay the price at some point in time. So it's more of a habit thing. It's just like when people say, how do you start investing? How do you start saving? You start by just having the discipline to put 15 or 20% of your check every week somewhere else in another account, and you commit to not spending it. And the more you do that, the easier it is. And the longer you do that, the easier it is to move it up to 25 or 30%. And so it's no different with your business and with those same guardrails and boundaries, the more that you take the time off. And Dan Sullivan talks a ton about this. He's one of the most successful entrepreneurs out there. I think we were going through his numbers and just from one of his businesses alone, just from Strategic Coach, I think they've done over $500 million in for sure in revenues. I actually think it's in profit over the years that he's been in business. And one of his whole premises is that you need to have free days, that you have certain days that you work on and certain days that you do no work. You literally turn your phone off and you don't do any work. And I think the studies really show that the entrepreneurs that do that have the most success long term.
- [26:26]
Brian Lubin
I love that. That's something that I'm working on because like you and like a lot of people, I tend to operate in extremes. So I was like, I've done the nothing for traveling eight months and I did nothing. And then I was just like, okay, let's swing the pendulum back over to this other side now. Let's work 247 for two years. And now it's going back to now, finding that healthy balance in between. So contrast creates clarity. So that's really good advice. And I've never heard it put about the investments, 15 to 20% starting there. And then you can also apply that with your time. That's huge. That was really good. So for people that don't know about everything that you do with mobile home parks, with your different businesses, with your different assets, if you can, as much as you're willing to share, like break down, what do you got today? What are we doing today? What are the different businesses? What are the different assets? So people have an understanding of the level of experience that you have.
- [27:17]
Justin Donald
Sure. We can get into kind of where I started. The whole web is quite big. I think we've got around 75 to 100 different entities.
- [27:26]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, I know. I was researching, I was like, dude, I don't even know where to take you.
- [27:31]
Justin Donald
And investment wise, I think we've got somewhere around 400 active investments. It's. It has grown into something big. I think it's probably easier to start with just how I got started in the world of investing, and it was through mobile home park investments. And that is still an important part of what we do. We think that this is a great asset class. It's been good to us. We've been doing it about 15 years. So before it was popular, before when people thought I was crazy and I had to second guess whether this was a good move or not. But we decided to get into it. And our research just showed us that the price that you could get, you're buying from a lot of baby boomers, people looking to retire. It's the least institutionalized or concentrated asset class out there, which is really nice. So that's another perk. They're good cash flow. And we just felt like there were a handful of other reasons why we liked them. But we're like, well, if we're going to get started somewhere, this seems like a great place. The Very first mobile home park we purchased, we produced literally almost to the dollar, the exact amount that my wife was making as a teacher teaching high school business classes. So she retired upon purchasing that, that property. We did it on a seller finance note. I only had to put 15% down and the seller is carrying the note for 20 years. So it's an absolute slam dunk of a deal due to the fact that it's seller financing, it's a non recourse loan, which that was important to me if, in case I didn't know what the heck I was doing. And I totally messed everything up. I just wanted to lose that asset, not all my other assets. So that was just a great start for us. And so my wife bought her time back and that put us on just such a better schedule and calendar where our, our time was lined up together, our cadence was better. We bought another mobile home park that replaced our survival income. So we always like to break down what does it cost us to survive, not our lifestyle, just what do we need to have in monthly income that gets us by. It covers our mortgage, it covers car payments, it covers utilities, it covers groceries. Nothing fancy, just survival. And with that second park purchase, we knocked it out. And it was this huge weight lifted off my shoulders because now I didn't have to work. I get to work and everything changed from there. It felt like I was floating right. It felt surreal, it felt great. It was easier to say no to things, it was easier to pull the trigger on decisions that needed to be made in the business because now I didn't have to rely on the business for income. So it went from making decisions based on the top question that I used to ask is can we afford this? Could the business afford this versus what's best for the customer, what's best for our team, what's best long term for the business? And so there's just a better quality question that we were able to start the conversation with. We bought another mobile home park and that one covered our lifestyle income. So that was real. Weights were totally off then. It was very, it was the most freeing experience, I think we, my wife and I would say that we ever experienced together. And then we bought another one, we technically sold one, flipped it into two more and that replaced our earned income. So we were now earning more with passive income than we were with our business income. And that was a huge flip because we had more money coming in. Like we had enough passive income to cover the, literally the bill, all the expenses of the business and that the game Totally changed. Who should we hire? What should we outsource? Why am I doing anything that I don't want to be doing? So that is a fun place to get. And then what's really interesting is you work hard over the years to save 10, 15, 20%, whatever it is, once you have surplus income. So the next property we bought was all surplus income. So 100% of those dollars can get reinvested. Or what we do is we like a portion of it going to charity and then a portion of it getting reinvested. But now 100% of those dollars aren't needed for anything else. And so that's a great way to start compounding wealth, is to take all of that. It's the flip flop. It's the inverse. Right. If before you were trying to save 20% and now you're reinvesting 80% and giving 20, it's a total game changer.
- [32:09]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, it's awesome. It's awesome talking to guys like you, man, that are, like, down the road, that you're like, yo, I've been doing this for 15 years. And it's just super fun running this podcast because it's just. Just you get direct access to y', all, and then thousands of people get to listen to this and benefit from it too, man. So it's super cool.
- [32:27]
Justin Donald
I love talking about this. This is a blast to me. And, gosh, I. I wish I had learned this. I wish I knew. And I'm lucky that I got plugged in with some of the people that I did. And I was intentional about my network, and I was intentional about reading books, and thank goodness for Robert Kiyosaki and Rich Dad, Poor Dad. And moreover, than that, cash flow quadrant was really like, that was the game changer for me. So thank goodness that existed for me because that's how I made my pivot. So today, I'm one of the largest consumers of books and podcasts because, you know, I consider myself an eternal student. I just want to learn. But as much as I can share the things I've done well and the things I haven't done well, hopefully it provides some great education to others to shortcut and get there faster than me.
- [33:11]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. And you have time under the bar, so it's like you did it, but then you also, for people listening, it's like you did that for 15 years, so everyone's expecting to just pop it out of the thin air. Right. And then you move into the. The next thing and the next thing and the next thing. And I'm like yeah, you can do it to a degree like one mobile home park like you said, like that thing could print you out four to $5,000 a month if you do it correctly, especially on your seller finance notes that you were talking about. But it's just. And you are also very clear on your numbers. That's a huge point that people miss is you knew exactly okay, this is our survive. This is we call arrive and thrive. So you're like, okay at this mark, like we're good. So if you're comfortable with sharing what was your number to where you're like, me and my wife can do anything that we want and everything else is surplus.
- [33:56]
Justin Donald
Yeah, I think early on and numbers change, but at that time I think our survival income was somewhere between 55,000 and 65,000 a year. That may sound high to some people and that may sound low to some people, depending where you are. And then for a good stretch of time we lived on $120,000 a year and lived a good life on 120,000 a year. So a month we were, we took great trips, we ate great meals and dined out a ton and 10k a month really was the number that we first needed to get to. And we have since grown it from there. And today we, I feel like we've been blessed with the lifestyle that we have and it's. Our passive income is certainly much greater than that. But keep in mind, the younger you are, the lower your expectations and needs are. For me, early on in my marriage we were being, we wanted to be. We didn't want to live a life of excess so we tried to good.
- [34:56]
Brian Lubin
Stewards of the money.
- [34:57]
Justin Donald
Yeah, that's exactly right.
- [35:00]
Brian Lubin
So I'm curious, what was the first business that you were running while all of this, while you were replacing all of this? Because were you ever in a corporate job or did you just start your own business and then eventually replace it with cash flow?
- [35:13]
Justin Donald
Yeah, I had a bit of a hybrid business. I've never been in corporate America. The closest thing to corporate America was working with Cutco and I sold Cutco during college and that's how I paid for my college. And I eventually got into management with them. And their model's interesting because you're partially a business owner but you partially have the back end support of the company on fulfillment and back office and that sort of thing. And so you get to build a portion of a business and really get to learn your chops. But the front end was a hundred percent your responsibility. Can you hire can you train? Can you retain? And that was a really great starting ground for me. Now prior to that, I had started a company based on what I did. I got a job when I was in seventh grade. My parents said, hey, if you want extra money, if you want to be able to do fun stuff, go get a job. So in seventh grade I got a job selling newspaper subscriptions door to door. And I was horrible at first and I eventually, after weeks and weeks, got good at the job and with time and with attention, I ended up becoming pretty good at it. And then I eventually took my own crews out. So in high school I was running my own crews, I had my own business, I was making cuts off of all the sales, of all the people that I took out, went to the different neighborhoods, I recruited friends, I put ads and papers, I recruited people. So that was truly my first business. And then getting into Cutco, that was my second business, except it was a product that people actually liked and used with a great guarantee. So it just was a lot easier to sell. And then from there we started the mobile home park business that evolved into tons of other real estate single family homes and self storage and industrial and all kinds of stuff. And from there we started a single family home maintenance company. So I had the experience doing this on the mobile home park side. And this was at a point in time where single family home rentals were just becoming a real estate asset class. For a lot of the younger people listening, it's probably everyone thinks of short term rentals and everyone thinks of homes as an asset class, but they weren't ever an asset class before the financial crisis when institutions came in and scooped them up in Mass. 2012, 2013 was when it really became an officially designated and tracked asset class. And so we are on the cutting edge of doing single family home maintenance for those large institutional players. And that business really took off and has done very well and will be on our series C sometime this year, most likely.
- [37:54]
Brian Lubin
Yeah. So Cutco, you're friends with Mike Chu also, right?
- [37:57]
Justin Donald
That's right, yeah. Actually just yesterday.
- [38:00]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, he. I just went out to speak keynote at his mastermind with champion development. Yeah, it was really cool. They actually mentioned you and I was just like, of course y' all know Justin too. Everyone knows Justin from the Cutco world, man. So that's amazing. I have a super niche question for you. So say that you've got the Cutco office or whatever business that you're running and it's an example that I use and also a lot of People are coming with the same thing. Alex Hormozi has this quote where he goes, it's actually easier for you to grow your business from like 1 million to 3 million and just focus on that. Instead of going and creating two other businesses or three other businesses, it's actually easier to just skill the thing that you're doing and then step away when you have more time to go start the new businesses. And then I have another Dan Martell, who wrote buy back your time, I did a podcast with him and he goes, entrepreneurs throw hand grenades 247 because they're addicted to chaos. And so you'll get into scale phase of the business and then you'll be like, okay, let's do this, let's do that, let's do this, let's start this. My question to you is, as somebody that is now in the scale phase of my business, we're in that 1 to 5 million hunt right now. I'm seeing all this other stuff like, oh, I really want to get into luxury real estate, boutique hotels. This is something I can start with an operator and really get off the ground and like really go all in on. At what point is there a like a cost benefit analysis to starting up something like your mobile home park fund where it's going to take time away from what you're already doing, what's already working. Does that make sense? Because everyone says, I'll just get an operator, but there's still a lot of time, energy and effort in the front end systems to build the machine.
- [39:41]
Justin Donald
Yeah, to get an operator is the ultimate solve, but if you don't get the right one, you're going to be the operator at some point. Yeah, there's truth to what Alex Hormozi said. There's truth to what Dan Martel said. I could make a case case on the other side of it too. If for you, the learning, the education, the doing something different is going to be good for you and inspiring for you, it's going to bleed back into that primary business anyway. So as long as you have the systems in place and the people in place where that business should run and you can take the time away, I think it likely can help you. Now, is it an easier lift to get to 1 million, from 1 million to 3 million than to start another business that goes above? Sure, maybe. What's the market cap? Are you in such a niche industry that it's really hard to grow it? In which case it might be easier to buy a business, it might be easier to acquire a business in a similar industry and grow it based on acquisition and a new customer database versus just growing the existing. Or you might find a niche that has a larger market cap that's easier to scale. It's hard to be absolutely in anything. But at the same time, be careful buying a new business because most of the time you're likely buying a new job at some point it will be a job. Now I feel like I've lucked out. I've been able to get some great operators and. But keep in mind, even with great operators, sometimes the business doesn't do well. So lots of caveats here. But I would say at the end of the day, it depends what your goals are. Is your goal to scale the one business? Is your goal. More profitability is your goal? Lifestyle is your goal? Time back. What is your goal that's going to influence what you do? I think it, I would buy a business over starting a business any day of the week now like today. But there are some people that really thrive on starting that new business. So each person's a little different and I think you've got to walk to the beat of your drum.
- [41:44]
Brian Lubin
All right, we've got, we're at 45 minutes deep, so I'll still the last one for some personal coaching here and then people can benefit from this too. So yeah, we have an online education business. So our, we have a community as well, the Action Academy community. We do 1.3 million a year recurring and now it's, we're growing at about 10% month over month. Like we're adding a lot of revenue each month and a lot of awesome people to the team, to the community. And so that's what we focus on. And that is my one thing. And so I sold all my real estate and I'm like, this is the one thing that I'm going to do and I'm going to take this to the freaking moon. Impact a million people similar to what you're doing now. I see. Now we started an international events company and now that's about to hit seven figures. So the first one hit seven figures. Now the second one's about to hit seven figures. And now we're using that event company as, okay, now we got 110 people flying down to Cabo or to Tulum and all these places. Then we started staying in these mansions, these boutique hotels. And I'm like, holy, why are we not owning these mansions and boutique hotels? And so now that is the progression that has gotten us to where we are today. And now what's keeping me up at night is I have the energy, I have the resources, I have the team and I have the knowledge to like, I have all the different ingredients to bake the cake of starting that acquisition machine. But I'm like, is it now time? Like when is the time? And I don't. I think your answer may be there is no like night and day right time. But I'm like, is this a distraction for me? Is this shiny object for to begin this acquisitions and go get $20 million of hotels, or is my time better spent staying where I'm at, keeping my head down and scaling the thing? So that's the specific context within which I asked the question. Hopefully that made sense.
- [43:27]
Justin Donald
I have many thoughts around this and I can play either side of it. Number one, we're in a high interest rate environment to make things cash flow. It's a lot tougher and a lot of sellers don't recognize the season that we're in. So they want to command a price that just is not reasonable today. So that's one thing. The second thing is we're in a season where we're seeing a lot more distressed deals. We are seeing some, it's not as many is what it likely will be in time, but there certainly is opportunity when things are distressed to get really creative with the financing and maybe even have some sort of a seller carry component and maybe to take a position with them. So not buy it out completely, but get in a senior secured position where if they default, you take the asset over. There's tons of strategic ways. And by the way, just straight up in the world of real estate, the two ends that make the most sense are to be on the extreme low end affordable housing and high end luxury. Those are the two that are generally impacted the least in good times and bad times.
- [44:37]
Brian Lubin
And we would be luxury. 100%. That is what we'd want to do. I've done the C class, D class renovations, hated every second of it. So that would be our thing. And that's what our partners are like, yo, I'm in on this. Because as soon as you take them down there, they're like, yeah, let's do something here. And I'm just like, is this a benefit or is this the distraction? So that's been, yeah, luxury is going.
- [45:00]
Justin Donald
To command a premium. Typically you're going to see, you'll see some defaults, you'll see some distressed deals, but it's just not as common. So I think the question you got to ask yourself Is how much time is it going to take? How much capital is it going to take? And is the value of that asset, short term and long term going to be worth the sacrifice that you may be making in either the other two seven figure businesses? I think you can make the argument either way. I also think that the season we're in now is not the most ideal season for acquisition. That doesn't mean it can't be done and that doesn't mean you can't find good deals. But there's likely going to be seasons of better deals. And if you pour time and energy into whatever the largest profit generators for you, then you're going to be building the war chest of dry powder when that time is here. Now I say all that, take it with a grain of salt because you might find an amazing deal that's off market where something happened with the seller, they need to get out from under it tomorrow. And you might have to seriously consider, you know, is this a location, is this a property that we want? So maybe that happens. I like to keep all doors open, but I also like to figure out what's best based on the current economic environment as well.
- [46:27]
Brian Lubin
Yeah, that answered my question. Thank you. That means a lot. That literally. Yeah. Because where I was leaning was that this business is much better with the cash flow. I have more fun with it it and I know it and I'm really good at it. So there's going to be a knowledge debt that has to be paid with the new one. Like we, we're going to be bring people and partners in that know the space extensively but there's still going to be a knowledge debt that has to be paid. So I'm like, if we just focus on the cash flow this year, building up the dry powder, like building up the capital partner relationships, the operator relationships, the local relationships, then going into the next couple of years when the distress begins to set in a little bit more because like you said today everybody is at two year ago prices in commercial and now they're finally slowly starting to come wake up with the interest rates then at that point then go all in on the acquisition machine. That was my idea, is just to be a little bit patient. So that reinforced it. But I may have a recency bias too.
- [47:25]
Justin Donald
Yeah, and keep in mind you can have the best of both worlds too. You can structure a deal instead of you being the acquisition arm. What if you partnered with someone else that is a professional in that space that already gets preferred pricing and has teams to actually run it. But because You're a strategic partner. You get a piece of the equity and you get to use it. So. Correct. Another way is you don't have to take it all down yourself. You can do so in a partnership form and get all the perks of it with way less of the capital, way less of the risk. That's something to consider as well.
- [47:57]
Brian Lubin
Thousand percent. It would definitely be like, that's what I'm doing right now is establishing those relationships to where it's, you know, you want to dig before the. Dig the well before you're thirsty. So, like, we're establishing those relationships to where somebody's like, dude, I do boutique hotels in my sleep. I'm like, okay, cool. I've got capital and reach. Let's have a marriage here. So, Justin, dude, this has been so awesome. Thank you so much for coming on. Where can people find you and more about what you do, who you are in your book?
- [48:24]
Justin Donald
Yeah, if you go to lifestyleinvestor.com it has everything for my book, by the way, in three weeks. I don't know when this is going to drop, but three weeks from today. So sometime in April, we're having the launch of the updated and expanded edition of the Lifestyle Investor. So I am really excited about that. We haven't really broadcasted that yet, so no one really knows. It's like a secret. And I don't. We've already hit number one Wall Street Journal bestseller. We're already at top 1% of all books ever sold. All the proceeds go to fight human trafficking. So we don't need any numbers. We're not trying to do anything crazy. So we haven't announced it to anyone yet, which is fun. We haven't even put it up on our own pages yet. But anything that people want. We've got free resources from the blog to downloadables free gifts to the podcast. And then we have several master classes. We have a passive income master class. We have a mobile home park investing master class. We have a tax strategy master class. That's our newest one. We're about to build our due diligence masterclass class here in about six weeks, so that will be available. And then of course, we have the Lifestyle Investor Mastermind, which is our flagship program. And currently it is a wait list right now, but people can still apply and get on the wait list. And when we do have an opening, we go in order of who we think would be the best fit versus who filled out the application when. So all these are possible, but something I'd love to do for your community, we do consultation calls. They're generally $500 calls where we give people next steps. What, what are your goals? Where do people want to go? What's next? How do we take the next leap or the next step? And so for your community, we'd love to do one of those totally free. And we can get you a link that has a discount code that can get anyone in your community that wants to do one of these sessions with our team for free. So that'd be at lifestyleinvestor.com forward/consultation.
- [50:18]
Brian Lubin
Awesome, man. Dude, thanks for being you. Thanks for doing what you do. And I'll be seeing you here soon, probably around Austin, Texas, buddy.
- [50:26]
Justin Donald
Sounds good. Thanks, Brian. Good to connect.
- [50:29]
Brian Lubin
All right, this has been Brian and Justin with the Action Academy podcast signing off. Hey, real quick, if you're still listening to today's episode, I'm assuming you got value from it. So I need your help specifically. My two year vision with this show is to help over 1 million people do what they want, when they want, with who they want. And I can only do that with your help. There are two main ways that a podcast grows. One is through ratings and reviews and the other is word of mouth. If you could please leave me a five star rating and a review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, as well as send this to one or two friends that you think would get value from it, we can reach the people that we're looking to reach. Thanks in advance. Talk tomorrow.