The Stages of Real Estate Investing (Where Do You Stand?)

Summary

BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast: Episode Summary
Episode Title: The Stages of Real Estate Investing (Where Do You Stand?)
Release Date: July 30, 2025
Host: Dave Meyer
Guest: Laika Devata, Real Estate Agent and Investor

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Introduction

In this engaging episode of the BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast, host Dave Meyer welcomes back seasoned investor Laika Devata to delve into the various stages of real estate investing. With over 15 years of experience in the industry, Dave and Laika explore the evolution of an investor's mindset, strategies for scaling, overcoming initial hurdles, and effectively managing resources to achieve financial freedom through real estate.

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Starting Out in Real Estate Investing

Laika begins by sharing her humble beginnings in real estate investment. Having moved to the U.S. seven to eight years prior, she started from scratch, emphasizing the importance of education and setting realistic goals.

Laika Devata [02:26]: "If you want to start investing in real estate, especially now, with the amount of free resources available like podcasts, books, and meetups, you should just immerse yourself. The more educated you get, the better foundation you have to scale from there."

Dave reinforces the value of continual learning and leveraging available resources to build a strong foundation for new investors.

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Overcoming Mental Hurdles

A significant portion of the discussion focuses on the mental barriers that new investors often face, sometimes even more daunting than financial challenges. Laika underscores the importance of self-reliance and consistent effort.

Laika Devata [04:58]: "Every project brings its own unique challenges and problems. You have to show up for yourself. You can't rely on others to solve these issues for you."

Dave adds his perspective on the necessity of taking ownership and maintaining discipline to ensure success.

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Finding and Executing Good Deals

The conversation shifts to identifying and executing profitable deals. Laika advises that a good first deal should be "easy to execute" rather than merely easy to find or fund.

Laika Devata [07:45]: "Your first deal has to be easy in many ways. I'm not talking about easy to find or fund, but easy to execute. Execution is key."

She further emphasizes the necessity of having a substantial profit margin to cushion against unforeseen setbacks.

Laika Devata [08:17]: "Don't go for deals with a minimal spread. For new investors, ensure there's at least a $100k profit spread to allow room for failure."

Dave concurs, highlighting the importance of patience and the willingness to walk away from overly complicated deals.

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Scaling Your Real Estate Business

As the conversation progresses, Laika discusses the transition from handling initial deals to scaling the business. She outlines critical factors for scaling, including capital acquisition and building strategic partnerships.

Laika Devata [16:11]: "The most important thing you need to scale is capital. You have to be okay with raising capital from lenders and private investors."

Dave explores the mindset shifts required when moving from solo operations to involving others, such as passive investors and hard money lenders.

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Capital Raising and Financing Deals

Capital raising emerges as a pivotal theme. Laika shares her experiences and strategies for attracting and managing investor funds, emphasizing mutual benefits and trust.

Laika Devata [19:32]: "When I first raised capital, I realized it was a win for both me and the investor. He earned a 12% return, and I could execute the deal."

She details her approach to structuring deals, offering both debt and equity options to cater to different investor preferences.

Laika Devata [22:32]: "If it's debt, the investor gets a straight-up interest rate, typically 9-11%, plus a point. If it's equity, they receive 15% of the profits."

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Structuring Investments with Investors

Dave and Laika discuss the importance of structuring deals that align with investors' risk appetites and financial goals. Laika advocates for clear, mutually beneficial arrangements that foster long-term partnerships.

Laika Devata [23:43]: "For long-term buy and holds, I typically do one investor per deal. They bring the capital, I handle the execution, and we split the profits accordingly."

This approach not only builds credibility but also ensures that investors feel secure and valued, enhancing trust and repeat investment opportunities.

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Time Management and Systematization

Effective time management and systematization are crucial for scaling. Laika shares her strategies for delegating tasks and leveraging reliable teams to maximize efficiency.

Laika Devata [24:18]: "Hire the right people and pay them well. This way, you gain back your time, which you can reinvest into finding and executing more deals."

She highlights the importance of building a robust network of wholesalers, contractors, and lenders to streamline operations and reduce personal workload.

Laika Devata [25:36]: "Finding good property managers has saved me so much time and effort. While it’s not passive, it significantly reduces the time I spend on each property."

Dave echoes these sentiments, sharing his own experiences with setting time limits and focusing on passive income streams to maintain a healthy work-life balance.

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Conclusion

The episode concludes with Laika teasing her forthcoming book, "Return on Real Estate," which delves deeper into execution strategies and personal anecdotes from her investing journey. Dave encourages listeners to pre-order the book to gain further insights into effective real estate investment techniques.

Laika Devata [36:06]: "My book covers not only the different strategies I use but also my personal stories on executing these strategies. It’s based on my own experience with various investing techniques and creative financing deals."

Dave expresses his excitement for the book's release, reinforcing the value of ongoing education and strategic execution for real estate success.

Dave Meyer [36:24]: "I'm excited to read your book. Thank you again, Laika."

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Key Takeaways

• Education is Fundamental: Leverage free resources like podcasts, books, and meetups to build a solid knowledge base.
• Mindset Matters: Adopt a self-reliant mindset, taking ownership of every aspect of your deals.
• Execute with Precision: Prioritize deals that are easy to execute and have substantial profit margins to mitigate risks.
• Scaling Requires Capital: Successfully raising and managing capital is essential for growing your real estate portfolio.
• Effective Structuring: Create investment structures that align with both your goals and your investors’ risk appetites.
• Delegate and Systematize: Hire reliable professionals and build a strong network to streamline operations and reclaim your time.

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This episode offers invaluable insights for both novice and seasoned real estate investors, emphasizing the importance of education, strategic execution, effective capital management, and the continuous evolution of one's investing approach to achieve long-term financial freedom.

Transcript

[Dave Meyer]

Real estate investing does not need to be complicated. If getting your first rental property sounds too complex or too intimidating, or you just can't figure out where to start, listen to this. Set realistic expectations. Write down a reasonable goal. Make the investment work for you. Just get in the game. Today, we're talking about how you can do just that. Hey, everyone. I'm Dave Meyer, head of real estate investing at BiggerPockets. I've been buying rental properties for 15 years, and I'm here to help you achieve financial freedom through real estate investing. Today, we're bringing Laika Devata back on the show. If you haven't heard Laika's other great appearances on the podcast, she's an agent and investor in Seattle. During her career, she's tried almost every possible investment strategy and used every financing option out there. And I wanted to bring her on today to share some of her experiences so you can hear how she started with achievable realistic goals and then adapted as she gained more experience and the market shifted around her. Today, even as she scales, Laika is still using the same mindset to make sure the properties she buys are aligned with her investing goals. This is a great conversation, so let's bring on Lekha. Laika, welcome Back to the BiggerPockets podcast. Thanks for being here.

[Laika Devata]

Thank you so much for having me back, Dave. It's always a pleasure.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah, I wanted to have you back to talk about the evolution that you go through as an investor, because what you do when you start is pretty different from what you're doing when you scale, from what you do after that. And so, since you have so much experience as an investor, I thought you'd be the perfect person to come on and share this with us. So tell us about your experience, your mindset, or any advice that you have for newer investors and, like, what your expectation should be. How should you approach real estate investing when you're just getting started on your first deal?

[Laika Devata]

So, starting out 11 years ago, I was brand new. Not just new to investing, but even new to the country in a way. I had moved to the U.S. like, seven or eight years before that. So it was literally I was starting from scratch. So anyone out there that grew up in this country or that comes from a background in real estate, you already had a leg up on me.

[Dave Meyer]

Really good point.

[Laika Devata]

I think the number one thing that I would say is if you want to start investing in real estate, especially now, the amount of resources, free resources you have, like podcasts like this, books, shows, meetups, like, you should Just immerse yourself. And the more educated you get, the better the foundation is for you to scale from there.

[Dave Meyer]

That's excellent advice. There is so much free education on this podcast on biggerpockets elsewhere as well. So you should absolutely be digging into that stuff. Like, you obviously had some unique challenges when you went into your first deal. Yeah. And I'm curious, like, how you thought about it. Like, I see so many people who want to get their first deal who face a lot of mental hurdles. There are real, you know, financial hurdles too, but I think the mental hurdles are often bigger.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

In my experience, Than the financial ones where people, maybe you have the money, but you are risk averse or you don't feel confident, which are totally normal things to happen in the course of your investing career. So how did you get over those things mentally and get that first deal when you were starting from, you know, a place with a very little knowledge and experience?

[Laika Devata]

No one's coming to save you. I think that is the biggest thing is there's no like, special force behind this. It's all you. What you put into this is how you create wealth. Every paycheck, even to this day, I'm like, okay, if I do X, Y and Z, then I am going to get paid out on this in 2027, 2028. So it's really just building that up and then showing up to work every single day, even after 11 years and doing hundreds of deals, you have to put out fires every day. Because every project brings with it its own unique challenges, own unique problems, new set of adventures that you have not seen in the last hundred deals. Because every house is different, every block is different, every city is different, every roof, every sewer line is different. And so when you do this, you have to be able to show up for yourself. You can't trust the wholesaler, you can't trust that the contractor is going to show up. You can't trust someone else to bring you a contractor. These are things that you have to do. How are you finding your deals? How are you finding your next deal or your deal after that? So you have to be able to build that pipeline. Everything that you put out is what you get back in return.

[Dave Meyer]

I think the thing about showing up for yourself is so important. Right out of college, I started a tech company actually, and I was talking to this advisor I had and I was complaining about how all the people who I hired or contractors just like, weren't working as hard as me. And he was like, every degree you get away from, you the people care less and less and less. Like, maybe your agent cares a little bit, and then the contractor cares a little bit, and then the subcontractor cares a little bit less. And, like, it's your job as the business owner to make sure they're all doing it because they're doing their own thing. They have their own business. That contractor is their own business that they care about. Right. And so it's like, totally on you. And I think that can be hard for new investors because you might not have the confidence to know exactly what to do. But ask other investors, like, go to community, go to all these meetups. But, like, it is your job to sort of do that and to make sure that everything gets done. I really appreciate that. Because if you start that way early in your investing career, you're going to be very successful. I see a lot of people, like, blaming the contractor for why they didn't succeed, and it might have been a bad contractor, but, like, it is your job as the business owner to make sure that goes well.

[Laika Devata]

I'm so glad you said that. Like, people blame other people a lot in this industry because it's easy to do that and not look inward. But I'll tell you this, even a deal that I'm closing this week, if I didn't do the due diligence, like, no one else is going to do that for me. The blame ultimately lies with you.

[Dave Meyer]

And that doesn't mean you can't ask for help. It just means that you have to. At the end of the day, like, you're the last line of defense. And, you know, you always have to make sure everything gets done. And in real estate, that's a lot of logistics. You know, it is juggling a lot of stuff. You know, it's like, it's not like managing one person. You're usually. You're handling a bunch of. And I don't want to make it sound more difficult than it is. Like, real estate has its ups and downs, but this is. These are manageable problems. These are not like, things that you can't do.

[Laika Devata]

Exactly. It's not rocket science. And the best thing about real estate is that you have incredible people that have been in their jobs a very long time, like escrow officers and lenders and insurance brokers. You can leverage these people to grow your business and to build momentum. And that's the beauty of real estate.

[Dave Meyer]

Yes.

[Laika Devata]

You don't have to have a huge team and you can 1099 everybody and still just have a robust group of people helping you succeed.

[Dave Meyer]

Absolutely. I have one more question for you on the early stage investing before we move on to more advanced topics and how your mindset kind of shifts in this kind of things you're looking for and expecting shift when you go into that growth stage. So let me just ask you this. How would you describe a good first deal? Like what does that look like to you? And what would you advise our audience to look for on their first deal?

[Laika Devata]

Okay. Your first deal has to be easy in many ways.

[Dave Meyer]

I like that.

[Laika Devata]

And I'm not talking about easy to find, easy to fund, I'm talking about easy to execute. Because everything comes down to execution. You can turn around a really bad deal and still make a ton of money if it's executed well. So if you buy a deal that's already good to execute, then you're winning. The second is don't go for the deals with the minimal spread. So just because you want to get into real estate, because that can crush you.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah.

[Laika Devata]

Still look for deals with a good amount of profit spread. Like I educate my new investors to not go for a deal unless it has at least 100k profit spread.

[Dave Meyer]

Wow. And that's not a flip. Right.

[Laika Devata]

That's just for a flip. And for a long term buy and hold, you have to make some amount of positive cash flow. Like maybe 100, $200 is not a lot. But you have to start with a positive.

[Dave Meyer]

Yes.

[Laika Devata]

Because that first deal sets up the rest of your investing career and your portfolio. And I just think that it's not about making the money, it's about having that spread to fail.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah. Just don't up.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah. You just, you have to be able to say, okay, I have 100k spread. Right. If the, if the economy turns for some reason or if you don't get the offers in the first 60 days or 60, something happens with just flipping this house or something happens to the bad tenant or whatever it is, you have enough of a spread to fail.

[Dave Meyer]

Oh, that's such good advice. Yes, I totally agree.

[Laika Devata]

So that's my only thing is easy to execute and have enough margin to fail.

[Dave Meyer]

And that means being patient sometimes. Right. Like if you have to wait another month and make more offers, go make more offers. I completely agree. Just you want to layup, right? Like you don't want a complicated thing, you just want to make an easy one. There's one other thing that I think is so important too. You've probably heard this. You know, people say you make money on the buy in real estate.

[Laika Devata]

Yes.

[Dave Meyer]

Maybe that's true. More for flipping than buy and hold investing. I think for buy and hold investing, you make money on operations, on execution. It's not like all like finding some perfect deal, but like if you can make the appropriate upgrades and you can keep your tenants in place and you can control your costs over a 10 year period, that's probably going to actually mean more to you than whether you got it for five grand, more or less.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

Like for a flip, it's probably different. But for buy and hold, I love what you're saying about execution being equally, if not more important than some of these other things people focus on early.

[Laika Devata]

I'm really glad you brought that up because I'm writing a book. It's coming out soon.

[Dave Meyer]

I heard you were writing a book. What's it called?

[Laika Devata]

Oh, it's called Return on Real Estate and it's actually all about making money on the exit.

[Dave Meyer]

Oh, interesting. I like that.

[Laika Devata]

So you know, you can buy anything, but it's about how you turn that around to your point with great execution to actually make money on the exit. Let's just talk about a simple fix and flip that I bought. I bought it from the wholesaler for 835k. My exit value was 1.35 million.

[Dave Meyer]

Woo. Yes. Like that.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah. Right off the bat though, I went through hurdle after hurdle after hurdle and Instead of spending 200k like the wholesaler suggested, I ended up spending 450k.

[Dave Meyer]

Wow.

[Laika Devata]

But guess what? My ARV went from 1.35 million to 1.925 million. We just closed last month and I made a killer profit on it. And so, you know, it doesn't matter what you buy or how much you buy it for. If there's enough margin to grow and do something out of it that no one else can see and execute it, well. Yeah, there's a lot of money on the sale.

[Dave Meyer]

Wow, I love that. Very cool. Well, I'm excited to read your book. We do it to take a quick break, but right after this, we'll move on to how your strategy and your mindset need to evolve as you go from your first deal into scaling mode. Stick with us. We'll be right back. America's senior housing crisis isn't coming. It's already here. Millions of boomers are aging into care and there simply aren't enough facilities. Worthy wealth is seizing this moment by buying and upgrading undervalued senior living properties to meet demand and deliver investors a targeted 15% annualized return. Quarterly dividends now, profit sharing later, demand for Senior living only going one way up. Ms. The wave and you're leaving serious returns on the table. Join the smart money by visiting worthywealth.com invest in senior living with worthy wealth that's worthywealth.com invest in senior Living with Worthy wealth all right, I'm going to share with you guys a little known way to fund your next real estate investment. It's actually your retirement account. With a self directed IRA from Equity Trust, you can invest your retirement savings into nearly any opportunity, including real estate. And here's the best part. You can reduce or even eliminate taxes on your real estate investments. If you don't have much in your IRA, that's not a problem. You can partner with other IRAs or funding sources to make deals happen. Equity Trust has over 50 years of experience and $58 billion in assets under custody and administration as the exclusive self directed IRA company for BiggerPockets, they're here to help you take the next step. You can get started online and learn [e-mail] BP that's trustetc.com BP I used to think I could booby trap my house like some scene from Home Alone. But it turns out setting up swinging paint cans can be pretty messy. And so I personally turned to a much better solution and Simplisafe. I use it because it doesn't just react after something happens, it helps stop bad stuff before it even starts. And that's what makes it different and way easier than installing a zip line to my treehouse. Simplisafe's new Active Guard Outdoor Protection uses smart cameras and live agents who watch over your property in real time. So if someone's creeping around, they can talk to them, shine lights on them, and they can even call the cops if needed. It's like having a professional bouncer for your house minus the velvet rope. There are no contracts, no hidden fees, and setup is super simple. Plus CNAT just named it the best home security system of 2025 and I get why. It gives me real peace of mind every single night. Right now you can get 50% off your new SimpliSafe system with professional monitoring and your first month free at simplisafe.com [e-mail] pockets there's no safe like Simplisafe. Aaron the ad guy here. You know, if your tax prep involves digging through emails and bank statements from like eight months ago, I've been there. We've all been there. Baselane though. Completely saved me from that chaos. It's a Landlord banking platform that organizes every transaction as it happens. Rent, expenses, everything is tagged by property and just a disclaimer. It's not technically a bank, but threadbank does the banking part and they're a member of fdic. That said, the way Baselane organizes everything is super helpful. Now I can actually see how my rentals are performing. Try it for [e-mail] BP and get a $100 bonus. There's something surprising. A lot of investors don't realize landlords actually file more insurance claims than homeowners. But most of the big traditional insurance companies, they're just not set up to handle those claims quickly or easily. That's why so many real estate investors are switching to steadily. They focus exclusively on landlords. So whether you got a single family rental, need a builder's risk policy for a brrrr, or focusing on growing your portfolio, you get fast quotes, flexible coverage, and protection for property damage, liability and loss of rental income. It's a good idea to review your rates and coverages every year on your rentals. So go get a quote in [e-mail] landlordinsurance today steadily landlord insurance for the modern investor. Welcome Back to the BiggerPockets podcast. I'm here with investor Leka Tavatha and we are talking about how both your strategy, your tactics, but also your mindset and your expectations need to shift as you go from that first deal into into scaling mode. So Laika, tell us, what do you think about scaling mode? What is the sort of like the mental unlock that you need to go through to get from that first deal into more of that growth wealth building mode?

[Laika Devata]

Yeah, so when I started doing this, the first year I flipped homes, I flipped one home. The second year I flipped three homes, and then the third year I flipped 12 homes.

[Dave Meyer]

Wow.

[Laika Devata]

And so I scaled quickly. So what I would say is the most important thing that you need to scale is obviously capital. You have to be okay with capital raising both from lenders, like hard money lenders, banks, other financial institutions, and also from private money lenders. Not just that, like finding creative ways to finance deals was really important to me. So just, you know, finding strategic partnerships, seller finance deals, like all of these things really play so much into how you scale your portfolio and scale your business. Another important thing that I always tell people is find one path. Either fix and flip homes or be a broker or be a buy and hold investor. But just do one thing till you figure it out. Once you figure that out, it's super easy to scale Once you know the process, it's easy to scale and then keep adding more income streams. So for me, that first, first path was fix and flip. And so I just got really good at flipping homes. So building the systems, building a deal flow pipeline, having amazing contractors that you can put your trust in, amazing wholesalers that have your back that are not minimizing the rehab budget when selling you a deal, you know, things like this. And then most importantly is building a network. I think very early on I viewed that as something that was going to really propel my career in real estate. And so I started building a network and I started a meetup group. And then the more value I added to others, the more value I added to my own portfolio. These are a few things that are well within your control that you can get started on to avoid getting burnout. You know, avoid taking on big risks and expectations and then keeping your time intact.

[Dave Meyer]

Okay, so let's break some of these things down, because financing was the first thing that you mentioned, and capital raising, because this one, I think is a big hurdle. Because, I mean, if you want to just save up your money and buy a deal every couple of years, that's totally fine, especially if you have a high income, like, you might be able to do that. But I think for people who are either have a lower salaried income or want to scale faster, this is just an inevitable thing that comes up. So, you know, let's break it down because hard money lending is for flipping. So let's talk a little bit about that. But then can you also share with us, like, if you wanted to be a rental investor, how you would think about just like the mindset of it? Because it is kind of hard to think about taking other people's money. And being responsible for that is a big step. It's a, it's a different business at that point.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah, I had never imagined that I could raise money from other people to fund my own business. But then when I first raised capital, that's when I realized, like, wow, this is as much of a win for me as it is for the person that I'm raising money from. And that was like such an aha moment for me because the person that I raised money from, he just had money sitting in a bank account that wasn't growing. And so he said, okay, I'm going to fund your deal for you. And in doing so, he earned 12% return on his money plus a point. And he was like, wow, that was like the safest investment I ever made. I Got to see your project from start to finish. And I actually really enjoyed investing. And so he's an investor for life.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah.

[Laika Devata]

And you know, the other thing about capital raising, it's easy. A lot of people have a lot of money in stocks or sitting in a bank account that they would not know how to grow because they have a pretty solid W2 income. So it all comes down to you as the operator. If you do what you say you're going to do, it's actually super easy to raise money. Money is everywhere. If the deal is right, the money will come. So, you know, raising money from private lenders is something easy if you have a track record and experience and then you just again show up and do what you are going to do.

[Dave Meyer]

That's a really good point about finding the deal first. I think a lot of people miss this. Actually. We were at a meetup together the other week in Seattle. At my first passive flip. I was talking to a young guy who's wanting to raise capital because the premise of this meetup is I was talking about how I invest passively a lot in other people's deals. I like doing that. And he was asking me, like, what do you recommend? He's like, would you lend me money? And I was like, for what? Like, like in a nice way, yeah. But it's like, I, I'm not lending it to you as an individual, just like for fun. I like, what is the deal? And I don't know why a lot of people assume it's like, I, you have to present yourself as the like entity to lend to, which is part of it. I do very carefully evaluate the person, but like, I'm not going to evaluate a person until I see the deal that they're presenting me. Because there's no point in evaluating the person if the deal stinks, you know. And so I think that's, that's a super important mindset shift. This is true in any industry. Right. Like, if you have a good business plan, people will fund it. If you don't, no one will fund it. And like, if you can't get a good deal together, that is appealing to an investor, then there's no point in even approaching them because you're going to lose credibility if you go to them without a deal or with a bad deal. And so I really encourage people to think about that first. And then secondly, put yourself in the mind of the passive investor because passive investors think about this a little bit differently. I don't know if you see this, but I think a Lot of operators focus on the like home run deal. They're like, we can make a, you know, a 50% IRR, you know, this huge thing. Great. As a passive investor, my whole objective is to minimize risk. I'm like, great. Like I just want to make sure you're not going to run away with my money. And like what happens if you're really bad at your job?

[Laika Devata]

Exactly.

[Dave Meyer]

And so I really recommend people sort of look at these kinds of things and think about how do I mitigate risk, how do I control risk and put the passive investor, the hard money lender, whoever it is, the partner that you want to raise, how do you make them at ease working with you?

[Laika Devata]

Right.

[Dave Meyer]

Instead of just focusing on the best possible outcome. Because no passive investor who's credible is going to believe you and they're going to haircut whatever you think you're going to get in half and then, and then go from there. So I think that's a, that's a super good point that you brought up.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah. And then I think to your point, the way I structure these on a flip is either through debt or equity. And if it's debt, then the investor just gets a straight up interest rate. Like I pay my investors anywhere from 9, 10 or 11%.

[Dave Meyer]

Great.

[Laika Devata]

And then maybe a point it's a one year loan term, typically with the option to extend by a couple more months. Say my deal is going over whatever it is, and if it's equity, then they get like 15% of the profit that I make on the deal. And a lot of my investors, you know, are low risk and so they just prefer going the debt route more than the equity route. And then the way that I structure the long term buy and holds is I typically only do one investment. I have done syndications in the past, I don't like them. But on the buy and holds, I just do one investor per deal. And so the investor brings all the capital, I bring all the deal. The execution, if it's working with the property manager. And then again they get 15, 20% equity in the deal. Like through the deal, whatever money we make on rent, they get. And then at the time of sale, whatever the exit value is, we get a profit split each.

[Dave Meyer]

Okay. This is a great example of finding mutual benefit when you're, when you're raising money and that, that is really sort of the name of the game when you're sort of going out beyond your own capital, beyond your own network.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

It's to just figure out ways that you can both benefit and that comes with giving something up as the operator. But you're also gaining a lot of ability to scale, and just finding the right balance for you is really important. Like you also mentioned before about in scale mode, sort of adapting your mindset to preserve your time. That's a hard one. So how do you approach that?

[Laika Devata]

If you can hire the right people and then pay them, what do you get back in return? Your time. And with that time, you get to scale. You get to learn new things. Put yourself in front of learning curves, and you can do bigger. Like, you know.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah.

[Laika Devata]

And so I'm all about like, okay, why do I have to go direct to seller and find these deals when I can get some of the best wholesalers in my city to send me amazing deals? Also finding the right lender. Like, why keep finding new lenders if you have one lender that completely works for you? They have all your business, they. They have all your bank accounts. They know what your credit score is. And then I just keep going to the same lender over and over again to get all my flips funded. And so the more you can, like, start, set up a system and hire the right people to do the work for you, the more time you can get. And in that time, I can underwrite more deals, I can execute better on my existing deals. I can find more investors. I'm also a broker, and so I go out and find properties for other investors. And I have a lot of fun doing that. So just focus on where the fun is and where your strengths are. And I think that eradicates a lot of the processes that you don't have to be involved in and just getting your time back.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah. I mean, this, this being an entrepreneur, whether in real estate or anything else, can just scale infinitely. It can take over your life if you let it. How do you mentally sort of stop yourself from doing too much or stop yourself from doing too little? Like, what's the sweet spot for you?

[Laika Devata]

My sweet spot could be doing a little less. Yeah, but, you know, it's about picking everything. Picking the investors you want to work with, picking the private lenders you want to deal with, picking the deals you want to work on, picking the right neighborhoods. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. And it's not something that you have the liberty to do when you first get started because you just want to explore everything and see what works for you.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah. And you should early on, and you should.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah, you have to put in those reps because otherwise, you know, you don't Know what's best. But as you go through it, I just feel like as you start to like, weed out what's good and what's bad, that's when you can truly succeed. And that takes time and that takes effort. But over that time and experience, I have a very clear set of the kinds of deals I'm going to buy going forward. And I won't stray from that. But it's taken me like a decade to figure that out.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah, it takes a while. You have to. There's just so many different things to do in real estate and a lot of them are great and you just need to figure out what works for you. And there is just some trial and error in that. Unless maybe you just find something that works. Actually, on this podcast, we, we sometimes just meet people who are like, I bought this one four Plex and I burned it. Now I've just done that 30 times. Like, good for you. That's awesome. If you like, if you found something you like and you just want to stick with that, it probably works better. But I don't have the like, mental discipline for that. I want to like, try a little bit of everything.

[Laika Devata]

Same. I want to try everything. But then also I think the biggest time freedom I have got is I did that. You know, I bought a property, I burned it, and I did that a few times when the interest rates were lower. And that's how I built my rental portfolio. But that also means I own a lot of rentals in a very tenant heavy state and for which I have to have the best property managers representing me. And finding a good property manager like that has saved me so much time and effort.

[Dave Meyer]

It's worth it.

[Laika Devata]

It's still not passive.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah, no, it's not.

[Laika Devata]

There's nothing passive about it, but at least it takes up less of my time.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah, absolutely. I've had this rule for myself where I only spend. I work full time. So different situations. You work obviously full time, but you work full time in real estate. Yeah, but I, I am like a 20 hour a month limit on real estate. And so that's basically. It's roughly an hour a day. A working day.

[Laika Devata]

Right, Right.

[Dave Meyer]

And so that's probably way less. You're probably like, that's crazy. But I, that's why I invest a lot in passive real estate.

[Laika Devata]

Right.

[Dave Meyer]

Or I'm thinking about maybe I'll do my first flip. Now I live in Seattle and everyone's convincing me to flip. That means I probably can't buy rentals for those three months because that, that is my limit because I work a lot at bigger pockets. I have other things that I do. Yeah, when I started, I didn't have that. I was working all the time on real estate. But now that I'm sort of a little bit older and I have other priorities and things I want to do, like, that's the way I just like keep that discipline and I, I think it works really well for people just like setting a limit because then I'm like, every year when I look at my portfolio, I'm like, man, this one property is like making me a decent return, but it's a pain in the butt and it's costing me eight hours a month. That's, you know, that's too much. That's 40% of the time I spend a real estate. I got to sell that thing.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

Buy something easier or I'm looking to add to my rental portfolio this fall. Purpose built, multifamily is built 80s or later. You know, like, it really just sort of helps you think about exactly what you need to buy. And as at least has helped me control my own like, desire to try everything and just like buy a random house that looks cool or has a good spread and might be great, but like, it's just going to be too much time for me. We do have to take a quick break, but we'll have more with Laika right after this. All right, I want to talk to you guys for a second about investing strategy. Smart investors know that reinvesting profits is key to building wealth. And with a 1031 exchange, you can defer capital gains taxes while keeping your money working for you. Here's how it works. Sell your property, defer your taxes and reinvest into higher value properties or new markets for long term growth. It's the ultimate cheat code for investors. With Equity 1031 exchange as your trusted qualified intermediary, you'll get expert guidance and a smooth transaction every single time. With over 50 years of combined experience, Equity 1031 Exchange can help you discover how a 1031 exchange can elevate your real estate strategy. Start building your path to tax deferred growth today at getequity1031.com BP that's get equity1031.com BP Aaron, the ad guy here. If you're a landlord, you've probably done this. You approve a repair, it's done, life moves on. Then three months later you're like, wait, did that water heater really cost that much? Baselane keeps track of all of that for you, it's free banking for landlords that automatically tags every transaction to the right property. And just as a side note, Baselane itself technically isn't a bank. Thread bank does that part and they're a member of fdic. But regardless, rent comes in, expenses go out, and you can finally see how each unit's actually doing. So go to baselane.com bp and grab your $100 sign up bonus if you own a short term rental, here's something worth knowing. Not all landlord insurance policies are built for your kind of property, but that's where Steadily comes in. Steadily offers insurance designed specifically for short term rentals. They cover things like property damage, liability, loss of rental income, and even unexpected issues like bed bugs. Steadily only works with real estate investors so they understand the details that make short term rentals unique, and they've built coverages specifically for short term rentals. One investor pro tip I always like to give out is to review your rates and coverages every single year. So go get a quote in [e-mail] landlordinsurance today steadily rental property insurance for the modern Investor do you want to invest in cash flowing rentals but don't have the time to manage the properties? Is your local market too competitive or expensive to invest in? Rent to Retirement offers new construction turnkey investment properties that you can buy with as little as 5% down and rates as low as 3.99%. Their team handles everything from financing, management, insurance and more so you can live where you want and invest in the markets that offer the best returns. Rent to Retirement has the best reputation in the industry with more five star reviews than any other company on the BiggerPockets website. To learn more, visit biggerpockets.com retirement or just text RE I 233777 to start investing in the best markets today. Welcome Back to the BiggerPockets podcast. I'm here with investor Leika Devata. Would you say you're still in scaling mode? Actually, let me ask you that.

[Laika Devata]

Yes and no. I'm always looking for good deals and I have the ability to now buy some incredible deals with huge profit spreads. And so if I find a deal like that, I'm never going to say no.

[Dave Meyer]

Yeah, no way.

[Laika Devata]

Unfortunately, I find a deal a month and I'm like oh my gosh, I just bought another house or I bought another building, whatever it is. But I would say that I'm always scaling but also I'm doing things that I like. I'm buying projects that I like I'm working with amazing investors who. Whose investing career that I can influence. So I am a big believer of just, like, giving back, you know, to the community. When you came on the Real Estate at Work meetup, Dave, like, I had so many people come back and tell me, okay, that was just one of my favorite meetups. I learned so much from Dave. I learned so much from just being in the room with all these other investors. So, like, just giving back is huge for me. So I'm always scaling, but I'm also scaling by doing less, if there is such a thing.

[Dave Meyer]

I totally think there is. Like, I think it takes time to develop this, but I don't know, I just feel like you get into this rhythm after a while where it gets easier and it's not like, stuff doesn't come up, but, like, you have your H Vac person, you know, like, you know who to call, and so everything gets just a little bit easier.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

And so you can actually do more and make more money by doing less in real estate over time, whether it's through passive income or just system. Like, I've sort of gone the passive route. You've gone more of, like, the systemization route. Yeah, like systematizing everything. So that's just much easier. But, like, either way, I think it's fine.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

You can just. This is just like, different paths for scaling that I think are better for different people, depending on, like, what you're hoping to accomplish and what your life is like.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah. I think when I went from flipping 12 homes in one year, the next year I only flipped two, and I made more money on those two homes than I did in the last 12.

[Dave Meyer]

Oh, wow.

[Laika Devata]

And that's when I realized you can actually scale the income you make by descaling the kinds of properties you're buying.

[Dave Meyer]

Absolutely. Or like, just as another example, like, if you're a buy and hold investor, if you can somehow cut the amount of time you spend managing your property, you could spend all that time looking for great deals or networking or, you know, like, doing just something else to scale your portfolio that probably is more cost and time effective. And for me, this was a big mental shift. I refused for 10 years to outsource my property management. Even when I was working full time and in grad school, I was like, I'm doing it all. I'm not paying anyone to do anything.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

And it was such a mistake. It was such a mistake. In retrospect. The only reason I did is because I moved to Europe and I was like, literally Forced to hire a property manager. Yeah, but man, like, learning to do that, the earlier the better. You don't need to do it right away, but I think, like, once you're. Once you're ready to scale and I think take the leap, just go systematize things as soon as you can. Well, like, I thank you so much for joining us again on the BiggerPockets podcast. Congrats in advance on the book. Can't wait till it comes out. Do you know when it comes out?

[Laika Devata]

You know, I think it's already on the Bigger Pockets website.

[Dave Meyer]

It is. I can see it right now. It's on the website. You can pre order it, though. It says it will ship September 23rd, so you can pre order it now if you want. Which comes with bonuses usually, right?

[Laika Devata]

Yes.

[Dave Meyer]

So get that. You do the bonuses, and then two months from now, you're gonna have your Leica Divatha book. That's awesome.

[Laika Devata]

I'm really excited for you guys to all read it because not only does it have all the different strategies that I personally use, but it also has my own personal stories on how I executed these different strategies. So it's really just based on my own experience doing a myriad of different kind of techniques, investing strategies, and creative finance deals. So I'm so excited for everyone to read this.

[Dave Meyer]

Absolutely. I am excited to read it myself. Thank you again, Laika.

[Laika Devata]

Thank you, Dave, for having me again.

[Dave Meyer]

Of course. I think once you've been on three times as, like, official, you're like a friend of the pod. So you're. You've been a friend of biggerpockets for a long time, but now you're an official friend of the pod.

[Laika Devata]

Yeah.

[Dave Meyer]

And thank you all so much for listening to this episode of the BiggerPockets podcast. We'll see you next time.

[Laika Devata]

See ya.

[Dave Meyer]

Thank you all for listening to the Biggerpockets real estate podcast. Make sure you get all our new episodes by subscribing on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Our new episodes come out Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I'm the host and executive producer of the show, Dave Meyer. The show is produced by Ian K. Copywriting is by Calico. Content and editing is by Exodus Media. If you'd like to learn more about real estate investing or to sign up for our free newsletter, please visit www.biggerpockets.com. the content of this podcast is for informational purposes only. All host and participant opinions are their own. Investment in any asset, real estate included, involves risk. So use your best judgment and consult with qualified advisors before investing, you should only risk capital you can afford to lose. And remember, past performance is not indicative of future results. BiggerPockets LLC disclaims all liability for direct, indirect, consequential or other damages arising from a reliance on information presented in this podcast.