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Real Estate Investing School Podcast
7. Bootstrapping your Real Estate Business with Megan & Jeff Ahern
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- [00:00]
A
We decided to just kind of sell everything we own in California, move to Nebraska in a travel trailer and then like park it behind each of our projects for the first year. And we started flipping houses and buying rentals and doing a little bit of wholesaling and just kind of whatever we could do. And then now we're. We've done 38 deals in the last four years that we've been here.
- [00:29]
B
What's up everybody? Welcome back to the Real Estate Investing School podcast. This is Brody Fawcett, your host and I'm here with Joe Jensen. What's up, Joe?
- [00:38]
C
What's up, Brody? Excited for another podcast today? This, these are gonna be a good one. I'm excited for it.
- [00:45]
B
We have, today we have have Megan and Jeff Ahearn is there is their name. Like I said, awesome podcast. These guys have only been at it really about five years and have really ramped things up in the last three years. So their focus is mainly flipping homes and wholesaling homes. And then they've started acquire a lot of these homes will kind of cherry pick their best ones and turn them into rentals. So they're really, really good at taking their passion which is helping people in a certain category which we're going to talk about here in a second and basically creating housing for them.
- [01:19]
C
Yeah, they've done a little bit of everything. They've only been in the game for like five years. They're super experienced experience and super humble. You wouldn't know that the success that they've had from talk to them, but they've really done quite a bit. So it's pretty cool. A lot to learn from them.
- [01:33]
B
Yeah, I think in the last, the last couple years they've done over 35 properties or 35 deals. And it's interesting because we talk about their first deal and it was a flop. Like they lost, they lost money on it. And it's interesting because we asked them like, hey, how important is it to just get in the game and do a first deal even if you're going to lose money? Do you regret that? And so yeah. Good, good stuff coming. I love their answer to that question.
- [01:59]
C
Let's go check it out.
- [02:01]
B
What's up guys? Welcome to the show. Today we have an awesome guest. Guest, plural, actually we have Jeff and Megan Ahern. How's it going guys?
- [02:12]
D
Good, good.
- [02:13]
A
Thanks for having us.
- [02:15]
B
Yeah, absolutely, thanks. Thanks for taking the time. It's interesting, like we get really cool high level people on here like you and your schedules are really, really busy and we know that Especially with how much you guys have going on in your place. So we always appreciate you taking the time because it's. I feel like it's more of a sacrifice than most people that aren't doing nearly as much as you, so we appreciate it.
- [02:37]
A
Yeah, for sure.
- [02:39]
B
And then we got Joe here. What's up, Joe?
- [02:41]
C
What's up? I'm excited. We got a two for one today. I think this is our first time having two guests on at the same time, so you guys should feel special, because I know we do.
- [02:52]
B
Oh, yeah. Especially married couple, too. How is that? How. How has it been? And we'll get into your story, but how's the dynamic being married and working together? My wife's sitting in right across from me in the office right now, so I know there's probably some challenges from personal experience, but how is it rainbows and butterflies? I need to learn from you, man.
- [03:15]
A
Definitely a different dynamic and definitely hard to shut it off then once you go home, too.
- [03:20]
D
Mm, yeah. I mean, just balancing the work and. And the home life and keeping it separate is the biggest challenge. But I get asked that a lot, like, what is it like working with your wife? Like, I could never do that, you know, And I tell them, you know, I don't see her most of the time, you know, so we've been pretty good about splitting up our responsibilities and our roles in the business so that we're catering to our strengths and weaknesses. And because of that, we just kind of have different roles and different functions. So we definitely. They intertwine and we work off of each other a lot, but we don't. We're not, you know, together all day long, because then that would definitely get challenging.
- [04:02]
C
Well, and I like what you said, how you just have different roles, and I think that's true of any kind of partnership. Just having those clear roles of, like, hey, these are your responsibilities. These are. These are mine. Like, and that's who's in charge of those. And we can, like, throw ideas back and forth, but at the end of the day, this is who's the end decision for each of these areas. For any partnership, I think that's huge. Yeah.
- [04:24]
B
Especially a marriage. That's something, too, because it's one partnership in general is you need to do those things, and it's great to find your roles and all that's good. But then when you talk about going home, that's a completely different story. And you're now parenting together as well, and you're now trying to balance that whole thing with work but is there anything you guys have found that's. That's worked really well or helped you out? Separating home and work and finding that balance?
- [04:50]
A
Dude, we're honestly not that good at it.
- [04:54]
B
At least you're getting normal. That's great.
- [04:57]
A
I could do real estate and talk about real estate and just like all day, every day. And so I'm really terrible at that. So probably not the. The expert on that one, but we definitely have like scheduled times. And so, like, the time between when we wake up at five in the morning till nine is like our personal time, like Bible reading, whatever gym. And then our time between 9 and 3 is working, and our time between 3 and 6:30 is our kids. And then after that, like our personal time. And so if we can try, at least try to keep those things, then it works out pretty well for us.
- [05:36]
C
That's cool.
- [05:39]
B
Super smart. I love it. I like how you time block that a little bit. So you said you can talk about real estate all the time. Is it different for you, Jeff?
- [05:46]
D
I mean, I have more of a waffle brain, so I definitely. I'm in whatever box I'm in. So when I get home, I try to just get into the out of work box and so my mind can pretty much stay there. Easier for me to separate things like that. But even then, things pop up on my phone all the time, and then it draws me in. So putting my phone away at home is the biggest thing. As long as I can put it away, put it on the charger in the other room, then I can focus completely on the kids and it's great. Otherwise, there's always something coming in, and there's always some pressing matter that needs to be tended to, or at least, you know, you think it needs to be tended to, but it. But it can wait. So I like talking about real estate, but I also am. I really like having time each day to not talk about real estate. And so that's equally important to me. So, yeah, 100%.
- [06:50]
B
Like you said about your phone, that's something that if you guys have read, read the book Atomic Habits, my favorite book. So good. But it's interesting because we have good intentions and it's like, oh, yeah, I'm gonna be done with work and then come home and be with my family and be present. And some of that's not good enough, right? Because as soon as your phone goes off, it's like, oh, I had a good intention, but now all of a sudden this came up and I'm gonna handle this right now. Or it's on my mind. It's distracting me from, you know, being present with my family. And. And that's something like what I've noticed when I'm doing well is when I get home from whatever I'm doing, I just leave my phone in my truck and I go back and get it, like, once the kids are awake. And it's interesting because we strive so hard to create this lifestyle freedom, and then we take our phone with us and it like, ruins it sometimes.
- [07:37]
A
Yeah. I never work while putting, like, I put a voicemail that says, like, hey, you reach my phone. I only respond during the hours of nine to three. So if you're calling me outside of that time, I'll probably call you back tomorrow or whenever I feel like it. And just really, like, religious about not having calls in the rest of the time.
- [07:56]
B
That's so good. I love that. So you guys have a cool story. We want to dive into it because I feel like it's super relatable to. To everybody out there, to normal, average people. Right. As far as how you got started and kind of the sacrifices you made to get it going and kind of where you're at now. But maybe just give us a brief synopsis of how you got started up to kind of what you're doing currently.
- [08:23]
A
Okay. So when we got started, we were living in California, and we kind of went through the whole phase of learning and trying and not really getting any traction. And then we got sober. We were both alcoholics, and we got sober, and that really acted as, like, a catalyst to grow our business because we were able to, like, free up all this money that we're wasting and time that we're wasting. And so in that first year, we bought two houses. And one was a live in flip, and the other one was a long distance flip that we ended up losing, like $20,000 on that first one. And then from there, Jeff got kicked out of the military for medical reasons. He got into a parachute accident. And so he got pushed out of the military. And so it's kind of like, all right, what do we want to do, like, for the rest of our life? And he wasn't able to really work in the roles that he was trained for. And so we decided to just kind of sell everything we own in California, move to Nebraska in a travel trailer, and then like, park it behind each of our projects for the first year. And we started flipping houses and buying rentals and doing a little bit of wholesaling and just kind of whatever we could do. And then now we're. We've done 38 deals in the last four years that we've been here.
- [09:50]
B
Wow. Wow.
- [09:53]
C
So how many years has been total since you very. Your first year going?
- [09:57]
A
I think it was about five years ago when we bought our first house. But those first two didn't go super well or super quickly. And they were in California. I felt like we couldn't get a lot of traction in California. It's just so much harder to like wrap your mind around like half a million dollar starter homes. And so once we moved out to Nebraska, it really just blew up for us.
- [10:21]
D
Yeah, we just, you know, once we decided to go into it full time with both of us, we really didn't have a choice but to make it work. And that's. And we started that March of 2018. That's when we.
- [10:35]
B
Wow.
- [10:35]
D
We were two deals in. And is that 38, counting all of them or just Nebraska?
- [10:41]
A
I think that's just our Nebraska, I guess.
- [10:44]
D
Four deals.
- [10:47]
B
So how did you.
- [10:50]
C
Oh, sorry. So that was the sole reason you went to Nebraska was just to build your real estate business? That was your connection, that was your tie? I think it's funny because a lot of people complain about their market. Oh, my market's not good. Or this or that. It doesn't fit what they're trying to do. And you guys, you just did it. You balled up and just made the change, you know, so you're in the market you wanted to be in. What made you want to choose Nebraska specifically? And obviously it sounds like it's worked out.
- [11:19]
A
We had looked at like a lot of different, different Midwest markets because we wanted rentals. So that was our main goal. And I just could not make California numbers work for rentals now. I could because I know more, but I just couldn't wrap my mind around it then. And so we were looking at a lot of different Midwest markets, but we also wanted a place where we actually wanted to live at because there are, there are places that have way better numbers than Nebraska. But like, do I want to live in Dayton, Ohio? Sorry. Or you know, wherever. St. Louis, Missouri or whatever. And so Lincoln was kind of a happy medium where we could get really good numbers that we wanted. It has multiple colleges, so a really strong rental market. Businesses are moving to Lincoln. So all these different kind of wickets that it hit. But it's also kind of a fun city. It's big enough that it has all the things we want. It's not like a Podunk town.
- [12:19]
B
Yeah. What? After your first Two, that kind of. I don't know if they failed or how bad they were. But you said they weren't great in California. Like, how do you go through that and still want to invest in real estate?
- [12:34]
A
Well, enthusiastically.
- [12:39]
D
Well, so that's that first deal. I mean, we kind of jumped the gun on it. We tried to wholesale it initially, but we couldn't find anybody to take it, which was red flag number one. But everybody that we talked to said it was just kind of just barely outside their criteria. And so we thought, okay, well, if we're not having to have those extra fees and things included, maybe we can do it ourselves and make it work. And if everything went perfectly, we could have made some money on it, potentially. But not everything went perfectly, obviously. And so it was kind of a big blow. And we did have to stop and reassess and say, do we want to keep doing this or do we want to try something else? And ultimately, I mean, at least for me, I said, I want that money back, at least. So let's try another one. Get that money back, you know, because we were working on a limited amount of money that we had. I had gotten, like, a severance from the military for my medical retirement there. And so it was like, that's what we had. That was our little nest egg. And a big chunk of it was gone right there. And it was like, well, I want it back. And then the next deal was a success. So we're like, okay, let's go for number three and see what happens.
- [13:57]
C
So, yeah, so let's dig into that failure a little bit, because I love to learn about. I think we learn a lot more from our failures and our success successes. And so I'd rather learn from your failures than mine. Right. So, you know that first one, you said it didn't work out. Why. Why do you think it didn't work out? Like, what was. What happened with it? So that people can kind of learn from that experience.
- [14:20]
A
Yeah, so we did, like, every single thing wrong that you should not do. And so it was like, looking back on it, we're like, okay, let's just never do any of those things again, and it will turn out 100 times better. But we had bought it. We lived in San Diego, and it was in Albuquerque, and we didn't know the Albuquerque market. We knew no one.
- [14:40]
B
New Mexico.
- [14:41]
A
Yeah, New Mexico. We just had. We sent out postcards, and this guy called, and he says, oh, I got a house. And he has all this motivation, and I'm like, great, where is it? And he's like, albuquerque, no, I want your house in Oceanside. And he's like, well, I already sold that one. But I'm like, well, if it's a deal, it's a deal, you know, so put it under contract. I'm, like, all excited, excited about it. Go try to wholesale it all. The real flippers won't buy it. So, hello. Obviously, it's not a good deal, but we. We were like, oh, well, we could flip it and make money and get all cocky, you know. And so we got, like, a Craigslist contractor, which then, you know, was like, okay, the project's gonna be 30 grand, and we're gonna. They're gonna charge us 1/6 on each of these draws. And so it was like, after the demo would pay him a six, and after the paint, we'd pay him a six or whatever. So he would send us pictures of, like, the demo is done. Here's a picture. Well, it's really just demoing one room. And then he'd be like, the exterior paint is done, and he'd just send us the one side of the house. And so we had sent him, like, 4, 6 of the money. And I was like, oh, I have this long weekend. I'll just drive out there. So it's a couple states away. And I realized, like, I. I thought we were like, set finish, like, we were in the home stretch, you know, and we got out there, it was like, not that way.
- [16:07]
D
It's like one side of the house is painted.
- [16:09]
C
Yeah.
- [16:09]
A
And, like, one room inside was painted. So we had contractor problems. We finally got that worked out. It got done, but we got. Got it done outside of, like, that good selling window. So they're very seasonal there. They're not selling houses in the winter. And so it was probably October by the time we finished up with it. So we ended up, you know, having to hold it all winter long, having the extra holding costs. And then what I also learned while I was there is we didn't understand fully the market. So I had pulled, like, ARV comps or what I thought it was, but there was like a one little everybody.
- [16:48]
B
What ARV means really quick after repair value.
- [16:52]
A
So I had pulled comps, like, from Zillow, and it was all within a very tight radius, but they had, like, a very specific bar scene. And then people wanted to live next to it, but they wanted to live within, like, walking distance of it. So each block by block, it. The values of those houses were. Would go down. If you've ever been to that Area you could just visually see it, like one block with super nice houses seven blocks away was like bars on the window and you could just see it. So we were somewhere halfway in the middle. But I was pulling comps that were closer to the bar scene.
- [17:27]
C
Wow.
- [17:29]
D
And then we had to hire a realtor that we, you know, we had no recommendations. We didn't know anybody that lived in New Mexico coast. So we couldn't get like a good referral or anything like that. So we just found somebody and picked him. And I think because we were out of state and kind of doing the investing thing, he was very kind of hands off and maybe he assumed we kind of knew what we were doing, but we didn't. And so, yeah, I mean after we had hold the property all throughout the winter because once school starts, the market stops there. And so we had to wait until school got out in the spring and the house sold in a second. And there's lots of interest in it. And if we had known better, then we would have pulled it off the market prior to that and brought the price back up higher than what we sold it for and probably still got that price. But we just kept dropping the price all winter just like, please get rid of this thing. Like we want to get rid of it. And so we kind of shot ourselves in the foot on that one as well. So it was just everything, you know, went bad. And so I don't know, it could have been worse.
- [18:39]
C
But now you guys on a hard money loan on that or is it just you use your own cap?
- [18:45]
A
No, we screwed that up too. So we talked the guy into doing what I thought was like maybe a subject to or like a lease option. I didn't really know what either of those words meant. So I like Google the contract and I didn't understand some of the things in the contract. So I was just like deleting parts of it that I didn't know. And then we bought it with like this thing. Like it was a kind of like a mix between lease option, land contract, seller financing thing, which is a botched contract.
- [19:16]
D
We paid him $5,000. Yeah, I think he needed to get to Florida and he didn't have money for that. So we paid him $5,000 so he could move.
- [19:25]
A
And we kept paying his mortgage over his payments. And we recorded this botched contract with the title company. Then we went to list it with the agent. He was like, you don't have equitable title. So we had to go back to the seller and have him re sign like Legitimate contracts. And really at that point, he could have been like, oh, I still own the house. Well, no thanks. I'm gonna just sell this beautifully remodeled house. Yeah, so yeah, he was a sweetheart for actually signing the paperwork for us and kind of digging us out of that hole.
- [19:57]
C
But so how does that work though? If you went to the title company, they did the title work and you had title insurance, like, how do you end up without equitable ownership? If the title company did their job.
- [20:10]
A
They recorded the contract that I made and that's what I wanted them to do, and they did that. But I had just chopped it all the heck. So it, it was like, it, it was like a lease option more than a land contract. And so when I went back to the title company, they hooked me up with one of their lawyers who just made the correct contract, which then they called it a, they didn't call it a land contract. I feel like every state calls it kind of something different. Yeah, it was called the land contract there, but whatever. We got little equitable title at that point.
- [20:52]
B
So I, I hear this all the time.
- [20:53]
C
Right.
- [20:53]
B
A lot of people have different thoughts on it. As far as your first deal goes, A lot of people say, hey, you just need to get in the game and do a deal even if you don't make a ton of money. I think there's a balance with all of that, obviously. But for you guys that have experienced that. Cause my first deal, like, I got really lucky and it was a home run. And that's exactly what it was. It was just luck because I didn't know what I was doing. And that's what like really kept me in the game. But for someone like you, I mean, how do you, how would you answer that question? I guess to someone's like, hey, should I invest in real estate, get in the game Even if my first deal is not a great deal, Is it better just to do a deal and get my feet wet?
- [21:31]
D
Yeah, I think, yeah. Because we had analysis paralysis for so long because we were just too fearful to jump the gun and just do it. We just wanted to find that home run deal where we knew, okay, there's no way we're going to lose money on this. But that deal never came. And I mean, if it did, we would always get outbid or out beat by somebody else. Somebody's always going to be willing to pay more in many instances. But even if, I mean, because if you do your first deal, it's either going to be a success or it's going to be A really good learning experience. And you need both at some point, you know, so just go for it. And if you lose some money, but you learned a lot, then next time you'll have better chances.
- [22:17]
A
Yeah, I feel like. Yeah, I feel like at some point everyone in this business is going to lose money. So I think people get really stuck on this. Like, well, what if I lose money? What if I screw up? And what if I, you know, blah, blah, blah. But it's gonna happen. Just, like, totally accept that you are gonna lose money at some point. You're going to screw up, you're gonna look like a dummy, your mom's gonna be like, see, I told you so at some point. And just be like, that's just it. It's fine. But you know what sucks more than, like, all of that is working till you're 65 or, you know, having to get a job as a greeter at Walmart when you're 80. Like, that sucks. That sucks worse than losing 20 grand on your first flip, you know?
- [22:59]
C
Yeah, well, and it's funny because, you know, another thing we lose money on but we learn is like everything else, like school, university, you know, when you buy a training course, like, there's no return on that. You just lost that money. But we don't look at that way when it's school or you buy a training course. It's like you spend 20 grand, you know, it's gonna go, oh, I lost money going to college. It's like, they got their education and it's the same thing, but even more because you're doing it in action and doing something itself as opposed to learning about the thing. You know, it's okay to spend that money on that education, you know, and if you make money on it, great. But if not, that's okay.
- [23:39]
D
Yeah.
- [23:40]
C
And sounds like you guys really took that and then leveraged it to, you know, a lot of success from. From not the smoothest beginnings.
- [23:51]
B
Yeah. Speaking of which. Oh, go ahead.
- [23:54]
D
I was just gonna. Yeah. Say, that's definitely how I, you know, looked at it was. It was $20,000 of tuition for my real estate education versus however many thousands of dollars at college to go be an employee. And now I'm my own boss. And so it seemed like a pretty easy decision at that point.
- [24:13]
B
Yeah, it's funny, I had that same. That's where my mind went as well. Same thing you just said, both of you guys. It's interesting. A lot of people aren't willing to do that. Right. Backing up a little bit. You said you guys were both alcoholics and you both stopped at the same time. Like, how, how does that happen?
- [24:37]
D
Well, we were together when we stopped. I mean, so I was in the special operations community in the Marines. So we were all pretty heavy drinkers. And it's just kind of. It's something that just kind of gets worse as time goes on. When my career started, I only drank on the weekends. And then it kind of turned into every night of the week. And then it turned into. It was. Even as I drank more and more, it was all social, it was all for fun. And then it just became like a habit and it started, you know, developing problems associated with that. And when I met Megan, she kind of came into the fold and was immersed into the military lifestyle. And so she kind of, you know, just came into that, you know, world together. And we got to the point where it was creating problems within our marriage. So our first year of marriage, our relationship up to that point, we were together about almost four years and it was great. It was all sunshine and rainbows. We got along great. We were best friends, we never fought. And then it got to the point where we fought all the time because we were. Were drunk all the time and we only fought when we were drunk. And it was always about absolutely nothing. And so we kind of got to the point where we realized if something didn't change, our relationship was not going to last. Just because, you know, alcohol is just a destructive force. And so we made the decision at the same time together that that was it and we were going to stop.
- [26:22]
B
Wow, that's powerful. Yeah, you guys. And then. And so what's cool about that? And because I didn't know that background about you guys, but I know what you're doing now in a sense to kind of like give back to people in need. Maybe tell us a little about that.
- [26:42]
A
So we have like sober living houses here. And that's obviously of my heart for that spawned off of from where we came from. And so we are opening up our third one in Lincoln right now. But it's just really cool. It's a really cool program. It really just creates a very supportive atmosphere for these people that are going through their process of getting sober and being able to kind of like partner and support them in that. So that's.
- [27:15]
C
So what is your role? What is the program? The. I'm not familiar with and how does that work?
- [27:19]
A
We actually rent to the program itself. So we have two year lease with the program. The program is the one that's actually filling the Bed so we don't have to deal with the comings and goings and are they minding the rules and all of that like minutiae stuff. And we get like the two year leases and once it's a program how house they would like it to just continue to stay that way. So it's, we really have like no turnover. So from an investing standpoint, it's really nice. Yeah, really nice. Because we have a lot of student rentals where we're turning them over every year and this is just like a much more hands off thing. And they deal with the snow, they deal with the lawn, they, you know, keep our properties really nice. From an investment standpoint, it makes sense. Sense for us. But also from like a warm and fuzzy feelings. Makes me happy too.
- [28:09]
B
Yeah.
- [28:10]
D
I was concerned at first about the, the state of the house, like how, you know, clean it would be kept or you know, things of that nature. But we've quickly learned that they are our best and cleanest houses. Every time we walk in looks great. Even better than a small house with four college girls, eight you would think would be clean and smelling great all the time. And not necessarily the case, but the program, you know, there's a president of each house and they're the ones responsible, making sure everyone's keeping up on their chores and they all have their responsibilities and so it's not just a free ride. They have to play by the rules while they're in the house. And like she said, we don't have to deal with any of that stuff, but it's just handled and taken care of. So it's worked out really well for us. So definitely a win win.
- [28:59]
B
Yeah, that's great. It's interesting like within real estate investing, just how, how common it is to find kind of like your passion and, and intertwine the two. And I think it's awesome. Like, I love, like, I mean a small example is like I always wanted a cabin, right. It's like my what I think my third investment property was an Airbnb. It was a condo, you know, and it was up on the mountain. And I was like, oh, I want a place where I can take my family. And so it's kind of cool. Like ended up being an amazing investment. Airbnb it and then we just block off nights here and there for our family to go up and, and create these memories and it's just cool. Something I've been more passionate about recently is like the whole unplugging type thing. Like yes, in the mountains, but Kind of like cold therapy, sauna. Like, I have a sauna. My garage, like, love it. Right? Just getting.
- [29:56]
C
I don't.
- [29:56]
B
Obviously, there's different benefits from it, but just aside from the way that makes me feel, going from, like, hot to cold to hot to cold, like, it just feels good. Right. And so we're building a. A tiny home resort right now, my wife and I. And it's. That's the name of it is unplugged tiny home resort. But part of, like, what we'll eventually do is just start off by blocking out a few weeks out of the year, and we'll have just different. Different retreats there. You know, kind of like unplug retreats, and we have a sauna that we've put up there. And so anyhow, just a long way of saying, like, it's. It's cool with real estate, because not only can you get an extremely amazing return from your money, but then you can also find ways to connect it and. And have these experiences. And, like, it's just. I love it. We've been talking about. We just spent the last month in the Virgin Islands and absolutely loved it. And so we've been talking about, oh, you know, where. Different places we could get a cool beach house. But one of the coolest parts about it was that our family came out, or my family came out for a few of those days we were out there, and it was awesome because it was. It was our way of, like, hey, we already have a place. Like, come hang out. Like, we'll go to the beach. You know, we'll just have a good time and just don't worry about anything. Just fly out here and we got you covered. And I just love that concept within real estate investing to where it's like, hey, we want to go have this place or go have this type of property, because we're now creating experience for other people, and that's what it's all about. And so that's cool that you guys have figured out a way to figure out how do I take what I'm passionate about and then also use real estate to kind of dump gas on that.
- [31:36]
A
Yeah, it is. It is really cool. And then you can do, like, other pet projects. Like, I. I feel like at some point you get to a number or something, a goal in your head where you're like, but why? Like, why. Why do I need to make a million dollars a year? Nobody needs to make a million dollars a year. But, like, if you have some very cool whys behind it, then it's really not about making whatever goal. It's about, like, accomplishing something so much bigger, and then I can trigger my brain to go ahead and do that thing. Like, if I want to be able to open 100 transitional houses, whether it be, you know, battered women's houses or people that are aging out of the foster system or sober living houses or whatever, then what I'm really doing is I'm getting behind housing like, 600 to a thousand people that are really struggling, you know, And I. I can. I could be about that. Like, I don't need to make a million dollars a year, but I might do that in the process on accident, you know, as a. As a cherry on top.
- [32:41]
D
Yeah. I think most people are fooled to thinking that money is the biggest motivator for hard work or anything like that. But I think deep down, most people are more driven by something that they believe in. And the trick is just finding what that is and how you can use it for whatever it is that you're trying to do. Even when we got started, we were working hard. We were working long hours, and it was good because it was working, and we were making money and the business was growing. But since we kind of have developed more of a purpose for something that we believe in, it's like, I mean, I love going. I love coming into work every day. Like, I love doing what we do. And it's the first time in my life I've ever really believed in what I'm doing and believed in the cause, and. And it makes it fun.
- [33:36]
B
That's cool.
- [33:37]
C
So tell us, how did you go from, you know, the beginnings? It wasn't so great, and that was more focused on flipping. You've now transitioned more to, like, long hold cat cash flow. It sounds like maybe, you know, as deep or as brief as you want to. Like, how did you make that transition from flip to cash flow? Or you. Or are you guys still flipping? And then how did you turn into a success? What does that daily life look like? As you know, you're saying we were working hard. Like, what were you doing? How did you turn that into a successful business?
- [34:07]
A
Well, we're just flipping all over, Flipping back and forth between strategies, all over the place, really, in all reality. So we came out here for rentals. That was the main goal. And at some point, we kind of realized, really, when. When Covid hit and 2020 and all that, we kind of went, okay, wait, let's. Let's look at our rentals real quick, because this might be the crack, but we said we hate our rentals, the rentals that we had, their college rentals or 100 year old houses. It's terrible, right? This is not the goal. And so we sold off almost all of our rentals. We started flipping like crazy. So we've been doing that for the last couple years and just being really super picky about what rentals we do bring on. We want them to be like very nice houses and we want them to be like very low bull crap situations. So either like those project the, the sober living houses or like really incredibly nice rentals where we're not going to be turning them over every year. And so we're still flipping at this point and just kind of cherry picking our rentals as we go into like this next year. I think that the ratio between what we keep and what we flip, we'll probably adjust some. I think we'll be keeping more and flipping less, but we'll also be wholesaling more where whereas I would just like to flip everything that I got my hands on in the past. And so we're going to be giving up some of those so that I can focus on kind of bigger projects and more of like my heart projects like those transitional houses. And I think a lot of that stemmed from like the Maui masterclass that we went to. Brody and I met at. They talked a lot about that and about like being in alignment with your goals, in alignment with your beliefs and everything. And so when we came, when I came back from that experience I was like maybe I want to flip a hundred houses a year. Like all these guys are doing it, so I want to do that or maybe I want to do multi family. Maybe I want to. And so I had to kind of really step back and re establish like what is it that actually I want to do and what is it that God is wanting me to do and calling me to do and what is it that I have like these strengths for that just make a ton of sense for me. So we are kind of going to be pivoting a little bit in the next few months.
- [36:34]
D
Yeah, also some of that pivoting too was just, just you know, some moves that we had to make to keep the business kind of going and growing. Like she said, when we first started our goal was rentals. We wanted passive income income. Our dream is to travel. We want to be able to do it more. We want to see the world. And the best way to do that is passive income. And but we were on a fixed income. I had my disability from the VA and that was what we were living off of. And I was able to buy, or we were able to buy a certain number of rentals. And so that was it. We were capped. Like, we could not qualify for any more loans. We can't use hard money or private money for long term rentals, obviously. So we were kind of like, well, you know, we're kind of stuck. We can't keep growing. What are we supposed to do? We got it. We started doing that thinking that every time we got a new rental, we'd be able to use the rental income to add to our debt to income ratio. But we didn't have two years of landlord experience yet, so they weren't counting any of it. So we realized, okay, we're gonna have to start flipping houses and building another source of income. So we got started into that. And the first house that we did was kind of an accident. It was. We bought it to be a rental. And it's. We finished the project at the wrong time of the year. This is kind of a seasonal market for renting as well. So you can get higher rents and get a lot more options for tenants in the summer than you can in the winter. And so we were kind of struggling to get the right tenant for the right amount of money that we were looking for. So we decided to just sell it and we made $30,000 on it. And we're like, hey, maybe there's. Yeah, let's try that again. And so then we just started flipping like crazy.
- [38:29]
B
That's cool. Do you feel like, because I get asked this a lot, I'm curious you guys thoughts, but do you feel like somebody has to be handy in order to start flipping houses? Like have a construction background or have experience in that?
- [38:42]
D
I had absolutely no experience at all. I do get asked that a lot. People say, oh, well, you must have had some sort of background. And I tell them, no, my dad was not handy and I didn't learn how to use a single tool or fix a single thing. And when we kind of got started, Megan's dad helped us on our first project and taught us a couple things and, you know, whatever he knew. And the rest was YouTube and really just the desire to make sure it was done right and just keep doing it until it was done right. Just having pride in our work and, you know, learning, learning the rest from there. So no experience needed for sure.
- [39:30]
A
In the beginning, we did do like a lot of the work ourselves. And at this point we're. I'm running like as a GC and so I run my subs, but I pretty much never get dirty. Like, if I have paint on me, you're in trouble. But in the beginning, in the beginning.
- [39:45]
D
All her entire wardrobe.
- [39:47]
A
I didn't own any clothes that didn't have paint on them. Them, you know, And I have. We have a. We have kids, right? Little kids, a five year old, a three year old and a two year old. So literally, over the last. While we're building our business, we're also growing our family. And so all of my pictures are just me, hugely pregnant, two stories up the building, painting the house or something. Just like my belly sticking through the rungs of the ladder, you know. So we definitely did a lot of it. It kind of helped that we were handy. It probably would have been more helpful if we weren't handy because then we would have just hire it out and rely on other people to do it, which is what we're doing now. And it's a lot funner that way. But.
- [40:30]
D
But at the same time, like it was. I think it's important to know.
- [40:37]
B
How.
- [40:37]
D
The whole process works from start to finish. Because since we. I mean, since we weren't handy at first and we kind of had to learn the ropes as we went and so we got a little bit better at it each house. But now because of that, Megan is a much better GC because she can keep the contractors in line because she knows, hey, if the drywaller says something crazy, no, this needs to happen before this can happen with the tile or this needs to happen in this order. And she can be there to make sure that things are happening properly because otherwise contractors will just go in and totally screw over the guy after them. And they'll just be like, oh, well, I can't do this right, because the guy before me didn't do this right. And so they'll just put lipstick on a pig and not even mention it to you. And if you don't know those, all those details, then you get those flips that we all have seen on the market all over the place that just look terrible. They look great in pictures. And then you go look at it in real person. You're like, ooh, yeah.
- [41:38]
C
But since you had done it yourself, hands on, you'd cut. You kind of were able to like apply that to. To contracting and general contracting everybody else. You don't miss all the little stuff.
- [41:49]
A
Yeah, I feel like, I think that's.
- [41:51]
C
Huge with a lot of real estate. People talk about like, at the beginning, you're doing everything and you don't want to run your business that way, but, like, so that's kind of the foundation so that you can run everything because you have played every single role. Yeah, that's cool.
- [42:05]
B
So for you guys, I mean, you mentioned in the beginning you. You had your travel trailer and you live behind the properties and move around and. And obviously that's not an easy thing to do. Especially, I mean, I don't know if you had kids at the time. Even without kids, it's not an easy thing to do. But why did you do that? How do you feel like that kind of set you guys up for where you're at now?
- [42:26]
A
We had one kid, she was a one year old when we moved here in the travel trailer. And so that was like, kind of fun. But it, it does. It totally sucks. Like, and it's Nebraska, so we have like, snow and it's cold. It's terrible. You a lot of times don't have, like, actually none of the times we had sewer hookups, so we'd have to like, hook up the trailer and go dump every week or two. And so there's just like, a lot of issues with living in a trailer, especially in a cold climate. But for us, I think we had a very small amount of money that we knew was coming in and we could live off of that if we lived in a trailer, if we didn't have, like a living expense. And so that was one way that we could kind of back ourselves into a corner and say, hey, we're gonna live, like, way below our means and be doing whatever we need to do to actually just like, make it work and be able to put all the money that we do have into growing our business. And then when we find out, like, okay, this is actually working, we're actually doing it. We're actually making money. Okay, then we could buy a house. And then I had got pregnant again, like, right when we moved out here. So I was pregnant with a one year old in this trailer for the first year and going into the second winter and about to pop pregnant. I was like, get me a house. I don't care what kind of house, but just any house. And so we ended up buying, like a super living flip. Like, the. The seller was like, yeah, my dad just did a really nice kitchen remodel in 56. And I was like, okay, do you.
- [44:08]
C
Know what year it is?
- [44:08]
A
Like, it's 2000.
- [44:10]
D
It was pristine. It was untouched.
- [44:12]
A
Yeah, it was beautiful. I love Lucy kitchen remodel. But we moved into it, like, on mattresses. On the floor and remodeled it while we lived there and stuff, which is another just terrible, sucky thing to do. But it was just what we needed to do, and we would do whatever it takes.
- [44:31]
B
Was it worth it?
- [44:33]
D
Oh, yeah.
- [44:33]
A
It's really worth it.
- [44:34]
D
Oh, yeah.
- [44:35]
A
The house is so cool now.
- [44:36]
D
I'll never forget the time that we spent in that trailer. I think it was. It was fun. I mean, it was. There were some challenges, but once we got the groove and got the hang of it, I mean, it was fun, you know, and. And it made sense. It was really the smart move because when we made pretty good money when she was working in California and I was still active duty, duty and the marines and. And we had our house and, you know, we had enough money to get anything that we wanted, and. But once we. You know, we're changing to our fixed income, we were like, okay, we have to cut back expenses dramatically. And so we sold my car. That was my favorite, and we bought a used truck, and we bought the trailer, and we sold half of everything that we owned that didn't fit in the trailer. And we were able to cut down our expenses so much that even though our new fixed income was less than half of what we were making before, we still had more money at the end of the month than we did before. So it worked. We actually were keeping more money every payday than when we were making a lot of money.
- [45:50]
C
So what did it look like? Because we've kind of seen, like, the hard beginnings of your story. What did it look like when it started to hit a turning point when you're like, we're. We're starting to live a life we actually want to live. You know, you look back and these memories are cool because they created something better, and you have fond memories of them, the sacrifice and the pride in doing that hard thing. But how did it. What was the turning point where it was like, this is a successful business now. This is what it looks like. And. And where did that kind of take you?
- [46:19]
A
I don't think that's happened yet. We just have different failures now, you know, and different problems. But I probably. I don't know, a year or so ago, I feel like we stabilized a bit more. But in all reality, like, every single year, I've kind of been like, man, we're either gonna make it big or, like, we're gonna file bankruptcy, you know? And, like, neither one of those have happened yet to me, I feel like. And maybe that's because we just keep moving the needle and, like, making Bigger goals and everything. But at some point certain things just start clicking. I think once we got like bank financing, we met up with a lender, I think about a year ago now who just really opened the doors to have, we could have like really great lending products. And to me, I think that was the point where I was like, oh, we're legit now. Like, you will actually lend to us. Because before we were just financing all of our flips on 18% hard money. And so that in itself is just incredibly hard to do. You have to do it like very specifically and very well. And, and once banks were like, hey, you are serious and we will lend to you, I. I feel like it got a lot easier for us and we could get kind of more creative. But yeah, I think that's probably.
- [47:48]
D
I mean, yeah, it was definitely a grind getting our business to a point where banks would lend to the business and not to Jeff and Megan on our fixed income. And so, and we had to learn that the kind of hard, slow way too, because our first year, first two years of our business, we were writing everything off and then we learned that that was a mistake, so we stopped doing that. And, and then, yeah, once we finally got a good relationship with the banker that was willing to give us good loans that we could even use for flipping, it just opened the door, door and it was like, oh man, it was like a breath of fresh air. It's like now. There's almost nothing stopping us now. And so because of that, like this year, we've just been able to buy stuff where we normally would have never been able to buy. And yeah, you know, so it's always, there's always challenges. It's always, you know, especially when we keep, like she said, moving the needle and keep setting the goals higher and higher. There's always going to be challenges and learning curves, but it does also get more easy and more fun as you grow and learn.
- [48:59]
B
I've noticed that for myself as well. It's interesting. I'm like, man, a few years ago if I would have been like, hey, if I have this much money to go and invest, like, oh, I'll be retired. I could do this, I could do that. I could buy so much real estate. And then fast forward, you get there and you're like, man, it's not enough. I need, I need this to do this or I need this to do this. And, and so I think, I think for you guys, I'm sure you, you keep leveling up in, in success. But then at the same time, because you're the type of people you are and you're always pushing, always striving. It's just like you. You never feel like you've reached it, so to speak, which I don't know if you ever do.
- [49:37]
A
I feel like we're just junkies, right? Like by nature. And so now we're just the junkies instead of.
- [49:46]
D
Yeah, we both have very addictive personalities, so we just had to find a healthy addiction. But also, when we first got into this too, like we set out, we said, we kind of made it like a five year plan. Like, what's our. What's our dream? What's our goal? And we worked backwards on the math from that and we said, okay, what is it going to take to get to that point? And you know, the, that goal has changed. It's evolved a little bit over the years. But ultimately we still want to be at a place where in a very short amount of time we are financially free enough to spend the majority of our time traveling. And you have to be aggressive to do that. And so we've just been staying aggressive and staying, you know, keeping our heads down and working hard. So that way we can do that and not just create a real estate empire. And I'll be 65 still, you know, wheeling and dealing, you know, I don't.
- [50:52]
A
Know if I can stop.
- [50:53]
D
Meghan won't be able to stop, but.
- [50:54]
C
I will.
- [50:57]
A
Get that next fix. Man.
- [51:00]
B
It's like house hacking. Like, this is the first house that we live in right now. It's not like an investment, you know, I mean, I'm sure it is from like an equity standpoint. We still bought it, right, and everything. But I could have kept going. I'm like, okay, let's go, let's go find a four plex.
- [51:15]
C
Let's.
- [51:15]
B
Let's get a triplex. Let's go house hack this. And it's just interesting because I'm the same way. It's like, all right, at some point, right? Enough's enough. But you said something, I think it was you, Megan, that one of your, one of your goals is to like, go sail.
- [51:31]
A
Yeah.
- [51:32]
B
Like live, like live in a sailboat, like full time type thing for a little bit.
- [51:37]
A
Yeah. When we, when we first moved out here, actually, we got here in like November and we started into the winter in the trailer and we're like, this sucks. Let's get out of here. So we went south for the winter and we went down to Florida and we had had this idea that we went, wanted to buy a Sailboat at one point. And you can't just like test drive those. There's not places to do that. So we went to the Miami Boat show show when we were down there and actually got to walk around on all these different sailboats and kind of picked out, like, got hands on, picked out, walked in this one that we're like, okay, this is it. 30 foot catamaran sailboat. This is what we want to do.
- [52:18]
D
44, 45. 45.
- [52:20]
A
Well, yeah. Was it then?
- [52:22]
D
Yeah.
- [52:22]
A
Oh, was it like a 40 foot, whatever. Not good with numbers. It's fine.
- [52:26]
B
Your goals get bigger over the years.
- [52:28]
A
I know I only had two more kids, so I was like, we gotta get a 50 footer now. It's fine. But we got hands on it. And so that kind of like pushed us and motivated us for years. And now I feel like, do I really want to sailboat? I don't know. That's maybe not the dream, but I think it kind of more symbolizes like that option to just live like a crazy dream and being able to like do whatever we want and travel a significant amount of the year.
- [53:00]
D
I still want to get this, but.
- [53:03]
A
You know, whatever, we'll see what happens.
- [53:05]
D
But we don't have to necessarily live on it.
- [53:08]
C
But.
- [53:10]
D
But if that's the case, you know, we have to, we have to make even more money for it to be a hobby versus, you know, a home. But.
- [53:18]
B
Right. You could house hack, take people and rent it out and take them scuba diving and.
- [53:25]
A
Yeah, you really.
- [53:28]
D
Yeah, we had all those thoughts and everything. And at first we were trying to keep it at like a 40 foot or 45 foot catamaran because all. Every. Everybody we talked to said, you know, if it's just two of you, like, you can manage and run a boat about that, that size. But once you get to like 50 foot or bigger, you kind of start needing to hire on some, some personnel or crew. And so we're like, all right, cool, we'll just keep it to ourselves. And then, and then, you know, as I was taking kind of classes to learn how to sail and all that, I would, you know, and I still want to do that. I want to know how to work my own boat. But then I realized, you know, once we get to the point where we can afford this lifestyle, like, what is it going to take another handful of deals and then I can afford a crew too, and then I don't have to work the whole time, you know, so then we need a little bit bigger boat. It's like, you Know, so, you know, you get how just kind of just.
- [54:22]
C
Raise those kids up and they'll. They'd be your crew, you know, could.
- [54:26]
D
Have somebody cook for me. I mean. Sounds great.
- [54:31]
C
So do you guys have any certain, you know, guiding principles or habits that you guys kind of stuck to or have developed over time that you feel have really given you an edge and helped you get where you've gone?
- [54:45]
A
I feel like just doing whatever it takes. I feel like that is kind of a thing that we do and then just kind of that aggressive. Aggressive growth is, is something else. Like, I used to, I bring this up a lot, but I used to race the Baja 1000, which is like a thousand mile off road race in Mexico. And we would spend like all year long trying to build up this race truck. And the thing is, is that if you just drove a race truck on the highway 60 miles per hour, you could drive it forever. It would never break. So you have to go purposefully break it. You have to go fast, you have to jump it, you have to do like, crazy nonsense. And then wherever it breaks is the weakest point. And then you have to like, take it back to shop and be like, okay, how do we rebuild this system and make it better? And I feel like that's what we do with our business. And so we just are kind of in this, like, constant cycle of like, all right, let's go fast, let's kill it, let's buy everything. And then like, oh, shoot, the wheels are falling off and we need to, like, go back and like, reel it in and build systems or put other people in place, like, to fix these issues. So that's kind of. I don't know how we grow aggressively.
- [55:56]
D
Yeah, it's just kind of like you got to push yourself outside of the comfort zone because being in a comfortable place is, is, I mean, it's detrimental. You'll never be able to grow and achieve big things when you stay in your comfort zone. So I mean, that's just kind of what we've always been good at, is just kind of backing ourselves into like a corner, so to speak, so that we have no option but to figure it out. And we were able to do that by like both jumping in and doing this full time, which everyone says, is that scary?
- [56:30]
B
Does that scare you? Like, I mean, it was, oh, that's super risky.
- [56:34]
D
Or, I mean, and. But that's why it worked, because I had to make it work. But if I had said, oh, let me just get out and get a job and we'll Kind of do it part time and we'll see, you know, we'll learn and do it. Like we'd probably won't even be in real estate anymore. Or we'd have like two rental properties and I'd still be working, you know, nine to five, somewhere else comfortable, but not achieving my goals and my dreams. So.
- [57:02]
B
What would you say to other people that are wanting to get started? I mean, obviously, if someone's dragging their feet, I think the message is clear. Like, you just need to do it, just get in the game. But like, for you guys, if you were to even go back, what pieces of advice would you give to yourself, kind of knowing what you know now?
- [57:27]
A
That's a good question.
- [57:30]
C
I would.
- [57:31]
A
I would say to go bigger, faster. Honestly, like, I think that even with, like, goals, like, I'm a goal junkie. So I make my goals every year or whatever, and when I make them, I think they're big. But then by the end of the year I'm like, oh, well, they, I guess, weren't that big because I could get pretty close to hitting them. But I think that if you make like, achievable goals, which everyone kind of says to do, you're cutting yourself short. And I think that, yeah, I just. If. If your goal is to flip 12 houses a year and you just accidentally freaking kill it and you've. You smash your goals out of the water, you flip 15, you'll never accidentally flip a hundred. Like, you have to completely redesign your whole way you do business to accidentally flip a hundred houses. Like, it's not going to happen accidentally. And so I would say to just like, scale up faster.
- [58:39]
B
Yeah, that's cool.
- [58:40]
D
Yeah. I think people are scared to not achieve their goals. But what they don't realize that if you set the goal big enough and you don't hit it, you'll still be further than you would have been if you had a smaller goal because you were trying for something bigger. So that's huge. And I mean, I guess, like, for me, the vice, like, I. We had a lot of people tell us this at the beginning, kind of like not necessarily in the same words, but the whole fake it till you make it kind of mantra. And I really don't believe in that. I don't think that you should be going around. I mean, you know, and we kind of tried to do that. You know, we went out and we got a logo for our business and got an LLC and did all of these things that were not step one. And we spent all this time and Money and. And brain power on stuff that didn't matter because we still hadn't even done a single deal. And, you know, so it was like we were trying to fake it till we make it. Robin's like, oh, here's my business card. Yeah, I invest in real estate. No, I don't. I don't know anything. And what I should have been doing is humbling myself and just networking and talking to people and learning. And it wasn't until we started really doing that that we actually started figuring out the right steps to take. And the real estate world is very abundant mindset. It's not a scarcity mindset. Like, I. Like, everybody is so friendly. Everybody's always willing to help, because we all know that you can always make a win, win situation out of almost anything. So it's not a competition. It's not a competitive, you know, market or competitive field. And if you just go and network and talk to people and let them know exactly where you're at, like, you're gonna grow, you're gonna learn. But if you go around pretending that you know more than you don't, or pretending that you're something that you're not, you're never gonna. Going to be stuck there because everyone's thinking, oh, he doesn't need my help. This guy's killing it. So, I mean, I think that that would be the advice that I would say, because I see a lot of people give that advice, and I love that.
- [60:46]
C
Because.
- [60:49]
B
One'S easy to do, right. And one's difficult to do, one's uncomfortable and one's more comfortable. Right? What feels more comfortable and what's easier to act like you know what you're doing, to not put yourself in a vulnerable spot. And, like, ironically, that's also not what gets you to where you want to go or gets you growth. Right. But getting uncomfortable being humble. Like, I love that. That answer. Just because it's funny. My. My wife and I were talking about this yesterday, just the importance of doing the things that, like, they suck sometimes they're. They're not as fun. Right. Especially in business. It's so easy to do these fun things and get the logo designed to get the. The T shirts made or whatever. Whatever. And it's like, that's easy, that's fun. But at the end of the day, don't forget what. What you need the foundation to be built on.
- [61:39]
A
Yeah. And in all reality, like, those things are actually not that important. Like, we have the T shirts and the logos on, but, like, when we were In California, we focused so much on all that and, like, building the website and all the things, and. And it's like, step one should really just be like, buying a house. Figure out all the other crap. And so when we moved to Lincoln, we were like, the focus is buying houses. Let's not get it twisted. And so we didn't even have a business until we had bought. And then we bought our. Started our business, actually, and put all the houses into it. But until then, it's like all these kids get all twisted up on, oh, should I have an LLC or S Corp or this or that? Or I need to talk to a attorney and a CPA and make business cards and make a website and like, no, you don't. You just need to buy a house and figure that part out, and then all the rest of the stuff you can figure out along the way.
- [62:32]
D
Yeah, you'll know when you need to get those things when the time comes.
- [62:36]
A
That's probably terrible.
- [62:37]
B
Yeah.
- [62:39]
C
No, I really liked. I really like what you said about just being humble and just being. Being, like, honest where you're at and just doing the dirty work. And then I love how you pointed out, like, real estate has an abundance mindset. I've never met people who are so willing. Like, you just want to talk about it. You love it. Like, you. You think about it all day, and then in your time off, you're like, talking to friends and family like, oh, you should buy real estate too.
- [63:03]
B
Why?
- [63:03]
C
You're like, how's that gonna help you? It's like, it doesn't help me. I just love it. Like, it's such an exciting, exciting thing. Everybody in this industry just wants to share, which is, like, take advantage of that, you know, like I said, we could talk about this for hours. We're already an hour into this. You know, we could just go on and on and on. It's exciting. We're gonna wrap up here. We have a couple questions we like to end things with for every podcast. I'm excited to hear you guys answers for before I do that. Brody, do you have any last thoughts or questions?
- [63:35]
B
No, I just say thank you. Like, this is. I. Like, I knew it was gonna be good just because, Megan, you're the first person I met in Maui, and we had some good conversations, but I didn't know that. That Jeff was a stud as well. So you guys are crushing it. I'm excited. In, let's see, what, two. Two weeks? I'll see you guys in Vegas. So I'm pumped for that. So thank you. Thanks for. Honestly, like this has been way better than, than I even thought it was going to be.
- [64:02]
C
So appreciate and so. So what's the best way for people to follow you guys? If they want to, you know, work with you guys or learn from you or just kind of follow your story. What's the best way for people to follow you guys?
- [64:14]
A
On Instagram, I'm the tatty investor. So that's the underscore. Tatty T A T T Y underscore investor. That's fresh. I just got me an Instagram in Maui.
- [64:27]
D
So there you go.
- [64:29]
A
Okay.
- [64:31]
C
Like tattoos, right?
- [64:32]
B
I sent her DM. It took her like 3 weeks to message me back. So she's like, it got lost.
- [64:37]
A
I didn't realize there was like another spot for the messages over there.
- [64:42]
D
We are, we're pretty new to the Instagram thing. Yeah. On Instagram, I'm Invictus investor. Or Invictus Underscore Investor. You can find, find us on Facebook, Acorn Properties. Just search it there. Or our website, acornhuskers.com. that's about it.
- [65:04]
C
Perfect. So here's the last three questions. So this has nothing to do with real estate, but what is the next bucket list item that you're excited to check off in your life?
- [65:15]
A
I want to dive the Great Barrier Reef. Reef. I've been scuba diving for like 20 years now. It's probably my number one.
- [65:21]
C
Yes.
- [65:22]
B
Yeah.
- [65:22]
A
And the reef is dying, so we gotta do it quick.
- [65:25]
C
I would love to do that as well. That sounds great. I know. You go. We gotta go before the reef's all dead. Huh? Actually, I heard that it's coming back and it's growing more. It's like so much was recovered like that. It's, it's actually really good news. So they'll still be there? Yeah, but no time to wait, right?
- [65:43]
D
Have so many things on that list. Yeah. I mean, I always wanted to skydive in Dubai, but that is kind of how I got my injury. So I don't know if it would be wise for me to ever skydive again. But yeah, I've always wanted to do cage diving with the great white shark. We've done some shark dives and it was fun, but like, I want to, I want to be scared. So there's a, there's a live aboard trip that leaves out of Cabo and goes to the Cerroquis Islands. And they see giant Pacific manta rays and just schools and schools of sharks and dolphins and I mean, just amazing trips. Like you can look up the videos on YouTube and, like, every trip they do is just incredible. Incredible. And I really want to do that. I think that'd be a lot of fun.
- [66:40]
A
I picked that one.
- [66:41]
C
You guys are speaking my language. I like these bucket list items. I'm all about that. All right, so question number two. What is your definition of freedom?
- [66:54]
A
I think just, like, having the option to do whatever we want, and I feel like that's probably grown from when we started, but really just being able to have the. The option to do whatever. I think originally I had thought I. When I could just not work anymore. Well, now I just really love my job, and I don't want to stop buying houses, you know, but to at least have the option to be able to leave for months at a time and then come back to it.
- [67:23]
D
Yeah, I think that's it. Just being able to do what we want, when we want, without money being the indicator on whether or not we can do it or not, like it is for most people. And even, you know, us now, there's still limitations and just getting to the point where we can just say, ready, set, go on whatever we want.
- [67:46]
C
That's cool. I like how you're willing to change that. Like I said, first was just not having to work, and then it was like, oh, having this passive income, and then it's like, it can kind of change as time goes on. I like that you're willing to do that. All right, last question. If you could send a text message to everybody in the world, everybody's phone's about to blow up right now. What would your text bomb to the world be?
- [68:08]
A
Dude, I wasn't expecting this question. You didn't put it on.
- [68:14]
B
We wanted this element.
- [68:16]
D
Whether you think you can or you think you. You can't. You're right.
- [68:23]
C
That's a good one. I think we've heard that one before, and I think there's a reason for that, because it is super true. And I think you guys are living proof of making that happen.
- [68:33]
A
That's the same one too.
- [68:37]
C
You can just agree if you want.
- [68:38]
A
It's up to you. I would say it would be a text that says, follow me at the Taddy Investor on Instagram serving.
- [68:47]
C
I like it, everybody. That's right. Well, this is sweet, guys. This has been fun. We look forward to following you and learning more about your journey and. And honestly, it's been super inspiring. I'd love to hear, like, what you guys came from and how you just set your mind to it, and we're just willing to go for it. So without further ado, this is Joe Jensen, Son, signing off for the Real Estate Investing School podcast, reminding everyone to just don't be afraid to get out there and do whatever it takes.