BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast - 186: How to Get Your First Few Properties - Even in a Competitive Market with Dave Meyer

Episode Date: August 4, 2016

There are a lot of excuses people use for why they don’t invest in real estate. Maybe they work too much. Maybe they don’t have any money. Maybe the market is too hot. But some — like our guest today — don’t let those difficulties stop them. Instead, they use creativity to overcome obstacles and build a real estate empire. So today on the BiggerPockets Podcast, we are excited to introduce you to Dave Meyer, an investor from the Denver market, who shares his story of buying eight units using creativity, intelligence, and in incredible level of hustle! In This Episode We Cover: Who exactly Dave, the VP of Growth for BiggerPockets, is How his silly neighbor unintentionally encouraged him to buy a house Why he chose his friend as a partner The details of his first deal What he looked for in his first deal The numbers on that deal Would it still be a great deal without the appreciation in Denver? How he raised his funds for this project The importance of acting on opportunities now Who manages his properties? How a tenant built a staircase for him How you can learn the market by working hands-on How Dave bought properties while waiting tables His first experience with house hacking Tips to keep in mind regarding zoning when finding properties And SO much more! Links from the Show Josh’s Twitter Account Brandon’s Twitter Account BiggerPockets Webinar BiggerPockets Forums Dancing with the Stars How Great Leaders Inspire Action by Simon Sinek (TED Talk) Books Mentioned in this Show The Book on No or Low Money Down by Brandon Turner The Ultimate Beginners Guide to Real Estate Investing by BiggerPockets Start with Why by Simon Sinek Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek Tweetable Topics: “If you have an opportunity, you’re a fool to ignore it. Find a way to do it.” (Tweet This!) “You learn a tremendous amount if you do hands on things such as screening the tenants, doing the open houses. You learn the market and what people want.” (Tweet This!) “Find the deal and figure out how to get the money to make it happen.” (Tweet This!) “Once you start owning, it feels weird to start paying someone else to live in their house.” (Tweet This!) Connect with Dave Dave’s BiggerPockets Profile Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Bigger Pockets podcast show 186. I want to have a full-time job that I'm not one of those people who wants to quit. So, like, I have constructed my whole strategy around continuing to work a full-time job, but being able to supplement my income and, you know, invest. You're listening to Bigger Pockets Radio, simplifying real estate for investors large and small. If you're here looking to learn about real estate investing, without all the hype, you're in the right place. Stay tuned and be sure to join the millions of others who have benefited from biggerpockets.com. Your home for real estate investing online.

What's going on, everybody? This is Josh Dorkin host to the Bigger Pockets podcast here with my co-hosts, Mr. Brandon Turner. What's up, man? I am doing fantastic. How about you? I'm doing really, really well. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Thank you. It sounds so formal. Well, I appreciate you caring and your concern towards. I don't. I don't care. It's just that. That's how we do the show. Wow.

Really? I care. I care. That's just, I care a lot. People, a lot of people say I'm the mean guy in this relationship. I think you're the abusive one. I don't know. People do say you're a lot meaner.

Here's how we're going to tell. So we both have Twitter. Josh is at J.R. Dorkin and I'm at Brandon at BP. And so go ahead and vote on Twitter and just say, you know, whether or not Josh or Brandon is the meaner one. Yeah, who's meaner? Yeah. I'd like to find out. You know, you know, what's funny is when.

we go in public together and people don't know which voice is which. It's really funny. You'll have people like yelling at me thinking I'm you and people are yelling at you thinking you're me. They're always yelling at me about Detroit. And I'm like, I don't mind Detroit. I got shot there once, but. All right. So, moving on. So yeah, today's show is awesome. You guys are going to love today's show. The good guy that is a good friend of both Josh and I. And he's got a really kind of a cool story of how he's building his real estate empire. He is. He's got eight units, using things like creative financing, really some great ideas on how he finds his properties.

And I love the story of his latest deal. He's got a really cool story. He takes this rifle approach. And it's awesome. So definitely stay tuned and listen up for that. But before we do, let's jump to some of this other stuff like today's quick tip. All right, today's quick tip is something very simple. You are fat, or at least you're probably out of shape.

So I want to encourage you guys to get out there. No, that's not an extra tip. I know. I am a little bit out of shape. So the quick tip today is. Most Americans are. Yeah, most Americans are. So here's a great tip for getting in shape and building your real estate empire,

and that is walking for dollars. Yeah, that's right. I actually go, like my wife and I last night, we got in our car, took a little new little baby girl, Rosie, went downtown the town where I like to invest, and then we just parked the car and we walked for five miles around town. Half of that was because I lost my Fitbit somewhere on the trip. And so we had to retract back our entire trip until I found it. Anyway, I found it though.

But anyway, we went and walked in for dollars and I found like half a dozen properties that were vacant that I'd never noticed before. And now I get to contact the owners and see if I can buy them to either flip them or rent them out. So walking for dollars. Excellent. And you can use the Bigger Pocket's lead manager to track all those. You can, but is that officially out yet? I don't know if it might be officially out by this. Yeah, I think it's, we're in beta.

We're in testing. Yeah. So if you're using the new lead manager, you can check that way. And if you're not, then stay tuned because we're going to talk more about that a lot coming up here in the future. Absolutely, absolutely. There are two kinds of real estate investors, those who have reviewed their insurance and those who think that they have. Most don't realize their coverage wasn't built for how they actually invest. Vacancy periods, rehabs, short-term rentals, or LLC held properties.

These gaps surface only when filing claims. That's why investors work with NREG. They specialize exclusively in real estate investors, understanding portfolios, risk at scale, and cash flow protection. One claim can erase years of returns. If you own a rental property, don't assume you're covered. Have NREG review your insurance with someone who gets investing at NREG.com slash BPPod. That's N-R-E-I-G.com slash B-Podd. Most investors spend more time chasing deals than reviewing their insurance.

But a quick coverage check can be fast, easy, and one of these smartest ways to protect and even improve your property's cash flow. As the months get colder, frozen pipes, icy walkways, and seasonal wear and tear can increase the likelihood of claims. And traditional insurance companies aren't always built to handle these claims quickly or smoothly. That's why more real estate investors are turning to steadily. They focus exclusively on landlords, whether it's a single-family rental, a burr builder's risk policy, or midterm holiday guests. You get fast quotes, flexible coverage, and protection for property damage, liability, and even loss of rental income. Now is the perfect

time to review your rates and coverage. Get a quote in minutes at biggerpockets.com. slash landlord insurance. Steadily, landlord insurance designed for the modern investor. For decades, real estate has been a cornerstone of the world's largest portfolios. But it's also historically been sort of complex, time-consuming, and expensive. But imagine if real estate investing was suddenly easy, all the benefits of owning real, tangible assets without the complexity and expense. That's the power of the Fundrise flagship fund.

Now you can invest in a $1.1 billion portfolio of real estate, starting with as little as $10. The portfolio features 4,700, a single-family rental homes spread across the booming sunbelt. They also have 3.3 million square feet of highly sought after industrial facilities thanks to the e-commerce wave. The flagship fund is one of the largest of its kind.

It's well diversified, and it's managed by a team of professionals. And it's now available to you. Visit fundrise.com slash BP Market to explore the fund's full portfolio, check out historical returns, and start investing in just minutes. Carefully consider the investment objectives,

risks, charges, and expenses of the Fundrise Flagship Fund before investing. This and other information can be found in the fund's prospectus at funnrise.com slash flagship. This is a paid advertisement. This is show 186 of the BiggerPockets podcast. You could check out the show notes at biggerpockets.com slash show 186. And you'll want to do that because there's going to be a really entertaining photo of Brandon on the show notes. So definitely, definitely check that out. Embarrassing.

Oh, boy. Well, let's let's. Let's get to this thing. Today's guest, Dave Meyer. Dave works about 10 feet away from me here in Bigger Pockets, headquarters. Really, really awesome guy, good friend. And he's doing some really cool stuff. Dave is also, and I didn't say this on the show because I don't want to embarrass him.

He's also probably the smartest person I've ever met. He's one of the smartest people. Yeah, for sure. He's a rock star. Absolutely. Yeah, definitively wicked smart. And yeah, you know, listen up. What Dave's doing is he's building his.

real estate quote unquote empire while working his full-time job. And, you know, his intention is to continue doing that. And I love that. You know, real estate investing doesn't have to be a full-time gig. You don't have to do it. You know, you don't have to transition to become a full-time real estate investor. You can actually do it on the side. And we dig into that a little bit. So let's bring him on. All right, Dave, welcome to the show. And happy birthday to you, sir. Thanks, guys. What's going on. It's your birthday today? Oh, my gosh. It is my birthday. I am 29 years old and I'm feeling pretty good about it. I didn't know I was older than you either. I thought you were an old man. I don't know this is weird. I know. It's the gray hair. I've got like, I don't know if you

can see it here, but I've got some sort of pepper going on. And that whole Jebediah beard, you're rocking. Yeah, yeah, you know, I just, I lost my razor and just haven't bought a new one. Yeah, they're expensive. So we're investors. We're cheap. All right. So let's get to your story today. So for those people who don't know, Dave, actually is a member of the Bigger Pockets team. He is our, what's your official title now? I don't know. Josh, what he got for me?

VP of growth, I believe. I think that's probably right. I'm in charge of growth in marketing. So I do a lot of the external email, doing some work on the product. We also do social media. But yeah, it's a really fun and exciting job. And I think I've been here almost exactly six months now. So this is like a good anniversary present for me letting me be on the podcast.

Nice. And we're not here for you to talk about what you do at Bigger Pockets. We're here to talk about you because you are a real estate investor. Isn't that correct? I am indeed. And that's how I came to Bigger Pockets. I like started Googling like real estate technology and found bigger pockets because I wanted to get into like working with tech and real estate at the same time. That's awesome. That's awesome. There you go. Yeah. Let's just start at the very beginning of your story. Why and how did you get into real estate? So I really had no idea what I was doing. I moved to Denver from New York about seven years ago. And I lived across from this kid. He was like my neighbor. And he was kind of an idiot.

And he was a really good skier. So I'd go skiing with him all the time. And one day we were like driving up to the mountains. And he's like, yo, I think I'm going to like buy a house with my girlfriend. We're going to make all this money. In the back of my head, I was like, if this moron can do this, I could definitely. That was Brandon, by the way.

Yeah, actually, it was Brandon Turner as my neighbor. That's good. That's good. I did live in Colorado at that time, so weird. Weird. I did have a neighbor who I went skiing. I don't know. This is getting uncomfortable.

If it's true, you've grown, you've gotten a lot taller since then. Like two feet taller. So he's just like, oh, I could do this. You can make all this money. And I was like, this actually is the smartest thing you've ever said. by far. I was just thinking about it all day we were skiing and I went home and my roommate, who was much smarter, I was like, dude, we can definitely do this. Like, this kid's got a pretty good plan, but we should just do it and we should do it better than him. And so that's how it started.

I had no money. I was just about probably six months out of college when I first started thinking about this. And neither did my buddy. He was a teacher. I was waiting tables at the time. But we figured that between us, we could scrounge together a little bit of cash. We could probably raise bringing a couple of other partners and that's ultimately what we did for our first deal. So let's talk about that. So you went, you know, you're with your roommate and you guys basically say, hey, we're going to get into bed together. Well, I don't know what you guys do behind closed. Those doors are in a bedroom apartment. You guys are going to get together and you're going to do business. Why did you end up picking him? Was it just like happenstance or had you guys been

kind of talking about doing some kind of stuff together. Yeah, how did that come about? Yeah, so he and I had like sort of been trying to think of like some business ideas. We actually wound up like running a tech company together for five years as well. So like we knew like we had worked pretty well together. He's a really smart dude. Like I just figured he would know he would just like be a good partner to have. Also like just like living in proximity to the property because like we were just learning how to be landlords and we had no idea what we were doing. So it was just like the ability to like drive over there together and just be like how do you fix this kind of thing? How do we deal with these crazy tenants? Like those are just having someone close by was really helpful. And we also just like knew all the same people that we thought

that we could bring in for partners. He and I have known each other since we were like 10 or 11. We're friends from high school. So that's ultimately we knew all the people we knew in New York who were way more successful than we were at the time that could contribute the capital that we needed then we would do the sweat equity piece of it. So I want to dig into that a lot, but let's talk about the deal and then you can talk about how everybody kind of came together. So what was the first deal? I mean, you bought like a condo or something small, right? No, no. It's actually a four unit. So I mean, I look like a genius because I bought in Denver in 2010. So I mean, if anyone follows the Denver market, they know that it's just absolutely exploded. And pretty much

buying most places in 2010 was a great idea. And so I found a place. It was four, four units. And I was just so naive, rather than just like buying a single family. I was like, no, we're just going for it. We're doing four. I did the same thing, by the way. Yeah. Have you realized? I don't know. Why? Why not? Ignorance is bliss. So we just, it's two, two bedrooms, two one bedrooms. And it's in a really great neighborhood of Denver that has like a very strong rental community. I mean, like, there's not many families in the area. It's like a very young crowd. So I felt like it would be a really good area. And also felt like I wanted to invest as close to like the geographical heart of Denver as possible. I just felt like as close as you can get to like all the commercial retail entertainment stuff you could do. And so looked at a lot,

a lot of places. Like I don't think my broker would even take me back at this point after. But probably showed me like 50 places and finally settled on this one. And it's been an unbelievable deal. It's just gone through the roof in appreciation. The rental income is amazing. And it's just been awesome so far. So you went and looked at like 50 deals. So can you tell like, talk to our audience for a minute and like when people are out

looking for deals, what did you look for in that first deal? Because that's a scary time, right? Were you just trying to build up your confidence? That's why you looked at so money. Or was there something about that fourplex that made of you. Definitely. No, it was like a lot about it. of confidence. It's like I just needed to see a lot of different things and get a better sense of

like what was out there. Like my whole idea of like multifamily places was like places I personally destroyed in college with my roommate. And so like I was like looking to make sure there was no people like me in any of these places. And secondly, I just like I've always like sort of had a good sense of like financial modeling and I just kind of wanted to run a lot of numbers. So I was just like, I built like my, you know, I didn't know about bigger pockets at the time. And I was just like building my own spreadsheets and I was just plugging in numbers and seeing what worked. And like, frankly, like, I had no idea. Like how I was modeling some of this stuff was like for like two percent appreciation over the long term in rent and both real appreciation. And like, so like everything

seemed really thin to me at the time. Like literally I could have bought anyone at one of them and made money off of it at this point. But I do think it was just like sort of getting out there understanding the different combinations. And then what I was really looking for was something that looked like it had been taken care of. I know, like, now I have a lot more confidence in my ability to fix stuff, and I know contractors and that sort of stuff. But at that time, like, I was just, I was really young.

I had no idea, like, how to fix anything. And I just, like, wanted something that I thought was going to be in pretty good condition for a long time. Right on. So let's go back to the property itself, four units, two, two bedrooms, two one bath. What were the numbers? What kind of rents were you getting? What did you guys pay? We wound up paying $460 for the place.

We were able to get a conventional mortgage on it because it's four units or under, which is awesome. Which was really nice. The rents at the time were, let me just do this quickly in my head, we're probably about $38 or $3,900 a month. And right now we're getting about $5,800 a month. So about six years later, it's gone up a really significant amount. It's probably like 60% just doing it in my head. But so that's been incredible.

And, you know, knock on wood, our expenses have been relatively low. We've had to put in a couple new driveways. We had to repair. There's like a deck outside that needed some structural repairs. But, you know, other than that, capital expenditures have been pretty low and, you know, normal wear and tear and maintenance. Do you think if Denver didn't have the crazy appreciation that it saw, let's say it was exactly the same shape that when you bought it in, was this still a good deal on that, do you think?

I do, yeah. I do think so just because the rental, like so, you know, just even if the property itself didn't appreciate rent has just been going up in Denver a lot. So I guess you can call that appreciation as well. But something I thought about a lot was that if you just look at the basic numbers of Denver, there are more people moving to Denver every year than they are building houses. So to me, that's basic economics. The prices are going to go up.

And so I thought so. But even if it stayed flat, like, We would have cash flowed a couple hundred bucks a month probably, and it would have been great. It still would have been a great deal, but it wouldn't have sort of led me to be able to sort of continue, probably not as quickly led me to be able to, you know, turn this into a couple more deals. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, it was a sub 1%, but at the end of the day, it sounds like the property was in pretty good shape. You know, if we run that over years and years, it may, you know, typically, you know, we've got that 50% rule that we like.

to talk about, you know, everything kind of possibly evens out. But, you know, you got that rent appreciation, which is awesome. You got the actual property appreciation, which is fantastic. But for those people listening, you know, you definitively don't want to count on that. You want to buy in the line of a possible appreciation, but you want to find a deal that's going to work for you and your needs that, you know, and that's a bonus, right? Oh, definitely. Yeah. I mean, I, like, I did these models. I had no idea what I was doing. I thought I was good at financial modeling and I was just like, oh, I'm making more money than I'm guessing I'm going to be spending. This is a great deal. Like, I definitely had no idea about the, you know, 2% rule 1% any of that kind of stuff.

But I mean, you guys know me. I'm like always like the pessimistic person about like trying to be really conservative about like numbers and stuff. And so I wanted to basically assume the absolute worst was going to happen for this. A lot of this because it wasn't necessarily all my capital and I was like really paranoid about losing other people. people's money. And so, yeah, I made sure that no matter what happened, like, it wasn't, it wasn't going to lose me or my partner's money. So, okay, partner. So let's talk, let's talk about that. I'm assuming you did some fundraising for this project. Yeah. So my buddy and I just knew some people back in New York who were smarter with their careers than we were and were willing to invest and had some money to do it. And so it actually has worked out really well. I was like a little worried about

working with friends. This is probably a unique situation. I definitely wouldn't recommend it for everyone. This is a special advantage, I think, right here. We're about to hear you. It really is, though. Like, literally me and my buddies from high school are, like, really close. We're all really, like, have been, like, known each other really well. And we just have good relationships with people and we all trust each other. And so it was like a really great situation. And so I definitely wouldn't say that you should do this with this, like, people you know casually. I also think what was good is, like there was like sort of a clear set of boundaries and like I was going to be running the property and managing the property other people who were just capital contributors and so like we set

this all out we put it in a document like we had it notarized you know we you know we've never had to call on that but like we made sure that that was positive and then so that went really well and then you know I did another deal recently and I went to a family member and after being able to show that like this actually works. I went to my dad and he was super pumped about it and and he provided a good amount of the capital for the second deal. But, you know, it's not like a, you know, he's made way more money than me off that. So it was like a really good thing. And like I know the whole superhero thing. Like I really think taking care of, you know, finding partners who who can contribute this stuff. Like I don't, you know, I'm not like, I think it's a great opportunity. If you have people who

can do that, like you absolutely should take advantage of it. Yeah. So, can you. So, can you. you tell us, so how many people, what was the arrangement? I love that you put it all in paper and then got it notarized. That's awesome. A lot of people will put it on paper, but they don't notarize it, and then, you know, kind of could call to question, hey, did I really write that? Was I really, you know, in agreement with that. That notary signature is amazing. So great, great idea. So how many people came in? What did they give? And, you know, obviously that was used as your down payment. Yeah? Yeah. So it's kind of. interesting. We came up with a structure that I thought was pretty awesome. So I was like we

basically we got the down payment and it was sort of treated as a secondary loan, like a secondary mortgage. So the two capital contributors got and continued to get interest on that down payment. And then we all actually from there split the proceeds 25, 25, 25, 25, 25 on the sale. But what me and my partner who lived here and did the work, we actually got to keep a high percentage of the cash flow. So it sort of made a great incentive. Like they were getting a return on their capital, just like most investors want. We were getting like sort of sweat equity. And it sort of incentivized us, right?

It's like if you can go and fix something yourself and save the whole partnership money by fixing yourself instead of hiring someone who's super expensive, like you might as well do that. and then you get to enjoy some of the benefit of actually going there and working. I mean, like, I totally messed up, like, half the things I had probably probably costing us way more money at first, but now I've gotten much better at it. I love the structure. I think it's awesome that everybody kind of gets back based upon what they've put in. And, you know, we hear a lot about two-person partnerships. You know, this was obviously more complicated, but, you know, the arrangement seems to make a lot

a sense. What type of return are those guys getting on that? It was 6% interest on the money. Yeah, 6% interest. So it's like really solid for them. And like, but again, like you were saying before, like we were assuming this property was never going to appreciate. Like they've obviously, I can tell you off the top of my head, but they're going to make a hell of a lot more money on that money once we sell this property because it has gone through the roof. That's cool. That's cool. I mean, I love the idea of partnerships. I love working with people because like, yeah, you were starting out. You didn't have a lot of money. And so a lot of people out there will just say, I can't do it.

I'm just going to give up. I'm going to go back to watch and dance with the stars or whatever, you know, because they have this block that says, I don't have the money to do it. That's all I watch. I have it on repeat in my living room. And we watch 18 hours a day. Oh, yeah. Just the same one.

I was trying to think right now like a funny person that's been on the show and I can't think of a single person to say that I watch. But whatever. All right. So anyway, I love the idea of partnerships. You know, I talk about it all the time. And in fact, if people are interested in learning more about partnerships, We're actually doing a webinar this coming week on the idea of how to use partnerships

and a couple other ideas for creative investing. So BiggerPockets.com slash webinar. You can sign up for the webinar titled my three favorite low money down strategies for real estate investing. And one of the hints is one of them is partnerships. We'll talk about that there. Again, bigger pockets.com slash webinar. Be there or be square.

Be there or be square. Or just be square. One of my buddies was like talking to me the other day and he was like, I mean, you know, like my grandparents might be able to help me out with the down payment. It's like not the whole thing. Like, but I don't know if I should do it. Like maybe I should just wait and like do it on my own because like I just like on my own person.

And I was just like, you know, screw that man. Like if you have an opportunity like you're a fool to to ignore it. Like find a way to do it. Like if you have an opportunity like every day you wait, you might wait 10 years and never be able to do it. Like if there's an opportunity in front of you, just do it. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Getting that first deal is so important. Even if you have to give away 99% of your future profit on that first. deal. I mean, again, don't buy a bad deal, but even if you don't make anything on that first deal, if you just get your feet wet, get in there, that's the hardest spot. Exactly. You'll learn so much and like your confidence will go absolutely through the roof. As soon as you're like in there managing, flipping whatever you want to do, like, as soon as you do your first one, it's also really addicting. Like the first time you do it, you're going to like,

oh my God, I just, I have to keep doing this. Awesome. All right. So that's the first deal. I think we've mostly covered it. So you're managing that. You guys don't have a property manager. No, I've been doing it. My buddy who's my roommate has since moved back to New York. He's in business school. So I run it by myself now. Right on. Okay. So any fun stories? Any interesting things as you were learning how to be a landlord? I'm sure you did not get it perfect. No. I mean, I'm just like still cringing how embarrassed I was doing. I like tried to like once just like build a whole staircase and this was like like six weeks into my first.

You actually like because I know you. You were 10 feet away from me. I can't really see you with a hammer. No, no. I was like sitting out there. I like had no idea. I had like one hammer like six nails and like a piece of like a two pipe six. I was just like sitting there trying to do it.

And like it's been like I come back like every day. You know, like I spent like three hours. I just screw it up. And I'm just like, what am I going to do? Like, I'm too embarrassed at this point to even, like, call the contractor. And, like, one day I just get back there and there's just like this immaculate staircase. And I was just like, what is this? What happened?

And my tenant just came out and it was like, my dad was here the other day and he just felt so bad for you. You looked so helpless that like he said that he was just build it for you. And he was, so he built the whole staircase. And I was like, can I like, can I like? give him like the money and she was like no no he doesn't want it but like I wound up just like figuring asking what the materials cost and paid him for it but I just like still think of like how embarrassing like what my tenants must have been thinking just like watching me out there just like hammering away doing nothing.

That's a great story. So Dave, do you recommend other people do what you did and start out by managing your own properties? That's a great question. I think it's like it's sort of a balancing act like you need to be somewhat humble as I wasn't. And like thinking like about like what is within your, your like realm of possibility. It also is like what you were doing. Like I was waiting tables when I first started.

So I was working like three doubles. I had four days off a week. I'd plenty of time to do this. So like I could I could do it. Like nowadays I think more and more about getting a property management company just because I, you know, I work full time. I'm also in school.

I think you learn a tremendous amount. Even if you don't do the repairs yourself, like screening tenants yourself, like doing the open houses or showings, and just like you learn the market really well. You learn what people want in their apartments. You learn like how much demand there is for your apartment. That's really helped me set my prices. Like knowing that I can put out an ad on Craigslist and get 75 people to show up for one of my one bedroom's. Like I know the price is too low. Like I can clearly raise that. So it really just kind of gives you a better pulse. I think I wouldn't have even known what to look for in a property manager. Again, like I

didn't really know about like bigger pockets or anything at that time. So I just felt like more comfortable doing it myself. Hey, I love that I love that you were a waiter buying this property. You know, I mean, seriously though, because there's, you know, what we do every day, what we try to do is we try to, you know, empower people financially, right? We're trying to help people learn this stuff. And a lot of people say, I can't do it. It can't be done. You know, you were waiting tables and you were broke. I mean, essentially, right? So you went, you found some people to put in cash who were working and all you needed was the deal. So many people are like, oh, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. Find the deal and then figure out how to get

the money to make the deal happen. And that's what you did. And that was amazing. Absolutely. Yeah, I didn't even know it at the time, but I basically like wholesale the deal and then was the property manager. Like I did get some equity in it too. But like I've, But, like, I think sort of at the beginning, that's essentially what I had done because I really had no way to buy into the property. Yeah, right on. Cool. So what came next? You said your dad financed the second deal.

How did that go down? What was that second property? Yeah, so I had made some money off this stuff. You know, I sort of moved on in my career after waiting tables and was able to save up some money. And, you know, through the first property, definitely made some good money as well. And, you know, my dad had come out to visit. showed him the outside of the property and he got really excited about it and wanted to learn more. And, you know, this was in late 2013. And the market had gone up in the single family, but the

multifamily market in Denver was still like a little bit lower than I would have expected. And so I just started casually looking for things. And one day I just found this property. Like, I was stunned. Like I looked at my agent and I was like, dude, we got to buy this like right now. Like call their agent and put in a bit of like write this. a second, has to be done. I called my dad. I was like, can we do this? Like, is this possible? And he was like, yeah, I guess. My dad's like a pretty cautious guy. Like, this is sort of like outside of his character to like make a split second decision. But he did and he jumped on it. And the cool thing is it's like literally totally by coincidence, like on the same block as my first

one. So it's like, I mean, of all the streets in Denver, it's like right next door. So it just seemed like this incredible opportunity. And it was. So that one is a three bed. three unit, excuse me. And the amazing part is the main unit is like this unbelievable, like, rare find in Denver. It is a four-bed, three-bath, 2,500 square foot apartment, like in probably one of the most desirable blocks to rent, like, in Denver. It's got like an off-street parking, which in this neighborhood is really valuable. And so it's worked out that that unit alone carries my entire mortgage taxes and insurance. What was amazing about it and why I bought it is like they were renting that apartment for $1,700 a month.

And when I bought it, I instantly turned it to $3,200 a month. Like that was just like, I saw that and I was like, dude, like we got to buy this. Like I know the market well enough to know that this is totally going to change. That's kind of what sold my dad on it because like I was just like I'm 100% positive, even if it's not $1,500. Like I knew it could go up a thousand. and I actually was able to move into one of that. So that was like my first experience house hacking. I moved into the small one bedroom upstairs, rented out the other two,

and was close by to my other property to take care of it. So it was like really an awesome situation. All right. I've got a whole bunch of stuff I want to talk about here. So I want to get into the house hacking thing. You had said that you saw this property and knew instantly you couldn't wait five minutes. you had to put an offer in. So that happens. And when it happens, you have to be prepared to move on it or you're going to lose the deal. So what was it specifically? You said the rents were under, under rent. What else was it about this property that said to you, hey, I got to jump on it. It was definitely the undermarket thing. And the house is just in like immaculate condition. It's like a 120 year old house. But it had a brand new roof, a brand new boiler. All the HVAC and plumbing had just reached.

recently been redone, and they had just recently built the third apartment. So that big apartment I had just talked about, like, was probably 3,000 square foot. And there was like this separate, like, old, like, mother-in-law suite type staircase up that you could basically break out. And so they had added an entire new unit and definitely hadn't like sort of looked at the rents and how they could start charging for that. Because originally, like, four dudes had been living in that main unit and one of them just moved up to the small one. So they didn't even increase the rent when they had like a second, like an whole other unit there. And I was just like, this is actually insane. This guy is like totally undervaluing his property. And so those, those are the main things.

Like, just being close for my personal lifestyle was really great. How great of a condition the house was in and just dramatically undervalue rents. Well, this is one of those things I love about real estate is that, I mean, majority of real estate investors out there, they don't read books on real state, they don't listen to podcasts in real estate. They don't, I mean, they don't go on bigger podcasts. They don't learn anything, right? They just like bought something once and then they just hope it works out well. What I mean by that is there's so much untapped potential in tons of deals. Like there's so much hidden value. It's like, I found so many properties where it's like that. There's just like a hidden bedroom over there. They don't use the bedroom or there's this big area that

easily could be another unit. They just don't use it as that. I bought a house once with a barbershop on the lot. And we just turned it to do a single family, another. single-family house. I also know it a duplex. Yeah. And it's like, people don't think like that. And I love that you do.

I'm going to ask you guys both something on that. Do you guys have tips on how to identify and find that? How, you know, was it just happenstance that, you know, you didn't see that on the MLS. Your agent didn't necessarily know it, right? So you were just randomly looking at this property, identified that there was that extra opportunity.

And from there knew that you had to jump on it. But like, there was, I guess what I'm asking is, was that something you would have known without having spent the time to go and check out the property? Definitely not. No, there's no way you could tell. And like one thing I do, which is like kind of nerdy, but I would highly recommend is like know a little bit about zoning in your neighborhood or where you're looking. Because like there are some places where they do that and it's totally illegal. And you have to like know where it's legal and where you can have the opportunity to add value. And now as I've sort of become a more sophisticated invest.

like that's something I look at really carefully is like zoning and opportunity to like add new units add like a mother-in-law suite and yeah definitely and like as brandon said like I think it's like probably the most fun part of being a real estate investor is like walking to a house and being like what could I do with this place like could I flip it could I rent it like what am I going to do like there's so many creative ways and approaches that you could take I absolutely like even when I'm not in the market for places I like see an open house and I pull over and I just go into the houses because I just find it really fun. Yeah.

Hey, Dave, you know, obviously you're not looking at every house for sale. That may not be possible. So you've got your own set of criteria for properties that you're looking at. So I guess what type of criteria are you using to find your properties where that makes something like this possible? Yeah, so definitely. I look for things that have underdeveloped zoning. potential. In Denver, for example, a lot of houses will have

or zoned a single family. So a lot of people look at that and be like, oh, it's single family. But like half of those single families are actually zoned as SUA1, which means that they can have an accessory dwelling, which means you can take a garage and turn it into a like a mother-in-law suite. Or if there is a separate entrance into the basement, that can technically be an accessory dwelling as well. So like you can look at these. these things. And like, if you think about the cash that it takes to convert those things versus the increase in value that you are going to get in rent, it's like disproportionately

high returns on your money. Like, it's, it's one of the best things. So like that's really where I focus now. I mean, I'm not like some prolific, I'm not Brandon. Like, I'm not this prolific investor. I've done three deals. But like, you know, I'm trying to sort of accelerate it. And that's definitely sort of the main thing I'm looking at these days. Well, three deals is three more than the average listener of our podcast. Three more than the average American. So you're well, well ahead of the game here.

So on the zoning potential, how do you, what exactly does that mean? What is zoning? And, you know, how are you identifying whether a property has under potential? Oh, how do I phrase that? Under potential?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. soul. There you go. Yeah. So, like, I first, I first look at, like, areas that I want to invest in. And, you know, working at bigger pockets and knowing a lot of these people, like, we have these conversations all the time, which is very fun. But, you know, my favorite way to do it just as a tip is I, like, I just ride my bike around Denver all the time. And you really get, like, a much better sense of, of the community. And Denver, I don't know if this is the same in other cities. It's, like,

very block by block. Like, you'll have a block. It's incredibly good value, a very small value. The only way you're ever going to know is, like, knowing it intimately. So I ride a bike around and just, like, look at the houses, which is really fun. But then I'll go and I'll see that community. Like, I'll be like, oh, I want to build in coal. Or that's a neighborhood in Denver. That's like a really great where I just bought my most recent place.

And then on a block by block basis, you can go on the city of Denver's website and just look and see, like, oh, every, I know because I rode my bike around. I've spent some time in there. these are all single family, but they are all zoned for an accessory dwelling. So I'm going to go look at those houses and see if any of them have the potential to convert a garage, to convert an attic to a second unit, because I think adding a unit is like basically the best way that you can increase value. And so that's sort of the process I went through with my, or I'm actually going through right now to look for other properties. Okay. Cool. Hey, I've got one more question on this. Sorry, Brandon.

Very good. The adding value. So, you know, a one to three, one to four unit property is typically sold based upon comps like similar comps, right? So you find a one bedroom, you find a three-bedroom two-bath house. It's going to sell for generally what other three-bedroom, two-bath houses in the area are selling for. So you're now going, taking that three-two, and you're finding a three-two that has a garage

that actually is in a zoning area that could potentially be converted to an apartment. You're paying what the typical person is paying for that 3-2 where maybe you're obviously not going to, well, it's not obvious, but in Denver it'd be kind of hard to get the rents you need at that to sustain and profit. But by adding that extra unit, which nobody else was even looking for,

you've now made a heck of a lot more money in rents. Right, exactly. So like, say you're, like, you can find a deal that's two units, right? And it's awesome and it's a good deal on its face. But then you go to the house and you realize, oh, I can turn that attic into a third unit legally. Like maybe it's going to cost me 50 grand, but I can now rent it out for, let's say, $1,000 a month. I'm going to pay that off then in four years. Like, you're never going to find a, like, a total property that has that kind of return on your capital. So, like, as long as the deal is good in the first place, like the subsequent expense that

you would have to go into convert a unit, like an attic or basement or something, I think it's probably one of the best ways you can spend your money, not just in real estate. It's like an incredible investment. I love that strategy. I think it's awesome. Yeah, I think that's awesome. Well, cool. Hey, let's go back real quick to the numbers on the second deal.

What did you buy that second property of the triplex for? It was 710. 7.10. Yeah. And so like the market had gone up definitely by then. But we came out, I think, so rents right now are like 66. hundred a month right now is where we were. And he was probably getting, he was getting 13, like 31 when we bought it. I'm laughing because it's just like actually crazy. What a good deal it is. But I mean, that's sort of what I waited for.

You know, like I don't have the cash or the time to like be buying real estate all the time. So I'm, I'm personally just very patient and just like wait to find something that is dramatically undervalued. it's harder and harder these days. I mean, people are getting smarter, and the market's just gone up in general, but I think those great fines are still definitely out there. Are you still living in this kind of house hacking deal? By the way, what is house hacking for those people

who have never heard that term before? Oh, yeah. So house hacking is like, I think, didn't you coin the term? I believe we'll put a little trademark on it. It's an awesome. Honestly, I think, We talk about this a lot just like on a personal level.

It's like the greatest thing you could possibly do from a financial perspective. You're basically buying a house, living and part of it and renting it out. So you can either rent out individual bedrooms or rent out several units. But basically you are getting someone to pay either part or all of your mortgage and you get to reduce your living costs very, very dramatically. Most people's budget is living. And so if you can reduce your housing expenditures dramatically or even have people pay you to basically live for free, it's an unbelievable way to start saving more money or actually earning some cash flow that you can then reinvest into more property. Yeah, I love that. The other thing I love about it is it's like training wheels for landlords.

You know, like it's not quite as scary as just buying a fourplex and then having to manage it from far away. It's like you're there. You can kind of handle things. You learn how to deal with problems. And I love that part of it. And if you totally screw it up, it's like only you who have to deal with it. You're like, oh, the kitchen hasn't worked for a month. Yeah, like there's no one who's just like really angry at you because you are totally incompetent at like finding someone to fix the sink.

Or like in the case of somebody who may work here, oh, there's no air conditioning that works in the unit. So I'm going to sleep in the bigger pockets office every day. Ham, hem, hem. I don't live. Actually, so this is a cool story. So I don't live in that house anymore. I recently just in May bought my third place. It was less of an investment. My girlfriend and I moved in together and I wanted to buy a place. I mean, once we thought about renting, but once you start owning, I feel like it feels weird to start paying someone else to live in their house. And so I was able to refinance the second property after only two years and pull out enough money. that I didn't have to go any cash on the down payment on the new property. So I got this awesome single family house. It's not, again, it's not like income producing. I'm living in it.

I do like to call my girlfriend my tenant a lot, though. It's really funny. She really dislikes it. But I really like to just call her my tenant when people come over. I'm like, oh, this is my tenant, Jane. But, no, it's, I picked a place that I thought will have like a lot of appreciations. but I didn't really see it there. But I actually do have a cool story about how I found that place.

Yeah, sure. So I just always am looking at houses. And since I bought my first two, one of my best friends here in Denver became a broker. And so I just make him show me houses all the time, even when I'm not really on the market. We just go and look at stuff. You know, he was a new broker. He wanted to get a sense for the market, too. So we just go all the time.

We went into this one house that I loved, and he just took off the market before I could, like, really get my act together. And so then I decided to buy a house when Jane and I decided to do this. And I like, I just couldn't find anything I liked. Like there was just nothing I liked. And we always talked about this house. I remember that one. Went off the market. It's off the market.

And so I couldn't even remember the address. I went on Google Maps and like street viewed around the neighborhood until I found the address, looked up this guy. He had an LLC. I downloaded the public records. found his name, found his phone number, and called him. Like, while I was working at bigger pockets, like stepped outside the office and called him one day. I was like, hey, man, like, I know you used to have this house in the market.

It's off the market, but I want to buy it. And he was like, dude, I am in the house right now changing the smoke detector batteries because we're putting it on the market this weekend. And like, if you know anything about the Denver market, like, everything's going over asking. And I was like, listen, do not put it on the market. What's your asking price? he's told me, I like went, we haggled a little bit, and I was like, I will buy it right now, I'll send you a contract right now, don't put it on the market.

And he did it, bought it, you know, there was no problems. You know, the whole thing went incredibly smoothly, but it was just an awesome feeling. Like, I felt like I just like totally hacked the market and like I was able to like go around and buy something off market felt awesome. I know it's like something we talk a lot about at BP. I highly recommend that. I feel like I got a much better deal than I could have just look going to open houses. by like going out of my way and like just hustling a little bit to find a better deal.

Hey, really quick on that. So what was, what did he ask and what did you actually agree to? The payment. Yeah, well, yeah, what did he want for the house and what did you guys agree to on the final? He was looking for 479 and we came in just a little bit under that. You came in under 479. Yeah, it was like a back and forth just about a couple of the things that needed to get fixed. and we wound up doing concessions and all this stuff.

But yeah, so it came out really well. And it was one of the easier, I mean, I've only done three things, but it was definitely one of the easiest things. So I think he was pretty pumped to just not have to put it on the market. And it was like amenable to a lot of the things we asked for. We weren't really haggling over the sales price. It was more about like getting a couple things fixed, a couple things added and improved, basically.

And had that gone on market, it probably would have gone for more than four. I had lost a couple days. Well, and I was going to ask that next. So he bid. I had lost two deals like in the previous weeks. I went like, you know, 5% over asking and lost them to people who had waived their insurance and appraisal objections, which is crazy. I mean, like, I guess people could do it if you've got cash or whatever. But like, waving an appraisal objection, like you would have, you could have to bring.

like a ton of cash to the table if the house doesn't appraise. Or like you could find out that you buying a house in a sinkhole and your house is following into the ground and like you'd still have to buy it. So I mean, the market's just really competitive. So just kind of have to find a way to be creative about it. What did you guys do as far as the agents were concerned? Your buddy's a broker. So did he just get the 3% and that was that? Yeah, exactly. Obviously that works to the benefit of the seller. Actually, no. So I think what happened, was, yeah, so the seller was a broker too. So, yeah, so he wasn't going to, so it actually didn't matter.

Now I remember, yeah, he had actually bought the house and I think lived in it for a little bit and like fixed it up and did a lot of the renovations. But so that wasn't as much of a selling point. Sure. Awesome. Well, cool. Well, I love that you took that, you know, kind of rifle approach versus like, just like, you know, look for all sorts of property. You, like, found one property.

You said, I'm going to aim for that one. I'm going to do what I need to do to find that one. And you go off to, it doesn't always work out exactly the way you said it. But, you know, it's going to work a lot better if you don't do anything. I mean, like, I love that approach. I love the hustle that you did with that. And I think it's something all the listeners can take, you know, off the show. Definitely, yeah.

I mean, I called the guy. I thought he was going to tell me to just, like, screw off. I don't want to talk to you. But, like, it just turned out to be really lucky. And, like, on the day he was going to put it on the market. Or he made that up and totally fooled me. But I don't know. I think it was awesome.

So, cool. Cool. And hey, really quickly, to the list. listeners, if you're hearing some kind of weird noises in the background, they are paving our streets right now. And it's really, really loud. So sorry for any strange noises you're getting. I just thought that was you farting again. But I'm really? Really? Wow. Did you just like that was the first far joke? That the first one? That might have been the first one in a long time. In 186 episodes. No, there was one earlier on. Wow. Yeah, one of the

earlier episodes. Of course it came from the manch, the man child, my co-hosts. Of course it came from me. I'm glad I could bring this out of you guys. Yeah, I appreciate that, Dave. All right, grow up. I think it's, I think it's time to move on. We are shifting gears. We are shifting gears. And move forward here to the world famous. It's time for the fire round. There are two kinds of real estate investors, those who have reviewed their insurance and those who think that they have. Most don't realize their coverage wasn't built

for how they actually invest. Vacancy periods, rehabs, short-term rentals, or LLC-held properties. These gaps surface only when filing claims. That's why investors work with NREG. They specialize exclusively in real estate investors, understanding portfolios,

risk at scale, and cash flow protection. One claim can erase years of returns. If you own a rental property, don't assume you're covered. Have NREG review your insurance with someone who gets investing at NREG.com slash BPPod.

That's N-R-E-I-G-com slash BP pod. Most investors spend more time chasing deals than reviewing their insurance. But a quick coverage check can be fast, easy, and one of these smartest ways to protect and even improve your property's cash flow. As the months get colder, frozen pipes, icy walkways, and seasonal wear and tear can increase the likelihood of claims. And traditional insurance companies aren't always built to handle these claims quickly or smoothly.

That's why more real estate investors are turning to steadily. They focus exclusively on landlords, whether it's a single-family rental, a burr-builder's risk policy, or midterm holiday guests. You get fast quotes, flexible coverage, and protection for property damage, liability, and even loss of rental income. Now is the perfect time to review your rates and coverage. Get a quote in minutes at biggerpockets.com slash landlord insurance. Steadily, landlord insurance designed for the modern investor. For decades, real estate has been a cornerstone of the world's largest portfolios. But it's also historically been sort of complex, time-consuming, and expensive.

But imagine if real estate investing was suddenly easy, all the benefits of owning real, tangible assets without the complexity and expense. That's the power of the Funrise flagship fund. Now you can invest in a $1.1 billion portfolio of real estate, starting with as little as $10. The portfolio features 4,700 single-family rental homes spread across the booming sunbelt. They also have 3.3 million square feet of highly sought-out. after industrial facilities, thanks to the e-commerce wave. The flagship fund is one of the largest of its kind.

It's well diversified, and it's managed by a team of professionals. And it's now available to you. Visit fundrise.com slash BP Market to explore the fund's full portfolio, check out historical returns, and start investing in just minutes. Carefully consider the investment objectives, risks, charges, and expenses of the Fundrise Flagship fund before investing. This and other information can be found in the fund's prospectus at fundrise.com slash flagship.

This is a paid advertisement. Number one, a question from the fire round from the bigger pocket forums is where would you suggest someone should look for, to look for a partner when it comes to invest in real estate? People they know, companies, strangers on VP, like, where should people go? Yeah, I mean, for me, I absolutely would recommend people you know. If you have someone that you trust and that you think that you can work well with, I think that's the easiest way to do it. I would just highly recommend setting clear boundaries, roles. Having things like overly official at first, it's going to seem silly like, oh, you're my brother, you're my dad.

like you're my friend like we don't need to do this but it always just like makes you avoid conflict if you know that like there is a legal document that is binding how all of these interactions are going to go um and we've never had to result to that but i honestly think it is like a voided conflict because we already know like how everything's going to work and like find a you know go on bigger pockets forums and ask people good structures find a lawyer whatever it is like find a good structure that works for you just to make sure, you know, nothing's worth losing like a friend or family member over, like a good relationship over. So just like make sure that you, you set clear expectations. And I think it's an awesome way to get into real estate. Just to add on to that

point there. I mean, the first few deals that I did with partners, we didn't put anything in writing. Like, we didn't make it official because we're just family and friends and whatever, right? But like, and it's fine then. It's fine for the first few months, the first maybe year. But then you start forgetting, like, what did we actually agree on? Like, I mean, it's, Even with my first partnership, we, like, we don't even know if officially we agreed that I was going to run property management forever or was that a limited time thing. So now it's really awkward. I'm like, so I'm going to run it forever because like I don't know. And so I'm just permanently in charge of managing this property for the rest of my life. I didn't have that in writing. So anyway, get in writing. I love that. I love that suggestion too because it just makes everyone know this is not a friendly thing. I mean, like we're friendly, but this is not just a hobby. This is big. business. So business weren't take it seriously.

I love that. Cool. Yeah. Awesome. By the way, Brandon forgot to mention that our far around questions come directly

from the Bigger Pockets forums and you can go there and ask your own questions or find answers to your questions at BiggerPockets.com slash forums. Yeah. Whatever. All right.

Next question on the fire round. By the way, this is show 186 of the Bigger Pockets podcast and you can check out the show notes at BiggerPockets.com slash show 186. How do you know what question to buy in?

Do you crunch numbers first or you go on sheer instinct? Well, I think you guys know me well enough to know how I'm going to answer this. I have definitely the number crunching type. It is a big part of my job here at Bigger Pockets, but it's something I've always nerdily really liked is like playing with Excel. I know I'm like the first person alive, except maybe Scott Trench. He definitely enjoys using Microsoft Excel. But I mean, I think it's a mixture, right?

I think the feeling on the appreciation and like feeling different opportunities and long-term upside is totally instinct. You know, it's like something you sort of have to feel out. But like what we were talking about before is like I want to make sure that if none of that happens, like it's still going to work for me today. And so like in that regard, I always make sure that the numbers work immediately and then like use some of my instinct to be like, okay, there's two good deals. Like the numbers are pretty close on both of them.

I'm sort of going to use my gut and instinct to be like, I like this neighborhood or this block better than the other one. I like it. I like it. Number three, for newbies, is it easier to manage yourself or partner with someone who can do the management for you? I think it's better to self-manage. I mean, like, again, like the whole theme I've been talking about here is like I had to earn sort of my keep in the first deal was really towards like sweat equity. And I think like you don't have to do everything yourself. Like you don't have to like start, you know, doing plumbing and electrical work. But like, if you can add value, do it in any way that you can. If it's just showing up and showing the place. If it's going and mowing the lawn, like, I still mow all the lawns in my houses. You know, like, I, like, there's no, there's no reason you can't do that stuff for yourself. It will teach you a tremendous amount about real estate.

And, like, when you look at future deals, you'll be able to look at a lawn or an HVAC system and be like, this is going to be a nightmare. Or, like, this is going to be great. Like, you can start to really get an instinct for that sort of stuff. So I think the hands-on opportunity to just learn about real estate and property management is invaluable as like the cash you make. It's like really, really a valuable skill to have. I love that. Awesome. Awesome.

All right. Last question of the fire round. What is the best advice you can give somebody who's working a full-time job who wants to invest in their first property? That's a good question. I think it's just like to try and save money. Like if you have a full-time job and have an income that you can save money, like if you can sacrifice for six months, a year, two years to save up enough money for that down payment, it is entirely going to be worth it.

And I think you can find an opportunity, maybe find something in a lower, like a lower price range neighborhood. But like we were talking about earlier, just get that first deal. Like you will learn a tremendous amount. You'll get hooked. You're going to see the past. power of like how real estate can supplement your life. And it's it honestly is like a life changing experience. Like it really has been for me. And I'm not a person who wants to be a full time real

estate investor. Like I'm not just saying this because these guys are, I work with them. And like I genuinely like, I want to have a full time job that I'm not one of those people who wants to quit. So like I have constructed my whole strategy around continuing to work a full time job. But being able to supplement my income and invest. I choose to invest in real estate instead of in the stock market or whatever with the money I make and save. I love that. I love that. And a lot of people are like, oh, this show, maybe this show is only for people who, you know, are trying to become full-time investors. It's not. We're here talking to different types of people with different strategies, Dave's strategy here. He's going to keep working a full-time job and he's going to build his

real estate. Brandon does the same thing. Hopefully you don't fire me. So yeah. I would like to keep working. I have no intention. I have no intention. That would be going to get a live firing right now. I fired you like three times live on the show. I've been firing so many times. But yeah, I mean, again, for the listeners, I mean, figure out what works for you.

You know, real estate is a vehicle to help you build well. You can go full time if you want, but you don't have to just because a lot of our guests do that. Just because of a lot of our guests do that. go ahead and turn it into a business and really scale it up. You don't need to do that. You can go and buy one or two or three or ten properties and still work your full-time job. Figure out what works for you and what works for one person is not always necessarily going to work for somebody else. So just keep that in mind.

There's not like, despite what the gurus want to tell you, like there's no one path to building wealth through real estate. I thought that was wholesaling. Isn't that the perfect way to get started? Isn't that what every guru says? Oh, yeah. Blah, blah. Yeah. All right.

Anyway. All right. Moving on. Moving on. The final segment of our show, which we love to me. Dave's going to join us on this one. Call our world famous. Famous for.

Famous for. Really, Dave? They fired. Yes. All right, the famous four. These are the same four questions we ask every guest every week. So let's throw them at you. Number one, what is your favorite real estate book?

Yeah, so I was a big idiot and never, like, did any research about how to be a landlord before starting. And so honestly, the first books I have read are since I joined Bigger Pockets, as you know, we have a couple of e-books and an awesome publishing arm. And so the one I have worked with a lot and have read and have really shared with a bunch of people is the ultimate beginners guide. So I'd highly recommend that for people who are just starting to think, learn some of the terminology, just sort of get like a really solid base for like what real estate investing is, what it can be. And so yeah. Cool. Which people can get to at biggerpockets.com slash UBG or get it free on Amazon. Kindle.

There you go. Excellent. Excellent. All right, guys, I'm talking to Dave here. All right, Dave. Next question. What is your favorite business book? Oh, that's a great question.

Probably it starts with Why by Simon Seneck, if you've ever heard of that book. It's a really interesting book. It's not really real estate focus, but it's all about just like how you'll be more successful if you have the right motivations and the right sort of like passion. I'd highly recommend. He also has a great TED Talk. So if people want a shortened version of the book and the TED Talks great. Yeah.

It's like 20 minutes long. It's an awesome. But I actually just ordered his new book. um leaders eat last i'm really excited to eat them uh eat i'm going to eat them what yes um eaters eat last yes okay good all right throw him on off the rails here all right uh what do you do for fun man what do you do outside of work in real estate i'm extremely you let him leave you let him leave i know he's like a eater like i think food Not books though, like I'm not actually going to eat a book.

I actually love to cook. And like everyone who lives here in Colorado, I'm like a big outdoors person. I love to hike. I am insanely passionate about skiing. I have recently started rock climbing. I am like getting slightly addicted to that and really enjoy that a lot. Awesome. Cool.

Me and Josh went rock climbing back, what was five months ago, something like that? I know. I heard it. It was like my second day here. I just don't want to be like, hey, could I come? I think I belayed you, Brandon. I don't even know what that means, but you probably did. I was the- You belittled me a lot.

Is that the same thing? I'm the 50-pound guy who was controlling your fate with the ropes. Oh, yeah. That's pretty much how life is, isn't it? All right. Moving on. Number four. Dave, what do you believe sets apart successful real estate investors from those who give up, fail, or never get started?

I just feel like it's all hustle. I imagine some people, other people say that, but I just feel like it's total commitment. You know, this is the difference between real estate investing and stock investing and all these other things is like, it is entirely in your control what you do. And so like there are certainly challenges. People have less money. Some people have more money.

But like, I mean, some of the most successful real estate investors we talk to come from absolutely nothing. You mean, you listen to this podcast. You hear people who have totally. hit rock bottom. And like what separates them, sure, they're smart and they like, they do their research, but like it's all hustle. It's like totally just committing yourself to doing something and then just staying with it for a long period of time. And it is entirely worth the, the time commitment. It really is. I couldn't speak highly enough about like choosing to spend my time and invest my

money into real estate. Awesome. Awesome. I will say it's not entirely in your control. Right. Of course. No, yeah, I mean, there's obviously like outside market forces. And like that is something that that you can definitely take some poundings on. It's like it's, I mean, everyone who was invested prior to the downfall definitely got hurt on that and no very few people saw that coming. But what I mean is like you can choose to make more money by like, like I said before, like you can go mow the lawn or you can pay someone to mow the lawn. Like your return is very much in your hand. Like if you invest in the stock market, it's sure you can choose to buy and sell.

But the way the CEO runs those companies is entirely out of your hands. Real estate, you have direct control over at least a day-to-day basis. Of course, you can't control for the larger market factors. Perfect. Perfect. All right, cool. Before we let you go, I've got a couple things. One, where can people find out more about you?

Where can they connect with you? Probably bigger pockets. I'm not like I don't have my own website or anything, but I am on the forums. love hearing from people. You know, like a lot of my job is outreach and talking to people. So if you guys want to hear some new stuff about bigger pockets, have any suggestions, like, I'm definitely your guy. Hit me up on the forums, hit me up on bigger pockets for sure. Awesome. All right. And what's up with the dead flowers behind you? I don't know. I'm in Hillary's office right now. Oh, they're not yours. No, no. But yeah, I had to move offices because Josh and I

sit too close to each other and there would be reverb. But let me say, actually, like this is, I love this because like once a week I have to just like be quiet, which you guys know is like the hardest thing on earth for me. Like every time you're recording the podcast, I have to like make a conscious effort not to like scream about what I want to eat for lunch constantly. And so like being on the podcast makes this a whole lot easier for me because I could actually just talk about as I walk. Nice. All right. And lastly, before we let you go, what is your best Brandon Turner story? Oh man.

I don't know if I have a good Brandon Turner story. We haven't hung out enough to. No, we've only met. once and it was like pretty briefly it was like right in my first week i wish i had a better brandon story oh well that's too that's too bad that's too bad i've got i've come back you have no good i have a really good brandon turner picture from our chicago trip a few weeks ago with with a piece of uh meat in his mouth maybe maybe we could show that on the show notes i was eating at epic bar and josh took a picture of me provocatively i don't know it was weird oh yes i

I shaped that whole photo. Yes. The Spengali of Brandon. I don't think so. All right, Dave, thank you so much for coming on the show. We really do appreciate it. And, of course, I will see you in about six seconds. Yeah, we all have a meeting in six minutes.

So I'll see you guys. Awesome. Thanks, guys. This is a lot of fun. Take it easy. Bye. See you. All right, everybody.

That was Dave Meyer here on the Bigger Pockets podcast. Big thanks to Dave for taking an hour out of his productive work. day to join us on the show. He's not a productive work day. He's doing the four-hour work week, just under your nose. Oh, man. Oh, man. Now, you got me paranoid.

I know. Now, he's a rock star. He produces the most, like, amazing stuff for BP. Like, we, like metrics and numbers and talking to our users and figuring out what people like and what's going to ultimately help them invest in real estate greater. Like, Dave's the guy that figures out. Dave is the guy. I love when Dave shares something.

And Brandon and I and the other folks here are like, huh? Can you explain that at like the level of a normal human being? Because we can't quite follow. Yeah. But also his real estate, I mean, is just on like fire. Like he's doing a good job. He's buying it in a very expensive market. In fact, probably the hottest market in the country.

And he's making it work. You know, it's a different strategy than I do, different strategies than you did. Like, then you like, I love it. I love it. Yeah. I think it's awesome. I think it's awesome. Cool.

Well, good show, good show. You guys, again, this is the Bigger Pockets podcast. check out the show notes at biggerpockets.com slash show 186. Please jump on that and follow the links to iTunes, Stitcher, and all the other players there and leave us a rating review if you have not yet done so. But otherwise, man, you've got lots of good stuff coming up, man. I do. Like the webinar that's happening up this next coming week.

So come to BiggerPockets.com slash webinar to learn about the three favorite, my three favorite low money-down strategies. And by the way, I didn't mention this to do the show, but you can actually sign up. for the webinar by texting the word BP webinar, like just that one word, no space is BP webinar to the number 3344 on your phone and you'll be signed up for this week's webinar. Sounds good, man. Sounds good. All right, guys, join us on the BiggerPockets forums at biggerpockets.com slash forums. Create your account today if you don't have one.

Otherwise, jump in, get active and start networking and hanging out and chatting and learning from guys like Dave and all our other guests, BiggerPockets.com to create your free account today. Brandon, let's get out of here. Let's get out of here. I'm Josh Dorkin. Signing off. You're listening to Bigger Pockets Radio, simplifying real estate for investors large and small.

If you're here looking to learn about real estate investing, without all the hype, you're in the right place. Be sure to join the millions of others who have benefited from BiggerPockets.com. Your home for real estate investing online. Time for the fire round. All right, the fire round. These questions come direct out of the BiggerPockets forums, which you can get to by going to biggerpockets.com slash forums.

But first of all, how do we transition into the Fireon sponsor? I can't remember. We actually have a sponsor, right? You know, it's funny, but Dave, add this. Please add this at the bat because he gives me crap. Every time I forget, like, my intro or something else. This is the first time I've ever heard him say that.

Dave, please tack that on as an outtake. Thank you very much. Thank you all for listening to the Bigger Pockets 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. Bigger Pocket's LLC disclaims all liability for direct, indirect, consequential, or other damages arising from a reliance on information presented in this podcast.