BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast - 316: How to Become a Millionaire Through Real Estate by 26 with Graham Stephan

Episode Date: February 7, 2019

Interested in becoming a millionaire through real estate investing? Of course you are! Today’s guest did just that—by age 26! Brandon and David sit down with top-producing real estate agent and investor Graham Stephan as he spills the strategy he used to build massive wealth at such a young age. You won’t want to miss his “fortune formula,” including how he adds value to the deals he buys, how he saved money to invest without missing out on life’s experiences, and how he found work he loved to do so he could work hard while still feeling like he was on vacation. Graham’s passion for real estate carried him to big success through investing, and he shares great advice for using YouTube to grow your brand. He also discusses how skipping college helped make him a millionaire and how he worked with his grandma to fund his first deal!  Graham touches on why he feels the future of RE is in development, ways to “make, not just find,” deals in today’s market, what to watch out for with Airbnb, and how he bought a house before he even owned a credit card. DON’T miss this powerful show from someone who made the most of his 20s to set himself up for future success. Download it today! In This Episode We Cover: Started as listing agent in L.A. at age 18 Closing over 3 million dollars as a first deal that made him quit college The plan he put in place What he could’ve done better What it’s like buying rental properties at a young age Hack on managing properties House hacking in LA The Subway sandwich story How Graham became a millionaire in real estate by 26 Why going to college would have set him back a decade The Millionaire Formula His current investments and future plans Tips on landlording And SO much more! Links from the Show BiggerPockets Forums BiggerPockets Webinar BiggerPockets Meet BiggerPockets Career Opportunities Mission Meats BiggerPockets Youtube Channel How I became a Millionaire in Real Estate by 26 (video) BiggerPockets Podcast 315: How to Read Human Nature to Succeed in Life with Bestselling Author Robert Greene David Greene’s Youtube Channel Books Mentioned in this Show The Book on Managing Rental Properties by Heather and Brandon Turner Buy It, Rent It, Profit! by Bryan M. Chavis The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss Tweetable Topics: “If people worth 10 million dollars are buying these properties, chances are this is something I should start paying attention to myself.” (Tweet This!)  “You don’t have to deprive yourself to be successful, you just have to be smart about the things you chase.” (Tweet This!) “Going to college for me would have set me back probably almost a decade.” (Tweet This!) “For me, my work is my vacation.” (Tweet This!) “Every year there’s a new opportunity out there.” (Tweet This!) “Landlording is a skill.” (Tweet This!) “If you pick up the phone, you are ahead of 80% of agents out there.” (Tweet This!) Connect with Graham Graham’s Youtube Channel Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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BiggerPockets.com slash landlord insurance. Steadily, landlord insurance designed for the modern investor. This is the Bigger Pockets podcast show 316. What gave me the biggest advantage is just doing it basically 24-7 for three and a half years. And I can really see the trends of the market and see where people are buying. And I figure, too, if people that are worth like $10 million are buying in San Bernardino and all of these big Beverly Hills investors are starting about, and they've been doing this for decades, chances are this is something I should really start paying attention to myself. 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, everyone? This is Brandon. Today's host of the Bigger Pockets podcast here with my buddy David Green. What's up, David Green? Not much, man. I'm doing really good.

Just did a seminar the other day. It's really like a meetup where I taught people how to invest while working a full-time job and I thought it went really good. We had 100 or so people show up and they got a free education and I got to share wealth building secrets with Bigger Pockets members. Nice. You get to grow your ego while other people learn. This is fantastic.

Yeah, they're forced to listen to me. Like, they're locked in a room and I get all the attention. It's my inner diva gets to come out. It's my Ariana Grande side. Very, very good. Seven rings. Isn't that the new thing? Anyway, so, all right.

So, David here, actually, this kind of leads into a short, quick tip for today, is if you're not getting out there meeting real life people in your area, I mean, if you've got some knowledge, go share it somehow, right? Go start a local meetup, meet with people one-on-one, become a mentor, because it not only helps them, it actually helps solidify your thoughts and your views, and you become a better investor for doing it. So do what David is doing. Go out there, meet people. Or if you're not at that level yet, if you're not already experienced, then go to them and learn and meet and connect and all that.

So very, very powerful stuff. So that is today's short pre-quick tip. That's like a pre-quick tip. Ooh. Is that a new part of the show? So there's more? There's more where that comes from. Now let's get to today's real quick tip.

All right, today's quick tip is short and simple. Bigger Pockets is hiring for two roles. They're going to be working with me. It's going to be awesome. One of them is called a digital membership retention specialist. It's basically somebody who's going to be in charge of making sure our pro members around Bigger Pockets, all tens of thousands of them are feeling good and getting more and more perks and benefits all the time.

So if you love our pro membership or you would love to help people be able to use their pro membership to buy more real estate and find ways to do that, and this is an in Denver job. So if you are in Denver or willing to locate to Denver, go to BiggerPockets.com slash jobs because I would love to talk to you about. whether or not you can work with me on a regular basis here at Bigger Pockets. So that is today's quick tip. Quick tip.

And actually, I have a quick tip, call it quick tip number three for the day. Do you remember back like six months ago, everybody listening to this? Not you, David, because I know you remember it, where I was talking about my buddy Pete. What are my good friends. His name's Pete. He's awesome. He runs a company called MissionMeets.co. And they sell like the best beef jerky and meat sticks on the planet.

Anyway, so like six months ago, I gave him a shout out on our podcast. and I said people could go to like missionmeats.com slash bigger pockets to get some free jerky when they buy something. Anyway, I was talking to Pete the other day and he said, yeah, go ahead and offer that again. So I'm just going to throw that out there. If anybody wants free jerky, buy some mission meat sticks, which are amazing. And then you get some of the best bacon jerky ever. So anyway, that's quick tip number three. Go to missionmeets.com slash bigger pockets and then just get like my favorite snack on the planet. But anyway, man, we are rambling too long. We got to get today's show. We have an incredible show today. We're actually interviewing a top producing

real estate agent in the LA area who also invests in real estate. So this guy has like a 360 perspective on finding a good agent techniques for how to like communicate with your agent to find deals, how he invest himself. He kind of sees it from every single angle. And this dude became a millionaire at 26 years old through real estate. Like this is some really, really good stuff. So I hope you guys are excited to learn from somebody who's already done it and shares exactly how we did. And they're going to learn about the fortune formula. Ooh, yes. I think I called it the millionaire formula.

But anyway, I'm formulating a future book right here on this podcast today. Listen for that later on. This is what it looked like to see Beethoven creating like his fifth symphony. I'm watching it happen in person as Brandon's rapidly coming up with these ideas. There you know, that's, that's, you know, it's not often people compare me to Beethoven, but I'll take it today. All right. With that, let's get to today's show.

All right, Graham, welcome. to the Bigger Pockets podcast. Really good to have you. Thank you. So I've been looking forward to this for a while. Awesome. Awesome. Well, this should be a lot of fun today. So, okay, so we're going to jump in. I know you've got a good thing going over on YouTube. I watch your stuff over there. You know, you seem to know what you're talking about. So first of all, good job on that. That's awesome. I'm actually learning a lot from you. Yeah. It's awesome. No way. Thank you, man. I'm getting some ideas from your channel too. So it's cool to kind of play the back and forth and love it. That's how it should be, right? Like, I think so many people in business always like,

look at everything is so like, I don't know, competitive, but really like, you know, if we're all helping like each other, I think it's awesome. So I totally agree with that. Very, very cool. All right. So we want to know more about your not so much YouTube abilities, which are pretty awesome in your social media stuff, but we want to know about your real estate investing. And I hear you're an agent as well. So let's kind of go through your story, maybe start the beginning. How did you get into a real estate? And also where are you located and kind of walks to the beginning of your journey? Yeah, of course. So I'm here in Los Angeles, California. I grew up here. I'm sorry.

Of course. The traffic here. I love that. Okay. Let's see. But anyway, I grew up here. Los Angeles, California. And I had really, really bad grades in high school. I hated school. Could not get into it whatsoever. I was working part-time doing, like, I basically do photography for this marine aquarium wholesaler. And because of that, changed my perspective on earning money because I figured, like, if I can work there instead of go to school, I can make like 50 bucks.

box instead of going to school. So for me, it was just like a no-brainer. Well, let me just miss school and not do my homework because instead I can go and make money. So it was because I had really bad grades in high school, did not get into college. And that left me kind of thinking, like, I really got to get my stuff together. I don't want to be this bum living in a van on Sunset Boulevard, not knowing what he's doing and like not making any money. And I didn't have, you know, I wasn't going to go to college or anything like that. So I ended up just randomly getting my real estate license. And I figured I would convince my parents, let me get one year of work experience here. And then after one year of working as a real estate agent, I can then reapplied to college and maybe

be an investment bank or like something fancy like that. But I ended up starting in real estate and loving it. Like every day for me didn't feel like work. It just felt like fun. Like I can get paid to go and see really cool homes to meet really cool people. And somehow this is a career. But I'm still planning to go to college. And it was. It wasn't until about eight months into it that I sold my first house. That was just a bit of luck, but I was holding open houses every single Sunday. And one Sunday, eight months in, a buyer came in and ended up having me represent him on a home in Beverly Hills for like $3.5 million. I think it was like $3,640,000 with my first deal.

And after that, I'm like convinced there's no way I'm going back to college. This is so much fun. I see a career in this. and I want to pursue it. So I continue doing that and having so much fun with it. But I would save every bit of the commission that I made because I saw how unstable it was. And I've seen other agents that would do like six, seven months without doing a single deal. And they would have to make that last commission tied them over until the next deal.

And it was this instability that I didn't know where my next deal was going to come from. I didn't know how big that deal was going to be. And I didn't know how long that was going to take me. So I saved everything thinking that like this could be my last deal for like a year. So after about three and a half years of doing that, I had, you know, all of this commission saved up. And I saved everything. Like I lived on $5 foot long subway sandwiches, wouldn't spend a dime.

Like the only thing I spent money on was a car. I bought like my dream car when I was like, I just about to turn 19. It was a lotus lease. And so I just figured like, that's the one thing I wanted. And then everything else, like I was fine with everything. You do what most agents do. And this is not a bad thing, but I know a lot of agents will buy a nice car because it actually improves your image to help you actually close more deals in the future.

Yeah. And it did. Looking back, that was not the intention at the time. But I started going to car meets and that did. I made my money back up in the car, probably like seven or eight times. What I started on the car? Just by business I met from car meets. There's like 100 people right now that are like, see, honey, see, listen, I get that car.

They're going to go by their car. Ferrari sales just like go through the roof after this. Everyone has a Lamborghini now. There you go. So anyway, so I saved up like three and a half, almost four years worth of income working as an agent. And I noticed that 2011, like housing prices were so cheap. And really what I ended up, where I ended up learning up most of my techniques and styles was watching what my clients were doing.

And so I started seeing my clients, like really wealthy, Beverly Hills clients that were buying at the time like South Los Angeles, they were buying in Riverside, and they were buying San Bernardino. And these are people that are worth, you know, five to ten plus million dollars. And they're going and buying these little like, you know, $100,000 houses, $200,000 houses. Like they have teams that are writing dozens of offers every single day, buying anything they can. And I'm talking to these people. I'm like, why are you buying this? Why are you buying this? And, you know, they were telling me that just it, the prices that you get that you're getting right now for the rents. Like this is the lowest I've ever seen it. It just makes sense. Like you could buy a

place for like $100,000. And they were getting like $1,800 a month for rent. They were going in, doing little minor renovations and getting a ton of money. And this just clicked to me like, wait a second. So I have all of this money saved up right now that I could be doing the same thing. And at the very least that would supplement the money that I make as a real estate agent. Because at least I would have some consistent income coming in that I can rely on. And that way I don't have to stress. If I don't do a deal one month, it's no worries, because at least I have this rental income coming in.

So I ended up starting to look and I focused on San Bernardino just around the Rancho Cucamonga area, just a little bit northeast of that. And what I would do is every single Saturday, Sunday, I'd go and I'd start to see all the houses available. I'd print out the big MLS sheet of like 60 homes and I would just spend the entire day with a friend going to every single property I could that's on a lockbox and just give to know the area. After about a month of doing that, I started writing offers. Now, I was an agent myself, so I figured I would just start writing all of the offers that I possibly could on anything

that came up. And all of these were short sales. So this means the owner had owed more on the property than what it was worth. They weren't making the payments. And they were trying to get out for the bank. And basically had the bank absorb the loss and approve, you know, a new buyer to, you know, to purchase that property. So I was finding a lot of these properties that were like $350,000. in 2005 that we're selling now for like $90,000. And they were like 2,000 square foot homes. And I'm like to read just to rebuild this home is 200 grand. Like just to build it.

And you're buying this for like, you know, $55 a square foot or something like crazy like that. So I'm like the replacement value of this home alone is worth way more. So I started writing all of these offers. And I would just sit there and anything new that would come on the market, write an offer. and I would just go down the list and write offers at prices that I felt made sense. I would low ball a lot of them, knowing that if I get it accepted, it's going to go to the bank, they're going to take six to 12 months to approve or deny it. And most of them, I knew would come back with their own price anyway.

So it didn't really matter what price that I offered as long as it gets accepted because the bank is going to do their own thing. So I probably wrote like, I don't know, 80 offers, 80 or 90. I mean, it was a lot of offers. Of those, maybe 20 got accepted, 20. if I got accepted. Then of those, banks would come back on like 10 of them and say, hey, you know, we want this price. We want this price. And then of those, I ended up buying three of them where the bank came back at the right price with the property that I liked in a decent amount of, you know, a decent time frame. So I ended up buying three homes. Two were houses.

And then one was a triplex. And all of them, I went in, I fixed them up, very minimal, you know, fix-ups and then rented them out. And it was from that that I began making about three, it was a little bit under $3,000. It was like $2,900 a month. That's awesome. And it was after that that I'm like, oh my, like, I was addicted after doing that. Because to me, it's like, if I can just take all the money as a real estate agent and then funnel it back into rental property, that's at least my base. And then over time, my base is going to slowly grow and grow and grow and and then that way it takes the pressure off everything else. So I continue doing that. I continue saving up as a real estate agent for another few years. I bought a house then in Culver City because

I noticed Culver City prices I felt were undervalued at the time given everything else that was going around in Venice and Santa Monica. And I thought Culver City was like really undervalued. So I ended up buying a single family home in Culver City in 2000, I think it's 2015 or 16. Somewhere around there, right before the values of Culver City really started to like go up dramatically. And I locked in a 30-year loan at 3.375% fixed on this house at Culver City, fixed up the house. That house was now, it's almost doubled in value since then. But then after that one, I went and bought a duplex just a little bit east of Culver City in a city called West Adams. And I felt at that time, West Adams was really undervalued, given the prices now in Calver City.

Sure. Fixed up the duplex. And then when I fixed up, I realized, I'm just going to move in one of the sides of the duplex and just house hack it to save money. And that way, like, I can save even more money to buy more real estate. Then a year later, I found another duplex that the owner, the owner just misrepresented it. I mean, they called this duplex a one bedroom, one and a half bathroom. It was very clearly, to me, a two bedroom. So they were basing this off of being a one bedroom, one and a half back. They priced it in line of that.

And they said it can rent for $2,100 per side as a one bedroom. I ended up buying this and getting an offer for $2,700. That's awesome. For that same unit just by calling it a two-bedroom because it was very clearly a two-bedroom. All right. So I want to unpack that a little bit because one of my all-time favorite strategies, I actually want to go back and go a couple of steps back here, but while we're on this topic and then we'll go back.

So we're going back to the future here. So one of my favorite strategies in all real estate, and I tell people this a lot is look for, like in my case, I will look for a two-bedroom house over 1,000 or over 1,100 square feet. Because a lot of times agents do misrepresent or they don't think, oh, that could actually be another bedroom. And legally, it's not a bedroom yet. So I'll find a two-bedroom house with 1,800 square feet. And it's like, I know for a fact that's not a two-bedroom house.

That's a four-bedroom house or a three-bedroom house or a five-bedroom house, right? So you get way higher rent. So it's one of the strategy I use. It's cool that you do the same thing. You look for really was like two-bedroom, but they said it was one. Right. I've seen that with studios to one. I've seen it from one to two or one to three.

Anyway, very, very cool strategy. that's awesome. But I want to jump back to the very, very first couple things there. You said you were doing these short sale offers, which short sales were really popular back then. Not so much today. Not so much today. They're not so much today. They're still out there. And they're going to come back. Maybe their market thing, right? When the market drops, so can you know, now a lot of people are underwater. So, let's talk about it for a minute because even though it's not very popular today to do a short sale, they are still out there. And they're going to come back maybe in the next few years. Who knows whenever the market drops. So can you, you said basically a short sales is when somebody owes more. than what the property is worth. And then you said something about you put in an offer, you know, maybe six to 12 months later they come back, that delay. We had somebody once called up the short sale time machine. So you like get a year goes price today. Yes, very true.

Yeah. So, but what happens in a case? This is a common thing question I get from people is what if you get more than one of your offers accepted? Like, I mean, that's like when I tell people to make like a fair number of offers, like if you want to get more deals accepted, you got to make more offers. And they're like, well, what happens if I get to it? accepted and then I can't buy both. You know, like that happened to you kind of. So like, well, how did you

deal with that? 100%. Well, I would say 99% of times, the bank will come back with a higher price. So they'll go through the entire process. You wait eight months and then they say, okay, we're accepting your offer, but we want it at this slightly higher price, which we feel like is now the current market. And then it's up to you at that time to say, I want it or I don't want it. And if I was unsure, I would just say, I want it. And then I would do my inspections on the property. And once I did my inspections, always these short sales had so many issues. I found mold. I found, you know, broken pipes. Sometimes tenants would just trash the home. There's a lot that's happened in the eight months or the 12 months or whatever it is when someone's living there and it's, you know, they're not making their

payments. Usually they don't have any upkeep. So there's always something. I didn't encounter that. Usually the bank would just come back at a higher price and it was up to me to say yes or no. Eight months down the line. And usually what I would do, even if they came back at a higher price, I would always come into a lower price. And usually sometimes there's a little bit of wiggle room there, like, you know, a few thousand bucks or whatever. So I was never worried about getting too many offers accepted.

If anything, I just was upset. I didn't have more money because there were two deals that I got back then that I just, I couldn't do. I tried to get money. I tried to like get a partner. I just, I couldn't get these two houses that I knew were like slam dunk deals. And I look back today, I'm like, if only.

But what? What would you tell yourself today, knowing what you know now about real estate investing? You're in your shoe, like, let's say somebody else is in the exact same shoes. They got a couple of deals that are really, really good. What would you tell them to do in today's market if they get a couple of good deals that they just can't find financing for? Well, the thing is back then, I was buying these deals cash because I didn't have a credit card. I didn't have any credit whatsoever. And if I just simply had a credit card, I could have financed all of them.

I could have put even like 30% down, 40% down, whatever, and finance them. But even back then, I think I should. have made the effort to try to see if I can, I don't know if I can really flip those contracts, but at least bring them to somebody else as an agent. I just didn't make the effort at the time because I was really so focused on getting this for myself that I should have, looking back, pitched it to some of my own clients and seeing if I can work out some sort of, even if I bring it to them and ask for a small portion of equity of the deal, just to get myself in the door because these were such good deal.

You make some really good points, Graham, and I want to kind of highlight them. And the first one is what you just said. you had a one-track mind where you were thinking, does the deal work for me or not? And if yes, I'll pursue it, if no, I won't, right? And we all start off with that. And it's actually a positive thing in the beginning to know what you want and know what you don't

so that you're not kind of scattered all over the place and you can't make a decision. But as you become a more experienced investor, more experienced business person, you start looking at this is a deal, but it might not work for me. I might not be in the position to capitalize on it, but what can I do with it?

Right. So if you're a buy and hold investor and you come across a flip in the beginning, you just say, well, I don't flip houses and that's good. But as you become more experienced, you should say, could I flip this house? Could I use my rehab crew from my buy and holds to flip a house? If not, could I give this to a flipper and wholesale it to that person, right? Could I find another investor who wants to get started and just do them a favor? And then they're more likely to bring me a favor back. So I wanted to highlight that for people that really all you need to do is find a deal and then figure out what to do with that deal. and you're going to make money in some way with real estate. And you're acknowledging that right now.

I think that's really wise point. Yeah. And you said a couple other things too. You mentioned that you were writing offers on everything, that you were a real estate agent and you were doing really good and you didn't go invest in Bitcoin. You didn't go invest in, you know, like stock options or something. I should have invested in Bitcoin.

Yeah, maybe. You were investing in something you didn't know. You're investing in something that you were. And I'm a real estate agent as well. And it boggles my mind how many people sell real estate. for a living. They know when they get a really good deal. They have all the access to run comps and run rents and figure everything out and they still don't invest in real estate. It's amazing how many real estate agents should be buying deals for themselves and they're not. But you, props to you,

because you actually did make that jump and you moved into the other world. And you had vision to see that investing was where it's at, right? Like you can make money as an agent. That's great, but that money gets tax a lot higher. I'm telling you guys, like, it's a good profession, but it's blood money sometimes. Like you pay the price to earn that commission, bearing your client's emotional burdens and putting out fires. And if you're a good agent, you're doing the job of both real estate agents. People don't realize that because I'm sure you, God, you're always figuring out the other side's problems because you don't make any money if it doesn't close. So you've got to. And then you didn't just say, oh, I want to be an investor instead of an agent. You knew that you needed to bring investing into it.

but you focused on making and saving capital through your main job, which for you is selling homes, and then amplify that capital through investing. And you were telling that story, and you gave us a ton of information that's really good. And I kind of picked out, that's what people need to take from this, because whether they're a car mechanic or, you know, like an airline pilot, whatever their job is, they can do the same thing that you did, use those same principles. I think that doing it as a real estate agent gives you an advantage, though, because you see the market, you know how real estate works. 100%. If anything, I really feel like that was what gave me the biggest advantage is just doing it basically 24-7 for three and a half years. And I can really see the trends of the market and see where people are buying. And I figure, too, if people that are worth like $10 million are buying in San Bernardadino and all of these big Beverly Hills investors are trying to buy, like they, and they've been doing this for decades, you know, chances are this is something I should really start paying attention to myself.

Absolutely. You know, and there's a synergy there because as you're working with people that have a high net worth and they're buying these homes, they can invest in your deals. You could hook them up with other people's deals and you just made that person a lot of money and they're more likely to bring you business. I think in general, people get this really like, hey, this is my way out of where I am that I don't like. I'm going to buy a bunch of rentals. And sometimes it helps to take those blinders off and widen your vision and see there's opportunity all around you that you're missing because you're only looking for one thing. Totally agree with that. Cool. All right. I saw what I move on and go, so you bought your first property. How old were you when you buy that first rental property? 21. All right. So let's talk about that for a minute because a lot of people listen to the show are younger. Like they are in the 20. I was actually 21 when I bought my first rental as well. David was like 63. And so like when he bought his very first property. Yeah. He's giving me that look. We didn't call them rentals back then. We called it homesteading. All right. So you're 21. Do you have any tips for people listening to the show? right now who are young, they're fired up, they want to get into real estate, they don't want the

prescribed life plan that our parents and grandparents followed. What do you say to those people about jumping into real estate at the young age? I would say it's probably just getting over the mental hurdle that you can't do it. And there was a lot of resistance for me too at 21 to buy a house, especially to buy a house cash. And I really kind of had this belief that's just like it's not right for a 21-year-old to own a home. Like it's not normal. Like, you're not normal. Like, You can't do that. You're too young to do something like that. And also, I won't lie.

I mean, I'll say that there was a little bit of guilt in that, too, knowing that, like, there were people in, like, their 40s and 50s who have been saving up their entire lives who still don't own a property. And they just can't do it. And there's some guilt that's like, is this fair for someone who's 21 to be, like, buying this house? And I think it was a lot of this kind of self-doubt that really got to me a little bit. But I just figured I just got to push through it and just,

and push all of those thoughts aside. So for me, I mean, that was probably the biggest thing, is more like the mental aspect of doing this. And also a bit of the awkwardness of all of my tenants were significantly older than me. And here I am as this kid. And it's like, I'm the landlord. And I'm like this 21-year-old kid.

And, you know, even at 21, I looked probably like I was 16. So it's like, here's this little kid who's like, I owe rent to every single month that was really an, It was really intimidating for me. Even to meet these people that were like my tenants, I was like, do, how do I act? Do I pretend? Like, am I their friend? Or what do I say?

What do I do? So it was definitely really scary and it was definitely a learning experience. But I would say you just got to jump in. I mean, there's no other way around it to really prepare yourself besides just getting that first hand experience. That's so good. You know, there's probably a couple things that you've already learned to work around that. Like one of them is when you're a landlord managing your own property, you never

tell people that you're the owner, you always tell them you're the property manager, right? You like, then they don't think, like, who's this 21 year old trying to tell me what to do? You're like, I'm obviously a kid savant. If someone hired me at 21 to manage this property, you're going to do everything that I say. Like, I'm sure there's some things you picked up along the way. That's very impressive. You did that at such a young age. When you look at most 21-year-olds now, they're actually avoiding anything that would cause anxiety or growth or risk, right? And they're chasing things that kind of make them feel comfortable. What do you say to the 21-year-olds? year olds that are out there that say, yeah, that's cool and all, but I don't want to save my money.

I don't want to work for money. I want to buy experience, not things, even if things can be assets that can be worth a lot of money and set you up for your future. I think it's worth it. Here's the thing. I mean, here's my own personal belief when it comes to this, is that you have such a massive advantage in your 20s that you're never going to have for the rest of your life. I really believe that if people take one decade and just really save for their 20s, that what they do in their 20s can set them up for the rest of their lives because they have the power of really just having this compounded interest working for them since for the very beginning that I think if they just make a very short-term sacrifice and they can still have the experiences and they can still

have a great time. They can still do everything they want to do, but dial it back and make saving a priority. They can go so far. Like I never felt like I have missed out in my 20. I'm going to be 29 next month. And I've never felt like I've missed out on something. Like if all my friends are going out to like a really fancy dinner, let's just say, I will order an appetizer instead of an entree. I mean, it's something as simple as that that you save me. No avocado, no avocado toast. No avocado toast. You just delay the avocado toast in your 20s. But I'd take it to an extreme. So I've definitely gone like this is probably a terrible, terrible thing to say. But All my friends went out to a really nice restaurant, like a really nice restaurant.

Like to the point where usually you would have to wear like a button down shirt and like dress shoes and stuff like this. I didn't want to spend like the $80 to plate, but I wanted to go with everyone. So I went to Subway and I brought up my Subway sandwich to the restaurant and I just asked for a plate. And when everyone else got their food, I had the Subway Sandwich like all my chair. I pulled out the Subway sandwich on my plate, just so I wouldn't have to spend the $80 so I spent like $5.00. That's hilarious. No avocado, so I saved that extra.

No avocado. But my point is this, is that I still had a great time. So I bought a Lotus a lease, and that was like my cool sports car. So instead of buying like the Lamborghini for like 170 grand, I bought a Lotus Elise for $30,000 that didn't lose its value. But it was like 95% the same thing in terms of experience for a fraction of the price. So there's a lot of these things that you can do that don't really cost a lot of money where you get basically the entire experience.

Or you can even now, I can travel anywhere in the world for free just with credit card points. And that's something very simplicity. So you can still do all of these things. It's just you don't need to spend money necessarily doing them. Or you can really cut down on that. So I really feel like your 20s, if you can just do that for 10 years and really build up that nest, and to get a few properties into your belt or just get some investments, that could set you up for the rest of your life so that when you're 30, 40, 50, you're never going to have to worry about like,

oh, this rental property or this wholesale deal or this real estate agent deal, because you're already going to have that nest that's kind of holding you. So that's been my philosophy. It's such a good time to build that foundation. And I mean, I'm sure we've all seen like the financial advisors who'd be like, you know, if you save starting at the age 21 versus age 31, it's like millions of dollars of difference. Like, oh, yeah. That actually decade. It's just, it's unbelievable. So speaking of being in your 20s, I want to cover a topic real quick that normally I wouldn't bring up to somebody like on a podcast, but because you already opened the door by having your third most popular video on your YouTube channel with

this, how I became a millionaire in real estate by 26. Can we talk about that for a minute? So a lot of people have that goal. I want to be a millionaire by 30. I want to be a millionaire or whatever. Can we like, how did you, how are you able to do? Obviously, they can go look up the video, just, you know, go to your YouTube channel or just type into Google, I mean, YouTube, how I became a millionaire in real estate by 26. But either Can you walk into that? How do you become a millionaire real estate? Was it all investing, agent investing combined or other things? What does that look like? I would say it's very much agent and investing combined. I had two things really helped me out a lot because when I was 18,

I think I made 60 something thousand the first year, 70,000 the first year at 18. But most of that was that one deal in Beverly Hills for like, you know, three and a half. Then my income really kind of went to about 100, stayed between 100 and 120 the next few years, took me a while to break through that. Then I think it was like 180 and then like 220 after that. So I had a really good income. I didn't spend a lot of money. I really kept like I was doing the $5 Subway sandwich. Like I was making more than all of my friends. And they were the ones to spend an $8, you know, $80 on the meal and I was spending, you know, $5 on Subway. So saved a lot of that money, invested at all. So I had two things really working in my favorite. One is investing in 2011,

2012. So those properties by then more than doubled. If anything, I think they more so tripled in value. So that was a significant portion. But it was also having a relatively high income working as a real estate agent in conjunction with that where I finally, I got a million dollar net worth by 26 between those two. Now, if my income was not as high as a real estate agent, I wouldn't have been there. If I didn't invest in 2011, 2012, I would not have been there. It would have taken me several more years because I saw like all this equity is to start growing. Rent started coming in a little bit higher and then my income started growing as well in the process. So let me ask you about that. You mentioned how you save money in your 20s, the subway footlong

instead of the dinner. That's really good stuff. The money you saved on your car, that's also a really good idea because you're showing is you don't have to deprive yourself to be successful. You don't have to be smart about the things you chase, right? But you didn't just save money during your 20s. You actually built up a lot of income during that time. And I know a lot of people's gut responses is going to be, well, that must be nice to be a really successful real estate agent. save that money. But tell us about the foundation you built in your 20s that led to you being able to generate a lot of money. What did you do during that time when everybody else was going to burning man and kind of screwing around and not purposely working on skills that would help them

build wealth that put you in the position right now? Yeah, I would say two things. So first of all, was not going to college. And by not going to college, first of all, I had no student debt that was holding me back. And like I didn't come from a wealthy family or anything like that. So college would be on me and I was going to have to take out loans or do something to pay for that school. So I didn't, I don't want to say a waste four years going to college. I wouldn't say college is always going to be a waste. But in my situation, I didn't spend four years going to college on something that wasn't going to be helping me. And I didn't spend money to do so. So going to college for me would have set me back probably at least a decade in terms of net worth, at least minimum, probably a decade.

So it was that. Secondly, I really loved what I did to the point where it never really felt like work and I was I would look forward to like a Monday because it meant that I can go and like kind of get clients and show houses and stuff like that like even Sundays I would do open houses but I was like excited for the Monday to really go and work and I just I just enjoyed it so much that like I don't know I didn't have a desire to go to like to Burning Man I didn't have a desire to go to Coachella I just loved what I did so much that that was my idea of fun And like I didn't need to go on vacations to try to escape something because like for me my work was like my vacation. Like it was just like every day was to me was like I get to hang out with these clients that I consider friends and see really cool homes.

And like this is my job and the people that I met in the beginning or even still to this day. Like I was being I would randomly meet like celebrities holding open houses in Hollywood and they would just walk in and. and no joke would like write down their email address. And then I could follow up with them later or they would call me on a listing. And I would rent them a home. Like I've had several A-list actors and actresses that I've represented that have literally called me on one of my listings. And I showed it to them and they were unrepresented and I continued showing them other homes until I sold them a place. Yeah, that's cool.

And like that's so cool. Like these are experiences that I feel like people would like pay for just the opportunity. to do something like that. So for me, it was just, it was fun. Yeah. And I think that is key. You know, I mean, kind of jotting out notes here as you've been talking. And this is something I've been thinking a lot about lately. And your story perfectly symbolizes that. When we talk about becoming a millionaire, like, I told it, like, the way I like formulate things in my head is like, I'm going to write a book on it. Right. So I'd write a book on like, call like the millionaire formula, right? And here's what it is. And you can totally steal this if you want or make a YouTube

video on it. All right. So it's basically here you did, right? You made a ton of money working hard on stuff you love. Like almost everybody I know who's really successful. I mean, I hang out with a fair number of like successful people. And they all generally made a ton of money working hard in something that they love. I think in order to make a ton of money, you have to work hard at something you love, generally speaking. I mean, obviously there's, you know, I can hate being a lawyer and still be a lawyer. But I mean, like, you like David worked super hard at here, David worked super hard at being a cop. And he loved being a cop. And so he worked super hard. I made a ton of money doing it. And then that moves on the step two is spend as little money as possible. But

or live responsibly. And you talked about how to do that, right? That leaves you with a good amount of extra money and then invest that in assets you understand that grow. That's like, that's like millionaire formula that I'm putting together in my head here. Yeah, make a ton of money working on hard on stuff you love, spend only a little of that money by living responsibly and invest the rest in assets you understand that will grow. And if you follow those three things, like it doesn't matter. You said earlier, you were like, well, you know, yeah, I was a real estate agent. It might not have happened if I wasn't. But my, guess is you're the type of guy that you maybe could have started a plumbing business, right?

That you would have worked, if you loved plumbing, you maybe would have started a plumbing business, worked super hard at it, hired a bunch of plumbers, grew that business, made a bunch of money, lived cheap and invested the rest in, maybe your asset that you understood was mutual funds. You'd probably still be a millionaire before you're 30 had you done that within a decade. That formula kind of works no matter how you do it. So like as much as yeah, you did it and people were like, well, yeah, you got lucky you bought in 2011. Okay, well, what is it, what's 2011 today? Like, what is today's 2011?

Yeah. Right. So, like, anyway, I like that kind of thinking. That's so true because I believe every year there's a new opportunity out there. Like, every single year, it's like, well, you got lucky then. Well, you can still get lucky now. There are other opportunities that you can get very lucky in. The same thing like that.

The many people that, they use that as an excuse for not even doing it. Yeah. That's usually. I think about this so much because I remember when I first, started buying rentals. Everybody was saying, don't do it. It was constant. Every time you turn down the news, real estate's in a plunge, America's headed to the next depression, locked at the gates, batch, it's going to go terrible, don't buy anything. And a lot of people told me that I was stupid for doing this, right? And right now, I think people are going to look back in 20 or 30 years and

say, can you believe how easy it was to get money? You just stuck your hand out and people were like, please take my money and invest it for me. Right? Or how easy it was. Or how easy it was. to find tenants because there's a lot of people that didn't want to own a home at this point. There are things happening right now that make investing in real estate such an amazing opportunity and we're just focused on, oh, prices are high, we're at the top of the market, all these things that are negative. Well, when that changes, there will be a whole bunch of new negative things that everybody focuses on. And I think Graham makes a really good point that there's always an opportunity in something somewhere. Even if you believe that this is the wrong time to buy,

that's fine. Why not go become a real estate agent and sell real estate to people who don't want to be investors, right? Or why don't you go get your mortgage license and do loans? There's something in real estate, if you really love it, that you can do to earn money. I think Brandon's point that the key that successful people or wealthy people needed was that they did something they loved. And if you're listening to this podcast and hearing my voice right now, you love real estate. That's why you're listening to it, unless you just love beards and you're here for Brandon's

beard. But for the majority of the majority, it's like half. Yeah, maybe so. Overwhelming it. I think it's like half, 50, 50, just for the beard. So for the other half of you that love real estate, right? Find something to do with it. This is what I always say.

During the gold rush, everybody came to California to make their millions, right? Those to me are the people who are going to the gurus and saying, here's $25,000. Teach me how to become a millionaire in real estate. And very, very few people actually made millions during the gold rush, just like people that go to gurus. You know who really made money during that time? Was the merchants that went out there and they sold the shovels and they showed the picks.

and they sold the pieces of paper for $100 each so that people could write home to their families, right? They were around the thing they love, but they weren't the fool that was chasing after the get-rich quick scheme. And there are so many opportunities like that within real estate. And the more you know, the more chances you'll have to take advantage of that. Yeah. Like one of the opportunities that I see right now as a real estate agent for anyone who wants to get in, because right now they think it's so competitive and like there's nothing they can really do and the market's saturated. And they think no one's buying right now because the prices are high.

But one of the biggest opportunities, right now that many people are not taking advantage of is becoming a real estate agent and representing tenants. All the people who say that the market is too high, all the people who are saying, I'm going to hold off a few years and see what's going to happen. All of those people are renting instead. I have seen several people sell their homes and decide to rent for a few years to see what happens. The thing is, as a real estate agent, no one is going after those tenants because they see, why would I want to earn a few thousand dollars representing a tenant when I can earn a hundred thousand dollars selling them a home? Well guess what? All of those people go on represented and

that's your chance to get your foot in the door represent them in the short term on a lease and make a few thousand or break even and five years from now all of those people come back to you and they bought and that's how I built my entire business is by you're a hundred percent right every I want to say probably half of those people ended up using me to buy in the next few So that little time commission was worth 150,000 a few years later. And that's what the smart business people do, right? Like that's why I educate people in real estate and I do seminars and I don't charge for it. And I give free education because it gives people an opportunity to see,

oh, this guy actually cares about me. He doesn't just want to commission. He wants to make me money. So then when they do want to sell their house, they're going to go to the person that they trust. They already have their relationship with having that long vision is what's going to help you build wealth. And building wealth is what's going to help you invest in real estate.

Then you're going to get on the bigger pot. gets podcast and talk about avocado toast and Lotus elites or make a video that goes completely viral because you became a millionaire at 26. And I think that's what Brandon and I are so passionate about is how we help the people who are listening to this understand what the really successful people that we know do in the way they think because there's a pattern that shows up all the time. They say things like what Graham just said. Quit looking for the quick score. Help that person by getting them an apartment. Represent them well, save them money five years later than they're going to let you sell their house. You're going to make $20,000.

on that commission. And if you help 10 people, you just made yourself, you know, $200,000 five years from if you do that five times, you became a millionaire just by doing something small that you could do now. And it works. That principle works for anything, right? Building relationships with wholesalers, setting up a buyer's list to wholesale properties to building relationships of people to partner on deals or finding off market deals.

You know, if you take that long game and you do the right thing, that stuff will come back to you, absolutely. I agree. Yeah, that's great. All right. So before we head on to like the deal deep dive and the fight around and famous four and all that good stuff, what about now? Like, you know, after the beginning of your business, back in 11, 12, it was great. We could find deals. So are you just like, you know, resting on your laurels right now and relaxing? Are you still looking for deals? Are you still buying stuff? Like, what's your business? I would say, I would say it's a little bit of both. So right now I've kind of enjoyed, I just bought my last deal about three and a half months ago and that was a duplex where they misrepresented it. And right now is the point where that covers all of my expenses. And I'm finally at the point now. where I've just been like, you know, I've been pretty satisfied right now. And I think I'm in really fortunate position where it's just like I don't need to do anymore. I'm still looking at deals because I see interest rates still, I think, very low on a fixed 30 year mortgage.

So I'm kind of tempted, well, should I buy something else? Where I think, at least for me in the short term, where the next opportunity is, I think is more so in development. I have one unit where I can renovate it, get the tenant out, you know, maybe make them an offer or something like that. to leave, renovate the unit. With about $60,000, I should be able to make an extra $1,100 a month on that. So that to me is really, I mean, that's like a 20% return on my money right there, that you can't get anywhere else. There's another unit where I want to build a guest house on the property, an ADU, about $200,000. But with that, I should be able to rent that out for $1,600. So right there, $260,000 investment right there should get me about $2,700 a month, just between

that. I have another property, another duplex actually, where I was thinking it's zoned for four units and it's two units. If I can save up another, I don't know, seven, eight years, save up something to be able to tear that down and build a brand new four unit on that. That to me works out to be almost about a 9% return on my money. I love the way you're thinking because like in, again, different parts of the market work for different things, right? So you're thinking, hey, what was working in tells us in 11 and 12 is not today. But what about this? What if I remodeled this? What if I did this? That's why David and I talk a lot about the Burr strategy, like buying a nasty property, fixing it up, rehab and renting and refinancing and repeat. Because that works in this market a little better than it did in 2011 and 12. Again, you're talking about the ADU thing. So you mentioned the ADU, which is what, auxiliary dwelling unit or accessory dwelling unit? Right. Right. It's like having that separate unit. That's huge out here in Hawaii where I live in Maui now, right? Like, almost everybody has an ADU because like it just makes sense. Like you bill one for a couple hundred hundred grand. And you can, I mean, out here that can rent for like three grand a month for like a $200,000 investment that like it's a no brainer, right? And so the people who are, I mean, there's other things like, you know, out and like another just example. I know it doesn't apply to everybody. But out here there's a special law that says if you have over 5,000 square feet, you can basically subdivide your lot and split it into two. That's like a thing out here. Now, every.

Every area's got different, unique thing, but the people who are like, okay, well, that's a tactic. I'm going to figure it out. I'm going to make it work. I'm going to buy one property, split it in half, build something over here. Now I got two. And it just, there's ways to make money in real estate in any market, good, bad, you know, normal, you know, there's ways to make money. And I love that you're looking at it as how do I do this?

How do I build this? How do I continue to drive forward versus, well, doesn't work anymore because it's not 2000. Yeah. I just kind of think what's going to give me the safest long term return? compared to everything else out there and where do I feel my money is best utilized. And right now from what I see is that

and it very well could be in the next year I find another amazing deal. If I find something else it gives me a better return, then I'm going for that. Otherwise, I think this is a pretty safe, conservative approach.

You know, another thing on that note that's really building steam right now but still so small as opportunity zones. I mean, we haven't even done a show on opportunity zones yet, but we will. But there's this new part of the tax code

that is really, really fascinating, but it's just complicated. It's hard. Right? So most of us, like, I have not even spent the time I need to dive in to learn how it all works. But the little I know, it's a very powerful strategy for somebody who's willing to invest the time to work and figure out how to make it work. So again, there's a million ways to do it. But anyway, I'm going to see you on thinking that way. So all right, so we got to get moving on in the show. Again, I love your story and all this. So I want to dive a little bit deeper into one particular deal. So about for the ado, let's head it to the deal. Deep dive.

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So let me just start by asking you, first of all, you got a property in mind? Let's do the first one because that was the one I made all the mistakes on. Okay, perfect. What kind of property is it? Like single family, multifamily. Single family. Okay. And where was that at?

San Bernardino. Okay. Perfect. Number two. How did you find this deal? This was on the MLS and I saw it. It was listed about like 1,200 square feet. But when I went to see it, I realized that, wait a second, this house is not 1,200 square feet.

They added on to it significantly. And they never reported it to public record because they didn't want to pay extra tax on that. But it was all done to code perfectly. And it was actually a 4-bedroom, 1,700 square feet, not a 3-bedroom, 1,200 square feet. That's cool. This folks. this is why you want a good real estate agent helping you. Can you take a second, Graham and explain to somebody how it would have been entered into the MLS without that square footage

and why somebody might not, like what you just mentioned, can you go into a little bit more debt for people who are, so they can find a deal like this. Yes. So this was a short sale and the agent had never seen the property before. He was hired by the bank and all he did is he went to the front of the property, took a picture with a cell phone. There was only one picture and then copied all the information. of the property from the public record. And of course, the public record said it's 1,200 square feet, three bedrooms, two bathrooms.

Had he seen it, he would have figured it out, wait a second. This is a four bedroom. There's all this extra square footage, a huge bonus room. You know, we're talking like 500 square feet here that's unaccounted for. Messed it up. He probably got paid 1% from the bank, so he didn't care. And that's what it's like when you pay 1% to a C agent to sell your house. And they also do volume.

I mean, this is probably doing like a few properties a day by this bank. listing listing listing listing has a whole team that they don't have time to go and do this unfortunately so it's up to the buyer then to do their own due diligence that's an opportunity all right how much was it uh what was it listed at and then uh what did you so so this was originally i think it was $255,000 2005 it was listed at I think it was $62,000 I offered 60 got it accepted at $60,000 and then during inspections, I negotiated an extra $500 for repair. It's a close. So I bought this house for $59,500.

That was like $250-something,000 a few years prior. Yeah. All right. Tell us a little bit about how you negotiated that reduction in price for the inspections. What was your process like? I did a general inspection on the property and basically determined that the lady who lived there was a hoarder. And I mean, it was just disgusting. She had things piled up as tall as I am. She had, it must have been a few dead animals in there. Melled terribly. Some of the roof needed some fixing.

There was a concern of maybe some potential water damage. It kind of smelled a little bit. So I took pictures of that. And then I sent everything to the bank. And I said, listen, this is going to take me, you know, several thousand dollars more than I expected just to clean it up. But I'm ready to close right now. Cash, I'll close, you know, in a few days, if you just give me a $500 credit. That's all I want is $500. And I think for them it was a small enough number when they figured out. Let's just get it off the books.

500 bucks, 500 bucks. Let's just get it out. All right. How about funding it? How'd you fund it? That was bought cash. Again, because I didn't have a credit card. I had no credit.

I tried to get a loan for the bank. They said absolutely not. I try to get one of my parents to co-assigned. they had really bad credit. So the bank was like, no. So I was forced to buy this one cash. I love this because you were 21 years old, right? Yeah, I was told my entire life credit cards are a mistake.

Broke people need credit cards. If you can't buy it cash, you can't afford it. So I grew up with that mentality that it was like a big mistake. And I was so adamant that like I'm better than everyone else because I pay with cash. I pay with a debit card. I just did not understand it. Yeah. I mean, you'd only had your driver's license.

for a handful of years when you were negotiating this deal. Like, that's just so cool. For the people who are out there saying, I don't know, this is scary. I don't want to do it. Like, don't get punked out by a 21-year-old who didn't even have a credit card and went out there and bought his first house. Exactly.

I was 22 when I got my first credit card. It's like right after this whole mistake. You had a house before you had a credit card. How cool is that? Yes, I did. Okay. Next question. What did you do with it once you bought it?

I spent $12,000 fixing this up. Back then, contractor, fixing up crews were so hungry. for business because their business just got annihilated. They weren't doing any more flips. And I was able to get these people. I mean, they were so eager to work for anything. And I was able to get a very good deal and give these people work that were normally not doing anything into this property. So spent $12,000 fixing it up with basically just basic stuff, cleaned it up, did minor landscaping, laminate floors, new paint. I bought pre-owned appliances to save on money on that. that. What else did I? It's a bathroom, minor bathroom remodel, minor kitchen remodel. I'm just talking

like countertops, paint, tile flooring, really just basic, basic stuff. And total, that was about $12,000 to fix it up with it. And then I ended up renting it out. What it went for and kind of what was the outcome? And you mentioned mistakes or problems like, what a terrible? Terrible. So at that time, I basically used all of my money that I had every single penny buying that house, another. house I got and the dryplex. I mean, everything, because they all happen around the same time. And of course, every project goes over budget. And I basically got down to the point where I was out of money. I had nothing left over and I owed a contractor $2,000. I had nothing, like literally nothing. And I had, you know, some deals lined up as a real estate agent, but those were

coming through. I couldn't just not pay a contractor. I ended up going to my grandma and begging her $2,000 just to pay the contract. And I told her like when my next real estate deal closes, like she'll get all of her money back. And I paid her back like about a month later, two months later, whatever it was. But anyway, so I had to borrow money from my grandma. But at this time, I was so just like, you know, this property wasn't being rented out. It was empty. I'm like, what am I going to do?

I owe money now. Like, I've never owed money in my entire life like this. I was so desperate to rent it out that I picked the first tenant that came through. And I think at the time I was asking $1,200 a month. And I put it up in the same night, I got a phone call from someone saying, we'll take. it, I'll move in like tomorrow, just let me know how to meet and done deal. And I thought this was like my saving grace. Yeah, it always goes over well. Oh my God. Like this is part of this. The timing couldn't have been better. I'm going to rent it out. I'm not going to have to worry about this

anymore. I meet with a guy comes in really clean cuts like a nice button down shirt and khakis and dress shoes and and his girlfriend's same way. Like it looks like they came from like a nice like accounting job or like, you know, but his credit was shot. It was like a. It was like a the 500s, had a few losses, but a few things in collections that he said was from an auto accident he got into and they told them like not to pay something and like he's suing them and he's going to win because it's like the big trucking company and when he wins he's going to prepay all the rent for the next year. They had a cash business where they basically said that because they owed money, they couldn't put money like in certain accounts. He has to do everything in his

girlfriend's name. On their tax return, they didn't claim a lot of this. money because they said like they just you know they were like we just don't want to claim it for taxes there's a lot of red flags there oh and they wanted to move in immediately so i asked like what do you want to you know move in immediately well you know the landlord wants to sell the home that they're in now so we've got to get out long story short they lied to me on everything it turns out that he was growing weed and that's what his business was was growing weed i didn't find this out until he started paying his lent late later later later later than he was a month before I wanted to refinance the property at the time because by then, after about a year, I had like a decent enough credit score where I could at least like refinance it.

Turned out he turned the garage into a huge grow-op. I mean, I don't know what's because they're huge, but basically the whole garage was a grow-up. And that's how he made his money was doing that. And not only that, but like I found him on Facebook. And I couldn't find him on Facebook before, but I found him on Facebook. And it's just pictures of him with like guns on the table. And he like would have, you know, a few. thousand dollars in cash on the table. I'm like posting this picture and he says he's laid on rent.

But meanwhile, he has a few cents my rent money with a gun on the. Oh, wow. You were, you were a part of a rap song. Oh, yeah. Oh, and then he had like, you know, and I love dogs, but he had a whole bunch of pit bulls with him as well that he didn't tell me. What are the odds? Right. That's funny. I like that he was bragging on Facebook that he was late on rent while posting. Okay. So there's a couple quick tips here for our listeners. One, if you are worried about this happening to you, which you probably should be, go back after this episode and listen to the one that Brandon and I just did with Robert Green, where he talks about how to read people, how to know if you're being lied to and how to not be taken advantage of.

And two, when you're going to buy a house, spend a lot of time looking at a garage. We always skip over that. The garage is just a garage, right? That is where you're going to find out what that house was used for because that's where the majority of the bad stuff happens. So when I was working as a cop and we would go do raids on these kind of things at all. always ended up in the garage. You'll see like extra electrical wires and outlets put in the garage, things hanging from the ceilings, like extra light. You'll see all the little things that

marijuana grow houses need to happen. They all happen in the garage. So like that's something you definitely don't want to skip over as I'm sure Graham is now looking at like, yeah, some of the warning signs were there, but he was 21 years old. He didn't know. And even making all these mistakes, you still want on to be a really, really successful real estate investor and agent. So what excuse do we all have, right? Exactly. That was honestly, I think, the best learning experience ever. I ended up evicting the tenant.

He got very violent, basically trashed the house. I lost a year's worth of income on that house. Between the eviction, fixing it up, insurance didn't want to cover that. I didn't want to fight insurance on that. But it was the best lesson looking back. I mean, like this, I think I lost like 12 grand or something, $13,000. But looking back, like I'm so happy, I paid $12,000,000. to learn that lesson because that could be a drop in the bucket now for the wrong tenant.

So, like, I'm glad I got that out of the way. That's the best college education I ever got. Yeah, this is also just good, like, you know, a good lesson that. Landlording is a skill. Like I say that a lot. Landlordy does not something that any of us are just born innately knowing how to do. And there's 100 tips and tricks that will help you, like, improve your landlording. So, you know, take it seriously.

If you're going to manage yourself, take it seriously. I mean, I made the exact same mistakes you did. I mean, every one of those things you said, I'm like smiling and nodding because I'm like, yeah, every one of them I made. Right. And a lot of us do. And so if you want to avoid that, just like read some books on being a landlord, talk to other local landlords. Or if you're not willing to invest the work needed to become a good landlord, hire that out and spend, spend your time finding the best property manager. I agree. Yeah. There's just too much. Very wise, Brandon. That's why they call me the wise old owl. Yeah, and listen to a lot of rap songs to see if your tenant or your property shows up in the video. Exactly. Good way to, that's a good, should be a part of tennis.

It was so funny to see my house in the background of all of his pictures. Like, he would take pictures of him holding a gun to the camera. I'm like, oh, that's my living room in the background. That's the, that's the stove I bought that was used to save a little bit of money on. At least it's still in good shape. Yeah. He broke that though. Oh, of course.

Yeah, no, he smashed. He smashed that thing before he left. Yeah. One of our tenants actually just moved out of our property. She's been there for a couple years now. her dog chewed through a door, a big wood solid door. The dog chewed through it. Like, I've never seen that happen before.

I'm always shocked. I'm always shocked at the level of destruction a person can have in a house, especially with dogs. But just in general. Yeah, it's absurd. But anyway, all right, anything else you learn on that lesson? And you want to kind of summarize that deal up or else we'll move on. I think we can move on.

I think it was really just the tenant selection on that deal that was really a big one for me. Yeah, well, cool. Well, hey, if anybody was interested in learning how, I manage my properties. My wife and I wrote a book on that a while ago called the book on managing rental properties. It's yellow. You can find it Barnes & Noble or Amazon or whatever, but, you know, I think it's kind of cool. With that, let's move over to the world famous fire round. It's time for the fire round. All right, let's get to the fire round. These are the questions that come direct out of the Bigger Pockets forum. So the real life Bigger Pockets members asking these

questions. We're going to fire them quickly at you, Graham, to see what you got to say. So, number one, Matt from East Grand Forks, Minnesota, says, I recently purchased my first rental property with no money down and I'm pretty cash broke. However, I usually actually contribute a good amount, a large amount to my 401k account every paycheck. Now, I'm considering stopping all my contributions from my 401k so I can focus on real estate so I can get cash flow. what would you do? I would probably do the same thing. I go very light on my 401K

because I just don't know how much money I'm going to be making when I'm 60 years old and I don't know what the tax code is going to be like in the future. I put minimal in there just so I can say that I have something in there

but overall I'm a little bit worried. I prefer Roth over that just because I'm probably going to make a lot more money and I expect that anyone starting this young is going to make way more money in the future as they build this up. I would go for it.

Personally, if that would be me, I still put a little bit in there, but I would maybe shift the focus to real estate. I'm all for that. Me too. Especially if you know what to do with it with real estate, right? That's different than the person who has no clue how to invest that money. Very true. Yeah.

And I was going to say, and if your company offers you like 100% match, I mean, that's just free money. You might as well get up to the match, right? Like if you could make 100% return immediately on your... Always take the match. Yeah. Always contribute to take the match. A hundred percent.

Yep. And then take it out of there and find some way to go by real estate with the money to $401. after it's been matched. Now you're thinking like David and Brandon. Okay, next question. I own a rental in Southern California that has been rented by the same tenant for the past five years. The tenant pays on time every month. They keep the place in excellent condition and they're super low maintenance. I look to Comston. It looks like I can get about $400 more per month. Should I raise the rent just because I can't? I love that question. My answer, my immediate answer is no. I think we're all different. I have not,

I've only raised the rent on one tenant in now going on almost seven years. I still have tenants that have been with me for seven years now that I have not raised the rent once. And usually what I'll do is I keep the rent the exact same. When they move out, if they move out, then I re-rented at current market rates. I hate raising the rent because when you have a good tenant, hold on to them. These are tenants that treat the house like it's their own. They pay on time. There's no hassle. There's no damage. And just the cost of turnover. If you, raise the rent a hundred bucks a month and that gives them that much more incentive to leave. It's going to cost you way more to have the house vacant a month, a month and a half, to kind

of repaint, get it prepped up, even get a tenant at a higher price. I love keeping the tenants that I have and I've got, I consider them almost like family. I mean, it's just like I got this great community of tenants that just solo maintenance and that's rare to find and you can spend a lot of time finding those tenants. What if you find someone that will pay you $1,000 a month more because they want to sublet out your garage as a marijuana grow house. There we get. Well, as long as you take a cut of the marijuana.

There you go. Take some equity in that deal. It's not just debt. You don't just want more money. You need the upside. You need 30% of profit. Well, what I like about what you're saying, not the marijuana grow house, but like, everyone's got like a different priority, right?

Like, yeah, if your goal in life, if your goal gram was to make as much money and to eat out every bit of profit possible, then yeah, you probably should raise your rent all time. But it's a tradeoff, right? By doing that, now you have more turnover. You have more hassle. You have more rehab to do when they do turnover. So like there's a balancing act that we all have to kind of make that decision for ourselves. Again, if you desperately need to get out of a job right now, then maybe you are somebody who should be maximizing every penny from your property so that you can, you know, get out. But if you don't need to absolutely do that right now, then maybe the relaxing, taking a little easier, not having turnover is much better. So it just, yeah, where are you at in your

career and cool. All right, next one. I've been looking into Airbnb. I've heard that cash flow can be much higher. What are some things I should know before I jump in and buy some short term rentals? By the way, do you have any short term rentals? And then you can answer that. I don't. I don't. I'll tell you why. So one of the things that I see with Airbnb, I see a ton of opportunity with Airbnb, especially Airbnb arbitrage right now. I have a feeling that's going to be like the next social media marketing trend is going to be. You're going to see a lot of these like 18 year old experts now coming up on YouTube about Airbnb arbitrage and how they're making. What do you mean by Airbnb arbitrage?

So I'm talking about being able to sublee a house like that. So you spent $2,000 a month and then you make $6,000 a month on Airbnb and you profit the difference. I think that is going to be a big trend. The problem that I see with that is that a lot of people go into it signing one-year leases, first of all, thinking that this is going to continue. And the golden era of Airbnb is going to be forever. But what I see happening is that there is so much regulation going on with Airbnb that oftentimes you run into very quick issues. Like I've seen people sign year-long leases and then a month in, all of a sudden the Hollywood Hills clamps down on Airbnb rentals and then now you have to apply for a permit and you're not allowed to rent the home

for X amount of days unless you'd live there as a primary residence. And right there, your business is done. I'm talking within like 30 days, your entire business is completely run down. And that's the biggest problem I see. Or I see people who will then buy a house and they think, well, it doesn't make sense to buy this house as a long-term rental. It will not cash flow, but if I put it up on Airbnb, I can make a killing. What are the chances that Airbnb regulation is going to be the exact same for the next 30 years for you to pay off this property? And I've seen people that buy these houses and it works really good for a year. And then something happens, and then all of a sudden, well, crap, can't rent it out on Airbnb anymore. It doesn't cash flow.

I'm stuck with it. Now I got to sell it for a loss. And in Los Angeles, the big one that just happened is that you can't use a rent-controlled property, any rent-controlled property for Airbnb. So I've seen all these people get these like 1920s rent-controlled properties and get around that by renting all of the units short-term on Airbnb and making like three to four times what they would normally make. Well, the problem is that in Los Angeles, inventory is so short to begin with that all of the available units were being taken up for Airbnb. And I am all for free business, by the way. But at the same time, I think we do have a bit of a moral duty to our city for the greater good of everyone and kind of take everything into consideration. But Airbnb cracked down on

that and realized that too many people are abusing it. So the same thing's true for Hawaii here. I hear it in San Francisco here at New York City do the same thing. Like there's a, there's a trend and it's not a happy trend for landlords that are doing it. It seems to be moving in the opposite. And again, who knows what's going to look like? I mean, it's going to shake out somehow. I don't think Airbnb is going to disappear, right? No. So I almost think it's, we're going to go from, you know, one extreme, which is basically anyone can rent anything on Airbnb and make a killing, to now we're shifting towards the other extreme where they're super strict or they're going in the direction of being super strict. I think eventually we go to the super strict part for a little bit.

People kind of figure out what's wrong with that and then have a happy medium. But I think this process could take five, six years to really shake out. All I say is this, is that if people look at a property and it cash flows with a normal renter, but they can make twice the amount with Airbnb. I'm all for it. Absolutely. So for the ones that don't, I'll give you guys another little quick tip here to stay safe. In almost everywhere I've seen with this, these rules apply to investment properties. But if you own the house yourself, it's a completely different game plan. They don't have all the restrictions. If it's your home that you live in. Sorry, don't own it. It's your primary residence or you live in it. Right. So what I do in the Bay Area is we help a lot of

house hackers and we Airbnb the units that they're hacking as opposed to just doing a regular monthly lease. So if you're looking at house hack or buy a home, Airbnb is a great way to maximize that income. But like Graham said, you don't want to be dependent on it. If you're assuming that's your income stream, you could catch yourself in some big trouble if they take away that opportunity. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Well, all right, cool. Last question of the fire round. All right. I'm looking for my first deal and found an agent with decades of experience. We agreed to work together two weeks ago, and today I just found the elusive one in 100 property with awesome numbers. I left a mention this morning and hadn't heard back yet as of 8 p.m.

How responsive should my agent be? I don't want to burn any bridges, but should I look for a backup agent? That's a good question. Wow. That's a really, really, really good question. I would move on with another agent. I hate to say it if you, but like here's a thing. Is it when I run that business as a real estate agent, I am available 24-7.

There should be no reason why you can't reach me for more than an hour. The only time you would ever be unable to reach me is if I'm in a meeting, my phone is on silent because I need to focus on the meeting or I don't have cell phone service. What if your, what if your grandma's in the hospital? Okay, so in the event of that, I always have a backup. Like, if there's really something like that that happens, I always will be able to text something and say, you know, this so-and-so happened. I have my colleague who's going to be taking care of you right now or something like that. I think if you find a hot property and you can't write an offer on it, you need to look out for your best interest at some point.

If 24 hours goes by and you don't know where your agent is and you can't write an offer on a property that you can lose, I think it makes sense to find another agent to write the offer. Do you think he's likely to find his next agent that will also respond within an hour like you do? It's tough because a lot of agents suck. And that's the thing in the business is that people think it's so competitive as a real estate agent, but they don't realize that 80% of the agents out there have no clue what they're doing and just don't pick up their phone. Just if you pick up your phone, you're ahead of 80% of agents out there.

You're in the top 20th percentile just by picking up your phone. I think that the majority of people, when they meet your agent and you have a good vibe and you sign up to work with them, right? Like all of our clients signed buyer representation agreements to work with us. But what we do is we communicate ahead of time. Here is how it works, right? Like when I'm recording this podcast, I'm not taking your call, right? However, I have three people that will respond to your email, take your call that you can talk to because I know I work with clients. I'm on appointments. I'm doing things I can't answer every single phone call, but there is someone that will, right? You should sit down with your agent and have a plan. If I come across a hot property and you're not answering your phone, what do I do?

I think that would have solved this all from the very beginning because like Graham, there's a reason you're a top producing agent. You're super good. Most people will get frustrated because they can't find a gram, right? So do something with your agent to come up with a game plan. for if I get a hot deal, I expect you to answer your phone immediately. Are you going to? And if he says, no, family time for me with, I'm with my daughter. I'm not going to answer my call during these hours. That's okay. They just need someone that you can talk to that can write an offer for you or answer your questions. I completely agree with that. Yeah. Cool. Awesome. All right. Well,

let's shift gears one last time and head over to the world famous. Famous for. All right, let's get to the famous four. Question number one. What is your favorite real estate specifically, real estate related book. I would have to say buy it, rent it profit was one of the books that I had read a while ago. It got it got me thinking about real estate and rental properties. And it was that book that really it was so practical for me. That that was the library. Yeah, I got that the library early on in my business. It has a really good name. Like I wish I had thought about that name. It could be a terrible book and people will still buy it. Yeah, yeah. Simple. All right, what is your favorite business book?

I like the four-hour work week. I think, you know, some people might say, eh, it's a little outdated now, but that got me thinking about building some sort of scalable business that you can remove yourself from that still ends up making money. And for me, that was the book. I think I read that when I was 18. That just got me thinking in such a different way.

It's clearly had an impact on you. Our producer, Kevin, when you were talking earlier, was saying, this guy sounds like he's a four-hour work week person. Like, you could tell that that's influenced you and it's helped you quite a bit. 100%. Okay. So for the 36 hours of your work week that you're not working, you can give four hour work week, and what are the hobbies that you enjoy? I would honestly say it's YouTube videos. Like for me, making YouTube videos has become a hobby in mind. I spend way too much time doing. It's just the fun of just like planning out a topic, the fun of like if there's something

trending to be able to give your own opinion on it. The fun of just having the creativity of a 100% expression that I can say, you know, reasonably whatever I kind of want to the camera, I get my opinion out there. And that to me has been so much fun to be able to make it. I just started one as well and I like your videos. They were really good. And Brandon's really good too. Like I watch Brandon on YouTube and I'm like, I already know everything you're saying, but I can't stop paying attention. Yeah. And it's a good communicator. It's a fun balance between giving information, but also it's entertaining. And there's some channels that I know everything already. But there's, just entertaining. Even if you know it's just fun to watch. It's like watching a movie that you've

already seen, but you just keep watching it anyways because it's so good. Exactly. There you go. Yeah. And in, anyway, Graham, you are a fantastic YouTuber. So keep it up. Thank you. Thanks so much. Number four, what do you believe sets apart successful real estate investors from those who give up, fail, or never get started? I think it's just having a long-term outlook. One of the biggest things that I see, especially from, you know, people on YouTube. And when you do YouTube videos, you see such a broad audience that you really, because sometimes you just see the other people that are really successful and you kind of like form your own little bubble on it.

But I think so many people look for something that's quick. And they just jump, like, I see too many people jump from like thing to thing to thing to thing. And if they don't get this immediate result, they just move on. And real estate is one of those things that you don't often see the results immediately. It's something that you'll see the results, you'll see the payoff years from now.

Like you could invest in something and just break even for the, for the first year or you can spend eight months of your life fixing up a property to get to the point where you even make any money on it. And most people don't have a long-term outlook. They just want to know what's going to make me the most amount of money right now. And I see a lot of people too that just say, well, why would I invest in real estate to make 10% when I can invest in, you know, Tesla and make 30% in a month? What's the, and they just don't see it. They don't have the long-term outlook. And they don't understand how safe it is. Like when you

do this correctly, I really feel like it's like it's almost a guaranteed return. If you buy them correctly, if you buy them conservatively, if you know what you're doing, you're not going to see that insane volatility. It's not like your rent one month is going to be up 30 percent. And the next month it's going to be down to it. It's relatively stable, even in a recession for the most part that you're going to see rents for the most part holding pretty, pretty steady. So I think it's really just having a long-term outlook. And everyone that I know who's investing in real estate just thinks about it, what's going to happen 10, 20 years from now? They're not thinking what, what's going to happen six months from now? What's going to happen a year from now? It's 20 years

or not. Is this going to be a good investment? It was those people who wanted to make $30,000 a month who lost their shirts in 0506 because they were looking for the quick score. They didn't understand the fundamentals what they were getting into. They didn't look at the long term thing. So I think that's great advice. If you take the long term outlook, it's very hard to lose money in real estate. But if you take a short term outlook, it's very hard to make money in real estate. You're going to lose. I have a YouTube idea. for you as well. I think you should film yourself going to subway and buying a footlong, like ordering it, picking out all the stuff you want, like telling people why you chose this

mustard over mayonnaise, and then taking it to like the most expensive restaurant in L.A. that you can possibly find. I love it. Yeah, exactly. Well, all your friends are getting these like $200 plates that are made by some like French chef who learned his trade from like four ancestor of people, right? And just like eating your sandwich and blow up. everyone away with your business knowledge while they're all munching on, you know, they're like asparagus and pomegranate seed, filet mignon. That would be a hilarious video. That's viral.

Yes. Okay. Graham, this has been awesome. I really appreciate the stuff you've been sharing with us. Can you tell us more or where people can find out more about you? Yeah, YouTube. Just YouTube my name, Graham, Stefan. Make sure to, of course, like and subscribe.

But I post three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I've been doing that for over two years now on YouTube. and I post everything I know there. So that's the best place to find me. All right. Well, dude, this has been awesome. Thank you so much. We'll see you around the community and around YouTube.

So take care. Sounds good. Thank you. Thanks. And that was our show with Graham Stephan. Awesome stuff. Awesome stuff. I love getting these young dudes on the show that are like, you know, I'm not even 30 yet,

and I'm just crushing it, and I did all this cool stuff. And here's how I explained how I did it. And he did exactly that. He totally delivered. Yeah. Super cool guy. bought a house before he had a credit card, right? Like, what excuse do we have? Yeah, yeah, pretty awesome. And I love just that mindset he has, right? I mean, you definitely see that he doesn't take like, oh, I can't get it done. He's like, how do I get it done? And he figures it out. And then the market changes. Like, okay, how do I make money now? Maybe I try develop it. Maybe I try that. Maybe I try that. He's just figuring it out as he goes. And yeah, I think that's awesome. Plus, just his whole, like, obviously he's a good agent for a reason. Like, you know, like, we didn't really talk a lot about that today. And I mean, we could probably do a whole show just on how he is a good real estate agent.

But, I mean, clearly he's good at what he does. And so, like, you know, if you're listening to this right now and you feel like you're not making enough money, ask you how can you be the Graham Steffen of your industry, whatever it is you're doing right now? Like, how do you just crush it? So you can make a ton of money doing something you love and then put that into, you know, live cheap and then live, you know, invest to us in real estate. How can you do that?

That's really good. Because they say success leaves clues, right? So you look at what successful people do and you copy it. If you specifically want to do that with being a real estate agent and you're in my area, I actually do a free super secret squirrel mastermind for those who want to become an agent. Once a month, everybody gets together at my office and I basically explain, this is what it takes to do it. This is what you're getting into. They kind of give them an idea. And then I see like who wants it and who doesn't. So if that's the case, reach out and I can let you know when

the next meetup that we're going to be having is to talk about that. Because I think if you love real estate, but you're not ready to invest yet, you don't have the capital. You want to learn more. Man, representing other people with buying and selling is a great way to learn really fast. there you go. I agree. I definitely agree. All right, y'all, thank you so much for being a part of our podcast. Remember, if you are loving these shows, make sure you leave us ratings, reviews, and iTunes. It helps us reach more people, which helps us reach more people, which change more lives. It's all like this nice little circle. So thank you so much. And David, thank you for being awesome. I appreciate that, man. All right. This is David Green for Brandon, the Opportunity Zone Turner, signing on. 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 height, 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.

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