Epic Real Estate Investing - EPREI 030 : How to Invest in Multi-Family Real Estate

Episode Date: April 8, 2012

Learning how to invest in multi-family real estate is something everyone seeking financial freedom should aspire to do. Done right... can you say, "Cashflow, casfhlow, cashflow?" On this episode, Matt interviews one of the premier multi-family investors in the country, Mr. John Dessauer. Listen in and learn how to actually "force appreciation" on your multi-family properties. Get your free real estate investing course at FreeRealEstateInvestingCourse.com Take your real estate investing education to the next level by becoming a member of the Epic Pro Academy. Learn more at EpicProAcademy.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Epic Real Estate Investing Podcast, episode 30. Without further delay. Your guru. Sorry. Your guide to a better life through real estate investing. Matt Terrio. Hello and greetings from the Epic Real Estate Investing podcast, the podcast that will show you how to build wealth through creative real estate investing. So you'll have the option to realistically retire in the next 10.

10 years or less. And enjoy the good life while you're still young enough to do so. That's what we're supposed to do. My name is Matt Terrio, author, full-time real estate investor, and family man. If this is your first time listening to this show, you're going to want to do two things. First, go back and listen to episode one, and so you get the ground rules of the show. Get an idea of what this is all about. And two, download the free real estate investing course, how to do deals, no money required.

and you can get that at free real estate investing course.com. It's a step-by-step course of where I unveil the mystery around doing deals with no money or credit. There's really nothing mysterious about it as long as you know how to do it. Okay, so I've got a great interview for you today. I'm very excited about it because it happens to be one of my mentors and not a personal mentor. I didn't work right alongside this gentleman, but he was a mentor from a distance for sure.

And he was actually one of my instructors when I first got started. and I had taken his two-day class on multifamily investing, and I was literally blown away. I would never been exposed to anything like that before. And it was his class where I really started to recognize how many different ways there are to make money in real estate, particularly with multifamily dwellings. I mean, it's amazing.

And so what I really enjoyed about it was the way that he taught his class and the way that he walked the class through deals. and he walked his class through the deals, he would share his mindset and he would share his thoughts at every little corner, every time he analyzed the deal, every little nook and cranny said, this is what I'm thinking here, this is what I'm thinking there. And every time he negotiated with a seller, he would say, this is my intent here, this is what I'm thinking here.

And it really just opened my eyes as to what's possible with real estate. Now, as excited as I was after that class about multifamily dwellings, it was a little intimidating. I have to admit, it was a little intimidating for me at the time. So I just, I went off and followed another instructor and really embraced single family houses and specifically the creative acquisitions aspect of it. I didn't have a lot of money when I got started. So I had to figure out how to do it with no money.

And so that's what I really embraced and that's, that just turned out to be my thing. And it's what's gotten me to where I am today. Now, as you know, I've been sharing intermittently over the last few months. months, how I finally took a dive into the multifamily arena. I finally took down my first building and everything is turning out awesome. And now in hindsight, I mean, it wasn't really anything to be intimidated about. And, you know, I guess that goes just for about any fear that you may have or have ever had, right? I mean, think about something that you've been afraid of in the past. And now you look back on it wondering, what was I so afraid of? We've all been there. We've all

have those experiences. Well, real estate investing is just like that. Okay. Oh, anyway, so I'm getting sidetracked. On the phone today, I am joined by one of the country's premier investors in multifamily dwellings, Mr. John Desauer. John, welcome to the show. Well, thanks for having me. I'm glad to be here. Awesome. I'm really glad that you're here as well. So let's just kind of begin with the beginning. How did you get started investing in real estate? Well, you know, one of the things that I I realized early on was, you know, my nine to five job that I was trained to do through college. And, you know, once you get that degree, it just felt like that was never my aura and never my destiny. You know, the cubicle and the corporate world, nine to five.

So I was always interested in achieving my income in different ways. And I always grew up in apartments. I grew up in Chicago and I learned the apartment business from the end. inside looking out. And, you know, for me, it was a very, um, uh, it was very simple. I got to see all of the tenants that lived in that apartment unit pay someone the most important check of the month. And I was attracted to that. So, you know, kind of growing up with that looking, uh, being on the inside looking out, I said, how do I become that apartment owner and, and changed the way I was receiving my income? I realized early on also that, you know, I can either

go to my nine to five every day and cut someone else a check like that or I can have other people go to their nine to fives and cut me that check. So that's what I was after. That's originally what attracted me to that multifamily. So it was really the multifamily strategy that appealed to you right away and that's what you pursued. Exactly. Well, now that you're there, I mean, now that you are an active multifamily investor, what is it that you like best? about your strategy? Well, I think two things. You know, I started out with a duplex and grew to just under 1,500 units.

And I've realized during that timeframe, that's been about, it's been about 12, to 14 years somewhere in there. I've realized two things. One important thing is establishing value and knowing what you're buying and how to establish a baseline of value with that asset. two is how do you take that asset and increase the value of it? And that's what anybody wants to know when they're investing in real estate is how do we grow this asset that we own. Some people do it by what we call natural appreciation, and that's fine. I'm more interested on the topic

of on-purpose investing. In other words, what are we doing on purpose to drive the value of that asset? There's a lot of different ways to do that. But I would say those two things are what I focus on most. Got it. What are some of the, I mean, every, every strategy has its cons as well. What are some of the things that you could do without? That I could do without, I miss that. Mm-hmm.

Right, that you could do without that you don't like so much about the business. Well, the toughest, like, you know, and I'm glad you asked that question because, you know, like I tell everyone, real estate investing is a tough thing to do. This isn't something where, you know, you're going to buy your first property and make millions of dollars. You're going to have to work at it. It's challenging, but like anything, it's well rewarded. Usually when something's more challenging, it's also well rewarded. So the thing that I guess I don't like the most is, you know, the challenges that come up with in today's world of financing. And I know for you and people that are looking at getting involved with your stuff,

I think that challenging financing scenarios today are here, and they're probably going to be here to stay. So you've got to find a way to get creative with them. So I really turn something that I don't enjoy a lot, and that's negative financing scenarios, and turn them into a positive. I almost treat it like a puzzle. How can I finance a deal creatively on the apartment world that makes sense today? And I think if you compare multifamilies to single families and creativity, I think multifamily properties far outpace the creative options that you have with comparison to single family. Right, right. When you're looking at a deal, you know, what are some of the things that you really take into consideration that makes it a deal for you?

Is it the actual existing value? Is it the potential value location? Mark? Yeah, great question. I think there's two things. Number one, I go back to that value play and you just hit it on the head, making sure that number one, I'm buying it at a discount to market. I've got to make sure that that happens. And number two, when I'm analyzing a property, I've got to make sure that there's a play in it. In other words, I can do something specifically to the property to drive its value over the next 12 months, 24 months, 36 months, that type of time frame. And if I can put those two things together, buy a property undermarket and put a play together on it, I'm probably going to move forward. So those are the two baseline things that I look for when I'm analyzing. Do you sell anything or you pretty much hold everything that you buy? Well, you know, I think that, you know, the market changes consistently. Change is going to be here.

It's going to be here forever. And I think you've got to take that strategy and apply it to real estate investing. You're not going to buy and hold every single property that you buy. At the same time, you're not going to fix and flip every property that you buy. You've got to kind of take that change and say, well, what's appropriate to the deal that I have and the market that I'm in? And if you do those two things, you might decide, hey, I'm going to sell some of these when I bring them to the top of the market, or I'm going to buy and hold these because they're an excellent cash flow play. So it really depends on your market that you're in, your property, your asset that you own, and your personal preference as well. You know, what more personal financial goals are in why you got involved in real estate investing in the first place.

Right, right. You said you're up to 1,500 units. Is that current? Yeah, that's been the most I've owned at one time. Okay. And, you know, I would say over the last couple of years, I've tried to simply. where we can in our portfolio, just because, you know, again, it comes down to that, you know, have I taken this asset to its highest potential, at least for the next five to ten years?

And the ones that I've seen that I've done that with, I'll typically put on the market. Others that I think that I've got more of a play with, I'll hold those a little bit longer. So right now, I mean, are you active? How many deals a year do you think you're doing? I've slowed down over the last probably two years, year and a half, because of several reasons. Number one, I think the market is changing. The commercial market especially has really identified a little bit of a bump with regard to properties that are looking to get refinanced and they can't. So I see a lot of opportunity there starting this year.

2012 into 2013. So I'm kind of putting a little bit of dry powder together to approach that market aggressively. The other thing that it was for me is, you know, for those of you that kind of hung out with me for the last few years, and man, I know you have a little bit. You know that I've been on a simplification mode. There's no doubt about it. The larger you grow in real estate investing in property management, you've got to. to have a system in place to manage that. And at some point in your career, you can say, you know, I need to, I need to adjust a little

bit. I need to make sure that I'm running more efficiently than I am right now. And I think all businesses, entrepreneurs kind of go through that. So I've been through that adjustment over the last two years. It's been wonderful. We're much leaner. We're much more efficient. We use a lot of cloud technology today to run our properties and property management.

So I've been focused on that the last, I would say 18 to 24 months, and now we're kind of gearing up for an acquisition phase. And I think it's perfect timing because of what the market's doing with respect to those refinancing models I discussed earlier. Can you kind of clarify? And I can imagine this may be a really loaded question or a deep question, but you can answer as briefly as you want. The difference between what your business complicated looks like and what you're aiming for to simplify, what's the difference between those two, two. Say that first part again, man, I missed that. Sure. So you said you're in simplification mode.

So what does your business look like when it's complicated and what does it look like now that it's simplified? Yeah, great. Okay, wonderful question. Well, a complicated business today, and if I just target this towards real estate investing, multifamily property management, a complicated business today is one that is overloaded with paper, one that's overloaded with files, with people in offices answering phones, with all the above. Now, I'm not saying that you don't need people. I want to make sure that I highlight that. But what I am saying is how can we use technology today to make our business more efficient? So what we've done over the last two years is we've taken, you know, rooms of files.

And what's in a file? Applications, leases, supporting documents, credit reports, things like that. And we digitize all of those files. So all of those files, not only do we store on our hard drive, but it's backed up in the cloud. so that we have access to those files anywhere we go throughout the country. And all of our employees now have shared access to those files. So if I make, you know, let's just say that I have, you know, Smith apartment in Chicago, Illinois,

and I have a property manager on site that has a new tenant come in. So they've got a new application, a new lease. When they add that file to the online file, I can be in the Florida Keys and open that same file up, look at that same application, look at that lease, and it's all done through the clouds. It not only acts as our backup system for files and important documents, but it also acts as a shared file system for easy access for all of the team. So that's one way that we've become simpler. We've really implemented that same type of strategy throughout all of our business so that, you know, we really take advantage of technology to manage our company and be, you know, good, efficient entrepreneurs. And it really kind of shows in our bottom line.

We don't need the office space anymore. We don't need some of the personnel anymore. And, you know, we're kind of, it's a double-edged sword because anytime you have to let go of personnel, it's a little, tough, but, you know, we're implementing technology for that. And in today's market, you've got to be competitive. You've got to be probably more important, creative in order to improve your bottom line. So that's kind of what we've been focused on.

So just smushing down the expenses a little bit and running on the income? You got to be. And that's really the theme with multifamily units in general. You've got to make sure that you're focused on. driving income and decreasing expenses. And that translates into two things, a higher cash flow for you. And the second thing is an increased value on the asset that you own. Right.

Right. You know, I know you're an instructor and you've had, you know, hundreds, if not thousands and thousands of students come through your classroom. And it was certainly one of the favorite classes that I've ever been to. From your students that you've noticed that have achieved success and have actually gone out and produce great results. What are some personality traits or characteristics among them that you find common? Well, if you're going to be in multifamily units and property management, you've got to have a sense of humor.

There's no doubt because you're going to come across the craziest scenarios. Matter of fact, I'm looking, hopefully we're going to put this together, but looking to put together a reality show with multifamily units. It's going to be the most popular one on TV. I can assure you. But with a sense of humor, I also think that you need to have a sense of assertiveness. This business is not one for the faint of heart and also one for a person that needs to have everything perfect before they take action. I'd almost recommend taking action when you don't have all the pieces aligned.

There's something about experience being your. your best teacher. And, you know, I consider myself a good teacher, but I've often learned the best when I'm actually doing it myself. Even when I don't know everything there is to know about that particular piece of property or market, it's when I push myself to take action and act as if I did know is when I get the best result. So I think those are the personality traits that I would probably lean on the most. You can do that. You'll be pretty successful. Got it. No, that's a biggie. because I pretty much just purchased my first multifamily building, acting as if.

And I've learned a ton. It's been an invaluable education. Absolutely. Congratulations, by the way. Thank you. Thank you. And you know what? I mean, that's one of the success stories you probably don't hear about is, you know,

I'm very grateful for your class and your teachings because without that class, I would have really never thought that that was possible for me. So, cool. Thanks. Thank you. You bet. You bet. And so I kind of know the answer to this question because, let's see, the next is do you need a lot of money to be successful in multifamily?

And, I mean, I know the quick answer, like this first deal that I did, I didn't use one penny of my own money to make this happen. But, you know, this is just my first one. Like in the long run, do you need a lot of money to be successful? Well, you know, there's a saying out there if you want to make, you know, a million dollars in real estate or a million dollars in the restaurant business, you start with two million. And I go a little bit with that because that's true. Mismanaged opportunity and mismanaged businesses can put you in a position where you lose money quickly. What I would recommend is take an inventory of your resources and really make sure that you identify what you have to spend. And you might decide that, hey, I don't have a lot to spend or I don't have a lot of money to put down on the property.

That's fine, too. At least you know where you're starting. It's kind of like that scenario when you're at the mall. And I certainly have this experience because I'm surrounded by women in my house. I'd like to say, you know, not the women that you say, my wife and two kids or daughters and all my dogs are girls. So I'm surrounded by females. But when you go to the mall and you're in the mall and you're looking at that directory and the dot says you are here, that's kind of what you have to do with your resources. And once you identify whether you've got money to invest or you don't have money to invest, that's going to dictate what your blueprint is.

Once you know your blueprint, then you can kind of take specific action steps in order to achieve your goal. And that might be to buy a six-unit building, a 20-unit building, whatever that is. You've got to kind of go through that process first. Got it. Do you need a lot of time, or could someone invest in multifamily on a part-time basis? I tell people that time is always more valuable than money. The more time, the better. I know people with a lot of money and no time, and I know the opposite.

with no money in a lot of time. So, you know, I think that time is definitely a resource you've got to consider. And I tell people the more time that you have to involve yourself in this, to understand your markets, to find opportunities, to build relationships with investors, the better off you're going to be. The problem that I see most often is that people don't have a lot of time or they don't think they have a lot of time.

And, you know, it's just a simple, exercise of managing your priorities. And in managing that priority system, things like TV and, you know, belonging to organizations that may not be giving you much of a return, you've got to kind of look at and go through and decide, hey, if I really want to do this, I've got to make this a priority. And, you know, going to the Oaks Club two nights a week or whatever may not be as important for you as putting your research in and developing relationships and networking or watching TV and things like that may not be as important.

So if you go through that, I think you'll find the time. Right. Right. Particularly, I guess it has a lot to do with the reason you're investing in the first place. Exactly. Yep. Absolutely. So let's just kind of take a general walk through your typical deal beginning with how you find

your deals. What's your favorite source or sources? of finding your deals. Sorry, I've got a rambunctious dog here sitting next to me. I think the best way that I have found deals is through networking. If you're going to things like the MLS and other avenues like that, you're going to a place where everyone else is going. I would really recommend setting up relationships and networking with people that could

give you opportunities in the multifamily business. Those deals that come through those avenues seem to set themselves apart than deals that are listed on the MLS or places like LoopNet and things like that. If you go to where everyone else is going, you're going to have everyone else's results. So whatever you can do to separate yourself from that, you're going to be better off. Right. Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more there. So when you find a deal, so your network put something on your desk for you to review, what are some of the things that you look at first that indicate, just right on the surface that indicate that there may be a deal there?

Well, you first got to go back to that pillar that I talked about earlier and then value. You've got to understand the market in areas of value. what that building or complex would be worth specifically in that market at what I call par. In a normal environment, let's say that building's worth 500,000. And you know that because of several different things, and one of them being cap rate. Cap rate is a way that you can kind of identify the price tag of the income stream that you're buying from that apartment building. And you've got to kind of know specifically what that is in that.

market it differs in every single market once you know that then you can go and look at the opportunity and say you know the way this opportunity is priced or the way that I can buy this property it's significantly below what market value would be so for instance it might be 450 or 425 in a 500,000 dollar market that's the first thing that I look at got it what are some things that you might review right away that could cause it or could be deal breakers for you? Well, usually what is a deal breaker for me is, you know, if it's priced too high or even if it's priced at market, if it's priced exactly at market value and the seller is inflexible, or maybe if I don't see an

opportunity to drive value by doing certain things like raising rents, maybe rents are at the highest in the market. Those type of deals would probably turn me off because there's a lack of opportunity where there's a lack of opportunity, you're going to have a lack of return. So I rather focus on properties with better scenarios with that. Got it. Just general standards. Can you make money here, basically?

Can you make money in apartment buildings? Absolutely. No, I was saying when you analyze, I mean, you're pretty much just looking for the opportunity. good opportunity to go. Yeah, absolutely. And I was just going to go into, yeah, if there's no opportunity, I move on. But if you look at the national statistics, rental demand is growing significantly in every metro market in the country.

On average, rental rates are growing by at least 4% in every major market. So that's a pretty strong rent growth. And it really boils down to supply and demand. Most apartment buildings are going to have opportunity unless they're priced at the higher points of the market, both in sales price and in rental rates. So those are examples of properties that I stay away from, and I kind of focus more of my attention towards properties that are under market value and maybe under rental market values. In other words, their rent that they charge are under market rents. Mm-hmm. Got it. Okay, so you've got a deal that was presented to you, and you've analyzed it, and you see the opportunity.

Is there any specific way or method or protocol that you go through to present your offers to get the most effectiveness or to increase acceptance? You know, usually today and an all-cash offer will definitely get someone's attention because of the challenges. So I often tell people if they have an avenue for all cash, you should do it because you could probably get a discount to price because of that. Another thing to do would be to make sure that you close quickly. So instead of 45 days, close in 30 days, 30 days, close in 15 if you have the availability to do that. Other than that, I think, you know, you've got to find out what problem the seller is trying to solve. Whenever there's a property for sale, there's a problem to be solved. Owner wants to retire.

Unfortunately, there's a sickness or a death in the family where someone has inherited the building or they just don't like the property management anymore. I think you can get notice of your offers by solving that issue. And if you can make note of that in your offer, I think that is another way to get a contract or an offer notice more. the numbers. Right. No, good strategy. When, once you take ownership of the property, and this is one of the most fascinating things that I enjoyed about your class, because I'd never heard it, I've been in real estate and I've been a real estate agent for a while, and I'd never heard the term forced appreciation. Yeah. I mean, it almost sounds illegal. But can you kind of go over, and I'm actually asking somewhat for selfish reasons as well, because I'm just putting my first ten of

in my building this week. And what are some of your favorite ways to increase the value of a building? How do you do that? And can you kind of go in to explain how those small little increments have a big impact on the value? Yeah.

Now, that's a little bit more of a detailed answer than I think we have time for this whole day lesson probably, but I can give you the Cliff Notes version for sure, a little problem, Matt. I think the best thing that you can do, especially on apartment buildings, five units and over, its value system is based on how much income the building receives. Sorry, that's my dog, Kona saying, as well. But when you look at how a building receives its income, you've got to go along and really make sure that you're putting a plan together in which you raise the net operating income.

What do I mean by that? Well, net operating income is achieved by taking the operational income, things like rents or money from the laundry facility or any kind of fees, you subtract out your operating expenses, things like taxes, insurance, maintenance, management, and you left with your N. If you can increase that N. OI, you can drive the value significantly. Now there's two ways, and only two ways, to achieve an increase in the NOI. That's either by raising the overall operational income or number two, lowering the operational expenses.

So some ways that I'll do that, especially in this market, one is by raising rent. So I'll look at supply and demand in that market, and I'll find out what the market rent should be, and I'll drop rents according to an appropriate percentage. So let's just take 4%. If rents in that market are $700 or I'm sorry, in that building that we're looking, that are $700, and I know that I can raise rent by 4%. I'm going to increase the rent by $28 per unit per month. So let's just say that we're talking about 10-unit building.

What I'll do is I'll take $28 per unit, so there's 10 units. So that's $288 for the month. And then I'll take that 288 and annualize that for the year. So Matt, if you got a calculator in front of you, take 288 and times that by 12 for me and what do you get? Oh, the Mac calculator is terrible. Well, I could probably do it real quickly. Okay, hold on one.

288 and what's the next part? Yeah, if you take 288 and multiply that by 12, what do you get? 3456. Okay, now take 3456. Let's just pick a cap rate in that market. But let's just say it's eight. Take $3,556 and divide it by .080. What do you get?

$43,200. Okay. So by raising someone's rent by $28, you give yourself a personal raise of about $3,500 a year, and you've increased the value of the property by, what does you say, $43,000? Yeah. $43,000. And the reason that is is because that system, capitalizes on any income increase or net operating income increase you do.

And that's how apartments are valued. So that's why it's so important to get in there and try to find ways to raise income, lower expenses because you always capitalize on that and increase the value exponentially. Perfect. That's exactly what I wanted you to go over. So thank you for the cliff notes. We're awesome. No problem.

Um, you could probably piece this together based off your answers because your answers were, were very thorough. But if you lost everything today, John, and had to start over, you know, what, what would you start doing in the morning? Um, well, first, I would take some time off, you know, losing everything is stressful. So I would just take time up and probably be a beach person, um, for a while, hang out at the beach, you know, have a couple beers. Um, the best thing that I think people can arm them.

with today with knowledge. Do you lose everything today? So what? Now what? What do you do the next morning? Great question. My advice is to take some time off. I know it sounds counterintuitive or, you know, maybe not as panicky or aggressive as some people might want to hear it. But you know what? Life is short. If you lose everything, take some time off from doing anything and realize how important life is. That's number one. So I would definitely do that. Number two is I'm an entrepreneur, and entrepreneurs do things that other people don't do and can do. So I would probably go back to the drawing board and start a business. It would probably be in real estate. It would probably be in multifamily. And I would start looking at opportunities and finding ways creatively to buy

real estate with no money down or very little money down. And so I would just start over. And, you know, I think that's the confidence that education can give you, knowing that you are going to come across tough times and hardships. And it's almost like a life insurance policy in a way that if you do lose everything, you've got that knowledge. No one can take that away from you. You just start over. You just hit the reset button and go from there.

So, I mean, there's a lot of confidence that's built with that. And I think that everybody has to realize they all go. go through ups and downs. And you might have some of your people listening to this right now that are either in a down part of their life or just come off of that. And I guess the best advice that I can give them is make a deep breath, breathe, or let's get to work. Nice.

So someone listening today and they said that guy Johnny's pretty cool and that multifamily thing sounds pretty cool. I'm going to give that a try. And I'm going to start tomorrow morning. What are your top three tips that you'd want to give to that person? Three things quickly, I can tell you, that matter the most. Number one, you've got to be armed and dangerous with not weapons, as in a traditional measure, but weapons of knowledge. You've got to get the education to know what you're doing.

That's number one. Number two, you've got to build your network and network with everyone you know from the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker. You've got to talk to everyone about what you do because everyone walking this planet is somehow associated with real estate. There's probably not one person, Matt, that you could name in everybody that you've met your entire life that has not lived in a piece of real estate. It might be a mansion. It might be a cardboard box, but it's a piece of real estate. So network, network, network. And finally, number three, you've got to take consistent action. For those people that don't take action and they get paralysis by analysis

or they get intimidated by real estate in general or financing, those are the people that are going to have delayed results. You've got to take action on a consistent basis. And typically, when that's done, those fruits of labor turn into something spectacular. Good, good. You know, John, I know, as I mentioned, you're also an instructor when you're an active investor and also a teacher and you're a coach. What do you like best about teaching and coaching? I guess the best thing for me, I'm writing my third book right now, and I speak. I do a lot of public speaking. I just got off a bunch of trips where I've spoken all over the country.

and I think that the best thing for me is when I teach, I become a better investor, and when I invest, I become a better teacher. And I love it. I love the interaction with people. I love delivering knowledge. But the best thing is when I can actually someone take that knowledge, take action on it, and get results. That's the best thing for me. So, you know, if I had to sum it up in one thing that I like the most, that would be it. Awesome.

Well, this is a very good interview, and thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule. Is there anything that I didn't ask that you feel I should have or any parting words? Other than what I see for the future for this world we call real estate investing, and I can't think of anything. I guess let me answer that question. I just ask myself and your listeners. I see some wonderful opportunity. I do see some challenge ahead, though.

And if you're not ready for that challenge with opportunity and with knowledge, with action, you're going to get caught up in the negativity. We have a lot of stuff to do. We've got a lot of issues to solve. And I think one of those issues is providing people with good quality rental housing. That's the biggest housing challenge we have on our horizon, amongst others. you know, our national debt and other things and inflation. But if you don't look at those challenges as opportunities and you don't look at things like

devastation and crashing and burning as a way to start over, I think you're missing the boat. And so I'm just pumped up about what we've got coming up on the Verizon. And I think everyone that you're associated with and is listening to this interview right now, you've got to be engaged and you've got to look at it as a way that you can forward your personal life, your business life, and all your opportunities. And that's just the message that I would leave for everyone. Great message. Well, thanks a ton, John, your wealth of information and thanks for being so generous with your information. If something comes up in the future, would you be open to coming back?

Absolutely. Just let me know when. Awesome. Thanks a lot, John. You have an awesome day, and we'll talk soon. Okay, sounds great. Thank you. You bet. Take care. Hey, Matt, Mike Freeman here from Texas.

I just wanted to let you know that I really appreciate your real estate investing course. I'm not having to spend a small fortune to learn about it. I've been thinking about this and studying it and researching it for a couple of years anyway when I ran across your course. And there was a lot of information in there that just helped me get the idea to just go ahead and do it. And just recently, we've acquired our first two properties. One for income and buy and hold. and one for a flip. So thanks again, and I appreciate it. We'll keep watching. Thanks.

Thank you for spending this time with Matt Terrio and the epic real estate investing podcast. When you have a moment, stop by iTunes to leave your comments and let us know what you think of the show. And if you haven't done so already, get started investing today by visiting free real estate investing course.com. To access Matt's free course, how to do deals, no money required. Until next time. To your success. To your success. This podcast is a part of the C-suite Radio Network.

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