Ep 218: Helping America's Affordability Crisis Through Mobile Home Parks with Kevin Bupp

Properties that we own in our current portfolio, historical deals that we've done. We go as far as actually putting links to appraisals and environmental studies and a bunch of other things up there. We go into detail on our business plan as well on properties that we've already turned around, exactly how we've extracted value out of them. And so more than just the offering that we currently have, there's other great resources that you can find on the website.

Welcome to the Next Level Income show where it's our goal to take your income, your investments and your life to the next level. I'm your host, Chris Larson. If you haven't yet, get a copy of our book for free at our website, nextlevelincome.com. that's www.nextlevelincome.com. just click on the book link and I'll even send you a copy if you put your address in. On today's show, we have my friend Kevin Buff. Kevin is a Florida based real estate investor, Top Apple podcast host. I've been listening to his podcast for a decade now. He's also the bestselling author of the Cash Flow investor with over 300 million in real estate transactions under his belt. Based on his decades of experience, Kevin has identified mobile home parks and parking lots as the top real estate investments in today's market. On his podcast, Real Estate Investing for Cash Flow, he shares over 20 years of experience guiding millions of listeners on how to find and invest profitably in commercial real estate. Under the umbrella of his private equity firm, Sunrise Capital Partners, Kevin makes investments in commercial real estate assets available to passive investors in order to help them build legacy wealth and achieve financial freedom. Beyond real estate investing, Kevin gives back to the community with the 72 hours to Key West 280 mile bike ride, a charity event that has provided meals to tens of thousands of families in need during the holidays. Kevin, welcome back to the show, my.

Friend Chris, thanks for having me, man. Excited to be back. It's good to see your face again.

Absolutely. It's good to see yours. You're a little more tan, you know, at the end of the summer here, you know, down, down in beautiful Florida. What listeners may not know is you look like that year round because you're in, you're in Florida, my man.

I don't know about year round. We definitely get a, a lot of sunny days, but it does get cold here. We, we get, we give it a good six weeks of where we got to put on, you know, our puffer jackets, you know, still try to wear flip flops with the puffer jacket, you know.

But sure, sure, I've been down there. I see the. I see those guys out there. You guys are wearing your North Face jackets. It's like 63 degrees outside, and it's like, you know.

Yeah, it's a wet. It's a wet cold. That's what they say.

Indeed it is. Indeed it is. But, Kevin, I'm being totally honest here. You're one of my favorite guests I've ever had on. You were with us over three years ago. I think it was episode 47, if I remember correctly. But one of the reasons I love having you on and having you back on is because your real estate Investing for Cash Flow podcast, which I can see right there on your wall, was. Was one of the first real estate podcasts that I started listening to like a decade ago. When did you start that podcast?

Yeah, you're aging me, man. Yeah. 2014. So 10. Literally, January of 2014. So 10 years. I hit the decade mark.

So I love it, man. You and Rogan out there is. Well, Rogan started in, like, 2008 or something crazy, you know.

Well, that's the reason why I started it. I mean, back then, I was. I started listening to podcasts back in, like, 2,000 and probably six, and there was a handful. Real estate guys, radio show that was around. Jason Hartman was. He's kind of an OG. He's been doing this thing for, like, 15, 16 years. And there's a few other random ones, but there wasn't a lot of good content. There was good content, just not enough of it. And so that's why I started it. Now there's. As you and I both know, there's a thousand new ones every day, probably that you release, but. Oh, and lots of great information.

Yeah, it's incredible. And, yeah, we're. I was just. Somebody asked me the other day how long we've been. I said five years. I was like, oh, we're going on. It's almost. It'll be six years this fall. So we're. Yeah, we're excited to continue to produce good content. Thank you. That's huge.

It's a commitment.

It is a commitment. It is a commitment. And, yeah, it's. It's fun, you know, especially when, you know, you can bring guests on like yourself that can provide not only value, but also inspiration. And, you know, one of the things I love about your story, which I'd like for you to share with the audience, Kevin, is, you know, you. You've got an Amazing business today, but you've kind of had the, the Real life heroes journey. If you don't mind, kind of taking us back a little bit before you started your podcast to, you know, kind of how you got your start in real estate and how you ended up in the mobile home park space is where you've, where you specialize in today.

Yeah, yeah, sure thing. And, you know, so I always joke and say that real estate found me, I didn't find it. And so very, very grateful and blessed that at the age of 19, I met a guy by the name of David who ultimately became my, my mentor. Met him through a girlfriend I was dating time he was dating her mother. So very random occurrence there. But ultimately he was a local real estate investor in Pennsylvania, where I grew up. And at that point I was literally going to school, not sure exactly what I wanted to do, but just going because that's what I was supposed to be doing and attending bar in the evenings and the weekends to make money. And so I was having fun, but I didn't, I didn't necessarily have a, a true vision of, of what, what adulthood was going to look like for me, what I could really pour my energy into. And so David came into my life at a, at a very opportune time. And so he was a local guy that owned single family and small multifamily rentals. And so fast forward a year and a half, I ended up working for him for free for, for about a year and a half. In between school, in between classes, and attending bar in the evenings and weekends, I was there helping him and anything he needed help with. And so that's kind of how I learned the initial ropes. I literally would. If you needed coffee, I'll go to coffee. If you needed Home Depot supplies dropped off. If you need me to, you know, drop off a lease or pick up a lease, I mean, whatever it was, I was around it and I was listening to him converse, you know, communicate with, you know, whether it be brokers or agents or homeowners that are trying to sell their home or, you know, anyone that was involved in the day to day. He was kind of a solo entrepreneur. So fast forward, I bought my first investment property, a single family home, when I was 20. With my bartending money I'd saved up in a private lender loan that I had established through David and his resources and network. And that was the start of it. You know, I, I'm one that doesn't like necessarily reinventing the wheel. If I see what I feel is A good business model. I just try to replicate it, maybe put my own spin on it, and you'll refine it as time goes on. But generally speaking, I just, I saw his business model, it seemed to work for him. He was incredibly successful, lived a very different lifestyle than what I had lived growing up. And so I was like, well, heck, why am I going to try to do it differently? I just, I'll do what David did. And so that's what I really did. To start me, I focused on single family investments for many, many years and ended up really hitting a stride. My early, early to mid-20s and ended up accumulating about 100, not about 120. 125 single family homes and a few hundred apartment doors by, you know, I guess you could say leading up to 08. So I bought that first investment property in 2000, in 2001 and then, you know, leading up to 2008, predominantly focused on the single family, really building a portfolio of rental properties and then also some, some smaller apartment buildings as well. So that was the start of it all really.

Remind me again, Kevin, was that, was that you're from Pennsylvania originally, if I recall.

I moved down to Florida in 2002. So yeah, I, I, I enjoy the snow. I don't enjoy, you know, six months of gray skies and very little sunshine. So I struggle with that growing up quite a bit. I never got used to that. And so I knew that I need to go somewhere at least where the sun shined, you know, you know, 300 days plus a year. And so I love the mountains and I love the ocean. It was either Colorado or Florida. Ended up moving to Florida. One person here came down to Tampa Bay, fell in love with it, and here we are today. So yeah, so I, I really, I hit my stride down here. I, I, I bought a number of properties up in Pennsylvania. It just wasn't as dynamic a mark of a smaller town, not a lot of growth happening and just appreciation wasn't really a thing. You pretty much had to create the value by buying a really junky property. Appreciation didn't really happen organically. Year after year, Florida was growing like crazy. Tampa Bay, you know, specifically. And so I really hit my stride. Like that's when I really, what I didn't know is that Tampa Bay is literally home to some of like the original real estate investment gurus, like, you know, the late night infomercials. A lot of stuff got videoed like here in Tampa Bay. A lot of those guys literally resided here in the Tampa Bay Area. And so moved down here, there was no less than three different real estate investment clubs on a, you know, weekly basis that I could attend, that could attend to, you know, within an hour radius of where I live. And so I was really plugged in. Meeting other folks that were doing what I thought was, you know, back home was like, that was unfathomable. Like there was many people doing multiple deals on a monthly basis, guys that had hundreds of units in a portfolio. And so I just really plugged. In fact, you and I both know Rod Cleaps is a great friend of mine. Oh yeah, I literally. He was one of the guys I met when I first moved here, him and his brother and did some deals together, got to know them. And at that point he owned, you know, six or seven hundred single family homes. And so really got to plug in with some guys that were doing some huge things early on in my real estate career and just again, tried to just, you know, not reinvent the wheel and just replicate their model. That work. So that's what I did, Chris. You know, up until I was, up until 2008, basically it was really residential, single family and some multifamily focused. And I really didn't start, I started dabbling a little bit in commercial stuff leading into 08. Like we bought a self storage 5 acre lot to develop self storage, bought some other random commercial assets in retail and some office, but really didn't venture into the commercial side of things until it was time to, you know, I guess go through the phase two or the rebuild phase of my journey, which is ultimately what, you know, kind of brings us to where we're at today. You know, I had a couple years of, of challenge and heartache. Oh, way to 11. More damage control. Yeah. Than anything else. Just trying to figure out how to manage what I had and then how to, you know, get myself in position that I could start rebuilding when the timing was right. So.

Well, that's.

And that's what, that's what, that's what took me to mobile home parks. So that, that's when I got introduced to the world of mo home parks.

Well, let's pause there because I think it's a great spot to pause because you, you hit some really important points that I want to, I want to highlight for the audience. And I got to spend some time with your partner, Brian. Last weekend we were talking about that event in Nashville. And one of the privileges that Brian and I both got was to work with the investors in training groups. This was younger group of Investors and you know, mostly high school kids. My 12 year old son was, was part of it too, which was kind of neat to kind of see him learn from these kids. And we were highlighting some different lessons that the, the younger investors could take. And you know, some, some of the things that you mentioned, Kevin, one of the things that we talked about was, you know, finding somebody that has achieved the success or the business that you want. And you said like, don't, don't reinvent the wheel. But the thing that really got my attention that you said was you went and worked for David for free. So and that's a great lesson. So if you're listening, you're struggling to find out, to figure out, like, hey, how do I start? How do I learn from a guy that, you know, knows all this? Find a way to provide value, get him coffee, set up appointments, you know, help him out with the contracts. Young gentleman, Caleb, that helped me start out and grow my business. He was 15 years younger, a teammate that I raced with and he was a marketing guru. So he came and I said, I'll tell you what, I'll teach you everything I know if you teach me and help me grow my marketing. So I think that's a fantastic lesson that you, you mentioned. Kevin, the other thing you mentioned is, you know, I hear this from a lot of young investors. They're like, well, how do I find money? How do I find money? And you said you, you found a private lender through a connection that David had to get that loan done. I had my mom co sign on my first loan. Ultimately, you know, bought her out. She was kind of my private lender in a way. So look for, sometimes you have to be creative when you're getting started, you know, so if you're, if you're saying, hey, I'm going to go buy something off the MLS through a broker and get a traditional loan, you may have to do things a little bit differently. And a great way to do that is going to those local meetups or local, we call them Koreas right back in the day, now they call them meetups, it seems, which are a great resource. And the last thing you mentioned, which whether intentional or not, I think is a fantastic lesson, find a growth market. If you can find a market where, you know the tide is rising, it's going to raise all ships, it's going to make your life a little bit easier, you know, so if you can choose a market that, you know, maybe is, is slow, it's stagnant, it's going downhill, or if you're young and you have the ability, the geographic flexibility to move yourself or your family to a market in Florida or Arizona or the Southeast that's growing, that has a real need for what you're providing, that can, that can make life easier. Anything you want to add to those lessons?

No, no, it's just, it's interesting. You. I mean, you hit. You hit some great points there as it relates to, you know, me work for David, but I don't know if you. You had the opportunity to spend time with Brian. Obviously, he's a brilliant individual. Yeah, I'm sure you probably agree, right? Really sharp guy. But that's how Brian and I met that. That, you know, and I. I don't think we probably talked about it before, but we. We literally met through my podcast. I used to do free calls every. Give back and meet other people that. That were either in real estate, wanted to get in real estate, just have fun conversations. Right. And a lot of times you never know where those conversations might lead. But Brian was very successful in his own right. Very academically privileged individual, like just brilliant person and. And very successful in his original career path, but he wanted to get into real estate and. And basically came to work for me for free. Gosh, for probably for about a year, maybe even a year and a half. And. And then ultimately worked into becoming a minority partner. And then now, as you know, we're pretty much equal within your organization after, you know, whatever. Seven, seven or eight years together. So. Yeah, no, it's. It's just. It's a beautiful thing. And he's brought a ton of value to the business. He's. He's everything I'm not. So it's like a good complimentary, you know, partnership. And. Yeah, that's. And that's. That's what I've always looked for, and that's what's always allowed me to thrive in the different businesses I've been involved in. So it's. And that's not for everybody. Some people like to be kind of the, you know, the solo guy and just, you know, not necessarily have partners, but I've always found it to be incredibly beneficial. But I thought I'd share that. That's. That's how Brian. I love that I really started what is Sunrise Capital today? So.

Yeah, no, I love that. I really appreciate you sharing that because I think, you know, one of, you know, you know, it's fun to make money, but it's even more fun to. To make money, to be successful, to help other people. When you're doing it with your friends and other good people to do that, I think. I think that's fantastic. And my wife and I work with a business coach several years ago, when we were building spec homes, and we took all these personality tests, and we. I'll never forget, we get online with this gentleman. His name's Will. Unfortunately, he passed away from cancer several years ago, but just a phenomenally kind of wise individual. And he said. He said, this is really interesting. He goes, I find that couples that are successful have one of two things in common. They either are very similar, so they work very well together because they're very similar, or they're complimentary to each other. And I think that's a great lesson. What you say is, you know, my wife is everything that I'm not. In a lot of ways, we communicate differently, but if you can find somebody who. Yeah, there you go, man.

It's good. Yeah. No, it's great, though. Yeah, but we're very different.

But. Yeah, that way you. You know, you're bringing value to the partnership, and, you know, it takes what I found. It's. It's actually harder. I found Kevin to find somebody that's different from you and partner with them because, you know, you. You tend to communicate slightly differently. You tend to come at it from a different direction. But, you know, again, if you're. If you're looking for a partner and you have that ability and, you know, to step back and say, okay, can I find somebody that is. That is my complement, that can really do those things, it can provide tremendous value and I think be a more robust partnership over time.

Yeah, I have to give Brian credit for that, because he'd have to listening to me for. For a number of years, understanding who I was. I spoke about my family, myself personally, and so he knew me really well. I didn't know him really well. And so I. Yeah, he. He's the one that pressed me for. For many, many months, and I tried to push him away. Who is this guy? What's. What's he want? You know, and we got to know each other and just. It was a match made in heaven. So. But, yeah, that's awesome. To your point. Differently. You know, and when your hair, like.

I mean, you guys, like, you have the great hair. He's got no hair. I mean, you got. So you got that going, right? So he might have the foresight to work with you, but I'm gonna. I'm gonna have to say that, you know. Yeah, you got. I'm kind of Right in the middle of you guys. So I can, I mean, I can make fun of both of you guys because, you know, I'm kind of got a little hair. Not, not as much as you, not as little as Brian. So he might not think that joke's as funny as you do. I don't know.

No, he does. He jokes about a lot of times. So we're good. You're safe.

I made that joke. I made that joke last on Sunday when I saw him. So you come up, you come up to the great financial crisis. And look, I think, you know, whether you, you know, whether, however, you made it through, I can, I mean, I, I can tell you. We, we started buying properties in 1999. No matter what. If you're in real estate, it just wasn't a fun time. It was tumultuous. It's like being on a rough sea, you know, it's like you're getting a little seasick as you go through that. What did you learn going through that, Kevin? And when you came out, you know, when did you kind of go full force into the mobile home side of things?

You know, it's interesting. I actually had this conversation and I approached it from a different angle yesterday when I was on the show. And, you know, I think one of the. We've had a great year and a half. Last year was actually literally one of the best years from an acquisition for being able to be opportunistic and actually be able to buy when others weren't buying. And I was not in that position 2009, 2010 to 2011, it just wasn't. I wasn't in the financial state. And, you know, there's a. There was. While there was a lot of inefficiencies with the business model I ran back then, which was a single family stuff. We were spread amongst like, you know, five different counties. You know, the technology now, as far as on the PM side of things, on property management side, didn't really exist back then. So you literally had leasing agents driving from one house to the next to the next, technicians or maintenance guys doing the same thing. And it just, it was incredibly inefficient for, for a lot of reasons. But on top of that, I think the, the, the bigger, the bigger mistake or challenge that I didn't, I didn't acknowledge. I think leading up to 08 was, you know, there was this. I don't know if you recall, just like, just like that happened in 2020, 2021, 2022, when race went really low, there was this frenzy, like everybody's buying. If I don't buy something, even if, I mean I can make the numbers work, you know, number. Even if the numbers don't work today, they're going to work tomorrow because the values are going up, rates are going to stay low forever. Right. So there's this, the sense of urgency to buy. And a lot of times the fundamentals fly out the window and like the discipline goes out the window. And I would say that I was very disciplined back then to a certain degree. I was a cash flow investor. However, I think some of those fundamentals started going out the window. And like we bought single family, so it's a little different. We had a, we had a certain formula of how we had to buy it, you know, 65% of the after repair value. We had a basic formula, sometimes 70% depending on the neighborhood. And. But it also had the cash flow. And I think what I. A lot of things happened in Florida back then. You know, we had a lot of hurricanes. Insurance costs went through the roof. That was a major challenge. I mean, that was huge. I mean, little insurance costs, like just like they are today. They like, you know, tripled or quadrupled in a matter of a couple years. That crushed a lot of cash. So I didn't care if you're buying things for 65, 70 cents a dollar. It just, it did cash anymore. And I think that's the fundamental that started. I started losing sight of. And we were buying deals just assuming that we've got the buffer there. And even if they continually just go up on an incremental basis every year, like we're really safe, even if we're not making a lot of money on a monthly basis, you know, not really factoring in what happens when a major hiccup occurs, you know, when a market actually crashes. Right. So that value went away within a matter of 12 months. It just completely was gone. And so, you know, fast forward to today. You know, it's interesting because one of the dynamics that Brian I've had so over the last four years, Brian is on the IR side of this. He does a lot of the capital raising side and on the deal side. So I'm looking at all the deals. I'm sourcing everything, you know, giving the yay or nay and, and kind of running the operations side of the house. And there's been a lot, there was a lot of push, pull in 20, 20, 20, 21, 2022 even, you know, before rate started going up, just there was a lot of money flowing around, we had a lot of investors that wanted us to deploy capital. And Brian, I always had this, you know, it was a really, it was a, it was a healthy, contentious, you know, debate internally in the organization. But it was a, hey, Kevin, I'm turning away investors. They're not happy that I can't take their money. And I'm like, I'm sorry, I can't make deals. Pencil out. I don't know what to tell you. I'm looking at a lot of deals or make a lot of offers, and we're just not, we're not there. Right. And so it was a lot of stress and I feel like I was missing out sometimes. And. But I tell you, a year and a half ago and rates started going up and things started, you know, really becoming challenging and everyone's frantic and, you know, debt maturity is starting to come due over the last 12 months. We have none of that, you know, we have none of that. We're in a really, really safe position with our current portfolio. And it put us in a really good, a really good place to actually take advantage of the market last year. And we bought some incredible opportunities at great discounts. Not distressed properties, but distressed situation. So I'm sorry, Chris, I forget what your original question was, and I went off on a, on a, on a rant there as it relates. You asked me something about, you know, back then, but I, I don't recall no question.

Well, I'll, I'll tell you what, I'll. Yeah, I'll help you out. So we were talking about kind of like what, what was learned from, you know, going through the great financial crisis to, you know, kind of the pandemic.

And the fundamentals never change. The fundamentals, like that's it. Like that's it. The fundamentals, they never change. Like, you know, rates have gone up. A lot of, lot of, you know, we still make a ton of offers. A lot of sellers still have expect pricing expectations of what they were, you know, two, three years ago. @ the end of the day, the fundamentals do not change. I don't care what you could have got for your property, you know, three years ago. I can't make economics work and I don't have the crystal ball. It's going to tell me that rates are going to go back down by 300 basis points over the next two years, that I can model that. So I got a model on what's, what's apparent and present today and, you know, and what's realistic. And so again, the fundamentals don't change if the deal doesn't make sense without you stretching or, you know, financial engineering to make it do so then you move on. You move on and do the next one.

So, absolutely.

That's it. I think disciplined. That's it. I mean, like, that's. And it's tough. I mean, I'm really happy now, but I can tell you that that was a big challenge the last couple of years with, with Brian. I mean, not in a bad way. It was, it was a healthy, a healthy internal struggle that we had. But he's know, he knows that I went through this period. I'm like, I'm not, I don't want to do this the third time. I want to say I want to, I want to, I want to, you know, keep what we have, protect our investors capital, protect our families along the way and ensure that we've got something that's stable footing and something that will serve all of us well through these coming years, no matter how challenging they are.

So absolutely. And, you know, that, that kind of brings us to, you know, the, the, the question I really want to, you know, finish our discussion with today, which is, you know, mobile home parks during this period where we've seen so much, you know, tumultuous. You know, it's been so tumultuous here the past few years. You know, we had 2019, we had the pandemic in 2020, you know, we had the whipsaw coming out. And that was when you and I, you know, when you were last on the podcast, kind of early 2021, where this kind of, you know, frenzy started, you know, going into 2022, when rates started their unprecedented rise. Right. 5% in what, six months? Just, just crazy. Which is really crushed a lot of investors out there and a lot of operators out there that didn't have, you know, that discipline or didn't see it coming. Whereas, you know, our, you know, our mobile home parks in our portfolio have been, you know, the stalwarts in the portfolio, very stable, very steady. You know, one of the things that I think people know but don't really maybe know the extent of it is we have an affordability crisis in this country. Kevin so why do you feel like mobile homes, mobile home parks are going to continue to be a great opportunity for investors going forward? Are you a high income business owner or professional earning 2, 300,000 or even more a year, but still feel like you're living paycheck to paycheck? Are you comfortable working till you're 65 or 70 to retire working. Do you want to achieve financial independence and live life on your own terms? You could join myself and Matt4 and learn how we both became financially dependent in our early 30s. We will teach you how to make, keep and grow your money, teaching you strategies to maximize your earnings, keep your income that you've earned through tax strategy and legal structures, and ultimately teach you how to grow it by determining your personal investing strategy as well as teach you how to analyze investments so you can grow your passive income to the point to live life on your own terms. Our coaching clients reliably do this in seven years or less. To learn more, check out our coaching program at nextlevelincome.com forward/coaching. That's nextlevelincome.com forward slash coaching.

Yeah, I mean speak to the affordable housing crisis. I mean you could pick any mobile home park that you currently have in your portfolio, anyone that we have in our portfolio. And I guarantee no matter what market it's in and whatever state across the country, it is the most affordable housing option in that respect, the marketplace. But it's actually a better quality housing option than a lot of the apartment complexes that exist, which is the alternative for a lot of our tenant base. And so, you know, it really, mobile home parks really fit in this void, this massive, massive void that we have of affordable housing. And it's the mobile homes of today are not what folks you perceive them to be. Right. They're not the in while you still get parks that have these old metal trailers in them that were built, you know, 50 years ago, but even then that doesn't mean that they're not nice. Yeah, I've been in many of homes, I'm sure you have as well, that are 40 years old that are remodeled with, you know, really nice high end, you know, luxury vinyl plank flooring, nice, nice counters, nice bathrooms, you know, nice light fixtures, LED lighting. All the, all the new, just like a house you can renovate.

And I've been on before they were renovated and yeah, they're not.

Yeah, right, right. But, but no different than, no different than that of a single family home. I mean you can, you can make it nice, it's nice or as ugly as you'd like. Right, exactly.

But really it comes. Apartments, the same thing.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. But the new product that's out there, these, these mobile homes that are rolling off the assembly line and what they, and what we, you know, number one, what mobile, as a mobile home park owner, what we can buy them for and then what we can Turn around and sell them for, for the end user consumer, the, you know, the value for that end consumer, it's greater than that of any, again, any apartment. I don't care. Even if it's a C class apartment, there's not really typically anywhere cheaper that they can live in that local marketplace that they're in. And again, this offers a much better quality living experience than that of any comparable apartment complexes. And it allows folks to, you know, they want to have that American dream as well. Folks that truly want to actually own their own home, they want to have their own little, maybe they don't own the yard, but basically they have their own space. They've got their own parking, you know, two parking pads, they can put Christmas lights up. They have no neighbors above them, below them, or either side that's banging on the wall or vacuuming in the middle of the night. So it's just a, it's a, a great option to again fix this affordable housing crisis. It's unfortunate that, that there's, you know, it's good and bad. Right? Like one of the big benefits of mobile home parks is that there's a massive bare D because there's not new supply being built. So that's great. Folks like you and I that own the community lease.

Yeah, repeat that, Kevin. This is one, this is maybe the only area in real estate where there's decreasing supply.

There's a diminishing supply. That's right, yeah. I mean, you got really two different factors. Number one, you got the NIMBY syndrome. You know, not my backyard. You know, everyone that, you know, everyone that lives in a stick built home feels as though if a mobile home park gets built next door, it's going to lower their home valuation. Right. And so like that. And again, they've got that old perception of what a mobile home park looks like because maybe there's one in town on the other, other side of town that's, you know, drug sex and rock and roll and it's the wrong element. Like those exist, but that also exists in apartment complexes. There's really bad apartment complexes and there's really bad single family home neighborhoods as well that you don't want to go into even during the daytime. But yeah, it's the NIMBY syndrome, not my backyard. So that's one. And then the second one, you know, every municipality, you know, they complain about the affordable housing crisis. They need more affordable housing and their, their local marketplace. However, from a tax basis, it's not in their, their best interest to allow a mobile Home park to be built. While it might actually solve some of their affordable housing challenges that they have locally, it's not going to give them the tax revenues that a, you know, you name it, a mixed use property, a multifamily property, retail property, whatever else could be built there would bring in, would bring in for them. So it's not in their best financial interest to allow mobile home parks to be built. So for that reason, again, it's, it's the only asset class that I'm aware of that actually has a diminishing supply, meaning that more are, you know, torn down, redeveloped, shut down on an annual basis than new supply that, that, that comes online. So it's, it's unique and, and some, and while I was getting to is, it's unfortunate because it really is, I'm sure you've been in some really, I mean there's some really nice communities out there, you know, communities that have a lot of brand new homes in them and again, you know, the amenities are similar to that of what you'd find in a really nice brand new high end apartment complex, like a class luxury apartment complex and at a much, much more affordable price.

So absolutely no, I, all those points are, are, I mean, can be repeated multiple times and you know, that is some of those things actually make this an even more resilient investment for a reason. Like, like you just said, if a city says hey, we, we could, we could use this property for something other than a mobile home park, well an investor could potentially turn that mobile home park into something else in the future if, if there was a higher and better use. But what was surprising to me, Kevin, I have one of my long, longest investors. He invested in our first or our second deal in 2016 or 2017 and first time we were talking about mobile home parks. He lives here locally. So we get together every, every, every now and then. He goes Chris, my wife and I actually lived, we owned a mobile home. And I was like really? He goes yeah, we, we're in this luxury lake community and they were actually mobile homes. And I think a lot of people don't really understand the variety that are out there. I mean Kevin, some of your properties that I've seen are just, just absolutely fantastic. You know, these three and four star properties that are out there. But you know what I learned actually with our church group going to, it's called Appalachian Service Project. When I was younger, growing up, we go to these mobile home communities and help fix them up. There's a real pride of ownership that I Didn't ever really see in the class C apartments that we owned. So there's definitely a different pride of ownership that's there. But I think it's, you know, as we try to solve this affordability crisis in this country, kind of like the energy situation, I think we need an all the above approach. So I think, you know, from an investor perspective, if you're interested in mobile home parks, the cash flow is great, the upside's great, you know, has some really great long term benefits, recession resistant, but it is something that, that we can do to really help, help the affordability crisis go forward. It can be a real win win for a lot of people.

Yeah, I agree. Yep, absolutely.

Kevin, a couple things before we gotta wrap up here. I want to talk about. You gotta, you got a book that, that listeners can get. We're gonna put that link in the show notes. You mind sharing a little bit about the cash flow investor and what, and how people can get that?

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So you can actually, if they're watching video, they can see it right behind me. Roughly, roughly two years ago. And really it's a, it's a compilation of two things. Number one, my story, kind of my experiences throughout the last 20 plus years of being a full time investor, the different, I guess, stages that I went through as far as growth and different asset classes I've invested in. I've got a number of case studies in there of deals, not just deals I made money on, but also deals that had challenges and kind of share a little bit more of those challenges. But then the other half of the book is it's really a compilation of, you know, I've had thousand plus interviews over the last 10 years of doing my show and there's been some absolutely brilliant folks on my show and I try to always take away a gold nugget or two from, from some of these conversations, actually integrate those into my very own business and into my life. And so a lot of the lot of the stories or the, you know, the, the tidbits that I share in that book are, you know, that are pulled away from others, you know, hundreds or thousands of years experience, I guess you could say collectively from those that I've interviewed on my podcast over the years. So. But it's a, it's commercial real estate focused, but really the book is, it's very fitting for someone, even if they're a single family home investor or a passive investor, just to better understand the various asset classes that exist out there. How to make money in commercial real estate. How to drive values and revenues and, and some other, you know, you know, important tidbits as well. So I love that. Anyway, you can get a free copy. Like I said, Chris, we've got a, we've got it set up as a free copy as well. You get a free physical version of the book. You can go to kevinbup.com forward/freebook and grab yourself a free copy. All you gotta do is pay. I think it's 6.95 free, you know, shipping and handling to get that free cop copy.

It's, it's worth it. I've read it. Lots of gold nuggets in there. That's one of my favorite parts of your show is when you share those gold nuggets. Check out your podcast Real Estate Investing for Cash Flow with Kevin. Bup. We'll have that link in the show. And Kevin, you have your fund open currently share it with investors how they can learn more about that if they want to learn how to invest and participate with Sunrise Capital Investors.

Sure. Yeah. So the company, Sunrise Capital Investors, you can literally go to our website, investwithsunrise.com we do have our current fund offering available and open. It's SEI Growth and Income Fund 4. All the information there, you can download the, you know, the PPM and the operating agreement and all the other relevant docs. But more than that, on our website, we've also got a lot of other, you know, not just helpful resources, but we share a lot of intimate details on properties that we own in our current portfolio, historical deals that we've done. We go as far as actually putting links to appraisals and environmental studies and a bunch of other things up there. We go into detail in our business plan as well on properties that we've already turned around, exactly how we've extracted value out of them. And so more than just the offering that we currently have, there's other great resources that you can find on the website as well. So again, it's investwithsunrise.com I love that.

And we'll have that in the show notes too. And last but not least, Kevin, you got a great charity ride coming up we were talking about before the show. I'm going to come down. It's the 72 hours Key west from, from Tampa to Key West. And I didn't share this with you before the show, but we've got a check here. So Next Level Income is going to be a sponsor this year of the ride. So we're excited to join you for that. And if you want to share a little bit about that, about how people can learn about it if they want to help out too?

Yeah, no, it's awesome. I'm excited to have you, Chris. Finally we get to ride together. I know we've talked about it for a number.

I know years.

Definitely looking forward to. Can be a little hot in November down here, so you're gonna have to maybe, maybe, maybe train in your garage with the heater on or something like that to get used to the 85 degrees you might have down here.

But I think I'll be okay.

Yeah. This will be our 14th year hosting the ride. It benefits now. Now it benefits two different charities. The Tiny Hands foundation, which is run by a near dear friend of mine, Rod Khleif. And then starting right now, both local charities here in the town Bay Area. But it's a, it's a three day charity event again, 14th year that we've been doing it. We ride, we start in Fort Myers Beach, Florida, which is down here in the west coast. And then we end up in sunny Key west at the southernmost point. And so it's 285 miles in total over three days. And it's a great group of people and, you know, doing it all for a great cause. Two great causes. That is so I'm looking forward to having you.

I'm looking forward to being there. I will train, I will put my, my puffy jacket on, train leading up to it and get a little sweat on going there. But Kevin Buff, thank you so much for joining us here, sharing your story, your inspiration and your gold nuggets here with our audience today.

Thanks for having me, Chris. Much appreciated, my friend.

Thank you. Hey Chris, here again. I hope you found this episode valuable. Now I have one more thing to gift you. We have a page for my coaching clients where you can get a free copy of my book as well as much more from previous guests on the show. Just check out nextlevelincome.com coaching to get a free copy of my book, audiobook and much more. I'll send you a copy of my book and cover all the shipping costs as a thank you for listening to the podcast. Also, please like share and take just 90 seconds to give us a rating on Apple Podcasts.