Ep 274 - Meet the FCI Acquisitions Team

Hey, everybody. Flip and Danny here, founders of the Freedom Real Estate Group family. I have companies with even more guest stars today. We've got Della and Eric here with us today. So welcome to another episode, and this.

Episode is called Meet the FCI Acquisitions Team.

That's what I thought it was called.

It's going on the fly.

And by the way, just in case you don't know, the name of this.

Podcast is called Freedom Through Passive Income.

There we go. I forgot this. I'm all out of whack here. So anyway, I'll let you take it over.

Okay.

Yeah.

So we're actually here in Ohio, and we're getting ready to do an event here, and, Eric, you're hosting it. So thank you very much for hosting this event. We're super excited. And last night I thought, oh, my gosh, we should, like, introduce the acquisitions team to everybody else, because it's so neat when everybody says, I feel like I know you already, and I want them to get to know you guys. So that's why you're here. Thank you for being here, Eric. I'll let you start. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Maybe your goals, passions, anything that relates to multifamily passive income. You know, what's your drive?

Yeah, of course. Thank you. I'm Eric. I've been with the company since late last year. I've been doing real estate for the past four or five years now. I got started on the single family side, moved into small multifamily, and then just recently got my Realtor's license. And then when I found you last year, learned more about you and Freedom Capital Investments and the whole group of companies just really drawn towards it. The people that are here, the quality of people, and just our whole mission and just like our core values, putting people first, integrity, just things that mean a lot to me. Coming from an Air Force background as a veteran and so commercial, multifamily on the commercial side of the house really also speaks to me, just being able to add a lot of value, not only to the properties that we go after, but to the tenants, to our clients that we serve as well. And so that's really what has drawn me down this path, and I'm excited to be here.

Awesome.

And you have a 16 unit under constant contract. Right. And it's getting ready to close. You want to talk us through it a little bit?

Yeah, of course. So we have a 16 unit here not far from the office. It's in West Carrollton, and that particular property was a pocket listing of A broker that I have grown a relationship with. And it's. They're good size two bedroom units. The current owner has owned them since 1987, I believe, so quite a while. Definitely does things the old school way, which isn't necessarily bad at any anyway. But he, he, he's a great, great owner. He, like wrote us a letter, like, right after we got our contract, like, explaining some nuances of the property, explaining certain things. And so we'll be closing on that September 19th, just so the appraisal come back on that. So that's fantastic. And we're very excited for it.

Awesome.

Okay.

And all owners are like that when.

Yeah, exactly.

All right, last question before we go to Della. Freedom through passive income. What does it mean to you? Where are you at in life with regard to it?

Right, so I have been very interested in passive income for the past 10 years ago. Like, past 10 years, my life. Like, by age 18, I had like a website I was working on to start trying to build passive income. And I've had websites over the years. But when I started getting more into real estate and just realizing the power that it can unleash of passive income in your life, like, I have no intention to be working behind a computer in a cube for the next 30, 40 years of my life. I want to be able to do something I love, which is real estate, which can be a win, win, win for all parties involved. And by doing so, build passive income to unlock more time, to accomplish more things that are meaningful to me in my life. So I'm very excited for that.

That's awesome.

Love that.

Great answer and thank you for your service, by the way.

My true dream was to work in a cubicle Till I was 70, but Danny pulled me off.

You can't live off what you can live off before.

Exactly.

I love it.

And so we talk about you guys on podcasts all the time. So we'll say, ooh, Eric has a contract. Contract, you know, a 16 unit. We're super excited. Della got the first 48 unit and we like. So again, so glad that you guys are here and people get to know you. So, Della, tell us about yourself, your journey in real estate, why you love multifamily passive income, anything you want to share.

So many things in there. I'm Della and I actually started my real estate journey early. I was 29 when I bought my first investment property. And I just always loved real estate. I just saw the value in it. It was just something exciting to me to have something tangible and my Husband loves the stock market, which is great, except we're, like, right now, not so good. So I like the fact that it is a tangible asset, and we did acquire passive income early in life, which is something I would highly recommend for people to do. Think about those things. And the hardest part, people ask me now, it's like, how did you get started and how did you pull the trigger? And I think that's the hardest part, is just taking action, because most of us fear, I guess, the outcome, like, what if, what if? And so you freeze in inaction so many times because you just are so afraid of taking that step. And I think sometimes you just have to take calculated risk. Right? I mean, everything is a risk, but no risk, no reward. So, you know, you have to be careful. You have to make sure you do your due diligence. And, you know, we didn't even know what the term underwriting meant at that time. So, you know, our due diligence was like running some numbers. Can we make the payment? And, you know, and then we made. We, you know, took that step, and we did it over and over. So one of the first books I ever read was no Money down by Robert Allen. Very old book. So I'm dating myself here. And, you know, so his. His premise was you buy two properties a year for 10 years, and at the end of 10 years, you, you know, sell 10 of them, pay them off the other 10, and live happily ever after. So I started down that path. One of the other, I guess, suggestions, I would say, is pick a niche. And so that's what I love about multifamily. You guys have come a long way in your journey as well, since 2008. Right. And it's led you to multifamily. So in our journey, we were all over the place. We didn't know what we know now, obviously, and there wasn't the education that there is today. So we had properties spread from Pickwell, Ohio to Florida. We had commercial, we had land, we had single family. We were all over the place. And so I love multifamily. And, you know, that journey led me to you guys and Freedom Capital Investments. And I started again in the fall, like. Like Eric did. And what I love about that is, first of all, I would have never aligned with you guys if I didn't, you know, trust your integrity. That was something important to me, to hang my hat with a. A team and a group and a couple who has the integrity to do the right things. And so that was important to me. But multifamily I think, is a way that you can do a lot of those things, but more in a focused manner and just, you know, have that passive income that you can build long term and not be have. You know, you can have like, you know, our first deal was 48 units and they're all like, it's four 12 unit buildings, all like within the same street. And what's nice about that is think about if you had 48 single family homes, you know, even if they're in the same city, you're still 48 different properties. And this is all under four buildings. And it just makes it so much easier for multifamily.

Yeah, I was going to ask you about the 48 unit. So that was the very first deal for FCI. Congratulations.

Thank you.

It's closed, it's under rehab. They're going fast, getting those units turned, get new tenants in there. So anything that you want to share about that particular deal and getting over the hump of the first one?

I think the biggest takeaway from that was about building the relationships. That acquisition came as a result again of the integrity of you guys and somebody knowing you and building that network. So I would suggest for people is to build your network and build the relationships. And it is about that people that know you, like you and trust you. Right. And so there was somebody who had an opportunity. It was a direct seller opportunity. He found out it was too big for him and so he asked somebody he knew who might be able to take this down. And so that led to Freedom Capital Investments. So I think the building the relationships is the first part of that. And even with the seller throughout the journey, I still keep in touch with the seller because I built a relationship with him and I really was intrigued by his life and his story. He's very young and he has multifamily properties and he has multiple multifamily properties. And I was so impressed by that. So I think just, you know, learning to build a relationship with the person and understand what their needs are and it's not just about us. It wasn't. It had to be a win win. And we built that win win. We were, you know, I was always cognizant of his needs throughout that process and knowing that whatever, you know, he wanted some other properties. And so we were trying to push the timeline to make sure it accommodated him as well. And so I think we came to the table quickly. We had proof of funds to him within two hours. And I was like, how did you do that? I'm like, because we know what we're doing. And the second thing is he just. He trusted us and he knew that we were going to close and get the job done. I love that.

Okay, last question. What does freedom through passive income mean to you?

It means building a lifelong secondary and eventually primary source of income so that you can live the life you want to live. You know, we. As you said, nobody dreams of working in a cubicle their entire lives, you.

Know, except for me.

So I think the key is to build passive income in whatever manner that may be, in whatever niche or niche that you want to pick to do that. But have a plan B or secondary while you're working your primary when you're younger. And I'm, you know, we talked about the stages of life, right? So I'm in that stage of life where, you know, passive income is more important to me now with my grandbabies and being able to travel. I've got a granddaughter in Florida, and I've got two grandbabies in Northern Kentucky, and I want to make sure that I have mobility and can travel and spend time with them. And so the passive income is important. As we get older in life, then you start working, worrying about other things like healthcare and things like that. So you got to just make sure that you build for the future and you can build exponentially through passive income. I love it.

Thank you guys so much for being here today. I know we have an event to get to. It's five minutes away.

Hope you all can come.

So I'm gonna let you wrap us up.

Absolutely. Well, she's got grandbabies in Northern Kentucky and Florida, so now I see more apartments in Northern Kentucky and Florida.

I'm on it.

Well, we hope that you enjoyed this and meeting. Meeting the team. Make sure you're heading on over to our website, freedomcapitalinvestments.com to join our investor club to find out what they've been up to. And also check us out on the social media channels, because guess what? That's where they are as well. But we like to end all of our podcasts with Invest Smart, Live Happy. Bye, everybody. Nothing on this show should be considered specific personal or professional advice. Please consult an appropriate tax, legal, real estate, financial, or business professional for individualized advice. Opinions and information on the show are not guaranteed. All investment strategies have the potential for profit and loss.