Grateful, Thankful and Joyful | REIal Talk | EP. 34

Oh, freedom fans.

Hello.

Welcome back.

Yes.

Another podcast.

Yes.

Thanksgiving next week.

I know. I'm excited.

Yeah. So we're gonna talk about what we're grateful for and gratitude and such.

Yes. I love this. When we are talking about podcasts, as soon as this one came up, I was like, oh, yay.

I wanted to be in this one because I tried, you know, like, and I joked as we were walking in here, you brought notes, and I didn't because this is a fluent language for me. Gratitude is, like, the most reliably grounding concept for me. Right. So, like, when, you know, stuff's rough, things are difficult, whatever, I always kind of come back to what I'm grateful for.

Yeah. Yeah.

I don't wait once a year.

That's a fantastic exercise. And I don't think the ride's too.

Wild to do it once a year.

Yeah, yeah, Agreed. And I've never done it enough, so. So sometimes I do have to think about it. But really, I told you before we started, I said, I want to be present and listening to you instead of thinking about what should I be saying next.

I'm thankful for that.

Yeah. Awesome. So who's starting? Are you going to start with something you're grateful for?

You know what? I'll tell you something I'm grateful for. So the last couple weeks have been challenging. I've had some, like, family loss and challenges or whatever. And, you know, it's always a good reminder to think, you know, one, there's always somebody dealing with something more difficult.

Yes.

Right. And. And two, you haven't lost everything. Nobody ever has. Right. So as long as you're able to grieve, you haven't lost everything.

That's right.

And oftentimes you're grieving something you've lost that you're grateful for. You're grateful to have had, you know, to have had that opportunity or that connection or whatever it is. Right. So anyway, there's a, you know, it's even a hat. It's a therapeutic habit for me to. Particularly even in times of loss and challenge and frustration or whatever, because I've trained myself to, you know, mitigate that way.

Yes.

So it's, you know, people ask me, how are you? Cool, Happy. Whatever else. It's all about perspective.

Yeah.

So anyway, one of the things I'm very happy. Grateful for is my family, my siblings, my children, you know, cousins, grandparents. It's a big family and really grateful to have them in my life. Not everybody has a big family.

That's right.

When they're crazy. And holidays are difficult. I'm like, okay, glad to have you crazy folks.

That's a good example, because, yeah, holidays can be crazy, right? And you're grateful. Grateful. And then you get to the holiday, man. But it's a good reminder.

Yeah, it is. So, you know, that's my start. What's on your mind?

Okay. Well, you started with family, and I think that was the right place to start. I tend to think about business first quite often, but when I was thinking about this, the first thing I thought about was my parents and the values that they instilled in me and why I am where I am today. Because of integrity, how we've built everything. Just a hard work ethic and never giving up and giving back and. But the idea of how big can we get so we can give back more? I mean, all of that is just super cool. And then talking about family led me to flip. And a lot of people will say, how the heck do you work 247 with your husband?

Because, well, you don't share a desk, for one. We do have a little elbow room.

Yeah, that is true. But we leave and we go to dinner at night, and we don't have kids, so we go out to eat every single night. What do we do? We recap the day. And so, you know, a lot of the things that we do aren't necessarily personal, and people don't know how to do that. But, like, he's my best friend, and I can't imagine doing this with anybody else. So I was like, that's gotta be, like, at the top of my grateful list always. Even though I go to business first, you know, my mind does that.

You know, I was thinking just last week, who was I talking with? PAC director in our acquisitions operation about, you know, is it personal? Is it business? You know, if you're doing it right, it's both. Yeah, right. There's nothing wrong at all with. With your colleagues, your customers being your friends. And some of my best friends are people I've worked with and worked for and who have worked for me and so on. So, you know, there's nothing wrong at all with those lines being blurred in my mind.

Yeah.

As a business or as a personal, they're the same things.

Yeah.

You refer to our organization, our people, as. As a family. I've heard you say that before. And in a way, in ways they are. Right. So we spend a lot of time together. So happy to be part of the family. Thanks for adopting me. That's one of the things I'm Grateful war, too.

Yeah.

Anyway, I don't see anything wrong with blurring those lines. I think that's pretty cool. And I think if I was. Flip isn't exactly my type, but I'd be pretty grateful to be with him.

Yeah. I agree with you on the whole family thing. You know, there's different lines. People say, don't call it a family. It's a business. And you need to be able to, you know, fire people, and it's hard to fire family.

Sure.

I totally understand that. But I understand. I get the bond, you know, that that creates in the travel and the journey, because this really is a journey. Right. And you want to do it with people that you like. So one of the people that I on here, and I haven't had to look at it yet even, was you, and it brought me to the who not how book. You know, learning how to identify the people who already are perfect for, you know, a certain situation or a seat or are. I was on a podcast recently, and he quoted something on the actual podcast cover that I said. And I was like, wow, I said that?

And it was.

It was about, it's okay to surround yourself with people who are smarter than you. And so, like, I've always said that about you. It's like, man, you know, you do things a totally different way than me and so much wiser, and you bring so much perspective to me. And so I'm very, very thankful for you.

Yeah. And likewise, you got plenty of expertise that I've yet to learn. So I'm grateful as well in that regard, and I've enjoyed that same habit. I spent a lot of time in technology in particular, where I was always surrounded by folks who were, you know, you know, who's smarter, who's not. It doesn't exist on a, you know, a line, various things that you're smart about. But I spent a lot of my career working with folks who were experts at things like I wasn't even entry level at. Right.

Yeah.

Understand the concepts and can talk around it a little bit, but spent a lot of time in rooms with people who were discussing things, and I was the least knowledgeable person. Right.

Yes.

I'm grateful for that. That's actually a really cool position to be in, to kind of avail yourself to constant learning. And so, anyway, I'm grateful as well. Learning a lot of stuff about multifamily. And the things you're tinkering with these days are fun, too.

They're very, very fun. I'm getting super excited about it. In fact, something I didn't put on my list was passive income. Like how we've always been on this chase for passive income. Right. And what can we build and what produces the passive income? And is that really passive or is it not?

Are you ever going to be passive about anything?

I know. Oh, that's very true. And I just, I actually am reading that I'm going to talk about. But the apartment complex that we talk about all the time, it was like an accident. We didn't mean to buy it. Right. But now that's like $37,000 a month of passive income that we're going to have. We're going to refinance, and there's going to be debt associated with that. But there was never a thought of, how do I get there? You know, it was always, let's try this, let's try this, let's try this. And suddenly, as we have taken this journey and built these businesses with a purpose in mind of doing it for us and helping others do the same. Like, we're finally going, whoa, what just happened? Here we are. And look at what that number is turning into. And now how do we, you know, do it again for others and do it more for us? And so the book that I was going to talk about, and I'm going to give it back to you, is dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy wrote who, not how, they just released another book, the Gap and the Gain. And as entrepreneurs, we have this habit of judging ourselves on what the ideal goal is. Right. And that goal keeps on moving. At least it does for me. I want to be here, but now I'm getting close now I want to be here and I keep moving it. And the lesson is, is that you, you start celebrating the gain. So if you have a start line, and here's your ideal world, whether that's moving or not, if you're ever judging yourself in the gap in between, you actually take a look at where are you based on where you started.

Yeah.

And if you look at the gain.

That'S so much more fair and healthy.

Right.

Because there's always something bigger. There's always someone better. There's always more. Right. You know this. I've often reflected on the conflict between ambition and drive and gratitude and contentment. Okay, Right. So where discontentment is kind of the birthplace of ambition and drive. Right. Like, I'm not happy. I don't have enough. I want more. I want more for whoever or whatever. Right. Like, whatever it is that you, you haven't accomplished enough or whatever Else there's some discontentedness associated with that ambition. Right, right. And then you just destroy yourself in your life if you can't reflect on what you're happy with. Right. There's a. There's a little bit of a, you know, a conflict between those. Those two things. And the answer is balance. Right, right. You know, obviously, like, having a little spur in your. In your, you know, side or whatever torn in your side to kind of get you up and get you going. And wanting more is great.

Yes.

But I think what you just hit on that. That. That spoke to me was being able to stop and reflect on. Maybe you're not content. Maybe it's not enough. Maybe you still have something that gets you going, but there's a lot to be grateful for.

Yes.

You know, I didn't ride the bus to work today. Right, that's right.

That's exactly right.

You know, nice, modest car or whatever. I'm happy about that. Right. I'm grateful for it. Right.

Absolutely.

And maybe next week, next month, next year, next decade, I'll drive a Lambo to work.

That's right.

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. But you know what I mean?

Yeah, for sure. And we continue to measure based on that. Yeah.

How? That makes a lot of sense. There's like. I think I heard somebody say that perfection is the enemy of progress.

Yes.

Right.

I love that line.

Yeah.

Yes.

If you're always measuring yourself by the absolute. And how can you ever say, like, I'm happy, I'm here, I made it, whatever.

Yeah. It's a demon that I dealt with. I think when we were building this, I wish I would have, number one, had that book. It wasn't published yet, so I didn't have it to read. But somebody like you, you would have taught me some lessons, because you always do. Whenever I go in your office, we talk about something and I'm like, wow, that's a totally different perspective. And I get to, you know, it's a nice mind shift. And it's nice to have those mind shifts and understand how you can appreciate and be happy, because the start of the book was really about the pursuit of happiness and the fact that there's a belief that you can never, ever be happy because you're never in your ideal state. So it was really nice to kind of reflect on that.

That's interesting. I might have to read that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the other thing I was going to say was health, because as you have taken over this company, guess what? Flip and I did got Healthier. No, we went to all the doctors.

And said, oh yeah, you finally got to check on yourself.

Yeah. We took the time to say, what have we done to our bodies over the last five years of just going crazy and you know, not a lot of sleep and just constant work and stress and sure, you know, we ended up being okay, you know, besides blood pressure being a little bit high. And now we just, you know, I just went today and he's like 122 over 80 or 122 over 82. I was like, bam. Did it. Yes.

I don't know the stats well enough to know what's good, but that sounds good.

That's really good compared to where I was. So I'm grateful, really grateful for health and knowing that, you know, we survived all that stress and craziness and we're here to, to celebrate it.

You said something earlier about. Yeah, that's. I mean, of all the things, you know, all the wealth in the world, all the luxuries, all the whatever you can get, you only get one chance at health. Right. So I mean my, my wife is a really good mentor and encourage her with regard to self care and health and that kind of thing. And, and she said, hey, we're paying for the experts. Right. Like you have the insurance or whatever, you have the money or whatever, pay the experts, figure out your health. You can't over invest in that. So I'm really glad to hear that you're able to prioritize that. Me helping get a few things done around here.

Thank you.

Enable that. That makes you feel good.

Yeah, us too, I think. Just the other day I was in your office and I said, you know what I'm grateful for right now? Said what? That you just had to deal with that because it was something that, that would have stressed me out big time. Yeah. And, and you do it with such grace, so. Wow.

Yeah. Sometimes it's easy.

It is kind of your superpower, let's just say.

Thank you. You said something earlier about, about family and having. Growing up with certain values and work ethic or whatever things you learn.

That's right. Yeah.

That made me think about this sometimes exaggerated idea that we, that we, that we cling to, about how self made we are and how we did it. All. Right. And so I always. There's a conflict there too and a balance there too. Right, Sure. I always, when I think about gratitude, that comment made me think about even having the ability to work hard, having a good back, a good mind, good, good character or connections to the Right. People with the opportunities or whatever, those are gifts that the. The world, the universe, God, whatever you want to refer to, give you. You know what I mean? And so, you know, to be grateful for those are really important. Even if you're grinding, you know, even if you're proud of what you've done.

Yes.

I've always. I think I got caught up in some exchange or it was a board, it was a forum of some sort that I participated in, or it was about. It was for students and whatever. And it was about what's the path to success? And whatever else. For some reason, they thought I was a point of reference. But, like, I've had a job. Okay, whatever. So, you know, and I had to remind everybody. I remember, you know, telling everybody that, like, I can't just pat myself on the back and say, here's the recipe. You work hard and whatever else. Like, there are things that drop into your lap and you, you know, you take advantage of those opportunities, some better than others or whatever. But health is a good example. Like, not everybody's as healthy as the other person.

Right, right.

I did a few property flips myself and did some of the dirty work. Hands on. Right, right. Do that with a bad back or broken arm or truth, whatever else. Right. So anyway, I try to. Every time I think about or reflect on wins in business or whatever, you know, we're making money, we're making deals, we're adding, you know, products or offerings, and we're accomplishing goals or whatever and somebody wants to credit that success. I always have to stop and think about the things we can't take credit for. Yeah, but just that we just locked into.

Yes, right.

And there's plenty of that. I mean, every success story is a good measure. Good fortune and taking advantage of those opportunities.

That's right. Yeah. And being that type of person that attracts exactly what you said at the very beginning, the law of attraction and the values being part of building you to be the person that you are that attracted those people. Because, like today, I could say that the success of where we're at is not because of Flip and I. It's because of this person, this person, this person, this person. And of course, the team. How do you do without everybody else? But a lot of those people wouldn't have come into our paths or even joined forces with us without the very beginning, foundational elements and that upbringing and the values that you portray, choose to portray because you can be brought up one way and choose to go, you know, totally somewhere else, not take advantage yes. Yeah. Yeah. So that becomes a deeper appreciation of the unknown of how the heck did I get here in the first place. It was all of these elements all combined. Right. Because I certainly. I don't even know that I would have met you had I not met Randy and had we not moved to Dayton and all of those things all coming together, it's. It makes you kind of go, whoa.

Steve took me to lunch and wined and dined me. You know, don't give Randy too much credit.

Right. Randy to Steve to you. Right. What's that 7 separation.

Anyway? The. Yeah, that's exactly right. And there's so many. Yeah. You know what? You're. That. Speaking of superpowers, that's kind of your superpower. I don't know if I've ever known anybody so who so aggressively and quickly consumes content, learns, applies, because it really, in this world, that. That works really well. In our kind of modern economy, that works really well. Apply, test, yes, reapply, whatever. Right.

Yep, that's right.

Your inclination towards learning aggressively and applying and testing fast is a great asset. I'm grateful for that. It's not exactly my pace or exactly how I operate, but there's. There's things about that that I've learned working with you, so I'm grateful for that too.

Yeah, well, you've taught me how to put on the brakes sometimes, too. Like, there are some times where, like, I would have said yes the day. Like the day after I was introduced to this concept, but I instead came to you and said, hey, what do you think about this? You asked good questions, I researched, I figured it out, gave you answers, and now we're like two or three. I would already been past it. I'm now onto the new idea because I said yes, and I just went and moved forward. But coming back to it, I was like, that was a really good decision, that I never would have taken that path.

So while you're chasing shiny things, Danny, I'm over here attending to the old rusty money machine that's just printing cash.

That's right.

It's a good balance. It is, to your point, like kind of leveraging strengths of others and whatever else.

Yes, for sure.

Yeah. So let's. I don't know what else is on your list.

I think I hit most of it. I was very. Oh, well. I mean, I said entrepreneurship, just the idea of being able to build things, have the desire and passion to build things, that provides jobs and puts more money into, you know, the workplace and provides solutions to all the People we get to work with, because the people we get to work with thank me all the time. They're like, man, I'm so glad that I met you and you. Your team and everything you're doing. And, like, without the bug of entrepreneurship, you know, none of that happens.

Yeah.

So I'm very thankful for that.

You know, when I reflect on the last year or so, since we're kind of talking about an annual period of Thanksgiving here.

Yeah.

You know, we're. We're grateful to have kept all. We didn't have to lose any of our staff to, you know, to lost business or challenges about, you know, rents and tenancy and all those kind of things. So we've been very fortunate in that regard, and I'm proud of that. I'm also thankful for that. You know, those are. It's really difficult. And. And the fact that we were able to help, not hurt folks through difficult time or whatever is pretty awesome.

Yes. Yeah.

It feels good to be able to be the good guy.

Thank you. We both say it feels very good. Yes. To be able to help other people.

Yeah. So it's been a. Yeah. In the business. I can think of things I'm, you know, we should be grateful for. Right. Like, we've seen. I just kind of think through our. Our different operating units. Right. Different operating companies, rather. We've seen a lot of, like, we've gotten into the retail space pretty hot and heavy.

Yes.

A lot of changes, a lot of challenges.

Yes.

But we figured things out that are valuable to us and to our customers.

That's right.

So I'm grateful for that. Ipm, our property management organization, has evolved a lot in the time that I've been hearing, even before.

Yes.

And I think we deliver. You know, we've seen our customer joy numbers.

I know.

I mean, this kind of went. Moved up fast. Right.

It really did.

So I'm really happy for how they're doing. And we doubled down on some, you know, advertising investments or whatever in our acquisitions operation. And so that's. I'm grateful for the opportunity to kind of be able to scale that up.

Yes.

And then you have this whole big universe of opportunity that you're building.

Yes.

In fci.

Yes.

Freedom Capital Investments. And so I'm grateful that you're able to give your mind to that.

I am, too. And that's why you are so important and valuable, because Flip and I can just. We can dive in. And that's where our passion lies, is diving in and doing that part of it and not doing the what takes that strategic, you know, vision and power and thinking and, you know, critical thinking, especially, that you are so great at. And now I don't have to stress about something that's not my superpower. And I get to go dive in and, you know, build something new and do things that are bigger, that help everybody.

Our team, investors, Pretty comfortable, confident, operator and grower of a business. Yeah. So I like the space I'm in. I love it. Let you guys go build from scratch. It's pretty good.

Awesome. We'll just keep on going like this and go, here you go, Aaron. Here's another baby. At some point you might go, er, stop it.

Yeah, that's very cool. What else?

I think just lessons. Life lessons. I'll go back to the book because I was listening to it on the way here and I was like, man, this is great content right before our podcast. And it's lessons that I've learned through the growth and the path that we've been on and how certain things affect other people and their lives, their happiness. You know, it's. And it's. Again, we're going to go back to your superpower and the team and how being appreciated and being valued and recognizing the path that they've gone on and not judging them by the gap of the ideal measure you want them to be at, but looking at that. And I went, oh, I made that mistake a lot. You know what? Thank God for Aaron. He fixed it as soon as he got here. So it was another. Like, I'm just. I'm grateful for every time there's a click.

Yeah.

That I go, I just learned something new. And I think I told you we were in a mastermind. And I said, I think I texted you, I said, you know, everything that everybody's talking about here. Well, I read books and I go to masterminds and I learn, learn, learn, learn. And I. And I apply it very quickly to what I learned, but I didn't know it back, you know, so those are the things I'm thinking about. I mean, I'm always in the moment, right? So, yeah, this is fresh car ride stuff.

You make it addictive to sit and have conversations with you because you're so flattering. I appreciate it. I was just. I went and got lunch here earlier and the clerk who sold me the sandwich, I told her, thank you, I appreciate you, you know, and just. Just having a genuine exchange like that. Yes, you could. I could tell that it impacted her. She was like, oh, you're welcome. You know, like, it. Yeah, it Brought joy to her life. Right.

Yes.

Just because I made eye contact and. And didn't snatch a bag and look the other way and say thanks, you know, I just said, thank you. I appreciate you looking. I think I picked that up in this office somewhere. I mean, I can't overstate how valuable and how. Just how cheap, affordable, free.

Yes.

Gratitude is.

Yes.

You know, like, when you pass it around liberally. It's crazy what it does.

It really is.

It's a. It's a. It's a productivity hack. Right. Like, I don't mean just mean for work. It's like love life, managing your kids, dealing with, like, administrative things and your finances, your whole perspective on yourself and your life.

That's right.

Like, gratitude is just a secret serum that. Like snake oil, man. That stuff works.

That's right. 100%.

It's a valuable little lever to pull, and we should. We should all do it more.

Yes.

It hurts. It costs nothing. It hurts nobody. And it's. It's a great value in every aspect of our lives.

Agreed. And I'm glad we're having this conversation today, because it just. It brings it top of mind.

Yeah.

And you summed it up wonderfully well.

Happy Thanksgiving to you.

Yes. Happy Thanksgiving to you. I appreciate you. If you didn't know that already, I.

You know, I don't know what. Do you want to go over some other stuff?

No, no, I'm thinking about our customers. Yeah, yeah, the customers.

We appreciate you, too.

Yes, we appreciate.

You know, we did the Ivan's Map thing a couple of months ago. We were talking about, like, our customer Persona, you know, and kind of gave them a name. But whatever your name is, whether you're buying properties from us, selling properties to us, we got properties under your management. You're investing in multifamily stuff. We're grateful to you. You pay our bills. We do not forget the fact that the world, Our world revolves around our customers.

That's right. Absolutely.

Our investors are the folks who. Who make this whole operation work. So I just taking a moment to reflect on how grateful I am to that whole community right now.

100%. I've said on many, many podcasts, and I'm surprised that I didn't say it here, so thank you for bringing it up. Is the private lenders that have, you know, helped us in. In the lending space. That's how we are doing volume. That's how we've grown to where we are. Because they continually say, I like you, I know you. I trust you. I've come to visit you, and they keep on saying, here's some more money. Here's some money. It allows us to buy another property, allows us to get another team member, and allows us to keep on. So we're just not here.

It helps that you keep cutting them big checks.

And that's true. They are thankful for that. It is a good relationship.

I'm sure there's some good well there. But I mean, I think the money matters, too.

It does.

It helps, right?

Yes, 100% it does.

It's fun to sunshine. It is fun to spread the wealth. You know what I mean? When you're able to see all the different stakeholders, your. Your team, your investors, the customers who make acquisitions and sell and whatever, all those folks benefiting from what you're doing and kind of see it all, making all the stakeholders lives better, it's pretty awesome.

Yeah, I agree. Anyway, good stuff, Aaron.

All right. You want to talk about gratitude more?

I think we did good.

All right. Well, happy Thanksgiving to everybody.

Yes. Happy Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving to you.

Appreciate you guys.

Grateful to be here.

Yes.

Grateful to be serving you guys. And happy holidays.

All right.

All right.

Invest smart and live happy. Bye, everybody.

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