Property Damage: How to Get the Most Amount of Money
21 Oct 2022 · 40 min
Public adjuster Gwen Beatty explains why real estate investors leave money on the table after property damage. Insurance companies send lowball checks; a public adjuster who represents you instead of the insurer can recover substantially more, taking a percentage fee with no upfront cost. She walks through covered perils, policy sections, and when a claim is actually worth filing.
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Welcome, ladies, to The Real Estate Investor Show, providing inspiration, strategies, and insight to empower women investors to live balanced and financially free lives. Now, here are your co-hosts, Liz and Andresa Guidelli.
So, in today's episode, we have Gwen BT, and she talks all things as a public adjuster. And so many people do not utilize public adjusters in their investment properties, and they're leaving so much money on the table when it comes to claims and damage and insurance companies. And the, and the long list goes in. We go into so much detail on today's episode around this topic to set you up for success with your properties.
And this is not just for all of you that are just went through a hurricane or something else. This is very, very informational, and I cannot emphasize this to you guys. This is a very, very informational episode for you to prepare yourself, to set yourself up for success if something happened. And guess what? You're in real estate, that's gonna happen at some point. So this is a must, just like your homework. You gotta listen to it because a lot of investors, as Liz mentioned, don't and the purpose of it. So this is your to-do homework for the day, for the week, or for the month. But this is a must-listen episode for all the investors, no matter if you are getting started or if you're leveling up and have tons of properties under your belt.
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Welcome back, ladies.
This is Liz and this is Andresa.
Welcome back to The Real Estate Investor Show, where our mission is to empower women to live a financially free and balanced life. That is what we do day in and day out, right, Andresa?
Indeed.
Excited to have Gwen Beatty with us today. We're excited to jump into damages and property and how women can win financially. I think there's a lot of things around that when we have issues with our property. So excited to jump in. Welcome to our show and excited to have you here today.
Thank you for having me. I'm so excited.
Yeah, we're gonna jump into that in a second here. Andresa, as we always do, we like to get connected to all the amazing women and men who listen to our show day in and day out. Quick tip and, uh, just then lead into the episode. So wanted to share a quick success story. With one of our Strive members, and we have a membership, Strive membership. She's one of our members and she was a 10-year veteran in the, as a scientist, and she basically quit her job, left her, replaced her W-2 income with her passive income. And I think it was in the last couple weeks. And we've seen her growth in our Strive membership, which has been amazing. I know Andresa, you work very closely with her and it's just been amazing to see. I think what I wanted to share And she said something in her post and sharing it with us, a couple things. Number one, it's not about living a life of extravagance, right? But it's about living life on your own terms. And I just wanna repeat that for everyone listening. This process of investing and building wealth is about living life on your own terms. Not, not about number of doors. It's even less about the money as much as it is about the freedom and what that allows us to do, right? Money is a vehicle and money's gonna get us to where we wanna go. But she's such a go-getter. And I think the irony too is that on the day she quit, her and her partners put a bid in, an auction bid.
That was hilarious.
For a 42-unit, and that was accepted. And I, I love that. And when there's moments in our life that are those uncertain areas and uncertain moments, life gives us like a little nudge and says, you got this. And I think that was one of those nudges. So just really proud of her. Yeah. And, and I'm really proud of her. And I wanted to mention how amazing she is and the women in our Strive membership are experienced women, 5 to 10 deals, looking to scale, looking to grow, looking to put teams in place. And I want to recommend women to check that out. It's on our website, therealestateinvestor.com/membership. You can even apply now. We open our doors in December, but really proud of her and I'm proud of her growth, right, Andresa?
Indeed. One thing that I want to say is that she made space for that 42-unit deal come in. Right? So sometimes we prepare for the worst. We also don't prepare for the good that might come out. So when we start shifting and telling the universe, listen, this is the route that I'm going to take, the universe will deliver, right? You, you take the leap and then you build the airplane and you go. That's the role. But she, the difference here that she was able to do this because she knew she had an army of women that is her net. She can fall, she can rely on, she can lean in. And that gave her, her the confidence to really go forward, plan the transition, and pull the trigger. That's the bottom line.
Good stuff. So with that, excited to jump into Gwynn's story. And, and, you know, we, in the past we've asked the question, how did you get started? And we're actually shifting things up. So wanna ask you the question, what has been the lesson that has taken you the longest to learn?
Ooh, wow.
So we're gonna start off with a bang here.
Yeah.
Ooh.
Well, there's been a lot of lessons. The longest to learn was, I think, to actually get going in real estate. I've always been a person that said you have to conquer your fear and you have to do that. Eleanor Roosevelt said, you must do that which you fear the most. But you have to identify what that fear is first. And you live with your fears, so you don't know what your fears are. You haven't put words to them. So I was always afraid of getting taken advantage of, not knowing what I'm doing. And in one year, I bought a property and got an Airbnb. So when you identify that, I said, okay, I'm afraid of this, so you must go do that, whatever it is. So this is why it's perfect that I'm getting expanding now. I've been going to investor meetings for a couple of years and listening and learning and getting to know everyone, and I think that's it.
Naming the fear, women. So the bottom line here, we're going to talk about properties that have damage, and more specific, you are a public adjuster, and we're going to start with a one-on-one on that because a lot of ladies might get confused. What is the difference between a public adjuster an insurance company? Are they the same? Where is one thing stops and the other one starts? Why should I even consider that? Is there anything that I should do before something happened so I can prepare myself? So all those questions we're going to discuss today, but let's get crystal clear on what is a public adjuster.
The best way to think about it is that the public adjuster works for the public. The insurance adjuster works for the insurance company, and we are at odds with each other. The insurance company wants to protect their interests. They want to keep their money. There's a formula to this. When you file a claim, they give you what's called the undisputed amount. That first check, it's a pittance of what they actually owe you. And you have no idea that that's all you're getting. You have no idea that the first check is not your last check. It's just the beginning. You think that's the settlement. You go into trauma, you go into PTSD. It's a very, very emotional place to be and devastating. Trauma turns into anxiety, depression, anger. So here comes the public adjuster, represents you in the claim. We work for you. You have a contract with us to work your claim. We have to have a contract because we have to have the legal capability to represent you and talk to the insurance company. When you have a public adjuster, I tell my clients, don't take any calls from the insurance company anymore because anything they ask you is meant to pay you out less money. We handle the documentation. We do our own scope, our own inspection of the damages. We write up our own estimate, and that is our tool for negotiation. We are licensed to negotiate on your claim. So the insurance company pays you this much, we want to get this much. Hey, I have a client that got paid $19,000 for that undisputed payment. We got them $375,000. It is no joke what they underpay you. There are no instances where you're going to get paid in full on that first check. The best case scenario is when you contact us, contact me before you call the insurance company, because us handling the claim from the beginning, we are going to package it and present it and get all the money and include all the money that you're entitled to. So there's a few places where statute comes into play. Matching, continuous. You have no idea that when one cabinet in your kitchen gets damaged, one cabinet, which would be replaced by the insurance company, doesn't match the other cabinets. Matching triggers here. So now we go for all new uppers and all new lowers because one cabinet wouldn't match. And we include the countertop because when they take out the cabinets and install new cabinets, they're probably gonna break the countertop too. So we include all that. You have no idea that when the floor is damaged, maybe a little bit of the floor, if you can't find an exact match to the flooring, you're entitled to get money for all of the flooring to get replaced all the way up to the thresholds. And sometimes those thresholds— there are no thresholds and the flooring goes throughout the entire house. For an example, we have a client that had a pipe leak under a toilet. And it damaged the flooring around the toilet, and the insurance company paid $2,000 and change. You can never find an exact match to the flooring. Even a different lot production is a different color. So that flooring went throughout that house. That flooring was expensive. That was an expensive house. We got that client over, just over $300,000, from $2,000 and change to $300,000. So what are you entitled to under the law? The public adjuster knows this.
So that's great, Gwen. That's a lot of great content that you just shared and just wanna like dissect that a little bit. So let's talk a little bit about, you know, investors are always working with property insurance companies, of course, right? Any property that an investor buys, they're gonna have insurance on. So walk us through what you've seen to be just from your kind of vantage point, mistakes, mistakes that investors can avoid. In general when working with just insurance companies in general, minus public adjusters. I get what you just said and I, you know, obviously there's tremendous value what you're saying. Let's just take a step back if that's okay to talk about mistakes that you've seen, you know, investors make and how, how they can avoid those when dealing with actually insurance companies. 'Cause we all are dealing with them every day.
The biggest mistake is thinking that you are going to get paid on your own because once they give you that initial payment, that undisputed amount, they don't have to do anything anymore. So the insurance adjuster who comes to the property to take a look at the damages, that person actually has no authority over what you get paid. The person that makes the decisions is called the desk examiner. That's who you talk to on the phone or on email. So one mistake is they ask a lot of leading questions. And you think you're being cooperative, and you think that in your attitude, in your disclosure, that you are going to get paid out fairly. It's not the case. One example is power surge. Power surges are not covered. So when they say, did you have a power surge, that's a trick. You are not an electrician. You should say no or I don't know. If you're not 150% sure of the answer, the answer is, "I don't know." So what are you sure of? The date that the storm happened, the date that you discovered the pipe leak, the water leak. That's what you're sure of. The rest is, "I don't know." And that's where we come in to answer the questions that they're trying to pay you out less money on.
When more specific, like how small is a problem that we need to tap into insurance and/or public adjuster?
Well, when we go to look at a claim, when we go to look at damages, before we figure out whether it's a claim or not, the two things we start with are date of loss and cause of loss. Is the cause of loss a covered peril? So a covered peril is a list of things in your policy that are covered. Your policy might have exclusions and it might have caps. Water caps are typical, but what type of water cap? So when you're figuring out whether you have a claim or not, and we do a claim evaluation with every inspection we do, which is free under the law, we figure out how big are the damages and how much above deductible is this. So if we're talking about— and you don't know since you don't know about matching and you don't know about continuous and you don't know about 25% roof or matching on roof shingles and tiles, you don't know what the extent of your claim is. People can be surprised in both directions. If you have $4,000 worth of damages and a $2,500 deductible on a water damage claim, we're going to tell you, don't file this claim. Because water damage claims count against you differently in your insurance history than nature claims do. This matters. Listen, don't be terrified to be dropped. If you've got $100,000 worth of damages, file the claim. But if you've got $5,000 worth of damages, don't file the claim. But know that if you have a hurricane— let's say, look, not everybody has hurricanes, but You only have one hurricane deductible either per calendar year or per policy period. Depends what your policy says, or it depends what state you're in. So maybe you have a little bit of hurricane damages, call it in anyway. Let's say you have $5,000 deductible, you've got $4,000 worth of damages. You don't get paid anything because that's called an underdeductible payment. But if you have another hurricane 2 weeks later, and I've seen it, Now you've only got $1,000 left on your deductible. This is good information, so don't be afraid to file a claim.
Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. And it sounds like a claim comes through and that might be a time to kind of take a step back instead of just knee-jerk calling that insurance company to kind of assess, right, the best strategy. How do public adjusters get paid? Do they get a percent? Just curious. They have to get some sort— they have to get paid from someone. Is the person that's engaging a public adjuster anywhere get, you know, paying out of pocket? Are they— or is it getting a percent of what the claim— they only get paid if the claim, you know, goes to a certain amount? I have no clue on how you guys get paid. So that's just, I think, a helpful thing for those listening to get their head around.
We get paid a percentage of what we get you, so there's no out-of-pocket costs. My whole goal is that you have no out-of-pocket costs even after our fee, to restoration companies, to contractors. There's no out-of-pocket costs. That's the goal. So that's why it's important for us to do a free inspection before you've called the insurance company, because if it's small, we're going to tell you not only don't file the claim, we're not going to work on that claim. You don't need to file a claim. You do need to file a claim, whatever the situation is. So we get paid on the back end and we want it to get processed and settled as quickly as possible. We don't drag it out. Attorneys working on claims drag it out because they get paid by the hour. We get it settled quickly. Here's an example. This is a big example. An HOA in Florida got denied on a hurricane claim. They said it was wear and tear, preexisting damages. Those are things that you don't get paid on. Just because you got denied doesn't mean it was a wrong denial. We took that claim, we turned that around, we got $15.5 million in under 8 months with no attorney. And that's why we want to get everybody back. It's very emotional. We want to get everybody back. When you have an HOA, everybody's upset. When is the property going to get fixed? When is the roof going to get repaired? You need your money and the insurance company is in no hurry to pay you. None.
Well, I have like already a list of questions here because I'm thinking like all the women are listening and they're having those questions too. So I'm like taking this down, and this might be my assumption, my own opinion, my assumption of it. If the public adjuster only gets paid based on the claim, public adjuster is on the investor side, why aren't we using more Is that a lack of information? Is it a, there's a myth behind it? Because I don't see it very often unless it's a huge type of claim.
Correct.
Well, people are afraid to use, number one, it's the best resource that's the least known. So I talk a lot. I do a lot of public speaking because I'm an advocate. Before this, I worked in Haiti for 11 years doing social development, doing on an education platform. I like everybody to know what the issues are. I like everybody to be informed. I like everybody to know what not to be afraid of. There's a whole bunch of things going on where the insurance company has made everybody afraid they're going to anger the insurance company. It doesn't work like that. A lot of big insurance companies have departments within them that are public adjuster departments when a PA is on the file. So this is just normal. They're not going to pay you without one, and they're only going to pay you with one. So it's about getting known. A lot of the times, especially after a storm, people say, I never heard of a public adjuster before. They might call me a private adjuster, but my license says public adjuster. Yeah, private is, you know, I privately work for you. So why don't we use public adjusters more? Some people want to wait. That's not a good idea because now you're 3 months, 4 months, 5 months emotionally invested waiting. It's a very frustrating process. Get us involved before you call the insurance company.
Got it. So, you know, we all know in investing and when we have team members, accountants are not created equal, attorneys are not created equal. We can make the long list, right? Contractors, we can have a fun conversation about that, not created equal. So public adjusters cannot be created equal either, I would imagine, just because it's right, not everyone has the same level of knowledge, what have you. So, you know, women listening, I would be asking myself, and I'm sure women listening are asking, you know, what are things they need to be mindful of when working with a public adjuster? What are those, you know, kind of musts that that public adjuster needs to have? And I should say, signs that they may not be working on your behalf. So how do they avoid the ones that are not going to be the right fit for them?
When you call a public adjuster to come take a look at your property, what you want to do is when they come and say, oh, this is a claim, yes, you should file a claim. Ask them, how much is this claim worth? What are you including in the damages? Let them explain it to you. That way you'll know if it's a small claim, a big claim. You'll learn what is triggering. A lot of public adjusters will go in and say this, this, this, and get out of there. Sure, I want to move on, right? That's not who you want. You want somebody that's going to explain the process. We don't know how long this going to take, but at least give you a sense. Also, you want a public adjuster that's going to be communicative. So when you ask a question, ask them when they go in to do the inspection, can I text you, can I email you, can I call you, will you respond? Something that you can't tell, but I want everybody to know, is not all public adjusters go for the most money possible. Some of them churn and burn. So maybe they'll come back to you and say, oh, we got you $30,000 where we might have gotten you $100,000. We'll never know the answer to that question, but I want to say that I love the organization I work with because we go for the most money possible. When you have a claim, you're going to get a lot of checks. You're not going to get one or two checks. So we push for the last $5,000, the last $10,000, more, more, more. We know what the claim is worth because we want to get you whole again. So this is hard stuff. So when you're looking for a public adjuster, you're looking for the person that's going to educate you when they do the inspection, and that's going to be communicative, and you're going to look for their character.
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Well, for the ladies that are listening, right? What's going through my head right now is, okay, I understand that if something happened and you have a claim, different routes that I can take. But let's say, is there anything that I can do prior to that? Let's talk about the insurance policy, right? Many of us do not read all those papers. We actually don't know the breakdown, the details to the T over there. Is there a way that the public adjuster can work with a homeowner or some way, shape, or form be a consultant in order to select the best policy or review current policy and recommend changes? Well, that's not part of their scope of work.
I do that for people. I will review your policy. You have 4 main areas of coverage. Coverage A is your dwelling. That is your home and everything attached to it, or your building, commercial property, and everything attached to it. So that number, if you were to have a total loss, would you be satisfied with that number? How much do you owe on the mortgage? Is that number above your mortgage so that if you have a total loss, you can pay off the mortgage and start over? Your Coverage B, other structures, is everything detached from your house that's fenced, shed, detached garage, detached carport, gazebo. Does that number represent what you have in your yard? And remember, with fences, after a storm, fence prices are going to be higher. What do you got going on there? C is personal property. That means everything in your house that's loose, everything in your yard, everything in your shed, your garage. And despite what the insurance company says, you do not need to provide receipts. For your personal property. Really? Yeah, that's just a tactic they use to say we're not paying for that. But you do need pictures. Take pictures, not video. Sure, you can take video, but take pictures of your home, in your closet, in your garage, in your shed. You are going to use this for your inventory list for the damaged personal property. So if something got damaged, whether you're keeping it or not, it can go in the list. And Coverage D, loss of use, is if you've lost the use of your house. So that includes evacuation costs, gas to get out of town, hotel, Airbnb, even paying a relative to stay at their house. They have to write something up. Restaurant receipts and sometimes grocery receipts. It includes— you are entitled to stay in a place of like kind of what you are accustomed to. So that might be $2,500 a month. Prices spike after a storm. You're entitled to get reimbursed for storage, pod in your yard, storage facility. And let me tell you, if you need your settlement money before you start your repairs and you still need a storage and a place to stay, tell us before the claim settles how many more months you need and we get that future money for you as part of the settlement. Once the claim settles, it's over. Do you need 4 more months? Our contractors backed up, our materials backed up. Get that money. It also includes gas for your generator. Write out the receipt because the gas is much bigger, ladies.
Yeah, I thought, oh yeah, listen, my brain here is just like, wait a minute, we need like a full workshop.
Yeah, I was thinking so. I wrote that down.
Yes, I have a document I've written up that I send out to people. I review people's policies. No charge. I can't charge for that. And I love doing it because look, your insurance policy is written so that you can't understand it by design.
Exactly.
Yeah, exactly.
Because it's confusing. And then we go with the basics, right? Now you're turning my wheels. Now I'm going to look at my policy and say, wait a minute, hold on a second. I need to review this to my best knowledge. And yeah, that's what was going on in my head. And I'm sure is going on to a lot of the—
Yes.
Gwen, question for you too around like different types of properties, right? So, so women listening are investing in single-family homes, they're investing in multis, you know, and they're considered commercial 'cause they're larger multifamily. And then women are investing in pure commercial, retail, mixed-use. There's so many different self-storage, so many different niches as you know in investing. Are there public adjusters who focus on residential, focus on commercial? Does size of building matter? I'm just— those are thoughts kind of going through my head of the women listening of, is that even something that's important or public adjuster on any sort of quote unquote property?
We do both residential and commercial, literally any size of anything, shopping centers, HOAs, COAs, anything. Not all public adjusters do that. So ask them, got them, and ask them, what is your experience with— and then fill in the blank with your type of property, type of property or type of niche even.
Yeah, that makes sense.
And let me ask you a question, because I'm sure a lot of people are like, damn it, I wish I had listened to this a couple of months ago, because now I went through it and I got either my first check or it was settled, or I am in the midst of it and I got started without a public adjuster. Is there anything that they can do if it was already settled? or what they need to do if they are in the midst of it?
Your claim is not settled unless you've signed a settlement release. That first check does not mean that your claim is settled. States are different state by state. In Florida, in New York, in Louisiana, you have 2 years from filing the claim to hire a public adjuster. That's the statute of limitations. So I don't know what all the states are off the top of my head, but if you filed a claim a few months ago, you have time. You can find out, can I still— even if your repairs are completed, let's say you got $10,000 from the insurance company, you spent $100,000 in repairs because you didn't get paid enough. Hey, give us those receipts. We will take a look at everything and tell you whether we can help you with that completely repaired set of damages on this claim or not?
No.
2 years. That's what I'm thinking, like the dragging and the back and forth. And a lot of people are like, I don't want to even deal with this. I just need to make those repairs and I need to get the kitchen back for my family to function. We have to have this roof on top and deal with that. The bottom line, ladies, is that We need to have tools in our toolboxes and we have to have people that that's their specialty and we can rely on. And our job as the real estate investor here is to provide those resources so you guys can really, number one, get the knowledge that that is a possibility, that that exists, and make the connections. So this episode is just like, I think, the tip of the iceberg. It is for much more. Into what it is, because I believe it's costing women a lot of time and most important, our energy that goes into it, because it's not a fun time when people need to go through it.
Oh, it's awful. It's awful. A public adjuster is your superpower. And another thing that I like to tell people is that once you get your roof replaced, go and get another 4-point and a wind mit and send those 2 reports to your insurance agent. Because now you've got a new roof on your insurance history records and your premiums might come down. And also know that no insurance agents sell for everybody, so you can shop around. Everybody sells for these 10 and those 10 and that 5 and those 15. So with residential, you can shop around to different agents at the same time. Commercial, no, just one. Also know that when you get everything fixed, make sure you get a receipt or an invoice from the roofer that put the new roof on. Because if you have a storm claim and you get a new roof put on and then you have another storm in a couple of years, the insurance company is going to say, hey, I paid for a new roof for you a couple of years ago. Show me proof that you had it done. No, they are not going to come look at your roof and say, oh yeah, that's a new roof. No paperwork, paperwork, paperwork. Use a licensed contractor so you can make sure you get that invoice. They don't give you that invoice, you can call the state that handles their license and say, Hey, they're not giving me the invoice. Watch how fast you get that invoice. You need that paperwork.
Wow. A lot here, you know, and I think the key too, I think as we build our team, because that's what so many women listening and men, of course, listening to our show, they want to build their team, they want to build their systems. They don't want to be a solopreneur anymore, right? They don't want to do this by themselves. And so what you're saying is interesting, and I want to make mention, is to really ask additional team members, especially like a public adjuster, or you're not, you know, someone that you're not sure of. How are they going to get paid? Because what I hear you saying is there's a level of speed at which you're moving, which is in an investor's best interest, right? Because when there's damage and we're not getting that, the tenant can't move back in, we're losing money and that's on our bank account. So how's the insurance company getting paid? And, and you know, we need to start asking ourselves these questions as owners of these properties, right? And not just kind of getting what's given to us. So I, I just wanna make mention of that is, and knowing how people get paid is everything in this business because you're gonna know how quickly, how slowly, what they're motivated for, what they're not motivated for. So I, I just wanna make quick mention of that. But Gwynne, this has been amazing. We have to do some more with you and getting into a lot of, a lot more detail. But where can the ladies listening learn more about you?
Okay, well, I'm gonna give my email, which is Gwynne, G-W-Y-N as in Nancy, N as in Nancy E. So G-W-Y-N-N-E at ucsf.com, unitedclaimsspecialistflorida.com. My phone number is 954-648-9258. I welcome anybody to send me their policy. I'll go over it with you. I'll have you understanding your policy in 10 minutes. And yes, we get paid on the back end. We get paid a percentage. So there's really no downside in— you're not having any risk, you're not having any out-of-pocket costs. Anything that happens along the way, we let you know. Great.
Awesome. All this information you guys can find on our show notes. Now we're gonna transition to our fabulous 3 questions. And the first one is, what's the most transformational book you ever read?
Let's see. I read a lot of books about life challenges and overcoming life challenges. I read a lot of memoirs. I'm tied between one called Hope's Boy and one called Chosen by a Horse, but I'll go with Chosen by a Horse. Which is a book about a woman with alcoholism and how she connected with her horse to recognize what was going on in her life and overcome that. I love a success story. Addiction is hard. I have addiction in my family. I've seen it. So that's why this one meant a lot to me. Hope's Boy is about a man who was in the foster care system and what he went through. So I felt agony for this guy, what he went through. I feel a lot for people that have struggles, and I think that's why I worked in Haiti for so long and worked down there helping them with their lack of ability to— there's no free education there. So I want to use this information in my life to sort of cheer other people on, which is why I'm really happy with any kind of success that people have.
And that comes through. That comes through. We all heard your enthusiasm about helping and supporting women. So we can see that connection. The second question is, what is the most powerful routine that you do to create a financially free and balanced life, whatever balance means to you?
Well, I work out. I kickbox 5 days a week. If you don't have that, if you don't have something that you do, I think we need to remain flexible and mobile our whole lives. So we always need to do something to keep ourselves going. And I, I don't do it to take out frustration. I do it to get lost for an hour and then I come back and then I can sleep well. So I follow and do a lot of TikTok because I see what's going on. I love TikTok because it's telling me how the country feels, how the trends, how people are feeling about relationships. And I see a lot of real estate stuff on there. So I'm learning little pieces of what everybody's doing. I feel very connected that way, and I feel very much, hey, I'm not the only one that feels that. So to feel about— sometimes you get sucked down the rabbit hole with TikTok, but, um, 2 hours later, but to feel balanced, I do a lot of art. My backyard is filled with chandeliers with solar lighting. I get a little obsessed. I bought 26 of them. I spray paint them. And what? Yeah. My backyard is my art studio.
So I love it.
So that's what I do.
That's awesome. The last question is, which women, famous or not, has inspired you the most?
Well, I have to go back to Eleanor Roosevelt with all of her very, very succinct motivational quotes that we've all heard over the years. Sometimes it's women, but sometimes it's men. I really admire Jimmy Jimmy Carter, because when I worked in Haiti, he got somebody released from political prison that I worked with for years, somebody who was imprisoned for 17 months, who then started a sports NGO, non-governmental organization that we funded for years. So that kind of humanitarian work I really admire. So anybody that lifts anybody else up, Eleanor Roosevelt certainly did that.
Great. Gwen, thank you so much for being on our show. Thank you for sharing your wisdom, and we appreciate your time so much.
Thank you for having me. I really enjoyed this.
Thank you. If you enjoyed this podcast and want to receive updates on our next interviews, go to our website, therealestateinvestor.com. There you can subscribe to our show, become part of our investor community, and get updates on upcoming episodes.
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Ciao.
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