In this live YouTube session recorded at LAX, Christian Osgood and Cody (DoingCodyThings) discuss multifamily investing with a focus on creative financing, especially seller financing. They share takeaways from a recent BiggerPockets episode, outline their "deal‑first, debt‑then‑equity" methodology, and emphasize treating sellers as owners to secure favorable terms. The conversation introduces the "circle drill" framework—relatable points, goals, and significance—to become the most logical buyer for any property. They advise investors to start in their own backyard, expand outward, and prioritize markets where they can drive the deal. Real‑world examples from Seattle, Bremerton, Moses Lake, and Los Angeles illustrate low‑debt, high‑value acquisitions. They also recount a misstep involving a cash‑negative deal, stressing the importance of cash‑flow discipline and building a portfolio of smaller, cash‑generating assets before tackling larger, riskier projects. The hosts invite audience interaction via chat and Instagram, preview upcoming episodes, and announce a regular live schedule.
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I believe live. We're live. It says the thing. We did it. We did it. Well, welcome to LAX. I'll not cover the mic with my hand because that's rude.
That's more better.
But hello everyone. If I turn this sideways so it's more optimized for YouTube, we'll get mad at me. We're gonna find out. Orientation locked. Put it back. Okay, it did come out. Hello YouTube. Uh, hello guys, we're live in LA. Uh, we just got done filming, uh, BiggerPockets episode Uh, 799? Is that it? 799.
It's our third episode.
It is our third episode. If you count the YouTube channel, it's like our sixth episode because we've filmed some other stuff that's gonna be coming out. Uh, but super excited to be back on the podcast. Super excited to be in LA. Um, problem with LA that I've noticed— I thought Seattle's homeless problem was the worst. Fact. LA is messed up.
That's—
that is, um, pretty bad. ADU city, if having tents and free rent counts as an ADU. That was wild. Uh, so things that we learned— I always like to share takeaways from the real-time thing. So we're in the airport, LAX, for those just joining in, welcome. Talking multifamily. We're actually down here on this episode talking creative finance. You know what's crazy? We've never been on BiggerPockets talking about creative finance. Never happened. This is the first one we're getting to talk about seller financing, and I thought it went really well.
It's been just about scaling for me and for Christian, about building the business off of solving problems. Hey Jonathan, good to see you in the chat. And if anybody else wants to jump in the chat, we will connect with you. But I know this was a really good time here in LAX and we got to dive into how we play the game at the highest level. And we've learned how to play the game at the highest level from the owners that own in Central Washington.
Now, apology, Apology from us because we were in Spotify studio recording for this episode during our normal 3 o'clock. So apologies that we're posting this late. I know we're gonna have a little bit less attendance, but that's okay. If you guys have questions, post them in the chat. Otherwise, we're gonna share some of our takeaways. Um, we gotta talk about our seller financing strategy. Uh, basic principles that we cover all the time. How do you buy it? How do you never lose it? Start with the deal, then the debt and equity, not the other way around. Let your deal dictate the money, not the money dictate your options for deals. The takeaway that Dave, David Green, and Rob had was they couldn't poke a single hole in our strategy. They just called it bulletproof and no further comments. Then we got to talk for like 40 minutes. It was fantastic. I loved the episode. But yeah, we got quite an endorsement from them, which is really fun.
10 of 10 approve their endorsement too.
Facts. Really excited for you guys to see that thing drop though. That was filmed at Spotify Studios here in LA. Huge bit of fun. We gotta talk a lot about the resort too. I didn't realize how much of our strategy was used on that when we first closed that. Uh, the relationship building, of course seller financed, but the way that was put together, like we built a relationship with Dion McNeely. Check out his channel, Dion Talk Financial Freedom. But the relationship with him, we never asked to buy anything. He just came across the deal that was not right for him. He recommended it to us We got the terms that we needed. We built the relationships we needed. This strategy works in every asset class, any market, anywhere. You do not have to ask for the sale to get special terms and actually buy a property. Treat every seller like an owner. I think that was pretty much the core of the message. Anything you would add to our message from what we just filmed?
Everything that you do, you need to become the most logical buyer. And whether you want to buy a resort, a house, an apartment complex, or just just a duplex. You need to become the most logical buyer for that piece of real estate. And everything that we do at Multifamily Strategy and teach at multifamilystrategy.com is how to become the most logical buyer. We map it out with our circle drill. You got relatable points, you've got goals, and you've got significance. Relatable points get you to the table. People relate based on your past. Where you're going determines if people want to work with you. And the significance of what changes when you hit those goals determines if they're going to give you these special terms that we're talking about.
Out.
You map that out for yourself, you map it out for other people, and you become the most logical buyer of any given piece of real estate. So as you're building your portfolio, make sure that you're mapping this out.
And you need to keep it simple enough so that it is repeatable. So when you're mapping these out, put your pieces together, meet with other players in the market. And again, they are all owners, they're not sellers. So map it out, ask your questions. This is a repeatable strategy, literally Everywhere. Example we used today was like, we're in LA. One of Cody's friends has over 900 units here in LA with almost no debt. What is it, like 20% loan-to-value?
20%.
That is very little debt on a ton of properties. This is a very high-cost market. This literally does work everywhere. We do it in Central Washington. It can be in downtown LA. We've just talked on our YouTube channel, coming out pretty soon, we're gonna have Axel Ragnarsson who did this in New Hampshire. Seller financing works everywhere. You can do this. Oh, which plays right into our first question. Need to know where to invest in real estate. Well, I would start where you at. Second question is where do you want to own? Because if you don't want to own where you're at, that kind of negates the first thing.
Start to invest.
Yeah, your backyard is the best place to invest. Now for us, my backyard, Seattle. I don't want to specifically be in Seattle, so I started there. I kept looking and I wound up with a city called Bremerton. Which is south of me about an hour. The next opportunity that came up was in Moses Lake, which is about 3 hours away, which is where Cody's already investing, and the rest is history. We picked up over 100 units there. But start where you're at. If where you're at does not fit the metric of I want to own here, which Seattle does not for me, keep expanding that radius. But within driving distance of you, I think would be the best place to start, because you could do this in any market anytime and buy the biggest deal in the best location that you can.
That's super important. Don't just go buy a duplex in the Midwest. Buy the biggest deal that you can in the best location. Now I'm not saying go out and buy a 400-unit complex in Miami. That's not what we're talking about. But something that you can figure out the deal, the debt, the equity, how to buy it, which is what that formula is right there, and then how to never lose it. Long-term fixed-rate debt, cash flow, and margin. If that's a 10-plex for you, absolutely do it. If it's a 100-unit complex and you can figure out all those pieces, absolutely do it. But don't stretch your cash flow just to buy a bigger deal, or the biggest deal that you can figure out how to buy and how to never lose.
Something we talk about on, uh, on the upcoming podcast. We bought a cash negative deal as our first deal together. Now Cody had 30 other rentals, I had 4 other rentals. They did not cash flow enough to out-earn the negative of that deal. What we had to do is we had to buy more rentals and build a portfolio that supported what we already bought, and that was over $600,000 of renovation. We did that. Is that a best practice? Absolutely not. Buy on cash flow, and with that cash flow, you can take on some of these properties that may be negative, that may have a lot of upside. We built that piece backwards. Because it worked is not a reason to do it. That was a hard way to do it if you're starting. Buy those smaller cash flowing deals first, in my opinion. The 12-plexes, the 6-plexes, the— build the pieces so you have a base of cash flow, And then if you find this property that has a ton of upside but it's gonna be negative for a little while, make sure you can afford it out of your business. Just don't sacrifice cash flow. That's how you lose the game. We disobeyed that rule, we got away with it, but that doesn't happen every time. So build your business better than we did. That's how we know you need cash flow.
Learn from our mistakes.
Yes.
And with that, we gotta jump on a plane. There's some gurus online that say they have to cut things short 'cause they gotta hop on a plane. We're actually hopping on a plane.
Facts, I can prove it. Look at that, look at that back there. I did not get through TSA just to expedite this meeting. If you guys have more questions though, we plan to be on a normal schedule, full live next Wednesday. Ask your questions there. And if you want to get a sneak peek of, uh, anything for next week, you can just ask us a question directly on Instagram. This guy right here, @DoingCodyThings, and Christian Osgood over here. All right, see you guys soon. Thanks for watching the short vid.
