YouTube Channel: @dothethingformula

I do really believe 100% from every part of me that everyone has the capacity to be able to do the things that they want and not to be held back by the mental baggage that's in our head that we want to push through.

Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. In each episode, we get down and personal with people who go after the things they want to make all their wildest dreams come true. Join us as we unveil and dissect a formula for what it takes to do the thing. Here is your host, Stacy Lauren.

Hey everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. I can't wait for you guys to hear from today's guest. He shares so many insightful nuggets that I'm sure will inspire you to embark on your own do the Thing journey. I first met him at Ryan Moran's NFT Mastermind and his story proves that you don't have to follow a prescribed path in life. Anyone can pivot and go after the things they really want. This guest is a full time real estate investor, but his journey began elsewhere. He built his successful business one goal at a time. He is the epitome of doing the thing. It's my pleasure to welcome Brent to the show.

Hey, Brent.

Hey, Stacy. How are you doing?

I am doing great. How are you?

I'm good. It's, it's great to talk to you again after our, you know, our little mastermind that we did a couple months ago. So it's awesome to get back in chat with you.

I know it was so much fun and it was so great to get to know you there and I just feel excited that we're going to be able to dive in even more to your story through this interview.

Awesome. And hopefully it's, it's helpful for, for, for your audience.

So I have a feeling it will be.

We'll make it Val for sure.

Based on the, based on the conversations we had in Texas. I'm excited. So yeah, why don't you start off and just for the listeners, tell everyone about you and your story.

Yeah, of course. So, Brent Kawakami. I'm based in the Dallas Fort Worth area and I am a full time real estate investor. My quick real background. So I'm actually originally from Honolulu, Hawaii, which is where I was born and raised and came to Texas for college. My mom's actually from Texas, so it's not like I threw a dart, you know, at the map and decided to go to Texas. I did have roots there, but went to College there for engineering. And I was very much your, you know, go to school, get a good job, and get good grades so you. You could work and climb the corporate ladder. That was very much my mentality, was not a single entrepreneurial bone in my body at the time, and did that. And a couple years into sort of my corporate career, kind of the real estate bug bit me. The entrepreneurial bug bit me. And it was one of those things where, you know, I was there and I was like, you know, I really don't want to do this for the next 40 years, that type of thing. So I dug into every book I could find, every podcast I could find at the time. So this was around 20, you know, 2009, 2010, that timeframe. Inevitably, what happens for a lot of folks who kind of go down that path. You read this little purple book called Rich Dad, Poor dad, which kind of tends to be the red pill that opens up the matrix for you. And so I went down that road, went down a few different things with different business ideas, different investment ideas. Ultimately settled on real estate. Started doing single family homes rentals here in the Dallas area where I'm at. Ultimately got into investing in multifamily apartments. So, you know, like larger apartment buildings. Um, this was around 2014, 2015. Met my current partner, business partner, a little after that. And it was kind of a serendipitous thing where he was a very experienced, Very experienced in that space. And I needed a mentor. And, you know, it's kind of a, hey, when the student. When the student's ready, the teacher appears, you know, situation. So it worked out perfectly. Started doing more stuff in that space. Ultimately ended up leaving my. My corporate job, and that's where we are today. So our company's called Think Multifamily. We're an owner, operator and an education company that does things around apartment building, Investing in apartment buildings. And. Yeah, so that's. That's a quick background.

Yeah, that's. That's amazing. I love that idea of you, like, following that prescribed path, getting the job, going to school and all that stuff. And then all of a sudden you have that moment where you're like, I don't want to do this.

Yeah. And I think. I think the biggest thing that was the reason for that was so I got in and I was working with a lot of, I'll call it seasoned individuals. So much, you know, much, much, much more experienced in owning that. And I'm trying to be respectful.

And what I found was that a lot of individuals who maybe had worked 20, 30 years for the same company, did great work and everything. And honestly, it scared me because you had a lot of folks who really dedicated their lives to that job, to that company. And honestly, it was kind of a. At the detriment for their own benefit, you know, estranged marriages or estranged kids, health problems. I remember distinctly there was one gentleman, he was about to retire, and he's like, I don't know what I'm going to do after. Because he didn't have any hobbies. You know, work was his hobby. And, you know, he ended up just contracting back after he retired. And so I think that was the biggest, you know, aha. Moment that I had for why I went down looking for a different path.

Yeah, that's amazing. So you almost got to see a vision for your future and realize, this isn't what I. This isn't what I want.

Yeah, no. 100%.

And then you read the book Rich Dad, Poor dad, and that opened up the matrix to entrepreneurship from there. So how did you go from reading that book to then finding that partner? What was that for you?

Yeah, yeah, I think so. You know, that's obviously a very, you know, pivotal book for a lot of people. And I think the thing is you don't actually know how to implement it after you read it. It just kind of like sparks the idea. So I, I was kind of just going around and most folks, you know, you Google stuff, you're finding podcasts, you're trying to find other books on just like businesses you could start investments. And, you know, you ended up kissing a lot of frogs too, or like experimenting with a lot of different things. So, hey, I'm going to get into dividend stock investing. Hey, I'm going to start an online e commerce business. Hey, I'm going to, you know, what's this peer to peer lending or what's this precious metals thing or. So you kind of dabble in all these different things. I think the thing that kind of caught me was, and whether this is true or not, you know, it could be an urban legend, but you hear these stats that 90% of new millionaires are made through either businesses or real estate. And so that's kind of what got me toward that path. And then at that point, you know, one of the things, especially sort of in like in the real estate spaces, there's so many ways to make money for it. And so again, you're kind of like just looking and researching and learning. But I think the biggest, honestly, the biggest impact of it is getting around other people who have the same interests. And so for me, it was, hey, I'm signing up for, like, going to conferences or I'm going to. Trying to find, you know, an education group that's out there actively seeking out a mentor in the space that I was looking for. So I think that's one of. Probably one of the lessons learned and how I ended up there was sort of he trying to get around other people that were doing what I wanted to do. And then from there, it's all it takes is one relationship or one person you meet. So.

So it sounds like. And I love the word I've heard kissing a lot of frogs in other contexts, obviously. And I love it in this one because, I mean, I've called it Shiny Penny syndrome. I actually went through this when I considered myself retired, and I've just been kind of exploring a lot of different things. And I like that idea of it not just being shiny Penny. It's, I'm just kissing a lot of frogs till I kind of figure out my next. My next move.

Yeah, yeah. And part of it was that focus, right? So follow one course until successful, I think is what if you see, like the. If you put into an acronym. And so it's like, some of it's like, you just got to find the right vehicle, right? That speaks to you, that you're passionate about that, you know, you wake up and you're like, man, this doesn't feel like work type of thing. And then just going, you know, full bore on it. Because in my space in real estate, right, there's so many different ways you can make money. Whether there's, you know, there's, hey, I have a rental, or I'm wholesaling, I'm flipping stuff. You know, I just happen to be in apartments, right? You could do houses, you could do self storage, mobile home parks. And then we get all these, like, things, you know, that were bombarded on, like, you know, Instagram or these other stuff of different. Different ways to make it or even, hey, I'm supposed to have 10 different businesses or like, 90 different streams of income. But especially in the beginning, when you're trying to find that thing, it's really okay. What is the one thing first to focus on? Go all in on that. And then I can start thinking about other stuff once I've kind of gone through and kissed. Kiss that frog, you know.

So my other thought was, so before you started getting into the actual real estate business, that's when you'd mentioned you'd gotten into like dividend stocks and some other kinds of investment strategies. Yeah, you, I'm curious, like, did, did the stuff that you did before, did it help build your confidence up so by the time you met that partner, you already had a certain level of, of confidence there?

Yeah, I think some of the different things I did back then before, some of them stuck. So, like example, you know, I still invest in other assets like that currently. I do this thing, if you ever call, you'll hear it called infinite banking. I started back then, I still do that today. I think one of the things that, when it comes to the real estate specifically was, you know, I mentioned I did like single family houses first before I kind of leveled up. And I think that was definitely a good progressionary thing because you're starting sort of small and then slowly scaling and growing. And so as an example, yeah, I went to an education thing, learned what I needed to do. Okay. I bought my first rent house. You know, I bought my personal residence, I bought another rent house, and then I progressed. And so what we do, it's called, it's called syndications, which essentially means is you're, you're raising funds for investors in a sense to go into these types of projects. And you know, you may have multiple people. You know, you can think of it, you know, for lack of a better term, like crowdfunding. Right. And I started doing that just investing first. Right. And then you're, hey, this is how it's supposed to go. This is what you want to do. Hey, I want to do more. I want to get more active in it. And then you, so you slowly level up from there. So I think that's maybe one component of it where it's like, it's the baby steps of kind of leveling up because it sounds very intimidating for what we do now where it's like, hey, we're buying a hundred, 200 unit, big apartment complex. And so going from zero to that obviously is like a huge, huge gap. But there's all these little bitty steps kind of in between that kind of led me to be able to do that in essence.

Yeah, And I'm glad you said that because that's actually one of the biggest things I speak to because a lot of people, I think what holds them back is that big hairy, audacious thing that they want to do and they don't realize not to start there. Right. Because otherwise that's almost two. It's insurmountable. So then it's hard to know how to get there. But when you can start with something way smaller. Whether it's related or not, it builds, it flexes that muscle, you know, so you build the confidence up.

Yeah, yeah. Because you know, the whole big hairy, audacious goal thing, like, that's great. All right. And yeah, you want to say, you know, hey, you shoot for the moon. What do you shoot for? The stars? You land in the moon or something like that. But I think sometimes it can get very. Just is random, right? And you're not. It's just some big goal that's out there and it's like, well, how the heck do I even get to that point? And that whole, like, how do you eat enough? I don't know who eats elephants? But, you know, it's one bite at a time, right? You know, the same saying. And so. And then it goes back to the steps of, hey, you know, you start. So there's a. There's a guy really online, his name's Andy Fercella and he has podcasts and stuff like that.

But it talks about what we got connected with is our 75 hard experience.

That's right. I forgot about that. Yeah, so I've done 75 hard too, like you have. And it's all about. He talks about the power list, right. And winning the day, where it's. If you can win the day for the five things, just, hey, I need to get done that day. And then you stack day after day after day, the wins that happen over time, right? You're. Then you're going to look up and you're going to be like, hey, you know, a year from now, two years from now, five years from now, ten years from now, hey, I made some progress.

And I had this epiphany for me personally when I started doing, you know, my journey, doing all these entrepreneurial investment type things. And you look up, you know, you're kind of just grinding, right? And then you look up several years later and you know, hey, I built something pretty cool, you know, or pretty, pretty happy with type of thing. And maybe you don't realize that as you're going through it, but it's that day to day, winning the day, getting the tasks that slowly get to you to that point versus like, holy heck, how do I get to that big audacious goal?

Yeah, And I find that a lot too. Like I did. That also is just, you're grinding so much. It's just you don't even have time to almost celebrate your, your successes. I'm trying to. That's something I'm trying to work on with people as they're getting in to do the thing is giving themselves those psychological wins so they can actually celebrate through each. Each moment. That actually is why I like 75 hard. Because it's like 75 days, right, of just really hard stuff. And then you're like, oh, my God, I just did this amazing thing.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I know. And I'm, I'm guilty of that too, personally, where I don't step back and celebrate the wins type of thing. And, you know, that's probably just a characteristic of entrepreneurs or people who just like to grind in their guard. But I say that all too part of it is enjoying the journey of it. Right. And that's the pleasure you get out of it where you're going through that hard stuff. But it's through that. That's what. It's the reward for you. And that's, you know, ultimately how, you know, and it's the people you. You're doing it with. Also, there's another. You probably followed David Goggins.

Oh, yes, I love him.

Yeah, yeah. So he talks about how, hey, training and doing these. Some of these things are like a suck fest, right? But it's going through that suck fest and you come out to the other end that that was the reward of having gone through that and enjoying that, that journey of going through that, going through the suck fest of what ultimately is that rewarding prize.

So totally. So what do you think's been the hardest thing you've. You've gone through?

I mean, you obviously have different situations with businesses, in our instances, properties where, you know, things don't go as planned or like not, you know, not in the way you expected or you have curveballs thrown at you. So in my business, there's things. Fires tap in, right. Residents do things to properties. I'm dealing with a sinkhole.

In instance, and, you know, those things happen. And that's just part of the business in that regard. I think one of the biggest challenges or things for me has been sort of trying to evolve and change. As an example in our business over the last year, you know, we've really gone through some adjustments and pivots, sort of like just business direction and trying to scale and all those types of things. You're constantly learning and growing. And what worked. What worked before is not going to work in the future. And so now it's almost a pivot. Right. And I've had to do that a couple times, even in the short time, you know, I've been in the Space example, you know, when the pandemic hit and then we're all looking around and we're like, man, how is our business affected? Right? Are we going to go down? You know, and then you're operating around that and things have been fine. Right now we're going into a period where, you know, for no one has a crystal ball but you know, next 6, 12, 18 months, if we're not already in a recession, it's looking like we are or will be. And so I think it gets just the aspect of rolling with those changes, rolling with those curveballs and you know, there's not any one big thing that sticks out in my mind, but just having to constantly evolve and change and make sure you're focused on adjusting.

What's the thing that really helps you do that? When you're rolling through the changes and you're steering through the curveballs, what helps you?

I think, I think one thing that's been big for us has been listening to our customers. So like what we do as an example. So I have two different types of customers in our business. One customer is sort of like an investor, someone who's like, you know, high net worth individual. Maybe they're a working professional that just wants to invest money, you know, into projects with us and on the other side of the business, same type of profile, but we have a platform where we coach and we educate. And it's more for folks who are looking to be more active and get their hands dirty. They don't just want to invest money, but they want to invest time and sweat equity, you know, as they call it. And I think one of the things that helps in that regard is actively listening to those customers. So as an example and our education platform and all that, we're randomly, we're always doing anonymous surveys. We're always serving our, our audience, our customer on, on things, hey, what's working? What's the best practices you're finding success with? What are the things you really like about what we're doing and how we're operating? You know, where can we improve? Where do we start type of thing, you know, doing things like that. I individually talk to a lot of customers and you know, there's a lot of those private conversations that you have when just you could be transparent and hear, hey, where are we screwing up? Where can we be bitter? I think that's doing that and also being, you know, having the humility, which is one of our core values is that having the humility to accept that and not take that in A manner where, you know, you're feeling attacked. Right. Or you're feeling. You have the, the humility to accept that in a way to improve in that regard as constructive criticism. So I think that's one of the biggest things for us that has been helpful in making adjustments to pivoting.

Yeah. And especially like with evolving, you have, because you're hearing firsthand from people that are working with you ways to improve. And I love that you mentioned that idea of humility and not taking anything to like a fault. It's almost like a. It's like a growth opportunity for you.

Yeah. What's that? There's that before agreements. I don't know if you've heard of that before. I have seen it. Yeah. Yeah. That's another great book slash principle. But one of the them is don't take things personally. Right?

Totally. Yeah. And I think the other one that applies is the. I can't remember exactly either, but it's like something seeing in the lens of that person at the time too.

Yeah, exactly. It's.

Their lens is totally different. Like their, their internal blueprints totally different than yours. You see a different side.

No. 100% agree.

You mentioned the term infinite banking, and I actually haven't heard of that. I thought you could maybe explain what that is especially.

Yeah, of course. So it's mechanically, it's basically a method of using life insurance as essentially a savings and investment vehicle. I shy away from saying it's an investment vehicle. It's really more of a. A savings vehicle. But in essence it's a strategy that, that allows you to basically take advantage or compound the money that you've made over time, over your lifetime. Because most folks, if you're out there, you either are like, hey, I don't want to go into debt. I save cash. I save cash and I invest for. I buy what I need. Or maybe you're on the flip side where it's like I'm constantly going to debt to buy stuff. Right. Whether it's a car or house or whatever. But the problem in those instances, you know, over the course of lifetime, your lifetime. Right. You're never really like building up, you know, the dollars, you know, your net worth because you're not taking advantage of compounding. You know, so like Einstein said, the one of the wonder of the world is compound interest. But the problem is, you know, you're not taking advantage of the combating effect of all the money you've ever made in your life because there's opportunity cost. Right. You have big Expenses that you have, you have investments you're going to make. And so it's a strategy that essentially allows you to do that and for lack of a better term, make every dollar in your life, do two or three jobs. And I know that sounds kind of crazy. It's one of those things you're like, how is this legal? How does this exist? But it's been around for like 100 years. A lot of the very wealthy families, a lot of high net worth individuals, it's a strategy that, that they take. So, you know, that's kind of the Reader's digest version is very complex. It's very sort of things to do your own research type of thing. But, you know, it's a strategy that can help you take advantage of the sa, you know, have a better savings or word chest, I guess, you know, for other investments you want to make, whether it's real estate or businesses or whatever.

I was also wondering, so how did you go from having the single family home and you built up the confidence for that to doing your first, getting your first apartment building? How did you get the guts there?

I think the first aspect was education, 100% like anything else. And so, you know, you, when it went back to like the first rent house, it was, hey, I'm reading books, I'm reading podcasts on the subject. I, I went to like a real estate seminar, like local seminar teaching, where you kind of learn the model and all that stuff. And so that was one of the kind of key things that gave me the confidence to do that. And then I think what happens, and this is probably with any investment or even any business, you know, we have that first one, you make that first like dollar, right? I remember specifically I met my first tenant, rented a house for me, like a Starbucks, and we went through like the lease agreement stuff and he paid a deposit, first month's rent and everything. I remember driving away from that, wow, this works.

So at that point, then your confidence builds. And then when it came to bigger stuff like the apartments, it was the same thing, right? Educating myself, going, reading every book I could find. Podcasts are like one of the biggest things. I'm, I'm a podcast junkie, honestly. But then again, finding the right person who could teach me, and especially in like bigger stuff like that, where it's like, wow, now you're in the big leads. That was when it was like, hey, I need a mentor. I have to have a mentor. Someone who's got battle scars, who's done this before. And you know, I Was fortunate to find mine, who's my partner now. But I think that's the biggest, the two biggest things there that gave me confidence. It was education and having a mentor. So.

Good. So how many people are you, Are you serving now? Like, were there, were there? Is that okay to share that? And just.

Yeah. So from a I mentioned, I kind of have two. We have two different types of customers, right. And so on one side we probably have a little about 100 to 200 clients that were like doing the education, coaching side of things. And then on the investment side, we have roughly maybe 1400 investors currently that invest with us are on our list and everything. And I say that just from like, that's the more direct customer that we're serving in that regard. But in another instance too, I mentioned, you know, because I'm in real estate and apartments, there are residents that live in our communities. We're serving too. Right. And those are folks that are our customers as well. And so, you know, our goal is not to be like, you know, the classic slum lord. Our goal is to like, hey, we're providing safe, clean, good housing for people because it's, you know, it's people's homes, right? It's where people live, it's where they put their head down at night. And our goal is to come in and operate properly. Well, right. And we're taking care of things in the property. In most instances we're renovating and we're doing things like, hey, we're making it nicer and putting new amenities in and hey, the property needs a new roof or hey, let's put a playground on there for the kids. So that's another largest set of customers or people that were, you know, essentially serving that. You know, honestly, I don't have a good number on that because, you know, it's a lot more folks. But we have, we have like 12,000 units right now in our portfolio. So probably a minimum, you know, in that number.

12,000 units?

Yeah.

My gosh, that is amazing.

It blows my mind sometimes that there's.

That'S amazing. Oh my gosh. And you have three types of customers then because you have the clients that you're coaching and then you have your investment clients and then you have the residents.

Yeah, I always leave out the residents sometimes because we're not as direct hand in hand with them, you know, because we have like property managers and other people that are like the day to day type of thing. But you forget, I personally sometimes forget that that's, that's a, that is a customer of ours that you're making an impact on.

Yeah. So if someone's listening and they're ready to do the thing in terms of investing, what, what would you recommend in terms of mindset or just strategy or whatever you're able to share at this point?

Would you? Yeah, I think from when it comes to, like, to an investment perspective, I think there's a couple of things. So from mindset wise, you have to really figure out like, what your sort of risk tolerance in your investment profile is. Most folks, what happens is, you know, we're, you know, if you kind of grew up in the traditional sort of system, right, you're always like, oh, I only know stocks, right, or my 401k at work or wherever, like that. And you really don't realize that there's this whole other world of stuff, right, that you could essentially like, invest in that are alternative things. Real estate's a big one. Like, and I mentioned various aspects. There can't be apartments, but there's houses and there's Airbnbs and mobile home parks and self storage, and then there's businesses, right. You can, you can invest and there's other things like crypto or oil and gas or other resources. I'm actually invested and I have a partner that we're in a vineyard here in Texas, which is really cool, really cool thing. But most folks don't realize that, that those are options. And so you kind of one have to break out of the mindset that there are these other things out there. And so that's one and then two. Like, they're all, they all have different qualities, right? They're all have different risk, you know, risk profiles. They all have different time horizons. They all require different amounts of starting capital or money to have. And so some of it's kind of looking at your situation and what fits, right? Not everyone can just jump to an apartment like we do. Like I said, maybe you got to start off with a house or maybe even smaller. Hey, maybe I'll do an Airbnb or I'll flip something or whatever, right? Or maybe you just gotta start saving, you know, and so you have funds to start doing something like that. So that's kind of the first kind of couple steps. And then I think the other aspect of, of that is just having sort of the emotional awareness of yourself, of how you will react in different investments. Because, you know, we always hear the term buy, buy low, sell high, right? But if you think about it, very rarely do we do that or do a lot of people do that. And the problem is, because, you know, when the world's burning down and you see the news and everything, like, hey, you know, things are bad, etc. Etc. It's. It's the Warren Buffett thing of, like, when there's blood in the streets, you know, is the best time to invest. The problem is when you're in the moment, it's very difficult to do because it's not the norm of other folks and you. And controlling your emotions of it type of thing. And so if, like, if you're the type of person that's just like, looking at your phone, looking at stock market all the time, right, there's probably some certain types of investments that are probably not just mentally healthy for you, you know, and so I think to circle back on that, it's going back to sort of knowing your internal compass and knowing your emotional strength and building that too, so that you can take advantage and be in the position where you are sort of at a. I think, if you follow this is. He didn't invent this, but Ed Milet's another guy. I love to follow, I'm sure YouTube as well. But he talks about equanimity, right? Having calmness and being able to, you know, when. When things are not going well or things are crazy around you, but having the calmness of mind to think and make logical intelligence decisions.

So, yeah, I was curious, too. It sounds like you were kind of going there with the Ed Mylett thing, but what. What is a way someone could build up their internal compass to be able to make these decisions for themselves?

Yeah, I think. I think the education thing, like I talked about, is huge because then you're at a point where you're like, you're way more comfortable, right? Because you have the knowledge about a certain subject. So, like, I. I keep referencing other people. So. So there's another person. So his name's Tom Wheelwright. You know, if you're interested in learning about how to be better with taxes, pay less tax legally and all that, he's like the foremost authority. But he. There's the analogy he uses where it's, hey, if I'm driving and I want to get in, like, one of those NASCAR cars and go 200 miles per hour around thing, probably a very risky activity, right? But you put someone like, I don't know who, you know, or like, the people now, but, you know, like a Danic Patrick or Jeff Gordon. I know that they probably don't race it anymore, but. Don't follow, but you Put something like that. And one of those things probably less risky, but it's all because, hey, they have the training, right? They've done this before, they have the experience. And so I think one of the things to be able to build that intestinal fortitude and that compass, to be able to react in those moments when things are not going, at least on the surface, aren't going the way that you think they should. If you've educated yourself and built that ahead of time so that you do have the knowledge of it, that's going to help a ton in having more confidence when you're zigging and everyone's egging.

Yeah. And I love, I love just how open you are to learning from others because it really speaks to that idea of when you keep your, your mind open, you know, to new things that you're really able to, to evolve so much quicker.

Yep, 100%.

So I, I interviewed someone actually, it was a while ago, but I love, I love this interview where he, we talked about a friend of his that was working a government job and he wanted to leave that job, but he wouldn't, you know, like, he just is miserable at the job. And then I asked, I asked the, it was actually the guy that runs my mastermind, which was funny because I'd never heard the story until the podcast interview. But I asked him like, what would get his friend to leave the job. And then he was like, well, I wouldn't even talk to him about leaving the job yet. I would have him build up his confidence doing other things, hiking a mountain or sailing a boat. And I, I love that idea of, for people that haven't really done the thing yet, you know, and like building confidence and other things that aren't even related. I was just curious if you had any thoughts on, just from like an investing standpoint.

Yeah. And I, I'll use my own story in that regard. So, you know, I mentioned I, I had the corporate job and I was doing that and I was doing these other real estate things on the side. And I tell people realistically, for a few years there I was working two full time jobs, in all honesty. And what's funny is like now I, now I tell folks, well, I actually probably worked more than I did then, as weird as that sounds. But it's totally different when you like really enjoy what you're doing. It doesn't feel like work. But I say that because I was doing that at the time. But that's what allowed me to build the confidence of, you know, when I Eventually I did step away from my corporate W2 to have that. Right. Cause I had already been doing it to a certain extent at the same time. So it was kind of a. That was one of the things that helped help me make that transition before doing the thing. Right. So that's one, I think the other thing that was helpful and I actually was. I was interviewing someone for a position an hour ago and this discussion came up. This particular individual works in, works in a college education system, very stable, very like, you know, type of thing. And you know, for us, we're a little more entrepreneurial. We're a small business. Right. And so that's one of her concerns is like making that jump type of thing. And I remember having the same situation for me, I said there. But one of the biggest things that I brought up and was personal for me was that I always knew I could go back too. Where it's like, hey, look, I'm gonna go do the thing. And I've prepared myself, right. I've been kind of doing the thing on the side for a little bit, right. And I'm gonna make this jump to kind of go full bore on it. But if things crash and burn, I can always go back. Like, there's nothing saying I can't go back to the same type of, you know, job I had. Right. There's nothing saying I can go find another job. I was confident enough in my own ability where I, I knew I could do that. And so that's where it was, you know, made it not as. That's what helped build confidence too as well.

Yeah, I love that. I, you know what, I don't know if I, if I have that in my, my tool belt yet. So that's really.

You can always go back.

Yeah, no, it's true. Right. Because you. I'm really working with do the thing. I'm trying to get people uncomfortable and out of their comfort zones. And it's hard to see people that really want to, but they won't. And it's true. Right. What's the worst that could happen? You just go back to what you were doing before. You don't need to continue on. And I feel like that kind of adds to that. A lot of times when people are doing something hard, they think it's going to be forever or they're going through something hard. But if you could just remember, like it is temporary, you know, like even if you think of a 12 step program where they're like one day at a time, that's literally something people can that mantra can be something in their life. So I think that can always go back is exactly what people need.

Yeah, yeah, you can always go back. And then even if you're going forward. So I like to think about things and like you always have different seasons of life, right? And sometimes it's just like, hey, there's a new season. And even if you are doing the same thing, it's, you know, we just talked about adjusting and pivoting and your business model changing. That's the case with everything. So there's just different seasons and so you, you know, it will change type of thing. And still I think part of it, part of it is knowing that, yeah, I can always go back and this, you know, but if may, this is a new season, you know, of my life, to be able to, to experience something new. And again, there's nothing saying, you know, what is it, you know, there's four seasons, right. And you know, maybe I'm going into summer or coming in winter. Well, he's at, I'm going into winter now, but it'll always be summer again, right? Eventually.

Totally. Yeah. I really like that. What do you think all the people that you work with? Because I'm thinking like between the high net worth individuals you're working with that are investing in your, your funds and then also the people that you're helping kind of do their own thing with investing. Would it. Is there any commonalities you've seen with them that help them move forward and keep going? Because there's a lot of people that can get stuck, right? Have you seen anything? It's really helpful.

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So one of the biggest things, at least I tell folks that we work with is that the aspect and hands down, even when we do surveys, the number one factor that helps people is other people and the networking aspect and talking to other folks and getting experiences. And I say that from like, say it's like one of the investor people, right? Talking to other investors, right? Talking to other people they can invest with. Just getting different viewpoints and different aspects of it. Hey, what are you doing? And hey, did you, did you invest in this? How did it go? Right? Did you invest with this person? How did it go? Hey, what's your thought processes on this? Or even people work with on the coaching side, like, and you know, they're talking to other people within our little ecosystem, they're talking to people outside of our ecosystem. And you never know when the next relationship is going to lead to. It could lead to the next. You know, deal that you do, it could lead to the next business partner that you do. And so that is probably one of the biggest things that I have seen with folks we work with that is impactful for them. It's actively like, hey, I need to get around and meet other people also trying to do the thing. And that will help me figure out. Figure out things for myself.

Yeah. It's so cool. And it kind of reminds me of where we've collided, you know, and met with that, that group that we just joined. And it's like I was reading through the introduction, so. And everyone in that group this morning, in my mind was like liter exploding with how amazing the people are in this group.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's. And you know, I mentioned. So I talked. I talked to one of the other folks that we met. Both met that I think you had. You mentioned you had on the podcast. And it's like, yeah, it turned out I met, I met her. She had done work in our space previously, honestly, for one of our competitors. Coincidentally not. She's great at what she does and I'm interested in working with her. Right. As an example. And that never would have happened if I'd, you know, just. That was out of my comfort zone going into that, you know, this mastermind that we both were in. And if I had never done that, I never would have met her and, you know, potentially could lead to, you know, us working together. Right. Which is pretty cool. You know, so totally.

It is so cool. So cool. I would love to hear. You've already shared so much good advice, Brent. But so, but I'm really curious, do you have, if you had one piece of advice that you could share with the listeners, what would it be for doing the thing?

Yeah. So I think the biggest thing we've talked about, adjustments and pivoting and stuff. I think the biggest thing for. To me, and I tell this to folks we're working with is, is self awareness. And you know, so Gary V. And I'm sure you follow, everyone knows, talks a lot about that where it's like having the self awareness to be able to look at yourself in the mirror and be honest and adjust. Right. And I say that from the standpoint of, you know, if you don't do that. Right. And we talked about, like being able to improve and grow and change. Right. It's very hard to do that unless you can, you know, it's great to like, get feedback from other people. Like we talked about where it's like, hey, you're listening to your Customers and doing that. But if you don't do that for yourself, right, you're never gonna actually, like, do the change. Right. Do the thing. So I think it's. I think it's. It's hard to do. Right. It's hard to develop that. And you're. It's always something that's like a work in progress, you know, for, for me. But if you can do that, that is one of the most powerful things that will help you and that will help you not only get better, but, you know, we talked about having the confidence or the, the ability to act when others are not or when the world's burning down and, you know, instead of being frozen, having self awareness in those instances and realize that's what you're doing is what's going to help a ton. So that'd be my biggest thing, is try to figure out a way to just develop that, develop that skill, develop that mindset.

Well, is there anything I didn't ask you that you wish I asked you?

No, I don't. I don't think so. I'm so thankful that you, you know, we got to chat. It was great, great seeing you again to be able to talk and everything.

Yeah, I know. I'm excited to see. See you hopefully at the next one. I, like I mentioned right before we started, I'm excited. I just signed up for the. The one that's coming up in February and then. Are you going to capcon too, in April?

Yeah, I will be. Yeah, I'll be there.

Okay, good. So I'm going there too. So that was the thing that really helped me the most last year when it was kind of at the perfect time.

So. Very cool. No, it's like we've been saying this whole discussion, right? Getting around other people, they're doing the thing. This is the biggest help.

So totally. Please share where people can learn more about you and the things that you're doing.

Yeah. So I'm on your usual social platforms. You know, at Brent Kawkami, it's just my name, but you know, the best way to reach me is I'm an email guy. I'm for better, for worse, the guy that lives in his inbox. So you can always shoot me an email. At Brent B R E N T. @brent think multifamily.com. so it's think, you know, like thinking multifamily.com. so, yep, that's the best rate of checkmate.

So good. And if you guys are driving, I will put it in the show notes. Did you not type it down right now. So thanks so much Brent for coming on. I really appreciate it.

Awesome. Thank you so much, Stacy. It was great.

Thanks for listening to the do the Thing podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. But even more, we hope you'll be inspired to do the Thing. Do you have a burning question on Doing the Thing that you'd like answered? How about an inspiring do the Thing story of your own that you'd like to share? We'd love to hear all about it. Just leave us a voice message at do the Thing callcast co or email us@helloothethingpodcast.com.