Birth to Net Worth with Chris Kirkman

Join us as we unravel our deep-rooted relationship with money, from earliest memories to eureka moments and building wealth. Birth to Net Worth with me, Trystan Trenberth. Good morning and welcome to another edition of Birth to Net Worth. Today we have another amazing guest, Chris Kirkman, uh, raised in and based in Southern California. And doesn't invest in his own state. He's a real estate investor, started out in single family, moved into self-storage, and now multifamily as well. He's also a great inspirer of people to take action and is now educating and mentoring people to, you know, get into their own business, get into their own areas of passion, and, and change their lives for the future. So welcome, Chris, thanks for joining us today.

Yeah, super excited to chat with you. And, uh, yeah, thanks for having me.

Of course. Well, I gave a little intro to you, but give me a little bit more of the background. Where— where we— I said you were raised in SoCal. I think I may have got that wrong, but, um, is it SoCal you were raised? Tell me a bit more.

It was, yeah, yeah. And if you— if everyone's familiar with Southern California, there's San Diego pretty much at the very bottom of the state. Um, right up against Mexico there. And then you have Orange County and then Los Angeles. So, uh, I'm from San Diego, lived there for 30 years, and now I've been up here in Orange County for about 10 years. So still Southern California, but, um, just a little up the coast from San Diego. So geographically just right under Los Angeles.

Fantastic. So let's, let's sort of move towards the, the first question, which is, is the common question, but tell me a little bit about your family background and You know, you got siblings. Tell me about your family situation.

Yeah, just one sister. My father and mother are fantastic. They both worked for the government. My dad actually became an elected judge, which was kind of cool. But I mean, we'll get into it. But I mean, he was an inspiration for me because he came from nothing and he made so much of himself and his life was pretty difficult along the way. And my mother was an educator herself. She was a teacher. Her whole, her whole life. And it's actually great because I have a couple kids, a couple small children. My boy just turned 3 and my daughter just turned 5. Actually, their, their, uh, birthdays are like a, a week apart. It's kind of funny how that works out because my sister and I, our birthdays are about a week apart as well. And, uh, it's awesome because my, you know, my mom being a teacher, she's so great with the kids, and my dad's great too. And they moved from San Diego up, uh, to Orange County, uh, a couple years ago, so they're, they're pretty close to us and the kids, and it's just great to have the whole family together. And my, my wife's family is up in Los Angeles, so they're pretty close. So very family-oriented, but, uh, I don't invest in my own state, and we'll kind of get into that a little bit. But, um, California is great for certain things, but I just don't buy properties here.

Got it. Fantastic. Yeah, my kids are 2 years and 6 days apart as well, so I—

wow—

and that as well. So, uh, But yeah, so, so let's, let's head into it, Chris. What was your first kind of memory or, or, you know, experience with money that really set your relationship with money and, and how you related to it moving forward?

Yeah, you know, I, I remember it, um, I was, I was really young. I forget what age I was, but there was, there was something I wanted to buy. You know, I had, I had an allowance, but I mean, it wasn't really an allowance. I had to do certain chores, you know, certain tasks around the house. So I got the concept of having to work for work for money and, and, you know, do certain things in order to get— in order to get that. And it wasn't a lot. Like, my, my parents did pretty well, um, but they didn't spoil me. I wasn't the kid that had every, you know, video game console growing up, or, um, you know, I only had one pair of shoes. You know, some kids had a lot of different shoes. Um, and, uh, anyway, so yeah, so I wanted to save up for this one toy. My parents wanted me to buy it. I didn't— you know, I mostly got presents, gifts, toys, anything I wanted only on my birthday or Christmas. So I'd always have to wait to get that one thing, or I'd have to earn it myself. So I just saved up a lot. It's this like walkie-talkie, as they, you know, like CB radio pretty much. It was like a watch combination. I had this big, big old antenna sticking out of this big old bulky thing you put on your wrist, but it was kind of cool. Really wanted it super, super bad. Maybe a friend of mine had it, so I had to save up really, you know, a long time to get it. I think it was only like $8 or $9, but back then, I mean, that was a lot of money. And also as a kid, I mean, that was even more money. So seemed like an eternity for me to save up, but I bought it. It was my own. I, I felt like, I mean, I bought this for myself. It was, it was kind of special to me.

And yeah, it's that feeling of accomplishment, isn't it? It's— you've had a goal, you, you've worked towards it, and you know intrinsically inside you the effort that you went to, to focus on that thing and You know, if we look in, in modern times of woo-woo to manifestation, you create the conditions for that, that to happen.

Absolutely.

So, um, you know, how did, how did you notice people around you, kids at school, you know, other kids, you know, was there that same sort of level of, um, assertion and intent to, you know, accomplish things like that? Did, were there other kids, or you mentioned shoes, you know, A lot of other kids maybe have had a lot of trainers and kicks and that type of stuff. I know that was a thing still these days, I think, as well. How did you— and I think in our younger days we compare or contrast ourselves a lot around things that we see, which are in the big picture very small things, but they can mean different things to different families. They could be compensation for lack of presence of parents and that type of thing in lives. You know, how did you observe yourself in contrast to other kids and people around you at that age?

Sure, absolutely, great question. So, you know, growing up here in Southern California, we got the surf, we got the skate, you know, skateboard culture, all that stuff, um, and then later on snowboarding I started getting really big into. But, you know, uh, all the cool kids and all that, they had, you know, skateboard shoes basically. So the first pair was like these Air Walks. They're not really around anymore, but they're so popular, uh, 30-something years ago. And, uh, yeah, yeah, super popular. But I already had my shoes, and my parents, you know, they didn't buy me a bunch of different pairs of shoes, so I had to kind of wait for my shoes to get worn out before I got this pair. And, um, it was— I felt like I was one of the cool kids at that point because I had those. And then, um, you know, you saw how all the kids would dress, and it Every year it would kind of change. Different styles and fads would come in, and I'd want to fit in and dress, you know, a certain way or buy something. I remember one year, it was kind of ridiculous looking back at it, but, you know, there were these t-shirts that had a hood. I mean, nobody would wear the hood, but it was like the style, and for some reason I wanted to wear that because all the— all the— all my friends and kids had those. So it was just like different things like that that I would kind of compare myself with them, but it wasn't necessarily money, but but money was, uh, money's what bought stuff. So I maybe I thought we didn't have as much money because we couldn't buy these things, and I wondered why all these kids were able to buy these things and, and have them. And, um, you know, video game consoles started getting big, you know, the big— the, the very first Nintendo was out, so I had that, but I didn't have all the different video games that were on it. I had friends that had way more than I did. Um, so my parents didn't really spoil me, even though they, they could have a bit more, but they really kind of showed me that I had to kind of work for work for things, and life wasn't about, you know, just collecting a bunch of possessions. But I still really compared myself with all these other people, and I, you know, I made sure that when a birthday or Christmas came around, I really asked my parents and Santa for like the biggest ticket, you know, item that was like the coolest thing, you know, so that like I really had to be really choosy and picky with what I wanted because it had to be, you know, that like the coolest thing, you know, like the thing that would make me, you know, feel like I was, you know, uh, would fit in the most, I guess. So there's, there's that, you know, just always trying to, you know, a lot of those clothing and, you know, possessions that other kids had that, that made you feel like you were, um, you know, you were worth something, you know.

So yeah, it's interesting that the sort of the pack analogy of, of wanting to fit in to the tribe and, and be alike in so many ways. And, you know, as I've you know, got through life. It's the uniqueness that is what we celebrate and look into these days. And, you know, I definitely relate to that. I remember there was a company that made wetsuits called Gull, and it was based in Cornwall. And all the other kids had, you know, not all, but a lot of the kids had Gull backpacks, and they were really cool-looking things. Unfortunately, they don't make the backpacks anymore, at least not like they used to. Because even when I went back a couple of years ago, I, I looked for them to see if they were there because I thought maybe my kids might appreciate that, or me even, just to get one now at, you know, 40-something, just to think that, oh, blast from the past, this would be a cool thing just to have as a memory almost, you know.

Yeah.

But yeah, so how, how do you now look back as a father and as an adult to how your parents worked with you in that way. I, I can see that maybe as a result of that, and I strongly lean towards that possibility, that them working with you in that way to set you up for not being spoiled, to appreciate the things that you did have, and to put some intention and effort into those things that you chose very carefully, particularly at Christmas and birthdays and that sort of thing. How has that manifested in your approach to life, maybe through your 20s, 30s? And I don't think you're in your 40s yet, are you, Chris?

I am. I just turned 40 this year, so I'm just now, now in that, in that realm. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, it's, it's made me appreciate all that a lot more. I mean, I definitely spoil my, my kids more than my parents did, but I try not to too much. You know, my, my kids have more than one pair of shoes. They outgrow them pretty quickly. But, you know, we, you know, we donate all the ones that they outgrow or give them to friends and family, you know, if they're still in good condition. But my boy doesn't keep them in good condition, so his don't really last that long. But, but yeah, I try to, I try to, you know, show them what money's worth. I, we just started this system and we're barely just kind of rolling this out now that they could really understand it. My daughter just turning 5, she's she's able to understand this a bit more. She has money that we've given her, um, and, uh, you know, she holds on to that and is kind of learning what that means. And we tell her how much things cost, um, you know, and, you know, she's kind of understanding what, what, what value money brings and, and what dollar amount buys you what. And we're starting this like chore sort of thing that I kind of grew up with where like, hey, you can earn some money by, um, by doing these things that— I mean, of course you want your kids to do, pick up after themselves and things like that, but those who have kids know it's easier said than done. Um, so we're trying to, you know, give them a little bit of that, and not just an incentive, but like they're going to feel like they're earning something, um, in order to, in order to, you know, make a purchase, in order to get some value. They're trading the dollars, uh, for something that's of value. You know, maybe my son wants this monster truck at the store, it's maybe $2 or something, you know. If he earned that from picking up his pile of monster trucks at home for X amount of days or weeks, he'll get the $2 and then he can go buy another monster truck. So different things like that. And I think, I think it's, it's really important to do that because we, we do intend to homeschool our children. There's a really good school nearby our house that they're in right now, but once they're kind of, um, you know, aged out of that and graduate, we will probably end up homeschooling them. So, um, you know, I want to really just kind of set up some, some really you know, the mode of us like teaching them some stuff that we really want them to learn that schools don't teach them. You know, when I was in school, we didn't really learn much about money and finances and accounting and any of that stuff. And I, I really think it's super important to, to do that because it's a real, it's a real world thing. And I, I intend to have them become, if they want, you know, I want them to achieve, you know, some really, really great things, but, you know, to still appreciate money. I don't want them to grow up spoiled.

I think that's super valuable because, you know, with us as a generation of parents that want to raise our kids differently than we were raised, by whatever that means— and everyone had a unique experience, but there are similarities— but I think, you know, I've observed maybe it's countrywide or country-wise versus my, you know, being raised in a different country of, you know, a lot of kids are just getting away with doing nothing to get things. It's almost like the everyone gets a certificate for turning up, they get whatever they want without any sort of contribution. And I think it's, you know, not to get into a political stand, but there's the— society needs contribution from different people and it needs different contributions and different people to make the world go round. And, you know, if people can understand that their contribution is valuable and understand that the evolution of their contribution through the, you know, the knowledge and growth of their creativity and their self-awareness can contribute in different ways, their value isn't now a time for money exchange. Now it's a value for return exchange on what they can contribute to somebody else that your son could have his sister tidy up for him, maybe, because she likes doing that. She wants to please him as a brother. And then he can give her a bit of money, which is less than he would get paid for getting the job done. And then maybe there's something he can do for her or another friend that pays him more. I was asking my kid to stuff envelopes for me for a mailing campaign, and I said, I don't care who does it. If you want to pay a friend to do it and pay them less money than I'm paying you, I'm happy for you to do that and you can outsource that. And just really, you know, she's, she's in her late teens now, but different from your kids, but just understand that the value that something might be more valuable for somebody else to do for a lower value of money where she can leverage her time to find the person that would do the job that she's asked to be in doing and delegate or outsource that to somebody else. So I think, you know, it is important to get that foundation of value in place. So that they can then contribute in a way that's meaningful and more meaningful to them in a return standpoint.

Yeah, absolutely. And you brought up so many great points there. And, um, you know, I'm, I'm kind of almost glad that I had— that we had our kids a little bit later in life because we've accomplished a lot more. Um, we, we value money a bit more. We're, we're way more financially stable. We're able to teach them a lot more stuff, more wisdom and all that. And, you know, in some ways I wish we had him sooner because we're definitely going to be a little bit older parents now that we're in our 40s. But anyway, yeah, so the thing is, I wanted to touch on the whole value thing, showing them that. So I did that as a kid. Sorry, it took me a moment to remember, but I remember doing this where It was Toys R Us that was having a sale on video games where you buy 2, you get the 3rd free. And I knew that a couple of my friends wanted this one game, so I bought— I think I wanted it too. I think I bought— I got 2 copies, got the 3rd for free, but I charged them a little bit less than full price, so they still got a discount, but I got my game pretty much for free. And, you know, they were able to, of course, get the game at a discount, but really they could have just bought it for a few dollars more. But I saw that whole way of almost— it's not quite the outsourcing thing, but just trying to be smart about how you might earn profit off of different things like that. So that's something that I like, that whole idea of, hey, if you if you do this chore for me, I'll pay you, um, I'll pay you a little bit for it. Um, you know, I'll have to, I'll have to kind of teach them about that when we, when we start doing a little bit more, a little bit more of that. Um, but, uh, but all that's, all that's really great.

Congratulations on your first wholesale transaction from Toby Trystan.

Yeah, you know, and it— I, uh, I, I, I did feel bad about it, kind of, which is weird. Um, but it's, it's because like I almost felt like I was— they were getting— probably because I, I got the free game, right? But I was, I was performing a service for them, I guess. I didn't really, I didn't, I didn't really realize it at the time because I always, uh, I always thought that, you know, people earn money a little bit more difficultly, like, um it was such a steal. I mean, like I said, like, I don't mean steal in a bad way. What I mean is like, the profit was so great that I got this free game that I didn't have to— like, I, I didn't really have to pay for it, you know.

I—

but I, you know, I paid like the difference of what their savings was, um, on the game. So it's— it was, it was kind of— I just, I never really felt that way before. And I felt like, oh my, I'm getting this for free. Like, I'm really profiting on this. This is kind of incredible. But later on in life, I really learned that trading dollars— I've been trading time for dollars— is not necessarily the right, you know, the best way to go. And of course, people that have to work at a post where they are performing a task for hours and all that, that I could see how, um, you know, working at a cash register or something like that, that could be traded for, you know, time, you know, the dollars for time. But other services and things like that, 100% should not be, um, should not be based off of, uh, you shouldn't be paid by the time you put into it. Should be— you should be paid by value. And that's the stuff I want to— I want to teach my kids because I don't want them to get sucked into careers or, um, anything where they're earning, earning a living off of, you know, trading time for, for, uh, for dollars, because you get limited that way. And I want to teach them that there's really not a lot of limits. You could, you could do so much by, by just providing more and more value, and you could provide endless value and, and earn quite a bit. Um, so all that, all that's really important, and, uh I mean, that— those are just huge lessons that I want them to, to, to have.

How much have you seen your value increase by seeing your own value increase? And by that I ask, how much of the value of you that is seen and perceived by others is shifted by your own increase of self-value and self-worth in the sense of your knowledge, your experience? Because this is really what we're trying to invoke with children is that when you go through life and you learn these skills or acquire this knowledge and can take action with it, your, your value goes up in certain areas. Now, I'm never going to be a professional ice skater, I realize that, but in real estate I can coach, and in business I can consult for equity, I can bring value, I can structure deals, I cannot offer ways to do transactions that many other people wouldn't consider of doing to provide value and tax benefits and other things which many others wouldn't consider. How has that changed in your view? And because this is really what you're describing to me about your kids, and at what point in life did you— were you ever in a W-2 situation, you transitioned into the real estate side of things, or were you already always an entrepreneur? And where did that kind of time for money versus value versus return shit come in your, your perspective?

Yeah, I have so much to say about that. Um, you know, part of it is I— going back to feeling like I'm, I'm just like, really, am I, am I doing things right? Am I, am I cheating the system or something like that? It came down to when it came, when it came to taxes. So something that I meant to mention earlier is, I mean, as a business owner, as a real estate investor, you're, you're providing you know, you're providing a service for the economy. You're actually contributing a lot to the economy, way more than a W-2 employee, because you're providing either housing for, for, uh, for people that's affordable, or as a business owner, you're actually providing more jobs. You're providing people, um, the means to actually be taxed. So the government likes that. They like people that make these jobs, make these big companies where there's people paying a lot of taxes. They actually earn more. For me, uh, you know, providing those jobs for people than if they were to just tax me. So that's why business owners are taxed way less. That's why I could write so much stuff off. That's why I have all these tax benefits. And as a real estate investor, by providing affordable housing and all that, I mean, I'm also contributing to the economy. So I— you're able to, you know, that's how investors and business owners and all that, they're able to virtually pay almost no taxes because of that. And people get so upset about it, but they don't they miss out that you're actually contributing so much to the economy, and it's the value you're actually providing. You're providing more value than the average person that's just, you know, earning their— they're, they're contributing to the economy by doing what they're doing. They're, you know, even working at a grocery store, you're helping, you know, the, you know, the local people be able to buy groceries. So everyone is contributing, but like owning a business, you're providing jobs. Owning real estate, providing housing. So that just goes a lot further. And, you know, growing up, I had all these odd jobs. We can kind of get into more of my past, but I was doing like pressure washing. I always found these different areas for me to earn money beyond, you know, selling video games to friends for a profit. I do like pressure washing for this landlord guy. He owned a bunch of houses. I would earn quite a bit of money just, you know, cleaning these houses. And by doing it not for an hourly rate, but for like a flat fee, I could get ultra efficient and really good at it. And do tons of it, you know, in a short period of time because I got better at it. So it's like the better I get, you know, the more I could actually earn if I'm just, you know, providing all this value. If it takes me 2 hours and I'm charging the same, you know, it doesn't matter. I'm still providing the same value. If it takes me 10 minutes, still doing the same thing, maybe I'm not going to do it as well. But if I do do it as well in the 10 minutes as if I were to do it 2 hours, still providing the same value, still getting paid the same. So I took that into my career. Now, I was— I went to school actually more than 20 years ago now, for graphic design. I was always artistic, design kind of came natural after that, did a lot of oil painting growing up. And, you know, I, we didn't have really product design or user experience design, which I ended up doing. But, you know, it was graphic design, web design, all that stuff. And the web was kind of, kind of newer back then. And, you know, so I designed like, you know, magazines, brochures, catalogs, and I designed websites. So got into that, then I started designing software apps, all that stuff for a lot of big companies later on in my career. And I found that, you know, a lot of this, uh, you know, you don't have to limit yourself by just working that W-2 job, or even if it's a 1099, like the 9 to 5, like why limit yourself to that, that amount of time? So I started doing this thing, like I living 90 days per month basically, like I could fit a lot more into my day, a lot more into my life by, you know, I could work in the morning, I could work in the evening, the weekends. So I would take these like side gigs, and if people I don't know if people use Craigslist anymore, but it was the only place to find these, these, these gigs. So I would take on these side projects designing people websites and all that, you know. People couldn't hire someone full-time, they just needed like a quick website or a brochure. I did tons of logo designs, um, you know, take these side projects on, and, um, it didn't affect my day job whatsoever. It actually made me better at it because I ended up having more experience because of my 90 days per month. So if I have 3 days And one day, you know, I'm taking on all this extra work. I'm actually better. I have more experience because I've done a lot more. My portfolio exploded because I had all these side projects. So for someone early on in my career, I already had a huge portfolio. So I saw that. I'm like, wow, this is kind of cool. So I could take that into 1099 jobs or even W-2s. You could stack those, especially work from home situations if you're providing the same value., you know, doing a good job, you could stack those two. Um, so I, I ultimately ended up doing, you know, things like that. You could earn a lot. And I, I saw like, wow, I mean, I'm providing value, I'm still getting— I'm like getting promoted, I'm— people love the work I'm doing. Um, and, uh, you know, all that is like, it's just learn efficiency. And I, I did this thing called, uh, well, there's the 80/20 principle, which a lot of people are, are familiar with, and it's, it's where, you know, 80% of the results come from 20% of the output. So what if your— what if your 80% of, you know, the results are as good as other people's 100%, or at least passable? That's just 20%. So you have 5 of those. So that could be spending more time with your kids, that could be, you know, taking on a project or taking, taking a class in painting or, or pottery if you want to learn how to— like, doing other things in life. It doesn't have to just be work, but you could do more work, you could do more, you could fit more. That could— your earning potential grows, basically. And it's not just about money, but you're earning other riches in life. And that could be riches through spending more valuable time with your family that you would otherwise be sitting at a desk, um, earning less doing. So, um, provide more for your family, have a more enriched life just by being more efficient that way. Uh, so I, I just learned how to just stack all those 20s, you know, um, those 20% up to, you know, 100%, and just That's how I'm able to do so much. And it grew my plate. I mean, a lot of people say, you have so much on your plate, how do you handle it? I'm like, well, my plate's just bigger than most people's. It's not like I have too much on my plate, my plate's just bigger. And you learn how to grow that plate by becoming more efficient. And, you know, I wanna teach my kids that. I want them to understand that like, you don't have to be confined to that 9 to 5. You don't have to be confined to just certain hours you can work in the day. You could do a lot more. You know, start that business. You could, you know, sure, you might not earn anything for the first year or something, but your earning potential grows so much more if you put the hard work in and, and, and really grow that business, you know, and you're providing value at that point. You know, people get upset by these business owners making so much profit and all that, but look at the value they're providing. They're the ones that made nothing for years. They're the ones that had those late nights, that made those sacrifices to make the business what it is. So yeah, let them sit on their yacht. Let them, you know, sipping Mai Tais on the beach. You know, just, it's, it's just perspective, and people just don't understand it. And a lot of the time, they're just not willing to put the work in. So another thing is, I don't take advice from people that haven't done it themselves. So there's a lot of naysayers, a lot of people that are against all this stuff, and I'll probably get some flack from some people watching this right now. But, um, you know, you just, you just gotta have, you know, you gotta shift your mindset. And a lot of my education, um, a lot of the education I put out. I mean, I, I, you know, the coaching I do, the, you know, all, all the stuff I put out, courses, you know, I haven't done the most. I, I'm not the smartest person out there, but what I do, um, for others is I, I get— I show them how to get started. I motivate them, uh, you know, I, I, I inspire them to take action because I'm a huge action taker. A lot of people, they might go through a coaching program, a course, you know, they learn all this stuff. This really ties into real estate or, you know, business. They learn all this stuff, but they're like, I, I don't know where to get started. Like, I, I don't know if I'm, um, underwriting this property properly. I kind of know how to do it, but is the numbers right? Or like, where do I find private money to invest in my thing? It's like all those different things. So I basically sit with people and hold their hand through the process and inspire them to get started. And I'm there with them walking them through the process. And I'm not the most qualified or accomplished person who's ever done this, but I have the ability to, to inspire people because I know, I know how to trade, um, you know, value for, for the dollars. And I show people how to do that themselves. And it just—

you—

the first step is taking that first step. And I, I know that's a lot to, to kind of take in, but, um, in essence, that's kind of how, how I've seen how, um, you know, you could really trade, trade a lot of value for, for dollars. And, you know, a lot of people just don't have that mindset. It comes down to just having a shift in that. And, uh, that's—

yeah.

Yeah, I think that, you know, so many people have seen it successful, they make a lot of money suddenly in the public eye, but it's— they've been under a shell for 10 years working. They're a 20-year overnight success because they didn't share the successes with people. I feel in a similar way. I had a conversation a couple of weeks ago in California, and I was talking to somebody, and, you know, I'm not very vocal about, you know, what I'm doing necessarily. Um, and it's almost, uh, an imposter syndrome of, do I want to put things on social media? Probably not. But it's kind of unfair for me not to inspire others. I'm realizing to not share the accomplishments— again, not the most successful, not the highest volume of deals or, you know, revenue, whatever those things are— but from somebody that's come through divorce, child support, all of those types of things self-limiting beliefs, all of these types of things in my midlife. You know, like my, my platform is Midlife to Millions. It's, it's my, it's my, my job to really inspire others that have been through similar or dissimilar situations, to inspire them that it's not too late to take action. It's not the fact that they haven't got to that horizon, which is always moving. They're never going to get to that horizon that they think the dream's never attainable. But to find out there's a dream a lot closer with inspired focused action, even if it's just small steps. The compounding of me losing 70 pounds since December, it wasn't an overnight thing that, oh wow, I woke up this morning a lot lighter. It was intention over a period of time. Days where I didn't stick to my, you know, my calorific reduction or whatever it was, I went over a little bit, fluctuated here and there. But it was the overall actions that took me to that place. And it works the same in business, finance, and everything else. It's just understanding what is the goal. And we can often attain that goal a lot sooner than we anticipate because it's, it's unreal and unrealizable to us until we start on the path. And then we see the changes, the compounding. And then we look at the 80% of, well, the fact that I've been to the gym 3 times a week isn't really the biggest reason I've shed weight. It's been part of it. But the diet has been the biggest thing and adding cardio and the other sort of fitness that comes along with the health. Same in business. It's yes, I might be working a day job, but I can do a little bit here. And like you said, by doing those things outside of your day job or your main job, you're more focused on your day job when you were there to be able to be focused on those other areas, which is why you can stack those 20% 20 cents in 3 or 4 different places to create another 80%, which is an 80% of 4 places instead of just 1, to now result in exponential results that don't necessarily add up to the normal person's distracted vision of, well, I can only do this one thing and be confronted by the fact they're not focused and they're not intentional about where they're going and where they've been. And realize that it's disempowering to them to be in that position.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I love, I love watching your journey with that. And as I've gotten to know you, I've— it's great that you put all that on social media. I mean, you're, you're definitely an action taker. And that's, that's what I love seeing. You know, the theme for my— for this year, I have 3 words: discipline, consistency, and resilience. And I have that— I made— I created a background on my phone. And that's what I look at every time I unlock my phone. And it's a reminder. And the first video I shot of the year that I put on social was just realizing that that was the theme for this year. And that's been the theme that's gotten me really anywhere. And you just got to do that. I had that imposter syndrome about, you know, coaching, about, you know, posting stuff on social, all that stuff. But really, that's what's been the most inspiration for people. You know, I feel weird about it. I'm like, am I bragging about this? Am I? But people, they cheer me on, you know, they get something out of it. They message me like, oh, I needed to see that.

Or do you have a great point?

Like all these different things.. And it's, it's, it's great to see that. And by people seeing that tremendous weight loss that you had, I mean, that's, that's a ton of inspiration. And, uh, you know, it's, it's really, really great that you put that out there.

And, and that's going to be part of my Midlife to Millions platform, is not just wealth but the health that goes along with the clearing your mind and clearing— because the running, I know my body can probably run a half marathon. I just registered a couple of days ago to do the Tempe Half Marathon Trystan Trenberth.

Never done one before.

I'd never run 5 miles in a row until 2 or 3 weeks ago, but I've committed. And it's training this, not my body. My body will follow the mind. Obviously, I'm not going to try and run 26 miles just, you know, this afternoon, but my body is capable of it through that compounding process and getting to that point where I'm physically, mentally, and emotionally prepared for doing the task, whether that's running running a business, coaching, and anything else. And I'm preparing to do a series of social media of what went wrong, the deals that didn't turn out as I anticipated. $20,000 that I lost on a loan last year, my friend foreclosed on it from a hard money company. You know, the squatters that we had to remove from a property that we wholesaled, which was my first deal. And because the builders that bought the land didn't start building quick enough, the squatters moved back and Unfortunately, it was their problem at that point. But I've got a series of stories that I'm now going to put out there, what went wrong, because these are relatable to the people that don't look at these gurus and influencers that everything's going right and everything should be perfect.

So, wow, what am I doing wrong that it's not going anywhere? Because these are the things that hold people back from taking action is that, wow, my first step didn't go right. And we need to understand that success is, is the journey itself and continuing in spite of failures. And despite failures, like Edison, if he hadn't bothered to do more than, you know, a thousand iterations of a light bulb, we'd be sitting in front of a computer screen right now, quite honestly. The technology that's developed as a result of light as a bulb, as he persisted doing His perspective was, well, I just learned another way that it didn't work, so now we don't need to try that again.

Now I can try another way that may work, it may not work, but we'll learn something in that step that is either going to be a success or a failure in the big story, but a success because we've learned something else along the way. There are those things that you can relate to through your business and career that, you know, were confronting at first, but then you lent into the failures or you know, the learning lessons along the way, the experiences to, you know, generate more of a leaning into success.

Yeah, you know, and I absolutely— I've, I've had so many failures and I'm not afraid to, to talk about them, and, and I'm kind of proud of them in, in ways where it, it shows that I actually, actually took action. I tried something, you know. There's, there's failures where you might not be proud of it if it's like you didn't learn the third time around and you kept going, but if what I'm getting at is like, if you learn from a failure and you're not repeating it, you know, over and over again, um, you know, that's, that's powerful. That's, that's how you actually put stuff to practice. That's how— I mean, your first steps as a baby, like, you fell over a few times, you failed, right? So you get back up, you keep trying, you learn how to walk. Um, then you learn how to, you know, go from that crawl, crawl, walk, run sort of approach. You're not running right as you start walking. So I mean, you gotta, you gotta learn. You gotta fail a few times, fall over a few times. And I've fallen over a lot, and that's how I learned how to do stuff. And that's partially what I want to, want to show others, is that it's okay to do that. And I don't want to work with people that have not failed. Like, if someone has a perfect track record and has— doesn't have any failures to talk about, um, I mean, even the most successful people have failed quite a bit too. It made them who they are. Uh, and, you know, people that don't have those failures, they, they're not trying. So I, I try to, you know, even people that I coach, it's like, hey, learn, learn from my failures. Like, part of working with me is not going to empower you to, to get started and actually get way more accomplished in a year than you'll be able to do alone, or, you know, than you ever thought you'll be able to do. It's, it's like, you're going to learn from my failures because I've failed a ton. I've done a lot of stuff that just did not pan out, and I learned from it, and I picked things up, and I got started and, and took things to the next level, way beyond, um, you know, where I would have, uh, ever, ever been able to take things if I, if I didn't have those failures. And a failure from a different business is going to help me in a completely unrelated business. You know, I, I, uh, because I'm weird like it, I started a random— I started a food truck, and, uh, I didn't know anything about it. I was— I was— I had a— I had a good friend of mine that needed, you know, some work. Uh, he wasn't really doing much. I had all the time in the world, and, uh, and, uh, you know, he, he kind of wanted to do it. And I'm like, oh, it's kind of cool. Um, and I could finance it and I could run the business and he'll just run the operations in the day-to-day. Um, so before, I mean, I didn't know how to— I didn't know any— the health code stuff. I knew nothing about that, so I had to navigate that with the county. And I'm in California, so stuff is way more rigid here. So I'm dealing with one of the most difficult counties, um, out here in Orange County. So deal with the health department, get all the stuff approved. First I had to buy a food truck, um, and then make sure it was, you know, you know, up to operational order and clean and all this stuff, get all the approvals. And it just took forever. Um, and then I had to find bookings, like where the heck are we going to sell stuff that's going to allow us to even run this thing. So before we even opened our doors, I had like, I think it was like 8 months worth of bookings and that's like 1 or 2 per day. That's like at least like a lunch and dinner, you know, office apartments or a fest. Like I was getting— we hadn't even started and I was already getting like festival, like tens of thousands of people at these events getting bookings for that because I really had good marketing. I had a good website already doing social before opening our doors, had the menu, had the photos, all that stuff just ready to go. Um, and, uh, it's that resilience. And just like, you know, I failed a lot along the way, you know, I did a lot wrong, I learned a lot from it, but I didn't get discouraged and just, and just walk away from it. And the person, the friend of mine that was supposed to just basically— I set everything up for him, just run the truck, you know, I'll help you hire personnel to run it with you. We had all these shifts worked out, all these different people employed by us, but he just ended up not being able to handle it. So I, I had to do it all, and I, I was doing this on top of multiple full-time jobs and some consulting stuff too. So nights, weekends, I was doing this, you know, loading stuff up, going to, you know, Grocery Outlet, getting all the stuff, uh, you know, taking it, just like doing this all, um, you know, from, you know, and I was failing like, like crazy doing all— but I, I would pick things up and I'd learn how to, how to do it right, and then, and just, I, I never I never quit. So this went on for months and months and months, and then I decided to sell the truck. I'd already established it. I had a website. I had, you know, all sorts of stuff established. So I ended up being able to sell the truck for, you know, a little bit of a profit. And coming away from that business, I take away all these different failures from the completely unrelated business. You know, I do a lot of real estate investing, so I was able to pull some of that out. And, you know, I learned a lot from it just about business, about just working with people, hiring staff, all sorts of different things. So it's like no matter what business you're, you're, you're getting into, no matter what unrelated, um, you know, occurrence in life that you think you're failing, and you could take that into, um, you could pull that into what you're doing. And people, people have, uh, you know, failures in even sports and different things like that. They learn things from, from athletics and all that too, and they pull that into, you know, a lot of us just like discipline and different things. So every, every failure in life, you could, you could take that into, into business or really anything you're doing. And, you know, really the failures, you know, they made me who I am.

Fantastic. I mean, I know you mentioned discipline was one of your keys for this year. For me, collaboration, finding the right collaborators, cutting down the number of projects that I'm working on, finding complementary collaborators instead of people that do the similar things that I've done, you know, 2, 3 years ago when I started out as relating with people that were more visionaries and, you know, creatives, but there wasn't an alliance possible because we did similar things. And, you know, it's finding collaborators that contrast what my skills and my, uh, experience is to be able to collaborate more effectively and more productively. And, you know, again, create more systems and delegate more. Um, you know, coaching is on the, on the the list for this year as well, setting up this platform, just starting out with that and just empowering my knowledge and sharing. You know, I think I might do like a Failure Friday, you know, piece of content each week, just do a short form, maybe do a little longer on, on YouTube, that sort of thing, and just divide my time into more, more— I, I've kind of done time blocking, but it hasn't been structured around certain parts of businesses that I have. Obviously you myself, but many people have multiple businesses. But to be more structured in, right, Monday morning is going to be XYZ LLC, that's going to be the focus. And when I need to do something for one business over, you know, 3 days a week, I'll do, you know, 3 days a week, couple of hours, just break things up a little bit more. Again, comes into that discipline, you know, it's the compounding of things over time, building the, building the brand, building the reputation of whatever it is that I'm working on or launching or just building, building deeper to a point. Maybe I exit that at some point. Maybe it's just, you know, a continuation of the business and pivoting, but bringing consistent value to people in a certain particular area. So I love what you're— what you've shared. It's really, really inspiring to hear your journey. Where is your journey currently? And, you know, what is your prime focus? I know you're investing out of state, you're traveling. I think next week you said to Arkansas for a particular property. Where are you now and what are your focuses?

Yeah, so I mean, I talked about a lot of other businesses and, you know, I love investing in real estate for a lot of reasons. I mean, it pays you 5 different ways, it has tons of tax benefits, and it's just super rewarding. It's great for dealing with inflation. It's great for multiplying your money. It outperforms the stock market. Um, there's a lot of different things you could do, and you could drastically outperform the stock market if you're really smart with it. Um, and, you know, I started out single family but hit limits. I'm like, there's only so much I could do with this. And I was using my own money. I was earning hundreds of thousands of dollars, but like, I, I ran into— I hit a wall. I'm like, okay, sure, I'm earning a lot, but it's going to take me forever to, to scale to where I want to scale to. I'm just going to be making a little bit per month off of each of these single families. I was doing the BRRRR method, which you basically renovate the thing and make it a bigger, you know, rentable home. You're able to refinance it, pull all your money out, rent it for more, of course, because you maybe added another bedroom and bathroom, you know, different things like that. So I was doing that, you know, getting pretty much houses— I got the house for free that I first did that with because of that, which is great. But if you do that and keep recycling it you still scale at a smaller rate. And if you use your own money, you're scaling at a smaller rate too. So I learned about OPM, other people's money. So I started working with investors, and I found commercial loans. I found, you know, other types of loans that were not just the normal type of loan that I would get for myself, you know, like, like I bought my house here for, you know, normal loan, um, you know, these, these loans, you know, for people that were kind of doing what I wanted to do and scaling. So I got into duplexes than triplexes than apartments. I still love apartments, but I see that self-storage has a lot more benefits to it. And these are garages and there's no toilets or kitchen fires to deal with, as I say. So I love self-storage for a lot of reasons. It's got the lowest default rate out of other sectors. It's good in any economy, recession resilient, returns are So, so good, especially compared to apartments. Low CapEx, capital expenditures, doesn't take a lot to fix up. Like I said, no toilets, don't have to do any painting, don't change carpet on turnover. These are garages, tenant laws are way different. So I mean, all these pluses, I could go on forever about storage. I love storage. But yeah, that's where I'm at. And what I'm doing is I'm expanding quite a bit. And I'm also educating others while I'm, while I'm doing that. And it's not just in storage I'm educating, we could talk about that in a second. But, um, you know, I, I do have my own property management company that'll manage my properties. I have a capital company that'll buy my properties, forming a private equity fund as well to fund some of those separately. I'll JV with a lot of people that'll bring me deals. I'm kind of growing my, uh, you know, stack of investors that I love, you know, kind of working with. But the thing is, like, with investors, I'm providing them with really good passive income. And it's through my failures, it's through my, my taking action that I'm able to do that. Because I wasn't afraid to take on that apartment where I did a full gut job, every single unit, did common areas, evict— you know, well, I didn't evict, but I, you know, legally got rid of everybody and had to rent the whole thing up. Um, so, you know, I do the hard stuff because it makes me, makes me stronger. And, you know, through these little failures, it makes me even more stronger because I've been there, I've done that. So I'm able to take on these deals. And now, because I've failed, because I've gotten experience, I could do these much more lucrative value-add projects where I could grab a storage facility or apartments or whatever. I could fix them up, or with the storage, if I plan to expand, build more. I gained all this experience and it allows investors to earn even more. The returns are much greater. It takes a little more time, especially when you have value-add. It could take about a year to get returns. But if you look at the exit and the multiplier, You know, the cash flow is way better. You more than make up for it. You're not waiting 10 years to double your money. You're doing that in a matter of sometimes 3 years or less. But yeah, so that's kind of what I'm about. You know, I do a lot of storage. I have a storage brand, StorePlus, that I'm using for my storage facilities to expand to. I am going to Arkansas. We're grabbing another facility out there. I've never been to Arkansas. I've been to most states, but but probably not Arkansas. Maybe I drove through a corner of it sometime going from one state to the other, but never really stopped there. Um, it's Hot Springs we're going to, really beautiful area. So looking forward to that. Um, grabbing some other facilities in Texas. I mean, I invest everywhere— Michigan. Um, but I don't really invest in California, and I live here, I love it here, don't, you know, like certain aspects of it. And part of that is just properties are really tough here. You know, the government makes things really difficult, uh, when it comes to being not only landlord but construction. I've done, I've done flips here though. I've done that, some construction too, but I won't, won't own rentals here. Um, I love going to states that are a lot more friendly to investors, so that's, that's typically what I'll target. Um, but really, yeah, I'll invest anywhere. Um, and, uh, you know, I just, I just love working with others and providing a good return on, on some of these investments. Um, and, and just everybody wins from these. And, uh, another thing I like to do is, is you know, I, I'm an action taker. I help people take action, and, uh, and I, I try to empower people through my coaching and my courses. And I, I did have the imposter syndrome, but I, uh, you know, at first, but I realized that, I mean, people, people are actually, you know, getting something out of this. I mean, I, you know, one guy that I'm working with, I mean, we got two, we got two properties after like a week. Um, you know, we're able to get, get, get offers accepted on that, you know, and just working together on it, just going through the formula that I developed. Um, so I mean, it's proving to, to have results, and I'm, I'm learning to, to be okay with knowing that I have a pretty good formula and, and others can benefit from it. And it's not all just me, you know, like, I, I'll give you the mindset, the tools, and, and all that, but everybody's putting work into it. And by other, you know, seeing others put the work into it, using some of the systems I've developed— I mean, I, I developed like an underwriting calculator, people could underwrite deals and in 90 seconds or less. So I simplified the process, taught people how to do it, you know, and people that are much smarter than me probably are landing deals quicker than I ever could. And, you know, it's just great seeing people have success through some of the stuff that I came up with just based on my own failures and based on all the education that I've done. I mean, I love love just trying to, to, you know, stay on top of education, reading a lot of audiobooks. I mean, listen to a lot of audiobooks, listen to podcasts, um, you know, all that's super crucial. And you can never, you can never learn too much. And, you know, I have coaches, I have a business coach, I've joined mentorships, um, and as, as one myself, I think it's important for me to continue to grow. So as I grow, everybody else benefits too. So You know, I just, I love giving back. I love just seeing people, you know, really, really succeed. And it just, it's awesome. I just want everybody to win, you know? And everybody can. I mean, I know they can. And, you know, part of it's just thinking differently and putting the work into it and being resilient and being disciplined. You know, I wasn't always a very disciplined person. What really helped is waking up at 5 AM, you know, every single day, even weekends, even on vacation sometimes. You know, if you could do that, you could pretty much do anything. And it's, it's terrible.

It's brutal.

I was not a morning person, but I get hours to myself where nobody's bothering me. I could really ease into my day, but tackle emails and get, you know, caught up on things. But I'm also doing a hard thing that I couldn't do before, and I'm doing it consistently. You know, that consistency is another thing that really, really can help you succeed. So it's helped me in every aspect of business, you know, by being consistent and putting the work in and having some form of discipline and being able to take on these challenges and not give up. And that's, that's really what, what I'm about and what I try to try to empower others to be able to do themselves.

Fantastic. So tell me 3 books that you read earlier in your career that changed the beginning of your career?

Well, you know, a lot of people, they'll say Rich Dad Poor Dad, and that actually was instrumental. Reading it again later on, I, I, you know, it, it's like, oh, okay, I remember it differently because it was more impactful the first time I read it. And it, it's really inspiring and it helps shape, you know, your focus, um, I mean, your, your mindset really, and, and think of things a little bit differently. And that really just— it— I wanted to get into real estate really bad, you know, for years. Been doing this almost 10 years. And, um, it, uh, it really just made me just shift how I think about things, and it like empowered me almost to, to be able to just finally take that leap and to, to just go after it. And, uh, you know, there's that Um, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, uh, I think that's— yeah, that's what it's called. I need to reread that. That was really instrumental. Um, and then, uh, Think and Get Rich is, is a really, really good one. Um, or is it Think and Grow Rich? See, I'm— I, I have learning disabilities. I have ADD, so, um, I forget the name of, of stuff, and, uh, overcoming that is, is another, another superpower. I think if people that overcome any sort of, uh, disability or anything, you know, makes them stronger. But, um, but anyway, yeah, so those, those are 3 books that, that were really— I mean, they're not— I mean, Rich Dad Poor Dad's real estate related, but all these books can be applied to, to any business or any type of, any type of thing that you're, you're into. Um, and, uh, Yeah, it's, it's— reading is, is so important. And if you're not a reader, listen to an audiobook. You're stuck in the car driving somewhere, put an audiobook on. You're at the gym, put an audiobook on. Out for a jog, put an audiobook on. And, uh, it— there's always ways to kind of get through, through this stuff. And this will, this will— you'll learn so much. I think one year I went through 80 audiobooks. It was crazy. Um, I can't do that anymore, but, um, it's— I learned so much that year, and that really really helped me, uh, get a lot further just by absorbing so much information.

Yeah. So what about— what are 3 books that you've read maybe in the last 3 months that have made a big impact in your current development?

Um, well, I mean, it— I wish they were a little bit more on, uh, general development, but, um, I— they're just self-storage books, you know. I, I'm a big fan of AJ Osborne. He's a friend, um, You know, I love the Self Storage Income platform that he has. It's great. Um, he put out a really good storage book. I mean, it really helps you learn a lot about it. Uh, reread that, that's really good. He put out a new, a new edition, so, so I went through that. Um, and really there's just, just different podcasts that I've kind of been going between. Um, I mean, podcasts like this are great to listen to and You know, I wish I've gone through more books, but I've kind of been in this hustle mode the last few months to try to accomplish my goals for the year. I wanted to— I started out wanting to get 4 storage facilities, and then, you know, I somehow shifted that to 10 by the end of the year, and I'm a little behind. So I'm trying to do it. But, you know, like, it's funny because they're all kind of falling into place, like, in my lap. Like, all of a sudden, it's like, we might get under contract like 6 this week. And it's like, oh my gosh, that's kind of crazy. So it's like just the work's kind of paying off. And a lot of it's because I read these books and, you know, it helps you just learn so much and to be able to, be able to put, put to practice, you know, all, all sorts of things from mindset to discipline to you can learn skills. You know, I learned about marketing from some books. You know, I'm having to market facility right now. So, uh, it's, it's— you can never read too many books.

Perfect. That's awesome. How, how do you go about reading a book and then implementing what you learn from the books? Because I went through a stage of reading a lot of books and I didn't necessarily implement what I was learning, but I can regurgitate that a lot of stuff to other people in seeing blind spots in others. How, how was there a point at which you may not have implemented things that you're reading and then realized, hey, hang on, Chris, I've got to start sitting down and actually going through what applies to me. Where can I apply that to my life and business? It's not making a difference. Was there a time— I hear the ADHD you're speaking of, but I don't hear that in the way that you've spoken to me in the whole of this conversation. You seem very focused and clear, and clearly it is a superpower.

Yeah, it's, it's a lot of practice to, to, to not, um, let that show through everything. And, um, you know, some of this preparation— I'm, I'm an Eagle Scout, so I'm all about being prepared. So before this podcast, you know, I tried to really think about what, what we might talk about. Um, but, uh, you know, I've actually done it where I was kind of go off on a tangent. You've probably seen that a few times, and that's the ADHD kind of, kind of shining through. Um, but yeah, as far as books go, like, I, I don't always take my own advice, and I think we all kind of do that. Um, but it allows me to, to fail and learn from it and be like, oh well, I did read about that in a book, why did I do, do the opposite? Um, so, but, but yeah, I mean, I could regurgitate it, you know, even in my own coaching, like, there's stuff I haven't even implemented myself, but I know it works, um, or I haven't had the chance to implement it and it's more applicable to someone else, but You know, it's, it's, it's— I've learned just so much from, from, from books to the point where I don't always use it right away. It might be years down the road. And now it's like, so I don't forget stuff, what I'll do is it takes me a little longer to get through audiobooks. I have to pause it sometimes. I got to relisten to it like, oh, what did he say? Oh, there's a list of 10 things. Oh, shoot. Or a book recommendation. Oh my gosh, okay, I gotta pause it. Okay, go to Audible, purchase. Okay, bam, I got 5 credits. Bam. Okay, cool, I could, I could buy those 3 books real quick. So I do a lot of that, and that helps me, you know, when I pause things, I'll be taking notes. Sometimes I'll email myself something, so I'll have a draft of an email with bullet points kind of in that draft, and then as I'm listening, I just pull that draft up and just start typing it in. And then that way I can email it to myself, and anywhere in the world I could check email. I could pull that back up if I want to look at it again, and I could title it what I want. I mean, there's note apps that are great that could do that. Um, I just maybe am not, uh, as high-tech as some others and use the latest tech on that. I just email myself. Um, and, uh, you know, I just think note-taking is kind of important. I don't do nearly enough of it. Um, but, uh, you know, very key points that I want to remember I definitely take notes of that, and it's vital for me to go back and reference that information because I don't want to have to reread that book to, you know, to try to get that. I'm not going to remember in an audiobook that at this particular place they talked about that. I mean, I would have to take a note of that, where that place was, where they talked about such and such. So might as well just write that down. So I do that. It just takes me longer to get through stuff because I got to pause it sometimes, listen to it a couple times to take note of like the really important stuff.

Yeah. So tell me a couple of books that you've listened over, you know, more than once at different times. I think you mentioned Rich Dad Poor Dad. You went through obviously at the beginning and we're a different person the next time we read it. There are different problems or different scenarios in life that are relatable that weren't relatable or we weren't aware of necessarily the first time we read these books. Are there a couple of books, you know, outside of Rich Dad Poor Dad, and what it was that you noticed the second time that you maybe didn't, you know, recognize the first time or weren't encountering the first time through?

Yeah, I mean, just looking at my Audible, I have, I have so many in my library here that I could kind of just rattle off. Um, oh, looks like my camera froze there for a second. Um, Yeah, um, let's take a look at, uh, yeah, some of the finished books that I have. I mean, there's a lot that I haven't even finished. Um, From Good to Great, uh, Good to Great's a really good one too. I learned a lot from that. I've gone— I'm on my second time, um, on that. Um, Rocket Fuel is really, really good. Um, I haven't gone through twice on that, but I, I intend to. That one's you're— that one's really, really good. Um, Think and Grow Rich. Um, I got it right, I said Get Rich last time, but Think and Grow Rich is, is great by Napoleon Hill. Gets so much out of that. I mean, there's some people that, uh, read that like every year, and I've— I haven't done that every year, but I'm on my third pass on it. Really, really good. Um, there's just— I mean, it was written decades and decades ago, but there's just— it's just so applicable right now. Um, that's, that's a really good one. Um, Die with Zero is a really good one too. Uh, that one's basically, um, it— you just gotta, you just gotta check it out. Um, really good. I mean, I, I could keep going on and on, and if anybody wants some book recommendations, I have a huge— I'm just scrolling and scrolling with my thumb here of ones that I finished, and it's just endless. There's just a lot of really good books, but those are some of my favorites right there that I filtered by. Um, so definitely can get a lot of that, but, uh, Think and Grow Rich is really good. Rich Dad Poor Dad, of course, is, is fantastic too.

So I think that it really is— it resonates with you and many others that just because you read a book once doesn't mean that you're done with the book, that there's other things that you can gain from the books that you didn't before. And, you know, you know, re-reading some of these— this content is, is important. I mean, one that I listened to, I think it was at the end of last year, was Outwitting the Devil. And it was the edition that Sharon Lecter had been a part of. Because Outwitting the Devil, as you may know, wasn't released during the life of the author. It was released afterwards because they were worried about backlash, because, you know, social values and dogma at the time. It was released, I think it was 10, 20 years ago now, and this was a re-release with Sharon interjecting with, with commentary and comments in the, in the book. And it was a really, really great read. And, you know, not necessarily business related specifically, but, you know, covered business and personal growth, and one that I'm definitely going to go back to again. Very much enjoyed that.

Um, yeah, that sounds great. I'm glad. I'm like I mentioned, probably I'll go into my Audible and I got some credits that are unused. I'll probably grab that one. That one sounds, sounds fantastic. And you're right about relistening to books because the first pass even if it's been years, you're at a different stage of life at that point. You know, you've learned a lot. Hopefully you've grown a lot. Like, I never want to be exactly where I am a year from now or even a month from now. Like, always continuously grow, um, and, and all that's important. So I know I'm already growing. So reread books that are impactful in your life. I mean, all that's like super, super important.

Yeah, I think Way of the Peaceful Warrior was one that I read kind of back to back earlier this year as well, which was a really great book. I really enjoyed that one. Also, Quiet Mind, Epic Life by Matthew Ferry. Ferry's dad, Mike Ferry, was a big real estate trainer, or is a big real estate trainer for agents. His dad was coached by Earl Nightingale, that was coached by Napoleon Hill. So great lineage there, and, you know, amazing, amazing perspective on life as well. So as we wrap up, Chris, What are you moving into in the future? You know, what are you looking for as far as assets now? Uh, what are you looking for in coaching clients? And, you know, how can people contact you? Obviously, we'll share your social contacts, etc., in the bio below. Um, but, you know, what are you looking for, you know, the next 6 months? Who are you looking for as coaching clients? And, and how, how can people reach you?

Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, just looking to continue to grow my real estate portfolio, you know, mostly storage, but going to get a little bit into hospitality as well, maybe some boutique hotels. I think the private equity fund I'm forming, Fund Number One at least, is going to handle additional sectors in addition to just self-storage. So getting more into that, probably still buy some apartments, but just trying to expand that and provide some really good investment opportunities for some some, some private investors, uh, you know, really good returns. I just want to be kind of known for the guy that's able to do that. Um, and, uh, yeah, I want to, I want to continue to help others, you know, get started and to kind of take stuff to the next level through my, my coaching and, you know, podcasts that I'm putting out that I'm, I'm working on recording right now. There's going to be some pretty notable guests on that too. Um, and, uh, you know, with that and my educational platform with coaching, with courses, all of that could be found at statingitreal.com. Um, just, it's kind of a play on words with, you know, from like real estate, stating it real. So you could check it all out there, links to everything I have out there, including a free course that I have. Everyone could kind of check that out. I got several lessons in that, including a free underwriting calculator, calculator that I'm giving away that I designed to really empower people to underwrite stuff simply in, in just in minutes. I got a tutorial video as well. So you can find me there, and I'm mostly on Instagram, so you just find me at Chris Kirkman, just @ChrisKirkman on that. I'm found on Twitter, but I don't tweet much there. Also, chriskirkman.com just has, you know, it's just a list of all the different, you know, a lot of different businesses I have and kind of keep up to date with what I'm working on. But yeah, I mean, give me a follow on Instagram and shoot me a message. Like, if you, if you watch this and got some got some value out of this podcast. I would love to connect with, with anybody if you have any questions. And, um, if you want to get started in real estate or anything that I talked about, I'd love to, love to, to answer any questions that you have and connect with you.

Fantastic. One more question just on the private equity fund. Is that going to be accredited investors only? What kind of investors are you looking to place capital with you?

Yeah, so, so I am creating multiple but this first one's probably going to be accredited investors only. But I will provide additional funds that will be— you don't have to be accredited for it. Of course, it's handled a little bit differently. Um, but yeah, I just, I just want to break down any barriers for people to be able to get started investing. So I'll do one accredited, another non-accredited. But I do have opportunities, uh, for investors that are not accredited too, uh, so people can message me for, for that as well.

Fantastic. It's been a joy having you on the call, Chris, and obviously getting to know you over the last few weeks has been incredible. A lot of mutual friends out there, and, and, you know, it's a small world, it's a big opportunity, and, you know, having collaborators and friends in the business, you know, outside of our own realms and beyond is, is amazing. So thank you so much for joining us. Check out the, uh, the links below., and please follow Chris. Find out what you can do to connect with him and see where you can collaborate with Chris and, and create some future success for you and your family. Just takes one generation to change the future of your legacy, and that starts with you. Your kids don't do what they tell you— what you tell them to do. They do what they see. So make sure you're showing them something great, and they'll, they'll surely grow into greatness. So thanks again, Chris. Have a wonderful day, and, uh, See you on the next edition of Birth to Net Worth. Thank you.

Thanks so much.

Thanks so much to Chris. Reading is such a big part of development, and that book list is underneath here. Reach out to Chris, take a look at his education program, and take some action. See you on the next edition of Birth to Net Worth.