Get Rich Education 583: "Getting Your Money to Work For You" is a Middle Class Trap
Keith reviews the state of the real estate market, noting that existing home sales are down about 33% from their 2021 peak, while prices remain firm due to low supply and high demand.
Affordability challenges are driven by stagnant wages, inflation, and higher mortgage rates, with 70% of mortgage holders still locked in at rates below 5%.
He observes that in certain markets, new construction may now offer better investor terms than comparable existing properties, especially where builders buy down rates.
The episode highlights a comparison of nearly a century of asset class returns, reporting real estate's long-term annual appreciation at approximately 4.7%.
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Complete episode transcript:
Keith Weinhold 0:01
welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, how do other audiences feel about the GRE mantras that we've come to love here, like financially free beats debt free and don't get your money to work for you? Then sometimes it's not what you're attracted to in life, but what you're running away from finally comparing the returns from six major asset classes over the past century all today on get rich education
Keith Weinhold 0:29
since 2014 the powerful get rich education podcast has created more passive income for people than nearly any other show in the world. This show teaches you how to earn strong returns from passive real estate investing in the best markets without losing your time being a flipper or landlord. Show Host Keith Weinhold writes for both Forbes and Rich Dad advisors, and delivers a new show every week since 2014 there's been millions of listener downloads of 188 world nations. He has a list show guests include top selling personal finance author Robert Kiyosaki, get rich education can be heard on every podcast platform, plus it has its own dedicated Apple and Android listener phone apps build wealth on the go with the get rich education podcast. Sign up now for the get rich education podcast or visit get rich education.com
Corey Coates 1:18
You're listening to the show that has created more financial freedom than nearly any show in the world. This is get rich education.
Keith Weinhold 1:34
Welcome to GRE from Kennebunkport, Maine to Bridgeport, Connecticut and across 188 nations worldwide. It is the voice of real estate investing since 2014 I'm Keith Weinhold, and I'm grateful to have you here with me, and we're doing something a little different today, as you'll soon listen in to me as I was on the hot seat being interviewed on another prominent real estate show. But first, when you pull back and ask yourself, why you're really an investor in the first place? There are so many reasons. Maybe you just want a few properties in order to supplement your day job income. Maybe you want to have more than a few so that you can completely replace that active income, or perhaps rather than going the route of building up your cash flow, which is valid, but some think that it's the only way to real estate financial freedom. Instead, you could own, say, nine doors or 22 doors, and even if they all had zero cash flow, you can just keep borrowing against that leverage and equity tax free and live off of that whatever you do when it comes to your day job, income, your degree of disdain for your nine to five job that is going to be greater or less than it is for some others. So your motivation for self improvement, it isn't always about what you're running to in life, which could be real estate investing, but it's also what you're running away from, especially if you don't get a deeply rooted sense of meaning from your job. So you could have both a push factor and a pull factor in what motivates you. There's a scene from the 1999 movie Office Space that just does this incredibly unvarnished job of saying out loud how so many of us feel today. What I'm going to share with you, I mean, you know that you have felt this at least once in your life. Office space wasn't supposed to be a mega hit movie, but it kind of was, because it's so relatable. Let's listen in to part of this clip. This is Ron Livingston playing a disgruntled male employee talking to Jennifer Aniston at a restaurant about his job in the movie Office Space.
Speaker 1 4:09
I don't like my job, and I don't think I'm gonna go anymore. You're just not gonna go. Yeah, won't you get fired? I don't know, but I really don't like it, and I'm not gonna go.
Keith Weinhold 4:24
Then it continues when she asks. So you're just gonna quit? No, not really. I'm just gonna stop going. When did you decide all of that? About an hour ago? Really? Yeah, aren't you going to get another job? I don't think I'd like another job. What are you going to do about money in bills and all that? I've never really liked paying bills. I don't think I'm going to do that either.
Keith Weinhold 4:53
That's it. That is the end of that classic dialog from office space that we can. All relate to you did not wake up to be mediocre, but a lot of people's jobs pummel them into a rather prosaic state. You were born rich because you were born with this abundance of choices, this huge palette in menu, but society often stifles that and makes you forget it, and it gets really easy to just fall into your groove and stay there. The main reason we aren't living our dreams is really because we're living our fears. Failure doesn't actually destroy as many dreams as people think fear and doubt. Does fear and doubt destroy more dreams than failure ever does financial runway? That is a phrase for the amount of time that you can maintain your lifestyle without the need for a paycheck. And it's critical for you to lengthen this runway if you hope to retire early, and it will dramatically reduce your stress level. An example is say that you currently earn 150k per year after taxes, and you spend 126k of that, all right. Well, that means you've got a surplus of 24k a year. Well, it's going to take you a little over five years to accumulate that 126k that you need to annually support your lifestyle. That's what happens if you don't invest. And see investing helps you lengthen your financial runway, that amount of time you can maintain your lifestyle without the need for a paycheck. That's what we're talking about here. Last week I brought you the show from Caesar's Palace in the center of the Las Vegas Strip. So therefore, what I've done is I have gone from the ostentatious and flamboyant over here to the familial and simple as this week I'm in Buffalo New York, broadcasting from a somewhat makeshift GRE studio here, the Buffalo Bills had a home game yesterday, so the city and hotels are busier than usual. Next week, I will bring you the show from upstate Pennsylvania, as I'm traveling to see my family. Let's listen in to me on the hot seat. I was recently a guest on Kevin bups long running real estate investing show. You're going to get to see how I present information and GRE principles for the first time to a different audience. And as I do, you're going to hear me provide new material, but you'll also hear me say quite a few things that I have told you before, even then, the concepts might land differently when I'm explaining them to a new audience. The show is based in Florida, so We'll also touch on the real estate pain and opportunity there. After I'm interviewed, I'm going to come back and tell you about something fascinating. I'm going to compare the returns from six major asset classes over the past century, since 1930 anyway, and that's going to include the first time on the show where I'll tell you real estate's annual appreciation rate over the last entire century. Just about what do you think it is? 8% 5% 3% you're gonna have, perhaps the best answer you've ever had. Here we go.
Kevin Bupp 8:31
Now, guys, I want to welcome back a guest that we've had on. It's been a number of years now. Keith Weinhold, I went back to look at the last episode we had him on. I think it's been about four years. So, you know, four years ago, the world was in the very different state. It was a very different time. And so, you know, thankfully, we're out of the covid era and on to newer and greater things. So for those that don't know Keith, he's the founder of get rich education. He's the host of the popular get rich education podcast. He's a longtime thought leader in the real estate investing space, and like myself. Keith was also born and raised in Pennsylvania. For those that know don't know, I was born and raised in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Keith, I believe, a couple hours away from where I was. But Keith has very much a unique perspective on wealth, building debt, and really the housing market as a whole. And today, you know, we'll be diving into everything you know, from why the property itself? This is something that Keith kind of coins, why the property itself is less important than you think, to how the housing crash has already happened in a way that most people don't even realize, to the role inflation and debt play in building long term wealth. And so again, it's been a number of years here, so I'm excited to welcome Keith back here. So my friend, Keith, welcome to the show. It's it's a pleasure to have you back here again, my friend.
Keith Weinhold 9:43
Oh, Kevin, it's good to be here and be in the auspices of another fellow native Pennsylvanian as well.
Kevin Bupp 9:49
That's right, that's right, yeah, no, Pa is rocking and rolling as I think I told you this little, this little tidbit last time everyone, every time I speak with someone from Pennsylvania, they never know this. But I'm going to share this fun fact. Are you already know, Keith. I'm gonna share it with the rest of the listeners here today, Pennsylvania, those that are born and raised there. It's the only state where, if you're from Pennsylvania, you refer to it by its initials, and you assume that everyone else, everywhere else across the country, they know what you're talking about when you say I'm from PA and that's the only state that does that. So I think it's pretty neat.
Keith Weinhold 10:19
That's right. No one else does that. No one else says, I'm from TN, if they're from Memphis, right?
Kevin Bupp 10:24
They don't, they don't. So with that, my friend. So, you know, it's, again, it's been a number of years since we, since we had you last on here, you know, let's start with just, let's back up a little bit. You know, what have you been up to? I mean, what, what have the last few years look like for you? Where have you been spending your time, energy and efforts? Obviously, it's, you know, we've gone through some quite a bit of turmoil over the last five years, and would love to just get an update as to what's going on your life.
Speaker 2 10:48
Well, one of the big words in real estate investing, we all know it, even the person that cuts your hair and cleans your teeth knows it, and that's affordability. You know, really, affordability has been under fire, under pressure. By a lot of measures, we have the worst affordability for home buying since the early 80s, when the Jeffersons was on television. So it's been helping a lot of people deal with that. It's really the effect of three things, general inflation, higher home prices and higher mortgage rates. Really, those three things the crux of the problem. It's not exactly inflation, really. It's the fact that over the long term, wages don't keep up with inflation. And really that's the crux of the affordability problem. So I've been helping people deal with that and put that in perspective, really, Kevin,
Kevin Bupp 11:42
what does that mean for, you know, investment, real estate? I mean, are you still still doing deals? Are you seeing deals still get done by your students? I mean, what? What's your world look like?
Keith Weinhold 11:52
Yeah. I mean, I think you're asking, you know, how many deals are taking place? One way to measure that on a national basis is existing home sales. You know, existing home sales have been down substantially. And when a lot of people hear that, they think, prices, oh no, we're not talking about prices. We're talking about existing home sales. That means sales volume. That means the amount of overall transactions. So to give an idea of a real estate market, a residential one that's become pretty lethargic and not very vibrant, is that sales volume. It had its recent peak of about 6 million home sales back in 2021 I mean, 2021 was crazy, kind of the crux of the pandemic, you know, Kevin, that's when for an open house. You saw cars wrapped around the block for just one open house. Okay, well, that year 2021 there were 6 million existing home sales. Today, we're on pace to do about 4 million, and we also did only about 4 million last year. So if you put that in perspective and think about what that means, prices have stayed stable, but that's a 33% reduction in transactions. So investors, you know, people like you and I, Kevin, we're not as affected by this as some other industries. But think about the mortgage loan industry. If you're doing 33% fewer transactions, think about the hard decisions companies have to make and lay people off. 33% fewer transactions for title companies. It's probably close to 33% fewer transactions for furniture companies as well. So really it's both affordability that's been a problem, and that's led to this relative lethargy, kind of a slow, not very interesting residential real estate market, at least from the transaction perspective, really, really slow.
Kevin Bupp 13:58
But Could, could one not argue, I don't know the data points. Keith, I guess, what did it look like? 2021? Was kind of the peak. I think you'd reference 6 million units a year. Transactionally, what did it look like prior? What, what was, what was a more normal year like? And maybe 2020, wasn't a normal year either, right? Because a lot of folks thought the role was ending for a period of time. You know, 2019 maybe just again, trying to, trying to find maybe a better baseline to use. And then, you know, does, I guess, in my mind, and I don't follow these data points as much as you do, is that maybe 2021, was, you know, somewhat artificial inflation, right? Lots of lots of money pumping into the marketplace. And ultimately, we had to get back to a sense of normalcy at some point in time. And so are we at a at a place of normalcy? Are we still behind the eight ball a little bit?
Keith Weinhold 14:44
We're still behind the eight ball a little bit. 5 million is more of a normal long term number. But yeah, I mean, if we've got 4 million now, that's, you know, 25% less still than 5 million, sort of this long term normalcy rate of existing. Home transactions. And if you're a careful listener, you notice I've been using the word existing that doesn't include new build. So you know, when you the listener out there reading headlines, always look at that closely. We talking about existing? Are we talking about new build? You can learn a lot from that when you introduce new build data that introduces an awful lot of noise. For example, even when we look at prices, sometimes we want to exclude new construction. So why is that? Why do we want to focus on existing a lot? Well, because new build can introduce a lot of aberrations to the market. For example, the size of new build properties has dropped substantially the past few years, again, coming back to the central theme of affordability to help make a home more affordable. So we're not looking at same same when the square footage of a property drops a lot. And also, another thing that's been happening as a response to the lack of affordability is you have more builders building further and further out from a central business district where there are lower land costs for that new build property as well to help meet affordability. So the takeaway is, yeah, we want to be careful when we look at numbers. Are we looking at existing? Are we looking at new? Are we looking at overall properties.
Kevin Bupp 16:22
If you believe that if rates come down, we really is that the is that the lever that has to be pulled in order for that transactional volume to kick back up and, you know, make homes more affordable for the average home buyer,
Keith Weinhold 16:34
yeah, it's certainly going to help. I mean, really lower rates is the most likely significant lever that can help with the affordability crisis. Prices are pretty firm. Home prices are up 2% year over year. It's difficult for home prices to fall. In fact, home prices have only fallen one time substantially since World War Two. A lot of people don't realize that. So home prices are firm. I expect them to stay firm. And then the other lever is if we get a huge surge in wage increases, which I really don't expect anytime soon, unless we have another really big bout of inflation. So to your point, yes, lower mortgage rates like, that's the biggest lever that can help affordability return. And to speak to mortgage rates, Kevin and help put all of this into perspective, including this affordability component, is the fact that today, mortgage rates are low, and that gives a lot of people pause. They're like, What are you talking about? Mortgage rates were 3% even as low as two point some percent, just as recently as 2021 and early 2022 What are you talking about? Like, mortgage rates are 2x to 3x that today we look at a long term perspective when we look at the arc of mortgage rates, instead of in setting up expectations where we think rates could go. And we need to look at a frame of reference. Mortgage rates peaked over 18% in 1981 that's if you had a good credit score and everything on a 30 year fixed rate mortgage. That's what we're talking about here. In fact, Freddie Mac, they're the ones that have the best, most reliable stat set for mortgage rates, and that goes back to 1971 the average mortgage rate since 1971 all the way up to today, through all these presidential administrations you know, Nixon and in the Reagan years, and Clinton and the bushes and Obama, everything You know up to today, from 1971 until today, the average 30 year fixed rate mortgage is 7.7% so that's why I talk about how mortgage rates are, you know, moderate to a little low today. That takes a lot of people back. I don't see any impetus. It's going to get us back to, say, 3% mortgage rates. So some real perspective here.
Kevin Bupp 19:06
Yeah, yeah, no. And, you know, the interesting thing again, you might have data points on this to see, is a lot of the lack, do you feel that a lot of the lack of transactional volume is also related to those folks that have locked in, you know, 3% you know, mortgages, right? Like they're they, why would they sell and ultimately trade into a, maybe a, you know, a, you know, upgrade of a home, but ultimately be paying significantly more than that of what they're paying at the present time, you know, double the cost of capital. Your rates today, 30 year, rates are where the six and a half, 7% range, I don't follow it, but yeah.
Keith Weinhold 19:42
I mean, as of today, 6.3% is is where they're at. But yeah, you have a lot of those homeowners locked in to low rates. I mean, first, if we just pull back and look at the overall homeowner landscape, four in 10 have a paid off property. So just to talk to those about the other. Or 60% that percentage that are mortgage borrowers, among borrowers, 70% still have a mortgage rate under 5% meaning it starts with a four or less. So yeah, you're bringing up astutely Kevin the lock. In effect, people are reluctant to sell and give up that rate to trade it for a higher rate. And here's what's interesting, a lot of people if they couldn't make the payments on their home and say they lost their home, something that actually happened a lot in 2008 when people were locked into in sustainable mortgages because they didn't have good credit and they didn't have good income, the borrower is in good shape today. But even if, for some reason, they couldn't make the payments on their home, and they lost their home and they had to rent. Rents are actually higher in many cases, than what that mortgage principal and interest payment is. Maybe even the mortgage principal interest, taxes and insurance that they pay today are lower than what comparable rent would be, and this helps stabilize the housing market, people are really motivated to make their payments, and they can easily do it when it is so low, speaking to that lock in effect, and we're bringing up another reason now why transaction volume is so low, that lock in effect. So homeowners are in good shape. Their payments are sustainable. They don't want to sell, and they're just staying put. They're staying in place
Kevin Bupp 19:42
tying that all back around. Keith, what does that mean for us real estate investors? I mean, is there still good value out in the marketplace? I mean, is the rent to value ratio still, you know, Is there good opportunity to be had, as far as ROI for an investor that wants to buy into a residential investment or a multifamily investment, or anything related to that of residential housing?
Keith Weinhold 19:42
Well, the deals in the one to four unit space, single family homes up the four Plex buildings, yeah, just are not as good as they used to be. The ratio of rent income to purchase price is lower than it was five years ago. And that's so simple, but that's just really the simplest formula for profitability for a real estate investor, you don't have to look at cap rate or or NOI in the one to four unit space. Let's just look at that ratio of rent income to purchase price. 20 years ago, it was easy to find a full 1% meaning, on a 200k property, you could get $2,000 worth of rent income. That's that 1% ratio. But now oftentimes you've got to find something that's more like seven tenths of 1% that would be a $1,400 rent on a 200k property. So that simple formula, and I love that, the rent income divided by the purchase price when I'm looking at properties, when I'm scrolling or scanning like that's a calculation you can do in your head. It's only if I would see a ratio that appears really good, oh, that I would like drill down and look at that property more closely. So of course, when you have something that is that simple, though, rent income divided by purchase price, there's a lot of things that doesn't tell you. You know, what kind of mortgage interest rate can you get? What kind of property tax Do you pay in that jurisdiction? But really, I love the simplicity. That's it, rent divided by price, but it has been under attack. Now today, I still don't know where you're going to get a better risk adjusted return than you do with a carefully bought income property with a loan. I've always liked fixed interest rate debt the best risk adjusted return anywhere. I really don't know of a better one than with buying real estate, because real estate investors have so many profit centers, five simultaneous profit centers, which few people understand. Yeah.
Kevin Bupp 19:42
So using that, I want to, I want to unpack the the 1% rule a little bit for those that aren't familiar with it. And again, there's a lot of variables there, as you had mentioned, you know, mortgage rate, taxes, insurance and that respective market that you that you're buying in, and so what? What are you really trying to back into when applying that rule? Is there? Is there? Is there a true cash on cash return that you're hoping to achieve, again, assuming all these other variables that we just don't know, what they are at this point, you know? Is there a target range of actual ROI that you're actually looking to achieve when applying that 1% rule?
Keith Weinhold 19:42
No, I'm just looking for any positive cash flow. You know, to your point, yeah, there's nothing like the cash on cash return needs to be at least three and a half percent or something like that. But, yeah, I still like buying a property that's that's greater than a break even. Inflation is probably going to increase your cash flow over time, even if you bought a property that that broke even or just had a trickle of cash flow or a $100 cash flow today, a lot of people don't understand that fact that right there you can't count on it, you shouldn't count on. Getting rent increases. But we all know it generally happens over time at a rate of about 3% a year, but it actually increases your cash flow. If you increase your rent 5% your cash flow can often increase something like 12% why is that? How could that happen? That's because, you know, it's key for the person that was listening closely, you get fixed interest rate debt, so your rent income goes up, your expenses increase, except for that mortgage principal and interest. Inflation can touch it. It's kind of like a mosquito buzzing against a window and always trying to get in. And inflation can't touch that in a way. It's sort of like debt that's an asset in some unusual way, or some play on words, getting that debt so So yes, you can't count on rent increases over time. We know what typically happens, and that's really part of the compelling value proposition of buying income property with a loan. You're sort of leveraging inflation. You're really on the right side of it.
Kevin Bupp 20:08
Are there any particular markets that you feel are ripe for opportunity today where you're spending your focus and energies in?
Keith Weinhold 20:08
Yeah, it's still in high cash flowing markets like Memphis, okay, little rock and a good part of the Midwest and the Midwest still has home prices appreciating faster than the national average as well. So those are some of the areas that I like. Those jurisdictions also tend to have laws, as your listeners might know this already, Kevin, they tend to have laws that benefit the landlord more so than the tenant, where you can get a prompt eviction, but those are still the areas where you do get that high ratio of rent income to purchase price on a single family rental home, you might still find eight tenths of 1% meaning $800 worth of rent for every 100k of property purchase in places exactly like that.
Kevin Bupp 20:08
I was hoping that you tell me 1% rule would is applicable.
Keith Weinhold 20:08
It's pretty rare. You know, if you do see, if you do see a property that has a full 1% rent to purchase price ratio, it could be in a sketchy area, you need to make sure that you can actually get the rent in like you would get a respectful rent paying tenant in there. That's something that we would have to look at more closely.
Kevin Bupp 20:08
Have you explored building new product? Is there an opportunity there getting at a lower basis by building ground up?
Keith Weinhold 19:42
You asked such a smart question. This is actually the first time ever, as long as I've been an active real estate investor, Kevin for more than 20 years where new build purchases for income property make more sense than existing purchases. Why is that? It's because builders know that investors and borrowers are struggling to buy and afford property and make the numbers work. Like you're talking about, that builders are incentivized to buy down your rate. For you, to buy down your mortgage rate, we deal with a lot of providers that buy down your mortgage rate to 5% or less for you, and this is a fixed, long term loan in order to help get the numbers to work. You know, especially where you might see a new build property where the rent to purchase price ratio is less than seven tenths of 1% and it's just like, ah, the numbers wouldn't work paying a higher mortgage rate, but some are willing to buy them down to as little as four and a half. However, if you're looking into buying a new build income producing property, you do want to look at that closely. Who is paying for the discount points to buy down the rate. Is it the builder, or is it you? Because some builders just suggest, hey, you can buy down. You can have your rate bought down. But yeah, the next question is, yeah, okay, who is actually doing the buy down? Yeah.
Keith Weinhold 19:43
I mean, just getting tacked on. I mean, in that instance, I'm assuming that a lot of it's just getting tacked on to the to the back end of the purchase price, or it's being baked into closing costs somewhere somebody is paying for it. More than likely the borrower is paying for it. Paying for it. Is that? Is that? Again, I'm assuming we probably have that here in Florida. Again, I don't really follow the residential market too much, but there's, as you had mentioned, like, kind of on the the outskirts of Tampa, the tertiary, necessary, tertiary, probably more secondary areas. That's where a lot of the builds are happening. Lots of these, you know, planned subdivisions. You know, hundreds and 1000s of homes being put up. And in my understanding, through the grapevine, is I hear that they're, you know, sales volumes is incredibly slow, and a lot of these builders are now offering some creative loan products, again, to what you've just stated there, to attract, not necessarily even just homeowners, but also investors, to come in and buy their product from them. Is, is there a real opportunity there, though? I mean, have you seen investors be able to benefit from buying brand new product at a fair price, with economics at work keeping as a rental?
Keith Weinhold 29:53
I have and Florida has some builders that are almost desperate. I'm a long time investor. Know personally, directly in Florida, income property, Southwest Florida, places like Cape Coral, they have been ground zero for real estate depreciation, a contraction in real estate values year over year of 10% or more in some southwest Florida markets. So like the post pandemic, migration boom is certainly over in Florida. And you know, Kevin, as little as 10 years ago, people used to talk about buy in Florida. It's cheap, it's sunny, cheap and cheerful, like you would sort of hear that sort of thing about Florida real estate. That is no longer true. Florida just is not as cheap as it used to be. It's the same or higher than the national median home price now in Florida. So yes, some builders are rather desperate. The other benefit of buying new build, especially in a place like Florida, where a lot of new building has taken place and the supply actually exceeds the demand here in the short period. You can take advantage of that, not only by getting the rate buy down, but because homeowners insurance premiums are substantially less on new build property, because they're built to today's wind mitigation and other standards than they are existing property. I have a friend that just bought a new Florida duplex through us in Ocala, Florida. That's sort of a central, North Central Florida, on that new build duplex that he paid 400k for. I saw the actual insurance premium, the the rate sheet, $694.06 $694 694 so the benefit of buying new build is you get a lower insurance premium. You get these rate buy down. Sometimes what your builder will buy for you make for you rather and of course, you're probably going to have low maintenance costs for a long time, since it's a new build property, and you get a tenant that is probably going to stay longer than the average duration. They're the first person to ever live there. It's difficult for the tenant to improve their housing situation when they have a new build income property, unless they would go out and buy, and it's a very difficult time to go out and buy. So through that lack of affordability, really, the advantage for a real estate investor is tenants are staying put longer. The average tenancy duration is up because they can't run out and be a first time homebuyer.
Keith Weinhold 32:32
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Keith Weinhold 33:44
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Todd Drowlette 34:17
this is the star of the A and E show the real estate commission. Todd Rowlett, listen to get rich education with my friend Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.
Kevin Bupp 34:38
That even trickles down to the to the space that we're in. We're in the mobile home park space. And while we don't have a lot of rentals inside of our portfolio, most of our residents own their home and they rent the land, but throughout our portfolio, we have roughly 400 units that we own that we have as standardized rentals, and we've noticed that trend as well. Historically. 10 years ago, you. Yeah, we track actually about, I can take it back about eight years, where we actually have data to support this. This claim is that our average renter would stay about 16 months. That was fairly standard. Whereas today it's over, it's nearly three years. At this point in time, the majority are staying nearly three in there's probably, there's some variables in there. You know, eight years ago, we weren't bringing a lot of new product into our communities, whereas a lot of the mobile home parks that we purchased today do have a lot of newer mobile homes in them. So again, to your point, it's, it's a it's a newer home. It's fresh. There might not be the first person that lived there, maybe they're only the second, right? But it's still a very new home. It's only a couple years old. All the appliances are new. It's fresh, you know, it's well insulated, and it's just a high quality product, but, but it's nearly double of what we used to experience and what we used to underwrite. It's, you know, which is, which is interesting. You know, I am, I want to, I want to circle back, you'd mentioned Cape Coral. I've got quite a bit, quite a bit of experience with Cape Coral. This is not the first time that Cape Coral and Port Charlotte in those areas have crashed. I mean, like, they've got quite an interesting history in time, back during the GFC, that area down there took probably one of the biggest hits in most of Florida, while, you know, the rest of Florida got, you know, pounded pretty hard with home values and decreasing home values decreasing rents, Port Charlotte, Cape, coral, in those areas as well. It's just It looks very different down there today. As far as you know, the job basis. I mean, there's a little bit more of a, you know, you know, an economy than what existed maybe 1015, years ago. But I don't know if you know the story of Port Charlotte. Is it some interesting history that you can if you want to spend some time, go on YouTube. There's some documentaries out there about, basically when that area was created. There's a two brothers that, essentially, you know, sold, subdivided and sold swampland and sold the dream to the northeast centers to come down and buy, you know, parcels of land down in Cape Coral, port, Charlotte and in that general area. And it took a lot of time for it develop over the years, but it's a beautiful area down there. But again, I think what happened to your point? A lot of folks during the covid era were wanting to come to Florida. We were fairly free down here. The sun was shining, you know, the Gulf of Mexico was warm, and that was a good value for a lot of folks. You know, the values were driving up there. Was home inventory down there. You got a good bang for your buck back at that point in time. But again, there's not, there's not as much as many amenities and supportive economy there. And then to me, there, like you might find in the Tampa area, or you might find Orlando, or even Ocala cow is a phenomenal market right now. And yeah, oh, Cal is, for those that don't you know you mentioned, you referenced the insurance there, which is, that's a great, that's a great price for that, that policy, you know, 700 bucks, basically, that is inland. For those that don't know the geography here in Florida, that is inland. So you are fairly protected from storms, you know, hurricanes and things of that nature, which crush us here on the on the Gulf Coast. But in any event, I just thought I'd share that there's some good, pretty cool documentaries out there in Port Charlotte, in the whole area down there, but a beautiful part of the country. But just Yeah, it's, it's suffering right now. There's, I think there's, I was looking the other day on Zillow. I just play around and check and see what waterfront home prices are going for. And down there, you can basically get a you can get a canal front home going out to the Gulf of Mexico for about $500,000 which was probably closer to 800,000 during, you know, the the boom era of 2021 2022 So historically, we used to buy properties down there. This is back in 2000 and 345, before the the GFC, we could buy those same properties for 150 and $200,000 waterfront home, waterfront homes, deep water canals going out to the Gulf of Mexico. But when it crashed, some of those homes were selling for $120,000 $100,000 so it's interesting to see how things have come kind of full circle multiple times, not just down there, but in all of Florida as well. Florida is always boom and bust. You know, I think they say that with you know, you could probably speak to that most of these coastal towns, whether it be in Florida, whether it be up the eastern seaboard, the coastal markets are definitely more of a roller coaster ride than the Midwestern markets, where you invest in would you? Would you agree with that?
Keith Weinhold 39:09
Yeah, I would. And yeah, you talk about Florida being a boom and bust, and what you said is certainly true in the shorter term. Back in the global financial crisis, we saw more price blood letting in Florida than we did in other states as well. But over the long term, the long arc, I'm bullish on Florida because of just the obvious constant in migration story. In fact, if you go back to decennial censuses, all the way back to the early 1800s every single decennial census, every 10 years, the population of Florida has rose, and it rises faster than the national average, almost all of those 10 year periods. So yeah, over the long term, I certainly like Florida, but Yeah, you sure can, you know, nitpick over the. Short term, but as little as five years from now. If you bought today, as little as five years from now, I could see someone saying, like, yeah, I bought back five years ago, because we're actually in a in a short term, overbuilt condition, and builders bought down my rate. For me, this could look savvy and this could look wise. So if you're looking for opportunity, new building Florida is definitely something to look into.
Kevin Bupp 40:22
I agree. No, absolutely. Like, the long term, you know, opportunity here in Florida, it's there, you know, it's interesting. We've got the we get these hurricanes every year. Last year was a pretty impactful year, at least here on the on the Gulf side, and the neighborhood I lived in, we got flooded. Luckily, our homes in newer builds built up. But, you know, 70% of the neighbor I lived in had 444, or five feet of seawater. And as did the, you know, the long stretch of the Gulf Coast here, and it was the first time this area has ever this immediate air right where we live, has ever had a it wasn't even a direct hit. It just happened to be a massive storm surge. But it was, you know, catastrophic as far as the damage that it did. And a lot of folks that we knew in our neighborhood here. Have lived here for 1020, 3040, or 50 years, and they had never had any floodwater whatsoever. And and there was two camps where they fell in either one camp where they didn't, they whether they had the money to rebuild or not, didn't matter. Like, mentally, they were never going to end up. They were never going to deal with that again. They were moving away, like they just didn't want to go through the heartache of that again. In the second camp, we're basically, I knew it was going to happen at some point in time. This is the kind of price to live, to pay, a live in paradise and and what ultimately occurred is, you know, you saw homes going up for sale, and in the initial chatter for those that that were impacted, is that, who's going to buy that? You know? You know, they're not going to get hardly anything for it. You know, it's just like, who's going to want to live here now that has been flooded. I said, Just wait. I'll say people have us as human beings, have short term memories. We do and and I can promise you, within a few months, those homes will be gobbled up, some will be knocked down, some will be rebuilt, but inevitably, the prices will come back incredibly strong, and you'll see very limited inventory, at least in desirable markets that are here on the water. And that's exactly that happened. Within six month period of time, prices are back up. You can't get your hands on a flooded property now, or one that had been flooded, right?
Keith Weinhold 42:12
I can believe it. And this is not the way that you want to have a waterfront property when the water inundates you and comes to you, that is not the way to buy waterfront property.
Kevin Bupp 42:23
Yeah, interesting, but, uh, no, Keith has been a fun conversation, my friend. So let's, let's talk about, you know, I like to you'll peek inside your brain if you were going to start all over again, from scratch, you know, you've been at this now, what? How long? Almost two decades. It's been, been quite
Keith Weinhold 42:38
Yes, yes, more than two decades. Is that what you're asking, how would I start, starting from today?
Kevin Bupp 42:47
Yeah, like, what would you do? Where would you focus, what asset type and any particular strategy outside of what you're doing today? You know, where would you focus your time?
Keith Weinhold 42:55
Actually, it is quite a coincidence. The way that I would start all over again in real estate is the way that I did start in real estate. It worked out phenomenally, in a way it makes sense, because if it hadn't worked out phenomenally, you never would have heard of me, and I wouldn't have become this real estate thought leader or whatever, because this is a way, an everyday person with virtually no real estate knowledge and very little money. Can start out, what I did is I made the first ever home of any kind, a four Plex building where I lived in one unit and rented out the other three. This is something very actionable for your for your audience as well, Kevin. Or if maybe you're a listener that has a an adult daughter or son and they want to get started in real estate with a bang without much money, is to buy a four Plex, just like I did. You can use an FHA loan, a three and a half percent down payment. You have to live in one of the units at least 12 months, and at last check, your minimum credit score only needs to be 580 now you will get a lower interest rate if you have a higher credit score. But those are the only three criteria you need. I mean, what a country talk about? The American Dream. You can use that FHA program with a single family home, duplex, triplex or fourplex, that's the formula. That's how I began. Actually ended up living there a little more than three years. But what that did for me was remarkable, and in fact, you know what it taught me? Kevin and every listener can benefit from this. It's paradoxical. A lot of times I say things that you would not expect to hear that make you go, wait what? Whoa, how can that be? Is what it taught me is that I don't want to focus on getting my money to work for me. You probably wouldn't expect to hear that. It's actually a middle class paradigm to say, well, I don't want to work for money. I also want to get my money to work for me. I'm telling. You that that's going to keep you middle class, or worse, that's going to keep you working until old age, and you won't have an outsized life and retirement and options. If you think that the best and highest use of your dollar is getting your money to work for you, it's not what's the paradigm shift if this four Plex building taught me the way I started out, which is still the way that I would start out today, and you probably heard this before, but I'm going to put a new twist on it. Is you want to ethically get other people's money to work for you, and we can be ethical. We can do good in the world. Provide housing that's clean, safe, affordable and functional. Never get called a slumlord that way. You can employ other people's money three ways at the same time, ethically by buying an income property with a loan, like we've been talking about in Florida, or with this fourplex building. How do you do it three ways at the same time, using the bank's money for the loan and leverage, which greatly amplifies your return beyond anything Compound Interest can do. The second of three ways you're ethically employing other people's money is you're using the tenants money to pay for the mortgage and some of the operating expenses on this fourplex. And then the third way you're simultaneously using other people's money is using the government's money for generous tax incentives at scale. So the lesson is that the best and highest use of your dollar is not getting just your money to work for you, it's other people's money, in this case, the banks, the tenants and the governments. That's what you can do. I mean, what an opportunity. A lot of people just don't even know about that FHA program.
Kevin Bupp 46:41
Yeah, I actually, I wasn't, I wasn't aware that it was that low of a down payment key. That's no idea. Three and a half percent, you said, a 550 credit score, believe me, 580 minimum credit.
Keith Weinhold 46:51
And you have to, thirdly, you have to owner occupy a unit for at least 12 months. And hey, I'm not saying it's always easy. You know, you got to think about that. Your neighbors are also your tenants. And I don't know how to fix stuff. I still don't. I'm a terrible handyman, but it's good to learn a little about about human relations. And you know, letting finding a general way to let the tenants know that you have a mortgage to pay every month. I mean, just that alone can can help them ensure timely rent payments. But, and this also doesn't mean every area, or every four Plex building is is good, but, yeah, that's the opportunity. That's how I started. I would totally do it again.
Kevin Bupp 47:27
Can you use that FHA program more than once? Or is that just the one time you know your first, first, first primary home purchase?
Keith Weinhold 47:34
It's generally you can only use one at a time. There are some exceptions, like if you and your job move, like, a certain mile radius away from where you got the first one, but, yeah, generally it's only going to be one at a time. A lot of people don't use it. Don't know about it. In fact, if you have VA benefits, Veterans Administration benefits, you can get a similar program, like I was talking about, but zero down payment, rather than three and a half with an FHA loan. It's a really good, amazingly good opportunity.
Kevin Bupp 48:05
That's incredible. That's incredible. Keith, my friend, I appreciate you coming back going. It's always good to catch up with you. Good to see that you're doing well.
Keith Weinhold 48:17
Oh yeah, a terrific chat there with Kevin. I hope that you like that really. At our core, real estate investors are not day trading. We are decade trading. Now I'm in western New York today, at the other end of the state, NYU compiled some terrific statistics that you want to hear about for nearly the past 100 years. It is the annualized returns of six major asset classes. This spans, the Great Depression, a number of recessions, World War Two, the New Deal, gold standard, abandonment, brendawoods, the Cold War, Civil Rights Movements, oil shocks, Volcker rate hikes, the.com boom and crash, the 911, attacks, the housing bubble, covid, 19, AI revolution and 16 presidencies, all those ups and downs and war and peace and economic booms and economic lows, and now there is going to be a mild tongue in cheek element here, because stats like this drive real estate investors crazy, but this is often how mainstream media portrays asset class comparisons. All right, the six asset classes are stocks, cash, bonds, real estate, gold, and then inflation, which isn't in an asset class, but it's a benchmark. All of these begin from the year 1930 so spanning almost 100 years. Let's take it from the lowest return to the high. Best return the lowest is inflation. And what do you think the CPI inflation rate is averaged over the last 100 years? Any guess at all? You might be surprised. It is 3.2% Yeah, even though the Fed's CPI inflation target has long been 2% it runs hot longer than most people believe. So therefore, today's inflation rate isn't high, it's just normal. The next highest return is cash at 3.3% How did NYU measure that the yield from three months T bills? Next up is bonds. They returned 4.3% that's the 10 year treasury average of the last 100 years. The next highest is real estate at 4.7% that uses the K Shiller Index. Now we're up to the second highest. It is gold at 5.6% and the highest is stocks at 10.3% using the s, p5, 100, and this was all laid out in a brilliant chart that also shows the returns by each decade for all of these asset classes. You'll remember that I shared the chart with you in our newsletter a few weeks ago. Now you are smarter and more informed than the layperson is, you know, but they see this chart and they think, Oh, well, that's it. I've got my answer. Real Estate's 4.7% appreciation loses out to gold's 5.6 and stocks 10.3 and then they go back to watching Love is blind. But of course, rental property owners like us know that we often make five times or more than this 4.7% when we consider all those other income streams and profit centers, leverage, rents, ROA and inflation, profiting on our debt, it's often 25 to 30% total. It's sort of like judging a Ferrari by only measuring its cupholders or something. Now, would stocks 10.3% get adjusted up as well? Yeah, probably a little, because the s and p5 100 currently averages a 1.2% dividend yield, so that might be added on the 4.7% return for real estate. That cites the popular Case Shiller Index. And the way that that index works is that it uses a repeat sales methodology. So what that means is that the Case Shiller measures the sales price of the same property over time. Therefore a property would have to sell at least twice in order to be measured by this popular and widely cited K Shiller Index. So then the 4.7% appreciation figure excludes new build homes, and new builds appreciate more than existing homes, but you do have more existing homes that sell the new build homes, so we can pretty safely assume that real estate's long term appreciation rate is higher, likely between five and 6% there it is. So yeah, making comparisons across asset classes like this is pretty tricky, because investment properties leverage and cash flow gets nullified. And when you make comparisons like this, it's a big reminder that even if you can't get much cash flow off a 20 or 25% down real estate payment, sheesh, most people put a 100% payment into stocks, gold or Bitcoin, and they don't expect any cash flow. And Bitcoin isn't part of what we're looking at for this century long view, because it did not exist until 2009 and also NYU had to use some alternative statistics. Sometimes the s, p5, 100 index only came into being in 1957 and the Case Shiller Index 1987
Keith Weinhold 54:02
next week here on the show, I expect to answer your listener questions from beginner to advanced. You've been writing in with some good ones for the production team here at GRE. That's our sound engineer, Vedran Jampa, who has edited every single GRE podcast episode since 2014 QC in show notes, Brenda Almendariz, video lead, brendawali strategy talamagal, video editor, seroza, KC and producer me, we'll run it back next week for you. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.
Speaker 3 54:36
Nothing on this show should be considered specific, personal or professional advice. Please consult an appropriate tax, legal, real estate, financial or business professional for individualized advice. Opinions of guests are their own. Information is not guaranteed. All investment strategies have the potential for profit or loss. The host is operating on behalf of get rich Education LLC, exclusively.
Speaker 2 55:04
The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth building, get richeducation.com