Get Rich Education

Real Estate Investing with Keith Weinhold
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Oct 27, 2025 • 42min

577: The Geography of Wealth: Zero-Tax States, Big Returns with Victor Menasce

Keith discusses strategies for amplifying investing returns and reducing lifetime tax burdens through real estate, geography, and industry.  He compares tax burdens by state and explains how investors can leverage low-income tax states and low-property tax states.  Podcast host, investor and developer, Victor Menasce, joins the conversation to highlight the industrial real estate market, emphasizing the demand for warehousing and logistics.They touch on the potential in industrial outdoor storage and the complexities of data center investments. Reach out to Y Street Capital to learn more about their projects and the real estate espresso podcast. Resources: Switch to listening to the podcast on the Apple Podcasts or Spotify app, as the dedicated GRE mobile app will be discontinued at the end of the month. Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/577 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  For predictable 10-12% quarterly returns, visit FreedomFamilyInvestments.com/GRE or text  1-937-795-8989 to speak with a freedom coach Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript: Keith Weinhold  0:00   Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, we're talking about how you can use real estate, geography and industry to amplify your investing returns over the course of your life and permanently reduce your lifetime tax burden today on Get Rich Education.   Keith Weinhold  0:21   You know, most people think they're playing it safe with their liquid money, but they're actually losing savings accounts and bonds don't keep up when true inflation eats six or 7% of your wealth. Every single year, I invest my liquidity with FFI freedom family investments in their flagship program. Why fixed 10 to 12% returns have been predictable and paid quarterly. There's real world security backed by needs based real estate like affordable housing, Senior Living and health care. Ask about the freedom flagship program when you speak to a freedom coach there, and that's just one part of their family of products. They've got workshops, webinars and seminars designed to educate you before you invest, start with as little as 25k and finally, get your money working as hard as you do. Get started at Freedom, family investments.com/gre, or send a text. Now it's 1-937-795-8989 77958989, yep, text their freedom coach directly. Again, 1-937-795-8989,   Corey Coates  1:34   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  1:49   Welcome to GRE from Milford, Delaware to Milford, Utah and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and this is get rich education, the voice of real estate investing since 2014 now, what do you think about a multi week government shutdown? That means there's a cut in your service level, but of course, oh geez, there's no commensurate cut in the amount of taxes that you pay. This is the government's version of charging rent on a vacant unit. That's what's happening. That's what we've been looking at in the biggest expense you'll ever pay in your life. It isn't housing, it's taxes. Before I get to how you can reduce the amount of taxes that you'll pay throughout the course of your life, which is huge. Let's pull back, and I guess it's a bit of a real estate geography riddle for you, imagine if there were a place that existed, and this place is within a 15 minute drive of a seacoast, 15 minutes of mountains, within 15 minutes of an urban core of about 300,000 people, and within 15 minutes of an international airport and a decent airport that has direct, non stop flights to Europe. Even, could that place exist all of that? I mean, it almost sounds too good to be true when I put it like that, yes, it does, and it's in the United States. On top of that, this same place with proximity, within 15 minutes of all four of those things, has zero state income tax and zero sales tax. Yes, all this is in the same place, and that's where I am coming to you from today, Anchorage, Alaska. I traveled a good bit, and I can't think of another place in the US quite like it. A quick check of Chad GPT corroborates this, saying that the US places that come closest are Honolulu, Juneau and Bellingham, Washington. They come the closest to that. Now, the biggest downside, in my opinion, is a long, dark, cold winter. Well, that's when I do more traveling, but I spend many months of the year right here in Anchorage. And my guest today, who you'll hear from later, I haven't had him on the show in years, where recently he I and his wife, Natasha, toured Anchorage. I drove them around.   Keith Weinhold  4:29   first, let me tell you about a creative way to pay both a low property tax and a low income tax, and that is no matter what state or province that you live in now, the big three taxes that people pay throughout their lives are income tax, sales tax and a property tax. Those are the big three, and when you combine those to come up with the highest and lowest tax burdens by state, you'll notice that coastal states often pay the most. They generally have the biggest burden, because coasts attract people, and therefore those highly populated areas, they need infrastructure, say, for example, more bridges, and they often have more social services for people, and it costs tax money to maintain all of that. Now, look, will people move to an area specifically because they can get low taxes there? Like is that amenity in itself an attractant? Actually, not so much. No, you do get some people to move to Puerto Rico, predominantly for that reason. But interestingly, the two states with the lowest overall tax burden, that is, when you combine income, sales and property tax, the lowest are Alaska and Wyoming, and yet they have the fewest people living there, under 1 million people each. So the two states with the lowest tax burdens are also the two least populous states. So it is not making people flock there. So where you choose to live? Oh, that has more to do with your overall quality of life. And you know that's probably as it should be. Well, whether you own your home or you rent your home, you effectively do pay property tax, because tenants end up subsidizing the landlord's expenses. Most property tax maps that you see out there, those national property tax maps, they show the average tax bill that a household pays by state, regardless of real estate values. Well, that's not so useful. You might remember that a few weeks ago in our newsletter, I sent you the best and the smartest property tax map that I have by county. You'll remember that it showed the property tax paid as a percentage of the home value, so that relative basis is what matters more. When we look at property tax paid that way, we can more transparently see that the highest property taxes are generally paid in three US regions. Those three regions with the highest property taxes are the northeast, much of the Great Plains and Texas now a 1% property tax rate is, for example, when you have to pay 4000 bucks a year on a property value of 400k That's that 1% and the lowest are in the Western US and the nation's southeast quadrant, often under 1% we're just talking about the property taxes only here. Now out west, lower property taxes, they still rarely create investor cash flow, and that's because purchase prices are too high out west, and rents don't keep up with them proportionally. But low taxes, they do adequately sweeten the most investor advantaged areas, that is in the southeast Indiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, Hawaii, and a bunch of the Mid Atlantic states. All right, so they are the investor advantaged areas that also have low property tax. The nation's lowest property tax rate is in Alabama. Roll tide, I think I've mentioned that on the show before. All right, so that's property tax, but states have to get their revenue somewhere, so oftentimes, if their property tax is low, well then they have to make up for that. So therefore their income or sales tax can be high. Now as far as income tax, each state has their own of course, the high ones are New York, New Jersey, California and Hawaii. Those are many of the high ones. But there are nine states with zero, absolutely zero, state income tax, and those nine states that are free of income tax are the aforementioned, Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming and Washington gets somewhat of an asterisk that has a little wrinkle in it. That's one of the nine with the wrinkle, you'll pay zero income tax on your wages in Washington. It only applies to high earners, capital gains tax income there, all right. Well, all of that is true for everybody there, every US citizen. But here's the arbitrage that a real estate investor can create. If you live in one state and you own property in another state, you always pay property tax where the property is physically located, not where you live. I mean, any longtime out of state real estate investor knows that. So you can therefore live in a state with little or no income tax, for example, Texas, and then a Texas resident can skirt Texas's higher property tax by investing in a different state that has low property tax, like, say, Alabama or Tennessee. Oh, well, now both your property tax and your income tax are low this way. And congratulations, you have just legally exploited the tax system. Some examples of a low income tax home state where you live and a low property tax investor state where your investment property is, so that you get the best of both worlds. They are, Texas is your home state, and Alabama is your investment property state, like I just described, and then a few other scenarios, so that you can legally use the system to pay both a low income tax and low property tax. Are having Pennsylvania as your home state and Missouri as your investor property state, having New Hampshire as your home state and Tennessee is your investor property state. And then another example, having Washington as your home state and Arkansas as your investor state. Those are just some examples of combinations there about how you can live in a low income tax state and then also enjoy having your investment property in a low property tax state and see perhaps now you're doing this without having to move. Yes, investing in low property tax states. Now, of course, property taxes are set at the county or city level. They're not set federally, but just within one state. Sometimes property tax can vary dramatically, which you probably know, but two of the biggest examples of this are in Illinois, Cook County, which is Chicago, and also Miami, Dade County, Florida. I mean those jurisdictions, they have tax rates that can make wallets cry more than their surrounding counties do, and some states have maximums, legal limits ceilings on property taxes. California proposition 13 famously limits property tax to 1% of assessed value, and then the increases are capped as well. I mean this means the two California neighbors with identical homes can pay wildly different taxes, and Florida is still looking to completely eliminate the property tax. Can you imagine that? I mean, it seems doubtful that that will happen, but you can conceive of how much more desirable that would make Florida properties, and that would probably make all Florida housing values skyrocket now, just because a property has a high property tax rate that doesn't disqualify it as an investment property alone, it's just one consideration that'll show up in your proforma, your cash flow. So the bottom line is that as an income property owner, property tax is mostly passed on to your tenant, but paying a low rate still keeps you more flexible and profitable. So think of a map of states with low property taxes, sort of like a treasure map, but instead of x marking the spot, it marks where your money will go the furthest.    Keith Weinhold  13:36   And if you want real estate maps like I'm talking about here, and stories and great charts and investment opportunities that I cannot fit onto the channel. Here, you can grab them in my free weekly newsletter at gre letter.com and part of this is because I just cannot adequately describe a map or a chart to you here in an audio format. You get more in the letter free wealth, building insight every week. And it comes straight from me. 1000s of investors read it every week. Don't live below your means. Grow your means. Get It At gre letter.com Again, that's gre letter.com   Keith Weinhold  14:20   something interesting just happened when Wells Fargo released their housing forecast for the next two years. Let's discuss that between today and 2027 they expect the federal funds rate to drop by a full 1% but they don't expect mortgage rates to drop as much only about a quarter point drop over the next two years in the 30 year fixed rate. For next year, they expect home prices to rise three and a half percent, and then the year after 3.7%. looking down the road a couple years here, and this is sorced by Wells Fargo economics and the US Department of Labor and the FHFA and more. All right, so only a small reduction in mortgage rates and a pickup in home price appreciation, although still pretty moderate. Now you gotta take any interest rate prediction with a grain of salt, like I've told you here before. I personally, I do not forecast interest rates, and when you're looking at interest rate predictions, you are squarely looking at a waste of your time.   Keith Weinhold  15:34   Now, a recent Gallup poll wanted to find out what Americans consider to be the best long term investment. That's the question that the pollsters asked, what is the best long term investment? And the findings were that 16% said stocks. I mean, despite the fact that stocks only seem to make insiders wealthy, still somehow 16% of Americans consider stocks to be the best long term investments, a higher share of Americans, 23% said gold. That actually surprises me, that nearly one quarter of Americans say that gold is the best long term investment, when only about 10% of Americans own gold in the physical form, like bars or coins. And part of this could be driven by the recent hype, where the gold price has more than doubled just since last year, and it broke above $4,000 an ounce for the first time in history this month. All right, so 16% said stocks, 23% said gold. And what's number one in the Gallup poll for what Americans believe is the best long term investment? It's real estate. Ah, well, they got that right. That actually gives me a little more faith than Americans there. Now, when it comes to real estate investment, you know, there's this long running mantra or catchphrase out there that I really disagree with. I mean, you've certainly heard this before, but it just does not resonate with me. And that is, appreciation is just the icing on the cake. That's the catchphrase I am not feeling the vibe there. How in the heck is appreciation just the icing on the cake? The presumption, the inference here, is that cash flow is the main driver of an investment philosophy, and then if you just happen to get appreciation too, oh, well, that's a little sweetener. Like the mantra would say cash flow is the cake, the majority piece, and then appreciation since the icing, oh, that's only a little thing. No, that's misleading. You usually get more of a return from appreciation than you do cash flow.   Keith Weinhold  17:56   I mean, on, say, a 400k income property, what if you only get $200 of cash flow? That can happen? That's $2,400 a year. But instead, 5% appreciation on that property gives you $20,000 a year. That is almost 10x. I think what the icing on the cake, curious catchphrase means is that cash flow is important because it controls the mortgage. Well, then I think it's just better to say that appreciation is not an inconsequential thing. It's often the biggest thing. So is appreciation just the icing on the cake? No, it certainly is not. In fact, I'm going to talk more about that next week when I've got something special planned for you here on the show. What I'm going to do then is look at the ways real estate pays you five ways in a slow market, the real estate market is slow. If you look at it on a basis of transaction volume, say that you buy a property today and over the next year, you don't even get what Wells Fargo forecasts say you only get 2% appreciation and zero cash flow. Just break even on a monthly basis. I mean, there's surely some disappointing numbers, but just say that's what happens. Well, next week, I'm going to add up what your total rate of return would be even in this dour scenario, and I think that you are going to Marvel be flabbergasted at how profitable you are if you just got 2% appreciation and zero cash flow. That's next week.    Keith Weinhold  19:36   As far as today, I'm about to bring in a super smart guest that hasn't been on the show here in a few years. He's usually a fellow faculty member on the real estate guys invest or summit at sea. But he wasn't there with me this year, so we met up in Anchorage. Instead, we're talking about changes to commercial real estate that market, and the opportunities that you might be able to find there from Industrial land, an activity that well generates noise, like Bitcoin mining operations and growing data centers with the increased use of AI. And as you listen, see if you know what I mean about how he feels professorial in his approach, and I mean that in the best possible way you can learn from him. He's from Ottawa, Canada, an international conversation coming up next. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to Episode 577, of get rich education.   Keith Weinhold  20:34   If you're scrolling for quality real estate and finance info today, yeah, it can be a mess. You hit paywalls, pop ups, push alerts, Cookie banners. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun. That's why it matters to get clean, free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor. It's direct, and it gets to the point, because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp and in the know about real estate investing, this is paradigm shifting material, and when you start the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video, course, completely free as well. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now at gre letter.com Visit gre letter.com   Keith Weinhold  21:46   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your prequel and even chat with President chailey Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lending group.com, that's Ridge lending group.com,   Tarek El Moussa  22:19   what's up? Everyone. This is hgtvs Tariq al Musa. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  22:27   Hey, it's great to welcome back a longtime industry friend. He's a senior partner at y street capital. He owns a development company that's active in nine US states and two Canadian provinces, and he's the host of the real estate espresso podcast. Hey, it's great to have back. It's been a few years. Victor Menasce, great to be here. Keith, well, you know what's different? I mean, we were together doing some sightseeing around Anchorage, Alaska. You I and your wife here just a few weeks ago. That was great to have you. And then you had a nice Alaskan cruise after that. It was lovely. It was great to spend time with you in person, where you and I have spent time together at conferences all around the nation. So thank you for that. Yeah, it was great to do some fun stuff and like, Oh, hey, this guy knows a world outside of just talking about cap rates all the time. So Victor, the commercial side is pretty dynamic, and it sure has been lately with all the changes that we've had in the world, really starting with the pandemic almost six years ago, now, that includes the industrial space and how the need for warehousing and storage has changed. So from a real estate perspective, tell us about what you're seeing there.    Victor Menasce  23:41   We're seeing a lot of changes. Of course, there's a lot of uncertainty that's been injected by the current administration in Washington in terms of international trade. But even if you put that aside the flow of goods from wherever they're manufactured to the end customer, that flow is still there. It's one of these things that often creates inefficiencies, especially as you start to think about really optimizing the overall cost. You know, if you think about what inventory costs you to have on a retail floor where you might be renting that retail space at, I don't know, 55 $60 a square foot, and it's occupying very, very expensive real estate, if you can instead put that in a warehouse that's maybe at 10 to $15 a square foot. Oh, but wait a minute, you've got a 27 or a 35 or a 40 foot ceiling height, and you're stacking it seven to nine levels high. Really, the cost of that inventory has gone way, way down because you're putting it much less expensive real estate, right? Okay, so here is one of the efficiencies of a retailer doing e tail instead of brick and mortar retail, absolutely. And you know, we often see situations where the last mile, you know, we want to get that instant gratification as a consumer, but we don't necessarily want to be having to drive to that retail space. And we don't that's. Supplier doesn't necessarily want to pay Amazon for warehousing that particular product. So often, the fulfillment is done locally, that last mile Logistics is extremely important. That's putting a lot of pressure on this category of product that has traditionally been called Flex industrial. These are those places in the industrial park that you might see an electrician or a landscaping company or a plumber or anyone like that that has an office at the front of 14 or 18 foot Bay at the back and a bit of inventory. A lot of that product right now is being pulled off the market for many different reasons. Some of that's just disappearing and that land is getting repurposed for residential. Some of it's disappearing because people are putting gyms and pickleball courts and things like that and those types of products. Some of it's disappearing because people with exotic car collections want to use that space for a man cave. There's many different things that are demanding that particular product, and there's very little of it getting built. So that's another area right now that is under a lot of pressure. On the demand side, not a lot of new supply and rents are going up much, much faster than they otherwise should be. Talk to us more about the industrial space from the supplydemand perspective, what do people want and what do people need? It varies widely. There are companies that are in manufacturing, they will often look to refresh their investment in equipment. They may not have the capital, so they will sometimes do a sale, lease back of their building, of their facilities, so that they can then repurpose some of that capital onto into the equipment side, so that they can maybe modernize their manufacturing. That's another area where we see significant shifts happening. In industrial we also see a lot in logistics, where the most efficient way to move goods is a 200 year old technology called rail, and it's still alive and well. I mean, if you think about the cost of shipping a container across the country, you're going to spend about two cents per ton mile to move that by rail, or about 10 cents per ton mile to do it by truck. So that's a five times difference in price. That means a container from Los Angeles to New York is going to cost you about $1,400 if you're moving it by rail, or about $7,500 if you're moving it by truck. But if you're now part of the rail system, there's now logistics that you have to worry about at either end. And so if you want to make all of that work, those transfer hubs become extremely important, and there's just not a lot of them,    Keith Weinhold  27:38   okay, so it might only cost 1/5 as much per ton mile to move a good over rail as it does road. But you're sort of talking about the logistical challenge of, oh, getting it that last mile from the rail Terminus to the end user.   Victor Menasce  27:53    absolutely. And there can be a lot of cost associated with that last mile. So if you can solve that problem for the logistics companies and lower their cost for that last mile. That's got significant value, and that's another demand for industrial land. And very few cities are adding industrial land to their master plan. You know, warehouses don't vote, so they don't tend to take other land and zone industrial In fact, if anything, it goes the other way. There's a lot of pressure to take land that was zoned industrial and rezone it for commercial or for residential. In fact, we see that in a lot of cities.    Keith Weinhold  28:30   Now, you the listener, if your entrepreneurial wheels are turning, you can see the opportunity for, Hey, can I get in and help solve the problem in that last mile demand creatively. How do I think I could get in? How do I think I could do that, as long as that demand is sustainable? Victor, when we talk about industrial real estate, like we are here as real estate investors, one of the things that we often think about is site selection. Tell us more about that through the industrial lens   Victor Menasce  28:58   I think there's a couple things that matter. Number one, you can't pay too much for it. It's got to be at the right price. So you've got to be thinking about, you know, we always do what's called residual land value analysis and and that happens in residential, commercial, every single asset class, everyone works backwards from the answer to the question. So the answer is, here's how much profit I need to generate. Here's my capital cost. Here's, you know, you keep backing up and you say, well, now what's left over? That's what I can afford to pay for the land. So you always gotta be working backwards from the answer to the question. And this is no different. We do this in industrial as well. So you gotta make sure that that situation where the numbers work. Number two, you've gotta make sure that there is the right supply, demand dynamics. Got to make sure that the property itself is not contaminated. That can be a liability. If that was once a heavy industry site, then there could be contamination. You want to make sure that that's somebody else's problem, not yours, or if it is your problem, that you can mitigate it where the cost is bounded. So you got to. You know, look at all of these things together. And then, of course, there has to be good connectivity, good access to freeways, to major arterial roads, good access to rail. If you can get a Rails per on the property, even better. But even if you can't, as long as you have good access to major roads. You know, I always look at this through the lens of product design, where you're designing a product for a very specific customer. And so it's really, it starts with the end customers need in mind. And it's not a speculative process. It's really understanding who that customer is designing a product for them and making sure that you're delivering it at the right price. So it's always, always working backwards from the answer   Keith Weinhold  29:43   nowwhen we think about site selection and geography of where we're putting this real estate cities are often located on a body of water, like a bay or a river, often runs through a city, but yet you think of industrial use. Land is not your priciest land, but yet you think of a city center as your priciest land. Oftentimes, where do you put the industrial real estate with regard to the city center? I usually think of it as far outside of that. But are there other trade offs or nuances there?   Victor Menasce  31:11   it can be. You know, it's a question of whether you're doing a greenfield project or an infill project. If the land was previously zoned industrial and you're now just redeveloping it, that can make a lot of sense. If it is a greenfield project where you're looking to build new then, yeah, it's probably going to be in the outskirts, because that's where you're going to get the best land cost. And then, of course, you got to be thinking about what the end product is, and it what's it going to cost you to get it where it needs to be. Most of these projects are built slab on grade, which means that the surface has to be suitable for that sort of building. The land might be cheap, but if you've got to bring in half a million yards of gravel to get the site where it needs to be, it might not look cheap anymore, because you could import so much material. So you have to think of the cost of the land in a shovel ready context, because you can spend an awful lot of money moving dirt, moving gravel, things like that that will be necessary for an industrial project. So when we look at land for that product, we're always looking at it through the lens of, is it in a floodplain? Is it high enough ground? Is it drain? Well, all of those things that come into the cost of preparing the site to accept that kind of a building.   Keith Weinhold  32:23    Now, when we think about what goes on in an industrial space in your mind's eye, you might think of an asphalt plant, or you might think of the noise in some rumbling concrete trucks. With regard to that, what are your thoughts about nimbyism? Do you see much, not in my backyardism among communities with industrial real estate.    Victor Menasce  32:44   Oh, absolutely, without a doubt. And oftentimes that's one of the reasons why industrial land often gets pushed out away from those residential zones. So once you're outside the radius of people who can object, then there's no objection. So that's one way to solve it, and often a good way to solve it, by the way, but you also have to be mindful the fact that if there is potential contaminants coming off of that site, you don't want to be near a body of water that can carry it down into an aquifer and so on. So you've got to be thinking through containment issues. You've got to be thinking through noise propagation issues. There's been, in fact, a lot of issues with data centers, where the air handling and the the air conditioning systems right generate a lot of noise, and that noise often carries over very large distances. And you know, we're talking noise levels that would be very offensive to most homeowners. Some people have had to move because the noise levels have just been so continuous.    Keith Weinhold  33:42   I like the way you put that Victor. It's sort of like, yes, industrial parks are built outside the radius of the loudest objectors. That's right where they're going to go. But that's really the way that it is sometimes when we think about more contemporary uses for how we use industrial real estate today. You touched on data centers, also Bitcoin miners, you know, these are some of the things that generate noise. So what are some of the considerations with those two?   Victor Menasce  34:06    If you're looking at a data center, they consume a lot of power and they generate a lot of heat. The most efficient way to get rid of heat is with water. And that sounds a little bit strange, but you think about it this way, if you heat a molecule of water by one degree. I'm going to actually give you the textbook definition of a calorie. You take that water and you heat it by one degree, that'll consume one calorie of water. That's the definition of a calorie. And if you take it from the liquid state to the vapor state, just that phase change at 212 degrees Fahrenheit, or 100 degrees centigrade, that phase change is going to consume 500 calories. So you're getting rid of tremendous amount of heat by evaporating water, and that's why data centers consume so much water, is because they evaporate the water. That's the way they get rid of the heat. They evaporate it into the atmosphere. And that's how they get rid of the heat. It's the most efficient way to do it, but it consumes a lot of water resources. And then, of course, you've got to have the power to get into the data center, and a lot of places don't have the electric infrastructure to provide what's needed on a sustained basis. So you need not just good power, you need good power redundancy. So if there's a power failure here, you've got maybe redundant paths. So if one transmission line goes down, you've got alternate paths to keep the data center running. And you need the same thing also with communication, so multiple redundant fiber pathways in and out of the data center. So all of these things come into site selection. And then if you got all of that right, you got to overcome the neighborhood objections.    Keith Weinhold  35:45   Yes, that's right. We're doing a little science here with Victor Menasce, experienced international developer, and Victor when we think about industrial real estate, and we're here on an investing show. You know, maybe an investor sees potential in data center real estate or something like that. So for the individual investor, what can they do? Can they do anything individually? Are there funds to invest in, to either avoid or be attracted, to tell us about how the investor can get in?    Victor Menasce  36:15   We're not active in data centers. We're active more on the industrial side. I know the existence of data center funds. I know, for example, Kevin O'Leary, very famous Shark Tank, is a major investor in data centers. If you look him up, there might be some potentials there. Many of the major players in artificial intelligence, Oracle right now is taking on a boatload of debt to build data centers for open AI, so they're going to both build and operate those data centers. And I don't know where they're getting their capital, but they're getting a lot of it, or at least that's what's been announced publicly. Data centers require a lot of at least at that scale, require tremendous amount of infrastructure. We're talking hundreds of acres. We're not talking a small warehouse here that might be a million square feet. We're talking big, big acreage for those scale projects and for more localized projects. Yeah, there are smaller data centers, but they're not that economical to run. So it's usually the large ones that are the most cost efficient.   Keith Weinhold  37:16   Well, two things Victor is there anything else about industrial real estate? Our listeners should know maybe something I did not think about asking you and then tell our audience how they can learn more about what you're doing.    Victor Menasce  37:27   We see opportunity in particular. We think of it almost like a covered land play. We're very active in the industrial outdoor storage space where there is need for things to be stored outdoors. It might be landscaping companies that want to buy materials by the truckload. It might be car dealerships that have an excess of inventory. It might be boat and RV storage. There's many different uses for secured outdoor storage, and these are products that are designed very specifically for customers that have those needs. And as a covered land play, frankly, some of the best returns that are available in the marketplace. We've looked at a number of different things, and this is where we're placing majority of our energy right now as a development company is in that space, because we see it as an underserved segment of the market where there is not a lot of institutional money that's come into the play yet, so we're very active in that space.    Keith Weinhold  38:22   And how can our audience learn more about what you're doing   Victor Menasce  38:25   best is to reach out to us at y Street, capital com. Be happy to have if folks want to learn more about our projects. There's a place where they can sign up on the website to get more information. And love to have you as guests or as listeners to the real estate espresso podcast, and that's a daily show, seven days a week, so love to have you as a listener for that show as well.    Keith Weinhold  38:46   And that's the letter Y, Y Street, capital.com,Victor Mesance, it's been enlightening as always. Thanks so much for coming back onto the show.    Victor Menasce  38:55   Thank you so much.   Keith Weinhold  39:02   Oh yeah, good stuff from Victor as always. Another thing that he, I and his wife did in Anchorage when he was here recently is visit, well, it was not an AI data center, but we went to a mint that sells gold bars, nuggets and bullion. I really just looked. It was fun to look with Victor and actually pick up and hold gold nuggets, something that you cannot do online. I didn't have any intent to buy anything with the run up in precious metals prices. I made my last purchase of those in the middle of last year. So a year and four months ago today, I hear about lots of people rushing to buy precious metals. Now, amidst this big price run up and the run up might still have a ways to go, but no, the time to buy was like a year and a half ago or more. It's not now getting caught up in the euphoria this sort of exhaltation where you're paying double the price.   Keith Weinhold  40:03   next week here on the show, I've got more that I want to share with you on today's opportunity in new build rental property. How real estate pays five ways in a slow market, which is just fascinating. And I've got a GRE live event to tell you about next week as well, and more, lots of intriguing wealth building material here in future weeks, and then sometime after that, my own right hand assistant here at GRE is going to come out of the show and ask me some of your listener questions. It's the first time you'll hear her voice on the show. But more importantly, get my answers to your investing questions. If you'd like your question answered on a listener questions episode down the road, as always, you can write into us at get rich education.com/contact, that's get rich education.com/contact, until next week, I'm your HOST. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Unknown Speaker  41:02   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,   Keith Weinhold  41:30   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth. Building, get richeducation.com  
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Oct 20, 2025 • 48min

576: How to Cut Vacancies and Keep Tenants Twice as Long - with Mid South Home Buyers

Keith sits down with Terry Kerr and Matthew Vanhorn, the leaders of America’s oldest turnkey real estate provider, Mid South Home Buyers, to unpack the practical systems that keep thousands of rental units profitable and tenants happy. With national renter mobility dropping, longer stays are now the norm. Average resident stay is 4 years—double the industry average, thanks to proactive maintenance and relationship-driven management. Instead of fighting for eyeballs on Zillow, they target HR departments at hospitals, universities, and major employers, tapping into pre-screened, income-verified tenants with stable paychecks and predictable work schedules. Invest where returns still make sense. Visit midsouthhomebuyers.com to book your investor tour and get $500 off your first property. Resources: Switch to listening to the podcast on the Apple Podcasts or Spotify app, as the dedicated GRE mobile app will be discontinued at the end of the month. Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/576 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  For predictable 10-12% quarterly returns, visit FreedomFamilyInvestments.com/GRE or text 1-937-795-8989 to speak with a freedom coach Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript: Keith Weinhold  0:01   welcome to GRE I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, learn about how to cut your rental property vacancies and keep tenants twice as long. Why Memphis, Tennessee stays the cash flow King, and exactly where to find really low cost, quality properties today. That make sense from day one today on, get rich education.   Keith Weinhold  0:26   You know, most people think they're playing it safe with their liquid money, but they're actually losing savings accounts and bonds don't keep up when true inflation eats six or 7% of your wealth. Every single year, I invest my liquidity with FFI freedom family investments in their flagship program. Why fixed 10 to 12% returns have been predictable and paid quarterly. There is real world security backed by needs based real estate like affordable housing, Senior Living and health care. Ask about the freedom flagship program. When you speak to a freedom coach there, and that's just one part of their family of products, they've got workshops, webinars and seminars designed to educate you before you invest. Start with as little as 25k and finally, get your money working as hard as you do. Get started at Freedom family investments.com/gre, or send a text now it's 1-937-795-8989, yep, text their freedom coach, directly. Again, 1-937-795-8989,   Corey Coates  1:39   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  1:49   Welcome to GRE from New York's Long Island Sound to Washington's Puget Sound and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and you're listening to get rich education. There's an economic trend that you need to be aware of. We're going to talk about how you can play it in this era, sources ranging from Redfin to Housing Wire and others, you know they're all in agreement that the transiency rate, that mobility rate for Americans, is down. And what that means is, when people find a place to live, whether they're a property owner or a renter, they are staying put longer. They put this big, heavy anchor down, and that kind of goes along with employment. Although the unemployment rate is low right now, there aren't very many people moving jobs or changing jobs. So the rate of hiring is low, that's bad, but the rate of employer firings is low, that's good. So on balance, Americans are keeping their job if they've already got one, and they're keeping their home if they've already got one. But because movement has slowed, as we are in this slower housing market, I'll drastically oversimplify here. All right, a few years ago, you might have had a tenant stay for two years, and then there would be a one month vacancy between tenancies today, double both of those. You're more likely to see a four year stay, but two months between vacancies. So your occupancy rate, therefore, is the same in both scenarios, but there's less movement. Again, oversimplifying, but you can see the effect a longer vacancy period is bad, a longer tenant retention period is good, all right. Well, how do you increase your tenant's length of stay and decrease that vacancy in order to be more profitable as an investor and yet give your tenant a satisfactory experience too well. One thing that you can do is list your vacant unit with an employer. Yeah, advertise it through a local stable company. You're going to end up with higher quality tenants. See, there's already this built in screening that was done for you. The employer basically did that for you. So when you work directly with especially hospitals, universities, corporate campuses or military bases, what you're doing is you're fishing from a pond of already vetted, income verified and drug screened candidates. See these tenants what they had to do. They already had to pass HR background checks and employment verification in order to get their job. So for you, that saves you both risk and time compared to the you know, the Craigslist style roll the dice crowd. Now, Of course, we cannot discriminate against certain groups of people, and we'll get into that shortly. But of course, steady employment equals steady rent tenants sourced through employers. They usually have reliable paychecks, often through direct deposit. They've got predictable work schedules, and there's going to be less income volatility. So that means that you'll have fewer late payments and lower eviction risk. And some landlords, you know what they do, they even structure rent payments through payroll deduction. I mean that essentially automates the rent collection. Yes, you can do that. Employees who move for a job, they often sign longer leases, because relocating again would be a hassle. So many will stay in your unit as long as they stay employed. That could be two years or five years, especially in the health care, education and tech sector. So less turnover means fewer make ready costs for you, fewer showings and just more ease and peace of mind. So advertising through employers that is a really low competition marketing channel as well. You know, most landlords, they blast their listings on Zillow apartments.com or maybe Facebook marketplace. Well over there, your post is just one out of hundreds, instead of all that competition, what you're doing is you're finding quiet, uncrowded channels when you utilize these employer housing boards and their HR relocation departments, and this way you can even get inside that company's internal newsletters so you're reaching renters before they can even start scrolling listings over on Zillow and see employers love this too. It's not like the employer is having to do a favor for you. They love it, because when they can help new hires or transferees find housing, it's better for that company. It reduces the employee's stress. It improves the retention at that company. If they have an employer that's satisfied and has a good place to stay, and it really boosts that company's recruiting success. So you're helping yourself, you're helping that company, and you're helping their new employee, which is your tenant. So this makes HR departments. They are surprisingly receptive to you. They might even circulate your listing internally or add you to their housing resource list. So this is a perfect fit for these hands off turnkey investors. So if you're doing that or you're managing properties remotely, this employer outreach, it really gives you a nice extra layer of reliability. And as far as the people that will be your tenants, think about nurses, engineers. IT staff, sometimes teachers, sometimes military based personnel. I mean, they are all ideal long term tenants. Now the way that you can actually do this and put it into practice is identify major employers that are near your property, that could be hospital systems, that could be universities or manufacturing plants, then contact their HR or the relocation department, and after that, it's not hard just provide them with a concise PDF or a one page flyer with your property photos and the monthly rent amount. And one thing you can do, and you should in this case, is put the distance or the time it takes to travel to the employer from your rental unit, and then add your contact info. That is exactly how you do it. You can offer a small incentive, like $50 off the first month for employees. So this is a slick way to advertise your vacancy with employers and make you more profitable over time.    Keith Weinhold  7:02   Now today, we're going to talk to who is actually America's oldest turnkey real estate company. As far as we know, they're based in Memphis, Tennessee, and we'll learn how they advertise a vacant unit and screen prospective tenants and place them and maintain their units over time. They are called mid south homebuyers. You've heard them on the show before, and because of their success, both investors and other real estate companies, they actually listen in intently to what these people have to say. I mean, others study them and learn from them. These are the people other companies study, and you're still going to hear from their principal and their sales lead about reducing your vacancy time and increasing your tenant duration. And, you know, it's just kind of funny how often Memphis, Tennessee, which is where they're based, how often this comes up in cash flowing real estate conversations that you have out there over time? I mean. And Memphis consistently has the best cash flow, maybe, amongst any substantial Metro in the nation. We'll just say among metros that are big enough to have a major pro sports team. I mean, Memphis does have the NBA Grizzlies. There aren't many other cities that can even compete with Memphis as the cashflow King, although there are some that you can work into the conversation. Indianapolis, Cleveland and Oklahoma City are some of those places. Now, before we're done, you'll also learn about how, even following this generation's big inflationary wave, how purchase prices are still as affordable as they are in both Memphis and Little Rock. I mean, this is going to make you ask out loud today, how could they still be so low? We'll also talk about conventional, enduring property management techniques today, now next month here on the show, we're going to talk about how you can use AI to self manage your properties, and that show next month is going to be with an expert straight from Silicon Valley. We're going to talk to the CEO of hemlane then and their AI driven property management software. She used to work for Apple, and she's got a Harvard Business School degree. That is next month today. It's about tried and proven techniques to make you more profitable as an investor   Keith Weinhold  11:24   I'd like to welcome in longtime friends of the show, with the emphasis on long time since they were first here with us, nearly 11 years ago, They are those ever steady property providers based in Memphis, mid south homebuyers. They also serve Little Rock, Arkansas. I have physically walked their offices and properties in person myself. They are, in fact, America's oldest turnkey real estate provider. And it's the return of their founder and principal, Terry Kerr and a second guest who you'll meet shortly, Terry, welcome back on of the show.   Terry Kerr  12:04   Thanks so much, Keith, so glad to be back.   Keith Weinhold  12:07   Congrats on your success. Your model and operation is prominent and exemplary nationally. You've now grown to 110 w2 employees there, and your 13 plus year property management guru who's been leading that entire division is now your sales director. It's terrific to introduce him to the world today. Matthew Van Horn,   Matthew Vanhorn  12:31   Keith, so great to be on here. Long time listener of the show. Really great to meet you.    Keith Weinhold  12:36   Yeah. Appreciate it now you'll soon be listening to yourself on the show. GRE, listeners are familiar with the turnkey real estate model. What you do is buy a distressed property, you rehab it, and then you place a tenant in the property, and you hold on to that for investors across the nation for the production of long term cash flow. Well, let's get an update between Memphis and Little Rock. How many properties do you hold under management for investors now and then? What percent are single family rentals versus other types?   Terry Kerr  13:07   Right now, we're about 57 maybe a little closer to 5800 and the vast majority of them are single family houses. I'm going to say probably. What 5% are duplexes? Matthew, something like that. Yeah, something like that. So no other multis, just single family, most of them rehabs. And of course, now we're doing a new construction direct to rental as well.   Keith Weinhold  13:29   Interestingly, with 58 to 5900 rentals, I mean, you can easily sort of be your own surveying outfit in an informal way, in finding out what's happening with the market, what all the dynamics are. So why don't we start at the beginning, when you're marketing and advertising and looking to place a tenant, tell us about just what you look for, just what you need to avoid. I mean checking for the tenant. That typically involves an employment check, a credit check, a rental history. Sometimes something might appear like a red flag, say, a 590 credit score. Would you always accept tenants in that condition? Because there are times when there are extenuating circumstances when a tenant with a 590 credit score actually might be a good placement. So tell us more about that screening.   Terry Kerr  14:17   As you know, it is renters that drive our returns as investors, and so selecting the right renter is where the money is made in this business, for sure, we are doing as much screening as we can for our renters. There's a lot that goes into that. We actually have a whole processing department. You know some people here who spend their whole day working in the processing division. And what you really got to watch out for, as far as red flags, is just fraud. There are so many ways you can use machines to defraud, and we have people who are able to detect and weed out the bad actors there, but we know what works really well. We have, for instance, in. Arkansas, the main employer of our residents is Baptist Health Medical Center, and we love our healthcare workers there. So that's a place that, you know, starting from the marketing side, we're going to dial up our marketing in those places we're going to go to the HR department, or we're often in the HR department of Baptist Health Medical Center, pushing and asking for referrals from them, you know. And same with just referrals in general, good tenants tend to refer other good tenants. We're of course, looking for strong income that we can verify. And more than anything, we're looking for strong, credible current rental history, so someone who's paying the rent today somewhere to a verified landlord, not their sister, you know, but a very verified landlord. That's the big thing, Keith.   Keith Weinhold  15:50   Tell us more about that. That's great that you're being proactive and getting right in there with a stable, steady employer. That is where our rent comes from. After all, are there any other red flags, maybe things that people would not think about identifying as a red flag when it comes to that employment, in that credit, in that rental history   Matthew Vanhorn  16:11   one reason I bring up the localized marketing that some people may not think about is that renters who move from Out of state often will land in a place and then stay there for one year, which is fine, but then they often don't renew their lease and they'll move somewhere else. Now, of course, what we have to do above all is we have to be legal, you know, so we can't discriminate against someone from coming from out of town, but what we can do is dial up our localized marketing so that we're getting people who are in the neighborhood, who love the neighborhood already where they are, and so that contributes to longer residence days, and it's just little things like that. Once again, you're looking for employment that you can verify, so that you know that you're getting a quality renter.   Terry Kerr  16:59   I'll also say that one of the ways that we try to attract the most potential residents we can is by having a free application. So typically, a property management company is going to charge, you know, 50 to 75 bucks per applicant. And we're very fortunate that we've get a terrific deal from Equifax, because we're also lenders, we do some lending to our investors, which gives us a really good deal on paying for credit checks. And so we waive those fees for our residents. And so a lot more folks are going to apply with us, because it doesn't cost them anything to apply. And of course, the more people that apply, you've got a much better shot at a filling the property quicker, but also finding a much better resident.   Keith Weinhold  17:44   well this is a great part of building the connection. One of the first interactions they have with you is realizing that you don't have any application fee. And AI can be great for marketing and for doing things like writing listing descriptions, but you build that human connection there. For example, you do in person showings. You invite prospective tenants in current tenants into your physical office, kind of replacing society's trust crisis with humanity.   Matthew Vanhorn  18:14   Yes, that's right, Keith. In the last 12 months, we've spent more money than ever on technology, so we are leaning heavily into creating the systems and processes that allow us to get to our service quickly. And at the same time, we've invested more into staffing up in the past 12 months, into inviting people into our office, you know, and we can still do everything remotely. We can do it virtually for folks who want that, we found that a lot of residents love to look us in the face, and they like to come down to our office, and they like to sit across from Karen and across from Gabby, and they just love the personalized experience that we give them. It's hard to quantify it, Keith, but I just really believe that it drives longevity, right?   Keith Weinhold  19:04   Having a face behind that rental because your properties are freshly rehabbed, or, in some cases, they're new builds, so hopefully you won't have too many tenant service calls once they do become a resident, and you don't need to interact with them all the time, though you're there for them, but once you have chosen a tenant, and that tenant is placed, you know somebody has to be the adult in the lease, and we sincerely hope that the tenant is one of them. So with regard to that, how do you help ensure that tenants keep making on time payments, and you can keep tenants and not get ones that break the lease. So can you speak to us about that, how you can help identify that in the screening and then that ongoing relationship?   Matthew Vanhorn  19:47    I will say that perfect vetting does not necessarily lead to perfect collections, because it turns out that every one of our residents, they are humans, and as humans, we run into things you. Know, divorce can happen. Relationship breakups can happen, job losses happen. Just very human things happen. And so we like to stay in touch with our residents as often as possible, and very much encourage an open line of communication. We very much believe in compassion based collections here at Mid South. And so when residents fall upon hard times, we are truly there for them. Memphis actually has more nonprofits per capita than any place in America then. So when residents do fall on hard times, you know, and it happens, we're actually able to reach out. We have connections with several agencies that can help with rental assistance for renters who need it, we found that by pouring into our staffing with the resident support and solutions department that we've had a lot of success in collecting just by keeping that relationship intact when the pandemic hit. For instance, and I know that's been a few years from now, and maybe we all want to forget it, our collections rate actually went up during that time, and I attribute that largely to the fact that, number one, we had a relationship in place with our renters. We staffed up, and matter of fact, we had a full time person just working to get rent assistance for those renters who kind of had been disenfranchised by the pandemic   Keith Weinhold  21:26   during pandemic times or post pandemic times whenever it is us as investors, we're always interested in reducing that vacancy time. We seem to be in a period, at least nationally, where when people get a hold of a place, they want to keep it and hold on to it. In a lot of markets, the duration of a tenancy has been increasing. So despite what era that we're in, can you talk to us about some of the best practices for how you reduce the vacancy time? Because we all know vacancy and turnover is our biggest expense over time. As investors,    Terry Kerr  21:58   I like to say, you know, at the heart of what we do is making sure that when a hard working, single mother comes home at the end of the day, she can give her child a hot bath. And that's not possible if the water heaters out. And that's just one example, but our main job is to give a good quality of life to the residents that we are caring for, and if we can do that, and if we can treat them with respect when they do fall on hard times, like Matthew said, they're going to want to renew the lease. So we have got a almost twice the average length of stay as the industry average, which is we've got about a four year average resident stay. And when folks move out of a mid south house, it's not because they can find a better value they're going to get. They're already in the nicest house on the street. And if something breaks, we're out there lickety split to fix it. When folks move out of a mid south house. It's either because they're downsizing. Kids are moving out, or they're going up because they're having their family increases and they've got to move up, or maybe something happens to them, like Matthew mentioned, you know, death, divorce, disability, these things happen, right? But no one's moving out because they can find a better value or because they're not getting the service or respect that they deserve.    Keith Weinhold  23:25   That says a lot. Being managers of 5800 to 5900 properties, which gives you this sort of canvassing or de facto surveying ability that you have. What are we seeing for the direction of rents? We'll get into rents and prices later, because nationally, rents are just holding steady. They're really not rising very much. What do you see there?   Matthew Vanhorn  23:49   Yes, we saw them fairly stable. Over the course of 2024 I have started to see an uptick here in the past few months, I will say, which is encouraging for investors, for sure, each month, I'm looking at all of the renewal rates personally, to kind of look at that, engage the market. And like you said, it really is helpful. I mean, yes, we have all the tools, Zillow, rentometer, all these things, but there's nothing like just our own data of seeing, hey, what's the house across the street renting for? You know, how long did it take for that to rent and incorporating that into our data. And right now, our houses are moving at a faster pace on the leasing tip, which rent increases tend to follow that    Keith Weinhold  24:30   when it comes to optimizing rents, a lot of that coming back to reducing vacancy time. There are a number of strategies that one can employ now it's not with you guys, but I have a single family rental home in another market, and one promotion that that manager is running and encouraged me to participate in is a 50 inch flat screen TV having that and giving it away to the tenant. Somehow, that only costs $250 so I decided to do that. At for a vacancy that I have there in that market. Now, some investors might say, you know, why am I buying TVs for a tenant? I'm already providing them with a place. If the rent is 1500 bucks, a $250 TV only costs five days of vacancy, and that helps me reduce that vacancy period. Might even make a tenant want to stay longer, so sometimes you got to be thinking about how your tenant thinks, and you can come up with inventive ways to reduce vacancy. Do you have anything like that, any small concession that you've offered or have needed to offer in either market?   Terry Kerr  25:33   Well, we haven't done anything like that, Keith, but what we do like to do, and Matthew mentioned this earlier, is as great tenants tend to refer other great residents, and so we have a referral bonus that we pay out to our residents that refer other folks to us, and that does not come out of the pocket of our investors, that comes out of our pocket, because it's our job to make sure that We rent these properties as quick as we can to qualified residents.   Keith Weinhold  26:04   One thing that I've liked about Memphis, which few markets have, is that it's embedded within renter culture in Memphis, since it is such a renter city, that renters travel with their appliances, like the refrigerator, in their stove, in their dishwasher, which always seems crazy to me, so you're not providing those appliances. It seems like that fact alone might help with resident retention in Memphis. They're just less likely to move when they have more stuff to move.   Matthew Vanhorn  26:35   Yeah, it's really true. Yeah. And the longer people stay, the longer they tend to stay as funny as that sounds. And yeah, that's something that we found even in our new construction homes where we do provide the appliances we've been finding in many instances, still the residents are coming with their own appliances. And so we're storing our appliance, our brand new appliances, in our warehouse.   Keith Weinhold  26:58   Wow, yes, that's just something that you don't see in other places. And when it comes to retention, we're interested in maintaining the property like you talked about being proactive with are there some other things you do to help ensure that the maintenance expenses stay lower throughout the lifetime of that investor ownership? How do you approach that?   Terry Kerr  27:16   It really starts with doing a full blown rehab, right? So every once in a while, you know, we'll have houses that, you know, have some age on the components. But when we do a rehab, everything is brand spanking new, like a new roof, gut, the kitchen, got the bathroom, you know, all new electrical, all new plumbing, all new HVAC, a new water heater the whole nine yards. So it starts there, and then when a property turns over, we go into the property, and we are looking for safe and clean, right? So we want to make sure to keep the water out. We want to make sure that everything is safe and the property is tip top and super clean. Fortunately, the folks that are maintaining the houses for our investors. The technicians are the same technicians that did the renovations on the property, right? And it's the same materials. Yeah, it's like, we have an assembly line and a junky house jumps on the assembly line, and we rip everything off, and all the same materials jump back on the house. So we're able to keep costs low because of that, and also because the labor that we end up having to pay the technicians typically is a lot less than normal, because they're used to working on the same water heater, the same HVAC system, you know, the same furnace, the same dishwasher. So our volume model kind of helps with that.   Keith Weinhold  28:39   Oh, if you were listening closely, yes, what a huge efficiency that can be. You fellas, have any last thoughts about efficient property management, since that's what you've led for more than 13 years, Matthew,   Matthew Vanhorn  28:51   I resonate with what you said about how many investors overlook vacancy costs when properties turn over. And so I think it's just getting your rents right on the money, maybe just a little below, can actually drive returns, as opposed to maybe trying to get an extra 25 bucks more, which takes you three weeks longer to rent. You actually did not come out ahead in that, in that scenario, Keith   Keith Weinhold  29:14   today, with inflation, a $25 difference, I mean, we're down to what 12 hours of vacancy is, really how we're talking about there Property Management turning a passive income into an active lifestyle since forever. That's what they do. Property managers are the people that have never met a maintenance issue that waited until business hours. So that's why I'm grateful that my managers do what they do for me. That's what we're talking about today. More when we come back with Terry Kerr and Matthew Van Horn of mid south homebuyers, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold   Keith Weinhold  29:45   if you're scrolling for quality real estate and finance info today, yeah, it can be a mess. You hit paywalls, pop ups, push alerts, Cookie banners. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun. That's why. It matters to get clean, free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor. It's direct, and it gets to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp and in the know about real estate investing, this is paradigm shifting material, and when you start the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video course, completely free as well. It's called The Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now at gre letter.com Visit gre letter.com    Keith Weinhold  30:56   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your pre qual and even chat with President chailey Ridge personally, while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lending group.com that's Ridge lending group.com   Tom Wheelwright  31:31   this is Rich Dad Advisor Tom wheelwright. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  31:37   welcome back to get rich education. You've got the pleasure of listening to the voices of America's oldest turnkey real estate provider mid south homebuyers based in Memphis, Tennessee, and some years ago, they branched out to Little Rock, Arkansas as well, just about a two hour road trip west of Memphis. When us as investors buy a property, we've got to be cognizant of the fact that that property swims in an economic ocean, and therefore job vibrancy is, after all, how the tenant pays the rent. So tell us about economic developments in Memphis and Little Rock, because there are some exciting ones.   Matthew Vanhorn  32:24   So yeah, both in Memphis and in Little Rock, we've got the roads, we've got the rivers, we've got the rails, which drives both Memphis and Little Rock as distribution hubs here in the middle of America. And so of course, FedEx famously has their headquarters here in Memphis. Many of your listeners will know it's the largest cargo airport in America. We've had a resurgence of X. AI has actually come to Memphis and built the world's largest supercomputer here in Memphis, and they're actually working hard now on building a second called Colossus two, which is going to be even larger. They're saying it may hold as many as 1 million Nvidia chips, which I can't do that math, but that's a lot of money. And so x AI is has quickly become the second largest taxpayer here in Memphis and in Shelby County. And 25% of those tax proceeds, by the way are going, they're earmarked to go right into that local community beside where the plant is, and all the development is in Little Rock. You know, of course, it's Arkansas's largest city. It's the capital city, and so by nature of that, there are many stable state government jobs there that is a bulwark of the economic development there. There is a actually Fintech startup space is big in Little Rock as well. Lockheed Martin has been doing developments there, so a lot of aerospace development around Little Rock. Folks who look at our homes will also notice that we are in Jacksonville, which is a suburb of Little Rock that's anchored by the Air Force base there in Jacksonville. And there's actually a large munitions supplier there, Sig Sauer, which provides a lot of jobs to the locals there. And our number one, I may have mentioned it earlier, our number one employer in Central Arkansas is actually Baptist Health Medical Center. And just generally speaking, health care workers make up the largest portion of our residents in Central Arkansas. So a lot of great economic drivers that we're seeing bringing renters to Little Rock and and new jobs there. As a matter of fact, not just that, but I noted recently that the cost of living in Little Rock is now 10% below the national average. I think we had a report on our website a few years ago that it was 6% and that's actually. It's only becoming more favorable to live in Central Arkansas.   Keith Weinhold  35:04   You're talking about stable and growing drivers here, AI related businesses and healthcare. Let's talk about those rents and prices. Because really, this is one reason why national investors are so drawn to that area. It's that high affordability and that high ratio of rent income to purchase price. So what sort of rent and price ranges are we looking at in both markets now,   Matthew Vanhorn  35:29   it's not the same as it was when I started here in 2012 Reds have increased and so, you know, average rents around here start around 900 and now we're going up to about 1700 toward the high end there. And you know, the great news is that incomes have increased as well, and so our renters are able to afford this just as well as they were before. Or maybe even better, like I mentioned, cost of living in Arkansas has actually improved. And so what that means is people are actually making more money compared to the rent, even though rents have increased, which I believe is good news for investors, and it's been good news for us as a management company, as I think that contributes to the resident longevity there, once again,   Keith Weinhold  36:17   nowhere in the nation Do we hear enough about increased affordability stories, which is exactly what you have when your income rises faster than your rent, which is a harbinger of being able to increase the rent in the future. Tell us more about the rent in price ranges in both markets.   Matthew Vanhorn  36:35   In Memphis, if you get a two bed, one bath, you can often find that for as low as 808 850, something like that. As you step up into a three bed one bath, that's going to be somewhere between 1000 1200, depending on where you are in the city, there in Memphis, if you're in our new construction homes, those can range between 1395 all the way up to 1850 once again, depending on the size of the construction and the location out in Arkansas, rents tend to be just a little bit higher than in Memphis. So you see the rent starting there around 950 and going up to just under 2000   Keith Weinhold  37:19   and we're interested in that capital price, because a lot of times, investors think about their purchase through that perspective of the ratio of the rent income to the purchase price.   Matthew Vanhorn  37:30   As far as sales price goes, Keith, we started right around $100,000 on the low end, and those can range up to 240,000 thereabouts, on the high end, if you're talking about a new construction, three, two with a two car garage in an appreciating area. You can see that sort of range in Memphis, very similar, very similar. We have some of our smaller rehabs starting as low as 100,000 and going up to about that $215,000 range.   Keith Weinhold  38:04   Now, I would imagine, in the inflationary era that we're still in, that you get investors that call in there, and you do have these robust interactions with investors, where you talk with them on the phone like a human being, and people that say, come on. How can you get a respectable tenant in a single family rehab rental home that only costs $120,000 How do you handle questions like that?   Matthew Vanhorn  38:30   That's the whole job here is explaining that Sure, no where our renters are living. It's the best home that they've ever lived in, and it's it's in a affordable area. It's in an area where their friends live, where you just have workforce, just blue collar, but beautiful neighborhoods where they live. And I mean, they're proud to call these houses their home, and for many, it really is their dream home.   Keith Weinhold  38:55   People mold their lawns. The streets aren't littered with trash. I know where you guys invest. I've been on the streets there with you, checking them out. What percentage of investors finance the property, and how has that changed over time?   Terry Kerr  39:09   I'm going to say that it's probably about 75% finance, 25% cash. A lot of your listeners come with their own mortgage broker. The ones that don't, we have our tried and true mortgage brokers. Interest rates are not 4% anymore, and some folks are are wanting to pay cash, and they do, and some of them will pay cash, and then, you know, plan on refinancing later. But right now, that's probably about 25% cash, 75% finance.    Keith Weinhold  39:36   Yeah, it's interesting to see that direction, since rates did begin to get higher in 2022 you have this robust interaction with investors, but that doesn't only have to be over the phone. You guys are so proud of what you do that you've long offered investor tours. In fact, now you're doing more of those investor tours than you ever have. I believe you're doing 11. In tours per year in Memphis, and five in Little Rock as well.So tell us about that.    Terry Kerr  40:04   I guess it was maybe seven or eight years ago. We're so stoked that everybody wants to buy houses from us, and we've got, you know, a short wait list, and that's awesome, but we want folks to come visit us, and so, you know, we just started offering folks $500 off of the purchase of their first home, if they'll just come visit us. And so we know it's in our best interest to try to get to know our investors on a personal level, and the investors that do come to visit us, and we're able to pull back the curtain and show them, you know how operational efficiency benefits them as investors. I think they appreciate it, and then we do also just kind of like the nerd out on the nuts and bolts of the business. So it's fun to be able to pull that curtain back.   Keith Weinhold  40:48   Now, you don't have to be an investor to come on the tour, either prospective investors or regular investors that are already there can come on the tour. Is the Tour Free? Absolutely. So the tour is free, and you get a $500 credit if you end up purchasing there. Most investors never come physically see the property at all, but you sure can do that, and they make it really easy for you. Well, this is going to help a lot of people, especially when we think about how to manage the tenant and reduce our vacancy time in today's era. Before I ask how our listeners can learn more about you. Do you have any last thoughts at all about anything that we discussed management or properties or tenants or anything else? Maybe I did not think about asking you.   Matthew Vanhorn  41:32   I'll just go back to Keith talking about how well staffed we are here at Mid South. I think that's where we stand. Apart from a lot of our competitors is that we're not just two or three guys in an office here, we have over 100 employees. It takes speed to deliver good service. Service leads to satisfaction. Satisfaction leads to the residents staying. The resident staying leads to stacks of cash for you as investors, and the only way you can do that is if you're staffed up properly. And so that's something that you want to ask if you're ever vetting another property manager, is what does your staff look like? And really understand, can they actually provide the service to their residents and to their investors that they're reporting?   Keith Weinhold  42:17   You have helped more of our listeners than any other provider in the nation, certainly over 100 of them, perhaps hundreds by now. I'm not really sure if listeners want to get a hold of you, what's the best way for them to do that?    Terry Kerr  42:31   Invest at mid southhomebuyers.com   Keith Weinhold  42:34   that's a great starting place for you. And that way you can take a look at properties, get thinking about the market. Learn more about their management and get a hold of them. Terry and Matthew, it's been valuable as usual. Thanks so much for coming out of the show.   Matthew Vanhorn  42:49   Thank you, Keith.    Terry Kerr  42:49   Thank you, Keith.   Keith Weinhold  42:56   Oh yeah. Sharp insights from Terry and Matthew at mid south homebuyers today, waiving their application fee means more applicants, a bigger renter pool to choose from, which either shortens your vacancy time or it's going to get you a better quality tenant. Now, a lot of people, they think that real estate is unaffordable and even impossible, but few make it easier and more affordable than these people. And I think I shared with you before that, an 18 year old guy who I do know and have talked to in person, he bought his first ever rental property from mid south homebuyers. So it's kind of interesting. His goal was to own his first rental property when he was 18, and he closed just in time the day before his 19th birthday. I think he's age 20 now, but because fully renovated single family homes can be bought in a range of about 100 to 220k here, and you will put 20 to 25% of a down payment on that your monthly rent is about eight tenths of 1% of that purchase price. Okay, so that's renovated, and then new builds sell in a range of 200 to 260k rent to price ratios on those are a little lower. They're point seven five or so. Now we are here in an era where mortgage rates are in the low sixes for owner occupied that means you'll pay closer to 7% on income properties. But if you go new build, which is really something I've been suggesting to you for a while, if you can swing it, those rates are as low as five and a quarter percent for qualified buyers here, yes, at these low Memphis and Little Rock prices, they've got a few duplexes usually available as well, renting your residence. It's just something that's sort of in the culture there in Memphis, and that's why they're confident in offering a number of guarantees for investors. They just do things that. That other providers don't do in the rare event that your property is occupied and then it somehow falls vacant during your first year of ownership. Their releasing fee is free. They also have a guarantee that you will cash flow after you close. They have a one year bumper to bumper warranty on the renovations we're talking about from the doorknob to the ductwork, and there's a lifetime 90 day occupancy guarantee. What that means is, if your property were ever vacant for that long, they would start paying rent to you on day 91 but you know what's amazing? It's easy for them to offer that they'll tell you that they've never had to pay out on that, because they've never experienced the vacancy of more than 55 days. Just amazing. And all those guarantees I just told you about that is in writing on their website. So if you want to get a hold of them, there's virtually no one else in the nation that makes it easier and more affordable. I believe that's an email address that Terry gave there. Again, it is invest@midsouthhomebuyers.com their website is, as you might have guessed, midsouthhomebuyers.com that's midsouthhomebuyers.com interestingly, you can even look at their income properties. There some provider websites don't let you do that. And again, they offer free tours, and if you prefer, their phone number is 901-306-9009, this week, you learned some great techniques for reducing your vacancy and being more profitable, as well as a provider that can deliver it for you. Should you so choose? The proverb goes, give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. Well, you've got the option of doing either one or both today, until next week. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 1  46:59   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 you   Keith Weinhold  47:27   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth building, get richeducation.com  
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Oct 13, 2025 • 40min

575: The American Dream Now Costs $5 Million

Keith discusses the rising cost of the American dream, now estimated at $5 million, due to inflation and housing prices.  He highlights the affordable housing crisis, with more Americans living in RVs and homelessness up 18% since last year.  The NAR's "Best Week" report highlights the benefits of buying during this time, including lower prices and more favorable terms. Resources: IMPORTANT: GRE mobile app listeners - Switch to listening to the podcast on the  Apple Podcasts or Spotify app, as the dedicated GRE mobile app will be discontinued at the end of the month. Check out the free video course on real estate investing at getricheducation.com/course. Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/575 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  For predictable 10-12% quarterly returns, visit FreedomFamilyInvestments.com/GRE or text  1-937-795-8989 to speak with a freedom coach Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, the American dream now costs $5 million learn just what that will mean for you. The beauty of 50 year mortgages, then after 11 years, I share the most depressing thing I've ever said on the show today on get rich education.   Keith Weinhold  0:26   You know, most people think they're playing it safe with their liquid money, but they're actually losing savings accounts and bonds don't keep up when true inflation eats six or 7% of your wealth. Every single year, I invest my liquidity with FFI freedom family investments in their flagship program. Why fixed 10 to 12% returns have been predictable and paid quarterly. There's real world security backed by needs based real estate like affordable housing, Senior Living and health care. Ask about the freedom flagship program when you speak to a freedom coach there, and that's just one part of their family of products, they've got workshops, webinars and seminars designed to educate you before you invest. Start with as little as 25k and finally, get your money working as hard as you do. Get started at Freedom family investments.com/gre or send a text now it's 1-937-795-8989, yep, text their freedom coach, directly. Again, 1-937-795-8989,   Corey Coates  1:39   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  1:55   Welcome to GRE from Norwich, Connecticut to Norwich, North Dakota, and across 188 nations worldwide, you're listening to get rich education. I'm Keith Weinhold. You probably know me by now, but if you're new, I am an active member of the Forbes real estate Council. You can see my work in the USA Today. And of Paramount import, I am an active real estate investor. We're talking about America's top shaved mammal on a microphone here, but suffice it to say, this mammal has at least shaved just how can this slack jawed mammal persist in this environment? Well, I don't know, but I've been doing it here for more than 11 years now. More on that later. This is episode 575, and each episode's release is a bigger deal than releasing the Epstein files. Today is no exception, although today's show release will get fewer people in trouble than the release of the Epstein files. Speaking of people in trouble. It is the middle class. It's the average American and the average Canadian too, because it now costs $5 million to fuel the American dream. But yet, at the same time, hordes of people are now going the other direction, and they're getting poorer. The affordable housing crisis that we've talked about here seems to probably still have not reached its crescendo. Or perhaps, if you know music, it's the opposite a diminuendo. Things are getting to a low point. How bad is it? Getting well priced out of a permanent home. More and more Americans are living full time on RVs, not like nice, fancy RVs either. Beaters. 486,000 Americans are now estimated to live in RVs because they are out of options. And the more soul crushing part of this is that that number has more than doubled just since 2021 I've got two minutes of astonishing audio footage of this to share with you shortly about the RV living homelessness is up 18% Since last year, that figure is sourced by HUD. HUD has the best stat set on homelessness, and that's a problem that's increasingly visible in your own city, more likely than not. And you know, I have personally gotten into more than just surface level chats casually with food servers and baristas, just these quick chats with them. And you know what they divulge to me, that they're living in their car. Yeah, I'm not probing and asking about that sort of thing, but they just share that with me, yeah, food servers and baristas that I just met. They will often tell me that they're living in their car within five minutes of chatting with them, and when they do that, by the way, it also makes me wonder if they're trying to get me to feel bad for them, and they're freely telling me that just to get a tip from me. Well, today, mobile homes are even being coveted. I mean living in a trailer park that is affordable housing. We covered that on last week's show now the real estate company Redfin and Ipsos, they conducted a survey of more than 4000 US homeowners and renters, and they asked respondents about the struggle to afford housing. And it was astounding to learn that to string together a life where they have stable housing, how people are doing all these things, they're delaying having children, they're getting rid of their pets, and some are going through the discomfort of living with an ex spouse just to have affordable housing, as far as what is now almost half a million Americans living full time on RVs and growing since they can't afford a home. NBC covered this, and it is sad. Let's listen into just how squalid the living conditions are, quickly profiling two people as this reporter goes on their tiny RVs. I mean, as you listen to this, okay, keep reminding yourself, keep telling yourself this is America today. And as you'll see, this isn't even in a high cost part of the nation that we're about to profile here again, tell yourself this is America today. Well, this NBC field reporter gets shown the insides of two different RV units by two separate owners, each living by themselves, first a man and then a woman. This is about two minutes in length    Speaker 1  6:53   for Gus Francis. This is home a 20 year old camper he bought for $5,000 parked in an RV lot in Graysville, Tennessee, just north of Chattanooga. I got all my rosaries for protection everywhere. Books, books, books. now retired, he worked for decades as a commercial diver and hoped to live closer to his widowed mother, but when he sought a more conventional home, I just can't see how people with their normal job making 15 bucks an hour can afford an apartment without multiple roommates. Meals are made in the microwave, the stove unused for fear of a gas leak. Right next door is Debbie Williams. She sold her house in Kentucky to be closer to her grandchildren, but housing prices near Chattanooga increased by almost 50% since 2020 apartments are like about 1200 a month, but then you got your utilities to pay. This is permanent, plus it include is like 550 a month includes electric water, saving over everything. It includes everything. Debbie works nights, helping adults with disabilities, and says she likes her setup, even if the exercise bike doesn't fit inside. Okay? I like my shower. It's really nice. And then my bedroom, Debbie and Gus now among the nearly half a million people in the US living in RVs full time. I sometimes thought, Man, if I could have saved more money in the past. But what it was is, I don't blame myself, either, because I raised four kids with no child support, despite the tight quarters, plenty of room to build a community that matters. Ellison Barber, NBC News, Graysville, Tennessee   Keith Weinhold  8:46   gosh, cramped and modest conditions there again. Tell yourself this is America today, and see, here's the thing. From all outward signs, these two people profile. They're not substance abusers. They're not criminals that can't get a job. These are American workers that have been productive people throughout their lives. The first guy, Gus said he worked for decades as a commercial diver, and that part of Tennessee, it's not a place in the nation where the cost of living is exorbitant, either the crux of the problem here is not just the wave of inflation that started in 2021 the essence of it is the fact that inflation has outpaced wage growth. Will you ever get to having a $5 million net worth? Because that's what it takes to live the American dream today. Now, a while back, I told you how, if you amass $5 million really that's the number, that's the threshold where you could probably stop working and just invest such that you could live off it forever. But inflation. Changes that and it keeps upping that number. Well, since then, Investopedia recently came up with this $5 million price tag that's just for living the American dream in today's dollars. Let's look at what that really means, and then we'll add up the spending categories. This is really interesting. All right, the definition of the American dream. What that means is owning a home, raising two kids, retiring comfortably, and maybe throwing in an annual vacation or two. So a nice life, for sure, but nothing extravagant and okay, yes, there is this other angle of like, Money cannot buy the best things in life, and that's true. There's a lot to be said for that, but this is not a relationships in a dating show, okay? So that's why I'm covering the financial angle here, and later today, I'll tell you how much the typical American makes throughout their lifetime, which is much less than 5 million bucks. But to get to that exact $5 million total, which is the least that you now need in net worth, the estimated lifetime costs of eight milestones most often associated with a dream were added up by Investopedia. And now, of course, everyone's dream is different, and housing costs differ nationally. But, I mean, this is pretty reasonable. Here they are. This is how much it takes for each of them today. And I'm doing some rounding retirement, over $1.6 million that's what it takes now. Healthcare, 414k this is all spent over the course of your lifetime, a wedding 38k And I hope that is wedding singular, not weddings plural, owning a home, 957k raising two children and paying for college that costs. 876k and then owning a new car, that is another 900k Yeah, that sounds like a lot, but that will include costs of financing and insurance and depreciation on cars throughout your life, and then a yearly vacation is 180k throughout your life, and pets, 39k All Right. There it is. That is the $5 million total for the American dream. And again, that is only in today's dollars. Inflation will, of course, make all of these future costs run up. All right, housing is really the biggest part of the dream. I mean, second to retirement anyway, all right. Again, the lifetime cost of housing, like I said, is 957k just a year ago, it was 930k okay, well, the national median list price of a single family home is about 430k I guess that makes sense. Most people live in multiple homes throughout their lives. Well, the price per square foot is up 50% just since 2019 that is what is pricing people out. That is what is making people become your renter instead of a homeowner. Well, this $5 million required for the dream, that is why more people are homeless or more people are living in RVs. This means that the demand for the product that you're providing to the marketplace affordable housing, that demand is considerable, and that demand is durable, and the median lifetime earnings for one American with a bachelor's degree is only $2.8 million. All right, so that's just over half as much as it takes to live the dream. But here's what's appalling. Are you ready? Here we go. This could be the most depressing and concerning stat you've heard on this show, maybe one of the most depressing and concerning in your entire life when you really think this through. All right, now, what do you think of as sort of a model for someone that is stable? How about both married and a homeowner? I mean, yeah, they're two big markers, married and home ownership that is foundational stuff when your kids grow up to be adults, if they become married in a homeowner. I mean, come on, who would be disappointed with that? That would probably make you feel proud and fulfilled. I mean, the future of the nation that is children and stable household formation material, right there. Well, by age 30, how many people do you think are married in a homeowner today, and how has that changed over time? What do you think this is the percent of 30 year olds who are both married and homeowners in the US? Right back in 1950 it was 52%.  today Okay, it is just a quarter of that. Only 13% of American 30 year olds are married homeowners today. Gosh, is that appalling? Or what? I mean, it doesn't exactly give you hope for the future, since Owning a home is a key pillar of the American dream, then the best thing that our local, state and federal lawmakers can do is to make it easier to build new housing. That is one of the most depressing stats I gave in 11 years of doing the show, probably the most depressing another thing we can do is not protest or block new development, no nimbyism.    Keith Weinhold  15:45   Now, earlier this year, the White House announced that they are considering declaring a national housing emergency. In fact, you saw me put a link to that in the section of our newsletter that we call the five, though we haven't seen a national housing emergency declared yet. If we do it all, the motivation behind it is largely to make housing affordable. One piece that's been floated out there is the introduction of a 50 year mortgage so that way mortgage payments are spread out and made lower than they are with the most popular mortgage in America today, by far, the 30 year fixed rate mortgage. Now, I wouldn't say that a 50 year mortgage is eminent and is about to happen. We can't say that, but it could be creeping closer. I mean, a 40 year mortgage that is already more of a thing. You've got 40 year HUD loans and 40 year DSCR loans both already here for residential property. We do know that buyers buy property more so based on a payment than they do the overall price of the property. Now look, I'll tell you if I could somehow magically snap my fingers and convert all of my 30 year mortgage loans over to 50 year loans. Oh, I sure would. It would lower my payment and increase my cash flow. Yes, my debt would hang around longer and well, we're right back to, you guessed it, financially free beats debt free. Let's run that comparison on a 300k loan at 6% interest, a 30 year mortgage payment, that is 1800 bucks a month, but on a 50 year loan that would be just 1580 Yeah, $1,800 versus 1580 1580 Well, that is going to boost your cash flow by $220 a month on that property, just by going from a 30 year to a 50 Year at the same interest rate. So maybe not as much of a difference as you thought, but probably worth doing, at least in the mortgage world debt free. I mean that concept of debt free that makes most people, in exchange for that debt free condition, grind and toil and work overtime and lose family time and eat dirt for decades because inflation and all these other forces work against them. And yes, this is just with mortgage debt that I'm talking about here. Of course, some debt is bad, like unsecured, high interest rate credit cards or doing a buy now, pay later, plan on a pizza that you split into four payments. That's ridiculous. And those are the type of debts you've also got to pay yourself. That's not what we're talking about here. In fact, it gets even worse for the mortgage debt free person. That extra $220 you're paying by having a 30 year loan instead of a 50 year loan, that would mean you're accumulating more dollars in home, which are illiquid. And again, 50 year loans don't exist yet, but understanding this concept and this trade off helps you be a better investor. Look, a debt free person can still be broke in the short term if they have a meager income, and they can be broke in the long term if they are not leveraging assets and debt. Being debt free, that is like bragging that you quit the gym so that you'll never pull a muscle again. I mean, you're safe for now, but you're going to be weaker in the long run. Let's use a different example. Let's just run a different set of numbers. Let's say you've got a 400k mortgage at three and a half percent interest, though your monthly payment is 1796 on a 30 year fixed. Some people think, Oh, if I just throw an extra $1,000 a month at this, I'm going to be debt free years sooner. And the truth is, yes, you will save 90k in interest, and you are. Going to own the house outright earlier. But what's the opportunity cost if that same 1k a month went into investments earning even 7% annually, after 15 years, it grows to about 311k   Keith Weinhold  20:16   Well, that is more than three times the interest savings, which again, was only 90k so for some paying off the mortgage early feels like some sort of emotional win, but it is rarely the best financial win. I mean, that is like benching LeBron to save money on Gatorade. I mean, that is a bunch of nonsense. So debt free is the floor. Financially Free is the ceiling. I mean, do you know about those popular call in shows where people are advised to lower their standards, diminish their quality of life, not go on vacations in order to get debt free? Oh, dear. I mean, those shows have got to be screening their callers closely to ensure that no one savvy actually gets on the air. Somebody, hey, how about you? Why don't you get on the air? Get on that show. Ask them some tough questions about getting mortgage debt free. You tell them yeah. Tell them that your ROI on all that equity is zero because home values change regardless of equity positions. Tell them that a home is never paid off because you'll still owe property tax and maintenance and repairs and utilities and maybe insurance and an HOA. Tell them you lost the gift of inflation eating your debt while you sleep. Tell them mortgage interest is often tax deductible. Tell them that their leverage is gone, and all these facts, every one of those I just stated, they're now figuratively not just talking. They're yelling. They're screaming now, because markets of all types are at all time highs. So instead, if you had used those funds to pay off a property, they would have really missed out on earning big returns for years elsewhere, a steep opportunity cost. Suffice it to say, I would love to see the widespread adoption of 50 year mortgages, and I would use them. The other thing that would happen is that it would make home prices rise further, because more people can afford the lower payments to bid up the price. So actually, here's something that I'm wondering about with you. Did you ever have a paid off property, and then realize all of this, and then go and get new financing on it again. Have you ever done that? If you have that would be really interesting. Let us know if you've had a property in a paid off position, realized the vulnerability and the opportunity cost of having all that illiquid equity, and then you went and put debt back on it. Let us know at get rich education.com/contact. That's get rich education.com/contact. Like Ridge lending group knows this when I have chili ridge here, like she and I discussed, you even get the cash chunk out tax free. And here's what else is interesting about this. Just say you know how out in the world of real estate agents, where people are buying and selling property, well, whenever a buyer's agent knows that that listed property is owned by a seller that still has a mortgage on it, well the assumption is that the seller, well, they might be a little more motivated to sell since they have to make mortgage payments on that property that they might not even be occupying anymore. Well, that is backwards. In most cases, you should be more motivated to want to sell a property if it's paid off because you've got all that dead equity in it that needs to be released through that sale. So really, a listing agent should be thinking, this seller has got to sell this property with urgency, if for no other reason, because he or she has lots of equity in that property. That's how to think about it. The world has it 100% backwards. That mindset is 180 degrees from the truth coming up next.    Keith Weinhold  24:25   Did you know that this week? Yes, right here in mid October every year is historically the best week of the year to buy a home. Also, what's it like behind the scenes here on the microphone? I've got that and more straight ahead. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to get rich education,    Keith Weinhold  24:44   if you're scrolling for quality real estate and finance info today, yeah, it can be a mess. You hit paywalls, pop ups, push alerts, Cookie banners. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun. That's why it matters to get clean. Mean free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, it's direct, and it gets to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp and in the know about real estate investing, this is paradigm shifting material, and when you start the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video, course, completely free as well. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now at gre letter.com Visit gre letter.com    Keith Weinhold  25:55   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours Ridge lending group NMLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your pre qual and even chat with President Caeli Ridge personally, while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lending group.com. That's Ridge lending group.com. Hi.   Russell Gray  26:29   This is Russell Gray, co host of the real estate guys radio show, and you're listening to get rich education with Keith Weinhold. Don't quit your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  26:36   welcome back to get rich Education. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, there's a lot to look forward to in future months here on the show, new content from me, new prominent guests, the return of some favorite guests, a live event to tell you about and our annual home price forecast show, where I'll also reveal if last year's GRE home price prediction for this year came true or not. I have got to say I have nailed it to the exact percent a few years in a row now. But if you remember, before this year began, I forecast 5% national home price appreciation for this year. We will see how that turns out, but home prices are only up one or 2% year over year so far. Yes, not only do I make the forecast, I actually follow up with the previous years to check the accuracy. Don't you wish everyone did that? Well, it is October, and it's the month where you got to be ready to defend your love of candy corn and the same Americans complaining about inflation also bought a 40 foot skeleton for the front yard. Well, the best time to buy a home, historically, is this week this year. It happens to fall on October, 12 to 18th, as it turns out. Why would that be? It sounds kind of random, doesn't it? Well, the NAR recently reported on this, and this is what they give, a three word moniker, aptly named the best week. That's what they call it, the best week. Now, this applies more to primary residences into one to four unit investment property, but it's a little applicable to apartment buildings too, and this really helps you understand real estate buying, selling and consumer nature. Historically, this week offers the most favorable balance of market conditions for buyers. This is when inventory tends to be elevated. Prices typically dip below their seasonal peak. The buyer competition slows, and just the overall pace of the market becomes more manageable. Again, quote, unquote, the best week this seasonal shift every year, it's influenced by school schedules and even weather patterns. Housing activity typically ramps up in the spring. It peaks in the summer because a lot of families try to move while children are out of school and the desire to settle before the new academic year that's back when you've got the warmer weather and the longer daylight hours, and you got these curb appeal enhancements from Lush summer foliage that also makes spring and summer an ideal time for showings in inspections, that adds further momentum to the summer surge. These sort of things actually matter. But then the calendar shifts into fall, and demand naturally tapers off. Every year you got families with school age children that exit the market, and then the remaining inventory begins to linger longer, and prices respond by dipping below peak levels. And homes tend to stay on the market longer. This happens every year. That makes for conditions that benefit late season buyers. So listings tend to become more plentiful now each October inventory levels, they tend to peak in early fall, and that's why it's about the best time to buy. You have less competition from other buyers, home buyer shopping during again, what is called the best week, you should expect less competition. Properties tend to attract the most viewership per listing early in the spring, and that's when buyers trickle into the market before the inventory picks up. And then the summer ushers in both more homes and more shoppers, and that means that buyers face quite a bit of competition in the summer, so the best week that should offer more time for buyers to deliberate, and it can mean that sellers are more eager to compromise. And the numbers back that up historically that this is the peak week for price reductions. So what can you do if you're potentially in the market? You might want to hit up gre investmentcoach.com and have our coaches connect you with the right income property if that's the right move for you, and doing that is totally free. In fact, most listeners buy their first income property that way. In fact, if you had a good experience with a GRE investment coach, go ahead and tell a friend about it. Now, let's say that you had $1 back in the year 1995 so you've got a green dollar bill in your pocket 30 years ago. All right. Well, what would happen to your dollar if you saved it versus putting it in stocks versus putting it in real estate? What do you think would happen in each of those three scenarios? Let's do it. Let's compare well, because of inflation, your dollar would be worth less than 50 cents if you had saved it, yeah, it would have just 47 cents worth of purchasing power today. Instead, if you had put it in the s, p5, 100, your dollar would have seen some pretty significant growth. It would be worth $19 today. That's how stocks have performed over the past 30 years. But what about real estate? Well, there are so many ways to do it specifically. What if it were a rental property where real estate pays five ways, not just one or two like stock. What kind of return can you expect from real estate? Well, when you add up all five ways, just using historic norms like classic rates of appreciation and a four to one leverage ratio, you get 38% as a total rate of return in year one. And then that rate starts to fall because equity accumulates. And if you're not initiated on that, and it sounds like such a high flying number, you can see my free video course that teaches you this at get rich education.com/course, the most valuable free course you've ever taken in your life. At get rich education.com/course, let's just get conservative and say so many things go wrong with your property that we're going to round that 38% all the way down to 20% per year. Yes, if you're new here, those sound like ridiculous rates of return. Anyone that's listened here for a while instead has been enjoying those rates of return if you bought right? I mean, you have so much more time and money in your life now, but at 20% ROI, your $1 from 1995 would be worth $237 today. Wow, and again, if it were saved under a mattress, it would be worth less than 50 cents, and in the sp5 100, just 19 bucks. This is a simplified way to demonstrate that compound leverage beats compound interest. I mean real estate beats stocks by more than 12x right there and see that's the type of multiplier that you're probably going to need on your money. Since it already takes $5 million to live the American dream, you might very well need $25 million over the next few decades, while the 401 K was created around 1980 the Roth IRA created in 1998 and the GRE podcast was created on October 10, 2014, and I trust that it's had a more positive impact on your life than any of those other vehicles.   Keith Weinhold  34:56   This means that I've released weekly episodes here for. 11 years, never missing a week at all, 52 weeks a year, and we've never replayed an old show either. I am here for you. Integrity means doing what you say you're going to do. Vedran, our sound engineer, has been here with GRE for 11 years as well. That is the team, the duo, that's been bringing you this show. And also, I didn't even tell my team here at GRE this yet, so I guess they'll learn now, the platform business rate just ranked us and awarded get rich education the best of the year, 2025 as a real estate school. Yes, we learned that this award is based on outstanding reviews from real customers, not nominations or votes, but the best of the year award comes from feedback through listeners just like you. Thank you for that, and thanks business rate this show and real estate investing, they are the main things that I do, and I expect to be here for you well into the future. Now, it's sort of funny here, kind of a paradox on the show I talk about income production that's largely passive, yet producing this show at a high level for 11 years here on this side of the microphone is not passive. It is highly active. I got a reminder of this recently when a doctor buddy of mine said he considers starting a podcast on the side. Let me tell you what I shared with him that is probably a terrible idea to launch an ongoing podcast where you'll constantly carve out the time to produce high quality week after week. That is not a side gig. 99% of those scenarios fail. You've got to deliver great new content yourself. You've got to have a network of guests to compliment you. You got to perform research and then cross check your research, because you've got to publish real, true information. You need a reliable editing solution. You need some organizational skills. You're going to need to hire some skilled and specialized assistance in the real estate world. You've actually got to get out into the field and visit cities in person to corroborate your research on the ground and go to in person conferences. I mean, there's a lot to do, but I did tell my doctor friend, you know, the good news is that there are alternatives to starting a show. There are a couple of them. In fact, first, you can do a 10 episode mini series on your area of expertise, host it on YouTube or Spotify and then send that link to clients. Another thing you can do is get yourself booked as a guest on someone else's show, and you'll pay a podcast booking agent to do that one strong guest episode that could do more than 100 of your own episodes ever could. So that's my guidance. In case you know any thought leaders that considered doing that, and what things look like from my view back behind the mic, it is not passive income, although my investing mostly is and another thing, if I've hosted a past guest on the show, and I get feedback from you or other listeners that they're not looking out for your best interest, or they don't want to do the property rehabs that they promised. Well, they are not coming back onto the show. Instead, we move on. I am here to do good and connect you only with providers that are doing good. Another show related announcement, and if you listen here each week through the get rich education mobile app. This is really important if you're listening to me right now on our dedicated mobile app, the hosting platform terminates at the end of this month, so you're going to have to listen in a different way. Go to either the apple podcasts app or the Spotify app and search get rich education to keep listening that way, you'll keep learning, stay motivated and never miss an episode of my incomprehensibly slack jawed vocals, profligate and unrepentant. Again, if you're listening to me right now on our dedicated GRE mobile app, the hosting platform terminates at the end of this month, you'll have to listen in a different way. Go to either the apple podcasts app or the Spotify app and search. Get rich education inside those apps in order to keep listening after this month, until next week, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your daydream   Speaker 2  39:41   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 and. Will see exclusively.   Keith Weinhold  40:09   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth. Building, get richeducation.com.  
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Oct 6, 2025 • 41min

574: Parking Lots and Mobile Home Parks: Do They Have a Real Estate Future?

Are You Missing Out on Real Estate's Best-Kept Secrets? Imagine investing in properties where: -Tenants fix their own roofs -You can boost income with a few tech upgrades -Most investors are too scared to even look This episode reveals two underground real estate niches that could change your wealth strategy forever: Mobile Home Parks and Parking Lots Special Guest: Kevin Bupp, an investor with over $1 BILLION in real estate transactions under his belt shares how everyday investors are building wealth in places others overlook. Resources: Grab your FREE real estate investment white papers and unlock hidden wealth strategies at InvestwithSunrise.com  Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/574 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  For predictable 10-12% quarterly returns, visit FreedomFamilyInvestments.com/GRE or text  1-937-795-8989 to speak with a freedom coach Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:00    Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, talking about first mobile home park investing and then investing in parking lot assets. What makes them profitable? What gets investors excited about mobile home parks and parking lots? What are the risks and what's the future of both of these real estate asset classes? All with a terrific guest today on get rich education.   Keith Weinhold  0:28   You know, most people think they're playing it safe with their liquid money, but they're actually losing savings accounts and bonds don't keep up when true inflation eats six or 7% of your wealth. Every single year, I invest my liquidity with FFI freedom family investments in their flagship program. Why fixed 10 to 12% returns have been predictable and paid quarterly. There's real world security backed by needs based real estate like affordable housing, Senior Living and health care. Ask about the freedom flagship program when you speak to a freedom coach there, and that's just one part of their family of products, they've got workshops, webinars and seminars designed to educate you before you invest. Start with as little as 25k and finally, get your money working as hard as you do. Get started at Freedom family investments.com/gre or send a text now it's 1-937-795-8989, yep, text their freedom. Coach, directly. Again, 1-937-795-8989,   Corey Coates  1:40   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  1:56   Welcome to GRE from Burlington, Vermont to Burlington, Washington and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and you are inside get rich education. We are all firmly in the fall season. Now, autumn, if you prefer. And as we often do, we're discussing residential real estate investing today, but it's two different and distinct niches within that, and I guess they both have to do with wheels, as it turns out, mobile home parks in the first part of the show and then parking assets later today. I think there's a compelling future use case for at least one of those two to speak to our international audience for a moment, but this will actually help clarify things for you. If you're a North American too, though it's called a mobile home, well, it doesn't really have that much to do with wheels. There might not be any wheels on it. And if a resident lives inside one of these for, say, a decade, well then it's probably going to remain attached to that same location on the ground all 10 years. That's why a mobile home is often referred to now as a manufactured home. What it is is it's a factory built residence, constructed on a permanent chassis and then transported to a site. I mean, that's what we're talking about here, and they are a less expensive alternative to traditional homes that have, say, a cast in place, concrete foundation. So therefore, understand, mobile homes are affordable housing, highly affordable housing, and that's really important in this housing affordability crisis. And I've talked quite a bit about that on the show, and the meager national supply of that all types of affordable housing, they are recession resilient. I mean, that's just one reason why we love affordable housing types here at GRE where we're often buying rental property just below an area's median price. You know, people think of mobile home parks MHPS, that they're all crime ridden and that there are slumlords. But that is not true in every case. There are actually nice ones. If you're an MHP investor, you often only own the land beneath the structure, and not the mobile home itself. The resident owns the mobile home itself. So therefore, if there's a leaky roof or a window needs replacement, or flooring needs replacement, that is on the resident to fix, not you. MHP dwellers, they often don't have to pay property tax, though, because, like I said, they don't own the land. The landlord, or the community, therefore, is the one that has to pay the property tax. So there's some thoughts on mobile home parks for you, parking asset, real estate that's still settling into its post pandemic pattern with Return to Office mandates that aren't really fully matured yet. We're still settling in and seeing how that is going to look. And then when it comes to parking lots, you got to wonder about its future. When you consider the proliferation of autonomous cars, will that make parking lots obsolete? I'll have our guest address that longtime GRE listeners, you might remember episode 13 of this show, yeah, almost 11 years ago, that episode was about how autonomous cars will affect your future and your real estate and the very need for parking lots and a lot of what I discussed there in early 2015 that is beginning to come true, but this autonomous car adoption that is way slower than a lot of people thought. I mean, most Americans, they still have not been inside an autonomous car at all. A lot of people are still saying that they don't trust that that should change soon. But as for now, I'm just guessing that fewer than one in 10 Americans have been inside an autonomous car, probably quite a bit less than that. Today's terrific guest has over $1 billion in real estate transactions under his belt. This should be interesting. He is a specific investor in both mobile home parks and parking assets.   Keith Weinhold  6:26   Today's guest is a seasoned real estate investor entrepreneur, and he's a prominent voice in the space, because he hosts the real estate investing for cash flow show. He's built a strong reputation as an expert in two niches that have less competition than some other investments, and we'll discuss those two today. They are mobile home parks and also parking asset investments too often overlooked yet pretty profitable niches, and he and I have a lot in common. I'm on the Forbes real estate Council. He is on the Forbes Technology Council. He and I are both native Pennsylvanians. It's been quite a few years. Hey, welcome back to GRE it's Kevin Bupp.    Kevin Bupp  7:06   Hey, Keith, thanks for having me back. And yeah, excited to be here, my friend, and excited to finally get caught up. When you referenced that, it was nearly eight years since we last spoke. I was taken back a little bit because A lot's happened in past eight years.    Keith Weinhold  7:21   I know that's wild with where things are at. People didn't even know the meaning of the word pandemic when you were last here on the show, Kevin, let's talk about really the case for mobile home parks. I know they can be a strong, cash flowing asset once people are really dialed into them. I think what's interesting is, since you were last here on the show, really, from the pandemic on, it's been a well documented national story where lay people just know about how the supply of housing just is not adequate in order to meet demand, and what that usually means, just talking about the single family space is, of course, they're building, but they're not building fast enough to keep up with population growth and housing demand. But what's so compelling about mobile home parks is, I mean, they're barely even building them anymore, like they are contracting in supply in a lot of areas. So tell us more about the compelling case for mobile home parks.    Kevin Bupp  8:16   Yeah, well, you had a big one. You know? It's an asset class that has a diminishing supply, right? We can get into the reasons behind that. But, you know, just from a high level perspective, one of the other factors as it relates to, you know, available homes, available housing for the growing population, is that while they are building stick boat homes, they're not fulfilling the needs of those that actually need affordable housing. So there's not a lot of the average working household can't necessarily afford the starter home any longer, and so mobile home parks are unique. I truly feel they're the best vehicle to help us fill this void of housing, affordable housing that is really needed throughout the entirety of the country. I mean, there's very few markets in this country that are still affordable. There's some places you can still go buy. You can probably go to Flint, Michigan, buy a home for 50 or $60,000 but generally speaking, I think the median home price today, I think it's crested over 400,000 I don't have the exact number, but I do believe over $400,000 and the average starter family, or even folks that are, you know, just working two jobs, making 40, $50,000 a year, they can't afford to purchase that type of home, a $400,000 home. And so again, these mobile homes you had mentioned, they're not building mobile home parks any longer. However, they're still building new mobile homes, and it's kind of interesting what's evolved over the past 10 years. The quality of the product is it's like a night and day difference of what it looked like 1015, years ago, of the homes themselves to what they look like today, and what you get for your money. You know, the average single wide that we might be putting into a community, brand new home, 13, 1400 square feet. Someone could come in and for roughly $80.70 $80 a foot, can buy a brand new home that's never been lived in before, that's unheard of, that's absolutely unheard of when you compare it to the average or the median home price across the US today. So it really is kind of the last frontier, and it's typically any market that we're in, if you take the same comparable quality of an apartment complex in the same, you know, area of town, the same school districts, we're typically about 20% less all in cost to actually own your own home, versus that of even renting the comparable size apartment. So it's a very compelling reason for folks that are looking for an affordable place, but not just affordable, but clean, safe and quiet. I mean, like we run very respectable communities, they're in the really good school districts. They're places that folks are proud to live and raise their families, then,    Keith Weinhold  10:22   yeah, that's true. This would really help meet that affordability challenge, another problem that's been so well documented. Talk to us more about what makes mobile home park investing different from investing in single family rentals or even a fourplex or a 20 unit apartment building.    Kevin Bupp  10:40   A lot of the fundamentals are similar, and I would say that it's probably more comparable to that of an apartment complex to a certain degree. Just think of it as a horizontal apartment complex, where units aren't stacked on top one another. They're just layout horizontally more wider than they are tall. But the bigger difference is in most instances, we don't actually own the homes, so the residents own the mobile homes, whereas we as community owners own the infrastructure, we own the land. We own the roads, when the sewer lines, the water lines, the common areas, if it has a clubhouse, if it has amenities, so we maintain and we own all that collective area where the folks basically come and they bring their home, they fix it to the ground, and then ultimately pay a slot rent to have their home there on that premise. And so for us, it's very attractive in that the resident that's in their home, if they have a Roofing Leak, they have a plumbing leak, they have their HVAC system go out. They're not calling us like they enter an apartment complex. It's on them, yeah. So they're homeowners. And a couple other really attractive elements of that that come as a result of having residents that live there, not just renters, is that they're very sticky. And so just like in a standard single family subdivision, where you've got folks that might have lived there for generations, you just reference that your parents literally live in the same house, and so they've lived there a very long time. It is quite common to find residents and even multi generations of the same family that live in our communities. And a couple come to mind. We just celebrated a woman's 50th year of living one of our communities in brendalin. And so you've got sticky resident base. There's not a lot of turnover. And then the last big piece of it that is really attractive us is a homeowner mentality is very different than a rental mentality as far as upkeep. And so you got folks that they plant flowers, they ensure that their units have curb appeal, right? They put flags out, they put decorations out during the holidays. It's a lot more warmth than that of what you might find in a traditional rental apartment complex.    Keith Weinhold  12:26   So what all does the tenant pay for? You mentioned that they pay for the lot rent. What other expenses do they have? How does that look for them?    Kevin Bupp  12:36   Typically, you know, utilities. So they'll have their own individual meter. They'll pay, you know, direct to the utility company, utility provider, water and sewer as well. They'll pay for their water and sewer usage. And that can come in many different forms. Sometimes, where our communities have public utilities, where it's built directly by the utility provider, sometimes it's more of a private system, where we're actually acting and participating as utility provider and building them back for their usage. Really the standard things that you might pay for if you live in a single family home. I think so the areas where it might differ. And honestly, this is really community by community for us, some of our communities, literally, the residents, they pay for the utility use, but outside of that, literally, we mow the grass, we shovel their driveway, we shovel their walkways, we handle all those type of elements, whereas some other communities, the residents we might require that they actually maintain their own grass so they their own grass, so they have to mow it, or hire a a third party vendor to come in and mow it. They might have to actually shovel their own driveway. And a lot of how we run a community really is depend on how it used to be run when we took it over. You know, if it's not broke, we don't fix it. And so a lot of times we don't like shaking things up too much. If they're used to a certain way, we just keep it status quo and continue rolling on of how the prior ownership used to manage it really similar elements of what a folks, an individual living in a single family home, might pay for so very similar.    Keith Weinhold  13:48   Okay, so they pay you the rent for the lot. This puts nearly all the maintenance and repair burden on them. So is there any sort of HOA like body here?    Kevin Bupp  13:58   Not in our community. You do find some communities, and most of these that have an HOA are typically a community that's gone through more of a co op type arrangement to where the actual individuals only like fractionalized share of the community, the residents that live there, and so then they have a the oversight from an HOA that's managing the daily operations, managing the financing, managing the budget, things like that. But in our communities, no, there is not an HOA, I'd say the one other thing that's typically included in lot rent is they don't have property taxes, right? So we own the land, and so the individuals that live in these units aren't paying individual property taxes. A lot of states require that they have a registration fee, just like you do in your vehicle, that they would have to pay on an annual basis. And then most of them have insurance as well. You know they're covering you're carrying homeowners insurance on the actual dwelling itself. Outside of that, it's, again, just pretty straightforward,    Keith Weinhold  14:47   yeah. So here we are in this low competition, low supply niche that we're talking about here we think about communities and nimbyism and building, not in my backyard. ISM oftentimes that's a sentiment that residents of a certain area have, residents say something like, ah, we don't want this new 200 unit apartment building or mobile home park here in our single family home neighborhood, like, that's nimbyism. But in mobile home parks, to me, it seemed like nimbyism is often at a different level. It's at the government or the municipal level, like your town or city, might not want one, because it doesn't generate as much property tax revenue as a new single family neighborhood would. Is that the reality? Kevin,   Kevin Bupp  15:31    that's absolutely the reality. And that's why you don't see new parks getting built. I think last year, ones that I know of, there are about a dozen that were built, many more than that. They're actually shut down, you know, for redevelopment purposes. And so that is absolutely huge part of it. In fact, you know, it's frustrating, because pretty much every municipality across the country the topic of affordable housing, it's on the radar, and it's probably one that is discussed quite often. And in all reality, again, these mobile home parks really would help resolve that challenge at most of these you know, municipalities are the shortage of homes, affordable homes, that they're facing across the country. And so, you know, another big piece of it, you mentioned the tax basis, absolutely, you know, the municipality would make, they'd have much better tax revenue from pretty much anything else that could be built there. And so that's a big barrier. But the nimbyism piece of it, I think a big part of that is it's unfortunate. I think it's getting better over time. There's bad operators in our space, just like they're bad operators in the apartment space, just like there's bad operators landlords that have single family homes that just let them deteriorate over time and don't repair things. Unfortunately, we kind of get lumped all the mobile home parks get lumped in that bad bucket. And so while there's, you know, I always joke and say there's mobile home parks that are on the wrong side of town, wrong side of the tracks, right? You don't want to go to and during the daytime. Well, guess what? There's subdivision, the single family home, neighborhoods that are the same thing, and there's apartments that are like that as well. You don't go anywhere near them. And you've got the middle of the road, right? You've got just the good, hard working, blue collar folks that want to send their kids to good public schools. We've got those communities apartments are that way too single family home subdivision, you got white collar stuff. You got some higher end stuff. Unfortunately, we kind of all get lumped in that bad bucket. That's where the assumption that's made by folks that don't understand mobile home communities have never driven through one. They just assume that it's all, you know, basically, drug, sex, rock and roll, the wrong element that we do not want in our neighborhood. We don't want anywhere near us. It's going to devalue our home prices. And for that reason, you just don't see them getting built. It's unfortunate, but it's the truth.    Keith Weinhold  17:20   Yeah, I'm just thinking about the mobile home park that I drive past most often. It's sort of walled off. There's maybe an eight or 10 foot high wall around it. I don't know if that's something that the municipality erected to sort of screen its appearance off, or something that the mobile home park built, which is my guess as to who built it, but not all mobile home parks look blighted   Kevin Bupp  17:43   absolutely, yeah. And I don't know the case that you just referenced there. I mean, it could be for sound deadening purposes, if it's off of a busy road. It could have been something put up as far as just to kind of shield off so folks that are driving past don't see the community. My guess would be that's probably not the the reason that was built. But in any event, these are, there's, you know, we've got a number of communities, Keith, that if you drove through, and I didn't, if I blindfolded you and you drove in, so you went past the entrance, you went past a sign that said manufactured home community, and I took you down a road, you wouldn't believe that you were actually in a mobile home park. Some of these homes, they're double wide homes, and they look like ranch homes, and so they're actually laid out perpendicular to this, or parallel to the street, and then they have two car site built garages that are attached to them via breezeway. So they look like your traditional ranch style home, but they're absolutely 100% mobile homes that could be moved if you wanted to move them, and for a fraction of the price of what a neighboring single family home might sell for. So there's all different qualities. They all come in different shapes and sizes. But to my point earlier, some of these communities, they're not even affordable. There's actually, there's down here in Florida, we've got what we call lifestyle communities. It's very common out in Arizona as well, where it's a lot of times a second home for snowbirds, you know, retirees that want to come down and want to live an active lifestyle. You know, they want to have two swimming pools. They want to have an activities director. They want to have, you know, shuffleboard and pickleball courts and tennis courts, and they want to live this lifestyle. And those units are anything but affordable. In fact, there's many. There's a community down the road for me that, you know, their lot rent is $1,200 a month, and so you factor that in with probably a house payment. And you know, you might be looking at 2000 to, you know, $2,300 a month, all in for the house and the lot rent. And so not necessarily in the affordable scheme of things, but they come in all shapes and sizes and again, unfortunately, we just get lumped into that bad bucket. It's unfortunate because I do think that we could really help start making a dent in this affordable housing crisis. I don't how it's going to happen any other way. I really don't, because we can't build affordable products at this point in time. It's not possible    Keith Weinhold  19:37   a posh an exclusive mobile home park there that you're referencing in Florida. As paradoxical as that sounds, tell us, Kevin, how that really works, because I know you help investors get in to mobile home parks. Does this mean an investor owns a full Park? Or I wouldn't imagine you're just doing it at the level where you just own one lot and then have One dweller pay you the lot rent. So tell us about how it works from the investor angle.    Kevin Bupp  20:05   We have fund structures that we typically roll out through sunrise capital investors and any one individual fund will own somewhere between nine to 13 somewhere, typically in that range, mobile home communities. These communities can range in size from maybe as small as 80 or 90 lots to the largest community we own at present time is 780 lots. And so it's quite large. I mean, the size of a small town. But essentially, investors come in and they own a based on their investment. They own a proportionate share of the various properties that are owned underneath that fund umbrella. And so one, an individual, might come with 100,000 and own a smaller proportion share than someone that comes in with a million dollars. But they are owners. They're absolute owners. They participate in the cash flow, they participate in the the upside, and they participate in the proceeds. When we have capital events, either cash out refinances or potential sale events.    Keith Weinhold  20:56   Tell us more about why it's so profitable. Why do mobile home park investors get excited,    Kevin Bupp  21:01   as with anything, Keith, you know, you got to buy it, right? And, you know, we look at a lot of deals, and a lot of deals don't pencil like, if we bought it for what they're asking, we would make money. We might lose money. And so the money's made on the buy, just like with any other type of real estate investment. But I think the one factor that really has allowed mobile home parks to be an attractive investment vehicle over the past, really, the last decade, it's grown the attention of lots of different private equity groups, institutional investors, that 15 years ago, they weren't in the space, and the biggest reason is a lot of these. It's a very fragmented niche, and so there was no consolidation that existed 10 years ago. There was really only two public traded companies outside that. It was mom and pops, mom and pops, that typically owned one, maybe sometimes two or three communities, but it was just a very fragmented niche. And what you find those fragmented niches that there's a lot of inefficiencies that exist in the operations. There's a lot of inefficiencies that exist with regards to utility management or managerial oversight within the community, or even keeping up with market rents. And so very often, we'll get into a community we just bought one at the end of last year, and right outside of Ann Arbor, you know, great sub market in Michigan. It's it literally has never traded hands. It was built back in the 80s by the gentleman we purchased it from. He was a subdivision developer, but he got into the manufactured housing space, so he built this, what looked like a subdivision, but it was mobile homes and and he basically owned it up until we acquired it last year, but gorgeous community, well maintained, needed some upgrades, different amenities that just were a little worn out and tired. But the biggest element within that community was that the market rents in the local area were roughly $800 a month. $800 a month for lot rent, and when we purchased it from him, the average lot rent throughout the community was $477 so there was a significant loss lease that exists. And we see this quite often with just over time they've owned it, free and clear, they go 567, years out, doing rent increases, and sooner or later, they find themselves in a situation where they are severely below the local market rents. And so there's typically a lot of loss, at least recapture, that we find going into these communities. Sometimes we'll also go in and we'll find there's a lot of waste with the water and sewer cost. It might not be billed back for usage to the residents, to where if you're not paying for something, sometimes you're abusing it. And a lot of times we can go in and put individual meters in and almost send entirely that savings down to the bottom line and find it as additional noi on our PNL. And so it's just inefficiency of operations, and again, quite common, given the mom and pop nature of this asset class. But it's very quickly becoming consolidated. Now it looks very different today than what it looked like as far as the ownership groups. When I go to an industry event 10 years ago, those other guys like us, and then a lot of mom and pops. Now it's, you know, the likes of reps from Blackstone and Carlisle group and and got lots of other institutional groups that are showing up there. So just it's very different world, and probably more akin to that of what the apartment sector looks like, as far as ownership groups and the consolidation that's happening.    Keith Weinhold  23:52   You're feeling more of that competition. Kevin and I are going to come back and talk about another, I suppose, real estate investment that has something to do with wheels, and that is investing in parking lots. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold   Keith Weinhold  24:07   if you're scrolling for quality real estate and finance info today, yeah, it can be a mess. You hit paywalls, pop ups, push alerts, Cookie banners. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun. That's why it matters to get clean, free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor. It's direct, and it gets to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long. My letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp and in the know about real estate investing, this is paradigm shifting material, and when you start the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video course, completely free as well. Now it's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now at gre letter.com Visit gre letter.com   Keith Weinhold  25:19   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage, start your pre qual and even chat with President chailey Ridge personally. While it's on your mind, start at Ridge lending group.com that's Ridge lending group.com.   Ted Sutton  25:51   Hey, it's corporate directs Ted Sutton. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  25:59   welcome back to get rich education. We're talking about two real estate investment niches with Kevin bump today, an expert in both mobile home park investing and in parking lot assets. And Kevin, I got to tell you, I am more skeptical about parking lot investing than I am about mobile home park investing, but you can probably help me with this. I think we know that. I mean, gosh, just historically, ever since Henry Ford did his thing. I mean, mass transit adoption is really slow in most US cities. But anymore, one needs to wonder, okay, can autonomous cars disrupt the parking model? A Robo taxi can just constantly stay on the road, dropping off and picking up passengers where, you know, some people foresee a day in the not too distant future that people won't even need to own cars. They'll sort of have a subscription to a car service, but now this is where your expertise is. So I'm sure you thought above and beyond that. So what are your thoughts there, just for the need for parking spaces?    Kevin Bupp  27:11   You make a valid point. I think the adoption of that, it's, I think it will be very different from market to market, say, the city, whereas, if you want to maybe look at one area. We have a parking garage today in downtown Phoenix, Arizona. Phoenix is very much a driving city. It's parsed out very far the public transit. It's not great there. And again, it's just it's a wider state, whereas, if you compare it to like a San Francisco, the adoption of Robo vehicles and robotaxis and things like that autonomous vehicles is much, much faster than that of a of a phoenix. But also San Francisco is much a much more consolidated marketplace as far as the urban core. And so for that reason, you know, we look at parking, it's got a there's a couple things also that feed into that. So I want to back up a little bit. One of the major changes that has been really playing out over the past 15 years within the parking sector is that building departments within now, I think it's over 100 cities across the country. Denver just announced last week that they're also adopting this policy. And that policy is that historically, if you were Keith, you're going to go on, hey, I want to build this in downtown. I want to go build this apartment complex, condo complex, mixed use property, whatever it might be. Historically, they would have required you, whether you wanted to or not. They would have made you put in a certain amount of parking per 1000 square feet, every municipality would have a formula. And what, what a lot of these cities realized a couple decades ago is that, based on their, you know, antiquated formulas, they had a surplus of parking available on a lot of these downtown areas. You know, it wasn't being used. And given the developer an opportunity and the choice to say, Hey, do I want to build 20 more parking spaces that aren't going to get used? Or I want to build want to build 10 more apartment units, they're going to choose the apartment units. And so the parking mem requirements have been taken away, have been eliminated in a lot of cities over the last decade plus. And so that's created a shrinking supply of parking because now when developers build something, they're building only as much as they need, sometimes not even as much as much as they really need, because then they can still rely upon other ancillary parking structures within the immediate marketplace. And so, so there's a shrinking supply of parking. And every city that we own in today there's a massive shrinking supply of parking. So that's big piece of it that we know that inevitably, if we get the location right, an area where literally, you wouldn't be able to afford, based on the cost of construction and the cost of lands, they wouldn't be able to afford even building new parking structure, if you so chose to. And now that there's also a shrinking supply, diminishing supply, of this parking that we can be comfortable in our demand for our product, and so to the point of like autonomous vehicles and things of that nature, I do think there will be a time. I don't know how long that time is. I do think that there will be a time where we'll see some sort of impact. I don't know what that is. And so how we underwrite deals is we feel very confident over the next 10 years. We have to have a absolute confidence level over the next 10 years that there's going to be continual demand based on the various factors within this marketplace, the demand drivers that are servicing that garage, like, who's parking there, why they're parking there. But second to that, when we. Buy something. We need to have the air rights. We know that there inevitably will be a higher and better use. So Location, location, location, it's got to make sense today as parking. We got the underwriting has to stand on its own as parking, and we have to have a comfort level that 10 years, there will be sufficient demand throughout the duration of the next decade, in the event things start changing down the road, we know that, literally, the lowest use that it could ever have is its present use, which is parking because it's just a concrete structure, sometimes just an asphalt parking lot, to where, once you go vertical, that's where you're going to be able to unlock a lot of additional potential. And so we don't underwrite the future. We look at that as icing on the cake. But we know, based on the the location, the proximity to, you know what else is happening in that marketplace, that location will be in demand, not just today, but many decades to come. So I'll stop there and see if you have any clarifying questions.   Keith Weinhold  30:51   I think about how for the parking lot investor, Jamie Dimon has been really good for you. He is so hard on the return to Office. Mandate?   Kevin Bupp  31:01   Yeah, I'd say one thing that's important to make note is, I don't know what the future holds for office I tend to make the argument that wherever picking office building in a marketplace, wherever they're at with occupancy today, I think it's probably as good as it's going to get. We don't have to go down that rabbit hole. But I just I feel like it's been long enough since covid. And don't get wrong, there's gonna be a few companies that are going to be pressed that are going to be pressing, you know, in a big way, to get people back, but I think 80% of them that we're going to go back are already there. And so any parking asset that we look at, if it's got more than 10 or 15% as far as relationship with an office building or multiple office buildings in immediate vicinity, then we typically pass on it. And on top of that, it's got to have a variety of demand drivers. So it just can't be supportive of one or two different demand drivers. We have have at least five. And so it can be a courthouse, municipal buildings, sports arenas. It's got to be a 24/7 city where there's something happening, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, hotel, valet, restaurants, retail, things like that. And office has to be a very minimal part of that makeup, or else we just move on, because I don't know how to fix it. How to fix that problem yet. I don't know what's going to you know what the future holds for your traditional office towers, especially the ones that are, you know, 50, 60% vacant at the present time? Yeah, that's interesting, because when you look at a parking lot and you're evaluating its potential and its current use, yeah, you're basically thinking about, what is that tenant mix. You don't want 100% of it to be for one office building. You would probably want a number of uses. That's correct. Yeah, absolutely. Again, like I said, Five is our minimum. I mean, the more the merrier. And I'd say another big piece of it, if we had to look at the different demand drivers and put a value or a hierarchy of what we feel, what are the highest priority demand drivers, transient is the best. I want to know that the folks that are coming there, there's enough attractions in immediate vicinity, and we need to know what those attractions are, and better understand those attractions. But there's a variety of attractions in the immediate vicinity to where it's going to continually attract transient parking. So it's not just it's not a reliance upon one thing. And so, for example, we just closed on a garage in historic Philadelphia, and so it's a block away from Liberty Bell, two blocks from Independence Hall, any of other museums. I mean, like it's it is we talk about location, location, location. It's there that part of Philadelphia has been in demand by tourism for hundreds of years, and I don't foresee that that changing anytime soon. And so 70% of the makeup of the traffic in that garage is made up of transient traffic, so folks that are visiting the various attractions and immediate vicinity. So even if one of those attractions went away, which most of them are historical, they're not going to go away. If one or two did, it still wouldn't have that significant of an impact on the parking demand.    Keith Weinhold  33:36   That's interesting. Okay, a transient customer, not one that's showing up and parking there every day to go to work. And yes, the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, there's going to be a long term demand to see those sorts of things in person. So that's an interesting way to think about that. And Kevin, while we've been talking about parking, at least in my mind's eye, a lot of times, I've just been thinking about one paved at grade parking area, but we're talking about parking garages as well. Or what are some of the trade offs there between parking garages and an at grade parking lot?    Kevin Bupp  34:08   Yeah, I mean, at grade parking lot is, can't get any simpler than that. I mean, typically they're asphalt or sometimes just crushed gravel, but that's it. So as far as future capex requirements, there's not many, right? It's very, very minimal. Whereas a parking garage, especially if it's in a colder environment, where there's snow and you've got salt on the road, salt that's making its way up the concrete, seeping into the cracks, you've got structural rebar issues to worry about, things of that nature. So weather can take a major toll on parking structures if they're not maintained well. Whereas you know the worst that could happen the same weather, you know, the weather takes the same toll on these asphalt parking lots, but it really only equates to maybe a pothole that you have to fill in, and a parking structure could be deteriorated to the point of no return if it's been neglected long enough to where it might be unsafe, structurally where you know now you're you're getting condemned or shut down. So big considerations there, it's interesting. We Own, the one we own in Phoenix, the Phoenix, it's a desert. It's a desert climate. They get very little moisture. And that was that parking garage was built in the 60s, so very long time ago. It's the oldest thing we have in our portfolio, but it better condition has been preserved better than that of of a recent garage we purchased that was built in 1990 that's all the environment that's in. You know, there's really not much that can deteriorate concrete once in the desert.    Keith Weinhold  35:22   Was there any last thing on parking lot investing like something that gets an investor really interested in this asset class? What's really compelling and profitable about it?   Kevin Bupp  35:33    It's very technology driven business, and what we have found is a lot of these parking assets, of either they're owned by, you know, an individual investor, or if they happen to be owned by an institution, they've never been viewed as the primary investment vehicle. A lot of institutions that own parking garages, they happen to own them by default, because maybe they bought the two office towers years back, and it just happened to come with parking right? And so a lot of times, they've been somewhat neglected, like the PnL has been neglected. They haven't found ways to really extract all the value out of these parking facilities. And so very commonly, we'll go in and we'll find that the technology that's in place is 10 years old. And think about what a computer 10 years ago look like, right? Like it's you're not catching all the license plates. You're not able to log in and adjust pricing in a dynamic manner based on supply, demand factors. And so we can simply go in and just create a more efficient pricing model and find sometimes, you know, 10 15% of additional revenue just from doing those simple things, like literally a few $100,000 worth of upgrades and technology, we can add millions of dollars of value. There's other factors, you know, just simple things folks want to park in a not just clean and safe, but well lit. You know, they want to feel safe in lighting. And we'll find parking facilities that still have old halogen lights. Half of them are burnt out. If you start serving people, they're actually not parking there in the evenings. They're finding somewhere else to go because they don't feel safe. And so just going in and doing a revamp, you know, an upfit with LED lights, making it nice and bright, bright and clean and letting everyone feel safe, we'll find a instant increase in demand and Parkers in the later evening hours. So I mean just little simple operational tweaks that we can make that just have simply been overlooked for many, many years by the prior ownership groups.    Keith Weinhold  37:15   That's really interesting, that oftentimes the owner of a parking lot owns that parking lot as an afterthought, because they were in it to purchase the building that accompanies the parking lot. So it would make sense that when you focus on that parking lot, you could really add value and profitability to that lot. Well, Kevin, these have been interesting chats between mobile home park investing and parking lot assets. I think that the commonality here is that you the investor, are just owning a lot, and therefore the maintenance and hassles with these things are really low. This gives our audience an awful lot to think about. So Kevin, are there any last thoughts that you have about this space overall, and then please let us know how our audience can learn more.    Kevin Bupp  38:02   No additional thoughts. I don't believe I'd say that if you have an interest, if we've piqued your interest at all, we've written a number of white papers on both asset classes, both parking as well as mobile home parks. You can download all that for free on our website. Invest with sunrise.com We've got a number of other case studies on our website. We're pretty transparent. Well, what we buy, what we've owned, what we've exited out of. We'll go as far as providing appraisal reports and third parties and things like that on our website. So if you just want to get a sense of not just who we are, what we do, but just have a better understanding of the investment thesis behind parking and manufactured housing, there's tons of resources that you can download from the website.    Keith Weinhold  38:37   Well, that's a great way to learn more about Kevin, what he does, and then maybe even invest alongside him. Well, Kevin, it's been valuable and eye opening. It's been great to have you back on the show.    Kevin Bupp  38:46   Yeah, thanks for having me, Keith. Been a lot of fun, my friend. Good seeing you again.   Keith Weinhold  38:57   Yeah? Good stuff from Kevin there. The MHP space becoming more consolidated and corporatized too. You know, single family rentals are different from mobile home parks in that way. I mean, 90% of single family rentals are owned by small mom and pops, which means those people that own between just one and five properties, Kevin used the term loss to lease a few times. That phrase loss to lease being a real estate education show what that term means is really a lot like how it sounds. It is the potential income that a property owner misses out on because the actual rent collected is less than the current market rent. That's what loss to lease means. Though, I like the long term future of mobile home parks more than parking deals. You know, Kevin did, though, have some great answers for why he still likes parking. He focuses on a 10 year horizon. He. Looks for at least five use types for the parking. And then another great point is that in a lot of cases, the land that the parking occupies is its lowest use. So therefore, when they sell the parking area, they can get some nice exit income. That makes a lot of sense. And being two native Pennsylvanians like we are, I am familiar with that part of Philly that he's talking about. In fact, what's funny is that, in producing this show today, I guess cookies are doing their thing. This parking lot deal in Philly just appeared in my Instagram feed next week on the show, it'll be back to no guest. It's going to be all me, and you're going to hear some things that you wouldn't expect to hear Until then, I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Dolf Deroos  40:51   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.   Unknown Speaker  41:19   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth, building get richeducation.com
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Sep 29, 2025 • 35min

573: The War on the Young and the Vanishing Middle Class

Imagine a world where your investments work smarter, not harder. Keith reveals the truth about why real estate trumps stocks, and how the current economic landscape is creating a once-in-a-generation wealth opportunity. Discover: -Why traditional investing wisdom is leaving younger generations behind -Why owning assets is the ultimate key to breaking free from economic uncertainty From the dying middle class to the rise of strategic real estate investing, Keith exposes the game-changing insights that most investors never see. -Inflation is reshaping the economic landscape - and you can either ride the wave or get swept away -Generation Z faces unprecedented economic challenges  Want to learn more? Your financial transformation starts here. Resources: Text FAMILY to 66866 Call 844-877-0888 Visit FreedomFamilyInvestments.com/GRE Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/573 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   Welcome to GR, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, talking about real estate versus stocks, how housing has been in a recession that could now be thawing. Then why the war on the young and the vanishing middle class threatens to get even worse today on get rich Education.    Keith Weinhold  0:19   You It's crazy that most people think they're playing it safe with their liquid money when they're actually losing savings accounts and bonds don't keep up when true inflation can eat six to 7% of your wealth. Every single year, I invest my liquidity with FFI freedom family investments and their flagship program with fixed 10 to 12% returns that have been predictable and paid quarterly. There's real world security. It's backed by needs based real estate like affordable housing, Senior Living and healthcare. Ask about the freedom flagship program when you speak to a freedom coach there. And here's what's cool. That's just one part of FF eyes family of products. They include workshops and special webinars, educational seminars designed to educate before you invest start with as little as 25k and finally, get your money working as hard as you do. It's easy to get started. Just grab your phone and text family. 266866, text the word family. 266866, that's family. 266866,   Corey Coates  1:37   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  1:47   Welcome to GRE from Rocky Mount North Carolina to Mount Shasta, California and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, and you are inside for another wealth building week of get rich education. A lot of people have been building wealth lately. Do you even understand all the markets that are either at or near all time highs, real estate, stocks, gold, all recently hit those levels, also nested home equity positions of American property owners are at all time highs. Silver is also near an all time high, and so are FICO credit scores. All this means that the haves are in really good shape, and the have nots aren't more on that later. Let's then you and I talk about real estate versus stocks. I've invested in both for decades, and it's not something that I do on the side. This is the core of what I do and talk about with you every week. And I've never felt more inclined toward investing in real estate ever the resilience of residential real estate, a major reason is that I've always found real estate investing easier to understand than the s and p5 100, and it comes down to the mechanics of each one in The stock market, a company can be well run, it can be profitable, and it can even be growing, yet its stock price might fall anyway. Why? Because expectations weren't met for a quarterly earnings report, or investor sentiment just happened to shift for a while, people just tended to focus on the bad stuff instead of the good stuff, even though it was always there, and that's why the stock price went down. So what makes a stock move more often than not, is kind of laughable. It isn't a word sentiment, emotions. It's how investors collectively feel about a stock and that can change on a dime. One quarter's earnings miss an interest rate hike, geopolitical news or even a single social media comment from a CEO that can move billions of dollars of market value in an instant real estate, on the other hand, that strips away a lot of that noise and that ability for other people's emotions to ruin the price of your apartment building that cannot happen at its core, the value of a property is tied to its income stream and the market that It sits in, that makes it far more direct and way more controllable. If I buy a property, I can see the levers in front of me and ask my property manager to push or pull them or even do it myself. For example, I just asked them to replace flooring in three of my apartment units. With pricier luxury vinyl plank rather than new carpet, and that's because I plan to hold that building for another five years or more. I'll attract a better quality tenant that can afford to pay me more rent. So I know that if I improve operations and increase occupancy, reduce expenses or reposition the asset down the road. I mean, that is directly going to increase net operating income, and that increase will directly affect my valuation. So there's a logic to this that's almost mechanical, and that is not to say that real estate is without nuance or risk. The risk lies in execution. You have to underwrite carefully. Is the location of your property sustainable long term? Are the demographics supportive of Lent growth? What capital improvements are truly lucrative to you and provide the tenants with value, and what kind of improvements are only cosmetic? So real estate isn't just tangible, it's also something that you can interact with. You can walk a property, you can even speak to tenants, study the neighborhood and know exactly what you're dealing with. It's not a ticker symbol reacting to opaque forces that you'll never see or control, and for me, that tactile nature creates clarity. When you buy the right property in the right market with the right strategy, then the path forward is not mysterious. It isn't whimsical, it's deliberate. Real Estate is easier to understand than the S p5, 100. And that also doesn't mean that real estate is simple, because there is that due diligence and strategy, but it's the cause and effect relationship between what you do and the outcome that you get that's far more direct with stocks. You can be completely right about the fundamentals. I mean, you can nail it. You can Bullseye that stock target, and after all that, yet still lose with real estate. If you execute well, the fundamentals eventually do show up in the returns and see because of that direct cause and effect relationship, you can improve yourself as a real estate investor faster than a stock investor can, and that's because you can learn about how your upgrade drove your properties, noi, that information, that feedback that you got, that's something that you can either replicate again or improve upon in your own investor career. So between real estate and stocks, execution is the real differentiator, and control is a key one as well. To me, that sweet spot is control that I have. But through a property manager that way, control doesn't mean that you're losing your quality of life, your standard of living. Now, some people, they do, have the right handyman skills to maintain the property and the right people skills to maintain the tenants. So self managing it can work for just a few people. I sure don't have the handyman skills myself. Sheesh, if I even try to hang a picture on a wall, there's a 50% chance that it's going to end in a drywall patch job. When you can see the cause and effect between your decisions and the property's performance, it creates that level of control that stocks and bonds just don't offer. And I'm also being somewhat kind to stocks by discussing a benchmark like the s, p5, 100, even harder to control and understand are the Wall Street derivatives and financial mutations that the people invested in them don't even understand. Unlike stocks, you own, the levers you own, the operations, the expenses and the occupancy, both have risks, but real estate's risks are more perceptible, more knowable. You won't have to cringe when a company's CEO posts a tweet that's either pro Israel or pro Gaza. Billions of market cap is wiped out, and your investment goes down 12% in one hour. This is why we talk about real estate on the show. There is less speculation and conjecture. It is concrete stuff, and that's all besides how real estate pays you five ways at the same time, as if that wasn't enough.    Keith Weinhold  9:38   Now, when we talk about real estate investing in this decade, do you realize that we have been in a housing recession for two years? A recession in real estate? I mean, it might not feel like it with those home prices at erstwhile mentioned all time highs. We don't need to have falling prices to have a recession. Investors are obviously. Making money in this housing recession. The recession I'm talking about is the slowdown in housing activity stemming from less affordability, lower sales volume and less available inventory. But we do now have signs that we are breaking out of these housing doldrums. As far as affordability, national home prices are staying firm. But what's helping there is that mortgage rates have fallen, and we've also had wages that are rising faster than rents and wages that are rising faster than mortgage payments. In fact, wages have been rising faster than both of those for most of the last year now, and that's sourced by Freddie Mac Federal Reserve stats and rental listings on Redfin. Yes, year over year, American wages are up 4.1% rents are up 2.6% and mortgage payments are basically unchanged over the past year, up just two tenths of 1% and of course, these facts, combined with lower mortgage rates, all supports more real estate price growth. Now to kick off the show, I mentioned how real estate stocks and gold all recently hit all time highs. Well, that's denominated in perpetually based dollars, of course. However, one thing that affects you that certainly has not reached all time highs is the level of available homes, the number of homes for sale, that inventory is up off the recent bottom in 2022 yet it is still below pre pandemic levels. We have had quite a recovery here. National active listings definitely on the rise. They are up 21% between today and this time last year. Well, that means that buyers have gained leverage, mostly across the south, where lots of new building has occurred, and some areas of the West as well. Yet today, we are still, overall here 11% below 2019 inventory level. So nationally, we're basically still 11% below pre pandemic housing inventory levels. And in the Midwest and Northeast, the cupboard looks even more bare than that, since new construction totally hasn't kept up there, we will see what happens. But with the recent drop in mortgage rates, buyers might take more of that available inventory off the shelf. But here's the twist that I've heard practically no one else talk about no media source, no one in conversation. Nobody. It is the paucity of available starter homes. It's the entry level home segment that has the great scarcity, and it's these low cost properties that are the ones that make the best rental properties. Their paucity is jaw dropping, as sourced by the Census Bureau and Freddie Mac starter home construction in the US. I mean, it is just fallen precipitously. Are you even aware of the trend? All right, defined as a home of 1400 square feet or less, all right, that's what we're calling a starter home. Their share of new construction that was 40% back in 1982 Yeah, 40% of new built homes were starter homes. Then by the year 2000 it fell to just a 14% share, and today, only 9% of new built homes are starter homes, fewer than one in 10, and yet, that's exactly what America needs more of. So although overall housing inventory is still low, it's that entry level segment that is really chronically underserved, and that won't change anytime soon, we remain mired in a starter home slump because builders find it more profitable to build higher end homes and luxury homes. Yet for anyone that owns this workforce rental property, which is the same thing we've been focused on doing here on this show, from day one, you are sitting in an asset class that's going to remain stubbornly in demand over the long term. And when it comes to starter homes, the ones Investors love most, they are more scarce than bipartisan agreement in Congress, really. That is the takeaway here.    Keith Weinhold  14:39   So last week, I had an interesting in person meet up at a coffee shop with a 19 year old college student because he's a real estate enthusiast, rapping Gen Z there. He's an athlete too, an 800 meter runner. Well, his dad read Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and his dad has 60 rental properties. Where they're from in Wisconsin, and maybe you're wondering, oh, come on, what could I learn from this 19 year old? I don't think that way. Now, I told him about some foundational GRE principles like financially free, beats debt free and things like that. It was also insightful to get his take on how he sees the world, and for me to learn what his professors are teaching him about real estate investing in his classes, he talked about how his professors show them, for example, what affects apartment cap rates. Also about how, whenever they run the numbers on a property, it always works out better to get the debt, get that mortgage, and how that leverage increases total rates of return. I was really happy that he's learning that over there at the university, but I was really impressed how at age 19, he's responsible and understands so much about society, politics, investing, athletics and even diet. I mean, this guy is rare, talking about his preference for avoiding food cooked in seed oils and choosing beef tallow instead. He also lamented on how Generation Z is so screwed up, saying that no one reads, no one's having kids, no one can buy a home, no one's going to be able to buy a home, and that people his age are so used to looking at screens that they're anxious about in person interactions, even in person, food ordering from a waiter at a restaurant gives them anxiety. He and I are planning to go running together next week. We'll see how that goes. As a college 800 meter runner, he's going to have the speed advantage on me, but we're running up a steep, 40 minute long trail where I've got a shot at an endurance advantage. So it was rather interesting to get his take and see what college professors are teaching on real estate. I mean, this generation that's coming of age now, Gen Z is the worst generation since George Washington to have it worse off than their parents. I'm going to talk about that today, shortly. next week, on the show here, I plan to help you learn about what's going on with some real estate niches and what their future looks to be over the next 10 to 20 years, including mobile home park real estate and parking lot real estate, one of these asset classes I really don't like the future of That's all next week on the future of some certain real estate niches. Straight ahead today, I want to tell you about mortgage rates in a way that you've never thought about before and more about the war on the young and the vanishing middle class. I'm Keith Weinhold. There will only ever be one. Get rich education podcast episode 573, and you are listening to it.    Keith Weinhold  17:53   If you're scrolling for quality real estate and finance info today, yeah, it can be a mess. You hit paywalls, pop ups, push alerts, Cookie banners. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun. That's why it matters to get clean, free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor. It's direct, and it gets to the point, because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp. And in the know about real estate investing, this is paradigm shifting material, and when you start the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video course, completely free as well. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now at gre letter.com Visit gre letter.com    Keith Weinhold  19:06   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your prequel and even chat with President Chale Ridge personally. While it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com that's Ridge lendinggroup.com   Todd Drowlette  19:38   this is the star of the A E show the real estate commission, I'd roll that. Listen to get rich education with my friend Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 1  19:49   Welcome back to. Get Rich Education. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, as a reminder that show the real estate commission starring our friend Todd Drolet, who is a guest on the show here with us at the beginning of this month, it starts October 10, on A and E, that's that reality based commercial real estate show. Late last year, the Fed lowered interest rates, and they're doing the same thing again this year, when interest rates rise and fall, think of it like a wall that's being raised and lowered. Cutting rates is like lowering the height of a wall or a dam. That's because it allows for the free flow of capital. Savings rate accounts. Well, since they'll now pay at a lower rate with this rate cut, they're more likely to get shifted out and invested somewhere and flow into something else, driving up that other asset's value. Mortgages are more likely to originate because you pay less interest. Lowering rates lowers the impediment to the flow of money. It eases that flow. Oppositely, raising rates is like increasing the height of a wall or a dam, because if your savings account rate goes from 4% up to 5% oh well, you more likely to keep it parked there a higher wall or dam around your money, and raising rates makes your mortgage costs higher, so you're more likely to stay put and not move money around, constrained by the higher wall, that's how interest rates are like walls and lower walls also increase inflation, since they increase The flow of money, and hence the demand for goods and services. Well, then why did the Fed cut rates, lowering the wall opening the door for inflation this last time? Well, I think you know that was due to the evidence of a sputtering job market. You know that, if you follow this stuff, a slowing job market slows the flow of money, hence why they lowered the wall to increase the flow. Now this might translate to even lower mortgage rates. It does have that loose correlation anyway, and this should lift the housing market. But here's the real problem. Inflation is higher than the Fed wants already, and it's still rising, and they cut rates, making it more likely to rise further. This is like pouring gasoline on a campfire while yelling, don't worry. I got this sure the fire burns brighter, all right, but you might lose your eyebrows. The risk here is that these rate cuts will make inflation spike, since lower rates makes everyone less likely to save and more likely to borrow and spend, this pushes up prices even farther and faster, and this is the Fed's dangerous game. This is the crux about why the Fed is between a rock and a hard place. Ideally, the Fed only cuts of inflation is at or below their 2% target, but understand it hasn't even been there one time in nearly five years. Now, year over year, inflation was 2.7% last month and rose to 2.9% this month. The price of almost everything is up even faster than it usually goes up, beef, housing, haircuts, flamin hot, Cheetos, everything as we know this inflation that's now positioned to pick up again. However, for us, this is the long term engine that makes our real estate profitable. It makes it easier to raise rents, all while your principal and interest payment stays fixed. Inflation cannot touch that like a mosquito buzzing against a window, and let's be real, official inflation numbers are like Instagram filters. They are shaved down, touched up and airbrushed. The government massages them with tricks like hedonics, the wave of inflation that peaked at 9% in 2022 that has already widened the distance between the haves and the have nots, like the Grand Canyon, eviscerating so much of the middle class. And now the powers that be are setting up a scenario for another wave of elevated, long term inflation. This could get dire. Look like I was saying earlier the generation coming of age today is the first one since George Washington to have it worse off than their parents. Do You understand the profundity of this? They had the lowest home ownership rate, and they're the poorest, often leaving them directionless, anxious, depressed, drug addicted and even suicidal for. The first time in US history, Americans are on track to be poorer, sicker and lonelier than their parents. They will make even less than their parents did at the same age, and that's despite having a college degree. Inflation is a big reason for that, and that's what I help you solve here. I can't really help you with the depression stuff. That's not really my role with what I do here in the show. But inflation, in getting behind is one contributor to all these things. Understand, in 1989 those under age 40, they held 12% of household wealth. Today it's just 7% older Americans got rich, and they basically locked the gates behind them. Those over age 70 only held 19% of US wealth in 1989 now it's 30% Harvard's endowment has grown 500% since 1980 that's adjusting for inflation, but yet their class size hasn't grown. I mean, this is just more evidence that old money wins and young people are losing and cannot get ahead in 2019 the federal government spent eight times more per capita on seniors than they did kids. We all know that Gen Z is delaying marriage, home ownership and family formation in 1993 60% of 30 to 34 year olds had at least one child. Today, it's gone all the way down to 27% in about 30 years, that's fallen from 60% down to 27% this is not a resource problem. It's a values problem and an inflation problem, and also the tax code, values owning assets which older people have over labor, which younger people have. This is the crux of the war on the young and the war on those that don't own assets. You've got to wonder, is it even fixable? Some of it is, but no one really wants to fix inflation, and now they're lowering rates to open the door for even more of that widening that canyon, yes, the wave of inflation that started four to five years ago that broke down the middle class, and now it's set up to widen even more. I want to tell you what you can do about that shortly. But first, have you ever wondered, why do we even stratify upper, middle and lower class based on somebody's income? Why the income criterion, if you say that someone's upper class, everyone knows what that means. It means that you have a lot of wealth or income. But why is that the basis? Why do we classify it based on income? Well, it really started forming during the Industrial Revolution of the 1700s and 1800s that began in Great Britain. Before that, class distinctions were usually based on land ownership or nobility or occupation, for example, aristocrats versus peasants. But as industrial capitalism spread out of the UK, wages became the dominant way that people made a living. So tracking income, it sort of became this natural way to map out class. And then this notion spread in the 1800s and 1900s that was propelled through both economics and social science. You had thinkers like Karl Marx and Max Weber that were deeply concerned with class. Marx emphasized ownership of the means of production. You've probably heard that before, capitalists versus workers. But as societies modernized people in the world of both Economics and Psychology, they agreed that income was an easier dividing line than ownership alone. And then, starting last century, in the US, the 1900s income statistics, they became rather central in all of these policies that we make, like our tax system and poverty thresholds and qualifying for housing programs and even welfare benefits. See, they all rely on income bands. And over time, this normalized in our vernacular, these strata of upper middle and lower class sort of this income based shorthand that we use, throwing these terms around. So whether we like it or not, classes are based on your income level, and that's how it came into being. Well, with. A quick history lesson with the eroding of the middle class, with the war on the young. What can you actually do to make sure that you find yourself on the upper income side of it without falling to the lower side the lower class? Well, we know who the future financial losers are going to be. It is anyone not owning assets, and it's also savers clutching their dollars as those dollars quietly melt like ice cubes in July, right in their hand. Those are who the financial losers are going to be. Who are the winners going to be? It is asset owners riding the inflation wave, and the winners are also debtors who get to pay back tomorrow with cheaper dollars today, especially with that debt that you have outsourced to tenants. Here's the big takeaway, if you did not grab enough real assets during the last wave of inflation don't get left behind this time, because the longer you wait, the harder it is to jump aboard this moving train that keeps getting momentum and moving faster. The bottom line here is that at GRE we advocate for simply doing it all at once. Use debt to own real assets while inflation pushes up your rents. That's it, right. There it is. That's really the most concise way to orate the formula. Look in your mortgage loan documents. It does not say that you have to repay the mortgage loan in dollars or their equivalent. It only says you have to repay in dollars. That's your advantage. As dollars keep trending closer to worthless. To review what you've learned so far today, real estate is easier to understand and has more control than stocks. Housing has been in a recession, but there's more evidence that it is thawing, and a setup for more inflation has America poised to exacerbate the war on the young and widen the canyon between the haves and the have nots, and it threatens to get even wider as the middle class keeps vanishing and struggling.   Keith Weinhold  32:23   Now, if you like good free information, like with what I've been sharing with you today, and you find yourself doing a bit too much scrolling for quality written real estate and finance info. I mean, yeah, it can be a mess. It can be tough. If you want to get the good stuff, you hit paywalls and pop ups, and you get these push alerts and cookie banners. It's a little annoying. It's like the internet is playing defense against you. Not so fun, and that's why it matters to get good, clean, free content that actually adds no hype value to your life. This is the golden age of quality email newsletters. I've got one. I write every word of ours myself, and it's got a dash of humor, yet it's direct. And it gets to the point because, as I like to say, even the word abbreviation is too long. My letter takes less than three minutes to read, and it leaves you feeling sharp and in the know about real estate investing, this is the good stuff, the paradigm shifting material, the life changing material, you can get my letter free at gre letter.com Where else would you get the GRE letter? Greletter.com and along with the letter, you'll also get my one hour fast real estate video. Course, it's completely free as well, and it's not to try to upsell you to some paid course, there is no paid course, there's just nothing for sale, no strings attached, free value. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be simpler to get as you know, I often like to part ways with something actionable for you, visit gre letter.com while it's fresh in your head, take a moment to do it now one last time it's gre letter.com until next week. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 2  34:24   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.   Keith Weinhold  34:52   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth building. Get richeducation.com
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17 snips
Sep 22, 2025 • 50min

572: Landlording vs. Professional Management, How to Increase Your Income as a Real Estate Lender

Dani-Lynn Robison, founder of Freedom Family Investments, specializes in recession-resilient real estate funds offering impressive returns. She discusses the balance between self-management and hiring professional property managers, highlighting cost benefits and risks. Dani-Lynn also delves into her firm's diverse investment options, such as multifamily and self-storage assets, ensuring 8-16% returns. Listeners can learn about liquidity in real estate lending, making it an attractive alternative for investors seeking flexibility and strong yields.
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Sep 15, 2025 • 49min

571: Trump's Takeover of the Fed Will Unleash a Wealth Bonanza and a Dollar Crash with Richard Duncan

Keith discusses the potential takeover of the Federal Reserve by President Trump, highlighting the macroeconomic implications.  Economist, author and publisher of Macro Watch, Richard Duncan, joins the show and explains that central bank independence is crucial to prevent political influence on monetary policy, which could lead to excessive money supply and inflation.  Trump's policies, including tariffs and spending bills, are inflationary, necessitating lower interest rates.  Resources: Subscribe to Macro Watch at RichardDuncanEconomics.com and use promo code GRE for a 50% discount. Gain access to over 100 hours of macroeconomic video archives and new biweekly insights into the global economy. Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/571 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, the President has a plan to completely take over the Fed, a body that historically stays independent of outside influence. Learn the fascinating architecture of the planned fed seizure and how it's expected to unleash a wealth Bonanza and $1 crash with a brilliant macroeconomist today, it'll shape inflation in interest rates in the future world that you'll live in today. On get rich education.    Speaker 1  0:33   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 in 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  1:21   You're listening to the show that has created more financial freedom than nearly any show in the world. This is get rich education.   Speaker 1  1:31   Welcome to GRE from Fairfax, Virginia to Fairfield, California, and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and you are listening to get rich education. The Federal Open Market Committee is the most powerful financial institution, not only in the nation, but in the entire world, and when an outside force wants to wrestle it and take it down. The change that it could unleash is almost incredible. It's unprecedented. The President wants full control. Once he has it, he could then slash interest rates, order unlimited money creation, and even peg government bond yields wherever he wishes, and this could drive wealth to extraordinary new highs, but this also carries enormous risks for the dollar and inflation and overall financial stability. And I mean, come on now, whether you like him or not, is Trump more enamored of power than Emperor Palpatine in Star Wars or what this is fascinating. Today's guest is going to describe the architecture of the takeover the grand plan. Our guest is a proven expert on seeing what will happen next in macroeconomics. He's rather pioneering in AI as well. But today, this all has so much to do with the future of inflation and interest rates. We're going to get into the details of how, step by step, Trump plans to infiltrate and make a Fed takeover.    Keith Weinhold  3:23   I'd like to welcome back one of the more recurrent guests in GRE history, because he's one of the world's most prominent macroeconomists, and he was this show's first ever guest back in 2014 he's worked with the World Bank and as a consultant to the IMF. He's contributed a lot on CNBC, CNN and Bloomberg Television. He's a prolific author. His books have been taught at Harvard and Columbia, and more recently, he's been a guest speaker at a White House Ways and Means Committee policy dinner in DC. So people at the highest levels lean on his macroeconomic expertise. Hey, welcome back to GRE joining us from Thailand as usual. It's Richard Duncan   Richard Duncan  4:03   Keith, thank you for that very nice introduction. It's great to see you again.   Keith Weinhold  4:08   Oh, it's so good to have you back. Because you know what, Richard, what caught my attention and why I invited you back to the show earlier than usual is about something that you published on macro watch, and it's titled, Trump's conquest of the Fed will unleash a wealth Bonanza, $1 crash and state directed capitalism. I kind of think of state directed and capitalism as two different things, so there's a few bits to unpack here, and maybe the best way is to start with the importance of the separation of powers. Tell us why the Fed needs to maintain independence from any influence of the president.   Richard Duncan  4:44   Central banks have gained independence over the years because it was realized that if they didn't have independence, then they would do whatever the president or prime minister told them to do to help him get reelected, and that would tend to lead to excessive money supply. Growth and interest rates that were far too low for the economic environment, and that would create an economic boom that would help that President or politician get reelected, but then ultimately in a bust and a systemic financial sector crisis. So it's generally believed that central bank independence is much better for the economy than political control of the central bank.   Speaker 1  5:24   Otherwise we would just fall into a president's short term interests. Every president would want rates essentially at zero, and maybe this wouldn't catch up with people until the next person's in office.   Richard Duncan  5:35   That's right. He sort of wants to be Fed Chair Trump. That's right, president and Fed Chairman Trump on the horizon. It looks like won't be long, Now.   Speaker 1  5:45   that's right. In fact, even on last week's episode, I was talking about how Trump wants inflation, he won't come out and explicitly say that, of course, but when you look at the majority of his policies, they're inflationary. I mean, you've got tariffs, you've got deportations, this reshaping of the Fed that we're talking about the hundreds of billions of dollars in spending in the one big, beautiful Bill act. It is overwhelmingly inflationary.   Richard Duncan  6:12   It is inflationary. And he may want many of those things that you just mentioned, but what he doesn't want is what goes along with high rates of inflation, and that is high interest rates, right? If interest rates go up in line with inflation, as they normally do in a left to market forces, then we would have significantly higher rates of inflation. There would also be significantly higher rates of interest on the 10 year government bond yield, for instance. And that is what he does not want, because that would be extremely harmful for the economy and for asset prices, and that's why taking over the Federal Reserve is so important for him, his policies are going to be inflationary. That would tend to cause market determined interest rates to go higher, and in fact, that would also persuade the Fed that they needed to increase the short term interest rates, the federal funds rate, if we start to see a significant pickup in inflation, then, rather than cutting rates going forward, then they're more likely to start increasing the federal funds rate. And the bond investors are not going to buy 10 year government bonds at a yield of 4% if the inflation rate is 5% they're going to demand something more like a yield of 7% so that's why it's so urgent for the President Trump to take over the Fed. That's what he's in the process of doing. Once he takes over the Fed, then he can demand that they slash the federal funds rate to whatever level he desires. And even if the 10 year bond yield does begin to spike up as inflation starts to rise, then the President can instruct, can command the Fed to launch a new round of quantitative easing and buy up as many 10 year government bonds as necessary, to push up their price and to drive down their yields to very low levels, even if there is high rate of inflation.   Keith Weinhold  7:58   a president's pressure to Lower short term rates, which is what the Fed controls, could increase long term rates like you're saying, it could backfire on Trump because of more inflation expectations in the bond market.   Richard Duncan  8:12   That's right. President Trump is on record as saying he thinks that the federal funds rate is currently 4.33% he said it's 300 basis points too high. Adjusting would be 1.33% if they slash the short term interest rates like that. That would be certain to set off a very strong economic boom in the US, which would also be very certain to create very high rates of inflation, particularly since we have millions of people being deported and a labor shortage at the moment, and the unemployment rate's already very low at just 4.2% so yes, slashing short term interest rates that radically the federal funds rate that radically would be certain to drive up the 10 year government bond yield. That's why President Trump needs to gain control over the Fed so that he can make the Fed launch a new round of quantitative easing. If you create a couple of trillion dollars and start buying a couple of trillion dollars of government bonds, guess what? Their price goes up. And when the price of a bond goes up, the yield on that bond goes down, and that drives down what typically are considered market determined interest rates, but in this case, they would be fed determined interest rates Trump determined interest rates.   Speaker 1  9:28   Inflationary, inflationary, inflationary, and whenever we see massive cuts to the Fed funds rate that typically correlates with a big loss in quality of life, standard of living, and items of big concern. If we look at the last three times that rates have been cut substantially, they have been for the reasons of getting us out of the two thousand.com bubble, then getting us out of the 2000 day global financial crisis, then getting us out of covid in 2020, I mean, massive rate cuts are. Are typically a crisis response   Richard Duncan  10:02   yes, but if we look back, starting in the early 1980s interest rates have have trended down decade after decade right up until the time covid hit. In fact, the inflation rate was below the Fed's 2% inflation target most of the time between 2008 the crisis of 2008 and when covid started, the Fed was more worried about deflation than inflation during those years, and the inflation rate trended down. And so the interest rates tended to trend down as well, and we're at quite low levels. Of course, back in the early 1980s we had double digit inflation and double digit interest rates, but gradually, because of globalization, allowing the United States to buy more and more goods from other countries with ultra low wages, like China and now Vietnam and India and Bangladesh, buying goods from other countries with low wages that drove down the price of goods in the United States, causing goods disinflation, and that drove down the interest rates. That drove down the inflation rate. And because the inflation rate fell, then interest rates could fall also, and that's why the interest rates were trending down for so long, up until the time covid hit, and why they would have trended down again in the absence of this new tariff regime that President Trump has put into place. Now, this is creating a completely different economic environment. President Trump truly is trying to radically restructure the US economy. There is a plan for this. The plan was spelled out in a paper by the man who is now the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors. His name is Steven Moran, and the paper was called a user's guide to restructuring the global trading system. It was published in November last year, and it very clearly spelled out almost everything President Trump has done since then in terms of economic policy. It was truly a blueprint for what he has done since then, and this paper spelled out a three step plan with two objectives. Here are the three steps. Step one was to impose very high tariffs on all of the United States trading partners. Step two was then to threaten all of our allies that we would no longer protect them militarily if they dared to retaliate against our high tariffs. And then the third step was to convene a Mar a Lago accord at which these terrified trading partners would agree to a sharp devaluation of the dollar and would also agree to put up their own trade tariffs against China in order to isolate China. And the two objectives of this policy, they were to re industrialize the United States and to stop China's economic growth so that China would be less of a military threat to the United States, which it is currently and increasingly with each passing month. So so far, steps one and two have been carried out very high tariffs on every trading partner, and also threats that if there's any retaliation, that we won't protect you militarily any longer. And also pressure on other countries to put high tariffs against China. The idea is to isolate China between behind a global tariff wall and to stop China's economic growth. So you can see that is what President Trump has been doing. And also in this paper, Stephen Marin also suggested that it would be very helpful if the Fed would cooperate to hold down 10 year government bond yield in this environment, which would naturally tend to push the bond yields higher. So that paper really did spell out what President Trump has done since then.   Keith Weinhold  13:59   This is fascinating about this paper. I didn't know about this previously, so this is all planned from tariffs to a Fed takeover.   Richard Duncan  14:08   That's right, the idea is to re industrialize the United States. That's what President Trump has been saying for years. Make America Great Again. And it's certainly true that America does need to have the industrial capacity to make steel and ships and pharmaceutical products and many other things in his own national self defense. But there's a problem with this strategy since the breakdown of the Bretton Woods system, and we've talked about this before, so I will do this fast forwarding a bit when the Bretton Woods system broke down up until then it broke down in 1971 before then, trade between countries had to balance. So it wasn't possible for the United States to buy extraordinarily large amounts of goods from low wage countries back then, this thing that's caused the disinflation over the last four decades, trade had to balance because on the Bretton Woods system, if we had a big trade deficit. Deficit, we had to pay for that deficit with gold. US gold, and gold was money. So if we had a big trade deficit and had to pay out all of our gold other countries to finance that deficit, we would run out of gold. Run out of money. The economy would hit a crisis, and that just couldn't continue. We'd stop buying things from other countries. So there was an automatic adjustment mechanism under the Bretton Woods System, or under the classical gold standard itself that prevented trade deficits. But once Bretton Woods broke down in 1971 It didn't take us too long to figure out that it could buy extraordinarily large amounts of things from other countries, and it didn't have to pay with gold anymore. It could just pay with US dollars, or more technically, with Treasury bonds denominated in US dollars. So the US started running massive trade deficits. The deficits went from zero to $800 billion in 2006 and now most recently, the current account deficit was $1.2 trillion last year. So the total US current account deficit since the early 1980s has been $17 trillion this has created a global economic boom of unprecedented proportions and pulled hundreds of millions of people around the world out of poverty. China is a superpower now, because of its massive trade surplus with the US, completely transformed China. So the trade surplus countries in Asia all benefited. I've watched that firsthand, since I've spent most of my career living in Asia, but the United States also benefited, because by buying things from low wage countries that drove down the price of goods, that drove down inflation, that made low interest rates possible, that made it easier for the US to finance its big budget deficits at low interest rates, and so with Low interest rates, the government could spend more and stimulate the economy. Also with very low interest rates, stock prices could go higher and home prices could go higher. This created a very big economic boom in the United States as well. Not only did the trade surplus, countries benefit by selling more to the US, but the US itself benefited by this big wealth boom that has resulted from this arrangement. Now the problem with President Trump's plan to restructure the US economy is that he wants to bring this trade deficit back down essentially to zero, ideally, it seems. But if he does that, then that's going to cut off the source of credit that's been blowing this bubble ever larger year after year since the early 1980s and we have such a big global credit bubble that if this source of credit has been making the bubble inflate, the trade deficit, if that were to significantly become significantly lower, then this credit that's been blowing up, the bubble would stop, and the bubble would implode, potentially creating very severe, systemic financial sector crisis around the world on a much, probably a much larger scale than we saw in 2008 and leading to a new Great Depression. One thing to think about is the trade deficit is similar to the current account deficit. So the current account deficit is the mirror image of capital inflows into the United States. Every country's balance of payments has to balance. So last year, the US current account deficit was $1.2 trillion that threw off $1.2 trillion into the global economy benefiting the trade surplus countries. But those countries received dollars, and once they had that 1.2 trillion new dollars last year, they had to invest those dollars back into us, dollar denominated assets of one kind or another, like government bonds or like US stocks, and that's what they did. The current account deficit is the mirror image of capital inflows into the United States. Last year was $1.2 trillion of capital inflows. Now if you eliminate the current account deficit by having very high trade tariffs and bringing trade back into balance, you also eliminate the capital inflows into the United States, and if we have $1.2 trillion less money coming into the United States a year or two from now, that's going to make it much more difficult to finance the government's very large budget deficits. The budget deficits are expected to grow from something like $2 trillion now to $2.5 trillion 10 years from now, and that's assuming a lot of tariff revenue from the tariffs, budget deficit would be much larger still. So we need the capital inflows from these other countries to finance the US budget deficit, the government's budget deficit. If the trade deficit goes away, the capital inflows will go away also, and with less foreign buying of government us, government bonds, then the price of those bonds will fall and the yield on those bonds will go up. In other words, if there are fewer buyers for the bonds, the price of the bonds will go down and the yield on the bonds will go up. In other words, long term interest rates will go up, and that will be very bad for the US Economy   Speaker 2  14:08   the yields on those 10 year notes have to go up in order to attract investors. Mortgage rates and everything else are tied to those yields.   Richard Duncan  19:36   That's right. And cap rates. When people consider investing in tech stocks, they consider they'll buy fewer stocks if the interest rates are higher. So this is why it's so important for President Trump to conquer the Fed, to take over the Fed. That's what he's doing. Technically, he's very close to accomplishing that. Shall we discuss the details?   Speaker 1  20:29   Yes, we should get more into this fed takeover, just what it means for the future of real estate markets and stock markets. With Richard Duncan, more, we come back. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold   Keith Weinhold  20:41   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your pre qual and even chat with President Chaley Ridge personally. 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Text family. 266, 866, to learn about freedom family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family. 266, 866,   Dani-Lynn Robison  22:24   you is freedom family investments co founder, Danny Lynn Robinson, listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 1  22:31   Welcome back to get Education. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, we're talking with macroeconomist Richard Duncan about a Fed takeover. I think the President wants to be Fed Chair Trump, Richard. Talk to us more about this, because this is really part of a grand plan.   Richard Duncan  22:57   So the Federal Reserve is in charge of monetary policy. That means it sets the interest rates on the federal funds rate, the short term interest rates, and it also has the power to create money through quantitative easing or to destroy money through quantitative tightening. So the Fed is in charge of monetary policy. The Fed makes its decisions at its it meets eight times a year, the Federal Open Market Committee, the FOMC, meets eight times a year, and they take votes. They discuss what's going on in the economy. They make a decision about what they should do about interest rates, and in some cases, decisions about creating or destroying money through quantitative easing or quantitative tightening. They take a vote. The structure of the Federal Reserve System is as follows. There are seven members of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, so there are seven fed governors there. The Federal Reserve Board is in based in Washington, DC. In addition to that, there are 12 Federal Reserve banks around the country, like the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, for instance, or the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Each of these Federal Reserve Banks have a president, so there are 12 Federal Reserve Bank presidents now at the FOMC meetings where interest rates are decided, all seven fed governors get a vote, but only five Federal Reserve Bank presidents get to vote, and they rotate their votes every year they the following year are different. Five fed presidents get to vote. The Federal Reserve Bank president of New York always gets the vote because New York is such an important financial center, but the other four other presidents keep rotating year after year, and the presidents, 12 presidents, serve five year terms, and they can be reappointed, and their terms expire all at the same time, all on the same day, all of their terms will expire next year on February 28 and they will perhaps be reappointed and perhaps. Be reappointed. So that's the structure, seven Federal Reserve Bank governors and 12 Federal Reserve Bank presidents. All the governors. All seven get to vote at every FOMC meeting, but only five of the Presidents get to vote. So that's a total of 12. The Governors of the Federal Reserve System are the most important the seven. Those seven include the Chairman, Chairman Powell, and this is why they're the most important. They're important because if four of the seven have the power to fire all of the Federal Reserve Bank presidents, if four fed governors vote together, they can fire all 12 Federal Reserve Bank presidents. It only takes four. Only takes four. Then those Federal Reserve Bank presidents would have to be replaced, but the Federal Reserve Board of Governors has to approve the replacements. So if President Trump has four fed governors who will do what he tells them to do, then they can fire all the Federal Reserve Bank presidents and only replace them with other people who will do what President Trump tells them to do. Gosh. So what this means is, if the president can get four Federal Reserve Bank governors out of seven, then he has absolute control over monetary policy. He can do anything he wants with interest rates. He can do anything he wants with quantitative easing. So how many does he have now? Well, he has two that he's appointed, Christopher Waller and Michelle Bowman. They voted to cut interest rates at the last FOMC meeting. That was a dissenting vote, because the rest of the voting members voted to hold interest rates steady. Those two have already voted with the President, so they're on Team Trump, and they're going to stay on Team Trump, because both of them would like to become Fed Chairman when Jerome Powell term expires in May next year, very suddenly and very unexpectedly. A month or so ago, another fed Governor resigned. Her name is Adriana Coogler. Her term was not due to expire for another six months, and she'd not given any indication that she was going to resign early, but she did this now gives the President can nominate the Federal Reserve Bank governors. So he is nominated Stephen Moran, the one who wrote the paper the grand plan. Grand plan. He's nominated him to replace Adriana Coogler, yeah, and he's going to vote on him on his appointment, perhaps within very soon, and it only takes 51 senators to vote him in. And since the Republicans control the Senate, he will be approved, it seems very likely that he will be approved, and that will give President Trump the third vote on the FOMC. He will have three out of the seven governors. He only needs one more, and this is where at least the cook comes in. So on the 26th of August, I think President Trump announced that he was firing Lisa Cook, a Fed governor, because she allegedly had made misleading statements on some mortgage applications that have not been proven yet, that they are alleged. So he says that he has fired her. She has said he does not have the right to fire her. The legal cases that the President does have the right to fire a Federal Reserve Bank Governor, but only for cause. And so there's a real question whether this qualifies as being for cause or not, especially since it's only alleged at this point, but assuming that he does get control. So if he does succeed in firing her, he will be able to appoint her replacement, and that will give him four members, four governors out of the seven. And as we just discussed, with four out of seven, he will have complete control over monetary policy, because with four out of seven, that would give him the power to command those four to vote to fire all 12 presidents of the Federal Reserve Banks, and then to appoint new presidents of the Federal Reserve Banks who would vote along with whatever President Trump tells them to vote for. So in that case, with four fed governors, he would have those Four Plus he would have the five presidents that he would appoint from the Federal Reserve Banks voting for him. So five plus four, that is nine, nine out of 12 voting members on the Federal Open Market Committee. He would be guaranteed nine out of 12 votes on the FOMC, and that would give him complete control over monetary policy, and that's what he needs, because his policies are inflationary. They're going to drive up inflation. They're and that's going to push up the 10 year government bond yield, and it would normally make the Fed also increase the federal funds rate, because higher inflation should the Fed in. Increase the interest rates to cool down the higher inflation. But now that's not going to happen, because he is going to take over the FOMC one way or the other. Just by firing Lisa Cook, he's sending a very clear message to all the other fed governors and to the 12 existing Federal Reserve Bank presidents, you do what I tell you or you may be investigated too. You're next, one way or the other, the President is going to get what the President wants, and what he wants is control over monetary policy, and what that means is much lower short term interest rates and probably another very big round of quantitative easing to hold down long term interest rates as well.   Keith Weinhold  30:41   That was an amazing architecture and plan that you laid out for how a President can take over the Federal Open Market Committee. That was amazing to think about that, and what we believe he wants you talked about it is potentially quantitative easing, which is a genteel way of saying dollar printing. Is it lowering the Fed funds rate down to, I think 1% is what he desired, and we're currently at about 4.3%   Richard Duncan  31:08   that's right. He said he'd like to see the federal funds rate 300 basis points lower, which would put 1.3% we could see a series of very sharp interest rate cuts by the Fed in the upcoming FOMC meetings, so we could see the short term interest rates falling very quickly, but as we discussed a little bit earlier, that would alarm the bond market and investors, because they would realize that much lower interest rates would lead to much higher rates of inflation by overstimulating the economy. And so the 10 year bond yields will move higher for fear of inflation, and that will then force President Trump to command the Fed, to create money through quantitative easing on a potentially trillion dollar scale, and start buying up government bonds to push up their price and drive down their yields, so that the 10 year bond yields and the 30 year bond yields will fall. And since mortgage rates are pegged to the government bond yields mortgage rates will fall, and credit card rates will fall, and bank lending rates will fall, and this will kick off an extraordinary economic boom in the US, and also drive asset prices very much higher and create a wealth Bonanza,   Keith Weinhold  32:15   right? And here, Richard and I are talking interestingly, just two days before the next Fed decision is rendered, therefore, with eminent cuts, we could very well see soaring stock and real estate markets fueled by this cheap credit and this quantitative easing, at least in the shorter term.   Richard Duncan  32:36   But timing is something one must always keep in mind, there is a danger that we could actually see a sell off in the stock market in the near term. If we start seeing the Fed slashing interest rates, then the 10 year bond yields will start moving higher. That would ultimately lead to quantitative easing to drive those yields back down. But when the falling short term interest rates start pushing up interest rates on the 10 year government bond yield because investors expect higher rates of inflation, that could spook the stock market. The stock market's very expensive, so before QE kicks in, there could actually be a period where raising expectations for higher rates of inflation drive the 10 year bond yields higher before the Fed can step in and drive them back down again. We could actually see a sell off in the stock market before we get this wealth boom that will ultimately result when the Fed cuts the short term rates and then quantitative easing also drives down the long term rates. I hope that's not too confusing. There could be a intermediate phase, where bond yields move higher, and that causes the stock market to have a significant stumble. But that wouldn't last long, because then President Trump would command the Fed to do quantitative easing, and as soon as the president says on television that he's going to do quantitative easing, between the moment he says quantitative and the moment he says easing, the stock market is going to rocket higher.   Keith Weinhold  34:05   And here we are at a time where many feel the stock market is overvalued. Mortgage rates have been elevated, but they're actually still a little below their historic norms. The rate of inflation hasn't been down at the Fed's 2% target in years, it's been above them, and we've got signs that the labor market is softening.   Richard Duncan  34:25   That's true. The labor market numbers in the most recent job number were quite disappointing, with the revisions to earlier months significantly lower. But of course, with so many people being deported from the United States now, that's contributing to this lower job growth numbers. If you have fewer people, there are fewer people to hire and add to job creation, so that may have some distorting impact on the low job creation numbers. The economy actually is seems to be relatively strong the the. Latest GDP now forecast that the Atlanta Fed does is suggesting that the economy could grow by three and a half percent this quarter, which is very strong. So the economy is not falling off a cliff by any means. If the scenario plays out, as I've discussed, and ultimately we do get another round of quantitative easing and the Fed cuts short term interest rates very aggressively. That will create a very big economic boom with interest rates very low. That will push up real estate prices, stock prices and gold prices and Bitcoin prices and the price of everything except $1 the dollar will crash because currency values are determined by interest rate differentials. Right now, the 10 year government bond yield is higher than the bond yields in Europe or Japan, and if you suddenly cut the US interest rates by 100 basis points, 200 basis points, 300 basis points, and the bond yields go down very sharply, then it'll be much less attractive for anyone to hold dollars relative to other currencies, and so there will be a big sell off of the dollar. And also, if you create another big round of quantitative easing and create trillions of dollars that way, then the more money you create, the less value the dollar has supply and demand. If you have trillions of extra new dollars, then the value of the dollar loses value. So the dollar is likely to take a significant tumble from here against other currencies and against hard assets. Gold, for instance, that's why we've seen such an extraordinary surge in gold prices.   Speaker 1  36:38   right? Gold prices soared above three $500 and Richard I'm just saying what I'm thinking. It's remarkable that Trump continues to be surrounded by sycophants that just act obsequiously toward him and want to stay in line and do whatever he says. And I haven't seen anyone breaking that pattern.   Richard Duncan  36:59   I'm not going to comment on that observation, but what I would like to say is that if this scenario does play out, and it does seem that we're moving in that direction, then this big economic boom is very likely to ultimately lead to the big economic bust. Every big boom leads to a big bust, right? Big credit booms lower interest rates, much more borrowing by households, individuals, companies. It would while the borrowing is going on, the consumption grows and the investment grows, but sooner or later, it hits the point where even with very low interest rates, the consumers wouldn't be able to repay their loans, like we saw in 2008 businesses wouldn't be able to repay their loans, and they would begin defaulting, as they did in 2008 and at that point, everything goes into reverse, and the banks begin to fail when they don't receive their loan repayments. And it leads to a systemic financial sector crisis. The banks lend less when credit starts to contract, then the economy collapses into a very serious recession, or even worse, unless the government intervenes again. So big boom that will last for a few years, followed by a big bust. That's the most probable outcome, but I do see one other possibility of how that outcome could be avoided, on the optimistic side, and this is it. If once President Trump slash Fed Chairman Trump has complete control over US monetary policy, then it won't take him long to realize Stephen Moran has probably already told him that he would then be able to use the Fed to fund his us, sovereign wealth fund. You will remember, back in February, President Trump signed an executive order creating a US sovereign wealth fund. And this was music to my ears, because for years, as you well know, I've been advocating for the US government to finance a multi trillion dollar 10 year investment in the industries and technologies of the future   Keith Weinhold  39:01   including on this show, you laid that out for us a few years ago and made your case for that here, and then Trump made it happen.   Richard Duncan  39:08   Let's try my book from 2022 it was called the money revolution. How to finance the next American century? Well, how to finance the next American Century is to have the US, government finance, a very large investment in new industries and new technologies in things like artificial intelligence, quantum computing, nanotechnology, genetic engineering, biotech, robotics, clean energy and fusion, create fusion and everything, world where energy is free, ultimate abundance. So I was very happy that President Trump created this US sovereign wealth fund. Now that he will soon have complete control over his US monetary policy, he will understand that he can use the Fed to fund this, US sovereign wealth fund. He can have the Fed create money through quantitative easing and. And start investing in fusion. We can speed up the creation of the invention of low cost fusion. We could do that in a relatively small number of years, instead of perhaps a decade or longer, as things are going now, we could ensure that the United States wins the AI arms race that we are in with China. Whoever develops super intelligence first is probably going to conquer the world. We know what the world looks like when the United States is the sole superpower. We've been living in that world for 80 years. Yeah, we don't know what the world would look like if it's conquered by China. And China is the control super intelligence and becomes magnitudes greater in terms of their capacity across everything imaginable than the United States is whoever wins the AI arms race will rule the world. This sort of investment through a US sovereign wealth fund would ensure that the winner is the US and on atop it, so it would shore up US national security and large scale investments in these new technologies would also turbocharge US economic growth and hopefully allow us to avoid the bust that is likely to ultimately occur following The approaching boom, and keep the economy growing long into the future, rather than just having a short term boom and bust, a large scale investment in the industries of the future could create a technological revolution that would generate very rapid growth in productivity, very rapid economic growth, shore up US national security, and result in technological miracles and medical breakthroughs, possibly curing all the diseases, cure cancer, cure Alzheimer's, extend life expectancy by decades, healthy life expectancy. So that is a very optimistic outcome that could result from President Trump becoming Fed Chairman Trump and gaining complete control over monetary policy. And this is all part of the plan of making America great again. If he really followed through on this, then he certainly would be able to restructure the US economy, re industrialize it, create a technological revolution that ensured us supremacy for the next century. That's how to finance the next American century.   Speaker 1  42:23   Oh, well, Richard, I like what you're leaving us with here. You're giving us some light, and you're talking about real productivity gains that really drives an economy and progress and an increased standard of living over the long term. But yes, in the nearer term, this fed takeover, there could be some pain and a whole lot of questions in getting there. Richard, your macro watch piece that caught my attention is so interesting to a lot of people. How can more people learn about that and connect with you and the great work you do on macro watch, which is your video newsletter   Richard Duncan  43:00   Thanks, Keith. So it's really been completely obvious that President Trump was very likely to try to take over the Fed. Nine months ago, I made a macro watch video in December called Will Trump in the Fed, spelling out various ways he could take over the Fed, and why he probably would find it necessary to do so. So what macro watch is is it describes how the economy really works in the 21st Century. It doesn't work the way it did when gold was money. We're in a completely different environment now, where the government is directing the economy and the Fed, or seeing the President has the power to create limitless amounts of money, and this changes the way everything works, and so that's what macro watch explains. It's a video newsletter. Every couple of weeks, I upload a new video discussing something important happening in the global economy and how that's likely to impact asset prices, stocks, bonds, commodities, currencies and wealth in general. So if your listeners are interested, I'd encourage them to visit my website, which is Richard Duncan economics.com that's Richard Duncan economics.com and if they'd like to subscribe, hit the subscribe button. And for I'd like to offer them a 50% subscription discount. If they use the discount coupon code, G, R, E, thank you, GRE, they can subscribe at half price. I think they'll find that very affordable. And they will get a new video every couple of weeks from me, and they will have immediate access to the macro watch archives, which have more than 100 hours of videos. Macro watch was founded by me 12 years ago, and I intend to keep doing this, hopefully far into the future. So I hope your listeners will check that out.   Keith Weinhold  44:46   Well, thanks, both here on the show and on macro watch Richard gives you the type of insight that's hard to find anywhere else, and you learn it through him oftentimes before it makes the headlines down the road. So. Richard, this whole concept of a Fed takeover is just unprecedented, as far as I know, and it's been so interesting to talk about it. Thanks for coming back onto the show.   Richard Duncan  45:08   Thank you, Keith. I look forward to the next time.   Speaker 1  45:17   Yeah, fascinating stuff from Richard in the nearer term, we could then see interest rate cuts that would go along with cuts to mortgages and credit card rates and car loan rates and all kinds of bank lending rates. This could pump up the value of real estate, stocks, Bitcoin, gold, nearly everything a wealth bonanza. Now, in polls, most Americans think that the Fed should stay independent from outside control. You really heard about how the President is dismantling the safeguards that protect that fed independence, the strategy he's using to bend the Federal Open Market Committee to His will. And this is not speculation, because, as you can tell, the takeover of the Fed is already underway. A fed governor has been fired. New loyalists are being installed, and key votes are lining up in the President's favor. But as far as the longer term, you've got to ask yourself, if these policies will inflate a giant bubble destined to burst down the road. I mean triggering a crisis as bad as 2008 I mean, these are the very questions that every investor should be asking right now, if you find this in similar content fascinating, and you want to stay on top of what is forward looking what's coming next macroeconomically, check out Richard Duncan's macro watch at Richard Duncan economics.com for our listeners, he's long offered the discount code for a 50% discount that code is GRE, that's Richard Duncan economics.com and the discount code GRE next week here on the show, we're bringing it back closer to home with key us, real estate investing strategies and insights, a lot of ways to increase your income. Until then, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit you Daydream.   Speaker 3  47:20   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 1  47:40   You You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access, and it's got paywalls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers, it's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters. And I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point, because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter usually takes less than three minutes to read, and when you start the letter, you also get my one hour fast real estate video. Course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text gre to 66866,   Keith Weinhold  48:59   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth, building, get richeducation.com you.  
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Sep 8, 2025 • 43min

570: Forget Population Growth—This is What Really Drives Rents

Keith discusses the factors driving rent growth, emphasizing income growth, supply constraints, and affordability.  He highlights that population growth has a weak correlation with rent growth, citing examples like Austin and San Francisco. The fastest rent growth is in San Francisco (4.6%), Fresno (4.6%), and Chicago (4%), while Austin (-6.8%), Denver (-5%), and Phoenix (-4.1%) show declines.  GRE Coach, Naresh Vissa, joins the conversation to talk about the administration's focus on lowering rates and the potential for higher inflation as a result. He encourages investors to stay informed and take advantage of opportunities when rates are low. Resources: Book a free coaching session with Naresh at GREinvestmentcoach.com Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/570 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, vital trends are moving the rental real estate market. And learn what really drives rent growth. It's probably not what you think. Then inflate, baby. Inflate. Why this administration wants inflation today on get rich education.   Speaker 1  0:22   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 and key 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  1:08   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  1:18   You Keith, welcome to GRE from Whippany New Jersey to Parsippany New Jersey. Not much distance there and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and you're listening to this week's episode of Get rich education, where it's not just about your ROI. It's about your roti, your return on time invested, and your return on life. Everyone says that population growth is what drives rents, yes, but that's just one part of it, and it probably isn't even the most important factor. There is evidence of this, from Harvard research to what HUD has found. Austin, Texas recently added 500,000 people, rents spiked, and then supply flooded in and rents stalled. Head count wasn't enough. I discussed that in depth when I walked the streets of Austin last year. San Francisco lost population, but yet rents rebounded and remain among the highest in the nation. Harvard's housing research shows that population growth only has a weak correlation with rent growth. So what actually does drive rents? Well, income growth, supply constraints, and then staying under the 30% affordability ceiling, which is HUD's definition of what a cost burdened household is, right? That means that a tenant spends more than 30% of their income on rent. That is cost burden, and this pattern holds from ancient Rome to modern Manhattan, rents follow paychecks, not head counts and on the supply side, well, not all metros are created equal. Some have quantified it with what's called a supply elasticity score, places like Houston can seemingly build endlessly, while Manhattan and San Francisco cannot. So it's that difference that explains why incomes turn into rent growth in one market but not in the other. So if you're chasing fast growing metros, okay, but be careful, because headcount does not equal pricing power. Paychecks are what do well today, rents are falling in boom towns, but they're climbing in what we would call legacy, established metros, the year over year, rent change across US, metro areas really has a striking contrast. The three with the fastest rent growth are San Francisco up 4.6% Fresno also up 4.6% and Chicago up 4% and the three biggest declines in rent are Austin down 6.8% Denver down 5% and Phoenix Down 4.1% rent contraction in those three cities. And here's the problem during that 2020, to 2022, real estate surge. Years ago, investors piled into Sun Belt markets, and they sort of expected this endless growth, but then new supply flooded Austin, Phoenix and Denver, pushing rents down and vacancies up, and all three of those are cities that I visited during the boom and I saw the. Cranes in the air myself, and yet, at the same time, older supply constrained metros, like in the northeast, in Chicago and in San Francisco, they are quietly regaining momentum. That's where demand is steady. Construction is limited, and that's why rents are ticking higher. So this is why, like I've talked about before, it's good for you to invest in some Sunbelt areas, say, like Florida and then others that have this steady demand, like, say, a place in Ohio. And it's worth pointing out, too, how unusual it is that a city like Austin has a 6.8% rent contraction. We all know that housing prices are more stable than stocks, sure, but real estate rents are even more stable than housing prices, so this rent aberration that was caused by such wild overbuilding in Austin. Now, I recently attended a presentation on the rental housing market. It was put together by John Burns. He's the one that presented it, and he's the owner of the eponymous John Burns research and consulting. And people pay good money to attend these presentations, and he's a guy worth listening to, always with good housing market insights, and some of his insights while they're the same ones I've shared with you for a while, like how there's been a persistent lack of housing supply in the Northeast and Midwest, and still an abundant supply in the south. The Northeast is the only region of the nation that's adding more jobs than new homes at this time, the top amenities that tenants want today are a driveway in a yard. Pretty simple things. They're not a pool in a clubhouse. They're a driveway in a yard. And if you think about them, it totally makes sense, and that's why single family rentals have become such a booming industry, because that's where tenants are getting a driveway and a yard and burns. Also pointed out that most US job growth is in low income jobs. The presentation talked mostly in terms of headwinds versus tailwinds. Lower immigration. Well, that's a headwind. That's a bad thing for real estate investing, since immigrants tend to be renters. The tailwinds The good thing that includes less future supply coming out of the market, fewer apartments and fewer build to rent, deliveries coming online, fewer being added between today and 2028 and another positive for the next two decades at least, is the fact that since people are having fewer kids, that makes people less likely to settle down, buy a home and need a good school district. Well, that is good for people renting longer, longer tenancy durations, and John Burns also spotlighted how building material cost inflation is up 40% from pre pandemic times fully 40% more in material costs. But that Spike has since flattened out. However, it is just another reason why home prices can't really fall substantially. Today's prices are baked in, and his summary overall is to be bullish and bet on the tailwinds those real estate investing positives that is mostly due to future rent growth because the new supply is going away, and it's going to continue to stay difficult to buy a home, more rent growth, and that's the end of what he had to say. So as you're out there, targeting the right areas and renters for your properties, I've talked before about how new build rental property is a sweet spot, since your builder will often buy down your mortgage rate. For you, new build is where you can attract a good quality tenant. Look for a moment, just forget finding a tenant that can just barely afford your unit because they're spending 30 to 33% of their income to pay you rent, because, see, in that condition, there's no room for you to get a rent increase. If you can offer great value to your residents and target a 10 to 15% rent to income ratio, aha, you are really in good shape, because the easiest rent growth is retaining happy residents that are conditioned to accept 5% rent increases. Well, that is more likely in a nice new build property. That's where you attract a better tenant. And if they were to move out, they would have to take a lesser property so they will stay and pay the rent in. Increase, and they're going to have the capacity to do so when the rent is only 10 to 20% of their income.    Keith Weinhold  5:25   Now, when we talk about a major factor that trickles down to rents, the level of inflation, a lot of this comes down to the Fed chair and even the president, to some extent. And you know what's interesting, half the nation bashes whoever is president, and the entire nation bashes whoever is the Fed chair. Look, every recent Fed Chair has been maligned and bashed more than a pinata at a toddler's birthday party, bashed open more than an umpire at a little league game. Well, since 1980 there have been five of them, Volker, then Greenspan, then Bernanke, then Yellen and now Jerome Powell, most of that group is known for substantially lowering interest rates, yet they've remained unpopular anyway. And you know the irony here? The most popular of these five is Paul Volcker. He's the only Fed chair that's celebrated, and yet he jacked rates in the 1980s to up near 20% yes, 20% he really made borrowers feel the pain, but yet he's the only guy that's celebrated, because that's how he stomped that out of control inflation fire, 45 years ago, in 1981 mortgage rates peaked between 18 and 19% yet Somehow he's the Fed share that we celebrate? Well, here in more modern times, will the Fed eventually have to do the same thing? This is because Trump wants inflation now. The short term, talk is about lowering interest rates, but there are so many inflationary forces that you've got to wonder about how interest rates could very well go much higher later to get on top of this inflation that I'm telling you Trump actually wants. Now, of course, no one is going to come out and explicitly say that they want inflation, but that is now so implied, there are a ton of policies that the administration favors that are super inflationary. Some are a little deflationary, like deregulation, but they are overwhelmingly inflationary. Look tariffs, that's inflation on goods, mass deportations, that's labor inflation, reshaping the Fed in order to lower rates. That's inflation, the one big, beautiful bill, act that's lots of spending and largely inflationary. I'm telling you, Trump wants inflation now I'm not here to evaluate these policies for being good or bad. This is about policies, not politics, and understand it's not just the US government. It's every government everywhere that secretly wants inflation. And why do they want that? Well, first, it fuels spending. If you know that your dollars are going to shrink in purchasing power tomorrow, well then you're going to spend today, and consumer spending makes up 68% of us. GDP, yes, Amazon, thanks, you. Secondly, inflation shrinks the government's debt. The third reason that governments everywhere want inflation is because it foils deflation. In a deflationary world, people hoard cash like its gold bullion, tax revenue dries up and the economy stalls, and also inflation. It facilitates wage adjustments. It helps the labor market function. If economic conditions are weak, well, then employers can implement real wage cuts just by keeping salaries flat right where they're at. I mean, that is so preferable to cutting nominal wages directly and giving employees a pay cut notice. Everyone hates seeing that. So those are what four big reasons why governments will take their gloves off and fight in a steel cage match to the death to ensure inflation. So most expect a rate cut at the Feds meeting next week. But if this continues and there were massive cuts, you know, there's something else you've got to ask yourself, do you really want to live in an economy where massive rate cuts occur. I mean, that's what the 2008 global financial crisis and the covid pandemic in 2020 brought to us. So massive cuts mean there's some giant problem out there. Therefore, although the Trump and Powell rivalry, it might make you. Interesting theater and headlines. You know, let's not get carried away. Let's put things in perspective. What matters to you more is how many dollars you're leveraging, the efficiency of your property operations and the quality of your business relationships. Really, the bottom line is that fed tweaks are background noise inflation, that is the long term engine that makes your real estate profitable. Focus there, and let the politicians keep doing the yelling concerns about ongoing inflation and what that means for real estate investors, that's next. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to get rich education.    Keith Weinhold  8:57   The same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your prequel and even chat with President Chaley Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com. That's Ridge lendinggroup.com.    Keith Weinhold  8:57   You know what's crazy your bank is getting rich off of you. The average savings account pays less than 1% it's like laughable. Meanwhile, if your money isn't making at least 4% you're losing to inflation. That's why I started putting my own money into the FFI liquidity fund. It's super simple. Your cash can pull in up to 8% returns, and it compounds. It's not some high risk gamble like digital or AI stock trading. It's pretty low risk because they've got a 10 plus year track record of paying investors on time in full every time. I mean, I wouldn't be talking about it if I wasn't invested myself. You can invest as little as 25k and you keep earning until you decide you want your money back, no weird lockups or anything like that. So if you're like me and tired of your liquid funds just sitting there doing nothing, check it out. Text family. 266, 866, to learn about freedom. Family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family, to 66866,   Ken McElroy  17:26   this is Rich Dad advisor Ken McElroy. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.    Keith Weinhold  17:34   we have a familiar voice back on the show. It's an in house discussion here with our own GRE investment coach since 2021 he's helped you completely free, usually over the phone, learning your own personal goals and then helping you find the market that's the right fit for you, and even help connect you with the exact property address that helps you win the inflation Triple Crown, like say, 321, Mulberry Street in Chattanooga, Tennessee. They say that formal education will make you a living self education will make you a fortune. Well, he's got them both. He's slinging an MBA, and he's an active real estate investor just like you and I. Hey, welcome back to the show investment coach and race Vista.    Naresh Vissa  18:25   Hey, Keith pleasure, to be back on.    Keith Weinhold  18:27   Inflation is something that affects real estate investors even more so than it does the general public. Since we're borrowing large sums of money and the inflation discussion sure has been interesting lately, you just can't quite get rates back down to 2% still, they've been elevated for years. So talk to us from your vantage point about inflation and future inflation concerns.   Naresh Vissa  18:51   Well, Keith, I am concerned about inflation. This is the first time in a year or so that I'm concerned with the direction and with the policy surrounding inflation, here's why. And I brought this up when I was on your podcast in July, the current administration is not talking at all about the fact that inflation is rising. We saw the CPI, for example, hit 2.3% which was four year low earlier this year, and since then, inflation has gone up. That is concerning, that inflation is going back up without any rate cuts. Yet it's gone back, I don't want to say gone back up, but it's gone up. And remember, the Federal Reserve inflation target is 2% so we want to get as close to 2% as possible. And the number one issue in the 2024 election, and the number one issue today is still the cost of everything is right, is too much, which we'll talk about, from gas prices to home values to rents to grocery that's the. Big one, the cost of groceries, the stuff that you buy at grocery stores, etc, everything is just too expensive. Of course, education, you name, childcare, everything is just too expensive. Inflation is still, I think the administration needs to really tackle this problem. They need to really, really tackle it, because it is the number one issue. It is what people essentially, their vote is, is based on it's not necessarily based on some peace agreement in a foreign nation. It's not based on some social issue. The number one issue is going to be this inflation problem. It's are things affordable? Do I have money in my bank account to pay for X, Y and Z? So I am concerned because, yes, tariffs are inflationary. That's kind of common sense. Now I think tariffs can be good. Tariffs can keep inflation in check. If they're handled the right way, we will see that. But my bigger concern is that inflation has been rising. We're not anywhere close to that 2% and we know with a very high degree of certainty that the Federal Reserve is beginning their rate cutting cycle next week with the September rate cut, and that's going to be extended. We've seen President Trump. He's very public, his Treasury Secretary, his Secretary of Commerce, all the economic advisors who he has, they're very transparent about the fact that they want rates slashed, and they want rates slashed quickly. And so we know that we're going to get a rate this is going to be a rate slashing cycle. It's going to be great for the upper class, if you want to call it, it's going to be great for real estate investors, but for the common man, the byproduct of that is going to be higher inflation. There's just no way that you can cut rates so quickly, so low, and you're not going to see inflation. That's my concern. Now on the other hand, and again, we have to see how this plays out. On the other hand, I brought up earlier this year, I've referenced Doge. I think Doge is doing a good job cutting government spending, trying to scale back some of the government initiatives, not that the government's always going to spend we know that, but it's you need to cut back, and doges is trying to do that. That's a plus. But even bigger, I talked about some foreign wars, right? Well, I think that the Middle Eastern conflict and the Russia Ukraine conflict, both of those actually are disinflationary, or fixing those conflicts, creating peace. We've seen a ceasefire in the Middle East. We've seen a peace agreement in Ukraine, and they're disinflationary because of some of the items that I brought up. I think oil is going to dip below $50 a barrel as a result of these peace agreements, these ceasefires. So we're going to see oil prices go down. When you see oil and energy prices go down, you see the cost of almost everything else go down, because you need oil and energy to transport everything else. If you're building a house, you have wood and steel and lumber and and all sorts of materials. And it's you need a truck to transport all that. And the truck is probably it's not an EV truck. You're getting these big trucks that are using diesel fuel. So if we can bring down the cost of of oil and gas and electricity, which these taking care of these conflicts will do, creating peace will do the price of those products, oil, the natural gas, the electricity, the wheat, the grains, those are your groceries. The cost of those are going to come down. So I think it's very positive what we're seeing with this idea of peace in regions that make a huge difference to the global economy. So I'm curious to see, like I think we could see greater than 100 basis point decrease in inflation just by solving these conflicts 1% or more, like I legitimately think so, and that's without the tariffs. That's without the federal rate cut. So even if we're at, let's say, two and a half percent inflation today, and you shave off 100 basis points up now you're at one and a half, and then you throw in tariff inflation, you throw in the rate cut inflation, and we're around 2% so that's the ideal scenario that the administration is hoping for. It's let's create peace, let's have a freer market, and then they can scale back a lot of these tariffs too, because many of these tariffs against India, for example, they can scale back the United States can scale back the 50% tariff on India. That tariff was India got hit with because they're buying Russian oil, and you take care of the Russia conflict. Now it's we say, oh, India, you know, we'll scale back to go back to your 25% tariff, or maybe even less, if you do X, Y and Z. For us, we can expect to see many of these tariffs scaled back. We can expect to see the price of specific goods and services, the prices decrease, which will bring down inflation. That's what I'm optimistic about. Hopefully all these agreements hold, which I think they will, and we can expect that, and the Fed can begin its rate cutting cycle, and everything will be booming, and everything will be great. This is the. Deal scenario. I'm not predicting this. This is the ideal scenario for the administration,   Keith Weinhold  25:05   when both war and terrorists get as bad as they can possibly get. From there, they can only get better, each of which would be disinflationary. Now, the CPI inflation has been reported at 2.7% each of the past two months. But when we talk about rates, Trump wants lower rates, of course, and I think we all know that the Fed's fear of lowering rates is that high inflation could resurface. One thing though, that few think about is that lower rates lead to higher inflation, which kills off the national debt faster. But when we think about upcoming federal reserve rate cuts anytime, whether this was 10 years ago today or 10 years into the future, these are the type of lessons that I like to talk about. All right, when we look at the last Fed meeting, there was no rate cut, but then awful jobs numbers were reported right after that. That's why some think that there could be a 50 point rate cut at the next meeting. The Fed meets eight times a year, so there's about a month and a half between meetings. Now, the Fed doesn't have to wait for a meeting to make a rate cut. They can do an emergency rate cut between meetings, like we saw during covid, but sometimes they're reluctant to do that because that really spooks markets, and that makes people think, oh my gosh, there was an emergency rate cut. Maybe things are worse than we thought. What's going on that triggers concern?   Naresh Vissa  26:24   Well, I think that would be a huge mistake to have an emergency. Yeah, anatomic was obviously an emergency. That was a global emergency. Makes sense. 2008 I remember, I was just college student, but that was an emergency because we saw people lining up on the streets of Manhattan with all their boxes of laid off work, and we saw that on Phoebe. You know, that was a trying time. I think that's out of the question. It's completely unnecessary, especially when the Fed meets every 45 to 50 days. It's, you know, you can wait another 20 days until the next meeting and then make a decision when you have lower rates than the cost, the borrowing costs on the debt, it goes down so the government can refinance its debt, and they would pay less keyword interest dollars. That's a plus, the other plus with tariffs. And I really hope, again, this is just my opinion. I hope this is what happens. But the government is raising quite a lot of tariff revenue, so close to $30 billion last month. And we can expect, in the first full year, next year, it's going to have raised close to half a trillion dollars just for fiscal year 2026 that's the expectation, about half trillion dollars worth of tariff revenue. And I hope that the government uses that pair of revenue to pay down the debt, because when you're paying down the debt, you're dissipating inflation. What I actually don't want them to do is to give us back that money, because they've been floating that around, saying, Oh, we got all this tariff revenue. Let's get it back as a tariff dividend, and every American gets hex, you know, $100 in their bank account or something   Keith Weinhold  28:01   very altruistic. Of you patriotic,   Naresh Vissa  28:04   I would much rather that they use 100% of it to pay down that debt, because the country is going to be better off as a whole over the long term, and in turn, the people will be better off over the long term. The people may not see it. They may want their $200 check or $100 check or whatever it might be, but over the long term, I think the tariffs are overall working out quite well. We're not seeing the crazy inflation that the mainstream expert predicted. I don't think we're going to see the crazy inflation that the experts predicted, if you it's not going to be because of the tariffs, in my opinion, I think it's going to be if there's this aggressive rate cutting cycle that juices the markets and the cost of everything just just goes up. And this ties into real estate investing, because when the Fed starts cutting, that's a very good time for real estate investors to pay attention when the Fed stops cutting immediately. That's a an even better time to pay attention when the rates have bottomed. And this has to deal with timing the real estate market. I'll give you an example. I own several properties. Of one of my properties when the Fed was cutting in 2020 it took about a year for all those cuts to permeate into the mortgage market and into the the market as a whole. It took it. The inflation didn't go up overnight. The inflation didn't go up in April of 2020 or or May of 2020 it went up in April of 2021, it took about a year. So I actually refinanced one of my properties in July of 2021, I refinanced my my property, and I saved about 110 basis points on that refinance. And that's what I mean by timing the market. Because, if you're paying attention, part of it was I knew, Okay, the Fed has stopped. It's cutting. And you know, let's follow the more. Good market. Let's follow the Treasury yield curve and all that. And I jumped in. I literally refinanced at the bottom, like at the absolute bottom. There was about a three month window that was the bottom, and I refinanced. I did the application all that at the beginning of those three months, and it was and I got that great rate at the end of those three months. And I think there's going to be a tremendous opportunity for real estate investors. And I'm sure the Bane This is why I'm a little concerned about inflation as well, because the big hedge funds, the big real estate investment firms, the big banks, the blackstones, the blackrocks, they're going to be ready, and they're going to buy up. They're going to buy up real estate again, and investors, including our GRE investors, they're going to start buying up too. So pay attention. We're going to cover it here. We're going to cover it here, on the podcast and in the newsletter. But pay attention to these rates, because it'll be, I don't want to say, a once in a lifetime opportunity, but it will be a once in a cycle type of opportunity to jump in and get some bottoming real estate values as well as bottoming real estate mortgage rates at the same time. So that equilibrium point is only, like I said, about three or four months long. So we're going to be coming to that point and timing it sometime, I think next year, 2026   Keith Weinhold  31:21   talk to us about the vibe that you're getting from GRE listeners that contact you for a free coaching session. It's really hard to time the real estate market. Why don't you help us out with that? Let us know about a listener or two that you recently helped.   Naresh Vissa  31:37   Well, we have free real estate investment coaching here at GRE. It's absolutely free of charge. You can call, text me, email me whenever you'd like. People can book a free meeting with me, and it's a session. It's an immersive session on real estate investing. So we can go over all of that on our call. You can reach out to me unlimited times, like I said, it's I'm here just to help you throughout and along your real estate investment journey, I've helped hundreds of people invest in real estate, hundreds so it's buying turnkey, cash flowing real estate properties, so our investors can buy properties, and use my guidance and advice to help them buy properties. I also help them if they already own properties, how to optimize their portfolio, how to find new markets. I help them with their existing properties, dealing with property managers, with contractors, even with issues that things aren't always great in real estate, sometimes things can be bad. So listener Paul, for example. Listener Paul, he had a problem with the builder, and he submitted earnest money, and he wanted his earnest money back. Many, many years had gone by, and he came to me and he said, Hey, Naresh, you know, I've got all this money tied up, and the builder's not giving me the money back. Can you help me? And so I got him in touch with the right people, and within three or four months, he got all of his money back, plus interest on all the missed payments. So he got everything back as a lump sum, and then he thanked me and said, Thank you so much. I can sleep better at night, and I'm just I'm doing very well now, and he was ready to buy his next property.   Keith Weinhold  33:15   That's an example of where a deal went wrong and the builder didn't perform and build a property.   Naresh Vissa  33:19   Yes, exactly. Think of me as a trusted advisor, but also as a super connector, someone who can get you in touch with all the right companies and people to make real estate investing very sound. We have listener Joe, who bought many properties through us. He bought his first property through me and through GRE through our coaching program, and that first property worked out really well. So then he said, Hey, I want to buy a second property about six months later. So he bought a second property, and that worked out well. And then he said, let's go with it. And he bought all these with the same provider. So once he reached four, because my rule is, you don't want to go more than four or five in one market. Then he asked me for the next he said, what market do you recommend next? So then I recommended the next market, and then he bought another three or four in that market, and he built a nice little portfolio of seven or I mean, some people think it's little, some people think it's big, of seven or eight properties. So that's very common with the coaching program, where our listeners are really happy. If things are going great, I'm here for them. If things are not going the way that they expected, I'm here to help fix that problem.   Keith Weinhold  34:30   Maurice, is there to help you start building and grow a portfolio. Now, how do you yourself analyze deals and find properties before you let our listeners know about them?   Naresh Vissa  34:40   Well, we work with 15 to 20 different providers around the country, 15 to 20. So these providers are always reaching out to me, emailing me, calling me, leading me voicemails, texting me, saying we've got this great deal. We've got this great incentive. So I parse through all of that, and I find a handful of what I think is best. US and many of these deals, I send them to you, Keith, to promote in your Don't quit your Daydream newsletter, which people can subscribe if they go to get rich education.com. I send them there, and I let our listeners know on the phone when they set up calls, or I have notes on every meeting. So I'm able to send all of these deals to them, and that's how I put the best deals in front of them.   Keith Weinhold  35:25   Most of the coaching calls are over the phone rather than zoom the race. Sure can arrange a zoom call with you if you prefer. You really don't need to do too much to prepare for the call either.   Naresh Vissa  35:38   No, not at all. Just sign up for the meeting, and I'll run things. I'll run the meeting, I'll run the call. It's very straightforward. It's a session. It's very immersive, very interactive.   Keith Weinhold  35:49   Yeah, and you just have to book a time with Naresh once there and afterward. Yeah, it's really casual. Naresh is very open to you text messaging him if you have any ideas, or if you just heard about something on the show that you want to know more of. But yeah, booking that first coaching call is really what opens the door to the communication. And you really staying up to date on things. You can find a race through GRE marketplace. And alternatively, you can learn more about him with his bio. And importantly, book a time on his calendar by going directly to GREinvestment coach.com for a while now he's had times available Monday through Friday, and even some weekend slots available, and yeah, keep in touch with him, because property inventory is ever changing, especially with late breaking news like we've had this year of Home Builders Offering major incentives like buying down your mortgage rate to about 5% so staying up to date has hopefully brought you, the listeners, some really big wins already this year. Naresh, do you have any last thoughts?   Naresh Vissa  35:49   Definitely book a meeting with me. You won't regret it. I think even if you think that you own all these properties, you have all this experience, I think you'll find that the resources we offer it through our free coaching program, there will be one or two nuggets that you didn't know about that will still help you. So it doesn't harm anybody to book that free session with me. If you don't think you need my help, maybe it's just a five minute call and we touch base and we're good to go. That's fine too, but I highly recommend that people get in touch with me. We go from there so that you can continue to have a fruitful investment journey.   Keith Weinhold  37:28   Naresh has been valuable as always. Thanks for coming back out of the show.    Naresh Vissa  37:31   Thank you very much, Keith.   Keith Weinhold  37:38   Yeah, some sharp insight from Naresh as always. Now, when you think about making your next property move, consider how, compared to a few years ago, uncertainty has largely abated and real estate has stabilized. Think about how back in 2020 covid was the big uncertainty concern 2021 it was this real estate boom and an inventory shortage. You would get 50 or 80 offers on one property, and buyers were waiving inspections. That was tough. That was such a seller's market in 2022 that's when you had inflation and the supply chain chaos. That's when CPI inflation peaked at 9.1% in 2023 the big uncertainty concern was interest rate shock and the affordability crisis. And last year and this year, they've pivoted more to macro economic concerns. So therefore today's chief concern gets somewhat more buffered from real estate. Now I discussed the direction of rents earlier in today's show, the recently released Kay Shiller numbers came out, and they show that national home prices are up almost 2% annually, 13 cities or higher and seven or lower. By the way, this continued nominal price appreciation that frustrates the bejesus out of those perpetually wrong crash predictors. They have been wrong even longer than the people waiting for flying cars to show up. And where will prices continue to go from here, probably even higher now, America just hit somewhat of a milestone in this cycle. You might remember that mortgage rates peaked at 7.8% almost two years ago. Well, mortgage rates have now slid down to six and a half 6.5% and here's why this has become significant, right? Just compared to when rates were 7% per the nar 2.8 million Americans now qualify to buy a home. 5.5 million more will qualify at 6% and 7.7 more will qualify at five and a half percent. My gosh. Now. Now, of course, not every newly qualified buyer is going to pounce on a property, but only if a fraction of those do. Can you imagine how this demand increase will stoke prices? There are still only about 1.1 million homes available today. So not only are mortgage rates at a fresh low, but inventory choices, although they're still historically low, they are now at a six year high, and this is all while there's less buyer competition. So today's buyer conditions are really improving, and the bottom line here is that you are in the best position in more than five years to find the right property while still avoiding a bidding war, you have really got some properties to choose from. That is the takeaway, and you don't need to do much to prepare for an immersive free call with Naresh. You know what your situation is, although you probably do want to have about a 20% down payment for a property ready to go, some of which cost as little as 200k in these investor advantage markets, whether you've never bought any property in your life, or if you have dozens, it probably will benefit you. You can easily book a time that works best for you right on a GRE investment coaches calendar that way. There's no back and forth, and you can set it up now. Should you so choose at GRE investment coach.com Until next week, I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 3  41:38   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.   Keith Weinhold  42:02   You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access, and it's got paywalls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers. It's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters. And I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point, because even the word abbreviation is too long. My letter usually takes less than three minutes to read, and when you start the letter, you also get my one hour fast real estate video. Course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre, 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text gre, 266, 866,   Keith Weinhold  43:18   The preceding program was brought to you buy your home for wealth, building, get richeducation.com
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Sep 1, 2025 • 44min

569: Star of A&E’s "The Real Estate Commission": Todd Drowlette on Big Deals, Big Drama & Bigger Negotiations

Todd Drowlette, a commercial real estate broker with over $2 billion in closed deals, joins to discuss his upcoming A&E show, "The Real Estate Commission," which premieres October 12.  Todd emphasizes that commercial real estate is "a trillion dollar industry hiding in plain sight."  He points out that people interact with commercial real estate every day - when they go to a grocery store, coffee shop, gas station, or office building - without consciously thinking about it.  Commercial real estate loans are about to face a major challenge, with many 5-year loans needing refinancing at much higher interest rates, potentially creating significant market opportunities for investors. Check out the "The Real Estate Commission" show on A&E starting October 12th. Resources: Follow Todd Drowlette on Instagram at @bettertalktoTodd and check out Real Estate Commission Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/569 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   Welcome to GRE I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, why is that convenience store, gas station or coffee shop located on that exact corner that it's on? It's strategic, and how does a deal like that really get negotiated? We're discussing this and more with an A and E television and streaming star today on get rich education   Keith Weinhold  0:28   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 in 188 world nations. He has a list show guests and key 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   Speaker 1  1:14   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  1:30   Welcome to GRE from Sudbury, Ontario to Sudbury, Pennsylvania, and across 188 nations worldwide, you're listening to one of America's longest running and most listened to real estate investing shows this is Get Rich Education. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, how did that ever happen? Here I am more slack jaw than a patient in a dentist's chair. But back with you for the 569th consecutive week. Anyway, this is the time of year where many people have just gone back to school. Here at GRE you go forward to school as you learn about what's really going to make a difference and move the financial meter in your future. Now, the world's best known negotiators include Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela today, the former FBI agent Chris Voss is perhaps the world's best known negotiator. You'll recall that we've hosted Chris Voss on the show twice here and talked a good bit about real estate negotiation. Then, I mean, who can forget my mock negotiation with him over a four Plex building, which played out right here on air. It was obvious who won that debate, but Chris is an all around negotiator, not specific to real estate. I thought, wouldn't it be great to get sort of a Chris Voss, but specific to real estate here on the show for you, and that's what we're doing today. So you're really going to enjoy this week's guest. He's also the star of a real estate reality show on the A E Network that's going to make its big, flashy debut next month. Now I had a small negotiation, I suppose, over email with one of my property managers in Florida recently, yeah, I got an email from my manager saying that an air conditioning unit needed to be removed and replaced in one of my single family rental properties there in Florida. Attached was a quote that they obtained from a company for $6,350 and there's conveniently a button for me to hit to approve this charge. But I did not hit the Approve button on that 6350, price. I requested that they provide me with two more quotes. And yes, remember, you pay your property manager often eight to 10% of the monthly rent in management fees they are working for you. So what are they working on to earn that make them go to work and do this for you? All right, for substantial work items, it's a reasonable request for you to seek three quotes. And all right, while they were tracking down the two other quotes, I went to AI. I asked chat GPT, what should the cost be to remove and replace an air conditioner in a 1500 square foot home in Florida? Chat GPT answered, 5500 to $7,500. For a standard three ton system in a 1500 square foot home. All right, so the first number the manager gave me that was sort of right in the middle of that range. A few days later, the second quote came in at 6150, all right, 200 bucks less than. The first one, I replied to them that if the third one doesn't come in substantially lower, that I am going to go seek quotes myself. A couple days later, the third and final quote came in, and it was 4990, yes, so I accepted it. This is about $1,300 less than the first quote that they gave me just for returning a few emails, and it will make the tenant happy to have a new air conditioning system. Newer systems tend to be more efficient, so it's probably going to make the tenant's electricity bill lower as well, and it probably makes it easier for me to justify future rent increases too. That tenant's been there for quite a few years. I'm thinking six years, and today's low home buyer affordability is probably going to keep them renting for a while. And the other thing that could keep them there longer is a new air conditioning system, and that is the biggest rental property expense, or the most I even had to get involved in quite a while, because remember, at GRE marketplace, almost every property there is either brand new or completely renovated. Your cap x expenses should be small for years. Let's meet this week's featured guest.   Keith Weinhold  6:31   Have you ever wondered why that coffee shop is on that corner that they're on, or why your grocery store is located just where it is? And how do those deals get negotiated? That's what you'll see on an upcoming new series on A and E. It starts October 12. It's called The Real Estate Commission. There are no scripts. The show captures real life deals as they unfold, as they crumble and fall apart and maybe come back together again. The star of that show is with us today. He believes he will tell you that he's the most prolific commercial real estate broker in the nation, and he has the experience and the gravitas to back that up, because he brings over two decades as a broker, and he's the managing director at Titan commercial Realty Group in New York. He's closed more than 1700 deals. Yes, 1700 deals totaling over $2 billion across the commercial real estate sectors. He's represented everyone from local startups to national REITs. Hey, welcome to get rich education, Todd Drowlette   Todd Drowlette  7:36   thank you, and that was quite the introduction. I don't think I could pop up myself.   Keith Weinhold  7:40   You've got a full interview is worth the time here to live up to that. Todd, you know, more than 10 years ago, I started living this life where it seems like everything that I say gets recorded and uploaded to the internet, and now you're gone down that same road similar to that. Tell us about your forthcoming reality TV and streaming show that starts next month. What can viewers really expect to see?   Todd Drowlette  8:04   There's over 100 shows on national TV about slipping houses, renovating houses, residential brokers. Ours is the first show ever on television to feature commercial real estate and to be entirely about commercial real estate. So it's a docu series. It's an there's eight episodes in the season. It follows my team at Titan and I doing actual real deals, from helping a divorce attorney search for new office space to investors to selling multi family properties. So viewers will be able to kind of see behind the scenes and see actual documented deals as they happen, fall apart, come back together again. I'm hoping the viewers will take away the fact that, yes, you have to be sophisticated and understand what's going on, but it's something that the average person can be involved in. Commercial real estate is a trillion dollar industry hiding in plain sight. You know, people go to the grocery store, like you said, they go to the coffee shop, they go to the gas station, they go to their office building. People use and interact with commercial real estate every single day. It's just like the air. You're not consciously thinking about it, even though you're using it almost every moment of the day,   Keith Weinhold  9:10   right? It's something that we all need and interact with. It's almost non discretionary, whether we're buying something at a retail store or filling up at a gas station? Yeah, I think to some people, commercial real estate sounds unapproachable. And as you watch this series, you're thinking, Oh, that's the life that that somebody else lives. It's really not that unapproachable. Does this series really help break that down?   Todd Drowlette  9:36   It does, and we made a very conscious decision. So I represent some very large corporations, but the series follows like smaller business and entrepreneurs, and seeing kind of people from the beginning or in different transitions of their business, like I'm growing but you're seeing in real life, actual successful business people. You're seeing them to react to real situations and that kind of moment where there. Like, Man, I think I'm ready to grow and expand. But what if I'm wrong? What if the economy turns Am I doing the right thing? And you're kind of watching us guide them through that process. But you see, you know so much of the internet is reception and people going, Oh, look at this. Look how successful I am. This. You're seeing successful people, and knowing that there's no guarantee in life like the best you're ever going to make is a calculated decision. But there's no point where your life where you're so successful that it just doesn't matter if you lose. Like the deals get larger and the stakes get higher, and every decision you make is potentially a pitfall. So you're going to see real entrepreneurs and real business executives dealing with those decisions of, when do I move? Do I invest? Do I buy? You know, I have this property, I need to get rid of it, and what's that process look like? I love commercial real estate. I can go on, on about it. What I'll be really excited to see is if the everyday person finds commercial real estate interesting,   Keith Weinhold  10:54   doers don't wait for uncertainty to abate, or else they would never get anything done. Doers educate themselves and make strategic moves despite the uncertainty and Todd shortly, I do want to ask you more about negotiation and just how that coffee shop gets that prime corner spot, if you will. But first dropping back a bit more introspective, I know that some have called this the series that launched five new real estate careers already. So how transformative is this? Personally for you to do this show, besides making mom proud, it probably changes how others think of you and how you think of yourself.   Todd Drowlette  11:32   Well, my mom thought I was nuts to national television, but she's proud, but thinks I'm crazy and she's probably not wrong. How this whole thing came about was we had a show also called The Real Estate Commission, that was on Facebook watch that we averaged about 1.3 million views per episode. The premise of that show that was also called The Real Estate Commission, was, Can four successful real estate brokers take just anyone off the street and turn them into the next 100 million dollar real estate agent. It was two commercial brokers, two residential brokers. When covid happened, I said to Brandon in my office, who's part of the cast of the show, on a I was, you know, looking back now, we know how covid played out, but at the time, it was like they made the announcement, I'm somebody who works 80 hours a week, and I'm looking at potentially, could we be a year with not working and doing nothing. So I'm like, we really need to do something to market. I go, why don't we do a reality show about real estate? And he's like, What in the hell do you know about producing a TV show? I go, well, nothing, but the whole world stopped. There's got to be people. We must know, people in TV who might be sitting at home and might be willing to help produce the show. And he started laughing. He goes, Well, actually, one of my college roommates is high up at Viacom, so we called him, and we put together a whole production team of 50 people in the middle of covid, put out a casting call and filmed the show, and it did really well. And then we kind of went around to the networks and made a deal with a E, but with A and E, I really wanted to show off commercial real estate and kind of show it to the average person and show them, hey, here's this thing that people can participate and be a part of. And it's a super interesting industry because, like, when I was 22 I was the youngest exclusive Starbucks broker in the country. So have you said that coffee shop that ends up in the corner? I was the guy that, you know, Starbucks would run their software and say, you run traffic counts that are available on, you know, state, D, o, t websites. People don't realize when you're driving down the road and you see the rubber thing goes, that's actually either a traffic engineer or the state, and they're seeing how many cars a day, but they're also tracking to the hour on which side of the road. So like, why is McDonald's on the pm side of the road? Or why is Starbucks or Duncan or seven brew coffee? Why are they on the am side of the road? Because they know, looking at the traffic patterns, who's going where. So when we would negotiate a deal like that, they would say, Hey, here's the target markets we want to be in. I was the boots on the ground, so to speak. That says, Okay, let me look up the tax records and let me look up the tax maps. I know they need three quarters of an acre to an acre to fit on. They want to be at a traffic light. We need this many cars per day. Hey, it's great. If we're across the street from a university or a hospital or a major office park or a grocery anchored shopping center. Can we get out in the out parcel? There's a deal structure to it, and then you negotiate the rent and how much tenant improvement dollars, or what contributions the landlord is going to make to the deal. And that's kind of how we identify, you know, locations and negotiate. And as a broker, I get paid a percentage of that overall lease value or a sales transaction,   Keith Weinhold  14:36   well, talking about making decisions in the face of uncertainty. I mean, there it is. Case in point, you put together the architecture of a show like this during the pandemic, during the height of uncertainty. That was a really interesting thing that you said when you talk about how, for example, you probably do want to have a coffee shop located, I would imagine when you're in bound on the right. Side of the road there sort of for am traffic, 100%   Todd Drowlette  15:05   the same reason, like restaurants that are more dinner based business, businesses will be on the pm side the afternoon drive home. Or liquor stores typically like to be on the pm side of the road because people are going home, they pop in and just continue on their way home,   Keith Weinhold  15:20   right? That makes total sense to me. Todd, you do have this great command of real world negotiation tactics, helping to be sure that those prime locations, sort of like we just described, play out and happen from this $2 billion in closed deals, which is a remarkable figure. I'm sure a lot of it has to do with who you work with, who you're negotiating with. Trump was negotiating Manhattan real estate deals, and now that's pretty different, as he's trying to broker a ceasefire agreement among foreign nations. So you've got all these stories, from working with small business owners to multinational brands. So can you tell us about how who you work with changes your approach?   Todd Drowlette  16:04   You have to always know what your goal is, and the more research you know about who you're negotiating with, and the more you understand them, the better you're going to do right. Sometimes winning in negotiation is about winning. Sometimes winning in negotiation is just about not losing so sometimes I have clients that say, Get me that particular piece of real estate. I don't care what it costs me. Just get it under any circumstances. I don't care you have I have other clients like, I represent a clothing chain that's like, similar to a TJ Maxx or Marshalls. They've been around 40 years, called label shopper. They're in secondary and tertiary markets all over the country. They are very inexpensive, and they pay very low rent, and they're opportunistic. So the approach for every single deal is completely different on depending what the person's trying to do, but the tactics always the same. I always try to, as a broker, you're in the middle, so I'm always trying to figure out what are the actual deal breakers and what's motivating this side that side, and then you meet somewhere in the middle. And I try to do deals where nobody feels like you bend them over a barrel, you know, and they have a vendetta for 20 years, because it's a very small world in a very long life. So if you really stick it to somebody to the point where they hate you over it, you don't know what's that deal next week or 20 years from now that you really need and find out that person is the kid of the person you really stuck it to, and now, all of a sudden, that deal you need comes back to haunt you from the deal that you won 20 years ago. So I try to like, let people keep their pride intact, and there's a lot of like for just general negotiations. A lot of people negotiate against themselves without even realizing it. So most people fear silence, and I always say, whoever talks first loses. So if I throw out like a number, like if you were selling me something, and I said, I think my top number is $100,000 I will not speak until the other person speaks, because most people are afraid of silence. And if I throw that number out, I'm gonna go, Oh my God, he's not responding. That number is too low, and I'm instantly gonna go, well, maybe I could pay 120 or maybe I could pay 150 I've seen people do it a million times. So when I'm negotiating against people, whatever they say to me, I never respond until they talk a second time, because I wanna see how much line there is in that run before it gets to the end, and whatever number they stop at, that's where the negotiation starts. And so many people do that. They just negotiate against themselves, unintentionally   Keith Weinhold  18:31   get comfortable with silence. Oh, you just brought up so many good points there. Todd, such an important one in negotiating. You sort of touched on it is that successful negotiation is finding out what the other side wants. I might be willing to pay you full price if you give me my timeline, say you get me to the closing table in 30 days rather than 90. So terms often mean more than price. So can you speak more about how to find out what the other side wants and making sure they actually get it while still getting what you need.   Speaker 2  19:03   It depends on person. I mean, generally, this crazy and dumb of an answer as it sounds, is I just ask anyone who's blooming knows I'm a very direct person. If I won't ask you on Monday morning, how was your weekend, if I don't sincerely care how your weekend was, I'm very much a get to the point type of guy, and I find in negotiating, unless I know the person in advance, or I've done research, that there's somebody who likes to circle the wagons and go around I'm kind of a very direct right to the point kind of person. So I'll say, listen, here's things that are important to my client, what's important to you, and let me see if we can work something out that either we both can mutually agree upon and feel good about or if we can't get a deal done, I always say, I'll take a quick no over a long maybe any day. I find most people will tell you like it kind of throws people off, because most people are slick and sly, and they kind of like circle the wagons. I think people, if they like my personality, they'll find it refreshing, because whatever I say or mean is what really what I say or mean, I'm not hiding anything. So when I say, Listen, I have a client. This is what they want. Can we get this done? You'd be amazed when you're candid with people, how directly candid most people are, because it kind of throws them off, and they don't really have any choice but to be honest   Keith Weinhold  20:17   yeah, how weird this guy actually says what he means. It means what he says. A lot of people really aren't used to that type of approach. You're listening to get rich education. We're talking with the star of the upcoming A E show the real estate commission. Todd Drowlette, more, when we come back, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold    Keith Weinhold  20:35   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your pre qual and even chat with President Chaley Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com. That's Ridge lendinggroup.com. You know what's crazy?    Keith Weinhold  21:08   Your bank is getting rich off of you. The average savings account pays less than 1% it's like laughable. Meanwhile, if your money isn't making at least 4% you're losing to inflation. That's why I started putting my own money into the FFI liquidity fund. It's super simple. Your cash can pull in up to 8% returns and it compounds. It's not some high risk gamble like digital or AI stock trading. It's pretty low risk because they've got a 10 plus year track record of paying investors on time in full every time. I mean, I wouldn't be talking about it if I wasn't invested myself. You can invest as little as 25k and you keep earning until you decide you want your money back. No weird lockups or anything like that. So if you're like me and tired of your liquid funds, just sitting there doing nothing. Check it out. Text family. 266, 866, to learn about freedom family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family to 66 866,   Robert Helms  22:16   Hi everybody. It's Robert Ellens with the real estate guys radio program. So glad you found Keith Weinhold and get rich education. Don't play your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  22:35   Welcome back to get rich Education. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold. We're talking with the star of the upcoming A and E show, Todd Drowlette. He's not shy. He will also tell you that he is the most prolific commercial real estate broker in the entire nation, and it's great to have him here. Todd, I know that through all your dealings, again, 1700 deals, it's put you in between a lot of interesting situations. And it sure isn't always about the numbers. Sometimes it's about the story,   Todd Drowlette  23:06   a very interesting story. So I mentioned earlier that I have a client called label shopper, that's a off price clothing chain. I was doing a deal in Oxford Maine, which is a very small town, and, you know, Central Maine, and I called up this time when fashion bug had gone out of business, and we were taking over closed fashion bugs, and they said, You got to talk to Bob. I didn't know who Bob was. Bob gets on the phone. He was the biggest stone Buster you could ever imagine. I'm negotiating the deal with and talking to him, and I realized the guy kind of just wanted to fight, and he had multiple shopping centers that he wanted us to look at. And I'm like, Bob, we have enough time to get up there. And he's like, Oh no, no. I'll send my helicopter down to millionaire in Albany, New York, and I'll pick you guys up. I'll show you my three shopping centers. I'll have you back in the early afternoon. And the same guy, while he said that was literally arguing over a difference of $5,000 on my commission that I wanted for the deals. And like, I go, I'm like, Bob. So I googled the guy, and then I realized he was a billionaire, and he had founded the NASCAR track in Loudoun, New Hampshire. I said to him, I go, I'm going to say something to him, and I'm not going to speak until he speaks. And I literally go, Bob, give me the difference of the five grand on the fees. I go, stick your helicopter. I go, and I'll drive up. And I literally stared at the clock on my wall for 33 seconds. And then finally, he's like, well, well, all right, I'll give you the money. But if you don't like that, you can go to Plum hell. And I started laughing, and I said, Okay, I go. I'll call you on Monday. So I call him up on Monday. Okay, Bob, we're gonna take the deal. We're gonna we'll drive up. And he's like, No, you sob. He's like, I'm sending the helicopter anyway. It's gonna pick you up tomorrow at 9am we end up flying up to his huge estate in Lake Winnipesaukee. We land in this like, looks like Beverly Hills, manicured garden. This guy walks up to me with his son, gets in the helicopter. After he looks at my client, Peter and I, and goes, which one of you two is Jesse? I go, Jesse, I'm like, I'm Todd, and he's Peter. He goes, No, Jesse, James robbing me blind on the commission. We birthed out laughing, and then we were friends ever since, unfortunately, he died recently, but he was, like, the most fascinating, coolest guy I met him. He was in his mid 70s. He went into his 80s, but he was literally a self made guy that, you know, grew up in Connecticut on a tobacco farm. Parents had no money, you know, never went to college, and just the most fascinating guy he could decide on a deal on the back of a napkin with a pencil he always kept in his pocket. So you never know in the world, like who you meet and who you're going to become friends with, and that's just funny stories of really fascinating, interesting people I met in very unlikely places,   Keith Weinhold  25:51   amazing. You just don't know everyone's story when you first meet them. 100% Todd, a lot of your experience has given you insight on how to help develop some of the best real estate technology in order to make deals more efficient. For example, I know you developed a software platform that's soon launching that competes with costar and LoopNet. So tell us more about what you're doing in the real estate technology space and about trends there.   Speaker 2  26:18   So we have software that's the same name as the show the realestatecommission.com it's kind of a category killer. So very, very low monthly price. People can post properties. They can search commercial properties. There's blogs so you can follow up and learn you know about commercial real estate. You can find traffic counts that we referenced earlier. You can run demographic reports and say, Hey, in this particular block, or from this street over to this river, or in one mile or three miles or five miles, how much money does the average person have? What are median incomes? What race are they? What's their education levels? That's all information that exists in the public domain, but software companies charge a fortune for it, even though it's public information. Just to aggregate it, we've put all the information, and we want the information to be inexpensive and available to the average user. The other interesting thing about what's happening right now is the larger companies are kind of asleep at the wheel, where you can buy your way to the front of search results in Google and Bing, the amount of daily searches that are going to platforms like chatgpt and other AI search engines is astronomical, and you can't buy your way to the front of those search engines right now. So if you're up on your SEO search engine optimization game, it's like resetting the clock 20 years that you have another chance to bite at the apple to get customers and clients potentially directly in front of you to your platforms. So it's a really exciting time and software right now.    Keith Weinhold  27:46   That's interesting how consumers have shifted away from Google and some of the more conventional search engines, where deep pocketed people and companies can buy their way to the top. So tell us more about really the opportunity there, because that's really interesting.   Todd Drowlette  28:01   So essentially, if you understand so search engine optimization, SEO, if people don't know what that is, that's essentially you can do things to optimize your apps or your websites that allows people it's how the Internet finds you, so to speak. So there's basically ways that you can put in code that aren't complicated things, but you can also specifically submit those things to directly to chat, GPT and the other platforms, and then they go through and they index your site, and again, they're looking at it, going well, what's the most relevant so if you look at how people are searching and what the terms are, you can figure out those terms, and then you can make sure you come up at the top of those search results. And like I said, a lot of the bigger companies in different industries, from residential real estate to commercial real other things, those people rely heavily on just buying their way to the top of search results. And you can't do that right now. And I don't remember the last stat I saw was about 30 days ago, and it was something insane, like 180 million searches a day are being done on just chat. GPT, so that is a huge market that people can get their way to the top of, where you're not competing directly with a big boy, so to speak.   Keith Weinhold  29:11   Yeah, this is a way for you to get found for sure. Todd, dealing with commercial real estate, we know that that entire industry has been subject to these interest rate resets, where in the residential one to four fixed mortgage rate world, we really haven't been so I'd love to know from your perspective, and being this broker that does all this negotiating from your unique vantage point, how have higher interest rates changed things   Speaker 2  29:39    I'm often told To never make predictions, because you can be wrong. I'm somebody who's made calculated risks my entire life, and I'm not afraid of being wrong. The commercial real estate industry, I think, is about to have a coming to God moment that I think we're three to nine months away from, and the reason for that is, unlike residential loans that are 20 or 30 year. Or 15 year mortgages that are self amortizing. Commercial loans typically have a 20 or 25 year amortization, but only a five year term, or sometimes you're lucky, a 10 year term. And what happened was, when covid drove interest rates down, I have some clients that had interest rates that were 2.5 2.8% and the problem with that is interest rates are now over six so we're coming up on that five year period where you could have the same tenants, the same income, the same taxes, same expenses, if you have to refinance in the next three to six months, and those rates don't drop by at least a point, there's going to be blood in the streets like you've never seen. It's going to make the financial meltdown in 2008 2009 look like a walk in the park because you have so many loans. That's why Donald Trump, even though he's a president, that guy is, was and will always be a real estate guy. He isn't saying why he's doing it, but the reason he's pushing for the Fed so much to drop the rate is because commercial real estate is going to get murdered if the rates don't drop by at least three quarters of a point to a point in the next three to six months. That's why you're seeing the heavy pressure from Donald Trump to the Fed, because there's a lot of commercial real estate guys that have been playing musical chairs, and there's one chair for every 10 people when the music stops. So anyone listening who's only been in one to four in that unit, if you're sitting on cash, you're going to have the opportunity to buy small strip centers, you know, small office buildings, smaller properties where you can get your feet wet, where banks are going to be giving these things back, just trying to get out from underneath them. I'm willing to be wrong. I can be the guy who said it. If something drastically doesn't change the next three to six months, you're going to have major defaults. Another thing nobody's talking about is, for the last year, home loans and credit card default rates have been sky high through the roof, which means the economy is strong, as people are acting like the economy is. It's kind of like the emperor's new clothes or new robe. The economy is walking stark naked down the street, and everybody's pretending that it's wearing, you know, fine linens. And I think the rubber is about to hit the road if interest rates don't drop very quickly.   Keith Weinhold  32:04   Tell us how bad you think it will get. For example, nationally, we've seen apartment building values fall 25 to 30% or more, and some certainly not all, but some office buildings fall in value 80% tell us more. How bad will it get? Who will it be worst for?   Todd Drowlette  32:25   So the problem with a lot of commercial loans. So a lot of commercial loans, the banks are lending money to borrowers based on the credit of the leases of the tenants. Like when you own a residential portfolio, they're looking at your credit score, your assets and liabilities, deciding, okay, we're lending you the money and we have recourse. We're gonna come after you if this doesn't work out. There are a ton in commercial real estate of non recourse loans, meaning the only thing I'm risking as the owner is this property and my down payment. If this goes bad here bank, here's the key back. You can't come after me. Personally. You can't affect my more. This is non recourse. So as those large office tenants go bad, or the economy goes bad, and all of a sudden their credit ratings, of those things drop, you're going to have banks left holding the bag to the tune of hundreds of billions, if not a trillion dollars. It's going to be bad,   Keith Weinhold  33:15   and who knows if the banks will get bailed out. I don't really know if that's the right formula, if that's the right example to set there where we publicize losses and privatize gains.   Speaker 2  33:28   I mean, they might argue it worked in 2008 2009 but even if that's the case, you still have a lot of people commercial real estate's driven by ego. So before the the actual foreclosures that can take one to two to three years to finalize out with the court systems. You still will have people doing short sales. So there will be a big opportunity for people to make a leap into commercial real estate. And guys ahead of me that you know taught me the business always said you make money in real estate when you buy, not when you sell. Anytime you can buy $1 for 50 cents, you buy that dollar. So if the market drops, and you know, that's a great location of a great property that has a good roof, has good mechanicals, is in a great location. If that thing was trading for $4 million and you can buy it for 1.5 million today, that's when you buy and then you write it back up. And you know, there's guys like me, I negotiate and broker for a living, so I have an advantage that I can go out and get the tenants and find the tenants. But there's guys that do what I do, and women that do what I do, all over the country. So people can start aligning themselves with local commercial real estate experts. And maybe it's the time that they can say, You know what, maybe I'll buy a 10,000 square foot office building and give it a try. Maybe I'll buy a two or three unit strip center that has a nail salon or a beauty salon or things in it that Amazon isn't going to come along and knock out of business.    Keith Weinhold  34:52   What sectors are going to have the best opportunities?   Todd Drowlette  34:55   I'm heavy, heavy, heavy on office so I'm a big proponent of reading books that are out of college. Be right. So I love reading books that were written interviewing the robber barons, you know, the Rockefellers, the carnegies, but were written at the time they were still alive. And there's one thing, when you go back to like the panic of 1893 or 2001 you can go back and look at all these things that happen, and things are based on cycles. And one thing I can tell you with absolute certainty is the people who don't panic in times of panic when everything drops and falls apart. They're the people that in the shortest window in a two to three year recovery period where that dollar dropped at 50 cents, and it's just coming back to $1 but they bought it at 50 cents. They're the guys in like every 10 or 15 or 20 years that ride a two or three year upscale when everybody else is panicking, that's when they buy the stocks, that's when they buy the real estate, when it's low, and then they ride it back just to normal. It doesn't have to get better, it just has to go back to sea level. And I think that's about to happen in commercial real estate. And I think office is a great market because it's been getting murdered in the headlines since covid, but in any headline, there's always an opportunity, because that scares a ton of people out and people will fire sale stuff because they think it's bad and there isn't bad real estate, there's bad deals. And if you overpay for something, they're the people who get hurt. If you underpay and buy something in a value, you can make deals other people can't, and you don't take the hits the way other people take the hits. People need to be conservative. So many real estate people are like, Oh, put as little cash into the deal. Borrow as much as you can. Highly leverage, leverage deals, leverage deals. And that's fine when it works, but when it doesn't work. You know, people who could have a $50 million net worth that become broke overnight because they never took the money off the table. To me keep some of that money in, pay down your debt and just increase your cash flow and work off the cash flow. That's always been my strategy. I have friends who make a fortune and they live that high life. I like calculated risks, and to me, I never want the bank to be my boss. I like being the boss's bank, and if you owe them too much money, and especially if people cross collateralize loans and say, this is a great property, but let me borrow against it to buy this property and this property, that can be the domino effect when it goes badly all of a sudden now you put all your assets at risk. I always strongly encourage people to not do that and to keep their loans and to keep their assets separate.   Keith Weinhold  37:18   Yeah, loan terms can certainly be more precarious on the commercial side than the residential side, much of it due to fixed versus variable. History doesn't repeat. It often rhymes, and sometimes in some sectors, you want to be that buyer, when the reaction to you buying is like, are you nuts? What are you doing? Maybe office is at that point. Todd, this has been a great chat about negotiation and industry trends and more. Again, the Real Estate Commission, the show on A E debuts October 12, Todd. Do you have any last thoughts, or maybe a call to action for our audience if they want to learn more about what you're up to?    Speaker 2  37:56   Yeah, if they want to visit the realestatecommission.com my instagram handle is at better talk to Todd and at the real estate commission, and the show begins airing on October 12, on a next day streaming. And I think people, if they have interest in real estate, will find this show fascinating, if not at me at better, talk to Todd and tell me what you think of the show,   Keith Weinhold  38:20   Todd. It's been an engaging chat. Good luck on the TV show. It's been great having you here.   Todd Drowlette  38:25   I would love to come back anytime, and thank you so much for having me. I always appreciate your time. And I love the podcast,   Keith Weinhold  38:31   yeah, and I appreciate that Todd is a GRE fan. It's always great to have celebrity listeners like him, but to me, it's just as special to have you as a listener. What a wide ranging conversation between Todd Drolet and I today. It just shows the breadth of his knowledge. And Drolet is spelled D, R, O, W, l, e, t, t, e. You know, these prominent negotiators, including when we had Chris Voss here, they don't have this disposition of some vicious pit bull. Instead, they come off as reasonable. It doesn't feel hard nosed like using well placed silence that Todd talked about today, he's a pragmatist, and even comes off as likable. See if you can feel that, and video helps here, the video of our chat today might be on our get rich education YouTube channel by now, when you drive around, have you wondered about that? Before? You know that was super interesting about how coffee shops are on the am side of the road, meaning, as you're inbound toward a city center, they'd be on the right side a liquor store on the pm side. You've got to think about how humans interact with real estate. For example, a car wash that's best placed on the. Pm side of the road. I mean, most commuters, they don't leave extra time during their morning commute to get their car washed. They don't want to feel rushed. People are more likely to wash their car after work. So it'll be on the right side outbound, which is the pm side. And let's keep in mind too, that the US and Canada, for better or worse, have car centric cultures. So these things matter here more than they would in, say, the Netherlands, the location of commercial real estate. I mean, it comes down to tax maps and traffic counts and income levels in this AMPM side, and some want to be at a traffic light, you're going to get more traffic if it's already stopped or slowed down, is it across from a university or a hospital or a grocery anchor shopping center that makes it more desirable for a location? So really some interesting demographic and economic considerations there. Todd likes office real estate as return to Office. Policies help somewhat with absorption there. It is not accurate to say that office real estate is dead, perhaps permanently contracted. Is more like it, yes, the scenes from another popular show, the office with Dunder Mifflin in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Those scenes are diminished, but they are going to live on. Speaking of popular shows, check out our friend Todd Drolet in the real estate commission starting October 12 on A E, besides being entertained, it might make a daunting topic like commercial real estate feel somewhat more approachable for you. Big thanks to Todd Drolet. As far as listening to get rich education every week, what you've got to do on most platforms to ensure that you don't miss it is be sure to find the Follow button. Hitting follow will get it delivered until next week, I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 3  42:08   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.   Keith Weinhold  42:31   You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access, and it's got paywalls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers, it's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter usually takes less than three minutes to read. And when you start the letter, you also get my one hour fast real estate, video, course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream. Letter, it wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text, gre 266, 866, you    Keith Weinhold  43:47   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth, building, get richeducation.com   
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Aug 25, 2025 • 43min

568: The Mortgage Moves That Can Make (or Break) Your Wealth

Keith discusses the impact of political rhetoric on mortgage rates, emphasizing the importance of central bank independence.   President of Ridge Lending Group and GRE Icon, Caeli Ridge, joins in to explain the benefits of 30-year mortgages over 15-year ones, advocating for extra principal payments to be reinvested rather than accelerating loan payoff.  They also cover the potential effects of Fannie and Freddie going public, predicting higher mortgage rates. Caeli Ridge elaborates on cross-collateralization strategies, highlighting the advantages of commercial blanket loans for real estate investors.  Resources: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/568 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I’d be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE’ to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   welcome to GRE I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, the President has called the Fed chair a dummy and worse. How does this all affect the future of mortgage rates? Also, I discuss 30 year versus 15 year loans. Can you bundle multiple properties into one loan? Then how Fannie and Freddie going public could permanently increase mortgage rates today on get rich education   Keith Weinhold  0:28   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 in 188 world nations. He has a list show guests and key 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   Speaker 1  1:14   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  1:24   Welcome to GRE from Pawtucket, Rhode Island to Poughkeepsie, New York and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm your host. Keith weinholdin, this is get rich education, not to inflate a sense of self importance, but each episode is an even bigger deal than a New York Jets preseason football game. You might have thought you knew real estate until you listened to this show, from street speak to geek speak. I use it all to break down how with investment property, you don't have to live below your means. You can grow your means as we're discussing the mortgage landscape this week. You know, I recently had a bundle of my own single family rental homes transfer mortgage servicers from Wells Fargo over to Mr. Cooper. And that was easy. I didn't have to do anything. The automatic payments just automatically transferred over. And yes, Mr. Cooper, it's sort of a funny sounding name that you don't exactly see them putting the naming rights on stadiums out there, but the new servicer prominently wanted to point out the effect of me making extra $100 monthly principal payments and how much in interest that would save me over time, sort of suggesting that it would be a good idea for me to do so. Oh, as you know, like I've discussed extensively, extra principal pay down is a really poor use of your capital. It's a lot like how in the past, now you've probably seen it like I have, your mortgage company promotes you making bi weekly payments all year, so you'd effectively make some extra principal pay down each year. That way. Don't fall for it. Banks promote biweekly payments because it sounds borrower friendly, it encourages an earlier loan payoff. Well, that actually reduces lender risk and increases your risk. And the whole program can come with extra fees too. It just ties up more of your money in something that's unsafe, illiquid, and with a rate of return that's always zero, since that's exactly what home equity is. As we're about to talk mortgages with an expert today, I will be sure to surface that topic. We'll also talk about the housing market effect of a president firing a Fed chair. When you're living under the rule of a president that desperately and passionately wants lower interest rates, you've got to wonder what would happen if a president just had the power to go lower them himself, which is actually what most any president would want to do, but you almost don't have to wonder what would happen. You can just look at what actually did happen in Turkey. Now, yes, Turkey already did have an inflation problem, worse than us, for sure, but Turkish President Erdogan went ahead and lowered Turkey's interest rates despite persistent inflation. I mean, that's a situation where most would raise rates in order to combat inflation. Well, lowering rates like that soon resulted in substantially higher inflation to the tune of almost 60. Yes, six 0% per year before cooler heads prevailed and the Turkish government was forced to drastically raise rates. But it was too late. The damage was already done to the reputation of Turkey's economy and its everyday citizens and consumers. I mean, that was a painful, real world example of how critical central bank independence is. You've also got to ask yourself a question here, do you really want to live in the type of economy where we would need a bunch of rate cuts? Because when rate cuts happen, it usually results from the fact that people are no longer employed, or we're in a recession, or financial markets are really unstable. So there are certainly worse maladies out there than where we are today, which is with moderate inflation, pretty strong employment and interest rates that are actually a little below historic levels. I mean, that is not so bad. Before we talk both long term mortgage lessons and more nascent mortgage trends today coming up on future episodes of the show here, a lot of info and resources to help you build wealth as usual. Also an A E TELEVISION star of a real estate reality show will make his debut here on GRE.    Keith Weinhold  6:24   Hey, do you like or even live by any of the enduring GRE mantras, like, Don't live below your means, grow your means, or financially free, beats debt free, or even, don't quit your Daydream. Check out our shop. You can own merch with sayings like that on them, or simply with our GRE logo on shirts and hats and mugs. And I don't really make any income from it. The merch is sold at near cost, and it actually took a fair bit of our team's time to put that together for you. So check out the GRE merch. You can find it at shop.getricheducation.com that's shop.getricheducation.com   Keith Weinhold  7:18   today we're talking to the longtime president of ridge lending group. They specialize in providing income property loans to real estate investors like you, and she's also a long time real estate investor herself. I've shared with you before that ridge is where I get my own loans. They've worked with 10s of 1000s of real estate investors, not just primary residence owners, but real estate investors as well as homeowners all over the country, and at this point, she's like a GRE icon, a fixture regularly with us since 2015 Hey, welcome back to get rich education the inimitable Chaley Ridge,    Caeli Ridge  7:54   ooh, Mr. Keith Weinhold, thank you, sir. So good to see you, my friend. Thanks for having me   Keith Weinhold  8:00   opening up that thesaurus tab right about now, I think maybe JAYLEE, why don't we have the chat everyone wants to have? Let's discuss interest rates, starting with the vitriol from Trump to Powell has reached new heights. This year, Trump has called Powell a numbskull, Mr. Too late, a real dummy, a complete moron, a fool and a major loser, among other names. And you know, at times, I've seen Realtors even blasting Jerome Powell for not cutting rates. Well, the Fed doesn't directly control mortgage rates, and it's also not the Fed's job to boost Realtors summer sales. It's to protect the long term stability of the US economy. Tell us your thoughts.    Caeli Ridge  8:48   So this is a rather complicated topic, okay, and there's a lot that under the hood that goes into how a long term mortgage bond interest rate is going to go up or going to go down. As you said, it's not necessarily just the Fed and the fed fund rate, which, by the way, for those that are not familiar with this, the fed fund rate is the intra daily trading rate between banks. So while there is a connection between that and that of the 30 year long term fixed rate mortgage, they are not the same thing. And in fact, statistically, I believe I read this last week, the last three fed fund rate reductions did the opposite to long term rates, right? So we went the other direction. So please be clear that the viral, as you say, of President Trump and what his opinions are about Mr. Powell and his decisions to keep that fed fund rate unchanged for the last several meetings that they've had, I think, is more of a distraction, but that's another conversation overall. I would say that, is he too late? Is he right on time? You know, there's so much data and so many data points that they're looking at, and there's this thing in the industry called a Lag that, in truth, they're not getting the actual data points that they need real time. It's lagging, so the data that's coming out to them today isn't going to be what's relevant and necessary to make changes tomorrow, next month and next week. Most recently, you probably saw in the news the BLS Bureau of Labor and Statistics and the jobs report came in far under what the expectation was. So that might have been the catalyst. I think that will drive Powell and group to reduce that is the overwhelming expectation that the fed fund rate is going to come down by how much. We don't know. Secondary markets are already baking that in, by the way. So when we talk about long term interest rates, I'm starting to see some changes on the day to day. I get access to that stuff, and I'm looking at it daily, the ticker tape of where the treasury bonds and things are. So I'm starting to see some slight improvement to interest rates in preparation of that market expectation, interest rate on the fed fund level will probably reduce. But I think overall, Keith that the Fed is in a really difficult position, because when you think about what really is going to drive the fed fund rate, and then potentially the long term rate, is counterintuitive to what most people or consumers expect, right? They think if the fed fund rate reduces by a quarter of a percentage point, then a long term 30 year fixed should probably reduce by the same amount. It does not go hand in hand like that. Now, while there are trends right, that doesn't happen that way, and more often than not, the worse our economy is doing, the better a 30 year interest rate will be. So in my industry, I'm kind of always playing on the fence, thinking I don't want anything bad for our country and the economy. However, the worse it does, the better interest rates are going to become. And if you've been paying attention, the economy is in decent shape. We're not doing that bad. Inflation is still up, so the metrics that they're using to kind of gage and predict that lag and where we're going to be are not in line to say that interest rates are going to drop a half or a point or a point and a half in the next year to 18 months. Those signs are not out there for me. All of that said, I know that interest rate is top of mind for I mean, I'm on the phone all day long. I like that part of my job where I'm still interfacing with investors on day to day. Big chunk of my day is spent talking to clients, and that is one of the top questions, probably one of the first questions that come out of their mouth, where interest rates? What are interest rates? And what I have sort of started to really form and say to that question is, if interest rates are the catalyst to your success in real estate, you probably need to do a little bit more research, because interest rates should not be the make or break for your success. Well, as a real estate investor   Keith Weinhold  12:45   the Fed has a dual mandate of maximum employment and stable prices. Inflation, though still somewhat elevated, has stayed about the same the past few months. History shows us that the Fed is more comfortable with inflation floating up than they are with suppressed employment levels. To your point about recent reports about us not adding many jobs, and the Fed being concerned about that, the translation for those that don't know is, if the job market is weak, lowering rates, which is what increasingly people think they tend to do later this year. Lowering rates helps encourage businesses. It's more likely that businesses will borrow and expand and hire more people. Therefore, if rates are low now, whether that translates into a lower mortgage rate or not, by lowering that fed funds rate? Yes, there is that positive correlation. Generally, the lower the Fed funds rate goes, the lower mortgage rates tend to go although that isn't always the case. To your point. Shailene, late last year, there were three Fed funds rate cuts, and mortgage rates actually went up, which is somewhat of an aberration that usually doesn't happen that way, but that's the environment we're in. Most people think Fed rate cuts are coming later this year.   Caeli Ridge  14:04   Yeah. And I would say, you know, the other thing too, when we talk about the pressure that the Fed is under right now, specifically, Powell, he's being attacked, fine, and whether I agree or disagree, really important for listeners to understand that the indifference that the Fed is supposed to have right bipartisan, it's not supposed to have a dog in that fight. If it did the calamity, I think what would happen economically in this country would be devastating if other economic powers were to see that our particular financial institutions are swayed one way or another. Politically, that would be devastating to us. So I think Powell has done a decent job at staying the course. He's continued to do what he says, says what he does. So so far, I'm okay. Is he late to reduce rates? I don't know that I'm qualified to say that, maybe. But at the same time, I think that his impartiality has been consistent, and that for that part of it, I'm. Grateful   Keith Weinhold  15:00   for those who don't understand if Trump just told Powell what to do and Powell followed Trump's orders, how does that devastate the economy?    Caeli Ridge  15:09   It shows partiality to or Fieldy to one particular party, right? It's not an independent institution where financial policy quantitative easing, quantitative tightening, all of those different things that are necessary to keep the pistons pumping. It isn't it's very specific to Fieldy and the leader of telling based on potentially ego or other elements that have not a lot to do with fiduciary responsibility.   Keith Weinhold  15:37   If Powell did everything Trump said, I feel like we would have negative interest rates right now   Caeli Ridge  15:43   that could be a problem, especially if the economy and inflation is on the rise, and then you get the tariffs. I mean, there's so much layering to this. I mean, we could go on and on about it, but overall, let me close with this. I think that interest rates are probably on the run, if I had to guess. Now, there's all kinds of variables that could make that statement untrue, but overall, in the next year to two years, I do think we'll see some relief in interest rates, barring any major catastrophe. But again, investors, if your success, if you're tying your real estate portfolio, your real estate investing, whatever modality you're interested in, if you're tying that to an interest rate, and there's a certain number that you have ethereal in your mind, you're going to lose your success in real estate. Interest rate is a component of it, but it should not be tied to your success or failure. You should be able to do the math and look at the differences in real estate opportunities, investment, whether it be long term, short term, midterm, single family, two to four appreciation, cash flow, all those things should be considered, and you will find adequate returns independent of an interest rate. If you're diversifying that way   Keith Weinhold  16:49   there is more evidence that Americans have warmed up and gotten somewhat used to normal mortgage rates. This normalization of mortgage rates, they are pretty close to their historic norms. In fact, a recent housing sentiment survey done by turbo home found that in q1 of this year, 41% of homeowners surveyed said that a 6% mortgage rate was the highest they would accept on their next purchase. Right that was back in q1 today, up from 41%, 52% of respondents now say a 6% mortgage rate is the highest that they would accept. Evidence that people are warming up and normalizing this.   Caeli Ridge  17:30   The other thing too is the pandemic rates. Right? That's been a very hard shell to crack. The people that got these two and 3% interest rates during 2020 2021, part of 22 they're really reticent to let those go, and I think that they're doing themselves a disservice as a result. If you can get a second lean HELOC, okay, fine, but overall, if you're just going to let that untapped equity sit, it's going to be to your disadvantage. If you have any desire to increase your portfolio and your long term financial stability and wealth   Keith Weinhold  17:59   you're listening to get rich education. Our guest is Ridge lending Group President Cheley, Ridge much more when we come back, including 30 year versus 15 year loans. Which one is better and more things that the administration is doing to shake up the mortgage market. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold.    Keith Weinhold  18:15   the same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your prequel and even chat with President Cheley Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com. That's Ridge lendinggroup.com.    Keith Weinhold  18:46   You know what's crazy? Your bank is getting rich off of you. The average savings account pays less than 1% it's like laughable. Meanwhile, if your money isn't making at least 4% you're losing to inflation. That's why I started putting my own money into the FFI liquidity fund. It's super simple. Your cash can pull in up to 8% returns and it compounds. It's not some high risk gamble like digital or AI stock trading. It's pretty low risk because they've got a 10 plus year track record of paying investors on time in full every time. I mean, I wouldn't be talking about it if I wasn't invested myself. You can invest as little as 25k and you keep earning until you decide you want your money back. No weird lockups or anything like that. So if you're like me and tired of your liquid funds just sitting there doing nothing. Check it out. Text family 266, 866, to learn about freedom. Family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family to 66866,   Rick Sharga  19:58   this is Rick sharga housing market. Intelligence Analyst, listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.   Keith Weinhold  20:05   Welcome back to get rich Education. I'm your host, Keith Weinhold. We're talking with a familiar guest this week. That's Ridge lending Group President, Caeli. Ridge wealth is built through compound leverage faster than compound interest. And leverage means using loans. I think most everyone the first time in their life they look at loan amortization tables and learn things like, oh, with a 15 year loan, you pay substantially less interest, perhaps hundreds of 1000s of dollars less interest with a 15 year loan and its lower mortgage rate than you do with a 30 year loan and its higher mortgage rate. But a lot of people don't take that next step and look that Oh, rather than paying down my home loan with extra principal payments, if I just invested the difference, I would be substantially better off down the road. So in a lot of cases, the more sophisticated investor chooses that longer loan duration, the 30 year. That's the way I see it. What do you see? Most of your prefer there.   Caeli Ridge  21:12   It's one of my favorite topics to cover, because there's quite a few layers that I think can all connect. If an individual wants to pay less in interest very easily, I'm going to strenuously advise them to take a 30 year over a 15 year and just simply apply the difference. So let's just start with the applicable version of 15 versus 30 and how it can benefit or harm. Because this is what a lot of times people that go for the 15 year and wanting to pay less in interest. Don't understand, and it's never been delivered to them in a reasonable way, I guess. So just looking at those two, and then we'll get to the strategy of potentially reinvesting those dollars elsewhere. But just look at a 30 year and a 15 year. I am a massive deterrent against a shorter term amortization. I hate a shorter term amortization, because all that's going to do to the individual is limit their ability to qualify later on down the road. And the reason for that is, is that the shorter term, as you had described, is going to yield a higher monthly payment. So when we pull credit for an individual, that's a higher monthly payment that the debt to income ratio has to support, when in fact, if we simply just look at the two side by side, 15 year and a 30 year equal, equal loan sizes. The 15 year is going to have a lower interest rate. It's true, but the amortization is obviously half the amount. We've gone from 360 months, 30 years to 180 months, 15 years. So the payment obviously is going to be much, much higher if you take the payment difference between those two mortgage products and apply it with a 30 year fixed payment. Let's just call it 500 bucks a month, whatever the number is, and you are disciplined to send that extra 500 bucks every single month with your 30 year fixed mortgage payment. You will cross the finish line in 15.4 years, I think, is the average when you run the amortization, so you'll pay a few extra months worth of interest, but whatever, you'll never pay the higher interest that the 30 year has locked at because you've accelerated the payoff of the debt so quickly, and you've maximized your debt to income ratio and future qualifications never take the shorter term amortization. It is to your greatest disadvantage. I hate them. That's part one. Did you have a comment? I can see that your wheels are spinning.   Keith Weinhold  23:24   That is a great answer. If you get the 30 year loan instead of the 15 if you apply an extra principal payment, whatever it would be, call it 500 plus dollars, that you will kill off that loan, that 30 year loan in something like 15.4 years. Yes, and you'll have the lower payment amount for your qualification, going forward, you'll have more flexibility in your life. That's great. I didn't realize the difference 15.4 versus 15 was that small? That's a great takeaway.   Caeli Ridge  23:50   Yeah, absolutely. And the other piece, you kind of just hit on it, the individual's feet are not held to the fire at that higher payment. So let's say it's a rental, okay, whatever. It goes vacant for a month, or a couple months, God forbid, or whatever may be happening. You now get to choose. You are not obligated at that higher monthly payment. You can say, Okay, this month, I'm not going to pay the extra. I don't da, da, da. It's all within your control. So you're killing like four birds with one stone. I really prefer the 30 year amortization for all those reasons. So now let's take it and move into how I believe, and I agree with your philosophy, taking those dollars and applying them, because when we talk about mortgage interest, especially on investment property, okay, it's probably a slightly different conversation when we're talking about somebody's primary residence, home, but for an investment property to take that difference and apply it toward another investment, because the interest remember, you guys, we're investors. We want that Schedule E deduction, that interest deduction, as money goes a 30 year fixed mortgage, even today, as interest rates are elevated beyond the two and three percents that people somehow fixated on, that that's where interest rates should just be forever. You've got Mass. Amounts of interest deduction, so you're paying less in taxes. For that reason, there's so many reasons to stretch out that mortgage on an investment property versus extinguishing that debt, not to mention, you want to constantly be harvesting equity, ideally, pulling cash out. Borrowed funds are non taxable, deploying them, but then taking that extra cash flow and stockpiling it for another investment, whether that just be the down payment or for other things. I just think there's so many better places that those funds can go to produce more wealth than accelerating the payoff of that debt that's benefiting you, from a tax perspective, and several other ways. There's lots of other ways to apply that money. I   Keith Weinhold  25:43   I often ask, why accelerate the payoff on a, say, 7% mortgage interest rate loan, when instead you can take those savings, reinvest them into other real estate, where it sounds preposterous on its face to think of the rate of return that you can get from an income property, but when you add up all the five ways you're paid, appreciation, cash flow, loan pay down, made by the tenant, tax benefits and the inflation profiting benefit on the long term fixed interest rate debt, a return of 20% plus is not out of the question at all. So if it's 20, why would you pay off extra on a seven? That's 13 points of arbitrage that you could gain there by not aggressively paying down a property and instead making a down payment on another income property. Chaeli, when it comes to these type of questions and accelerating a payoff, why do banks seem to encourage that you make bi weekly payments rather than monthly payments, therefore accelerating your principal pay down.   Caeli Ridge  26:42   I'm not sure the reason behind that. I don't know that I've even seen a lot of that from my lens and my perspective. It's definitely not something I ever comment or preach on. But the overall, what's happening there when you do it the bi weekly, so instead of making $1,000 at the first of the month, you make 500 and then 500 right, middle of them on first of the month. What's happening there is, because of the way the annual calendar goes, it ends up being an extra payment per year, right? I think that's the math. Is, when you do it that way, you end up making an extra payment per year, so you can accelerate. And there's you're not doing anything different, necessarily, to in your cash flow, etc. So I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I don't know what the benefit is to the institution that would in communicate that to its consumer. Yeah,   Keith Weinhold  27:27   Yeah, it ends up being 26 bi weekly payments, which has the effect of making 13 monthly payments in a 12 month year, accelerating your pay down. In my experience, it seems that banks encourage this. They contact borrowers. They've contacted me in the past, laying out a welcome mat. Hey, would you like this plan here? And in my mind, accelerating the payoff. We already talked about how that's typically not a good investment. The more you know about the trade off between loans and equity, really, I'm transferring more of the risk onto myself and less they're onto the bank when I accelerate my payoff. So I agree. I'm not interested in doing that at all.    Caeli Ridge  28:06   You know, maybe Keith, it could be, because I people talk about this a lot, those people, and let's say that there are a group of individuals that might benefit. Let's say they're in phase three, right? They're well into retirement. They just want to start paying off. They're not maybe investing anymore. They just want to leave that legacy, perhaps, or whatever their circumstances are, and they don't want to take additional capital and apply it to the principal and lock up those funds and make them illiquid. So maybe, just as an easy sidebar, they just make two payments month versus one. I get a lot of people asking that question. I mean, over the years, I know that like at the closing table, we'll have clients say, Hey, is the servicer going to be set up to accept bi weekly payments? And a lot of times they don't like SLS. I mean, there's a lot of servicers out there that will not accept or don't have the infrastructure to collect those bi weekly so maybe just as a consumer desire out there, the servicers have gotten wise to it, and they just offer it. I can't think of the reason behind why they would promote that to their database. I don't know.   Keith Weinhold  29:09   Another question that I hear quite often, and probably do as well there is about bundling multiple properties into one loan. Can you tell us about that?   Caeli Ridge  29:20   Yeah, that's called cross collateralization. So we're taking residential property, okay, and putting them into a commercial blanket loan. So any combination of single family, up to four unit, five Plex and above is now considered commercial. So it's got to be single family, condo, duplex, triplex, fourplex, right? It's residential property, and they're taking any combination of that and putting it into one blanket loan, cross collateralizing it. Now, I believe the most incentivized way or desire to want to do this is probably for two reasons. One, to free up golden tickets, right? Golden tickets are those Fannie Freddie loans that we talk about a lot. There are 10 of these per qualified individual, if. If someone has maxed out their golden tickets, let's say they've got 12, 1314, properties, they could take five or 10 or 13, whatever the number, and put them into a commercial blanket cross collateralized loan, as long as it's non recourse. That means no personal guarantee is attached to it. The rule per golden ticket will free up all those spaces. So usually this applies to an individual that has a portfolio that has stabilized. This will usually work when the portfolio has had a couple of years to make sure that you've got your consistent tenants and anything that may come up, repairs, maintenance, et cetera, stabilized portfolios and then putting them into that cross collateralization, because the terms are not going to be the same as just a 30 year fixed Okay, especially if you're going to be looking to take cash out and harvest equity that way, that may be a real opportune time to borrow funds. Borrowed funds are non taxable once again, pull the cash out, put it into a non recourse loan. You've got half a million dollars of capital now that you can then go and get a whole new set of golden tickets for expanding your portfolio. So that's something that we focus on for individuals that have maybe maxed out of that that conventional landscape and or are looking to scale and acquire more properties, but they don't want to necessarily look at some of the DSCR loans. They want to get back into the Fannie Freddie box.    Keith Weinhold  31:22   Yeah, so someone could bundle and get cash out simultaneously, potentially, is there anything else that qualifies or disqualifies one for bundling many loans into one like this?   Caeli Ridge  31:35   It's a commercial underwrite. So they should be aware of that. Now, certainly, we're looking at the individual typically in those loans, the underwriting of those loans, the individual's liquidity and credit are most what we're focusing on, but it's about the property in the portfolio, DSCR, that debt service coverage ratio is a big factor. So we're looking at the income against the monthly expense. Generally. That's going to be the principal, interest, tax and insurance on a commercial basis, they throw in the maintenance, vacancy, et cetera, averages. So you want to see, generally speaking, about 1.2 on those when you divide the incomes and the expenses and then otherwise, yeah, LTV might be a little bit restricted on something like that, 70% usually, maybe you can get as much as 75 if you've got a really strong portfolio. But otherwise, for you, individually, liquidity, some liquidity there, and good credit is what is important. As long as the portfolio is operating at a gain, then you're good to go.    Keith Weinhold  32:32   Yeah, that cross collateralization could be really attractive. Well, Chile, we've been in this presidential administration that has shaken things up like few, if any, prior administrations have. One of those things is that they have pushed for cryptocurrency holdings to be recognized as assets in mortgage loan qualification. Now that's something that would probably pend approval by the FHFA and critics cite volatility. I mean, there's been a pattern where every few years, Bitcoin drops 80% before rebounding, and I'm not exaggerating, and that has happened a number of times. And another administration desire is this potential Fannie Mae Freddie Mac merger, or an IPO an initial public offering. Can you tell us what that's about   Caeli Ridge  33:21   let's start with the crypto first, whether or not this, this gets through the Congress and or FHFA, however, that that develops and becomes actualized, that may be different than what the lending institutions decide to take a risk on, right the allowance of that crypto so it even if it's approved and they say that, Yes, that we can use this for asset depletion or reserve requirements, or whatever it may be. I don't know necessarily that you're going to see a lot of the lending institutions jump on board. I think they'll probably have overlays. It's just kind of the layering of risk on the crypto side to ensure that the asset and the underwrite is less likely to default. I don't see a lot of lending institutions that are probably going to jump on that bandwagon immediately. That's probably going to need more time and consistency with that particular asset class. That's the crypto thing. So that's a TBD on the other side, we're talking about conservatorship. So post, oh 809, right? The housing crash and Dodd Frank, if you've not heard of those names before, they're just the last names of individuals that that rewrote that sweeping legislation across all sectors of finance. Once we saw housing and lending implode upon each other, Fannie Freddie, as a result, went into conservatorship. Now what they're saying, what the administration is saying is, is that they are going to say that the implicit guarantee actually, let me back up really, really quickly. I will not take too much time on this so Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac The reason that those products are the golden tickets, as we call them, and we're just focused on investor products right now is because highest leverage, lowest interest rate. And why is it like that? That's because it has a United States government guarantee. Against default. So this mortgage backed security is bundled up with other mortgage backed securities and sold, bought and sold on the secondary market to investors, foreign and domestic. Right? Investors that are buying mortgage backed securities, they know that that paper is secure. If it defaults. We've got the United States government that's giving us a guarantee against default. So that's why it's such a secure investment. If we come out of conservatorship, technically, that would normally mean that you may not have that implicit guarantee. However, the Trump administration and those that are in that space, FHFA, Pulte and all those guys, they're saying that that guarantee should still apply if that happens, if that's how they release this, I don't see anything wrong if they do it without all of the volatility. You know, let's use the tariffs as an example. It was all over the place. It was there, and then it was gone. It was up, and then it was down. It was 30% then it was two right? It was it was just so much, and the markets really had a hard time with it. And as a result, I think a lot of people lost massive amounts of wealth in the stock market because of that. So I think that there is some real benefits to getting the Fannie, Freddie, the GSCs, government sponsored enterprises, out of conservatorship. I think it just opens up for more fair trade in the market. But they have to do it the right way, and as long as they keep that guarantee, that government guarantee, and then they take their time and apply the steps appropriately, I think it could be a good thing, ultimately, for the consumer. Now, if they don't, it could really have devastating impacts, and I think it could even raise interest interest rates higher. I know Trump and folks don't want that, so I think they're mindful of it. That's just kind of the take I get. But we'll see,   Keith Weinhold  36:42   yeah, because that's my preeminent thought with this. Shaylee, if Fannie and Freddie come out of conservatorship, and there's no government backstop on those loans, it seems like the banks are exposed to more risk, and consequently would have to compensate for that, potentially with a higher interest   Caeli Ridge  36:57   rate. You said it better than I did. Yes, I get too technical when I go down those rabbit holes. That's exactly right. I do not think that they will go down that that path without that implicit guarantee. I expect, if this thing comes to fruition, I expect that that guarantee will be there.   Keith Weinhold  37:13   Yeah, it does seem likely, with as much administration concern as there is about the housing market and the level of mortgage rates and all kinds of interest rates out there. Well, JAYLEE, this has been a great, wide ranging conversation all the way from strategy to what the administration is doing in interfacing with the mortgage market. If someone wants to learn more about you and your products, tell us what you offer, including your very popular all in one loan there at ridge.    Caeli Ridge  37:41   Ooh, thank you for teeing that up. Yeah, especially right now, when people have a lot of concern about interest rates right or wrong, the all in one is a very unique product that removes that fear. It's a way that investors, especially can take control of their equity, pay less in interest, and sometimes hundreds of 1000s of dollars less in interest, while maintaining equity and flexibility and liquidity. Cannot say enough about this product. The all in one. First lien HELOC is my very favorite. For the right individuals, we've talked about it many, many times. They can find us talking about it all over YouTube. You and I have quite a few conversations about that. So that and so much more, guys. So the all in one, you've got the Fannie Freddie's, our debt service ratio products, our bank statement loans, our asset depletion loans, ground up construction bridge loans for fix and flip or fix and hold. We really run the gamut there in terms of loan product diversity. There's very little we can't do for real estate investors. So we're uniquely qualified in that space   Keith Weinhold  38:36   and you offer loans in nearly all 50 states. Now tell us more and how one can get a hold of your company. Yes, we are   Caeli Ridge  38:44   licensed in 49 states. The only state we're not licensed in residentially is New York. We can still do commercial there. But to reach us, you can find us on the web, Ridge lendinggroup.com you can email us info@ridgelendinggroup.com and feel free to call us at 855, 74 Ridge 855-747-4343,   Keith Weinhold  39:04   I'm so familiar with all those avenues because, again, that's where I get my own loans myself. Chaley Ridge has been valuable as always. Thanks so much for coming back onto the show.    Caeli Ridge  39:13   Thanks, Keith.   Keith Weinhold  39:21   A lot of experts believe that stripping Fannie and Freddie's public backing and taking them public, yeah, that that will increase mortgage rates. See, besides there being more risk, like we touched on there during the interview, Fannie and Freddie would face strong incentives to increase profitability, to make an IPO appealing to potential investors, that's just another reason that would probably increase mortgage rates. But if you're the type that truly champions free marketeerism, then the government would get out of Fannie and Freddie and let them IPO, and you would want. To see that happen now you as an investor, you probably resonate with the fact that rather than having to methodically and even painfully save money for your next property, instead you can just borrow funds, tax free, out of your existing property, and that way, you're using more of other people's money, the bank's money, in this case, and less of your own. Similarly, if you avoid aggressive principal pay down well, you would just retain those funds in the first place. As you can see, Chely is really good at taking a deep look at what you've got to work with and helping you lay out a strategy that might make sense, keeping in mind and evaluating your cash, cash flow, equity DTI and loan to value ratios, they offer free 30 minute strategy sessions. You can book one right there on their homepage at Ridge lendinggroup.com Until next week, I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, don't quit. Sure. Daydream.   Speaker 2  41:07   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.   Keith Weinhold  41:31   You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access, and it's got pay walls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers, it's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters, and I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point because even the word abbreviation is too long, my letter usually takes less than three minutes to read. And when you start the letter, you also get my one hour fast real estate video. Course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream. Letter, it wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text, gre 266, 866   Keith Weinhold  42:47   The preceding program was brought to you by your home for wealth, building, get richeducation.com.

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