Property Management Growth with DoorGrow

For Jason’s 48th birthday, we held an in-person sales workshop event for property management business owners in Orlando. What he didn’t know was that his wife, daughter, team, and clients had a surprise for him! In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss what Jason has learned in the last year in business, relationships, and life, and what he’s looking forward to in the next year. You’ll Learn [01:48] Reflecting on a Year of Innovation at DoorGrow [07:36] A Year of Relationship Growth  [16:27] The Power of Being Able to Ask for Help  [22:10] Shifting Your Beliefs and Setting Goals Quotables “Because boundaries are about setting your locus of control, not trying to control somebody else.” “If you have a partner that's growing, if you're with them, you're tethered to this roller coaster that's on the move.” “Leadership is about inspiring others to be willing to support and follow you.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript Jason & Sarah Hull (00:00) Yeah, no big deal. Just a bunch of property managers about to take over the whole industry. That's what I feel like us and our clients are really going to do is we're going to dominate the entire industry.   Hi everybody. So I'm Jason Hull and this is Sarah Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow and the COO of DoorGrow, co-owners. And this is the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. We...   have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like bar rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses, and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry.   At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. All right, now let's get into the show. All right, so today is   June 30th, which is my birthday. So some of you may see this later. You may see the recording later. We'll broadcast it live later, because that's what we do now. But it's my birthday today. And so we were thinking like, Happy birthday to me. So I am 48 years old. Sarah surprised me. We came out to Orlando.   to do a sales training event to teach our clients on the new model of selling stuff that we've been doing, to teach them my framework, the golden bridge formula, which I am now just starting to work on writing a book about that I think could revolutionize sales. And she surprised me by having my daughter, Madi who's our head of client success, be here.   and our clients be here the first day we got in, which I didn't expect. And they said surprise and they surprised me and we all hung out and it was very cool. And so I appreciate that. And so we were thinking like, what should we talk about today? my suggestion was let's talk about the last year and how things are different for you and then what you're hoping for in the next year.   So yeah, reflecting, so we actually do our planning year at DoorGrow starting on July 1st, not because of my birthday on June 30th, but because we want to offset it by two quarters because kind of trying to reach end of the year goals and hit your goals and strive towards success and winning as a company doesn't really work out super well at during the holidays when everybody's focused on family and Christmas and stuff like that. And so we offset it.   And so that we're hitting the end of our planning year in the middle of the summer, which really allows us to focus on things, get excited about new things and our upcoming plan. And so this is the end of our planning year. And it's also end of the next year of my life here on the earth. And so this is a good opportunity to reflect just on like what have we accomplished in the last year. And we've made a lot of changes at DoorGrow, so   What are some of the things that we've accomplished at DoorGrow in the last year? I think one of the big things that we did is we added more to the onboarding and now we're doing some of the onboarding with clients in person. So it used to all just be, you know, kind of talk with us and meet with us on Zoom and talk with us on Telegram and, you know, watch some courses on DoorGrow Academy.   And there is still all of that. And then of course you get your one-on-one meetings with coach for the first couple of weeks and we walk you through everything and make sure that you have access and make sure you know where to find everything and that you can log in and you know how to use it. And then there's another part of it that we bring you guys out to the North Austin, Texas area and we do a one day deep dive into your business. And that that's been a big shift.   We have been doing that for just about a year now Yeah, it's really there's something we've noticed and I call it the real bubble there's this bubble or this perception that we have to burst that the internet zoom calls videos like this are not real life and We have to break that or burst that bubble and connect them to us being real people because we're actually real people   Like you can fist bump us, hug us, give us a high five, give us a hug. Like we're real people. But until we pass that barrier with our clients, we've noticed they don't get as good of results. They don't absorb the content the same because this is not real life in their mind. So videos in DoorGrow Academy. so yeah, the in-person onboarding has been a really big deal in allowing us to really get to know clients better, to connect with them.   get people breakthroughs, usually we can offset the cost of the whole program, maybe even in that first in-person session. So that can be pretty powerful. And it's really increased our retention rate. It's really allowed us as coaches to keep clients more engaged and have them stay a lot longer. Yeah, and I think it makes us a lot more accessible to people. Because until you meet us in person, it's like, you can message us any time.   Sometimes people feel a little weird about doing that. Sometimes they don't know, am I allowed to do that? Or should I reach out? Or no, I don't want to bother them with that. But it's just so much more personal once you meet us in person. then it's like there's so much more of a deeper connection and relationship. And then people go, ⁓ yeah, they'll know the answer. I can talk to them at any point. And then they really start to leverage that resource.   So yeah, we've spent the last several years making a lot of improvements to our program. And I think the last several years, this last year, we've really put a lot of attention on lead generation, on focusing on how to actually grow our business now that we've got the program even more well dialed in and figuring out how can we reach more people. And ⁓ even just recently, we got some really strong breakthroughs in how I think we could help a lot more people.   a lot more quickly and just optimizing our sales process, which I think is just, I'm really excited about. Like I'm really excited about the stuff that we're rolling out and that we're doing at DoorGrow. Personally, man, I feel like this has been a big year of growth for me personally. A lot of changes. I feel like our relationship has evolved a lot. Like it's been, you know, I think coming into a new relationship.   and we've been together, we've known each other for total maybe what did you say today, six years? He's listening, yeah, almost six years. Almost six years. I'm bad with dates, stuff like that. yeah, almost six years. so, yes, we've known each other for a little while, but I feel like I'm just now starting to get clarity on some of the things, my own issues, some of the things that have helped me back, some of my own insecurities, some of my own challenges.   This year has been a year of me really learning and growing in relationship. I feel like quite a bit as well. But I think one of the things I've noticed in you, especially over the last year, is you   you shift much more easily into leadership at home with the family. Okay. Yeah. I think I've put a lot of study into the masculine and the feminine and just recognizing my role as being a leader and being willing to lead. And I think that allows you to feel lot safer and calmer.   in the relationship. yeah, yeah, for sure. Which also makes me feel a lot safer and calmer in the relationship. And so I think there's a lot of men that you see out there complaining about women. You see a lot of women complaining about men. And I think really, I really do believe that men really are meant to lead in that. And that leading doesn't mean controlling. It doesn't mean bossing people around.   Leadership is about inspiring others to be willing to support and follow you. And I think men are meant to be leaders. Like if they don't step out and be leaders, I think it's men's responsibility. And so if men are complaining about women, well, it's your fault guys. And if women are complaining about men, you're right. It's the men's fault. That's how I view it. Women, women. So it's your fault no matter what, men. Yes. Like, yeah.   Because if men really stand up and they really lead and they're meant to be leaders and they're not waiting for women to change and trying to hold their breath till women change and they change, I believe that if they lead and they take responsibility and they work on themselves, women in their life, if the women love them, will follow and they will allow these men to step into leadership because that allows them to feel safer and to calm down and to like...   relax into the feminine. And so I think for a lot of men it's about shattering their own feminine frame and there's a great book on that I read that really kind of changed things for me that is called Shattering the Feminine Frame by Jerr J-E-R-R. I thought that was a brilliant book. I've given it to some guy friends and that were kind of in that feminine frame of that. And the feminine frame for guys is that they're trying to please, they're trying to please their partner, please their girlfriend, please their spouse.   They're trying to please everybody else. And in that state of pleasing, they become unsafe to everyone around them. They're not leading. And it's not appealing or generally attractive to most women when a guy's in that state. So that's something that I've shifted more into in stepping more into the masculine and stepping more into leadership. And   The thing I think that's key that I understood from that book and his other book, which is called The Wall Speaks by Jerr, J-E-R-R, this philosopher. The other basic principle is that men really need to believe in themselves. Like if they believe in themselves, a lot of times men were trying to get belief from our partner. Like I love when Sarah believes in me. It's everything. Like men are constantly trying to get women to believe in them. It's the thing we crave.   However, if a man is always trying to place his locus of control for belief and power in his woman, then the problem is she now feels unsafe and she's way less likely to believe in him. And so I think one of things I've realized is that I have to believe in myself. I have to believe in me first. Even if it's unrealistic or crazy, I have to have unrealistic.   impossibly amazing self-belief. And if I believe in myself, then everyone around me believes in me too. And if they don't, it doesn't matter anymore. If I believe enough in myself, either everyone else will go, my gosh, this person's amazing. I believe in them too. I want to follow this person. I want this person to lead me, they won't and you won't care because your self-belief is so strong.   And so I think it's really important for guys to develop that self-belief and not try to put that onto their partner. Because that's a really big burden for me to throw on your shoulders. Well, and I think for women, I can't speak for all women, but for myself, it's really hard to have belief in someone or something that isn't confident in themselves. So if I'm more confident in you than you are in you, there's a problem.   At least I do, like we can tell. We can just tell. yeah. Women can smell weakness because women are kind of born from birth, like having to deal with fear and having to deal with the dangers of society and men and difficulty things and whatever. Like men, we're not afraid to walk down the street generally.   We're not worried about somebody hurting us. Like we're generally the stronger half of the species, you know? And we just, don't have that mindset. We're not like looking for safety in a lot of instances. The thing we're looking for, physical safety, what we are looking for a lot of times is emotional safety. And we try to create that by pleasing. And maybe if I'm nice enough, she will be kind and it usually works out the opposite way.   because women want to test our strength and they want to test us emotionally, see if we are stable enough to support them and to handle them. And if we do, we kind of pass that unconscious test that they throw at us that they now can lean into us and feel safe and go, this man is a rock. This man is stable. I can have my feminine emotional waves of things going on and he is still that stable grounded rock that I can, know.   I can lean on. So that's been a big deal for me is to kind of take back that locus of control because I'm on my third marriage. This is like, I spend a lot of years thinking the game was happy wife, happy life, and I have to please my partner. And that becomes a really uncomfortable game if you have an unpleasable partner. And a lot of times by trying to please your partner, you end up doing the opposite. Like it makes them feel less and less safe and less and less pleased. And they want you to just step up and lead and plan some date nights and like...   make some decisions and let them actually relax and be in the feminine occasionally, right? And Sarah has to step into her masculine a lot in business and in work. And so I think being able to come home and being able to sometimes with me relax into the feminine is probably feels good. I don't know. Yeah, there are times and I think in every relationship you can kind of figure out what are the things that each person prefers to handle.   So for me, there are certain things that even if he did it, I would still want to go back and probably redo it or there would be things that I would have to confirm or check on because I wanted exactly a certain way. And if it's not, you know, exactly the way that I pictured it in my head, then I'm just not going to be satisfied. And then I'm going to feel like man, I should have just done it myself. So if you have those things and it can be anything, you just kind of have to figure out, what are the things that each partner wants to do?   and really what are the things that each partner can rely more on the other one for. Like every time we travel, my brain would not be able to handle it if he handled the travel details. Like booking the dogs and booking the hotels or the Airbnb, like where we're at right now, the Airbnb, or getting the flights and figuring out rental cars and all of the things. I just, I...   First all, it's fun for me to do that. And second of all, I wanted a very specific way. There's a right side of the airplane for me to sit on. It happens to be the right side. So if he books the ticket and then he puts me on the left side of the airplane, it's not that it's wrong, but it's sort of wrong. By the way, I upgraded our flights on the way home. And I got you an aisle seat. And I'm next to you.   because I know you love that and we're on the right side of the play. Okay, so you did it the right way. That's good. So there you go. So part and you know, part of that is also getting to really know and care about your partner. Like I take a lot of notes. I've got a lot of notes in my notes file. I have a whole folder in my notes app on my iPhone called Sarah. So I think I have like 80 notes in there. Yeah, that's how complex you are. So yeah, because I study her because you know, I want to win the game.   win the game of marriage and of life, but part of winning the game is not just being a pleaser and trying to please all the time. It's also recognizing my own boundaries and my own needs emotionally and being willing to ask. That's been a hard thing for me. That's really hard for you, which is so interesting because I don't feel like that's something that I struggle with. What I struggle with, I struggle with asking for help. I am not good at asking people for help.   because the way I grew up, it was viewed as weakness. If you need help, it's because you're weak. If you need help, it's because you don't know how to do it. If you need help, it's because you're less than. You're not good enough, you're not enough, you're not smart enough, you're not strong enough. It's whatever it is. So for me, it's so hard to ask for help. So my ways of asking for help are instead of directly asking or especially nicely asking, the way that most people would say,   Hey, could you please help me with this thing? Like I can't, I just, I can't seem to bring myself to ask that way. So I'll start to do something and then hope that somebody picks up on the cues that I'm giving, like sighing, like, like I'll wait. There was like a big, you know, case of water that I'm carrying. Like I'll carry everything else or I'll try, like try to go pick up the water and can I do it myself? Yes, of course I can.   But it's nice when your partner goes, hey, you know what? Do want me to help you with that? I'm like, yes, yes, I do. Because then I didn't have to ask. So I'm not good at asking for help, but you're not generally good at asking for what you want, which is really interesting. Because when I want something, I'm very good at just saying, and I don't generally ask, I just state it. It's more of a statement. I want this, I want that, I don't want this, I want this. So I'm very good at saying, this is what I want. I'm not great at asking for help, but you're...   really not great at asking for what you want. Well I think part of that is I grew up in this really conservative religious culture in which you were kind of the the right way of being was to self-sacrifice and to serve others and do it wasn't about what you want it was about taking care of everybody else and doing what God wants and what others want and it was not about what you want. And so I think that that   But if you don't ever ask for what you want or do things or try to get what you want out of life, then you end up depleted. You end up miserable. You end up frustrated. You end up wondering why nobody cares about you and other people might. They just can't serve you or reciprocate or benefit you if you don't ask them for what you want. And I mean, you know, it's it's so simple that sometimes I make such a big deal about it. But if I just ask you for something.   You're just like, okay, and then I get what I want. And it's, it know it's like magic, it's crazy. I know, it can be that simple. It's really weird when you ask for someone and then you get the thing that you asked for. I know, and then asking for help is difficult for you, but it's the secret thing for like, for women. Like, I have to ask somebody to help me do a thing that I should be fully able to do by myself. So especially if you're an attractive woman, it's so easy. You don't even have to ask for help.   You can, if you ask for help, everybody will give it to you. But if you just state how you feel about something, the person around you that cares will just step in. Like guys, we wanna be the hero. Like if she just says, my gosh, these water bottles are so heavy. Like I can tell she's feeling that away about them. Then I would just be like, my gosh, let me take care of this. Like I'll just step right in. Like that's the magnetic energy of women.   man it'd be so nice if these water bottles were just put away. That's a little obvious, right? It's like my way of asking. That's a really obvious way of doing it. It'd be so nice if I didn't have to do at you like, really? Okay, I can take care of this. Yeah, but see, there's a way that you can do it, right? That makes me feel honored and like, and there's a way that makes me feel nagged, right? Like if you were like,   I'll get the water bottles myself. I'm like, my gosh, I'll take home and and then I'm like Whatever she is So then yeah, so then I'm like that but then if she was like, my gosh, these are so heavy who can help me You know, I'm like, ⁓ damn's a little distress. Here comes your nine shining armor. I got it I'll take these water bottles   do with this water. so heavy. Let me come help you. But even if that's not real life, don't know real life. If women share, if they have a man that actually pays attention to them and cares about them, if she shares how she's feeling about something, not like to put him down, but saying this thing is causing me stress or I'm worried about this or it's really bothering me that there's this thing, then guy will want to step in and save the day. We just want to do, we would much rather save the day.   than be nagged to do something. That's like very easy. Like, so you don't even have to ask for help. If you ask for help, like obviously, if you're like, oh my gosh, could you please help me these water bottles, you big strong man. I'd be like, absolutely. Like, let me do this. Like, yeah, I would think I'm so great. That's like, that's the superpower. Like women have that superpower. You can just like, we wanna, we just wanna take care of you. So that's, I think that's been a big thing this year is kind of.   stepping a little bit more into recognizing the differences in masculine and feminine and being able to step into that. And gosh, what else this year? What I think you touched on it very briefly, but I think one of the things you've been a lot better at recently is setting boundaries. That's been interesting. Yeah, I read a book about boundaries and it   kind of gave me a breakthrough. I thought boundaries were about this is what I'm willing to tolerate and I need to control other people. And I think that what I read about boundaries though that kind of shifts in my thinking is that boundaries are not about saying what the other person needs to do or should do or shouldn't do. It's about figuring out what I will do and what I will do if people act a certain way. Because boundaries are about setting your   locus of control, not trying to control somebody else. It's about you being in control of you. And so figuring out here's what I'm comfortable with and if things are gonna go this way then I don't wanna be part of this or I'm not comfortable. So I think there's been a little bit of setting boundaries. I think though there's also been a heavy for me challenge in kind of resetting expectations boundaries. I grew up in a very conservative culture.   where the women did not, you're not really supposed to talk to other men if you're a married woman. Yeah, oh I know. And so that to me, it felt like Sarah was always trampling on my boundaries because she's like, this year you've really gotten into flying. And so she's spending hours alone with a guy, a dude in an airplane. And that's something like I've had to instructor is a male. Yeah, yeah. And so that's been something I've had to get.   I had to challenge those beliefs because that belief was causing me a lot of grief. A lot of times we think the other person is causing the grief. It's usually the belief you have connected that person that's causing. The belief was, Sarah shouldn't be talking to men. Now, I had to question that belief. If you've ever heard of Byron Katie, she's got this great book called Loving What Is, and this whole methodology she calls Doing the Work.   And went through and I did the work on this, which is you question the belief. You take the belief, you figure out what it is, you figure out how do I feel when I think this thought, when I have this belief? Well, then I feel angry and I feel hurt and I feel disrespected and all these kind of things. And so then I take that belief and I question it. Is it true? Is it true that Sarah shouldn't be around men or talk to men? Well, obviously, I can't say that that's totally true because...   We coach clients. We coach clients. We coach men. Yes. lot of our clients are men. Some are women. Yeah. And, you know, she has a pilot that she learns from. And so I recognized I had to find a truer belief. So the truer belief that I got in touch with was because part of the exercise is to turn around. Sarah should be around other men. And I was like, how is that true? Well, yeah.   ⁓ good men will help develop Sarah, good men will protect Sarah, good men will help expand her mind and help her reach higher levels and make her a better person. Good men will, right? And so I was like, okay, so that's true also. So there's this conflict, maybe that's not as true. And then I was thinking, well, if it's good for her to be around other men because they help her teach and they can help her learn and help her grow, then.   you know, then it can be a good thing. It can be a good thing about that. But if that's true, then what is all these feelings that I have? Well, my past relationship, there were a lot of challenges that traumatized me that like would bring up stuff. So then I had to actually deal with that stuff and heal things instead of try to get Sarah to be a certain way to make me feel safe. The other thing I got in touch with working with them,   Men's out there for a second. Yes, I feel like that's something that you do really well that not everyone can do What's that you well, you just did a whole bunch of work on that. Yeah, I mean you acknowledged hey I'm feeling a certain kind of way and is This how I should be feeling and does that belief and does that? Emotion and does that thought system does that actually serve me or is there something that's better and true and I should actually look   at myself instead of projecting that onto other people. And I think that's something that, I mean, you've generally always been really good at that, but I think like this last year, you've done that in a lot of different aspects. And I just wanna like commend you for that because I don't know that everyone can always do that. Yeah, I appreciate that. Yeah, I think that's true. think the fact that you are a high growth minded individual,   and you're reaching big goals and you're moving towards your dreams and you're flying and getting your dream car and doing all the stuff that you're doing. Yeah, mean, if you have a partner that's growing, if you're with them, you're tethered to this roller coaster that's on the move. And so yeah, think that being in relationship with you, I'm a high growth individual too. There's times where I thought I would outgrow you and it would create discomfort, like you wouldn't keep up with me.   And I've always been pleasantly surprised as well. And so I think that's the challenge and the benefit of being in a relationship with somebody that wants to grow when you want to grow as well. It's going to force you to grow in areas that you didn't expect to. And so I had to reconcile all these different feelings that would come up as you're stepping into new ways of being and new areas of growth to figure out to figure myself out and figure out why am I feeling this way and how do I feel about this and.   So yeah, I think that's been really beneficial to recognize that we have great mentors that are great men. Yeah. Right. And how what a shame it would be if I couldn't learn from people like that. And I would love for you to absorb as much as you can from some of these mentors and great men that we know. And and to have a belief that you shouldn't like communicate with men or or pair off with a guy or whatever. There's like that would make   flying pretty difficult or you'd to find a female pilot instead of the best most women don't like me. Maybe a lot of women don't like you, I don't know. It's hard. So I think, yeah, I think there's been a big year of growth in kind of figuring out that and figuring out what my needs are and, you know, my, mentioned I have a coach that coaches men. She's a woman and so I'm spending time with her, right?   And she's helping me to get insight and understand some of the things that are my challenges so that I can grow and develop and help me understand how this really allowing you to grow benefits me. You're a much more fun and playful, even feminine person as you get into the state of play in life and being able to do the things that you enjoy doing and flying planes and having dogs and all of the stuff that you love to do.   All right, well we have a few minutes before we wrap up because we've got your birthday dinner to go to. yeah. So before we end then what are you looking forward to in the next year? Well I'm really excited. I feel like I have been on a really strong personal trajectory for growth in the last year and I feel like our relationship has gotten a lot deeper. I feel a lot   safer and more connected. There's always been this kind of subtle anxiety from the previous traumas and the previous stuff that I'd gone through and relationships and stuff like that. And I feel just like, I feel like I finally understand you. Cause there was a lot of friction related to that previous thing thinking Sarah doesn't understand men and doesn't understand the dangers of men, doesn't understand the boundaries of men. And that Sarah   doesn't have boundaries towards men. So we had conversations about this, because this also allowed me to bring up my concerns. And then you shared, you're like, no, like this is how I would handle this. This is how I feel about this. This is how I would never do this. And like this sort of thing. so whereas before it felt like we were kind of playing this tug of war rope where I was trying to get you to be more respectful in relation to not.   being around men or communicate with men without me or something and you were trying to not feel controlled by this domineering husband. And so we're like, er. I like double down. That's what I, that's my fun game I like to play. Yeah. So we were both kind of misunderstanding each other. And so it's been a lot nicer to be able to recognize, ⁓ we really have a lot more in common related that and healthier boundaries. And we both really value the relationship.   And that's allowed me to feel a lot safer and for you to finally understand me and be able to communicate what's going on with me for you to understand that. And then my coach that I'm working with to say, hey, it's OK for you to have these feelings and have an issue that you need to work through and to go to your partner saying, hey, I could use some reassurance with this, but not to go to them with accusation and then they resist, right? To go to you and say, hey,   I'm feeling away about this and I'm getting all mixed up in my thinking or it's getting more than I can handle and I'm freaking out. You know, can you like reassure me and like if I communicate that way, then you can help me through that. And then it reduces the need for that because then I'm in a state of safety. Whereas what we were creating before was kind of, it was snowballing into more and more anxiety in me because of that tug of war. so, yeah, so I'm really excited in the next year.   how our relationship will develop even more. I feel like we've grown so much and I feel like we've got really big goals that we've connected with in the business. Just even in the last few weeks. Just even the last few weeks that we're planning to do that really can take DoorGrow to the next level and really have it dominate and benefit the industry. And we've got some big, big enemies we want to go after. We've got some big goals that we want.   To do we've got some big impact we want to have to make a difference and you know And it's been just so rewarding to be able to connect with clients about this and get them thinking it with a bigger vision as well So I think I truly feel like if you're not involved in DoorGrow You're going to miss it like you're gonna miss the bus like the the bus is taking off soon like it's going Get on it   But I feel like, that was one of my comments on Jeremy's post the other day. He's like, just me and 12 of my best friends having lunch. And I was like, yeah, no big deal. Just a bunch of property managers about to take over the whole industry. That's what I feel like us and our clients are really going to do is we're going to dominate the entire industry. And I'm super excited for that. Yeah, we just took a trip recently to Mexico. We were part of a big mastermind with some high level thinkers.   And we got some really good mental technology installed in our brain that really was a game-changer for us thinking outside the box with a bigger vision and We're injecting that into all of our clients getting the think bigger and I think we're going to have the most innovative group of property managers and clients ever and I nobody will be able to keep up with innovation and the things that we're all doing because we all have such bigger goals and our clients are little   They're excited. I'm excited. And so I think that DoorGrow is going to do some big things and I think we're going have a big impact, which is awesome. So that makes me really excited because there's nothing better than changing lives. you know, we've got a client named Joy and she messaged me the other day and she said, ever since we met and did our jumpstart session, she says, I'm finally sleeping again at night. And that's like, yeah, that's the stuff. That's way better than money.   You can't buy that. You have to really contribute to others to get something like that. And so that's really amazing. So I'm just really excited to help change some lives and have some impact. that's the next year. well. All right. Well, let's wrap up and go to dinner. All right. So if you've ever felt stuck or stagnant and you want to take your property management business to next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow.com   and join our free Facebook group. You can get into our free Facebook community. It's just for property management business owners by going to doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, then don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. And until next time, remember the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye, everyone.  

What are some of your goals you have for your property management business? Do these goals inspire you? Do these goals make you feel motivated to take action TODAY? In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull share ideas they learned from Dr. Benjamin Hardy at Mastermind in Paradise surrounding impossible goal setting as a strategy for growing faster. You’ll Learn [01:25] Using Goals and Time as Tools for Growth [07:51] Changing Your Mindset  [12:25] Changing Your Goals Changes Your Priorities Quotables “Goals that we set usually that are realistic are based on our current level of thinking.” “If we only operate based on our current level of thinking, we don't grow.” “You need to have something that's going to stretch you out of your current comfort zone and your current level of thinking.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript Jason & Sarah Hull (00:00) if you felt uninspired in your business, you're not getting the growth that you want, you're on a bad   All right, we are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profits, simplify operations, and build and replace teams.   We are like bar rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners   and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show. Okay, so we just recently got back from Mexico. We got back from Mexico and we had a good trip there. So what do we go to Mexico to do? We actually went to Mastermind in Paradise.   which was incredible. It was absolutely incredible. It was actually better than I thought it was going to be. Yeah, it was really cool. We got to connect and network with a lot of really cool people. And one of the key speakers that we got to do a private session with, with a small group was Dr. Benjamin Hardy. So Ben Hardy has written some amazing books. 10X is easier than 2X, The Gap and the Gain, Who Not How, and we got a preview   of two of his upcoming books one is time as a tool and the other is the science of scaling and everybody's mind were blown at this event and he He shared a different framework for how to look at goals. And so do you want to explain this? Why don't you why don't you explain it? Okay, and then i'll chime in. Okay So this is really exciting. So   A lot of times we set goals that are realistic and the challenge with realistic goals, goals that we set usually that are realistic are based on our current level of thinking. Our current level of thinking is the current problem. it's a limited thing. It's, it's our current thoughts and capacity and abilities and ideas. And if we only operate based on our current level of thinking, we don't grow. And so these are crappy goals. These are not effective goals to get us inspired, to get us excited. So   I realized I in some ways felt really unmotivated because I've had a goal for a while to get to a certain growth level and impact level and revenue level, but it was a linear goal. It was a realistic goal. was making sure the goal was realistic, that I could see how to do it. And then it just meant more work because it was realistic. I was just thinking, this is what I know how to do now. And I just need to do based on my current level of thinking, more work, like 10 times more work if I want to get.   10 times bigger. And that's just such a grind. It's just really draining. So if you felt unmotivated, if you felt uninspired in your business, you're not getting the growth that you want, you're on a bad path currently. path is not is a path based on your current reality, which means you're not thinking differently. And so he talked about how it's important, essential to have impossible goals. You have to pick a goal.   that is impossible or unrealistic or unreasonable based on your current level of thinking. And if you pick a goal that is currently impossible or unreasonable, what's amazing is your brain is like a masterful supercomputer. It's like a quantum computer and your unconscious mind and your subconscious and eventually your conscious mind will come up with ideas, new ways of thinking. If the goal is outside of your current level of thinking, it's currently impossible with your current level of thinking.   And so this was where the goal becomes a tool to get you to think differently. And so if you view goals instead of as something you have to hit or you beat yourself up or you try to hit because you want something and you try to get yourself really motivated, that's, think that's a poor way of thinking about the goal. The goal really is a tool to help you to think differently and help you to grow and help you to expand and get into a new mode and new level of thinking.   And then he compounded that with talking about time. And you can either make the goal way bigger to the point where it becomes impossible. And so you have to start finding new ways of thinking. Or you can shift the timeline to take your goals, like a lot of property managers say, I want to add 100 doors in a year. That's a crappy goal. I mean, it's a realistic goal. It's a decent goal. And we help lots of clients do that. But that's not a really exciting, inspiring goal.   But what if you shift the timeline to 90 days? That sounds impossible at first, like 100 doors in 90 days. And I shared this with some clients just before this call. I was on a call with some clients and suggested that some of them were like my goals 100 doors. But now based on what Jason's saying, I'm going to make it a 90 day goal. And then they start thinking of ideas. They start thinking like, what if I just found four real estate agents that have 25 units? They're tired of managing.   I could hit a hundred doors. What if I found one small acquisition deal? What if I found an investor? One of our clients on the call says he has an investor right now that's going to has like 120 units that he's going to onboard another investor with 40 units. And he's just like growing rapidly. Now he's fast on his way to being at a thousand units. It's going to happen. And so his goal is to get the 3000. He's now making a bigger goal. Yeah. Yeah. So   So you need to have something that's going to stretch you out of your current comfort zone and your current level of thinking. you know, but some of the people on the call were like, well, if I shoot for this goal in 90 days and I don't hit it, I said, well, what if you only got 50 in 90 days? Would you beat yourself up and feel horrible? They laughed and they're like, no. I said, what if you got 25 units in 90 days? Would you beat yourself up and feel horrible? They said, no, of course not. Because their goal was a hundred in a year originally.   So it's just having a better tool to give you a better path. And the current path that you're on towards a goal that you have, it's not the same path. It has to be a completely different path. It's like trying to fly to Hawaii versus New York. It's a completely different path to get to a much better destination. It's a totally different path. You cannot just 10 times the amount of phone calls that you're gonna make or 10 times the amount of hustle   they're going to do to hit this goal in 90 days or to hit your five year goal in a year or to, do something 10 X bigger or a hundred times bigger. You have to find a different path. And so when you get your brain working on that, you will start to find different paths. You will start to connect with others that may be able to put you on a different path and at DoorGrow, That's one of the things we do for clients is we help them have a bigger vision and we help give them, one of those who's he talks about.   Finding a who not a how and new who's can give you new paths and this is what we do We give clients a new path to get to these goals that they weren't able to think of before So that's my two cents on it. So I Think that's pretty good and then also when when the book comes out because you can't get it yet We were lucky enough to to preview it. Yeah, so when the book comes out   Definitely make sure that you read it. It is so fantastic. I don't even have enough good things to say about it. And Dr. Benjamin Hardy he's phenomenal. And all of his stuff is really good, but he pursues excellence in everything that he does. He doesn't want to just write a book and publish a book. He wants it to be a masterpiece, like an absolute work of art.   that really comes across in his work and hearing him speak. And it was great that we got to be a part of that, Do you remember him talking about the floor? Could you touch on the idea of the floor and how setting a big goal changes the floor? Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's something that you and I have both been really questioning. when he talks about what is your floor?   So this is kind of like the minimum that you will allow. What are the lowest level things that you will do? And when you have a goal, like let's just say it is 100 doors in a full year, does that mean that you need to do anything today?   No. No. No, because you have 364 other days. Does that mean on the weekend you have to work? No. No, not really. Does that mean that you have to give up certain things? Not really, because I can probably figure it out. But if you now have a goal of 100 doors in, let's say, 30 days, do you have to do something today? Probably. Absolutely. On the weekend? Absolutely.   Do you have to sacrifice certain things? Absolutely. No, is it forever? No. And the things that we need to be able to give up are the things that are now below the floor. And all that essentially means is anything that is, I would call it a distraction, anything that is not in alignment with this big, huge goal that you're working on, that now falls below the floor. So you should not...   be doing that. So if you say, hey, I want 100 doors, I'm gonna go do in 30 days. Does that mean for the next 30 days, you're gonna be watching any amount of Netflix? Probably not. no, it doesn't. Now forever and ever, Netflix is not gone, it's just gone while you're trying to hit this crazy goal that you've got. And what if your goal isn't even 100 doors in 30 days? What if it's a thousand doors in 30 days?   There are certain things you are not going to be able to focus on at all. There are certain things that you will not be able to fit into your schedule. There are certain things that you will go, wow, if it's at all possible for me to hit this goal, I can't do this thing. I'm going to have to give it up. And that might be   Cooking, might be cleaning, doing your laundry, washing your car, driving your kids to school, spending time with your family for a small short period of time. It might be answering phone calls, talking to tenants, writing leases, doing showings, doing accounting, if that's not your thing, right? It could be so many different things. Because any of those things that I just mentioned, is that going to get you a thousand doors in 30 days? No.   It sure isn't. So all of those things now, they either become something that gets in your way or something that is a distraction, something that is an obstacle for you to be able to hit this huge goal. It doesn't mean you have to give it up forever, but it does mean that it's now not high enough of a priority for you to continue to do it. And we talk about this a lot on time studies.   when we have our clients do time studies, we talk about it through a very different lens. So this is a really great lens to kind of talk about the same topic. But when I look at someone's time study, I always ask them, why are you doing that? Why are you the one who's doing that? Somebody should be doing that. You should offload this. Why is this still on your to-do list? Why are you the one who's doing this again? And it's always the same thing, oh, because I feel like I have to. But when you have this huge goal, the thing that you   feel like you have to do is hit the goal, not all of this other stuff. Yeah. Well, raise the, when you raise the goal up to a much bigger goal, your floor automatically raises. There's always going to be stuff you finally stop tolerating because you have this big vision. It's exciting. It's inspiring. It's something you actually want and you're motivated to do it. And so you have to change your level of thinking, which also means you have to give up stuff that you've been holding onto.   because you didn't really have a good enough excuse to get rid of it anyway, but there's stuff that you have to do. Like I can no longer be taking sales calls from people that no show. So I have my team members canceling a large percentage of my calls. Like we started making a ton of changes and it took me, I was like, I sat with the question, like we closed, I think, what? 13 deals in the last month. think 13 or 14. 14, I don't know. Yeah. And I'm like, how can I do 100? How can I 10X this?   If we're doing on average, maybe 10 or something. How can I do a hundred? And I was like, that's impossible. But I sat with it for like a week, week and a half. And then all of a I had all these ideas. I would have to stop doing this. I would have to stop taking calls like this. I would have to stop doing that. What if every person that showed up to the call, I could have a single call close because they already had clarity on their problem. They already were trained on what they need. They already went over our offer. And so I'm now building that out. And it was like, it's a completely different path.   than what I was on, which was like to 10 X our business wasn't a big enough goal. And now I'm trying to like 10 X it in a month, which would hundred X our business. Right. And so I had to come up with a completely different path. And what's surprising to me is a lot of the ideas were already in my head. They were things I had seen videos I had seen, but my brain was not able to put them together to help me achieve a goal because my goal was so weak that it   was all very realistic and doable. just needed to get more salespeople and get more setters and like do more lead generation. And I don't have to change anything on the front end. I can just change our internal processes. And I think we could 10 X the business. And so I started seeing a different path and my brain started pulling out different ideas that I'd heard of in the past and piecing them together. And I came up with a whole new set of ideas.   And it was just based on it was stuff that was already in my brain, but it wasn't at my current level of thinking was above my current level of thinking. So I raised my goal and it raised my level of thinking so I could tap into all this other stuff I had in my head. And it also raised the floor. So there's a lot of things I'm cutting out. I am not going to have people no show. I'm canceling people if they don't confirm their appointment. My team are canceling them. And so then they can warm and nurture these people up. But I'm going to be talking to people that are committed, ready to show up.   and are already qualified and already know what they need to do. And I have a team that's facilitating that. And so like we've made some big moves, big changes, and I'm excited. So now I'm building out all this stuff and building out different things and building out a completely different path. And we've had clients go from 100 to 1000 doors. We had a client do that in one year because he found a different path because his path to get to 100 was not the same path he could do to get to 1000 in a year.   He couldn't follow the same path, so he had to come up with something else. And what's surprising is the path for him to get to a thousand was way easier than what it took him to get to a hundred. And that's the idea of 10 X is easier than two X. The path I'm setting up for our sales system is easier than me grinding through a hundred sales calls in a month. It's going to be way easier. And I can even spend less time on these calls because they're coming more prepared. And so when you have big goals, you have big thinking.   you find way better paths, which is the idea. So use either the goal as a tool, make that goal much bigger, or collapse time and use time as a tool and you will actually speed up time and it actually gets easier to reach the goal. That's the idea. So we're super pumped, I'm super pumped. I'm like really pumped about the business right now. Like I'm really excited.   and then I'm really excited because our clients are getting this tech mentally. I'm already training and coaching them on setting up these goals and helping them understand time and goals as a tool. And so they are going to be the most innovative property managers in the industry. That's going to be our group. And so they're going to come up with the best ideas. And so you want to be part of this mastermind. It's going to be the freaking best thing on the planet for property manager. I'm super pumped because nobody else has big crazy goals like our clients.   Like they've already had big goals that outpace anyone else in their markets. Now they're getting ridiculous and unreasonable and impossible and they're going to find solutions to this. And I'm excited to see what they innovate and share it with everybody else. So stay tuned y'all DoorGrow's about to get crazy. So, all right. that's basically it. Let's wrap up. All right. So if you've ever felt stuck or stagnant and you want to take your property management business to the next level,   Reach out to us at doorgrow.com. Also join our free Facebook community for just for property management business owners by going to doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and please leave us a review. We would really appreciate it. And until next time, remember the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone  

As a property manager, you know the value you provide to real estate investors. You offer peace of mind, safety and certainty, and expertise. What if every investor found a property manager to partner with before even contacting a realtor? On today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with real estate investing author and coach Dustin Heiner to talk about building wealth through real estate investing and the role of property managers. You’ll Learn [06:06] Dustin's Journey to Financial Independence [17:48] The Importance of Property Management in Real Investing [30:04] The Importance of Finding Clients You Want to Work With [41:42] Investing as A Property Management Business Owner Quotables “If you try to serve people, then your life is going to get better.” “If you don't have your business that could run itself, then you're going to be losing money.” “Your property manager is absolutely your quarterback.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript Dustin Heiner (00:00) this is the number one thing that I teach all my students, the first thing they always say, Hey Dustin, I found a great city to invest in. I've already got five realtors sending me deals. said, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Let's say you bought one of those properties. Who's going to manage that? And they said, I don't know. I said come on. Like you, you're putting the cart way before the horse realtors are the last thing because you need to make sure that the   business is going to run perpetually without you. Cause the last thing you want is another job.   Jason Hull (00:26) All right, we are live. I am Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, and we have the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted,   cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like bar rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses, and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow we believe that good property managers can change the world and that property management is the ultimate   high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now, let's get into the show. I'm hanging out today with Dustin Heiner who is successfully unemployed, according to his shirt.   it for those that can't see this later. So Dustin, welcome to the DoorGrow show.   Dustin Heiner (01:53) Jason, thank you so much for having me on the show. just love, I love property managers. I'm a real estate investor, bought property since 2006. Just, I don't know, I've got 30 plus properties, 750 apartment unit complexes and hotels I invest in. And I love not doing any work because my property managers are amazing. it takes a lot of time finding the right property managers, but in the end they make my life easier and I love paying them. They're only one of two people I love to pay, my accountant   and my property managers, because they make my life easier. I love that you have this show. I'm super pumped to be on, so thank you so much for having me.   Jason Hull (02:31) Awesome. I love the positivity because a lot of my clients get a lot of... How do we say it? Shit. Really. And you know, they feel unappreciated in a lot of... So I know there's a lot of listening. They're like, man, I want investors like this guy. But yeah, I love that you love paying property managers. I think I've said on one of my TikToks or reels, I said, the biggest mistake landlords make...   with rental properties is not hiring a property manager. And during this process.   Dustin Heiner (03:01) I don't want to deal   with tenants personally. I invested so that my property would work for me and I did not want to handle talking to tenants. In fact, I did at the beginning, I started talking to tenants, but I found out I'm a pushover because it's my property and I'm trying to be nice and everything like that. And it's so much better when there's a middle man that's going to be there. I tell my property managers, use me as the bad guy. Like say, this landlord, he's a jerk, but this is what we got to do.   I want to help them to make it easier on them, but in the end they make my life easier. yeah, I absolutely love that. Well, one thing you and I both know, property managers should be investing themselves too. They should be grabbing properties. if you know of a, if you're a property manager, you will eventually know somebody, an investor, who's going to be selling a house. Well, shoot. Instead of like, oh, point this over to investor, which I get lots of property managers sending me deals, say, hey, this guy's looking to sell. I'm like, great, and I'll buy it.   how much better would be if you guys bought   Jason Hull (04:00) Yeah, absolutely. I mean if you're a property manager you should really understand and know real estate investing like you're you're basically the advisor for your clients to do this and You have a pulse You know an understanding of the market that nobody else has and so leaning on a good property manager It can also be they could be an invaluable resource   of knowledge. if you before you get into a property one of the smartest things you could do is go ask the property managers is this a good investment or is this a good area or is this like is this a good idea and they're like no you should not have a short-term rental property out in the middle of the desert that nobody wants to go to like it's not you're not gonna cash flow but the you know the guru I'd listen to said I could you know yeah don't do that   Dustin Heiner (04:47) I've got, yeah, no, and you're 100 % right. So I personally, I've coached thousands of people to buy properties and I like buy and hold. Like it could be long-term, short-term, medium-term, even co-living, but we're gonna buy and hold these properties. Like we've got five kids. So I'll give these properties to my kids. I started investing back in 2006, just kept buying property after property. And then I realized when you get cashflow, when you get money coming in every single month from every single property, then you get financial independence and everything else on top of that is just gravy.   Jason Hull (04:47) Okay.   Dustin Heiner (05:15) And I consider my property manager, my quarterback of my team, like the football football team, they're going to make me money. They're going to protect me. They're going to make sure that everything is going right there. They're the, they're the quarterback of my team. And so when I find a good property manager, I hold onto them. In fact, I love find, well, here's what I do also. So in finding a good property manager, I do interviewing. I don't just grab first person because I personally feel like it's best to, you know, not everybody can work with everybody meaning   Somebody might not work well with me. I might have a bad personality of them. They're like, I don't like this guy. He's too hyper. He's got too much energy. Or they might say, hey, this is a great person to work with. And so what I love to do is when I grab a property manager and I just keep buying properties and keep giving it to the property manager, they keep doing well. But I mean, honestly, in the end, I wanted financial freedom and I knew that as I bought real estate over time, the value goes up. But the biggest thing is I invest for cash flow so that   Jason Hull (05:48) Bye.   Dustin Heiner (06:10) Money comes in every single month and give you case in point, your property managers are sending money. Like if you're a property manager, you're sending money to your investors, which is great because you're, making money, but you're also making them money. But at the same time, imagine that money coming into your pocket.   Jason Hull (06:27) Okay, I love this. think the clients listen to this or even property managers just listen to this and be like, I should probably send this out to all my clients so they should they can listen to this because this guy knows something and I want all my clients to see us in this light. This is a great light to see us in. So let's let's go back because we skipped qualifying you. Let tell us about yourself. Qualify yourself. Why should investors that   that these property managers send this podcast episode to and say, listen to this guy Dustin, you should be, you want to be like Dustin. Why should investors be listening to you?   Dustin Heiner (07:00) Absolutely, totally.   you know what, I'm even gonna tell you a quick story of what really shoved me into real estate investing. I started investing back in 2006, but I was not born with money. In fact, I was born into a very poor family, and I did what everybody is taught. We're taught this same exact path. You go to school, you get good grades. You take those good grades, and you go to college or university and get thousands and thousands of dollars into debt.   and then you get a piece of paper or a degree, that's what it's called, and you take that degree and you shop around and you try to find a job, a quote unquote career from someplace. And so I'm doing that exact same thing. In fact, Jason, I get the most stable, secure job you can ever think of. I got a job in the local county government in California doing IT. So California is not going away, government's not going away, and IT is definitely not going away, because I'm just like risk averse. Well, at the same time, I bought one rental property.   And that one rental property, I remember that check I got from the property manager. It was $317. Like, this is great. I need to buy more and more properties. But you know what happens? Life started getting in the way. My wife and I started having kids, after kid. Eventually, and this is what really got me to make sure I started investing. So I stopped because life got in the way, buying properties. But my wife and I started having kids. And when my wife had our fourth child, I went on paternity leave. That's where the dad stays home with the mom, changes poopy diapers, all that good stuff.   Well, after two weeks, I go back to work and on a Friday at 3.30 in the afternoon, I get a call from my boss's boss's boss's secretary, like the top dog. she says, Dustin, would you please come in the office? I said, sure. And I paused for a second. I hung up the phone. thought, why in the world are they calling me in the office? Like, this isn't normal. It's not normal. And I've also seen plenty of movies Friday at 3.30 is not a good sign. And I remembered a little bit before, right before I went on paternity leave.   Jason Hull (08:48) now.   Dustin Heiner (08:51) There was some rumors or some rumbly going on in the county that there could potentially be layoffs. And he really shook it off. said, there's no way I've got great seniority here. My boss is thinking of doing a great job. So I get up and I walked down the hallway to my boss's office. Now this hallway isn't very long. In fact, it's kind of short, but every single step that it took, felt like the hallway got longer and longer and longer. And it felt like my feet became lead bricks because as I was walking, I started thinking I could potentially get laid off while I get down the hallway.   Jason Hull (09:01) Amen.   huh.   Dustin Heiner (09:20) I turn the corner and I see my boss's door. His door is closed and I see his secretary there, super sweet, nice old lady. She says, Dustin, would you please have a seat? And I go and I take my seat and she's kind of sheepishly grinning at me, trying to console me with her eyes, because she knows everything about what's going on. I know nothing about what's going on. So I take my seat and I started thinking about my life. This entire plan that other people told me, I started thinking, if I lose my job, did I just waste my life doing this? And my goodness, we just had our fourth child.   Jason Hull (09:38) man.   Dustin Heiner (09:50) If I can't provide for our kids, does that make me a failure as a father? Does that make me a failure as a husband, as a man trying to provide for his family? Well, as I'm sitting there, my hands get all clammy, my forehead gets all sweaty because the nerves are just crushing me. Well, the door to my boss's office opens up and out walks a coworker of mine with a piece of paper in her hands. She is noticeably distraught, very upset. She's not necessarily crying, but you could tell her world has been rocked. She passes by me and my boss says, Dustin, would you please come in the office?   Jason Hull (09:54) Hmm.   Dustin Heiner (10:19) So I get up and I go into his office and I get laid off. And this is the government. Nobody gets fired or laid off from the government, but I did. And this is the reason why I tell the story. So I take that layoff notice and I go back to my desk and I realized two things sitting there at my desk, just getting laid off. Number one, I need to get another job to be able to provide for my family. So really blessed, praise the Lord to find another job in the same county, another department wasn't having those issues. Second thing I realized, I need to make sure this never.   Jason Hull (10:24) Hmm.   Dustin Heiner (10:48) ever happens to me again. I didn't make sure that nobody can take away my ability to feed my family. So right then and there, I said, I am an investor. It may so happen that 100 % of my money came from my job. That's now my part-time job. I'm a full-time investor. So quickly fast forward the story. Started buying property after property after property, each one making me 250, 350, $550 a month. I still own all of them. And now fast forward, I go to my new boss after 30 plus properties. say, Hey boss,   Jason Hull (10:57) No.   Dustin Heiner (11:17) I'm laying you off. laugh and it says Dustin, what are you gonna do? I said, I don't have to do anything. I own real estate that makes me money without even working. So last quick part of the story. Remember that short hallway that got longer and longer and longer? Well, I would walk to and from my car to my job a mile and a half every day. I was too frugal to pay for parking. Well, this last walk, I felt like I was walking on clouds because I knew I would never need a job again because I had money coming in from my property. So for you listening,   I want you to realize if you have your own business, if you're working for somebody else, if you have real estate that makes you money without even working grows over time. In fact, every 15 years, real estate doubles in value. mean, that alone is just should blow your mind. And then the cash flow that it makes. So in the end, what I suggest is if you make your own value coming from what you put into your own investments, IE rental properties, you're actually going to have   a floor of income. Now, just same thing with a property manager. You get your landlords and let's say you have 100 units. Well, you have a floor of income because that's normal income that comes in. Same thing with real estate investing. Let's say, God forbid, all those landlords to say this is not working out, we're moving. Well, you have your properties that has a floor of income coming in for you and then it takes so much stress off of you. So I'll pause the story because you've probably got plenty of questions, Jason.   Jason Hull (12:43) I love it. what a journey. there's always something that of thrusts us into a new state or even into entrepreneurism. I was suddenly a single dad trying to figure out how do I have time to spend with my kids when I'm stuck at a job at HP because I was in IT.   I'm like, I haven't even earned a week off yet. And I'm gonna get them for a week to spend time with them? How's that gonna work? How do I get to be dad? so, yeah, so sometimes I joke my kids are what made me finally leap to become an entrepreneur. so.   I love this idea of real estate allowing you to fire your boss or fire yourself from the job. Explain to people now what you do and your programs and all the stuff that you've built since, because you've done a lot of big things. I want people to make sure they understand Dustin's a badass and he knows a few things.   Dustin Heiner (13:36) Yeah.   Thanks, man. Well, here's what really   happened. So as I was quitting my job 2014 2015 inch I was 37 years old and I had so many people asking me how I was not working for somebody else and still making money if I feed my family I told them I invest in real estate and they would always ask the second question. Well, can you show me and so I just started showing friends and family members how to do it and then I realized two things number one was fun and number two I had plenty of free time because when you're not working for somebody else   When you're not having like, if you're a property manager, you have many bosses. Let's say you have 10 different landlords, working with 10 different bosses. That's really what it comes down to. And if you don't have any bosses bossing you around, you have 40 plus or more hours of your life back to do whatever you want. And so I just started helping people. So fast forward, I started a podcast, the master passive income podcast, you were on it. And that podcast in 2015, over 2 million downloads now with me just coaching. It's usually a solo show, like literally a solo show where I don't even   It's just me teaching how to do this, but over 2 million downloads because I just want to give this out. Then wrote three, no, four books, coach thousands of people. Now even have a live event, bring in hundreds of real estate investors together, but all for a goal. Here's the main goal. It's to help 1 million people to invest in real estate. And the big reason why I decided to have this goal was because the more people that I serve in my life, the more money they make and the more money I make in the end.   And so now everything from coaching thousands of people to having live events where we're just coaching even more and helping even more to books and podcasts, YouTube, you name it, like social media, Instagram, I'm over a hundred, 200,000, almost 200,000 followers on it now, just giving. And here's the big thing, a takeaway that I would love to share with everybody listening. For you listening, you need to realize if you serve and if you try to serve people, then your life is going to get better. The more people that I serve,   My goodness, I make so much more money, but the great thing is it's not a win-lose. It's not like somebody loses in order for me to win. No, it should be a win-win-win. And so now everything I do at Master Passive Income, to the free courses, to the paid coaching, all that sort of stuff, it's to help people to invest in real estate to get 40 plus hours of their life back and become successfully unemployed.   Jason Hull (15:59) It's amazing. And that's just really, really awesome. You're doing big things. You're doing big things. And you're not the typical property management client. How many different property managers do you have? Because your portfolio is spread out now, or is it all in your network? Five different states.   Dustin Heiner (16:14) Five different states? Yeah, correct. Five different states.   I think we have five main property managers. ⁓ Yeah, five main property managers that I work with.   Jason Hull (16:20) Yeah.   And how many units in total do you?   Dustin Heiner (16:26) So   single family home, like I might say single family, four units and below. So I would consider anything four units and below be residential. We have 33, 32, 30 plus single family homes, short term, midterm and even long term. Then we have two large apartment complexes, one's near Nashville, 350 units and other one's in Chattanooga, Tennessee, 325 units. And so we have great property managers for those properties. Then also,   I've invested in some hotels and so we have the, you know, the management company for that. But, what I found, and this is the number one thing that I teach all my students, all my students, lots of them, because here's what the first thing they always say, Hey Dustin, I found a great city to invest in. I've already got five realtors sending me deals. said, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Let's say you bought one of those properties. Who's going to manage that? And they said, I don't know. I said come on. Like you, you're putting the cart way before the horse realtors are the last thing because you need to make sure that the   business is going to run perpetually without you. Cause the last thing you want is another job. In fact, this is the one big thing that I see when a mom and pop investor, somebody buys one property and then they buy a second or third, maybe they get to five, six, maybe seven or eight and they're managing it themselves and they cannot scale. And I know your audience, everybody knows about scaling cause you want to scale your business, the property management business. Well, you can't scale if you're the only person doing all this sort of stuff. And so,   Here's another question I get that people, other investors or even my students say, Dustin, how do you afford a property manager in your properties? I say, I don't afford a property manager. Like I don't pay my taxes on any of my properties. I don't pay my insurance. I don't pay for my property manager. I don't pay for repairs. Meaning I don't have to get a job to pay for any of that. My tenants pay that in the form of rents. And then I make sure I do not buy a property.   unless all of those expenses are accounted for even repairs, vacancy factor, and especially property manager. And that's the thing that most people don't do is realize, let's account for all those expenses, but then utilizing your property manager well enough. Here's the big question. And so all your audience is property managers. So they're going to, they probably rarely get this question, but here's my favorite question that I ever asked property managers. One of the first ones that said, if you would invest your money in this city now,   Jason Hull (18:37) Mmm.   Dustin Heiner (18:48) What area would it be? What zip code, where would it be? That is gold. I've asked actually the opposite question. Where should I not invest that city? And property managers say, I probably shouldn't answer that because discrimination and all that sort of stuff. so the question is better. Where would you invest your money? And then, yeah, you're gonna understand the entire market because the property manager, but you also Jason, we're awesome. The question is,   Jason Hull (18:51) Mm-hmm.   Yeah, wherever you...   Dustin Heiner (19:12) Would you manage this property not after you bought the property, but before you buy the property? That's a big thing. Cause a lot of people buy a house because they listen to tick-tock gurus and they just bought a house and they, Oh yeah, it should work out. Well, if you don't have any of the manage it, it's no longer an asset. It's a liability. So how much better is you ask the property manager beforehand, especially if you are investing, you're seeing, or sorry, if you're a property manager, you're seeing where the best properties are, where the best clients are, the best tenants, all that sort of stuff.   Jason Hull (19:19) Yeah.   Yeah, sometimes 100, 1000 times over. Like they have a lot of anecdotal data, right? And data data. So the bad path then is you kind of mentioned is to go to a realtor first, get a property, and then maybe go find a property manager. That's a really bad path. And that's kind of the default path that a lot of people would go down. And they're just headed towards a potential train wreck. Odds are   that the realtors incentive is not to just get you into the best investment solution. You get the most money on a deal and then you're going to you're picking this property and you have no idea if it's going to work out and then you might not even realize you need a property manager and you're saying start with the property manager. Ask them the area.   Dustin Heiner (20:16) No, it's to sell a property. That's all it is.   Absolutely.   Jason Hull (20:34) get their advice and clarity and find the property manager that you would want to be able to manage this. Like find a good property manager first and then make some good decisions. make some, let them help you make some good decisions.   Dustin Heiner (20:48) Well,   how I would explain it is I'm going to find the experts and it could be also definitely property management, but think of also inspectors, mortgage brokers, contractors, plumbers, handymen, insurance agents. I'm not the expert. In fact, like I said, I've coached thousands of people now to invest in real estate successfully. And sometimes they'll ask me, hey, Dustin, you invest in this city.   You're the expert. Tell me like, where should I? Tell me all this stuff. said, Whoa, I'm not the expert at all. In fact, I don't want to, I might know a little bit, but I don't want to be the expert. I hire experts. I hire them. So if you're a property manager, what you need to be thinking is, well, number one, you are the expert in that area because you're currently investing your time in your business to build up for landlords to utilize you. Well, that's number one, but who else would you actually want to start working with?   Now, personally, what I find is the property manager. so if you're not a property manager, if you're an investor listening to this, your property manager is absolutely your quarterback. I treat them as best as I can. Like I treat them so well because they take care of me and they want to take care of me. If I'm a jerk, if I'm like, you know, withholding, withholding money or like, we don't need those repairs. And they're trying to do their job and I'm holding them back from it. They're not.   excited about working with me. And so what I want is as best I can, my property manager to look favorable on me so they could take care of my property so I can have all my life back to play with my kids.   Jason Hull (22:15) Yeah, I mean this very much goes along with like Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan's idea of who not how. Like finding the right who instead of going around and trying to just find the what like a property. Go find the who that can help you figure out how to do this instead of trying to figure out how to do everything on your own. Which is the slowest path to growth. Period. You know, is to do everything on your own.   Dustin Heiner (22:39) Well, you can't scale that way.   Yeah, you can't scale. If it's all about yourself, you can't scale. can't get like all my 30 plus properties. I love saying this. So a lot of people have heard of the book, the four hour work week. Good book and all. Basically, the premise is make your life so that you only have to work four hours a week. Well, honestly, I think working four hours a week is for suckers. I don't want to work four hours a week. I don't even want to work four hours a month. I maybe work 30 minutes a month on all of my properties because they get the property management statements.   I verify everything that's good, but I'll say this also. My daughter who's 16 years old, because I've coached a thousand people now, I coached her, she's my oldest and all my other kids are going to do it. She bought her first property four months ago and I coached her. She now does all the bookkeeping, all the, basically instead of me doing the work, 30 minutes, I pay her to do it and she oversees her property as well. And it is so much better when you have the experts first. One quick last thing, because you mentioned a really key, most people, and I did this too.   Jason Hull (23:32) if   Dustin Heiner (23:36) I wouldn't write to how do we find properties? In fact, my most downloaded podcasts are because on Master Passive Income, have lots of like how to find properties, how to fund properties, how to find property management. Like literally, it's just coaching. And the most downloaded are how to find and how to fund. Those are by far because people think those are the that's number one things that they don't have, but they believe that they need, which is not necessarily the case. Same thing on my YouTube channel. The most downloaded videos I have one.   That's like think like 16 different ways to get creative financing. If you don't have money yourself, how to buy properties with creative financing. I'm the most downloaded, but that's here's here's what I definitely got to say this. If you don't have your business that could run itself, because I always talk about building your business first. If you don't have your business that could run itself, then you're going to be losing money. And they give you a quick example what that looks like. I buy a property that's going to be making me money every single month and I don't buy it unless all expenses.   Jason Hull (24:11) Yeah.   Dustin Heiner (24:34) property manager included, vacancy factor, repairs, all included. And I add on my profit. If I want to make $400 a month, I don't buy a house unless the price is low enough, interest rates right, all the expenses are right to where I'm making that profit every single month on that property. And then obviously rents go up. But here's what it's like if you do not build a business, you do not get the right people in place. Imagine a convenience store. You're to start a convenience store, know, candy bars and soda machines and all that sort of stuff. Well, you will not sign a lease on a location.   open the doors and set a box of candy bars in on the ground. You wouldn't do that. You go out of business in two seconds. But what you would do is you would get, you'd build the business first. You get the gondolas, the shelving units, and all the candy bars go on the countertops, cold storage, bank accounts, cash registers, insurance, managers, everything in the business before you buy any inventory. Same thing with real estate investing. You build the entire business, get everybody the right people in the business, and then every property that I own,   is a piece of inventory that I put into my business. When you start realizing that even though you're an investor, you are a business owner that has inventory. Because I remember in 2006 when I first started investing, 2008 happened. 2008 happened and the crash happened. I knew so many real estate investors went bankrupt. fact, still talk, if anybody was investing back then, most likely you ask them, how did you do in 2008? I went bankrupt.   Jason Hull (25:44) Thanks.   out   Dustin Heiner (25:57) Honestly, that's literally, that's conversation happen all the time. But for me, I made more money. I was blown away. In fact, I was worried because I was just new to this. And because I was solely investing for cashflow. Now appreciation will come. That's great. But I'm going to give these properties to my kids. But I was solely investing for cashflow, $500 a month, $600 a month. And because of that, sadly, people, they had to get foreclosure because of the economy and all that sort of stuff.   but what did to the pool of renters, the pool went up. So there's more demand, supply's the same. In fact, I just buy properties and there's more renters. So my rents went up. I made more money in the crash when everybody else was going bankrupt because I was solely investing for cashflow. One quick, let me say one more thing, because I definitely want you to jump in. One more quick thing. Imagine that candy bar that you would buy to sell. If you had a candy bar business,   If you can buy it for 50 cents and sell it for a dollar and you knew all day every day, you can buy it for 50 cents, sell it for a dollar. You think, how can I get more money? Well, you'll make money. But let's say this is a great thing about real estate investing. Let's say you didn't even have 50 cents. It took you 25 cents to borrow 50. Well, you're out of pocket 75 cents. You still sell it for a dollar and you make 25 cents every single time. You would do that deal every day and you would think, how can I get more money? You'd borrow it. But here's one thing you would not do. Same thing with real estate investing.   You would not buy a candy bar for $2 if you could only sell it for a dollar. You do not do business to lose money. So I'll pause it because you could probably have plenty of questions, but we want to build a business and make money.   Jason Hull (27:26) Perfect.   No, love your analogies. I love that you're equating it to like even just buying and selling candy bars, which maybe some of us did in elementary school as a side hustle, or our kids do sometimes. My daughter makes little rubber bands, like little bracelets with different colors, and she goes and sells them. And the materials cost very little. And then she's like building these bracelets and ask them what colors they want. And then she's selling them at a market. She's like, I made like 20 bucks, you know.   Dustin Heiner (27:48) yeah.   Jason Hull (28:00) Yeah, so, you know, we've done this as kids, but when you equate it to something so simple, because we look at raw real estate and the complexity and all the numbers and we're like, this might make sense in the long run with some depreciation and then like, yeah, and you're like, let's keep this really simple. Let's like equate it to a candy bar.   Dustin Heiner (28:21) Because all that will come   like appreciation, depreciation, tax benefits, market appreciation over time, forced appreciation. Like when you buy a house, you fix it up, you guys know it'll make more money or it'll be worth more. All that will come, but income does not always come. So if you buy for income every single month from your property, could be long term, midterm, know, 30, 69 days, short term, or even co-living. If you buy for that, you will always get wealth.   If you buy, I'm hoping it'll go up in value. Like I hope this candy bar, I'll buy it for $2. Hopefully from a dollar now it'll be a $3. If you hope you're going to be stuck holding the bag and it's going to hurt. And so what you want to do is you want to make sure that you are investing for income. Cause when you invest for income, everything else will always come. But if you invest for just appreciation, you will not necessarily get income. You won't necessarily get all the benefits of everything that comes with real estate.   Jason Hull (29:17) Yeah, the other thing is the property managers often are one of the first to know if an existing client or owner wants to sell that property off. So they're great people to know if you want access to off market deals. I'm sure the property managers you have would love to get all of their clients to sell their properties and give them to you because you're easy. You're like their dream client because they'll have a one off like super emotional accidental investor that couldn't sell the property that's like.   driving them nuts and like they want it to be a perfect time capsule for a year because grandma planted the flower bed and like Timmy has his height in the door frame and like they want it to be perfect so they can sell it a year later and they're like, and it's like 10 times to 100 times harder to deal with operationally for them. The operational costs are really extreme. It doesn't sound like you're calling your property managers all the time.   Dustin Heiner (29:53) Ha ha!   Let me just say this. I don't want to talk to my property managers like month after month after month. I don't want, I just want the money. And as long as everything's going well, which is here's another thing. So if you're an investor, you want to make sure that your property managers understand your systems and procedures and processes. Like I have different property managers. They all treat all their landlords, everybody differently. But I say, when you're working with my properties, here's exactly how I want you to do it. And it's very simple things like   Jason Hull (30:13) Fuck it.   Dustin Heiner (30:37) Hey, rent's due on the first, late after the third, then you put a three day notice on the door if they don't need to get a late fee. And then once that three day notice is up, you start the eviction process. Like that's clockwork. It's most non-discriminate, yes.   Jason Hull (30:47) And this is pretty typical.   This is pretty typical, like decent property managers are already doing this anyway. Like this is really standard stuff.   Dustin Heiner (30:55) They should be. But I don't want to talk to the property manager. They're great people. I don't hire them unless   I like them. But at the same time, leave me alone so I can play with my kids. I could go to golf. could go to, I'm going to South Africa tomorrow for an investor trip. You know, I just want to live my life. Property manager, you take care of it. And if they are doing what I honestly like, I, they don't do well, meaning if they, if there's, it's not getting rented or there's that's a month after month where we're not getting,   rents paid, if things like that, then I'm like, I gotta find somebody else. Cause I don't want to have to think about it. If I have to think about the property, then why do I need you?   Jason Hull (31:29) Yeah, this is a challenge. They're property managers listening right now. Pay attention to this. Because a lot of property management business owners that come to us, they're not setting healthy boundaries with their clients. Because their clients don't know what they need. And so a lot of times the clients will artificially create a worse property manager. Because they're like, I need like this and I need that. I want, how's the renting process going? And did you talk to some people? Did you show it? And like what they think.   and they want to be so involved in the whole process, they're trying to micromanage the manager. And the manager's way better at this than them. By their own admission, they suck at this stuff, and they don't like it. But then they're trying to micromanage the manager, and bad property managers let them do it. Like the worst property managers usually have the highest operational costs in their business because they give every tenant and every owner a blank check for their time.   call me anytime and they phone system stuff so you can call them anytime and ask any question and they don't have a good system and so then they're wondering why they have, I had a client company once with 600 units under management in their business and they were making zero dollars. Property management can easily be death by a thousand cuts. I have seen inside thousands of property management companies and there are a lot that are making very little money.   And then like my wife Sarah, she had a property management business with 260 units. She was pulling in 90, 60 to 90 % profit margin. It took her, it was a part-time job for her really. And she moved to Austin with me and she managed these remotely. And these were C-class properties in Pennsylvania. We're talking $1,000 rent or less. This is like ghetto, like difficult tenants, difficult situations. And she had such strong boundaries.   and such good relationships with their owners in setting those boundaries that if they got needy or whatever, she would tell them that she was gonna fire them. And they were desperate to keep her because most property managers suck because of some of these reasons. And so she set really strong boundaries. And so her business was easy. She eventually installed one part-time person boots on the ground to help her open up property, show property, whatever, because she couldn't be there to do that and to pick up the mail.   and she had 60 to 90 % profit margin. It's like ridiculous. And so this is one of the trainings we have in our platform that we coach clients on, but property management could be death by a thousand cuts very easily. so it's just as important as it is for you to find a good manager to partner with, for them to find good clients to partner with and to be picky about their clients.   or to at least set better boundaries and expectations with their clients to help them be more like you.   Dustin Heiner (34:16) Absolutely. And it has to be a beneficial event where you guys are working together, a relationship. And like I said in the very beginning, I try to serve as many people as possible. The more people I serve in this life, the better my life gets, better their life gets. And as long as it's a win-win, in fact, one of my property managers, I paid him 12 % of the rent. the rent used to be, yeah, like when I, so this is when I first started investing in, it was in Ohio in 2006.   prices of rent were like 500 bucks. from 10, 10 % to 12%, it was like, you know, five bucks. And I was like, yes, go ahead. Now these are renting for a thousand dollars, but it's a hard area. It's like D plus C minus. I mean, it's a really rough area. In fact, I don't suggest any of my students invest there anymore because it's really, really rough. It's hard to find, like this property manager, I found them diamond in the rough, they worked with them for 10 years and then he retired and his daughter took over. So she's doing great too, but   All that to say, what you need to do is as you're hiring, finding the right property manager. So if you're an investor and you were trying to find a right property manager, you really need to make sure that you're paying them accordingly. That's going to be like, like I said, 10 % to 12%. Exactly. Exactly. Like they're going to make my life easier. What I need to do as an investor, if I need to pay more for a property manager, I need to buy the property for less.   Jason Hull (35:26) Yeah, don't try to cheat out on them. Yeah.   Dustin Heiner (35:38) I don't buy the property unless it pays for that good property manager. If I have to pay 15 % for good property manager, I don't buy the house unless I can afford that 15%. And in the end, my property manager in that one specific area, that's like C or D, D plus to C minus, I don't talk to her because she's so fantastic and she just doesn't bother me. I just let her run with it she does such a great job. And so it's such a great beneficial environment.   Jason Hull (36:03) Yeah, love it. I'm biased, but obviously, but I believe DoorGrow creates the best property managers because we help them figure some of these really simple things that they need to get down in. Sometimes they can't even see. Like one of the things we've been rolling out with clients is a three tier hybrid model because different investors have different strategies. There's really three psychological profiles of buyers that are taught in pricing psychology and those are the cheapos, the normals, and the premiums.   And so you need a pricing model that is a better fit for them. And the cheapos usually are really hyper concerned about price. They're not really focused on the long term as much. They're short-sighted. And so they're looking at what's the lowest fee I could get and they're like, cheaping out and they're making some big mistakes in the long run.   Dustin Heiner (36:46) Let me add, let   me add one thing with the cheapos. The cheapos will be the worst clientele. They will be the most problematic. It's just how life is. In fact, I'll give you.   Jason Hull (36:53) Next.   Operational cost   is the highest with the cheapos and so So one of the things that we coach our clients on is to make sure that they have these pricing models that balance between The a la carte of a cheapo and like you're gonna pay for everything extra so that they because then you're they're trying to gamble against the house Property managers the house and the property management should be winning right but a lot of times what property managers mistakenly do   Dustin Heiner (37:00) Absolutely.   Jason Hull (37:25) is they subsidize all of their lowest rent properties and their worst owners with their highest rent properties and their best owners. And they have properties in their portfolio they're actually losing money on. And sometimes they don't even realize this because they're not assessing them individually. We're like, yeah, you should fire those. Like you should just let them go or raise the price. It seems that is so obvious, but.   Dustin Heiner (37:45) especially if you're losing money on it.   Jason Hull (37:50) A lot of property managers have an entire section of their portfolio that's like 80, it's like the 80-20 rule. It's 80 % of their stress and their work and their challenges and it's like 20 % of their profits.   Dustin Heiner (38:02) And so here's a fun thing, like a thought, as you were saying, this had gotten to mind if and when somebody is pulling their hair out, an investor pulling their hat over a property or multiple properties, they just, they're just going to sell and because they're not good at investing. In fact, that's what I love to do is I coach people how to be good investors, how to make sure we're buying it right, how we're finding the right people, all that sort of stuff. Well, what's great is let's say they, you're, you fire them as clients, you fire them.   And they're like, I pull my hair out. I'm just going to sell. then eventually a good landlord will buy it. Good investor will buy it and they'll start working with you. So you start cutting out the 80 % that is just wasting your time and money and keep going after the 20 % that are making the money, making your life easier. That's just going to help everybody. Like it's just going to keep rising because in the end, the bad landlords there, they should just not be owning property.   Jason Hull (38:55) Yeah, I've had some interesting guests on our show recently and one of them runs a company. Basically, he explained to me that investors outside of the US love the US for real estate investing because he said almost nowhere else in the world can you get a 30 year fixed rate mortgage that allows you to do a payment that's low enough you could cash flow on it and just start making money right away, month after month.   And so they want to be able to get access to this. And so they help them set this up quickly. Get an EIN in a week and like get everything set up. Because it's complicated for them to figure that out. There's another company. I had a gentleman named Lioran. Really cool guy. Originally from Israel. He's here in the US, investor. And he created a company called Blanket. There's this really amazing platform for property managers that they can white label and that they use that allows them   It's like kind of like a property retention platform. So it allows them to put their clients portfolios into it, get a ton of extra data on their portfolios, and then they can, if they decide they want to sell this property, allows all the other investors in the entire blanket network to be able to get this and they get to keep managing that property without having to give it up. So property managers can have the properties   turn over and go to different owners and different investors, but they still retain them as that property is in their portfolio to manage. And so there's just, there's some really amazing things out there now for property managers. There's amazing tools, systems. We've got a lot of clients getting AI maintenance coordination using some really cool AI maintenance coordination tools that's allowing, cause getting a maintenance coordinator in a property management business, hard.   Ideally, it's like they're a veteran of doing maintenance of like 20 years and they don't want to run their own maintenance company and they want to come help you figure out what needs to be done. But there's an AI maintenance coordinator company that has been programmed by a guy who managed 30,000 units coordinating maintenance, all the way from small all the way up to that.   a long lengthy amount of experience and the system has programmed into it probably by now over a half a million work orders. Like and so it knows how to handle this better than probably anybody that you could hire and once you tell it you still have to train it you have to teach it but once you tell it how to handle things it can do it. And it's now doing phone calls it's like doing emails it's doing text like it's the craziest thing ever. And so there's this this there's this weird sort of   AI revolution happening right now and the smartest property managers are already adopting some of these tools because it allows them to scale their operations effectively. Eventually it'll be so commonplace everybody's like yeah we're all using this stuff and we can all like it's cheap enough or whatever and who knows maybe we'll all be out of jobs including property managers who knows but right now there's a good opportunity that if property managers are on the bleeding edge of what's working   you get as an investor a better property manager. And if.   Dustin Heiner (41:53) Well, for me,   there are plenty of software out there. Turbo Tenants One, Avails and other, apartments.com, those are fine, but I don't wanna even do any of that stuff personally. Yeah, as an investor, I don't wanna deal with that stuff. I wanna hire a person. And honestly, I don't think that AI, even though there's great tools as a property manager to help your business better, I don't wanna have AI run my business because I want an actual person   Jason Hull (42:05) this part of the night.   Yes.   Dustin Heiner (42:23) that it's   going to make sure like they have the emotions and feelings that they know, okay, there's something here, there's something there. And I just know personally, and this is why I teach all my students is, hey, these software are great if you're gonna manage yourself, but you can't scale if you're managing yourself. What we need is to hire the right people. It's all about, like you said earlier, there's a book, it's who, not how. We don't want to figure out the how, we want to get the right people in place. And one last quick thing that I said this a little bit earlier,   But people always ask, well, Dustin, how do you afford this, that, or the other? And the way I don't afford it, I make sure I don't buy a property unless all those expenses are accounted for, like the property manager to taxes, insurance, and even my profit. I make sure that is in there before I buy the property.   Jason Hull (43:10) Yeah, we have a ROI calculator that some of our clients use that we built out that already has their fees built into it so that the investors can see what are the benefits of this. What are the tax benefits? How does the cash flow like all this? And then, yeah, and in that, if it's not going to math out, then you just change how much you're putting down, you know, or you're getting a different property, right? so, but the...   The property management fees, if you're smart, should already be built in.   Dustin Heiner (43:41) Absolutely, 100%. And on top of that, again, I have to say your profit. If you're just guessing how much profit you're making, in fact, I always like to be conservative in my expenses higher so I don't get surprised, oh man, I didn't have the, or, and, or my revenue or the income from the rents. I estimate it or be conservative on the lower end. So if I could rent it for 1300, I run my numbers maybe at 1250, maybe 1200.   just so I'm not gonna be like, man, I can't make any money out of this property. Because trust me, it's really easy to overlook something if you're not hiring experts. Like my property managers, they know, here's a good property manager. I'll say, hey, property manager, I'm looking to buy this property, know, number one happy street. Tell me about it. Will you rent it? How much will it rent for? What's the vacancy factor? Will you manage it? What's the clientele like? And the grit ones will say, you know what? I know that area. In fact, I have a property like one or two streets over.   We were trying to rent it for 1400 Zillow said 1400, but we couldn't rent it for that. We got 1300 for it. That's gold. That like, is so much better information for an investor. When a property manager is he knows he or she knows exactly what's going on in there on the ground. And that's going to make sure that you're doing everything right. So when you hire the experts, they're going to make sure you do it right. Because especially property managers, I would say realtors, we said that a little bit earlier. Realtors just want to sell, sell for the high smoke, but your property managers.   for the longevity of that property, they're taking care of it. They're constantly making sure that it's working for you. So always ask them before you buy the property.   Jason Hull (45:16) I love that. This is a great message Dustin. I really appreciate you coming on and sharing this. I'm pretty confident that our clients and property managers listening is gonna be like, man, like every investor should listen and do what Dustin says. This would make our lives so much easier. And it makes them feel so much more valuable as a property manager. So I appreciate you sharing a positive message to everybody here on the DoorGroves show.   Anything else that in imparting that you would like to say to property managers that might be listening?   Dustin Heiner (45:46) Yeah, so one thing that I mentioned a little bit earlier is having a floor of income that's outside of whatever your job or work, your business, having a floor of income coming in. And what I planned on was I asked my wife, how much money do I need to make every single month in order for me to quit my job? Like what's our expenses like? And I remember the number, plan is day $4,200, insurance, mortgage, food, like you name it, everything, all of our expenses. I thought, okay, to become financially independent,   Jason Hull (45:52) Yeah.   would probably be double   nowadays. Which would probably be double nowadays.   Dustin Heiner (46:14) What's that? Oh,   probably, probably. Yeah, definitely. And so I said, okay, this is just math. If I buy one property that made me $500 a month. Well, in one year, that's $6,000. 10 properties, that is $5,000 a month. Okay, I got 10 properties right there. Then it covers it. That's $60,000 a year in income. 20 properties, that is $10,000 a month. That's $120,000 a year. That's passive. That's cash flow. That's after expenses.   And I thought, my goodness, all I need to do is hit that certain number. And then once I do, I don't have to work anymore. But here's the great thing. I had 40 plus hours of my life back that now I only build businesses that affect me and my family, as opposed to working for somebody else or, you know, having 10 different bosses that are just pulling my hair out. Now, let's say you had properties that of your own and you had your own property management company, you can fire those.   Jason Hull (46:59) You   Dustin Heiner (47:10) landlords that are taking up so much your time. You're making five bucks a month. It's like, it's not even worth it. Fire them because you have a floor of income. You are able to move forward. So in the end, when you're investing in real estate, you're going to be able to have a floor of income, which is so much more amazing because you have so many more options. Options are what's going to help you to make sure you scale and level up in life.   Jason Hull (47:33) Love it. Yeah, I think it's it's there's few things investment wise that can have as big of a return as having a business. So property managers listening. Cool. Build your business up. Grow that. But if your primary goal is just to get more doors, that's to manage for other people that I think you're making a mistake like your primary goal should be since you know real estate investing and they say invest in what you know.   you should be stacking your own doors. You should be investing and putting that in just a much better store of income for the long term and it's gonna grow and it's also if you're making a cash flow, you've already got the systems, you've got everything. Like you would make way more money on those units. So you should be building up your own real estate portfolio. One of our clients, he fired most of his third party clients because he just focuses on using his property management business now as a honey pot or a fly trap.   people come to him and say, hey, I've got this rental property. He's like, cool, let me scare the crap out of you of the tax liability if you ever decide to sell it. And maybe you should just, you know, do seller financing with me without talking about seller financing. All right, and so he's just got all these properties. He's just stacking doors and he's making so much money, right? So if you're listening and he's in our program, come be in our program. You get to hang out with this guy and other really amazing people do amazing things. But if you're a property manager, build your business up.   Yes, but also build up your real estate portfolio because you're one of the best at this. You're an expert at this. And that puts you in a state of integrity anyway, like if you believe in this stuff. And then build up your portfolio of clients portfolio.   Dustin Heiner (49:10) Hey Jason,   would you mind if I gave everybody a real estate investing course completely for free just for listening to the show?   Jason Hull (49:16) I would not mind that at all.   Dustin Heiner (49:19) Awesome. I like I said, my goal is to help 1 million people to invest in real estate. want you to invest. So get my real estate investing course completely for free. If you text the word rental, R E N T A L rental to three, three, seven, seven, seven rental to three, three, seven, seven, seven. I'll literally give it to you for free. Or you can go to master passive income.com forward slash free course. All one word for it. Master passive income.com forward slash free course.   I'll show you how to find if you are investing your area, that's great, but let's say you want to go into another area. I love investing out of state five different states now that I'm investing in how to build a business everywhere, anywhere in the country, how to scale to become financially independent. You can also find me quickly. I'll just share that master passive income, the podcast. Like I just love giving out so much more coaching on the podcast. I've had people binge the entire 400 episodes now, Jason, binge all of them and like DM me on Instagram. They'll say Dustin.   just from listening to your podcast, I started investing in real estate. I'm like, yes, that's exactly why I have the show. So yeah, one quick last thing. If you want to DM me, The Dustin Heiner on Instagram. love chatting with people. I love helping people. And in the end, when we all invest in real estate, everybody wins because we have great properties that people need to rent. We make money, property managers make money. We have a floor of income coming in.   But in the end, my goal is to help a million people. it's just another way that I can serve. But honestly, in the end, everybody wins.   Jason Hull (50:51) I love it. So they can text rental to 33777. They can go to masterpassiveincome.com slash free course. And they can go to masterpassiveincome.com to check out your stuff. then the, the Dustin Heiner, H-E-I-N-E-R.   Dustin Heiner (51:14) Correct.   More than likely you'll find me. I'm probably the only the Dustin, like if you just type that in, but man, I've been working really hard at Instagram. find out I actually kind of like it. I do like it. I'm almost 200,000 followers now. I didn't buy any of them. Like literally just hard work, putting in just great content, helping people.   Jason Hull (51:29) Yeah,   you're crushing it, man. I'm at 8,000, so I've got to figure out how to 10x my goal to that. So I'm working on that too. very awesome.   Dustin Heiner (51:38) We could definitely chat some more.   I could show you at least some insights of what I've done, but no, it's been great. I would love if your entire audience, all your property managers realize, let's just, it could be as simple as once a year, you just keep one for yourself. You find one, you buy it, and just year after year, you get more and more properties. I think that's a minimum you should be doing one a year.   Jason Hull (51:42) All right, we'll keep going.   So how do we start matchmaking your best investors that get it with my best property managers that get it? This is something for us to think about maybe offline. I don't know.   Dustin Heiner (52:08) Mmm.   Yes, we can   definitely chat through what it really comes down to is areas, know, areas like what cities are they investing in? But let's definitely chat because I think we could have a really good, really good way because I might. In fact, I while we are on this call, you know, have I have slack and that's where the community I've got thousands of students now, but we're in there chatting. I saw one note pop up, Christina. She's been with me for years and years and years. She's doing really well. And she was like, man, in Cleveland, like I have this property manager. I'm not going to name their name.   they're falling apart, I need another property manager, and so what it really comes down to, maybe you just help me know where they're managing, and then I could just point them to my students.   Jason Hull (52:48) Or   tell that person, if any of your investors see this episode or whatever, tell them to get their property managers to go talk to DoorGrow. Just say, look, you're not doing a great job. I'm actually considering finding another property manager. I think you should go listen to Jason and go talk to DoorGrow and get your shit together.   Dustin Heiner (53:05) That's a fantastic idea.   Absolutely.   Jason Hull (53:08) Because here's the thing, property managers do not wake up in the morning saying, I want to have a shitty business today. But most property managers suck. So where's the disconnect? The disconnect is they don't have the right strategies for growth. They're trying to do a bunch of digital marketing. There's very little search volume of people looking for property managers online. And usually the ones that are are the worst. They're the cheapest owners that view them as a commodity. They're at the end of the sales cycle. Word of mouth usually captures all the good stuff.   So these are the shitty scraps that fell off the word amount table. they're built, so they're spending money that they don't really have to get clients that they don't really want. And then they have these portfolios that are really difficult to manage. so then customer service is the first thing to go out the window because they're struggling. And I call it the cycle of suck. Take on any client, you have bad clients. You take on bad clients, you have bad properties. You have bad properties to deal with. The tenants are not gonna be happy. So you have bad tenants. And then you're gonna have a bad reputation. And that sums, and then what does that do?   helps you attract more bad owners. And so this sums up the whole industry in aggregate and that's our mission at DoorGrow is to disrupt that cycle of suck and we have a different cycle, a cycle of success where you're filtering at each stage and improving things at each stage. yeah.   Dustin Heiner (54:22) Fantastic,   man. I'm super pumped. I'm glad you're doing this because we need good property managers and property managers need to be buying properties themselves. So I appreciate having me on the show,   Jason Hull (54:32) Awesome, thanks for being here. Alright, so appreciate Dustin hanging out with us. If you felt stuck or stagnant and you want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com or if you're an investor and you're tired of your property manager but there aren't any other good ones either, then send them to doorgrow.com. Also join our free community just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com.   on Facebook and if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone.  

They say you are the sum of the 5 people you spend the most time with.  In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull shares the importance of surrounding yourself with like-minded people, including growth-oriented entrepreneurs in the property management industry. You’ll Learn [01:24] The 3 Key Ingredients for Building Friendships [08:56] Creating Connections in Entrepreneurship [16:46] The Importance of Physical Proximity and Community Quotables “If you don't have the connections, the network, the friends, the success that you're hoping for, part of it may just be you don't have proximity. You haven't chosen to initiate stuff with people.” “They say you're the sum of the five friends you spend the most time with.  You'll start to adopt their mindset.” “Not a lot of people are willing to get a coach or hire a consultant or invest in themselves or invest in their business.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] The fastest path to growth is to do it with others. [00:00:03] It's to have people that are playing a game. They can make mistakes for you and tell you what they learned. They can tell you what's working and you can try that stuff too. And it just helps speed up momentum. [00:00:15] All right. I am Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them to figure out how to grow, add doors, improve pricing, increase profits, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. [00:00:56] In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind, with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. [00:01:18] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We wanted to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show. So what I wanted to talk about today with everybody, one of the things that's really interesting that I've been thinking a lot about is proximity. [00:01:43] I want you to think about the power of proximity, location, nearness, distance proximity can be very powerful. So I've been listening to this audio book by Mel Robbins called Let Them and All About the Let Them Theory that she came up with, and I think it's a brilliant book. It aligns with a lot of other books that I think have really good philosophy and ideology in it. And one of the things she talked about is creating friendships and how to create friends and how as adults that's hard and why. And what she explains in the book is that when you're young, you have like... First, friendship takes three key ingredients, proximity, timing, and energy. Proximity, timing and energy, these three pillars of friendship. And when you're a kid, you have set schedules, you're going to school all the time, you're around other people for hours and it takes like 70 plus hours to make a decent friendship and like, I don't know, 200-300 hours to make like a really strong friendship. [00:02:45] And we don't generally get that a lot of times as adults. It's hard to get that amount of time with people. Can you imagine 70 plus hours with somebody. Like it's difficult to get that. So then we end up, we've got our spouse, maybe our kids like, you know, so we, it becomes really difficult. Not only that, but she talks about how at around our twenties there's what she calls the great scattering where proximity and timing changes dramatically for everybody. [00:03:12] People are like, you know, leaving, graduating college moving away. Like there isn't this set system that you're caught up in that creates proximity and the timing is the same, where everybody has the same stuff going on. Then there starts to be marriage and kids and traveling and like moving places and work and so timing shifts for everybody. [00:03:35] And just because proximity or timing changes doesn't mean that you're no longer friends with that person and they're now your enemy. Because their timing changes and you feel maybe like they abandoned you, but really as soon as the timing aligns or proximity aligns like you're nearby or you're at a similar stage in life again, like you both have kids now or something like this, you're both married now, then the friendship can pick right back up. [00:04:01] And I thought that was a different perspective. A lot of people, you know, I think as adults find it difficult to make friends and so it's about proximity and you know, the person you have the most proximity to is going to be your spouse. Like, you got to choose your spouse wisely. So I'll give you an example. [00:04:16] So Sarah lately has been really into flying, really into getting her pilot's license, not because she wants to someday become a commercial pilot and fly people around. It's because she wants freedom and it's this hobby and this passion of hers that she's caught up in. And she really is into power and achievement. [00:04:35] So she loves being able to learn and level up and develop skill in whatever. Like at a young age, she got a black belt in kenpo karate, right? And you know, she's this kind of personality, power and achievement is her basic need. So she's been flying. Well, because I'm around her and I'm in proximity to her. [00:04:54] I'm learning a lot about aviation, I'm learning a lot about weather. I'm learning a lot about all the stuff she's learning about because she's telling me and she's excited about it. And so, you know, just in proximity, and she just did her first flight. She just did her very first solo flight, which was like a big celebration. [00:05:12] And her instructor cuts off the back of her shirt because I guess the tradition is when your trainer would sit behind you in a plane and tug on your shirt tails to let you know if you need to go right or left because they didn't have the planes they have now, which is like dual control and you can steer. [00:05:28] He cut off the back of her shirt and like there, there's this celebration. I got to watch her first flight. I got to go up in the tower at Georgetown Municipal Airport or whatever it's called. That's near our home. And I went up into the tower twice. I got you know, we bribed them with cupcakes to let us come up and they were willing to let us come up. [00:05:46] I got to see that I got to see, you know, takeoffs and landings from the airport. I got to see the hangar at Pilot's Choice where she was learning and meet instructors there. And I got to see kind of her whole world that she's been involved in for months and get the experience. And eventually she convinced me to do a flight. [00:06:06] I'd never flown in a small plane. Like these are small, these are like, it was a tomahawk. This is what she's been learning in. because they say it's the hardest plane to learn in, and that's what Sarah intentionally chose to do. She's like, I want to be in the most difficult plane to fly. It's like a lawnmower with wings. [00:06:26] Like it's just like it's really tiny, no air conditioning. Like you get really hot in the summer. And I went and did my first flight. It was a discovery flight with her instructor. And I got to go up and experience what it'd be like, and I had no idea, like, I thought maybe it'd be like flying in a... I thought it'd feel like a rollercoaster. because you know, big planes don't get moved around a lot. I thought the little plane would feel like I'm like a rollercoaster, like my stomach's moving around and I'm like freaking out and whatever. But it wasn't that exciting. It wasn't a rollercoaster. It felt like just bumping around on the air. [00:06:58] Like it was pretty cool and I got to do everything. He had me do the takeoff turn everything except landing, which thanks for helping me land, Mike. We tried to trick Sarah that I had landed my first time and I was an expert because that's one of the harder things to do. But she didn't give us the reaction we were hoping for. [00:07:16] And because she knew we were messing with her, I think. So it, that didn't work, but we were trying to mess with her because when she first started getting her first landing, she was so excited. So he was like, "he's a natural have been teaching him, because he just landed the plane by himself," and she didn't give us any reaction, which made it not fun. [00:07:33] Thanks Sarah. So she knew we were up to something. Anyway, so it was it was an experience. I would never have probably just chosen to get into a little plane and fly it and do a lesson or any of this if I wasn't in proximity to somebody that was doing it. And so the people that you choose to be around... what I'm trying to illustrate... are important. Proximity matters. [00:07:56] And so if you don't have the connections, the network, the friends, the success that you're hoping for, part of it may just be you don't have proximity. You haven't chosen to initiate stuff with people. You haven't been around the right people. You haven't been around people that are successful. [00:08:12] If you aren't feeling successful, it may just be you're lacking proximity. It really can be that simple. They say you're the sum of the five friends you spend the most time with. You'll start to adopt their mindset. You'll start to adopt their goals to some degree, you will start to do this. [00:08:27] Who knows? Maybe I'll end up getting a pilot license too someday. I don't know. Sarah's so passionate about it. I might catch the bug. Right. You know, now after we get past this great scattering in our twenties as adults, you know, especially as entrepreneurs where we feel really isolated, we feel like nobody else is like us. [00:08:45] We're aliens. Everyone wants safety and security, and they want to get a job, and we want freedom and we want fulfillment. We're just different. It's important to create proximity and connections with other entrepreneurs. This is one of the things we've really worked hard to facilitate in our mastermind. [00:09:03] When people join our program, we get them connected with each other. Madi, my daughter, who's over client Success, who edits this podcast, shout out to Madi, while she's watching this and editing and does all of my social media and helps with organizing our short form videos and everything that we do. [00:09:19] But she's over client success. One of her goals or responsibilities in the results that she's expected to accomplish is to get clients connected with each other because we know that one helps them get better results. Two, helps them stay in our program longer because they have friends. And three, helps them just create relationships that can last a lifetime and that will positively impact their future and help them. You know, these are people that, in our mastermind that we attract, these people are people that invest in themselves and invest in their business. Not a lot of people do that. Not a lot of people are willing to get a coach or hire a consultant or invest in themselves or invest in their business. [00:10:00] I mean, that's. Those are rare people. These are people that have kind of realized that the hardest way to do it is to do it alone. They've struggled. They've figured out it's not working to like just do it all myself and watch YouTube videos and read books and think I'm the smartest guy in the room. [00:10:16] And you end up spending like a decade longer. You could collapse a decade down into a year in results. You could get a result in a year that would take some people a decade to figure out, because you don't have to make all the mistakes. Somebody else has done this. People can point you in the right direction. [00:10:31] And so this is one of the things that we're really trying to figure out, and one of the problems or challenges we're working on at DoorGrow is how can we create more proximity? When we did DoorGrow Live just recently, one of the things that we did is we went bowling. We took everybody like we went bowling. [00:10:48] Another thing that we did is we all we did a mixer and a, like a little group mingle thing. We played a game two questions and a lie. And people are just sharing all sorts of property management stories. They had to share two true ones and one that wasn't true and people had to guess. [00:11:03] And people were gathering points based on whether they guessed accurately, all three on a person. And then there's those in-between moments where people going out to, you know, get lunch or eat dinner together, or, you know, spending time in the evening together. These things create, this allows proximity, allows you to spend some time connecting with people and networking and creating those relationships. [00:11:25] And so you need to make sure you get in the room with the right people. You need to be around, you need to have proximity to people in your industry. You need to have proximity to people that are growth minded. And if you can find a place that does all of this, that's rare. And so this is one of the things we wanted to facilitate with clients. [00:11:44] And then if we find out people are near each other, like we've got a bunch of clients in Florida for some reason right now, we've got a bunch of clients in California. We've got a bunch of clients in certain geographic areas. We want to get them connected. You know, the fastest path to growth is to do it with others. [00:12:01] It's to have people that are playing a game. They can make mistakes for you and tell you what they learned. They can tell you what's working and you can try that stuff too. And it just helps speed up momentum. And it's just great to be connected with people that are playing a similar game that understand you, that don't make you feel like an alien and just hear what you're dealing with and say, why don't you just go get a job and why do you deal with this? [00:12:25] You know? And so. It's great to have that. So proximity. Now, timing, you need people that are at a similar stage in life. Well, if they are married, have kids are building a property management business, that's a very common stage. That's a similar stage that you could be around others in. [00:12:44] And that timing is the right timing because without timing you, it's really hard to connect and have a relationship or relate to these people. You know, like if you are married and have kids and they're out just drinking and partying all the time or whatever, and that's how you used to kind of live. [00:12:58] You're like, well, it doesn't kind of fit my lifestyle now. So now we're not friends. The timing's just off for now. And then energy is just the way she describes, it's kind of like the vibe or the connection. You can't choose that. Just some people you connect with well, and some people that you don't, but I think in general, you increase the odds of that dramatically by being around people like you. [00:13:18] You tend to like yourself, hopefully, and you're a good person. You're a badass. You've dealt with challenges. You started a business. You're doing property management, which is difficult work. You're building up your operations and you're focused on adding doors and growth, I mean you're going to find people with a similar energy to you, which is growth-minded positive focus, active, action takers. [00:13:41] And so if you can match all three, you can find people that you can create proximity to, that are at the similar stage in life, the right timing, and they have the right energy that you want to connect with and be around, and there's just that energetic chemistry or connection with them, these are amazing people for you to be connected to and it's going to make life feel lighter. It's going to make life feel easier. It's going to make life feel more fun. It makes things worth it. And so that's my challenge. That's something I'm going to be really focused on and working on because I've moved around a lot. [00:14:12] I've been in California, I've been in Idaho, I'm now in Austin, Texas area. And I've really loved the Austin area. It's been a lot easier for me to find people that have similar energy and there's good proximity to people with similar energy. There's a lot of entrepreneurs. There's an entrepreneurial culture here. [00:14:30] So I've really enjoyed being able to connect with people in the Austin area, and I made some really good friends, and we don't have to see each other all the time. We don't have to hang out all the time. I might see somebody like once a year and we're still like, we pick right back up and we're connected and we, that's how entrepreneurs work. [00:14:46] We're busy, and really good friends that are really successful. They're busy people. And then I've got friends that are scattered throughout the US and beyond that, you know, I've had a good connection with at an event or something, and I know the next time we get on a Zoom call or we hang out in person or whatever, it's just going to feel like awesomeness and magic, right? [00:15:04] Again, because they have the right energy and that'll be the right time to do it. And it doesn't matter if we're not connecting now, they're still my friends. And so my challenge, all of you listening is create some proximity. Make that a focus of attention. If you feel like your business is stuck or struggling. [00:15:23] Maybe look at the proximity of the business owners you're around. Are they stuck, struggling? Who are you connected to? Maybe you just don't have anybody you're connected to. You need a friend, you need a mentor, you need somebody you can relate to. You need people that are playing a similar game, and if we could help facilitate that at DoorGrow, we'd be happy to. [00:15:41] But there's plenty of other things you could maybe go try. It doesn't have to be us, but you need to be connected and you need to create some connections. And that could be through trade organizations like NARPM, N-A-R-P-M, the National Association of Residential Property Managers. It could be at local meetup groups. [00:15:57] It could be hanging out with other real estate investors. Whatever floats your boat, whatever makes you feel connected and valued. So that's my message for today is go create some proximity. Sarah and I are about to take a trip to Mexico. We're going to go connect with a bunch of people and these are people that just to be at this event, they've spent over 25 grand or more, some like a million dollars, like to be part of this group that we're going to see. And we've spent a lot of money to be in and connected with this. And so that's like, you know, kind of pay to play, right? There's a certain caliber of people that we get to be around that are willing to invest so much and we're really excited to meet these type of people. [00:16:38] You know, I'm in a local mastermind, an organization called Speakeasy and it really has nothing to do with drinking because we don't do any of that. But it's like we get together in somebody's house and like they're all local entrepreneurial business owner people and they're all doing really cool things. [00:16:53] There's some amazing people. So I've been able to connect with local people doing that. I'm in a mastermind for coaches and it's mentored by two really amazing high level, high net worth coach, people that run coaching businesses that may be a little similar to DoorGrow, different industries. [00:17:11] And so I create a lot of proximity and connection to that. And we go to that several times a year and sometimes hang out on Zoom calls related to that. And gosh, what else? And there's lots of other little things, events we go to, stuff that we enjoy. And so, proximity. [00:17:28] So there's power in just being around each other. And the other thing is physical proximity, not just zoom calls, but physical proximity. There's something different about that. There's something that psychologically switches in our brain that it becomes real, and we get past this, that everything digital is maybe fake or not real, and we connect with real people and we feel real energetics and like our physical body, they say actually energetically extends out feet from our body. They can measure this and we're kind of like an atom like the visible part is, what you can see is like right here, but there's this aura or energy or whatever extends far out. And so when we're in proximity, we're connecting with people. [00:18:08] We can feel them. There's an energetic aspect to this, there's a quantum physics aspect to this, and so proximity can be really powerful. So go create some proximity, people and if we can help you at DoorGrow, let us know. So that's my message for today. If you felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, you want to create some proximity with some cool people reach out to us at doorgrow.com. [00:18:33] Also, we have a free community. This is one little, not as deep, but it's a way of creating some proximity. It's a community just for property management business owners. We don't let team members in or other people in, we try to filter that out. We reject 60 to 70% of the applicants into this group. It's just business owners. [00:18:50] It's exclusive. You can get to that by going to doorgrowclub.com, and if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe, reciprocate, help us out. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. It helps us spread this message. It helps us reach more people and helps us have more fun and enjoyment. [00:19:10] We'd appreciate it here at DoorGrow. And until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone. 

How did you end up in the property management industry? Becoming an entrepreneur is often a difficult and lonely path with many ups and downs along the way. Many property management business owners are miserable in their own businesses. In today’s episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with property manager and DoorGrow client Derek Morton to discuss how he was able to build his property management business and team around himself. You’ll Learn [01:53] The Entrepreneurial Struggle [09:03] Building a Business Based on Humanity and Care [26:48] The Impact of The Right Company Culture and Team [38:57] Masterminding with Savvy Property Managers Quotables “Property management really is a business of relationships.” “If people fail me, sometimes I don't have a proportional response. So why would I expect anyone else to act differently?”  ”Your internal beliefs really, I think, shape the environment that we allow or create around ourselves.” “If you're relying on team members, it's really dumb to think you've got all of the best ideas and nobody else is as smart as you.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Derek: Sarah was like, "Hey, you did all this stuff, how did you do it?" And I'm like, I don't know. And so we went back and we ran the numbers. 88% of my growth has come from my network and just those relationships.  [00:00:13] Jason: They say your network is your net worth, right? [00:00:15] Jason: Okay. I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management business owners. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. [00:00:32] Jason: At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses, done websites for hundreds more than that, and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate, high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. [00:01:16] Jason: That's our mission statement. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show.  [00:01:27] Jason: So I'm hanging out today with one of our clients, Derek Morton, over at Net Gain Property Management. [00:01:32] Jason: Derek, welcome to the show.  [00:01:33] Derek: Thanks for having me. I'm excited.  [00:01:35] Jason: So, Derek, you're doing a lot of unique things there and you've had a lot of success and things have been going really well. I'm excited to to, you know, get into you know, some of this unique stuff that you're doing and chat about this topic of 'from crisis to connection.' [00:01:53] Jason: And so to kick things off, tell everybody how did you get into— when did you first figure out you were an entrepreneur? Like how'd you get into business? And then maybe that'll segue into starting a property management business and so on. Give us some back background on you.  [00:02:10] Derek: I still struggle viewing myself as an entrepreneur to be honest with you in that way. [00:02:16] Derek: Like I've done sales stuff growing up and my parents are like, you suck at this. Like, you're not going to be able to make a living.  [00:02:23] Jason: They didn't believe in you.  [00:02:23] Derek: No, they're very self-aware. Like, I mean, trust me, I understood like they were right. But like, what was funny is like on the sales, like I couldn't close but I could present and I could put on a show and make it entertaining. [00:02:37] Derek: And so, like, one of the things that I did is I sold Cutco knives. Okay. But I couldn't close. But I would have more people like, and I'd have a longer list of referrals of people's friends after the end of each one of the presentations than anyone else. But I couldn't close, so I was getting, I made a decent amount of money, because you got paid per presentation. [00:02:57] Derek: And they couldn't figure it out. And they sat in on one of my things and they're like, "you need to close the deal." And I'm like, "I don't know how to close the deal." I just, you know, and then I ran a snow cone shack, and that was probably one of the funnest things I ever did. And we went crazy with stuff. [00:03:10] Derek: Couldn't make any money, me and my partner, but we had a good time and made an impact. We had came up with all sorts of crazy combinations and all this time I was in the title industry when I was running that and marketing and just built relationships and that was all my sales, was just relationships. [00:03:26] Derek: I can't do hard sales like it makes me sick. Yeah. But the relationships and all that stuff comes naturally. And so, I mean that's—  [00:03:35] Jason: and property management really is a business of relationships.  [00:03:38] Derek: It is.  [00:03:38] Jason: And people that lose sight of that think it's some sort of tech game or like a lot of these businesses have felt failed. [00:03:45] Jason: They just, they don't get it.  [00:03:47] Derek: As you say, the deals close at the speed of trust. Yeah. I do say, and so see, I listen sometimes and sometimes, enough to gather a few things. But being able to work on those relationships and just see people has like, been that secret elixir. [00:04:03] Derek: And so when I was looking to start a property management company my parents were like, "you're an idiot. You failed at everything else." Even my wife was nervous. The only thing that convinced her was we were in the process of building a house and we were going to rent out our town home. And she's like, "there's too many property management companies where we're at. I'm not going to pay, you know, who's going to pay 10% or whatever for this, like, when you can do it yourself." And I said, "okay, you're going to do this on your own." And so I just let her do it. And she had asked questions and I said, "Google it." And as someone who's married yourself, you can understand how well that went over. [00:04:39] Derek: And so, and then hearing everyone's stories and different things like that, my wife, by the time we had it rented out was like, "okay, you have my support." And then the, you know, the rest is history. Rough first year, and then we've just been on a rocket ride since.  [00:04:53] Jason: So you, how important do you feel like it was to get your wife's support? [00:04:59] Jason: I've been the entrepreneur that didn't have support in a previous marriage, like that was a rough thing.  [00:05:05] Derek: Oh it's a hundred percent. Like, I mean, it's the only way I could do like, I mean, so about six months in, so I didn't take, really take a paycheck the first year. We were living off savings. Yeah. It was kind of a struggle. My partner was looking at me like, "you're going to make this work." And once again, like, I struggled one, you know, with hard sales and the hard part that I didn't realize that, you know, I was marketing for title companies, so I had all these real estate agent contacts. But it's a town. It's notorious. When you try something new, they're like, "we know you as the title guy. We don't know you as the property management guy. That's a different thing." And so I was like, "oh they know me, trust, and they sent me all these deals to close for them, you know, for the client. [00:05:42] Derek: So they're going to try. And they're like, it's different. And I'm like, okay. Yeah. So I didn't anticipate that, but I remember one time, my partner had set up with the real estate brokerage he was in the management company or the broker of the business. Were going to start a statewide management company. [00:05:59] Derek: And they were going to have me run Cedar and we had a conversation and my partner was laughing because I was, I had no leverage. But I was kind of belligerent because I'm like, your software sucks. Like, I know I don't have a whole lot of clients, but like why would I ask them to take a step down on the level of service? And with that being said, I'm like, I have a family to provide for, and I'm like, the dream's dead. Everyone's right, right? I can't do sales. I'm not an entrepreneur. I can't work for anyone else either, so I'm like, I'm kind of screwed.  [00:06:26] Jason: I'm unemployable. That kind of means you're an entrepreneur if you're unemployable. [00:06:30] Derek: I mean, that's the funny thing is my family's like, "why don't you find a job?" I'm like, "I tried." All these companies, like, "dude, you've done so many cool, amazing things. We love you and everything. We can't hire you." "Why not?" "You just don't fit our culture." And I'm like, "**** you!" Oh yeah that's probably why I don't fit your culture. [00:06:45] Derek: Right. And so like I had at that point decided I was going to sell out and I'm like, okay, I'll work for something else and if not something else, I'll just kind of, this will be the next step. I'll just balance and then figure out where I go to next.  [00:06:56] Sarah: Yeah.  [00:06:57] Derek: But I woke up at like three o'clock in the morning and I'm just like, I can't do it. [00:07:00] Derek: I can't do it. And told my wife, I said, "I can't sell." And she's like, "okay, but when are you going to make money?" "I don't know. You know, I just know I can't sell." And I went to my business partner and I'm like, "I can't sell." And he looks at me and he is like, "I've seen you do dumber stuff. So, okay. What's your plan?" [00:07:21] Derek: "I don't have a plan." And then I remember. So I'm just like, all right. Like I have to figure this out. Two weeks later, an agent buddy of mine like calls me and he is like, "I am tired of my wife doing property management. Come in, let's talk." And at this point I think I was like at 40, 40 units. And you know, accounting's not my strong point. [00:07:41] Derek: because everyone's like, "oh, 40 units, you should been making money." I'm like, I was just trying to figure out the flow of money. Like that's not my strong point.  [00:07:47] Jason: And so this is the crisis. And the crisis to connection is like, you were just like trying to figure out mm-hmm we need money. Mm-hmm. [00:07:55] Derek: And and so he goes, "here's the deal you pay me, you know, one month's management fee and they're all yours. Here's 25 units." We did the math, it was like five grand. And what's funny is my business partner's like "you do not make a deal without talking to me." We were 50: 50 partners and we'd always joke around about like, Hey, I'm going to use my 50% majority and make this decision. [00:08:17] Derek: And we just, you know, this is kind of, we were interacted. So I came out of that meeting and I said, "I'm buying them." And he was pissed. He is, like "I told you—" and I said, "dude, it's $5,000." And he's like, oh yep, nope, we're good. We're good. We didn't tell anyone. Didn't make a big announcement. Yeah. But there was something about that moment like that led to credibility. [00:08:37] Derek: For whatever reason there was just a threshold of units. All of a sudden, now I'm at 65 and I was like, oh, like you're kind of legit. And then it's just kind of has been spiraling since then. And within six months I'd hired my first employee. because we were at a hundred units and I was adding 20 that month. [00:08:51] Derek: But but yeah, so that's just kind of the story and I still laugh because I don't view myself as an entrepreneur. It's just kind of, I view myself as a guy who's really good at relationships and magic happens with that.  [00:09:03] Jason: So, and you know, you mentioned at the beginning that you really, that's kind of your area of genius is you're really good at connecting with people and building relationships. [00:09:13] Jason: One of the things that I, you know, that one of the gifts I see in you that I've noticed, you know, as a coach is you genuinely care about people. You genuinely care about your team. You genuinely care about your clients, you care about the tenants. And I think it's that care that's really allowed you to have the success that you've been seeing. [00:09:35] Derek: Oh, a hundred percent. Like we, we laugh all the time. I said people as a whole are awesome and so good. There's so many incredible things. Individuals can be idiots, some, you know, me included. I'm an individual. But by and large, I mean that's,  [00:09:48] Jason: That's a very different belief though. And there's a lot of people that are like, "I don't like people, but I like you." [00:09:53] Jason: You know, or stuff like this. My wife's Sarah, she's like, "I don't generally like people, but I like you." You know, she likes Derek, you know, but Yeah. But you have this belief that people are awesome and I think that belief is, you know, that's a unique belief.  [00:10:07] Derek: Yeah. And I, you know, and especially in property management, like I, I mean, "oh, you're going to get yelled at all the time." [00:10:12] Derek: And I'm like, yeah. I mean, yeah. You know, sometimes it's deserved, sometimes it's not. And as long as you can separate those, like that's what's amazing. Like sometimes you're like, we failed and I can't control how people are going to respond. because if people fail me sometimes I don't have a proportional response. [00:10:27] Derek: So why would I expect anyone else to act differently? And so we just own it and try to fix it and apologize and, you know.  [00:10:36] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that another attribute, you know, there's generally, you know, the idea of not having to be perfect or look perfect all the time, there's a certain level of humility. [00:10:48] Jason: You joke about yourself like a lot, and you know, you, even from the outset of this, you know this podcast you recognize you're not this perfect unflawed person. And I think there's, that level of humanity, it's disarming, it allows people to feel even safer. And I think a lot of property managers listening could take note is they're always trying to maintain this perfect perception that there is this thing that never has a problem. [00:11:15] Derek: Oh, like, yeah. I mean, yeah, it's life's messy. I'm messy. Like, I mean, like everyone's messy. Yeah. We try to put on this show, you know? And I mean, that's one of the things, like part of the, my background coming into property management has given me the different perspective. I mean, so I served on the board for the local homeless shelter. [00:11:37] Jason: Okay.  [00:11:37] Derek: And so, like I saw on a day-to-day basis, like people going through crisises and seeing them and realizing, I'm like I was one or two decisions, or one or two friends from being there.  [00:11:50] Jason: Yeah.  [00:11:50] Derek: And so being able to recognize like that going, you know, if I would've gone to this, or if I would've done this, or, I mean, I can count on one hand, like times in my life that I'm like, you know, that was divine intervention. [00:12:05] Derek: I had a friend gimme a call at the right time and invite me to go do that before I did something stupid. You know, and it's like, I tell my kids all the time, I said, you're going to make mistakes. You know, the deci the hard part is making sure that those mistakes aren't life changing. And unfortunately, outside of a few, like big obvious ones, you never know when those life changing ones are until you know they're past. [00:12:27] Jason: You know, I really believe we are the creators of our own reality, and I believe that your belief that in divine intervention, belief in God being able to take care of you and that you trusting in that has allowed you to avoid some of those. Because I'm sure when you were talking to people at that local homeless shelter, you're getting this perspective, oh man, they just made one bad decision that led to this. Or they were just like, I'm one step away from this. But they probably, a lot of them you probably picked up, they have a different belief system than you do.  [00:13:01] Derek: Yeah. And I mean, what's fascinating though, when you work with those, they're generally trying to change. [00:13:06] Jason: Yeah.  [00:13:07] Derek: And this is a perspective of it, and it was eyeopening. So like when we set up our first transitional house for men and women coming out of homelessness and domestic violence, my kids still call it the stinky house. Like it was the stink, it was stinky house, it was a dump. [00:13:18] Derek: And like we fixed it up. Like, I mean, I've told the story like Home Depot, like called and walked off the job. because they were pulling up carpet. There was like dog crap, like somehow shoved underneath the— like, like, it was horrible. They had like 20 people and 15 dogs and 13 cats living here before this owner bought it. [00:13:37] Jason: Yeah.  [00:13:38] Derek: And he wanted to do student housing. And we're like, and I was like, all right, let's do it.  [00:13:42] Jason: Because all their parents paying the bill want them to be in that property.  [00:13:45] Derek: This was not like student housing at the time, but he is like. You know, as far I'm like, and it was still, to this day, it's like one of the best property pitches I've ever done. [00:13:53] Derek: And I'm still kind of a little bitter and I still manage this owner. I'm like, "we've done a lot of good with this house. But remember that pitch?" And it is like, "I know," and that pitch would've cost me a lot of money that I wouldn't have been able to make. It was awesome. It's what sold me on you and trust me. [00:14:09] Derek: because you put a lot of work into that. And so we pivoted because it's, you know, it was funny. It's like going back to divine intervention. Yeah, he spoke numerous times. He's like, "this house was speaking to me." Like, he's just like, "I have to have this house. I don't know why. I don't know what, despite everything," and so, you know, we kind of pitched and we made it up and worked with the homeless shelter going, here's what we think, there's, here's some funding. [00:14:33] Derek: Like, let's just figure it out. And he was on board and you know, so when we moved the first three in, they were so, so ecstatic. Hearing their stories, one of them grew up not far from where I grew up, and I laughed because, you know, he left where he grew up because he didn't want to get into drugs. [00:14:52] Derek: Lo and behold, he came to Cedar City and he got into drugs. So he left where I'm like, "dude, yeah, no wonder like you, you didn't do drugs in that area where you grew up? Like that's impress— but you got into it in Cedar?" he goes, "I know it doesn't track. I left to get away and then it was just. It just, you know," and it goes back to the connections that he made and the friends that he made and  [00:15:12] Jason: Yeah.  [00:15:13] Derek: And all of that, their ability,  [00:15:14] Jason: ... really that's who you are and how you're showing up and your beliefs and what you feel you deserve and what you you feel you're worth. And so really boils down to your internal belief. [00:15:24] Jason: And your internal beliefs really, I think, shape the environment that we allow or create around ourselves.  [00:15:30] Derek: Yeah. And these people like with, as their belief group, like their ability to celebrate like small victories.  [00:15:37] Jason: Yeah.  [00:15:38] Derek: That were just like, you wouldn't think we're that big. I remember they threw a party—  [00:15:42] Jason: Things they didn't have that most people would take for granted. [00:15:44] Derek: Yeah. I mean, the one got a job and he was able to hold it for a week, and so they threw a party. They bought a big old huge cake. I don't know how they got the money held. And they're like—  [00:15:53] Jason: yeah.  [00:15:53] Derek: They're like, "he kept his job for a week. He hasn't done that for years. Like, we're going to throw a party. You should come." [00:15:59] Jason: Right. Celebrate the wins.  [00:16:01] Derek: I mean, they had a cake and they were celebrating and like the music was loud, and I'm just like, " you kept a job for a week and you're celebrating?" Like, it was just I'm like, is this real life? Like this is, we're celebrating? I'm like, this is like common sense. Like, you know what I mean? [00:16:18] Derek: But it was a big deal for them. And then, you know, same thing with—  [00:16:21] Jason: it's common for you and it's maybe common for others, but for some that's not common. And so, yeah. We got to celebrate progress.  [00:16:29] Derek: Like, it was amazing. And just, you know, when you look at their sobriety coins and stuff they get at, those are always huge things. [00:16:35] Jason: Yeah.  [00:16:36] Derek: To do and being able to, you know, and they have to fight. Like, holy crap. Yeah. I mean, I wish people fully understood how hard they have to fight.  [00:16:45] Jason: Well, I think it was Alex Hormozi one of my former mentors and coaches, and he was also in a mastermind with me. He mentioned that you don't get self-esteem or self-worth by saying a bunch of affirmations in the mirror. [00:16:59] Jason: You get it by getting evidence. And these little wins that they're getting is giving them some evidence that maybe is in conflict with the current identity they've been holding.  [00:17:09] Derek: Yeah, I mean. When you look at these people, I mean, they, you know, and I love them. I love that population.  [00:17:15] Derek: Like it, it's amazing. [00:17:17] Derek: The insights that I've gotten into life and everything is unbelievable. And it's changed the way I operate my business and understanding to make sure that we can try to find support because you really are, there's these moments as we hinted at that you know, like, I think sometimes we have an inkling that these are moments, right? [00:17:37] Derek: But not always. And there's these moments that if you can get the support or the right person, like they're life changing and they go it makes a huge impact. Way more than it would on my life.  [00:17:49] Jason: Yeah.  [00:17:49] Derek: But it's huge on theirs.  [00:17:51] Jason: Yeah. So I mean, and this goes to your kind of core values that you've kind of built your business and your life around is, you know, related to contribution and making a difference. [00:18:02] Derek: Yeah, I mean, it's something, I mean, my, my parents raised me that way and I laugh like they, they always think that they failed me. because I just I'm different and quirky as you can attest. Yeah. And they just are like, you are not our child. Like we don't know where you came from. [00:18:17] Derek: And I just said, "I am both of your guys' best and worst qualities on steroids. So you struggle because you're looking in a mirror going, that could have been me. And instead we made it and now we can't control it." But I know my dad and mom were always heavily involved in different things and I watched that. [00:18:35] Derek: My poor kids have experienced too. I don't think they're going to be as heavily involved because they've seen more of the bad as opposed to the good.  [00:18:41] Jason: Okay.  [00:18:41] Derek: Sometimes with being willing to put yourself out there and be involved. And we're in a small town, so my kids can't escape dad. They go over, "oh you're Derek's boy, or you're Derek's daughter," and they just go, "yes." [00:18:54] Jason: right.  [00:18:54] Derek: But those values and being involved and realizing, you know, that was something that was instilled. Like, I can make a difference. And just, you know, my parents didn't put it this way. It's what I tell my kids all the time. I'm like, "you can go far in life. Just don't suck as a human being." Like you really just don't suck as a human being. [00:19:12] Derek: Like I said, my kids, my parents didn't put it that way. But they, I mean, it's through their actions and  [00:19:18] Jason: stuff.  [00:19:18] Jason: Are your parents, I mean, you strike me as pretty extroverted and connect and comfortable with people. Are your parents pretty introverted?  [00:19:26] Derek: Actually, my mom after the divorce, like she came out like pretty extroverted. [00:19:32] Derek: My dad was pretty extroverted. Okay. I grew up pretty introverted and it's still like my social battery, like it winds down and it's like, yeah I'm on a battery. When that battery's done, I just like but I've trained myself and I've just had to do so many different things that I'm like, I put myself out there and here's what it is, and that's how I have to get stuff done. [00:19:52] Derek: It's the only way to accomplish it. And then I can decompress and not have to worry about people until the next time.  [00:19:58] Jason: So, yeah, I'm very much the same way. I would categorize myself as an ambivert. So give people some context of kind of your journey here. How long ago did you start this property management business? [00:20:11] Derek: I started nine years ago in July.  [00:20:13] Jason: Okay. Nine years ago. And how many units are you at right now?  [00:20:18] Derek: We're at 650 units. Nice.  [00:20:20] Jason: Okay. Yeah, and I generally don't see people break four or 500 units unless they've got really good culture and a really good team. It just generally doesn't happen. And so you've built kind of a, it sounds like a unique culture. [00:20:33] Jason: You had mentioned earlier you didn't fit other people's culture. I. Like it was hard for you to get a job or stay in a job because you just didn't fit. In what way did you not fit that culture and how has that changed the type of business you've created around you? Because you have a very different culture in your business. [00:20:49] Jason: Obviously you fit in it because you're at the helm.  [00:20:52] Derek: It's my culture.  [00:20:53] Jason: It's yours. Yeah. It's your culture. So you built the business that didn't exist that you could work at. You know?  [00:21:00] Derek: So I'm pretty outspoken. And that doesn't always fit with the typical corporate job or working for other people. [00:21:07] Derek: because I'm not afraid to be like, "this is dumb and here's why I think it's dumb." And then with that, I think the other thing is I'm not as risk averse. I was really risk averse at one point in time, and then I got fired. And at that point I was like. Yeah, screw it. Like, like I survived once and so like, let's try this. [00:21:27] Derek: Um, Why not? You know, I like, but I also do a lot of research, so like, what seems risky the most like, is just the next step and it's logical. And I'm like, okay, yeah, we're going to do that. And you know why? Everyone's like, I, you know, I can't believe you're doing that. And I'm like, why? Like, this is the next step. [00:21:46] Derek: Why are you doing what you do? Like. You're selling yourself short. Like this is not risky to me. Yeah.  [00:21:51] Derek: And so because I just, you know, you get all the things in place and then you make the leap and you know there's going to be mistakes going back to, you know, the messiness. You're like, okay, I make that leap at 60, 70% certain and, you know, and realize that 30% may kill me off. [00:22:06] Derek: But because there's always stuff I miss, but, you know, life's more enjoyable that way and so those cultures just don't fit. You know, a lot of corporate and working for someone else. And then with us, like, you know, we try to let the girls in my office, I have three full-time employees. [00:22:20] Derek: And then and then a virtual assistant that, you know, they can speak openly and sometimes that is pretty open and honest with both of us with all of us. Yeah. And can be pretty gruff, but that's what we need. And like I tell them all, I said, "if you think I'm being an idiot, you can tell me I'm an idiot. Just, you know, make sure you have the evidence."  [00:22:37] Jason: How would you describe the culture then in your business? Like everybody has a voice. You mentioned outspoken, you mentioned basically, it sounds like you're willing to take feedback and you know, and I would imagine that allows the business to innovate and move forward much faster than most companies that don't foster environment of feedback or honesty. [00:22:58] Derek: I mean, there's a lot of times the girls in my office are right. They see stuff that I don't see. Yeah.  [00:23:03] Jason: If you're relying on team members, it's really dumb to think you've got all of the best ideas and nobody else is as smart as you.  [00:23:10] Derek: Well, and they, and we all balance each other out. [00:23:12] Derek: Like, you know, as you in your coaching terms I'm the visionary, right? The craziest thing you ever told me when we did the jumpstart.  [00:23:19] Jason: Yeah. [00:23:19] Derek: And I still laugh. For this past year and I wanted to, I brought it up at DoorGrow Live as part of the breakout session. When we did that, you're like, dude, you thrive in chaos. And I'm like, nah, yeah, maybe like, they're like, no, that's your life. And then as I was going through and putting together that breakout session, I'm just like. Jason was right, like is the girls are all stressed and everything. And my wife's like, what is going on? I'm like, this is amazing. [00:23:45] Derek: Like every said, you know, I got to figure out the student housing thing. And then we got this and we got this. And I'm like, this is fantastic. My mind's on overload. I'm going a million miles an hour, and I'm just like, this is great. All well, the girls are like ready to be balled, you know, baller than me pulling their hair out and, you know, and all of this stuff. [00:24:02] Derek: But that's where the balance comes in.  [00:24:04] Derek: And so, because with a visionary, there's certain tendencies that are pretty horrible and self-destructive that I've learned.  [00:24:12] Jason: Yeah.  [00:24:12] Derek: That have, it's been painful lessons over the years. [00:24:16] Derek: Which is why like, we spent the last three years really just cleaning up. Most of the stuff is still cleaning up our database from like eight years ago. That's like, why is not all this information in the property? I was just running, you know, who has time for that? [00:24:29] Derek: And so having that balance has been huge to kind of tone down those different aspects of my personality. So that we can move forward in a way that works and fit that's much better for us, much better for our owners that we work for, and much better for our tenants.  [00:24:50] Jason: Yeah. Well, you know, yeah I definitely can thrive in chaos and I think those that a lot of visionaries that might be like that, that are listening, that, you know, there's a certain amount of chaos that we feel really effective in while the everybody else are like freaking out. Sometimes I call it the Amon principle because like you've got, I was raised Mormon, and in that, there's this story where like, they're running around, freaking out. "We're going to get killed by the king, because the, these bad guys scatter our flocks." And Amon was the one that was like, "Hey. There's chaos. Here's an opportunity. I can create something out of chaos." And that he was able to show up as a leader. And everybody's like, "yeah, we'll do whatever you say because we're all going to die probably." So anything's better than dying. So they're like, let's do what this guy says and instantly is leading a group, even though he is the new guy. [00:25:40] Jason: Those are those in Myers-Briggs that have a P at the end that are listening. Like the raw material of chaos and new ideas and different things allows you to formulate some new thinking and to innovate and to create stuff. [00:25:52] Jason: Whereas those js, they're like, they're the ones that kind of keep us stable and they think inside the box and the box is a nice container and we need those team members that like can keep us a little bit, you know, protected and away from the, a little bit too crazy. And sometimes I jokingly call them the crusher of all hopes and dreams, but they keep us grounded and they keep us connected to reality and they protect the business, and they help us know when we're getting a little too wild, but we're the ones that stretch them outside the box. [00:26:22] Jason: We're the ones that help them lean into new ideas. And so I think depending on what you are as a business owner, we need that alternative. We need somebody that kind of can stretch us into growth or stretch us into maybe constraint and into some guardrails and some protective measures. And having a good planning system eventually and having team members that have a voice, I think is really important. [00:26:48] Jason: So. You built the business and built this culture and in nine years getting to 650 units that's, you know, that's no small feat. That's pretty decent growth. How have you gotten most of the doors up to this point?  [00:27:02] Derek: This is what's crazy. So when I was asked to do that breakout session and Sarah was like, "Hey, you did all this stuff, how did you do it?" And I'm like, I don't know. Yeah. And so we went back and we ran the numbers and so 88% of my growth has come from like my network and just those relationships.  [00:27:22] Jason: They say your network is your net worth, right? Yeah. So,  [00:27:25] Derek: so I mean, current owners expanding their portfolio, which is like awesome, right? [00:27:29] Derek: Because that means you're doing a really good job. They're like, "Hey, I'm comfortable, I want to buy more." [00:27:33] Jason: Yeah.  [00:27:34] Derek: Then they refer their friends. And then just kind of my group of friends that I have and then agents relationships that I've had over the years. Yeah. And so really only like 12% of my business has come from Google over the years, which was eyeopening. [00:27:48] Derek: Yeah. You know, because you hate when I say this phrase, but I don't know any other way like.  [00:27:53] Derek: You know, the really the ethoses of our companies, we just try not to suck. And I'm like, that was like the most—  [00:27:58] Jason: yeah,  [00:27:58] Derek: the best validation of that philosophy. I haven't figured out a better way to say it, to make it more Jason approved. [00:28:06] Derek: But it was awesome. Like, I mean, and so, and it was just validation for all the crazy stuff we've done. Like the owner's conference we do, the owner's gifts.  [00:28:16] Jason: Yeah, you do some unique things.  [00:28:18] Derek: Like just all those different things that it was like, alright, like the craziness worked. Like it was, you know, I have my own way of doing things. [00:28:25] Derek: I have my own way that I view the world. And that was like the best validation ever. Like it was awesome. And it was empowering because it just. You know, it played into my strengths as opposed to making, you know, cold calls and trying to do that way where I'm not as good at. It was a slower growth. [00:28:41] Derek: It was a slower burn. But now it's just— [00:28:44] Jason: now you can build systems for growth and we're working on some stuff with you, which is, which  [00:28:48] Derek: is the step that we're, that I'm on now, so.  [00:28:51] Jason: So, you know, there's a lot of property managers listening that maybe they have maybe more similar personality to you and they're good with people and they can make friends. [00:29:01] Jason: But one of the challenges I've seen with some of these individuals. They get stuck in this thinking as a business owner, that they have to be a business owner and what that looks like, and maybe it's more that corporate environment and they're like, I got to step out of being the guy that's connecting and networking and creating relationships and friends, and I've got to run this business and do all this stuff that's like not even aligned with their personality. [00:29:22] Jason: And so they really, it prevents them from being able to grow and creates a business that makes a miserable job for them. And then there's those listening that are like, "man, I suck at friends. I don't believe that people are awesome, as Derek says. And I just, I'm not into connecting with people," and they need to maybe. [00:29:40] Jason: You know, get a business development manager or salespeople or that like people, that can connect with people to bring in business and that's not their strength, you know? And so I think it's really awesome that you've been able to focus on building a business that you actually enjoy being in where most business owners think they need to build a business to please everybody else. [00:30:01] Derek: Well, and this is really a credit to you, Jason. So, I mean, I've been with you just over a year now.  [00:30:06] Derek: Like I stumbled across you. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, it's  [00:30:09] Jason: been a while. Little while. I didn't realize it's been that long.  [00:30:11] Derek: Yeah. Like, just kind of stumbled across you. because we'd, I had owners tell me like, "Hey, you need to expand up north and manage our properties. It's no longer a question of of if, you can no longer tell me no, it's a matter of when." I'm like, I can't do that, that my mind doesn't work that way. There's a reason I've been telling you no for years.  [00:30:27] Jason: Yeah.  [00:30:28] Derek: And so like we just stumbled across you and you know, I signed on pretty quick. [00:30:33] Derek: Yeah, because, you know, you spoke to me like you understood kind of at a level that I'm like, yeah, you know where I'm at. I understand,  [00:30:39] Jason: I understand your level of crazy for sure.  [00:30:41] Derek: I'm still that, like I'm in parts of the business that I'm not good at. I've pulled back so much and I'm in the process of pulling back more. [00:30:51] Jason: Well, what do you feel like over this year, what are some of the changes that you feel like you've made or that have been beneficial? How did. DoorGrow, me, Sarah, team help. Like what's changed?  [00:31:03] Derek: So one, trusting those that I hire, like I've had amazing staff, you know? [00:31:08] Derek: Yeah. But I'm also like, I need to do this. I'm the owner. And so being able to offload some of that. And so when you look the biggest thing is, you know, we all have certain ways that we think our business needs to look right, certain positions, we need to do this, we need to do that. And you gave me the freedom, and this is going to be kind of counterintuitive, but the time studies. [00:31:32] Jason: Yeah.  [00:31:32] Derek: You know, like was eye opening. because it's like, oh yeah, let's just take that off the girls' plate. Like, they don't like doing that. Why am I having them do that? Like, okay, so where does this need to go? And so being able to shift some stuff and now like now it doesn't matter, like what it looks like. It's based on my current staff. [00:31:51] Derek: And you know what I need and what the business needs. And so now like as I scale, I don't know what it's going to look like and nor do I care.  [00:32:00] Jason: Because you feel like you have a system for figuring out  [00:32:04] Derek: Yeah. Like, I mean, you, I remember you telling me that you know, each progressive time study, you're going to get more mad at yourself. [00:32:13] Derek: And I didn't believe it. because at first I'm like, oh yeah, like I love doing the showing. It's like, no problem. You know, I'll keep the girls in the office. Like, like I said, I love people. So me interacting with people you know, a lease and everything's like, dude, I love this property. [00:32:25] Derek: Like, cool, what do you do? Like, and just be able to like, I want to rent from this guy. And all of that. And then just certain other things. And so then the second time study I did, I was like a little more aggravated. And then the one I did in January with the girls in my office, because I said, we're going to do one and, you know, and kind of get some stuff into place for as we continue to grow and what that needs to look like. My whole thing was like, why am I doing this? He was all like, I was angry. Yeah. And Shaunna, as we're going through this, she goes, "your whole thing's angry." I'm like, "yeah, I'm shocked." [00:32:53] Derek: Like this was the worst thing ever. Like I was pissed. I'm like, why am I still doing showings? This needs to get off my plate.  [00:32:58] Derek: And she's like, you love doing showings? And I'm like, I do, but it's stupid for me to be doing showings. Like it just makes no sense. And so like over time having that and looking at the girls time studies and seeing certain trends, I'm like, okay, like yeah, I've got this. [00:33:13] Derek: I'm like, I have data and we're going to do another one here at the end of June to kind of make our next step because we're looking at another hire that we're trying to figure out exactly. This one will be, honest and frank conversations between me and my staff because I'm like, this is what I think we need and we can have them do. [00:33:28] Derek: And I think this is what they think going to be and well, so it may come to rock paper scissors, we'll see how that how that's decided. But having that time study and realizing. Like systems and people, you know, peoples and processes, right? You can, as long as you have those in place, you can scale.  [00:33:42] Jason: So for those listening, they're like, "time study. Like what? Like tracking your time?" Like could you explain to them the time study process and why it's beneficial?  [00:33:50] Derek: So it's basically every 15 minutes, here's what I did. And was it, you know, was I interrupted? Is this something I enjoy doing? Is this something I don't enjoy doing? Yeah. And so you can learn, you know, how to minimize the interruptions, you know, if there's certain things. [00:34:04] Derek: And then, you know, how do you get some stuff that you don't enjoy doing as much? You know, there's always the nature of it. There's always going to be things you don't enjoy doing, right? Yeah. But if you can kind of farm those off and then let those focus on. You know, those that are, be good at that be able to take that on because they actually enjoy doing that. [00:34:24] Derek: I think you described it to me like, because it was like, this doesn't make any sense. You're like, how many plumbers are there in the world and they love it.  [00:34:32] Jason: Yeah,  [00:34:33] Derek: they love swimming in the muck and here's what it is and they make good money with it. And I'm like, that makes sense to me. Like it just, it's, I'm like, oh yeah, there are a lot of plumbers. [00:34:40] Derek: Yeah, there,  [00:34:41] Jason: there's people that love doing everything that you don't enjoy doing. There's somebody out there that loves doing that and I think the time study, the purpose of it, isn't just to see where your time goes, there is that advantage, but it's really to figure out, not just time, but it's to figure out energy, like which things are giving you life, which things are taking it away? [00:34:59] Jason: What are the plus signs? What are the minus signs? And I love that you're already having team members do it because if you want to keep team members, and keep them happy and have really good culture and really good team, you want to move them towards their areas of genius, the things that they're naturally inclined to be great at in their personality. [00:35:15] Derek: Well, and it also like the way we did it, I had, I promised the girls, I said, I'm not looking at what you're doing. I know you're doing your job.  [00:35:21] Jason: Yeah.  [00:35:22] Derek: And they had all come from a corporate environment, so when they're hearing time studies, they like, there was huge fear. [00:35:27] Derek: There's a reason it was took nine months after I hired you, before I was finally like, you need to do this, right? Like, I'm going to die on this sword and you're going to have to trust me that I'm not looking at going, "Hey, like why are you doing this instead of you doing this?" and so when I went to with Shaunna, like I looked at it and we went through, I was like, man, we're taking a lot of phone calls. [00:35:48] Derek: Is there ways we can do that? And not that we had to make out actions on any of that right now, but it's like it started the conversation that now even six months later are starting to come to fruition that, that look, hey, like we are still dealing with a lot of this. We're dealing with a lot of this. Is there ways we can do this? [00:36:04] Derek: Things that I've put on the back burner for years, I'm like, I really need to look into this. That, like, looking at it, I'm like, oh yeah, this is like crisis. Like I've failed my staff, right?  [00:36:14] Jason: Yeah.  [00:36:15] Derek: And so kind of put some of those solutions in place and get answers for them and make things like that work. [00:36:19] Derek: So it was eyeopening, but it doesn't really. You don't matter how it looks. I mean, so like, I joke all the time, you know, at one point in time my office staff, because you're used to, when you hear property management, like, oh, you have a leasing agent, you have a maintenance coordinator, you have, you know, your office manager and the grocery, oh, you have a regional manager. [00:36:39] Derek: My staff at one point in time was a student life coordinator, a housing advocate, and an office queen. That was her technical term. Right. We even gave her a crown. When I went to London, I found a shirt that had a queen. And so like, we got her that, right. It was, it was on her business cards and everything. [00:36:54] Derek: Okay. But it doesn't matter. Like, and titles don't matter. Like, it's just a matter of putting them in the position to where they and the business can succeed.  [00:37:04] Jason: I mean, really a lot of business owners are trying to optimize their team through micromanagement and through KPIs and through metrics and trying to force them to perform better. [00:37:14] Jason: And our philosophy at DoorGrow is quite different. Like we're basically by doing time studies and by setting really good culture and establishing that we're optimizing based on personalities. Which is fundamentally way more effective. And so your business from the ground up is becoming more and more optimized based on your talent and they're able to perform at a much higher level. [00:37:37] Jason: Also, by doing the time studies you had mentioned getting clear on interruptions. Interruptions of that hidden thief in a property management business I talk about. And so by getting your team conscious of these interruptions and taking a fresh look at them. Do they need to happen? Most property management companies give their tenants and their owners a completely blank check to steal their money, steal profitability, and to increase operational costs. [00:38:01] Jason: They're like, call us anytime. And they just think, "we just got to add more staff and more phones and more everything." And so by your team doing time studies, they're becoming aware of interruptions, interrupting each other, interrupting you, like all that. They're starting to become conscious that this—  [00:38:16] Derek: or me interrupting them. [00:38:18] Jason: Yes.  [00:38:18] Derek: Like that came out. I'm like,  [00:38:20] Jason: Derek interrupted me five times on my time study. What the hell, Derek, why? Like, why can't, that came up quite a bit. Let's find another system, right? because there's Derek's sneaker net in the office walking in, interrupting, and you know. Yeah. So taking away Derek's blank check to disrupt his own team maybe. [00:38:39] Derek: Yeah. That's when we build a new office it's mandatory that I have my own space. Right now we have an open concept.  [00:38:45] Jason: Right? I've had clients after doing time studies that start working from home and their office performance goes up because they're not screwing everything up all the time. [00:38:53] Derek: That's now that my son's moved out, that's in the works myself too, so.  [00:38:57] Jason: Okay. Yeah. So, so it sounds like a big thing that you've gotten so far in DoorGrow is just more and more clarity. And so you can make better decisions as a team.  [00:39:07] Derek: Well, and confidence. I didn't know what I was going to be doing like when we were looking to make that leap, I'm like, Hey, I pretty much told I have to, so I have to figure this out, you know, to manage Northern Utah. And now like, we kind of laugh because it's like, okay, we did that and now it's just here's what we require for other parts of the state. [00:39:27] Derek: And having done it once we're kind of like, why the hell not? Like, what's next? That's been eyeopening. And then the other thing that's awesome. I mean, so I mean you got a network of the other property managers that you can use their brain and they can use yours and brainstorm and I mean that was the magic of DoorGrow Live a couple weeks ago. [00:39:46] Jason: Yeah.  [00:39:46] Derek: Being able to network and visit with 40 other property managers and be able to just kind of hear their pains and brainstorm and  [00:39:53] Jason: Yeah.  [00:39:53] Derek: You know, I learned just as much from those that had 25 units as those that were larger. I mean, and everyone had an attitude of learning. I mean, one of the best meetings ever is like, so we had a breakfast that Sunday morning, Ed and Sylvie and I, and all three of us were just like. [00:40:09] Derek: And Sylvie's like, I mean, she's a small, Ed's over 300 and has done it all and seen it all. And I'm at 600 and we're just like sitting there taking notes with what Sylvie was saying, like, we're like, that's genius. You know? Yeah. And and so just learning kind of where everyone else is at and understanding you can learn things from other people like, and it,  [00:40:26] Jason: yeah. [00:40:26] Jason: Sylvie's super sharp and I mean, she's just starting her property management business. But she's worked with coaches and mentors that I've been around that like were in high ticket masterminds and different things. Like her mindset is different and so everybody's bringing different things to the table. [00:40:42] Jason: Like you said, you can't just judge them based off door count. Some people are bringing some amazing things to the table. I think also, you know, we at DoorGrow, we attract a different breed of property managers. Like these are growth-minded people. It's very different. They're kind of the cream of the crop of the industry. [00:40:58] Jason: They're unique people that would invest money into their personal growth and personal development and into improving the business and be willing to take feedback and ideas from outside themselves, from a coach.  [00:41:10] Derek: And it's crazy at the time they're doing it. I'm like, man, I wish, I mean, that's ballsy. You're like, I'm at 50 units and I'm going to spend this much in a coach. Now it's money well spent. I'm like, I would've saved myself a whole lot of time and hassle had I done that. You know, so it's like it's a genius. We help them get an ROI,  [00:41:25] Jason: they can afford us, that's for sure.  [00:41:27] Derek: Yeah. I'm like, that's, that's gutsy. [00:41:29] Jason: Yeah. Some people are, they're really gutsy. But I think on the surface it may seem gutsy, but what I've noticed is I also get a lot of people coming to me that have bought into franchises that have really struggled. They've spent tons of money and they've really struggled, and sometimes for years, and I'm like, we could have solved this stuff like in a quarter, like we could have solved so many of these problems or helped them figure out how to grow so much quicker and they've just struggled with bad ideas and bad advice and not growing and, you know, or just so much stress and all of this stuff is so solvable and, you know, and I was that hardheaded guy in the past where I was like I can do everything myself and I'm a smart guy and I can watch YouTube videos and do courses and read books and but once I started investing in myself and realizing I sucked and I couldn't. I was hitting limits because of, you know, just who I was at the time. [00:42:24] Jason: I needed mentors and coaches to help me collapse time. Like it just reduced the amount of time wasting and experimentation because I mean, all of our clients are smart. I think they're all smart. All of them could figure out everything eventually, but, you know, it could take a decade longer. Like you can collapse a decade into a year if somebody just said, "Hey, I've tried that stuff. That doesn't work. Do this." And that's my shameless plug or competitive advantage is I've been able to see inside probably thousands of property management companies and see what doesn't work and what does work. And I'm not in the fire, like I'm objective. I'm not attached to any particular ideas. And so, you know, and I think that's the thing is I'm like, well, I've seen this and this. You could try that, but here's what will probably happen. [00:43:12] Jason: And I'm usually right because I've just seen, I've got so much data to work with. You mentioned confidence and I've, this is something I've noticed in you, Derek. I feel like you've shifted a lot over this last year in terms of confidence, just going from where you were when we first had our first conversation to you presenting to a group at DoorGrowLive and talking. [00:43:32] Jason: What have you noticed in the stuff that you've been working on in yourself and with your team in your own shift in confidence? Or have you seen this?  [00:43:42] Derek: I think clarity is what it is. Like. because I mean, I'm a control freak in so many ways, right? [00:43:48] Derek: It's my business and— Yeah. And I laugh because I'm not, unless it comes to my branding, I'm not OCD enough to be a control freak.  [00:43:58] Jason: Yeah.  [00:43:59] Derek: My branding, it's a completely different thing. Like I am like the crazy stuff I do. I'm like, it speaks, it has to be me. And I'm pretty anal retentive, and it's just a completely different beast. [00:44:09] Derek: Like, but as far as my business, I was such a control freak. And to be able to let that go so that I can be like, oh yeah this is what I enjoy. This is what I need to focus on. I care about that stuff. But that's a Shaunna and I can like, and then like recognizing certain things like now in the employees because— I recognize where we're at, like how do we jump in, you know, to kind of, to help. But the more I've gotten out of the day to day actually, the better the business has gotten because I can focus on the more higher level vision stuff. [00:44:43] Derek: And here's what it looks like. I, like I tell as I explain to people, I say I hate puzzles, but I'm really good at putting together the border and finding the like pieces and going, okay, these are all the pieces that go to the car. This goes to the bush. There may be some tree pieces in there like in the bush. [00:45:05] Derek: because you know you're just going. But I'm really good at that and kind of getting it close and seeing where things need to be. And that's my talent. I'm not good at spending the time to finish the puzzle. I enjoy the puzzle when it's done. Like, because, oh, that's beautiful, right? But getting in there, like, but I love gathering the like stuff. [00:45:28] Derek: I'm going, okay, here's this. Like, here's what you need. You know?  [00:45:32] Derek: There's this tech that I think can solve this problem. Holy crap. Like this is next level stuff. I can see that future and I can make those pivots. Yeah. And I can see those more clearly now as I've gotten out of the day to day. And that's where that additional confidence from. [00:45:45] Derek: because I'm like, you know, before I'm like, can I do this now? I'm like, why the hell not? Like it's just, and I've done enough crazy things that I've had some basic confidence, but. I mean, when I came to you, I've had the crap beat out of me for like three straight years. because of the growth and trying to clean up the book, like so much cleanup because I was an like, I was just an idiot and didn't have the systems and processes in place. [00:46:06] Derek: And so now that those are still, and we're still building them and still, you know, tweaking them and figuring them out, but that's where I'm like, cool. I can do a lot cooler stuff for us that I love, you know, that are important to me as opposed to being in the day to day. And I never really, like, I laugh because I told you, I said I do enough research that when I do the crazy stuff, it doesn't feel crazy. For me, when we made that leap up north, it's like there's now just kind of these moments that I'm like, that was crazy. Like I, we went to the Utah Apartment Association or Utah, sorry, rental Housing Association conference.  [00:46:41] Derek: And I'm talking to people like, oh, you're in Cedar City. Like, what are you doing up here? [00:46:45] Derek: Oh, like, I had to come, I came up here for a week for this and. You know, I had to work on my properties up here and they're like looking at me like, wait, hold on, you're managing stuff up here and you're based out of there. Yeah. I mean, we have two listings, 300 miles apart and that's all sudden. I'm like, that's kind of crazy. [00:47:00] Jason: Yeah.  [00:47:00] Derek: That's kind of insane, but it's just like, it just feels natural to me to where I'm like, unless you break it down like that, it just doesn't feel that crazy for me. Like, here's what it is. We got lucky on a few things and now like putting systems in place that I can continue to expand, know, where I want to expand. [00:47:15] Derek: And it's just like, yeah, we can make this happen. And that's more what we've, where I've gotten out of it. I always kind of had the crazy confidence to do crazy stuff. Now it's just like, oh, my business is no longer beating the crap out of me at the same level. And I can focus on what I enjoy. [00:47:29] Derek: Yeah.  [00:47:30] Jason: Well, I think that's maybe a good point to wrap up on is I think really it's been about helping you understand just yourself and helping you understand you so that you can build that business of your dreams. You can build the team around you that supports you. I mean, even from the very beginning and in the onboarding training, this is why I make sure that everybody's clear on the idea of the four reasons. Some of you maybe have heard me talk about on the podcast, I have a video on visionary versus operators, so they can kind of identify themselves and the more clarity we can give you on yourself and then doing time studies and figuring out your personality, then we can start to build the team and the business around you and get you out of those things. [00:48:08] Jason: And I find entrepreneurs make good decisions once they have better information. And the best information you can have is to really have clarity on yourself.  [00:48:15] Derek: I a hundred percent agree.  [00:48:17] Jason: So I'm really excited to see what you do over the next year or two. Like, I think you're going to have some big changes and some big shifts, and your business is just getting started. [00:48:26] Jason: I think you guys could easily be over a thousand units in the next year or two if you guys really put the pedal to that.  [00:48:31] Derek: That's open conversation in our office, which in the past, any of those conversations would've led to any of us being pelted with whatever was on their desk at the time. [00:48:41] Derek: And now it's just this is happening. What does it look like? I mean, and that's what's funny is like it's just really, we're just like, okay,  [00:48:46] Jason: there's kind of a new reality floating around in the office for  [00:48:48] Derek: the future. Well, it's a reality we already dealt with. Now we've just owned it and we're no longer fighting it at the same level that we used to. [00:48:55] Derek: Yeah. because we're getting stuff in place and you know, trying to minimize the chaos that is always there in property management. Anyways.  [00:49:03] Jason: Cool. Well, to wrap up, any parting words you would say to property managers that maybe were dealing with similar challenges of chaos or where you were at when you first came to us? Or, you know, something you want to say those listening that have property management businesses that might be struggling.  [00:49:21] Derek: You know, relationships matter. Like, they really do. I mean, like I said, that's how I built my business. That's how a lot of the stuff we've been able to do with the tenants and some of that focus that we've done, like those relationships matter. [00:49:31] Derek: People are people and they deserve to be treated as such, so, and it makes a huge difference.  [00:49:36] Jason: I, yeah, I think that would help every property management company's growth is just start to view people through a more positive lens and focus on relationships. Love it. Cool. Great. Parting words. [00:49:48] Jason: Derek, appreciate you coming out and hanging out with us on the DoorGrow Show. Do you want anyone to connect with you in any way or like any social media or anything?  [00:49:58] Derek: Best thing? Go to our website, netgainpm.com, N-E-T-G-A-I-N pm for property management.com. Yeah.  [00:50:05] Jason: And Derek, you're doing really cool stuff. [00:50:07] Jason: I love that you're kind of out of the box thinking and the stuff that you're doing to make things fun in your business. And like you mentioned, you do an owner conference where you have your owners and you do this virtually and you do some cool stuff. So it's exciting to watch you and I'm excited to see what you do over the next couple of years. [00:50:22] Jason: So it'd be awesome. So, sounds great. All right, thank you.  [00:50:26] Jason: So for those that are listening, if you are stuck. Or feel stagnant and you want to take your property management business to the next level, we would be honored to help. Reach out to us at doorgrow.com. Also, join our free Facebook community. We've got cool people in there like Derek, that are helpful just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. [00:50:49] Jason: And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a positive or review wherever you found this. We'd really appreciate it. And until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. Bye everyone. 

As a property manager, have you ever worked with foreign investors? If not, what is stopping you? Is it because you don’t know another language or because you don’t know where to find foreign investors? What if there were a service that handled that piece for you? In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with the founder of HomeAbroad and Ziffy to talk about how property managers can connect with investors living outside of the United States.  You’ll Learn [01:49] Building a Platform that Helps Foreign Investors Find Properties  [08:21] Helping Investors in the U.S. Find Investment Properties  [14:46] How HomeAbroad and Ziffy Can Benefit Property Managers  [25:23] Using Real Estate Investing and Property Management to Move to the U.S.  Quotables “No one wants to be a landlord… They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash.” “If you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management.” “You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself.” “You grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, so we will introduce the property manager at the right time and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property, so, we'll kind of introduce you in the right point in that journey to make sure that you have a high conversion as well.  [00:00:20] All right, I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. We have rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. [00:01:06] And if you are wanting help with any of that stuff, then reach out to us at DoorGrow. So we believe at DoorGrow that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. [00:01:28] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.  [00:01:38] Now let's get into the show. All right, so my guest today, I am hanging out with Amresh Singh, welcome to the DoorGrow Show.  [00:01:46] Thanks, Jason. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.  [00:01:49] It's good to have you. So I would love to get into your background so people understand, like who are they listening to or viewing on this, and tell us a little bit about your journey into entrepreneurism and how you kind of got started and that will lead us into your business. [00:02:04] Awesome. So my background has been at the intersection of mortgages and technology. I used to work for a leading international bank before I started HomeAbroad. And originally I'm from India, so I moved to the US 10 years back, working for this big bank who moved me from India to the US to work closer to the headquarters over here. [00:02:25] I managed their international customer acquisition. And you know, in that journey, you know, I realized that two things that we have. Or I should say two really fascinating things about the US real estate market, which is, you know, 30 year fixed state mortgages, which we, in the US you know, we tend to ignore and we take it for granted. [00:02:45] It does not exist in most places around the world. It's a superpower, 30 year fixed state mortgages. Right? Yeah. Plus combine that with, you know, higher rental leads in the US market. You know, you're really looking at a true wealth building too. Right? So that realization coming from, you know, an international market into the US market, seeing the superpower of the, you know, how real estate in the US can really help you build generational wealth. You know, gave me the idea to start HomeAbroad, you know, which was a company that was focused on global investors investing in USD asset market, right? You know, and taking the advantages of, you know, some of these superpowers, I will speak later in your podcast. [00:03:24] Right? But that's how the journey started. And then, you know, as part of that journey, we realized, you know, some similar gaps exist in the domestic market as well that led to formation of Ziffy, which I'll talk about as well as we progress in the podcast. So that's kind of in nutshell, my know, my entrepreneur journey, my background, so.  [00:03:40] Very cool. I've noticed, you know, every now and then I get clients that they've got some special connection to an international market. You know, I've got a client from Israel and he's able to pull in Israeli investors and they're wanting to get into the US market, and he helps them handle all of that. [00:03:56] I had a client that same thing with China you know, and other different foreign countries, you know, and so that's a competitive advantage that each of these property management business owners have, but it's not one that every property manager can just create because they don't know a different language. [00:04:14] They don't have a network or connections overseas, and so that could be a challenge. But I see how that could be a competitive advantage for building up your own portfolio if you could access international investors. And I didn't really realize that, but I just grew up in this bubble of the US but 30 year fixed rate mortgages sounds so normal. You know? Yes. So, okay. So cool. So, so tell us a little bit about what you've got going on.  [00:04:40] Yeah, so, you know, as I mentioned, you know, we operate two brands. HomeAbroad is where we started, right? And that's a shop, that's a PropTech and FinTech shop that's focused on helping global investors invest in the US real estate market. [00:04:52] Right? If you think about, you know, real estate, right? It's kind of, you know, wealth building tool or is a mode of, you know, building generational wealth around the world. People invest in real estate for stability, right? For, you know, that that ease of mind, okay my investment is going to grow, right? [00:05:08] But you know, in most places around the world when you're investing in real estate, you're not doing that with leverage. You know, you are buying that in cash and you are, you know, mode for return on that investment is really banking on the capital appreciation on that property, right? What changes in the US market is because of 30 year fixed rate mortgages, there's no payment shock. [00:05:28] The rate is fixed for the term of the loan. That's 30 years. Since it's amortized for a 30 year period, your monthly payments are lower, right? Rental liens are higher. So what ends up happening in the US market is rent covers mortgage in majority of the scenario. [00:05:44] Yeah. It cash flows day one. Absolutely right. And that is something. So think about it, right? So you are generating cash flow from day one with leverage. I'll repeat that with leverage, right? So 20-25% of your money is able to help you buy a hundred percent of the property with cash flow or passive income from day one. [00:06:05] It just does not happen in most places around the world. Now imagine this: you explain this to someone who has no idea about the US state market, right? And then you tell them, Hey, not only you know the value prop, but as a company HomeAbroad, we are going to give you mortgage financing with no US state history. [00:06:25] Right. And we are going to underwrite you not based on your personal income or assets from your home country. We are going to look at the property's income, right? And we're going to underwrite based on that, right? Suddenly someone who has no affiliation with the US, you know, market or financial market is able to invest or buy US real estate for the obvious benefits I mentioned, right? [00:06:49] Cash flow with leverage, but also you're putting your money in the largest economy in the world. USD is still the reserve currency, right? So you're shielding yourself from currency risk that's might exist in your home country, right? And suddenly when you explain this to a global investor, it's an aha moment for them, right? [00:07:04] Because this is something that does not exist in their home market. You know, they want to, you know, kind of diversify their assets and dip into what US has to offer this kind of opening American dream to the world. Yeah. Without them having to live or work in the US. You can live and work in your home country and dip into what America or American dream has to offer, you know, while you sit in your home country. Right. And that's kind of what was a game changing phenomena for us. Great traction, great, you know, reserves. But what we saw, Jason, you know, these people were coming in and we're like, okay, great. I want to invest in USA asset market. But I don't know where to invest. [00:07:40] Right. I don't know the US market, I don't know which city to invest in. Right. And my team, you know, we found ourselves going onto Zillow doing investment analysis and coming back to them and saying, "okay, this is a good place to invest." And then we said, "okay, wait a minute. Let's just build a tech platform, and that's what led the evolution of Ziffy, which is kind of, you know, Zillow for investment properties, ziffy.ai, where you know, as an investor you can kind of just say, okay, this is my investment objective. [00:08:05] I want to generate X dollar cash flow every month. I want to generate Y percent in rental. I want to find all the rent properties. And the algorithm mines everything that is listed on MLS right now from an investment perspective gives you detailed investment analysis and helps you take the data driven recommendation. [00:08:21] And then we realized only 8% of Americans own investment properties. If it's such a good thing that global investors want to put their money in the USA market, why Americans are not building generational wealth by investing in real estate. Right? Because people don't want to be a landlord, right? [00:08:37] Right. But once you put this data in front of them, suddenly the perspective changes. And that's what we are right now. We are launching ziffy.ai where it's going to be the Zillow for investment properties to really help more Americans buy and invest in US real estate.  [00:08:50] Okay, great. And what's that tool called? [00:08:52] It's Ziffy, Z-I-F-F-Y, dot A-I.  [00:08:56] ziffy.ai. Okay. And you mentioned the big other z name Zillow, you're like, you're trying to take their lunch, I guess. Right? We'll see how...  [00:09:06] not really. Thing about it, zillow is focused on primary market, right? Yeah. It's a much bigger market. Right. And, you know, investment, of course, 16% of the transactions are investment properties. [00:09:17] Right. But having said that, it's a huge market and there's lot of, you know, scope for growth because a lot of Americans still, you know, what they don't know about is there are specialized loan products that exist, you know, that can underwrite based on the rental income of the property. [00:09:32] So if I have a mortgage, I have a car loan, I think, okay, there's no way I can buy investment property. No one's going to give me a loan. I'm going to walk in my local bank or my local branch, and they're going to say, "okay, Jason, you know, what's your current mortgage? What's your car loan? Oh, you don't qualify based on your debt to income ratio." [00:09:49] They don't know that this specialized loan product called DSCR loan, which is debt service coverage ratio loan, where I'm qualifying you for the mortgage based on the rental income of that property versus your personal income. Right. So suddenly now you can build portfolio of hundred of investment properties because each property qualifies based on its own merit. [00:10:11] You buy one investment property, right? Rent covers mortgage from day one generates you cash flow. You wait three, four years, you gain equity in the property, do a cash out refinance, take that money to put down payment on other property. That property is cash positive from day one and the cycle repeats. [00:10:27] So if you're a smart investor can really help that first investment property, help you build a portfolio of investment property over 10 to 15 year period and build that generational wealth for you and your family. And people just don't know about it. And that's what we're trying to democratize.  [00:10:41] All right. [00:10:41] I love the idea. You know, we've leveraged a DSCR loan and it's nice because you don't have to give them all your personal info. You know, it doesn't matter how much debt you already have leveraged with properties you already have. So the rates are a little bit higher. [00:10:55] Right. But if you're able to cash flow it effectively, then I guess it doesn't matter.  [00:11:01] It doesn't matter. But also, I'll tell you, Jason, it's not that much higher either. No. If you think about an investment property loan from Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae conventional loans the rates are going to be higher than what you're going to pay for a 30 year fix it mortgage for a primary home. [00:11:14] Right. If you compare an investment property loan from an, from the jcs versus a DSCR loan, the rate difference you're talking about is 0.25%, or, you know, like, so it's not, it's very competitive.  [00:11:28] So. A lot of the people listening run property management companies. They've got a pool of investors. [00:11:33] These are their clients. How do they leverage  [00:11:37] HomeAbroad or Ziffy? That's a great question. Right? So we are also opening a marketplace for property managers, right? Because think about these foreign clients that are coming over to us, right? Think about domestic clients, right? A lot of these clients, you know, no one wants to be a landlord, as I mentioned earlier, right? [00:11:52] They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash. Right. And they don't want to take the day-to-day hassle of being a landlord. Right. Right. That's where property management comes in. Right. And if you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management. That's what we tell our clients. You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself. You got to get property management in, right? Yeah. And what we are doing is we are trying to, you know, open up a marketplace where, you know, foreign investors, of course, they have no idea about whom to work at in the US so they can connect to property managers in the US through a platform. [00:12:31] Right. But in addition. If you're a property manager and if you have clients who are looking for next investment and so forth, you can white label our Ziffy platform for your clients. Right, okay. To give them as your own tool. And if they come back to us, you know, for a mortgage, we give you a referral fee. [00:12:50] You know X, we give up to 40 to 50 basis point on the loan amount as their referral fee. So that could be not only you're servicing your clients, you're giving them tools to help them find their next investment, which by the way, you will end up managing as well. But you're also increasing your value prop by helping your client find the next investment and adding additional revenue stream to your overall portfolio, right? [00:13:12] So it's a win-win situation for everyone.  [00:13:15] So becomes absolutely profit center. Okay, so. And they can white label Ziffy. What about is the Ziffy and HomeAbroad databases, are these linked? Like, are these properties, because you know, I think a lot of property managers listening are like, "how can I get access to these foreign investors because I don't have that capability?" [00:13:32] They're linked. It's just the branding, right? Because for foreign investors, you know, we go with the brand name HomeAbroad, okay? And for domestic, of course, you know, HomeAbroad will not resonate with the US based customers, right? So that's where Ziffy comes in. And we are kind of actually actively going through a rebranding exercise where HomeAbroad will become powered by ziffy.ai. [00:13:52] You know, so at the end of the day, Ziffy is the overall umbrella brand, right? Ziffy.ai is our AI powered investment property search platform and HomeAbroad is the portion of Ziffy that's focused exclusively on foreign investors. But if you're part of our network, you get access to both clients, you get access to foreign investors, you get access to local investors. [00:14:13] Okay, perfect. So it sounds like property managers, if they're listed in this marketplace, it sounds like 1. You might be feeding them some free business from. Absolutely. HomeAbroad brand. Yep. They wouldn't be able to access otherwise. And they're able to support boots on the ground helping with the property locally. [00:14:32] Yep.  [00:14:33] And then they can also leverage Ziffy and do a white label thing for their existing clients and help get them and facilitate getting them into more property.  [00:14:41] Absolutely. Yep.  [00:14:42] Awesome. Okay, cool. Yeah that's very cool. So how does a property manager get into this marketplace?  [00:14:49] What are your qualifications? [00:14:51] So we of course, want to make sure that our clients are taken care of, you know, so we do initial vetting, just to understand, you know, you have the I would say capabilities and infrastructure to help service our clients. So everyone has a good positive experience, right? And then once we kind of have that initial meeting to vet you out, you will become part of our network. [00:15:10] We'll sign a good partnership agreement. You'll be part of the network and then, you know, you'll be listed prominently. If the customer is looking in that particular area, you know, you'll be listed prominently within that ecosystem. Now, good news is we are vertically integrated shop, right? [00:15:24] So client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, right? And you know, we know exactly when the customer, you know, is closing that transaction, right? So we will introduce the property manager at the right time. There's no point introducing a property manager right when they're starting their journey to find an investment property, right? [00:15:42] But as soon as they close on that transaction, we'll introduce the property manager. We will expose our, you know, marketplace to them and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property from our vacant property management, based in say, Phoenix, Arizona, or say, you know, Dallas, Texas, like wherever the client is, you know, closing that transaction. [00:16:03] Right. So, we'll kind of introduce you in the right you know, point in that journey to make sure that, you know, you have a high conversion as well.  [00:16:11] So how do you, at Ziffy and HomeAbroad, how do you determine which markets you want to be in and focus on?  [00:16:21] So the cool thing, Jason, you know, like as the customer decides for us, right? [00:16:24] We are operating in 43 states, right out of 50 states in the US right now, right there are of course hot markets, right? But you know, we let our algorithm, because now, it's data, right? We know the data. We know what's the expected rent, which is our for algorithm to calculate the expected rent across every plus property listed on the MLS right now for sale. What's your monthly mortgage payment is going to be? We are the mortgage shop. So we know what the monthly mortgage payment is going to be. Yeah. Rent minus mortgage is your cashflow. Right? So you can basically punch in those numbers and you say, okay, I want to generate $500 in cashflow every month. [00:16:59] Show me properties in entire us. Show me properties in Midwest us. Show me properties in California. Show me properties in Texas. Right? Whatever is your appetite, right? But you can kind of, you know, find that right investment property with right investment objective, you know, and I would say market agnostic. [00:17:16] Right? Yeah. Find that property and then say, okay, yeah, this makes sense, this doesn't make sense. And what we are adding to our AI layer. You can ask AI question, show me population growth trend in this area in the last five years. Show me rent you know, growth in this area in the last five years. [00:17:30] Show me you know, is this a landlord friendly state? You know, like our AI will help you basically California, evaluate that property.  [00:17:36] So basically, California's out. Florida and Texas are in, or?  [00:17:40] Yep. Yep. And that's what we see. That's what we see. You know, Florida and Texas are two hot markets. Yeah. [00:17:45] Midwest is really picking up, you know, because the property prices are lower, taxes are lower, rents are higher, right? So Midwest US is the new hot market from a rental standpoint Okay. Is what we are seeing a lot of fixed and player opportunities as well. But Florida and Texas continue to be two hot states, you know, from a rental property standpoint. [00:18:03] Got it. Okay. Now, these people that are, you know that they're global investors. They're around, you know, around the world. They're watching the news, they're seeing all this stuff that's going on in the us. I don't know what their perception is, but when they're watching all this, I'm sure that factors into their decision making in which states they want to be in. [00:18:23] Absolutely a hundred percent.  [00:18:25] So they're like, it does, I don't want to be in California. They look like they're crazy there and they're watching the news and they're seeing these, you know, sanctuary cities with homeless people everywhere. And then they're like looking at like areas where it's more conservative and there's like more freedom and more options. [00:18:41] Then they're like, maybe, maybe there. So perception, I would imagine affects where they're choosing to invest as well.  [00:18:49] Yeah, it totally does. Right? And what we tell our clients, you know, you got to think of real estate as a long-term investment game, right? For example, you know, the rhetoric around current administration, right? [00:19:00] From global investor standpoint, you know, like, do I really want to put my money in the US at this point? You know, what happens if like X happens? Y happens, right? And what we tell our investor, right? The basics why US, you know, is a good market for real estate investment has not changed, will not change, right? [00:19:15] It's going to be still remain a good market for US estate investment. The question is, where do you invest, right? And what are your objectives, right? You want to invest in a landlord friendly state, right? You want to invest in, in states with, you know, job growth, population growth, right? And you want to invest in state you know, in a market where you're getting good ROI on your cash investor, right? [00:19:36] And that's a function of, you know, appreciation and function of cash flow, right? That you're generating. Right. So until you have those data points figured out, right, you know, in long term it's going to be a viable investment. Right. And you're going to make money, right? Is what we tell our investors, right? [00:19:51] And when we explain them from that perspective, from that lens, you know, I have not seen someone that has said, okay, USDS investment is off my list. Right? Is something that just still motivates and drives them.  [00:20:04] Very cool. All right. I like it. And the best property managers, they're DoorGrow clients, like we help them figure out how to actually do a good job. [00:20:10] Most property managers suck in most markets. This is... absolutely, yeah. The admission of property managers, they're like, I get a room of property managers. I'm like, how many of you believe all your competitors suck or most of them do? And everyone's hands go up. And everybody that comes to me and says, "Hey, I'm thinking of starting a property management business." [00:20:27] I say, cool. And they tell me their story. It's they have investment properties and they tried property managers and most of them were terrible and they decided to finally start a good company. And so there's this issue. So yeah, maybe we should get all the DoorGrow clients getting into your marketplace. [00:20:43] So  [00:20:43] A hundred percent, you know. Let's talk about that a hundred percent.  [00:20:46] Alright, cool. Have you heard a Blanket, have you heard of these guys? Not really. So I think I should connect you to Lior over at Blanket. They've got a really cool platform as well, and I think there's some synergy. [00:20:59] They're basically like a retention platform. Okay. For property managers. They were one of our sponsors at DoorGrow live. And they've created a platform that allows their clients to see all of... they're basically a white label portal for all their clients to have their portfolios. And it allows them to keep the properties in their portfolio by helping them find and access other owners when that owner wants to sell. [00:21:25] Awesome. Okay. I think there'd be some awesome synergy between these two tools. Yeah. And I'm always making connections. You guys don't see this, those that are watching the podcast behind the scenes, I'm always trying to connect different vendors to each other when I see some synergy. So, but I think that might be a cool connection. [00:21:40] So, because I think what you're doing would work really nicely with that and it'd be a really cool synergistic thing. So we'll just get HomeAbroad, Ziffy, Blanket, DoorGrow, and then some other vendors, we'll just start stacking, we'll create Voltron. Yep. This ultimate, you know, superpower to help.  [00:21:57] This very exciting. [00:21:58] Hey you grow together. You know, that's how I've always believed. You know, you grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.  [00:22:06] Yeah, absolutely. So, well, I like what you're doing. What's the easiest way for a property manager to reach out? [00:22:14] Which of the websites should they go to? How do they start getting vetted so they can get into this marketplace? And is this like a free thing because they're providing value or do they pay to become part of the marketplace or how does that work?  [00:22:27] It's a free thing, right? They will be listed on a platform for free. [00:22:31] So it's a two way street, as I mentioned here, right? So we are going to pay a referral fee to our property manager partners, when they refer clients over to us, we're going to give them free tools to help facilitate that process and vice versa. You know, we'll collect a referral fee if our existing client signs up with them as well. [00:22:47] You know, it's a revenue stream for us too.  [00:22:48] So if let's say I have one of those clients that has, a bunch of connections in a particular country like Israel or China or something like this, would there be an advantage to them to leveraging HomeAbroad to facilitate that rather than having to figure out all this work themselves? [00:23:05] Absolutely. Absolutely. Because we are, as I said, you know, we are one stop shop, right? So say for example, you have an Israeli client that is just thinking about investing in US real estate, right? So what we do, we start. From setting up the LLC, right? If you are US based, you know, setting up an LLC, receiving an EIN is pretty easy, straightforward process, right? [00:23:23] If you're a foreign national who has doesn't have an SSN or an IT number, just getting an EIN number from a IRS, you know, you're talking about faxing, you're talking about mailing, you're talking about six months, six to eight weeks to get, you know, your number in mail. Now, you know, we kind of have developed that expertise in this segment so we can get an EIN and with an analysis set for a foreign national not living in the US within a week. Right. Wow. We can help them open a US bank account while they're in their home country. Right. Of course, you know, we'll need the US Bank account as part of the mortgage process, but also they will need a US bank account to manage their property, right. [00:23:58] When they invest in the US market, right? We can, of course, financing for Foreign National, which is our bread and butter, right? So we help them with 75% LTV or 75% leverage to purchase an investment property in the US. So they only need to put 25% down payment on that investment property, as I mentioned, we don't look for any US history. [00:24:18] We don't look for trade lines or create history from their home country as well. It's a pretty straightforward process for foreign nationals. You know, all we are looking for is, you know, they have enough assets to close, which is 25% down payment plus closing costs. Right? And if the appraisal comes in right where we want it to be, right. [00:24:36] So whether they meet the ratio or the DSCR ratio where rent covers mortgage, right? Even if it does not, we have a sub ratio DSCR program for them. So one way or the other. You know, we'll be able to do the loan just based on the property's income versus considering their personal income or assets in their home country. [00:24:52] Right? So we covered them right from helping setting up an LLC you know, opening US bank account mortgage financing, connecting them with a local realtor, which is not just any realtor, but a realtor with CIPS, which is certified International Property Specialty Designation by now. Right. So they have gone through specialized training to work with foreign national, global investors, right? [00:25:13] And then property management connections, you know, through a marketplace, right? So we are kind of one stop shop for everything that foreign national would need to do to invest in the US real estate.  [00:25:23] Interesting. So here's another random idea that comes up. And I don't know if this even relates, maybe this is just completely out of left field, but occasionally I get clients that they've come from a foreign country to the US. [00:25:36] And in order to, you know, to immigrate and to become integrated in the US, they have to start a business. And so they will buy a franchise sometimes, which usually in this industry, buying a property major franchise, I'm pretty outspoken about that. I think it's generally a bad idea. I get a lot of franchisees coming to me that have struggled like, you know, a gal that came, bought into a franchise, she's already invested $100k into this and the franchise gave her poor strategy and she only has one unit under management and she's $100k in and over half a year in invested into this. And she's like, you know, concerned and freaking out. I've got another client, he's immigrated from the uk. [00:26:16] He's built a property management business. They both built their business in Florida, by the way. Nice. So the land of freedom and humidity. So is there some sort of advantage for some of these people that are overseas also? They're like, "you know what? I like the idea of investing in, you know, the US but I want to be in the US." [00:26:37] Is there a way that they could build a business leveraging this and could that be something that is facilitated as well?  [00:26:45] Yeah, that's a great question, Jason. You know, and something like a lot of, you know, foreign clients ask us, right? So I'll give you a two part answer to this question, right? [00:26:52] One, if you are part of E3D countries, right? So US has a E3D, you know, with I think UK, Japan you know, Australia, Canada, and the few other countries on that list, right? Yeah. So if you're part of one of these countries where the, where you have a E3D you know, with the US you get a visa called E2 Visa. [00:27:12] E2 Visa, where, you know, where you can start a business in the us, get that visa to come manage the business. And a lot of our clients in from these countries would start up LLC to manage two to three properties. Show that okay, they're managing a real estate business. Right. To kind of get that E2 visa, right? [00:27:29] And so it's a great way for them to not only build you know, a profitable business in the US right? And kind of benefit from the US estate investment, but then also, you know, try get a residency visa, you know, based on this business. Property management kind of falls under the same aspect as well. [00:27:46] Okay? Then other countries which are not part of the E3D, where you have something called an EV5 Visa, which is you know, which were one of the key differences is that you have to show that you generate 10 employments and invested at least around a million dollars in the US to generate those employments. [00:28:03] Now that is where, you know, it becomes a little bit trickier, right? Because you know, you have to show that you brought that money in, you putting that money in real estate qualifies. Right. But the the important aspect is creation of 10 jobs. You have to show that you've created 10 jobs through that investment, you know, for that purposes. [00:28:21] If you buy, you know, like 10 properties or buy a multifamily unit and you know, you have a property management around it that employs 10 people to take care of it, technically it qualifies. Right. You can also you know, buy a hotel, you know, buy 2 commercial property that employs, you know, 10 people to kind of, you know, to qualify on the, that, that visa rule. [00:28:44] Right? But again, you know, you're talking about a million dollar investment. You know, from your end, you know, which is not, you know, applicable for everyone, right? Yeah. So there are a couple of ways, right? But for E2 Visa, you know, it becomes really easy, right? Because that job requirement criteria is not there. [00:28:59] You have to show that it's a functional business. It's an active business, which could be a real estate business, right? And it becomes, the qualification becomes a little bit easier on from that perspective.  [00:29:09] Got it. Okay. Interesting. If you run into these people, we should totally be homies and... [00:29:15] absolutely. [00:29:15] If you run these people one of the things we're really brilliant at DoorGrow is helping people avoid all the mistakes they make when they get their business started. We help them clean. We're like bar rescue for property managers, as I said in the intro. And for startups, we're ideal. [00:29:29] We help them avoid all the pitfalls of the franchises. We help them come up with their own brand, their own website. We help them build out their hiring process. We help them make sure they get good people, like we help optimize the business and get the right systems and installed. And so we really are like the ultimate franchise alternative. [00:29:46] And I've just gotten tired of seeing the franchises hurting people. And so my mission. Is to get people to sign up with DoorGrow instead of going to these franchises and set ourselves up as a franchise alternative because we can help them get going with a lot less cash involved and a lot more help. [00:30:05] And and then we can help them give them real strategies for growing their portfolios. And it sounds like this might be a really nice addition to any of my client's strategies for growth is to leverage HomeAbroad because they would love to have people that are hands off. Yeah. In another country trusting you to just take care of stuff that, that's a easy, no-brainer type of client they would love to have. [00:30:25] Yeah, absolutely. Jason, and we should talk after this podcast. We'll talk, you know, this. I think there's a lot of synergies.  [00:30:31] Okay. Very cool. So, well, what else should property managers or investors listen to the show know about HomeAbroad or Ziffy that we haven't covered? Or what questions do people tend to ask that they're concerned about? [00:30:45] Yeah, I think, you know, one of the things, you know, that we also advise our clients, right? You know, it's not about, you know, property management eating into my cash flow, right? Because that's something that we see, you know, people concerned about, or people you know, like want to kind of, you know, want to do it by themselves because they want to make sure they maximize their cash flow, right? [00:31:05] But what we tell our clients, you know, at the end of the day, you got to think of it as a business, right? And what's your net return and how do you value your time? Right. What's the hourly rate that you assign to yourself, right? And what would else you'd be doing if you're not managing five properties on your own? [00:31:21] Right? That's an opportunity cost, right? So think about this more from an opportunity cost standpoint versus, you know, okay, it's eating into my cashflow because that opportunity cost can help you buy five more properties, right? That can, you know, overall amplify your return on your cash invested versus nickel and diming, you know, the money that you're trying to save, right? [00:31:42] And you know, when we kind of, you know, talk to them about your, their ROI return cash, we want them to kind of consider this as an expense that goes into it. Because at the end of the day, even though we are not the property management providers, right, we partner with your clients, so to speak, Jason, right? [00:31:58] We are trying to do what's in best interest of that client in order to build that real estate investment portfolio. Right. So that's something that, you know, just want to reiterate to you, to the listeners of your podcast. Right. Why partner with us? You know, because that's something that we inherently, you know, advise our clients, you know, and we position property management as one of the pillars, they need to really succeed to build a successful real estate investment portfolio. [00:32:22] So you kind of insulate, because I know there's some property managers listening and they're like, man, some of these foreign investors are such cheapos. They're like so cheap and they complain about everything and they're really difficult. You kind of insulate them from that. Yep. With your organization and you know, and property management really, yeah. It is a no brainer. I mean, there's a lot of properties that a lot of these investors on their own probably wouldn't even accurately raise rent. And so if they didn't raise rent over the last two to three years, for example, they're probably 10% below market rate anyway. And so if the property manager just kept rent where it actually is in the marketplace, the property management basically is free. [00:33:01] Yeah, it pays for itself. Hundred percent. It's a no brainer. And so, yeah, I think the biggest mistake investors can make period, if you're an investor listening to the show, is to not use a property manager, a good one. Because there are bad ones. But if you can find a good one, that is the biggest game changer because it takes all the work off your plate and you make just as much money. [00:33:22] Absolutely. And another thing for your listeners, Jason, right. You'd be surprised how few people know about the specialized loan products for DSCA investor, right? So if your client is with you managing one property and is thinking in my head, oh, I already have a mortgage in my primary, I have another investment property here. [00:33:38] No way in the world I can buy another investment property. It's an education gap. It's a knowledge gap, right? Yeah. So they can help educate and that's where like and HomeAbroad comes in. because we will educate them on your behalf. You know, you retain the relationship, you retain your brand, right? We'll white label it, but like not only show them properties that will give them their next cashflow investment. [00:33:58] But also educating them, okay, for this loan to qualify, I don't need to see your debt to income ratio. I'm going to qualify based on that property's income. And you know, the only upfront cost is an appraisal cost, right? But us being the mortgage shop, you know, vetting that, okay, this property gives you cash flow, or from a conservative standpoint, it's good for you at the end of the day because you know, you won't invest if the property is not cashflow policy from day one, right? [00:34:24] So something that people don't know, you know, and there's a gap there.  [00:34:27] Yeah, we've had some lenders on talking about DSCR loans in the past, and yeah, a lot of people just aren't aware of it as an option. Yeah. So property managers, if they can have a partner like yourself to, you know, educate them on these alternate sources of funding and methods of getting cash to invest in real estate. [00:34:46] Yeah, it's going to open up the door. Not only that, but I like the idea of those because it kind of creates this veil of protection. So it's not an asset in your name if there ever is a liability with the rental property. Absolutely. They don't even know who the owner is. It's an entity and there's kind of a shield there of protection. [00:35:05] And so there's some additional advantages to going that route as well.  [00:35:09] So, absolutely. And like majority of our clients request the title in an LLC. What's the reason that you just mentioned you always need to have that, you know, protection around you in a litigation rich country, so. [00:35:21] Got it. Cool.  [00:35:22] Well, hey, I think this is a really awesome idea Amresh. It's great to have you on the DoorGrow Show. Any parting words or how can people get in touch and how can they find out more?  [00:35:32] Sure. You know, so if you're a property management company, you can get them in touch with us at partner@homeabroadinc.com or partner@ziffy.ai. [00:35:42] You know, my personal email address is amresh.singh@homeabroadinc.com. You can shoot me an email as well. Website is HomeAbroadinc.com for HomeAbroad and Ziffy.ai for our Ziffy brand. Okay.  [00:35:56] Awesome. Alright, thanks so much for coming to the show. So those of you listening, if you've ever felt stuck or stagnant, you want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com. [00:36:07] Also, be sure to join our free community just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. We reject 60 to 70% of the people that apply to join that group. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it all alone, so let's grow together. [00:36:30] Bye everyone.

If you are still doing sales the old-fashioned way in your property management business, or selling the same way you sold 5-10 years ago, you are likely struggling to add doors right now In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull shares his current model of sales and the sales strategies working for him right now. You’ll Learn [02:26] Generating and Nurturing Leads [09:08] The Discovery Phase [14:39] Creating a Sense of Urgency [20:45] The Golden Bridge Formula Quotables “You want to be careful about the type of leads that you're getting on because it actually can limit your growth and hurt your growth.” “There's very few people searching for property management online and the biggest companies are already spending tons of money on that.” “So I want them to be clear on the problem because if they're not clear on the problem, and I'm not clear on the problem, then there's no point.” “There's always a motivator that's driven them to action.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] I've made millions and millions of dollars, right, doing sales. I've made millions of dollars and it's because I believe in what I do and I love being able to help people and being able to help people and get paid to do it almost feels like cheating, right? [00:00:15] I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. We are the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. [00:00:31] At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace entire teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses, built websites for hundreds more than that, and we run the leading property management Mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. [00:01:16] At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now, let's get into the show. Alright, so what are we talking about today? [00:01:36] This is the first day in a while that I don't have a guest and I don't have Sarah to be on the show with me. So this is just me getting to talk about whatever I want to talk about. By myself. So Sarah is actually flying right now. She has a pilot's lesson. She's working on getting her pilot's license, which is just super awesome, very proud of her, and she's just a badass. [00:01:57] Anyone that knows her, like she just achieves, achieves, achieves. All right, so. What I wanted to talk about today is I just got done with a sales call and I was thinking, what should I talk about on today's podcast that would be really interesting? And I thought maybe some of you would like to know how does Jason sell? [00:02:17] How would he sell to me if I actually ended up getting on a call with him? How does sales go with Jason, like how does DoorGrow do sales? So let me tell you a bit about some of our processes. Okay? So sales includes the first three functions of business, which is lead generation, nurturing those leads, and converting those leads. [00:02:39] So let's start at the beginning and I think you're going to hopefully get some really strong value out of this. And I'll tell you how I sell, some of the things I would say. What I would ask, I'm going to give you a little bit of a quick masterclass on how does DoorGrow do sales? How do we do this? [00:02:55] Okay? All right, so let's talk about this. Very beginning, lead generation. So how are we getting leads? Well, at DoorGrow, we're getting leads from a lot of different channels, a lot of sources. We're doing everything from paid Facebook ads to I do this podcast, and some of these are more nurture tools, like this podcast is more nurture, that second stage, it kind of warms people up, gets people familiar. We're doing short form video. We're doing long form video. We're doing lots and lots of different stuff, right? YouTube... what else are we doing for lead gen? Also, I have three setters currently that they will do about a hundred dials a day, calling colder leads, leads that are in our system. [00:03:40] Maybe you will get a call from them at some point. And they will probably have maybe only about 10 conversations out of all those a hundred in a day, maybe even less because there's a lot of voicemails, a lot of people don't answer, you know, whatever, receptionist. So they'll have like maybe 10 or less conversations, and out of those, they'll usually get one appointment booked a day. [00:04:04] Those are kind of their stats. If they're doing at least that, then we don't fire them. Right? That's the idea. So we've got three setters. They're really great right now. We're about to add a fourth and we may continue to just add setters because we have a lot of people that they could be reaching out to. [00:04:19] So that's kind of the idea. So, they're just filling up my calendar right now. And in the past I've had sales teams, I've had closers, I've had people that would you know, do the calls, but right now I'm doing the sales calls, so if you know, pretty close to hearing this podcast, reach out. [00:04:36] You may actually end up talking directly with me. I talk with basically every single client that joins our program, gets to talk with me and there's some filters. So what happens is the setters do these dials, they schedule these appointments. Some of these appointments end up being with themselves, not with me. [00:04:51] The appointment is with the setter to qualify them, but if they're already qualified, and so this is the first stage is we do cold outreach. Then the next stage is qualification in sales. So the goal is for them to figure out: are these people that could maybe afford our program? There's the financial qualification. [00:05:09] Are they people that maybe do they have a property management business? Is it a type of property management business that maybe we could help? because not every vertical or every type of business may need help growing. Or do they need help with systems and most any property management business, we could help with that side. [00:05:24] So they're trying to figure out like are they qualified? Are they somebody that maybe could use us, that maybe we could help? And do they have enough revenue or just enough money set aside that they can maybe afford to do our program. Otherwise, I end up on a lot of calls with people that are broke, think our stuff's awesome, they can't afford to do anything, and they're starting a business or something like that. [00:05:46] Right. So that's qualification. If they're qualified during that initial quick call that they'll do with one of my setters. And sometimes I call that a fit call or a qualification call or whatever it might be. If they do that call and things go well, then the goal during that call is to book them on a next call. [00:06:06] If they just do that during their first cold interaction or cold call, they qualify the person and ask these questions. And then one of the qualifications that we do is we want to ask, what would lower your stress more as a business owner now? Would it be adding more doors? Another a hundred, 200 doors and more money? Or would it be getting your systems team and processes more dialed in so you felt comfortable adding more doors? What would help you out personally as a business owner. And so based on that answer, then my setters will send you a free training. [00:06:38] They'll send you an email. "I would love to send you this free training," and it helps you understand something that is about lead generation or something that's about process, the process myth. Basically we're breaking down two myths people believe at these stages, the leads myth. "I just need more leads," which you might be thinking if you need to grow and it's not accurate. You might think you need more leads, but we'll explain that and we'll send you free training. Just say, "Hey team, give me the leads training" on any of my social media. I want to see it. And if you want to see that, you can just go to doorgrow.com/leads and you should be able to get to that training and watch that. And that explains why you don't just need more leads and not all leads are equal. And you want to be careful about the type of leads that you're getting on because it actually can limit your growth and hurt your growth. And some leads are really expensive and it's not worth it, or you're losing money, et cetera. [00:07:28] Right. And I explain and break down why most marketing doesn't work, why you don't need to do SEO or pay per click or content marketing or paper lead or social media marketing or any of this kind of stuff to grow your property management business because there's very few people searching for property management online and the biggest companies are already spending tons of money on that. [00:07:47] So I break that all down in that leads training. Otherwise, if it's systems and team, and that's usually more like 200 door plus companies. If you're growing fast, maybe you hit that a little prematurely, like around 150 or something like that, or you break a hundred. But this is where you need team, hiring, systems, processes. [00:08:04] And most people when they get stuck in that stage of 200 to 400 doors, I call the second sand trap. The first sand trap is under a hundred doors. Right? You can't break that a hundred door barrier because you don't really know how to grow and you're taking on too many crappy doors and you get caught in the cycle of suck, et cetera. If you grow past, you get maybe into that 200 to 400 door range, usually then you're stuck because you've built a team around the business and not around yourself, which means you aren't supported. You are working harder the more people you add and the more doors you add. It takes more time and there's more questions and you're getting more stressed instead of less, which means you're doing it wrong. [00:08:42] And so I explain in that the process myth that everybody thinks, "I just need more processes, I just need more KPIs, I need more control, I need to squeeze more blood from the stone, and that will always keep you usually below four or 500 units. I don't see people break 500, 600 units unless they get good culture. [00:09:01] They like go through a lot of pain in figuring out hiring and we can help you collapse time on all of that significantly. Okay, so after that, we will send you one of those trainings and then usually my goal or hope is that you watch one of these trainings, you understand. It disrupts your current thinking, helps you see what the real problems and issues are, and then you make better decisions and you don't go waste a bunch of money with a bunch of marketing companies that exist out there and advertisers that are targeting property managers that people spend a lot of money on, don't get a lot of ROI on, and then come to us a year or two later saying, man, I've spent a lot of money and I haven't added lot of doors from that. Where have you gotten most of your doors? Word of mouth or other warm channels, things we focus on with clients. So you watch those trainings, you get on a call then with me, they'll get you scheduled for a call with me. And then I usually will do, it's usually an hour call, spend an hour, and I spend probably 90% of it asking questions. The last call I was on the. This lady said she had been you know, following me for like six years. I'm like, okay, why now? And so I go through a series of asking questions. [00:10:13] There's the beginning is like, you know, first I go through kind of connecting with them. I want to figure out what their current problem is. Why were they willing to get on a call? What's happened? I want to then figure out their current situation. What are you currently doing about whatever this problem is? Like about growth or adding doors, you know, in this particular case, she said, nothing. [00:10:32] I haven't really focused on this. I've just been getting business these other ways. So I understand the situation. How's your business set up? Sometimes people have a bad split with a broker. Like I'm always digging in. I want to understand their whole business, how it's set up so that I can figure out if I can help them because I see a lot of different problems. So I'm pretty aware of a lot of problems that are pretty common with startups. I'm pretty clear on a lot of problems at all the various stages in property management. You know, first sand trap, second sand trap, and all the other little milestones of transition in between those and everything else. [00:11:04] So. I want to figure out what their current situation is. Where are they? Can I maybe help them? And so then I need to get them aware of their own problems. So I ask questions to help them become aware of their problem. You know? Do you like your current process or what you're doing now? Sounds like things going pretty well. [00:11:20] Is there anything you would maybe change? Or maybe in the results you're getting or how you could, or what do you mean by this? How long has this been a problem? What's causing this problem? What impact is this having? Right? So I get into all these questions. And then the next stage I usually get into what sort of ideal future? So now they're clear on the problem. I've helped them, maybe even I'll reflect back emotionally. Like it sounds like this is really stressful, or it sounds like this is affecting your marriage negatively, or it sounds like whatever. So I reflect back emotion. So I want them to be clear on the problem because if they're not clear on the problem, and I'm not clear on the problem, then there's no point. Right? I can't help them. But I need them to be clear on the problem, so I ask questions to help them get clarity on that. Then I'll ask questions to figure out what do they want? What's the ideal outcome? [00:12:05] What's the ideal solution? If we were to work together for a year, where would they be hopefully? Like what do they want? And so I want to see if I can help them get out of the pain they're in now, and if they're aware of it, and then I want them to become aware of their desire or their goal, some positive future state that I can maybe help them get to. [00:12:24] And then I want to figure out, get into commitment and urgency. So I want to figure out why are you reaching out now? If you've known about this for a while or why now, is this a priority? Sounds like you've had the business for many years. There's always a motivator that's driven them to action. So I want them to be conscious of why it matters to do this now, because that creates a sense of urgency. [00:12:46] I found for a while when I wasn't doing this that I'd talk to people and they would love what we have, and they're like, this sounds amazing, and it would really help me grow, but they didn't connect in their brain why it needed to happen now, and they weren't aware of their pain and they weren't aware of what they wanted, and so there was no urgency. [00:13:03] They're like, yeah, maybe I'll do that in a few months. Or someday. And so I was like, but this is so like helpful and you really need this. But they didn't see it. And I assumed everyone understood their problem. Everybody understood their positive future they wanted. because I usually have pretty strong clarity around this stuff, but most people don't. [00:13:20] So I'm going to ask you, and I'm going to help you get clear. I'm not really trying to sell you, I'm trying to help you figure out what you want and then see if maybe you want what I can maybe help you with. So I get them clear on their ideal outcomes and solution, and I create this positive alternate future with them. [00:13:40] Then I go back to commitment urgency. Why now? You don't have to do this now, so why not put it off? And then they'll tell me they find a reason why it matters to do it now. Well, it's like, what's the main reason for doing this now? Like, you've been aware of us for a long time, six years, you know, or you've been listening to my podcast for a year. [00:13:59] Why now are you doing this? And when I ask why now? It's a powerful sales question. I get some crazy answers. I had one client say, "my fiance passed away a month ago. He would want me to do this," right? Or I've had somebody say, "I have cancer and I need to get this business ready so my wife can take over it because I'm not going to be around much longer." I mean, serious stuff comes out that I never would've known. And I'm like, what's motivating you to do this now? Why does this matter now? And if I'm aware of that, then I can be even more empathetic. I can, you know, understand where they're coming from. And once I get clear on that, then I want to get into consequence. [00:14:39] We've already built up positive alternate reality. Right? Now I want to get into the negative current path they're on, like what's the consequence? Because the consequence is going to be that they don't get this positive future that they're hoping for, right? If they just keep doing this on their own, they'll have more of what they've had in the past. [00:14:58] So usually I get into questions like, what happens if you don't achieve this goal? You said you wanted to achieve X in the next 12 months. What happens if you don't make that? Or what happens if this continues? You don't end up working with us or any other coach or anyone else. And it just continues. [00:15:14] Because if they're not willing to explore failure or a negative future, they're not going to be motivated to take action now. I asked one gentleman this on a sales call after going through all of this, he was really stressed, but he didn't see it. He probably would've continued doing it forever. [00:15:29] You know, he was really stressed and I said, well, after getting clear on his stress and all this, I said, how much longer do you think you could deal with this? He's like, honestly, now that I'm thinking about it, I think I can handle another 30 days and then I'm going to just quit this business and I'm out. [00:15:45] I was like, whoa, that's, that sounds really serious. He's like, yeah, I'm just burnt out. And when you help people get clarity, they can't tolerate it anymore. They're like, I'm done. I don't want this anymore. I want out now. I want to solve this now. Right? Amazon now, give me Amazon things right now, like people get impatient when they recognize there is an alternate, there is a path, there is something else, or they're clear, oh, I am dealing with a problem. [00:16:08] I've just been so comfortable in it. It's kind of like that frog in the water that's warming up a little bit, but you could boil the frog and it won't jump out because it just gets so comfortable that eventually it's cooked, right? You've been in your business so long, you don't even maybe see it until somebody asks you or creates contrast. [00:16:24] Says, well, where are you at now? Where will you be in the future positively if you get help? And where will you be negatively in the future? So this is where we get into the consequence, and then once they're clear on that, then I get into the presentation. Right? And so this is like 90% of the call. The last call I was on like the majority of the whole hour with like maybe the last 13 minutes or something, I got into what some would call the pitch, right? The presentation. I'm like, well, based on what you've told me so far and what challenges that you're having, what we're doing might be a good fit for you. And here's how our program works. Here's what it costs. I usually go over pricing first. [00:17:03] I don't hold that out. I don't try and keep the price a secret. And so let me give you all the value first and then spring the price on you and hope you like it. I'm like, here's what we cost. Here's the pricing, we've got these levels. I think this would make the most sense. This level would make the most sense for you. [00:17:18] Here's what it costs. And based on what you've told me you know, how you're dealing with this particular issue you had mentioned this problem that's stressing you out. Well, we would do this thing and this would be relevant. And so I usually pick three things. And the other thing that I will do is before I go into pricing or anything, I just throw the tug of war rope. This is not a competition where I'm trying to get something from them and they're trying to not do the sale and do the deal with me. Like most salespeople think it's like an adversarial, I got to manipulate them. I throw them the entire tug of war rope. I'm like, here's everything. [00:17:53] And the way I do that is like we use offer documents. So I give them an offer document that has all the details of our program, it has everything. It has a video explaining the offer doc at the top. It has a commercial talking about the benefits of video on that. It has a list of all of the problems that people are dealing with related to this, so it really stings and connects with their problem. It then talks about all the benefits and it lists out all the benefits of people doing that particular level of our program, which usually is exactly what they're hoping for. [00:18:26] Then it gets into our DoorGrow code roadmap and our testimonial videos. It has a link to that. We have more than any other coach or consultant in the industry. And then it has our DoorGrow code roadmap I mentioned, which shows the path and shows where they're at. And it shows, it's like a magic cold read where they can see where their problems are now and what they're dealing with at the door level and revenue level they're at. [00:18:47] And so we have that DoorGrow code roadmap. Then it has a list of everything included in the program. Here's what you get. Three weekly group coaching calls, one related to our rapid revamp where we rebrand, do your website, clean up your business, change your pricing, optimize, put you into a three tier hybrid pricing model. [00:19:04] Like we just, we clean up the whole business, like bar rescue for property managers, right? And then it goes into how we do a call and you get a website and like all the stuff that we do. Our jumpstart session where you meet with us in person at the beginning all of that. I usually start though by saying, here's the offer document, scroll to the bottom where it says investment, and this is where it has the pricing. [00:19:27] And let me go over that real quick with you. So I go over that first, then I go through the offer document and I say, and it lists everything included in the program. There's a lot. Let me make this really simple. because anything other than what you need is a distraction. You don't need everything, especially not right now. [00:19:45] Let's keep it simple on three things. And I focus on the three things that I think they need most to move the needle and solve whatever current challenge they're dealing with. Whether it's getting more business, more leads or getting their systems or team or doing some hiring or whatever, depending on the offer doc, depending on the challenge. [00:20:04] So I go over three things. I'm like, these are the three things. Does that sound like what you're looking for? And do you think that might help? Right? So this is where I'm getting commitment. Does everything make sense? Do you feel like this could help you get from point A to point B where you're wanting to go? And they're like, yeah, this sounds great. [00:20:22] If they say, well, I think so. I say, cool, what would make you a hundred percent? Like what? What do you need? What else do you need? Or what questions do you have? And so then they might bring up some objections. They might bring up some objections or some challenges. But usually at this point, because I've done all of this, there's very few objections. [00:20:42] There's almost nothing. because the main objection is trust. One of the things that I try to do, by the way, that I teach clients to do during the sales process is what I call the Golden Bridge Formula. I explain to them why I do what I do. So my Golden Bridge formula is my personal why. I connect it to my business why. I connect that then to their why. And there's a little more detail to it than that. But in interest of time, I'm helping them understand my motive. And my motive isn't just to get their money. That's the default assumption in sales. I let them know there's a lot of ways I can make money a lot faster off property managers just selling them what they think they need, but instead. [00:21:21] I really want to help people, and my motive is the reason I have DoorGrow. The reason I exist and live my life is I want to inspire others to love true principles. That's my personal why statement, and what that means is I love figuring out what works, sharing it with others. I would do that for free, for fun. [00:21:38] I'm sharing with all of you for free for fun right now because I love doing this and I've made, you know, millions and millions of dollars, right, doing sales. I've made millions of dollars and it's because I believe in what I do and I love being able to help people and being able to help people and get paid to do it almost feels like cheating, right? [00:21:59] Like, I get to benefit people and love what I get to do, and they pay me for that? But that's the way business should always work, right? So I love getting to do what I get to do and our why statement of DoorGrow is to transform property management business owners and their businesses. And so we legitimately, everyone on my team, we believe in helping our clients. [00:22:18] We want to see them win and succeed. Like you don't see it behind the scenes, but we are celebrating. A client sends us like a telegram message saying their wins. Then we're like, yay, look at this. And we share it with each other and we're like, yay, we love that. And we're like, cool. Get a testimony video from that person. [00:22:33] Like, we, your wins are our wins. We want you to win. Our interests are in alignment. This is our why at DoorGrow. And so DoorGrow basically is this golden bridge. That allows you, as a client of ours to get what you want and allows me as a business owner and my team members that love the role that they're in to get what they want out of life. [00:22:53] So there's strong alignment for desires. It's a win-win, win for everybody and that you can trust. That's motive. And so we teach our clients to do that as well. So at some point, I usually share that. You'll see me share it in the leads training. You'll see it shared in our process, myth training and all the other trainings that we have. [00:23:11] Every webinar I do, every podcast I go on, I am relating my Golden Bridge formula typically. And so, that's basically it. There won't be very many objections at that point. They're like, yes, this could help me, but I'll deal with whatever objections there are. And then I say, cool. What do you think the next steps might be? Are you ready to get going on this now? Would that be appropriate? And then I send them a quote with a payment agreement. They sign that. That authorizes payment, then they make the payment, initiate that it. Takes a few days to go through, which is why we do a payment agreement. [00:23:46] There's no contract, no term limit. We don't make people stay for a year or commit to a year. We like clients that want to work with us forever, and our goal is to help support you through every stage of growth forever. But we do not force clients to stay with us. [00:24:00] We make money If you are making money. We want it to be a win-win, and so we have people sign to authorize a payment agreement, get them started, and then we get them right away into DoorGrow Academy. And then we have an amazing onboarding process. We have them come out and hang out with us for a day in Austin doing what we call jumpstart session. [00:24:18] Go deep in their business and usually, if they have enough doors, it's easy, we can optimize or add a maybe sometimes $10 a unit or reduce expenses by a handful of dollars per unit. And we can usually pay for the program on a monthly basis residually. It's already paid for. So we work that magic from the beginning. [00:24:38] So that's basically our sales process. And if they don't sign the agreement right away or they're not ready during that call and they're like, I got to get funds together, then my setters will work that deal. because they set it up, they're responsible to help me move that deal forward and they get a piece of that sales commission. [00:24:59] We'll pay them. So they're incentivized. So they're following up and doing the follow up and getting them on another follow up call with me to deal with things or meet with their spouse or their business partner or whatever it takes to move, help them feel safe, comfortable, and move the deal forward. [00:25:12] Maybe give them trainings to watch so they know what we're all about or how we do what we do and stuff like that. So, and that's it. And we just move them forward. So that's our current process for doing what we do. We basically do coaching calls. That's really what I'm doing is I'm just asking a lot of questions to help them get clarity, which is what coaching is. [00:25:32] And they get to experience that we care. They get to experience empathy. They get to experience clarity. We give them trainings so they get to experience some education, some learning, which poisons the well against most alternatives and most of our competitors' strategies that they're trying to sell. [00:25:48] Because our stuff's better. And that's basically what we do. So hopefully you learn something valuable from this that you can apply to your process for sales. And if you really want to learn to get great at selling, I have training material on all of these things. We have training material on how to identify your golden bridge, how to get clarity on your personal why, how to create the right pitch. [00:26:12] I talk about my four phases of selling. I talk about the different stages of questions to take them through during that pitch stage and like all of this stuff in detail and we have pricing secrets and branding secrets and website secrets and all these different training material in DoorGrow Academy. [00:26:30] And so if you found this helpful or interesting and would like to just really get your business growing and are tired of doing it all on your own. Reach out to us at doorgrow.com. So if you felt stuck stagnant, you want to take your business to the next level, that's reach out to us.  [00:26:49] Also, you can join our free Facebook community. It's just for property management business owners. Everybody helps each other out in there. You know, so it's an easy place to ask questions and feel supported. It's just for business owners. We reject 60, 70% of the applicants that try to join. You have to be a property management business owner or starting one. [00:27:07] And that's at doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. Make my day. I'd appreciate it. Reciprocate. Like give something back and we would love that. Thank you so much. And until next time remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. [00:27:30] Bye everyone. 

Recently, Sarah was working with a BDM (salesperson) who believed she was ready to hire a sales setter to help with some of the sales outreach and follow up. In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull discuss how to know when you need to hire a sales setter and things you can do to increase your sales volume without one. You’ll Learn [00:43] The Importance of Having Sales Metrics and Data  [05:45] Setting Your Salesperson Up for Success [07:57] More Volume = More Results [09:47] The Two Main Components of Sales Quotables “There are certain things that we're gauging all the time in our business, but I think sales has to be probably number one.” “ You have a BDM and they're good at sales and you have them doing anything other than sales, you are making a very stupid mistake because that's the lifeblood of the business.” “Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results.” “If something's not working, you just got to not tolerate it.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: I bet you, you can just get more results by doing more work, which means stop doing the other things that you're doing. [00:00:05] Sarah: Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results. And then you can probably don't even need to pay a setter. [00:00:12] Jason: We are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. And we're going to keep this episode a little brief, so I'm going to skip some of our intro. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. [00:00:31] Jason: We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change the perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show.  [00:00:41] Jason: Alright. What are we chatting about today?  [00:00:43] Sarah: Alright. I wanted to talk about this just because I think it happens a lot in business and we have to just kind of gauge, right? So there are certain things that we're gauging all the time in our business, but I think sales has to be probably number one. So one of our clients had asked me last week on the scale call she's a BDM, so she does all the sales and she said, "Hey, we are actually thinking about hiring an appointment setter. And they will kind of help with a lot of the outbound calls and you know, the follow up and the scheduling and you know, rescheduling any appointments and just kind of like staying on top of things and making sure that everything is being tracked and, you know, moving forward and doing a whole bunch of outbound calls." [00:01:36] Sarah: That's really what setters do is they just sit and call all day long. Yeah. So she says, "yeah, we're thinking about hiring this sales setter, and I want to know what you think about it." So the first thing I did is I was like, okay, if you actually need a sales setter, then like, here's the Rdoc and that's great. [00:01:56] Sarah: Like, we would hire a sales setter...  [00:01:58] Jason: which is a job description for those unfamiliar.  [00:02:00] Sarah: Yes. So we would hire a sales setter the same way that we would hire A BDM. Mm-hmm. I always recommend going through the DoorGrow Hiring process, but before we really dig into the hiring piece is we should first figure out is this actually something that you need right now? [00:02:16] Sarah: So one of the tools that we have for our clients in our client workbook is a sales tracker, and I happened to pull up the sales tracker for them just out of curiosity. And lucky for me, she had actually filled it out. So my one recommendation is for whoever is doing sales, and if it's multiple people, then that's fine. Multiple people need to then fill out the sales tracker. So fill out the sales tracker at the end of every single day. This is like your end of day report.  [00:02:42] Sarah: If you have two BDMs, then they both need to be doing it. If you have a, BDM and a setter, they both need to be doing it. It doesn't matter. [00:02:50] Sarah: Every single sales person needs to be filling out and submitting their own data and metrics. So I said, well, let me look through your sales tracker. Now, she did not have it filled out consistently every day. There were some days that she had it filled out. There were some days that were not filled out. [00:03:07] Sarah: And then there were some days that had pretty solid data, and there were some days that had like, you know, "I did three to four hours," or "I did, you know, six to eight appointments." Well, is it six, is it seven or is it eight? So don't give me like the range, give me the actual raw data. So I was looking through this, and even with the data that she had in there, I was able to kind of make an assessment. [00:03:31] Sarah: I said, "listen, if this was my business, I would not be, at this point in time, I would not be looking at hiring a sales setter. The reason being is that with the resources that we currently have, which is A BDM, what we need to do is just turn up the volume for the BDM. And once that BDM is totally maxed out, then we can look to see, hey, do we actually need some additional support? [00:03:59] Sarah: And that might be a sales setter. So what I was noticing, and now she's a newer hire. She's been there only a few months and she's doing a great job so far. So. The early on data, she was still in training and onboarding and learning and kind of testing and figuring things out. And you could see that as you go down the list, the later the date, the better results that she was getting. [00:04:24] Sarah: So in the very beginning, she was maybe doing like half an hour or 45 minutes a day, and later on in the list she was doing, you know, one to two hours and then she was doing three to four hours. And then she tends to do about four hours a day on average now. And then same thing with phone calls. [00:04:41] Sarah: You know, she would do, you know, a couple of phone calls in the beginning and then later on down in the data you would see, hey, she was doing more phone calls, she was getting, doing more time. She was doing more phone calls. She was setting more appointments, and therefore some things were starting to close. [00:04:58] Sarah: But what I could also see is that she is not fully maxed out.  [00:05:01] Jason: Right.  [00:05:01] Sarah: So if we have a BDM who is full-time, meaning at least 30, maybe even 40 hours a week, and they're doing four hours per day, that's like 20 hours a week. So that's like part-time BDM work. Yeah. So then what is happening with the rest of the time? [00:05:18] Sarah: So I said, "first of all, anything that you are doing at all that does not have to do with sales, cut it out immediately. Stop it. If you're on like client success meetings, because the property manager was also on that call." Yeah. So, and I know that they work in tandem. They work as a team, which is really great. [00:05:34] Sarah: Like the team culture there is fantastic. But when you're dragging the salespeople into the customer service side.  [00:05:42] Jason: Big mistake.  [00:05:43] Sarah: You're costing yourself so much money.  [00:05:45] Jason:  I want to comment on that just real quick. I mean, everybody listening, if you have anybody in your organization that's good at sales, whether it's you that should be doing the sales and you don't have anyone else to do it, and you're the business owner, or you have a BDM and they're good at sales and you have them doing anything other than sales, you are making a very stupid mistake because that's the lifeblood of the business. They feed the business, they pay everybody else's salary. They're the only people that bring money, fresh money into the business. And they should not be dabbling as a property manager. They should not be dabbling as a leasing agent. They should not be dabbling or picking up slack for anybody else. [00:06:27] Jason: No. Hire other people if you need to, but get your salesperson spending full time spending their time on sales if they're good and they will make you a lot of money. And having them do anything else is a massive waste of a resource.  [00:06:40] Sarah: Absolutely. I've said it like this before, if you have a star quarterback on a football team, do you want that quarterback doing any other, like playing any other position? [00:06:50] Jason: I like that analogy.  [00:06:51] Sarah: Do you want them kicking? Do you want them walking? Do you want them to be a tight end?  [00:06:54] Jason: No, there'd be dumb. No.  [00:06:56] Sarah: Why? Why on earth would you do that? No. If I've got somebody who can hurl that ball with pinpoint precision and accuracy to any spot on the field at will... [00:07:08] Jason: don't make them a kicker. [00:07:09] Sarah: I got to preserve that resource. And then I'm like, that's literally the only thing you're going to do.  [00:07:14] Jason: The kickers, kick. That's all the kickers do. The kickers do one thing. They just kick the ball's. That's it, and they're not used very often. Like, it would be ridiculous to say, "you know what, kicker, why don't you also occasionally be our backup quarterback?" [00:07:26] Jason: Like, you're second string now. Like, it just, it doesn't make sense. If he could be a quarterback, he would not be a kicker.  [00:07:32] Sarah: Right.  [00:07:33] Jason: Yeah.  [00:07:33] Sarah: Yeah. So I said, anything that you're doing that is not sales, stop it immediately. Like today. Don't stop it. Monday. Stop it today. Okay. That's it, period. That's number one. [00:07:43] Sarah: Then number two, we need to just get more time out of you. So if you're doing, you know, four hours a day, what's the rest of your time being spent doing? So we just needed, we need to spend more time and then we just need to increase the number of calls. So she actually happens to be in my accountability group. So that call was Friday. Every Monday, we have a telegram group that it's real quick, it's just an accountability group. We set a personal goal and a professional goal for the upcoming week, and then we give updates on the previous week. And her goal for monday, like this past Monday was to do a minimum of 100 calls per day after our call on Friday. [00:08:24] Sarah: Which is awesome because I said, "you have to increase the volume. Yeah. So that you can get more results. And then once we have the volume increased so much that you cannot add anymore. You are absolutely maxed out. You can't add more time without, you know, working like 80 hours a week. [00:08:40] Sarah: We can't add more time. We can't do more calls. We can't possibly like squeeze any more, you know, blood from the stone. Now I know you're maxed out. Now it might make sense to look at either hiring another BDM or hiring a setter.  [00:08:55] Jason: Yeah.  [00:08:55] Sarah: But right now, you are not maxed out. All you need to do is just increase your volume so that you can get more results, because I bet you, you can just get more results by doing more work, which means stop doing the other things that you're doing. [00:09:06] Sarah: Just do more of the things that you should be doing and you'll get more results. And then you can probably don't even need to pay a setter.  [00:09:14] Jason: Yeah. So we have three setters. Yesterday they made 200 calls between the three of them. And they each booked... on a Monday.... they each... yeah, on a Monday, which is hard for property manager, for property managers.  [00:09:24] Sarah: Come on. [00:09:24] Jason: And they each booked a one appointment, which is pretty good. But that's a lot of calls. And we have a lot of other growth engines installed at DoorGrow, but we're getting almost 300 calls a day. And we'll probably add some more setters, but like, we're doing outreach and so this is the game. [00:09:41] Jason: This is the game. And if you're not putting in the numbers, but you're like, "maybe it's not working," you don't get the game. Yeah.  [00:09:47] Sarah: So my big thing is there's two things. There are two main components of sales, and almost every single, if not every single problem that you have in sales. It all boils down to one of these two things I can almost guarantee it. [00:10:02] Sarah: One is volume, and two is AB testing. That's all sales is, and if you fix your volume and you AB test everything to optimize for best results, you will never have a sales problem.  [00:10:15] Jason: Yeah.  [00:10:15] Sarah: So that's what we figure out here at DoorGrow, how to have people optimize, AB testing and volume. And that's why our clients can get the results that they're able to. [00:10:26] Sarah: That's why our clients can get results that other people aren't able to. They're like, oh, I'm doing like all these calls. I'm doing all this stuff. Yeah, but you're not doing it. Either you're not doing enough or you're not AB testing the right way. And you're not using the right strategies. [00:10:38] Sarah: Yeah. I mean everything. Like, listen, I can give you a list of, you know, a thousand people and you can call them your way and we can call them our way and we'll get better results. Why? Because we've AB tested everything. Yeah. So it's always, it's either volume or AB testing. Yeah. [00:10:51] Sarah: Those two things. And you will never have a sales problem again.  [00:10:55] Jason: If something's not working, you just got to not tolerate it. That's the problem, is at each stage there's things that are not working if you're not getting deals, and if you don't change what's not working and you keep doing it the same way, you're going to keep getting the same result. And so this is what we coach on. We're like, cool. You need to fix that step now, this step in the pipeline, now this step. And until you get everything dialed in, it's not really working. But once you get the whole growth engine built out, it's all unclogged, the water's flowing, then you're making money. [00:11:25] Jason: And that's why I say it's the last 10% of getting things dialed in that gives you 90% of the results. All right.  [00:11:31] Sarah: All right.  [00:11:31] Jason: Okay, so if you felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com. You can also join our free community at doorgrowclub.com, our Facebook group. [00:11:43] Jason: And if you found this even a little bit helpful, help us out. Don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. And until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone. So let's grow together. Bye everyone. 

What if you could retain the doors you manage even when your owners decide to sell? What would that mean for you and your property management business? In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with Lior from Blanket to talk about how property managers can retain doors while also helping investors grow and add more to their portfolios. You’ll Learn [02:59] Property Managers Can Become Asset Managers [11:13] Valuable Lessons Learned from Tough Situations [25:40] How to Move into More of an Asset Manager Role [37:25] Reducing Client and Retaining Clients [47:51] Helping Your Investors Grow Their Portfolios Quotables “You have to be very robotic, very technical, and that is one of the most important skills that really allows me to face difficult, you know, decisions in life, especially in business, without taking them personally.” “When you are rational and you're not driven by emotions, that actually allows you to be a lot more, you know, empathetic and kind and caring.” “There are no failures in life. There are only challenges, and every challenge is an opportunity for success.” ”Why be so focused on the failure if you can be focused on the lesson that you're going to learn, even before you even know it?” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Lior: The combination of these two, this is what allows you to be that ultimate asset manager to your clients. That can help your clients, optimize their portfolio and generate more cash flow, but on the other hand, help them make more money by expanding their portfolio, buying more properties, and growing it. [00:00:18] Jason: Welcome everybody to the DoorGrow Show. I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. We are the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. [00:00:31] Jason: For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. [00:00:52] Jason: We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. [00:01:17] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show. All right, so today I'm hanging out with Lior. [00:01:37] Jason: How do you say your last name? Abramovich?  [00:01:42] Jason: Abramovich.  [00:01:43] Jason: Abramovich. Man. I butchered that one. All right. So with Blanket, he's repping it on a t-shirt, if you're seeing the video version of this. And so, Lior, we've had several calls, hanging out and you're just a really cool guy and we've really enjoyed hanging out. [00:02:01] Jason: Yeah. We've really enjoyed hanging out. He's given me a heart shape with his hand for those listening. But I haven't had you on the podcast yet, have I?  [00:02:09] Lior: True. This is the first time.  [00:02:11] Jason: Yeah. That's so odd to me. Usually people start by doing the podcast with me and so we're doing the reverse. [00:02:17] Jason: And you're a sponsor at DoorGrow Live, our conference coming up. Thank you. And we're really excited to have you there. One of our vendors said it's the only conference he still attends now. That's it. He's like, "it's the one I get the most value from learning, and the other ones just aren't worth the, you know, paying to go be a vendor there." [00:02:36] Jason: And I'm like, okay, cool. So hopefully you get some benefit from doing that as well. So I'm excited Lior to expose people to Blanket because I think it's very complimentary to our vision and what we do at DoorGrow in helping grow property managers. And I would call it like a client retention platform, but maybe you describe it differently. [00:02:57] Jason: But before we get into that, why don't we give some background on you and why don't you tell everybody how you kind of got into entrepreneurism, then got into property management and give us some backstory. We need the origin story of Lior.  [00:03:11] Lior: Will do. I'll try to make it exciting and interesting. [00:03:13] Jason: Okay.  [00:03:14] Lior: I started from real estate. I didn't start from the tech side or from, you know, the startup world. I started as an investor. I bought my first rental property in Atlanta, Georgia when I was about 18 years old. So started quite early with a lot of inspiration from my mom, which is my role model in life for pretty much everything. [00:03:33] Lior: And at that point in time, I actually was doing that investment from Israel, thousands of miles away. This is where I was born and raised. I actually moved here to the States just about a year, yeah, exactly a year ago. Moved to Miami, Florida. After just, you know, living on the line, flying back and forth almost every month for multiple years, but in that first stage of like my, you know, real estate, I would say career, at that point I also started my active duty service in the Israeli Navy. [00:04:05] Lior: So I'm a graduate of the Israeli Naval Academy, then served for almost nine years as a naval commander commanding hundreds of soldiers, officers, and combat soldiers in quite intense and interesting situations I would say. That's a whole topic that we can talk about for hours in another podcast. [00:04:25] Lior: Yeah. Episode.  [00:04:26] Jason: Interesting. I didn't know that about you.  [00:04:28] Lior: Yeah. That was quite an intense nine years and definitely shaped me as a person and as an entrepreneur as well. Most of what I know, most of what I do, most of what I act upon is pretty much majority, you know, of what I learned and implemented in myself as a person in my qualities, in my values, in my worldviews through that time in the Navy. [00:04:52] Lior: And, you know, before that, before like that step of buying that first rental property, it's not like it came from out of nowhere. You know, probably I started as most of our listeners today by reading the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki when I was about 13 years old. Again, my mom gave me that as a birthday gift at 13 years old. [00:05:14] Lior: And to me it was fascinating, this whole concept that you can, you know, like make money from like a property that you actually took money from the bank to pay for it, and it pays for itself and it makes some extra money. So this whole like very, you know, conceptualized plan was very interesting to me. [00:05:35] Lior: And I said like, this is something I would like to do at some capacity in my life. Especially because the fact that I was born for a family of immigrants, my entire family came from Ukraine to Israel. So we didn't have, you know, very good financial you know, let's say position in life as most immigrants do. [00:05:54] Lior: And my grandparents don't have, you know, today also a pension plan that, or that's how we call it in Israel. And here we call it 401k. So they don't have that. And to me, real estate was always a way to take care of my loved ones, to take care of my grandparents, to be able to at least give them one rental property that can enable them stable, and I would say secure financial retirement, and just really retire with dignity, retire safely. And that was like the big why behind everything I'm doing. So. Quick, you know, fast forward nine years in the Navy, kept doing real estate throughout that time. Helped a lot of my fellow naval officers to buy properties in the United States. [00:06:38] Lior: Okay. And then started working for a big investment firm in the United States that was doing build to rent before build to rent was a thing. You know, today, you know, people are talking about build to rent is with this cool name, but back then we just called it new construction you know, for investors. [00:06:52] Lior: So we were one of the largest operators in the Southeast. We were one of the largest operators, specifically in Georgia and Alabama. And I started there as their head of acquisitions quickly promoted to vice president of business development, overseeing our entire operation from due diligence, meaning land acquisition development, and then, you know, disposition and sales and marketing. [00:07:14] Lior: So, really had the opportunity to experience every part of the value chain of real estate investments from start to finish, seeing all the good, seeing all the bad, I had, you know, contractors that went bankrupt in the middle of a 300 property community. And I had very good stories as well. But that whole period of time of me working there for almost three years was the best school I ever got to really, you know, operate as an operator and manage an operation of hundreds of millions of dollars because in that time alone, I personally oversaw about $200 million worth of acquisitions and worked directly with over a thousand individual investors, mainly mom and pop investors, like most of you know, the clients of most of our listeners today. And the unique thing about it, and this is where Blanket sort of like starts to form up as an idea, the unique thing about my position in that company was that it had a very interesting model where. [00:08:16] Lior: All the clients that we sold properties to, which were clients, by the way, all over the world. We worked with buyers from Israel, Canada, Russia, China, Australia, like everywhere. You know, that was one of our, you know, major, I would say efficiencies, which we were working with a lot of foreign investors and we are one of the biggest drivers of that. [00:08:38] Lior: So we've seen pretty much everything in every one of those clients that we actually sell the property to we kept managing the relationship with them instead of the property manager. So think of that company as like an investor relations arm, right? Where you refer that client after we sell a property to a property manager partner that we worked with and we worked with a lot of folks and then that property manager is not talking with that owner. [00:09:05] Lior: No headaches, no nothing. We are managing that owner. So every time the owner has a question, he sends that to us and if we need, we escalate that to the property manager. If the property manager wants to convey something, he escalates that. So like he gives it to us and we pass it on to the owner. But the whole notion was that we will be their asset manager and this whole thing enabled me to see all the things that work and all the things that don't work when it comes to owner relationships and how property managers manage their owner relationships, especially with the things that are missing, which is what owners expect and what property managers don't provide, which leads in many cases to churn. [00:09:48] Lior: And that churn problem that today is pretty much the same as it has been 10 years ago, which is almost 25 to 30% annually. That's the average in the industry today in terms of how many properties we're losing today as property managers. So in that aspect, like you think to yourself, okay, what's causing that? [00:10:09] Lior: And that was the question that always led me to ask all my property management partners. Why are you losing so many clients? Like, we know we're doing an awesome job as your asset manager and you know, but like why is this a big problem in your business today? Yeah, and a lot of it was always due to owner sales or to owner experience, which we were solving a lot for because we were taking care of those owners. [00:10:33] Lior: So every time they wanted to sell a property, they told us and we were able to sell it inside the other, you know, the network of property owners and clients. And also when they... [00:10:43] Jason: if somebody wanted to sell property that was a client, you would be able to turn around and sell to one of your other clients so that you continued to keep the property, which is exactly awesome, which is a no brainer. [00:10:55] Jason: And I'm sure a lot of property managers like say that would be the ideal. That'd be great if I can do the sales, get those commissions, and still be able to keep the property in my portfolio. That would be really great. Exactly. Blanket helps do this, right?  [00:11:11] Lior: Yeah. We'll get to Blanket in a second.  [00:11:13] Jason: I have a question before we continue. You mentioned being in the military and being in the Navy and being Navy commander. I didn't know this about you. So what do you feel like that did to change you? How do you feel like you would be different if you hadn't have gone through that?  [00:11:30] Lior: It will be pretty much everything that I know and everything that I do. [00:11:33] Lior: But if I were to pick a few, I would say main things that were changed in how I view the world and how I operate, number one is being more rational than emotional, pretty much about everything. My mom even jokes all the time. She says, I'm like a robot, like you know, I'm not driven by emotions at all. [00:11:54] Lior: And that is one of the things that you have to sort of develop yourself into, when you're dealing with life threatening, you know, situations, you have to be rational. You have to be very robotic, very technical, and that is one of the most important skills that really allows me to face difficult, you know, decisions in life, especially in business, without taking them personally. [00:12:16] Lior: And, you know, it's business.  [00:12:17] Jason: I love, I love that idea. One of my favorite books lately is this book by a guy named Jerr, this philosopher, and it's called, The Wall Speaks and it's all about building a masculine frame. And it's being less emotional, displaying less emotion, and how that earns you respect and how that makes people around you, especially women, feel safer and everything else. [00:12:40] Jason: And this is something that just, if you are in very challenging situations. Like war, you know, military, whatever, like you learn this naturally. It's just, it hardwires it into you and. Yeah, exactly. Over emotionality is going to make a lot more sense. It's much more rational. So yeah, I think that's a great principle. [00:13:03] Lior: I would say even more than that, because probably, you know. The first thing that comes to mind when you hear that is like, oh, I don't want to be, you know, a cold person or a very, you know, apethetic person, like someone who doesn't, you know, acknowledge other people's feelings, et cetera. Sure. I say on the contrary, when you are very rational and you're not clouded by emotions, you are emotionally available to express emotion, to express care, to express, you know, concern about the other person in front of you, because you're not all centered in what you are feeling right now because something is, you know, bothering you and you're like all into that. [00:13:42] Lior: Instead, you are able to look at the other person in front of you and think how they're feeling. Think what, you know, what can help them feel better. So like when you are rational and you're not driven by emotions, that actually allows you to be a lot more, you know, empathetic and kind and caring. [00:14:00] Lior: Because you're not centered on what you're feeling and what you're experiencing, then you can really be thinking about the other person.  [00:14:07] Jason: Yeah. I love that. I think in order to reach that space, like it talks about in the wall speaks, we have to get out of this mode of trying to please everybody and trying to please others. [00:14:17] Jason: And so when we're so concerned about how everyone feels about us and we're too concerned about emotion, then we're trying to please everybody. So I love this idea this first point of rationale over emotion. This is super important in business. [00:14:31] Jason: And I love the idea that it actually enables you to be a better leader, to be able to take in and take into account other people's emotions and to see things from their perspective, because that's a more rational viewpoint than getting overly, you know, steeped in your own emotion and which blinds you to what others are feeling and what others are experiencing. [00:14:53] Jason: So you said that's number one. So I'm guessing there's a number two.  [00:14:55] Lior: There are, there are a lot. There are a lot more, but we'll keep to the I would say to the big ones. Yeah. The second thing is this very strong belief. I would say almost religious belief that there are no failures in life. [00:15:12] Lior: There are only challenges, and every challenge is an opportunity for success. Love it. That whole perspective. Well, it takes time to really live by it, but once you live by it, you don't have stress, you don't have, you don't worry about stuff. On the contrary you're getting excited about things that don't work. [00:15:33] Lior: You're getting excited about, you know, things that you would normally call failures because you're excited about what's on the other end of that. What's the lesson to be learned and what's the improvement that you're going to bring? So instead of. Being concerned about this thing right now, that it's not working. [00:15:50] Lior: You are excited, positively about what is going to happen after that because it's going to make you better. It's going to make your business better. So like this whole notion of understanding that at the end of every problem, challenge, failure, that some people might call, on the other side of that, there's always a good side. [00:16:13] Lior: Like think of it as like a coin, right? Like that's how I try to see, you know, failures in life. On one side you see the failure, you know, as some people would call it. But on the other side is the lesson, and every failure has that lesson. So why be so focused on the failure if you can be focused on the lesson that you're going to learn, even before you even know it? But you know there will be something there. You know you will be better. You know your business will be better. So let's get excited about that.  [00:16:40] Jason: Yeah, I love this idea so much. I often say I either win or I learn.  [00:16:46] Lior: Exactly.  [00:16:47] Jason: There's the only way you lose is if you quit or you give up. That's it. Like, so I either win or I learn. And I love this idea that, you know, after every struggle or failure or uncomfortable emotional experience or challenging, you know, thing in life, if we don't learn from it, then yeah, it's just trauma. It's just a problem. But if you learn from it, it becomes the bricks by which you build your character, by which you build a whole new life and a whole new self image. And if you learn from it, you're destined to not repeat it as well, which is nice. So you learn the lesson. Exactly. [00:17:23] Jason: And I think, you know, God and the universe keeps giving us the same lessons over and over again, maybe in stronger and stronger fashion until we finally learn the lesson. And I think going along with these two points, which relates heavily is being open and willing to take feedback from others, you know? [00:17:42] Jason: And so one of the things that I've, realized is that feedback a lot of people think is painful, and it can be really uncomfortable, but I've noticed that when I go to my mentors and I'm open and vulnerable to getting feedback. Sometimes, you know, it can cut pretty deeply, but it's good medicine and that's where I have the most growth and learning. [00:18:00] Jason: And so I've learned to actually love and enjoy the discomfort of feedback. And so I seek it now. Then I collapsing time on my learning. Yeah, and I'm experiencing the discomfort in that and, but I know that there's benefits to that because now I can see something that I was blind to or I'm experiencing something that I didn't realize. The reason I hire these mentors is because they're at a vantage point in some sort of area that they're ahead of me. And so being willing to get feedback takes somebody that's willing to be really rational and it takes somebody that's willing to see that there's no failure. You are not bad, sick, and wrong because somebody pointed out something that you're doing that's bad, sick, and wrong. Like that means now you have an opportunity to change or improve, which is good news. [00:18:43] Jason: It's like the best news ever. Yeah. Love this  [00:18:46] Lior: 100%.  [00:18:47] Jason: That's why we get along, Lior. You and I have just been through enough shit to learn some lessons, so. Hell yeah. So cool. Do you have a third one for us?  [00:18:55] Lior: Yeah, let's do a quick one. Leading by example. Okay. Is number one. And I'll actually give a quick story here just to explain how powerful that is. [00:19:06] Lior: And I think that's also really important for, you know, all of our listeners for property managers. Because in my first assignment in the Navy as a commander, I was assigned as a chief engineer, meaning I was in charge of the mechanics department. These are all the folks that are working the hardest. Like, think of them as like your maintenance, you know, contractors. [00:19:26] Lior: These are the folks who are going in fixing plumbing, fixing AC systems and like heating systems, like getting really dirty, you know, and like crawling underneath engines filled with like gasoline and stuff. It's like the hardest job in, you're doing the worst,  [00:19:44] Jason: worst job. It's like Mike Rowe's show Dirty Jobs. [00:19:48] Lior: Yeah. I don't want to be too explicit and vivid. But you're dealing with like pipes of like things that you know Sure. We use for other things stuff and who knows.  [00:19:56] Jason: Yeah. Okay.  [00:19:57] Lior: Exactly. It's bad. It's bad. Yeah. So anyways, so on when I was first assigned as the chief engineer, so the chief engineer in the ship is like the second to the commander. [00:20:07] Lior: Like if the, something happens to the commander of the ship. I'm taking command. So, you know, you have your respect and your sort of like, honor just with the title, you know? Yeah. It comes with it and you can walk around like, you know, like a peacock. Very proud of yourself and, you know, I'm like, I'm the boss. [00:20:25] Lior: I'm the big man or whatever.  [00:20:27] Jason: Yeah.  [00:20:27] Lior: Or you can do some other things. And for example, what I did on the first day of me getting, you know, onboard the ship and, you know, getting the role and getting command of the ship. So the first thing that I did was like every day we have like an hour at the end of the day that we're cleaning the entire ship. [00:20:46] Lior: And part of cleaning the ship is also for the mechanics department. Is getting below the engines that run the ship and cleaning all the oil residue that builds up there. So you have to literally, you know, take a lot of like cloths and sheets and just like, dive into the oil and just push it out. [00:21:04] Lior: Wow. So like you get out black, like completely black. And normally the ones who are doing it are the youngest, you know, mechanics and the youngest soldiers on the ship because it's like, you know, it's a newbie. Don't have seniority.  [00:21:16] Jason: And they're new and you give them the worst job. They get the shit job. [00:21:19] Lior: Exactly. So what I did, I went and got beneath the engines myself. Yeah. And it, it became a show. All the soldiers came to watch. Oh man, the chief got beneath the engines. He's crazy. What is he doing? It was a shock, but nobody forgot that. Like my soldiers up until today, were like best friends or like my little brothers, they remember this until today, this little thing that I never done after that again, by the way, I did it once. [00:21:48] Lior: Yeah. But they never forget it. And that sets so many examples in terms of what I expect from them in terms of ownership, you know, and values and teamwork and not being afraid to take on, you know, jobs that, that are like beneath me or whatever. That was such a powerful message without me even saying a word. [00:22:08] Lior: Yeah. So think of yourself as a property manager. Like what things you can do like that, that you need to do only once maybe in your life, you know, and show your employees that you're not afraid to get dirty and do the hard work and really show them that nobody should be feeling that something is beneath them or like it's not, you know, to their level or whatever. [00:22:31] Lior: Like if you are doing that, like who am I to, you know, raise any objections of doing something? Like I'm not the company owner and if the company owner is doing that, I better do that. Right? So  [00:22:44] Jason: yeah, that's a great story. Great example. I. You know, it's a great display of leadership. There's a really good book kind of about this principle called The Motive by Patrick Lencioni. [00:22:54] Jason: And in he talks about how there's two types of CEOs and there's the CEOs that think because of their position, everybody owes them everything. They're king, they deserve everything. And they end up having organizations that have a lack of ownership, a lack of accountability, and a lot of problems. [00:23:10] Jason: Because they think they're superior to everybody else. And then there's the CEOs that have the right motive and they understand that they have the worst job in the company because their job is to do anything that's not working and to step in anywhere that there's a problem and they need to be willing to, like you talked about, get dirty and start, like help out at the bottom if that's what the business needs to get clarity or to fix things or to figure it out. [00:23:38] Jason: And so being able to display that is a powerful thing. Like it reminds me the other day, I'm training some setters right now to do some cold calls for us, do some outreach to property managers. because we're like. The best kept secret in property management. Not all our people have heard of DoorGrow still, and so we're having them do some outreach and they're like, oh, it's really hard. [00:23:56] Jason: I don't know how to deal with gatekeepers and all this. And you like the subtext says, Jason, you don't understand. This is difficult. So I'm like, cool, let me do it right now. And I picked up the phone and they were watching me on Zoom and I'm cold calling and doing it. And the second call I got first was a voicemail. [00:24:11] Jason: I'm like, here's how to leave a voicemail to get them to call you back. And then the second call was a receptionist. And I connected with her. I made her laugh. I got info from her about the business owners, what their challenges are. Oh, there's two business owners. Okay, cool. And I got all this information about how many doors they have, everything about the business because I was nice to the receptionist and treated her like a person. [00:24:34] Jason: And and she was helping me out. She wouldn't give me their cell phone numbers, but I got everything else I needed so we could call back. And I'm like, cool. Did you see how that went? And they were like, well, it's really cool. So yeah, when we're willing to step in and show them how to do something, it can break some of their preconceived ideas, their perceptions, and so yeah, they see a leader and they're like, oh, well the leader can do this and the leader can do this well. Be cause if everybody underneath you is like, yeah, but he's never done this hard stuff, or he hasn't done this, and they're like. There's always that story. Well, he did that worst job, like he was pushing, they're like, what? Yeah, first day? I mean, it speaks volumes of character and it, yeah, it makes your leadership much easier. [00:25:19] Jason: That's kind of the equivalent of people say, if you get thrown in prison, go fight the biggest guy there, or something like this. Right? And that was the most challenging thing that nobody thought you would do, and you went and did it. And so, yeah, you earned respect. And you know, leadership has to be born out of respect. [00:25:35] Jason: So these are great principles. This was valuable in the podcast alone. So let's move on to getting into Blanket. And I think this is a game changer. I think every property management business owner should be using Blanket every single one. It's an absolute no brainer. It helps them retain their clients, well retain the properties. [00:25:58] Jason: So basically keeping their portfolio, even if the owners are leaving and it gives them access to a network of investors. And there's just so many benefits. So I'll let you tell everybody about it because you probably know a little bit more than I do, so.  [00:26:12] Lior: Sure. Thanks. Sure thing. I'll actually do I normally have, you know, the whole spiel and the features and what we provide and whatever, but I think if we already started on such a inspiring, I would say, note to the, to this episode. [00:26:25] Lior: I'll start with the why. With why we're doing what we're doing, because I think it's important and we, and I think we're not doing a good job maybe at explaining the why enough in pretty much everywhere we go about, yeah.  [00:26:36] Jason: People don't buy what you do. Simon Sinek says they buy why you do it. [00:26:39] Jason: So, exactly. Let's into the why behind Blanket. Why does Blanket exist? Yeah.  [00:26:44] Lior: So the overarching premise is that. Today there is a very big, I would say, failure or gap in the market in our single family rental market. When you look at other asset classes, when you look at commercial, when you look at, you know, multifamily, industrial office, any investors in those asset classes have an investment manager, a professional investment manager. [00:27:13] Lior: That provides them, you know, quarterly, you know, reports provides them with strategy sessions about their next capital, you know, allocation about their disposition. Yes, they have someone to guide them in a very professional way to their goals and to and to match their needs. The only asset class, the only asset class that does not have the function of an investment manager is single family. [00:27:40] Lior: Yeah. And that's especially the asset class that needs it the most because 99% of all single family rental owners are mom and pop investors. Institutional players own, roughly, depending on which source you're reading, but roughly between one to 2% of all the single family rental properties across the country. [00:28:02] Lior: The most is owned by mom and pop investors. The people who need that guidance the most. And they don't have that, which is why they're making mistakes, which is why they have maybe sometimes, and I bet all the listeners can agree some unrealistic expectations of what a property manager should do. And that creates a big gap that the only one losing or not the only one, but like the two people that are losing from the situation is that mom and pop owner and us, the property manager, because we then lose a lot of clients. [00:28:36] Lior: And it's sort of like this identity crisis where we as property managers are perceived as service providers, as rent collectors, as toilet fixers, but we are held accountable as if we're the investment managers. Like, you know, why am I losing so much money on this property? [00:28:57] Lior: It's all you. It's all about you. You didn't, you know, collect the rent. You didn't rent it on time. Yeah. Why it's vacant. Like with all due respect, you are the one who bought this property. You know, you bought it in this problematic area. You bought a very old property that never replaced the roof, never replaced the ac, and it is a very bad shape in a very bad neighborhood. [00:29:17] Lior: Like there is a limit to what I can do for you at the end of the day. But the problem is that we as property managers, we're stuck in this middle where we are held accountable. As if we're their investment manager, but we're perceived as just a service provider, which is the most difficult position to be at. [00:29:34] Lior: Now, how does that connect to our why? When I started doing real estate again, remember that like my personal why my grandparents, right? I wanted to build a real estate portfolio that will allow me to give them at least one property from which they can live off. To act as their pension. Sort of like plan. [00:29:53] Lior: And as, as more as I grew up in this industry as an operator, as sort of like a property manager without all the headaches of operation, you know, just acting as the owner relationship manager. I understood that if there was a platform, you know, back then when I was just dreaming about it, if there was a platform that will empower the property managers to become investment managers for their clients. I know that my parents and my loved ones can be in good hands because if those property managers that manage my grandparents' homes can tell them what to do based on, you know, what's happening with the property, when should they renovate, maybe, when should they sell, when maybe when should they refinance and cash out? [00:30:40] Lior: Or maybe when should they buy another property or any other question that is sort of like surrounding the investment life cycle or the investment journey, right? I know that their sort of like goal of retiring financially safe can be handled because there is no one else who will take care of that. The agent who maybe, you know, sold them that property, he has no vested interest in the long term. [00:31:05] Lior: He's doing a transaction and he's done. Out. The lender, same thing. He got the origination fees, he secured the loan, he's out the window and they're out. Nobody besides the property manager has a long-term vested interest in the wellbeing of the property owner. So for us, this is what motivates our entire team. We understand that if we'll be able to empower our partners, our property managers into investment managers, we will take care of our loved ones. [00:31:36] Lior: We will make sure that they will be in good hands and this is the why, because there is a gap that only property managers can fill. And this is that the gap of a missing investment manager for the investors that are the least experienced, that need the guidance the most, this is what we wake up for, this is what we work for. [00:32:00] Lior: This is everything that, you know, leads in every decision making intersection or like point in our company's life cycle. Yeah, I love it.  [00:32:08] Jason: This is why we come to leaders. This is why people come to a property manager. They're looking for leadership, they're looking for guidance. And when you're at that peak of customer satisfaction, customer service, that's where you are an advice giver, where you're giving advice, not just like the title of this episode is from Rent Collector to Asset Manager, and the idea is: [00:32:32] Jason: if you can go from just being somebody that keeps the rent coming to helping them manage the asset, you are already head and shoulders above other management companies. So if you can present yourself as an asset manager, and I've had a podcast episode with a client who's very good at doing this, he is able to assess their property. [00:32:51] Jason: We have this really cool tool called the ROI calculator. He'll help show them whether it's performing properly, what the long-term benefits are. What the tax benefits are, and so he can help them assess the property and they already just view him as an expert instead of wanting to work with any other management company. [00:33:08] Jason: So a lot of you feel like you're competing with other management companies because you're doing cold lead marketing stuff that probably doesn't work very well. And if you're doing that, reach out to DoorGrow, we'll help you fix that problem. But there's plenty of business out there. There's no scarcity. [00:33:20] Jason: But if you do feel like you're competing with other companies, one way to set yourself head and shoulders above the rest is to no longer be a property manager that just collects rent and coordinates maintenance, but to be an asset or portfolio manager for this investor. So, how does Blanket help with this? [00:33:37] Lior: I think we nailed it. We are right on point. And I love,  [00:33:40] Jason: I love it. I mean, everyone needs to realize this is the motivator. This is the reason. Because property managers, if you want to have an easier time closing deals, you want to retain clients, keep clients trusting you, and if clients trust you as an asset manager, they're way more hands off. [00:33:56] Jason: They don't try to manage the manager, they stop trying to micromanage you because they look at you as the advice giver and as the advisor instead of thinking, this is just somebody that works for me that I now need to manage and make sure they're not stealing from me and they do it my way.  [00:34:11] Lior: Exactly. [00:34:11] Lior: So we are really tackling this mission from two angles and the understanding here is that. As you said, if you are acting as a trusted advisor, if you're acting as an asset manager and your clients appreciate you as one, you will have less churn and you will grow a lot faster. So when we're thinking about these two, you know, functions of your business, on the one hand churn and on the other hand, growth, these two things always go together in property management. [00:34:47] Lior: Why? Because if we're looking at the average,  [00:34:49] Jason: and let's explain churn real quick for, because some people, this is a new term for them, they're like, what does this mean? Churning? So churn means you're losing business, you're losing clients, they're churning out. So this is the rate at which you're losing clients every year. [00:35:03] Lior: Exactly. Exactly. It's how many doors you lost technically, again, no matter what the reason, but like you lost the door, you know that's churn. So in property management there is a very unique and frustrating thing is that you'll always have churn. You can never lower to zero. Why? Because life happens. You might have a client that's super, super happy with what you're providing. [00:35:27] Lior: He loves you. He loves the relationship, he loves the service. He's getting everything from you, but suddenly life happens and he needs the money, he needs to sell that property, unfortunately. It has nothing to do with your performance, it's just his life. So that property is going to be sold and you're going to lose that, so you'll have churn. [00:35:46] Lior: So in property management there always be churn and it's something we have to accept. So that means if you can't, you know, really lower churn to zero, that means you always have to have a growth strategy to offset the doors that you're still going to lose. Yeah. So growth and churn, and. Or the opposite of churn, which is retention. [00:36:10] Lior: Okay. Growth and retention and property management have to work together always at all times. On the one hand, if we're like, imagine a bucket of water and your task is to keep in full and you have a hole at the bottom so it's leaking. Okay? Yeah. So you always have to work on closing that leak. [00:36:31] Lior: But you always have to keep pouring more water to keep it at the same level. That's pretty much the secret. That's how Blanket is built. We have two packages, one called Retain and the other called Grow. Very simple not too complicated on that front. And each one has various features and various products to help you achieve that goal. [00:36:53] Lior: So, for example. And by the way the combination of these two, this is what allows you to be that ultimate asset manager to your clients, right? That can help your clients, first of all, optimize their portfolio and generate more cash flow, and forget about a lot of headaches that come with property investing, but on the other hand, help them make more money by expanding their portfolio, buying more properties, and growing it. [00:37:20] Lior: So the combination of these two packages, that's what helps you allow, you know, what helps you be an ultimate asset manager. Now, what do each one of those packages do? So the Retain package gives your clients a branded investor dashboard. So it has your logo, it has your face, nobody knows who Blanket is, and that investor dashboard gives your clients real time performance metrics. [00:37:42] Lior: It allows them to see how their properties are really doing. Through an integration with their property management software and through pulling a lot of data from title companies, public county records, and national data providers that allow them to really see every property related transaction in real time from their mortgage payments, their property taxes, their insurance, their HOA and everything that you're tracking as well in your property management software. [00:38:07] Lior: So that way they can see exactly what's their net cash flow every month. They can see their property's value and how much it appreciated this month. And they can also see how much equity they have in their homes so that whenever it's time for them to take the next step, they can quickly press on the cash out button and refinance and extract the equity that they have in those proceeds and buy another property with that. [00:38:30] Lior: So that's part of the retained package that is owner facing. All the rest of the features are property manager facing, meaning your team is going to use them. But one thing I forgot to mention on that front, on the sort of like investor dashboard that your clients are getting, we also are doing what we call white labeled email communications. [00:38:52] Lior: So remember that story of me handling owner communications for property managers? This is where it comes from, and the understanding that your clients are used to a very bad, sort of like foundation of communication, which is I'm either getting an email about me having to pay for something I need to fix right now, and you're asking, you know, my money, or I'm getting an email with the owner statement, with that accounting view that I can't really understand and I'm getting just more confused instead of actually getting value from it. [00:39:24] Lior: Plus, it never shows me the full picture because it only shows me, you know the fees that you're charging, maintenance and like the rent, I don't see exactly how my property is doing. So it's really not a value. So like this is the foundation of the relationship. So if you are not providing your clients with additional positive touch points, how can they appreciate what you're doing for them? [00:39:45] Lior: because that's what they get. It's like, it's very the energetic I would say, you know, frequency of, from all these emails and touch points, getting them is negative. Like that's what they get. So what we're also doing, we're doing white labeled email communications as well. Again, it's your logo, it's your profile, it's your name that sends them, for example, a monthly report or update on how much their property is appreciated in value. [00:40:08] Lior: It sends them, you know, some like tips on how to utilize the platform and how to really be on top of things and always be in control of how your properties are really doing. A lot of these things that are just, yeah, just like, it's automated. You don't have to do anything. So like, it just gives them more transparency and feeling of, I'm in control, right? [00:40:28] Lior: Like I'm in control. I know how things are doing, like, and if there's something I need to do,  [00:40:32] Jason: which reduces their anxiety. The number one reason owners are constantly calling you, being interruptive, trying to micromanage you, is because they are anxious. Exactly. If you can reduce their anxiety. By increasing their awareness and their trust in you, it's a no brainer. [00:40:47] Jason: It's going to lower your operational costs dramatically.  [00:40:51] Lior: Exactly. So that's on the owner facing side of things. In the retain package, the team facing sort of like tools, they provide you two main things. There are two products within the retain package that your team is going to use. One is our portfolio manager. [00:41:06] Lior: Think of it as like an asset management dashboard. And the other one is our AI risk manager. So this one, you know, think of it as like your churn, you know, mitigator, and each one of them provides you two aspects of the same owner. The asset management dashboard shows you the health of every owner's property. [00:41:29] Lior: The churn manager or the risk manager shows you the risk of every property of churning. So the asset management dashboard will show you. Right.  [00:41:39] Jason: So the risk of them that like how likely they are to maybe start paying attention to maybe selling it, things like that.  [00:41:45] Lior: Just leaving, yeah. The risk of them leaving. [00:41:47] Lior: So, okay, let's maybe start with that because that's really, you know, one of the coolest products that we have. So the AI Churn Manager technically shows you the churn risk of every owner. Okay. Pretty much the risk of every owner from leaving you with ai, which takes in a lot of data. A lot of data from the communications with that owner to the property performance of that owner, everything that goes into whatever is related to that owner is taken into account and then it shows you the risk, but it also shows you the client value of that owner, meaning how much revenue this owner is generating your company. [00:42:25] Lior: Because we're integrated into a property management software, we know that revenue per unit of every property, so we can tell you how much every owner is worth for you. So the combination of these two elements of the churn risk and the client's value can really give you the ability to prioritize on whole, on who you are going to focus on first, and then you can really focus on the ones who are at high risk and high value. [00:42:50] Lior: And now what are you going to do next? Next, what that AI Retention Manager does for you is it also tells you exactly what to do to retain this owner. For example, let's say you have an owner that has a property that's currently undergoing a renovation, and he also has a mortgage in place, so he's losing money every month. [00:43:10] Lior: He's stressed. He might be thinking to himself, you know, why did I get into this whole thing? You know, I'm just losing money. I'm taking money outta my pocket every month. It's painful. So the AI will notice that and tell you something like, Hey, Jason, because A, B, C, D, what he should do is send this owner a link to his performance, which is one of like the features we have in that investor dashboard is like the forward looking performance of this property, right? [00:43:35] Lior: Send him a link to his performance so he can see that he should hold onto this property and not sell it right, because he's going to make a lot of money and waive two months of management fees. And again, those fees wouldn't cover for the losses, right? But it would show the owner how committed you are to his financial wellbeing. [00:43:54] Lior: So those are the things that the AI can tell you to do based on the retention policy that you will set in the beginning by answering questions that the AI will ask you to understand how you're thinking, what's your approach to retention. And lastly, when you'll see that recommendation, it will also draft you an email or a phone call script with your tone of voice. [00:44:15] Lior: So all you have to do is like literally hit send or just call them and read the script. So that's what the ai retention manager does for you. Okay, cool. And the asset management, you know, dashboard, which is that portfolio manager, that shows you just the overall performance of all your properties. And it can show you, for example, which properties are underperforming, meaning which properties are in negative cash flow position, so that you can reach out to these owners and tell them something like, Hey Jason, I see that this property is really not doing well. [00:44:42] Lior: We tried this, we tried that. We tried this. Why not think of 10 31, exchanging this property. Let's change it to a better property, one that wouldn't have all these headaches that we're going through. Two, it will be able to yield higher cashflow for you because we'll be able to charge a higher rent, you know, property in a better condition, so less expenses, and three, maybe even this will be a property in a better location, so more appreciation, potential, right? So like three wins for you, Mr. Owner, and to me, two wins because I'm getting the commissions maybe from both sides, right? Plus I'm getting a new door that might have a higher revenue per unit. [00:45:21] Lior: Or maybe there's enough faculty or which just more operational  [00:45:24] Jason: cost. Yeah, just easier to deal with. So like it's a winner. Also, maybe you could convert all the shitty properties in your portfolio and the easier properties to deal with.  [00:45:34] Lior: And that's the thing I always tell to all of our clients, think of this as like your blueprint to building the portfolio of your dreams. [00:45:42] Lior: Because it shows you which properties are underperforming. It shows you which properties have a high maintenance income ratio. So you can see which owners are really spending a lot of money on maintenance compared to how much money they're making in rent. And by the way, if, for example, if you have a maintenance division or you're charging markups on renovation, those properties are an additional revenue stream that you cannot reach out to all those owners and tell them. [00:46:05] Lior: Hey, Jason, like we're spending a lot of money on maintenance in the past couple of years. Let's think about, you know, reinvesting some of that cash flow and, you know, improving the property's condition, which is, you know, revenue for your company as well. So that what that, you know, asset management dashboard allows you to do is to see which properties are performing well, which properties are performing, you know, bad. [00:46:25] Lior: And for those that are performing well, you'll see things like, you know, which owners have a lot of equity trapped in their home? So that maybe when interest rates go down a little, you can reach out to them and say, Jason, like, look at this. Remember you said you want to build, you know, to grow your portfolio? [00:46:40] Lior: Interest rates have gone down right now and you have like $300,000 in equity. Let's step into that equity refinance, take the proceeds and buy another property in our area, which we have access to a lot of off market inventory here, which leads us to the grow package now. So that's the retain  [00:46:57] Jason: package that grow package. [00:46:58] Jason: I'll run through it quickly. I want all of my clients listening to this to be using Blanket like I want they all should be. This just is an absolute no brainer.  [00:47:08] Lior: Yeah. We definitely, by the way, it's not like I want to also give a shout out to all of our clients and all the folks that were with us from the start. [00:47:15] Lior: It's not like we are, you know, so smart and we had the solution for everything. This is a lot of hard work and sweat. By listening to all of our client's feedback and what they need the solutions to their like day-to-day problems and needs that they always experience and just never have the opportunity to really do it at scale. [00:47:33] Lior: Right? So, yeah. Back to the growth package. So that was the retained package, just as a summary. Two owner facing, you know, propositions, which is the investor dashboard and the branded owner communications, and two propositions for your team, which is the asset management dashboard and the AI retention manager.  [00:47:51] Lior: On the growth package, you also have two owner facing tools. One is the investment property marketplace, which is also white labeled with your logo. And this marketplace technically shows all your clients because it's closed only to your clients or anybody you invite to it. And we'll cover that in a second. But your clients who are in that marketplace see all the properties, all the off market properties that are for sale in your area. [00:48:16] Lior: So that way whenever they decide to buy another property, that will be a property that you're going to manage for them. So the marketplace. Acts as like this, you know, main tool for number one, capturing owners who want to sell. Remember what we started, we, you know, we want to capture the owners who are selling so we can at least, you know, get that commission or better get that commission and sell it to one of our other clients and retain the management of that unit. [00:48:41] Lior: But it also allows your clients to buy more properties. Now you're probably asking, you know, okay, where do those properties come from? So we source inventory on a national level from the largest wholesalers, turnkey providers, home builders for sale by owner feeds, anything that's off market, we are pretty much sourcing it across the country  [00:49:03] Jason: Is Blanket using investors that they can list their properties in this as well?  [00:49:09] Lior: So your clients, whenever they list their property, they will be at the top. They are what we call the exclusive properties category. So they are at the top. [00:49:17] Lior: We are pushing them always front face and center. They're the first ones for all your other clients to see, to increase the chances of them buying that from your clients and retaining the management of the unit. So all those properties that we have are all off market and. Yeah. Then this allows you not only to give it to your clients, but you can also invite anybody you want to it. [00:49:37] Lior: So maybe you have a list of leads that you bought in the past, you know, some cold leads or whatever. Or maybe you have friends and family that are interested in buying a property and working with you, or maybe you're going to like a BiggerPockets, you know, meetup or conference with investors or whatever. [00:49:51] Lior: They're always on the hunt for off market properties. So what you can do, you can invite them to the marketplace as a prospect. So like as a visitor, and once you invite them. And they log in, it appears as a prospect lead that you can then call them and say, Hey, Jason just saw you logged into our marketplace. [00:50:07] Lior: Hope that you liked it. By the way, if you have other properties in our area, I would love to send you some, you know, special friend, you know, discount for our property management services. And now you have a different conversation that is based on, you know, what your brand can offer them. So that's the marketplace. [00:50:24] Lior: And as you can see, the marketplace, technically what it does, it generates you leads, buyer leads, seller leads, prospect leads, et cetera. And what we provide is also sort of like a CRM feature that allows you just to keep track of all those leads, engage with them, or integrate with your existing CRM. [00:50:40] Lior: So folks might be using different systems we can integrate and push all those leads to your system. And lastly, the last feature that is also used by your team, by your BDM, or by yourself if you're starting out, is what we call our referral management system. So this system takes in all the agents in your area and pulls in information about them from the MLS and many other sources, and shows you, for every agent in your market, how many transactions they sold in the past two years, how many years in business, what's the average price of the properties they're selling, their contact details, their website, everything you need to actually start increasing or expanding your referral network that you have already in Blanket. [00:51:21] Lior: So what you do then. You could start reaching out to them, sending them emails from the Blanket system. And whenever they respond, you get on a call, you offer them, you know, to partner up and pay them referral fees for any client they're sending. And then you are giving them also a user in the system. And that's one of the interesting things. Today, agents are struggling, especially buyer's agents, which are normally, you know, the younger ones in every brokerage because the listing agents are normally the brokers and the most experienced ones. [00:51:48] Lior: So like buyers agents are having a hard time today with interest rates and with everything that's happening. So you can position yourself as their exclusive off market inventory partner, which they can leverage to be winning with their potential clients. So that way whenever you invite them as a partner, you're giving them access to off market inventory that they can't find anywhere else. [00:52:13] Lior: And that way whenever they bring on clients, they're sending them through the system and with a click of a button directly to you, you get those leads. They get paid through the system with that referral fee that you've set and agreed to with them, whether it's $500, 250, whatever. And the cool thing about it is that it has also automated updates to the agent every time one of the referrals inquired about a property they want to buy or to sell, assuming you promise them, you know, to return that lead back to them when it's selling. So that way you are making them happy. Those referrals are happy and you are able to really grow, you know, your referral network with everything within your ecosystem. [00:52:51] Lior: And be that center of the ecosystem, be that asset manager. Nice. So that's the goal package as well.  [00:52:57] Jason: That's super awesome. So cool. This Blanket sounds like an awesome tool. You've shown it to me. I think it's really a brilliant idea. I think every property manager should be using it. It's a no-brainer. [00:53:08] Jason: How do people get started with you? How do people get in touch?  [00:53:12] Lior: So you can either visit our website: Blankethomes.com and just schedule a quick, you know, 15 minute discovery call. You know, just listen to what we can offer so we wouldn't waste your time. And just understand if it's the right thing for you. [00:53:26] Lior: And then you can either just, you know, send me a LinkedIn message, send me a dm, pretty much on every social media platform. I'm not really responding very fast. And we could just get on a call. And I also invite anybody that wants you to just, you know, even if they're not interested in Blanket, right? [00:53:41] Lior: Like if you're thinking to yourself maybe it's too much for me. Maybe it's too expensive, I don't have the bandwidth right now, but you want to brainstorm about, you know, how to be more investor, you know, investment manager mindset as like guided property manager, how to be more of an asset manager. [00:53:56] Lior: This is my passion, this is what I've been doing my entire life. Like, if you want to just brainstorm, shoot me a message. Like I can talk about this for hours, so, you know, I'll be happy to help anybody that needs that. Even if you're not a Blanket client, again, you don't have to be a partner of ours to really just, you know, get inspired and, you know, learn from other people's mistakes. [00:54:14] Lior: And we've done quite a few.  [00:54:16] Jason: Awesome Lior, thanks for being a guest here on the DoorGrow Show podcast appreciate you hanging out with us. So, if you are watching this and you felt stuck or stagnant and want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow, also join our free Facebook community. [00:54:33] Jason: It's just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. And if you've found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. Bye everyone. 

DoorGrow has been helping property management business owners transform and grow their businesses for over a decade… what’s changed? In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth experts Jason and Sarah Hull explore some of the things DoorGrow has been working on in the last 5 years to innovate the property management industry. You’ll Learn [01:24] Why DoorGrow Continues to Innovate [06:94] Helping Property Managers Avoid Common Mistakes [13:23] Changes and Improvements to the DoorGrow Mastermind [21:52] Innovative New Sales Strategies Quotables “A lot of people think, ‘I just need more leads. I just need to turn that on.’ And they ignore this hose that has six major leaks in it.” “If you ask them the right questions, people will basically sell themselves.” “It's like when you go to a buffet, you're not going to eat everything at the buffet… You only want to eat the things that you want right now.” “You are the sum of the five property management business owners that you're the most connected to.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Sarah: Do you have any idea how powerful it is to be connected to a coach? 24 hours a day? Like there is no time in the world that you cannot message us. [00:00:08] Jason: All right. We are Jason and Sarah Hull, the owners of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improved pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. In fact, we have cleaned up and rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind for the industry with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry.  [00:00:59] Jason: At DoorGrow, we believe that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.  [00:01:09] Jason: At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management, business owners and their businesses. [00:01:13] Jason: We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. Now let's get into the show.  [00:01:24] Jason: Alright, so today, what are we talking about, Sarah?  [00:01:28] Jason: We're talking about what's new.  [00:01:30] Jason: So we've helped a lot of clients in the past, and if we've helped you three, five, maybe 10 years ago, there's been a lot that's changed at DoorGrow because we innovate and make changes pretty quickly, right? [00:01:44] Jason: And we've got systems for innovation in our business. And so, I think this is why we have the most comprehensive program in the industry and why nobody else can keep up with our pace and our level of creating and innovating and adding new stuff. And so a lot of you maybe have listened to this podcast a bit, maybe a while, maybe you're past clients. Maybe you've never worked with DoorGrow, but I'm going to talk about some of the stuff we've implemented since somebody was maybe a client in our older programs, like our seed program, or maybe did some initial marketing stuff with us back in the day. And so we're going to chat a little bit about what's new since then. [00:02:24] Jason: And so if you are a past client, this will be a great episode for you to catch up on what is new at DoorGrow. And if you'd like us to go deeper, I have a 37 minute video I recorded with slides on this subject going into a little bit more detail, but we're going to skim through some of this and help you understand there's a lot of innovation. [00:02:44] Jason: So if you had some connection with DoorGrow in the past, since then, we have become the world leaders at growing and scaling property management companies. And especially in the long term residential space. We've become the world leaders of property management branding. Like I said in the intro, we've rebranded over 300 companies. [00:03:04] Jason: We have launched hundreds of websites, more than we've done rebrands. And so hundreds and hundreds of websites. And we're still the leader in building responsive mobile friendly WordPress sites for property managers, which is the world's leading content management system. And if you're past client, you might be due for a website refresh. [00:03:24] Jason: We have over 70 different designs you can choose from, and they are clean designs, they're set up so that these sites, we call them seed sites, they're optimized for conversions, they're optimized to build trust. And so if it's, if you have an old website from us, you might be due for a refresh and we can certainly help you with that. [00:03:46] Jason: And past clients, we'll give you a discounted rate. So we're really great at doing websites for those that aren't a past client. And so, reach out, we can help you with that. And we include websites for free in some of our programs. You still have to pay like the support costs monthly, but the design piece, which normally is thousands of dollars to get a site built, we cover and take care of that. [00:04:09] Jason: That's included in our mastermind program. Related to that, we've also launched the world's leading mastermind for long-term residential property managers called The DoorGrow Mastermind. So, do you want to talk about this one?  [00:04:22] Sarah: Sure. I guess. Okay. All right. So one of the things that we had launched, what, like two years ago now maybe? [00:04:29] Sarah: Yeah. Is what we call the DoorGrow code. So what we've done is we've just seen over the many years and over Jason talking with thousands of property managers. He's just amassed a whole bunch of data. And after that happens, then you start to kind of see some patterns. So. What we did is we created this whole map that lays out stage by stage and step by step. [00:04:56] Sarah: The various different ,I'm going to call them stages, of a property management business. So all the way from, "I'm brand new, I have no doors yet, not quite sure I really want to get started, but I, you know, I don't actually have any clients yet" to, "well, now I have my first client and then I'm growing up to, you know, 50, a hundred, 200, 300, 400 doors, all the way up to a thousand plus. So we've created this whole roadmap, and then if you're in the DoorGrow Mastermind, we also have created some corresponding belt levels. So we kind of like a martial arts system, we've created different color coded built levels that corresponds to both your door count and your income because both things are important. [00:05:43] Sarah: And what are the things that you need to do at each different stage in order to progress to the next level in your business? Meaning you are making more revenue, you're adding more doors, and hopefully you're stepping back a bit from the things that you're not loving in the business.  [00:06:02] Jason: Yeah, and we call that the DoorGrow code, like we've cracked the code on growth and this is based on talking to thousands of property managers. [00:06:09] Jason: We started to notice a pattern. So if you'd like a copy of the DoorGrow code and see where you're at and stuck, reach out to us. We'd be happy to send you a copy. Just shoot us a DM on any social platform. Say, Hey. Just send us the word code and we'll, we can send you information about the DoorGrow code and that'll help you get some clarity on where you're at. [00:06:28] Jason: So that's been a game changer. We used to have this old program called the Seed Program, where we would kind of clean up their business and get it ready for growth. And it used to be a six month program. Some clients would take a year to do it. We've replaced that with a 90 day Rapid Revamp program, and so our Rapid Revamp program is even faster and this is where usually I use a diagram of a hose and there's like a faucet to turn on the hose. And that faucet Or spigot, it usually says lead generation. A lot of people think, "I just need more leads. I just need to turn that on." And they ignore this hose that has six major leaks in it, and so we've identified six major leaks, and so as part of this Rapid Revamp. [00:07:09] Jason: We spend like three months with clients, usually our newer clients that come on board, we do this first. This is like sharpening the ax before we go try to chop down trees, you know, try to do the work to grow the business, and we're optimizing it for growth and we're shoring up those six major leaks. [00:07:24] Jason: And the big leaks are branding, reviews, website, pricing, trust, and sales, your pitch. So we call it positioning, perception, presence, pricing, purpose, and pitch. And if we can get those things really well dialed in, we find that companies without even changing their lead gen sources, can double the amount of deals that they're getting on right now. [00:07:43] Jason: So if you feel like it's been hard and you can't see why, these are usually six major blind spots. And this is why it's been so hard. If we can get this stuff dialed in, even without changing any of the lead sources, however you're getting business right now, you could potentially double the amount of business you're getting on just by getting these leaks shored up. [00:08:02] Jason: And do you want to talk about pricing?  [00:08:04] Sarah: Okay. Pricing is actually one of the things that we cover now in the Rapid Revamp. And what we've noticed is even companies that grow to a considerable door count, most of the times their pricing is still just not great. I think we have yet to see a business that their pricing is already optimized, so a lot of times, they're leaving money on the table, which is so awful. Because you're working so hard for your money. Yeah. And you're just not making enough of it. And there's some statistics and data from NARPM. If you ever look at the NARPM data and you look at what like the average property manager's profit margin is, it's pretty abysmal. Yeah. And this is one of the reasons why. [00:08:48] Sarah: It's not the like the only reason, but it's one of the big ones. It's one of the factors. Pricing. So what we've figured out is, hey, a lot of property managers, they just kind of go with the flow. They do what the competition in their market is doing. You know, they just kind of, sometimes they wing it and they go, I think this is good. [00:09:07] Sarah: And they put something together. And when we come in and take a look at it, we can find thousands of dollars more per year. So like Anthony O'Reilly Brookes just said a couple weeks ago on the pricing, he's like, oh, if I just do this one change, I don't even have to do all of these changes. He is like, if I just do this one change, then I can make myself an extra $26,000 a year. [00:09:28] Jason: Yeah. This is one of our clients. It was great. So yeah, so we had an old training. We were the first to roll out kind of the three tier sort of pricing model to bring this to the industry. The basic idea was based around the Goldilocks principle and how it's easier to sell if you have three different types of pricing based on three types of buyers. Pricing secrets, we've rolled out 2.0. [00:09:51] Jason: So some of our past clients, you've gone through our original pricing secrets. You've have maybe a three tier model or maybe at least three plans sort of. Some of you maybe have lease only as one of them, which we don't recommend anymore. But now we've got this three tier hybrid pricing model and I got some of the idea from Scott Brady, really brilliant property manager. [00:10:14] Jason: He was using a hybrid model for pricing out associations. I then put my own spin on it based on what I know about pricing psychology. And I believe this is the most ethical and easiest to sell model. And it allows you to be unique and sell against all your competitors and to kind of poison the well against flat fee companies or percentage based companies. [00:10:36] Jason: And so it gives you competitive advantage and it helps you close more deals more easily at higher price points. So we've got that. The next thing we've made some big advancements into sales. So some of you went through my old Sales secrets training and and this was old school sales, like it was based on NLP neurolinguistic programming. [00:10:57] Jason: It was based on different formulas of communication that some would maybe calm, manipulative, but the idea, and I would present at the beginning, like, don't be evil. You know, like, these are powerful techniques. Well, a lot of the old school sort of sales tactics of high pressure closing and a lot of training you get from most salespeople and people that are known for sales really isn't working in the last three to five years. [00:11:23] Jason: And so there's kind of this new model of selling that needs to be done. And because we're in this post trust era, like everybody's been kind of exposed and woken up a little bit that everything's kind of fake. The news is fake. The pandemic's fake. Voting's fake. Like, like nobody knows who to trust or what to trust because we realize we've just been gaslighted and lied to by everything. Especially the government and powers that are over us. And so nobody trusts anything anymore. And so there's a new model of selling that allows you to create trust that we've learned and rolled out, and we get into some cool tactics like the three dominoes to creating the ultimate pitch. [00:12:05] Jason: I have a model of four phase selling, which is a simple framework for understanding four simple phrases to take people through when having a conversation. And then our Golden Bridge formula, which is even if you learn nothing else, is the ultimate sales hack to just creating authentic trust and connection with somebody, which is the crux of sales. [00:12:25] Jason: You know? And so this is high trust selling, figuring out your personal golden bridge I've used for years in my own sales and in getting on clients, and it's why people trust me so much. And so we'll help you figure out your own. And then we get into this whole new model of selling, which has multiple phases that helps people get their own clarity. [00:12:44] Jason: And what I've realized is people don't understand their problems and what they need, and until you ask them the right questions, and so if you ask them the right questions, people will basically sell themselves. You don't have to push, be pushy In sales, this is more about being empathetic, curious, asking questions, and it feels very good to be sold to in this way, if you could even call it selling. It's really coaching. And so I'm teaching you how to do that as well in this training. And then we've also added recently offer documents, sales trackers, like some really cool stuff that we use at DoorGrow to close deals and that are helping our clients increase their close rates significantly. [00:13:23] Jason: So we made a lot of improvements to our coaching program. Maybe you could talk about some of those things.  [00:13:30] Sarah: Yeah. So there... man, I feel like since I stepped into DoorGrow, we changed everything, so. [00:13:37] Jason: We did.  [00:13:38] Sarah: Which is great because it's like there's a lot of things that we wanted to improve, and there were a lot of things that we wanted to add. So I think one of the best things for me anyway, is I really love the Jumpstart events. So if you join the DoorGrow Mastermind as a newer client, then part of your launch package is going to be an in-person deep dive into your business with Jason and myself, you spend the whole day together with a small group of property managers. [00:14:08] Sarah: We keep it small because I cannot do a deep dive with like 10 people or 20 people. So we do a very small group. Yeah, and we really get into the weeds. We get into the nitty gritty. You walk away with a very clear action plan. You know exactly what to be doing, and you just get so much clarity and connection with other property managers that are attending that event, which is really great because after the event, those people, they stick together for a while, you know? [00:14:36] Sarah: Yeah.  [00:14:36] Jason: Create some nice connections. We rolled out the jumpstart sessions because we started to notice a pattern that when clients would meet us in person or come to DoorGrow Live or conference or anything in person, they would suddenly realize psychologically we were real people. There's just something psychologically about video Zoom calls video trainings in DoorGrow Academy. [00:15:00] Jason: That's not real to our brain. And so I call it the real bubble. And we've realized if we can pop that real bubble from the beginning, clients' perception of and recognizing that we're real people, then that translates into the things that we teach are real. And the things and the results clients are getting are real. [00:15:18] Jason: And so they start to get way better results. And so we want to give people that experience from the beginning, and we've got a much better outcome from all of our clients by getting them to do these in-person things towards the beginning of them joining DoorGrow's Mastermind and they're getting way better results. [00:15:36] Jason: They recognize that this is all real stuff and so they absorb the content in all the information in a completely different way, which is really powerful, so. [00:15:45] Sarah: And I would also say in addition to that too, though, if you had worked with us prior to what, four years ago? I would say probably four is the right answer. [00:15:56] Sarah: If you worked with us anytime before that, we recognized onboarding was very hectic and it was, oh man, it's really overwhelming. Everybody was like, "oh my God, there's so much information and I don't know what to do," and then they try to take it all in and they're overwhelmed and they're focusing on the wrong things. [00:16:13] Sarah: And then they have a bunch of questions and they're trying to like, jump on the calls to get their questions answered. So we did a few things. And the best thing that we have rolled out is. We have a really solid, streamlined onboarding process now.  [00:16:29] Jason: Yeah.  [00:16:29] Sarah: So we take you through a very proven like we have a whole course on DoorGrow Academy on onboarding to make sure that you get into all of the tools. You have access to everything. You know how to use it. Because just because you have it, doesn't mean you know how to use it. Yeah. And then that you're connected with our team. Because there are still some times that people are like, "oh, I didn't even know I could talk to Madi. Oh, I didn't know I could talk to Giselle." Or like, "oh, I didn't realize I could do that." Yeah, you absolutely can. We have a whole team to support you. So we make sure that you're connected with the right tools. We make sure you're connected with the team. You get on like a couple of 15 minute coaching calls with our like onboarding specialist right at the beginning just to make sure, like we're going to walk you through everything. We're going to check everything, we're going to explain everything to you, make sure you're on telegram, make sure you're connected to our entire team. And then they get a brand new thing that we had rolled out in addition that we added to onboarding is our client workbooks. [00:17:26] Sarah: So one of the things that everybody says is, "oh my God, it's like drinking out of a fire hose." I hear this almost from every client.  [00:17:33] Jason: Yeah. That analogy comes up all the time. It's like drinking out of a fire hose. Like they say it all the time. Yeah. Yeah. They're like, oh my God, there's so much, there's so much available. [00:17:41] Jason: Yes, there is. So we help them get focused.  [00:17:43] Sarah: And that's great. But it's like when you go to a buffet you're not going to eat everything at the buffet.  [00:17:48] Jason: No.  [00:17:49] Sarah: You only want to eat the things that you want right now. Yeah. And maybe you're like, oh, I'm saving room for dessert later. I know. Like, I'm going to pace myself because I want dessert later for sure. And that's great because you're not ready for dessert now. So it's not that you skip it, it's just that you don't need it right now. So we have a much better system of figuring out what do you need right now. So it's a lot more personalized, it's a lot more customized and then you're able to go through a proven roadmap that's for your business and for your stage. And a lot of that lives in our client workbooks. And that way there's like one place to refer to, you know your belt level requirements. You know your Rapid Revamp to do items. You know what the homework is that you're supposed to be doing. Your sales tracker lives in there and all of your action items and to do items, they're all in there, so you know exactly what to be doing and there's one document to refer to that makes it really easy. [00:18:45] Jason: And when you talk to a coach, we'll map out exactly what you know, we want to figure out your goals, and then we map out tactical items for you to check off and to work on specific to you. And so, even though we've got some different, you know, paths and formulas and classes, we always tailor this to our clients. [00:19:02] Jason: And the client workbook really helps that communication. It literally gets us on the same page, right? Yeah. Together. So, we've added client Success manager, my daughter Madi, who manages all her social media, does all our video editing. She is now also our client success manager, and she's amazing at that. [00:19:17] Jason: So we've had a couple different client success managers over the years and that's really helped improve the connection clients have, the clarity they have, and we also have giselle on our team who can find anything for clients and help them find things.  [00:19:32] Sarah: Giselle is like ai, but she's not. [00:19:34] Jason: Right. Yeah.  [00:19:36] Sarah: She's the best human AI I've ever seen.  [00:19:40] Jason: Yeah. So, and so we've got really good support systems for our clients. We also now leverage Telegram Messenger. We used to use Voxer. Some of my clients in the past, maybe remember Voxer. So I think we've upgraded by using Telegram Messenger for sure. [00:19:54] Jason: And it's a lot more reliable. And so we coach clients directly through it. Walkie-talkie style. They can answer questions anytime. So that's been really effective.  [00:20:01] Sarah: And I mean, that's super powerful too because, yeah, this is the one thing that I like, especially in the Rapid Revamp. I harp on this a lot. [00:20:08] Sarah: Do you have any idea how powerful it is to be connected to a coach? 24 hours a day? Like there is no time in the world that you cannot message us. Yeah. So you can message Jason, you can message me, you can message our whole client success team, including Madi. You can message us any time at all. [00:20:25] Sarah: It doesn't mean we're going to get back to you immediately. Sure. But we get back to you pretty darn quickly. Yeah. And out of all the communication channels, those are the ones that we check the most. So like Jason will never check his email. So if you ever email Jason, it's a black hole, don't do it. [00:20:41] Jason: Someone else will read it. Eventually  [00:20:42] Sarah: But Telegram, he checks Telegram a lot. And I check Telegram. I mean, I message people sometimes back at midnight, like if they send me a message at 11 and I'm still awake at midnight, I'm like, okay. I'm like messaging you in bed. I have no problem doing that. [00:20:55] Sarah: But you're connected very easily and very quickly to a coach who can rapidly answer questions. And it's not, you know, it's not like this cumbersome thing where you're like, "oh, I have to get on a call and figure out a time that works for me." Right? Like it works for you all the time because you just send a message. [00:21:12] Jason: Yeah. So that's been real effective. We've got three different weekly group coaching calls. We've got a Rapid Revamp class where we're optimizing the product of the business. And getting the business dialed up and ready for growth. Then we've got our Growth Accelerator class that we do. So the Rapid Revamp's on Tuesdays. Growth Accelerator is on Wednesdays, and this is where we focus on just adding doors. [00:21:34] Jason: We work with BDMs, we work with salespeople, we work with business owners to figure out how to grow and working on different growth engines. And then we have our Friday class, which is our operations class where we get into creating scalable operations so that you can handle high paced growth without the business falling apart. [00:21:52] Jason: So, we've also added in our Growth Accelerator, we've added a bunch of different growth engines. These are different sort of vehicles or engines you can build in your business that feed you business organically without having to pay for marketing or advertising. And it's actually more effective than any cold lead advertising we've seen to date. [00:22:12] Jason: We just brought on a client with 6,000 doors that was spending 30 grand a month. Trying to do internet marketing and digital marketing to grow their business, and they reached out to us for help. And so we're giving them a better strategy of leveraging business development managers in each market doing organic outreach, and they're going to grow way faster. [00:22:29] Jason: And it's going to cost them way less money. Way less. Right.  [00:22:32] Sarah: And for those of you that are doing paid marketing, do you think you can outspend someone who's spending $30,000 a month?  [00:22:38] Jason: Right. And the reality is there's very little search volume of people looking for property management on the internet, and that's what all of the companies are competing in that red bloody water. And there's tons of blue ocean of people. 60% are self-managing. There's no scarcity. And so we help you get these different growth engines dialed in and we've got great tactics like you know, product research interviews, realtor intros, which is 10 times more effective than realtor referrals, which a lot of you try and it doesn't work super well. [00:23:05] Jason: We've got you know, some clever tactics of going direct to investors. We also launched this ROI calculator that's pretty brilliant. That goes along with our realtor intro strategy. We've got the neighbor strategy. Which helps you get business from neighboring property management companies, which is really brilliant. [00:23:23] Jason: We've got warm review outreach, which will help you get better reviews, help you increase the lifetime value of your tenants and owners, and help you get more referrals from your existing clients. And so that can be real effective. Any one of these has helped our clients at a hundred to 200 doors a year organically, and you can install as many of these as you want. [00:23:42] Jason: We've got outbound partner prospecting where you can go after lenders, insurance agents, attorneys, vendors, and another example is groups like one to many sales and how to, instead of walking away from a group interaction where you hope maybe you'll get a lead or a referral or something, you walk away with scheduled, booked calls and can make money. [00:24:04] Jason: So, cool. So those are some of our growth engines. Let's talk about, this is new.  [00:24:09] Sarah: I love talking about DoorGrow Hiring. We could do a whole podcast episode on just that alone. Sure. And this is not specific just to property management businesses, this is businesses in general. Yeah. They. Really struggle with hiring. [00:24:22] Sarah: It's hard. It is so challenging and what usually happens is you wait until you're in pain and then you hurry up to hire and then your situation gets worse than it was before. And then, now you've got, you know, some scar tissue and now you're like, oh, I don't think I want to hire. Or like, ah, there's no good people out there. [00:24:44] Sarah: Like, I've been burned before. And it's because people approach everything pretty much the wrong way. Yeah. So we built this into entire system that's called DoorGrow Hiring. And we'll take people through it to make sure that you've got everything in line that you need ahead of time. So that you can actually be prepared to find the right person. We also give you proven processes to help you find the right people. Including things like your R Docs, which is just a fancy word for job description, your company culture. We build out your application, we put it on your website. We give you like the job postings. We give you an interview guide. [00:25:20] Sarah: I literally give you the words to use in an interview, these are the questions you're going to ask. This is the order you're going to ask them in, and these are the words you're going to say, and then that is it. We take you like step by step. So we created this whole system in order to help people find really great team members instead of playing Russian roulette with hiring, which is really dangerous. [00:25:45] Jason: Yeah. So, and the whole crux of it is focused on the three fits, which is finding the right culture fit, skill fit, and personality fit for the role. You cannot create those in people, you have to find them. And finding all three can be challenging and our whole hiring system's built around that. So, just three more things real quick. [00:26:03] Jason: One, we've focused on the five levels of exit. So a lot of property managers can't figure out how to exit the frontline work of the business, so they end up then selling the business because they're miserable in it. So we help you figure out how to get to there's five levels. We help you figure out how to get to somewhere in the middle where you're happiest and you're out of that frontline work without going all the way to exit five and selling the business and having a lack of purpose or you know, not having the business anymore and then trying to start something new and getting to the same level of problem in the video game and you keep losing against the same boss and whatever. So we help you figure out how to beat that boss in the video game. We also launched DoorGrow OS, which is a really robust planning system. [00:26:45] Jason: We have found some fundamental flaws in other planning systems, which are a step up. Just having one like EOS, Traction, Rocket Fuel, some of this kind of stuff. We've built something we believe is innovative and far better after working with some of the most brilliant operations people. And, probably in the world. [00:27:01] Jason: And so this is DoorGrow OS and this is our secret sauce at DoorGrow. And so we're helping people roll out and implement a planning cadence and system and get operators in place that can run this for you, the visionary entrepreneurs. So that your business runs smoothly and you can handle high-paced growth and have goals and get your team focused on the strategic side of the business rather than just being micromanaged through tactical work and task management. [00:27:29] Jason: And then this is the last item you want to talk about this one? [00:27:33] Sarah: Well, we've got our DoorGrow Live conference coming up, so I think you did the first one in like 2018. Then we took a break and then we brought them back. So yeah. We run our DoorGrow Live conference once a year, this is our big event, we open it up to clients, past clients, people who have never even worked with us. People who are in and around the property management industry, including real estate. Because if you're in real estate, you should seriously consider getting into property management, or at least knowing a property manager. And if you need to know a great property manager, there's going to be a lot of them in the room. [00:28:06] Sarah: So, the DoorGrow Live, it's a really powerful event. We bring in some fantastic speakers. It's always very motivational and very tactical, so no matter what it is that you're looking for from the event, you will find it there. And it's a great place to connect and meet people who are doing the same thing that you are doing. [00:28:28] Sarah: Because that is just such a powerful tool to be able to have a network of people that you can rely on and that understand you and understand what exactly you're trying to do and what you're going through.  [00:28:40] Jason: Yeah, and we have some amazing vendors that sponsor the event. One of them told me this is the only event that they now do of all the property management events, because it's their favorite. It's the best one. Even though it's small compared to many. They love this one and they get so much value out of learning and being at it as an entrepreneur. And so that says a lot. And so, these are different property managers. [00:29:03] Jason: These are growth-minded people that invest in their businesses. These are not the people that are just trying to have a shitty vacation and escape and go to a bar. These are people that are focused on growth. And so if you want to be around the best in the industry DoorGrow Live is the place to be around the best, and you are the sum of the five property management business owners that you're the most connected to. [00:29:23] Jason: You know, birds of a feather flock together. So if you're growth minded, you want to be at this event. So, and by the time this airs, for a lot of you, if you're listening to this on Spotify or somewhere else. You may have already missed this year, so, but get your tickets and we've got some cool bonuses that we're giving to people if they attend. [00:29:40] Jason: So. Cool. That's it for today. If you have felt stuck or stagnant or want to take your property management business the next level, reach out to us at DoorGrow.com. Also join our free Facebook community just for property management business owners. We reject 70% of applicants doorgrowclub.com. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. [00:30:02] Jason: We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it alone, so let's grow together. Bye everyone.