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Itunes – www.TonyJavier.com/itunes 

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Guest Bio: Jim Manning is a truly talented residential Real Estate investor who went from patiently waiting for over 18 months to crack his first deal to receiving over 500 deals in a year!

Listen to the full episode at www.TonyJavier.com/itunes and please leave a review.

If you want to watch the video, go to www.TonyJavier.com/podcast.

Join 50,000+ Rehabbers, House Flippers, Wholesalers, and Agents who use Rehab Valuator, to get a free version, go to www.TonyJavier.com/valuator

More about him – https://tonyjavier.com/jimmanning

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Show Transcription:

 

Tony (00:02):
Welcome to today’s episode. We have Mr. Jim Manning on the line. He is a real estate investor and agent. This guy does over 500 deals a year, and it’s kind of like me, he’s removed himself from the business, which I love, I love talking with these business owners because it’s such a high-level conversation. And, you know, even if he was in the business doing over 500 deals a year, still high level, so we’ll jump right into it. What’s going on, James or Jim? How are you doing, sir?

Jim (00:30):
Thank you for having me, Tony. Appreciate it, man.

Tony (00:31):
Absolutely man. So you’re in St. Louis, Missouri you do quite a few things. You have removed yourself from the business. You’ve automated things to where, you know, you and your business partner. I know you for sure are mostly removed from the business. You said last year, you looked at one deal and you didn’t do the deal, which you know, is awesome. Most people look at every single deal that they do like I used to do and are in the weeds. So tell us what has gotten you from where you started to where you are now to where you can do hundreds of deals a year and be basically almost a hundred percent removed from your business?

Jim (01:07):
Yeah, so I think the biggest thing on it guys is like, if you look at it there’s a quote, I forget by who, but you over, you underestimate what you can do in a decade and you overestimate what you can do in a single year. So when I started out, I mean, it took me 18 months to be my first deal. And like, you know, there’s several people like, you know, people that were kind of mentoring now I’ve done 40, 50 deals in a year. And their first couple of years in the business, it took me like four years to get to 50 deals in my first year. And so like the biggest kind of thing I would say upfront has made sure that you’re not, you know, especially if you’re just starting out, don’t hear that 500 deals market and be like, Oh my gosh, I could never get there. Well, I mean, if, as long as you can do two deals in first 18 months to do you’ll have out-produced what I was able to do. Right. but it just takes a lot of dedication, a lot of forwarding steps, some steps back when you mess things up, and just a lot of determination to kind of keep moving forward, no matter what kind of gets in your way. And we’ve had a lot of ups and downs. And at the end of the day, I think when it comes down, it was just getting some of the right people around you that you can trust. And so my business partner, Ryan Wessels you know, we’ve been business partners for 10 years now, for instance, high school. And kind of the first key for me was realizing my own weaknesses, my own kind of drawbacks and finding a business partner that wasn’t like me, that was actually strong where I was weak. And so, like, Ryan, I’ve kind of had a really good synergy and it’s really kind of helped us get rocking and rolling and growing this thing over the last decade or 13 plus years of being an investor. So,

Tony (02:55):
Yeah, That was a really good nugget. You just said, Tony Robbins says that all the time, he says it, you an overestimate what you can do in a day, but you underestimate what you can do in a lifetime is how he puts it. But it’s the same thing. It’s like, you know, no matter where you are, you have so much opportunity and so much growth that you can do that you don’t realize what your potential is until you get there. Cause like I can even took five years, five years ago where I was. And at the time, you know, I was, I felt like I was at a fairly high level, but then I even, you know, five years later was even dramatically higher than I thought I could ever be. And I can only imagine another 5, 10, 15 years will do. And so 18 months. So a lot of people don’t fight in their first deal, right? A lot of people get in this business, they don’t find their first deal. You were fortunate enough that you had the, I guess tenacity, whatever you want to call it, to find your, for, to, to stick it out 18 months. Right? Most people month, two months, three months, they’re out of it. They’re done. And I’ve heard this from many people that it’s, it’s taken them many months to find their first deal. I was fortunate enough. I think within about three months I found my first deal. I got the first taste and really got motivated. So tell us about that 18 months. What did that look like to you and what kept you going to continue looking for your first deal?

Jim (04:16):
Yeah, so I think the first thing looking back is that I have lied to myself. I told myself, well, I got to learn all this stuff before I, because I don’t want to lose any money on my deal. And Oh my gosh, like I, just have to learn and I have to learn and I have to learn. And the first year was just spent on podcasts on YouTube gen name, just trying to figure out this whole investing thing I bought. I remember I bought a thousand-dollar course online to just teach myself how to do like repair estimates, a system, to work with contractors, you name it. But at the end of the day, looking back, what I was really doing was as I was actually telling him, you know, I was procrastinating because I was scared to do the couple of key things that, that are required to be able to make money.

Jim (05:06):
And, you know, like I, you know, I was, I was really scared to start spending some money on marketing and investing in that. I was really scared to start talking to people because I was insecure. I thought, well, I’m not good enough. I’m not gonna, you know, people are going to see right through me. If I call a wholesaler like that and I haven’t done my first deal, like, like, is that wholesale going to take advantage of me? So I don’t want to do that. And I got into this thought pattern, a loop of, I just had to learn, learn, learn, learn, learn. And I didn’t actually do anything. Like, it’s kind of the same thing as if you were like a baseball player on the sports guide using an analogy. And I read a book on hitting, but I didn’t get in a batting cage and swinging swing, any baseball bat with a baseball bat and all there. I didn’t actually get in the game cause I was too scared to do that. But I just read 15 books about how to hit a baseball at point until you get an, a game you’re not going to have to now, which right so like, it was like, I mean we.

Tony (06:05):
Just analytics bases is analysis paralysis. Right? Just making sure you had everything perfect before you jumped into something.

Jim (06:11):
Yeah. And what’s amazing about these guys is like when we talk a lot so I have my own podcast as well doors to deals is the name of it and I interview a lot of people too. And literally a pretty high percentage of people, like have had some sort of obstacle or they’ve had sphere deep, dark fear of losing a lot of money on a deal and a high percentage of them. Actually, it happens to them and what their, one of their fears actually ended up happening. And then they ended up okay. And they ended up better. I’ve had, I can’t tell you the number of people I’ve had that have said, Oh, my deepest fear was this on a version of was a version of it happened. And then all of a sudden I realized looking back, it was the best blessing that I’ve ever had in my life.

Jim (06:57):
It was like literally the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me because had I not gone through that, I wouldn’t have developed the skill set and I want to be the individual I am today being able to do the things that I do. So like a lot of things we beat, you know, we’re so afraid of things. And then, you know, it’s false evidence appearing real, I think, is a common one that we hear all the time. But at some point you just have to kind of make it up and have, you know, have some courage and get into the caving, you know?

Tony (07:24):
Yeah. you know, I know a lot of really successful real estate investors. A lot of ones I know are kind of the ready fire, aim, personality, you know, they fire, it’s kind of like building a, jumping off a cliff and just building a parachute on the way down. Not always the best way to do it. I mean, you obviously want to take some calculated risks, but at the same time, sometimes you just have to jump in and get that experience. You know, like I, look at, I don’t tell anybody not to go to college, but for me, like looking back, knowing what I know now I could have just jumped into real estate and probably learned way more, four years of like diving into real estate than I did in four years of college. And I, actually did an interview at WSU Wichita state university the other day because they interviewed some successful people that had gone to gone to Wichita state and I didn’t even graduate.

Tony (08:15):
And they said beyond, and I told them the same thing. I’m like, they’re like, no, be honest. And I’m like, okay, well, and part of the segment was, you don’t have to go to college. But anyway, so it’s kind of interesting how, you know, people think that you have to be so smart to make a lot of money or so smart to be successful. And honestly, like, you know, I had a decent GPA, but most of the investors that I know like the successful ones aren’t necessarily the smartest. They were just willing to jump in and do it and figure out how to make it work. So it’s interesting that you say that.

Jim (08:52):
Yeah, I completely agree. I had a conversation a couple of weeks ago, a new person calls me and says, Hey, you know, I have these seven business ideas. I have a full-time job and I’d be selling an ideas, business ideas. I want to do all of them. And can I sit down and meet with you? And I said, well, hold on a second there, I already know you’re going to fail on all of them. You know, these ideas are amazing. You’re trying to do part-time seven different businesses and make it successful, pick a one, do it for a little while, get good at it. And then if you need to add a second. Okay, great. But at a certain point, like, like, so I can typically know, like if I’m in some mastermind groups and things like that there’s been a trend with the entrepreneurs that I meet, the people that are doing the least amount of things really, really well and have the least amount of businesses typically are making more money than the, than some of the other people that come in the group and say, Oh, I have these five different things going on on coaching. I’m wholesaling, I’m flipping, I’m doing all these different things. And like, I like I’ve noticed a trend even, and, and the, the sixth level of success with people that are doing less things.

Tony (10:06):
So yeah, I had, I had someone in a mastermind group say, Hey, I I’ve been in the, like doing, doing this for a year and I’ve been doing well at it. So I want to do this. And I’m like, wait a second. You’ve only been doing it a year. Do you really feel like you want to take the concentration that you’ve developed in making this business really good and really successful and take your efforts and start concentrating on this other thing. And I, you know, I don’t know how well she had it set up, but I was like, make sure you have that dialed in. Like you’ve got to dial in on one thing and do it really well and make sure that it’s really good until you like, take your focus. And that’s not saying you can’t have some other things on the side, but it is a good point that like, if you’re going to take a lot of your time and put it into a second or third thing, you got to make sure the first things dialed in, because it’s, it’s gonna take your attention away from that and you need to make sure that the train stays on the tracks. So how do you do it? Like you have, you know, you, you guys are doing a high volume of deals and you’re just looking at it from a high-level perspective. So have, how have you built it out to where you’ve got a business that’s doing such a high volume and now you’re, you know, you’re doing podcasts and you’re doing some other things. How have you gotten that set up to where you’ve got it running? Well, do you feel comfortable walking away from,uor taking your attention away from a business that’s doing, doing so much?

Jim (11:32):
Yeah. So I think the biggest thing is getting clarity on your vision and exactly what you want your business to do. Okay. And if I was, there’s a book, I don’t even help that if there’s a book, it’s like a pumpkin book, I forget.

Tony (11:49):
The pumpkin plan.

Jim (11:51):
Pumpkin plan. Yeah. So I don’t know the name of, because it’s on my to do list to read, but I was in a mastermind group and they use this analogy and it’s been really helpful for me. So so if you havea group of a pumpkin patch and you’re growing pumpkins, what makes the most sense is to just get one pumpkin, as large as you possibly can because your resource, all your resources, all your energy can get poured into one pumpkin. Right? So when I have like a podcast, like the pockets of we have the vision of it is to help provide value and give value for people and to help share stories that, that inspire people to get into the action mode, to get off their rears, their rear ends and start making things happen that end goal of the podcast is not to be in the podcast business. It’s, viewing it as a marketing arm, as an extension to gain influence, and to help people out that then can circle back and help us make money through doing deals with our agent team,udoing deals like lending and potentially on the investing side,udoing deals as well. So whether the podcast goes nationwide or is it stays local, and it has a really good impact locally. UI’m not in the podcast business. I’m really clear on that when I’m in, is trying to gain, influence and build relationships with people and help people out. And so that I can kind of make money with our agent team and make money with our acquisition team. Uso there’s a difference there because when you’re clear on exactly what your pumpkin is on, what you’re doing, you can kind of merge everything out and kind of merge it all into one pumpkin. So,I don’t know if that makes sense or not, that is the distinction they’re helping ask me some questions. You’re not following it, but like, so, so one of the keys is, is that, that everything I’m doing, I know what that end goal looks like. I’m not trying to become a podcast or who like a Joe Rogan who makes $18 million from Spotify. I think it was,because he has that big of a following on a podcast. Like that’s not the angle or the purpose of the podcast.

Tony (14:10):
I think it was a 109 he made in and Yeah. So, 18 million, a 100 million, whatever, it doesn’t matter. But so going back to, I guess, your current business, so you’re able to put, you know, all of your efforts in your pumpkin, which is your real estate investing business, and now you’re able to do podcasts and things like that. So what is your like your team look like? Like how do you take your time and attention away from the business to be able to do those things?

Jim (14:40):
Yeah, that’s a great question. Yeah. So we have on the acquisition side of things,we have an operations team that has a bookkeeper, a transaction coordinator, and a gosh, we don’t even have a title for these. She’s like our systems person as she’s really like the integrated operation.

Tony (15:03):
Operations basically.

Jim (15:05):
Yeah. She we’ve tried to give her a title and she’d be like blatantly refuses to get us to that title. So, no, I don’t want to share, but yeah, so then they’ve been all in their roles for each of them for over three years. So it’s kind of a well-oiled machine there. And then on the that acquisition side of things my business partner, Ryan’s the guy in charge of reviewing every single deal,ucoaching, mentoring,upeople, which I’m actually,uugoing to be getting that kind of get back into more one-on-one coaching with some of the team because,uI really enjoy doing it and I haven’t done it a little while. I’m going to get into doing that again because of just,uyou know, some of the, sometimes when you figure out your scope of work, I think we all have a unique genius zone and we all have things that we like to do. And,that’s one of the things I really liked doing. I really liked developing people and helping people grow. And,uso I’m really excited about actually getting back into that. I think, you know, take money aside. I think I would want to do that anyway, you know, so I actually be kind of going back into that and then, yeah, we have the team members that go out on a hunt all days with deals there’s six, we have six guys that go out two girls, six guys that go out on the kind of hot deals for us every day.

Jim (16:32):
And we’ve developed lead generation systems the whole shebang we use Podio is kind of this, the CRM that we use, although I wouldn’t recommend it to anybody. I think we have about over $50,000 invested in our Podio system. So it’s cool. Now, but you know, I think something more out of the box, like an REI Blackbook or, you know, some sort of like a CRM was actually designed for investors is probably a little bit better. All you’re a little bit better. All right. But yeah, I mean, so as far as the setup goes, it’s really just about making sure you define okay, what exactly the role is

Jim (17:14):
Set up, what success looks like, and then kind of do set up a 30, 60, 90 day review on, okay, this is the training path we go through and just kind of hold people accountable to the end result. And then when they get up and running then cool, like you got somebody up and running and you kind of move onto the next thing, you know? Yeah, I mean, but I mean, it’s been a, I mean, it’s a 13 year thing guys. Like it’s not been, you know, something that happened overnight. I mean, we’ve messed up more things than I care to remember on it. Yeah.

Tony (17:49):
And you mentioned Earlier, before we started recording, as you’ve been a part of, most of the, you know, different departments of your business, which I have to, you know, I’ve done acquisitions, I’ve done project management, I’ve done property management. I’ve had to do transaction coordination way in the beginning. So there’s a lot of those things you’re going to have to do in the beginning, just because it’s you, but the really way you build a successful sustainable business is first of all, if you start getting rid of the things that you don’t like to do, I think you mentioned a little bit ago that you do the things that you love to do which, you know, that’s what most successful people do is they figure out how to do the things they love to do, and that produce the higher produce, the highest amount of dollars into your business, and then figure out how to build your apartments so that you have people that are responsible for different areas of your business.

Tony (18:45):
You know, you’ve got someone that’s responsible for bringing in the deals. You’ve got someone that’s responsible for making sure they close. You’ve got someone that makes sure the property is sold. And that’s really the way that I think you build a a really good business as you’ve got a really good team in place that runs different apartments. And then you mentioned systems and operations having those in place. And once you start dialing those things in, it’s crazy how much more you’re able to do as you add certain pieces to the puzzle. Cause I’m sure you’ve seen the same thing. It’s like, you know, one year you’re doing something and the next year you realized, Hey, I added on, you know, one thing, two things, three big things. And then all of a sudden it’s just completely changed. Right? cause like for me, you know, 2000, I think 10 or 11 is when I wanted to really step out of my business. I’m like, I am, you know, so burnout and being in the overall details of the business. And then if I looked at it from year to year, I like just started stepping out, stepping out, stepping out. And about four years later, it’s like, I didn’t even have to come into the office if I didn’t want to. So like a puzzle.

Jim (19:51):
Yeah. They go through resolution solution and people think it’s like like you’re a baby and you crawl. And then you’re a teenager that needs a lot of attention. Like the teenager can kind of go away and spend the night out. But then also having to have that talk with a teenager for staying out past curfew and you really have to watch that teenager. And then that business, that teenager grows up into an adult and then you get a, like, just play with your grandkids, like, you know, feed them candy and then like, like say, Hey, see you later, it goes through these evolutions. So like just cause you hire a transaction for you and it’s working out does that mean you’re not ever going to get that job back? Like when you’re in our qual phase, right? Like you may hire the right person and then they just prove to not be as talented as you want and you may have to let them go. And then, you know, you, you know what, you get a little bit better for the next tire. And one of the things you realize when you hire a talented person is the talented person pushes you and then you don’t ever get any of that job. They actually expand the role that they’re at. And there’s a lot of times when we cling on, I’ve done this guys, I’ve done this for years. I held onto some of the wrong people on our team that I knew they were the wrong fit. They knew they were the wrong fit. And yet we would hold on, just cause like you develop a relationship or a friendship. And we had a situation with one of our team members that was going through a gambling addiction and going through some, some really serious depression and some issues. I mean, it was all the way to the point that that my business partner actually walked in on this individual trying to trying to end their life. And we’re like, Oh my gosh, okay. So then we, we absolutely, we said, Hey, go get the help that you need. Obviously we can’t work together anymore because you have to take care of yourself. Your health is way more important than any sort of role that we have for you. And a year and a half went by. And then the person came back and sat down with us. Cause we’re still really close friends with this person. We, we love this person. Right? And we sat down with the individual and we said, Hey, what should we have done differently? When we knew you were going through the gambling stuff, we knew that we were having to even pay some stuff for you because there’s some of this stuff. And we had all this goofy stuff going on and he says, honestly, guys, what you did for me that was wrong was you should’ve fired me a year before you then,uyou know, on that, like florists are like, wait, what are you talking about?

Jim (22:30):
Like I had it, he told us, he said I had to hit rock bottom before I could rebuild my life. And because you guys did what was easy and not what was right. Which what was right, would have been firing me. And it took me an extra 12 months of being miserable to where I could start my life over again. And we too often think that like, Oh, what’s easier. They need this job. They want this job. And we so often think like that, but I promise you having someone in the right role or the, having a good person in the wrong role sucks for them because they could be going out and finding something. That’s truly their passion truly in their unique genius zone, truly what they should be doing and is bad for you too, because there’s somebody else out there that needs a job that could be just doing an amazing thing for you. So that was a huge lesson learned that, that I took my comfort first and delayed something that, that then actually costs this individual 12 months of their life because I put my own comfort first. And what was easier by not letting that person go?

Tony (23:33):
Yeah. At the same time, a lot of people, including myself, you know, I have done this many times in the past is felt bad if I were to fire somebody, but someone put it well a long time ago that just really stuck me. They said, you know, you firing someone and it’s kind of like pretty much what you just said is doing them a disservice because if they’re not shining in the role that they’re at, don’t feel bad for them because you let them go fire them. So that not only can you free yourself up mentally from having the issues that are with that person, but they also get the opportunity to go find a job where they shine because they may suck in your position and your organization, but they may go somewhere else and completely shine. I actually had someone that great person, great mother. She just could not like when she came to work, she just shined, but she could not show up on time to save her life. Like she was literally like an hour to two hours late, almost every single day. And finally, we were like, we just can’t do anything where if people are frustrated, like if they need something at 9:00 AM, they need you there so that they can, they can have you accessible. So long story short, we ended up letting her go. And, and she actually went to kind of a business acquaintance or a friend of mine. And she’s been in that same role for like four years, but he has such a laid back mentality. He’s like, come in when you want to leave, when you want to just get your job done. And she’s like, she loves that. She’s been there for like three or four years now. And it just wasn’t, it wasn’t our culture, but she fit in someone else’s. So don’t be afraid. I guess what both of us are saying is don’t be afraid to, you know, let people go that aren’t working well in your organization. Because again, it’s going to like, there’s so much mental energy and keeping people in your business that don’t shine. And at the same time, it could be permitted from vending them to preventing them from shining you know, with someone else and something else they could be doing.

Jim (25:26):
Yeah. I love that Tony. Absolutely. And the, I mean, the only thing I would add to this guys is like with hiring the right person and really finding the right business partner is what all, like, we tend to want to work with people who are like us. And we tend to like people that are like us. So the most natural thing in the world to do is, is I need an executive assistant. Well, I’m interviewing five people. Gosh, that one guy’s just like me. I think we’d get along. We’d be great friends. Let me hire that person. Well, like, I’m sorry, but there is not one of y’all listening that once Jim Manning, as there, I would literally be the worst executive assistant and the world, everybody, I would hate it. You went ahead, you name it. So when we look for business partners, when we look for people, I’m a huge proponent of assessments and figuring out, okay, what is the hard wiring of someone that would be a successful executive assistant? Then let’s give this job a candidate. Isn’t an assessment. A predictive index is one that we use quite a bit that we like. Let’s give them that assessment and see how they fit that role. And then if you’re hardwired to do something, then you, it doesn’t mean you’re going to be that there, it’s going to be a slam dunk. They’re going to be successful on a roll, but at least you’re starting out on the right foot. And you’re kind of pitching your best, giving yourself the best chance that you can get and have success in that role. So have you guys ever done anything with assessments?

Tony (26:56):
Yeah. I’ve been doing assessments for gosh, almost 18 years now. Uwe use DISC. Uso we use,uTony Robbins has a DISC online that we send people to take that’s free and then we upgrade the report. Ubut yeah, it’s totally like, you know, we hire for core values. So that’s like, you know, if we hire for anything similar to us, it’s core values and like what people will fit in with our culture, but you’re totally right. Like me, I’m like a high D I’m like a hundred miles an hour. Like, like I said, you know, ready fire aim. Like, and I need someone that, you know, I need people that are working for me that have a higher C profile, which is like cleaning up the pieces. Cause I’ve got a hundred projects going on and I’ve got really good teams, but I need them to be able to take the pieces that, you know, maybe I forgot and put them together and, and help,uyou know, help glue it all together so, you know, having someone that has the right behavior profile is big. Ubut at the same time, just remember that you don’t want someone like so distant from your profile that you guys have a disconnection. Right? UmSo like, you know, when I hire someone I’m a super high D so I don’t want someone to be super high D cause I don’t want them to be like me, like you said, but I want them to have an a D that there’s not so much disconnect that I get so frustrated that they don’t have enough, like, you know, follow through or like go get it mentality. Uso yeah, behavioral profiles are so important, making sure that you,uyou know, assess people and make sure that they fit, fit well with any role in your organization.

Jim (28:28):
Yeah, absolutely.

Tony (28:29):
So cool man. 500 deals. So was it like, what was your vision? You, said you know, you underestimate what you can do in a certain amount of time or overestimate what you can do in a smaller amount of time and then underestimate what you can do in a larger amount of time. So starting this business out, like for me, 19 years ago, I was like, if I had 30 rental properties by the time I’m, you know, 65 and retired, I would be like super happy. Right. And so, you know, within like I don’t know, 5 to 10 years I had over a hundred properties. Right. And, and so like my vision when I first started was way lower than what I anticipated. It could be. So what was your vision like when you got into the business and you started doing deals, so like after that 18 months you started getting into tasted things, did you ever think you’d be at 500 deals a year? Like what, what was your what was your anticipation on how, how your business would look compared to what it is?

Jim (29:29):
You know, what I did was I don’t know if I, wish I had kind of began in the past with kind of like an end goal because like we got down a rabbit hole or were you just, the goal was, Hey, let’s build the biggest baddest company we possibly can and do the most amount of deals that we can. And when you go after something like that,uthat can kind of create like that. Or you’re a hamster on a hamster wheel type of feeling and you’re chasing down deals and you’re chasing down deals and you’re chasing down deals. And we’ve had years where we did an extra a hundred deals, but we made the same amount of profit at the end of the day. And it’s like, like, you know, and then you get so busy because you’re doing so many deals and you have to kind of keep this thing going, because now the overheads 120 grand a month, it used to be 80 grand a month. Now it’s 130 grand a month now was $150,000 a month,uwas kind of our, was our record, right. $150,000 a month of overhead to carry. And,uI think it’s almost like a false idol. Like I think it was like stroking. I can’t speak for Ryan, but I can speak for myself, but kind of stroking kind of like the ego part of me that like, Hey, like we have to build this biggest baddest thing, you know, if I had to do it all over again, and we got really aggressive with like one of the best business principles that you can use and practices is leading with revenue. Well, there were times when we didn’t leave with revenue, we tried to get just aggressive and do more deals, that we took some risks that we quite frankly shouldn’t have and when we bought a 50 house package that our operations team wasn’t ready for that, you know, it ended up being okay, but we broke a few things and we created a lot of damage.

Jim (31:20):
So,I think if I had to give anybody any advice, it would be kind of like the, I kind of keep the like it’s not, Oh, you’re not always making the most amount of money. The more deals you do, it’s like, well, how do you retain profit and grow it by like, so, now what the goal is is how do we build the,uumultiple profitable business that we can and the life that we want and have that carved out like that exact idea lifestyle that we want. And that’s, that’s completely different. So,yeah, that’s cool. I can say that we did 588 deals last year. That’s right. Great. That’s fantastic. Umnd I wish, what I would say is that, Hey, mur, our goal was to make $5 million this year and we hit it, you know, like regardless of I didn’t one deal or 588. Right? So, I think the goal starting out was really just kind of make me feel important, make me feel like I was doing something too big and important, helping a lot of people out because like the one thing I will say about doing a lot of deals is you are feeding a lot of people. You’re feeding a lot of contractors doing all those jobs, and you’re creating a lot of jobs, a lot of opportunities, but, um really at the end of the day, getting that vision crystallized on exactly the business, all it is, is a vehicle for what you want your life to be exactly how you want to, what you want out of it. And until you get really crystal clear on that like it can be, uh can be an interesting thing. Like in our case, like, like we ended up getting such a beast, uh t we kind of looked at it at the end of the day. We’re like, okay, well, we need to slow down. And we need to think and do things a little bit smarter because our, uh were in a situation where that revenue and expenses were going up at the same clip. And it’s like, well, why would we have an extra three team members, um have an operations manager, if all, that’s just eating into the additional profit, you know, you on such a high volume, we have our losses went up too, and we started losing more money than we were used to losing on, on properties. So,

Tony (33:29):
Yeah, there’s kind of that fine line, right? They call it diminishing returns. I mean, you start growing your business, you got to figure out where, where you feel like you’re growing. And the most impact is because some people, they get to more deals, then they kind of start doing this, right. You know, about year and a half ago, we decided to downsize our team because we realized we were investing way too much. And in what we’re doing we started cutting out the marketing wasn’t working. We started cutting out departments. We felt like were returning. We stopped, you know, doing some of the deals we, we thought weren’t great. And now we have a very lean team to where if we have a slow month or two, it’s not a hundred, some thousand dollars check we’re writing you know, to bribe and fund the business. So it’s and you know, there’s a big there’s a big shift. I feel like in, in, in the real estate investing industry, because the competition has gotten so high in the last five years, even 10 years that people are looking at their their businesses better because, you know, I know people that are doing five to 10 deals a year that are making more money than some of the guys are doing a hundred deals a year, you know? So the leaner, you can do it and you got to find out that sweet spot of like, what lifestyle do you want? You know, when you get to a certain amount of deals, if you don’t have the right team in place, you’re going to be sucked into the business. You’re fortunate enough to where you scale the business and you know, you’re not in the everyday details, but that’s not everybody. Not, not a lot of people can do that. So any, I guess we need to wrap it up here. So any last words that you have, like what are some things that you feel like our listeners should know whether they are new in the business, just starting out, or maybe they’re seasoned investors that you think would be good for them to take home with them?

Jim (35:18):
Yeah. I mean, it’s a simple business. It, does not take you 18 months to learn this. I if you want to do more deals, get in front of homeowners, you can do that with direct mail. You can do that with PPC. You can do that with cold calling. You can do that in networking with wholesalers, you name it, you can do it a number of ways, but really that simple and make more offers. And a lot of times we over-complicate, it, we think it’s this big complicated thing. And then the more I get into some more, I realized just how stinking simple it is. Just cause something simple. Excuse me, just get something simple. Doesn’t mean it’s easy for sure. Right. So like, what I would say is, just make sure that you you’ve realized that. Uand then just focus on the couple of key, important tasks, getting good at negotiating deals, getting good at regenerating, getting good at building rapport with the seller and then you can, I mean, you can really very easily. I mean, one of the best things in real estate is you can easily make a hundred, 200, 300 grand in a year and really have a pretty lean company if that’s what you want. So,I would say just, I mean, honestly, just, just keep it simple and, and what happens. And this is one of my pet peeves, and what happens is, is there’s a lot of really good marketers in this space and somebody has a new shiny object. That’s a magic bullet. That’s gonna literally help you grow money on trees. Like that’s like how it feels when you hear these marketers talk about this new investing niche. Well, one thing I would tell you guys is that it’s not new. It’s already been around for probably 20 plus years. It’s just a new marketing name for it.

Jim (37:01):
It’s already been around. It’s already there. And, and at the end of that training at the end of that course, you’re still going to battle yourself and what’s in your mind, you’re still going to have fear. You’re going to have to overcome it. And you’re going to have to find a way and be resourceful and maybe do things you’re uncomfortable with. So we win. We win every single day. Our thoughts start, you know, first we have to win our thoughts. Then we have to win our actions and our habits. And then we can get the results that we want, that, everybody wants the, you know, everybody wants to win the world cup or the world series. But what people don’t see is they don’t see that professional athlete dedicated literally their entire life. They’ve practiced for hours and hours and hours to be able to get good enough to get on the field and dedicate into the craft. So you don’t see all that you want the end result, the end prize, but you don’t necessarily want to do all the work to get there. So, if you can’t get in the action mode and kind of combat that and like really work on kind of winning your thoughts and overcoming your obstacles, doesn’t matter, right? You can spend a thousand dollars like I did on a repair program, or you can buy whatever online course you want. You can hire whatever guru you want and you will not be successful if you don’t win the battle in between your ears.

Tony (38:27):
Well, good stuff, man. I’m glad you stuck through your 17th month and got to the 18th and got your first deal because can you, how different your life would be, had you quit that and then done something different? You know what I mean? It’s just crazy how life can change just by, you know, just by inches, if you don’t, you know, continue and follow through with something.

Jim (38:48):
Absolutely. I appreciate that, man. Well, thanks for, thanks for having me. I appreciate you. And talk to you next time man.

Tony (38:55):
We’ll catch up soon. Thanks buddy. I appreciate it.

Jim (38:58):
All right. See you.

Tony (38:59):
See you, man.