Deals & Dollars: Real Estate Investors and Entrepreneurs
Welcome to the Deals & Dollars Podcast, hosted by David Choi, Eric Panecki, and John Libretti, three real estate executives from the New York City metro area. Every week, they bring on the best real estate investors and entrepreneurs they know to learn about how they got started, how they source their deals, and -- most importantly-- how they make their dollars.
If you're interested in being on the show or want to receive exclusive invites to our networking events, you can reach out at (http://www.dealsndollars.com)
Deals & Dollars: Real Estate Investors and Entrepreneurs
How to Build Wealth in Real Estate NOW! w/ Eric Melnikoff
Today on the show we have the Founder of Build It Now and RE MD Capital, real estate investor Eric Melnikoff.
Calling somebody's story "rags-to-riches" may be a bit cliche, but if anybody has earned the accolade it would be today's guest: Eric Melnikoff, the real estate operator who went from a high school dropout to a property investment powerhouse. His story is a masterclass in tenacity, revealing the sweat equity involved in turning financial woes into a bona fide empire, brick by brick. From overcoming financial hurdles to celebrating the triumph of his initial profitable property endeavor, Dave talks to Eric about his incredible career arc... and how he's keeping an eye on nurturing generational wealth and forging pathways for the next wave of young investors.
If you're interested in attending the Build It Now LIVE Conference, tickets are available now: https://builditnowlive.com/
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A lot of people. I see a lot of people who are sitting on stage speaking for me. They say the same thing conferences, you know, meet-ups.
Speaker 2:They're in those secret sauces game. You can listen to a thousand podcasts. It's the same thing over and over again. Pick up a fucking book, listen to some podcasts and show up to networking events and you're done that. That right there. If you do it consistently, day in and day out, and day in and day out, you will succeed in this business. There's no other way to put it All right.
Speaker 2:Today we have Eric Melnikoff. Eric is man. There's very few people I know that have Such a passionate. Why? For being, why he wakes up in the morning, why he's doing what he's doing right now bussing his tail. It's it's not about him. It's about providing for the next generation and giving kids you know, between 19, 25 year olds, a younger generation an Opportunity to not miss out on what he missed out on right, and it's to build passive income, it's to build generational wealth. And so, eric man, task someone like you on the podcast that Actually cares about, about the future generation. It's an honor to have you on the show, brother. Thank you so much honor to be here.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna be here. I watch you a lot and good to be in the room.
Speaker 2:Appreciate it, brother. Thank you so much, eric. Um, I'm not gonna do a great enough job giving you the the proper introduction, so why just give the, the audience, a little background on on yourself?
Speaker 1:Yeah well, I'm 55 years old a lot older than than I'd like to be 55 years old and it starts out as a high school dropout you know, messed around with the wrong people, you know, drove my mother crazy for the first 30 years of my life sounds like every entrepreneur other than son yeah and and Got into real estate in my early 30s is like my third career.
Speaker 1:My third. I sold a business. I was able to successfully exit a telecom company that I started and Sold that business had a year between where he paid me like a no-show. That was a good thing, because most people don't get into real estate with the brings truck. Backing that, you know, backing them into the parking space, you know they're Like a third thing. So yeah, you know that's what I did. I got into real estate, started in Hoboken as an agent renting apartments and you know, thankfully I did okay, you know I was. I was making six figures as a rental agent.
Speaker 1:So that was that was enough to kind of get the ball rolling, but there were still a lot of struggles after that. I remember I Remember going out to dinner with the guys in Montclair a bunch of guys and I'm looking at the menu because I had $18 to my name and it was in my left pocket the guy one of my boys looked over me, is like I got you, man, don't worry about we got you, just order whatever you want. Because he knew I was sweating over the menu and that was already like four years into real estate. I had a couple like a low, a low there for a minute and Couple months later we decide, my buddy and I, who I grew up with, we decided to put out bandit signs for to buy houses and you know he laid out the money because I remember I had no money and we got a call, you know, in Edgewater, a defunct HOA. The lady couldn't sell her house on the market and they were buying another house. They were in contract. So she was desperate.
Speaker 2:Hmm.
Speaker 1:So he laid out the $5,000 deposit. We offered her 220 on a house that was worth like three a condo, so it was like 350. We offered her 220. She took it and I put it on Craigslist and my now partner Answered that ad. It was like 15 years ago and he bought it for it was like a $32,000 assignment never closed. So we took his $5,000, turned it into 30, you know, $32,000 profit.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 1:We did that two or three more times within like three months. The bandit signs worked, by the way.
Speaker 2:Not anymore, man. No, I don't know, it's all metal, now it's.
Speaker 1:There's no wood anymore, it's all metal Signpost or whatever.
Speaker 1:Yeah you know, run out at midnight with a six foot pole, boom, you know, tap them up. We were bad, bad ass, but it worked and so I put like 45,000 in my pocket in like three or four months Signing these contracts. That was pretty cool and that kind of got my. That was my foray into Into investing, yeah, and I and I was always helping my own brokerage in in 2010, did that for a couple years into, until the flood of 2012? I don't remember what flood that was Wiped us out in Jersey. I think it was Sandy. Yeah, yeah, it was hurricane Sandy.
Speaker 1:Was yeah, you were 14 years old. What?
Speaker 2:do you know what man?
Speaker 1:14, whatever. So you know the book, the. So I then merged. You know it was like that flood came. I started rebuilding. My partner was like what are you doing, man? Just go join another brokerage. Because it was like I was the only agent in my brokerage. Everyone left no cheese. So, yeah, I had a lot of listings for taking, like 40, 50 listings a year. I was taking them and I'm like you know he's right. So I went to Keller Williams and, and you know, again I started flipping at one or two homes a year, never buying and holding. Like partner who buys and holds Didn't buy his first family house. I remember he got. He got married, had three kids. I think he had his fourth kid. They were still renting, but he had like 11, 12 units. Wow, maybe I think he has 11 buildings and multiple units in each building.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah and so the first house he bought is his forever house. I mean, it's a big house out in the West somewhere in Jersey with like five or six acres. I'm like he did it right, you know. So that's me, I, I'm, you know, I. I'm my worst, my own worst enemy.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you something, man. That's a great story. I appreciate you being so authentic and transparent About the highs and lows. You know you got to real estate. You're breaking six figures on the rental side in Hoboken. How did you end up, four years later, $18 in your left pocket?
Speaker 1:Not making good moves with the money. You know, not paying my taxes, most realtor's right. Oh right, I'll get you a couple years not paying taxes. Then you're, you know. Someone says to you oh, you haven't been paying your taxes, you know. And the IRS starts done in you.
Speaker 2:You got to pay him.
Speaker 1:You know that's what early. What was? I had to pay a bunch of years of taxes. My fourth year. I had to pay the first three years of taxes and I think I was using a char block, so I wasn't getting good, I wasn't doing it right.
Speaker 2:They were not helping you out at.
Speaker 1:Completely ignorant. I was never brought up with money principles or you know, single-parent household? Yeah, never, you know. So it take my licking's, you know, and that's where I was at that point.
Speaker 2:And and it's it's always the single family households Like I, grew up with just a mother. My dad left when I was like eight years old. My mom raised me just her whole life. Bro, I was getting to fights, I was selling pot, I was smoking weed.
Speaker 1:I was stealing, you know.
Speaker 2:The whole nine, I mean, but you don't have a father there to kick your ass. You're wilding out, yeah, and so yeah, no, I empathize with the struggle. Man, you probably had it worse because you dropped out of college, you dropped out of high school and you're just figuring it out. But okay, so now we fast forward. Right, you go through, you start a business very young age of telecom business.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You exited that very successfully, oh yeah. And then you get into the real estate game and you start. You start transitioning out of the rental business and you start doing listings for sales, listings for sale. You start doing some wholesaling, some assignments, and you're doing a bunch of fixed and flips along that journey. Right, but instead of doing you know, you and your partner making the same amount of money, but instead of doing what your partner did, which was buying and holding assets for cash flow and long-term wealth right, you were on the other side of spectrum. I'll make that much. I'll make significantly. I'll put 40 down. I'll make 80 by the end of the year with a fixed and flip right. What would you have told your younger self?
Speaker 1:Well, you know, I didn't know. I started late with the family, my own family. So he had the family. You know, he had the wife and family at home. I was running around having fun, yeah.
Speaker 2:So that costs is, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know if I'd say I don't have fun. But you know, settle down. You know, I wasn't focused on it. I'm my first kid until I was 49. Wow, right, you know, and when you, when you have a kid, it kind of changes, you you know. So I don't know. I mean I would have focused more, I would have saw, and I was always into like self-based learning, but I wasn't really focused. So that's it, just focused more.
Speaker 2:Tell you what man being single, ready to mingle, costs a lot of money, Cost money. Oh my gosh, that's money. You know I just went through a breakup. These pockets are empty right now. Man, I see this big account trading every month. I'm like Lord, it does cost money. See, the earlier they did. They did statistics on this. They have data that shows that the earlier you get married, the wealthier. The wealthier you typically are. Yeah, because you're not here to impress anybody. You don't need the Rollies, you don't need the limo pulling out, you don't have to buy the table, you're just going home to a nice home cook meal and hanging out with a wifey.
Speaker 1:The key is you got to stay married. I got married when I was 26.
Speaker 2:Oh man.
Speaker 1:I also got married again when I was 32. And then I got married again, so you got to stay married. I told you, I'm my own worst enemy.
Speaker 2:Listen, brother, I hear you man.
Speaker 1:The trauma does enough.
Speaker 2:The trauma does some damage.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, and every time you get divorced it costs a little money.
Speaker 2:Cheaper to keep from a friend yeah.
Speaker 1:Cheaper to keep her Cheaper to keep her. I have a 12, a 13 year. It's going to be 14. I got a 14 year old Girl, boy, boy, yeah, good man, good man, good football player. Nice, we're driving home from football one night and I go what do you want to do when you grow up? I was asking that question to my niece when she was seven. She's like eventually, she's like uncle, stop asking me that question at like 18. You know, but I asked the kid at 14, what do you want to do when you grow up? I want to be a football player. Go bro, you're good at football. Everyone's cheering you on. You're in the Pete, whatever grade you're in 14, you know.
Speaker 1:Let's just think of a plan B, just in case. Just in case you're not going to be a football player, you know, and no one can tell you not to learn how to grow your money. My buddy who, who invest his son, invested with us at 19. He's 21. He's done a couple flips with us, flips with us already. He think you know no one told him, his father didn't say no, I don't want you focusing on real estate right now. Go back to high school. And he was focused on it and he started investing at 19. So that's what I want to teach the kids, right?
Speaker 1:That's teach my kids teach your kids. I didn't think like that. I thought about partying and was I weighing out selling the weed and doing that kind of shit and stupid shit you know, yeah, yeah. So, um you know, focus on learning, focus on growing.
Speaker 2:So fast forward. Now you have a. You know I've been hearing about your events for a while, but I think you have a massive, massive event coming up on April 2nd and long range.
Speaker 1:Tuesday, april 2nd Tuesday.
Speaker 2:April 2nd. You have some crazy heavy hitters showing up to that event. What's the purpose of build it now? Why did you create and found build it now and what is it?
Speaker 1:Build it now, right now. You know. Instead of you know, I said I'll do it later. That's what's one of the things you could have done differently.
Speaker 1:I said I'll do it later you know, and so, um, I founded that so we could educate young kids to think differently. And adults, young adults who, who don't think, in their twenties or thirties, you know, who are still partying Um and uh. Yeah, to put all the knowledgeable people in the room, guys like you who have done it, who have clearly proven the, the here's the process, and and get the, the recipe from them you know, so there's that.
Speaker 1:that's the live aspect. Um, get the recipe to success right there on stage, take notes, go back and do it. We have challenges to challenge the people. So four or five day challenges to say you know, in the next 60 days you're going to buy a property. We want to join our challenge. We have the junior REMBA, the real estate MBA program, where they start with finance 101. And over the course of 12 months they'll be into the real estate and how to take down properties, you know. So there's a whole platform community. Of course, in the you know Facebook community, everyone's got one right and the idea is that we put these people into this community and they're learning how to change the way they think. You know they're focused. Instead of focused on the video games or on the, the role ease, or you know tarmac you know all the shit they see on social media they're focusing on learning the actual plays.
Speaker 2:I love that man. I love that because, like dude, you're clearly like a very savvy business person. You've you built, sold the company. You're making multiple six figures, fixing and flipping. You're doing a bunch of 50 listings a year. I mean you know how to make it. You know how to make a dollar. Wherever you go, no matter what right, I'll make it, you'll make it. And now, but like throughout that period of time, you were just balling out you haven't. You were having a lot of fun making mistakes along the way and you look back 55 years and you said, damn, if I, if I had started 10 years ago, what if I started 20 years ago, 30, 30 years ago? Where would I be financially? How much passive income could I generate to what I have right now if I just started at 20 something years old?
Speaker 1:I still have to grind every day. I have to grind every day. Right, I could take a week off, a couple of weeks here and there. Last year I, I, I worked less still made money. Had my team make money. A couple of shifts in the team. One good guy leaves, gotta go back to work. Yes, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because I don't have passive income because I don't own real estate. I started one eight unit building. I sold it Biggest mistake I ever made. Biggest mistake Rooming house too.
Speaker 2:So it was a big cash Cash cow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, cash cow In in Caldwell, so good town.
Speaker 2:Oh no, dude it's. You always look back and you're like, why the hell did I sell? Yeah, I hope I never have to sell it. Man, when you syndicate, though, you have a five year exit, you have no choice. But I look at some of these buildings that I own and I'm like, oh man, I wish I never took a dollar of investor capital.
Speaker 1:Can't you refinance those? Take out your partners and keep it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In syndication.
Speaker 2:It just gets a little convoluted because you know you, we don't have like a fixed return. You get a, you get a preferred return on your money, Right, and then you participate on the upside. So it's kind of hard to structure. You don't want to resell it to your sort of cash out.
Speaker 2:Resell it to myself, but then I'd be buying it at Premium. At a premium, and you know what, I might as well go buy something for myself, right, got it. So, yeah, yeah, I wish I never had to sell. That's great that. That in itself is something that I've heard on this podcast time and time and time again Do not sell, you're going to regret it. The only time you should sell is when you have another opportunity that you could 1031 tax exchange into.
Speaker 1:That's better, right and bigger, bigger and better, bigger and better in a better location.
Speaker 2:All that right, yeah, so talk to me about this 19 year old kid. You mentioned him earlier. He's like what's his story?
Speaker 1:Nico Rizziieri Got to give him a plug. Nico's yeah, I mean he's. You know his father raised him right. Man, love that Father raised him right, you know. And God first family, and then follow your passion. So it was music with this kid and money. And he loves to invest, you know it was like how could you turn a kid away?
Speaker 1:One of my inspirations, actually One of the kids that made me. I always wanted to do something for the kids, always had an idea let's do a challenge. We'll do a national challenge. My friends like, yeah, all right back to work Two years later, what happened to that challenge? I'm busy, yeah.
Speaker 1:And then Nico comes along and we're doing flips and he's like, and his father's like, I want, nico, wants to invest, what do you mean with us? Yeah, but he wants to learn. He's got any money, got to have some, got to pay to play, you know, yeah, and so he did. He had a couple of bucks and his father went in with him. You know they did it together, which is part of the NBA program where you know you can't ask a 17 year old to start doing stuff. You need parents approval, you know. So you jump in with your parents, so it'll be a family affair. And he got in, you know, and he would come up to they're down the shore, they're down near Long Branch, coincidentally and so they came up like three, four times in the course of a four month flip. Taking notes, you know, jumping on calls a little annoying. I'm, like God, just your, your passive investor.
Speaker 1:You wanted to learn right. You want to, and that's great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, you got to let the kid know.
Speaker 1:And yeah, he just, we just did our last one and he's getting into another one. Wow, he rolled it over. He just keep the money. I want to press, I want to press it, you know. So I'll give you another 10,000.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:She give me my profits. Keep the principal, I'm giving you another 10,000. Wow, smart kid, good head on.
Speaker 2:Can't wait to see where he's going to be in 10 years. Yeah, you know, holy crap yeah.
Speaker 1:So so that's like again the inspiration, it helps, it kind of. It's very good contrast to what I did, exact opposite. So I love it, you know. So it's.
Speaker 2:So you got kids like Nico he's kind of like your test dummy into this. Build it now.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:R E M B A program that you're developing this community of kids like him, where you could give him an opportunity to learn the game, invest in deals and start start early. Yeah Right, I got a little cousin, smart kid, 19 years old. He's hungry. Yeah, he loves making money.
Speaker 2:And he comes to me, he's like Dave, where do I have to start? I'm like bro, you got to finish school. I must be giving him bad advice, right? I do say, hey, look, you got it. You got to read this book and read this book and read this book. But, man, you know how many events I had to show up to to learn what I had to learn to do what I'm doing right now? Bros, every Friday, was showing up time and time and time again just trying to piece together little, little, bitty, bitty pieces of information, to kind of take those fragments and make it whole. You know how many fucking books I had to read, hundreds of books. How many podcasts that I had to crush for it to start making some sense. I mean, I'm talking about, like self taught, thousands of hours to get to the point where I was like, oh, this is how you play the game of real estate, save me, right. And so this RENBA program is a shortcut for all of that.
Speaker 1:Trying to fast track it, yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, can you kind of walk me through what a curriculum looks like? I can't. No, oh.
Speaker 1:No, it's you know. First, the first curriculum will will make be made up of just basic finance.
Speaker 2:OK.
Speaker 1:Just, you know how to write a freaking check. Yes, because we don't do that anymore. Not that people are going to be writing checks, but there is a thing called a checkbook. Wow, balancing your, your finances in, you know, simple, one on one, right. Once you learn that, you'll learn the basics, just the real basic language of real estate. Simple, so you'll go through those. They're short little modules 10 to 15 minute modules. I have 80 day, you know.
Speaker 1:I'm getting ready to go into another self paced learning program and I asked the guy a guy selling me this $20,000 coaching thing. I go oh, we're going through. He shows it on the, on the screen as well. I see 55 minutes up there. Are these all 55 minute modules? Because I'm done, I'm out of here. Yeah, no, no, no, they're 15 minute module. Ok, good, so these are all kind of you know, one topic, 15 minutes or less. Nice, you're in, you're out. You know, and it's just going to go through each of the things that we probably took months and years to learn and got beat up and had to, you know, beg for someone to talk to us about it. Yes, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:And that's it and eventually it'll go through to the point. It's also encouraging them to, you know, go get a job and you know, if they're making 200 bucks a week part time as a, as a teenager, to save half of it for their investment, we'll create a challenge where we'll match a certain amount of money for deposit. That's what we're going to do.
Speaker 2:No way.
Speaker 1:Not next week, but, you know, in the next year or so Right.
Speaker 1:Have enough people in the program. Well, if they, if they follow the prescribed program, not just go through the curriculums but get a job. Go get part time job making. I think today they're making 15 bucks an hour. Right yeah, minimum wage. And don't go blow it on video games or clothes or whatever. Save half of it to invest in real estate when you're legally able to buy your own property. Wow, the idea is that by the time they're 18, 19 years old, they have 10, 15 grand and you know, with that they might be able to do something.
Speaker 2:Hell yeah.
Speaker 1:You know you can pull down a little piece of crap property. Yeah, you can, you know.
Speaker 2:Two, three guys with 15, 10, 15 dollars gets a deal done. There you double your money.
Speaker 1:Yeah, after they go through that one on one, they'll go get into how to joint venture, how to raise private capital.
Speaker 2:Wow, yeah so it's a 12 month.
Speaker 1:It's not it's an ongoing It'll. It'll probably progress past one month. It's not fully built out, gotcha, it's not. It's in the process of being built now. So there's going to be back end stuff that we haven't done yet. That's so cool, man, you know I love that you're doing this. It's fun, it's for the kids.
Speaker 2:It's for the kids for the kids, man no that's amazing, we do we do like this thing called leverage cares, where the mission of leverage cares is like a nonprofit division of this company is to promote financial literacy and entrepreneurship to the kids in Newark. That's nice Young kids, but it's so hard, man. I'm like sitting down, I'm trying to teach them how to budget, you know. I'm trying to teach them what debits and credits are. I'm trying, and for me it's like dude, this stuff is so boring. I want to get to the juicy stuff, right, like the. But the fundamentals of it all is what? If I didn't know the fundamentals, bro, I wouldn't have been 23 years old with 65 grand in my pocket that allowed me to jumpstart my career in real estate.
Speaker 1:Somewhere along the line, though, you had a why.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, big time.
Speaker 1:You know, whatever it was, I don't know what it was right. We all have our why.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I didn't find my why until I was in my late 30s. You know, and that's the thing. So I'm, you know, I talk to my kid, I see other kids, what do you want to do, why? Why do you want to do why? Why do you want to like, what do you want to do? So it's taking that why.
Speaker 1:And then you know again I'm just listening to your credits, debits. You get a credit card. Why do you want to get that junk or whatever it is you want? Why do you want those sneakers? What are they going to do for you? What could you do? And I told us to talk to my six year old about this. I don't know if it's too young, but I'm like what do you want, right? Yeah, well, I want 10,000 toys. What would we're now doing? A thing where if you get a toy, you got to give two away. Because she got 10,000 toys, you got to give away. I don't give away, you don't want to give it away. She's just wants, wants, wants. So I'm trying to teach her what would it feel like if you were to give somebody some? Go to a hospital and give some sick kid your toy that doesn't have it, or poor kid your toy that doesn't have it.
Speaker 1:What would that feel like oh, I feel good, you want to try it? No, I'm still. I'm still not getting through. But the idea is to get through to them and say, well, if you want all those toys, I'm not buying her toys anymore. She's got some money in her piggy bank. I have a system getting off track here.
Speaker 2:No, it's all good Gold.
Speaker 1:You know, it's a system where once she has a certain amount of money and she's got little chores, she gets points for chores and at certain points she'll get I don't give allowance, you've got to earn the allowance. You don't do it? Sure, if I have to ask you more than twice to eat your lunch or your breakfast, points are coming off, no way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's rigid rigid, it's militant yeah.
Speaker 1:And at the end of the week she might get two, three bucks and at a certain point when she has certain amounts. She got like $150 in her piggy bank, right, she can go out and buy her own toy if she wants something, but she can't draw that balance below like 80 bucks. It's a little system there. If you want something, you know. I wanted to value money, right. Some people criticize it hey, it's to just let the kid be a kid, and. But I wanted to value that money and I got video of her getting in the car. Dad, can we go driving for dollars? No way, yeah. I'm teaching her that shit. No way, yeah. So that's really cool, and so she's. And she, she knows what I do for a living. She doesn't say it, right, you know something with houses. I don't even know how she says it.
Speaker 2:She sticks her, it's great. She must go driving for dog. You know they say that the daughter gets the dad's braid, the son gets the mother's. Do you really yeah?
Speaker 1:Mom. He's mommy's boy. He's a mama's boy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's daddy's little girl.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, and so we'll see. You know, like the idea is that you have these conversations with them, the conversations I never had. My mother was out working three jobs. Wow, you know, I was home weighing out the weed, you know yeah selling it. So you know, at the end of the day, you know I have these conversations so that they value, like what's on the other end. It's not just for money sake. You know money's only good for the money you can do with the impact you can make.
Speaker 1:So build that build that knowledge, build that consciousness right, so they they're conscious of it. You spend that money on those sneakers. What are you missing? You know what do they say? Warren Buffett still drives like a 20 year old Cadillac or whatever.
Speaker 2:He still, he still. He still rides like economy in the planes. No, I don't think he does anywhere.
Speaker 1:But yeah, he's just. You know that $40,000 car, whatever it is, isn't 40,000, because I can turn that 40,000 into 300,000 over the 20 years.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's a little crazy, you know. It's a different way of thinking. So real estate is probably the best asset class you could be in in order to build that generational wealth.
Speaker 2:I think it's really just kind of crazy how easy it is. Look it's hard. Nothing, nothing worth having, is easy. So when I say easy, I just want to do it with a grain of salt, but it is definitely doesn't. You don't need to be a brainiac. It could be an average Joe getting seas. You could be failing high school, middle school, elementary school. You don't have to have anything special about your intelligence, but so long as you're willing to.
Speaker 2:Well, first and I don't want to just go back to what you keep saying is why if you have a strong enough, why you have a purpose for being, then you're going to have enough grit to get through the hard times and the times where you don't want to sit down and read a book or go through a module or show up at a networking event or make that cold call that, that, that 300th call that you just made for the day. If you have a why, that stuff becomes really easy. And so what real estate allows you to do is, if you have a big enough, why you have enough and you're able to take that why and turn into energy towards learning about the game and actually taking action. It's Unfathomable for me to say that you will not, you won't, you won't be a millionaire doing this. It's too easy in this game. It's hard, it's hard to mess up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the two people come to mind as you're talking. Or I have a friend I grew up with. He's a plumber, a successful plumber too. Yeah, not the brightest bulb in the batch. You know, he was in the special classes with me in high school, junior high, the short, the small classes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what we were. I'm sorry, we're friends. It's gotta be worth 30 million dollars. Owns Real estate like real estate that's just sitting there. He doesn't care right now, just sitting there. Yeah, I'm gonna put 40 units there All up and down Bloomfield Avenue, montclair, verona, called. Well, I'm giving so much information, he'll really just call me. Not the brightest bulb in the back, not the best ball the back he's worth. Gotta be worth north of 50 million cheese.
Speaker 1:The other guy is a guy went to go look at his building to buy up a Mars County Way overpriced, mixed use seven unit, a seven apartments and three stores or six and three. Guy barely speaks English, doesn't speak much English at all. Comes from Columbia. When he's 18 years old, works as a porter in the Mars Town hospital whatever hospitals in Mars town. Buys a two family in Maristown at 25, married. Buys a two family house hacks before house hacking was a term. Yeah, right, and we had coffee went to the building.
Speaker 1:I I love listening to stories. He's he's gotta be 80, 89 years old trying to get it. He's gonna speak. He's gonna speak. I just gotta get a good translator. I'll give him like 10 minutes because his story is amazing. It's because April 2nd and he, um, you know two family four or five years Sold it, got another two family. The only thing he didn't keep. It Eventually kept his two, two families and a two or three two families and bought this building. This building he bought like 40 years ago. You could imagine it's paid for so much and his story is like this is not again. Not, he didn't come here with a master's degree or he never got a master's degree. He was a porter cleaning bedsheets and bathrooms in the hospital.
Speaker 1:Yeah and he owns a few million dollars in real estate.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And he's like I'll sell this for a million and if not, I'll just keep it and Take the you know hundred and twenty or whatever, whatever, I don't remember. The rent roll right, but he's making money. So you don't have to be a genius, you just got to do the work. I think you just have to be patient. Yes, have grit. You mentioned the word grit.
Speaker 2:So that thought by now I would be a billionaire, you know. But everything takes two times longer. Yeah, cause two times. You'll be there, I'll get there, I can see your operations.
Speaker 1:You'll be there.
Speaker 2:I Gotta have you speak. I gotta be speak on stage. We got to get Jeremy on the other podcast and I'll shmooze him up a little bit.
Speaker 1:Be them up tomorrow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll get him to. We'll jump in for both sides. So talk to me about the the build it now conference. Who's gonna be there? Why should the people listening? I'm gonna be there, guys, so if you're there, we'll. We'll tap up, we'll have a good time, maybe have a drink or two, what? Yeah, who's there? Why should they be there?
Speaker 1:So we have investors flying into all over country. Rod Cleef is a big, big multi-family. Rod Rod Cleef coming in. Well, I'm getting blanks. Jeff Glover is a guy from. He's actually a real estate broker, owns a bunch of Keller Williams offices in Michigan Number one Michigan agent for the last ten years. He's owns a massive coaching company, but he also invests. He's, you know, quietly accumulating hundreds of properties. So he's gonna speak. Two kids from from Washington State, cody and Christian. Cody started three years ago and he was 19 when he spoke for me in June he had 105 doors. He's speaking for me. I just him and Christian are partners. I interviewed Christian on a 15-minute teaser on our building out site. They now have 225 doors. It's less than a year later, 120 doors for him.
Speaker 1:So they're speaking. How do they? 23 and 27, 30 maybe, maybe Christians a little bit older, 30. It's incredible, janelle Wilson. She's a bigger pockets contributor. She owns 150 doors in Philly, does a lot of section 8. Nice Henry Washington, bigger pockets podcast host. I think six years ago the guy had a thousand bucks to his name. Couldn't be on his wife's mortgage. Today he has over a hundred doors and flips like 30 properties a year good for him yeah so, and that's just a half of the group.
Speaker 1:You know they can go to build it now. Live comm. Look at the speaker list. I'm pretty excited. You know I'm going to learn. I'm like who do I? When I go, when I pick the menu for the lunch, I'm like, do you guys have real avocado or spread? Because I don't want to spread shit. I'm picking it for me All due respect, you know. So at least it's gonna be good. And the investors I picked and I got to come speak are people I want to learn from. I want to build a portfolio. I don't want to have to work, I don't want to grind every day. I want to be like you.
Speaker 2:You know, when I grow up, I want to be just like you know.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, it's gonna be pretty big and and I think we're gonna sell out this year, I think we're gonna sell out. So, yeah, it's gonna be fun.
Speaker 2:That's incredible, Eric. I Think you said it a couple times now.
Speaker 1:Build it now calm build it now, live calm, build it now live calm, guys.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you what, right right now. If it wasn't for networking events, wasn't for conferences, I Would not have the net, I would not. This business would not exist today.
Speaker 1:This is an amazing operation you have here. I'm blown away. I really am not to turn it on you, but it's just, it's freaking amazing. I've seen it on a lot of your video. Like you do a lot on social, you're blowing up on social, by the way. Next, and I'm like boss, guys, I see the conference room, I see the culture, so, and a lot of people. I see a lot of people who are sitting on stage speaking for me. They say the same thing conferences, you know, meet-ups.
Speaker 2:So not to cut you off, but it ain't a secret during those secret sauces game, you could listen to a thousand podcasts and at the end they're gonna say what's the best piece of advice you can give to a younger generation If you want to get started in real estate investing? Dude, it's the same thing over and over again Pick up a fucking book, listen to some podcasts and show up to network and events and you're done that. That right there. If you do it consistently, day in and day out, and day in and day out, you will succeed in this business. There's no other way to put it. So anyway, if you guys are not there, you're listening this podcast. You're not. You're not showing up to the build it now conference. You're full of it.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:You're full of you, you're talking to talk, you're not walking. And guess what? I'm not getting any referral fees from this plug either. So I mean it from the bottom of my heart. I think what you, the guest list that you have on the show on your at your conference, is tremendous, and I'm really, really excited for what you're building and, hopefully, the massive impact, even if it's a small impact, but the impact that you have on the future generation, future real estate investors, I think it's. It's tremendous man.
Speaker 1:So I ripple effects. It will. It will. I appreciate your support.
Speaker 2:All right, well, thank you so much, man. It's been a real pleasure, my pleasure.
