Journey to Multifamily Millions

Finding Growth through Partnerships with Leann Mouritsen, Ep 84

• Tim • Season 1 • Episode 84

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 37:50

Today's guest is Leann Mouritsen, She is a managing partner at Crowned Capital, a private multifamily investment firm. Inspired by "Rich Dad Poor Dad," she started with single-family rentals but shifted to multifamily.

She values teamwork and collaboration, learned through raising seven daughters! She also has a strong commitment to philanthropy, aiming to donate millions to help those in need and create opportunities for others.

Leann shares her journey from single-family rentals to multifamily investments, highlighting the challenges of upgrading homes solo and the shift towards relying on professionals. This led her to explore passive investments in multifamily real estate, culminating in a partnership with Open Door Capital on a 673-unit apartment complex.

Focused on networking and continuous learning, Leann emphasizes the significance of due diligence, staying informed, and asking the right questions for investors. She believes success encompasses spiritual, physical, mental, and financial well-being.



Episode Topics

[01:19]  Meet our guest, Leann Mouritsen
[03:49] The First Investment: A Learning Experience
[08:57] The Importance of Collaboration and Networking
[14:19] Vetting Sponsors and Deals
[22:27] The Role of Education in Real Estate Investing
[27:37] The Fund-to-Funds Model in Real Estate Investing
[30:09] What is one red flag every investor should look out for?
[31:58] What is a myth about the real estate business?
[36:09] Connecting to Leann 



Notable Quotes

  • I was just enamored by the idea of passive income. It had never occurred to me that the opportunity was passive income. And I got really excited about it." -Leann Mouritsen 
  • Even if I'm asking stupid questions, are they taking the time to educate me - Tim Little.
  • "I trust this person. I don't even vet the deal anymore. Yeah, you should always vet the deal." -Tim Little 
  • "Respect that you tried everything. Lessons learned cost time and money. 'Who, not how' is in the background." -Tim Little 
  • "The right property manager is crucial. Contracts often have a minimum term; knowing it is key to successful vetting."  -Tim Little 
  • "You can't feed people from empty cupboards" -Leann Mouritsen 
  • "I empower dentists to invest in real estate for retirement without a second job, making a significant impact over time." -Leann Mouritsen 
  • Go out there and learn everything you can, and then to make a choice and move, take action and get out there and do it. - Leann Mouritsen




👉Connect with  Leann Mouritsen

👉 Connect with Tim

 Subscribe, Rate, and leave a review here 🌟
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/journey-to-multifamily-millions/id1634643497

[00:00:00] Leann Mouritsen: That was really hard for me to switch that mentality of I do it myself to being able to collaborate with other people. And that's when I started networking by going to networking events and meeting like different sponsors, meeting. people who were really good at market research and really good at making connections with lenders and really good at doing every aspect of the business. And so I was able at that point to partner up with, open door capital. That's who we partnered with Brandon Turner and we were able to get in on a 673 unit apartment complex. And we were able to invest passively. And we were able to vet them as operators and go in there and look at what they had done and be able to participate in that.

[00:01:16] Tim Little: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the journey to multifamily millions. I'm your host, founder and CEO of ZANA Investments, Tim Little. And on today's show, we have with us Leann Mouritsen. Leann is a managing partner at Crowned Capital, a private multifamily investment firm. inspired investment firm inspired by rich dad, poor dad. She started with single family rentals, but shifted to multifamily. She values teamwork and collaboration. Learn through raising seven daughters. She also has a strong commitment to philanthropy, aiming to donate millions to help those in need and create opportunities for others. Leanne, welcome to the show.

[00:01:57] Leann Mouritsen: Thank you for having me. I'm excited.

[00:01:59] Tim Little: Yeah. and please feel free to correct me if I messed up the last name. What is it? Moritzen.

[00:02:05] Leann Mouritsen: You're right. Yeah. Yeah. not very many people get that right the first time, but yeah, more it said.

[00:02:09] Tim Little: Okay, awesome. good on me then for forgetting it right there. All right, so Leah at first I have to applaud you for raising seven girls and finding time to literally do anything else let alone be on a Podcast I have two girls and you know in between taking them to school swim lessons, etc I feel like I never have enough time So before we get into time management and systems and processes, which I'm sure you're a master at I want to learn more about your journey please tell us how you got started in real estate and how you got to where you are today

[00:02:44] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah. So back in 2017, when my husband got his first dental job, he was given a book by his employer called Rich Dad, poor dad. And I was more into fantasy books at that time. I wasn't really into self help books, but my husband was reading. A lot of them and I just thought he was crazy because he would talk about all these really big dreams But I decided to read this book because it seemed simple enough and after I read it I was just enamored by the idea of like passive income like I always had that you know the dog and the picket fence and the home and just The vision that's given to you. And it had never really occurred to me that the opportunity was passive income. And I got really excited about it. And then, my husband had fallen asleep with another book that I picked up and ended up reading. It was called the art of the old by Trump. And I was just floored by the numbers. This guy was working with 300 million. He was coming in and doing these huge projects and. I thought it was the coolest thing. I was up till three o'clock in the morning reading this book and got up talking for hours to my husband the next morning about it. And I was like, there's no way I could do this. So let's start with a single family home. And I started searching and we found a cute little, it was under 25, 000. Up in South Dakota at the time and, it had been on the market for a while and we had a contractor come in and give us a quote to get the place fixed up and looking nice for 20, 000. And we were just out of middle school. We had a lot of student debt, right? So we were like 20, 000 seemed like a lot to get this home fixed up. And so we ended up purchasing it, but we decided we were going to do the work ourselves. And, at this time I just had my fifth daughter

[00:04:23] Tim Little: Devereux? Yep.

[00:04:26] Leann Mouritsen: over to this house and started knocking down walls and stripping out the bathroom and just went to town on it. And The thing was one problem led to another one when we opened up the walls, we realized the wiring was bad and they blew a fuse and had an electrician come in and he was like, Oh, we need to do this, but you should have done this before this. And we're like, Oh, so we doubled our money in that area just because of not planning. And so just, we kept renovating, and a year later, we're still renovating this house. And we were paying rent and renovating, and it was so overwhelming. After a year, I ended up calling the contractor back up, and he's you would be surprised how many people call me back up. I was waiting for your call. He was just like, I was just waiting for you to call me. And I was like, Oh, okay. And within six weeks, this guy went in and just completely finished it. He had his team come in, finish the flooring, finish the walling, mudding, painting, just everything. and he had these tools that like, as a single family home, I went to it and bought this big stander, right? Or all of these really cool toys, not toys, tools, right? But he had all the equipment because that was his job. He did that full time. And I was, I really was like, this is amazing. This guy just came in. We ended up selling the home for 61, 000. And had we went with him, like 25, 000 plus, 20, 000 from him, we ended up spending like 35, 000. So we actually spent 15, 000 more. And that's not including our rent payments that we were paying also, and our utilities from the other house from not getting in there. And it was. A good learning experience? I never would have thought of a lot of things that I look at today had I not gone through it, but it was one of those things where I really realized how important it is to one, go in with a plan when you're going to invest. I was just so excited to jump into it. I didn't really Map out a plan for what we're going to do. And then secondly, too, that it's okay to rely on professionals to help you out. And that when you get good professionals on your team, they can be a very critical player, right? And. We ended up moving from South Dakota out to Florida after that. We rented the place out for three months, but we're like, all right, we really don't want to do this long distance management thing. And it was a 1927 build, so we didn't really want the issues associated with it. So we were like, okay, we're just going to sell this. We'll come out here. And we're looking for another, we bought another single family home with the idea of renovating and fixing it up. And. I just told him like, there's gotta be a better way of doing this. So I started researching things. I'm like, I talked to a lot of people like doctors and dentists where I was like, Oh, real estate. And I was so excited talking to people about it. And they're like, Oh yeah, I've been there. like a lot of them are like, I've already done that. I don't like it. The one had a, one lady had a mom who was always calling her up saying, I got this new house that needs fixed. Bring all your kids and help me. And she was just like, I don't want to like, And so I realized a lot of people were enamored by real estate, but It was the same problem I was having, right? You're in there, you're trying to renovate it, you're trying to fix it, and you're working a job on the side. And so I had my kids full time and then my husband was working a full time job. Plus like a prison gig, where he was helping out, doing dentistry at the prison. And so it was like, our life was just so packed. And I, I don't know if you've heard of Tyler Duverell. I don't know if I'm saying his last name right. He does a multifamily mindset group . We went to one of his one day events, two day events, and then ended up joining his mentorship program. And. I thought it was the coolest thing, right? I was like, this is awesome. He had a four week course where he walks you through the whole process of setting up like your own team. So he goes through market research, building your team, building relationships with vendors, lenders and with brokers. And he walked through this process. I'm like, all right, I'm going to do this. But once again, I went at it and I'm going to do it on my own. And so I was trying to do the market research, which took weeks diving into these markets and then doing the underwriting and then talking to the brokers and talking to the lenders. I was trying to do all this on my own and time wise it was very consuming and I stepped back. I'm like, all right, what am I doing wrong? I'm like a school. You're so focused on happening to get in there and do everything yourself. Even my kids, a lot of times are like that. I had this group project where they weren't helping and I just did it myself, right? and they're like, you're supposed to collaborate though. they won't do anything. And so I think a lot of times you're just taught to do it yourself, go in there and get it done. And that was my mentality. That was really hard for me to switch that mentality of I do it myself to being able to collaborate with other people. And that's when I started networking by going to networking events and meeting like different sponsors, meeting. people who were really good at market research and really good at making connections with lenders and really good at doing every aspect of the business. And so I was able at that point to partner up with, open door capital. That's who we partnered with Brandon Turner and we were able to get in on a 673 unit apartment complex. And we were able to invest passively. And we were able to vet them as operators and go in there and look at what they had done and be able to participate in that. And to me, I haven't had to think about the deal, right? Like I, I put my investment in there. It was very hands off and I was like, this is so cool. Like you still get the benefits of it, right? Like you still get to be invested in real estate. We still get passive income. Like they do monthly payouts after the value add portion. And then on top of that, like you're still going to get the deductions, you still get to, get your K 1 write offs. And so to me, it was like, this is. Was just a door opener to realize that there was an another way doesn't have to be a better way But if people want to be actively involved, I'm like go for it because I think it's a great learning experience But I really think like the opportunity of finding great partners and then allowing them to do what their best at what you are still able to do what your best at Really open a doorway for us. And so that's really what got me like I'm whole about going into multifamily And picking that lane. I know there's a lot of places you can make money in Obviously, if you do it correctly, but that's the doorway that I've chosen to enter to do the multifamily mine, the multifamily apartments.

[00:10:45] Tim Little: Yeah, that's awesome. And so I want to go back, because I think people are going to be able to relate to a lot of your story, right? You talked about seeing people, who are at the top of the game, whether it's Trump, Greg Cardone, these people were doing billion dollar deals. And while it's helpful to see what's in the realm of the possible, I think by looking at people like that, it's not particularly helpful to figure out how to get started. and so you went in,rich dad, poor dad, obviously a staple. I think I read it the first time and not all of it sank in, I got what I got at the time, which is okay. I should own more stuff that makes me money and own less stuff that costs me money. And that was enough the first time I read it when I was in college, right? And it wasn't until. I was in a different place in life where I started to get some of the other lessons. And that's when I transitioned into real estate as well.

And I really respect the fact that you guys tried to do everything yourself in that first single family house, but there's a lot of lessons to be learned there too. Just like you said. there's some people who have the tools, the skill sets to do those things and there's others who it sounds like yourself, who are

[00:12:04] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah.

[00:12:05] Tim Little: learn as you go, which can work, but oftentimes, and I, it sounds like you learned this, it winds up costing you more time and money than it would have. Otherwise now there's still valuable lessons that you take away from it, right? Just like I've been my own property man. I've self managed properties I won't do it again, but I learned a lot of things in that process Like I would rather just pay that 10 percent 6 percent whatever it is to someone else Who has the tools, who has the expertise and again, almost more importantly, the time, because as probably better than most time is one of your most valuable assets and for you guys to be spending more than a year doing those renovations all that time you were paying two mortgages, right?

[00:12:58] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:12:59] Tim Little: Yeah. And so that's devastating for me, a cash flow perspective. and so it sounds I have who, not how right, right here in the background.

[00:13:10] Leann Mouritsen: my mind is changing, but I read that one. I was like, wow, that was like one of those books that your mind just says you're reading it and you're like, so cool. It's Brad, do you have to read this?

[00:13:20] Tim Little: Yeah. and I think, the lesson, it's Oh man, had I read this before, we did that. You probably would have just hired the contractor and like seeing on paper how much money you would have saved and how much time you would have saved. But again, part of that whole learning process. And I'm sure there's so many people who are going through this right now because. someone told him to take action. So they bought a property and they're like, I'm going to use a little elbow grease and fix all this stuff myself. But yeah, between the cost of the tools, right? Because tools for construction are not cheap and the expertise required for things like electrical and plumbing and stuff like that. let alone gettingpeople to sign off on it from the city if you needed to pull permits for that stuff. but no, I think that's great that you learn those lessons early, you move past it, and then it sounded like you were trying to find a way to scale, right? And you found passive investing. What was your process for vetting? That sponsor who in this case, a lot of people know, Brandon Turner, right? As one of those sponsors. but still that might lull people into almost a false sense of security where they're like, Oh, he's famous. I don't need to vet him. It sounds like you still tried to do what you knew as your due diligence for that sponsor. Cause you were probably giving them, what for you was a sizable amount of money. Is that accurate?

[00:14:45] Leann Mouritsen: well, and I actually was on a call with, cause I'll go on calls for different sponsors and hear what they say, how they answer questions, and I remember one, one call I went on, the investor said, Oh, I trust this person. I don't even bet the deal anymore. And I'm like. Yeah , you should always bet the deal. one of the things that I don't think a lot of people do, like they have off memorandums that I, they're long, they're 165 pages long. and I read 'em, like I, I read the whole packet. I don't wanna get into an investment that I don't know. And there's times I'll go through and I'll be like. this sounds, what is this? And I'll call them up and what part of this, why are you wording this way? What's up with this? and how I'm walking through it. but also running background checks on operators. So I know a lot of people, I just heard a story about a lady who had lost millions of dollars in a deal.  And she said, how do I simply run a background check on this person? I would have seen that he was a scammer, like she would have known that immediately. and, but because of it, she lost his money, granted he went to jail, but, but still she lost that money, right? She didn't get that back. And so I do think even just doing a basic, doing that, and then also do go through the financials of a deal. So looking at the numbers and making sure that they're not like, Oh, it's like when you look at a deal and like the pro formas, but then the pro formas are way exaggerated from what the actual numbers are. So going in and actually looking at the numbers and the deal, looking at the cash flow, looking at the debt that they already have. and then being able to, we also, I like to go and interview the property managers they're going to go with, or, getting professional interviews from people who've worked with them directly, and then, being able to, go and read reviews on, different investors who've been in those deals with them, and I'm an avid reader, so I do go through and I'll read their books, I'll look through all their content, I'll look, there's been times I'll look through content and they'll say stuff that I'm like, that doesn't really, yeah. Mesh with how I feel or they just seem a little bit more eccentric in areas that I'm not comfortable with. And everybody's different, right? Everybody's risks are different, right? so there's some people who take certain risks that I wouldn't, right? I'm more of a conservative person. And I also look at the type of debt that they're carrying, the type of interest rates that they're carrying, how those affect the deals. I remember asking one person when I first started out just to be like, Oh, the interest rates are high right now. And they're like, you just write the deal with that interest rate, like you make sure that when you're underwriting the deal with that interest rate that the numbers work and if they don't, you don't do the deal but that doesn't make the deal not plausible. It just means you have to underwrite it so that you're underwriting it with a higher interest rate. And I was like, Oh, that makes sense. but, so yeah, those are a couple things that we do also going out and seeing the properties. And, meet, meet and with the people who are part of it, just really being able to get to know them on a personal level. I do also partially go off of how I feel when I talk with them, and just like the vibe. there's some people I'll immediately just be like, and I could be wrong about that, but I'm not gonna not go with that. But no, I think Going through, through all the documents, going through the underwriting, going through the market research, right? There's a lot you need to know about the market itself. Those are just a few things that we do, before we go into a deal, and invest our money.

[00:17:50] Tim Little: and that makes a lot of sense and you brought up a few things that not a lot of people talk about when it Comes to vetting deals, which one of them is the property manager, right? Like I don't think people appreciate enough The impact that having the right property manager or the wrong property manager can have for a deal and ensure you can fire a property manager, but not everyone is aware that a lot of times there are contracts in place for, a minimum term for a lot of these property managers, say a one year term. Minimum for that under contract and then after that you can fire them. That's an important question to ask. You know, what is our requirement to stay with this property manager if we're not seeing the performance We want in terms of researching the property manager? Another thing that you can do Is look at the other properties that they manage. You know, how well are they? managed look at their reviews for those other properties that they manage. Are they responding to reviews? Stuff like that. It'll give you a good idea of how they're going to treat your property. You know if you hire them because you can fire a property manager, but it's very disruptive And it just causes its own set of issues, right? Because if you get to that point, there's probably already things that have gone wrong. There's already money that has been lost. So you don't want to have to do that. Yeah,

[00:19:15] Leann Mouritsen: we're. We heard a story of a property manager, it was out of state, the guy had a property manager over it, and the numbers were adding up, and when he went out there, he had been pocketing money, same places were rented that weren't, that, he was just doing all sorts of shady stuff, so being able to,make sure they're doing what they're supposed to be doing is very important, and making sure your property is run correctly, yeah,

[00:19:35] Tim Little: yeah. And then, oversight of those property managers, right? That asset management piece. Because I found, and I, Not to speak negatively of property managers, but some will just do whatever they can get away with, right? oh, we'll charge for this and we'll charge for that and then until you start digging into the financials You're like, wait a second. What is this? Why are we paying for this? That doesn't make sense and then the way to go. Oh, sorry. Yeah. No, we'll just take that out. So you just gotta keep an eye on it so that things don't get away from you, especially on site, staff. How much are you paying for staff? How many people do you have? Does that make sense? You know if you have a 50 unit building and you have you know, four full time staff on there It probably doesn't make sense. But if you have a hundred plus units okay, then that makes sense right? There's industry standards that go along with some of this stuff that even as a passive investor You can ask the question. Hey, how many full time staff do they have on site? Does that make sense, right? So I think that's really important because sometimes passive investors don't feel as empowered But they can ask these questions. They just need to know what questions to ask. And it may not always be feasible for them to visit the property like you were talking about. Certainly if it's local, they, they should, why not? a lot of times it's just not going to be the case. So the better the questions they're able to ask, I would argue the more comfortable they'll feel with that investment.

[00:21:39] Leann Mouritsen: I agree. I always encourage people to ask as many questions as you want. Because that's a very important part of investing. Yeah.

[00:21:48] Tim Little: And that was what you talked about, that gut feeling that was part of it for me the first time I passively invested. I was listening very acutely to how they answered the questions. And if they decided not to answer some questions, right? Are they patient with me as a newbie passive investor? Even if I'm asking stupid questions, are they taking the time to educate me, and, They were for the ones that I decided to eventually passively invest with. And I think that's important, right? We should be seeking to educate passive investors, not make them feel stupid for not knowing what they don't know.

[00:22:26] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah. I agree. Yeah. We actually created the investor one on one course for that purpose. Cause we're like, we don't want, I tell people, I was like, I don't, this sounds like a scam. And I'm just like, dude, I'm glad you feel that way. Cause. It is important to make sure you don't get scammed. Okay. So I say, yes, I go before you even invest with us. I want you to go educate yourself, know the terminology, know how to look at the numbers, know what you should be looking for in a market, know what the sponsor's responsibilities are, what your responsibilities are. yeah, I very much think investors before they ever should touch an investment should educate themselves on what.

[00:23:02] Tim Little: What it is, what they're getting into, what the risks are, what the pros are. Yeah, because those are very important things to know before any investment. Okay, and you walked us through, your first passive investment. Now, go from there. What happened there to where you shifted from being a passive investor to being on the more active side? And what role do you play now?

[00:23:25] Leann Mouritsen: yeah, I, after I did that, invested past, I thought this is a great tool for, so my husband's a full time dentist, and he goes to work from 7, 15 to, 6 o'clock at night, right? And then on top of that, he's continuing education. And, improving his skills, Dennis, right? And I realized when we were trying to do this at home, right? That it took up a lot of his time. We were working from six to midnight, trying to do this single family home and then trying to go home, put the kids to bed, come back. And I realized that a lot of dentists, like they're in the same situation, like they're running a practice, they're working full time. They're improving their skill sets. And they're on their time off. Not all of them. I'm assuming you want to go and do real estate on the side. And so I, we have a good income. I don't. Need to go to work by any means like my husband's got a good job, right? But to me, I wanted to provide an opportunity for Dennis to be able to get into real estate without having to take on A second job and also to help them prepare for retirement. So I really got into this. That's one of the reasons for this and to be able to provide opportunities for them to invest passively And still be able to build up their wealth and not rely primarily just on their practice for retirement. So a lot of dentists will build up a practice and that's what they consider their retirement. but then by the end of the 26 some years, they'll sell it and they realize that it's not much to live off of. And To me, I've just, I've seen a couple of dentists in that situation where they sold their practice and then they're not able to really retire and they end up going back and getting an associate job. And I'm like, if you would just invest 50, 000 a year over the past 26 years, you wouldn't even have to be thinking about it, right? Like you would have had, and then you could have sold that practice and reinvested also and lived off the passive income, right? But we're so used to living off active income that, and you make good enough money to be able to live off of it. That you don't really have to think about it. And so being able to help them be able to, so I guess it's more of a long term view for me, like long term 15, 20 years down the road. When dentists are starting to retire, I want them to be able to, not have to be like, Oh, wait a minute. I can't do this actually. I have to go back to work. And so I, that's probably one of my main reasons. My other one is being, I do love, the idea of providing. help others. And so I read, I don't know if you've read Grant Cardone's millionaire booklet. It's the little pamphlet booklet he has.

[00:25:39] Tim Little: Yeah, I have it. I haven't read the whole thing yet.

[00:25:41] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah, it's pretty short. But in the beginning of it, he tells a story about raising money for a charity event. And he talks about it, not thinking that he was going to be able to raise enough capital. He was raising 2 million for this charity. And the last person ended up donating a million dollars to this charity. And I was like, Oh my gosh, that's so cool. I just thought that was so cool. So to be able to, build wealth to a point where like you could say, Hey, I can go write this million dollar check to this worthy cause and be able to help people out. So the more people who can build wealth and be financially free, the more people can give. And, you can't feed people from empty cupboards, right? I don't know if you've heard that phrase. So to me, I really want to help people become financially savvy to the point where they can make wise investment decisions and then build wealth to the point where they can be like, Hey, I can give freely and I'm going to be okay. And I can be able to serve and give and not have to worry about whether I'm going to be taken care of. And but I love that concept that I guess I villainized wealth for a while. I thought they were selfish. I don't know, that sounds bad, but I grew up thinking that. And, my parents were very generous. Despite us not being very wealthy, they were always very generous. And, but I realized that the more freedom you have, the more you can like, Give right. And so I love that concept too. And the freedom that multifamily real estate can do to build your wealth to the point where you can get more.

[00:27:00] Tim Little: Yeah, and I think that's a common sentiment, is that, hey, the whole money is the root of all evil and all that stuff. But I think the counter to that is exactly what you were talking about with the empty cupboards, which I hadn't heard before, but I get it. If you don't have enough money to take care of yourself. Then you can't help others, right? And the more you have, the more you can help others. And I think that resonates with a lot of people too. Cause oh, yeah, that, that actually makes sense, right? Like you can't give tons of money to charity if you don't have enough to pay your own bills. and so it's a very common sense way to counter that. programming of the rich is evil. Money is evil. But that's where you put your heart at, yeah, and so I guess what you're doing now, are you more of a, like a, an operator or are you,working on these assets or are you more of a fund to fund where you're vetting the sponsors who are working on these, deals day to day?

[00:27:54] Leann Mouritsen: yeah, so we do more of a fund to funds model and then vet the operators themselves. it allows that, like we said, like that limited time. So I, my timeframe usually is from like 8 to 11 at night. And the nap time is usually when I'm. so that strategic partnership where I can go out and I can meet these people, I can vet them, I can run checks on them, I can interview people, I can do that in my spare time, but then they can fall into all the operational aspects of it, which is what I love about that model, right? So creating a special purpose vehicle where we can gather other dentists. Primarily, but other friends, family too, but, gather them in that, that, Entity and then be able to go and negotiate with those operators to be able to get a good deal. is more of our focus. So I'm really big on my, like investor relationships, educating investors on vetting operators, and then being able to, feel comfortable enough to the point where they could, invest into those deals themselves also.

[00:28:46] Tim Little: Yeah. And I think that's because some people get intimidated when they hear stuff like fund to funds and syndication and stuff like that. All these fancy

[00:28:54] Leann Mouritsen: rightly Yeah. Rightly

[00:28:56] Tim Little: And it is confusing at first, but I think, just to break it down simply for people, like I'm generally a sponsor, Like people invest directly with me. I'm in asset management meetings yelling at the property manager. I don't really yell at him, overseeing property managers, stuff like that. But someone like you is able to pool funds of investors and really take advantage of economies of scale to negotiate with sponsors to say, Hey, listen, I'm bringing a million, 2 million to the table. Can you give my investors a better deal? And that's what you're able to do for them. So that's the benefit, really,that I see in using a fund of funds versus going direct. Cause could someone go directly to a sponsor? Yes. But they may not get the same returns. They'd also have to do more homework, which is one of the services that you're providing, right?  So I think that's just the difference. I wouldn't say, one is necessarily better or worse than the other. It's just what makes more sense for that. Individuals because time is always a consideration, they're the risk profile Expected returns all of that stuff that goes into being an investor of any type all right, we are running against the clock. So I do need to transition into the turbo round. Are you ready for that?

[00:30:06] Leann Mouritsen: Let's do it.

[00:30:07] Tim Little: All right. So the first question what is one red flag every investor should look out for

[00:30:13] Leann Mouritsen: Okay. So when I just thought of it, you should not wire money to someone directly. But I had a friend who was told that she could be a part of a deal. She wired 200, 000, but the paperwork wasn't done correctly and she lost her 200, 000. So I would say make sure the paperwork is done properly. Make sure that you're not wiring money to a personal bank account like that, the entity is set up, do your background check before you put any money into the deal. Because there are people out there who unfortunately are crooks. And so being able to make sure that, whether you're working with a lawyer or financial advisor, that you can do that background check on that company and make sure that like the protocol set up that needs to be set up before you wire over any money. So I don't want anyone seeing their money vanish. That's just what I heard. I was just like, ah, so they're going through legal proceedings and such, but, it's gone, so being wise where, make sure you get the company you're investing with.

[00:31:07] Tim Little: That's gut wrenching.

[00:31:08] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah , it's really sad.

[00:31:10] Tim Little: No, but that's absolutely true. I mean with any wiring, right? and we tell investors like, Hey, do not wire your money until I say it's okay to wire your money. Cause we don't want them jumping the gun either. If paperwork hasn't been done because then if we have to return the money for some reason, then it's that much harder, right? If they've already sent it, if something wasn't correct with the paperwork. So we'd rather make sure, all the T's are crossed, D's, I's are dotted. Yeah, I got that before we have them even wire the money, and then it's a matter of, okay, confirm the details with me. call the bank if you have to confirm the details because it's not easily reversible, I guess is the best way to put it. So you certainly want to make sure you're sending it to the right place and to someone you trust. But even after that, you want to make sure that all the details are correct. All right. Awesome. So what is a myth about this business that you would like to set straight?

[00:32:02] Leann Mouritsen: I think one thing I hear is people like, I can't do that. I can't get into large apartment deals. I can't, that they have to start with a single family home, which you could, it's a good learning experience, but that doesn't mean that you can't start bigger. So if you have reserves, if you have the ability to be in a position financially, where you could invest that money, you can go into bigger deals right away and be able to enjoy that passive income and be able to have that investment there. And yeah,

[00:32:26] Tim Little: Yeah, and I agree. I think some of it is limiting beliefs, but it is limited based on our knowledge, right? Like I didn't know about passive investing until I knew about passive investing. So I didn't think it was possible, right?

[00:32:39] Leann Mouritsen: Yep. I didn't learn about passive investing until 2017. and I rented for 10 years. occurred to me to be on the other side of the

[00:32:46] Tim Little: right

[00:32:46] Leann Mouritsen: house. Like I just never even crossed my brain. So yeah, being able to be educated and know your opportunities. Yeah. It's

[00:32:53] Tim Little: Yeah, that and I think the other piece is letting people know that they wouldn't be missing out on all the things that they like about, owning directly like with their single family rental that they have because they like cash flow or they like getting depreciation. Most people wouldn't think that if they're only passively investing that they could still take advantage of some of that stuff, but you glossed over it at the beginning. They still get those things. Like a lot of these deals will kick off distributions, which is just money, to you from the profit, whether it's monthly, quarterly, whatever the case may be, right? And they also get that depreciation, which may lower their tax base, which is given to them through what you said, the K 1. So a lot of people don't realize that either.

[00:33:38] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah. And you can't make it, but even the appreciation is something that is like, like if you owned a home, you'd have that appreciation, but that is true. Also with apartments, they can't, we don't ever do that in our underwriting. You can, that is a benefit also the appreciation too. So

[00:33:50] Tim Little: Yeah, and and just like on the single family homes where you force appreciation by renovating. It's very similar to apartment buildings, right? You're forcing appreciation by making it nicer so that you can charge more rent. And that's where the appreciation comes from. Because a lot of people don't realize that the value of apartment buildings is. Is based largely on the income that they get from rent and other sources. All right, awesome. the last question, what does success look like to you?

[00:34:16] Leann Mouritsen: And you asked, I was like, Oh, what does that mean? So one of the things my husband and I do when we talk about what is success to us? We say, what are our top three priorities? And so like, when I look at success, I would say number one is your relationship with God, personally for us, like when we make decisions, you're like, okay, are we prioritizing God above everything else? And then if we're not, we're like, all right, let's put ourselves in check, make sure we're doing what we need to. And then. I know a lot of people will switch these and say families next, but, we'll often say self because how you take care of yourself also influences how you take care of your family, right? And my husband's really big into working out and eating good foods and exercising and reading books, taking care of yourself mentally, spiritually, physically, emotionally, right? all of those influences. The third one we would say is family, right? The way that you're, you and your family are. And which also goes into your career and your life and your relationships with others, right? So I really see success as being able to have a good relationship with God and be able to have a good relationship with yourself. And then, having those good relationships with your family. And Yes, having financial liberty and freedom is, can also be considered part of being financially successful, right? But I do feel like it encompasses, I feel like when you're successful, it encompasses all areas, right? both financially, spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, like every aspect of those areas are important to your success in life and really, truly being fulfilled and feeling happy.

[00:35:38] Tim Little: Yeah, no, that's great. it's not something that we've, we haven't heard that nuance, as an answer to that. This question because you got into the prioritization piece, which I think is important, right? Because how can you identify what success is for you if you don't know what your priorities are? So I think that's an important point for people to take that step first before they answer that question, which it sounds like you did in like record time while you were. sitting there. so kudos. All right. Hey, Leanne, this has been awesome. Please tell our listeners how they can get ahold of you and if there's anything else that you'd like to share with them.

[00:36:09] Leann Mouritsen: Yeah. So if you go to crownedcapital.net, you can get ahold of me the, or you can email me at leann@crownedcapital.net and yeah, I would say continue to listen to, I'm grateful for Tim being able to let me on this podcast and continue to educate yourselves and learn more. We do have an investor one on one course. If you're, if people are new to this, you can go on, same thing, crownedcapital.net, forward slash investor one on one. And then, you could probably put a link below, I assume too, if you want. And yeah, I really encourage people to learn. That's the first step. To go out there and learn everything you can, and then to make a choice and move, take action and get out there and do it. But yes, thank you for having me on your podcast today. I do appreciate it.

[00:36:51] Tim Little: Absolutely. It was a pleasure and we'll definitely have all that information in the show notes. So Leann, thank you again for coming on and I look forward to continuing to see you do big things on your journey to multifamily millions.

[00:37:02] Leann Mouritsen: Thank you.

Head Shot

TIM LITTLE (FOUNDER/ CEO)

Host