66. Unfiltered Success: Wonderful Togbey on Building A Real Estate Empire, 75 Hard, and Credit Card Mastery

In this inspiring episode, Jason and Rachel Wagner sit down with the multifaceted Wonderful Togbey—a successful Chicago real estate investor, 75 Hard enthusiast, and master of credit card hacking. 

As an immigrant from Togo, West Africa, Wonderful Togbey shares his incredible journey of moving to the U.S. at 16, building a thriving real estate portfolio from scratch, and balancing a full-time job, family life, and global travel.

Kicking things off with his experience tackling the grueling 75 Hard program in 2021, Wonderful reveals a surprising twist. From there, the conversation dives into his real estate adventures: starting with a house hack in Omaha, navigating tenant nightmares (think Walmart parking lot deals and stolen copper), and scaling up to a million dollar commercial property in Chicago’s Washington Park. 

With transparency as his superpower, Wonderful doesn’t shy away from the battle scars—flooded basements, evictions, and $200,000 budget overruns—proving real estate’s forgiving nature rewards those who persevere.

Wonderful drops game-changing tips on credit card point hacking, showing how he turns everyday expenses into business-class flights to Togo and Spain using tools like Seats.aero and ChatGPT. 

Whether you’re a real estate newbie or a seasoned investor, this episode is packed with grit, practical wisdom, and a reminder that the sweetest rainbows follow the toughest storms.

Follow Wonderful’s journey on Instagram @mrwonderfulinvests 

Chapters

• 0:58 Introduction to Tugby and 75 Hard
• 6:27 Discipline Beyond 75 Hard
• 18:21 Balancing Family, Career, and Investments
• 21:59 Immigrant Journey and Finding Real Estate
• 29:36 First Investment Properties in Omaha
• 52:02 Moving to Chicago and Scaling Up
• 1:05:52 The $295K Property That Changed Everything
• 1:29:06 Credit Card Hacking for Travel
• 1:41:25 Tenant Horror Stories and Lessons Learned
• 1:52:37 The Value of Transparency in Real Estate

Transcript

Jason Wagner: 0:29

Welcome back to another episode of the Real Life Investing Podcast with Jason and Rachel Wagner. We have an awesome guest with us today, a guy that does amazing things in real estate but also. This guy is like he's multifaceted, he's a 75-hour champion. He's got just these life hacks of how to travel the world and how to utilize your credit card rewards and like how to just do some really cool things and the tricks behind that and make things like a lot more feasible and so wonderful. Tugby, welcome to the show.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:03

Thank you, I'm so happy you're here, man. I appreciate it. What is up?

Jason Wagner: 1:08

All right. So, first off, I want to cover 75 Heart, because that is one of those. It's one of those programs that you know obviously very dear to our hearts. I mean, what made you want to do the program? And I mean I think you did it back in like 2021, right. Yes, yes and have you done anything like since to kind of like keep up with some of those habits that you learned on 75 Hard.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:30

Yes, all right, so let's get right into it. Yeah, done 75 hard. Yes, all right, so let's get right into it. So, yes, I started 75 hard January 1st or 2nd of 2021, you know, right after. Well, in between COVID, while I was at home for the past you know few months I decided well, I'm at my heaviest now and I don't like this. Right, I've learned about 75 hard. I need to change something about it, which I did, and I got through it. It was phenomenal, it was hard.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:56

Actually, I want to get into something right off the top, because I feel like, after completing 75 hard, there's one thing that I found out that I may have to give back my 75 hard completion card here today. All right, so here's how I do it. Right? So you have to do two workouts every day, right, I would typically go get my first workout and when I'm done at the gym, I would immediately get a running Right and count that as two. Right? So, actually, as of a few months ago because I was telling a friend that, hey, I love 75 hard I haven't done anything else since then and I can kind of see that I don't have that discipline and things that I want to do.

Wonderful Togbey: 2:35

I feel like I have these goals and I looked at my 2022 board. You know, I got a few things checked off, you know, and 2021 was great at that because, because I did 75 hard, it helped me do a few other things. Right, I haven't done anything else since then. Family happened, babies happened, so I looked at that and I was okay, I'm getting ready to do this. And he told me well, bro, you gotta you have to do two workouts with a four-hour gap in between them, so I'm taking your 75 hard completion card away from you and you have to do it again.

Rachel Wagner: 3:06

So so then I'm all right, I guess maybe because I didn't do that.

Wonderful Togbey: 3:10

Maybe that's why I've kind of softened on a couple of things since then. But I, I actually came on here today to say and I'm just going to get into it and I'm going to need you guys to hold me accountable that I did it, but I feel like I need to redo it.

Jason Wagner: 3:25

So yeah, hell, yeah, you know, here's one thing that I love about you Wonderful is that one? First off, your name. Your name is phenomenal. It's phenomenal, mr wonderful. And then, but second, dude, you are so. You're so transparent, dude, you're transparent with everything that you do. You are this real estate phenom. You know doing these huge major projects and you're very successful with it, but you also share, like the downside stuff.

Wonderful Togbey: 3:56

Oh yeah.

Jason Wagner: 3:57

Right, you share the losses and you share like hey, I was actually, I think I was watching one of your videos. It was, like you know, you were 200,000 over budget of what you were expecting and you shared that publicly.

Jason Wagner: 4:09

And then this is why I love you, man, because you know I feel like there's so many like sunshines and rainbows and you know it's hard to come across like true, legitimate people, that they're just like dude. I'm going after this it's really hard and I'm going to share the whole you know whole side of things the good, the bad, the ugly.

Wonderful Togbey: 4:42

And that's what, that's what you do and that's what, literally, you just did with 75 hard. Yeah, I didn't get four hours in between. You know, like you said, I've come to find out, after you know, getting into real estate, that some of the people that I learned from I looked up to some of the things that I've been doing, that I was, I would go to them for help. They actually haven't done, or they, you know, what did you do when so-and-so happened? Oh, you know you would get some advice that you just know that someone who's gotten, you know, punched in the mouth wouldn't tell you this, because I can tell, just because of how you would approach the situation, that you haven't actually been there, right.

Wonderful Togbey: 5:36

So that's why I'm always, I want to always share those things and also inspire, because I share them and I try to find a balance, right, because sometimes knowing all the, all the behind the scenes of things may actually make you want to be like, well, you know what, I don't know if I want to do this right, but for the people that are actually going to put in the work, you know, I feel like knowing what's on the way, what's possible, you know, can go either way good or bad helps you prepare mentally for that. So then when you're in front of that situation, you know you're better informed, better prepared and you can face it head on. That's kind of how I approach yeah, my sharing or sometimes oversharing approach of life in general.

Jason Wagner: 6:11

Yeah, I love it, man, I love it, so all right. So, going back to 75, hard, all right you, but you did 75 days of this and then you just realized that after you did, after you completed the program, that you're like, oh shit, I actually sort of had space in between the two workouts, yes, but you still, you still went through the tasks and reach what are the, what are the tasks of 75 hard.

Rachel Wagner: 6:31

So two 45 minute workouts. One must be outside and drink a gallon of water. Read 10 pages of a nonfiction book, follow a diet of your choice, but no cheat meals, no alcohol, and then take a progress picture every day.

Rachel Wagner: 6:44

And I love that you just like remembered all that it's like yeah, well, I've been thinking about it but one thing I would note, because with the thing that you're saying you missed the consecutive workouts, I would agree that they do say you're not supposed to do it consecutively, but you did it pretty early. The program, I feel like at that point was still fairly new and so some of the rules, I think, were like a little hard to distinguish, depending upon where you first heard about the program and like where you got the rules from. So I, I could see how that could happen. You know you're right. I, I could see how that could happen. You know You're right, I think that's what it is.

Wonderful Togbey: 7:14

I don't, cause I heard about it, you know, cause I was telling other people about it. I hear you should do this and that's when I found out about you know all these the consecutive rule. But you know, hey, I gotta, I gotta do it how it's supposed to be done and I just feel like it's. You know, it's one of those things think I learned about 75, how hard is, and and I think about anything, any program that ends like that right is it's great to get you to jolt you and burn habit.

Wonderful Togbey: 7:41

You know, start habits right and get in, the, get in the mode, get in the zone, but you still have to figure out a way to keep that stimulus going after the fact right because, there's a lot of things, and just in life in general that I've, you know, I would think about a lot of things that, once you do it, or you would just become this person who now is this is just what you do now all of a sudden, right, like I would. I would think honestly, I would think, okay, now that I've become, now that I've completed 75 hard, automatically going to become someone who works out twice a day, right? Or I'm just going to become someone who eats, who doesn't eat cake or who doesn't drink. You know, it will just be easy to do those things because I completed 75 hard and actually that's not the case, right, if you, if you let go, or, after the fact, if you don't find a way to you, have to continue challenging yourself, right, it's going to help you build this pattern.

Wonderful Togbey: 8:35

And you have to realize at that point that, hey, I'm kind of, uh, a lot further than I was when I started and I should not, you know, give up on certain things. Right, which I'll honestly, again, I did give up on certain things that I, that I decided to pick back up on and I, and when I realized that, okay, when I go through those slumps, all right, it's been a week or two I haven't hit the gym Like I need to do this, right Cause now that, now that I know that I can do it right when I I can know, I know that I can go to, I can have, uh, my, my daughter's birthday was my first year birthday was around that time. Everybody was here, everybody was eating cake and everybody was eating good food and I was like nope, it's, you know, it's eight o'clock, you know that's the diet I was on. I wasn't doing so many fasting. I could tell everybody else.

Wonderful Togbey: 9:19

I was strong enough to say you know I, you know this doesn't follow the plan that I need to, that I've given myself to follow Right, so it gave me that power to do it. So I think it's good to have something like that, like 75 hard, that gets you through it, but you have to find ways to start another cycle and I think that's what 75 life or like no, the one year right.

Rachel Wagner: 9:42

They live hard, Right. So.

Wonderful Togbey: 9:44

I think you just have to find ways to do that. And for people like myself that you know out there, that have done something and all of a sudden don't feel like, oh man, I didn't get these superpowers that I would expect to get right, and like even as a parent, sometimes, you know, I would think now that I'm a dad, right, there are certain things that I'm just going to be able to do now because I've been given this superpower, right, it's just not that way that I find in things you just do the work and it's just consistent with it and eventually you change as that person that you want to become, but you still 100% have to put in the work, and it's every day and it doesn't end.

Jason Wagner: 10:28

Yeah yeah, you bring up a lot of good points. It's a program to kind of get you back on track is what I've recognized. But we've had to do it. I mean I've completed it three times. But the reason that I've gone back to it was because I fell off right and it was. I was like man. You know, it is hard to develop the habits and they say like habits really kind of develop after like 70 some days, like that's why he chose like 75 days, big round number like that.

Jason Wagner: 10:55

But I don't think that's right. Like dude, I think I think you need, I think you need over a year of like intense discipline to kind of like really really shake your whole like habit system. And because now I finally I'm a guy that I work out every day. I don't do two workouts, but I work out every day because I've recognized after the three times that I've done it.

Jason Wagner: 11:18

and all of that time, like it's all of a sudden it beat into my head, All right that man you know, when I do work out, I have the best days ever and, like, I'm mentally sharp and, like you know, if there's a day that I miss, I'm really kind of sluggish. But you don't recognize that stuff until you, like, you put yourself into the mode of I'm going to do a program because I've heard great things of it and then I'm going to continue to try and keep those disciplines alive and maybe I fall back, I fall off, but if I want to get back on track again there, it is Exactly right.

Wonderful Togbey: 11:46

I can, I can dial it back in, I can turn it on Right, yeah, and so, for sure, I need to do that again.

Jason Wagner: 11:54

Hey man, I mean we're probably at the same point. Maybe we're ready to do it again.

Rachel Wagner: 11:58

In my mind I'm doing it in the fall.

Jason Wagner: 12:00

Yeah, yeah, as soon as you have the baby.

Rachel Wagner: 12:03

Yeah, and get through the first three months.

Jason Wagner: 12:05

Rachel is pregnant with her third child, and so the baby is due in May.

Rachel Wagner: 12:15

But you were already talking like as soon as I have this baby, I'm starting. Yeah, I'll need to find the discipline again, but yeah, Okay. So a couple of questions for you. So you did. You had one kid when you did 75 hard.

Wonderful Togbey: 12:24

Yes.

Rachel Wagner: 12:24

Okay. So I want to see if you could kind of speak a little bit to the balance of having kids while doing the program and what your wife kind of thought about it and just like if there was anything going into it that you were like, gosh, this is going to be really hard, and if those moments came for you at all.

Wonderful Togbey: 12:39

Yeah, the amazing thing about having a partner is that they can hold you accountable right and they can actually make things easier because once you get started and you show that you're, you're committed right, which for me, and when I told my wife about it, she was like, yeah, that's crazy, you know, there's no way I can do it. Good luck to you, though. I think you could. So right Then, even that first one, she was all right. I think you can do this, babe, like knowing I don't I don't really think she believed it then, but she was all right, I think you can do this.

Wonderful Togbey: 13:08

So, and having her actually allowed me to stick to the goal. So she'll do things in the morning, so that I would have time. Like sometimes I would think, okay, I'm just going to knock out to work out, or you know, very late at night she's like, no, you got to. If you skip this, it's going to be hard to get all six activities in there. So she helped me end up in that standpoint making sure that I stick to the goal. You know sometimes where I would travel I think we went out to Vegas and I was running on a strip and you know she helped me make sure I got those in, because I would try to. Well, maybe this is somewhere that I think I was like trying to do it in like a covered parking lot. Oh no, this is an outside. You got to get outside and do it.

Rachel Wagner: 14:01

You did that in Vegas. Yeah, how brutal lots. Oh no, this is an outside.

Wonderful Togbey: 14:04

Yeah, you gotta get outside and do it. So, yeah, yeah, how brutal. Yeah, so I mean I think just having someone there I'll pull those things. Um, but did it make it hard, uh, having a kid? If you're on the sideline wondering if you know, honestly, I don't think so. I mean I didn't try it, you know, without kids, so I can't really speak to that fact, but I was able to do it. You know, having a daughter we have two now, so I'll see what that challenge looks like. But I mean, when you really think about it, it's more in the mind game, you know, than it is what you have going on at home.

Rachel Wagner: 14:44

So, yeah, yeah, it's so much a mind game. Yeah, yeah, that's why it's a mental toughness program. Right, it's a mental toughness program. It's not a women's program, it's a mental toughness program.

Jason Wagner: 14:54

It's a mental toughness program, yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 15:02

So you have two kids at home. I do Two daughters, Two daughters. What are their ages?

Jason Wagner: 15:04

Five and nine months, five and nine months. Man, you're in the thick of it.

Rachel Wagner: 15:07

Yeah, yeah, that's awesome.

Jason Wagner: 15:10

So how do you do all the things that you do? Because are you working a job too? I am, yeah, bro, all right. So you're a full-time real estate investor, you have a full-time job, full-time software engineer and a family Family and you guys travel all the time, yep.

Wonderful Togbey: 15:28

How do you do all this, I mean honestly, when I oh man, I just don't want to say my wife again, man, because it's like, here's the thing. We as a family got together and, well, these are the things that we want to do, right, and I think we read this book I'm going to forget it now, but this was a book by Elena Cardone and I'll send you the title so you can share here but it was about helping each other accomplish goals, where there's a role that you play to help your partner, you know, achieve certain goals, right. So we came up, so sometimes we would and I think it was more of you know me being this warrior, right, it was going about going out and figuring out these things and her helping me accomplish those things so that, as a family, we can accomplish them right. So a lot of things come to that like I get up, she, you know, if I have, when I have to do work, sometimes, when I need to take time to do work, I'll let her know. Hey, today's a it's a busier day than I need to do and I need to focus on certain things and she helps make sure home is okay, right, whether you know, taking care of the kids, because I need to.

Wonderful Togbey: 16:48

Sometimes I have a lot going on up here, right, with all those things. I wouldn't be able to do all those things without being able to maintain the job, because I do have to. I don't have hours, right, I can be checking on projects, rental properties, in the middle of night. Sometimes, right, sometimes I have to. I have to leave things at home and go handle business.

Wonderful Togbey: 17:10

Right, there is certain I'm ashamed to say this but certain things that I I do more for on my rental properties that they don't even have the time to do for at home, right, because, uh, that is business sometimes, and you know that does come with the priority. That's just what we've chosen for ourselves for this, for this period of our season, season of our lives, and, uh, yeah, I think that's our game plan and there's sacrifices that need to be made in order to, uh, to do those things. And you're just doing, and I mean I, I mean I just still think there's a lot more that can be done. You know it may seem like I'm doing something, but I tell myself, man, I can do a lot more. That's just the truth of it.

Jason Wagner: 17:52

I love it, man, and that's just like the drive that you have right, absolutely. Where did all that come from?

Wonderful Togbey: 17:58

Well, for me, it's just having a shorter time horizon. I want to put it that way I just, just, as an immigrant, moved to the states as a 16 year old, you know, looking for, well, I don't I don't know if I was 16 I was trying to really make a living. I was just trying to. I was just trying to come to America and and, uh, um, finish my college and get a good job, right? So so then I did that, graduated, started working, and the thing about it is so, having parents and people that you're responsible for at a at a young age, like that makes you, makes you want to do more than just be good yourself, right? So I think about myself.

Wonderful Togbey: 18:46

Now I'm good, but I think about the sacrifices and things that my parents have have made for us, right, and think about how can I do? I've been given a lot in order to do a lot with, so I need to be able to use those opportunities that I have, and just, I need to be able to use those to the maximum right and deliver, have them reach their highest potential in life and in real estate. That's kind of everything that I do. You know, I take old properties and turn them into new properties, properties, you know. I take the opportunities I was given to be in this country and turn them into gold. I guess I can put it that way, can?

Rachel Wagner: 19:33

you share? Where are you originally from?

Wonderful Togbey: 19:35

I'm from Togo. Togo is in West Africa, a French-speaking country. So, uh, yeah, we grew up there. I, uh, that's where I was born and raised moved here when I was 16 and I yeah, I, it took me about seven, eight years before going back. As a 16 year old, I think. I returned around whatever, that is, 23, 24. And, yeah, it was great, as great as it is. You know, I miss home sometimes, right, and I do have to, and it costs to do those things, right? So that's another thing where I have a building family here, but I also have people back home that are counting on me, sisters. So I never forget home, right? So, and I need to do more in order to provide. I think that's the typical immigrant story. But even anyone else too, right, like if you're, you know, born and raised in in america, you have parents back home, could just be a couple of blocks away and you know, I'm sure this is not uncommon.

Jason Wagner: 20:46

So your parents are back in Togo.

Rachel Wagner: 20:47

Yeah.

Jason Wagner: 20:50

So is there anyone here on your family side?

Wonderful Togbey: 20:53

with you. Yeah, I have brothers and sisters here. You've got brothers and sisters here.

Jason Wagner: 20:58

And then you also have sisters that are back home in Togo. That's right.

Wonderful Togbey: 21:01

We're kind of uh, kind of split, yeah, yeah, yeah I have a lot of siblings.

Jason Wagner: 21:07

What was the? How many siblings do you have? Seven, seven, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you got how many that are here in the states? Four here, four here in the states, yeah, yeah, yeah, cool. And are they all in Chicago or are they? No, you're all over the place, oh yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 21:23

Yeah, texas, north Carolina, maryland.

Jason Wagner: 21:29

Okay, yeah, so you're the only one in Chicago, then yeah, yeah.

Rachel Wagner: 21:32

So how did you get into real estate or find like mentors, I guess? How did you learn about it? You're coming here at 16 and your family's kind of spread out all over the place like how did you and where'd that desire come from? But then also, how did you learn it?

Wonderful Togbey: 21:47

yeah, so I was in, I was working. Then I was, I got, you know, I got my four-year degree. I was working. So the plan for us, let me say this so I didn't really grow up with an entrepreneurial you know mindset. Right, it was go to school and you'll be good. You know, try to try. Let me say this so I didn't really grow up with an entrepreneurial mindset. It was go to school and you'll be good, try to do your homework, be smart and everything will take care of itself, which I did for the most part. I went to school, I got good grades, graduated and I started working, then decent salary.

Wonderful Togbey: 22:19

But then I realized how much working not working for myself or having a job still limited me in certain things. Right, I remember, even after seven years for some, I got to go back home. I was, I think. I had a two weeks vacation, that and I still had to worry about work the whole time. I was there and I was a man I I have, but I have bought a house was like man, I have bought a house. No, I don't think I had bought a house then, but I just realized that, hey, even with all this money coming in, you still have to show up for work and there is just not going to be enough to actually do more than just take care of every day. So, for me, I thought about what can I do? Right, so I'm in tech. And at that time I was. You know, facebook was hot, right, so tech or app developers, right. So I was like man, unless I can come up with the next Facebook, I'm screwed. I don't know how I'm ever going to be able to reach the sweet life that, you know, zuckerberg and all these guys have. So I just couldn't think of anything Right.

Wonderful Togbey: 23:30

And I remember I actually went to a tech conference and it was about I thought it was about there was a talk about entrepreneurship and this gentleman that came up talked about investing in real estate. He was, so it was supposed to be a talk about entrepreneurship into starting apps. And because he was a real estate investor at that point and ran his own brokerage no, I think it was a broker was he a broker? Anyway, he was in real estate, right, and he was going to share about how you can start your own business, right, whether on a tech side. And I was like, no, actually, let me hear more about this other thing that you're doing right. Let me hear about this real estate thing. You got some rentals and what happens, like you can you know? Because I mean you know that if you're getting, I knew, you know empirically that if you own a house and you rent out, you can make some money there, right, so that was about it. But that was the first person that I actually knew that actually owned a house and people were paying him to to have to have rent coming. So I sent him an email right after that and grab some coffee. Uh, sims casanova, uh, which is you? It sounds like a made up story. My name is Juan Rafael and this guy I met, his name is Casanova Shout out to you man. So he was kind enough to give me some of his time.

Wonderful Togbey: 24:51

This was when I was in Omaha, nebraska, so and I, we met up and he just kind of gave me some resources at that point and one of the biggest ones then was Bigger Pockets, which I started then just binging everything that you know, they could, that I could, that I could define Right At that time. I would, I would. My fiance was living here in Chicago and I was in Omaha, so I would. I would. I would be on eight hour drives listening to Bigger Pockets. I couldn't wait to have to come see her because I know that I could get through seven or eight episodes then right, just listening.

Wonderful Togbey: 25:26

And for me it was all right. I just need to get enough to cover my costs, right? So if I can get 200 bucks a door, I would eventually be able to supplement my income and get out of working well for money, right? So, yeah, that was a long way to get to it, but that for me it made sense. I was like I don't have any crazy revolutionary ideas. I don't have an app that's going to make you know that billions of users are going to be on. I have a little bit of money saved up because I'm a little, you know, frugal for the most part. So this is a way for non-creative people to make some money. So I went all in and, yeah, that's kind of how I got started, dude.

Jason Wagner: 26:13

That's amazing. So it just it takes somebody who's been successful in it to kind of plant the seed, but you did the work there. You reached out and said, hey, I'm interested in this real estate stuff, where what's a good place I could go. He gave you bigger pockets, which is by far that's where I started to. It was, it was bigger pockets. And then and then it was the fire within which we know that you have, which was I'm hey, I've got eight hours here. I'm going to binge all these episodes. It's literally what we would do. What we would do, we would on road trips, we would. I'd be like, hey, you want to listen to a podcast? And like we would just listen to the bigger pockets. And that was the reason that I was able to get her on board. Did you have any problem with, like, getting your wife on board to do the real estate stuff?

Wonderful Togbey: 26:51

So not really because I was able to show for me it's like I like to show first. So by the time that so we weren't married when I bought my first investment, I had already had a couple of investment properties. So I had, I was lucky enough that I put in the work right. So if you just have to show that you, you're, you'll follow through on things right. So I mean even my, because my well, my friends that I needed to, you know, buy into that at that time, because I, we'll always talk about it. Hey, we all know that we should own properties because this will, this is the way it's like. It's like that, right, if you own real properties, or if you own properties, you'll sell yourself out for the future because properly, always, you know, value always goes up. So that part wasn't too hard. It was my circle that I actually had.

Wonderful Togbey: 27:37

You know I'm talking about, uh, road trips like I. I think there was a trip that we went on and I had, can you imagine, three of my buddies, you know, two in the back and one in the one in the front, and I wanted to take my car because I knew that this is what I usually do on road trips. I listen to bigger pockets and I I made them sit through and listen to bigger pockets. They had no interest in doing real estate right, so I was.

Wonderful Togbey: 28:06

You know, that's just the level of determination that you have to have to do to do this thing right. If, if you can, if you can convince three of your friends that are going out of town to to have a party to sit in the car and, instead of jamming out to music to, you know, sit there and listen to bigger pockets. I think at the end of the ride there they all knew who Brandon Turner was and who Bigger Pockets was. So you just have to show that type of commitment to people around you, to really show that you're putting in the work and, surprisingly enough, people just start helping you once they see that you're actually helping yourself. Do something.

Jason Wagner: 28:41

And those three guys that were in the car with you? Did they turn into real estate investors?

Wonderful Togbey: 28:45

you know what they did not?

Jason Wagner: 28:48

ah, they did not they wish they did.

Jason Wagner: 28:51

Uh, yes, but so, but they always uh, they have it's hard man, it's hard, you know it takes a special person like commit and do it because they were probably your age, yeah, yeah. And you know there's so much stigma which is like dude real estate's for the old guys, right, the old guys that got money and like you can't get into the game. You know it's just too hard. But you had a little bit of money saved up, so like let's kind of talk through, like what was, what was that first property like for you? And like you know how'd you pull it off? And you're an immigrant and so I'm assuming that you got financing. So like how did that whole piece play into all this?

Wonderful Togbey: 29:33

So so I think buying my first house actually helped, but before buying the investment property. So and I'll talk about the house first, because so, this was 2017 and I've always had a roommate, you know, through college. So we, I knew we were paying. I think our rent was about 900 bucks at the time or something like that. It was two bedroom apartment that we were renting, and we went to his brother who owned the house and who was the one person that I could.

Wonderful Togbey: 30:11

I was comfortable enough to ask hey, how much do you pay for this thing? Right? And who was? Who told me, I believe his mortgage was around I think it was 13, 1400, 1400 and at the time for me, like it was, it was a.

Wonderful Togbey: 30:26

It was a shock to me because I I know this thing is supposed to cost a few hundred thousand dollars, you know for to get a house like this. So when he took because I didn't really put it together that, oh, like you, you actually don't need hundreds of thousands of dollars for this. Like you, your mortgage can be as close as possible, because I looked at it as oh like you mean to tell me, if I can add a couple more hundreds, I can buy a property and be able to live in it. I don't need a. I think he had a four or five bedroom house. I don't need this, right, if I can get something. Uh, that was, uh, I can buy, start building equity instead of, uh, paying for rent. Right, and I have my buddy here, you know he's, uh, we're already going 50, 50 on the rent. Like, hey, would you be interested, like in, in going 50, 50 on a mortgage, right? Uh, so that's kind of how I, I I sold that to him and that was turned.

Wonderful Togbey: 31:19

It turned out that was my first house hack, right. And the great thing about that experience is the realtor that I worked with at the time, you know, made everything seamless for me. He made it a great experience, right. So I think if it hadn't been for him, or if I was, he helped me pick the right house for me, right, so that helped transition into the honest property.

Wonderful Togbey: 31:43

Um, and so then, when I was done with that and I was like, oh, okay, like you know, went to, I had, I had decent credit, you know, and I didn't, I didn't know I had new credit until I went to buy for me, my brother took me this advice. Uh, before I got my first credit card, hey, pay it off. I paid off every month, like that's all he said. And I was okay, like like that's all I needed to know. And I just did that. And I'm glad he said that, because if he hadn't, like, I would just think this was just I don't know if I would have done it right. So just knowing those little things and being diligent with money helped me down the line right. So just paying all my credit cards I turned out I think I went to yeah, so I started talking to a banker then okay oh you have pretty good credit.

Wonderful Togbey: 32:28

I was like, okay, what does that mean? Well, we can get you this, for I think it was like 4% then, so I was able to get in. It was a conventional with a 4% down loan, so I didn't have to go FHA because they're like, well, I think commercial is good for you. I didn't know if it was a thing then. So that's kind of how I get into the first one. This was and I can get it.

Wonderful Togbey: 32:53

I think I put down maybe it was a hundred and fifty thousand, our house and three or four percent, I think I put down where was it? I just know Omaha, okay, yeah, yeah, so that was. I think I put down 9,000, something around there. There was a seller helping, help me out with some stuff. I just know that. You know the realtor told me that, hey, you got some, uh, seller credits or things like that. Yeah, that that helped. So, uh, that was it. But I just want to say that just working with a realtor then you know that helped me.

Wonderful Togbey: 33:30

Um, you know, not buy, not buy too big of a house, right, because I was approved for a little more than that and I just making that process in my time he wasn't, you know, he wasn't in a rush because we saw three or four houses well, actually a lot more close to a dozen before making the right decision and he would flat out tell me, no, I don't think you should buy this one. I'm like, oh, okay, this is good, I can. Actually, you know, this guy's not just out here to take his commission and bounce right. So, yeah, the help. And so for the second house, I figured, okay, well, like, I guess I need a whole lot of money to do this, right. So I called him up and said, hey, I want to buy my second property. I still have a little bit of money saved up. And that second, that house, was $57,000 that I bought.

Jason Wagner: 34:17

So much less than the first one.

Wonderful Togbey: 34:18

Much less than the first one, right? Yeah, right. So when I called him actually I was like, well, I don't, I don't know if I can afford another one, but I would like to. Can you help me get something else right? And and all he had to do was I just had to tell him what I was looking for, kind of what I can afford, and he started sending me a list of uh, of houses, and I didn't even know that there were houses that are less than $100,000. That would be decent, right, and I'm sure you probably.

Wonderful Togbey: 34:47

If you live in a different market now, they might not be 100,000, but it might be a lot less than what you actually think, right, because you're probably looking at houses that you would live in, which this one maybe I could have lived. I mean, it was in a decent condition, it was the. It was a worst-looking house in the best neighborhood I could afford, right, which has been my formula for investing all throughout. You know, find a, find a neighborhood that is good enough, buy the ugly house there and you'll be okay. So, yeah, we bought the house. I think it was listed for 90, we negotiated, we negotiated pretty hardly, he did all that and I got in $57,000. Wow.

Jason Wagner: 35:26

That's almost half the price of the world. Right, You're the best realtor of all time.

Wonderful Togbey: 35:30

It sounds like, and at closing I found out it was worth $78,000. So I was awesome.

Jason Wagner: 35:37

Built-in equity yeah, immediately.

Wonderful Togbey: 35:39

Wow, Praise to your realtor man. That's awesome. How did you get connected with?

Jason Wagner: 35:42

him. Good question, I think Was it just like a Zillow thing.

Wonderful Togbey: 35:48

Yeah, you don't know. I actually yeah, I didn't know I went to Zillow, looked up a house that I thought would be good for me to look at and I went to see the house he was selling and I was like I showed up and say I'm looking to buy a house, and he's like, where's your realtor? And I was like, what's that? I don't have one of those. Uh, would you you know? And he's oh, I can help you. Yeah, you know. And directly I was like are you sure about this? You know, maybe he's just like, yeah, he'll talk me into buying his right. So luckily he didn't, right? He told me well, I think this one is good for you, but you know, if, if it's not for you, then it's not for you. Just just let me know. So that, just, that's all right. I guess there he can help me get your next one.

Wonderful Togbey: 36:31

So, you know, I would test him a little bit on certain things, like and I think you should do this with anyone you work with, because I try to do that with even contractors now you just, you know, you just kind of see if is, is this person always going to be a yes person, right? Is it always? Is everything just going to be the greatest thing for you to get right. So and he'll? He'll tell me, you know he'll shoot his trip. He'll tell me not. I don't think this one would work. Um, I think this is probably a little better for what you're trying to do, like, um and yeah, um yeah, so you got the luck of the draw there.

Jason Wagner: 37:01

Yeah, so sometimes, sometimes you get the agents through Zillow where it's. You know I used to do that right, but you can meet. You can meet great people. You know, if you're not a representative, and people will do that and they'll meet the person that's showing the house so that they can show you some value. You can feel like they're like an honest person. You know, latch on to that and yeah, it's cool that you kind of test them too. But all right, so go back to your. So so the first house, just to kind of recap, the first house you bought with a buddy of yours and you guys just basically split the mortgage so I right.

Wonderful Togbey: 37:32

So no, so I was the only one. Uh on the on the on the loan.

Jason Wagner: 37:35

But you kind of had a handshake agreement that you were splitting the mortgage, right, right well, yeah, you know, I told him I think my, my mortgage was uh, 1200.

Wonderful Togbey: 37:43

And I told him, hey, just give me 500 bucks. Okay, cool, and and you're good, you live in the house. I had a little pool in the back. Hey, you want a house with a pool? Just give me 500 bucks. That was a deal for him yeah, all right.

Jason Wagner: 37:55

So then the second house you bought without intention to live there, right? So this is actually going to be your first renovation project. So did you finance it or did you pay cash for it? I financed it.

Wonderful Togbey: 38:04

Okay, yep, as small as the loan was, I only had about 15% of that left in my bank account then. So, whatever that ended up being is all I had and I put down the down payment for it and well, I think I saved a little more to do some rehab for it. And well, I think I saved a little more to do some some some rehab for it, which actually so got the house and didn't know didn't know anything about, nor to get a lease or anything like that. I started going to meet up still, which, which was another thing. Number one well, close, top five success lessons just get around a community of people who are doing what you want to do, so going in there, the first conversation is that I had, with these people, helped me save thousands of dollars because I had in my mind that I had to do so many extra things that will not get, that would not bring him all right.

Wonderful Togbey: 38:56

I was going to redo the, redo the. What was it? The driveway. I was that thing. I was alright, like this is gonna be. I got a couple of bins are gonna be 9,000 or so. I was gonna spend money on that. I was gonna spend money on a lot of things that would not have made sense. Right, because they would have. They would, I would just I would have overdone it for the house, and being able to cut through, find out what needs to happen in order to get the best rent or best property is what is the advice that they gave me, and I made up a couple of the buddies of mine.

Jason Wagner: 39:35

I still call today for four questions things like that, so that one they turn into a rental for you yes, it turned into a rental.

Wonderful Togbey: 39:42

Uh, was not. My first tenant paid rent the first month and the second month did not. Uh, oh, so yeah, what a start.

Wonderful Togbey: 39:52

So yeah so, you know, we start hitting bumps now. So if we can get into those bumps because I know so far it's been pretty good with the realtor second house did not want to pay rent and I should have known you screen well, or how'd you? Yeah, no, I, I did not do much of that. Okay, it was a lady that wanted to move in within the next couple of days. Maybe I Walmart, give me a check. And I was all right, here are the keys and you're good to go. Met you at walmart. Yep, maybe, yep, maybe. In the parking lot I was, I had to work and, uh, she was. She was in a rush to get in and I was all right, like I, you know, I was like, well, I'm at work now. She said, well, I'll just, I'll just, I'll just come meet you there, you know, and I was like, oh yeah, that's, that's perfect. I mean, that's exciting like you know this is this is the way to go right?

Wonderful Togbey: 40:46

someone that had money you know that was cash ready to go and no, yeah, don't do that. I should have been a little more patient with that. I turned and I was able to. Uh, I think she went a few months without paying rent and, you know, she ended up just taking off.

Jason Wagner: 41:00

How'd you get her out?

Wonderful Togbey: 41:02

Well, you know, things are a little different than they are here in Chicago.

Wonderful Togbey: 41:06

It was I didn't have to do, I think she just took, I think I, you know, maybe threatened an eviction, then that's all I needed to do then I guess. And yeah, she took off and I mean she left a bunch of trash, uh, trash for me to handle and it was, she wasn't the cleanest person. So I mean, you know, I've had worse stories since then, like you know, now, if you tell me that I would have a tenant that would leave and just leave clutter and a mess, I'd be, hey, sign me up, right, right, but much better than, uh, someone who lived there for for for months and uh, and actually damaged the property. So, yeah, I mean, in all these things and things in hindsight even and I've gotten worse stories on that but like, looking back, like man, like I mean that property even, I think, yeah, so after, when she left the property, I I got, I got robbed. Then, you know, someone came in and vandalized the property, stole all the copper, uh, you know, in between that, yeah, geez.

Jason Wagner: 42:07

So you got someone that's not paying rent and then, all of a sudden, someone breaks into the house while it's vacant and steals all this stuff.

Wonderful Togbey: 42:12

Yep, I wonder if you know that that wasn't a plan of theirs to come. And, you know, take the rest of, uh, what they left behind. So, yeah, someone you know took all that and I I didn't even you know, and I got in there and I didn't even know that I was, I was, I was some, I got, I got rubbed. I walked in and I just noticed things just didn't look quite right, you know, and I and I called, I called my plumber up to uh, you know, I was like, hey, I'm not getting water, like you know, come check this out. And he comes like yo, that's all your copper. They took your, your ac condenser outside, like you, you need to call the police.

Wonderful Togbey: 42:46

Yeah, so you know, and then, uh, that happened, and at the time I mean I, it actually ended up being, uh, believe it or not, because and I end up being a blessing in some in some way because then I, I was able to call the insurance up and say, hey, I, you know, I need all new plumbing done here and I need a new ac, uh condenser and all these things that I was, they were able to take care of for me. Uh, you know, a couple of months later I think I yeah, I had to front the cost and then they paid me back. But you know, now I had a property that I was like, hey I, I have brand new plumbing, I have a USC unit and I was able to then that $50,000 house I believe I was able to get. I was able to get a refinance and got a $40,000 check out of.

Jason Wagner: 43:36

So, so, so, sometimes, sometimes, when you go through all these challenges and then you go to correct it, you actually get rewarded 100%. It kind of goes back to your comment where you're like, well, the market's always going up, right, and that's what we have been seeing is that the market has been going up. And the longer that you hold the property, yeah, you might have some headaches, but if you have a big refinance situation, oh shit, it's worth more. Oh wait, I can pull this money out.

Wonderful Togbey: 44:02

What? Oh shit, it's worth more. Oh wait, I can pull this money out. What, right, right, that was it, and you know it was still. I was able to get better rent, I was able to do a few more things with with that extra money, and I mean it's.

Wonderful Togbey: 44:09

I mean, this real estate game is just so real, you know. So forgiving, you know, and I mean you do have to, you do need time right. So if if I wasn't let's say that I was I couldn't pay my mortgage right after that tenant did not pay, then I would have been screwed because then the bankrupt came in and taken the place right. So you do need to be able, you do need to not overpay when you're buying right. So once you do that and you don't, yeah, once you have that in place and you have, you can give yourself a little bit of room with reserves. And just because real estate is forgiving, don't just buy the house and take the extra money to buy a Tesla right. Save some of that money for a rainy day. I still live frugally. So that's what allowed me to wait it out and solve these problems and get rewarded for them.

Jason Wagner: 45:02

Do you still own the property? I do no kidding, I do yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 45:05

Do you?

Rachel Wagner: 45:05

own both of the ones and no one.

Wonderful Togbey: 45:07

I sold the one that I lived in. That had helped me buy other properties, so that was sold out in COVID. During COVID I lived in the property for two, three years, moved here, I rented out for a few months to my buddies and then I was getting close to getting out of the homeowner's exception, where you get to sell a property and take up to $250,000 of tax-free profit. So I ended up selling it. I think I got a $70,000 check for that.

Jason Wagner: 45:44

That was the first one. Yeah, that was the first one. Yeah, Sweet. So then you ended up. At what point did you come to Chicago?

Wonderful Togbey: 45:52

Yeah. So 2020 actually was when I and right before COVID is when I moved to Chicago. We were expecting my wife was expecting our first daughter and moved to Chicago here I would visit her. So I kind of knew where she lived and kind of saw that, oh, there's a lot more activity going on in this part of town which is Bronzeville, and I kind of fell in love with it. So, right when I moved here in January, I started looking for properties right then and there and I know that there's something going on here Now I know what to do. Right, I know I can get a three unit, four unit, live in one of the units and be able to I'd be able to increase my network essentially.

Jason Wagner: 46:36

Yeah, so you knew that stuff from BiggerPockets right, Because they talked about the house hack situations and how to do that and it probably wasn't really. Were there multi-family properties?

Wonderful Togbey: 46:46

in omaha? Yeah, not many. So I did end up buying a duplex after that, uh, other house in in uh in omaha, but it wasn't in a place that I would. I would love you know my family were living. It was, it was a little rougher area.

Jason Wagner: 46:58

Yeah, was that uh, that was a house hack then. No, that was not. No, it was a little rougher area.

Wonderful Togbey: 47:02

Was that a house hack then? No, that was not a house hack, it was 67, so I convinced my brother to give me some money and we went and half and half on that and we put down 20%. That's right. Then I've been 25%, which of 70 grand. It wasn't terrible. I'll be able to make that happen, which we still hold to.

Jason Wagner: 47:20

You still have that one, I still have that one. Yeah, yeah, you've only sold one property so far. Yep, that's right. Even now, even now, yeah, yes, that's funny. That's funny, I'm kind of the same. Well, and you're in, which is interesting because you're a, you know, buys the shitty ones and makes them look beautiful and gold. There's a lot of people that are like, oh, let's take the profit out of that, right, yeah, but you kind of seem to have this mindset of like, oh, no, no, there's a lot more money to be made from this property. Absolutely, it's not just today, but what it's going to be worth in about five years 100%.

Wonderful Togbey: 47:55

It's like make money today and tomorrow. That's kind of how I look at it. You know it's. Why would I choose just today, if I can? I can cuz I mean I've done, I've done the bulk of the work. Now, right, I fixed this thing up, it's. You know it's like a juggernaut. I mean there's still gonna be. You still got to my biggest concern there. He's gonna be to find a good tenant, right. So once that, once that's done, I mean why just give it up to someone else? If I was in that game, sure, but I'm in the, you know, long-term game. So that's kind of how I look at that so then, all right, so back to Bronzeville.

Jason Wagner: 48:27

So, bronzeville, you bought a multifamily. Yep, yep, and that was a house hack, yes, that was a house hack. And that was an FHA. That was an FHA. Yeah, three and a half percent down three and a half percent down.

Wonderful Togbey: 48:37

Yep, yeah, again through numbers. That was uh, 320,. Uh, then it was. You know, I was getting to some bigger numbers. Now I left my 50 and 60 thousand dollar uh house days and now I was buying stuff in the in the hundreds of thousands. So but yeah, it was great, it was listed for, I think, closer to 400. Uh, now when I, when I moved to chic, I moved to Chicago and just found out first, I did ask my buddies in Omaha, the new people in Chicago, about realtors that I could work with. It was a little harder then because then and now I consider myself a little more of an investor, a little more savvy, so I wanted to do a little more of a negotiation that I wanted to do. I reached out to another gentleman and wanted to submit an offer and I had to actually push him because he thought my offer was too low. But it was accepted. I think it was listed for close to $380. We got it for $320.

Jason Wagner: 49:38

Oh, that's good Wow. It must have been out of the market for a while. It was yeah, so this was I mean you got to think about it.

Wonderful Togbey: 49:45

This was we're closing April of 2020. So this was right before lockdown.

Jason Wagner: 49:50

Oh, that's perfect timing. Perfect timing, literally perfect timing?

Wonderful Togbey: 49:53

Yeah, yeah, nice. And you know the owner was living in Wisconsin. She had a friend who was her buddy, who was the listing agent for that. You know two older ladies, you know they were not too computer savvy and so they would take their time to do their showings and people would want to see the place and they just weren't always available. And you know, for me I lived close enough and I was willing to do the hard work on this one. They actually didn't wanna go with my offer because it was FHA and they needed a few things done.

Jason Wagner: 50:30

Yeah, it's not always the easiest to kinda get that done. It's a property that needed work.

Wonderful Togbey: 50:35

It didn't need work, but it had a peeling paint on the porch and a few things outside that needed to be done, like there was, some windows are covered, that and when I? Well, so when I got the offer, when he accepted my offer, there was a few things that needed to be done for them to before my lender would continue, and the seller was not willing to do those things, like the thing they wanted them to get rid of. You know, the paint got the paint right, yeah, and it was a and it was outside, and so what I did was I was like you know what that's, that's fine, that's no problem, I'll do that. You know this was uh. So I, you know this lady that was in, uh, in in wisconsin and uh, she was, you know, elderly and you know she was like, hey, man, like I'm not gonna put up with this. We have another, um, we have another offer that's coming on down the pipeline. If your, your bank, wants too too many things, so we're just not gonna move forward with this. Oh no, no worries, I'll find someone to do this.

Wonderful Togbey: 51:31

And I think at first she sent me, uh, she sent one of her uh contractors that could do it, and they. They wanted, I think I don't know know three or four grand to take care of. They had to take a cover off, a window or something like that. They wanted to make sure that the window wasn't broken and I was like, no, I'll find somebody to do it. So I ended up finding a guy who I paid, I think, 500 bucks to go and rip off some paint. Actually, we went over there with the intention to repaint the deck and he was actually savvy enough. The contractor that I got was like, oh no, with FHA you don't actually have to repaint, you just have to get rid of the old paint. So got over here. So now I'm spending money on this property that's not even mine yet, you know, that's just the level of determination you have to have to make these things happen.

Wonderful Togbey: 52:21

I don't know if you you know what you imagine. Someone went by your house and you know you send someone. I was, I think I was in. I mean it wasn't a lot of money, but like I had to make sure someone was there, I had to make you know you didn't have a ladder out of make sure we go right in the ladder. He was up on the on the third floor porch there fixing up things. I just so I could get a little bit on the brim Cause. At that point I knew that, oh yeah, I have something here that's worth a lot yeah.

Jason Wagner: 52:49

There's been a number of deals that we've been a part of where like, yeah, the buyer had to go in and, you know, do the paint thing, and it's funny. It's funny how many times that you, you know it's such a small little piece and a lot of times you can just paint right over it, right, yeah, that'll, that'll solve the day and get the loan approved, which is just so silly, the lead paint stuff. But anyways, all right, so cool. So then you know, the rest of the property was mostly like turnkey or like just a little bit outdated yeah, it was.

Wonderful Togbey: 53:19

It was mostly jerking, so theyking, so they were already tenants in there, so it was just the one vacant unit that I ended up moving into for about a year and I was able to just refi that. I mean that was another great one, I mean 2020.

Jason Wagner: 53:37

So you bought it in 2020. You got a low price on it and then when did you do the refi?

Wonderful Togbey: 53:41

Oh man, a year later, a year later, a year later.

Jason Wagner: 53:44

And it was worth how much $460,000.

Rachel Wagner: 53:49

That's what was happening, though, during COVID Right yeah.

Jason Wagner: 53:53

We went through the boom. Yeah, we went through the surge.

Rachel Wagner: 53:57

And now, what's the property worth today? Amazing timing execution.

Wonderful Togbey: 54:02

Oh, it's got to be in the fives. I haven't yeah, I mean that's yeah. I was like man. This property is worth more than all the work I've done. I didn't get paid, it was $140,000 a month.

Jason Wagner: 54:15

Okay, so you lived in one of those units and then you rented out and it was a three unit.

Wonderful Togbey: 54:20

It was a three unit.

Wonderful Togbey: 54:21

yes, yeah, and then you rent it out and it was a three unit, it was a three unit, yes, yeah, and then you rent it out to two, yeah, and what I was saying here was that, even buying that touring property right. There was other challenges there, like I had one of the tenants in the in the building I was not paying rent, right, so I was. I almost walked away at that point when I when I found out that, oh, you know, I'm, I'm in Chicago now there's different rules, you know, to getting people to pay rent and you can rent into people that will take advantage of the system.

Rachel Wagner: 54:48

Can I ask is that required to be disclosed as you're going through the under contract and closing process, or was that something that they willingly shared? Or how did you find out that? Because they typically tell you if there's a lease, right, so you know if there's a lease on the property and what the rent is, but how do you find out if they're not paying?

Wonderful Togbey: 55:08

yeah, interesting, I think. I think the lady was probably just warning me that hey, be careful with these people. Like you know, it was I the seller the seller yeah sorry yeah, the seller was. You know, I got on her good side, which I always try to do when I'm in this process. You have to get people to lower their guards as early as you can, because then that makes everything else go a lot smoother.

Wonderful Togbey: 55:28

So in those conversations she shared that, hey, these people have been a headache Because I learned to try to find the pain in the process, because it's going to end up being yours. So, oh, why are you selling this property? Those questions like what are some of the problems that have happened? And I found out, hey, well, I'm out of the state. I'm out of state and you know, I have these people that are not paying and they're very needy. You know those were her words. So that was oh man, do I want to inherit this problem? Right, inherit this problem, right?

Wonderful Togbey: 56:02

So I actually posted a question on uh, on bigger pockets. I think that was my first post there. Hey, what, what would you do? I have to go back and look at it and see what answer is. Uh, I got. But you know, I, I follow, I follow through, right. So I still did close and I'll tell you I've owned that property for five years now and these are the people that did not pay and they hadn't made. They haven't missed a single payment, uh, since then. Oh, so you got them. So, yep and uh and so, and so that happens, right. So not everybody's good, but everybody's bad, right. So, yeah, they, they actually just needed someone that would fix things right. So they I mean, they're a little particular about certain things like I've I probably upgraded everything else in their unit since then. Right, there were some annoying things that I found, but I was like, okay, all right, it's not unreasonable, right, but I was a good landlord and took care of them and they've taken care of me, oh, wow, that's awesome.

Jason Wagner: 56:54

So yeah, so it wasn't just people that were just, hey, they couldn't pay and then they were just freeloading it. It they couldn't pay and then they were just freeloading it. It was. It was actually they didn't want to pay because they needed some things updated in the last and the last landlord didn't respect it and right whatnot, honestly?

Rachel Wagner: 57:09

so they held right she was older and out of state.

Jason Wagner: 57:11

Wow, wow, well, that's a. That's a great story honestly because how would how a tenant situation can really turn around if you just treat the tenant like like person, right, right.

Wonderful Togbey: 57:21

Yeah, I did. You know every case is different, so you do have to, you know, don't assume anything right. Protect yourself. Right, because you just don't know right and know that there will be people that will try to take advantage of you. Right, so do the pros and cons and sometimes you just have to, you know, take a chance on certain things.

Jason Wagner: 57:38

Yeah, you just have to take a chance on certain things. Yeah, all right, so from there what did you do next?

Wonderful Togbey: 57:44

What did I do?

Jason Wagner: 57:46

next, and how long did you live on that property for?

Wonderful Togbey: 57:48

Just about a year. Yeah, so about a year. I was getting ready to do something else with it. I was looking to buy my next property. No, actually it was a little more than a year, it was two. I ended up staying in there until I bought another FHA, so a little 2021. Another FHA, oh because you refinanced out of your first one.

Jason Wagner: 58:10

I refinanced out of that first one. Yeah, yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 58:11

All right, I got $460,000, not doing anything. I even got a little bit of money. I think I got $30,000, in cash out from that. All these down free and clear now, well, not free and clear, I got all my money back from them.

Jason Wagner: 58:27

Oh okay, your initial investment is back up, yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 58:30

I still have a mortgage on those that I'm paying, obviously, but yeah, so after that I bought there was a four unit that I. At that point I had a little more cash and this was when I I well, I took the biggest bets right. So I had sold my first house in Omaha, the $150,000 house. I got a $70,000 check for that that I was wanting to put into, you know, put in somewhere else. So I found a four unit building that was listed for I think it was originally set for 475. I had gotten this. It had continually been, you know, dropped right. They have dropped lower, lower the price a few times and I eventually got this thing for 295. Times. And I eventually got this thing for $295. So this was listed at the height of COVID.

Wonderful Togbey: 59:27

You know where I think it went on the contract a couple of times, so where regulations were changing. I mean, even then I had some trouble with closing that first FHA property because I was doing contract work here. So, and that was something with FHA that I FHA, that I had to. That was an issue. They had an issue with that because they wanted to make sure they wanted to know what happens after this six-month contract is over, are you going to still have W-2 income coming in, right? So I actually had to email HR and get them to say that I'm going to have work even after my six months contract expired, right? So all these things you have to do a lot of legwork, like. So imagine you were getting you know and there was a lot of unanswered emails. But we get that done, but anyway.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:00:14

So back to the, to the second property there. So it was just. It was just just persistency too. So I got over there. It was it had gotten out of contract for like the third time. I think someone was looking to do FHA but it ended up being so much work there so that you know they couldn't do that. And this was this needed to be. Uh, this was, this was. Uh, I ended up going hard money with this, uh, so at 295, I put down, was it 15% of that? Yeah, so, something like that. So at this point I this was my first big rehab project that I was going to do. So in my mind I'm going to go in here as a four unit. I knew, I knew that I could make it work because I'm getting that 300.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:01:06

There are some stuff on the market that were like it was a big gap, right. So that's that's what you get in Bronzeville sometimes. So there are some high end stuff that were like a million plus right. And there was some stuff that on a low end that was like you know, like 600, right. So just depend on how much work you're willing to put in Right. So I was in my mind then I was all right, I got the. This was my first go at working with a hard money lender. So I went over there, got this property on a contract and I was hoping that I could. Uh, they came over there, got this property on a contract and I was hoping that I could. They came over there and they appraised it and they said that it would only be worth around $600,000 when it was all said and done. Actually, that's like $500,000 or something. So they drastically low-balled what the ARV would be done.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:01:53

It would be when I'm done with the rehab, even the hard money lender. I later found out that this can happen Because essentially, if they say your ARV is going to be worth a million, that means your loan cost is going to be much higher. I found out that maybe they're just a little more conservative with their appraisal of their estimate, so this was just something that I didn't know at the time. So I got in here. So all right, because this is only going to be worth six something or 500 something. We can only give you about $179,000 in construction alone and so all right. So I got that. I was like, okay, well, we'll see. I got the first. I think I had maybe 10 contractors bid me for their property because, right, then, I'm getting ready to close and everybody or I think I had already closed at this point Everybody else was like it was in the $300,000 plus.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:02:56

I'm like yo, I got. I got less than. Like I got less than 200k to do this, I think maybe 180, even less than that, to do this work. Like how am I gonna come up with 300 000 to do this work? Right? So yeah, uh, yeah, that was uh yeah, it's not looking good right now.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:03:13

No, no, no, it's not looking good, it's not looking good, this was, uh, this was a time, because what's the purchase? Price right now, uh, so 300k, 300, yep 300, and they were telling me that I would I'll need another 300 to put in yep uh, and they said the, the arv was like six six hundred, just about 600, yeah, yeah, something like that there's no, there's no profit yeah, there's no profit and yeah and that's on the low end too, you know, because I was like, oh man, this is not looking good, so this was, I think, the one I had to.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:03:42

Actually, everything has been pretty good so far, but this is the one time that I think I had to sit my wife down and say, hey, yeah, I'm going to need to get another job to do this work.

Rachel Wagner: 1:03:52

That was going to be my question.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:03:56

What did your wife say about that? Yeah, I'm going to. I know this. I know like I believe the ARV is wrong.

Rachel Wagner: 1:04:05

Right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:04:05

Like, I know I'm seeing stuff out there. If I put in the work, I think I'm going to get a better value for this Right. I know that. So get a better value for this right. I know that. So that's. That's a good thing about real estate. You can go out there and find comps that would justify you know where you need to be right. You can kind of and work your way backwards, right. I saw that. I saw the comps that I used and these were like across the highway, right it was same same zip code but across the highway.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:04:31

Okay, yeah, I see right so I was like, man, like these, they didn't use Bronzeville comps, right, so, okay. So, and then I, and I even I've talked to some people there well, I mean, you just gonna have to, like, you know, just paint this room and just just get them ready to go right, and maybe you'd be okay, right, maybe you can get maybe 1200 bucks per unit here, right, so, whatever. So, whatever that ended up being, I think I was, when I was getting into this project that was a best hoping I would be around like 1500 for like the four bed units that was, that was, uh, which was the biggest unit in there. So, but I knew that if I, I knew that if I had the comps of things that were above that. So I just I believe in the property high level and I just I was like, all right, I just got this.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:05:24

Now there are comps that justify this being. You know they. I just have to make sure that they qualify. When they're looking at two four units, right, I need them to pick the nicer looking one and the higher ARV one as a comparable to mine. So how many of those things that the new property that's, the nicer looking four unit have that I can replicate here. So you know, they had an open concept, right, open floor concept, so they had those. So I had to do that. They had an open floor concept, so they had those, so I had to do that. I had to start moving walls, right. So now, all of a sudden, you buy a property that looks good, right, but once you start talking about changing layouts, like you know, yeah, so you had to move the kitchen.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:06:07

Oh yeah, oh yeah I had to move the kitchen from the back to the front to make it open.

Jason Wagner: 1:06:12

So they weren't. Probably. When they did that analysis for you, they didn't anticipate that you were moving kitchens or you know I didn't, so again you got to like extreme ownership concept, right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:06:24

It's kind of what I did. I didn't do a good enough job showing them what the final what you were gonna do well, what I would do right, oh, what I would do right, so uh, or actually what I needed to do to make it work. Like because, like it's, either either I cut corners right and try to just turn this over and, you know, struggle finding good tenants, right because? Or I put in the work that is needed to get to the valuation that I need to, uh you know, in order to do a successful BRRRR right, which is yeah, so, yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:06:58

So I ended up, you know, I got a second job. I was, you know, pouring going and I'm laughing because even that $180,000 that I was supposed to get from the hard money lender, they actually ghosted me after I closed on this property. So now I'm closed on this property Lender yeah, oh my gosh. Who is the lender? Well, here it goes. So this was more of a mortgage broker, I would say. So I didn't actually go through because you I mean, if you're on Facebook, you're going to see these posts say, hey, we're going to give you 100% construction, you put down 10% you know the loan, like this was 2022, so you're going to get, like, you get all these people that would promise these things.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:07:51

So that was one of those right, so they'll work with lenders, right, but they are I just want to call them mortgage brokers but or private money, something right. So this is who I went through, right, they're out of North Carolina somewhere, right. So I closed and they said I will get this money. They actually I closed in. I had like three grand in extra closing costs. Like you know, you look at the HUD statement and you see that, oh, I, like you know, you look at the HUD statement and you see that, oh, I'm like there, this is wrong, right. So I tell him, hey, you need to change this so that I can get, like this is over three grand. And so, oh, yeah, just go ahead and close. Like I'll take care of you. You know, once you've done yeah, so after I close, don't hear from them. And yeah, so now I'm like, okay, I only have one guy's phone number. I didn't go through the loan docs At this point. I just closed and I put the loan docs somewhere. I'm like man okay.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:08:45

I just got to do this thing. I just knew that I had to keep paying the Harmony Lender. I think it was 10%, no, no, it was 7% then actually, so it was a great rate. So I mean, you think about 7% hard money loan, now that is like normal, that's a normal mortgage. That's a normal mortgage, now right, so yeah that was the best I could find, so I went with it, but I could not. This guy would not answer my calls.

Jason Wagner: 1:09:11

Sometimes what I've realized is like the best rate that you can find on the market comes with the worst service and the worst other terms.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:09:19

Yeah, Absolutely, absolutely, so yeah. So these it's like they have a partnership with other, they're like a front right and they get their money from another bank right. So yeah, so I was into this. I just knew that I mean, even I was trying to not over leverage, right. So yeah, so I was into this. I just knew that I mean, even I was trying to not over leverage right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:09:40

I was, even though I knew that I had this money there I was trying to get you know as much of it done, like I think I went about like cause I had 70 from, uh, my own, from the sale of the house, I think at that point I had like sold some stocks, like I was. I had to make this thing work Right, and so I had, uh, I had everything. I had some credit cards that I was using for the, for the rehab, and I just had to keep piling on it and like I just need to get this done as soon as possible. So it got to the point where I'm like I like I really need to get some money from this guy so I can continue to continue on the project. So that's when I went down like pull back up.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:10:19

You know when you, when you close on a property, you get this stack of papers and I was like, ok, I got a fund it was already my mortgage and try to get some money back from these people. They can date so they can pay me for the, for the, for the construction. So if you're familiar with how hard money construction loans work, you get reimbursed for the work that you do. So I had at that point I had already done, like I said, I think, 50 grand in work and hadn't received a check from them. So I ended up finding a contact for the lender in there. I ended up calling. It turned out the actually holder of my mortgage is in a company in New York. I called them up and they were like oh yeah, we have this here, but you have to go through. You know, you have to go through this other company. You know we can't work with you directly. And I'm like hey listen.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:11:09

Like these people have not answered me, like I've sent. So now that I knew that, okay, now I got somebody. So I was pro, I ended up sending them a ton of emails. You guys got to help me out here. Like these people are not answering their calls, they're scamming me, Like they. You know, I I blasted them Right. So and eventually they're like okay, fine, we'll, we'll. You know, you've been paying your hard money loan all this time, we'll get you through it. So they ended up actually scheduling the first inspection. So they send their inspector out and actually they're like all right, you don't have to work with this third-party company anymore because there's conflict there. So we'll just take it on directly. And I was like okay.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:11:50

Also, I know I only get this mark, I only get about 180 in construction, but I'm going to need about 300K to get this one. I only get about a 180 in construction, but I'm going to need about 300 K to do this thing. And they're like yeah, good luck with that this is just.

Jason Wagner: 1:12:03

this is incredible. I I know you were able to pull this off, but I'm like what in the world?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:12:10

So yeah there, so they're obviously not going to give you more money for it because they're like, no, we can't do this. So, man, it was. I mean, it went on like this was a good you know year and a half of just grinding this thing out, man, grinding this thing out, and man, I've had $30,000 surprises on this thing. You know, I had, you know, pipes that burst in the middle of the night. You know water pouring, pouring in the streets. I had crazy things happen on this project. I put in the work and it eventually got a price for $870,000.

Jason Wagner: 1:12:48

Once you finished, once I finished. So how did you get the money to do the extra work that you needed?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:12:55

Yeah, got, uh, so I got. So at this point I have about, you know, I did end up getting all the money from the. They did give me those. I would do the work and then they would pay me as I go. So I eventually you know, gradually got all the 180 that I could get from them. So this is now. So now I got about four credit cards business credit cards to do the rehab. So I had one year 0% APR credit cards. Shout out Chase. They helped me get through this one.

Rachel Wagner: 1:13:27

Yeah, we've been there.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:13:28

Yeah, so I think they're each of them. You know I had decent credit too, so that was they were able to give me. I think I had 20 grand on each of those, so I think I was probably a good uh 70 grand on this. I'm like.

Jason Wagner: 1:13:40

Hey, I just once. I just get this done. What happened to your credit score when you put all that money on there? Well the good news is that's.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:13:55

That's one good thing. I did so.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:13:57

Those those were all business credit cards, so yeah pays to have good credit and, uh, I was able to do that and I still had income from, you know, from my w-2. So I kept that and, yeah, most of that went to that and every everything else. So I would get my paychecks. So now at this point I'm working two jobs. I would get two checks that would come in and then my real bosses will call, which will be my contractor. So I get the money from my W-2 income and my real bosses, which were my contractors, will call and they'll take all that money. So that's just kind of how I just kind of kept it going, kept it going on, for I think the toughest part were, like the last, you know, a few four months and that's yeah, that's that's that's always, yeah, it's always the last, the last part of the project where you've you've exhausted all the cash yes and you're trying to finish it and you're trying to find out where it's going to come from, and so you took it straight from your other jobs.

Jason Wagner: 1:14:55

income Wow, man.

Rachel Wagner: 1:14:56

So what was the time? This was like 2023 when you bought this is that timing right, or was it a little earlier 2022. Okay, cause I was like I was trying to do the timing here. I'm like okay, so you just moved to Chicago, you had a baby, you are kind of in the middle of COVID and now you're taking on this really big project and you did 75 hard in 2021. So there were kind of like a lot of things happening for you right around all that time.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:15:21

Yeah, Crazy time, man Dude this is a lot and a job.

Jason Wagner: 1:15:26

What an epic story, all right. So then you got this over $800,000 value that you now still own, and then you were able to pull out 75 of that right yep, yeah, I was even more uh, so I ended up getting uh. I ended up getting you.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:15:42

You pulled out 20, 25 percent right I was able to get a little more. Oh right, yeah, because, uh, so, because, so at that point, rates were, were, so I think I have a mortgage of uh 6.75% on that now. Uh, so this was beginning 2023, which at that time, I was like man, this is ridiculous, like I'll refinance this as soon as I can, right, and I just called up uh, actually just uh, like a few months back and on that, bro, you still have a good rate, so just keep just hold on to that thing, uh, but it is a.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:16:15

It is an adjustable mortgage that I had a seven year arm on it, so I do have a little bit of time again. Won't recommend this for everyone, but you know that's what I needed to do in order to get all this debt paid off and get the maximize my uh um my cash out. So I think it was. I think it was closer to 80 on that one that I was able to get out.

Jason Wagner: 1:16:37

Oh wow yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:16:39

And that took care of uh. You know, paid everything else off. I think I got a. I got a check, uh over $300,000 on when I was done. Uh, yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:16:48

And this was the project that had the hey I was 200 over budget.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:16:51

That's the project. That's the project, that's the one Yep.

Rachel Wagner: 1:16:55

Yeah, dude, I love this Was how I, just sitting here talking to you, your demeanor is so calm and level. Is that how you are, as you're going through all this stuff too? Like you just kind of? 100% for the most part Okay.

Jason Wagner: 1:17:11

Wow, I mean, yeah, there are times, you know that meme where the guy's drinking coffee and there's a fire in the background.

Rachel Wagner: 1:17:20

Yeah, Well, I'm just, yeah, I mean, it was just.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:17:23

What are you going to do, right? I mean you can freak out. The scariest part for me was the day where you come in the basement. I was on my way out, right, because I would check on my properties after work sometime in. I was on my way out, right. This was because I would check on my properties after work sometime in the evening, like on my way out, I hear just sounds like rain in the basement. So I come down, the basement is flooded and you know pipes, you know busted and water is everywhere. And I go out on the street and it's coming. So the main water actually broke. So water is on the streets outside in my basement, everywhere, and I had to break. You're going to need to tear out this dig in the streets to fix this thing.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:18:14

And I remember making a video that day. Everybody still asked me about that and that day was a little scary. It was probably one of the scarier ones. I was like man, I'm already deep in this and here's a scary. You know, first couple of people I called said this is going to cost you close to $20,000 to $30,000. You know, first couple of people I called said this is going to cost you close to you know, 20 to 30 grand.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:18:43

I think I ended up finding someone to do it for, like you know, 15 or something like that. So I mean not great. But hey, now you know, because I had to do that, I ended up all right like let's do it right. So now I replaced all the plumbing, all the water lines up to the. There's a coach house in the back there, so I redid all that. So now that's doing great. I mean there's these units that I originally thought would be at best renting for 13, 14. I even called a realtor up to give me an estimate of how much he think this will rent for. I think he said no, 1,200, right. Like now, my lowest rent there is $2,000, right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:19:19

And I have a midterm rental there that's about $2,500. You know I made a small 600-square-foot coach house into a nice-looking midterm rental right and I'm able to get you know wintertime is a little slower around $2,100. But in summertime I can get up to 2500 for that and I have one that I live in, so I fluctuate the midterm one in into midterm and airbnb. I depend on the season.

Jason Wagner: 1:19:47

Um, yeah, just make it work oh, so you do do the airbnb the short term yep, yeah, yep, I do one. So wait, do you still live in this property or no, you moved out.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:19:57

No, I moved out in that one. Yeah, I moved out in that one too. Yeah, so now yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:20:04

All right. So actually I want to talk about that midterm and the Airbnb stuff, because that's pretty fascinating. You've had some stories with the Airbnb, haven't you?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:20:14

Or You've had some stories with the Airbnb, haven't you or no? Yes, yeah, I've had. You know, my very first Airbnb guest ended up. Well, was very messy. Let's just put it that way, that's what.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:20:26

I'm remembering, yeah, so there was you know, there was pizza crumbs, you know, on the bed, on the sofa, everywhere. So I've had to deal with ants, ants, like for, you know, for a few months after that. That was terrible, uh. So that was, yeah, that was, that was my very first guy man. Thanks, buddy, thanks for this. So but then, you know, and then I got some some lower, some four stars that I, that I, that everybody, they said everything else was great, but they gave me a four. So that I, that I, that everybody, they said everything else was great but they gave me a four. So that was a little like ah, come on, man, but everything else has been pretty good for the most part.

Jason Wagner: 1:21:00

Yeah, yeah. So it's cool that you kind of switched the, because in Chicago it's kind of the hard part.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:21:10

So you were able to get the.

Jason Wagner: 1:21:12

Airbnb and then you can switch. You can switch from midterm in the winter months. That's right, that's a smart way to do it.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:21:20

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I just kind of stumbled on that. I've spoken to you, I've spoken to Jenny about midterm right and she recommended hey, furnish Finder, shout out to Jenny. So that helped me and I was able to get someone in there around October and they stayed for the winter essentially. So that was awesome. And when it came back around to spring and summer, got some listings, got some bookings on Airbnb, so I would just rock with that.

Rachel Wagner: 1:21:50

Yeah, boy, you're rolling in the dough here.

Jason Wagner: 1:21:56

yeah, yeah, boy, you're rolling in the dough here, but what the the beautiful part is is that all of this shit was fucking hard oh yeah 100. Oh, yeah, yeah all of this was hard and all right, so where do you go from there?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:22:10

yeah. So after that you know we did that project. Now I got a little bit of success and I got some buddies that want to do projects.

Jason Wagner: 1:22:23

We bought six units after that. This is your first commercial deal.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:22:31

First commercial deal and partnership. That was also pretty good. That was mostly turnkey in the sense of all units were rented, but we wanted to be able to get the rents up a little higher. So I think the average rent there was about $1,100, $1,200 when we took it over A couple of you know tenants that were not up to date on their rent payment. So those are the two that we are going to. You know, rehab first and gradually did it that way. So first, so we do that Now I have. So all six units, well, actually, uh, five out of the six units. I've seen a high level of uh renovation, so newer finishes, flooring, um, air conditioning that's like the one thing that I like to do in all my units and uh in.

Jason Wagner: 1:23:28

Were there furnaces to begin with? There were furnaces. Yes, so that was. That was goodbye for sure.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:23:33

Yeah, that was yeah. That was a solid win there, because all I had to do was add the condenser unit. You don't have to run your duct right.

Rachel Wagner: 1:23:42

Is this one? The same area Is Chicago and Brunsville.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:23:45

Yeah, this one's in Washington Park.

Rachel Wagner: 1:23:47

Okay, very close to the university Nice.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:23:51

Yeah, so that one was $600,000. We had to put 20% down commission. We raised a little bit of money to do the rehab there, so do the turnover. But that was through.

Jason Wagner: 1:24:06

So, between your partners, you guys were able to pitch in Yep, yeah, get the funds for the rehab, get the funds yeah, we raised about $175,000, so 20% plus some to do the rehab yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:24:16

The funds yeah, it was about $175, so 20% plus some to do the rehab, yeah, average right now is around $1,800 from the $1,200.

Jason Wagner: 1:24:26

Nice. And then have you refinanced out of that? I have.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:24:31

As of two weeks ago. We got the numbers we are 1.1 on that. Wow yeah, 1.1 million.

Rachel Wagner: 1:24:39

Yeah, and you bought at 600 and put in one Bought at 600K.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:24:42

We probably put in about. This is fresh off, so we're going back and tallying everything out, but I believe so probably another. Okay, so we put down $175,000. So $121,000 went to the down payment. So we had what $50,000 left to do the work and I think we raised another round of about $70,000.

Rachel Wagner: 1:25:08

So about $120,000 that went into it. Okay, yeah, nice In there, nice margin there.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:25:15

Yeah, the, the good if, yeah, on the commercial side too, you know you do get to uh, to use the rents to. You know it's all about how much rent you're bringing in. They also use some, some comps, right. But what I learned about that is you have to drive, you really have to really drive your destiny on those things Like, if you, you know, when I do it's a whole.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:25:36

I believe the day the appraiser is coming out is the most sacred day. And, as for a real estate investor, you have to make sure I mean, you have to prep a little bit before that as well. But I show up there, I give him enough proof that my property is worth what I think, what I think it's worth, right, and that's that's. You know you have to be very organized, so I keep track of everything else that I've done. I keep track of all my numbers, I uh, I show the comps that I think are similar to mine and hopefully they use that, you know, cause then I make it hard for him to argue that it's not worth that when I do that, when I do that much work, it's, it's been, it's been pretty good.

Jason Wagner: 1:26:21

What cap rate did they end up putting that at?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:26:24

I believe I actually I got a copy of the appraisal like two days ago, but I think, yeah, I have to get back to you on that. I want to get back to you on that. I want to say seven something.

Jason Wagner: 1:26:39

Yeah Well, a turnkey building.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:26:41

Yeah, in Washington Park.

Jason Wagner: 1:26:44

Seven yeah Dang.

Rachel Wagner: 1:26:48

Alright, can we shift a little bit into the credit card hacking that you talked about?

Jason Wagner: 1:26:54

Yeah, let's go back to the shout out at Chase.

Rachel Wagner: 1:26:59

I'm so curious about this. So we're actually leaving for vacation next week and this is the first time that we've even attempted to like use some of our points, and Jason tasked me with it. He's like wonderful, Does this all the time? Just figure out how we can like get our flights and get our hotels and get this, and it's there. But I didn't find it like super easy because it's kind of a puzzle. Each card is different and you got to like move points around. I'm just curious like your process and how you got it.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:27:27

Absolutely. So I mean, all this stuff, I don't, I don't figure it out. I just find smart people that that that help out you know. So, like I thought I was for as long as I can remember, I thought I was very smart by the way I used it, which was hey, just, you know, I stack a lot of points and I use it to just pay off the balance right, and which is the worst way to do this, right?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:27:49

And you know, I think you might have done this too, jason, or just use it for you know frivolous things right, like I had I would, because I would put everything on one credit card. So I think I started off with capital on one credit card, so I would, after a year or so, I'll probably end up with like 80,000 points, which was like $800. If you want to take out cash, Now, right, so I would just pay off the balance there, and I think I even use it to like, or go on a portal to buy a flight then, right. So which is the worst way to do it, right? So what I learned is that there are partners, so all these credit card companies, so there are certain credit cards companies that are good to do this with.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:28:31

So that's the chases of the world. Capital One is one of them, american Express is also one of them. So what you do with them is, and because they allow you to transfer your card to other airlines, you know a ton of airlines, right? So if you were to get as opposed to getting, like, a delta credit card with that, you know now, you're now stuck with delta, right, you have to get delta uh, miles, uh, or uh, um, or like you know, like us.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:28:59

If I have, I have a us bank card, right. I use it to get 18 zero percent apr, but it doesn't get me any any points that I can transfer to airlines, right. So chase is great for that one because it has a very low fee. I think the chase sapphire card has a very low fee. I think the Chase Sapphire card has a very low fee. I think it was about less than a hundred dollars. To do so, you need to have a certain credit card. So yes, it. I'll just say this it is. It's very hard to figure it all out. You have, you do have to get into the, you do have to get a fee. This was like another side of social media for me when I was. I find this out, you know, and, and then once you start, I get. It's just called credit cards hacking. Right, so you can start your homework there Just looking at a credit cards hacking.

Jason Wagner: 1:29:48

Yeah, oh point hacking. Yeah, credit card hacking no-transcript.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:30:20

West Fargo never did this, right, so I started off with West Fargo cars and they never did this. So my first Chase car that I got, I was able to get this $900, right. Now, $900 is actually worth 90,000 points, right, 90,000 miles, 90,000 points, right, so now, because these, so you can either go on. So the first one for me was actually let's look at when I'm going back home to Togo, right, so you can get there's. You can take Ethiopian Airlines right to go to Togo from Washington DC, or let's go to Europe, because I also used it to go to Spain. So you can use your points right. So now, instead of, you can buy an economy ticket for Chicago to Spain for I don't know, know, maybe six $700, right, so, and you can either use your points right To pay that off. So that means you can take your.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:31:22

Let's say that I got 90,000 points on my chase card now. So, instead of taking the, I can then take that, convert that to cash $900 and pay for my economy class. That is not a good redemption rate, right? So surprise. So what I found out is now on a website like for airline. Like you know, iberia is is one of spain's airline companies and they have. They're offering uh economy. They're offering business class flights for about 50,000 points, something like that.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:31:58

Yep, then what you do is there are websites where you can put in your origin and your destination and it will tell you the best value you can get for your points. One of the websites is Seats Aero and you tell get for for your points, right? So one of the websites is seats that arrow, uh, and you, you tell it your your origin and your destination and it will tell you these are all the airlines and how many points you are required you will need to book these flights on there.

Jason Wagner: 1:32:29

Right yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:32:30

Okay, so uh um. I hope uh, no one's losing me here, but that's essentially it.

Jason Wagner: 1:32:36

So you find it, so you're on seatsaero seatsaero.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:32:40

That's the website. That's yep, that's one of the websites you're just putting in the destination, and it's telling you the most efficient way to use it, okay so it'll tell you that delta will charge you a hundred thousand miles for this.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:32:51

It'll tell you that. They'll tell you that, uh, air canada will only charge you forty thousand points for this. They'll tell you that. They'll tell you that Air Canada will only charge you 40,000 points for this right. So, and that's because these and you might wonder why are these miles so different based on the airline, right? So I think so they're all part of an alliance, right? So airlines have these alliances.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:33:08

Again, I'm not the best at this, but this is the buddies that I go to who actually told me hey, you know, don't be a dummy, this is a better way to use your points. Right, they told me these things and I've watched a ton of YouTube videos on this after the fact. Right, so there are airlines that you're also able to book, like you can book Chicago to Miami on Southwest, right, but you can also book it on American Airlines, you can also book it on United, right, you can also book it on united right. So, depending. So they have all these partnerships, right? So there is one world, uh partnership and the star alliance, uh partnerships.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:33:44

Or, depending on the partnership that you go to, they may price it a little differently, because maybe that's not their, their common route, right? Like they don't get too many of these, or they, like certain depending on the season, like just their customers have a higher need for a certain route, right? So you might end up finding that it's actually cheaper on their portal, right? So that's yep, so that's kind of how you end up finding deals on these other airlines. So it's not very straightforward or that's not intuitive, right? But once you do go on websites like that, just find the best way to use your points. This is what I always ask, right? So you just Google that ChatGPT is going to be a good one for that. Now.

Rachel Wagner: 1:34:33

Oh yeah, good idea.

Jason Wagner: 1:34:34

Whoa, you just made things Good idea, whoa, you just made things so much easier.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:34:38

Yeah, yeah, start with that.

Jason Wagner: 1:34:42

Wow, and that's been working. That's been working. Yes.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:34:45

Yeah, and I also have a buddy too that I go to. I mean, he has a consultation. You can reach out to him, and then I can drop his contact.

Jason Wagner: 1:34:55

Oh, like he does it as a profession of like.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:34:58

Wow, yeah, yeah, I've been pushing him to do this because I'm like yo, like this is because, for me, I mean, think about it this way. Right, you're looking at you, know, as an immigrant, where you have family abroad and your biggest expense out of the year is going to be your travel back home. Right, these are over, it's almost two grand to go back home, right, fifteen and two grand. And you're telling me that, instead of paying $2,000 or $1,500 for this, like people, I mean, if you work in a minimum wage job and your family is abroad, it's going to be hard for you to spend that money.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:35:34

a minimum wage job and your family's abroad, it's going to be hard for you to spend that money every year to go see your family right yeah, so and so if you do, if you're gonna don't go buy stuff that you're not gonna buy right, like you would normally not buy right if you're buying you get one or two of these cards, you put all these miles on it, you pay it off all the time. You you can't do this game without good credit. Like, let's start off with that. You gotta have good credit because these cards do, uh do have a fee. Right, there is a. You know they are, they are. They do have an annual fee. I think their lowest ones are about uh you know, 100 bucks and there are some zero.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:36:09

so there's some zero uh annual fee cards that you can also get this way right. So you, you think about it. Way you get one of these cards, you've bought stuff that you normally buy. When I was getting 70,000, 80,000 points on my first credit cards, I wasn't doing anything crazy, I just put everything on there that I can Just your normal expenses?

Rachel Wagner: 1:36:30

Yeah, just my normal stuff.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:36:32

If I can pay my utility bill with my credit card, I'll do it. I'll call them up and put my credit card on there. I will not use my credit card to pay for things that would charge me, Because then it's not worth it. This game is to spend as little as possible on that, so have all the expenses go through that Now, because I have tens of thousands of expenses with my construction.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:36:55

I have a bunch of points that I can redeem yeah so then you, just you just use that chat, gpt, ask it to give you the best reward for this point. I'll find you're putting your destination. It will give you some options there. You know there's there's a lot of blogs there. There's a point guy, you know you can read up on things there and because and also these are actually you use your, I would advise getting business credit cards for these, which is, if you have one LLC, right, I mean you can, and you can have a business credit card by with just your social too, right? You just do. You know, if you drive Uber or you sell stuff on MSR marketplace, get yourself a cool name, register your entity and you can get a, get a, get the docs, whatever it is called, and then you can, you can go to or you can apply for a credit card, right, that way you don't have to carry these balances on your personal right, Cause I, with all this stuff I've been able to.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:37:56

I was nervous at first, but you know, I just checked and I'm back in 800 credit cards. So that's with having a ton of business credit cards and millions in real estate debt, right, but you know you play this game the right way. It's, it's, it's, it's worth it, yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:38:14

Yeah, well, I love the whole chat GPT thing. I didn't even think about that in terms of I know I forget about it so often.

Rachel Wagner: 1:38:21

I've been using it a lot more lately just to ask like basic questions. But yeah, you can use it for so much more, yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:38:27

Yeah, All right. Well, I mean that that. So when we did all of our rehab financing, we actually did it with personal. We did personal credit cards that was in our personal name 0%.

Rachel Wagner: 1:38:40

That was 0%.

Jason Wagner: 1:38:41

And at one point I probably had like five of them going. And they each probably had anywhere between like a $7,500 balance to like a $15,000 credit limit, so we'd stack them all. But I had a great spreadsheet which was like I knew when this one was ending on the 0% and then we never paid interest on this.

Rachel Wagner: 1:39:03

But you know what?

Jason Wagner: 1:39:03

that does. It fucks your credit.

Rachel Wagner: 1:39:05

Yep, yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:39:05

It totally destroys your credit. So you did it the smart way. I did not.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:39:09

And your career usage is going to be through the roof.

Jason Wagner: 1:39:11

Yep, yeah through the roof. Yep, yeah, yeah. So the credit utilization um you know it takes, it takes away on your um, on our score. So, like we, at one point we probably had like um low 500s in in a credit, but it was all because, and I'm just like, yeah, who cares?

Jason Wagner: 1:39:26

like it doesn't matter because, because when we paid them all off, everything just like, yeah, at the end of the day, when you do go to sell the property, or like you get the cash out right and and then you go to pay off those you know the money that you use for the rehab All of a sudden your score goes, you know through, yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:39:41

I mean so yeah, you got to do what you got to do.

Jason Wagner: 1:39:43

I mean, if I didn't have that option.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:39:45

You know, I would definitely have been putting on my personal as well. But, yeah, do, just do try to. The danger in that is, when it comes to refi, you might run out of options, right?

Jason Wagner: 1:39:58

Yeah, because they have to qualify you. You have to be qualified on that refinance.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:40:03

Right yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:40:05

If you destroyed your credit all of a sudden, you're really hard to get a loan for.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:40:09

Absolutely.

Rachel Wagner: 1:40:10

Well, I think you did refi that property you're talking about. I think the credit cards were in my name because I had a job.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:40:16

You didn't.

Rachel Wagner: 1:40:16

And you ended up refi. That's the thing.

Jason Wagner: 1:40:20

You go back to that whole thing of how your partner can help you achieve goals. So that was our secret.

Rachel Wagner: 1:40:28

Carried the debt.

Jason Wagner: 1:40:30

One of us was going to carry the debt and try to keep the other ones still alive there.

Rachel Wagner: 1:40:36

Yeah, it worked out. It's all good. These are the battle scars.

Jason Wagner: 1:40:40

These are the real. These are the real life, battle scars and, uh, you know, it's not all sunshines and rainbows, but the rainbows come after all the hard stuff, right yeah?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:40:48

I mean you have to. You have to solve some problems in all these, in all these deals. There are people that had pain and you have to be willing to take it on. You have to find the ones that make sense for you. There's reward in solving that problem.

Jason Wagner: 1:41:06

How many apartments do you have?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:41:07

now I have 3 units under construction and 17 units that are rented currently Nice 20 20 apartments.

Jason Wagner: 1:41:17

Yeah, sweet man. Oh, that's awesome, and you've been and you started. What was the year that you started?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:41:23

oh, but my first investment property in 2019, 2019 yeah, it hasn't been that long.

Rachel Wagner: 1:41:28

That's the same as us. Yeah, same as us. We just got our five, six years we just got our 22,.

Jason Wagner: 1:41:34

six years we just got our 22nd units yeah, we closed on it actually earlier this week and, yeah, we started in 2019. Awesome so it's like nice yeah, nice little pace, yeah, right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:41:45

Okay, good, good, yeah, it was, it was a good time then. I mean it's. You just have to keep going, though, like for me, I know the market isn't as great now, but you just have to keep going smartly or in a smart way. Smartly is a word, but in a smart way.

Jason Wagner: 1:42:01

In a smart way yeah. What's the ultimate goal for you?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:42:08

With the real estate, yeah, or wherever Like.

Jason Wagner: 1:42:11

where are you going Like? What is it?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:42:12

Yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:42:14

I mean, you got 20 now, right, so what is it? What's that? Uh, what's the number? That like does it for you, or like, or, or. Have you thought about it?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:42:22

you know I not as much as I used to. In the beginning, you know it was, it was more about a higher number of doors, uh, but I've I found out that I would rather have solid performing properties right that are bringing in great rent or tenants are happy and paying on time. I mean I'm 20. I'm still far away from that number, but it's I mean. But I think it's less about the number of doors so more about the cash flow coming in. And actually, no, I don't want to say cash flow, because I've learned that it's all about the net worth that you're building.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:43:02

The equity that you're able to use for other things, right? So if you're able to get all these assets right what the rich do, right, you have all these assets for you and when something happens, what to do, you're going. You have all these assets for you and you know, when something happens, you know what to do. You're going to have to maybe sell one of those to take care of a problem, right? So as much of those little guys that I can assemble that would shield me from, you know, life's pain or those problems, that's kind of what I'll try to get. And now I'm thinking about it this way, like I mean, it's, just think about it this way First year, right, we're buying these things and we're we're so worried about cash flowing.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:43:43

Year one or year two, like, you got this thing. But think about it Like in 15 years or 10 years, I say that your mortgage is a third paid off or something like that, your, your rent is going to be that much higher, right, like it's. It's they're working in in in inverse, right? Uh, one is going up and one is going down, which is, your net worth is going up and your debt is going down, just about like you know 20 years from now, even 30, like it's really gonna.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:44:08

It's gonna get really good once you don't have a mortgage on this, so I just just hang on there, like you know it's good now, but you just wait. You know, imagine getting on, imagine getting all his friend and not having to, you know, to pay the bank for it, right yeah?

Jason Wagner: 1:44:20

I mean it's gonna be sweet so so is that the retirement game I think so.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:44:27

Yeah, just have, just have as many of these things that can cover my expenses as possible. Hopefully by that that time the rent have. I'd say rent doubles every 10 years or something like that. I think I read that somewhere, maybe shorter these days. But yeah, just play your games right. Find an area that you believe in, that has a long-term horizon in, has the fundamentals in place, and just take it out.

Jason Wagner: 1:44:55

Yeah, and have you gone through evictions or yes. I have that story.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:45:02

Yeah, I have, so I have. Well, yeah, I've had one in COVID and during COVID in Omaha actually, I had a, you know I was able to get. The thing about Chicago is it's kind of crazy when you, when you have a tenant that decided to take advantage of you, right and for one reason or another and I've seen your posts and man, I feel your pain. Man, when I see that you have to do cash for keys, I mean just the like. I just look at there's some part of me that just really, really struggles with that. I just feel like man, there's just someone out here that sees that oh, there's no idea all the hard work that I put into this and wants to take advantage. And it just really irks me. And there are people out there that do that. I haven't gotten to officially wait to serve someone. The papers my worst ones have come with, just not. I mean, because I've been fortunate enough to do a certain level of screening.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:46:06

I still pick the wrong guy, like my last guy that left. He applied for the unit and got in and he claimed his income and I don't know how much due diligence I did on that, but it turned out that income was from taking care of his mom, so he was getting a social security check or whatever that is, which is fine. But I just kind of over inflated things a little bit. You know so, and that doesn't always, you don't always get that, or there would be another thing that would happen. So he had, I took that, I was okay. Like you know, he's taking care of his family, that's fine. And then he showed me another income, but then he wasn't, as there were just a few other things that would happen in the unit. So for me it's like now he's putting this was a six unit, so now he's putting all the other tenants in the building in a bad spot. Right, because you know that means he's coming with the parties, he's coming with the you know, showed up with.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:47:01

First day I was. I get there after signing the lease over. There's three little dogs in there and there was only supposed to be one emotional support animal. So, man, I mean I'm in here for a rough one. You know it's like you know what am I going to do now? But you know it stuck it out. You just have to, from day one, just show that you know, like let him know that.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:47:22

Hey, I'm laying down the law here Like you have to. I try to let him know that he's not going to, because if I have budged on certain things like I had to charge late fee when he was late, I had to write an eviction I have to serve him on the 6th right and that helped. He ended up the last three months. I ended up not paying, but he did leave at the end of the lease and I was able to get someone else in there. I mean staying strong when I was going through it, but hey, that's on me. I got to find a better applicant.

Jason Wagner: 1:47:54

Yeah, yeah, a little backstory on ours. So yeah, we're going through two evictions right now the same building, which stinks the same building, but it's been okay because I was able to do the cash for keys on one of them and we were only behind really on two months and this would really be like the third, but we are going to start leasing it again next week, so it really ended up being a much better situation than it could have been, because I've got this other one where they stopped paying in December and they're still there, and then we just got the order to allow them to be evicted and so now we put it in with the sheriff, but now the sheriff is telling apparently the sheriff is backlogged and so they're another like two months out to get them out.

Jason Wagner: 1:48:42

So so that is a that's December, january, February, march, april, may.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:48:49

Yeah so that's.

Jason Wagner: 1:48:50

That's probably what we're looking at.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:48:51

Did you try Cash4Keys for them too?

Jason Wagner: 1:48:54

So they have. Yeah, so we're going to have to. I mean, I did try that. I did try that. The problem is they? Don't have anywhere to go and they're just a, they're a bad situation. You know they're mentally like not there and they really can't like do anything. So it's, it's a really it's. It's a tough one, but did you inherit these inherited?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:49:18

inherited them?

Jason Wagner: 1:49:19

yeah, the the last guy, the last guy we we put in, and that one was that was really hard to prevent, honestly, because what happened here it was that it was a woman that applied and you know it's supposed to be her and her daughter, who was five, that was going to be living there.

Jason Wagner: 1:49:34

She had the income, she had the credit, she had a great background, and then, all of a sudden, there was another guy that just moved in and I didn't think anything of it, because they did pay about three months' worth of rent and one of them was late, was late, but you know they paid it and they paid the late fee, but then then they stopped paying, and then I served them the notice and you know, and, and I had to do that a couple of times and yeah, and ultimately they were just. I was just like I don't, I don't know how I could have prevented that. You know what I mean? I, because I did screen her right, but I don't, I don't know how I could have prevented. Well, there was this, actually, another guy who was phantom who just moved into the apartment because I guess.

Jason Wagner: 1:50:19

I guess what I could have noticed was that, oh wait, there's somebody else that's living there. You're not on, you're not on the lease, like this is a problem right but the thing was is that they paid me. So I was kind of like, well, I guess it's not that big of a deal. So I don't really know how to prevent that.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:50:35

That's a tough one. That's a tough one. Yeah, I, it's hard. I try to, you know, make sense of the needs. So I got, I do these. Now I screen as an interview no-transcript, like I get these applicants now that I'm seeing a crazy amount of income being reported. And okay, let me talk to your last tenant. Oh, I've actually moved out of there. I've been looking for a property now for the last couple of months, so I'm just staying with a buddy in the meantime, like someone who's making six figures is not going to be just comfortable living crashing on a buddy's couch for four months while they look for a property. It just doesn't make sense to me.

Jason Wagner: 1:51:34

Yeah, I guess, I guess. Yeah, here's what I didn't do. I didn't do a landlord verification.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:51:38

Yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:51:39

Right. Talk to the last person, because if they were doing that scheme like this was a pretty well oiled, it felt like it was. It was intentional from the beginning, like pay a few months and then it was just stop paying Right, and then we'll do a cash for keys situation. Yeah.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:51:53

Yeah, I mean even like I've I've been also now, cause I try to think about okay, how can they get me Right? Like, definitely speak to the, to the previous tenant, a previous landlord, but you'll you definitely want to talk to the landlord before that. So the last two right, because the previous landlord is trying to get rid of this guy. Oh yeah. So he's going to tell you, you know he's the best person ever. Literally yesterday.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:52:18

I called the previous tenant or an applicant and they're like, oh yeah, they're so good. They pay rent two weeks in advance. I'm like, no, there's no way, because I already had some doubts.

Rachel Wagner: 1:52:28

Nobody's paying rent two weeks. Nobody's paying rent you know too much.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:52:34

I even let out a chuckle on there. I was like, oh okay, that's great. Yeah, thank you. Thanks for telling me what I need to know, Because I mean they have buddies that are giving the number right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:52:46

And they'll try to sign professional. So you just have to again. You just have to, you know, protect yourself. And for me, if I can confirm, like the one time I was like, oh, I can't reach these people, I'll just, I guess you know I tried my best, right, I couldn't get a hold of the previous landlord or I couldn't get a hold of the, I couldn't confirm the job, and I was like, all right, that's fine, I guess I tried. And then I took them and they ended up stopped. You know, they stopped in, they stopped paying rent. So if I can get a whole, if I can verify anything, I'd rather be wrong and go vacant than take a chance and, uh, have to pay for it later. That's kind of how I'm looking at it now yeah, that's, that's really good advice.

Jason Wagner: 1:53:25

That's really good advice, sweet man. I think we got to probably wrap this up, and this was a fantastic conversation.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:53:33

I appreciate you coming on. I appreciate you.

Jason Wagner: 1:53:35

Yeah, rachel. So how we kind of, how we kind of do the wrap up here is what's the biggest takeaway from the conversation. So I'll always start with Rachel.

Rachel Wagner: 1:53:43

Yeah, he always talks to me first. I really liked what you said it was kind of earlier on about how real estate's really forgiving, and I think you said, when we were off camera just for a brief period, every transaction or deal that you've had there's been something right. There's always something that's going to happen, there's always something that's going to come up, but in the grand scheme of things, it's very forgiving and property values are going to continue to go up and so you're in the longterm equity gain and I just think that's such a great perspective because I think initially, when people start thinking about investing and all they think are horror stories, horror stories, horror stories and they're there, right, you shared a bunch of them right there's, so many and they were there for you right from the beginning.

Rachel Wagner: 1:54:26

Right that first, that first investment property, with the copper being stolen and the Walmart renter, right, like you felt it right in the beginning. But it's not about those brief moments. You just keep going, keep persevering because it is forgiving and in the long term it's worth it. Like you said, you know it's going to be great in 20, 30 years when you're just bringing in cash and not paying the mortgage and I just I really enjoyed that. That was good perspective.

Jason Wagner: 1:54:51

Yeah, yeah, totally, yeah, my big, my big thing here is that again, I think it kind of goes with when I first introduced you. You're just a transparent guy, you know and, and transparency just gives trust, yeah, right, and, and look at you, you've got stories of like, hey, I was able to get some of my buddies to go in on a project with me and we raised the money. It wasn't your family, it was your friends. You convinced your friends, but you convinced your friends because you had past experiences and you were transparent and you've been that way your whole life.

Jason Wagner: 1:55:23

It sounds and it's only going to serve you well by being transparent and sharing the wins and losses and the bullshit. And you know you combine it with Rachel's forgiveness on the real estate end and everyone's going to be happy in the end. You know it's a, it's a fantastic way to carry yourself and so I give you a lot of credit for that and it's it's well-deserved. So that's kind of like my big. My big takeaway is that I just appreciate all these stories and hearing the battle scars and then being like, yeah, it's going to be pretty sweet when we uh, when we got these properties paid off.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:56:00

It's going to be pretty sweet. I need a friend that.

Jason Wagner: 1:56:05

And what about you? What was the biggest takeaway from this conversation?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:56:08

Yeah, so for me it's when you're out there in a battle. We all got scars, Just kind of like you said, I hear yours, and it's not all sunshine and rainbows for you. You're out there too, like I see, because sometimes when it's happening to you, you might think you're the only one that's going through it. But if you're out there, if you're out there in the arena, you're fighting, you're going to get some arrows thrown at you, you're going to have some in the back, right. So if you don't want any of that, then don't get in there, right. But if you want a reward, then you have to be for some of the pain that makes for the biggest stories. Then you have to be for some of the pain that, like you know, that makes for the biggest stories. Like you know, if I had called, if I had come on here and said, okay, I bought this and it was all great, great, great, great. I mean it's I would have been a cool story, but it wouldn't have been as great as this one, right?

Wonderful Togbey: 1:57:01

so some of those, uh, some of those pain that we've gone through and having the my goal and kind of how my uh, my, yeah, my, my vision, vision now is just think about how good it's going to be down the line, because you do forget. The good thing about life is you forget some of the pain, right? Life rewards you for the work that you put in right, and a few years, I'm sure, when some of these troubles that I've gone through, I had some sleepless nights, right, but it's, it's hard to remember those now, like that's how crazy it is.

Rachel Wagner: 1:57:34

Right.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:57:35

You just continue and yeah, it'd be, you'd be good. So just just just stick it out and put in the fight.

Jason Wagner: 1:57:42

Oh yeah, oh yeah, wonderful. Let's see what's your Instagram and how can people follow you.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:57:47

Yeah, mr Wonderful invests. People are going to and how can people follow you? Yeah, mr Wonderful invests. Mr.

Jason Wagner: 1:57:52

Wonderful invests. People are going to be thinking that you're tied with Kevin O'Leary.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:57:55

Yeah, he's a fake, mr Wonderful. He's got a real money though.

Rachel Wagner: 1:58:02

Yeah.

Jason Wagner: 1:58:05

All right, Awesome brother. Well, thank you for coming on. I appreciate it.

Wonderful Togbey: 1:58:07

Thank you. Yeah, I mean I want to say too, thanks for having me. You guys are awesome. I've you know it's energy of people like you that keep me going, like you know, knowing that I can, I can call you up, and when I have an issue and I've called you up on several occasions, or I was just watching your stuff too, and I really appreciate it thank you guys for having me here of course, man.

Jason Wagner: 1:58:27

That's what this is all about, you know, and yeah so, if, uh, if, any of you guys for having me here. Of course, man, that's what this is all about, yeah, so if any of you guys found any value in the show, which I guarantee it I mean the credit card stuff is just like we're all going to be going to chat GPT and be like. I've got 100,000 points. How do I utilize that stuff?

Rachel Wagner: 1:58:45

That's going to be one of the best parts here.

Jason Wagner: 1:58:50

But if you found any value in the show.