Ed Mathews 0:05

So the big question is this how are real estate investors who don't have a ton of free time, don't have access to off-market deals and didn't start life on third base, how do we grow a real estate business conservatively to support our families, finally leave the corporate rat race and build a legacy? That is the question, and this podcast will give you the answers. I'm Ed Matthews and this is Real Estate Underground. This is the Real Estate Underground Podcast Show number 79. Greetings and salutations, real Estate Undergrounders. This is Ed Matthews, again with the Real Estate Underground Podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today. Today is an interesting conversation because it's something that I've heard about and I think I know what I'm talking about, but I'm probably not an expert. Mike Hardy, with the Cirrus Opportunity Fund, has agreed to join us and educate us on the wonderful world of opportunity zones as well as we're going to get into tax opportunities and a whole bunch of other things. So, mike, welcome to the show and thank you so much for your time today, absolutely.

Mike Hardy 1:19

Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. I look forward to your conversation.

Ed Mathews 1:22

Yeah, this is going to be fun, All right. So you and I have been going back and forth for a little while and I stalked you on your website and LinkedIn and a few other places. So I know who you are, but why don't you explain to the other three people that are listening to this podcast no, I'm kidding who you are and what your story is all about. How'd you get here?

Mike Hardy 1:43

Yeah, absolutely. I'm first a husband and a father, married 25 years, 26 years and four kids that range 21, 19, 16, and 14. So it's a circus at our place at all times. Yes, it is. I'm getting used to having two adult kids and two kids that are still needs a healthy amount of parenting. But I love real estate, I love numbers, I love people, and anything that is a mix of that combination is just a sweet spot for me. So I'm a serial entrepreneur. My early memories of making money I lived in New York, in Connecticut, and I figured out that I could shovel driveways for my parents, first for make a few bucks and then, of course, the entire neighborhood in Mowing Lawn. So I've always looked for ways to be able to save and then understand this world of investing.

Ed Mathews 2:36

So snow removal and back spring, yeah, awesome. So snow removal and landscaping, tycoon to world class mortgage broker and now a managing partner of a really interesting opportunity zone fund. So obviously, being a serial entrepreneur, you could probably do a lot of things. I mean, I strongly suspect your skill set is pretty broad and probably pretty deep too. So why pick real estate as the vehicle that you were going to make your way?

Mike Hardy 3:11

I believe that we only live once, and so it's important in my mind not just to do well financially to build wealth, but to do it in a way where it is fun and fulfilling and aligns with strengths and passions and interests. I just I think real estate is amazing for a number of reasons, but from a personal fulfillment standpoint people, numbers and real estate and just how that all fits together and the inefficiencies that exist and the creation of value there's just something super fulfilling about seeing something that can be improved upon, whether that is a person or whether that is in real estate. There's just the opportunity to bring life to something.

Ed Mathews 3:55

So you're a builder, right builder of people and a builder of businesses. I got it All right. That's awesome. And so when you started to kind of look at now, I know you were in the mortgage business for quite some time I think you still are and now you're in the real estate investing business. You've been doing that for a while. So let's talk about your focus in terms of the opportunity zone fund what is so attractive and these are self-serving questions because I want to know. So what is the opportunity zone all about and why is it so darn attractive?

Mike Hardy 4:31

Yes. So the opportunity zone is something. I'll tell you the story of how this came about, because it was really serendipitous, of how this happened, and I've been in the. I am in the mortgage business. I've been in the mortgage business for 20 years and partner with Churchill mortgage for the California Nevada marketplace, but I've been real estate investing and various projects for about 15 years as well, so I find that there's a very nice neat overlap between the two. The businesses actually complement each other very well rather than a distraction.

Mike Hardy 5:08

But I was the chair of a financial advisor network for Azusa Pacific University, local to me, and we were doing some forward facing education for CPAs, financial advisors, real estate professionals and on just different creative ways of being able to build wealth. And so we're coming to 1031 exchange, the 721 provision, charitable major trust, dsts. And then there's this new kid on the block called the Opportunity Zone was out, and so we had experts for every area, but we couldn't find one for the Opportunity Zone. This is, I don't know, four years ago or so Long story short, I said, guys, I'll do the talk, but I'll do it as an interested investor and I'll take a smaller section disclaimer not to be disingenuous, but I was really curious about it. So I had to saturate in the tax law for about three weeks to a month to prepare.

Ed Mathews 6:02

And so the whole time is.

Mike Hardy 6:05

I'm thinking this seems too good to be true. How is it possible that this is allowed? And it makes perfect sense. I'll kind of give you the broad strokes. But that's how this came to be. It was by accident. And I come to find out that all of the ultra elite and wealthy they're doing this.

Mike Hardy 6:25

This is a common practice with family offices and sort of the very high end institutions to be able to mitigate capital gains, take care of the strategy, but rarely does it kind of make its way down to mainstream, so to speak. So anyway, that's kind of how this came about was just looking and thinking bigger and thinking different and taking the time. So that's the backstory I thought was interesting because I realized that I can solve my own pain and in doing so that there's a lot of other investors that are maybe just kind of above mom and pop that don't know that exists and realize, oh my goodness, this can be. If done right, the combination of tax mitigation and then compounding and tax free exit, which I'll explain in a minute it can be a huge difference in the wealth building for somebody. So that's the backstory to this.

Ed Mathews 7:20

Yeah, that's amazing. So, like I started to say, the best way to learn something is to approach it as if you have to teach it to someone else, and so it's certainly helpful. All right, so let's get into this, roll up our sleeves and get into Opportunity Zone. What is it and how does it work?

Opportunity Zone Investing

Mike Hardy 7:43

Yep. So this is created as part of the 2017 Tax Act and it was a designation to create these different areas of the country that are typically the lower income areas and designate them as quote opportunity zones in order and then create some amazing tax incentives for investing in that area, to attract money and capital into areas that typically wouldn't have that level of influx of investment. And so it's really in concept, because it gives investors a very significant tax advantage, which I'll talk through in a minute but it also attracts capital and it brings up the base and just improves the entire area. So the thinking is, the lower 20% in each state gets to designate where their opportunity zone areas are, so they're able to say and map this out. So on our website, for example, cyrusozfundcom, right on the front page, you can go and see and plug in an address and see if it happens to be in an opportunity zone or if it isn't and it's shaded, so it's really easy to tell. So but the tax advantage. So for an investor I'll walk through like what this means for an investor and it's an ideal solution for somebody that may have a busted 1031 exchange, but for an investor, if somebody has capital gains and it doesn't have to be real estate, it can be any capital gains.

Mike Hardy 9:10

Securities can be hard. I mean it doesn't matter Capital gains. They have the ability to move the gain portion of a sale. If it's real estate, let's just say you've got your basis in your game. But the gain portion can get moved into a qualified opportunity fund. It's called a QOF, and this fund then is able to, which is what we've established. The fund then has to invest in the opportunities else.

Mike Hardy 9:38

But for the investor, when you invest in a QOF, qualified opportunity fund, a couple of advantages happen. Number one any capital gains tax that would be would be due is deferred until April of 2027. Okay, so you've got to defer it. The best advantage far and away is that all of the growth that takes place in that fund, as long as it stays in a QOF for a 10-year window and you can exit each year if you need liquidity options, but as long as it stays invested, all of the growth will then be eligible to exit tax-free.

Mike Hardy 10:18

Very much like a Roth IRA. Wow, like mind blowing, mind blowing. And so where is? I mean there's limits, obviously, to where there's options to have money grow and compound and exit tax-free, so to be able to have this as an option, to be able to defer for a while and then all of the growth exit tax-free. When you run the spreadsheet and the numbers on this, it's just, it's pretty exciting what that can mean for an investor. It can shake years off of what somebody can build. I mean, if you look at our largest liability is our tax liability if you have the most majority swimming in any area. So to be able to have compounding growth and tax-free exit amazing.

Ed Mathews 11:34

Yeah. So you know it's interesting because the fact is that from an investment perspective, I didn't realize that you could take just the gain of a transaction. Let's say I sell an apartment building and I make a dollar right and my print, my basis, is a dollar right. So I can take that dollar back, put it back into my business and then take the dollar that was profit, capital gain, and hand it to a fund like you and for 10 years that gets to grow and hopefully turn into $2 and then $4. And we'll see after that. Right, that's great. And then you pay taxes. I want to make sure I understand this part. So you pay taxes on when you collect that money at the end of 10 years. What portion of that is taxable?

Mike Hardy 12:31

Right. So all of the growth that takes place in that is going to be a tax-free exit. There is tax due. This is one of the complications and we have a creative solution to it. But one of the complications is that the capital gains tax that would be due today is, instead of doing 2023, it's doing 2027.

Mike Hardy 12:55

Okay, this program sunsets at the end of 2026.

Mike Hardy 13:00

So any investors that want to participate in this what I think is a once-in-a-lifetime tax strategy those gains need to get into a qualified opportunity fund before the end of 2026, then it sunsets.

Mike Hardy 13:14

Okay, if you get the capital gains, whether you move it into a fund today or whether you move it into a fund by the end of 2026, those are due April 2027. We have set up the ability for an investor to margin loan, a wash loan against their contribution to 20% to be able to cover if they need a liquidity to cover the tax. So we wanted the investment, the opportunity to stand on its own and I've set this up to really solve my own pain initially and realize that I was doing enough projects and paying enough tax and I was a financial advisor early in my year, prior to the mortgage and real estate world, so I had some fund management experience and so I understood enough to realize that I can set this up in a way where it will significantly benefit my efforts and make it very streamlined for other investors that have similar issues to be able to participate in this opportunity.

Ed Mathews 14:19

So it's interesting I mean just the time value of money right being able to defer for three to four years a chunk of capital gains tax right and then, on top of that, being able to allow that to grow over that same timeframe plus. It's a seems like the math is. I'm sitting here calculating in my head that $1 that I would hand to a fund, and it gets very attractive very quickly. So I'm curious. The assets themselves, Opportunity zone tells me that it's probably a pretty rough area sometimes, and so how do you manage that risk? And then, secondly, how do the returns typically right? We're not talking specifics, but at a very high level. How do the returns track relative to, let's say, multi-family as an overall asset class, figuring 9% to 12%, depending on where you are in the world?

Mike Hardy 15:23

Sure, no great question.

Mike Hardy 15:27

Fortunately, there's enough opportunity zones, and I'm in Southern California and we have a little bit of a unique advantage because I know the areas that we're in very well and then also have existing 20 years of relationships of real estate professionals that happen to bring us a lot of off-market opportunities, and so because we're above the mom and pop size but below the Wall Street, so we have a really interesting niche where we can buy things that are, I mean, my belief and this has been my strategy for a long time and one of the reasons I love real estate to your earlier question is there's enough inefficiencies in real estate that exist that if you have the right network and do the right research, the money's made when you buy, and so we're able to buy and start the game already at a very attractive position and then work through a particular project.

Mike Hardy 16:28

So we're careful about the areas that we invest in and we know that we buy right and then a lot of so we do. We're building out a whole series of different townhomes and are able to have a couple of different niches and then, as we're able to buy, typically get the land rather inexpensively, and so we're starting from a very efficient place and then we can build efficiently and then our strategy is built to rent for the next 10-year window. I've spent countless hours in the research of understanding the demographics and the trends and how this market compares to 08 and sort of the tailwinds that we have of the millennials coming in and then the post-mortem meals, the housing crisis, all the things I'm sure talked about fairly often. But a combination of build to rent and then just the local intel that we have is really competitive advantage and then being again below the Wall Street bite size and above the Marmin Pop there's so much inefficiency there I don't think people realize.

Investment Model and Entrepreneurship Philosophy

Ed Mathews 17:37

It's the space I live in as well, so I couldn't agree more. So, as far as the returns and expectations, we can wave off of specific numbers if you want, but I'm curious if multifamily has an asset class on average depending on who you talk to is 12% let's pick a number and self-storage is in that 16%, 17% range historically. So I'm curious with regard to opportunity zones, because you're buying so well, one of the big challenges I would imagine and I'm curious how you manage this is everybody talks about real estate and location, location, location, and so I was down in Nashville last summer and I saw neighborhood after neighborhood after neighborhood being completely transformed to the positive and absolutely gorgeous townhomes and apartment buildings and duplexes and build-to-rent type neighborhoods and all that, and it was really impressive, right. So I'm curious from your perspective, what do you see as the opportunity relative to other asset classes? Is it same? Is it better? Is it less? Is it?

Mike Hardy 19:01

Sure, I'll walk you through what our approach is. And we've been running even with the recent downturn and re-evaluations, we've been running 13.5% as the historical return for a month. So we were even a bit higher than that prior to the last two quarters. So I like the model. I'll walk you through how I think, and this is a million-dollar investor with a rule of 72 and 116. So a 11.6% rate of return is going to be. Money will triple and exit tax-free after 10 years. So at a 15% rate of return, money will quadruple. So, a million-dollar investor, the way that we are set up with our game plan and this is how I'm looking at it and I'm a sizable investor at my own fund is I want my money to somewhere between triple and 4X over a 10-year window and exit tax-free, if I like to say.

Mike Hardy 20:04

I'm a simple guy like that's the game plan Ten years, money triples and if it quadruples, even better and then with very contained risk because we're buying right. We find highest and best for some of these smaller projects. Then we're able to do some pretty deep, heavy rehab, fix and flip projects. I do a lot. I've done those for many, many years. There's some that will fit the opportunity zone parameters as well. Between the combination of fix and flips and the build to rent and where we find the inefficiencies in the market, we feel very comfortable that we've got very contained risk for returns that will be a tripling, to even be ecstatic for quadruple. I approach things conservatively but if you want to know my model, that's where I am. I want it to triple or 4x over 10 years and exit tax free.

Ed Mathews 21:01

That is impressive. Yeah, I'm not going to lie. We're going to talk about this after we hang up on the show. So, as far as the way that you approach your business and I'm curious obviously you are an accomplished entrepreneur I'm curious, from your perspective, what separates guys like you and your peers from the folks that are we were talking about it before we started, right the folks that were stopping in the grocery store and saying, man, I wish, wish, I wish I could be in the business you're in. I could do what you do for a living. So I'm curious what separates you from the people I love to call dreamers?

Mike Hardy 21:48

I'll tell you, I grew up poor, so I have a really interesting perspective. I've had to work for a lot of things in life and I remember some of my early memories where we were living in a mobile home that to me and my two younger sisters had one small corner with the bunk beds and the side bed could barely fit in there. My folks were in the other end, in this little hallway, and so you know. And then my dad my dad was going through school, he was getting his PhD and ended up doing really well in life. But I got to watch a transition from having very little, no, to very little money to then him being very well off, but a discipline, a healthy discipline that went with it and a healthy work ethic, and it's just something that's been ingrained in me. So what I was able to realize is that any and I'm a believer of this that we any there's so many opportunities that exist out there.

Mike Hardy 22:40

Part of my challenge for a while was trying to do too many things at once, because it's, and being mediocre at a lot of things. And I learned this, you know, about 15 years ago, fortunately and then got very, very focused. But I think part of it is some people want, I don't know. We kind of live in a microwave mentality where people just expect there to be results, and for me it's always taken way more work and longer than I wanted or hoped.

Mike Hardy 23:05

But when I've under, this is the saying. I don't remember who said this, but it was one of those sayings where you know it's, it's over, it will over. The first year usually it's twice as expensive and you get half as far as you thought. But because of with focus and intention and compounding, when you get to like five years, all of a sudden now you've, you've started to turn and scale up Right, and I don't know that most people have the discipline or have it modeled to them that sometimes you just got to grind for half a decade and that seems to get lost somewhere along the line. So I don't know. I've. I am a believer that we are always 100% responsible for results and I think sometimes people can take on a victim mentality rather than one of. I will find a way to win, even if I have to fight for it, and so that's my approach.

Ed Mathews 24:01

Yeah, that's profound. The you know. The fact is is that everybody you, me, folks listening everybody are exactly where they are because of the choices they've made. Right, period, end of end of story. And so you know, deciding that you're going to to grind, to use your word is is something that I think is kind of rare in this world. Right, because I've seen so many people peers, friends, you know, folks I met through the industry or outside the industry that were almost there, almost, and then they stopped and went and did something else and had they just pushed a little bit more, they would have gotten where they were looking to go. So perseverance is certainly a a very important attribute.

Mike Hardy 24:53

I I've learned. I had a bucket list to do an Ironman, and I did an Ironman a number of years back, and one of the lessons from that was and this is something that David Goggins talks about in his book, can't Hurt Me but one of the things that I think is true, not just physically but in in all areas of life, mentally as well is he had this statement when you think you are just done physically, you're actually only at 40% of what is really capable of what's truly possible physiologically. Right, because our mind can play tricks on us sometimes, and so I know that that was a lesson that that I learned. Doing the Ironman is, at some point you're just exhausted, but you know what. You press in and press on, and most people don't or won't, they think they can't, but they, they don't, and I think that happens in business too.

Mike Hardy 25:44

It's like, oh, it's too hard, I'm going to, you know, check out, and so, anyway, I I well, I can't remember what it was, but I think it's. You know, it's like the 80-20 rule and then the 80-20 of 80-20. Only there's a, there's a cutoff of 80% of the people when we go so far, and then there's another group, which is 96%, will get to a certain point. Then there's the point eight. It's called 1%. That will find a way to win, no matter what the odds are, and I think so. That's that's where my attention goes.

Ed Mathews 26:15

Oh, that's great. So so you know, obviously you've you've been doing this for a while and clearly you had an excellent role model in your father. You know in in watching him come from, you know a modest background to working, you know working hard and learning and and becoming the person that he ultimately was, was destined to be, and reaching that potential. And you know it's pretty rare to have someone in your life like that. But I'm curious and it might have been your dad that gave you the advice, but I'm curious who, what was the best advice you ever got and who gave it to you?

Mike Hardy 26:54

Oh, that's a great question. The best advice I ever got, you know what comes to mind as you say that is that I think one of the secrets in business is to it's not just work hard, but it's a combination of a whole series of things. It is what you know, it is times who you know, times how hard you work, but also times how much of your time is spent in an area of strength and genius, and what's fascinating to me is that you know we have I mean, you think about it, there's 7.9 billion people on this planet and every individual. There's a streak of genius in them. There's something unique about them, and I think that when you, when we can take our individual strengths, which we're naturally wired to excel at, that our friends or family would say this is where Ed just runs circles around people and you can do that 80% of the day in an area that you love, in an area that's bringing value to the world, and also an area that will pay you for your efforts. That's the sweet spot.

Ed Mathews 28:06

Okay, so that's how it all comes together. Yeah, oh, that's amazing, and so so. Was that something that you've learned over time, or did somebody put that in your ear, or both?

Mike Hardy 28:17

You know I had, I had an uncle. My uncle, years ago, said something along those lines and it was you know. It's not just what you know, but a lot of life is who you know. So I never forgot about that and I've had some really good coaching and mentoring over the years. You know, in addition to listening to my dad. That helped me to get really clear on where my unique strengths were and what was.

Mike Hardy 28:45

You know this is there's a less brown saying I heard one time, which is you know, every, everyone is born unique, but most people die as clones Like, for whatever reason. A lot of times people start to just gravitate toward the mean as opposed to stand on like their unique genius and identity, whatever that is, because it's uncomfortable a little bit. So you know, that's one. And then the other thing that comes to mind is that you know life can be rough and I think that for a lot of entrepreneurs you know you can everyone starts with big dreams, but very few people truly like press through and most end up like, oh, cal, just go get a job. And they quote you know, settle in life, so to speak.

Mike Hardy 29:32

And I think life is supposed to be just the opposite of that, but this was the saying it was most people are die at age 25, but they're not buried until age 80. Right, so the dreams die and so, but and so, like my thought process and something like I want to instill in my kids is life is a great adventure, yeah, and it should. Endless adventure that should be fulfilling and fun and profitable and you bring value. Like there's just so much there, and I think so often like people can get jaded too fast and I just I'm extra careful to guard against that.

Starting Over

Ed Mathews 30:07

Absolutely. You know somebody I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he, you know, super smart, you know, has embraced his highest and best use and ran a software company and grew it to a gigantic size and then, you know, had the good fortune to sell. And so, you know, and he's a young man, right, he's 53 or 52. And because I'm older than he is, and you know we were, we were talking about the concept of retirement and you know he said to me he's like Ed, I am 52 years old, I have minimum 30 more years on this earth and I still haven't even figured out what I want to do with my life. Right, and you know that curiosity, that you know that, that feeling that you know I'm not done yet is something that you know drives a pretty small slice of of the world. And if you can figure out, you know I tell people all the time I'm 53. I don't know what I want to do, you know, for the rest of my life. I haven't figured it out yet. You know, real estate is what I'm doing today and I'm going to do it for a while. But you know there's, I guarantee you that I've switched careers three times so far.

Ed Mathews 31:25

So, and you know, I'm sure you know, obviously, just just looking at LinkedIn and our conversation here, I mean you've, you've done the same. You've done a lot of really cool things for very different organizations and companies. So, no-transcript. So, getting back, let's talk history for a second. Okay, so if I took a magic wand and I wiped out everything that you've accomplished, right, you can keep your knowledge, you can keep your family, you can keep your network, but the stuff, the money, the bank accounts, the fund, all of that wiped away, what would you do to start over?

Mike Hardy 32:02

You know, what would I do to start over? I've actually had this exercise with my kids sometime that they had to land in a random city with any money. How would they get, you know, survive. So what would I do different? I feel like I can do in five years what it took me 15 to 20 to do. If I had to do it over, and I'm so. The level of certainty that comes with that is so high that it's just not even a question. So it would immediately. It would be.

Mike Hardy 32:34

I've read a fascinating book.

Mike Hardy 32:36

I've read it a couple of times now, but it's called who, not how, by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy, favorite of the relation.

Mike Hardy 32:43

Okay, so you know, a lot of it comes down to the this is my belief is that, like one new idea or one new relationship can change the trajectory of your life, and it's like the acres of diamonds, thinking, and so again, there's endless opportunity everywhere.

Mike Hardy 33:02

So for me it comes down to who are the people? That number one will give me the opportunity, and I don't want anything handed to me, but they will give me the opportunity, if I'm answering your question, to be able to have a running start and I'm like, okay, cool, I can, I know I can run, and how do I help this person win? That's giving me the opportunity at the same time, right, and as part of that opportunity, will that person open their network to me? Because I'm a believer in transfer of trust, yep, and so for me it would be very quickly establishing relationships with folks that are at a very high level, that need my wisdom and perspective, in exchange for whatever it is that they could help me get started with. But that would be a way to fast track and it would be a five year game plan, and it's kind of a fun exercise. Now that you're saying this, I haven't thought about this for a little bit, yeah it's interesting.

Ed Mathews 34:00

I read a book it was actually during COVID Russell Brunson created it and one of the things he did in marketing guy digital marketing guy and one of the things he talked about it's if you, if you lost everything, and he went to his customers who were very successful and said, all right, you lost everything and you got 30 days to make your mortgage or your rent and feed yourself, what would you do? And it was an interesting conversation because you're talking to people. He's talking to people that are selling coaching and real estate and supplements and all these different, wildly different things, and a lot of them were talking about.

Ed Mathews 34:42

Certainty is certainly one of the things that I think you and everybody that was in that book that I was reading shares, and the other part of it is that keeping it simple, man right, and fortunately, you can't unlearn the stuff that you've learned over the last 15, 20 years, so you get to bring a much bigger tennis racket to the game when they ask you to step back in the step, back on the court, so to speak. So, mike, I've really enjoyed this conversation and thank you for the education I'm grateful. So, when you're not talking about real estate or what do you enjoy doing? How do you spend your time?

Mike Hardy 35:28

Oh, that's great. I'm a family guy. We have a place up in Big Bear Lake that we get to quite a bit. I'm an adventure and athlete through high school and college and so I really stay on a lot of things. Physically. I've been going through and doing the 75 Heart Challenge again, if you're familiar with the 75 Heart Program, and in fact I like to. Oh so, the 75 Heart is interesting, so it's. I'll give you the cliff notes on it. It's 75 days of two workouts a day, 45 minutes each. One of them needs to be outside. Okay, drink a gallon of water. That's why I'm drinking a gallon of water each day.

Mike Hardy 36:12

You have to read 10 pages of nonfiction, which is pretty easy, but still it's daily. You have to take a picture and upload it into the app. Doesn't have to be like posted anywhere, but just so you can see the progression over time. Let's see what else. And then, no alcohol, no cheat meals, follow a diet and do that for 75 days straight. And so like challenges like that. My entire, my mortgage group, a whole bunch of us are doing that altogether. So I like bringing in challenges personally and like integrating it with business to improve it, build certain fun, but so anything that's outdoors, that is a challenge, that's challenge oriented love, all that stuff, so that complimented with real estate.

Ed Mathews 37:00

I'm gonna check that out. That's interesting, all right, and it's always better when you do it with somebody else, right, cause you're holding each other accountable and I'm sure there's little side bets and money exchanged at the end of it, and you know. Just to make sure, make it interesting, right.

Mike Hardy 37:14

That's right.

Ed Mathews 37:15

I got a dollar says I can do this. You know better fester than you can. So, mike, thank you so much for your time today. Hey, so if people wanna learn more about you know, get to know you or contact you or learn more about the Opportunity Zone Fund, you know what's the best way to do that.

Mike Hardy 37:37

Sure, no, absolutely there is, I would say, to reach out directly. You know, mike at CyrusOZFundcom is my email address. One thing I didn't mention earlier that's super important is that if somebody has a busted 1031 exchange, it does not need to go directly to an accommodator so they can actually have possession of the gains for 180 days and then, as long as it moves from their pocket into a qualified opportunity fund a four day 181, it's eligible for this preferred tax treatment. Wow, so looking backwards, so any investor can look backwards up to 180 days and we have openings in January and in July and then if someone needs liquidity, for whatever reason they can have, there's an off ramp in January, so every January. But what most people realize is I think about 10 to 15% of 1031 exchanges are busted for some reason. That is, that person can take their basis back, invest only the gains, but look back 180 days and still be eligible. So we didn't get to cover that.

Ed Mathews 38:52

But key benefits, but it's a great safety net right Cause you know stuff happens. Great safety net Right right on. Great All right. Well, Mike Hardy, thank you so much for your time today. Thank you for your wisdom, and I appreciate the lesson in opportunity zone investing, cause I feel like I'm a little smarter right now than I was 40 minutes ago. So thank you.

Mike Hardy 39:15

Awesome Ed. It's been a pleasure to talk with him, Get to know you. Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you.

Ed Mathews 39:24

This has been the real estate underground podcast, a Clark Street Capital presentation. Thanks for joining us. If you're enjoying the show, please remember to subscribe and share it with your friends. If you'd like to learn more about Clark Street Capital and our upcoming projects, please join our investor club at clarkstcom slash join Until next time. Happy investing.