Legacy Builders with Kyle McGee
"Legacy Builders with Kyle McGee" is a top-tier podcast aimed at entrepreneurs, business leaders, and high performers. The show will focus on leadership, mindset, habits, discipline, and the secrets behind success. Through insightful interviews and practical takeaways, the podcast will empower listeners to build their personal and professional legacies.
Legacy Builders with Kyle McGee
Building Relationships That Outlast Tough Times with Joe Fairless
Joe Fairless, co-founder of Ashcroft Capital with $2.8 billion in assets under management and creator of the Best Ever CRE Show podcast, shares his perspective on building a meaningful legacy through present actions rather than seeking long-term name recognition.
• Legacy isn't about being remembered generations from now, but creating positive ripple effects through our daily actions
• Intentional environment design trumps willpower – keeping phones grayscale, out of the bedroom, and free from social media
• Maintaining a "90th birthday clock" as a visual reminder that every moment and where we direct our attention matters
• Successful scaling requires finding partners with aligned values but complementary skills and personalities
• During challenging times, relationships either grow stronger or deteriorate – finding mutual purpose is key
• Volunteering at hospice provides valuable perspective on what truly matters in life
• True character shows in how you treat people who can neither help nor harm you
If you're interested in passive apartment investing, visit ashcroftcapital.com to learn more and see investor perspectives from people who have invested.
Other ways to connect with Joe:
LinkedIn: Joe Fairless
Instagram: @officialjoefairless
Podcast Instagram: @besteverpodcast
Official Website: joefairless.co
Stay connected to the conversation by joining us on your favorite social media platform!
All right, welcome to another episode of the Legacy Builders Podcast. I'm your host, kyle McGee, and we have Mr Joe Fairless on today. Joe Fairless is the co-founder of Ashcroft Capital, which has over 2.8 billion in assets under management. In addition to Ashcroft Capital, joe created the Best Ever CRE Show podcast, which is the longest running daily real estate podcast in the world, with over 3000 episodes. Joe's also a proud member of the Texas Tech Alumni Advisory Board for the College of Media and Communication. He's a Junior Achievement Board member, volunteers at Crossroads Hospice and was recognized as Multifamily Investor of the Year by Think Realty Magazine. He and his wife also created BestEverCausescom, proudly supporting 77 different nonprofits over the last 77 months. Mr Joe, welcome. Well, thank you. Yeah, looking forward to our conversation. Yeah, absolutely so. I'd like to start by just diving right in. So the name of the show that we have today that could positively influence someone who's listening.
Speaker 2:I read a decent amount. One book I recently read was the Almanac of Naval Ravikant and he mentions that in three generations no one's going to remember you. He mentions that in three generations no one's going to remember you and if you think about it he's right, barring some crazy outlier. I'm also reading the Fourth Turning. It's an older book and it just talks about basically one generation experiences things. The next generation is brought up from that first generation because they experienced those things, so they are influenced by it, but the third generation doesn't remember what that thing is. So legacy to me is about the moment in time that we're in right now and doing the best that I can that we can in this moment, because there's no better gift in the world that someone could give you than this moment that we have right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a beautiful definition and I think that it's easier said than done. Right, living in the present right. When did you first start thinking about legacy? Right, you're in your fort 40s if I'm not, yeah, I'm 42, 42. So was there a specific moment where maybe it started shifting to where you went out of, you know, just kill it achievement mode to kind of thinking about okay, what is beyond this?
Speaker 2:I would say that you know, I I used to. I still would say, like, what I want on my gravestone is people were better off having come across me than not. That's what I want people to say about me. I still try to kill it. I still try to maximize my potential. I still try to get better physically, mentally, professionally, physically, mentally, professionally. I don't have the, in my opinion, the false belief that in generations from now people are going to be talking about me. I don't think they will be. I think we talk about very few people who are living right now in three generations. But I do believe that with our legacy, the conversations we're having now could influence someone and then they could do something positive and then the people who they impact in that positive way could have a ripple effect on many other people. And there's an insignificance in our name staying power but there is a significance in the actions that we take today and tomorrow for what that could do for people now and in the future.
Speaker 1:So I read a quote this morning, a huge quote guy Me too, Anytime I have a note, a running note on my phone if I read or see a good quote I do it, and there was one this morning. That's exactly what you were just saying, and this was a quote from Abraham Lincoln. Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1:Take action right. Sense of urgency.
Speaker 2:Once you take action on matters to end the day. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, all the listeners about your, your death clock? Yep, well, my wife has asked me to change it to call it my 90th birthday clock. So, yeah, that's right there. We go right there, 17,337 days before my 90th birthday. Originally was a death clock. Death clock Either way.
Speaker 2:The purpose of it is to remind me that every moment matters. It ticks down from days to hours, to minutes, to seconds. It's a reminder that time is precious and our attention is precious. I used to think it was just about what we spend our time on, but it's really, if we drill down a little bit more, it's what we invest our attention on, what we pay attention to. Boy, we have a lot of competing interests with our lives on a daily basis.
Speaker 2:For what takes our attention from us and the big one is this thing right, and I don't have the phone in the bedroom at night. I keep it in the office and I don't have social media on my phone. I've got the gray scale now on my phone. I just recently read that's a way to decrease the amount of addictedness to it, and so there's dopamine. Was what I was thinking of decrease the amount of dopamine if it's grayscale. So I think being intentional about how we structure our environment because I have a very strong willpower, but even the strongest of the willpowers will crumble if the environment isn't set up for success. So I think creating our environment and being intentional about how we create our environment and where we place ourselves and who we place ourselves around is a huge factor for what we do or don't do in life.
Speaker 1:Thank you for sharing. So I met you at the Best Ever Conference, which is about three years ago. I started going to that and before that I read your book, the Best Ever Apartment Syndication Book.
Speaker 2:There's that bad boy.
Speaker 1:Everybody should get this book, Anybody interested in syndication book. It's deep, very detailed. That goes back to what you were sharing about earlier this ripple effect, this impact you can have without ever knowing it, Right? So, I knew who you were before you ever even knew that Kyle McGee existed in this world. Right.
Speaker 1:And that was taken from an action of discipline and something that you were doing every day in order for your future self, and I can imagine that it was super uncomfortable when you started getting into writing, and maybe you don't even like it still. But talk to me about the early stages of Joe Fairless, but I think it was 10, 12 years ago. Right, getting out of and I don't want you to have to repeat your story that you've done a million times. Right, but you're getting out of. You're in an advertising role in New York City, the best of the best. Right, you had itch and real estate investing and then you started to take the steps to be abnormal, right, to be a super high achiever. Talk to me those early days what were you doing and how did you condition yourself in order to get comfortable being uncomfortable?
Speaker 2:I would say a YouTube video that I saw with Tony Robbins and his TED Talk. That was a big thing for me. And then, once I saw that, I started studying personal development and that served as a foundation for me. That was a huge part being comfortable, being uncomfortable While I still had my W-2 job. I was unsettled. I knew I wanted to do something else. I wasn't fulfilled.
Speaker 2:I climbed the corporate ladder. I was the youngest VP of this advertising agency on Wall Street and on the side and I was working decently long hours there. I was working really long hours a place before that, but this place is decently long probably nine and a half hour days or something and I thought you know what I need to sample different things in life. So I wanted to be better at public speaking. I took an improv class and then in the improv class they said why are you here? I told them and they said well, you should do stand-up comedy, because stand-up comedy is a lot harder than improv.
Speaker 2:If you want to get better at public speaking, that's trial by fire. So I did that. I ended up performing at Gotham Comedy Club in New York City as part of the class. The very end of the class we performed and technically Jim Gaffigan opened up for me. Technically speaking, he was there before and then I did it a couple other times. Actually, I think I did it two other times, but for some reason my mind is completely blocked out one of the times.
Speaker 1:So it must have been really bad.
Speaker 2:The other time it was bad. My buddy was hosting a show, a comedy show, and it was in the basement of some place and nobody laughed. Nobody laughed. How long was this?
Speaker 1:it was approximately six minutes and so you had a couple jokes prepared, or all.
Speaker 2:I had the whole, the whole thing prepared. Yeah, I just I just took the bit that I did at gotham comedy club, where you have to invite friends to attend because the club wants to actually make money off all these amateurs, right? So in order to perform, you have to bring people, and, and so I just used that same bit as like five to six minutes and I just did it at this, this other place your own friends didn't laugh well at gotham comedy club.
Speaker 2:It was a hit because all the friends were laughing, because there's a nervous for me and it was fine. So that was fine. But then when I entered an area outside of friendly territory and it was just my buddy who was hosting the comedy show but it's just, I didn't bring anyone, it's just my buddy's like hey, do you want to perform? I was like not really, I'm not looking through this professionally, but sure I bombed. It was bad and everyone should experience that at least once in their life. What it's like. And shortly thereafter the whole comedy club shut down. What out of business. Joe fairloom plays out of business. It is no longer in operation in the east village of Manhattan. Yeah, so I just sampled different life experiences like that.
Speaker 2:I interviewed a bunch of people for a book that never actually got published. I still have the notes and it was how to have an extraordinary career or how to have a remarkable career. And I interviewed probably 20, 30 people on their careers, from the soldier of the year to vice president of Southwest Airlines to a handful of other people. And I think it was a precursor to my podcast days, because I love hearing people's stories. I love learning from people directly. I love being able to selfish, ask them questions that I want to ask.
Speaker 2:And with the podcast I ended up doing launching the podcast, but it wasn't daily and I did it for about a month and I realized I don't know if people are listening, I don't know if this is good use of my time. So I'm going to make a commitment it was October of that year I'm going to do it daily, every single day, for the end of the year and then I'm going to see if it's good use of my time or not. And I did it every single day. And then I got a sponsor at the end of it for I think $2,000, maybe $1,000. I think it's $2,000 to sponsor the whole month, which covered my costs at the time, and I thought you know what I might be onto something. And so I just kept going.
Speaker 2:And now fast forward, many days later. I don't do the daily interviews anymore, but I contribute to it. I have a bunch of other hosts who have different shows within the platform. We have a syndication show, multifamily syndication show. We have a beyond multifamily show that Ash Patel hosts. We have a LP investor show that Pascal hosts. We have mindset, one that Matt Faircloth hosts, so we have different hosts that do shows under the umbrella now.
Speaker 1:And that's a gradual thing, right? You didn't start with a grand vision of saying, hey, I'm going to create this platform and there's going to be five different hosts, and this started as a daily discipline that you got after. Every day you got a little bit better and it's kind of created its own life, I guess you call it. In the early days, what were you doing full-time to make money? Obviously, it was000 bucks at the end of a year for one month. What were you doing to make money during those times?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I had saved $50,000 to then go and make it happen, and that came from a cash out refinance. So I had purchased four homes. I was renting an apartment with a Craigslist roommate which is a large part of my comedy bit, by the way, that I talked about but I was renting an apartment with different Craigslist roommates in New York City and I kept my rent low for New York City standards. It was about $1,000, my portion of the rent the whole time. I was in New York all 10 years and I would take that extra money that I made. Well, I had my full-time job. Because my full-time job, I ended up making about $150,000 base salary. So I was taking all that money and buying homes along the way and then I realized that it wasn't scaling the way I wanted it to. So I looked at apartments, but I got a cash out refinance on one of the four homes right before I left to do this full time and so I had about $50,000 in the bank. Now I didn't realize that COBRA insurance was about $900 a month and looking back, I don't know how old I was late 20, early 30s. Late 20, early 30s Shouldn't have even had it. I should have just rolled the dice at that point. But I kept Cobra insurance. That was a chunk of money. So it's $2,000 a month, cobra, and rent just right there, $2,000 a month. So yeah, money was short.
Speaker 2:But I ended up buying a property in July of that year so I left in December. Technically, I got laid off, so I got a severance through the end of January even though I was about to quit. But it all worked out, fortunately. So I ended up getting the severance and I was able to get some money from the closing of that deal. And then I ended up teaching classes at the library and I was teaching classes at some shared workspace in New York and I would charge 50 bucks to attend and I'd make like 350 bucks or so $400 every 10 days or something. So I was scraping by Real estate investment classes. It was, yes, it was real estate. Yeah, the one at the library was on a career and I did that for free, but the one that was at the shared workspace was a real estate class that I was charging for. It was just cobbling things together and living off my savings until some larger things hit.
Speaker 1:So until some larger things hit, that's a perfect segue. You've scaled Ashcroft Capital with your partner Frank to $2.8 billion. Take us through that journey of going from owning four homes getting laid off slash you're quitting anyway to scraping by right and then to building this massive organization and scaling a big community in the best ever brand. Where did that come from? How do you think about scale? Is it out of necessity?
Speaker 2:The first thing that comes to mind is partnerships, because what I've realized is that me personally, I need a partner in order to properly grow a business. I've realized that with apartment syndication, I've realized that with the Best Ever brand, and it's because I have deficits, I have flaws as a business person and I need someone who excels in the areas where I do not excel in or I'm bad at. So how the ventures I've done have been able to scale is through the right partnerships. Now, that's me personally. Some people might have all the tools and tool chest and then they just need to hire the right people. That's a perfectly realistic scenario. I'm not that way. I need to have the right partner or partners.
Speaker 2:So for the conference that you and I know each other through, next year will be our 10th year that we've done the conference, 10th year Congrats. Yeah, thank you. And it is in existence because of my partner, ben, who I partner with on that conference. I had it as an idea, but he said, hey, you ever thought about doing a conference? I said, actually, yeah, it's on my piece of paper here. Would have stayed on the piece of paper for a little while. But he said well, let me handle the logistics, you handle helping us get people there. He lived still does in the Denver area. So we held our first conference in Denver area and it was surprisingly well attended. For a first conference it was probably about 200 people. I think that's well attended. It was a little bit larger than a regular meetup, but from people all over. But what was so refreshing about it was the quality of people who were attending and the experience level and how humble they were and how helpful they wanted to be. And so we've scaled that up as a result of just putting in the years I mean next year's going to be our 10th year and the word of mouth.
Speaker 2:Last year, this past year, a couple months ago, we did our ninth conference and a lot of companies weren't having conferences, a lot of them skipped it, a lot of them stopped doing them all together we did it and it's the staying power and the reputation that we're building, not just for this year but for years to come. Oh, you remember that year when it was especially tough for operators and it was especially hard, man, the best ever conference. They still had it and there were about a little over 700 people there Wow, lower than previous years where we'll have a thousand people but just have 700 people there. That says something, and I call it the long haulers. Right, we're in it for the long haul. So I think of partnerships, I think of scaling as being in it for long haul with people. I'm in this for long-term relationships with long-term people. That's how I think of things.
Speaker 1:I want to unpack a couple of things. First, I want to plug the Best Ever Conference Again. I only go to two conferences a year. I have a young family, three little kids under three. My time with my family is super important, so I go to two conferences a year. One is close by. It's like 45 minutes home. It's actually the guy recorded the last podcast with Nathan Cox. He runs a great leadership entrepreneur conference called Chasing Greatness, and then yours Best Ever Conference and I thought it was mainly around multifamily investing, but it's around all commercial real estate investing.
Speaker 1:There's very, very strong people there. I meant top of the line people that I met. I was hanging out with a guy, Caleb, in Wisconsin, guys in Austin, texas, california, cincinnati, ohio, new York, florida, all over the country and super high quality people, not first timers, not people trying to learn. These are people that know what they're doing. They're going to get industry insight. They're going to rub shoulders with very strong people. So definitely want to give you a plug there. It's a great conference, highly recommend anybody interested in real estate investing to attend, and we can put a link in the show notes for more details on that.
Speaker 1:The other thing is more of a question, because I think that you've stated that very eloquently and make it sound easy. I think the stat is like 90% of partnerships fail or something like that. Right, majority of people fail in their partnerships and whether that's choosing the wrong partner because of values misaligning or mindsets aligning or misaligning or strengths, partnering was stolen with the same strengths. Right, and I've been very blessed with very strong partners in my life and I can attest to what Joe's saying. The importance of scaling is finding the right partners that align. But can you unpack it a little bit more? Have you had any partnerships?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I have had partnerships or people who I've brought on that didn't work out. I'm thinking of someone who we were working on a book project together and just didn't see eye to eye and she was a little emotionally unstable. It's just a little batty, so we parted ways. That's the first one that comes to mind. Let's see.
Speaker 1:I don't want to put you on the spot there. Maybe let me rephrase this a little bit differently, Because a lot of times the ability to find strong partnerships you don't know how people are until you start working with them.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So the first thing I'd say is you mentioned 90% of partnerships and that's probably right. I do know that about half of marriages end up in divorce, right, and I'd say that before we go looking and I'm happily married, been married for like 2017, 16 or 2015 or 16. So for a while, hopefully, she's not listening.
Speaker 2:Well, you know what, though? Yeah, hopefully not, but you know, in my mind it's like we're married, we're good, why does it matter how many years? But she might not think that. So my thought is that before you can go seek out a partner, whether it's in business or in a personal relationship, you've got to make sure your house is in order right, because if you go seeking something that you don't have already, to come to some capacity, if you go seeking love but you don't love yourself, good luck, buddy, good luck. That's not going to work out. If you go seeking someone who is reliable, is trustworthy, but you're not reliable, you're not trustworthy, not going to work out, it's just not going to work out. So it's important, prior to going into partnerships in business, now focus on business in business to identify the skill sets that you have, that you're bringing to the table, that you you can be relied upon to, to contribute. That's the first thing looking in the mirror and identifying what are the skill sets that are needed and what do I, which ones of those do I have for this, this venture, and then you simply look at okay, well, these are the skillsets that are needed for the venture, these are the ones that I have. Well, that's not all on the list. There's others on the list that I don't have, so let me go find someone who has those. That's a good way to make sure that you're not overlapping your strengths, because you don't want someone with the same strengths as you. You don't want someone with the same type of personality as you. You want someone with the same values, the same integrity with the same work ethic, with the same alignment of interest, but not the same skill sets, not the same personality, because it's just, you have to complement each other. So that's something that I would say to do just a simple three-step process. What are all the skills needed for this industry? What do I have? And now, what do I need to go find in someone? Those three steps Then.
Speaker 2:With real estate in particular, we're very fortunate. We're fortunate because we can do this on a deal-by-deal basis. And then, on a deal-by-deal basis, as things work out, then we grow it into a company. If they don't work out, then we step back. And so, yeah, now I'm thinking through. Yeah, there have been other partners along the way on a deal-by-deal basis early days. Yeah, just didn't. They weren't as motivated, or my perception was they weren't as motivated, or my perception was they weren't as motivated. It's just for some reason just didn't jive with them as well. There's various things, but we can test it out in real estate, fortunately.
Speaker 1:Do you mind sharing a little bit about yours and Frank's beginning of your relationship? How did you guys meet and how has that transpired through the years?
Speaker 2:Sure, we met through a mutual friend actually a friend of a friend so Reed Goossens. He is Australian living in the US, invested in US real estate, friend of ours. He hosted a meetup in Los Angeles and Frank's friend attended the meetup and Reed thought that Frank and I should meet. So then they introduced us and we ended up talking and talking about a deal in Houston and that deal ended up being our first deal that we partnered on together. So it went well for us, for investors, for the community, for the sub-market, and so then we kept going after that.
Speaker 1:Awesome. One of the big takeaways I took from your keynote on the Best Ever Conference this past year was about relationships. Not only you know you can relate this in the business world, a personal world, but in trying times, in very difficult times, relationships get better or they get worse. They don't stay the same.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right and in the past two years, real estate, and specifically multifamily real estate well, any real estate investments have been difficult. Real estate well, any real estate investments have been difficult. Right, there's been interest rate fluctuations, wild insurance increases. How have you guys maintained a strong relationship through the difficult times?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's something I learned from a former boss of mine. I learned what not to do as an employee of the company and reporting into this person. When things got harder, the boss would attack, nitpick and I saw that I didn't want to be around that person. And I saw other team members my colleagues, who also reported in them didn't want to be around that person. We got farther apart. Now we ultimately got through it, but nobody wanted to work for that person. So that was a good lesson for me, while as a W-2 employee, of what not to do.
Speaker 2:Because, as you mentioned, one thing I said at the conference is, yeah, when things get tough, you either grow tighter together or you grow apart. You don't hold serve on. Whatever your relationship is, we have each other's back. We don't agree on everything, but we talk through it and we can talk through it. How we've gotten stronger is we know what our mutual purpose is. Just like the book Crucial Conversation says, when times are tough and opinions might vary, find that mutual purpose and if you find the mutual purpose, you can build up from there in any conversation. Find a mutual purpose and you can build up from there in any conversation. Ultimately, start with what do we both want and then build up from there, and that's ultimately how we've approached this.
Speaker 2:And yeah, it's been very challenging over the last couple of years. And there's also an opportunity. Right, with any challenge comes an opportunity, and the opportunity is to get tighter together, get the operations even better and running more streamlined and in the best, most effective way possible, and also have some growth. That comes with challenges. Right, you grow on the last rep when you're pumping iron. Right, it's that the challenge that gives you that growth. And recognizing that, if we recognize that while we're going through the challenge, then it's something we can approach in an empowering way. If we think, oh, woe is me or this sucks, those are disempowering thoughts and we're not getting the growth that is there. You have to go through it either way. So might as well have empowering meanings so that we can grow and get better as a result of it, not just woe is me or this sucks, and then just get through it and then not know how you just got better if you did it all.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that that's a consistent thought pattern of high achievers, that it's not choose your hard right. That's what we talk about as a team a lot. It's hard going through this. It's hard failing it's also hard. It's easier to blame others and cast doubt, but it's harder to take ownership right. Communicate through these trying times, put your head down, go to work, maybe cut some, take some losses here and there and learn from it. Keep going.
Speaker 1:So one thing that I didn't hear but you alluded to it a little is just high touch communication right, trusting to where you're not looking over their shoulder. Right, like you've got a lane, you trust that Frank is crushing it in operations or construction or asset management, whatever his lane is, and then you're keeping conversations, and fluid conversations, with investors and your marketing messages. So staying in your lane and having trust with your partnerships. You struck me I don't know you too well, but getting to know you better and you struck me as a very humble person who gives back a lot without sharing right. And tell me a little bit this is something I'm personally kind of exploring the intersection of faith and business. How do you interpret and how does your faith intersect with your business?
Speaker 2:From an outward standpoint it doesn't. I keep faith separate. So if you invest with us, we don't donate a portion of our proceeds to a certain faith-based charity, for example. I keep that separate From an inward perspective. And something that in my opinion for me well, not my opinion for me must be present is just a faith in higher power, faith in things happen for a reason, faith in the process, faith in a guiding hand throughout my journey. Having that faith is necessary for me because from my belief, it's much bigger than me. I'm a component and I'm helping, do the best I can do. But thinking about it that way has been necessary for me. It could also be a cop-out, slash, fallback for someone to say, well, things happen for a reason, it's not up to me. It's like well, we've also.
Speaker 2:What was that Jim Rohn thing, where someone was, he had told a story of someone who took over some raw land and it was all weeds and everything. And then he put a lot of work towards it and got it all tilled up and everything was growing the right way and lots of fruits and vegetables. And then someone came over and said, wow, look what God brought you. And he said, well, kind of you should have seen it before, you know, when God had it all to himself. It's like well, you know I put in the work here too, so let's not dismiss that. And so I think you know that's something that you know. Those are my personal beliefs and thought process.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that it's important, whatever you believe in, to understand that God creates opportunities. But it's still up to us to make the best of those opportunities right and bring your best foot, put your best foot forward, focus on yourself so you can serve others. And that brings me to a point. I heard that you in an interview that you volunteer at hospice. Share about that. I don't want to put it in at hospice. Share about that. I don't want to put it in your own words. Share about your volunteering with hospice.
Speaker 2:Yes, I've done that for a while and I have a goal of 12 visits a year, so once a month. So I don't do it often, I do it once a month on average. I keep track of it. I've done it twice so far as we speak, so far this year. I just go visit with the patient and talk to them, listen to them, do what I can to comfort them.
Speaker 1:Are there any specific insights you've gained from talking to people on their final hour?
Speaker 2:you gain from talking to people on their final hour. I would say family and friends are really important. I mean, it's not depressing but it's eye-opening, maybe slightly depressing to go into those facilities and yeah, it smells like urine, it smells like poop. Everyone's watching TV, the TVs are blaring. It's just not a good scene. It's just not good. And different facilities have different degrees. But then I've gone to another one where they have a freaking movie theater room with the old school popcorn and stuff and people go do that.
Speaker 2:I've seen wildly different degrees of it, but yeah, it's just a lot of them have really good perspective. One of them couldn't walk and I was pushing him on the wheelchair and he came across someone else and they were talking and I was pushing him on the wheelchair and he came across someone else and she couldn't. They were talking and they were saying she's saying how she couldn't use her phone anymore, couldn't figure out how it works, and he's saying he couldn't walk today. And then she said, okay, have a good day. And he said I'm going to have a great day. And just hearing people in that level of discomfort have that type of mindset, it's like okay, joe, are you gonna have a great day, because, if not, you deserve to be punched in the face. Yeah, because you get through this free finance, exactly, exactly. So it's it's having perspective also, but I'd say, yeah, that's something I've learned is perspective.
Speaker 2:And then also the book Die With Zero. The author talks about memory dividends and pay for experiences, because then you'll get dividends from a memory standpoint, and I think that's a really powerful concept, because that seems to be what people assuming that their mind's not gone and their memory's not gone they seem to talk about a lot are those different trips or different experiences.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that says a lot about you, that you've experienced a great level of success. You've made an impact on thousands and thousands of people through the Best Ever brand. I know when I first started learning about investing in real estate on a deeper level, I tuned into Best Ever podcast every day, and so you've experienced this level of success. But you're still humble and you're giving back to the community because ultimately, you understand that that's where true fulfillment comes from it's from helping others and giving back. So two more questions to close it out. Are you currently working on that you are most excited about right now?
Speaker 2:I'd say, getting our portfolio loans that have floating interest rates, getting them fixed or getting them to refinance or recapitalization. That's what I'm most excited about. Focus is always on our current portfolio.
Speaker 1:Okay, and the final question, which we alluded to at the beginning of the episode, but just rephrase it one more time this episode will go out into the cloud or wherever it goes into, and it can live forever, right? So if your great grandkids were listening to this episode, what is one thing that you would want them to leave them with? To remember about Joe Fairless.
Speaker 2:I would say forget, Joe Fairless. Focus on making the most of your time today by contributing in the ways that you can contribute to your family, friends and those who cannot help you or hurt you. So that's where the true character is If someone can't help you or hurt you, but you still help them out, that shows some character.
Speaker 1:Giving, expecting nothing in return. Well, thank you very much, joe. I think this is an insightful conversation. Appreciate your time very much. If people want to get a hold of you or learn more about you, how can they reach?
Speaker 2:Mr Joe Fairless, you can go to ashcroftcapitalcom and you'll see the contact us there. You'll also see a bunch of investor perspectives from people who have invested with us if you're looking to passively invest in apartment deals.
Speaker 1:Awesome, and those links will be in the show notes. So again, mr Joe Fairless, thank you very much for coming on and remember everybody to continue building your legacy, brick by brick, day by day. Thank you very much, thanks everyone.