Understanding Turnkey Real Estate Investing: Structure, Risk, and Operations

In this episode of Real Estate Connections, Mary Foerster continues the conversation on real estate investing by examining how turnkey investment properties operate.

Mary speaks with real estate investor Tim Robinson and investment consultant Danny Cole about the mechanics of turnkey investing, including property acquisition, renovation, leasing, and ongoing management. The discussion focuses on how investors evaluate markets, understand operational structures, and assess potential risks when purchasing property outside their local area.

Topics discussed include:

• What turnkey investing involves
 • How out-of-state investing can be structured
 • The role of property renovation and tenant placement
 • Operational considerations in vertically integrated models
 • Evaluating risk tolerance before purchasing investment property
 • Questions investors should ask when reviewing investment providers
 • Long-term considerations in portfolio management

This episode provides a general overview of how turnkey investment models function and what investors should understand before entering into any real estate transaction.

Tim Robinson is a real estate investor based in the Washington, DC metro area.
Danny Cole works in real estate investment consulting.

Connect with Tim:
http://www.statesideresidential.com
https://thereiconcierge.com/

Connect with Danny:
https://spartaninvest.com
https://go.spartaninvest.com/cole

This episode is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice.

Transcript

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You are going to love this episode on turnkey properties. You've probably never heard of turnkey before, but you're going to really learn a lot from our two guests, both enthusiastic about this level investing. It has really very little upfront costs and can be few risks. So stand by for the conversation with Tim and Danny, and thank you for visiting Real Estate Connections podcast. Welcome to Real Estate Connections podcast, where relationships open doors. I'm Mary Forrester and housing is a universal need. We are often thinking about our existing housing, our future housing, that possibly of family members. This is where you're going to hear the issues and the people who are working the issues every day. Please hit subscribe and like if you find this podcast helpful to you. Thank you. Well, welcome everybody. Today we are going to have a really good time talking about something called turnkey investments. I don't know if you ever heard about turnkey, but today we're going to learn from people who have worked with it and are it in their daily lives. So today I am so happy to have two guests, Danny Coles, Senior Investment Consultant with Spartan Invest LLC in Birmingham, and Tim Robinson, Co-founder of REI concierge, Realtor in the Washington DC area. Just a general investor and has been on our program before. So welcome today, gentlemen. I'm so glad to see you. Thank you, Mary. I'm happy to be here. It's exciting. Yeah, good. We have snow up here, Danny. So we'll send it down to you. We have lots of snow to send you. Please don't. Yes, yes, yes. Keep that in your guard. Yes, yes, yes, sir. So why don't we start by telling our audience what turnkey investment is. Tim, you want to start? Sure. I mean, Danny is the pro. He is the turnkey guy, but I was lucky enough to find him. I don't know, seven, eight years ago now. I mean, I guess the premise behind turnkey and Danny can elaborate on this is kind of ease of use for investors. So Danny can go more into the process, but it's essentially a one stop shop for folks, especially that are investing from out of town or out of country, which is kind of my specialty as folks that are investing from abroad. And I bought several properties with Danny and his outfit from the Netherlands when we lived there for many years. And it was honestly seamless. And that's that's kind of when I fell in love with it. I mean, zooming back a little bit, like I've been an investor for a long time. We moved overseas because my wife's with the State Department. We were living in the Netherlands and I didn't want to get out of real estate investing. But the way I had invested before was I'm a realtor, right? Like I go see the property, I see what work needs to be done. I see the value add play. I run the rental comps. I do all the things, but you obviously can't do that from overseas. And so my partner, Lisa Tolstra, who, you know, co-founded the REI concierge with me, said that she had been investing in turnkey properties. And I said, what is this? And she said, it's like Monopoly. And it kind of is like you you don't do any of the footwork. So you essentially go to someone like Danny and Spartan and say, hey, I've read about Birmingham. You know, I've read about Huntsville. I like the metrics. I know the general gist and the way the city is going. You know, the neighborhoods, you know, the product, you know, the tenant base helped me get a property. And then you kind of just hand over the keys and they do that. Obviously, it's collaborative with you kind of getting to know what you want, your risk tolerance, your budget, you know, like what you're looking to long term and timeline and stuff like that. But then it's very much hands off. And we bought three properties from overseas that I to this day have not seen. And Danny helped me buy them and they're managing it for me. So it's an all in one shop from renovation to purchase to tenant placement and then property management all under one roof. So to the person who's never heard of turnkey and is thinking about investing, we'll come back to who that person typically is. But Danny, you've heard the buyer's perspective, the investor's perspective of your business. How would you describe turnkey? Yeah, Tim, he hit it on the head. It's it truly is that there's so many investors out there that need they've got busy lives, they've got children, they've got soccer, they've got, you know, W2 jobs and maybe they just live out of market. Maybe they live in a market that is very cumbersome to make cash flow work, you know, the landlord friendliness, the taxes, the just overall rent ratio or just the level of entry. You know, you do you try to do the same thing. Let's say everything was even in our market versus L.A. except price. Your diversity or ability to have diversity is very limited at six, seven, eight hundred thousand dollars versus, you know, let's say one hundred fifty thousand, one hundred seventy five thousand, which is a really big sweet spot for us. So there's just so many customers that want that diversity. They want exposure to real estate assets because they believe in them. You know, they truly need diversity. They're not saying like, hey, I'm in blue chip stocks, I'm in some ETFs, I'm like, oh, I'm diversified. They want something that truly is diversity diversified that will be a hedge against inflation and they can get paid on many different levels. And without turnkey, it's just it's for many, it's impossible. So it opens up a door for so many investors just to have the opportunity. And and I love it because my first conversation with our investors, it's about getting to know them. Where are you at? What are you doing? What's your experience with real estate? What do you like? You know, sometimes they tell you the unicorn that they're looking for and other times they're very reasonable in their expectations. So sometimes it's just kind of getting them into the helping them understand what's available, what's realistic. You know, it's not a get rich quick scheme. If anyone, that's the biggest misconception about real estate. They want millionaire status tomorrow. And if you're truly a real estate investor, you're in this for the long haul. You'll have hiccups sometimes no matter where you invest. There are things such as maintenance and vacancies and all that. It's just a matter of staying the long haul, believing in the market, but finding a good partner, looking at their background. So who is a typical investor? Is there a typical investor? Are your investors driving around in jets and arriving in sleek limousines or is it kind of just your average person who doesn't want to be bothered with the day to day control or day to day management of a piece of property that they own? Yeah, absolutely. The jet thing is spot on because I mean, that's how I travel. You know, I translate that into the money. My family's got a vacation to. So it helps me know people. But no, no, no, no. Most most of our investors are mom and pop single investors or individual investors that they're looking for many in many cases, their first home. You know, they they they've never done anything in the real estate sector, right? They they've always been in the stock market or something a little more passive. And and that's the way, unfortunately, so many people look at investing in real estate is like I've got to be Donald Trump to invest in real estate or I have to have this intense understanding of every aspect of real estate to invest. And and nothing could be further from the truth. But the the aid in that is good turnkey companies are out there. And that's where we excel. Again, most of our investors have very busy home lives and they want that exposure. But outside of doing making the investment with return key, they just couldn't. And and other investors, I have many investors that are very active investors. They've got a history of being an active investor. But there's as you know, there's only so much time in a day. Yeah. And there's always a cost to your time. And unfortunately, so many people leave that behind or leave that out of their mindset when they're factoring in decisions. And and as I get older, I think I'm understanding that more and more on a daily basis, you know, because we're not. So one thing we can't get more of. But many of my active investors, they may be active in, let's just say, Indiana, right? And and they need to utilize the funds that they have. But maybe they want diversity in another market. And doing that by themselves would again be next to impossible. So they lean on a good partner. And that's where we come in. So let's go. Let's do the nuts and bolts. I first heard about turnkey from Tim Robinson. And he was overseas and he's going to describe Aria Conseirge. And I thought, well, what is this all about? You know, what is this business model? And when I heard that you buy property site unseen from a company that has largely rehabbed the property so that you're not seeing a lot of capital costs early on in your ownership and then they sell that property to you. Yes. And then they manage that property for you. I thought this answer is one issue for me, which is I'm a lousy landlord. I am such a lousy landlord. You can't make the month's rent. Oh, that's OK. Pay it again. I'm not kidding you. I'm not kidding you. So when I heard about investing, I thought, oh, no, no, I can't do this. So, Danny, tell us what happens. I call you up. I've never done this before. Walk me through what I need to know in order to make a decision. Yeah, first things first, you know, getting to know that investor, what their goals are, why are they doing it? One thing is frustrating about some of the conventions I go to. And that is when you go there, it's this mindset that, you know, everyone's looking to have 100 homes or many multifamily developments. The reality of it is that many investors are looking to cancel out maybe their spouse's income or help pay for their kids' college or maybe go to a basketball game. I work so much that I can't go to my kids' own sports. That's not millionaire status. That's like, hey, give me a little time. How can I get a little time to live my life like I want to live it? And so understanding their goals is paramount to everything. You know, what are you wanting to do? And if that goal is, again, a unicorn, it's like, whoa, pump your brakes, guy. You know, I have sometimes high earning professionals come in and, you know, maybe they've made some frivolous decisions over the last 65 to 70 years. And they're like, hey, Danny, I need you to help me cancel out my income the next five. I'm like, well, there's going to be a big inlay of cash for you. How are you looking? Well, we don't have much. Well, this is a problem. So when you say unicorn, describe what you mean by unicorn. You know, someone comes in and says, hey, I want a, you know, a hundred thousand dollar home. I want it cash flow six, seven hundred dollars a month. You know, the far and wide reaching, you know, big cash flow, little investment. Unreasonable expectations. Yeah. I want to put three percent down. They just sometimes they just don't understand. And that's okay. That's my job to educate. Again, 99 percent is education. But first things, understanding their goals, understanding what their their their needs are. And the next thing is to take them through a day in the life of Spartan. You know, how do we do this all the way from acquisitions to inspections? There has to be with a good turnkey operation. There has to be checks and balances. It doesn't matter if there's a failure in the process or when the failure is. It all comes back to us. Our reputation, the goals that we have for our customers and just being a good steward of your money. So as we go through that process, we will I'll take them through the full checks and balances, the acquisition stage, how we analyze numbers, give them the safeguards regarding our warranties, our lease warranty, which is amazing. You have a year from the onset. Once your property closes a year that we guarantee your rent after if it's not at least within 30 days, we start paying your rent. If you go through an eviction, we pick up that lease warranty. It's just amazing. It's a safeguard, especially for new investors. Give them information about our maintenance warranties, get the information about communication, because again, these are investors in many cases that are very new to investing. And they're like, well, how do I know what's going on? How do I know if there's a maintenance issue, a vacancy or anything? So we have our investor relations team, which are amazing. I call them. I have properties with Spartan myself. And if there's questions, I just ring them or I can, of course, email them. And they're the liaison between you and all things property management. So we have a very vertical integration when it comes to maintenance and communication and communication, all those things that is important to an organization to be able to number one, for that investor to be able to continue to buy and to understand what they're getting and what the next steps are. But number two, for an organization to know where we're going wrong if we are. So there's metrics involved. And every single week on Friday, we have a meeting to discuss, you know, what are our occupancy numbers? What are the move out times? What is our maintenance level? What is the eviction level and all those things? Because they're very relevant to our organization and our industry. But if you don't keep up with those metrics, you may be doing you may do wonderful for a long period of time, but the market will shift. Something will shift. And eventually you'll run into a wall, but you won't know why you won't know how to prevent it. You won't know how to just miss the hurdle, if you will. But so all those things are important. I walk them through that. And then usually the first call is never like, hey, let's get you into this property. We really don't discuss properties. It's not about that. Hey, let me get you some really good information. Help you understand what we're doing. Help you understand the partnership. And then in two weeks, we can have something like that, depending on their urgency. We set up another call and then we dive deep into some sub markets. We dive deep into some neighborhoods and some specific properties and renovations and scopes of work and all that information is shared with them. They have access to pictures. And I call our original pictures when we buy the property on our renovated properties. That is the dumpster fire folder. It's. Yes. The before. The true before. You know, some of them are pretty horrendous, but it's amazing to be able to see that and be transparent show that to a customer and then say, hey, you don't recognize this house anymore. And that means it was fully renovated with pecs pie. And, you know, siding maybe and electrical updates and all those things. But that matters because it's not a band-aid. It can't be it. You know, we know these properties are going to have a third party inspection and they're going to call us out on anything like that. So we want to make sure the property is good or the customer has a good experience and they can have some longevity in that property. So, Tim, you know, you were overseas and recommending turnkey to your clients. Right. And who were typically your clients? Were they overseas also? They were. So, I mean, our clients really run the gamut. And I think that's where I mean, turnkey. Turnkey is kind of like a bridge slash band-aid. You're thinking about that. I'm mixing up my analogies in my head. But I'm trying to like it's a cheat code. Like it's really so I mean, to your question, Mary, we work with folks that read a book. They read Rich Dad, Poor Dad. They read, you know, something and they said, oh, real estate investors sounds cool. Let me talk to Tim and Lisa about how to do it. And we'll teach them soup to nuts, right? Like from the first conversation to buying their first property. We also have folks to Danny's point earlier, you know, hedge fund managers that come to us and make a million. Plus a year and say, hey, look, I'm very heavily in S&P 500. I'm very heavily in crypto. I want to put some in real estate and they'll go buy five, six properties. Right. But know nothing about real estate. Right. We also have a mix. Right. Like surgeons that pay very well that have bought many multifamily properties and now just want like a townhouse. Right. Like there's so we really run the gamut of investors and we can kind of meet them where they are is what we like to say. But I think with turnkey, it's really it's a cheat code. And I think that there's a couple of things I wanted to kind of focus on that Danny can back up. But I really think one thing I love about turnkey is they kind of get I mean, we've all anyone who's been investing those by paralysis, by over analysis. Right. Yeah. And I'm guilty of that. I mean, when I kind of stumbled upon real estate investing very many, many years ago when you and I started talking and I'm pepper questions and I'm reading all the books and listen to the podcast and going to meetups. Run and spreadsheet after spreadsheet after spreadsheet. There is not a perfect property. There's nothing right. Like there are good deals. There are fine deals. There are bad. And what's heartbreaking to me, like I'm passionate about real estate investing has changed my life. I think it's changed a lot of our clients lives. And so when people don't get started because they want to find that 11 percent ROI or that's six point two cap rate and like all these buzzwords that people say you need. You know, that one percent deal that's no longer a thing in America. Right. Like waiting for four percent interest rates. Good luck. All these things that like if then when it are not going to happen. And I fully understand the paralysis that can come from looking at a hundred different properties in one spreadsheet and not getting what you want to see. And so Danny and Spartan and turnkey in general, they're like, hey, look, you don't have to. It's a it's an incitement to action. Right. Like if you can kind of take all that off your plate. And they send you the pro forma and it looks OK to you. It moves you to act. And I think in real estate investing, acting is the most important thing. You can analyze yourself to death and you're never going to do anything. So I think that that's one of the biggest kind of cheat codes in real estate investing. Now, the caveat to that is you have to have a good turnkey operator. Right. I agree. They're real hard to find. I mean, just to be perfectly honest, a lot of folks we worked with six, seven years ago are no longer business and some went down. And some went down in flames because it's very hard to do what Danny and Spartan do. It is an art and to do it at scale and continue to grow and continue to adjust with market conditions is fantastic. And there's a lot of markets where the numbers simply don't work, even if you're an excellent operator in like a D.C. Like I thought about starting exactly. Let me start a DC turnkey. Right. Well, it doesn't work. There's just not enough properties where the numbers work and you can't make numbers work in a market where the numbers don't. So you have to be in the right market. So I think that is something they absolutely excel at. And one reason that I kind of fell in love with turnkey was alignment of interests. I think that is something that is so like one of my biggest questions, especially when investing site site unseen from overseas, is because we also work in markets where we can't find a good turnkey operator for the aforementioned numbers don't work. Right. So we go the more traditional, traditional realtor, property manager, contractor, inspector. So we have all those folks and they kind of work in a collaborative team. But where do the interests align there? And like you can be the most trusting person in the world. But like if I'm a realtor and you come to me from California to buy something in Maryland and I help you buy it, I'm gone. Right. Like I don't I want you to do well, but I also have no responsibility for where my rent numbers. Right. What happens with the tenant? I'm not backing these people up. They have to stand behind what they sell you. And that's something that really clicked with me. It's like, hey, I know nothing about Birmingham, but Danny does. Right. And he's not going to sell me something that they won't manage. Period. So like that house that they buy and renovate, they will have in their ecosystem forever. And so they are responsible for it. Why would they sell me something that's a limit? Right. So I think that that is the one of the biggest keys to me that I really think needs to be shouted from the rooftops. It's like, hey, this isn't just some realtor I found on the Internet that is good and has good reviews because he's not the one managing it. So what if the realtor is not talking to the property manager and the realtor says, this will be twenty two hundred dollars a month. And the property manager is like, that's fourteen. That goes from a deal to a sunk cost disaster. Exactly. Right. So like I love that it's all lined up under Spartan and Atlas roof. Like and I always say like I like to be the one throat to choke. Right. Like if there's a problem coming to me, it's my responsibility. Danny's my throat. Right. Like if anything goes wrong, I'm coming back at Danny. You know what I mean? How are you feeling, Danny? And he's actually a role that has for years. And so like that I just there's cascading failures right in between. And like the more you can bridge that and keep it all under one roof and one responsibility structure, I think that's tremendous. Especially for folks that aren't in country or in market. In market. Well, you know, Tim, it is so true. There is no perfect property. And we all we read these books and it's, you know, we expect it to follow X, Y and Z. And we're going to be money. Money is going to be pouring in until we send Adam to college. Right. And then we'll let me find those properties. Yeah. You have you have found those properties. But it is really true. I was thinking I'm not I'm not a numbers person. I'm a back of the envelope person. Just tell me the back of the envelope. Okay. And I told you guys the other day, I was listening to somebody recently, a turnkey. And I kept thinking, what happens if there's a problem? I just had a feeling, an intuitive feeling. So so listener, this is this is about buying a piece of property with the help of a professional company. Where they assess the the properties worthiness. They bring it to a certain level of, you know, livability. They sell that property to you. You the investor, Carl and me as the investor. And then we have a contract with them to actually rent that property out. And they manage it every single year. So we have never been to Bessamay, Alabama. We we might get there someday. We'll never see that property. However, it has really been a really good experience for us. And and I do encourage you, if you are thinking about expanding, putting something in your portfolio that you do not have to babysit and you do not have to talk to the the renter about. Then then think about doing turnkey. Another area, which is what I wonder if you guys would address, which is, you know, what are people's risk assessment? What is it? What do you recommend? Obviously, some people are really risk averse and are on your phone call every day. I would imagine you don't want that kind of client all the time. How do you handle people's assessment of their their ability to tolerate risk? Yeah, every customer is going to be different. And that is a frustration of mine when I speak to customers and I try to understand what their goals are, etc. Like I mentioned before, they said, well, I spoke to another ex provider and at the onset of the conversation, it was about, well, how much money do you have? Are you prequalified? And, you know, are you ready to go? That's all that matters. Let me stick. We have 30 properties. Let me stick any one of these properties in front of you and that will work. Well, all properties aren't the same. All properties. It's not to say it's bad, but everyone's buy box is different. Everyone's risk. How risk averse they are is going to be different. And so I had a conversation with a customer the other day, actually placed property under contract. And I walked the property. I was there. He's a fantastic property on a fantastic street and she ended up dropping it. And I was like, well, she saw something in the inspection. It was very minor. Well, I talked to her about it. I said, listen, I can, you know, showcase that this isn't a problem. If it is a problem, we can fix it before you close. You'll have an inspection, all these things. Right. I said, but before I do that is, have you already written this property off? Is this scare you? Like, what about this? You know, can we move forward? Because I don't want to sell you this. I never want to sell someone something and they feel like they got something they didn't want at the end of the day. And she told me, she said, yeah, I think I'm a little bit scared of it. I said, that's okay. So let's just drop it. Let's be done with it. I said, I can sell this property. It's a fantastic property. I thought about buying it myself. Right. I said, but I think new construction would be a better fit for you. And that's kind of the whole risk averse thing. Some customers, they just ride a wrong. It doesn't matter. And there's really not a right or wrong answer. I have some customers that only buy new construction and some that only buy renovated homes and some that focus more on cashflow and some that want that, you know, kind of happy medium. You know, it was cashflow and appreciation and an accelerating area. But at the end of the day, I'm not doing myself any favors. If I don't listen to that question, I'm going to be doing it. But I don't want to be doing some favors. I don't listen to that customer and what their fears are because their fears are just as important as their goals. Right. And if their fear is, you know, what if something goes wrong with maintenance? You know, maybe that polished brand new home in that neighborhood that's a bit more cookie cutter is a better fit to that customer. And we provide that and that's what I love about our diversity and the fact that they can get those inspections and the appraisal protects their earnest money. I'm not going to call them and say, "Hey, the deal's going great, but you owe us 20 grand because the appraisal came up shorter. You lose your earnest money." It just doesn't work that way. There are a lot of customers out there that have those big fears because it is kind of scary. Hey, it's a living, breathing home. It's a thousand miles away from where I live. As Tim mentioned, I've never seen this property, as you mentioned, I've never seen this property. It puts a lot of trust in the organization, but that's where I can't shout enough from them at rooftops. The people you're working with, find a good turnkey provider. Ask the difficult questions. What are your metrics? What are you doing to safeguard my investment? What are your checks and balances regarding that process? If they can't answer the questions, are they him and her and oh, and oh, that's a red flag. They need to understand what they're doing. They need to understand their market. Their sub markets, their build quality, what they're putting into the properties, the materials they use. Some things are just as simple as the efficiencies because of economies of scale. They need to understand that if they're doing this as a full service turnkey operation. As far as us passing management, we pass it downstairs. Maggie knows where to find me. It's not a situation that I can walk away and wash my hands of it or our operation can because our reputation is truly on the line. That truly is. That gives some people peace of mind and the warranty's help a lot as well. I don't focus so much on the warranty, like our leasing warranty. As I mentioned before, if we don't rent your property for a renovated home in 30 days, we pay your rent. Now, that's a fantastic warranty at face value. The bigger thing to think about is, is how much skin does that put in the game from Spartan? You want to find a quick way to bankrupt a company? Find out language numbers on a pro forma and then guarantee them. You will be a distant memory in a short period of time. Those are the things I try to focus on to get peace of mind. Unfortunately I have had the stock investor that's the only thing they've ever focused on that I've had the hard conversation with. I don't think real estate, not with us, but I don't think real estate is your game. They want to micromanage every aspect of the deal. This again is a long-term investment. You buy one, you save, you buy another, you save, you buy a third. You're not just getting cashflow, you're getting appreciation and cashflow and tax benefits and the hedge against inflation, et cetera, but it takes time. There's just no silver bullet in this situation. Tim, you are nodding a lot. I can't help it. I think it's having worked with dozens of turnkey providers, of which at least 50% could put, I just can't agree more with what Danny says, just spot on. I think that we, I like your question about risk, Mary. It's just that we frame everything at the RIA concierge through the lens of your why, your how, and your risk. We have documentation and questionnaires that we send all of our clients when they first sign on that's very detailed into your risk because while I'm very analytical, I'm very spreadsheet driven, I've learned over the years, especially as a realtor, that it's not all just logic, right? To Danny's point, is a leaking pipe really caused to dump a house at the 11th hour or what else is going on here? I think that's really important. We don't even talk markets. We don't talk numbers. We talk nothing for the first two calls with our clients until we understand where they're coming from. Why? Why real estate to Danny's point? We might decide after the second call and we will give you your money right back if real estate is not for you. It is not for everyone. If it was for everyone, everyone will be doing it, but they don't. Why real estate? Did your uncle do it in 1970 and you want to give it a shot because you think it's fun? Well, you might need more desire than that. Or is it just because people tell you you're supposed to? I'm in stocks, I'm supposed to be in real estate. Maybe not. It's not as passive as people make a thing. Turkey is about as passive as you can get, but you still got to manage the manager sometimes. And then how do you want to do it? Is it Turkey? Is it with a realtor? Is it multifamily? Is it condos? There's a million. Is it liens? Is it tax and deeds? There's so many ways to invest in real estate. You can really choose your own adventure. And then of course the risk. We have questionnaires about risk. How risk averse are you? How much skin do you want to put in the game? How much are you willing to put down? Does it deflate your risk some if you can put more down and have more of a cushion between your PITI and the income you're receiving from rent? Does that make you feel better? And sometimes you can just see people shoulder job like,"Yeah, that'd be awesome." Well then put 50% down and you're going to do fantastic. There are ways to do this. So I just think that's critical. And I think what Danny's saying, I just, again, back to the alignment of interests. And this is what really sold me on the whole process. And then to the point about vetting turnkey providers. Lisa and I will call these turnkey providers from the Netherlands and just try to get the CEOs on the phone. And we have a handbook that we give to all our clients that says, "Ask these questions." Hundreds of questions. What are your metrics? What's your return? What are all of these things? Because we asked them. And a company's going to be good on the phone. They always are. They were trained to say what they're supposed to say to make you feel better. But what they do in practice has to match that. And I've found that that's very rarely the case. Because I think a big problem, don't let me get on a tangent on this Mary. But I think this has become a big problem in the real estate industry is people just trying to get too big for the britches, as my grandma used to say, especially property management space and the turnkey space. Yes. Oh, that was easy. We crushed it last year. Let's go buy 1200 more houses. Well, no, you don't have the operations to scale that fast. You can't do that. Or property management, Everness, for example. I hope they never become a sponsor of yours. They're just buying up all the mom and pop property managers in the country. And they're not good. They have a tech platform. I can't get someone on the phone for the life of me. I've tried to get Danny to manage my other property in Birmingham for years because Everness, I won't say names, too late. It's already on the air. But these are the things, right? Like it is have pride in your development. Grow at a pace that's sustainable for your clientele. As far as the phenomenology of that. They're huge, but they didn't get there overnight. They add pieces. Let's dip into Chattanooga. Let's dip into Georgia. Let's dip in a new construction slowly and surely once we know what we're doing. And how all these companies blow up is they're like, that was simple. Let's go to Kansas City and let's go to Cincinnati and let's go to Detroit, even though you don't have people in these places. Systems are incredible. It's not all systems. You have to have the people. And if you don't have the people, you're going to collapse. So sorry, this sounded like an ad for Spartan. And it is an ad for Spartan. They're fantastic column. I appreciate that very much. But no, I mean, you can't push a rope. If you don't have people on the ground, you can't sustain that, that quality that you put into another, to another market. And it doesn't matter. Like there are nuances to every market, even localized. And I love the fact that we're pretty condensed within our market. We didn't run off to Texas or run off to Indiana or wherever. Yeah, right. Yeah. Because they're just not the same. Like even Tuscaloosa is close to Tuscaloosa and Birmingham are to one another. There are a little nuances to the market. Huntsville to Birmingham. There are differences, what you can expect the outer markets, just so many little things. And yes, there are things that you can kind of keep going in the home office, but you have to have people on the ground. And as you mentioned, Tim, I, gosh, there's nothing truer than if you grow too fast, it's not the, can we accept your money? Can we collect rent? That's easy. Taking someone's rent. That's a cakewalk. The problem is, is what do you do when you have to turn it over? Do you have the vendors? Do you have the people internally or you vertically integrated enough? Do you have the systems in place to be able to continually turn these properties, do what you need to do, handle maintenance, communication internally, all those things, because buying it on the onset, that that's the least important thing in my mind as an investor and as a Spartan employee. The first week you bought it, congratulations, the high five moment, that doesn't matter. It's the, that's why I call customers in three months and six months and I reach out, hey, how, and I do it blindly on purpose. I'll reach out and be like, how are things going? Because if they do have a problem, I want them to tell me that we have an investor relations team that they can lean on and all those things. But I want to understand how we did and how we can be better and not just ignore the situation and be like, oh, well, I sold it. Because selfishly for me, I want you to have a good experience. You know why? Because if you have a good experience, you go tell your friend or your cousin or whatever, and they come back and it makes my life easier, it makes my job easier, makes Spartan ability to grow easier. But if you have a terrible experience and I stick my head in the sand, you're going to tell everyone you know, and that comes tenfold. So you both are just perfect examples of why I wanted to start this podcast. It is the people and the relationships that make the effort successful. It is Real Estate Connections podcast where relationships open doors, because I really agree with you both. It is who are you trusting, who are you relying on? And is it a company that's getting too big for a Spritches as somebody's grandmother might say, whatever. You guys are both perfect examples of that. I'm going to wrap it up. I asked you to be prepared to give some advice, but I think you just did already. And unless you want to say something else in terms of where to go, I think it would be useful to have another conversation and really kind of focus on the numbers. Help somebody who is more than just curious about turnkey. But if you would be willing, we'll do a follow up conversation where what does it take to get into a market, this kind of market? And what are the distinctions with new versus renovated, etc. Would you guys be willing? Absolutely. Okay, great. Good. Good. Definitely. Any final words, gentlemen? If anyone wants to reach out, I'm more than happy to have a conversation with them to help them understand again, education is 99% of this process. I love the education side. Great. Tim. Likewise, I think Danny and I are both in the business of education. We are both investors at heart. We both started as investors and we both became entrepreneurs in the investor field, right? Like helping other investors do what we're passionate about. So we're not here to sell you anything. We're just here to talk investment and answer any questions that you have. Great. Thank you both very much. It's been a great conversation. Thank you for your patience with the technology and we'll just keep going out there and serving our clients the best we can. So thanks. Thanks, Mary. Thank you, Mary. Thank you so much for joining us today. And I hope you found this conversation useful to you and your real estate goals. You'll find the contact information for our guests in any links they recommend you have in the show notes. And should we be able to help you identify some strong real estate professionals in your area? Give us a note at info at real estate connections podcast.com. Thanks again and bye for now.