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Welcome to this inaugural episode of our series Called to Worship! Co-hosts John Shimp and Pastor Karl Dyrli lay the foundation for this new series with a biblical overview of what worship truly is. They explore the mission of Fellowship Church and of Fellowship's Worship Ministry, helping us see why gathered worship as a local church is not only vital but commanded by God.   In this episode, they address common misconceptions about worship, point us back to the truth of Scripture, and remind us that every believer is called to worship—both individually and as a gathered people for the glory of God.   Start here to be encouraged and equipped to embrace your God-given calling to worship him with your whole heart.   Resources & Links I Am a Church Member: Discovering the Attitude that Makes the Difference by Thom S. Rainer

Title: From Hustle to Holdings: The Smarter Path to Passive Wealth With J. Scott Summary: In this episode of the Passive Income Attorney Podcast, host Seth Bradley discusses the importance of transitioning from active to passive income with guest Jay Scott, a seasoned real estate investor. They explore various investment strategies, the significance of due diligence in syndication, and the differences between house flipping and multifamily investments. Jay shares his journey from tech to real estate, emphasizing the need for teamwork in multifamily projects and the importance of understanding market conditions. The conversation concludes with actionable insights for listeners looking to create financial freedom through passive income. Links to watch and subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V26Rze2S9TM Bullet Point Highlights: Active income is trading time for money, while passive income allows for financial freedom. Investors should focus on the highest and best use of their time. Flipping houses can be tedious and may not be the best use of time for high-income earners. Transitioning to multifamily investments can provide more control and cash flow. Market conditions can significantly impact investment strategies and outcomes. Due diligence is crucial when vetting syndication sponsors and deals. Understanding the underwriting process is essential for passive investors. Building a strong team is vital for success in multifamily investments. Investors should seek to understand the risks associated with their investments. Passive income allows for a lifestyle centered around family and personal interests. Transcript: Seth Bradley (00:10.188) What's going on, law nation? Welcome to the Passive Income Attorney Podcast, your favorite place for learning about the world of alternative passive investments so that you can practice when you want to and not because you have to. Now, if you're ready to kick that billable out of the curb, start by going to attorneybydesign.com to download the Freedom Blueprint, which will also get you access to partner with us on one of our next passive real estate investments. All right, let's talk about   the highest and best use of your time. We've talked about active versus passive income and for good reason, they are completely different. They're on opposite sides of the spectrum. When we talk about active income, we're talking about your job as an attorney, as a doctor or a business owner, where you trade your time in for money out. Depending on your skill set, background, education, work ethic, et cetera,   You know, this could be a great use of your time or it could be a terrible one. But when most people think about getting into real estate investing, they're torn. Should you do a fix and flip like you saw on HGTV? Should you invest in a REIT like your financial advisor and Charles Schwab told you to do? Should you buy a single family rental or invest in a syndication? There are endless options so I can understand why it's so confusing. Well, start with this.   ask yourself, what's the highest and best use of my time? If you're thinking about doing an HGTV fix and flip and your partner at a big law firm, for example, is that flip really the best use of your time? And don't be mistaken, a flip is transactional and it is active. So will you make more per hour on that fix and flip than you would at your job?   After you factor in the learning curve, the deal sourcing, the headaches, what it takes away from your job and everything else, it's not even close. Unless you truly love doing it, which some people do, it just doesn't make sense for high income earners. You should be focusing on transforming the income you earn actively into passive income streams. At different levels on the passive scale, that could very well be a single family rental or an Airbnb.   Seth Bradley (02:34.26) or could be passive investments into commercial syndications. But if you truly want to obtain financial freedom as quickly as possible, don't create more time consuming activities that aren't as fruitful as the active income stream that you already have. Focus on passive investments until you are financially free. And then you will have the freedom to transition or not into any   active activity you have a passion for. Today, we have a very special guest, Mr. Jay Scott of Bigger Pocket fame. Jay is an entrepreneur, investor, advisor, and the co-host of the Bigger Pockets Business Podcast. He has bought, built, rehab, sold, syndicated, and held over $70 million in residential property, and currently owns several hundred units. Jay is the author of four bestselling books on real estate investing,   with sales of over 300,000 copies. Get really excited for this, folks. You're in for a treat.   This is the Passive Income Attorney Podcast, where you'll discover the secrets and strategies of the ultra wealthy on how they build streams of passive income to give them the freedom we all want. Attorney Seth Bradley will help you end the cycle of trading your time for money so you can make money while you sleep. Start living the good life on your own terms. Now, here's your host, Seth Bradley.   Jay Scott, what's going on, brother? Welcome to the show.   Scott (04:09.196) Thanks. Appreciate you having me here Seth.   Absolutely, man. Appreciate you taking the time out of your day, We've got a little bit of history, but let's jump into your history, man. What's your story? Tell us about your background. Take it back as far you'd like to.   Yeah, I'll keep it short because nobody really cares about what I used to do. So I'm a tech guy by education and former trade. I worked in Silicon Valley for a long time, spent about 15 years doing the engineering thing and the product management thing. 2008 decided to get married. My wife and I, she was in the tech world also. We decided to leave and do something different so we could start a family.   focus on our family. Basically, we were both working ridiculous hours and it just wasn't sustainable if we wanted to start a family. So put our jobs in 2008, moved to the East coast, ended up flipping houses. Long, boring story about how that started, just kind of serendipitous. We didn't really plan it, never really considered real estate, but fell into flipping houses. Over the next eight years or so, we flipped about 400, 450 houses, was great. It ended up being the,   next career we were looking for, it gave us the flexibility to kind of raise our kids and never have to miss a soccer game or a piano recital, which was fantastic. But then around 2017-ish really got burned out on flipping houses and that's when I started to look for some new stuff to do. and that kind of leads me into what I've been doing the last few years.   Seth Bradley (05:41.742) That's awesome, man. That's a ton of houses you flip, man. think that that's, know, a lot of the folks who've been in the game for a long time, they've heard you speak on, you know, on bigger pockets and all of that. So, you know, what attracted you originally to house flipping rather than, you know, buy it holds or anything like that?   So I'll be honest, I don't love real estate. I love business. I'm a business guy. like when I was even when I was in the tech world, I got my MBA and I did some business development and I moved from the engineering side to the product side where I could be more involved in the business stuff. And I'm a business guy by heart. And that's what I love doing. So when it came to flipping houses,   For me, was, I could have been buying and selling anything. It ended up being houses. And again, not an exciting story. mean, literally the story was my wife was watching a show on HGTV with some people flipping houses and she said, let's give that a try. Just as kind of like a fun thing to do on the side while we were waiting for our wedding to come up. So it wasn't something that I ever thought about or planned to do. It just kind of happened.   And so if it weren't flipping houses, it would have been buying and selling something else. would have opened a restaurant or I would have opened a retail store or who knows what I would have done. But for me, the challenge was in the business. It wasn't the real estate piece of it. And so I've always enjoyed the scaling part. So yeah, flipping a house is great. Flipping five houses is great. But I always wanted to know, how do I go from flipping five houses to flipping 50 houses in a year? What are the systems and processes I have to put in place?   how do I build that type of business? That to me is what's exciting. And so for me, it's always been about not the real estate part of it, but about the building the business part of it.   Seth Bradley (07:25.248) I love that man. I don't think I've heard anyone just come out and say that, even though a lot of people are probably in the same boat as you that, you know, you don't have to love real estate to recognize that it's a great business. Right. Yeah. So that that's awesome. So tell me a little bit about your, your transition and what you're doing now, your current business, how you kind of progressed from house living to what you're about to tell us about.   Yeah, so 2017, I just got really burned out on flipping houses. It was good to us financially. We got good at it. I wrote a bunch of books on it, but I'll be honest, it was never fun. And as the years went on, it just ended up getting more tedious. I felt like I wasn't learning anything new. It was revising processes and creating new systems. it was fun, but I needed some new challenges.   So 2017, I decided, okay, done with flipping, actually went and started doing some business stuff. So I do some advisory work for some tech companies. I do some angel investing. And so for a few months, I actually considered getting out of real estate altogether, focusing on other business pursuits. But I actually, what I realized was that I didn't like the nuts and bolts of real estate. I liked the mechanics of real estate.   I loved the negotiation piece. I loved the asset management piece. I loved the putting deals together piece and I was good at it. And so while I really didn't wanna be flipping houses, didn't want to be involved in the day-to-day aspects of managing the projects. I enjoyed the deal part of real estate. And so in addition to that, after I stopped flipping, I had all this cash.   And I was like, okay, what am I going to do with this cash? I was using it to flip houses. We were doing 50 houses a year. It's put a lot of cash to work. Now I had all this cash. I'm a control freak. do invest in other people's syndications, but I don't sleep well at night when all my money is being managed by other people. So I said, how do I kind of take back control of my own cash as well as kind of get back into real estate? What can I do in real estate that I would enjoy? And now I can also deploy a bunch of my own cash. And what I realized was multifamily.   Scott (09:38.648) That was a great opportunity. And I had been thinking about multifamily for a long time. But what I realized was from the syndication side of multifamily, could, one, I could have the control. could be a general partner. could control the deal. I could put the deal together. I could manage the deal. But also I could come in on the limited partner side as an investor. And it was a great place to deploy my capital. So I could deploy my capital in deals that I had full control over. So 2017, I decided I wanted to get into multifamily, probably wanted to get into syndication.   I reached out to a friend of mine, Ashley Wilson, who managed a company called Barred Down Investments. She and her husband had started the company a couple of years earlier. They were doing exactly what I wanted to do. And so I reached out to Ashley and I said, hey, I would love to learn multifamily. I don't expect you to like just take all this time and teach me so I can often be your competitor. But here's what I am willing to do if you're willing to do this. I will come work for you for a year.   And in that year, you've got all my time, you've got all my energy, you've got all my knowledge, you've got all my contacts, I'll put money into your deals, whatever it takes. You mentor me for a year, you've got my commitment for a year. After a year, we can figure out if like, there's a place for me on the team or if I'll go off and do my own thing. But basically, let's work together for a year. And she loved that idea. mean, I think she liked the fact that I was really good with the systems and the processes and the operation stuff.   And I obviously loved the fact that I could jump into a team that was high functioning, already owned a lot of properties and was doing deals. So for the next year, I worked with her team. It took about a year and a half before we finally did a deal. But 2020, just before COVID, we started putting together a deal. That deal went really well. Ashley and I realized that we were like, just we made a great team.   We had a bunch of complimentary skills, the things that she was really good at, I wasn't, the things I was really good at, she wasn't, it was just a good partnership. Around the same time, her husband decided that he didn't really want to be doing real estate anymore. He kind of wanted to be a stay at home dad. He liked helping with the business. He ran the underwriting team and he did a lot of the analytics, but he didn't want to be a partner in the business anymore. So about a year and a half ago, Ashley came to me and said, Hey, would you want to join me and be a partner in the business?   Scott (11:57.678) 2020, 2021-ish. Ashley and I joined forces. She and I now run bar down investments and we do value add multifamily all around the country.   That's great man, said you weren't having fun anymore, you having fun now?   I'm having a ton of fun. And I think the big difference between then and now is when you're flipping houses, flipping houses is a very, it's a solitary venture. Yeah, you have contractors around you and you have eight real estate agents and you have closing agents and lots of 1099 people, lots of vendors and people that come in to help you. But at the end of the day, you're running the show. You're doing the four big things that you do when you flip houses.   you're acquisitions or you're running acquisitions, you're doing the rehab or you're running the rehab, you're doing the disposition or managing the disposition and you're raising the money. mean, all four of those things, you don't generally have a big team to do those things because it's just hard to scale a big team when you're flipping houses. The profits aren't there, the margins aren't there. Unless you're doing real high-end houses, the deal size isn't there. But in multifamily, the thing I love about multifamily is it really is a team sport. When you're doing it,   $10 million deal or a $50 million deal, it's not something that I could ever do myself. It's not something anybody or very few people can do themselves. Typically you have to be part of a team because things are very specialized. mean, the acquisitions piece, you need some of the best acquisitions people in the world to be finding deals in this market. The renovation piece to be renovating a 200 or 400 or 600 unit apartment complex, it's not like flipping a house. You need to have really good systems and processes. need to...   Scott (13:36.448) really know the renovation side of things. Managing the property, I mean, you have to know the asset management side. You have to know how to carry out a business plan. You have to know how to increase and reposition rents. You have to know how to decrease expenses and improve the efficiency of the management. And then on the sales side, that's a whole other world where you have to really know the market and be able to work with the brokers and know how to position the company for sale. And then finally, there's that raising funds piece.   And that's a whole world by itself, whether you're dealing with raising debt through a broker and you're going like just typical, like getting loans, or you're going out to private investors or institutions and you're raising equity, people that come in as partners. And I mean, that's a full-time job in itself, those two things. So when you do multifamily, you really need to figure out what are you great at? And then you need to surround yourself with people who are great at everything else. And so that's what I loved about multifamily. It allowed me to focus on what I was really   and then bring in people who are literally the best in the world at all the other stuff. And now it becomes a team sport. It goes from playing tennis to playing basketball. It goes from being yourself reliant and you have to do everything and be the best versus you have to be able to put together the best team and manage that team in a way that not only is everybody fantastic, but working together, they're better than the sum of their parts.   Yeah, yeah, that's fantastic, man. The whole team game part of multifamily and commercial real estate. It's really interesting because when you get into other businesses, it feels more competitive and kind of like if you if you have the secret sauce, you keep it close to your vest. You don't you don't tell everybody about it. Whereas when you're in this commercial real estate world, everybody's sharing ideas. Everybody's trying to partner. Everybody's trying to see how they can help you rather than just looking about, well, how can you help me kind of?   I call it, I'm gonna get in trouble here, but the Hollywood mentality where it's like, what can you do for me? Oh, you just drive a three series, you probably can't help me. So it's a different attitude.   Scott (15:41.294) Absolutely. I like to refer to it as co-op petition. It's like there are deals that you're going to do with other people and then there deals you're going to do yourself and you may come back to those people later. You may never come back to them, but everybody kind of looks out for each other because you never know when you may end up in a deal with somebody that previously you were competing against. And so anytime that you're not in a deal with somebody, you're still treating them as if, the next deal we could end up being partners. And the deal after that, we could end up being partners.   because it really is, it's a small industry, everybody knows each other. we really, again, going back to the sum of the parts is greater than the parts themselves. mean, working together, we can really do a whole lot more than if we just are purely competitive and try and take each other down.   Yeah, absolutely. And I think kind of going back, there's a lesson to be learned about how you were transitioning from house flipping and you were the best at it. And then you're like, okay, I want to go into multifamily and a syndication. You went and you sought out someone that was already in the game that knew what they were doing, that had the experience. And you said, what can I do to help you? What value can I bring to you to help you so you can teach me what you've done? And there's a lot of value to be found in that lesson for folks that are trying to   you know, get into the active side. A lot of listeners out there are passive investors already and they're, you know, maybe thinking about, maybe I want to do in the active side. And they're like, well, what can I do? Cause a lot of attorneys, especially in doctors and folks like that, they think they have this one track mind. They're only trained to do one thing. And they're like, what value can I provide as somebody else? But there are a lot of skills that you've learned in your W2 profession that you can apply to help other folks that are already in the industry.   Absolutely. I mean, I talk about it a lot, but even outside of real estate, I do a lot of advisory work and I'm still pretty active in the tech world. And I find companies that kind of bridge that gap between technology and real estate. all know about the Zillows and the Airbnb type companies. There are a lot of startup companies in that space too called property technology type companies. so...   Scott (17:46.998) I love to use my experience, my knowledge, my relationships to go into those companies and help them grow their companies. In return, I'm not an employee. I'm not even a 1099 contractor. In return, I'm getting equity so that if I can help make them successful, ultimately my equity is gonna be worth something. I'm gonna be successful as well. And so what I like to tell everybody like figure out what you're good at and then figure out who needs that expertise.   and then figure out how you can offer that expertise in a way that isn't trading necessarily hours for dollars. Figure out how you can trade your expertise, your knowledge, your Rolodex, your whatever it is for equity or potentially passive income so that you can grow potentially many fold as opposed to I charge $200 an hour or $300 an hour. mean, everybody loves $300 an hour, but the minute you stop working, you stop making that money. But if you can get equity, that equity can work for you for a while.   Yeah, absolutely. And it's tough for a lot of the WTs out there listening, they're highly paid professionals. It's tough to get off of that treadmill. For some folks it's easier because they're not making as much money, but for the lawyers, the doctors out there that are making a good amount of money in their profession, it's tough to try to see, you know, to stop trading time for money. But you've got to kind of see through the weeds there.   Yeah, well, what I tell people is, there's two types of income. There's your active income. That's the stuff that you're trading your time for, whether you're a doctor or a lawyer or an engineer or you're a house flipper or you're a consultant or you're a small business owner, whatever it is, that thing that when you stop working, you stop making money. And then there's a passive income. It's the thing you trade money for money. So you put your money out there and hopefully it continues to come back to you for the rest of your life or at least the next several years.   And so what I like to tell people is don't think about those the same. Those are completely different. figure out for your active income, figure out what the highest and best use of your time is. If you're gonna make more money as an attorney than you are flipping houses, don't flip houses just because you eventually want to retire on real estate. You can always use real estate for the passive side of things, but if you're gonna make more dollars per hour as an attorney or a doctor or a consultant, then do that because you wanna get out of that active income as quickly as possible.   Scott (20:05.9) And the way you do that is you make as much as you can and you move it over to the passive side. So focus on whatever it is that's generating the most dollars per hour for a shorter period of time so that you can then start moving that money over to the passive side and start building up the passive side. don't, people ask me all the time, should I flip houses or should I buy rentals? And I'm constantly telling them that's not the right question. Flipping houses is your active income. Compare that to all the other.   potential active incomes you can have. And rentals is passive income. Compare that to all the other passive investments you can make. And so don't say flipping houses or rentals say, should I be flipping houses or should I be an attorney? And don't say, I be flipping houses or rentals say, should I be doing rentals or should I be investing in syndications or dividend generating stocks or something else? And think of them very differently. then secondly,   Make sure as much of that active income as you can, move it over the passive side so that you can start that snowball rolling. I compound interest is the key to financial freedom. And the sooner you can put more money to work, the faster it'll compound and the sooner you can start to live on.   Yeah, I love that man. mean, lot of folks, you know, calls that I take, they're like, hey, they're attorneys. Should I quit my job or how do I quit my job? I'm like, if you want to quit your job, don't be hasty about it. First of all, you're probably making a good amount of money in your active income. You just need to figure out a way to transition that active to passive income and don't just quit your job. It's very difficult to flip houses, to do an HGTV fix and flip while you're working at a big law firm or something like that full time.   I tried to do it, I didn't do it very well. You're not even gonna make it nearly as much money as you would as a doctor, as an attorney, unless you get to level like you did, Jay, but that takes time and that takes a buildup of accumulation of skills and money to be able to get to that level.   Scott (22:05.826) Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, it's a math equation. mean, your passive income or your ability to build up enough income to be able to retire, whatever your number is, is based on how much can you put in per month into that wheel, that passive income growth machine? How much are you generating every year on what you're putting in? So what do your returns look like? And three, how long do you have to compound it?   And so everybody can go out into a compound interest calculator and say, okay, I have $5,000 a month that I can invest passively and I can return 12 % per year and I need $6 million to retire. Well, based on those three numbers, you can now figure out that fourth variable, is how long is it going to take? And so figure out how much do you have per month to put in? What's the rate of return you can generate and how much do you need? And that'll tell you how long it's going to take or   figure out how much you have to put in, how much your return is gonna be and how long you wanna spend. And that'll tell you how much you'll end up with at the end, either way you wanna look at it. But again, it's a pretty simple math equation, but too many people don't actually do that equation where they don't think about it until too late and they think, I wish I would have taken that $5,000 a month that I was spending on my second home in the Bahamas and put that into real estate so that I could have been.   compounding it and so now I could buy that home for cash five years or 10 years later.   Absolutely. Attorneys hate math, but I think they can handle that little equation. I want to take a step back for a minute because you got into house flipping in 2008, which is kind of like around the big crash. And now we're kind of at the height of a market. We don't know where that height is going to end, but we're definitely in it. Right. So can you maybe compare and contrast getting into, let's say,   Seth Bradley (24:01.652) one real estate venture in the middle of a crash compared to getting into another venture kind of towards, towards the upswing.   Yeah, so it's one of the reasons I like multifamily and I like commercial and I like syndication. Anytime you're doing purely transactional deals, buying something and then selling it, not generating any cashflow in between, you run a risk. If the market turns in the middle of the transaction, you're gonna lose money and you don't have a lot of ways to mitigate that risk.   Whereas if you're buying something like an apartment complex, or even if you're buying a rental property, or you're buying a self-storage complex, or you're buying anything that cash flows, the nice thing is if the market turns, you may not be in a great position. You may not be thrilled with what's happening with the value of your assets, but if you're still generating cash flow, you can weather that storm. Maybe it's gonna take, the average recession lasts about 18 months. And so if you can make enough income that you can keep yourself afloat for 18 months, or maybe   it's a horrible recession and it lasts three or four years. If you're still making income and you can keep yourself afloat for three or four years, the market's gonna come back. And so when we do our multifamily deals, yeah, we typically say we're planning to hold three to five years, but we also do all the underwriting to ensure that if we have to hold for six years or eight years or even nine or 10 years, that the numbers still work because.   Again, who knows what's gonna happen three years down the road, we could have a major recession that lasts four years and now we're seven years down the road. I wanna know that my multifamily investments in seven years, they're probably gonna be producing more cashflow. We're probably gonna see more growth in terms of population. We're probably gonna see more growth in terms of employment. Hopefully we're gonna see more wage growth once we come out of that recession. So all the economic indicators that kind of lead towards value growth in multifamily,   Scott (25:58.486) are going to happen over those seven years if I can just get my property seven years and not lose it. With a flip, well, I'm not generating any income. So if the bank calls the loan due or if my two-year loan comes due and I can't refinance, I'm screwed. But in a multifamily, I just waited an extra couple of years and I'm probably in a better position than I was anyway. So that's one of the reasons I love multifamily because we can't predict   what the economy is gonna do in the next couple of years. But I do know that whatever the economy does, it's probably gonna come back in the next five or 10, and I'm still gonna have the problem.   Yeah, yeah, that's great. That kind of rolls into this next question. How does a passive investor that's kind of vetting a sponsor, how do they check kind of the boxes to see if their sponsors are taking the extra measures to look into those risks that you just mentioned, to mitigating those risks, to taking those risks into account in their underwriting and things like that. How can they best vet the sponsor to make sure that they're thinking of those things?   So I invest in a lot of other people's syndications as well as my own. And so when I do that, I kind of look at five areas for due diligence anytime I invest in a syndication. Number one is the team. And that's probably the most important thing. For a lot of people, I have been pleasantly surprised that a lot of our investors have recognized that team is the most important aspect of the deal. I know in the flipping world, everybody was concerned about the deal. Nobody cared about   what was my experience, but in the multifamily world, a lot of investors recognize that the team has to be great. So number one is the team. Number two is location. Location is often overlooked, but at the end of the day, the thing that's gonna drive value for multifamily and for commercial real estate in general is gonna be population growth. So you want more people coming into an area, employment growth. So you want more employers coming into an area that will bring more people in. You want wage growth because that will ultimately drive rents up.   Scott (28:06.082) and you want employment diversity. You wanna know that if one industry takes a big hit, so for example, we invest in Houston, but we won't invest in the energy corridor of Houston because it's so reliant on oil and gas, that if the oil and gas industry took a big hit, the real estate around there would probably take a big hit. So we wanna see that there's good employment diversity. But at the end of the day, location is that next big thing. So team, location, number three is the deal itself.   So you need to know that the deal is gonna stand on its own. I wanna know that if I took a deal and I handed it to pretty much any other indicator, they couldn't mess it up too badly. Obviously, again, we're gonna go back to the team is super important, but I want the deal also to stand on its own. And I wanna know that the business plan for the deal, the hold period, the numbers and the underwriting, the pro forma for the property makes sense. So team location deal.   Number four is the returns. So obviously when I invest with somebody, I'm in it for the money. And so I wanna see that the returns are commensurate with the risk. I wanna know that the returns, if somebody tells me I'm gonna get 10 % returns in this deal versus 20 % returns in another deal, I wanna know, well, why am gonna settle for lower returns? I want the answer to be because it's a lot lower risk or because you're gonna get your money back a lot sooner, which is gonna allow you to compound it or whatever the answer is.   I want to know that the returns make sense given everything else. And then finally is the risks. At the end of the day, I'm always going to sit down with the syndicator and I'm going to say, what are you most concerned about here? Like where, if I'm going to lose money on this deal, where am I most likely going to lose money? They say, there's no shot of losing money. walk away because we all know every deal has risks and every syndicator knows what those risks are. And they're thinking about those risks. I just want them to tell me.   So if I'm gonna lose money on this deal, where am I most likely? Why am I most likely to lose money if I'm going to lose money? So those are the five things that I look for. Talking about each individually a little bit more. the team, I like to know that one, I wanna see how many deals the team has done together because again, like a basketball team, you can put the best basketball players in the world together. And if they've never played on the court together,   Scott (30:31.672) they're not gonna be necessarily the best team out there. You can find another team with five inferior players who have been playing together for 20 years and they're probably gonna be better because they know each other better. So I like to see teams that have worked together for a while. I like to see teams that have gone full cycle in deals. So it's easy to buy 10,000 units. It's hard to buy 10,000 units and also sell 10,000 units for a profit. So I wanna see that if a team has bought a lot of deals, they've at least sold some for a profit.   I wanna see a team that's putting their own money in the deals. So I want people that have skin in the game. If they don't have skin in the game, and I've seen plenty of syndicators that don't like to put money in the deals, well, they need to sweeten the pot for me somehow. So maybe they're saying, we're not gonna take any profits until at least year three, or we're gonna give you a better preferred return, a better split than you would get if we were putting money in the deal. I wanna know if you're not putting money in.   that you're at least giving me something that aligns our interests and ensures that you're gonna be working hard even though you might not have as much financial risk. So those are the types of things I like to see in the team. I like to see things like at least one or two people working full-time. If everybody's part-time, that's kind of a little bit scary. Obviously not everybody has to be full-time because there are a lot of jobs on a GP team that aren't full-time jobs. There are a lot of jobs that might stop the day you purchase the property. Like the person that's raising money, job's   pretty much done other than communicating status when the property's been purchased. But I do want to know that whoever's managing the asset is doing it full time. So that's kind of the team stuff. Location, again, population growth, employment growth, wage growth, and employment diversity. So those are the four big things I look for. Next is the business plan. So I want to see the biggest question when somebody goes in and...   does what I do, which is a value add multifamily. Basically they buy it, they raise the value of the property and then they sell it for a big profit. Where is that profit coming from? Generally the profits coming from raising the rents. There's also some lowering the expenses, but at the end of the day, raising the rents is kind of the big thing that's gonna generate the big profits in multifamily. And so I wanna know how are you raising the rents? And two, when you tell me that you're raising the rents from X to Y, where is Y coming from?   Scott (32:55.182) Show me the comps that tell me that why is a reasonable new rent, market rent for this property after you've done the renovation. So I wanna see the comps. So that's kind of the deal. The returns speaks for themselves. I wanna see like the structure of the deal. So when's the money coming back to me? Is it paid monthly? Is it paid quarterly? What are the returns look like? What's the preferred return? So is it a low preferred return, which means   that the syndicators are getting paid sooner, whereas at a higher preferred return, which means the syndicators have to do more for me before they take anything home. So that speaks for themselves. And then for the risks, I wanna know both the catastrophic risks. So what's the thing that's like going to make me lose all my money? Is there something out there that can cause me to lose all my money? Hopefully the answer is no, but there are probably some risks that are bigger than others. So we do a lot of deals in Houston. If somebody were to say to me, what's the biggest risk on your deals?   The answer is generally going to be weather. If we have a really bad hurricane, if we're in a flood zone, we probably have flood insurance and we have hurricane insurance. But if it's in a place that's never experienced the negative impacts of a flood or a hurricane, and we are not required to have flood insurance, but there's still a massive hurricane that wipes out that property, that's not going to be good. We're going to have to pay for that ourselves. So what's our mitigation there? We don't have a great one. Luckily.   the risk is really low. We don't buy in areas where there is that risk. And if there is, we're gonna get flood insurance. But I do want my investors to know that no matter where you invest, whether it's a risk and especially in Houston, if we see a storm bigger than anything we've seen the last 50 years, some of our properties could be at risk. And then there are the smaller risks. So maybe there's five other complexes being renovated all around us. Maybe there's class A, brand new class A being developed.   all around us. So basically our absorption of units is going to slow down because there's so many more units. Maybe there's one big employer in the area. Amazon just built a warehouse that's employing 8,000 people. Well, what happens if Amazon has a bad year and has to lay off 4,000 of those people? How's that going to affect us? So, so risks is the next thing. And the way I approach it is I literally sit down with the, with the syndicator and say,   Scott (35:15.554) What keeps you up at night? What are the biggest things you're concerned about? And so those are the things that I do. I have no problem basically saying to a syndicator, I need 15 or 30 minutes of your time to ask these questions. Typically the good ones will either find the times themselves or have somebody on their team that will sit down and answer these questions. If they're not willing to answer those questions, well, that's probably a good indication that that's not a good team.   Yeah. For our listeners out there, that breakdown was incredible. Rewind that, listen to those five items again. That's a quick, but thorough and awesome rundown of what you need to do. Just as at least the starting points for your due diligence. And that's, that's great that you said if they won't book a call with you either themselves or an investor relations person on their team, then it's time to, you can just walk away and look at the next, look at the next deal. One question I had on the deal.   So a lot of folks, it's kind of overwhelming to see an underwriting model or something like that. And being a passive investor, I don't know how much you even want to dive into it. Some people do, some people want to nerd out on it. Most people don't. And we don't generally have access to the T12 or the rent roll or anything like that. What are maybe some quick tips on how to maybe proof through that pro forma to make sure that the assumptions are reasonable and the pro forma is generally   a reasonable prediction of what we might expect from that investment.   Well, let me start, me take a step back before I answer that particular question and just say that even for you and me, mean, you know how to do an underwriting, I know how to do an underwriting. If you or I were gonna invest in somebody's deal, Joe Smith's deal, we're probably not gonna have enough information even though we know this business really well and we know the underwriting models really well, we're probably not gonna have enough information.   Scott (37:08.908) that we're going to be able to know for certain that Joe Smith's not trying to scam us out of money. So if Joe Smith is really smart and he could probably put together an underwriting that could fool us because we're just not gonna be putting in as many dozens of hours underwriting as he and his team are. So the number one thing I would say is make sure you trust your syndicate. This goes back to why team is so important.   because there's two types of things that Joe Smith can do. One, he could do a bad job of underwriting and come up with bad numbers. That's not good, but that's not nearly as bad as Joe Smith wanting to scam us out of money. So number one is make sure Joe Smith's not the kind of guy who wants to scam us out of money. And so work with people who are reputable. And that's why I would invest with you before I would invest with 95 % of syndicators out there because you're an attorney, you passed the bar.   you know that if you go and somebody finds out that you're trying to scam somebody, well, you're putting your entire career at risk. And so what I tell people is, so what do you have that really proves that this person is on the up and up? And maybe it's a track record. Maybe it's 10 or 15 years of doing deals. Maybe it's, I like to think with me, I've been doing this business for 15 years. I've done thousands of deals with hundreds or thousands of people.   And if you go out on the internet, nobody's gonna, you're not gonna find anything that's written negatively about me. So that's a good sign. But make sure that there's something out there that gives you faith in that syndicator, even if it's just somebody else that's invested in a couple of deals with them. So that's number one. So that's the way to rule out that catastrophic, they're trying to scam you risk. Then there's the more likely, what if they just didn't do a good job of underwriting risk?   And so for that, would say for people that have very little knowledge of how the underwriting works and how the numbers work, it can be really difficult. And so what I like to do is, or what I recommend people do is sit down and ask to do a Zoom call for 15 minutes with the investor relations person and say, hey, will you kind of walk me through the high level underwriting? And at least force them to go through and then just ask questions.   Scott (39:30.958) when they say something, even if you have no idea what you're talking about and they say, well, it looks like we're gonna be able to reduce expenses by implementing a rub system, blah, blah, blah. Oh, okay, well, what is rubs and how does that work? And at least make them explain it to you. At least then you'll get an idea that they're not making it up as they're going along, or at least you'll get that confidence that it sounds like they know what they're talking about. But the biggest thing that I would say is that whole comps thing.   And this is a question that a lot of people don't like to ask. But I actually, and when people ask me this question, it always makes me nervous because it's the hardest part of the business, but it impresses me when people do. to the underwriting or the investor relations person, what are the comps that you used for your post renovation market rents? So again, the thing that drives values in multifamily is after the renovation is completed, in theory, you should be able to bring your rents up higher.   and your rents, those higher rents, you should be able to figure out what they are by looking at other units that have already been renovated and seeing what their rents are. So if I buy one, two, three Main Street, and I know I'm going to put $8 million into it, well, now that property is going to comp out to 678 Main Street. And well, what are the rents at 678 Main Street? And so by asking, hey, so you're buying one, two, three Main Street, what are the comps for the rents after you renovate?   and they tell you, it's going to be 678 Main Street and 123 Smith Street, whatever it is, you can then go look up those properties and say, okay, well, it looks like a two bedroom at those properties is renting for 1200. Now I go back to the investor relations person or whatever information they gave me I see, oh, okay, after renovation, they have their rents at 1200. Makes sense. If that's a reasonable comp, they now have the rents at kind of where they should be.   If he says that six, seven, eight main streets, a comp, and you go look in a two bedroom at six, seven, eight main streets, 1200, but their underwriting tells you that after they do the renovation, they're going to be charging 1500. Well, why are you now $300 above this property that you said was a comp? And so that to me is kind of the first thing that I look at or the biggest thing I look at is what are the comps that they're using and does just a kind of first pass.   Scott (41:57.762) jumping on apartments.com or calling the complex and asking them what different things rent for. Does that coincide with what they're telling you their post renovation rents are gonna   Yeah, I love that man. I mean, it's not as simple as just going into an old dilapidated apartment building and saying, I'm to put granite countertops and hardwood flooring and stainless steel appliances in there. And then I'm going to triple the rent or double the rent. It's not that easy. If it's not in the right area that could support those, those market rents or that have potential tenants that want those types of things, it doesn't work. So that's why that's so important to check those comps to see what's around those apartments that you're going to be investing in to see if, they can achieve those.   those proforma rents. All right, man, before we jump into the freedom four, what's one last gold nugget for our listeners?   Absolutely.   Scott (42:45.634) Yeah, so again, what I would tell people is figure out your highest and best use on your active side. And then for the passive side, figure out how you're gonna scale. And I know a lot of people like to invest in a whole lot of different things, but I'm a big fan of doing some work so that you don't have to diversify as much. Diversification is great, but diversification,   is for people who aren't really an expert in anything. If you want to get your best returns, the way to get your highest level of returns is not to have to diversify. And the best way not to have to diversify is to get knowledgeable about whatever you're investing in. So if you decide you wanna invest in all your syndications, just cause that's what you and I do. So it's an easy example. If you want to invest in syndications and that's how you wanna grow your nest egg, my recommendation is,   get as much information about syndications as you can. Pick up a good book on syndications. Go find somebody that does syndications and say, hey, I'd to pay you a thousand bucks for five hours of your time. Or you just to walk me through what a typical deal looks like or what the underwriting looks like. Or go sit in on a hundred multifamily syndication investor videos, presentations. So you can see all the different things they're talking about and become as much of an expert there as you can. So that way you're reducing your risk without having to do a lot of the.   diversification. So focus on whatever your highest and best use of time is on your active income and then become as knowledgeable as you can for whatever you're investing in passively. What I like to say on the passive side is it's not truly passive. Nothing's truly passive. But the best investments are the one where all the work is done upfront. You do your due diligence and then it becomes passive.   Yeah, that's awesome, man. And then what you can do though is diversify within that strategy, right? Absolutely. Yeah, different asset types can have different business strategy, value add, or maybe you're dealing with just a class A where you're chasing yield or across different cities, different geographies, or across different sponsorship teams. There's other ways to diversify within that same type of investment strategy. Yep. All right, man, let's jump into the Freedom 4.   Scott (45:05.598) It's time for the Freedom Four.   What's the best thing you do to keep your mind and body healthy?   So for me, it's admitting when I need a break. I know so many people that it's a badge of honor to work 80 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, never take a vacation. I'm just the opposite. If I wake up one morning and I'm tired and I don't feel like working and I don't feel like I'm gonna be productive, I will grab a book. I might even turn on the TV. I might say to my wife, hey, let's go to breakfast or let's go spend the day, let's go to a movie.   And I have no qualms with just saying, I need a break today. Today's not gonna be a productive day. I don't need to pretend to work just so I can have that badge of honor that I work hard. And so, yeah, and that's one of the nice things about real estate. mean, I don't have a hundred percent flexible work-life balance. I can't do anything I want any time I want, but if I wanna take a couple hours off, I normally can. And so I'm not scared to do that.   Yeah, yeah, that's a great answer. With all your success, what is one limiting belief that you've crushed along the way and how did you get past it?   Scott (46:15.734) Yeah, I still have a lot of them. I think we all do. But I'd say the biggest one is that doing a big deal is not that much harder than doing a little deal. I'm not going to say a hundred million dollar deal is just as easy as a hundred thousand dollar deal. But if you're smart enough to do a hundred thousand dollar deal, you're smart enough to do a hundred million dollar deal. And the people that are out there doing those hundred million dollar deals, mean, we have, we now have a hundred million dollars assets under management.   I remember a couple of years ago, looking at the people that had nine figures under management and thinking, they're different. I can't do that. These are people, went to some school that I will never go to, or they were born into something that I was never born into, or they know people I don't know, or whatever it is. No, they're normal people. And the only difference between them and me was I wasn't thinking big enough.   and I wasn't willing to take some risks and I wasn't willing to acknowledge the fact that doing again, a hundred million dollar deal is certainly within my capabilities. So that to me has been probably the biggest one and it's made it a lot easier for me now to say, okay, $50 million deal, let's go do it, not think twice.   Yeah. I had a similar experience working in, in, big law, doing house flips, doing single family rentals, things like that. And even though my clients are doing 50, a hundred million dollar deals and I'm helping them close those deals, it was just like the mindset shift that, a minute, I can do those deals too. I'm actually giving them advice on how to, how to do this thing. I need to step up my game and, and, take some.   Exactly, it's the difference between people doing a hundred million, a hundred thousand, it's all mindset.   Seth Bradley (48:00.866) Yep, absolutely. What's one actual step our listeners can do right now to start creating more freedom.   take action. So the biggest thing that I see stopping people is just this fear to take the first step. And I know this doesn't apply to a lot of your listeners, but I talked to a lot of people who want to get into house flipping or they want to get into rentals and they've been thinking about it for years and they just never take that first step and then they end up giving up. One of the the few truisms I see in this business   is that there are two types of people I meet. Number one, I meet people that have never done a deal. They've done zero deals. And maybe they're still working on it. Maybe they've given up whatever it is, but they've done zero deals. And then the other type of people I meet in this business are people that have done a lot of deals. They've done five or 10 or 20 or 50 deals. There's one type of person I never ever meet in this business. And that's somebody that's done one deal. Because if you get that one deal, you're gonna get the second and the third and the fifth and the tenth.   Nobody does one deal and then says, okay, that's it, I'm done. can't do this. So what I like to tell people is, and that applies to a lot of things in life. If you can get over the hump and do it once, you're gonna get that snowball effect and it gets easier the second time. It gets even easier the third, it gets even easier the hundred. So don't give up until you achieve that first step or that first iteration of whatever it is you wanna achieve because that's gonna get that snowball rolling.   Yeah. Yeah. We preach that on their show all the time. Just like, you know, just do a deal, just invest in a deal so you can get that experience and it'll just kind of open up your mind to other opportunities. You'll just see opportunity all around you. Once you just do one deal last but not least, how it's passive income made your life better.   Scott (49:51.886) Passive income has given me the ability and the confidence to raise a family. Before this, my biggest concern with raising a family was I didn't want to be, I had, my parents were great, but my parents were always working. And I didn't want to be the same type of father that my parents were. Again, they were fantastic, but I wanted to always be there. I wanted to be at every soccer game, every piano recital.   I wanted to be able to go into school for the parent-teacher conferences. so passive income has really given me the ability to build my life around my family as opposed to building my life around   Love that, love that. It's been fantastic, brother. We're gonna listen and find out more about you.   Yeah, anybody wants to get more info, go to www.connectwithjscott, just letter J, Scott, connectwithjscott.com, and that'll link you out to everything you might wanna find.   Awesome man. Talk soon.   Scott (50:54.945) Awesome. Thanks,   All right, Mr. Jay Scott from Master House Flipper to multifamily syndicator. He's a master of creating profitable, well-oiled business machines. I've been reading Jay's bigger pockets books for years and it's awesome to have the opportunity to have him on the show today. Major key, focus. Focus on transitioning your active income to passive income and don't get distracted. All right, if you're ready for a change, you're ready to take action.   partner with us on one of our next passive real estate deals. Go to passiveincomeattorney.com and join our Esquire Passive Investor Club. All right, kiddos, as always, enjoy the journey.   Thank you for listening to the Passive Income Attorney Podcast with Seth Bradley. Do you want more ideas on how to generate multiple streams of passive income? Then jump over to passiveincomeattorney.com for show notes and resources. Then apply for the private Facebook community by searching for the Passive Income Attorney on Facebook. And we'll see you on the next episode.   Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en J. Scott's Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jscottinvestor/ https://www.instagram.com/jscottinvestor/ https://x.com/jscottinvestor https://linktr.ee/jscottinvestor

Matt Forbeck is all that and so much more. He grew up in Wisconsin as what he describes as a wimpy kid, too short and not overly healthy. He took to gaming at a pretty early age and has grown to be a game creator, author and award-winning storyteller.   Matt has been designing games now for over 35 years. He tells us how he believes that many of the most successful games today have stories to tell, and he loves to create some of the most successful ones. What I find most intriguing about Matt is that he clearly is absolutely totally happy in his work. For most of Matt's career he has worked for himself and continues today to be an independent freelancer.   Matt and his wife have five children, including a set of quadruplets. The quadruplets are 23 and Matt's oldest son is 28 and is following in his father's footsteps.   During our conversation we touch on interesting topics such as trust and work ethics. I know you will find this episode stimulating and worth listening to more than once.     About the Guest:   Matt Forbeck is an award-winning and New York Times-bestselling author and game designer of over thirty-five novels and countless other books and games. His projects have won a Peabody Award, a Scribe Award, and numerous ENnies and Origins Awards. He is also the president of the Diana Jones Award Foundation, which celebrates excellence in gaming.    Matt has made a living full-time on games and fiction since 1989, when he graduated from the Residential College at the University of Michigan with a degree in Creative Writing. With the exception of a four-year stint as the president of Pinnacle Entertainment Group and a year and a half as the director of the adventure games division of Human Head Studios, he has spent his career as an independent freelancer.   Matt has designed collectible card games, roleplaying games, miniatures games, board games, interactive fiction, interactive audiobooks, games for museum installations, and logic systems for toys. He has directed voiceover work and written short fiction, comic books, novels, screenplays, and video game scripts and stories. His work has been translated into at least 15 languages.   His latest work includes the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Core Rulebook, the Spider-Verse Expansion, Monster Academy (novels and board game), the Shotguns & Sorcery 5E Sourcebook based on his novels, and the Minecraft: Roll for Adventure game books. He is the father of five, including a set of quadruplets. He lives in Beloit, Wisconsin, with his wife and a rotating cast of college-age children. For more about him and his work, visit Forbeck.com.   Ways to connect with Matt:   Twitter: https://twitter.com/mforbeck Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/forbeck Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/forbeck.com Threads: https://www.threads.net/@mforbeck Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mforbeck/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/forbeck/ Website: https://www.forbeck.com/     About the Host:   Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!   Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast   If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset .   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review   Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.       Transcription Notes:   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of unstoppable mindset today. We get to play games. Well, not really, but we'll try. Our guest is Matt Forbeck, who is an award winning author. He is a game designer and all sorts of other kinds of things that I'm sure he's going to tell us about, and we actually just before we started the the episode, we were talking about how one might explore making more games accessible for blind and persons with other disabilities. It's, it's a challenge, and there, there are a lot of tricks. But anyway, Matt, I want to welcome you to unstoppable mindset. We're glad you're here.   Matt Forbeck ** 02:02 Well, thank you, Michael for inviting me and having me on. I appreciate it.   Speaker 1 ** 02:06 I think we're going to have a lot of fun, and I think it'll work out really well. I'm I am sure of that. So why don't we start just out of curiosity, why don't you tell us kind of about the early Matt, growing up?   Matt Forbeck ** 02:18 Uh, well, I grew up. I was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I grew up in a little town called Beloit, Wisconsin, which actually live in now, despite having moved away for 13 years at one point, and I had terrible asthma, I was a sick and short kid, and with the advent of medication, I finally started to be healthy when I was around nine, and Part of that, I started getting into playing games, right? Because when you're sick, you do a lot of sitting around rather than running around. So I did a lot of reading and playing games and things like that. I happen to grow up in the part of the world where Dungeons and Dragons was invented, which is in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, about 30 miles from where I live. And because of that I was I started going to conventions and playing games and such, when I was about 12 or 13 years old. I started doing it when I was a little bit older. I started doing it professionally, and started doing it when I was in college. And amazingly enough, even to my own astonishment, I've made a career out of it.   Speaker 1 ** 03:17 Where did you go to college? I went to the University   Matt Forbeck ** 03:21 of Michigan over in Ann Arbor. I had a great time there. There's a wonderful little college, Beloit College, in my hometown here, and most of my family has gone to UW Milwaukee over the years. My parents met at Marquette in Milwaukee, but I wanted to get the heck out of the area, so I went to Michigan, and then found myself coming back as soon as we started having   Speaker 1 ** 03:42 kids well, and of course, I would presume that when you were at the University of Michigan, you rooted for them and against Ohio State. That was   Matt Forbeck ** 03:50 kind of, you know, if you did it the other way around, they back out of town. So, yeah, I was always kind of astonished, though, because having grown up in Wisconsin, where every sports team was a losing team when I was growing up, including the Packers, for decades. You know, we were just happy to be playing. They were more excuse to have beers than they were to cheer on teams. And I went to Michigan where they were, they were angry if the team wasn't up by two touchdowns. You know, at any point, I'm like, You guys are silly. This is we're here for fun.   Speaker 1 ** 04:17 But it is amazing how seriously some people take sports. I remember being in New Zealand helping the Royal New Zealand Foundation for the Blind. Well now 22 years ago, it's 2003 and the America's Cup had just finished before we got there, and in America beat New Zealand, and the people in New Zealand were just irate. They were complaining that the government didn't put enough money into the design of the boat and helping with the with the yacht and all that. It was just amazing how seriously people take it, yeah,   Matt Forbeck ** 04:58 once, I mean, it becomes a part of your. Identity in a lot of ways, right for many people, and I've never had to worry about that too much. I've got other things on my mind, but there you go.   Speaker 1 ** 05:08 Well, I do like it when the Dodgers win, and my wife did her graduate work at USC, and so I like it when the Trojans win, but it's not the end of the world, and you do need to keep it in perspective. I I do wish more people would I know once I delivered a speech in brether County, Kentucky, and I was told that when I started the speech had to end no later than preferably exactly at 6:30pm not a minute later, because it was the night of the NCAA Basketball Championship, and the Kentucky Wildcats were in the championship, and at 630 everyone was going to get up and leave and go home to watch the game. So I ended at 630 and literally, by 631 I timed it. The gym was empty and it was full to start with.   Matt Forbeck ** 06:02 People were probably, you know, counting down on their watches, just to make sure, right?   Speaker 1 ** 06:06 Oh, I'm sure they were. What do you do? It's, it is kind of fun. Well, so why did you decide to get started in games? What? What? What attracted to you, to it as a young person, much less later on?   Matt Forbeck ** 06:21 Well, I was, yeah, I was an awkward kid, kind of nerdy and, you know, glasses and asthma and all that kind of stuff. And games were the kind of thing where, if you didn't know how to interact with people, you could sit down at a table across them and you could practice. You can say, okay, we're all here. We've got this kind of a magic circle around us where we've agreed to take this one silly activity seriously for a short period of time, right? And it may be that you're having fun during that activity, but you know, there's, there's no reason that rolling dice or moving things around on a table should be taken seriously. It's all just for fun, right? But for that moment, you actually just like Las Vegas Exactly, right? When there's money on the line, it's different, but if you're just doing it for grins. You know, it was a good way for me to learn how to interact with people of all sorts and of different ages. And I really enjoyed playing the games, and I really wanted to be a writer, too. And a lot of these things interacted with story at a very basic level. So breaking in as a writer is tough, but it turned out breaking as a game designer, wasn't nearly his stuff, so I started out over there instead, because it was a very young field at the time, right? D and D is now 50 years old, so I've been doing this 35 years, which means I started around professionally and even doing it before that, I started in the period when the game and that industry were only like 10 or 15 years old, so yeah, weren't quite as much competition in those   Speaker 1 ** 07:43 days. I remember some of the early games that I did play, that I could play, were DOS based games, adventure. You're familiar with adventure? Yeah, oh, yeah. Then later, Zork and all that. And I still think those are fun games. And I the reason I like a lot of those kinds of games is they really make you think, which I think most games do, even though the video even the video games and so on, they they help your or can help your reactions, but they're designed by people who do try to make you think,   Matt Forbeck ** 08:15 yeah. I mean, we basically are designing puzzles for people to solve, even if they're story puzzles or graphic puzzles or sound puzzles or whatever, you know, even spatial puzzles. There the idea is to give somebody something fun that is intriguing to play with, then you end up coming with story and after that, because after a while, even the most most exciting mechanics get dull, right? I mean, you start out shooting spaceships, but you can only shoot spaceships for so long, or you start out playing Tetris, and you only put shapes together for so long before it doesn't mean anything that then you start adding in story to give people a reason to keep playing right and a reason to keep going through these things. And I've written a lot of video games over the years, basically with that kind of a philosophy, is give people nuggets of story, give them a plot to work their way through, and reward them for getting through different stages, and they will pretty much follow you through anything. It's amazing.   Michael Hingson ** 09:09 Is that true Dungeons and Dragons too?   Matt Forbeck ** 09:13 It is. All of the stories are less structured there. If you're doing a video game, you know you the team has a lot of control over you. Give the player a limited amount of control to do things, but if you're playing around a table with people, it's more of a cooperative kind of experience, where we're all kind of coming up with a story, the narrator or the Game Master, the Dungeon Master, sets the stage for everything, but then the players have a lot of leeway doing that, and they will always screw things up for you, too. No matter what you think is going to happen, the players will do something different, because they're individuals, and they're all amazing people. That's actually to me, one of the fun things about doing tabletop games is that, you know, the computer can only react in a limited number of ways, whereas a human narrator and actually change things quite drastically and roll. With whatever people come up with, and that makes it tremendous fun.   Speaker 1 ** 10:04 Do you think AI is going to enter into all that and maybe improve some of the   Matt Forbeck ** 10:09 old stuff? It's going to add your end to it, whether it's an ad, it's going to approve it as a large question. Yeah. So I've been ranting about AI quite a bit lately with my friends and family. But, you know, I think the problem with AI, it can be very helpful a lot of ways, but I think it's being oversold. And I think it's especially when it's being oversold for thing, for ways for people to replace writers and creative thinking, Yeah, you know, you're taking the fun out of everything. I mean, the one thing I like to say is if, if you can't be bothered to write this thing that you want to communicate to me, I'm not sure why I should be bothered to read this thing well.   Speaker 1 ** 10:48 And I think that AI will will evolve in whatever way it does. But the fact of the matter is, So do people. And I think that, in fact, people are always going to be necessary to make the process really work? AI can only do and computers can only do so much. I mean, even Ray Kurzweil talks about the singularity when people and computer brains are married, but that still means that you're going to have the human element. So it's not all going to be the computer. And I'm not ready to totally buy into to what Ray says. And I used to work for Ray, so I mean, I know Ray Well, but, but the but the bottom line is, I think that, in fact, people are always going to be able to be kind of the, the mainstay of it, as long as we allow that, if we, if we give AI too much power, then over time, it'll take more power, and that's a problem, but that's up to us to deal with?   Matt Forbeck ** 11:41 No, I totally agree with that. I just think right now, there's a very large faction of people who it's in their economic interest to oversell these things. You know, people are making chips. They're building server farms. A lot of them are being transferred from people are doing blockchain just a few years ago, and they see it as the hot new thing. The difference is that AI actually has a lot of good uses. There's some amazing things will come out of llms and such. But I again, people are over the people are selling this to us. Are often over promising things, right?   Speaker 1 ** 12:11 Yeah, well, they're not only over promising but they're they're really misdirecting people. But the other side of it is that, that, in fact, AI as a concept and as a technology is here, and we have control over how we use it. I've said a couple times on this this podcast, and I've said to others, I remember when I first started hearing about AI, I heard about the the fact that teachers were bemoaning the pack, that kids were writing their papers just using AI and turning them in, and it wasn't always easy to tell whether it was something that was written by AI or was written by the student. And I come from a little bit different view than I think a lot of people do. And my view basically is, let the kids write it if with AI, if that's what they're going to do, but then what the teacher needs to do is to take one period, for example, and give every student in that class the opportunity to come up and defend whatever paper they have. And the real question is, can they defend the paper? Which means, have they really learned the subject, or are they just relying on AI,   Matt Forbeck ** 13:18 yeah, I agree with that. I think the trouble is, a lot of people, children, you know, who are developing their abilities and their morals about this stuff, they use it as just a way to complete the assignment, right? And many of them don't even read what they turn in, right, right? Just know that they've got something here that will so again, if you can't be bothered to read the thing that you manufactured, you're not learning anything about it,   Speaker 1 ** 13:39 which is why, if you are forced to defend it, it's going to become pretty obvious pretty fast, whether you really know it or not. Now, I've used AI on a number of occasions in various ways, but I use it to maybe give me ideas or prepare something that I then modify and shape. And I may even interact with AI a couple of times, but I'm definitely involved with the process all the way down the line, because it still has to be something that I'm responsible for.   Matt Forbeck ** 14:09 I agree. I mean, the whole point of doing these things is for people to connect with each other, right? I want to learn about the ideas you have in your head. I want to see how they jive with ones in my head. But if I'm just getting something that's being spit out by a machine and not you, and not being curated by you at any point, that doesn't seem very useful, right? So if you're the more involved people are in it, the more useful it is.   Speaker 1 ** 14:31 Well, I agree, and you know, I think again, it's a tool, and we have to decide how the tool is going to be used, which is always the way it ought to be. Right?   Matt Forbeck ** 14:42 Exactly, although sometimes it's large corporations deciding,   Speaker 1 ** 14:45 yeah, well, there's that too. Well, individuals,   Matt Forbeck ** 14:49 we get to make our own choices. Though you're right,   Speaker 1 ** 14:51 yes, and should Well, so, so when did you start bringing writing into what you. Did, and make that a really significant part of what you did?   Matt Forbeck ** 15:03 Well, pretty early on, I mean, I started doing one of the first things I did was a gaming zine, which was basically just a print magazine that was like, you know, 32 pages, black and white, about the different tabletop games. So we were writing those in the days, design and writing are very closely linked when it comes to tabletop games and even in video games. The trick of course is that designing a game and writing the rules are actually two separate sets of skills. So one of the first professional gig I ever had during writing was in games was some friends of mine had designed a game for a company called Mayfair games, which went on to do sellers of contain, which is a big, uh, entry level game, and but they needed somebody to write the rules, so they called me over, showed me how to play the game. I took notes and I I wrote it down in an easy to understand, clear way that people had just picked up the box. Could then pick it up and teach themselves how to play, right? So that was early on how I did it. But the neat thing about that is it also taught me to think about game design. I'm like, when I work on games, I think about, who is this game going to be for, and how are we going to teach it to them? Because if they can't learn the game, there's no point of the game at all, right?   Speaker 1 ** 16:18 And and so I'm right? I'm a firm believer that a lot of technical writers don't do a very good job of technical writing, and they write way over people's heads. I remember the first time I had to write, well, actually, I mentioned I worked for Kurzweil. I was involved with a project where Ray Kurzweil had developed his original omniprent optical character recognition system. And I and the National Federation of the Blind created with him a project to put machines around the country so that blind people could use them and give back to Ray by the time we were all done, recommendations as to what needed to go in the final first production model of the machine. So I had to write a training manual to teach people how to use it. And I wrote this manual, and I was always of the opinion that it had to be pretty readable and usable by people who didn't have a lot of technical knowledge. So I wrote the manual, gave it to somebody to read, and said, Follow the directions and and work with the machine and all that. And they did, and I was in another room, and they were playing with it for a couple of hours, and they came in and they said, I'm having a problem. I can't figure out how to turn off the machine. And it turns out that I had forgotten to put in the instruction to turn off the machine. And it wasn't totally trivial. There were steps you had to go through. It was a Data General Nova two computer, and you had to turn it off the right way and the whole system off the appropriate way, or you could, could mess everything up. So there was a process to doing it. So I wrote it in, and it was fine. But, you know, I've always been a believer that the textbooks are way too boring. Having a master's degree in physics, I am of the opinion that physics textbook writers, who are usually pretty famous and knowledgeable scientists, ought to include with all the text and the technical stuff they want to put in, they should put in stories about what they did in you bring people in, draw them into the whole thing, rather than just spewing out a bunch of technical facts.   Matt Forbeck ** 18:23 No, I agree. My my first calculus professor was a guy who actually explained how Newton and Leipzig actually came up with calculus, and then he would, you know, draw everything on the board and turn around say, and isn't that amazing? And you were, like, just absolutely enamored with the idea of how they had done these things, right? Yeah. And what you're doing there, when you, when you, when you give the instructions to somebody and say, try this out. That's a very big part of gaming, actually, because what we do this thing called play testing, where we take something before it's ready to be shown to the public, and we give it to other people and say, try this out. See how it works. Let me know when you're starting out of your first playing you play with like your family and friends and people will be brutal with you and give you hints about how you can improve things. But then, even when you get to the rules you're you send those out cold to people, or, you know, if you're a big company, you watch them through a two way mirror or one way mirror, and say, Hey, let's see how they react to everything. And then you take notes, and you try to make it better every time you go through. And when I'm teaching people to play games at conventions, for instance, I will often say to them, please ask questions if you don't understand anything, that doesn't mean you're dumb. Means I didn't explain it well enough, right? And my job as a person writing these rules is to explain it as well as I humanly can so it can't be misconstrued or misinterpreted. Now that doesn't mean you can correct everything. Somebody's always got like, Oh, I missed that sentence, you know, whatever. But you do that over and over so you can try to make it as clear and concise as possible, yeah.   Speaker 1 ** 19:52 Well, you have somewhat of a built in group of people to help if you let your kids get involved. Involved. So how old are your kids?   Matt Forbeck ** 20:03 My eldest is 26 he'll be 27 in January. Marty is a game designer, actually works with me on the marble tabletop role playing game, and we have a new book coming out, game book for Minecraft, called Minecraft role for adventure, that's coming out on July 7, I think, and the rest of the kids are 23 we have 423 year olds instead of quadruplets, one of whom is actually going into game design as well, and the other says two are still in college, and one has moved off to the work in the woods. He's a very woodsy boy. Likes to do environmental education with people.   Speaker 1 ** 20:39 Wow. Well, see, but you, but you still have a good group of potential game designers or game critics anyway.   Matt Forbeck ** 20:47 Oh, we all play games together. We have a great time. We do weekly game nights here. Sometimes they're movie nights, sometimes they're just pizza nights, but we shoot for game and pizza   Speaker 1 ** 20:56 if we get lucky and your wife goes along with all this too.   Matt Forbeck ** 21:00 She does. She doesn't go to the game conventions and stuff as much, and she's not as hardcore of a gamer, but she likes hanging out with the kids and doing everything with us. We have a great time.   Speaker 1 ** 21:10 That's that's pretty cool. Well, you, you've got, you've got to build an audience of some sorts, and that's neat that a couple of them are involved in it as well. So they really like what dad does, yeah,   Matt Forbeck ** 21:23 yeah. We, I started taking them each to conventions, which are, you know, large gatherings gamers in real life. The biggest one is Gen Con, which happens in Indianapolis in August. And last year, I think, we had 72,000 people show up. And I started taking the kids when they were 10 years old, and my wife would come up with them then. And, you know, 10 years old is a lot. 72,000 people is a lot for a 10 year old. So she can mention one day and then to a park the next day, you know, decompress a lot, and then come back on Saturday and then leave on Sunday or whatever, so that we didn't have them too over stimulated. But they really grown to love it. I mean, it's part of our annual family traditions in the summer, is to go do these conventions and play lots of games with each other and meet new people too well.   Speaker 1 ** 22:08 And I like the way you put it. The games are really puzzles, which they are, and it's and it's fun. If people would approach it that way, no matter what the game is, they're, they're aspects of puzzles involved in most everything that has to do with the game, and that's what makes it so fun.   Matt Forbeck ** 22:25 Exactly, no. The interesting thing is, when you're playing with other people, the other people are changing the puzzles from their end that you have to solve on your end. And sometimes the puzzle is, how do I beat this person, or how do I defeat their strategy, or how do I make an alliance with somebody else so we can win? And it's really always very intriguing. There's so many different types of games. There's nowadays, there's like something like 50 to 100 new board games that come out and tabletop games every month, right? It's just like a fire hose. It's almost like, when I was starting out as a novelist, I would go into Barnes and Noble or borders and go, Oh my gosh, look at all these books. And now I do the same thing about games. It's just, it's incredible. Nobody, no one person, could keep up with all of them.   Speaker 1 ** 23:06 Yeah, yeah, yeah, way too much. I would love to explore playing more video games, but I don't. I don't own a lot of the technology, although I'm sure that there are any number of them that can be played on a computer, but we'll have to really explore and see if we can find some. I know there are some that are accessible for like blind people with screen readers. I know that some people have written a few, which is kind of cool. Yeah.   Matt Forbeck ** 23:36 And Xbox has got a new controller out that's meant to be accessible to large amount of people. I'm not sure, all the different aspects of it, but that's done pretty well, too   Speaker 1 ** 23:44 well. And again, it comes down to making it a priority to put all of that stuff in. It's not like it's magic to do. It's just that people don't know how to do it. But I also think something else, which is, if you really make the products more usable, let's say by blind people with screen readers. You may be especially if it's well promoted, surprised. I'm not you necessarily, but people might well be surprised as to how many others might take advantage of it so that they don't necessarily have to look at the screen, or that you're forced to listen as well as look in order to figure out what's going on or take actions.   Matt Forbeck ** 24:29 No, definitely true. It's, you know, people audio books are a massive thing nowadays. Games tend to fall further behind that way, but it's become this incredible thing that obviously, blind people get a great use out of but my wife is addicted to audio books now. She actually does more of those than she does reading. I mean, I technically think they're both reading. It's just one's done with yours and one's done with your eyes.   Speaker 1 ** 24:51 Yeah, there's but there's some stuff, whether you're using your eyes or your fingers and reading braille, there's something about reading a book that way that's. Even so a little bit different than listening to it. Yeah, and there's you're drawn in in some ways, in terms of actually reading that you're not necessarily as drawn into when you're when you're listening to it, but still, really good audio book readers can help draw you in, which is important, too,   Matt Forbeck ** 25:19 very much. So yeah, I think the main difference for reading, whether it's, you know, again, through Braille or through traditional print, is that you can stop. You can do it at your own pace. You can go back and look at things very easily, or read or check things, read things very easily. That you know, if you're reading, if you're doing an audio book, it just goes on and it's straight on, boom, boom, boom, pace. You can say, Wait, I'm going to put this down here. What was that thing? I remember back there? It was like three pages back, but it's really important, let me go check that right.   Speaker 1 ** 25:50 There are some technologies that allow blind people and low vision people and others, like people with dyslexia to use an audio book and actually be able to navigate two different sections of it. But it's not something that is generally available to the whole world, at least to the level that it is for blind people. But I can, I can use readers that are made to be able to accept the different formats and go back and look at pages, go back and look at headings, and even create bookmarks to bookmark things like you would normally by using a pen or a pencil or something like that. So there are ways to do some of that. So again, the technology is making strides.   Matt Forbeck ** 26:37 That's fantastic. Actually, it's wonderful. Just, yeah, it's great. I actually, you know, I lost half the vision of my right eye during back through an autoimmune disease about 13 years ago, and I've always had poor vision. So I'm a big fan of any kind of way to make things easier,   Speaker 1 ** 26:54 like that. Well, there, there are things that that are available. It's pretty amazing. A guy named George curser. Curser created a lot of it years ago, and it's called the DAISY format. And the whole idea behind it is that you can actually create a book. In addition to the audio tracks, there are XML files that literally give you the ability to move and navigate around the book, depending on how it's created, as final level as you choose.   Matt Forbeck ** 27:25 Oh, that's That's amazing. That's fantastic. I'm actually really glad to hear that.   Speaker 1 ** 27:28 So, yeah, it is kind of fun. So there's a lot of technology that's that's doing a lot of different sorts of things and and it helps. But um, so for you, in terms of dealing with, with the games, you've, you've written games, but you've, you've actually written some novels as well, right?   Matt Forbeck ** 27:50 Yeah, I've got like 30, it depends on how you count a novel, right? Okay, like some of my books are to pick a path books, right? Choose Your Own Adventure type stuff. So, but I've got 35 traditional novels written or more, I guess, now, I lost track a while ago, and probably another dozen of these interactive fiction books as well. So, and I like doing those. I've also written things like Marvel encyclopedias and Avengers encyclopedias and all sorts of different pop culture books. And, you know, I like playing in different worlds. I like writing science fiction, fantasy, even modern stuff. And most of it, for me comes down to telling stories, right? If you like to tell stories, you can tell stories through a game or book or audio play or a TV show or a comic, or I've done, you know, interactive museum, games and displays, things like that. The main thing is really a story. I mean, if you're comfortable sitting down at a bar and having a drink with somebody, doesn't have to be alcohol, just sitting down and telling stories with each other for fun. That's where the core of it all is really   Speaker 1 ** 28:58 right. Tell me about interactive fiction book.   Matt Forbeck ** 29:01 Sure, a lot of these are basically just done, like flow charts, kind of like the original Zork and adventure that you were talking about where you I actually, I was just last year, I brought rose Estes, who's the inventor of the endless quest books, which were a cross between Dungeons and Dragons, and choose your own adventure books. She would write the whole thing out page by page on a typewriter, and then, in order to shuffle the pages around so that people wouldn't just read straight through them, she'd throw them all up in the air and then just put them back in whatever order they happen to be. But essentially, you read a section of a book, you get to the end, and it gives you a choice. Would you like to go this way or that way? Would you like to go beat up this goblin? Or would you like to make friends with this warrior over here? If you want to do one of these things, go do page xx, right? Got it. So then you turn to that page and you go, boom, some, actually, some of the endless quest books I know were turned into audio books, right? And I actually, I. Um, oddly, have written a couple Dungeons and Dragons, interactive books, audio books that have only been released in French, right? Because there's a company called Looney l, u n, i, i that has this little handheld device that's for children, that has an A and a B button and a volume button. And you, you know, you get to the point that says, if you want to do this, push a, if you want to do that, push B, and the kids can go through these interactive stories and and, you know, there's ones for clue and Dungeons and Dragons and all sorts of other licenses, and some original stories too. But that way there's usually, like, you know, it depends on the story, but sometimes there's, like, 10 to 20 different endings. A lot of them are like, Oh no, you've been killed. Go back to where you started, right? And if you're lucky, the longer ones are, the more fun ones. And you get to, you know, save the kingdom and rescue the people and make good friends and all that good stuff,   Michael Hingson ** 30:59 yeah, and maybe fall in love with the princess or Prince.   Matt Forbeck ** 31:02 Yeah, exactly right. It all depends on the genre and what you're working in. But the idea is to give people some some choices over how they want the story to go. You're like, Well, do you want to investigate this dark, cold closet over here, or would you rather go running outside and playing around? And some of them can seem like very innocent choices, and other ones are like, well, uh, 10 ton weight just fell on. You go back to the last thing.   Speaker 1 ** 31:23 So that dark hole closet can be a good thing or a bad thing,   Matt Forbeck ** 31:28 exactly. And the trick is to make the deaths the bad endings, actually just as entertaining as anything else, right? And then people go, Well, I got beat, and I gotta go back and try that again. So yeah, if they just get the good ending all the way through, they often won't go back and look at all the terrible ones. So it's fun to trick them sometimes and have them go into terrible spots. And I like to put this one page in books too that sometimes says, How did you get here? You've been cheating there. This book, this page, is actually not led to from any other part of the book. You're just flipping   Speaker 1 ** 31:59 through. Cheater, cheater book, do what you   Matt Forbeck ** 32:04 want, but if you want to play it the right way, go back.   Speaker 1 ** 32:07 Kid, if you want to play the game. Yeah, exactly. On the other hand, some people are nosy.   Matt Forbeck ** 32:15 You know, I was always a kid who would poke around and wanted to see how things were, so I'm sure I would have found that myself but absolutely related, you know,   Speaker 1 ** 32:23 yeah, I had a general science teacher who brought in a test one day, and he gave it to everyone. And so he came over to me because it was, it was a printed test. He said, Well, I'm not going to give you the test, because the first thing it says is, read all the instructions, read, read the test through before you pass it, before you take it. And he said, most people won't do that. And he said, I know you would. And the last question on the test is answer, only question one.   Matt Forbeck ** 32:55 That's great. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah,   Speaker 1 ** 32:57 that was cute. And he said, I know that. I that there's no way you would, would would fall for that, because you would say, Okay, let's read the instructions and then read the whole test. That's what it said. And the instruction were, just read the whole test before you start. And people won't do that.   Matt Forbeck ** 33:13 No, they'll go through, take the whole thing. They get there and go, oh, did I get there? Was a, there's a game publisher. I think it was Steve Jackson Games, when they were looking for people, write for them, or design stuff for them, or submit stuff to them, would have something toward the end of the instructions that would say, put like a the letter seven, or put seven a on page one right, and that way they would know if you had read the instructions, if you hadn't bothered to Read the instructions, they wouldn't bother reading anything else.   Speaker 1 ** 33:42 Yeah, which is fair, because the a little harsh, well, but, but, you know, we often don't learn enough to pay attention to details. I know that when I was taking physics in college, that was stressed so often it isn't enough to get the numbers right. If you don't get the units right as well. Then you're, you're not really paying attention to the details. And paying attention to the details is so important.   Matt Forbeck ** 34:07 That's how they crash from those Mars rovers, wasn't it? They somebody messed up the units, but going back and forth between metric and, yeah, and Imperial and, well, you know, it cost somebody a lot of money at one point. Yeah. Yeah. What do you   Speaker 1 ** 34:21 this is kind of the way it goes. Well, tell me, yeah. Well, they do matter, no matter what people think, sometimes they do matter. Well, tell me about the Diana Jones award. First of all, of course, the logical question for many people is, who is Diana Jones? Yeah, Diana Jones doesn't exist, right? That's There you go. She's part game somewhere? No, no, it doesn't be in a game somewhere.   Matt Forbeck ** 34:43 Then now there's actually an author named Diana Wynne Jones, who's written some amazing fantasy stories, including Howell's Moving Castle, which has turned into a wonderful anime movie, but it has nothing to do with her or any other person. Because originally, the Diana Jones award came about. Because a friend of mine, James Wallace, had somehow stumbled across a trophy that fell into his hands, and it was a pub trivia trophy that used to be used between two different gaming companies in the UK, and one of those was TSR, UK, the United Kingdom department. And at one point, the company had laid off everybody in that division just say, Okay, we're closing it all down. So the guys went and burned a lot of the stuff that they had, including a copy of the Indiana Jones role playing game, and the only part of the logo that was left said Diana Jones. And for some reason, they put this in a in a fiberglass or Plexiglas pyramid, put it on a base, a wooden base, and it said the Diana Jones award trophy, right? And this was the trophy that they used they passed back and forth as a joke for their pub trivia contest. Fell into James's hands, and he decided, You know what, we're going to give this out for the most excellent thing in gaming every year. And we've now done this. This will be 25 years this summer. We do it at the Wednesday night before Gen Con, which starts on Thursday, usually at the end of July or early August. And as part of that, actually, about five years ago, we started, one of the guys suggested we should do something called the emerging designers program. So we actually became a 501, c3, so we could take donations. And now we take four designers every year, fly them in from wherever they happen to be in the world, and put them up in a hotel, give them a badge the show, introduce them to everybody, give them an honorarium so they can afford to skip work for a week and try to help launch their careers. I mean, these are people that are in the first three years of their design careers, and we try to work mostly with marginalized or et cetera, people who need a little bit more representation in the industry too. Although we can select anybody, and it's been really well received, it's been amazing. And there's a group called the bundle of holding which sells tabletop role playing game PDFs, and they've donated 10s of 1000s of dollars every year for us to be able to do this. And it's kind of funny, because I never thought I'd be end up running a nonprofit, but here I'm just the guy who writes checks to the different to the emerging designer program. Folks are much more tied into that community that I am. But one of the real reasons I wanted to do something like that or be involved with it, because if you wander around with these conventions and you notice that it starts getting very gray after a while, right? It's you're like, oh, there's no new people coming in. It's all older people. I we didn't I didn't want us to all end up as like the Grandpa, grandpa doing the HO model railroad stuff in the basement, right? This dying hobby that only people in their 60s and 70s care about. So bringing in fresh people, fresh voices, I think, is very important, and hopefully we're doing some good with that. It's been a lot of fun either way.   Speaker 1 ** 37:59 Well, I have you had some success with it? Yeah, we've   Matt Forbeck ** 38:02 had, well, let's see. I think we've got like 14 people. We've brought in some have already gone on to do some amazing things. I mean, it's only been a few years, so it's hard to tell if they're gonna be legends in their time, but again, having them as models for other people to look at and say, Oh, maybe I could do that. That's been a great thing. The other well, coincidentally, Dungeons and Dragons is having its best 10 year streak in its history right now, and probably is the best selling it's ever been. So coinciding with that, we've seen a lot more diversity and a lot more people showing up to these wonderful conventions and playing these kinds of games. There's also been an advent of this thing called actual play, which is the biggest one, is a group called Critical Role, which is a whole bunch of voice actors who do different cartoons and video games and such, and they play D and D with each other, and then they record the games, and they produce them on YouTube and for podcasts. And these guys are amazing. There's a couple of other ones too, like dimension 20 and glass cannon, the critical role guys actually sold out a live performance at Wembley Arena last summer. Wow. And dimension. Dimension 20 sold out Madison Square Garden. I'm like, if you'd have told me 20 years ago that you know you could sell out an entire rock stadium to have people watch you play Dungeons and Dragons, I would have laughed. I mean, there's no way it would have been possible. But now, you know, people are very much interested in this. It's kind of wild, and it's, it's fun to be a part of that. At some level,   Speaker 1 ** 39:31 how does the audience get drawn in to something like that? Because they are watching it, but there must be something that draws them in.   Matt Forbeck ** 39:39 Yeah, part of it is that you have some really skilled some actors are very funny, very traumatic and very skilled at improvisation, right? So the the dungeon master or Game Master will sit there and present them with an idea or whatever. They come up each with their own characters. They put them in wonderful, strong voices. They kind of inhabit the roles in a way that an actor. A really top level actor would, as opposed to just, you know, me sitting around a table with my friends. And because of that, they become compelling, right? My Marty and my his wife and I were actually at a convention in Columbus, Ohio last weekend, and this group called the McElroy family, actually, they do my brother, my brother and me, which is a hit podcast, but they also do an actual play podcast called The Adventure zone, where they just play different games. And they are so funny. These guys are just some of the best comedians you'll ever hear. And so them playing, they actually played our Marvel game for a five game session, or a five podcast session, or whatever, and it was just stunningly fun to listen to. People are really talented mess around with something that we built right it's very edifying to see people enjoying something that you worked on.   Speaker 1 ** 40:51 Do you find that the audiences get drawn in and they're actually sort of playing the game along, or as well? And may disagree with what some of the choices are that people make?   Matt Forbeck ** 41:02 Oh, sure. But I mean, if the choices are made from a point of the character that's been expressed, that people are following along and they they already like the character, they might go, Oh, those mean, you know that guy, there are some characters they love to hate. There are some people they're they're angry at whatever, but they always really appreciate the actors. I mean, the actors have become celebrities in their own right. They've they sell millions of dollars for the comic books and animated TV shows and all these amazing things affiliated with their actual play stuff. And it's, I think it, part of it is because, it's because it makes the games more accessible. Some people are intimidated by these games. So it's not really, you know, from a from a physical disability kind of point. It's more of a it makes it more accessible for people to be nervous, to try these things on their own, or don't really quite get how they work. They can just sit down and pop up YouTube or their podcast program and listen into people doing a really good job at it. The unfortunate problem is that the converse of that is, when you're watching somebody do that good of a job at it, it's actually hard to live up to that right. Most people who play these games are just having fun with their friends around a table. They're not performing for, you know, 10s of 1000s, if not hundreds of 1000s of people. So there's a different level of investments, really, at that point, and some people have been known to be cowed by that, by that, or daunted by that.   Speaker 1 ** 42:28 You work on a lot of different things. I gather at the same time. What do you what do you think about that? How do you like working on a lot of different projects? Or do you, do you more focus on one thing, but you've got several things going on, so you'll work on something for one day, then you'll work on something else. Or how do you how do you do it all?   Matt Forbeck ** 42:47 That's a good question. I would love to just focus on one thing at a time. Now, you know the trouble is, I'm a freelancer, right? I don't set my I don't always get to say what I want to work on. I haven't had to look for work for over a decade, though, which has been great. People just come to me with interesting things. The trouble is that when you're a freelancer, people come in and say, Hey, let's work on this. I'm like, Yeah, tell me when you're ready to start. And you do that with like, 10 different people, and they don't always line up in sequence properly, right? Yeah? Sometimes somebody comes up and says, I need this now. And I'm like, Yeah, but I'm in the middle of this other thing right now, so I need to not sleep for another week, and I need to try to figure out how I'm going to put this in between other things I'm working on. And I have noticed that after I finish a project, it takes me about a day or three to just jump track. So if I really need to, I can do little bits here and there, but to just fully get my brain wrapped around everything I'm doing for a very complex project, takes me a day or three to say, Okay, now I'm ready to start this next thing and really devote myself to it. Otherwise, it's more juggling right now, having had all those kids, probably has prepared me to juggle. So I'm used to having short attention span theater going on in my head at all times, because I have to jump back and forth between things. But it is. It's a challenge, and it's a skill that you develop over time where you're like, Okay, I can put this one away here and work on this one here for a little while. Like today, yeah, I knew I was going to talk to you, Michael. So I actually had lined up another podcast that a friend of mine wanted to do with me. I said, Let's do them on the same day. This way I'm not interrupting my workflow so much, right? Makes sense? You know, try to gang those all together and the other little fiddly bits I need to do for administration on a day. Then I'm like, Okay, this is not a day off. It's just a day off from that kind of work. It's a day I'm focusing on this aspect of what I do.   Speaker 1 ** 44:39 But that's a actually brings up an interesting point. Do you ever take a day off or do what do you do when you're when you deciding that you don't want to do gaming for a while?   Matt Forbeck ** 44:49 Yeah, I actually kind of terrible. But you know, you know, my wife will often drag me off to places and say we're going to go do this when. Yes, we have a family cabin up north in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that we go to. Although, you know, my habit there is, I'll work. I'll start work in the morning on a laptop or iPad until my battery runs out, and then I shut it down, put on a charger, and then I go out and swim with everybody for the rest of the day. So it depends if I'm on a deadline or not, and I'm almost always on a deadline, but there are times I could take weekends off there. One of the great things of being a freelancer, though, and especially being a stay at home father, which is part of what I was doing, is that when things come up during the middle of the week, I could say, oh, sure, I can be flexible, right? The trouble is that I have to pay for that time on my weekends, a lot of the time, so I don't really get a lot of weekends off. On the other hand, I'm not I'm not committed to having to work every day of the week either, right? I need to go do doctor appointments, or we want to run off to Great America and do a theme park or whatever. I can do that anytime I want to. It's just I have to make up the time at other points during the week. Does your wife work? She does. She was a school social worker for many years, and now as a recruiter at a local technical college here called Black Hawk tech. And she's amazing, right? She's fantastic. She has always liked working. The only time she stopped working was for about a year and a half after the quads were born, I guess, two years. And that was the only time I ever took a job working with anybody else, because we needed the health insurance, so I we always got it through her. And then when she said, Well, I'm gonna stay home with the kids, which made tons of sense, I went and took a job with a video game company up in Madison, Wisconsin called Human Head Studios for about 18 months, 20 months. And then the moment she told me she was thinking about going back to work, I'm like, Oh, good, I can we can Cobra for 18 months and pay for our own health insurance, and I'm giving notice this week, and, you know, we'll work. I left on good terms that everybody. I still talk to them and whatever, but I very much like being my own boss and not worrying about what other people are going to tell me to do. I work with a lot of clients, which means I have a lot of people telling me what to do. But you know, if it turns out bad, I can walk I can walk away. If it turns out good, hopefully we get to do things together, like the the gig I've been working out with Marvel, I guess, has been going on for like, four years now, with pretty continuous work with them, and I'm enjoying every bit of it. They're great people to work with.   Speaker 1 ** 47:19 Now, you were the president of Pinnacle entertainment for a little while. Tell me about that.   Matt Forbeck ** 47:24 I was, that was a small gaming company I started up with a guy named Shane Hensley, who was another tabletop game designer. Our big game was something called Dead Lands, which was a Western zombie cowboy kind of thing. Oh gosh, Western horror. So. And it was pretty much a, you know, nobody was doing Western horror back in those days. So we thought, Oh, this is safe. And to give you an example of parallel development, we were six months into development, and another company, White Wolf, which had done a game called Vampire the Masquerade, announced that they were doing Werewolf the Wild West. And we're like, you gotta be kidding me, right? Fortunately, we still released our game three months before there, so everybody thought we were copying them, rather than the other way around. But the fact is, we were. We both just came up with the idea independently. Right? When you work in creative fields, often, if somebody wants to show you something, you say, I'd like to look at you have to sign a waiver first that says, If I do something like this, you can't sue me. And it's not because people are trying to rip you off. It's because they may actually be working on something similar, right already. Because we're all, you know, swimming in the same cultural pool. We're all, you know, eating the same cultural soup. We're watching or watching movies, playing games, doing whatever, reading books. And so it's not unusual that some of us will come up with similar ideas   Speaker 1 ** 48:45 well, and it's not surprising that from time to time, two different people are going to come up with somewhat similar concepts. So that's not a big surprise, exactly, but   Matt Forbeck ** 48:56 you don't want people getting litigious over it, like no, you don't be accused of ripping anybody off, right? You just want to be as upfront with people. With people. And I don't think I've ever actually seen somebody, at least in gaming, in tabletop games, rip somebody off like that. Just say, Oh, that's a great idea. We're stealing that it's easier to pay somebody to just say, Yes, that's a great idea. We'll buy that from you, right? As opposed to trying to do something unseemly and criminal?   Speaker 1 ** 49:24 Yeah, there's, there's something to be said for having real honor in the whole process.   Matt Forbeck ** 49:30 Yeah, I agree, and I think that especially if you're trying to have a long term career in any field that follows you, if you get a reputation for being somebody who plays dirty, nobody wants to play with you in the future, and I've always found it to be best to be as straightforward with people and honest, especially professionally, just to make sure that they trust you. Before my quadruplets were born, you could have set your clock by me as a freelancer, I never missed a deadline ever, and since then, I've probably it's a. Rare earth thing to make a deadline, because, you know, family stuff happens, and you know, there's just no controlling it. But whenever something does happen, I just call people up and say, hey, look, it's going to be another week or two. This is what's going on. And because I have a good reputation for completing the job and finishing quality work, they don't mind. They're like, Oh, okay, I know you're going to get this to me. You're not just trying to dodge me. So they're willing to wait a couple weeks if they need to, to get to get what they need. And I'm very grateful to them for that. And I'm the worst thing somebody can do is what do, what I call turtling down, which is when it's like, Oh no, I'm late. And then, you know, they cut off all communication. They don't talk to anybody. They just kind of try to disappear as much as they can. And we all, all adults, understand that things happen in your life. It's okay. We can cut you some slack every now and then, but if you just try to vanish, that's not even possible.   Speaker 1 ** 50:54 No, there's a lot to be there's a lot to be said for trust and and it's so important, I think in most anything that we do, and I have found in so many ways, that there's nothing better than really earning someone's trust, and they earning your trust. And it's something I talk about in my books, like when live with a guide dog, live like a guide dog, which is my newest book, it talks a lot about trust, because when you're working with a guide dog, you're really building a team, and each member of the team has a specific job to do, and as the leader of the team, it's my job to also learn how to communicate with the other member of the team. But the reality is, it still comes down to ultimately, trust, because I and I do believe that dogs do love unconditionally, but they don't trust unconditionally. But the difference between dogs and people is that people that dogs are much more open to trust, for the most part, unless they've just been totally traumatized by something, but they're more open to trust. And there's a lesson to be learned there. No, I   Matt Forbeck ** 52:03 absolutely agree with that. I think, I think most people in general are trustworthy, but as you say, a lot of them have trauma in their past that makes it difficult for them to open themselves up to that. So that's actually a pretty wonderful way to think about things. I like that,   Speaker 1 ** 52:17 yeah, well, I think that trust is is so important. And I know when I worked in professional sales, it was all about trust. In fact, whenever I interviewed people for jobs, I always asked them what they were going to sell, and only one person ever answered me the way. I really hoped that everybody would answer when I said, So, tell me what you're going to be selling. He said, The only thing I have to really sell is myself and my word, and nothing else. It really matters. Everything else is stuff. What you have is stuff. It's me selling myself and my word, and you have to, and I would expect you to back me up. And my response was, as long as you're being trustworthy, then you're going to get my backing all the way. And he was my most successful salesperson for a lot of reasons, because he got it.   Matt Forbeck ** 53:08 Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, I mean, I've worked with people sourcing different things too, for sales, and if you can rely on somebody to, especially when things go wrong, to come through for you. And to be honest with you about, you know, there's really that's a hard thing to find. If you can't depend on your sources for what you're building, then you can't depend on anything. Everything else falls apart.   Speaker 1 ** 53:29 It does. You've got to start at the beginning. And if people can't earn your trust, and you earn theirs, there's a problem somewhere, and it's just not going to work.   Matt Forbeck ** 53:39 Yeah, I just generally think people are decent and want to help. I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've had issues. Car breaks down the road in Wisconsin. Here, if somebody's car goes in the ditch, everybody stops and just hauls them out. It's what you do when the quads were born, my stepmother came up with a sign up sheet, a booklet that she actually had spiral bound, that people could sign up every three three hours to help come over and feed and bathe, diaper, whatever the kids and we had 30 to 35 volunteers coming in every week. Wow, to help us out with that was amazing, right? They just each pick slots, feeding slots, and come in and help us out. I had to take the 2am feeding, and my wife had to take the 5am feeding by ourselves. But the rest of the week we had lots and lots of help, and we were those kids became the surrogate grandchildren for, you know, 30 to 35 women and couples really, around the entire area, and it was fantastic. Probably couldn't have survived   Speaker 1 ** 54:38 without it. And the other part about it is that all those volunteers loved it, because you all appreciated each other, and it was always all about helping and assisting.   Matt Forbeck ** 54:48 No, we appreciate them greatly. But you know every most of them, like 99% of them, whatever were women, 95 women who are ready for grandchildren and didn't have them. Had grandchildren, and they weren't in the area, right? And they had that, that love they wanted to share, and they just loved the opportunity to do it. It was, I'm choking up here talking about such a great time for us in   Speaker 1 ** 55:11 that way. Now I'm assuming today, nobody has to do diaper duty with the quads, right?   Matt Forbeck ** 55:16 Not until they have their own kids. Just checking, just checking, thankfully, think we're that is long in our past,   Speaker 1 ** 55:23 is it? Is it coming fairly soon for anybody in the future?   Matt Forbeck ** 55:27 Oh, I don't know. That's really entirely up to them. We would love to have grandchildren, but you know, it all comes in its own time. They're not doing no well. I, one of my sons is married, so it's possible, right? And one of my other sons has a long term girlfriend, so that's possible, but, you know, who knows? Hopefully they're they have them when they're ready. I always say, if you have kids and you want them, that's great. If you have, if you don't have kids and you don't want them, that's great. It's when you cross the two things that,   Speaker 1 ** 55:57 yeah, trouble, yeah, that's that is, that is a problem. But you really like working with yourself. You love the entre

LOL From 2009.  Makes you think about how much you should spend on expert advice, and staplers. 

Today we're talking about Pakistan in the 80s. Specifically about their "president" (military dictator) at the time. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq did some real dirt on his way up the totem pole to seize power and once he was up there he did some more, but he also managed to do a few good things, I can't deny him that. He just happened to do more bad than good. Makes for an interesting story though. I mean, just look at a picture of him. He's the perfect Bond villain. Enjoy!

The kettle is boiled, the tea is stewing, and we're ready to go! That's right, Dr Matilda Siebrecht is back to join you onTranscript your tea-break, this time with a slightly new focus and a different name: Tea-break Archaeology. Listen in to hear all about Matilda's research background, why she got into podcasting, and how she's been inspired by “cosy archaeology”.TranscriptsFor rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/teabreak/36LinksBlog: Mugs, Makes, and MicrowearAPN Discord serverContact the HostEmail: matilda@thearchaeologiststeacup.comhttps://www.thearchaeologiststeacup.cominsta: @the_archaeologists_teacupfb: /TheArchaeologistsTeacuptwitter: @ArchaeoTeacupArchPodNetAPN Website: https://www.archpodnet.comAPN on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/archpodnetAPN on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/archpodnetAPN on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/archpodnetTee Public Store: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/archaeology-podcast-network?ref_id=5724AffiliatesMotion

She arrives earlier than needed + Makes lifelong friends Tuesday 9/9/25

The kettle is boiled, the tea is stewing, and we're ready to go! That's right, Dr Matilda Siebrecht is back to join you onTranscript your tea-break, this time with a slightly new focus and a different name: Tea-break Archaeology. Listen in to hear all about Matilda's research background, why she got into podcasting, and how she's been inspired by “cosy archaeology”.TranscriptsFor rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/teabreak/36LinksBlog: Mugs, Makes, and MicrowearAPN Discord serverContact the HostEmail: matilda@thearchaeologiststeacup.comhttps://www.thearchaeologiststeacup.cominsta: @the_archaeologists_teacupfb: /TheArchaeologistsTeacuptwitter: @ArchaeoTeacupArchPodNetAPN Website: https://www.archpodnet.comAPN on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/archpodnetAPN on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/archpodnetAPN on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/archpodnetTee Public Store: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/archaeology-podcast-network?ref_id=5724AffiliatesMotion

Keith discusses the factors driving rent growth, emphasizing income growth, supply constraints, and affordability.  He highlights that population growth has a weak correlation with rent growth, citing examples like Austin and San Francisco. The fastest rent growth is in San Francisco (4.6%), Fresno (4.6%), and Chicago (4%), while Austin (-6.8%), Denver (-5%), and Phoenix (-4.1%) show declines.  GRE Coach, Naresh Vissa, joins the conversation to talk about the administration's focus on lowering rates and the potential for higher inflation as a result. He encourages investors to stay informed and take advantage of opportunities when rates are low. Resources: Book a free coaching session with Naresh at GREinvestmentcoach.com Show Notes: GetRichEducation.com/570 For access to properties or free help with a GRE Investment Coach, start here: GREmarketplace.com GRE Free Investment Coaching: GREinvestmentcoach.com Get mortgage loans for investment property: RidgeLendingGroup.com or call 855-74-RIDGE  or e-mail: info@RidgeLendingGroup.com Invest with Freedom Family Investments.  You get paid first: Text FAMILY to 66866 Will you please leave a review for the show? I'd be grateful. Search “how to leave an Apple Podcasts review”  For advertising inquiries, visit: GetRichEducation.com/ad Best Financial Education: GetRichEducation.com Get our wealth-building newsletter free— text ‘GRE' to 66866 Our YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/c/GetRichEducation Follow us on Instagram: @getricheducation Complete episode transcript:   Keith Weinhold  0:01   Welcome to GRE. I'm your host. Keith Weinhold, vital trends are moving the rental real estate market. And learn what really drives rent growth. It's probably not what you think. Then inflate, baby. Inflate. Why this administration wants inflation today on get rich education.   Speaker 1  0:22   Since 2014 the powerful get rich education podcast has created more passive income for people than nearly any other show in the world. This show teaches you how to earn strong returns from passive real estate investing in the best markets without losing your time being a flipper or landlord. Show Host Keith Weinhold writes for both Forbes and Rich Dad advisors, and delivers a new show every week since 2014 there's been millions of listener downloads of 188 world nations. He has a list show guests and key top selling personal finance author Robert Kiyosaki, get rich education can be heard on every podcast platform, plus it has its own dedicated Apple and Android listener phone apps build wealth on the go with the get rich education podcast. Sign up now for the get rich education podcast, or visit get rich education.com   Corey Coates  1:08   You're listening to the show that has created more financial freedom than nearly any show in the world. This is get rich education.   Keith Weinhold  1:18   You Keith, welcome to GRE from Whippany New Jersey to Parsippany New Jersey. Not much distance there and across 188 nations worldwide. I'm Keith Weinhold, and you're listening to this week's episode of Get rich education, where it's not just about your ROI. It's about your roti, your return on time invested, and your return on life. Everyone says that population growth is what drives rents, yes, but that's just one part of it, and it probably isn't even the most important factor. There is evidence of this, from Harvard research to what HUD has found. Austin, Texas recently added 500,000 people, rents spiked, and then supply flooded in and rents stalled. Head count wasn't enough. I discussed that in depth when I walked the streets of Austin last year. San Francisco lost population, but yet rents rebounded and remain among the highest in the nation. Harvard's housing research shows that population growth only has a weak correlation with rent growth. So what actually does drive rents? Well, income growth, supply constraints, and then staying under the 30% affordability ceiling, which is HUD's definition of what a cost burdened household is, right? That means that a tenant spends more than 30% of their income on rent. That is cost burden, and this pattern holds from ancient Rome to modern Manhattan, rents follow paychecks, not head counts and on the supply side, well, not all metros are created equal. Some have quantified it with what's called a supply elasticity score, places like Houston can seemingly build endlessly, while Manhattan and San Francisco cannot. So it's that difference that explains why incomes turn into rent growth in one market but not in the other. So if you're chasing fast growing metros, okay, but be careful, because headcount does not equal pricing power. Paychecks are what do well today, rents are falling in boom towns, but they're climbing in what we would call legacy, established metros, the year over year, rent change across US, metro areas really has a striking contrast. The three with the fastest rent growth are San Francisco up 4.6% Fresno also up 4.6% and Chicago up 4% and the three biggest declines in rent are Austin down 6.8% Denver down 5% and Phoenix Down 4.1% rent contraction in those three cities. And here's the problem during that 2020, to 2022, real estate surge. Years ago, investors piled into Sun Belt markets, and they sort of expected this endless growth, but then new supply flooded Austin, Phoenix and Denver, pushing rents down and vacancies up, and all three of those are cities that I visited during the boom and I saw the. Cranes in the air myself, and yet, at the same time, older supply constrained metros, like in the northeast, in Chicago and in San Francisco, they are quietly regaining momentum. That's where demand is steady. Construction is limited, and that's why rents are ticking higher. So this is why, like I've talked about before, it's good for you to invest in some Sunbelt areas, say, like Florida and then others that have this steady demand, like, say, a place in Ohio. And it's worth pointing out, too, how unusual it is that a city like Austin has a 6.8% rent contraction. We all know that housing prices are more stable than stocks, sure, but real estate rents are even more stable than housing prices, so this rent aberration that was caused by such wild overbuilding in Austin. Now, I recently attended a presentation on the rental housing market. It was put together by John Burns. He's the one that presented it, and he's the owner of the eponymous John Burns research and consulting. And people pay good money to attend these presentations, and he's a guy worth listening to, always with good housing market insights, and some of his insights while they're the same ones I've shared with you for a while, like how there's been a persistent lack of housing supply in the Northeast and Midwest, and still an abundant supply in the south. The Northeast is the only region of the nation that's adding more jobs than new homes at this time, the top amenities that tenants want today are a driveway in a yard. Pretty simple things. They're not a pool in a clubhouse. They're a driveway in a yard. And if you think about them, it totally makes sense, and that's why single family rentals have become such a booming industry, because that's where tenants are getting a driveway and a yard and burns. Also pointed out that most US job growth is in low income jobs. The presentation talked mostly in terms of headwinds versus tailwinds. Lower immigration. Well, that's a headwind. That's a bad thing for real estate investing, since immigrants tend to be renters. The tailwinds The good thing that includes less future supply coming out of the market, fewer apartments and fewer build to rent, deliveries coming online, fewer being added between today and 2028 and another positive for the next two decades at least, is the fact that since people are having fewer kids, that makes people less likely to settle down, buy a home and need a good school district. Well, that is good for people renting longer, longer tenancy durations, and John Burns also spotlighted how building material cost inflation is up 40% from pre pandemic times fully 40% more in material costs. But that Spike has since flattened out. However, it is just another reason why home prices can't really fall substantially. Today's prices are baked in, and his summary overall is to be bullish and bet on the tailwinds those real estate investing positives that is mostly due to future rent growth because the new supply is going away, and it's going to continue to stay difficult to buy a home, more rent growth, and that's the end of what he had to say. So as you're out there, targeting the right areas and renters for your properties, I've talked before about how new build rental property is a sweet spot, since your builder will often buy down your mortgage rate. For you, new build is where you can attract a good quality tenant. Look for a moment, just forget finding a tenant that can just barely afford your unit because they're spending 30 to 33% of their income to pay you rent, because, see, in that condition, there's no room for you to get a rent increase. If you can offer great value to your residents and target a 10 to 15% rent to income ratio, aha, you are really in good shape, because the easiest rent growth is retaining happy residents that are conditioned to accept 5% rent increases. Well, that is more likely in a nice new build property. That's where you attract a better tenant. And if they were to move out, they would have to take a lesser property so they will stay and pay the rent in. Increase, and they're going to have the capacity to do so when the rent is only 10 to 20% of their income.    Keith Weinhold  5:25   Now, when we talk about a major factor that trickles down to rents, the level of inflation, a lot of this comes down to the Fed chair and even the president, to some extent. And you know what's interesting, half the nation bashes whoever is president, and the entire nation bashes whoever is the Fed chair. Look, every recent Fed Chair has been maligned and bashed more than a pinata at a toddler's birthday party, bashed open more than an umpire at a little league game. Well, since 1980 there have been five of them, Volker, then Greenspan, then Bernanke, then Yellen and now Jerome Powell, most of that group is known for substantially lowering interest rates, yet they've remained unpopular anyway. And you know the irony here? The most popular of these five is Paul Volcker. He's the only Fed chair that's celebrated, and yet he jacked rates in the 1980s to up near 20% yes, 20% he really made borrowers feel the pain, but yet he's the only guy that's celebrated, because that's how he stomped that out of control inflation fire, 45 years ago, in 1981 mortgage rates peaked between 18 and 19% yet Somehow he's the Fed share that we celebrate? Well, here in more modern times, will the Fed eventually have to do the same thing? This is because Trump wants inflation now. The short term, talk is about lowering interest rates, but there are so many inflationary forces that you've got to wonder about how interest rates could very well go much higher later to get on top of this inflation that I'm telling you Trump actually wants. Now, of course, no one is going to come out and explicitly say that they want inflation, but that is now so implied, there are a ton of policies that the administration favors that are super inflationary. Some are a little deflationary, like deregulation, but they are overwhelmingly inflationary. Look tariffs, that's inflation on goods, mass deportations, that's labor inflation, reshaping the Fed in order to lower rates. That's inflation, the one big, beautiful bill, act that's lots of spending and largely inflationary. I'm telling you, Trump wants inflation now I'm not here to evaluate these policies for being good or bad. This is about policies, not politics, and understand it's not just the US government. It's every government everywhere that secretly wants inflation. And why do they want that? Well, first, it fuels spending. If you know that your dollars are going to shrink in purchasing power tomorrow, well then you're going to spend today, and consumer spending makes up 68% of us. GDP, yes, Amazon, thanks, you. Secondly, inflation shrinks the government's debt. The third reason that governments everywhere want inflation is because it foils deflation. In a deflationary world, people hoard cash like its gold bullion, tax revenue dries up and the economy stalls, and also inflation. It facilitates wage adjustments. It helps the labor market function. If economic conditions are weak, well, then employers can implement real wage cuts just by keeping salaries flat right where they're at. I mean, that is so preferable to cutting nominal wages directly and giving employees a pay cut notice. Everyone hates seeing that. So those are what four big reasons why governments will take their gloves off and fight in a steel cage match to the death to ensure inflation. So most expect a rate cut at the Feds meeting next week. But if this continues and there were massive cuts, you know, there's something else you've got to ask yourself, do you really want to live in an economy where massive rate cuts occur. I mean, that's what the 2008 global financial crisis and the covid pandemic in 2020 brought to us. So massive cuts mean there's some giant problem out there. Therefore, although the Trump and Powell rivalry, it might make you. Interesting theater and headlines. You know, let's not get carried away. Let's put things in perspective. What matters to you more is how many dollars you're leveraging, the efficiency of your property operations and the quality of your business relationships. Really, the bottom line is that fed tweaks are background noise inflation, that is the long term engine that makes your real estate profitable. Focus there, and let the politicians keep doing the yelling concerns about ongoing inflation and what that means for real estate investors, that's next. I'm Keith Weinhold. You're listening to get rich education.    Keith Weinhold  8:57   The same place where I get my own mortgage loans is where you can get yours. Ridge lending group and MLS, 42056, they provided our listeners with more loans than anyone because they specialize in income properties. They help you build a long term plan for growing your real estate empire with leverage. Start your prequel and even chat with President Chaley Ridge personally while it's on your mind, start at Ridge lendinggroup.com. That's Ridge lendinggroup.com.    Keith Weinhold  8:57   You know what's crazy your bank is getting rich off of you. The average savings account pays less than 1% it's like laughable. Meanwhile, if your money isn't making at least 4% you're losing to inflation. That's why I started putting my own money into the FFI liquidity fund. It's super simple. Your cash can pull in up to 8% returns, and it compounds. It's not some high risk gamble like digital or AI stock trading. It's pretty low risk because they've got a 10 plus year track record of paying investors on time in full every time. I mean, I wouldn't be talking about it if I wasn't invested myself. You can invest as little as 25k and you keep earning until you decide you want your money back, no weird lockups or anything like that. So if you're like me and tired of your liquid funds just sitting there doing nothing, check it out. Text family. 266, 866, to learn about freedom. Family investments, liquidity fund again. Text family, to 66866,   Ken McElroy  17:26   this is Rich Dad advisor Ken McElroy. Listen to get rich education with Keith Weinhold, and don't quit your Daydream.    Keith Weinhold  17:34   we have a familiar voice back on the show. It's an in house discussion here with our own GRE investment coach since 2021 he's helped you completely free, usually over the phone, learning your own personal goals and then helping you find the market that's the right fit for you, and even help connect you with the exact property address that helps you win the inflation Triple Crown, like say, 321, Mulberry Street in Chattanooga, Tennessee. They say that formal education will make you a living self education will make you a fortune. Well, he's got them both. He's slinging an MBA, and he's an active real estate investor just like you and I. Hey, welcome back to the show investment coach and race Vista.    Naresh Vissa  18:25   Hey, Keith pleasure, to be back on.    Keith Weinhold  18:27   Inflation is something that affects real estate investors even more so than it does the general public. Since we're borrowing large sums of money and the inflation discussion sure has been interesting lately, you just can't quite get rates back down to 2% still, they've been elevated for years. So talk to us from your vantage point about inflation and future inflation concerns.   Naresh Vissa  18:51   Well, Keith, I am concerned about inflation. This is the first time in a year or so that I'm concerned with the direction and with the policy surrounding inflation, here's why. And I brought this up when I was on your podcast in July, the current administration is not talking at all about the fact that inflation is rising. We saw the CPI, for example, hit 2.3% which was four year low earlier this year, and since then, inflation has gone up. That is concerning, that inflation is going back up without any rate cuts. Yet it's gone back, I don't want to say gone back up, but it's gone up. And remember, the Federal Reserve inflation target is 2% so we want to get as close to 2% as possible. And the number one issue in the 2024 election, and the number one issue today is still the cost of everything is right, is too much, which we'll talk about, from gas prices to home values to rents to grocery that's the. Big one, the cost of groceries, the stuff that you buy at grocery stores, etc, everything is just too expensive. Of course, education, you name, childcare, everything is just too expensive. Inflation is still, I think the administration needs to really tackle this problem. They need to really, really tackle it, because it is the number one issue. It is what people essentially, their vote is, is based on it's not necessarily based on some peace agreement in a foreign nation. It's not based on some social issue. The number one issue is going to be this inflation problem. It's are things affordable? Do I have money in my bank account to pay for X, Y and Z? So I am concerned because, yes, tariffs are inflationary. That's kind of common sense. Now I think tariffs can be good. Tariffs can keep inflation in check. If they're handled the right way, we will see that. But my bigger concern is that inflation has been rising. We're not anywhere close to that 2% and we know with a very high degree of certainty that the Federal Reserve is beginning their rate cutting cycle next week with the September rate cut, and that's going to be extended. We've seen President Trump. He's very public, his Treasury Secretary, his Secretary of Commerce, all the economic advisors who he has, they're very transparent about the fact that they want rates slashed, and they want rates slashed quickly. And so we know that we're going to get a rate this is going to be a rate slashing cycle. It's going to be great for the upper class, if you want to call it, it's going to be great for real estate investors, but for the common man, the byproduct of that is going to be higher inflation. There's just no way that you can cut rates so quickly, so low, and you're not going to see inflation. That's my concern. Now on the other hand, and again, we have to see how this plays out. On the other hand, I brought up earlier this year, I've referenced Doge. I think Doge is doing a good job cutting government spending, trying to scale back some of the government initiatives, not that the government's always going to spend we know that, but it's you need to cut back, and doges is trying to do that. That's a plus. But even bigger, I talked about some foreign wars, right? Well, I think that the Middle Eastern conflict and the Russia Ukraine conflict, both of those actually are disinflationary, or fixing those conflicts, creating peace. We've seen a ceasefire in the Middle East. We've seen a peace agreement in Ukraine, and they're disinflationary because of some of the items that I brought up. I think oil is going to dip below $50 a barrel as a result of these peace agreements, these ceasefires. So we're going to see oil prices go down. When you see oil and energy prices go down, you see the cost of almost everything else go down, because you need oil and energy to transport everything else. If you're building a house, you have wood and steel and lumber and and all sorts of materials. And it's you need a truck to transport all that. And the truck is probably it's not an EV truck. You're getting these big trucks that are using diesel fuel. So if we can bring down the cost of of oil and gas and electricity, which these taking care of these conflicts will do, creating peace will do the price of those products, oil, the natural gas, the electricity, the wheat, the grains, those are your groceries. The cost of those are going to come down. So I think it's very positive what we're seeing with this idea of peace in regions that make a huge difference to the global economy. So I'm curious to see, like I think we could see greater than 100 basis point decrease in inflation just by solving these conflicts 1% or more, like I legitimately think so, and that's without the tariffs. That's without the federal rate cut. So even if we're at, let's say, two and a half percent inflation today, and you shave off 100 basis points up now you're at one and a half, and then you throw in tariff inflation, you throw in the rate cut inflation, and we're around 2% so that's the ideal scenario that the administration is hoping for. It's let's create peace, let's have a freer market, and then they can scale back a lot of these tariffs too, because many of these tariffs against India, for example, they can scale back the United States can scale back the 50% tariff on India. That tariff was India got hit with because they're buying Russian oil, and you take care of the Russia conflict. Now it's we say, oh, India, you know, we'll scale back to go back to your 25% tariff, or maybe even less, if you do X, Y and Z. For us, we can expect to see many of these tariffs scaled back. We can expect to see the price of specific goods and services, the prices decrease, which will bring down inflation. That's what I'm optimistic about. Hopefully all these agreements hold, which I think they will, and we can expect that, and the Fed can begin its rate cutting cycle, and everything will be booming, and everything will be great. This is the. Deal scenario. I'm not predicting this. This is the ideal scenario for the administration,   Keith Weinhold  25:05   when both war and terrorists get as bad as they can possibly get. From there, they can only get better, each of which would be disinflationary. Now, the CPI inflation has been reported at 2.7% each of the past two months. But when we talk about rates, Trump wants lower rates, of course, and I think we all know that the Fed's fear of lowering rates is that high inflation could resurface. One thing though, that few think about is that lower rates lead to higher inflation, which kills off the national debt faster. But when we think about upcoming federal reserve rate cuts anytime, whether this was 10 years ago today or 10 years into the future, these are the type of lessons that I like to talk about. All right, when we look at the last Fed meeting, there was no rate cut, but then awful jobs numbers were reported right after that. That's why some think that there could be a 50 point rate cut at the next meeting. The Fed meets eight times a year, so there's about a month and a half between meetings. Now, the Fed doesn't have to wait for a meeting to make a rate cut. They can do an emergency rate cut between meetings, like we saw during covid, but sometimes they're reluctant to do that because that really spooks markets, and that makes people think, oh my gosh, there was an emergency rate cut. Maybe things are worse than we thought. What's going on that triggers concern?   Naresh Vissa  26:24   Well, I think that would be a huge mistake to have an emergency. Yeah, anatomic was obviously an emergency. That was a global emergency. Makes sense. 2008 I remember, I was just college student, but that was an emergency because we saw people lining up on the streets of Manhattan with all their boxes of laid off work, and we saw that on Phoebe. You know, that was a trying time. I think that's out of the question. It's completely unnecessary, especially when the Fed meets every 45 to 50 days. It's, you know, you can wait another 20 days until the next meeting and then make a decision when you have lower rates than the cost, the borrowing costs on the debt, it goes down so the government can refinance its debt, and they would pay less keyword interest dollars. That's a plus, the other plus with tariffs. And I really hope, again, this is just my opinion. I hope this is what happens. But the government is raising quite a lot of tariff revenue, so close to $30 billion last month. And we can expect, in the first full year, next year, it's going to have raised close to half a trillion dollars just for fiscal year 2026 that's the expectation, about half trillion dollars worth of tariff revenue. And I hope that the government uses that pair of revenue to pay down the debt, because when you're paying down the debt, you're dissipating inflation. What I actually don't want them to do is to give us back that money, because they've been floating that around, saying, Oh, we got all this tariff revenue. Let's get it back as a tariff dividend, and every American gets hex, you know, $100 in their bank account or something   Keith Weinhold  28:01   very altruistic. Of you patriotic,   Naresh Vissa  28:04   I would much rather that they use 100% of it to pay down that debt, because the country is going to be better off as a whole over the long term, and in turn, the people will be better off over the long term. The people may not see it. They may want their $200 check or $100 check or whatever it might be, but over the long term, I think the tariffs are overall working out quite well. We're not seeing the crazy inflation that the mainstream expert predicted. I don't think we're going to see the crazy inflation that the experts predicted, if you it's not going to be because of the tariffs, in my opinion, I think it's going to be if there's this aggressive rate cutting cycle that juices the markets and the cost of everything just just goes up. And this ties into real estate investing, because when the Fed starts cutting, that's a very good time for real estate investors to pay attention when the Fed stops cutting immediately. That's a an even better time to pay attention when the rates have bottomed. And this has to deal with timing the real estate market. I'll give you an example. I own several properties. Of one of my properties when the Fed was cutting in 2020 it took about a year for all those cuts to permeate into the mortgage market and into the the market as a whole. It took it. The inflation didn't go up overnight. The inflation didn't go up in April of 2020 or or May of 2020 it went up in April of 2021, it took about a year. So I actually refinanced one of my properties in July of 2021, I refinanced my my property, and I saved about 110 basis points on that refinance. And that's what I mean by timing the market. Because, if you're paying attention, part of it was I knew, Okay, the Fed has stopped. It's cutting. And you know, let's follow the more. Good market. Let's follow the Treasury yield curve and all that. And I jumped in. I literally refinanced at the bottom, like at the absolute bottom. There was about a three month window that was the bottom, and I refinanced. I did the application all that at the beginning of those three months, and it was and I got that great rate at the end of those three months. And I think there's going to be a tremendous opportunity for real estate investors. And I'm sure the Bane This is why I'm a little concerned about inflation as well, because the big hedge funds, the big real estate investment firms, the big banks, the blackstones, the blackrocks, they're going to be ready, and they're going to buy up. They're going to buy up real estate again, and investors, including our GRE investors, they're going to start buying up too. So pay attention. We're going to cover it here. We're going to cover it here, on the podcast and in the newsletter. But pay attention to these rates, because it'll be, I don't want to say, a once in a lifetime opportunity, but it will be a once in a cycle type of opportunity to jump in and get some bottoming real estate values as well as bottoming real estate mortgage rates at the same time. So that equilibrium point is only, like I said, about three or four months long. So we're going to be coming to that point and timing it sometime, I think next year, 2026   Keith Weinhold  31:21   talk to us about the vibe that you're getting from GRE listeners that contact you for a free coaching session. It's really hard to time the real estate market. Why don't you help us out with that? Let us know about a listener or two that you recently helped.   Naresh Vissa  31:37   Well, we have free real estate investment coaching here at GRE. It's absolutely free of charge. You can call, text me, email me whenever you'd like. People can book a free meeting with me, and it's a session. It's an immersive session on real estate investing. So we can go over all of that on our call. You can reach out to me unlimited times, like I said, it's I'm here just to help you throughout and along your real estate investment journey, I've helped hundreds of people invest in real estate, hundreds so it's buying turnkey, cash flowing real estate properties, so our investors can buy properties, and use my guidance and advice to help them buy properties. I also help them if they already own properties, how to optimize their portfolio, how to find new markets. I help them with their existing properties, dealing with property managers, with contractors, even with issues that things aren't always great in real estate, sometimes things can be bad. So listener Paul, for example. Listener Paul, he had a problem with the builder, and he submitted earnest money, and he wanted his earnest money back. Many, many years had gone by, and he came to me and he said, Hey, Naresh, you know, I've got all this money tied up, and the builder's not giving me the money back. Can you help me? And so I got him in touch with the right people, and within three or four months, he got all of his money back, plus interest on all the missed payments. So he got everything back as a lump sum, and then he thanked me and said, Thank you so much. I can sleep better at night, and I'm just I'm doing very well now, and he was ready to buy his next property.   Keith Weinhold  33:15   That's an example of where a deal went wrong and the builder didn't perform and build a property.   Naresh Vissa  33:19   Yes, exactly. Think of me as a trusted advisor, but also as a super connector, someone who can get you in touch with all the right companies and people to make real estate investing very sound. We have listener Joe, who bought many properties through us. He bought his first property through me and through GRE through our coaching program, and that first property worked out really well. So then he said, Hey, I want to buy a second property about six months later. So he bought a second property, and that worked out well. And then he said, let's go with it. And he bought all these with the same provider. So once he reached four, because my rule is, you don't want to go more than four or five in one market. Then he asked me for the next he said, what market do you recommend next? So then I recommended the next market, and then he bought another three or four in that market, and he built a nice little portfolio of seven or I mean, some people think it's little, some people think it's big, of seven or eight properties. So that's very common with the coaching program, where our listeners are really happy. If things are going great, I'm here for them. If things are not going the way that they expected, I'm here to help fix that problem.   Keith Weinhold  34:30   Maurice, is there to help you start building and grow a portfolio. Now, how do you yourself analyze deals and find properties before you let our listeners know about them?   Naresh Vissa  34:40   Well, we work with 15 to 20 different providers around the country, 15 to 20. So these providers are always reaching out to me, emailing me, calling me, leading me voicemails, texting me, saying we've got this great deal. We've got this great incentive. So I parse through all of that, and I find a handful of what I think is best. US and many of these deals, I send them to you, Keith, to promote in your Don't quit your Daydream newsletter, which people can subscribe if they go to get rich education.com. I send them there, and I let our listeners know on the phone when they set up calls, or I have notes on every meeting. So I'm able to send all of these deals to them, and that's how I put the best deals in front of them.   Keith Weinhold  35:25   Most of the coaching calls are over the phone rather than zoom the race. Sure can arrange a zoom call with you if you prefer. You really don't need to do too much to prepare for the call either.   Naresh Vissa  35:38   No, not at all. Just sign up for the meeting, and I'll run things. I'll run the meeting, I'll run the call. It's very straightforward. It's a session. It's very immersive, very interactive.   Keith Weinhold  35:49   Yeah, and you just have to book a time with Naresh once there and afterward. Yeah, it's really casual. Naresh is very open to you text messaging him if you have any ideas, or if you just heard about something on the show that you want to know more of. But yeah, booking that first coaching call is really what opens the door to the communication. And you really staying up to date on things. You can find a race through GRE marketplace. And alternatively, you can learn more about him with his bio. And importantly, book a time on his calendar by going directly to GREinvestment coach.com for a while now he's had times available Monday through Friday, and even some weekend slots available, and yeah, keep in touch with him, because property inventory is ever changing, especially with late breaking news like we've had this year of Home Builders Offering major incentives like buying down your mortgage rate to about 5% so staying up to date has hopefully brought you, the listeners, some really big wins already this year. Naresh, do you have any last thoughts?   Naresh Vissa  35:49   Definitely book a meeting with me. You won't regret it. I think even if you think that you own all these properties, you have all this experience, I think you'll find that the resources we offer it through our free coaching program, there will be one or two nuggets that you didn't know about that will still help you. So it doesn't harm anybody to book that free session with me. If you don't think you need my help, maybe it's just a five minute call and we touch base and we're good to go. That's fine too, but I highly recommend that people get in touch with me. We go from there so that you can continue to have a fruitful investment journey.   Keith Weinhold  37:28   Naresh has been valuable as always. Thanks for coming back out of the show.    Naresh Vissa  37:31   Thank you very much, Keith.   Keith Weinhold  37:38   Yeah, some sharp insight from Naresh as always. Now, when you think about making your next property move, consider how, compared to a few years ago, uncertainty has largely abated and real estate has stabilized. Think about how back in 2020 covid was the big uncertainty concern 2021 it was this real estate boom and an inventory shortage. You would get 50 or 80 offers on one property, and buyers were waiving inspections. That was tough. That was such a seller's market in 2022 that's when you had inflation and the supply chain chaos. That's when CPI inflation peaked at 9.1% in 2023 the big uncertainty concern was interest rate shock and the affordability crisis. And last year and this year, they've pivoted more to macro economic concerns. So therefore today's chief concern gets somewhat more buffered from real estate. Now I discussed the direction of rents earlier in today's show, the recently released Kay Shiller numbers came out, and they show that national home prices are up almost 2% annually, 13 cities or higher and seven or lower. By the way, this continued nominal price appreciation that frustrates the bejesus out of those perpetually wrong crash predictors. They have been wrong even longer than the people waiting for flying cars to show up. And where will prices continue to go from here, probably even higher now, America just hit somewhat of a milestone in this cycle. You might remember that mortgage rates peaked at 7.8% almost two years ago. Well, mortgage rates have now slid down to six and a half 6.5% and here's why this has become significant, right? Just compared to when rates were 7% per the nar 2.8 million Americans now qualify to buy a home. 5.5 million more will qualify at 6% and 7.7 more will qualify at five and a half percent. My gosh. Now. Now, of course, not every newly qualified buyer is going to pounce on a property, but only if a fraction of those do. Can you imagine how this demand increase will stoke prices? There are still only about 1.1 million homes available today. So not only are mortgage rates at a fresh low, but inventory choices, although they're still historically low, they are now at a six year high, and this is all while there's less buyer competition. So today's buyer conditions are really improving, and the bottom line here is that you are in the best position in more than five years to find the right property while still avoiding a bidding war, you have really got some properties to choose from. That is the takeaway, and you don't need to do much to prepare for an immersive free call with Naresh. You know what your situation is, although you probably do want to have about a 20% down payment for a property ready to go, some of which cost as little as 200k in these investor advantage markets, whether you've never bought any property in your life, or if you have dozens, it probably will benefit you. You can easily book a time that works best for you right on a GRE investment coaches calendar that way. There's no back and forth, and you can set it up now. Should you so choose at GRE investment coach.com Until next week, I'm your host, Keith Weinhold, don't quit your Daydream.   Speaker 3  41:38   Nothing on this show should be considered specific, personal or professional advice, please consult an appropriate tax, legal, real estate, financial or business professional for individualized advice. Opinions of guests are their own. Information is not guaranteed. All investment strategies have the potential for profit or loss. The host is operating on behalf of get rich Education LLC, exclusively.   Keith Weinhold  42:02   You know, whenever you want the best written real estate and finance info, oh, geez, today's experience limits your free articles access, and it's got paywalls and pop ups and push notifications and cookies disclaimers. It's not so great. So then it's vital to place nice, clean, free content into your hands that adds no hype value to your life. That's why this is the golden age of quality newsletters. And I write every word of ours myself. It's got a dash of humor, and it's to the point, because even the word abbreviation is too long. My letter usually takes less than three minutes to read, and when you start the letter, you also get my one hour fast real estate video. Course, it's all completely free. It's called the Don't quit your Daydream letter. It wires your mind for wealth, and it couldn't be easier for you to get it right now. Just text gre, 266, 866, while it's on your mind, take a moment to do it right now. Text gre, 266, 866,   Keith Weinhold  43:18   The preceding program was brought to you buy your home for wealth, building, get richeducation.com

Prioritizing yourself isn't selfish—it's survival. This FYF brings a listener's bold boundary win, a reminder that rest prevents burnout, and a big team celebration with the launch of a brand-new coaching app. Plus, Lesley and Brad drop an affirmation that will remind you of your one-of-a-kind gift to the world.If you have any questions about this episode or want to get some of the resources we mentioned, head over to LesleyLogan.co/podcast https://lesleylogan.co/podcast/. If you have any comments or questions about the Be It pod shoot us a message at beit@lesleylogan.co mailto:beit@lesleylogan.co. And as always, if you're enjoying the show please share it with someone who you think would enjoy it as well. It is your continued support that will help us continue to help others. Thank you so much! Never miss another show by subscribing at LesleyLogan.co/subscribe https://lesleylogan.co/podcast/#follow-subscribe-free.In this episode you will learn about:Why standing firm on your policies builds respect in your business.The real cost of burnout and how it impacts your ability to show up.Saying yes to breaks and travel as a way to protect your energy.How better systems free up energy for you and your clients.Episode References/Links:Cambodia October 2025 Retreat - https://crowsnestretreats.comSubmit your wins or questions - https://beitpod.com/questions If you enjoyed this episode, make sure and give us a five star rating and leave us a review on iTunes, Podcast Addict, Podchaser or Castbox. https://lovethepodcast.com/BITYSIDEALS! DEALS! DEALS! DEALS! https://onlinepilatesclasses.com/memberships/perks/#equipmentCheck out all our Preferred Vendors & Special Deals from Clair Sparrow, Sensate, Lyfefuel BeeKeeper's Naturals, Sauna Space, HigherDose, AG1 and ToeSox https://onlinepilatesclasses.com/memberships/perks/#equipmentBe in the know with all the workshops at OPC https://workshops.onlinepilatesclasses.com/lp-workshop-waitlistBe It Till You See It Podcast Survey https://pod.lesleylogan.co/be-it-podcasts-surveyBe a part of Lesley's Pilates Mentorship https://lesleylogan.co/elevate/FREE Ditching Busy Webinar https://ditchingbusy.com/Resources:Watch the Be It Till You See It podcast on YouTube! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq08HES7xLMvVa3Fy5DR8-gLesley Logan website https://lesleylogan.co/Be It Till You See It Podcast https://lesleylogan.co/podcast/Online Pilates Classes by Lesley Logan https://onlinepilatesclasses.com/Online Pilates Classes by Lesley Logan on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjogqXLnfyhS5VlU4rdzlnQProfitable Pilates https://profitablepilates.com/about/Follow Us on Social Media:Instagram https://www.instagram.com/lesley.logan/The Be It Till You See It Podcast YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq08HES7xLMvVa3Fy5DR8-gFacebook https://www.facebook.com/llogan.pilatesLinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/lesley-logan/The OPC YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/@OnlinePilatesClasses Episode Transcript:Lesley Logan 0:00  It's Fuck Yeah Friday. Brad Crowell 0:01  Fuck yeah. Lesley Logan 0:02  Get ready for some wins. Welcome to the Be It Till You See It podcast where we talk about taking messy action, knowing that perfect is boring. I'm Lesley Logan, Pilates instructor and fitness business coach. I've trained thousands of people around the world and the number one thing I see stopping people from achieving anything is self-doubt. My friends, action brings clarity and it's the antidote to fear. Each week, my guest will bring bold, executable, intrinsic and targeted steps that you can use to put yourself first and Be It Till You See It. It's a practice, not a perfect. Let's get started.Brad Crowell 0:48  Welcome Be It Pod squad. It is September 5th, Friday. It's Fuck Yeah Friday, and I'm, obviously, Brad here, stepping in for Lesley for the first part of this episode. She's gonna take over the second half of this episode here, where we're bringing your wins, and she's going to celebrate a win, but we're going to start today off a little bit differently with an affirmation, in a way that I think Lesley is going to get a kick out of. I hope you really enjoy it. So feel free to sing along. This is an encouraging, amazing song that I've often drawn inspiration from, and I think you're gonna love it. Brad Crowell 1:21  I've paid my dues time after time. I've done my sentence but committed no crime and bad mistakes I've made a few. I've had my share of sand kicked in my face, but I've come through. And on and on and on. We are the champions, my friends, and we'll keep on fighting till the end, because we are the champions. We are the champions. No time for losers, because we are the champions of the world.Brad Crowell 2:24  You know it. You know it. You hear it in the background. You are singing that song, too. I love this song because it's very relatable. You know, even though you know it's Queen and they're like epic rock stars, but listening to those lyrics, listening to that song, is something that I've always found relatable. You know, I've paid my dues time after time. I've done my sentence, but I committed no crime, right? How often do we feel like that, where we are feeling like I'm doing everything right, and yet things still aren't going my way? And maybe along the way, you know, and bad mistakes I've made a few. Maybe along the way we've made some bad mistakes. I've had my share of sand kicked in my face, but I've come through, right. And as a small business owners, you might feel like that too, but you will come through this. And I wanted to celebrate that chorus with you. We are the champions, my friends. You know we're gonna keep fighting. And that's, that's the thing, when you're, when you are, doesn't even have to be just in business, but in life, you know, one foot in front of the other, y'all. Keep on going. Consistency, persistency. You got this. You can do this. We are the champions, and we'll we're the champions of the world. So really excited to have you joining us this week for this Fuck Yeah Friday. I'm gonna pass the torch here on to Lesley to celebrate a few of your wins, and then hopefully, you know, you're gonna take encouragement and send in your own win to us as well so we can celebrate you on an upcoming Fuck Yeah Friday. So thanks for being here today. Lesley Logan 4:00  All right, now, for the next part of the episode where I share a win of yours. So, win of yours. We had a couple wins from Melissa Capitano, so we'll go through these. Stood up for myself when a client tried to bully me, she didn't think I should charge her for a late cancel because she had been a client since the founding owner, and she was good friends with her. She also told me that she never got any warm and fuzzy feelings from me and that I wasn't friendly towards her. I stood my ground. She told me she's going to pretend the conversation didn't happen, and proceeded to buy a 12 pack and book privates with one of my instructors. So I'm counting it as a win. So I just want to say it is interesting being a business owner, the requests that people ask or demand or think that they are worthy or entitled to, it really does show like, I don't know how this person would like live their life, but clearly there was some sort of luxury, or maybe their family was gifted things or given things based on a last name or whatever. But here's the deal, when you agree to a frequent or patronize an establishment, they have rules, and when you participate in that business, you are agreeing to participate with the rules. Now, if you don't like that, you don't have to patronize the establishment. That's why we live where we all have a place like there's more than one Pilates studio. There's more than one lunch place. There's more than one sandwich place. It's extremely rare in most of the world, where you listen to podcasts, that you are the only thing that exists, and even if you are, you still are worthy of having rules and boundaries for how people can participate with you. And the fact that, like, she's been a client with the original owner, that's cool and that she didn't get warm and fuzzy feelings for you, that's not your fault, right? You weren't creating a best friend environment. You were creating a business that can make people safe and have a place where they can call home for their Pilates practice for years and years to come. So, way to go, Melissa, way to stand for yourself. And I think it's hilarious. It's just like, okay, well, this conversation didn't happen. Like, interesting. Sometimes we have to be a mirror for people. Okay, you have another win. So my win. I'm on the road now, on our way to a family reunion. I needed this break. I've been teaching 35 to 45 hours a week for the last three months. I seriously thought about just staying home and letting my family go, but I remembered what Ella said about you're not helping anyone if you burn yourself out. So anyway, we are on the way stop to pick up lunch, taking Brad and Lesley with me on the road. She's wearing a shirt with Brad and I on it, and I love that so much. And it's really, thank you Melissa for making this a win so we could talk about this as a group. Seriously, you're a zero help to anyone burnt out. You are so not helpful to anyone. One of my friends from a group that I was in. I, by the time I'm recording this, I'm seeing that her husband's in the hospital, and like her, she and her kids, like, flew immediately to go see him. He was in a different state than where they live, and after about 36 hours, she flew the kids back home, because taking care of the kids and him and herself is, like, not an option, right? And the hospital's not the place where they can feel stress free and like, where little children can like, relax either. So she did something for herself so she doesn't burn out, right? So everyone can be protected. There's no right answers in those situations. You might have done something differently, but the point I'm sharing with that story is, Melissa's story, with you is there's always a reason to not go on the trip. There's always a reason to not start the thing. There's always a reason to not take the day off or not go out. And if what the thing that you are saying you don't want to do is used to fill your cup and you're just tired, go do it, because it's going to fill your cup. You're not going to fill your cup at home. You're going to find things to do at home. You're not going to relax. You're not going to rest when you are working that hard in your business, and there are seasons for that you must make sure you are taking care of yourself. So, Melissa, kudos to you. Hats off to you. And thank you for sharing this win so that other people can be inspired that that that is something that they can do. So if you are feeling like close to burnout now, my loves like, what is the thing that you are thinking you shouldn't do? Right? Are you already making excuses? Like, oh, you know that that October trip I shouldn't do. I had somebody reach out about the Cambodia retreat, and they're like, I really want to go. This is like, my dream retreat, but I just start a new job, like, five months before the retreat. Okay, totally understand not every job is reasonable. Maybe they don't have vacation time built up by five months. But also, like you're not gonna lose your job by saying, hey, by the way, in October, I need one week off to take care of myself. If you show your work that you are a better employee after resting, they're going to let you do that. Most places do. Now, you work for an asshole. I can't help you there. Lesley Logan 8:40  All right, a win of ours. So we actually released an app this summer, guys, we did it. Our team did it. It hit the deadlines that we'd set for ourselves. It works. People are using it. They love it. So we've always had, we've already had an app for OPC. People could take classes. You don't have to be a member to use the app, like you can listen to podcast on it. There's like, free tutorials you can watch on it. There's some free challenges. But if you're a member, you can be in the community. You can chat with us, you can take your classes on the app. Makes it really fun to do is take it yourself wherever your phone can go or your iPad can go. So we've been working on that for Profitable Pilates, and it's beautiful. It's really simple. It's really easy for our members to use. So, Agency members, instead of being in Slack now have one place to go to chat with the community, to share their wins, to have a moment to watch videos from me that are notes of inspiration, to see when the next office hours is, to book coaching calls, to watch courses all in one place. And for seven half years prior to this, they had to go to a website and to Slack and, you know, all this different stuff. And so we're, you know, we're so grateful that the way that technology has gone, that we have this opportunity to do this. And I'm really happy with the way the app is, way it looks, way people are using it. I'm just so proud. So this is one of those wins that months in the making and was a more of a team win than a me win. But you know, I am someone who often doesn't like change. I know it's kind of crazy. You think I love change the way I like preach like you should, like, just act like you're already the person you want to be. But like, I always worry about, like, oh my God, we have to transition people from one thing to the other thing. Are they going to do it? Will they come? Are we going to lose people? I don't want people to have a bad time. Like, there's a lot that can go wrong in a transition. And we, you know, it's hand holding everybody is not the easiest thing to do. Some people need it. And so I just am so grateful and so excited for what we've done. And now, y'all, if you want to coach with us, you get to use an app, and it's great. And of course, there's still Zoom calls and things like that. Anyways, really, really grateful for that, really, really proud of that huge win, and I'm just glad I get to celebrate that with you. Lesley Logan 10:53  Okay, your affirmation, another affirmation, but one that's a little easier. There is something in this world that only I can do, that is why I'm here. There is something in this world that only I can do, that is why I'm here. There's something in this world that only I can do, that is why I'm here. You know why I love this it's because I literally tell our aAgency members all of the time, you are the only person who can do what you do the way that you do it. Sometimes I have to say it slower for people to hear it. You are the only person who can do what you do the way that you do it. There are many people who went to the same training that I did in 2008 and are the same age and have the same experience and we teach differently. There are people who stayed with Jay and Sandy and all these people, and we all teach Pilates in theory the same way, and yet they'll be different than me always, and I'll be different than them. So you are the only person who do what you do the way that you do it. You're it. So never play small. Doesn't help anyone. And until next time, Be It Till You See It. Lesley Logan 11:58  That's all I got for this episode of the Be It Till You See It Podcast. One thing that would help both myself and future listeners is for you to rate the show and leave a review and follow or subscribe for free wherever you listen to your podcast. Also, make sure to introduce yourself over at the Be It Pod on Instagram. I would love to know more about you. Share this episode with whoever you think needs to hear it. Help us and others Be It Till You See It. Have an awesome day. Be It Till You See It is a production of The Bloom Podcast Network. If you want to leave us a message or a question that we might read on another episode, you can text us at +1-310-905-5534 or send a DM on Instagram @BeItPod.Brad Crowell 12:41  It's written, filmed, and recorded by your host, Lesley Logan, and me, Brad Crowell.Lesley Logan 12:46  It is transcribed, produced and edited by the epic team at Disenyo.co.Brad Crowell 12:50  Our theme music is by Ali at Apex Production Music and our branding by designer and artist, Gianfranco Cioffi.Lesley Logan 12:57  Special thanks to Melissa Solomon for creating our visuals.Brad Crowell 13:00  Also to Angelina Herico for adding all of our content to our website. And finally to Meridith Root for keeping us all on point and on time.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/be-it-till-you-see-it/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In today's episode we will talk about the "Back to school" period in September and how it looks like in Greece. We will also talk about some traditions and preparations for the new school year.E: Καλό μήνα! Επιστρέψατε από τις διακοπές; /Happy new month! Did you come back from vacation?D: Ναι! Ετοιμαζόμαστε για την επιστροφή στο σχολείο. Εσείς; /Yes! We're getting ready for back to school. How about you?Ε: Εμείς γυρνάμε αύριο από το χωριό και τα παιδιά δεν θέλουν να φύγουν με τίποτα! / We're coming back from the village tomorrow, and the kids don't want to leave at all!D: Μία από τα ίδια κι εμείς όταν φύγαμε από τους παππούδες. Πού να δεις χαρές που θα κάνουν στις 11 Σεπτεμβρίου που θα ανοίξουν και πάλι τα σχολεία. / Same with us when we left the grandparents. Just wait till you see how happy they'll be on September 11th when school starts again.Ε: Τι τάξη θα πάνε φέτος; / What grade are they going to this year?D: Η Μαρία θα πάει πρώτη Λυκείου και ο Παναγιώτης Δευτέρα Γυμνασίου. Εσένα; / Maria is going to 10th grade (first year of high school) and Panagiotis to 8th grade (second year of middle school). Yours?Ε: Ουάου! Η Μαρία τελειώνει το σχολείο σιγά σιγά! Εμένα ο μεγάλος θα πάει Τετάρτη Δημοτικού και ο μικρός νηπιαγωγείο. / Wow! Maria is slowly finishing school! My oldest is going to 3rd grade in primary school, and the little one to kindergarten. D: Άντε με το καλό. Και από του χρόνου στο Δημοτικό και ο Γιώργος! / That's great. And next year George will be in elementary too!Ε: Ναι, αυτός χαίρεται λίγο περισσότερο για την επιστροφή στο σχολείο από τον Ανδρέα! / Yes, he's actually a bit more excited about going back to school than Andreas is!D: Λογικό! Το ίδιο και η Μαρία… αγχώνεται πολύ που μπαίνει στο Λύκειο φέτος./ Makes sense! Same with Maria… she's very stressed about starting high school this year.Ε: Το φαντάζομαι. Εμείς αύριο θα πάμε να πάρουμε μία  καινούργια τσάντα και ένα παγούρι για τον μικρό. Θέλεις να έρθεις; / I can imagine. Tomorrow we're going to buy a new school bag and a water bottle for the little one. Want to come along?D: Φέτος λέμε να χρησιμοποιήσουν τις περσινές τσάντες και κασετίνες και για τα υπόλοιπα σχολικά είδη θα πάμε αφού ξεκινήσουν τα σχολεία και ξέρουμε τι χρειάζονται. Μπορούμε όμως να κανονίσουμε έναν καφέ πριν μπούμε στη ρουτίνα. / This year we decided they'll use last year's bags and pencil cases, and for the rest of the school supplies we'll shop after classes begin, once we know what they need. But we can definitely plan a coffee before we get back into routine.Ε: Εννοείται! Μέσα στο Σαββατοκύριακο θα είμαι ελεύθερη, πάμε όποτε θες! / Of course! I'll be free over the weekend, let's go whenever you want!D: Θα ξαναμιλήσουμε μέσα στη βδομάδα! / We'll talk again during the week!Check out our Instagram @greek_lang_experts or visit our website for our upcoming⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Greek classes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!If you enjoyed this episode please rate our podcast and leave a comment!

In Space, No One… Makes it out alive? Unless you’re a cyborg. This week Jason and Rosie are talking about the flashback episode of Alien: Earth, episode 5! They are asking the important questions, are we even team human anymore at this point? This podcast remains to be team aliens! Let’s talk about what happened aboard the Maginot and breakdown the story so far. Follow Jason: IG & Bluesky Follow Rosie: IG & Letterboxd Follow X-Ray Vision on Instagram Join the X-Ray Vision DiscordSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Welkom bij Nerd Culture #223, de Gamekings podcast waarin we het laatste nieuws en de heetste geruchten uit films, series en alles nerdy bespreken. In deze aflevering duiken we onder meer in de langverwachte terugkeer van Knight Rider op het grote scherm, gemaakt door niemand minder dan de makers van Cobra Kai. Daarnaast hebben we groot Marvel-nieuws: Jon Bernthal's Punisher krijgt volgens de laatste berichten een prominente rol in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Natuurlijk checken we ook trailers, opvallende statements en het laatste nieuws rondom franchises als Star Wars, Gladiator en Gremlins.The Punisher krijgt een grote rol in Spider-Man: Brand New DayHet MCU staat op scherp, want er gaan sterke geruchten dat Jon Bernthal's Punisher een grote rol krijgt in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Volgens scooper Daniel Richtman zou Frank Castle zelfs meer in beeld komen dan andere helden die in de film verschijnen, zoals Hulk en mogelijk Yelena Belova. Dat is groot nieuws: fans verwachten vaak een cameo, maar dit klinkt alsof Castle echt verweven raakt met Peter Parker's verhaal. Hoe hard gaat Marvel durven om de rauwe, gewelddadige toon van The Punisher samen te brengen met Spidey's wereld?Met Tom Holland terug als Peter Parker, Zendaya als MJ en Michael Mando's Scorpion die opnieuw zijn opwachting maakt, belooft dit een stevige mix van bekende gezichten en nieuwe dreigingen. Regisseur Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi) heeft zijn handen vol, maar de potentie is enorm. In de podcast bespreken we hoe deze crossover de Spider-Man films kan veranderen – en of Frank Castle misschien wel dé gamechanger wordt voor Phase 6. Makers Cobra Kai komen met Knight Rider filmNa jaren van geruchten lijkt het eindelijk te gebeuren: Knight Rider krijgt een officiële filmadaptatie. De iconische 80's serie die David Hasselhoff tot superster maakte – met de onvergetelijke KITT, de AI Trans Am – wordt nieuw leven ingeblazen door de makers van Cobra Kai. Universal heeft bevestigd dat Jon Hurwitz, Hayden Schlossberg en Josh Heald niet alleen het script schrijven, maar ook de regie en productie op zich nemen. Daarmee lijkt het project meer kans te maken dan eerdere pogingen, want rebootplannen rondom Knight Rider gaan al meer dan vijftien jaar rond. Van Kevin Hart en John Cena tot James Wan en zelfs gesprekken met James Gunn en Robert Rodriguez: niets kwam echt van de grond. Maar nu het team achter Cobra Kai aan het stuur zit, is de verwachting hoog. In de podcast bespreken we of Knight Rider nog relevant kan zijn in 2025, en hoe AI anno nu perfect past bij KITT's comeback.Timestamps:00:00:00 Nerd Culture #22300:00:40 Donkey Kong Bananza00:04:48 Gamescom00:05:34 Supermarkten00:11:27 B&B Vol Liefde00:13:10 Twin Peaks00:14:25 28 Years Later00:15:34 Huey op zwemles00:22:10 Bugonia Trailer00:25:10 Superman nieuws (Koos krijgt een krat bier!)00:30:36 Stelling 1: The Last Jedi is beter dan The Empire Strikes Back00:35:38 Star Wars deelt eerste beeld Starfighter00:42:33 Volledige cast Star Wars: Starfighter00:45:47 John Williams houdt niet van filmmuziek 00:50:14 Stelling 2: Filmmuziek (John Williams) kan zich meten met orkestrale muziek00:53:46 SISU: Road to Revenge Trailer00:56:27 John Bernthal's Punisher is geen cameo maar de grootste rol naast Spider-Man00:59:18 Jackie Chan's stunt team werkt aan Spider-Man Brand New Day01:00:34 Wanneer wordt teasen spoiler?01:02:40 Kumail Nanjiani dacht 10 jaar in de Marvel Cinematic Universe te spelen01:04:01 War of the Worlds 4 miljoen keer bekeken01:07:17 Makes van Cobrai Kai komen met Knight Rider film01:10:28 Streamer Raja Jackson slaat worstelaar bijna dood01:15:23 Pierce Brosnan staat open voor terugkeer als James Bond01:18:26 Ridley Scott is onvermoeibaar en werkt aan Gladiator 301:20:09 Gremlins 3 toch opeens in limbo01:22:46 The Lowdown Trailer

IT'S FRIDAY BABY!!! If you missed the LIVE show at 5am pst / 8am est, NO WORRIES, here it is for you to sit back, sip your coffee and get your Music on before work!!! TOMPodcast on Mixcloud and The Old Man's Podcast give you More Music / Less Talk Right Here, Right NOW so, Turn it on and TURN IT UP!!  Music is what Makes you Special, Listen, Like and FOLLOW!!! See you next Friday for another LIVE Early Bird Music Show!!! Later Gators!! *Get everything you need to start your own successful podcast on Podbean here: https://www.podbean.com/tomspodcastPBFree *Visit our webpage where you can catch up on Current / Past Episodes: www.theoldmanspodcast.com     *Contact us at: theoldmanspodcast@gmail.com     Checkout and Follow the Writings of Shonda Sinclair here: Roaming the Road (of Life):https://www.shondasinclair.com/   *TOMPodcast Music Shows: https://www.mixcloud.com/TOMPodcast/

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Codesport’s Matt Hickey is back in the Garage as F1 fires up for the 2nd half of the season.McLaren reckon their drivers are getting on well (unlike some of the other inter team rivalries over the years) but surely there’ll be a blow-up between Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri at some stage? Cadillac will give Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas the keys next year. Makes sense right? But can this new F1 team sneak a point or two and be better than ‘cellar dwellers’ in ’26? RedBull is currently 4th in the Constructor’s standings (is it crazy to think that) and while it’s not in Max Verstappen’s nature to wave the white flag surely the team will start to shift its focus to next season and the new regs. And while Daniel Riccardo recovers from a dirt bike crash hopefully he writes a wish list of post F1 Motorsport events he’d like a crack at….Bathurst anyone? It’s two blokes talking Motorsport with an F1 flavour as the sport’s summer break comes to an end and we rev up for the Dutch Grand Prix this weekend. Head to Rusty's Facebook, Twitter or Instagram and give us your feedback and let us know who you want to hear from on Rusty's Garage.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

0:00 - The Avalanche released their national TV schedule today. 17 total games across ESPN, ABC, and TNT. For what it's worth, you can always find every single Avalanche game right here on Altitude Sports Radio 92.5 (regardless of which TV channel has it).20:13 - Let's get back to the BIGGEST SPORTS HEADLINE OF THE DAY! It's absolutely the most important sports story across the vast, sprawling, wide wide world of sports. 33:03 - Sam Ehlinger was released by the Broncos, then signed to the practice squad. All this cut vs waived vs released vs signed to the practice squad stuff is confusing. Makes our heads spin. We need a Jake Coyne equivalent to explain NFL roster gynamstics. 

Hello and welcome listeners to Episode 28 of Side Quest Podcast. On this episode, your hosts, Jake from Guitar Case Full of Reviews and David from Journey with a Cinephile: A Horror Movie Podcast stick with the slasher genre. This is inspired by students and set on a small college campus. The movie selected was Final Exam (1981). The premise is intriguing and shows what doesn't necessarily work. Makes for an interesting discussion though! Thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy coming on this journey with us! Also make sure you check out Jake over on Guitar Case Full of Reviews along with everything else that he does along with his social media at Dark Mariachi Studios.Social Media:Dark Mariachi Studios: ⁠YouTube⁠Email: journeywithacinephile@gmail.comReviews of the Dead Link: https://horrorreview.webnode.com/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dgarrettjrTwitter: https://www.twitter.com/buckeyefrommichLetterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/davidosu/Instagram: davidosu87Threads: davidosu87Journey with a Cinephile Instagram: journeywithacinephileThe Night Club Discord: Journey with a Cinephile

HAPPY FRIDAY!!! If you missed the LIVE show at 4am pst / 7am est, NO WORRIES, here it is for you to sit back, sip your coffee and get your Music on before work!!! TOMPodcast on Mixcloud and The Old Man's Podcast give you More Music / Less Talk Right Here, Right NOW so, Turn it on and TURN IT UP!!  Music is what Makes you Special, Listen, Like and FOLLOW!!! See you next Friday for another LIVE Early Bird Music Show!!! Later Gators!! *Get everything you need to start your own successful podcast on Podbean here: https://www.podbean.com/tomspodcastPBFree *Visit our webpage where you can catch up on Current / Past Episodes: www.theoldmanspodcast.com     *Contact us at: theoldmanspodcast@gmail.com     Checkout and Follow the Writings of Shonda Sinclair here: Roaming the Road (of Life):https://www.shondasinclair.com/   *TOMPodcast Music Shows: https://www.mixcloud.com/TOMPodcast/  

Message Title: Divine Acceleration - Speed of On Time 2In this video, our global lead pastor, Pastor Shola Okodugha, continues from yesterday's teaching and teaches that strength is required to carry and birth what God has placed in your spiritual womb. You don't just need strength to endure, you need strength for acceleration.Strength is not limited to the physical; it is everything required to conceive, sustain, and deliver God's purpose in your life.Key Scriptures:- Genesis 24:10-15- Psalm 90:12He also raised a prayer Point:Oh Lord God of my father, give me good speed today.He further teaches what Divine Acceleration does:-Removes physical and spiritual burnout- Renews hope and strength- Enables you to cover great ground in a short time- Makes your journey mysterious to othersWhy the Spirit Realm Matters:- The earth was created to depend on the realm of the spirit.- The realm of the spirit gives access to the past, present, and future at the same time.Ecclesiastes 5:9 -“The profit of the earth is for all…”Pastor Shola wraps up the message by indicating Signs You're Surviving (Not Living Fully):- You do so much but see little results- You're constantly burnt out- You have to calculate everything before enjoying anything- You're always at the mercy of others' decisions- You have potential, but nothing to show for itWatch this message and receive strength for divine acceleration in every area of your life.——ABOUT THE NEWWe are a people of love and excellence who are result-oriented, spirit-led, word-rooted, prayer-driven, and kingdom-conscious. Led by Pst. Shola Okodugha, we are on a divine assignment to equip and raise men; to release people from strongholds that have stifled them from taking their rightful places, and to give young people an avenue for their God-given gifts to find expression.OUR CREED"As sure as God helps us,We will not give upWe will not cave inWe will not quitWe will not failWe will not dieUntil our job is doneAnd victory is won"——Partner with us to spread the influence of God all over the world. Give - https://pay.squadco.com/TheNewglobal——BROADCAST DETAILSMinister: Pst.Shola OkodughaDate: 19/08/2025——Stay ConnectedSubscribe to the latest content: http://bit.ly/subscribethenewliveWebsite: http://wearethenew.org/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wearethenew_global/#TheNewLive #SholaOkodugha

- Bloomberg: All US-Bound iPhone 17 Models Launching from India - Morgan Stanley Sees Apple Story “Turning the Corner” - UK Backs Off of Demand for Back Door into Encrypted iCloud Data - Fourth Public Beta of watchOS 26 Makes the Scene - Apple Seeds New AirPods Pro 2/AirPods 4 Firmware to Developers - Apple Expands Self Service Repair to Canada - Montana Launches Digital ID Program for iOS and Android - Apple TV+ Gives “Palm Royale” Season-Two a Mid-November Premier - Apple Watch Challenge Celebrating US National Parks on Tap for Sunday - Sponsored by CleanMyMac - Now with Cloud Cleanup. Try 7 days free and use code MACOSKEN20 for 20% off at clnmy.com/MacOSKen - Securing Saint Paul and naming a culprit on Checklist No. 436 - Find it today at checklist.libsyn.com - Catch Ken on Mastodon - @macosken@mastodon.social - Send Ken an email: info@macosken.com - Chat with us on Patreon for as little as $1 a month. Support the show at Patreon.com/macosken

A round-up of the main headlines in Sweden on August 20th, 2025. You can hear more reports on our homepage www.radiosweden.se, or in the app Sveriges Radio. Presenter/Producer: Kris Boswell.

Billy Wayne Davis joins Brendon M. Walsh in the new WRP to talk about Billy Joel, ICE, religion, comedy, and everything else, including, quitting drinking, gangs, having kids, and...well, you'll just have to watch or listen to the whole giant long in-depth episode. I hope you enjoy listening to two cool guys talking about life! We love you! Go see Billy do a show! https://www.bwdtour.com/ Join the Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/worldrecordpodcast 00:00 Welcome to the show! 04:20 TDBJ 09:30 AA 16:35 Don't Tell BW is doing stand up again 23:05 Makes u feel good 29:18 Play about football 39:57 CC TBS 45:16 BWD Dates

Australian guitarist Davey Lane discusses his new album 'Finally, a Party Record', joining You Am I at 18, meeting Paul McCartney & nerding out on vinyl! Listen to the new album here. Topics Include: Davey Lane discusses his new album "Finally, a Party Record" and the ironic title choice Originally titled "The Great Unraveling" but changed to something more approachable and chipper Despite upbeat title, songs deal with dark subject matter that inspires his songwriting Finding peace with mental state and place in world as he's gotten older Always includes glimmer of optimism even when writing about romantic catastrophes going wrong Makes music as compulsion, not for career goals - realistic about posthumous appreciation Big Star, Nick Drake - artists appreciated later in life Avid record collector who browses sections aimlessly rather than shopping with lists Discovers new bands like Comets on Fire by hearing them playing in record stores Vinyl is primary listening format - meditative experience that keeps him focused and level Thinks about album sequencing early, including crossfades between songs on new record Beatles were gateway drug, fascinated by production techniques on Sgt Pepper's at age seven Met Paul McCartney in 2017 backstage in Melbourne through Jimmy Barnes and Michael Gudinski Took Valium beforehand, talked about McCartney's jacket instead of asking musical questions Started transcribing You Am I songs as teenager, sent tabs to drummer Rusty Got invited on stage at 16 to play with You Am I at all-ages show Returned to high school as local hero after performing with established rock band Tim Rogers called offering solo tour opportunity, left university after two days to tour Officially joined You Am I in 1999 at age 18 after proving compatibility on tour Took years to feel like full band member rather than nervous new guy Learned importance of authenticity over networking and career-focused schmoozing in music industry Collaborated on The Rites project covering Stevie Wright's "Evie" to raise money for legend Recorded with Saints' Chris Bailey on what became his final album before passing Created experimental Dual Monophonic vinyl with Tim Rogers and King Gizzard's Stu McKenzie Each vinyl channel contains different arrangement of same song, can be heard separately Technical challenges getting proper stereo separation on vinyl pressing required multiple attempts New album on Cheer Squad Records features striking red and yellow vinyl pressing Cover art deliberately references Rod Stewart despite not particularly liking that album Record designed to catch browser's eye in record stores like albums that attracted him Interview wrap up Extended and high resolution version of this podcast is available at: www.Patreon.com/VinylGuide Apple: https://tinyurl.com/tvg-ios Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/tvg-spot Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/tvg-amazon Support the show at Patreon.com/VinylGuide

FULL SHOW : Max Gawn is in to talk round 23 and Melbourne's search for a Coach; Ed Kavalee tells us about his soccer trip and hosting the Adult Entertainment Awards; and we find out what Makes you Rage! Tomorrow: Broden Kelly and Melbourne Storm's Cam Munster. Catch Mick in the Morning LIVE from 6-9am weekdays on 105.1 Triple M. To watch your favourite new Breakfast Radio crew in action, follow @molloy and @triplemmelb on InstagramSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Well that was a tough watch. Makes you appreciate QB2 a million times more. Well regardless I go position by position and tell you my thoughts coming out of an ugly preseason loss to the Browns.https://sportspyder.com/nfl/philadelphia-eagles/news?pid=4349

A weekend spent in Wellington inspired me to re-create a dish from Ortega Fish Shack's dessert menu: Crêpes filled with a delicate custard and doused in a caramel orange sauce – I swear they're the best I'd ever had. This is my attempt at these and they're very, very good. Makes 10-12 crêpes. Ingredients 100g plain flour a pinch of salt 2 eggs 300ml milk butter for frying ½ cup store-bought thick custard softly whipped cream Orange caramel sauce ½ cup caster sugar 3 tablespoons water zest and juice of 1 orange a splash of brandy or rum Method Sift the flour and a pinch of salt into a bowl. Make a well in the centre then break in the eggs and pour in half the milk. Whisk together, gradually incorporating the flour to make a smooth thick batter then stir in the rest of the milk. Leave to rest for 15 minutes. Heat a little butter in a medium frying pan. Pour about 2-3 tablespoons of batter into the pan, tilting the pan as you pour, until the batter thinly coats the base. Cook over a moderate heat for 30–60 seconds until golden brown on the underside. Then flip and cook the other side for another 30–60 seconds. Repeat with remaining batter. When the crêpes are cooled, dab a teaspoon of custard and spread it on one quarter. Fold the crêpe in half then over again to form a triangle. Make the caramel by heating the sugar and water in a small saucepan without stirring until it begins to colour, about 4 minutes. Let it bubble and deepen to a light caramel colour before adding in orange zest and juice and alcohol. Simmer for a few minutes more until it thickens. To serve: Return folded and filled crêpes to the pan, drizzle in the caramel sauce and gently heat until crepes are warmed through. Serve with a dollop of whipped cream. Pure decadence! LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Most guys drift through their late teens and 20s letting comfort and distraction set their priorities. In this episode, I challenge you to take control of yours. I'll share 25 powerful ideas—from learning new skills to building deeper relationships—that will make you stronger, more confident, and more interesting. Pick one, start this week, and watch how fast your life changes. Below are the priorities we will cover: Boxing/Jiu-jitsu – Builds confidence and toughness; teaches you to stay calm under pressure.Push-up/Pull-up Routine – Strength you can see and feel; instant progress marker.Read on a topic you like – Makes you sharper, even in what you're already into.Learn 5 high-protein meals – Fuel your body like someone who respects it.Write letters – Forces you to slow down, reflect, and connect deeply.Walk + podcast – Move your body and your mind at the same time.Wake early + cold shower – Start your day winning; mental toughness.10k steps/day – A foundation for better mood, health, and energy.Nightly wins list – Trains your brain to notice progress.Public speaking course – Confidence in front of anyone.New language – Expands your world and your brainpower.Recreational sports – Fitness, fun, and friendships.Art class – Unlock creativity and expression.Weekly challenge – Discipline and camaraderie.Bookstore self-improvement hour – Mental fuel and fresh ideas.Find a mentor – Shortcut years of mistakes.Learn a profitable skill – Start building income potential now.Plan routines – Structure equals freedom.Gratitude letter – Strengthens relationships and humility.Class on confidence/human behavior – Social advantage in life.New hike + vlog – Adventure plus story to share.Set/track one goal – Learn how to actually achieve something.Tell parents what you love about them – Changes your relationship instantly.Take grandma on a date – Memory she'll never forget; maturity for you.Do 1 thing every 2 weeks – Your year will be stacked with growth.

Tired of being held hostage by thoughts like "When can I eat next?" or "I need to work this off"? In this game-changing episode, Lindsey introduces her signature Triple Threat Tool that stops ED thoughts from spiraling and puts YOU back in control of your mind. Learn the exact 3-step framework to go from being controlled by eating disorder thoughts to being completely in control of your recovery. Key Takeaways You can't fight what you don't acknowledge, and you can't change what you don't challenge Your ED thoughts aren't actually YOUR thoughts - they're learned responses The Triple Threat Tool threatens the lies, the spiral, and the ED's power over your choices You're allowed to have the thought - but you don't have to believe it or act on it Deciding your comeback in advance stops spirals before they start The Triple Threat Tool Breakdown Step 1: NAME IT - Who's Really Talking Here? Purpose: Identify whether this is your ED voice or your authentic voice How to Do It: Give your ED voice an actual name (Restriction Rachel, Control Freak Carla, Body Critic Betty) Separate the ED voice from who you really are Recognize these aren't YOUR thoughts - they're learned responses from diet culture Example: ED Thought: "I shouldn't eat this cookie" Name It: "That's Restriction Rachel trying to control my food choices" Step 2: TAME IT - Take Your Power Back Purpose: Acknowledge the thought without giving it power How to Do It: Refuse to let the ED voice drive the bus Thank the voice but decline to take orders Set boundaries with your ED thoughts like you would with a demanding person Example: Tame It: "Thanks for sharing, Restriction Rachel, but I'm not taking orders from you today" Lindsey's Example: "Rachel, you've been fired. I'm in charge of my nourishment now" Step 3: FRAME IT - Create Your New Truth Purpose: Replace ED lies with recovery-aligned thoughts How to Do It: Create thoughts that feel true and move you toward recovery Not fake positive affirmations - authentic recovery truths Choose thoughts that serve your healing journey Example: Frame It: "My body needs consistent fuel throughout the day, and this cookie is part of my recovery" Real-Life Triple Threat Examples Food Thought Scenario: ED Thought: "I need to work out extra today because I ate something different last night" Name It: "That's Control Freak Carla" Tame It: "Carla, exercise isn't punishment for eating" Frame It: "I move my body because it feels good, not to earn or burn off food" Body Image Scenario: ED Thought: "I look disgusting in this dress" Name It: "That's Body Critic Betty" Tame It: "Betty, your harsh comments aren't welcome here" Frame It: "My body deserves to be treated with respect, and I choose clothes that make me feel comfortable" ED Voice vs. Authentic Voice Guide Your ED Voice: Is harsh, critical, and demanding Uses words like "should," "can't," "need to," "have to" Makes you feel anxious, guilty, or ashamed Wants you to be smaller, eat less, control more Your Authentic Voice: Is kind, curious, and flexible Uses words like "I choose," "I want," "I deserve" Makes you feel peaceful, empowered, or hopeful Wants you to be nourished, rested, and free Common ED Thoughts to Practice With Food Thoughts: "When can I eat next?" "What am I allowed to eat?" "How can I avoid eating?" "I need to work this off" "I shouldn't eat this" Body Image Thoughts: "I look huge in this outfit" "If I eat that, I'll gain weight" "I'm bigger than everyone else" "People are judging my body" "I'm disgusting" Powerful Quotes from This Episode "You can't fight what you don't acknowledge, and you can't change what you don't challenge." "Your eating disorder thoughts aren't actually YOUR thoughts." "You're allowed to have the thought. There's no judgment in having an ED thought pop up." "You are not your thoughts. You are the thinker of your thoughts." "Your ED voice is loud, but your authentic voice is stronger." When to Use the Triple Threat Tool In front of the mirror when body image thoughts attack At meal times when food anxiety kicks in The moment any ED thought enters your mind - don't wait for it to spiral During social eating situations When getting dressed or shopping for clothes Before, during, and after exercise This Week's Homework Give your ED voice a name (make it specific to your struggles) Identify your 3 most common ED thoughts Write out your Triple Threat response for each one Practice your comebacks - decide in advance what you'll say Use the tool immediately when any ED thought pops up Lindsey's Personal Example Situation: Standing in front of closet, choosing what to wear ED Thought: "You can't wear that dress, you look huge, everyone will notice how much weight you've gained" Name It: "That's Gina trying to make me hide my body" Tame It: "Gina, you don't get to dictate my wardrobe choices anymore" Frame It: "I'm choosing clothes that make me feel comfortable and confident in my recovery" Result: Wore the dress, had an amazing day, realized Gina's opinion had nothing to do with reality Signs You Need This Tool Food thoughts consume your mental energy throughout the day You spiral from one negative thought into restriction or shame You feel controlled by thoughts about your body or food You believe every critical thought about yourself You can't distinguish between ED voice and authentic voice What Mastering This Tool Looks Like You catch ED thoughts before they spiral You feel empowered instead of controlled by your mind You can enjoy meals and social situations without mental chatter You respond to body image thoughts with compassion instead of criticism You're present in your life instead of trapped in your head Ready to Master Your Mental Game? If you want to learn how to use the Triple Threat Tool in every situation and build an entire toolkit of weapons against ED thoughts, go to www.herbestself.co and fill out an application to work with Lindsey. Stop trying to figure this out alone. Your ED voice has had you for years - but it doesn't get to have your future. Connect with Lindsey Website: www.herbestself.co  Private Facebook Community: www.herbestselfsociety.com  Client Applications: www.herbestself.co/services  About the Host Lindsey Nichol is a former competitive figure skater turned God-led entrepreneur, boy mom, and digital CEO. She created the Triple Threat Tool during her own recovery journey and now teaches women how to boss around their ED thoughts instead of being bossed by them. If this tool empowered you, please share it with someone who needs to learn how to control their ED thoughts. Your support helps more women discover they don't have to be held hostage by every thought that pops into their head. *While I am a certified health coach, anorexia survivor & eating disorder recovery coach, I do not intend the use of this message to serve as medical advice. Please refer to the disclaimer here in the show & be sure to contact a licensed clinical provider if you are struggling with an eating disorder.

Wwwhat's up swingaz? From the tbhq in the grizzly lands of wisconsin, welcome to thrall's balls episode #196!Teabag Time!Calcas just joined our Discord and one of the first things he did was leave a little blurb that FELT like a mini-review to me, so...Imma tea bag the fella.Calcas: "Hi! Love the show. The stories and the banter are great. Makes me feel like I'm in guild chat when folks still used that."He also told Aaron that he was "taking a ka'resht from the new patch" and I just wanna say I love and appreciate the pun :DWanna get teabagged? Send any feedback, reviews, or even just comments our way! Spotify comments, Apple Podcast reviews, email thrallsballspodcast@gmail.com, or even join Discord from ThrallsBalls.comMixed Drink of the Week (Johnnie - The Phase Dive)1.5 oz Vodka0.5 oz Lavender Syrup0.5 oz Lemon Juice0.5 oz Creme De Murenext week: Gershom (Reshii Wraps)WoW News11.2 is Livehttps://www.wowhead.com/news/patch-11-2-ghosts-of-karesh-now-live-in-north-america-378010Delver's Racehttps://www.wowhead.com/news/alliance-sweeps-the-delvers-race-across-na-and-eu-wow-regions-378073Ky'Veza Exploithttps://www.wowhead.com/news/blizzard-removing-rewards-from-kyveza-spell-reflect-exploit-378045https://www.wowhead.com/news/fixed-spell-reflect-cheese-kills-hard-mode-kyveza-delve-boss-in-1-minute-378037Shadefur Brewthiefhttps://www.wowhead.com/news/new-shadefur-brewthief-pet-twitch-drop-now-live-378019Midnight Preordershttps://www.wowhead.com/news/housing-early-access-for-pre-ordering-midnight-expansion-bundles-and-prices-378027Naughty Chinese Playershttps://www.wowhead.com/news/1-820-season-2-enterprising-hero-titles-removed-from-chinese-players-378069https://www.wowhead.com/news/disciplinary-action-against-over-27-000-players-leads-to-stricter-anti-boost-and-377998Go ahead and follow us in the social places. You can find the various proper spellings in the episode description!@Woolly08 twt insta bsky @Woolly_08 tktk@HunterGershom twt @HunterGerrshom insta@BoomyNation Twt YouTubeJohnnie.Tips Discord, @Johnnie.Tips InstaCRAIIIIG! @CraigAddict Twt@ThrallsBallsPod Twt InstaSearch ThrallsBallsPod on YoutubeEmail us with any feedback or questions: ThrallsBallsPodcast@gmail.comYou can also leave us feedback on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or even in a specialized reviews channel on our Discord. Go to ThrallsBalls.com to find our Linktree. All our relevant links (including Discord) can be found there.Bye we love you be good!https://discord.gg/HuFkhagM3Z

Title: Million Dollar Monday - Mike Hoffman Summary: Mike made his first million in real estate during the COVID short-term rental boom, and his last million by flipping outdated vending machine routes into modern micro markets selling unconventional products like shampoo and Tide pods. His next million will likely come from leveraging AI to scale vending and small business operations. He emphasizes the rapid evolution of AI and its ability to replace manual tasks, predicting a near future where AI-powered robots handle everyday chores. Links to Watch and Subscribe: https://youtu.be/1EOavier6ug Bullet Point Highlights: First million: Real estate + COVID timing (short-term rentals) Last million: Vending machines → flipped old routes into micro markets Sold high-ticket items (e.g., $35 shampoo) in vending setups Tech improvements + AI driving down costs, boosting efficiency Next million: Scaling vending/small biz ops with AI tools Believes AI is replacing human roles fast (e.g., virtual assistants) Predicts humanoid AI robots in homes within 5 years Transcript: Seth Bradley (00:00.172) Welcome to Million Dollar Mondays, how to make, keep, and scale a million dollars. Mike is a super successful entrepreneur in the vending machine business and beyond. Tell us, how did you make your first million dollars?   Yeah, Seth, probably actually through real estate and just getting a little bit kind of lucky with timing with COVID and short term rentals and some of that. But yeah, that's probably how I got the first million.   Gotcha. Yeah. Real estate usually plays a role in the everybody's strategy down the line, whether they're in, you know, in that primary business or not, you know, whether they start out there or they end up there, real estate usually plays a part. How'd you make your last million?   Yeah, that's a good question because it's completely different than real estate, but it's actually been vending machines. that's been kind of fun. just, you you talk about product market fit whenever you're an entrepreneur with a business. And that was just kind of the perfect storm right now of traditional vending really kind of being outdated. And we found a product market fit.   with it. Gotcha. Cool. And that was from, was this maybe mostly attributed to kind of buying those routes, those larger routes?   Mike Hoffman (01:14.646) Exactly, yeah, buying old school routes and really kind of flipping them like a house with modern micro markets, charging with different products and what would fit in a vending machine like more of the unorthodox, know, toilet paper and tide pods and things that wouldn't fit in a traditional vending machine. I mean, we'll sell $35 bottles of shampoo in these micro markets. So just kind of go and add it in a different way.   Yeah, and then with the aging population, there's got to be more and more of these things popping up. So there should be more opportunity for people to get involved or for people like yourself to just snag everything, right?   Yeah, think there's no chance I could snag everything, not even just in this town alone that I'm currently in. I mean, machines are getting cheaper, the technology is getting way better with AI. And nowadays, it's not what fits in a vending machine motor. It's okay, what's shelf space? So if it's a bottle of shampoo or a glass Coke, it doesn't matter because it's not just getting thrown down the chute of a traditional machine.   Makes sense, makes sense. Last, how are you planning on making your next million dollars?   I think probably with AI, we're doing a lot of interesting stuff with helping people scale their vending routes that is applicable to any small business. And so I'm really intrigued. Just every time I go down a rabbit hole with some new AI tool, I feel like there's another better one that just came right behind it. So I just think it's kind of that time where you can really get ahead by just learning right now in this kind of wave of AI.   Seth Bradley (02:49.27) Yeah, totally makes sense. mean, people that are not paying attention to AI, whether it's simply using chat GBT instead of Google search are getting left behind quickly because it's just advancing so fast. I can't even imagine what this world's going to look like five years from now, the way that things are moving.   It's crazy. Three years ago when I was working for a tech company selling software to the government, I would have to work with three secretaries to schedule a meeting with the general to sell their software. Now my EA is literally an AI bot and everyone that's scheduling time on my calendar, they don't even know they're talking to a non-human, which is perfect.   Yeah, 100%. I predicted within five years, everybody's going to have a humanoid robot in their home with AI instilled, and they're going to be doing physical things for us at our homes.   I hope so. I hope they can go to Costco, get all our groceries, do our laundry, the dishes.   Yup. Yup. Awesome,   Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Mike Hoffman's Links: https://www.instagram.com/mikehoffmannofficial/ https://x.com/mrpassive_?lang=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikedhoffmann/ https://www.tiktok.com/@mr.passive https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en

Lil Tay Joins OF on 18th Birthday and Makes 1 MILLION Dollars In 3 Hours!

Headlines says the majority of people don't change their underwear often Do you really need to flex in song form these days? Makes you wonder how product placement in music really works We gotta talk about Summer Slam and holy hell was it good

An apple pie, plain and simple, with no sugar added – these are a real favourite served with ice cream, cream, and cinnamon. Makes 6 individual pies Ingredients 1 kg apples, granny smith 1 cup water 2 x 400g blocks sweet short pastry Ice cream to serve Cream to serve Cinnamon to serve Method Set the oven at 200 C fan bake with an oven tray already in the oven to heat up. Grease large-sized (Texan) muffin tin. Prepare the apples by peeling, coring, and slicing, and placing with 1 cup of water into a saucepan with the lid on and gently cook for about 15 minutes. They should retain their shape without turning into pulp. Drain in a colander, reserving the juice which can be reduced to a syrup by simmering it for 5-8 minutes. Cool the apples completely before you start filling the pies. Please note apples do not need added sugar, as they are sweet enough. Now roll your pastry out and cut into circles about the size of a small saucer. Gently line the muffin tin holes with pastry. Patch up any tears or holes. Fill to 3/4 with the apples and then cover with another smaller round of pastry and pinch top to bottom to seal. Use a sharp knife to make a small cross on the top (this lets the steam out). Place on hot tray and bake for approx. 25 minutes near the bottom of the oven, as this makes sure the bottoms cooks. The pastry should be a lovely golden colour. Keep checking to making sure the edges of the pies aren't burning.  Cool in tins then gently remove from their tins. Serve with ice cream and clouds of whipped cream and a sprinkle of cinnamon with a small jug of the reserved apple syrup. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Title: How to Make Millions with Vending Machines with Mike Hoffman Summary: In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike Hoffman delve into the world of vending machines as a business opportunity. Mike shares his journey from a Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur in the vending industry, highlighting the evolution of vending technology and the potential for passive income. They discuss the importance of location, understanding demographics, and the scalability of vending routes. Mike emphasizes the need for upfront work and learning before delegating tasks, while also addressing the misconceptions surrounding passive income in the vending business. In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike discuss various aspects of entrepreneurship, particularly in the vending machine business. They explore the importance of capital raising, the journey of self-discovery, influences that shape business decisions, and the definition of success. The dialogue emphasizes the significance of flexibility, discipline, and focus in achieving entrepreneurial goals, while also touching on financial milestones and the attributes that distinguish successful entrepreneurs. Links to Watch and Subscribe:   Bullet Point Highlights: Mike's journey from a classic Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur. The evolution of vending machines from traditional to smart technology. Understanding the importance of location in the vending business. The analogy of baseball levels to describe starting in vending. Scaling up from single A to big leagues in vending routes. The significance of demographics in product selection for vending machines. The potential for passive income with proper systems in place. The need for upfront work before achieving passivity in business. Vending is not a get-rich-quick scheme; it requires dedication. The future opportunities in the vending industry are expanding rapidly. Raising capital can dilute ownership but may be necessary for rapid growth. Self-discovery often leads to unexpected career paths. Influences in business can come from personal experiences rather than just mentors. Success is often defined by the ability to prioritize family and flexibility. Entrepreneurs work harder than in traditional jobs but gain flexibility. Discipline is crucial for saying no to distractions. Successful entrepreneurs often focus on niche markets. High foot traffic locations are ideal for vending machines. AI is transforming business operations and efficiency. Networking and connections can lead to valuable opportunities. Transcript: Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:04.898) Mike, what's going on buddy? Doing great brother, doing great. How about you?   Mike (00:06.748) Don't worry,   Mike (00:11.664) Good, I'm a little flustered. I usually have my mic set up over here, but I guess we just moved and it's not here today. I guess, yeah, new office and it's been a whole hot mess.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:19.822) New office or what?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:27.862) Nice man, nice. I see you got the whiteboard cranking back there. Love to see that.   Mike (00:33.114) Always. I love your background. That's sweet.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:38.03) Thanks man, yeah, I'm on camera all the time so I like I need to just build this out instead of using like a green screen so Made the investment made it happen   Mike (00:44.86) Totally.   Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:49.442) Have we met in person or not? I don't know if we've met at a Wealth Without Wall Street event or I couldn't tell. Okay. No, I did not go to Nashville last year.   Mike (00:58.478) I don't think so. don't think you're... Were you in Nashville last year?   Mike (01:04.634) No, okay. No, I don't think we've met in person. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:08.256) Okay, all good, man. All good. Well, cool. I'll just go over the format real quick. We'll do kind of a shorter recording. We're do like 30 minutes, something like in that range. And then we'll just kind of like break. And then I'll, want to record a couple of other quick segments where I call it Million Dollar Monday. I'm kind of asking you about how you made your first, last and next million. And then 1 % closer, which would just be kind of what separates you, what makes you the   top 1 % in your particular vertical. So we'll just kind of record those separately. Those will be real short, like five minutes or so.   Mike (01:44.924) Okay, yeah, I'll follow your lead. All good.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:47.15) Cool. Cool. Let's see. I think I already have this auto recording. So we're already recording. So I'll just jump right in.   Mike (01:55.377) Okay.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:57.782) Welcome to Raise the Bar Radio, hosted by yours truly Seth Bradley. We today we've got Mr. Passive, Mike Hoffman. Mike, welcome to the show.   Mike (02:08.189) Thank you for having me fired up to be here.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:10.855) Absolutely man, really happy to have you on. I know it's been a little bit of a trek here to get our schedules lined up, but really stoked to have you on today, man. I see you said you moved into a new office. You've got the whiteboard cranking, so love to see it.   Mike (02:25.372) yeah, whiteboards are the only place I can get my thoughts down.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:29.399) Yeah, man, it makes a difference when you actually write something rather than type it or even on a mirror board where you're doing it online. just there's something about physically writing something down.   Mike (02:41.328) You know, I'm glad you said that because yesterday I flipped to Seattle for a quick work trip and I didn't have wifi and I literally had three pages of just, I, was so like the clarity of some of these kinds of bigger visions I have now from just being able to write for an hour on a flight was, I was like, man, I gotta do this more often.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:00.363) Yeah, for sure. The key though is once you write it down, it just doesn't go into the trash or into a black hole somewhere where you never see it again. So that's kind of the disadvantage there. If you have it on your computer and you're taking notes or you have it on a mirror board, at least it's there to reference all the time. If you write it down on paper, sometimes, I've got my Raze Masters book right here for notes, but it's like, it might go into the abyss and I'll never look at it again. So you gotta be careful about that.   Mike (03:27.184) Yeah, yeah, I need to check out the Miro boards. I've heard a lot of good things about them.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:31.467) Yeah, yeah. Awesome, Mike. Well, listen, for our audience who doesn't know anything about you, maybe just tell them, you know, tell them a little bit about your background. Tell them about your your main business and we can take it from there.   Mike (03:43.354) Yeah. So I think for those that don't know about me, I'm a classic Midwest farm boy started with a classic, you know, showing cattle at the county fair and all of that and had a lemonade stand growing up. And then my first job was actually at McDonald's, you know, thinking about the whole success of that business model. But when I was coaching and, out of college, I got my first rental and I was like, wow, this is crazy. making money without.   really much time involved. and then with my work in Silicon Valley, know, Seth, was classic Silicon Valley, you know, cutthroat job that, startup life and traveling three weeks out of the month. And I was on, I was in airports all the time. And was like, these vending machines I would run into at airports were just so archaic. And so I went down this path of like unattended retail and kind of the future of, of that. And that's really where I just see a huge opportunity right now.   And so it's kind of what led me into all these different income streams that I'm passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (04:49.431) That's awesome, man. Well, let's dive into that a little bit deeper. me about these income streams. It centers around vending machines, right? But I'm sure there's a lot more to it. I'm sure there's a lot of different entry points for people. Maybe just kind of give us a general synopsis to start out.   Mike (05:06.78) Yeah, so I think the big thing with, you know, if we're talking vending specifically as an income stream, you know, most people think of vending as the traditional machines where you enter in a code, you put your card on the machine and then a motor spirals down a Snickers bar or a soda and you go into the chute and grab it.   Nowadays, there's these smart machines that literally you just unlock the door, or even if you go into, land in the Vegas airport right at the bottom of the escalator where it says, welcome to Las Vegas, there's a 7-Eleven with gates and AI cameras, and there's no employees in the 7-Eleven. And it just tracks whatever you grab and to exit the gate, you have to pay for it. So like, there's just this huge market now where we just installed it in urgent care.   less than two months ago and we can do over the counter meds in that machine because it doesn't have to fit into a motor. It's just shelf space. You identify with the planogram with the AI cameras like, okay, Dayquil in this slot or Salad in this slot and then whatever they grab, gets charged to the person that pulls it from it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (06:15.469) That's interesting, man. Yeah, I mean, my initial thought too, was just like the traditional old vending machine where you're getting a candy bar or a cola out of there. But yeah, nowadays, now that you mentioned that, you see this more and more every single day where you've got these scanners, you've got kind of self-checkout, that sort of thing. So that's kind of, that expands that world and really opens it up to the future, right? Like it just really, that's what we're trying to get to, or at least we think we wanna get there, where we're kind of removing humans and...   kind of working with technologies and things like that.   Mike (06:49.488) Yeah, and I think, you know, removing the whole human thing. mean, those machines still got to get stocked and you know, there's not robots running around doing that. But I just come back to, I was a Marriott guy when I was on the road all the time and I'd go to these grab and goes at a Marriott and grab a, the end of the night, I'd grab like a little wine or an ice cream sandwich. And I literally had to go wait in line at the check-in desk behind three people checking in just to tell them, Hey, put these on.   room charge and I was like if I had a checkout kiosk in that grab-and-go I could have just removed all the friction for this customer experience.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:27.772) Right, 100%. Yeah, I mean, there's a place and time for it and there's more and more applications for it that just pop up every single day and you can kind of spot that in your life as you're just kind of moving through, whether you're checking into your hotel or whatever you're doing.   Mike (07:41.456) Yeah, yeah. So that's just kind of what excites me today.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:45.973) Yeah, yeah, so when a stranger asks you what you do just in the street, what do you tell them? Because I have a hard time answering that question sometimes too, but I'd love to hear what your answer is.   Mike (07:56.804) Yeah, I would just say it depends on the day. You know, what do you do or what's your, you know, it's like at the golf course when you get paired up with a stranger and they're like, tell me about what you do for your career. And I just say, I'm a classic entrepreneur. And then I'm like, well, what do you do? And it's like, well, tell me about the day. You know, what fire are you putting out? Like today we just got the go ahead for five more urgent cares for our local route. But then, you know, we have a community of operators across the country that we help really build.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:57.933) haha   Ha ha ha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:09.879) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (08:25.616) Vending empires and so we had a group call this morning. So literally, there's a lot of just, you know, it's classic entrepreneurial life. You never know what the day's script is gonna be.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:36.161) Yeah, for sure. And you focus a lot on not only on your own business, but also teaching others, right? Teaching others how to kind of break into this business.   Mike (08:45.402) Yeah, that's my passion, Seth. When I got into my first investment out of college was a $70,000 rental, you know, putting 20 % down or 14K and using an emergency fund. like my background in going to college was as a coach. like I knew I wanted to kind of take that mindset of like coaching people, you know, teach them how to fish. I don't want to catch all the fish myself. It's just not fulfilling that way. So that's really where my passion is.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (09:15.373) Gotcha, gotcha. tell me about like, tell me about step one. I mean, how does somebody break into this business? Obviously your own personal business is probably very advanced. There's probably a lot more sophisticated investing strategies at this point and you've got different layers to it. But somebody just kind of starting out that said, hey, this sounds pretty interesting. This vending machine business sounds like it can be passive. How do you recommend that they get started?   Mike (09:40.57) Yeah, so I'm always, I view like the whole vending scale as similar to Major League Baseball. You got your single A all the way up to the big leagues. And if you're just starting out, I always recommend like find a location where you can put a machine and just learn the process. Like to me, that's single A analogy. you know, that always starts with, people want to jump right to like, well, what type of machines do you recommend?   products, how do you price products? And the first question I'll always ask Seth is, well, what location is this machine going in? And they're like, well, I don't know yet. I was just going to buy one and put it in my garage to start. And it's like, no, you need to have the location first. So understanding that, is it a pet hospital? Is it an apartment? Is it a gym? Where is the foot traffic? And then you can cater to what's the best machine for that type of location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:36.887) Got it, got it. Now is this a kind of a rent, you rent the space to place the machine with that particular business or wherever you're gonna place it or how does that all come together?   Mike (10:47.644) not typically, some people are kind of more advanced, like apartment complexes are used to the revenue share model. So they're going to ask for a piece of the pie for sure, for you to put the machine in their lobby. but like, you know, when we're talking urgent carers or even pet hospitals are viewing it as an amenity. And so we probably have, I don't even know how many machines now 75 now, and we, you know, less than half of those actually,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:50.423) Okay.   Mike (11:15.1) us rent or ask for a revenue share to have them in there. So I never leave lead with that, but we'll do it if we need to get the location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (11:23.989) Interesting gotcha. So it's really a value add for wherever you're gonna place it and that's how most people or I guess most businesses would look at that and then you're able to capture that that space   Mike (11:27.366) Mm-hmm.   Mike (11:34.236) Yeah, absolutely. So, um, a great case study is we have a 25 employee roughing business here in Oregon. And you might think like, only 25 employees. It's not going to make that much money. Well, we do $1,200 a month. And the cool thing about this, Seth, is the CEO of this roughing company literally did napkin math on how much it costs for his employees to drive to the gas station during their 20 minute break. And then   How much they're paying for an energy drink at the gas station and then how much gas they're using with the roofing like the work trucks to get to and from the gas station So he's like I want to bring a smart machine into our warehouse Set the prices as half off so that four dollar monster only costs his rofers two dollars and then we invoice him the the business owner every month for the other 50 % and so he actually   Calculated as a cost savings not asking for money to rent the space   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:35.597) Yeah, gotcha, gotcha. That makes sense. That makes sense. I love the baseball analogy with the single A, double A, triple A, even into the big leagues here. know, a lot of the folks that listen to this are already kind of, you know, in the big leagues or maybe think about some capital behind them. Like how would they be able to jump right in, maybe skip single or double A or would they, or do you even suggest that? Do you suggest that they start, you know, small just to learn and then maybe invest some more capital into it to expand or can they jump right to the big leagues?   Mike (12:48.891) Yeah.   Yeah.   Mike (13:03.966) I think they can jump right to the big leagues. this is, I'm glad you brought this up because just listening to some of your episodes from the past, there's no doubt that you have people that could buy a route like a off biz buy sell today. And I think this is a prime opportunity. it's very similar to flipping a house. you, you know, there's a route in Chicago, I think it was for $1.1 million, you know, whatever negotiating terms or seller financing or, or what have you, got a lot of, your, your   audience that is experts in that. But the cool thing about these routes is they have the old school machines that have the motors and that are limited to, this type of machine, you can only fit a 12 ounce cannon. Well, guess what? The minute you buy that route, you swap out that machine with one of these micro markets or smart machines. Now you just went from selling a 12 ounce soda for $1.25 to now a 16 ounce monster for $4.50.   Well, you just bought that location based on its current revenue numbers and by swapping out that machine, you're going to two or three acts your revenue just at that location. And so it's truly just like a value play, a value upgrade, like flipping the house of, okay, there's a lot of deals right now of these routes being sold by baby boomers where it's like, they got the old school Pepsi machine. Doesn't have a credit card reader on it. They can't track inventory remotely via their cell phones. So   They're not keeping it stocked. Like all those types of things can really play in your favor as a buyer that just wants to get to the big leagues right away.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:37.651) I love that. When you say buy a route, what are you really buying? Tell me about the contractual agreement behind that. What are you really buying there?   Mike (14:47.184) You're just buying the locations and the equipment associated with it. So like this Chicago route, it's like, we have machines in 75 properties all across the Chicago suburbs. And they could be medical clinics. could be apartments. could be employee break rooms at businesses, but that's when you start diving into those locations. It's like, I have a snack machine and a soda machine here. Well, you swap that out with a micro market that now instead of.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:49.279) Okay. Okay.   Mike (15:13.626) that machine that'll only hold a small bag of Doritos that you charge two bucks, well now you get the movie size theater bags that you can really put in there in a micro market. Like naturally just that valuation of that route based on those 75 machines current revenue, I mean you're gonna be able to two or three X your revenue right by just swapping out those machines.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (15:35.959) Wow, yeah, I love that analogy with real estate, right? It's just like a value add. It's like, how can I bring in more income from what already exists? Well, I need to upgrade or I need to put in some capital improvements, whatever you want to call it. Here's the vending machine upgrades or a different kind of system in there. And you get more income. And obviously that business in itself is going to be worth more in a higher multiple.   Mike (15:58.396) Absolutely. mean, a great example of this is we had a machine in an apartment complex and it was your traditional machine with the motors and you have to enter in the code. Well, we could only put in four 12 ounce drinks and then chips. Well, we swapped that out with a micro market. Well, now that micro market, we literally put in bags of Tide Pods for laundry, like these big bags of Tide Pods. We'll sell those like hotcakes for 15 bucks. And our old machine,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:25.281) Yeah, let's say those aren't cheap.   Mike (16:27.246) Yeah, our old machine Seth, it would take us to get to 15 bucks, we'd have to sell eight Snickers. That's one transaction.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:33.547) Right, right. Yeah, yeah. How do you do an analysis kind of based on like what you think is gonna sell there, right? Like you're replacing, let's say a Dorito machine with Tide Pods, you know? So you have to individually go to each location and figure out what will work, what will sell.   Mike (16:47.738) Yeah.   Mike (16:51.834) It's all about demographic. Absolutely. So, you know, we have, we have, we have a micro market and a manufacturing plant that's, it's a pumpkin farm and there's a ton of Hispanic workers. So we do a lot of like spicy foods, a lot of spicy chips. do, we do a ton of, mean, the sugar or sorry, the glass bottle cokes. They do, they love their pastries.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:53.431) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:06.349) Yeah.   Mike (17:15.868) So we just doubled down on the demographics. So yesterday I was filming at one of our micro markets that's in a gym and they crushed the Fairlife protein shakes, like the more modern protein shakes, but they won't touch muscle milk. So we're literally taking out one row of muscle milk just to add an extra row of Fairlife shakes. So you're constantly just catering to the demographics and what's selling.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:40.632) Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. I mean, this is literally just like real estate, right? Like you go and you find a good market. You're talking about demographics, right? Find the market, see what they want, see how much you can upgrade, how you can upgrade. If it's an apartment, it's a unit. If it's here, it's the product that you're selling and the type of machine, or maybe it's a mini market. A lot of things to kind of tie your understanding to here.   Mike (17:45.926) Yeah.   Mike (18:05.904) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (18:07.615) Yeah, awesome, man. Awesome, Where are you at in your business? Like what, you know, what are the big leagues looking like right now? You know, what are you doing to expand your business, raising the bar in your business?   Mike (18:18.692) Yeah, I'm going after that's a really good question. I'm going after kind of these newer markets and we're kind of past that point of like, okay, let's pilot in this location. For example, that urgent care, we didn't know if it was going to be a good location two months ago when we installed. Well now it's already crushing it. Well, there's six other urgent cares in town and we just got to go ahead on five of those six. So like for me, it's doubling down on our current proof points of where.   okay, we know that manufacturing plant, the pumpkin farm does really well. So let's start getting intros to all their, manufacturers of the products they need to grow pumpkin. know, like we're just doubling down on scaling because now we have the operational blueprint to really just kind of to go after it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:03.917) Gotcha, gotcha. Tell me about how passive this can really be, right? So I used to have, before we switched over to the new brand, Raise the Bar podcast, it was the Passive Income Attorney podcast, right? I was really focused on passive investments, focused on bringing in passive investors into my real estate deals, things like that. And I think that word passive gets thrown around quite a bit, right? And sometimes it's abused because people get into things that are not truly passive.   Mike (19:18.427) Yeah.   Mike (19:28.784) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:33.517) What's your take on that as it relates to the vending business?   Mike (19:38.49) Yeah, so I think as far as with the vending business, there's clearly upfront leg work that needs to be done, whether that's finding locations or any of those things. So I have a route that is here in Oregon, and then we bought a route last year in Illinois and have scaled that route. I spend 30 minutes a week on each route now. that these urgent cares and stuff, like we have an operator that's running the whole route.   Here's the problem, Seth. It's like people are so scared to build systems to ultimately systemize things or they're too cheap to hire help. And I'm the opposite. like, you know, kind of like Dan Martell's buy back your time. Like I have like a leverage calculator and like I constantly think about is this worth my time? Cause as you know, you're busier than me. Like it's so limited.   for me, my routes, I would consider them passive, like one hour a week is, is nothing in my mind. But as far as like, you know, I'm, I'm also a passive investor on, we're building a, an oil loop station in Florida and I sent my money a year ago to, to my, active investor and I haven't talked to him since. Like that's actually truly probably passive now, you know, I'm not doing anything, but there's, there's different levels to that. And I'm a huge believer like.   don't delegate something until you know what you're delegating. So people that want to start with the vending routes, sure, if you want to buy a route that already has an operator, that's one thing. but these, if you're starting a vending route for your kid or for your stay at home wife or whatever, as a side hustle, like get in the weeds and install that first machine. So when you hire help to take over the route, you know what you're delegating.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:09.773) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:27.021) Yeah, that's key. That's key. And you you described just like any other business, right? I think that's kind of where people get themselves into trouble. That sometimes they get sold the dream that is truly passive. And eventually it can be. I mean, you're talking about an hour a week. To me, that's pretty damn passive, right? But you know, upfront, you you've got to learn the business. You've got to know what you're getting yourself into. Like you said, you've got to learn before you delegate so that you know what you're delegating.   There is going to be some upfront work and then as you're able to kind of delegate and learn Then you can make it more and more passive as you go   Mike (22:00.88) Yeah, I mean, it's no different than what's the same when people tell you that they're busy. I mean, you're just not a priority. Like that's a fact. you're not. People say it's the same thing when people come to me and they're like, I'm so busy. It's like, okay, well let me, let me see your schedule. Where are you spending your time? You know, it's like when people are like, I can't lose weight. Okay, well let me see your food log. What did you eat yesterday? Did you have ice cream? Like this is like the same kind of thing. That's where passive I think has been really abused.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:16.097) Yeah. Yep.   Mike (22:29.638) To me, the bigger issue is like, vending is not get rich quick. And so like, if you're expecting to leave your nine to five tomorrow and vending is going to make up for that in one day, like that's not going to   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:41.089) Right, Makes sense. Speaking of passive, do you raise capital or do you have any kind of a fund or have you put together a fund for something like this?   Mike (22:51.48) We haven't put together a fun, we're definitely buying routes is definitely becoming more and more intriguing. And I know there's some PE players starting to get into the vending game, but it's something we've been definitely considering and on our radar of do we want to.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:58.541) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:10.231) Gotcha. Cool. I mean, you brought in money partners for some of those routes yet, or is that still something you're exploring too?   Mike (23:18.168) No, I think it's just something we're thinking about. mean, what do you recommend?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:21.089) Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd recommend I mean, it depends, right? Like I'm I'm scared to turn you by trade, but I don't like to say you should always raise capital no matter what. Right. Like you've been able to scale your business as you have and grown it to where it is without bringing outside capital. It sounds which is great because you own 100 percent or with whatever business partners you might have. You know, when you start raising capital, you're giving a large chunk of that piece away, not necessarily your whole company. But if you're buying   you know, a set of routes or that sort of thing. You you're gonna give a big piece away to those past investors if you're starting a fund or even if it's up. Even a single asset syndication here for one of these, you know, these routes, you could put it together that way. You know, it's just something to consider. But a lot of times when people are looking to scale fast, right, if they wanna grow exponentially, you've gotta use other people's money to get there or hit the lottery.   Mike (24:08.294) Mm.   Mike (24:15.856) Absolutely, no, agree. That's spot-on and I actually before you know the Silicon Valley company That I was part of we had a we went through probably series a B C D C ground   Let's just say we weren't very fiscally responsible. So I come from the, you know, it's like the ex-girlfriend example. I don't want to just start taking everyone's money.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (24:42.413) Yeah, yeah, that tends to happen with some startups, right? Like before you get funding, you're super frugal because it's your money and every single dollar counts. And you're like, I don't want to pay, you if it's software, you don't want to pay the software engineers. I'm going to out, you know, put it, you know, hire Indian engineers, that sort of thing. And then once you get a few million bucks that you raised in that seed round, then it just goes and you're like, whoa, wait a minute, let's hire 20 people. You know, it's you got to be careful about that.   Mike (25:05.606) Yeah   Yeah, yeah, that's a great, great take on it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:11.245) Yeah, it's, yeah. It's a question I love to ask and I think it's about time for that. So, in a parallel universe, tell me about a different version of you. So a different but likely version, right? Like, for example, for me, I went to med school for a year and a half and then I dropped out and I ended up becoming an attorney. So that was like a big turning point, right? So I could have easily at some point just said screw it and became a doctor and that would have been a totally different route than I'm going down right now.   What's an example of something like that for you?   Mike (25:42.524) Wait, are you being serious about that? I took the MCAT too. I got into med school and then I, yeah, I was pretty mad in school. And then the more I learned about exercise science, I was like, organic chemistry is not fun.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:44.321) Yeah, totally.   yeah? There you go.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:57.39) It is not fun. I did not love that. I majored in exercise physiology and then I ended up switching to biology because it was just a little bit of an easier route to get my degree and go into med school and I went for a year and a half and then I dropped out because I absolutely hated it. I knew I didn't want to do it. I was just more attracted to business and that sort of thing.   Mike (26:16.346) Yeah, that's crazy. That's awesome. parallel universe. I, that's a really good question. I don't know. I, kinda, I have two kids under three and the other side of me wishes I would have traveled more.   you know, I mean, we'll get there hopefully when they get out of high school and someday. But right now I just think there's so many different cultural things and ways to skin the cat. And it's just fascinating to learn some of those things.   Mike (26:55.352) yourself in those cultures.   go to different cultures and really like understand how they did things for a time, a period of time to really just learn their thinking.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:07.777) Yeah, I love that man. I had a similar experience of what you're describing. I didn't travel abroad really other than like, you know, Canada and Mexico until I studied abroad in Barcelona during law school and I got to stay there for a couple of months. So you actually had some time. It wasn't like you're just visiting for a week or a weekend or anything like that. You got to kind of live there right for a couple of months and it just totally changed my, you know, my outlook on life and just the way that you see things like I feel like we're in the US and we just think   Mike (27:19.627) Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:37.76) US is number one and there's only one way to do things the way that we do things that kind of attitude. And then when you go to Western Europe and you see that culture and you drive or get on a train, it's like an hour away and you're in a totally different culture and they're doing it a certain way as well and it's working. You just see that other people are doing things differently and still being successful at it, still having a thriving culture and it's just awesome to see.   Mike (28:03.312) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (28:06.251) Yeah. Tell me about some major influences in your life. What turned you or got you into that, the vending business? It's not one of those typical things. mean, I know you're in the education business, so you're kind of really spreading the word about this type of business. But I would say when you started, there might not have been a mastermind or educational courses around this. mean, how did you kind of get drawn into that? Were there any particular people or influences that brought you in?   Mike (28:29.308) you   Mike (28:36.188) Yeah. So the, biggest influence for me to get into vending, uh, wasn't actually a person. It was actually, was, um, I had landed, I was coming back from the Pentagon from a trip back to the Bay for the startup we were talking about. And I was in the Denver airport and 11 PM, you know, our flight was delayed. And then they're like, Hey, you have to stay in the airport tonight. The pilot went over their hours for the day, blah, blah, blah. So I went to a vending machine and I remember buying a bottle of water.   I think it costs like at the time three bucks or something. I knew that bottle of water cost 20 cents at Costco. And I was like, there is someone that's at home with their kids right now making money off me and they're not even at this mission. Like the machine is doing the work. So I had like an aha moment of like, what are my true priorities in life? And like, why am I chasing this cutthroat startup from.   Palo Alto and trying to make it when reality was my priorities are freedom to spend more time with my family. So that's really kind of what led me into this path of starting a vending machine side hustle to keep our lifestyle as we had kids. We wanted to have a nanny and we wanted to be able to still go on dates and things like that as a couple with my wife. So that's really kind of my family and just like...   having the freedom to do things. Like that's what I'm really passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (29:59.084) Yeah. Yeah. I mean, building on that, and you may have already answered that, but what does success look like for you?   Mike (30:01.766) next   Mike (30:06.268) an empty calendar.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:08.621) Good luck with that. Good luck with that.   Mike (30:11.516) Oh man, I was gonna say, how do we crack that code? No, yeah. No, but I think success to me is doing things like picking up my daughter at three and even being able to say no to the things that aren't gonna get you to where you need, like the discipline piece of this too.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:15.708) man.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:33.995) Yeah, yeah, mean, you know, for me, it's kind of similar, right? It's not going to be able to empty that calendar. Not yet, at least maybe here in the future. But for now, it's pretty filled. But it is it's flexible, right? Like us as entrepreneurs, you know, we probably work more than we ever worked when we were in our W-2s. But at the same time, it's you know, we're working in our own business for ourselves, for our families. And we have the   Flexibility, a lot of people will say the freedom, right? But we have the flexibility to move things around. And if you want to pick your kids up at school at three, or you do want to take a weekend off, or something comes up in your schedule, you have the flexibility to do that. Whereas if you're kind of slaving away at the nine to five, you can't really do it.   Mike (31:04.486) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (31:20.198) Yeah, that's spot on. mean, I just wrote that down, but flexibility is, cause you're right. When you started becoming an entrepreneur, this is what I tell people all the time when they want to get a venting around is like running your own business. You are going to work harder than you do for your boss currently at your W-2. Like you have to do payroll. You have to do, like you gotta like make sure there's money to actually do pay, you know, like all those things that you just don't even think about when you have a W-2. It's like, today's   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:39.543) Yeah   Mike (31:48.89) You know, this Friday I get paid. Well, when you run a business, mean, that money's got to come from somewhere.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:51.905) Yeah   Right, yeah, 100%, man, 100%. All right, Mike, we're gonna wrap it up. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Tell the listeners where they can find out more about you.   Mike (32:05.286) Yeah, so thanks for having me. This has been great. I have free content all over the place. can find me on the classic Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, but I also have vendingpreneurs.com is where we help people that are more interested in actually the vending stuff. But I've been really trying to double down on YouTube lately because there's just a lot of content and you can't get it off a one minute reel.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:32.417) Love it, man. All right, Mike, appreciate it. Thanks for coming on the show.   Mike (32:35.91) Thanks for having me.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:37.227) Hi brother. Alright man, got a couple more questions for you. We do like a quick, kind of do the full podcast episode and then I'll just do kind of a quick episode that'll follow up on a Monday and then another one on a Friday. Cool.   Mike (32:55.814) See you.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:59.693) We out here.   Welcome to Million Dollar Mondays, how to make, keep, and scale a million dollars. Mike is a super successful entrepreneur in the vending machine business and beyond. Tell us, how did you make your first million dollars?   Mike (33:20.922) Yeah, Seth. It was probably actually through real estate and just getting a little bit kind of lucky with timing with COVID and short-term rentals and some of that. But yeah, that's probably how I got the first million.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:25.229) Mm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:37.079) Gotcha, cool. Yeah, real estate usually plays a role in the everybody's strategy down the line, whether they're in that primary business or not, whether they start out there or they end up there, real estate usually plays a part. How'd you make your last million?   Mike (33:53.956) Yeah, that's a good question because it's completely different than real estate, but it's actually been vending machines. So that's been kind of fun. just, you you talk about product market fit whenever you're an entrepreneur with a business. And that was just kind of the perfect storm right now of traditional vending really kind of being outdated. And we found a product market fit with it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:57.57) Right. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:16.215) Gotcha. Cool. that was from, was this maybe mostly attributed to kind of buying those routes, those larger routes?   Mike (34:23.32) Exactly. Yeah. Buying old school routes and really kind of flipping them like a house with modern micro markets charging, with different products and what would fit in a vending machine, like more of the unorthodox, you know, toilet paper and tide pods and things that wouldn't fit in a traditional vending machine. I mean, we'll sell $35 bottles of shampoo in these micro markets. So just kind of, go and add it in a different way.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:49.857) Yeah, and then with the aging population, there's gotta be more and more of these things popping up. So there should be more opportunity for people to get involved or for people like yourself to just snag everything, right?   Mike (35:01.102) Yeah, I think there's no chance I could snag everything, not even just in this town alone that I'm currently in. I mean, machines are getting cheaper, the technology is getting way better with AI. And nowadays, it's not what fits in a vending machine motor. It's okay, what's shelf space? if it's a bottle of shampoo or a glass Coke, it doesn't matter because it's not just getting thrown down the chute of a traditional machine.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:05.387) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:27.521) Makes sense, makes sense. Last, how are you planning on making your next million dollars?   Mike (35:34.3) I think probably with AI, we're doing a lot of interesting stuff with helping people scale their, their vending routes. that is applicable to any, small business. And so I'm really intrigued. Just every time I go down a rabbit hole with some new AI tool, I feel like there's another better one that just came right behind it. So I just think it's kind of that time where you can really get ahead by just learning.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:06.209) Yeah, totally makes sense. mean people that are not paying attention to AI whether it's simply using chat GPT instead of Google search are getting left behind quickly because it's just advancing so fast. I can't even imagine what this world's gonna look like five years from now the way that things are moving.   Mike (36:23.132) It's crazy. Three years ago when I was working for a tech company selling software into the government, I would have to work with three secretaries to schedule a meeting with the general to sell their software. Now my EA is literally an AI bot and everyone that's scheduling time on my calendar, they don't even know they're talking to a non-human, which is pretty   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:43.479) Yeah, 100%. We're gonna, I predicted within five years, everybody's gonna have a humanoid robot in their home with AI instilled and they're gonna be doing physical things for us at our homes. Yeah. Yep. Yep. 100%. Awesome, All right, moving on to the next one.   Mike (36:50.181) Yeah!   Mike (36:57.917) I hope so. I hope they can go to Costco get all our groceries do our do our laundry The dishes   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:11.501) You're clearly in the top 1 % of what you do, Mike. What is it about you that separates you from the rest of the field?   Mike (37:19.056) Ooh, that's a good question, Seth. I think it's just discipline, know, discipline and focus. One of the hardest things is being able to say no with the things that don't align. And when I was growing up, I had a quote that has really stuck with me. That's like, it's better to be respected than liked. And I think that really resonates. Like naturally as a human, you want to be liked and help people, but the 1 % are really good at saying no.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:47.649) Yeah, I love that man. That's a great answer. Kind of building on that, what do you think the number one attribute is that makes a successful entrepreneur?   Mike (37:57.468) probably focus. Yeah. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:59.212) Yeah, focus. Yep. The one thing, right? The one thing.   Mike (38:04.186) Yep. That's why you come back to like the most successful entrepreneurs. They always niche down and they niche down because they just, got hyper-focused. Like this is kind of why for me, you know, I started this passive Mr. Passive on social media before I even got into Vendi. Well, now everyone's like, well, how passive is Vendi? And well, it's like, what's really interesting is I was posting all these different, what I thought passive income streams in the time, but everyone, 95 % of the questions I got about   Airbnbs are all my different investments was about bending. So I just niche down on, on bending and I just looked back on that and I was like, it really forced me to focus.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (38:43.263) Awesome, awesome. What's one thing someone could do today to get 1 % closer to success in the vending machine business if they are really interested in learning more?   Mike (38:53.892) tap into your connections and find a location that has high foot traffic, whether that's a friend that works at an urgent care, a sister that lives at an apartment. You know, you take your kid to that gymnastics studio that has a ton of foot traffic between 4 PM and 8 PM. Like all those locations are prime locations to put one of these modern smart machines in. so, tapping into your connections, well, you know,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:24.567) Love that man. Awesome. All right, Mike, I appreciate it, brother. We'll to meet in person sometime,   Mike (39:30.574) I would love to. Where are you based, Seth?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:31.789) I'm in San Diego, where you at?   Mike (39:34.78) I am in Eugene. Yeah, Oregon. I'll come down your way though.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:37.39) Cool We're planning on doing yeah, we're planning on doing so me and my wife we have a Sprinter van and Last May we did we did going back to the flexibility piece, right? We did 32 days in the van up through Wyoming Montana and then into like Into Canada and they're like Banff and Jasper and all the way up to Jasper and then we circled back on the west coast Through Vancouver and then down back to San Diego Yeah   Mike (40:05.52) What?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:06.829) Pretty wild, pretty awesome. And the reason I brought that up is this year we're gonna do shorter trip. We're probably gonna do two, maybe three weeks at the most, but we're gonna do kind of the Pacific Northwest. So Oregon, Washington, and Vancouver and all those parks and stuff up there.   Mike (40:17.254) Yeah.   Mike (40:21.744) Yeah, you definitely have a, have you been to Bend before? Bend is like my, that whole area, Central Oregon is, and even Idaho, like all those kind of, yeah. That's awesome. Please let me know when you're up this way. I mean, I'll come meet you wherever. That'd be amazing. Absolutely. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:24.641) Yeah, yeah I have.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:38.861) Sure man grab a coffee or beer. I appreciate it. Yeah, let's do it. Yeah all right brother great to meet you and I will send the information on when this is gonna get released and give you you materials and all that stuff so we can collaborate on social media   Mike (40:51.964) Okay. Okay. Yeah. Is a lot of your audience, like passive investors?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:58.593) So most of that, so now I'm rebranding. I rebranded because I'm gonna be speaking more towards like active entrepreneurs, Active entrepreneurs, people raising capital, that sort of thing. Whereas before it was based on passive investors and people really focused on attorneys. So I'm an attorney and I was raising capital from attorneys for my real estate deals. Now I'm really more into selling shovels. I'm scaling my law firm. I'm chief legal officer for Tribest, which is, we've got a fund to fund.   Mike (41:20.262) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:28.085) legal product there as well. So we're really trying to bring in active, active entrepreneurs and people raising capital.   Mike (41:29.777) Yeah.   Mike (41:36.572) Okay, because I got that, I was just thinking through when we talking about that oil development project, that could be a good, the guy that runs that fund could be a good interview for you. Just thinking through your audience, because he's always looking for investors into his fund and like these oil lubs are just crushing it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:49.901) Cool. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:58.464) Yeah, cool. Who is it? Just, I don't know if I know him or not.   Mike (42:02.183) Um, Robert Durkey, he's out of Florida. has, his problem is he's sitting on a gold mine that has no, like he's old school, doesn't know social media, any of that. So that's why I think he'd be perfect for you. Cause I think you could help him and he could definitely help you with some kickback. Yeah. So cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully we meet soon. Okay. See you Seth. Bye.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:05.645) I don't think I know. I don't think I know.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:13.889) Yeah. Gotcha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:20.705) Cool, okay, sounds good man. Yeah, I appreciate the introduction.   Yeah, all right brother. Talk soon. See ya. Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Mike Hoffman's Links: https://www.instagram.com/mikehoffmannofficial/ https://x.com/mrpassive_?lang=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikedhoffmann/ https://www.tiktok.com/@mr.passive

In this episode of the Progressive Dairy Podcast, learn about the dairy provisions included in the One Big Beautiful Bill. American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) Economist joins host Kimmi Devaney to discuss the farm bill programs included in the bill, the increased estate tax exemption and what's on the horizon for a skinny farm bill later this year. Sign up for the AFBF Market Intel newsletter here.  Here's an episode overview: [~1:10] General overview of the One Big Beautiful Bill [~3:55] Dairy provisions: Dairy Margin Coverage [~6:20] Dairy provisions: funding for the USDA to conduct mandatory dairy processing cost surveys every two years to provide better data for future make allowance decisions[~9:15] Dairy provisions: Funding for conservation programs[~10:45] Dairy provisions: Funding for animal health programs to prevent, control and eradicate animal diseases[~11:50] Dairy provisions: Disaster assistance[~13:30] Dairy provisions: New trade promotion funding [~15:20] Dairy provisions: Makes the Section 199A tax deduction permanent 1099A[~16:05] Increased estate tax exemption that is now permanent[~16:20] Tax policy changes that dairy producers should know about[~18:30] What is the economic impact of this bill for dairy producers? (Immediate and long-term impact)[~21:00] Other information dairy producers should know about this bill[~26:00] What to expect with continued farm bill discussions this fall[~28:30] Other dairy-related legislation [~30:25] Tips for dairy producers interested in getting involved in policy[~32:20] Farm Bureau resources[~37:00] Rapid-fire questions

I wasn't aware that the game was gonna be digital only. Makes me wonder about 2K.

Makes no sense

Well maybe! It's recently been a red moon, so it seems to have possessed us to talk about anything that comes to our minds! The Mindy Project (Hulu), Megan (Hulu), Maria Menounos, 28 Days Later (Pluto), 28 Weeks Later (Hulu), 28 Years Later (in theaters) and finally Buc-ee's! Makes sense right?!

Kindness: The Next Superpower Hey my friend—kindness… a superpower? Really? In this longer, deeper episode of the Personal Development Unplugged Podcast, Cloughie explores why kindness is one of the most underrated forces for change—inside and out. In a world that feels increasingly self-centred, reactive, and short-tempered, a simple act of kindness can disrupt the noise and spark real transformation. This is part personal confession (yes, Cloughie admits to being “a bit of a dick”), part gentle wake-up call, and 100% full of practical reflections to help you become more self-assured and more connected to those around you. What you'll discover: Why kindness isn't weakness—it's proof of deep inner strength The surprising return on investment of a small act of kindness How to shift from frustration to compassion (even in traffic!) Why you sometimes forget your own kindness—and how to bring it back to mind A reminder to start by being kind to yourself, because that's where it all begins How kindness feeds into your personal goals and dreams—if you choose to include it You'll also be invited to: Reflect on the kindness you've received and how it shaped you Review your day for simple “kindness moments” (smiles count!) Set an intention to actively make the world a better place—starting today This episode isn't fluffy—it's practical. It's a reminder that we don't need to wait for the world to change. We start with us. One kind moment at a time. Be kind—pass it on: If this touched something in you, share the episode with someone you care about. https://personaldevelopmentunplugged.com/453-kindness-the-next-super-power/ Subscribe or follow to never miss a moment of mindset magic, deep musings, or a little friendly self-hypnosis. And if you've not yet explored all the free hypnosis at paulcloughonline.com, now's a good time. Because whatever you think you are… you're more than that. Let's fly Shine Brightly

Makes no sense.

Title: Stop Chasing the Woman in the Red Dress: Multifamily Is the Smartest Move with Joe Fairless Summary: In this conversation, Joe Fairless and Seth Bradley discuss the importance of authenticity in business, the current state of the multifamily real estate market, and effective strategies for raising capital. Joe shares insights on sticking with multifamily investments despite market fluctuations, leveraging technology like AI and EOS for operational efficiency, and the significance of building authority and expertise in the field. The discussion also touches on personal reflections and aspirations, emphasizing the value of character and commitment in both business and personal life. Links to watch and subscribe:   Bullet Point Highlights: Authenticity is key in business interactions. Focus on your strengths and expertise. The multifamily market fundamentals remain strong. Utilize technology to enhance capital raising efforts. Building authority is crucial for new capital raisers. Networking through influential connections can be effective. Character is more important than reputation. Sticking to one niche can lead to greater success. Continuous learning and adaptation are essential. Coaching and mentoring can be fulfilling personal pursuits. Transcript:  Joe Fairless (00:03.629) Hey, how you doing?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:04.881) Alright man.   How are you? I don't know if we've actually met in person or not, but funny, I'll share the story once we start officially recording, but once upon a time when I was trying to find my place in this syndication world, had a phone call with you and it was awesome to actually get to speak with you at the time because it was just like, whoa, this is Joe Fairless, right? So it was a huge deal, so it's awesome to have you on the show.   Joe Fairless (00:34.966) You know what? I take notes of every conversation and I see it was around May of 2019. Yeah, yeah, I see that. It's awesome. Well, looking forward to every five years we should do this.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:43.988) There you go. There you go. Awesome, man. Awesome.   Yeah, let me...   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:53.1) Sounds good, man. Sounds good. Sounds good. So just to give you a little bit of groundwork here. So I'm a securities attorney by trade. I've raised capital for syndications, those sorts of things. I'm currently with Tribest, I'm chief legal officer over there. So we do, put together fund to funds in a box for capital aggregators. And I'm rebranding the podcast. So once upon a time it was Passive Income Attorney. I was really focused on bringing in investors into my deals, raising capital, that sort of thing.   Now I'm rebranding this as raising the bar gonna be kind of more of a general General podcast on business and raising capital and in real estate that sort of thing. So It's gonna be more of a general audience before it was past investors This is gonna be more kind of business people active investors because I'm actively trying to bring in you know capital raisers and People like that. They're putting deals together for my law firm and for for tribe vest   Joe Fairless (01:33.998) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (01:48.354) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (01:51.884) Makes sense. Thanks for that context.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:53.544) Yeah, cool cool. So and then format wise we'll just do it'll be pretty short We're gonna do like 25 minutes 30 minutes And then we'll go into kind of these like mini segments because I want to do these mini episodes And I think I sent those over to you one is just million dollar Monday. Just kind of how you made your first million How you made your last million how you're make your next that sort of thing and then the next one is the the 1 % segment which is kind of you know, how did you become basically?   Joe Fairless (02:00.504) Sweet.   Joe Fairless (02:15.47) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:21.364) 1 % like the best top 1 % in what you do and that sort of thing and just kind of giving actionable steps to the listeners about how they can get there too.   Joe Fairless (02:25.442) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (02:30.314) Awesome. Sounds good. Sounds like fun.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:32.98) Cool. All right, man. Well, we're already recording, so I'll just kind of jump into it and then we'll make the, I'll make the cuts later. cool. Welcome to Raise the Bar with me, your host, Seth Bradley, where we have elevated conversations on raising capital, real estate, and entrepreneurship. Today, we have an incredible guest, Joe Fairless. If you've been living under a rock, then maybe you haven't heard of Joe, but everybody in my industry knows Joe as an industry leader, a thought leader.   real estate entrepreneur, extraordinaire, marketer, master marketer, all of the above. So Joe, welcome to the show.   Joe Fairless (03:10.36) Looking forward to our conversation, Seth.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:12.884) for sure man. So, you know, I like this question because it's kind of unusual and I have a hard time answering it and you might too, but we'll see. you know, when a stranger asks you what you do and it just comes up to you maybe at a conference or on the streets, what do you say?   Joe Fairless (03:28.398) I'd I buy apartment buildings.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:30.546) I love it. Keeping it simple, man. I guess that was an easier answer than I anticipated.   Joe Fairless (03:35.182) Well, yeah, I've been to in my early days I went to seminars and they have much longer more thought-provoking responses like, know, I help high income earners create passive income or something along those lines, but I keep it simple. I buy apartment buildings and then, you know,   let the conversation go where it naturally would go.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (04:06.366) I love that man. Yeah, and you know, to be honest, know, that response that you just mentioned is a little bit played out. Don't you think? I feel like if you're on LinkedIn or if you're on, you know, conferences, everybody's like, yeah, I raised capital from passive investors so I can help them do this and do that. Do you think that's a little bit played out? Do you think that people need to kind of change that marketing strategy at this point?   Joe Fairless (04:25.697) Well...   I think you should just be authentic. think just go with what feels right for you and what you'll enjoy talking about. Just go with what feels right for you. That's what I do. I am not a salesy person.   I feel uncomfortable if I'm trying to sell someone something. I believe in what I do, but I feel uncomfortable if I'm trying to force it. And so if I'm like, I was just at a dad-daughter dance this past Sunday and we met up with some couples that I didn't know any of them. was just couples that, you know, my daughter...   goes to their parents of the kids who go to school with my daughter. And so I was talking to one of the dads and he said, what do you do? I I buy apartment buildings. And he said, that's interesting. Then we started talking about what I do because he was naturally interested. And I enjoy that much more than trying to intentionally bait a hook. I'd just rather just have a conversation.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (05:40.03) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (05:43.57) Yeah, yeah, I think that's the key, right? Especially in today's world where everything's online and you just get marketed to and advertised to all the time. You've got to be authentic and you need to have an elevator pitch, it's got to be authentic. It's got to be really who you are. And it can't be sales because people are so sensitive to that nowadays, whether you're raising capital or whether you're W2 doing your job. And we're all salespeople to a certain extent, whatever we do.   But people are very sensitive to that. So you've got to really focus on being authentic and coming from a place of genuineness.   Joe Fairless (06:20.91) Nobody in the world can do you like you do you. You've got a unique strand of DNA that no one else can be the Seth Bradley that you are, the Joe Farrells that I am, because it's impossible. It's impossible. There is no one like you. There is no one like me.   And it's just the more magnetic, the more genuine and true to who I am, the more magnetic I feel like I become because people enjoy authenticity and it's just the right way to play it, right way to do it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:01.684) Totally, totally, totally. For our audience, just tell us what you're doing nowadays. mean, there's been kind of some changes in the market with the interest rates going up, those sorts of things, maybe starting towards the end of 2022. I know for myself, I was in the capital raising game for a number of years and then I kind of slowed down there towards the end of 2022, beginning of 2023, just to kind of see what the market was gonna do, just to see if we could still get some really good deals going, see if some of the other deals were going bad.   you know, what, what are you up to nowadays? Like what's your focus? right now.   Joe Fairless (07:36.77) The focus has been and always will be on our current portfolio and the deals that we have and operating those deals the best that we can and continuing to improve the NOI. So that is the focus.   There we have some deals that have floating rates with rate caps and the focus is to figure out how not to have floating rate with rate caps that you have to continue to renew once they expire. So that comes with refinancing and in order to refinance and sometimes you have to do a capital call or if you don't do a capital call you gotta bring in equity in some form or fashion to refinance.   some cases, it just depends on the deal. So the focus is on the portfolio and always will be. And then the secondary thing that we look at is acquisitions. How do we capitalize on the market that we're at right now? mean, the best way to describe it that I've read is it's stagnant. You know, it's just...   Not sure. The water, there's stuff growing in the water, but not sure if you really want to be part of what's growing in the water right now. Like it's just, it's stagnant and what will, but we also know what is coming.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (09:00.486) Yeah.   Joe Fairless (09:12.264) and that is the supply demand shift in multifamilies favor depends on the sub market and the market obviously. But generally the Sun Belt is going to greatly benefit in the next year, year and a half, in some cases six months from now.   with the supply-demand dynamic with new supply drying up and increasing the demand for the existing supply. Again, depends on the market, depends on the sub-market. So how do we capitalize on that? is there any way to be opportunistic with what's happening with some deals from other operators that   didn't work out. know, there haven't been a lot of foreclosures, but there have been some. And we have relationships with our lenders that are pretty strong. And in fact, one, a large lender that we have a really good relationship with, that we have properties with, they foreclosed on someone else's deal. And I won't name names on who they foreclosed on, but they foreclosed on someone else's deal and they came to us   Afterward and said hey here here. Here's a here's an opportunity. It's in a great area of Fort Worth and I'm from Fort Worth so I know we have a lot of property there too, but I know the market also I grew up there and We'll give you this special financing of around 3 % or so interest rate fixed interest rate   for year one and then it's fixed through the whole period of the loan but then the interest rate steps up to around four, four and a half percent over the five years. So to get that type of essentially seller financing but it's lender financing direct from the lender lending institution that foreclosed on the deal in a very good area of Fort Worth.   Joe Fairless (11:29.326) There are opportunities out there also. So it's how do we become opportunistic and find these deals. And so we're in the process of closing on that deal or doing due diligence on that deal. We're under contract and we're scheduled to close in about a month and a half from now.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (11:49.316) Awesome, awesome. Have you found it difficult at any point in time, kind of over these last couple years where the market has slowed down?   Joe Fairless (11:56.654) Whatever you're gonna say, yes. So finish your question, but the answer is yes. Yes, I found it difficult over the last couple years, but what exactly are you asking about that's difficult?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (11:59.732) Yeah. Sure. Specifically, should say sticking with multifamily because you are a multifamily guy and you you've seen you've seen where everyone, you know, everybody wanted that on that multifamily train for, you know, a decade, if not longer.   Joe Fairless (12:15.598) Mmm. Man.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:23.696) And now you've seen a lot of these same people change their tune and say, okay, well, you know what? Let's pivot to something else. Let's pivot to car washes or private credit funds or all these other things.   Joe Fairless (12:29.998) Man, I'm actually, I know you're an attorney, but can I strike my yes actually from that question? Cause no, actually the answer is no. I haven't found it difficult to stick with multifamily. Hell no. No. You know, you go to a restaurant at a diner and they offer lasagna, California roll and what else?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:41.16) Hahaha   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:49.107) Ha ha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (13:01.204) Ha   Joe Fairless (13:01.356) Pad Thai, you know, are they gonna have the best lasagna, California roll, and pad thai? No, no. They've got something for everyone, but they're not gonna be great at any of it. I'd rather go to an Italian restaurant that makes their own noodles, right? Makes their own pasta. And where they specialize in one thing.   Not at all. No, we I believe in the fundamentals of multifamily. I believe in the supply demand that is here. I mean we had a record number of supply across the board and multifamily and the occupancy maintained 90-91 percent depending on the market but it maintained in the 90s in a record number of supply and by the way at the same time you got   the capital markets raising interest rates the way they did. And a lot of people have been able to hold serve. And the fundamentals of the supply demand and how much...   how many renters there are out there and how that will continue is there. That's cold hard facts. There is demand, a lot of demand, and there will continue to be even more demand because the supply is trailing off. We have never looked.   outside of multifamily because it's so strong. I think that is a cultural thing actually because if you, anyone who's in the sports, college sports, they'll know about the NIL and   Joe Fairless (14:54.784) how you can bounce from one team to another year after year. And so you'll find some people who aren't starting and if they put in the work then, and I'm for NIL, I think players should be paid, but I don't think that they, I don't think they should, I don't think it serves them as young men and young women.   mostly young men in this case who are bouncing from place to place, to not compete and not work for a starting position and instead just go somewhere else the path of least resistance. That's not how you build character. There's a really good book, it's called The Road to Character.   and they talk about in the book, they give different examples of people throughout history. And they're not exceptional, like saintly people. They're people who are normal people, but what they did that is atypical for what our culture does now is they stuck with things even when it was tough.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:09.682) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (16:09.998) and instead of bouncing from thing to thing because what happens is when you bounce from thing to thing you don't get an expertise you don't get the the depth of knowledge the scars that that you need in order to be truly exceptional at that one thing and it's just surface level   And it'd be like if you feed your kids candy for every meal. I mean, it's same thing. You can't live on mental candy, right? You gotta have some substance. You gotta go through things.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:43.06) Yeah, I love that man. I love that metaphor. I love that. Like you've got to get reps, whether the times are great or an easy or whether they're hard. And those hard reps are the ones that are really going to set you up for success down the line. Like if you're able to execute in the hard times, then when times turn good again, you're going to be at the top, right? You're going to be cream of the crop. What do you, what do you think it is about you and maybe your company that's enabled you to do that, to stick?   to multifamily and not say, ooh, you know what, I'm a really good marketer so I can raise capital for anything if I really want to, right? You're in that position and what is it about you and your company that's been able to allow you to stick to multifamily and just stick to it during these hard times?   Joe Fairless (17:32.762) the fundamentals are there. I mean, you could make an argument that if we were office investors, and I have some friends who are really keen on investing in office now and in the future, but you could very easily make an argument that with the amount of office space that people have currently, you don't need as much of that space.   It's not a five, you know, three to five to seven year play. Maybe it's a 20 to 50 year play. I don't know. Who the hell knows what's going to happen with office and working from home and AI and automation and all that. But with multifamily, the challenge is capital markets. Now there are some other aspects like the hyper supply, which has tapered off.   because of the higher interest rates increase in you know insurance which has tapered off back to the single digits by and large but that that was a big thing property taxes depending on where you're at but the fundamentals are there people are renting and consumers for yeah unfortunately for generally you know for the general consumer their credit card debt   is going up. They're still paying off their credit card debt from purchases almost 12 months ago. More than half of people are paying off purchases for more than 12 months ago. that's so right now they've been out earning their income because income has been increasing. But what happens if that income stops increasing the way it has been?   the debt's not going anywhere, especially credit card debt, and that's certainly not going to make more first-time home buyers that dynamic. So the fundamentals are there, and not to mention we already have a housing shortage deficit, major deficit.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:50.866) Yeah, so it's the belief and it's the knowledge like it's the education like you you know that the fundamentals are there you you're you're basing your resilience in the market to What you're seeing in the data like hey, it's you know We we believe in this asset type because of the data that i'm Well educated and well versed in   Joe Fairless (20:09.752) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (20:14.346) Absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (20:16.168) That's incredible. That's incredible. Has anything changed in the way that you potentially because you've got a deal that might be going through in the way that you either have raised capital recently or how you are going to raise capital for your next deal as compared to when it might have been a little bit easier, let's say five years ago from passive investors?   Joe Fairless (20:38.612) Yes, we have implemented a system that I'm sure a lot of your listeners have heard of EOS, Entrepreneur Operating System, and that has been very helpful. We just did our focus day a month ago, but we've hit the ground running and we have our, I think, Vision Day part one later this month and Vision Day two.   next month and that has allowed ownership among the team members to really thrive because team members are responsible for rocks or their goals but if you say goals instead of rock they'll the EOS person will slap your hand so I'll continue to say rock so they're responsible for rocks and it's just   It takes more, the individuals on the team have more ownership. So that's not something sexy or flashy that I think your question was getting to. So I'll say something else that has been helpful would be doing Facebook ads for getting new accredited investor leads.   at scale. That's the best way that we found to get credit investor leads at scale is through Facebook ads. And we have an agency that we work with. And I just hired a director of marketing who has some really good experience and he's overseeing them and the marketing team. And then   Another thing that has been helpful that where I'd say just scratching the surface I'm a big proponent of AI and how I believe We are in the middle of a major change for our society with because of AI I think it is just as major of a change as it as it as when we all got internet in our homes   Joe Fairless (22:51.602) on a personal computer. I think it's that big to have access to, just think about phone books to Googling something on your computer. So with AI we've incorporated it and are incorporating as much as possible in one aspect to address your question about how we're doing things differently. One aspect.   is that on our investor calls, our prospective investor calls, we record them. They know it's being recorded and on a recorded line. We have an AI service that then takes the information from the call and grades the call. But then not only that is we look at, those investors, which ones of those investors invest?   What did we say? What did they say on those calls? What are some common commonalities? Which ones didn't invest? What did they say? What did we say? And starting to identify trends and words and topics to talk about and to address on the calls to increase the conversion rate.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (24:07.048) That's great, man. I love it. You kind of went full circle there. You've got EOS, which I'm a huge proponent of. We use that across the various companies that I have, some form or another. There's got to be a framework of organization and accountability and being able to look back and say, hey, we've had this problem before and here's how we solved it before. Or hey, this problem is still occurring from last week's L10 meeting. What do we need to do to improve it? How do we solve that issue?   Joe Fairless (24:33.166) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (24:36.712) How do we keep moving forward rather than, what did we talk about last week or what did we talk about last month? You've got to have a way to organize things and a way to solve issues organizationally, especially as you grow. So EOS, huge proponent of it, man. I mean, it's awesome. Like you have to have some form of it, even if it's not to a T with the book, Traction is where that comes from. You have to implement some form of organization and framework for your company. And then like you said,   Joe Fairless (24:41.389) Yeah.   Joe Fairless (24:56.575) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:03.284) you know, with AI, everyone has to stay on the forefront of what's going on right now. I know I was even a little resistant myself. was like, chat GPT, is that? Eh, you know, and put it off for a little bit. And then once you start using that, along with all the other things as well, I'm just using that as kind of a baseline, but just learning how to use chat GPT in your everyday life, it's just a game changer. Because now your whole thought process changes. It's not like,   Joe Fairless (25:08.547) Yep.   Joe Fairless (25:20.14) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:31.22) I need to put together this entire article or blog post. It's like, how do I prompt it correctly to to produce this blog post or this article in my voice and then edit it through that or, you know, all these different things you figure out, like how to prompt rather than how to actually take this solution all the way from start to finish. Let that technology tell you how to do it. So it's awesome. And then Facebook ads as well.   Joe Fairless (25:45.206) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:58.964) you've got to really dial those things in, right? It can be a money pit, but at the same time, if you can master that, and it sounds like you hired an agency that's very industry specific, which helps out a lot. And from what I've seen, we have gems, we have a capital raising business, we have all these different things, and finding somebody that's niche to that industry is super important.   Joe Fairless (26:22.434) That's right.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (26:25.756) I'd love to go back and stay on this capital raising subject, especially for people that just started out. So like now you're doing EOS, now you're using AI, now you're using Facebook ads, do you have some capital to be able to invest in those ads? What about for somebody that's just kind of starting out? they're, you know, maybe this is their first fund to fund or, you know, their first property that they're raising capital for. Like how do they effectively launch their first   Capital Race.   Joe Fairless (26:56.59) Well, I would read the book that I wrote on syndication because I walked through the whole process of that best ever syndication book. So, but for this this relatively short conversation, I'd say first,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:04.404) Great book.   Joe Fairless (27:19.606) People have to make sure you have to make sure that people perceive you and you are actually a real estate expert and That because you might have you might have been if this your first one first deal then I'm assuming you came from some other industry or   If it was real estate, maybe you're a property manager, they don't know about all aspects of your expertise as it relates to real estate. you've got to, by having a thought leadership platform, you'll interview others who have that experience, you'll continue to learn, hone your skills, and then you'll also be associated with those who have those skill sets, and that will be helpful for you.   Once you do that, assuming that you are the expert and you are also perceived as the expert, then what I would do, and what I did actually on my very first one is I created a spreadsheet. And the spreadsheet had the name of the person, how I knew them, and then,   What I did is I wrote down all the different names and then how I knew them. So for example, I was on the alumni advisory board for Texas Tech. I was on a flag football team in New York. I wrote someone's name down there. On my flag football team, was working at different companies. I worked at different companies, so I wrote down different coworkers at different companies.   the key here for doing it this way is identifying the person. So then you sort them by how you know them. all the people from the flag football team would be sorted together. All the people from XYZ company would be sorted together. And then you identify the most influential person within that group. And you talk to him or her.   Joe Fairless (29:39.306) about your opportunity. And once you talk to him or her about the opportunity, and if they find it appealing or at least they want to learn more about it, then you can go to the next person in that group and you can name check. You can say, I was just talking to Seth about this and he's got some follow-up questions about it and I thought it also would make sense to talk to you about it too.   So then you come in a little warm with the group dynamic versus if you come in cold on an individual level.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:11.924) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:18.822) I like that man. That's a very, very nuanced strategy tidbit there. What I really heard was, you know, authenticity and authority, authenticity in that. Yeah, you've got to educate yourself. You've got to be a real estate expert if that's what you're raising capital for and authority. And then you've got to show people, you know, why you're the expert, why you know all these things, why they should listen to you to invest in something like this and even leveraging the authority of others with that.   that strategy where you go to this influential person and say, look, this person likes this deal too, and here's why. And then they can go to them and they kind of look to them as additional authority because they kind of look to them as that thought leader or that leader in general. So pretty great, man. Start wrapping this up, but this is kind of a nuanced question that I love to ask and ...   Because once upon a time I went to I went to med school for a little while and then I dropped out and because I just I hated it knew it wasn't for me and I'm going to law school and then got into real estate. So you know in a parallel universe tell me about a different version of you a different but likely version of you if you didn't exist as you do today because right now you know you're you're an apartment buyer you're a great marketer you're an entrepreneur.   Joe Fairless (31:38.164) I'd say I really enjoy coaching my daughter in soccer. I do not know soccer. I grew up in Texas. I played football. I played baseball. I ran track in that order. There wasn't a soccer option or maybe even a soccer ball in Texas when I was growing up. But I enjoy coaching and in an alternative universe, I would   I would do more of that because time is, it flies whenever I'm doing that.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:15.036) Awesome, awesome. All right, Joe, for our listeners out there, what can they find out more about you?   Joe Fairless (32:21.494) You can go to AshcroftCapital.com and if you're looking at passive investing or if you're an operator or someone who is partnering with others, then my conference is a good place to be. It's besteverconference.com. It's gonna be March 3rd and 4th in Salt Lake City this year.   I can get a discount code to your people too.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:52.51) Great, yeah, I'll drop that in the show notes and I'll see you there, Joe. So we'll shake hands in person. So thanks again for coming on the show. Really appreciate it and we'll catch you next time.   Joe Fairless (32:57.304) Sweet. Awesome.   Joe Fairless (33:05.518) You know what, in just a second, I'm gonna just tell you the code, that way you don't have to do any work. Whenever I do a podcast and someone says, I'll send it to you, I'm like, more work for me to do later. So, all right, here's a code. Hurry 25, it'll be 25 % off all ticket types. H-U-R-R-Y, all lowercase, and then number 25, you get 25 % off all tickets, except for the LP ticket.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:09.917) Okay.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:13.808) Yeah, I know then you gotta follow up.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:35.924) Let's roll right into these million dollar questions and then I'll let you go.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:44.884) Alright Joe, let's jump into this. So, how did you make your first million dollars?   Joe Fairless (33:52.185) Same way I made my last one so spoiler alert. It's it's selling when a deal exited so The is probably The seventh or eighth Deal I had one million dollars on one transaction, right? Like is that chunk about? Yeah, I   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:55.56) Hahaha   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:12.767) Really million dollars in your net worth   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:17.96) What puts you over the edge there? How did you grow that first million?   Joe Fairless (34:21.626) I lost my first million before I ever came across it. That was on the very first deal. It would just be, it'd probably be through an exit of a deal.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:26.056) Ha   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:35.614) Sure, yeah, and I'll bet it's probably similar. mean, how are you gonna, how are you planning on making your next million dollars? Same thing, the apartments, all about apartments, man. I love it, singular focus, that's where it's at. mean, riches are in the niches.   Joe Fairless (34:41.144) Same thing. Yep. The apartments. All apartments. That's right.   Yep.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:52.564) All right, you're clearly in the top 1 % of what you do. What is it about you that separates you from the rest of the field?   Joe Fairless (34:58.958) Mmm.   I do what I say I'm gonna do. And sadly, that separates me from a lot of people, not all people.   but that's a big focus of mine. And it's not about my, I recently read something that resonated and that was don't focus on your reputation, focus on your character. Reputation is such a vanity metric, but the character is who you are when no one's looking and being proud of who you are. And that's vital to me.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:37.524) Yeah, and it's not just saying what you're going to do to other people, but also with yourself, right? To yourself.   Joe Fairless (35:43.726) Mmm good point. Yeah when you're when when I'm on those runs and I can just stop Whenever I want But then I'll be I'll know I'll know I didn't go through this, you know, you know made up finish line that I had predetermined in my head and And that's that's there's there's something to be said there. I'm glad you brought that up   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:10.644) Yeah, that's that's the key right? It's not just when somebody when it's dependent on somebody else or somebody else is watching It's you know, what do you do when nobody's watching and what do you do when it's just a promise to yourself? Do you follow through do you keep those promises things as easy as hey when you set your alarm in the morning and you wake up Do you do you get up or do you hit the snooze button? Like you made a promise to yourself the night before to wake up and get up when that alarm goes off Do you keep that promise?   Joe Fairless (36:15.415) Mm-hmm.   Joe Fairless (36:25.229) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:39.12) Awesome. All right, brother. I think that should do it. I will see you. I'll see you at BC, man.   Joe Fairless (36:46.42) Awesome. I appreciate it. yeah, if anything you can do to help get to get the word out about the conference to your email list, I'd appreciate that also. All right. Thanks, Seth. All right. Bye.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:57.404) Absolutely. All right, brother. Talk soon. See you. Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en   Joe Fairless's Links: https://www.facebook.com/imjoefairless https://x.com/joefairless https://www.linkedin.com/in/joefairless/ https://ashcroftcapital.com/our-team/joe-fairless/ https://www.instagram.com/besteverpodcast/?hl=en

Would you like access to our advanced agency training for FREE? https://www.agencymastery360.com/training We've been talking about AI on this podcast for years — not just as the next shiny tool, but as the biggest shift agencies will face this decade. Yet most agencies still haven't done more than dabble. Meanwhile, their competitors (or even their clients) are using AI to move faster, make sharper decisions, and drive results that leave everyone else scrambling to catch up. If you're still on the sidelines, you're already behind. Today's guest is clear about the game-changing role of AI in the agency world. He argues it's not just about making your shop more efficient — it's about driving better client results, delivering faster, deeper insights, and adding to your bottom line. Agencies that fail to embrace AI risk being outpaced by clients who bring it in-house or by competitors already using it to gain an edge. To stay competitive, you have to take a forward-thinking approach that uses AI to scale operations, increase client value, and keep your best people. Phil Parrish is the co-founder & President of PrograMetrix, a boutique programmatic advertising agency that also crushes it in paid search and paid social. Celebrating their 10-year anniversary this past April, Phil's team has stayed nimble, focused, and mighty — helping clients dominate their digital paid media while driving real, measurable results. He'll discuss his vision on AI, how he's using it as a multiplier, and why that are not already adapting their processes to include this technology, will be exposed. In this episode, we'll discuss: Navigating pipeline churn anxiety. Delivering quick wins with AI. Why agencies that don't adapt will get exposed. Focus on the wins, not just the tasks. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio Sponsors and Resources E2M Solutions: Today's episode of the Smart Agency Masterclass is sponsored by E2M Solutions, a web design, and development agency that has provided white-label services for the past 10 years to agencies all over the world. Check out e2msolutions.com/smartagency and get 10% off for the first three months of service. Betting on Yourself (And Getting Clients to Bet on You Too) Phil didn't stumble into agency ownership by accident, but he didn't overcomplicate it either. He built strong client relationships over the years, recognized the moment when he thought, “I can do what this company does — why not do it for myself?” and took the leap. With clients ready to follow, he launched PrograMetrix and started generating revenue quickly, sidestepping much of the risk that keeps many would-be agency owners stuck. The takeaway? If you've built trust and consistently delivered, clients will follow when you launch your own shop. Relationships and results are your best startup capital. Navigating Uncertainty Without Panic Every agency owner hits moments of chaos—those “Are we going under?” nightmares that keep you up at 3 AM. So far, Phil's journey hasn't quite hit the “we can't make payroll” panic, but pipeline uncertainty and client churn anxiety were very real, especially during COVID-19. Ironically, the pandemic ended up being a huge growth driver. As trade shows and in-person events vanished, clients who were spending six figures on live events had to redeploy budgets digitally. PrograMetrix was perfectly positioned to catch that wave. “You've got to have a good business plan, offer strategic value, make smart bets, and stay laser-focused when your back's against the wall.” It's a solid reminder: when chaos hits, the cream rises. The agencies that pivot fast come out stronger.   AI: Beyond Social Posts and Rocket Emojis Let's get real: most agencies are looking at AI like it's a shortcut to crank out social posts and blog content (and yes, that's part of it). But Phil's approach is a level above—he's integrating AI deeply into PrograMetrix's operations to enhance speed, insights, and performance, not just save a few hours per week. In his view, agencies that have depended on time as their inventory and work on the basis that the more time they can utilize the more revenue they can drive will struggle unless they modernize operations using AI. For its part, Phil's agency is building a proprietary product using a licensed data warehouse, pulling data from all their platforms (The Trade Desk, Meta, Google, TikTok, LinkedIn, etc.), and using AI to run advanced queries and develop unique optimization techniques. The end goal would be to deliver faster, clearer, and more impactful insights that clients can't get by simply logging into their ad accounts. The bottom line: If your agency isn't embedding AI into how you operate and deliver, not just as a tool to “save time,” clients will either bring it in-house or go with an agency that does. The market is moving, and speed and value are non-negotiables if you want to win and retain serious clients. Delivering Quick Wins and Story-Driven Insights Mid-market and enterprise clients dropping six to seven figures on ad spend need to feel your authority and your velocity from day one. They need to breathe easier knowing your agency has it handled, and they need to see progress fast, or they'll be out. Using AI, Phil's agency uncovers insights like: Path to conversion (impressions and touchpoints before a sale) Channel impact across the funnel Audience segment insights Messaging that drives real ROI They're not just sending reports but turning complex data into actionable stories for their clients. If you're still measuring your agency's success by how much time you can bill rather than how much impact you can deliver, it's time to rethink your model before your clients rethink you. Why Agencies That Don't Adapt Will Get Exposed Look, AI isn't going to wipe out agencies. But it will wipe out agencies that are stuck operating like it's 2015, coasting on outdated processes, and sending the same recycled reports clients can pull themselves. AI is like the giant scoreboard in baseball, showing every advanced stat in real-time. Agencies that are half-assing delivery can't hide anymore. If you're running bad ads, AI will show your client you suck, and you'll get fired. (Like the agency I just fired.) AI won't kill the agency model, but it will expose agencies not using best-of-breed tools to deliver value faster. AI as a Multiplier, Not a Threat — and Saves Him $200K Phil is using AI as a force multiplier to: Deliver faster, clearer insights for clients Optimize campaigns for even a 2-3% lift that compounds over time And they're doing this without having to invest in new talent at the rate they otherwise would have. As Phil says, “if we can skip hiring one or two traders, that's a $200K swing to the bottom line.” And it's not because he doesn't value his team—he's investing in making his team better. AI helps smart people do better work, get better results, and actually enjoy their jobs. Clients see more value, your agency scales efficiently, and your team sticks around longer, reducing churn and recruitment costs. It's About Buying Wins, Not Just Doing Tasks If you've seen Moneyball, know Billy Beane reinvented baseball by focusing on “getting on base,” not vanity stats. Agencies should think the same way: What are your “get on base” moves that drive client results? Are you outcome-driven and problem-solving, or are you a task rabbit waiting to be replaced by AI? When clients have big challenges, do they come to you first, or are you stuck doing low-value production work? If it's the latter, it's a sign to reposition your agency now. If you don't, you're writing your own exit letter from the industry. Make AI Use Mandatory, Not Optional As an agency leader, it's time to go all-in on integrating AI across all SOPs, not just as an add-on for the leadership team. Why? Because this tech: Makes employees more valuable in the marketplace Makes them happier by removing annoying, low-leverage tasks Keeps your team aligned with your agency's growth goals Before they started using AI prompts to understand how to optimize a campaign or improve performance, their campaign managers were conducting huge Excel exports. Now they can focus on strategy. If you're the only one using AI in your agency, you're toast. You need to lead, train, and require your team to use these tools to become outcome-focused problem solvers rather than task executors. Stop Being Fearful. Start Doing If you're feeling fear around AI, that's normal. But you'll stay scared if you don't start using it. Phil's team didn't wait for a perfect moment; they're actively building, testing, and refining AI use across their delivery and ops. The agencies that will win over the next 3-5 years aren't the ones worrying about AI—they're the ones using it to solve bigger problems faster for their clients. Do You Want to Transform Your Agency from a Liability to an Asset? Looking to dig deeper into your agency's potential? Check out our Agency Blueprint. Designed for agency owners like you, our Agency Blueprint helps you uncover growth opportunities, tackle obstacles, and craft a customized blueprint for your agency's success.

Qool DJ Marv Live at Soho House Manhattan - July 3 2025 - Makes a Differencehttps://sohohouseny.com/        +    Artwork: https://www.bettyblayton.com/about-betty-blayton   ---      https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5gQLsodBsCys1_3Zbm83vg     https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/qool-dj-marv-aural-memoirs-and-buttamilk-archives/id269880758     https://music.apple.com/us/artist/qool-dj-marv/1558418894    https://bsky.app/profile/qooldjmarv.bsky.social     https://www.instagram.com/qooldjmarv/    https://qooldjmarv.bandcamp.com/album/sound-paths-v-1    https://tidal.com/browse/artist/23883666    https://www.mixcloud.com/qooldjmarv/    https://open.spotify.com/artist/48vhJ2d1hVaFHf6gqXeTm0?si=fWO0N456QeWRMWLUtqe4Yg    https://soundcloud.com/qooldjmarv    https://www.twitch.tv/qooldjmarv    https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/QoolDJMarvMusic 

The Difference That Makes the Difference: NLP and the Science of Positive Change by Josh Davis, Greg Prosmushkin https://www.amazon.com/Difference-that-Makes-Science-Positive/dp/1250349087 Take control of your life and create profound change today using NLP and the science of positive change! Learn why people resist change, why they sometimes embrace change, and how to lead change quickly and in lasting ways. It all comes down to finding the difference that makes the difference for each person and context. Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) is great for finding that difference. NLP helps us understand what makes people tick. When we understand how they think, feel, and act in key situations, we have the raw material with which to make change happen, often quickly and profoundly. In the 1970s, a linguist and his partner studied the language patterns and nonverbal cues of great psychotherapists, as well as how people are affected by the systems they're part of. The two pinpointed key aspects of what enables human beings to change. Their findings formed the basis of NLP. Since then, NLP has often been taught to therapists and life coaches aiming to master one-on-one interactions in those contexts. When the lawyer Greg Prosmushkin discovered NLP, he realized how incredibly valuable these tools could be outside a therapy context. How to communicate with confidence, model excellence, and influence your own and others' thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are useful for many people in many situations. Greg used NLP to make huge breakthroughs in his trials and to step into his own as an entrepreneur. In 2022, Greg met Josh Davis, PhD, a Columbia University PhD who studied psychology and neuroscience, and the Founder and Director of the Science-Based Leadership Institute. Josh is an NLP expert who grew up in the 1970s and 80s as the child of two pioneers in the field of NLP. He's an NLP native. He's been training others to use NLP for over a decade. Josh is also the internationally best-selling author of Two Awesome Hours, a science-based set of strategies to work less and get your most important work done. Greg and Josh set out to make NLP easily accessible for everyone. They show how the tools of NLP can be used by anyone in their daily work and personal lives, and connect these actionable tools to the science of change. The Difference that Makes the Difference is a result of their rigorous and dedicated collaboration. In this book, readers learn how to: -Communicate with confidence -Model excellence, to learn and master new skills -Influence their own and others' thoughts, feelings, and behaviors in positive ways -and much more! You'll get: -Step-by-step instructions with tips -Guided prompts to follow that help you apply these time-tested tools to your own specific needs -Examples of how to use the tools in everyday situations -Simple explanations of the theory and science behind the tools -Clear explanations of why the tools are so powerful NLP has been time-tested for fifty years, but until now it has only been accessible for a select few. Books and methods of teaching NLP were complex because the subject matter was highly sophisticated and derived from the work of professional psychotherapists. Greg Prosmushkin and Josh Davis, PhD have spent a combined 35+ years studying and unlocking the value of NLP. Josh has been teaching these concepts and tools in specialized NLP trainings, as well as one-on-one and group coaching settings, to Fortune 500 audiences and beyond. They have been using these concepts and tools in their professional practices of trial law, entrepreneurship, and leadership development. They have made a careful study of how to make the complex simple to learn and apply. It's time to move past simply waiting and wishing for your life to be different―dive into the tools of NLP and the science behind change that supports those tools,

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We dive into Nucleus Genomics, a startup backed by the Founders Fund, that wants to help you evaluate, rank, and name your embryos in a pre-IVF dashboard designed for “genetic optimization.” We talk about the junk science and wild ideologies that drive these desires to treat your genes and children like assets to be managed – with the ultimate goal of creating and enforcing a society ordered by genetic hierarchies. We then wrap up by tying these biotech visions to their AI counterparts in the “Gentle Singularity.” ••• This 25-Year-Old Biotech Founder Says His Startup Can ‘Optimize' Embryos for Intelligence https://www.inc.com/ben-sherry/kian-sadeghi-says-nucleus-genomics-can-optimize-embryos-for-intelligence/91198815 ••• Controversial genetics testing startup Nucleus Genomics raises $14M Series A https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/30/controversial-genetics-testing-startup-nucleus-genomics-raises-14m-series-a/ ••• Genetics testing startup Nucleus Genomics criticized for its embryo product: ‘Makes me so nauseous' https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/06/genetics-testing-startup-nucleus-genomics-criticized-for-its-embryo-product-makes-me-so-nauseous/ ••• OpenAI wins $200m contract with US military for ‘warfighting' https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jun/17/openai-military-contract-warfighting ••• This is the gentle singularity? https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/this-is-the-gentle-singularity ••• China shuts down AI tools during nationwide college exams https://www.theverge.com/news/682737/china-shuts-down-ai-chatbots-exam-season Standing Plugs: ••• Order Jathan's new book: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520398078/the-mechanic-and-the-luddite ••• Subscribe to Ed's substack: https://substack.com/@thetechbubble ••• Subscribe to TMK on patreon for premium episodes: https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (bsky.app/profile/jathansadowski.com) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.x.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (bsky.app/profile/jebr.bsky.social)

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Angel Studios https://Angel.com/ToddBecome a Premium Angel Studios Guild member to watch The King of Kings, stream all fan-curated shows and movies, and get 2 free tickets to every Angel Studios theatrical release. Alan's Soaps https://www.AlansArtisanSoaps.comUse coupon code TODD to save an additional 10% off the bundle price.Bioptimizers https://Bioptimizers.com/toddEnter promo code TODD to get 10% off your order of Berberine Breakthrough today.Bizable https://GoBizable.comUntie your business exposure from your personal exposure with BiZABLE.  Schedule your FREE consultation at GoBizAble.com today.  Bonefrog https://BonefrogCoffee.com/toddThe new GOLDEN AGE is here!  Use code TODD at checkout to receive 10% off your first purchase and 15% on subscriptions.Bulwark Capital https://KnowYourRiskPodcast.comBe confident in your portfolio with Bulwark! Schedule your free Know Your Risk Portfolio review. Go to KnowYourRiskPodcast.com today.Renue Healthcare https://Renue.Healthcare/ToddYour journey to a better life starts at Renue Healthcare. Visit https://Renue.Healthcare/ToddLISTEN and SUBSCRIBE at:The Todd Herman Show - Podcast - Apple PodcastsThe Todd Herman Show | Podcast on SpotifyWATCH and SUBSCRIBE at: Todd Herman - The Todd Herman Show - YouTubeDid someone say “No Kings!”? // The Incelling of Fiction. // God Made Brains Changeable.Episode Links:“Do I own three residences? Yes I do.” A beautiful home in Burlington. A place in Washington. And a “summer camp”. “That's it!” -No King SandersHere's Randi Weingarten leading a "No Kings" rally today. Abolish teachers unions.Why is big government trying to shut down #amosmiller, a 5th-generation Amish farmer with zero complaints in 25 years? Big tech and pharma! The Amish way threatens their control. Makes you think, doesn't it?Young Adult authors have been told their audience doesn't read books written in “Third-person, omniscient” perspective. This thread explains why and WHY it's important.Scene from Adolescence Negative thoughts might be changing your brain in surprising ways, study suggestsResearch shows negativity bias correlates with depression, anxiety and memory problemsBen Zeisloft on Twitter - Read the testimony of my friend, Kyle Hacker, as he describes his journey from homosexuality and transgenderism to freedom in Jesus Christ, and most recently to the joys of marriage!Dr. Miriam Grossman: “We are seeing the detransitoners stand up after a few years of so called gender affirming care and saying Why did you let this happen to us? How did you doctors do this to me?”What Does God's Word Say?Philippians 4:8 8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.