Making 200k Per Flip & Lifelong Relationships Per Mastermind w/ Leka Devatha

All right. What's up. How are you?

I'm good, Brian, how are you?

I am fantastic. I wanna start off with the power of network because you and I were just talking off, we're already best friends because oh, . Mr. Gabe Hamel has texted me multiple times about this woman right here. That is on the show today. He has said, you need to stop what you're doing. I need to get her on the show because she's doing massive things. And you guys met at Brandon's Maui mastermind, right?

Yes. We met at the Maui mastermind and I have to just say that Gabe is just one of the most amazing things to happen to me after the mastermind. He is just such a dear friend and I am constantly inspired by that guy.

He's just the nicest guy But anyways, let's start off before we get into the backstory. Talk about the Maui mastermind. Talk about that whole situation with Brandon and going to maybe one of those first ones and walking through the difference between doing this by yourself, to dip in your toe, to masterminds.

Absolutely. So first I've always been a networker from the day that I started investing or the day I started my path to learning about real estate investing. I was. Just inspired to go get mentors, to really go find the people that were actually doing deals. There's people that talk about doing deals all the time, but I was like, who are the action takers? Let me find those people. So right off the bat, I had found a couple action takers in my. My in the greater Seattle market. And I was like, okay, you guys are going to become my best friends and I'm going to shadow you. I'm gonna learn from you. And I'm gonna add as much value to you first so that we can be good friends. So that it's an equal opportunity space for the both of us. It doesn't feel like you are just giving, giving, and I'm taking. You have to feel like being friends with me also works to your advantage. And very early on, I made friends with one of the biggest flippers in my market. Soon, like I, I got to know other people like massive wholesalers deal makers deal bringers. Became friends with them. And then it's a matter of a keeping your friendships, right? Keep being loyal doing what you say you're gonna do. If I say, I'm gonna buy this deal, then I'm closing on that deal doesn't matter. And then C really taking care of your people back, and so my network just continued to grow and. I one of my closest friends in the Seattle market is Tara Aber. And Charles started this mastermind with Brandon Turner and Tara was like, listen, you have to come to this mastermind. It's gonna, you're just gonna meet people that you don't meet in. One city, like this is like a national mastermind. And so I was like, okay, I don't know what I'm signing up for. It is the first time I'm do, I was doing like a outstate mastermind cuz before that it was all local and I went for it and I was like, oh my God, blown away by just the caliber of people. I met Brittany Anisa and Ryan Pinda, AJ Osborne Brian Murray, Ryan Murdoch, Brandon Turner of course. My God, this Charles McKinney, Gabe Hamel, of course, Ashley Kerr. Just the caliber of people, the rock stars, right? These are not just people that talk. These are people that do. And soon what we started to do was collaborate with each other, call each other on our deals like, Hey, can you gimme some creative ways to finance this? Or can you gimme creative ways to structure this? Hey, do you wanna partner on my deals? Let's go big on social media. Let's, educate, let's give back. Let's do cool shit. yeah, basically and that's honestly like how my network has grown. And then after meeting Brandon there, he asked me to come on the bigger podcasts podcast and of course, being on a podcast and having such a public. Forum and public platform really helped scale my business. People then knew who I was. People saw the deals that I did because at the end of the day, for me, it all comes to creating income. If you're not creating income, then everything you do is a moot point. Nobody cares. Nobody cares about how pretty you look on social media. Nobody cares about how good of a connector you are, the end of the day. Are you putting your money where your mouth is? Are you really working on those deals? Are you struggling? Are you having bad days? What is, are you real? Are you authentic? And I think that's what really, those are the people that just rides above the rest. Everyone else just fades away.

Woo. Couple different directions to take you from the opening statement. So first and foremost, let's talk. When you were beginning to network with these rock star wholesalers flippers in your market yeah. In the beginning of your flipping career. So did you even have any really under your belt yet? Or were you just come hell or high water? I'm adding value to you? Yeah,

I was just like, I have nothing under my belt. Zero. I have zero. Like I have zero deals. I don't know what real estate is. I don't know what drywall and Sheetrock are. I don't know anything, but you know what? I'm a good person. What do you need? And I'll make it happen. Oh, yes.

Yeah, that's it. Okay. This is badass. Okay. Let's park here. Let's park. What do you think? So obviously you're wired this way, but this is something that a lot of people are missing. So people even, I do a lot of membership calls for GoBundance even, yeah. And people coming to GoBundance and they don't even know how they can offer value in GoBundance they're already a millionaire. Right. How I see this over and over again. So people will, I'll have guests on the show and you have these like Brittany and Brandon and all these people, and they're doing big stuff. And then the audience will go and say, Hey, I wanna be mentored by you. I want to have a relationship with you. But it's just there's no value exchange right there. How do you generate. Value when you haven't done a flip and when you haven't done a wholesale deal, I know the answer to this, but I'm curious about your perspective here.

Honestly, it was being likable and being fun to hang with. Number one, it's not that difficult. It's not that difficult. It is the easiest thing to do, but be authentic, right? Like you can't be like, oh, I'm gonna make this fun because then in turn, I'm gonna tap into your network or your deal or steal your wholesalers from you. It's not that it's being authentically a good person. Then I think the number one way that you can add value is. Listen to what this person needs. And maybe you don't have the power. If someone needs a deal, someone wants to buy a $10 million apartment building and you don't have any $10 million apartment buildings, brokers, escrow officers, Other people in your community that maybe know how to find a deal. And all I need to do is send out 10 emails or pick up the phone, call a few people like, Hey, what's going on? How can we help my friend out here? And that's initially that's what I started doing. Like I had no business calling around for million dollar deals, but I did that. I was like my friend, Sean. He wants a house to flip and I'm gonna find him something. My friend, John needs an electrician. I'm gonna go find him one and just, I don't know, just adding value that way. It could also be like, Hey, I'm hosting this, meet up. Can you market it? , it's simple things, But like being valuable to the other person extending yourself for them.

What do you think made your request stand out originally? Was there any specific way that you reached out to these people that really stood out? Because I know that is gonna be a issue right now is how do you cut through all the noise? If you are, if somebody's listening to this. So the audience that listens to this are people that do shit. They are action takers, which is why they're listening to a podcast with a dude that talks about action. How do they stand out? If they're reaching out to somebody, maybe they have a deal under their belt, but they wanna get into a commercial real estate deal. And they wanna reach out to that rock star. They wanna get into mobile homes and they wanna reach out to Brian Murray. How do you, what's some advice you can give for them to cut through the noise. Stand out.

So I'll give you an example. And this is not something that I did. This is what something someone did to me. So when I was on the bigger pockets podcast, I my, my episode aired and literally over the next two months, 5,000 people reached out to me. It was crazy. I got emails. I got phone calls. I got text messages. I, people reached out to me on social media. People send me messages everywhere on my LinkedIn, on my Instagram, everywhere they could, they barely could find me. They would reach out to me. It was really cool, but one kid, okay. He was 23 years, 21 years old at the time. And he worked for Facebook. And what he did was he reached out and he said, Hey, I don't want anything from you at this time, but I heard your podcast and I heard your buying criteria. Four deals. So what I did was I built you an app. I built you an app that would scour the internet for deals that match your criteria in the locations that you want. And it'll send you an email directly to you, and then you can open that email. It'll take you right to the Redfin link and check out this property and it'll give you cap rates. It'll give you occupancy rates. It'll give you vacancy rates. Like it'll give you everything. I just built you this app. This is for you. This is free. And I'm like what I'm like. Yeah. That right there is an action taker. And instantly I reached out to him and I was like, let's get coffee today. He is part of my team. He is my underwriter. He is part of my very first apartment syndication. He's on the GP. He and I did a flip last year and I made him 65 grand in three and a half months. It, we crushed it on this flip and it all started from him taking action.

Oh man. That's awesome. Doing what

he knows how to do. He's a software engineer, he's a techie. All he had to do was go build something in his spare time. And he did that. Doesn't take any more

effort than that. Yeah. And what he did, which is for everyone listening to reiterate he first. Interacted with your content. He actually followed you. He watched you, he saw what was working, what wasn't working, wasn't specific, actionable area that he could offer value and that he could help in. And he comes out with a not what's in it for me, but a value first approach. And he says, Hey, I will help you with this specific problem that you're having. And then you just throw it out there and you see. hey, am I gonna get a reply? Because that will get a reply else. Yeah. Oh yeah. Have you did Gabe tell you the story about how I met David Osborne? No. So I was I was the same position as that guy, although I was not working for Facebook. Yeah. But I was like 22, 23 years old. And I heard him on the bigger pockets podcast. I could not figure out how to get in touch with David Osborne. So what I did was I went on his website and I requested to book him for a speaking engagement. Yes. So that's my strategy is I went and I was like, I want you to come speak for 10,000 people in Atlanta, Georgia, but then in the body paragraph, I'll put, Hey, I don't actually have a crowd, but my name is Brian. I've, here's what I've done. I've done this deal. So here, I've got skin in the game. I will do anything you hate doing for free. Yeah. And I will fly out to Austin, Texas tonight. To earn the right to take you to lunch or dinner. I was like, I'll fly out tonight. So let me know. And then what they ended up doing was him and his assistant replied and they said it was a Tuesday. They said, Hey, man, that sounds great. We got this GoBundance event on Thursday in Colorado. It's gonna be $5,000 is a guest fee and we're not gonna cover your room board anything, but if you want to come, we've got you a guest spot. I called out sick from work.

Oh, my God is the best story. I

hopped on a plane. I, I hopped on a plane. I did not have any money. I put $5,000 on the credit card. Then on top of that, I bought the rental car. I bought the airline ticket. I bought the and then at, I showed up. And they didn't think I was gonna come and I showed up. And then as a thank you, as a Hey, okay, you did this. Then I got to go golf with them. They put me in a tee time. Oh my God. Yeah. And every single person told me how dumb of an idea that was. That's why I always asked that question about mastermind because I wasn't ready, yeah. I wasn't, I hadn't done anything. But what I did was I got in a room full of people that were doing. Oh, my

God. I was terrified to go to the mastermind because I was like, I am not nearly as accomplished as most of these people. , I'm not even close. So what am I gonna go and talk about? But then I got there and I was like, oh my God, I am. I'm in the middle of a room of rock stars. And all I can do is learn and grow from this.

Yes. Oh my God. It's so awesome. And then if you're in the right circles, obviously you have this stuffy country club, like old rich white guy club, which they're eh, But if you're in the right circles with good people, like for the most part, a lot of these people that you're talking about are just great freaking human beings and they wanna help people and they wanna help people that are actually gonna do what they say. So they say, Hey, if you go, want to go buy this book, go buy the book. Yeah. And let them know that you bought the book. Show 'em that you took action. I wanted to hit on that first because you've got this confidence and this swagger I could tell that you just had from the beginning. I love it. And that's such an that's such an action item that anybody that listens to the show can take. Let's go back a bit and let's talk about your transition. So we just got through the mastermind and how you went from getting started in your career here. Talk about your. From retail and making you wanna do real estate at all. Cuz you were already successful in the retail space, right? Yeah.

Yeah. I mean I worked at Nordstrom corporate. I was in a brand merchandise strategy and I absolutely love my job. Okay. But the thing that was holding me back from just, saying, okay, this is it. This is what I wanna retire from was the fact that I was working so hard to make someone else rich. And I said, What if I worked just as hard, but I was the only beneficiary. What if I could give back? What if I could build a legacy for my kids, my grandkids, they can talk about the coolest grandmom alive. What if I could do all those things, which I'm not doing right now, I'm not touching anybody's lives. And since the time I was, I think I turned 18 and I was an entrepreneur. I started my first business back home in India and I've always. Had this ability to make money from nothing. And that's been my, one of my I think superpowers is finding ways to make money creatively. And so I started doing that at the age of 18. When I moved here to the us, I didn't have a work permit and I, somehow ended up getting a work permit, getting jobs that I didn't like. Then just making my way up the chain. So finally the job that I had at Nostrom was just like, anybody's dream job. And one day I said what if I quit this and started a company? And I knew that's what I wanted to do. I just didn't know what company. Would it be in retail? Would it be like an online marketplace for some fashion? Cause fashion was all I knew. Sure. And I was like, I don't know. So at the same time, one day I was driving to work and I heard a radio ad for a real estate investing company coming to Seattle. And I was like, what does that even mean? Because still then I thought real estate for women. Being a broker selling homes. I never knew that you could own more than one home, more than your primary residence. I just didn't know that concept was alien to me. And I was like, let me go to this seminar. And I went to it. It was a fortune billion seminar. Literally my mind was blown. And then for the next. Few months. All I did was educate myself, learn, go to meetups, do stuff. Like I started my company. I ended up quitting my W2 and diving into this full time.

So you quit your W2 before you even had your first deal.

Yeah, I quit my W2 cause I realized, what I realized very soon was I, and this is after I started a month or two after I started my company was everyone that I wanted to network with was busy. The same time that. I was free. Like people worked from nine to five, even on their day jobs. And then when I wanted to meet them, they wanted to spend time with their family. And they were just out of commission, like whether it was lenders, whether it was contractors, whether it was escrow officers. So I was like, okay, the only way to do this is if I could meet these people during the day, otherwise that there's no like clear path for me on how I'm gonna even find my first deal or how I'm gonna fix it out. So I said, okay all I can do is burn the boats, leave Nordstrom, leave my w two and dive into this full time. If I failed miserably, then I'd have to come back. And so I said, okay. And I left Nordstrom. It was a saddest day ever. And I went on my journey and then I like literally took everyone to coffee. Everyone took coffee for five minutes, if they could. And we. I basically networked to find my first deal. And then once I had my first deal, which was a complete train wreck, I was hoped, I was like, that was the worst experience I've had, but it is the best. And I've learned so much. And the only way to go from there is to grow and scale.

You may be.

I am insane, and I always say this to

do what . I think we're all

insane. Like you and me and Gabe, and for all of us to do what we do, we have to be a little insane. You cannot be yeah. A straight shooter thinker philosopher to be able to do this. You can't have a fully logical brain. There has to be something off.

Did you have any kind of cash cushion when you left? Which just burned

the boat completely. I literally like, so my husband did have an amazing W2 which I was like, okay, if like worst case scenario, right? Like we're still fine because we have his W2. Yeah. But we took a HeLOCK on our primary and we used those funds to buy the first deal and the, just the down payment for the first deal. Wasn't a lot of money. It wasn't a

lot of money at all. Okay. So this. It's just freaking awesome. Just burn the boats and just go for it. Cool. How many hours a week were you working at your Nordstrom job?

Nordstrom was like a nine to five. Monday to Friday,

Okay. Yeah. So what, when I was working, I was in like in a sales position in corporate. So I was doing like, probably like 50 hours a week. Yeah. And then I went to tech sales and tech sales was like 90 hours a. Yep. But they promised me that I would make a million dollars W2, which I guess is technically possible. But my realization was when I was working 90 hours a week, I said, Hey, if I'm the type of person that is capable and I have the discipline to actually work 90 hours a week, why would I not just work 90 hours a week on my own thing. Exactly. Yeah. And then also you said this point, which is in what I told my girlfriend. I don't know if you have heard my story at all, but we're like literally less than a month away from moving to Greece. We're gonna go travel around the world for a year. Stop it. Yeah. that is so easy. Yeah. I quit my corporate. I just retired from corporate America a month and a half ago and not two months, two months ago. And now we're gonna go travel for a year. So

I love that. Good for you and Brian, tell us how old you are. 27. Yeah. So you, oh my God. I

love it. Yes. So the reason I say that, And for people that follow that are listening to the show, like a lot of them are like, they've heard this from the beginning, cuz it was a running joke. . But you said this one statement and it's literally true. Always. What's the worst thing that could happen if you had left your job and you had gone and just burned the boats and just tried to do this yourself and failed ably you, would've just gone back to doing exactly what you were doing before. That's it? So your worst case scenario is your present day reality. I love that. Yeah.

I love that.

Yeah, absolutely. So you did it and so your endeavor worked, tell the people where you're at today.

All right. So today I have been in the business eight years. It was in April, 2014 that I started my company and I have flipped about 50 or 60. I've lost track of single family homes and they're all full gut remodels and they're not cosmetic updates. I have helped dozens of buyers and sellers sell real estate. So I've sold about 30 million as a broker. In my area, I have a pretty. Nice rental portfolio here in the greater Seattle market and just my rental portfolio, although it doesn't cash flow a lot of money. My network grows incredible, like tremendous amounts every year. I have now moved from just flipping homes to, I have done land subdivisions additions. I bought my first commercial office building. I syndicated my first apartment building and I'm looking for a million other deals and ways to do business. And I, I also host a virtual meetup called real estate at work. Ooh,

I'm so sorry that none of this real estate thing worked out for you I have to go back to Nordstrom. I am so sorry. It's been a fun run.

I know. It would be fun, though. It would be fun to go back and sit and write purchase orders for, special occasion dresses. Not gonna lie. that was a fun job.

oh man. All right. So walk us. Okay. So right now you and I were talking, I don't know if we had it on mic or off mic about where you haven't technically hit financial freedom. Do all of this stuff. So talk about what does financial freedom look like for you? How far off, and, you have a lofty goal, so let's walk through it. What do you, how much further do you have to hit your financial freedom?

I think financial freedom has something to also do with just fire in the gut. There is so much fire left in me that. Yeah, it could be financially free today if I wanted to. Sure. I could just not do another deal and I'll be pretty comfortable. But I think the fire within me says, I have so much more to go. I have such a long distance to go and because I wanna go that distance. My own need for, okay. How much passive income I need to make, how many doors I need to own. That just keeps going up every year. Like before it was, oh, I have 20 doors by the age of 40 and today I have 40 doors and I'm 40. And. Now I wanna say retire by the time I'm 45, but I wanna have like maybe 400 doors. And when I say doors, I don't mean be part of an apartment syndication. Doors that I own not free and clear, but doors that I own personally huge difference, right? Because. Someone could have the same network, but own a thousand doors.

Oh, I own two, 2000 units and they're like a one 22nd partner.

That's not what I mean. Like you have to own these doors. Every decision is yours. You are collecting all that rent money, it's all yours. And your net worth is the one that's growing. So financial freedom for me is a little different. Like I do wanna grow it just, I think it'll stop for me where I say, okay, now I've had enough. I don't wanna do anymore deals. I don't wanna take a step back, but for now I'm just like, will that happen? What that'll happen? Yes. I think at some point. So like you, I'm a big, I dunno, a foodie and travel addict. Sure. I'm actually living for Morocco in a week. Oh, that's gonna be. I know, and then I'm going to Croatia and visa. And so I like to travel a lot. So maybe I just travel one day.

I love hearing everyone in different parts of their wealth building journey because it just, it reinforces the truths that, David like David Osborne has given to me. Yeah. And a lot of my mentors have given to me where they say doesn't stop really. It just really doesn't stop. And then when you take a step back and you really look at what you're trying to accomplish, was it ever really the door count? No. Was it really ever the passive income? No. That's just a scorecard that we use as a means of keeping track of improvement. We just wanna get better. That's what we wanna do.

That's it? It's about what wakes you up that you are so excited for that day? Yes, right? Yes. And for me it's about, yes. I just completed a massive rental on this building. Money has stopped driving me, honestly. Like I was on another podcast with actually the weekly juice,

the weekly, ah, the weekly juice. I was just on that. Ryan with

Ryan and Curry. Yeah. And Corey, I love those guys. Yeah. I was just on

those today. Oh, yesterday.

Oh my God. That's so funny. Yeah. So I was on it a couple weeks ago and literally Ryan and Corey kept asking me about my deals and how much money I made on this project and that project. And then suddenly they stopped and they were like, wow. You know what we is that money doesn't drive you at all? It is that satisfaction that comes from completing a project. Yes. Even better than any amount of money you,

I went so shout out to the weekly juice pod. That's what she's talking about. And it was hilarious because I went on the show and the entire first 40 minutes of the episode, they interviewed me as a guest. All I talked about. Was just like philosophy of money and what life is actually about. And I said, money isn't even real, bro. It's just energy, it's just energy. It doesn't even exist. And then they were like, we were all like whoa. Okay. Hold on a second. Let's not make me look like an idiot here. Okay. I also do deals. I also have money coming in guys. It's okay. It's yeah, exactly. Yeah. It's It's all about what fires you up. And I it's interesting that you say that because for me, I hate that shit. I hate it. Yeah. I don't wanna flip any houses. Yeah. I thought for a long time that yeah, I wanted to do that. I was like, I'm gonna make, I'm gonna flip some houses. Let's do it. And. Guess what I never did because it wasn't my thing. It didn't fire me up. And I thought that was the only way to go about this. Yeah, little did I know that if you keep knocking on different doors, you'll find your.

That's it, you have to find something you're passionate about. Like for me, direct mail campaigns or wholesaling deals or finding off market properties. Those are not my strong suit doing my own marketing. That was not my strong suit. My strong suit was networking with like-minded individuals. My strong suit was running construction projects, interior design. Like these are things that I'm excited about. Coming and, figuring out learning curves, how do, how does one do an apartment's syndication? How does one stabilize an office building? Those are the things that get me. And so I was like, okay, let's focus on what I want to get good at what I have passion for, and then let everyone else do the rest. So I just outsource what I don't wanna do.

What advice can you give to someone that. And there's a lot of people that are maybe so here's a good example, Jay Scott, perfect example. Mm-hmm Because when we're saying these lessons and these principles, they apply to the experienced investor, just as much as they apply to the newbie investor. Jay flipped like 500 plus houses, he didn't like flipping houses. Yeah, he didn't wanna flip houses. He's if I could go back, I would choke myself and say stop flipping houses. cause he's I wanted to, I should have kept him as Reynolds. Yes, for sure. And he's like banging his head against the banging his head against the wall. So now he's super interested in multifamily. Yeah. And that's his thing is like him and Ashley Wilson are now doing the, all the multifamily syndication. Yeah. They've got their fund talk a little bit about maybe some actionable ways people can. Figure out, what is their lane and what to stay away from.

Yeah. So there's active income and there's passive income and you have to figure out for yourself what is it that you are after in five years? Do you still wanna keep making active income or do you wanna just sit back, go to. And then let your rentals take care of you, right? So based on just your life goals, you have to create that path. And that's the beauty of real estate is you create the path you want. There's no roadmap. There's no. Strict guidelines to say, okay, you have to do this first, then do this second, do this third. You can go do anything you want to do, which is so beautiful. And I would say for me, if I were to go back very much like J Scott, and this is what I tell everybody, I'm not stealing Jay's line, but keep everything you buy. That was advice that was given to me in five years ago. And since then, every deal that I buy. I'm like, okay, how do I find ways to keep it? So how do I create find creative ways to keep it? And so I started doing things a little different, like I would subdivide lots, or I would do rooming houses, or I would convert them into assisted living homes. Anything that would help me just hold onto the property. And so I think that is the biggest thing is okay. You can make active income through all of these active deal making, but at the same time, if there's way to create passive income, even as a side hustle, then that's what I would do.

Yeah. I lo I love all of this. You're preaching to the choir. Yeah. Because even for me, I don't have my passive income doesn't really look sexy. Like kinda like three, four grand and passive, like it's all right. Yeah. And then after I'm gonna rent my car out full time on tour when I'm gone, so that's gonna be another grand, so I'll call it five grand. So what that does is it covers the baseline expenses, but I'll tell you what. I'm a freaking active income machine. Super. I love it. Super fun. I don't wanna do any small deals anymore. Yeah. So can you talk about your transition to your commercial building? Because that's super interest.

Yeah. So I have always been interested in scaling. And and here's the thing. I'm a. Big believer of making active income while you can like making hay while the sun shines. Right? So I also still flip homes, but only because we have such a lack of inventory in my market that flipped homes, turnkey homes do so well. And I ended up making a two to 300, a hundred K profit on every deal that I flip. So I'm like, why not continue to what . brian: Yeah. All right. Pause. Yeah. . leka: How. How, because I do super intense rehabs, so they're not easy flips. When I buy them, we go into the full like engineering, structural permitting decks. I'm taking everything down to the stats. I'm converting a three bedroom house into a five bedroom house with three bots, living spaces, decks, outdoor garages. Like I am really changing up my homes. So say I buy a house for six 50 or 700. I end up putting one 50 or 200 K to fix it up. And then we sell it for 1.2 to 1.3 and that's easily a two to 300 K profit. And I've done that repeatedly for the last three years. So I've started to do less and less deals, big active deals, active flips, because they are just more intense, but I also make a lot more money. on these deals. Then if I did 10 and made I dunno, 10 grand on each deal. So I focused on doing three to four flips a year. So that's where my passive income comes from. Oh, active income comes from,

and people don't think big enough because nobody would think that's possible. To just do one deal, one deal a year. But technically like one deal a year, $200,000 is a lot of money.

Is someone's tech salary. It's not like tech basically, right? Yeah. Which is what is amazing. But I ended up making a seven figure income on a flip that I did. And I did that one because I one flip, I, it wasn't technically, wasn't a flip. So I bought a house to flip and I ended up subdividing the. Putting in all the horizontal utilities and it took me four years. So it became a four year process. But at the end of those four years, I ended up selling two lots and one house for a million dollar profit. And I took all that money. Like I literally haven't played with that money at all. I took all that money and I went and I bought my first office building. And the reason I bought an office building is. Again, like for me, Again, I'll go back to saying that there's no set rule in real estate, which is the beauty of it. And I don't play by anyone's rules. And so this is, I could tell. Yeah. And so what I did was I was like, okay, I'm just gonna go after the deal. It doesn't matter if it's office, if it's. Multifamily, if it's assisted living, if it's single family, it doesn't matter, but I'm gonna go after the most lucrative deal. And so I got wind of this building. It's in downtown Seattle, it's in a very nice neighborhood and I was like, I just want this building, cuz there's no way you can find a building like this in that location for that price. So my neighbor is Facebook. So Facebook headquarters in Seattle Facebook's neighbor is apple and then down the street is Amazon. So I have all these companies located next to my building and I'm like, I want this building. So I 10 31, all my money into buying this office building, which I am about a month away from finishing my innovations and we have seven office spots. Two have already been leased out. We're gonna start marketing the hell out of the other five and we're just gonna stabilize it and sit on it because that land is worth so much money.

How did you find that deal?

So that deal was off market. I of course it was yeah. Connections, it's connections. And it's actually one of my closest friends that brought me this deal. I've been buying deals for, from him for, since I started. And I've bought about 30, 40 deals from him so far. And he told me about this building and I literally like. Every day. I hounded him for this building. I took my kids there. I took photos of my kids in front of the building and I was like, look, this is it's meant to be theirs one day. And he was just like, you cannot emotionally blackmail. I was like, no, this building is

my,

I will emotionally blackmail you. I emotionally blackmail. You're gonna get this building from me. So he, a broker reached, had reached out to him, told him about this building. And then once I got wind of it, I basically went hard. I was like, get it on a contract. After I think I heard about the building in February, I didn't have it at a contract till August. They kept changing the price. They kept upping the price on me, went through all that stress. Finally said, you know what? I'm gonna buy it no matter what. And I bought it, I still bought it for a steep discount. It appraised for 2.4 million and I bought it for 1.95

There you go. Like 500, 500. Yeah, swing right

there in the height of a very lucrative market.

Yeah. When things are just bananas right now, bananas. Yeah. Okay. So here's, what's cool about real estate, right? So I was like, I've got a couple houses and now. This is how it works. It's just like Brandon had this analogy that he used before about a plane taken off from a runway or a train that's starting to get momentum. There's so much work. And it feels like not much is happening in the beginning, but then all of a sudden you've got all this momentum and then you can take off the runway or the train is like starting to go. And then once it's going, it's very difficult to stop. Yeah. Because it's just off to the race. Yeah. So what I'm gonna do is my goal is to save up like right now I've got probably 40, 50,000 in cash. I wanna save it up to a hundred, 200,000 in cash. want to take a line of credit. On both of my properties. I wanna take a home equity line of credit on my primary pull, like a hundred grand out of there. I wanna take a line of credit on my rentals, pull yeah. Pull money out there, pull it all together and just go in with a partner and just be like, all right. Here's three, $400,000, this partner on this, and this takes down something sexy. Yeah. And did exactly what you just did.

Yeah, exactly. That's it.

And then that's how real

estate works and that's how it works because once stabilize, my building's gonna be worth twice as much.

And then you're gonna be able to pull lines of credit off your building. Yeah, exactly. Just for instance, repeat with that money, that's it? Oh my God. Yeah. So where do you see? So on that note, what's your three year, five year vision. Where do you see, where do you wanna take all of.

I wanna really start growing my apartment's indication business because that's one where I feel like scale is so important. And now that I have all this experience doing one small apartment building I'm in LP on a hun on a $30 million building. I'm like, okay, now I gotta go buy that $10 million billing and that $30 million billing. And I wanna play in my area in Seattle because I know the market, I have a good network. I'm like, this is where it's at for me. And so I think just growing that, doing larger and larger and more massive deals, I think that's the next goal is over the next three to five years is really honing in. No, one's really buying a lot of multifamily in Seattle. So what if that becomes my niche?

Everyone's buying multifamily in Atlanta.

yeah. And Houston and something. There's a special way to do Seattle multifamily and that is buying properties that are severely distressed and doing a deep value add on it. A very high CapEx.

I love it. Oh my God. Yeah. And see, you would know that cuz that's your competitive advantage, like play to your strength, play to your advantage. Yeah. I don't know. At what point in school did we get the, like they said, oh yeah. Work on your weaknesses to to become a successful. That's not true. Yeah. It's not true. Just focus. What are you really freaking good at? And then exactly week at find somebody else to do that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I'm a visionary. I'm not an integrator, so yeah, like I don't need a partner. That's a talker. I do it enough. I know. I just need someone. That's just I just need like a rain man. That's just oh, I can like, look at all these numbers and now I've got a bunch, and that's the cool part. Because then you get, so you take the action breeds confidence. Yeah. Confidence, breeds, clarity. So it's just Just build award chef figure out. What do you wanna bring to the dealer? Do you wanna bring capital? Do you wanna bring hustle or do you wanna bring connection? And then you just figure out which part you wanna bring. I wanna bring the capital and then you just have a whole roster of people to pick from, and you say, okay, who wants? Who's the specialist in what area? And yeah. Who wants to do this? Who wants to do this? That's it that's and that's real estate and that's connection. So on the point of connection, where can people connect with you?

I love that podcast. On LinkedIn. I'm very active on LinkedIn and on Instagram.

Okay. And what's your

Instagram handle? Le David for both. For LinkedIn and

Instagram. Okay, perfect. Any websites you wanna direct anyone to, or just get with you on LinkedIn and Instagram? Yeah. My

website is rehab homes.com that's R E H a B I T. homes.com. Feel free to connect with me over there. Come to my virtual meetups. I have some cool guests coming up and yeah, that's it. I'm and

then when then whenever you're in Seattle drive by the Facebook headquarters and put your kids in front of lakes, building send a picture.

I am still not bring it up.

all right. This has been freaking awesome. I had no doubts. Thank you, Gabe. . Thank you, Gabe. We know that you're listening by the way, Gabe, if you haven't left us a review by this point Leave one, dude. Come on. but this has been Laker and Brian with the action academy podcast signing off.