Former basketball player turned real estate investor, Wyatt Simon, delves into his journey from leveraging a line of credit to build his portfolio using the BRRRR strategy to navigating the multifamily market's challenges and returning to single-family investments. He shares insights into creating multiple revenue streams from single deals through vertical integration and highlights his philosophy on property management and coaching aspiring investors.
This episode is packed with practical advice and inspiring stories that will motivate anyone looking to scale their real estate endeavors - don’t miss out on the valuable lessons Wyatt has to share!
Key takeaways to listen to:
About Wyatt Simon
Washed-up basketball player turned investor, Wyatt Simon, owns and operates a $20M+ vertically integrated real estate portfolio and has mastered the BRRRR strategy. Wyatt helps students take control of their financial future by utilizing real estate. He is a member of Citylight Church, and the author of "Your First 100 Doors: A Real Estate Investor's Guide to Scaling a Rental Portfolio."
He is an industry expert in multifamily real estate and Co-founded Full Circle Real Estate, a real estate acquisitions company. In 4 years of focused investing Wyatt became financially free at the age of 27. Featured in the Jake and Gino movers and Shakers podcast, The Healthy Investor Podcast,and Success Science, Wyatt has helped investors internationally accelerate to their goals through real estate.
He specializes in market research, due-diligence, strategic planning, project development and execution. Wyatt has surrounded himself with coaches and mentors to help him get to the next level. This includes Jake Stenziano and Gino Barbaro who have over 1,500 apartment units, who also aid as his mentors and advisors.
Resources Mentioned:
Connect with Wyatt Simon:
To connect with Randal and learn more about passive investing, visit www.ridgelineig.com and follow our social media pages below!
Former basketball player turned real estate investor, Wyatt Simon, delves into his journey from leveraging a line of credit to build his portfolio using the BRRRR strategy to navigating the multifamily market's challenges and returning to single-family investments. He shares insights into creating multiple revenue streams from single deals through vertical integration and highlights his philosophy on property management and coaching aspiring investors.
This episode is packed with practical advice and inspiring stories that will motivate anyone looking to scale their real estate endeavors - don’t miss out on the valuable lessons Wyatt has to share!
Key takeaways to listen to:
About Wyatt Simon
Washed-up basketball player turned investor, Wyatt Simon, owns and operates a $20M+ vertically integrated real estate portfolio and has mastered the BRRRR strategy. Wyatt helps students take control of their financial future by utilizing real estate. He is a member of Citylight Church, and the author of "Your First 100 Doors: A Real Estate Investor's Guide to Scaling a Rental Portfolio."
He is an industry expert in multifamily real estate and Co-founded Full Circle Real Estate, a real estate acquisitions company. In 4 years of focused investing Wyatt became financially free at the age of 27. Featured in the Jake and Gino movers and Shakers podcast, The Healthy Investor Podcast,and Success Science, Wyatt has helped investors internationally accelerate to their goals through real estate.
He specializes in market research, due-diligence, strategic planning, project development and execution. Wyatt has surrounded himself with coaches and mentors to help him get to the next level. This includes Jake Stenziano and Gino Barbaro who have over 1,500 apartment units, who also aid as his mentors and advisors.
Resources Mentioned:
Connect with Wyatt Simon:
To connect with Randal and learn more about passive investing, visit www.ridgelineig.com and follow our social media pages below!
[00:00:00] Wyatt Simon: I built my entire portfolio in my twenties using the BRRRR strategy with a line of credit. Like I just recycled the line of credit. Didn't even have cash. I just recycled the line of credit. So it's that's. That's what I love helping people do. So you don't have to wait every two years to buy one.
[00:00:14] Wyatt Simon: You can buy six in a year or 20 in a year and just keep recycling.
[00:00:19] Intro: If you're a real estate agent earning 200, 000 a year, and you want to grow your passive income, this show is for you learn secrets, other agents use, and hear from experts in our field who will guide you on your journey to investing in assets like apartment communities, so you can take your commissions and turn them into cashflow.
[00:00:39] Intro: Here's your host. Randall, let's dive
[00:00:41] Randal McLeaird: in. Hey, welcome back. It is great to have you again today. My guest is Wyatt Simon. Guy's a beast. Like I really enjoy the conversation because we talk about his ramp up and single family getting into multifamily, getting back into single family. So it rings true to me because that's something that's been happening on our front as well.
[00:00:58] Randal McLeaird: Just due to the headwinds that are [00:01:00] currently facing the multifamily market. Not saying it's a bad investment or it's not a long term play, but currently right now, it's very challenging to buy multifamily. So it's refreshing to speak to somebody who has gone through the process of building up a single family portfolio, buying some multifamily deals, and then seeing how long the payout is on those deals and moving back into the single family deal atmosphere.
[00:01:20] Randal McLeaird: So why it's in the Omaha, Nebraska market, really interesting to see what he is currently working on and the way he is. Taking a single deal. We talk about this at length and trying to squeeze as much profit out of that single deal as he possibly can. The way he's doing that is through partnering with the title company, creating a hard money lending company and having a property management company, getting his real estate license, all these things so that every single deal that he gets into his pipeline, he's able to take to one of his.
[00:01:47] Randal McLeaird: Buyers and nurture that buyer all the way through the closing process from the acquisition of his wholesale to them all the way through to his listing their property and selling it for them on the MLS once they've finished their rehab. So if you're looking [00:02:00] for that type of strategy, it is a great episode.
[00:02:02] Randal McLeaird: You're going to get a lot out of it. Wherever you're listening to this, please go on rate and review helps us out a ton to bring on awesome guests, just like Wyatt. All right, let's jump into the conversation. Here we go.
[00:02:10] Wyatt Simon: I'm an investor and I just got my license like two weeks ago. Might as well get it.
[00:02:15] Wyatt Simon: There are so many advantages that come from having it. So I am a recently licensed realtor, but really I moved away from multifamily. Like I own 178 units, 150 of those, or I don't know. I own 48 houses, but we do mostly houses. And that's my primary acquisition strategy is off market houses, wholesale fix and flip BRRRR.
[00:02:34] Wyatt Simon: And BRRRR is my. That's what I've built everything around. So
[00:02:38] Randal McLeaird: my man, I'm like, okay, you went from single family to multifamily back to single family. Let's start right there. Honestly, I just tell me why, how did this happen? Because I know. For myself, why it happened, but go ahead. Do you tell me, cause I'm just curious.
[00:02:53] Wyatt Simon: Yeah. So for multifamily, it was great in 2021 and then 2022, it was pretty good. And then [00:03:00] 2021, we took property management in house. And I say, we, I started a management company, which was. Holy smokes over my head, but I had to learn a lot of skills and eventually I hired a consultant. And that was the last time I ever said, I'm not going to do things without a consultant.
[00:03:12] Wyatt Simon: That was really shifted my trajectory. But there's not a lot of money in property management. And I also left my W2 in 2021 to start a management company thinking I was financially free. And long story short, like when you're raising capital for multifamily, when you're doing all that stuff, like it sounds sexy, it sounds cool.
[00:03:29] Wyatt Simon: You got these big numbers, like you're in charge. They can be even be great deals. Like I haven't done a bad deal yet, but like you don't get paid until the exit. You get paid a little bit until the exit. And it's I don't know about you, but I'm a long term buy and hold. So it's man, it sounds cool, but you got to have something that's going to really generate cash in the meantime.
[00:03:49] Wyatt Simon: Yeah. Cause the cashflow is such a minor piece of real estate. There's really the equity, the appreciation of the tax benefits. Those are the big three, in my opinion.
[00:03:57] Randal McLeaird: Okay. So very similar story. I'd flipped [00:04:00] houses and been doing things for a long time. And then in 2020, I was like, all right, let's look at apartments.
[00:04:04] Randal McLeaird: And I started digging into it, but I really took a year to learn about funds and syndications and strategies along those fronts. I wasn't like actively going out trying to raise capital or do anything. And then when I got to the point where I was like, okay, Jake or Gina or local guys and pulled the trigger on one.
[00:04:19] Randal McLeaird: No one's Hey, at that time, it wasn't a bad time, right? It wasn't a bad time to get into multifamily, but the underwriting still, if you look back on it now and you look at we're going to underwrite 12%, maybe 15 percent annual rent growth. That's insane. It's not normal. And we're going to exit at a five or six cap.
[00:04:34] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. And now look at what rates are. Yeah, exactly. So I looked at it and I said the same thing. I was like, all right, so I'm going back. I'm going to do a ton of houses and just. Start building a pipeline again, just on that front and start looking for other assets as well. So I'm curious, have you looked at other assets other than multifamily now that you have dipped your toe in the water of buying some of those?
[00:04:54] Wyatt Simon: Yes and no. So I own one commercial building, which I haven't looked into massively. It was [00:05:00] just a deal that dropped in our lap. That was a home run and it was like, why not? So we did that all from our drop off market stuff. And then I did a 44 unit storage facility that again was like a home run, but we eventually just exited it because it was such a for me, storage was not a pleasant experience because 44 units is just not worth it.
[00:05:19] Wyatt Simon: There's so many systems that you have to do and it's not like property management where you could just click a button and post to 36 websites and get leads. Like you really have to market radio, like signs, like you have to find and market a lot more than property management. For me, storage is worth it if you're on like 200 plus, but we happily exited storage when, cause I'm literally chasing people for 60 and a hundred dollar rents and our late fees are more than that.
[00:05:43] Wyatt Simon: It's this is just not worth it. So I also do coach, like one of the things I love doing is helping people build rental portfolios, mostly single family, And it's just like a lot of people come to me because they're like, how do I build the portfolio without putting 20 percent down every time?
[00:05:56] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:05:56] Wyatt Simon: And a lot of real estate agents that I work with have that question. And it's dude, I built my [00:06:00] entire portfolio in my twenties using the burst strategy with the line of credit. Yeah. Like I just recycled the line of credit. Didn't even have cash. I just recycled the line of credit. So it's that's what I love helping people do.
[00:06:10] Wyatt Simon: So you don't have to wait every two years to buy one. You can buy six in a year or 20 in a year and just keep recycling.
[00:06:17] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So how big was that line of credit? Just real quick. It was a 200 K line of credit that I
[00:06:23] Wyatt Simon: just
[00:06:23] Randal McLeaird: kept recycling. So you could you buy two at one time?
[00:06:26] Wyatt Simon: At first I thought one, and then eventually I was able to, okay, I can use that as a down payment.
[00:06:30] Wyatt Simon: So now I was able to buy four.
[00:06:31] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:06:31] Randal McLeaird: And then got it. Solid. Yeah, because to buy 20 in a year, you've got to be really turning capital and that 200, 000 has to be at work. So yeah, that's interesting. All right, let's go back then. Let's build the story from the beginning, right? You're working W2 job and at the same time you start buying all these houses.
[00:06:46] Randal McLeaird: Okay. So walk through, I know that your dad was, what, investing in stocks and you guys had some hardship in like 2002, 2008. How did that play into your One, go and get a secure job. Did that play anything into [00:07:00] that? And then investing in real estate, how did that come about from seeing that backstory?
[00:07:04] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. You've done your
[00:07:05] Wyatt Simon: research. I'm impressed. But yeah, so my parents, my dad worked hard and he got burned in 2000. And then in 2008, he lost 50 to 60 percent of his portfolio twice because he sold at the bottom. And I also popped out when my mom was 41. So they were like ready for retirement. And then I was the whoopsie right.
[00:07:20] Wyatt Simon: Or the surprise. And they weren't able to retire until recently. So that was like, not a fun experience to live through. So I knew that there had to be something that was like some kind of good investment. Cause my parents worked hard. They live below their means, but couldn't retire. It's what the heck?
[00:07:34] Wyatt Simon: And so eventually I found out real estate through rich dad, poor dad, I was like, these assets can generate money while you sleep. So you don't have to work. It's why did my parents work all of their life then? And so eventually found real estate. And then eventually I was like, okay how do I buy these assets to generate cashflow for me when I don't have any money?
[00:07:50] Wyatt Simon: And so I found out about this birth strategy thing, and then I was like, oh my God, that's my ticket. And so now I just had to find out, okay, how do I do this initial purchase? And that [00:08:00] was when I didn't have any money. I was 22 at the time, but I went to my parents and I said, Hey, I know you guys don't have any money either, but you have your house paid off in cash.
[00:08:08] Wyatt Simon: Could I take a line of credit on your house and do this birth strategy thing? And they said, absolutely not. I was going to say,
[00:08:15] Randal McLeaird: that's nuts. Yeah, no, they
[00:08:17] Wyatt Simon: said, no, it took me nine months of going to meetups and educating myself and showing them that Hey, this thing is working. And simultaneously I had a job and I bought a duplex with my own funds.
[00:08:28] Wyatt Simon: And so I was able to start house hacking and really kept showing them how all these others, investors were doing it. And eventually they took a flyer and they said, okay, we'll try it one time. And it was on that house that it was my 46th offer on market to find. And then after I finally got it and closed on it, it took me six months.
[00:08:45] Wyatt Simon: I rehabbed it myself with a buddy and guys, I'm not handy like at all, but one of my buddies was, and so I said, Hey, I'll pay you 25 bucks an hour. Like I'll buy a new tool set and I'll work for you for free. Like you just told me what to do and we'll do this thing. So for six [00:09:00] months after work, we worked on the house and I threw my back out on it, like all the things happened, but I learned, and then at the end of it, it appraised out I had to pay 2, 000 to buy that house.
[00:09:10] Wyatt Simon: So I didn't BRRRR out all the way, but I burned out everything except two grand. So I paid my parents back everything that they had, plus they got 50 percent equity, plus they got 9 percent interest on their money. And they were happy, and then I was happy I got the house, and we were off to the races, proof of concept.
[00:09:27] Randal McLeaird: Yeah, that's awesome, man. So many little stories in there, I'm sure. It's just yeah, that first deal, having buddies go out and rehab it with you. Do you still own that property? I do. I
[00:09:36] Wyatt Simon: just posted about it today. It just came up. It was like, seven years ago to the day.
[00:09:40] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Right on. Congrats, man.
[00:09:42] Randal McLeaird: That's awesome. And so you took that first one, took you six months, start to finish. So you were, moved in or had it repaid. And then from there, how long did it take you to actually go and like ramp up and do your, okay, I can do this like four at a time, right? Yeah. I
[00:09:56] Wyatt Simon: want to say right after, but it would be a lie.
[00:09:59] Wyatt Simon: I keep in mind, [00:10:00] I was like 22, maybe 23 by the time I got done with it and with no coaching and no experience. And so my next property, which it would have been my third property, cause I got the duplex and then I got this one, my third property, which was the second flip I ever did was the purple pallets, and this is god, I hate this house, but it's, it was all purple on the outside. I got it from a wholesaler. And so then I go in to do the rehab. I'm like knocking down the plaster and laugh on the inside. When the city inspector comes in and says where's your permit for this? And I was like, what's a permit?
[00:10:31] Wyatt Simon: And then he continued to educate me on what a permit was as well as what a red tag is. So I got to pay four X for permits for that property. And then it was a blessing in disguise, but I had to go find licensed contractors to do the work. And that took me 11 months to do that rehab. Cause I didn't have the skillset of hiring and I didn't know who to hire.
[00:10:51] Wyatt Simon: And so I had to go through and recycle a few of them and then get them working with the city. And that rehab went from 20, 000 to 60, 000. And then [00:11:00] finally the tenant moves in and I get a call saying, Hey, Wyatt smells like piss and shit downstairs. Like it smells bad. And so I go to check it out. And there is.
[00:11:08] Wyatt Simon: It's some shit downstairs yeah, the sewer was Orangeburg pipe built in World War one. And basically Orangeburg pipe is paper mache. So the entire sewer line from the house to the street had to be redone and it didn't stop there. It had to go into the street. So we actually had to physically take out the street and repave the asphalt on it.
[00:11:26] Wyatt Simon: So that was another 14. 6, 000 after they moved in. So that was my learning lesson. I spent about, yeah, 56, 400 more than I thought I was going to spend on that property. Thankfully, the market went up while that was happening and I bought it pretty right. And so I was able to BRRRR out most of it, but that was a very painful 11 month long stressful experience to break me in.
[00:11:52] Randal McLeaird: Yeah, man. Yeah. That sounds like a long learning experience on that. Good for you for sticking with it after that. Seriously. Cause it's a, [00:12:00] that would have turned many people off of investing in general in single family real estate. I think so. How did you. Mentally come back from that. You're like, Oh I got my money back.
[00:12:09] Randal McLeaird: So I guess that was the wind. So how did you come back?
[00:12:11] Wyatt Simon: Yeah, thanks, man. I don't know. I guess I just think that, the winners just keep learning and don't give up. You succeed as long as you keep going. And so at that point, it'd be so silly to quit because you already got the learning curve in, like you paid the learning tax.
[00:12:24] Wyatt Simon: Why quit now?
[00:12:25] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:12:25] Wyatt Simon: So at that point, then things started to work well, where I started to buy. Two at a time and do two BRRRRs, and then things started to ramp. Ruth, that was going well. And the, really the bottleneck that I ran into was how do I find good deals? Cause these wholesaler deals, they were making their margin.
[00:12:40] Wyatt Simon: I was like, I can't really find these great deals anymore. Cause I still got a BRRRR out most, if not all my money. And that was when I set up a direct to seller system with a business partner and that full circle real estate. That's what we do now.
[00:12:51] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:12:51] Wyatt Simon: And that was when we were able to buy 20 plus houses a year.
[00:12:54] Wyatt Simon: And yeah, this year we were on track for more than
[00:12:57] Randal McLeaird: that. Yeah. Solid. Okay. So you ramped [00:13:00] up and before you got into multifamily, how many did you have and where were you on everything? I probably owned. 18 to
[00:13:06] Wyatt Simon: 20 houses at that point, but we were probably buying four to five a month and then wholesaling or flipping a few of them because we had to pay for marketing.
[00:13:15] Wyatt Simon: So we were figuring out, two or three and then flipping the others.
[00:13:18] Randal McLeaird: Yeah, it's
[00:13:18] Wyatt Simon: crazy. So do you still do direct to seller? Yes, we restarted at the beginning of 2024.
[00:13:25] Randal McLeaird: Okay. Yeah. I was going to ask because that obviously I was talking to somebody earlier today and it was the same thing. It's like super expensive.
[00:13:31] Randal McLeaird: The way they do it is all cold call and texting now. And so his cost to do, I think it was like 15 deals wholesale per month. Plus he's buying about 10, he has 10 rehabs going at the same time. Man, that's crazy. What are you spending on your marketing? Cause for us to do that, it was costing us 50, 60, 000 a month in marketing.
[00:13:48] Randal McLeaird: And he's 10 grand. Anyway, so I was curious if you had ramped that back up or if you were going to, because when you take that cost into account, like you could pay the wholesaler their fee essentially. So [00:14:00] you know do you enjoy the marketing side of it? Do you enjoy the direct to seller and the negotiation?
[00:14:04] Randal McLeaird: Because it's really like another business on top of a business. And I
[00:14:07] Wyatt Simon: think obviously a lot of your audience is real estate agents. So I think everyone has their unique ability. And so for me, I love the negotiating. I love the appointments. Like sales to me is like what amps me up. And so for a long time, I was chasing like this fancy, like I'm going to live off a cashflow and I'm going to sit on a beach and I'm going to do nothing.
[00:14:24] Wyatt Simon: And then after going through this multifamily journey and I still own 48 houses, like cashflow is not terrible, but it's not like amazing. If you use the burst strategy and leverage everything. And so it's I love this. I'm going to continue to do this. And that's my unique ability is. Do that.
[00:14:40] Wyatt Simon: And so if you're a real estate agent and your unique ability is doing real estate agent sales, then do that and pay the wholesaler because to your point, it is work. It's a lot of work. And we do spend a lot of money in marketing, but we have generally a three to five X on what we spend.
[00:14:54] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:14:54] Wyatt Simon: So what about, are you spending on marketing?
[00:14:56] Wyatt Simon: We were spending about 5, 000 a month and we're ramping up [00:15:00] to 14. 5k right now. Yeah. Yeah. And the main driver,
[00:15:03] Randal McLeaird: is there one you're like, this is our bread and butter? I would say postcards is our bread and butter. Yeah. That's it worked in San Antonio. We tried doing all kinds of different things, but that was like the number one.
[00:15:12] Randal McLeaird: We tried PPC and some other stuff, but for whatever reason in our market, that's what it was. Have you ever tried the texting and the cold calling and all that business? Or is that?
[00:15:20] Wyatt Simon: We hired a marketing agency that was doing that for us and it was working, but it wasn't as good as driving for dollars is what we were doing.
[00:15:28] Wyatt Simon: And so at this point now we're doing everything except cold calling and texting or adding PPC. And then we've got SEO that's going pretty well. So we're starting to rank up and get free leads, which is pretty cool.
[00:15:38] Randal McLeaird: Yeah,
[00:15:39] Wyatt Simon: that's
[00:15:39] Randal McLeaird: the way to do it. Okay. You built up, you got 20 houses or so you guys are you're working on it.
[00:15:43] Randal McLeaird: And then you decide shiny object, multifamily is that what happened? Tell me how that thought process goes.
[00:15:49] Wyatt Simon: Yeah, I think everyone inherently wants to get to multifamily. Like everyone's like scalability. It's awesome. It's cooler to brag about all the things, but, and my first deal was, [00:16:00] it was an off market through a family member.
[00:16:02] Wyatt Simon: We bought a 23 unit seller financed, amazing first deal could not have been better. People hear that and they're like, oh man, I also have a story of like how I lost a million dollars on a 48 unit that came my way that I didn't know how to underwrite. And then he wanted to sell it to me for 2.
[00:16:19] Wyatt Simon: 4 and it sold for 3. 4. So I was like, okay, I'll never miss out on that opportunity again. And then this opportunity came. So for everyone out there, I did miss out on a big one.
[00:16:29] Randal McLeaird: I was going to say, yeah, I know you, you said you had a deal and you just didn't know how to underwrite it. Is that 4 or something that, yeah,
[00:16:36] Wyatt Simon: it was on that deal.
[00:16:37] Wyatt Simon: Like I'll give a bridged full story, but essentially I was working on for a foundation company. We got a lead, I go out there to do a waterproofing estimate. I meet with some guy that's cussing and smoking. Like I think it's the maintenance tech. Eventually he signs the contract to do the work.
[00:16:50] Wyatt Simon: And I realized that he's the owner. And I'm like, do you want to do this? Cause he's hates it. Like tenants are approaching him and he's just like cussing at him. I'm just like, okay. And he [00:17:00] hates it. And so he was a motivated seller and he's yeah, no, I inherited this property. I've been doing the maintenance for 30 years.
[00:17:05] Wyatt Simon: I just don't want to be here. And I was like, okay, I'd be interested. And this was while I was doing the purple palace. So this was like early on in my journey and I had no idea how to underwrite. And eventually, he ended up calling me a week later Hey, are you going to do this or not?
[00:17:19] Wyatt Simon: And eventually I was like, Hey, I'm probably not the guy for you. I don't know what to do here. Yeah. And that property sold not six months after for 3.
[00:17:27] Randal McLeaird: 4. Yeah, that's crazy. Okay. So that was the kick in the butt you needed to go and learn about multifamily essentially in that you're like, wow, those numbers look great.
[00:17:37] Randal McLeaird: I'm going to do this.
[00:17:38] Wyatt Simon: Yep.
[00:17:38] Randal McLeaird: Okay. And.
[00:17:39] Wyatt Simon: So then I got into it, did a 23 unit with a partner. It went well. We then partnered on another one, a 12 unit, and it went well, or sorry, a nine unit. And that one went well. And so then we bought a 12 unit. And that one we probably overpaid for. Cause again, I didn't have coaching for it.
[00:17:52] Wyatt Simon: I was just I was partnering with somebody with an experience in my market. And so they were helping, but they weren't helping that much. We'll just say that. [00:18:00] And so eventually that led me to getting coaching on multifamily and then chasing that shiny object for a while until 2023 things dried up.
[00:18:08] Wyatt Simon: And it was like, I felt like I was beating my head against a wall, running these numbers and not getting anything
[00:18:13] Randal McLeaird: accepted. Yeah. Yeah. Very similar boat, man. So on the ones that you bought, the ones that you actually did close on, are those still in your portfolio? Or did you sell those things off? So you're long term on those.
[00:18:23] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Yep. Long term. Did you syndicate? Did you just traditional finance those with your own money? What'd you end
[00:18:29] Wyatt Simon: up doing with those things? So the first 56 units that I bought with my own money, it was just me and a buddy. And so we went 50, 50 and we still own it. We're long term buy and hold.
[00:18:38] Wyatt Simon: And honestly, for everyone listening, that is the best way to do it in my opinion. But then if you have experience, if someone has experience, if you don't have experience, then you probably shouldn't be getting into it. But anyway, so that was my first one. And eventually we ran out of cash as people do.
[00:18:52] Wyatt Simon: And so then we had another deal come up and we started syndicating. And so I've syndicated two deals and those are going well. But Yeah, they don't [00:19:00] pay out until the end. So
[00:19:01] Randal McLeaird: yeah, that's what I want to clarify. So the best way to do it was it couldn't tell if you were saying 50, 50 with somebody else, or if you meant just buying it with your own money, rather than bringing on investors to do the deal.
[00:19:11] Randal McLeaird: So you mean it's easier doing it with your own money.
[00:19:14] Wyatt Simon: If you can do it without a bunch of people involved, it's usually better in my opinion.
[00:19:19] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So if you're listening and you want to be a limited partner, any deal, maybe give some explanation from an operator's point of view as to why that is the case.
[00:19:29] Randal McLeaird: Because it's hard being operators, hard, like running these projects is hard raising capital is hard, but it's just a lot.
[00:19:35] Wyatt Simon: And I would say most of our limited partners have been great to work with, but, if it's your like last 50, 000, you probably shouldn't put it into a syndication. Like it's important for the operators to screen who they're raising capital with. So that way the entire group is on board with the vision and it doesn't have any, mix ups or friction on it. Yeah.
[00:19:52] Randal McLeaird: Yeah, I agree. Yeah. So it's also if you look at the numbers from a syndicator's point of view.
[00:19:58] Randal McLeaird: And I had [00:20:00] another guest on and he was talking about this. He was like, if you buy one single family house with your own money, you're going to be probably, that's going to impact you more financially than if you are 0. 001 percent owner of some like 6, 000 unit project.
[00:20:12] Wyatt Simon: I was like, yes, that's true. Just to touch on that subject.
[00:20:15] Wyatt Simon: You really got to do an audit of where you want to be with your investment portfolio with your time. If you don't have time and you're crushing your real estate business, then invest in syndications all day long. Just vet the operator, make sure they're good and they know what they're doing.
[00:20:29] Wyatt Simon: If you have time and you want to take control, then that's when you can start to implement like your own stuff and build your own portfolio, but no, it's going to take time. And sometimes it's, you got to do an inventory of yourself and see where's your time best spent.
[00:20:42] Randal McLeaird: Yeah, for sure.
[00:20:43] Randal McLeaird: Having started. A property management company. How are you feeling about that now? Because again, it was something that we were looking at doing me and the wife, and I was going to have her come in and do some of the things. And we were just going to have all the units that we have in house. And I asked a number of people, I was [00:21:00] like, is it worth it?
[00:21:00] Randal McLeaird: So having done it, how do you feel about it? And are you getting. Enough benefit from having the control over it to offset the time and energy that goes into it. So
[00:21:11] Wyatt Simon: I'm happy that I did it looking at it in the, 30 year period. Yeah. So if I look at it just in my emotional, like my last three year period where I had to do all of the setup and all of the hiring and firing and the.
[00:21:25] Wyatt Simon: Everything like that was tough, especially because I went from making a lot of good money in my job to running a company that I worked more and got paid way less, so it was like tough for the short term, probably not worth it for a lot of people, but I know that I'm entering my thirties here and I'm going to be owning real estate for another, 50 years or so, hopefully.
[00:21:45] Wyatt Simon: And so at the end of the day, now we've got like one of the best, if not the best property management companies in Omaha, and we're running it super efficiently without much of my time involved. And thanks to my incredible team. So worth it. In the long run. That's awesome. [00:22:00]
[00:22:00] Randal McLeaird: So is the management team focused on small multis and single family or single family?
[00:22:05] Randal McLeaird: Or what are you guys focused on?
[00:22:06] Wyatt Simon: Single family and multifamily, smaller multifamily. Our biggest complex is 54 units.
[00:22:11] Randal McLeaird: Okay. Yeah. There is a. Curious how you find this because there's a, like a gap in the market, anything sub like 80 units, it seems like there's not really a good property management style or structure.
[00:22:24] Randal McLeaird: And I don't know if you found that when you were looking for third party or if you even looked for third party for the smaller units.
[00:22:29] Wyatt Simon: Yeah, I did.
[00:22:30] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. And obviously bringing it in house is helpful for all the 48 doors that you have that are just standalone, single families. But what have you done that's allowed you to capture that 50 and under market as well.
[00:22:42] Randal McLeaird: What kind of systems do you have to put into it? What kind of tech do you have? What are you
[00:22:44] Wyatt Simon: doing? So we use AppFolio for our CRM. And then we've modeled a lot of our stuff off of Jake and Gino. So their move in process, like we do a 495 move in fee and then an assurant bond instead of a security deposit.
[00:22:58] Wyatt Simon: So that's huge because it goes to our [00:23:00] bottom line, but I don't know, just overall systems rip off and duplicate as much as I could. Yeah. Unfortunately, some of the coaching programs out there, like I couldn't rip off and duplicate as much as I thought I could. And so eventually we hired a consultant that really helped set things up from the get go.
[00:23:15] Wyatt Simon: Somebody local to you or somebody that like Jake and Gina told you about? It was something through Jake and Gina. I'll give her a shout out. Monica Windham from Ram Consulting was freaking awesome. So she had done 3000 plus units for over a decade. And Yeah. So she's really good about helping property management companies vertically integrate.
[00:23:32] Wyatt Simon: Okay.
[00:23:33] Randal McLeaird: Yeah.
[00:23:33] Wyatt Simon: We'll
[00:23:33] Randal McLeaird: put a link to her in the show notes. Anybody's looking for it. Anything that you're working on right now, like what's the most interesting thing you're working on right now?
[00:23:40] Wyatt Simon: So right now, since we're getting volume, so we're closing about a deal a week right now for single family off market.
[00:23:46] Wyatt Simon: And it's really awesome because we're like, we're providing opportunities for other investors. We're wholesaling whole tailing properties. And on that front, now we're getting ownership of a title company. We've set up a hard money line. And so we're really [00:24:00] taking a vertical where we have one transaction that, is netting us X amount of dollars.
[00:24:04] Wyatt Simon: And we've doubled, if not tripled that transaction by being able to find it, wholesale it, Own title company, hard money finance it. I have my real estate license. I can list it on the backend if someone's looking to flip it. And so these are all ways that we can take one transaction and just for exit. And I do coaching so I can help my students provide them deals and then help them with all the other pieces, which is, it's awesome because we get off market deals and so everyone's like, how are you closing these deals?
[00:24:31] Wyatt Simon: It's my students get first shot.
[00:24:33] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Yeah. Solid. All right. So let's go back to the title company then. How did this come about? Mike. For a long time, we were doing tons and tons of deals, right? We were doing, I say tons, I don't know. A lot of people do a lot more deals than we were doing, but it was like 50 to 60 deals a year, right?
[00:24:48] Randal McLeaird: That we're wholesaling, flipping, doing whatever. And my wife at the time was like, we got to look into this title company deal. And we never actually closed that gap on the, how do you do it to actually implementing it? So walk through the [00:25:00] process of doing that. And yeah, just in general, like just, 30, 000 foot view of it.
[00:25:04] Randal McLeaird: So maybe
[00:25:05] Wyatt Simon: we got lucky. I don't know, but we'll take it. So I use three different title companies in my market. And I was like, we had issues with every single one of them. I was like, what, how hard is it to do title? And so eventually one of the investors, my market that we were wholesaling to that was doing a ton of volume, he's use this company. And so we started using this title company and they just were so awesome to work with. They were an owner operator. And the gal that owned it was just crushing deals. Like she didn't sleep. She responded to everything. Like she even stepped in and saved some of our deals. When like some things happen, like she would play dumb and she's awesome. So anyways, she was amazing to work with. And eventually she started doing JVS with other people that were doing volume. Cause she wants to grow this to a national company. She's actually doing JVs nationally with people.
[00:25:50] Wyatt Simon: So if you guys are interested, you really got to have 60 plus transactions a year, but I can definitely hook you up. So I'd say reach out to me if you are doing 60 plus, and we can get you involved with that. [00:26:00] But I level of you, they own and take care of everything. And then we get. A percentage of the transaction volume.
[00:26:06] Wyatt Simon: And the reason why it's so awesome is title is you make a little bit on the transaction fee. You make all of your money on the insurance, the title insurance. So with how they set it up, it's a legal way to get part of that title insurance policy.
[00:26:19] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. If you're looking at it, your title policy, I don't know how many realtors actually look at those.
[00:26:22] Randal McLeaird: You really should be, but on there, it clearly states how much is going to who. Yeah. And a percentage goes to the actual closers and I'm sure that's what's being shared. Are they licensed in all 50?
[00:26:32] Wyatt Simon: They're not yet, but they will do it or operator if they vet them and think it's good, then they'll set it up.
[00:26:38] Wyatt Simon: And they're doing it in three States right now. Okay.
[00:26:41] Randal McLeaird: So I love that again, in, you're talking about the other side of it on the property management side, how you change from taking security deposits. And now you're just taking an app fee, like a 500 move in fees that we call it. Yeah. Move in fee. Beautiful.
[00:26:55] Randal McLeaird: Yeah. And so what's the policy that you're giving them? Cause I've heard of Rhino, but [00:27:00] what is it compared to, is it Rhino?
[00:27:01] Wyatt Simon: It's the same thing as Rhino. It's just called assurant. The reason why I like assurant better is because they will do a fee upfront rather than a monthly recurring Rhino is, 15 bucks a month, forever.
[00:27:13] Wyatt Simon: Assurance like a one time depends on your credit score, but it's usually and so they just pay that once and then they're good to
[00:27:18] Randal McLeaird: go. Yeah. And then that covers you if anything happens to it. Yeah. Yep. Awesome. Okay. So I love that. All right, let's move on. I want to talk hard money then. So you're in the process of hard money. What are you guys on a transaction volume basis trying to accomplish there?
[00:27:31] Randal McLeaird: This is
[00:27:31] Wyatt Simon: fresh. All right. It's fresh. So we just started doing loans like last month and we just got a line set up. So now we can arbitrage that line, right? Some people are just getting the deal and then brokering it to someone with the capital, but we're actually, arbitraging it. So yeah, right now it's fresh in our market, but it's seems like a really easy business model.
[00:27:50] Wyatt Simon: Obviously you got to vet the borrower to make sure. And right now we're just not lending on any project that we don't feel comfortable taking over in case something were to happen. Yeah. But I know it's not common in most [00:28:00] markets, but in Omaha, it's actually really common for people to lend a hundred percent of purchase and even a hundred percent of rehab.
[00:28:07] Wyatt Simon: And so is that what you guys are doing? We're doing that with borrowers that are repeat customers that we know and trust with newer borrowers. We'll do 100 percent of purchase and and vet them a little bit more
[00:28:17] Randal McLeaird: on the rehab side. Yeah. How difficult
[00:28:19] Wyatt Simon: was
[00:28:19] Randal McLeaird: that to set up?
[00:28:20] Wyatt Simon: Not hard. Yeah. Get a name, hang a
[00:28:23] Randal McLeaird: shingle.
[00:28:23] Wyatt Simon: Yeah. Somebody else was doing it in our market. And so we just got set up with the same bank and They're like, yeah, you guys want to do the same thing. You've got equity in your portfolio. We can just take it out on the line and use that to put to work. So nice. I was like,
[00:28:35] Randal McLeaird: yeah, let's do it. Yeah, for sure.
[00:28:37] Randal McLeaird: And then I think just having looked at that model, one of my first private lenders guy has, I don't know, 40 million anytime out on the street and lent out of his money and talking to him and seeing his business. He, at one point I was like, I need somebody to come help me with this takeover. And so I looked at.
[00:28:52] Randal McLeaird: How it was set up, how he had structured it. He has the best opportunity to see deal flow [00:29:00] of anyone that I know. Absolutely. He knows anybody that's trying to get finance on anything. And it's a solid move for that reason. Because if, as a lender, you're, it's different if you're going 100 percent of the purchase price.
[00:29:12] Randal McLeaird: But even that, you should be, deep in the money, should they not fix the property up, you should be deep in the money. So it's just like another lead source. So kudos to you for setting that thing up. That's awesome. Thanks, man. Lists on the back end, like all these things, the reason I'm asking about all these things, because you're just like stacking, like little, things that get, they're not all little, but they're things that take one deal because that deal is so difficult to find, acquire, to obtain.
[00:29:36] Randal McLeaird: Once you have it, milk it for everything that you possibly can and be that source. So I love how you have structured this. It's awesome, man.
[00:29:43] Wyatt Simon: It's very, thanks man. And I'm not smart, but there's a guy that wholesaled me a deal like three years ago in our market and he did the same thing.
[00:29:50] Wyatt Simon: He wholesaled the deal. I saw the assignment fee on the closing. I'm like, dang, he made 40 grand on this. And then he hard money financed the entire thing. And and then he offered to list it for me, but I ended up [00:30:00] selling it to a different investor and just make it a little bit, but
[00:30:02] Randal McLeaird: yeah,
[00:30:03] Wyatt Simon: so smart, such a smart business model.
[00:30:05] Randal McLeaird: Okay. So think about that then he had 40 that he didn't even have to see. So he was in it for his price, right? He was already in it super deep. 100%. Yeah. It's like owner financing your wholesales. Is essentially what it is. Yeah. That's a good way to put it. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Very cool. And then you got coaching.
[00:30:24] Randal McLeaird: So real fast, high level was like your coaching. Who are you targeting? Just new investors that are trying to get into the rental game or what's your main focus on the coaching side?
[00:30:32] Wyatt Simon: Yeah. My main focus are investors that have already done one or two deals and they're really looking to add gas to the fire.
[00:30:38] Wyatt Simon: Like they don't want to wait to do one or two deals a year. They want to do, four and then five and then 10 and then 20 deals a year. Because most people think that they're capped with the down payment. And it's or they're capped with the deal flow. It's no, like you can do all of the things.
[00:30:54] Wyatt Simon: You just have to learn finance and you have to learn how to run the numbers. And then you have to learn how to delegate. And if we [00:31:00] can do those three things for you, the world is your oyster. You can do any deal and you can get deals sending to you and. You keep your day job and just start crushing real estate on the backend.
[00:31:09] Randal McLeaird: So this is a scratch my own itch question, but what are you charging? And like, how are you setting that up? How are you promoting it? And is it book based or is it mentor based? Like I'm going to get on a call with you. I'm going to walk a property with you. I'm going to like, what is it set up?
[00:31:22] Randal McLeaird: How's that structured? Once a
[00:31:24] Wyatt Simon: quarter, I do a group cohort. And so I take 10 people that want to go crush real estate. That's called the millionaire accelerator program. And so literally we take you and say, Hey, I want to become a millionaire. This is how to do it. And so you get all the education that's pre recorded.
[00:31:39] Wyatt Simon: Plus you get one call a week with me, one, a group where you can ask live Q and a live deal analysis. It's just I'm there to help you make sure you scale and get to where you want to go. And dude, our first student was Alejandro you can look him up. The dude's a 23 years old. He's got 12 units already.
[00:31:57] Wyatt Simon: He started the program with three and then he got done [00:32:00] with 11 and 12 weeks. And it was just like, I'm not that great guys. Like I promised, like he's a stud, but he didn't know how to negotiate like seller financing into a few leads that he already had. And so we were able to set up seller financing. So he didn't have to bring much cash.
[00:32:13] Wyatt Simon: And that's one of the things is a lot of people think you have to have the cash. You don't, you just have to know how to use leverage or negotiation or seller financing to get deals. Yeah. Awesome,
[00:32:23] Randal McLeaird: man. Love what you got going on, man. That's very cool. It's inspiring. It makes me want to go out and do more deals.
[00:32:28] Randal McLeaird: So I think you're doing just fine, brother. Yeah, we're doing all right. We're doing okay. Hey man, look, I've enjoyed the conversation. Great getting to know you. If anybody's trying to do any kind of deals, man, like I'm going to have your contact information in the show notes. They can reach out direct to Wyatt here again.
[00:32:43] Randal McLeaird: Thanks for jumping on charity knowledge and diving into your business. Yeah. Appreciate you having me, Randall. It's been fun. All right. Have a good one. Did you know that 80 percent of the agents we speak with got into real estate in order to gain passive income so they could obtain financial freedom and become work optional?
[00:32:58] Randal McLeaird: If you want to stay up to date, [00:33:00] the best way is to make sure you're subscribed. So if you haven't done that, go ahead and do it now. We'll catch you on the next episode.