Agents Building Cashflow

EP 171: Achieving Lifelong Financial Freedom Through Purposeful Real Estate Investing with Randal McLeaird

• Randal McLeaird

Share episode

In this episode, Randal is on an interview on the Know Your Why Podcast with Dr. Jason Balara. Randal shares his journey from modest beginnings to becoming a successful real estate investor, focusing on how his early experiences shaped his current strategies.

He discusses the importance of understanding your "why" in both life and business, as well as the pivotal moments that led him to shift from small-scale single-family investments to larger, more impactful projects.

This episode dives deep into mindset, risk-taking, and the power of designing a lifestyle that aligns with your personal and financial goals. Tune in to discover actionable advice and inspiration to fuel your own real estate journey!

Key takeaways to listen to:

  • Understanding the importance of your "why" in real estate decision-making.
  • Overcoming analysis paralysis by taking calculated risks in real estate.
  • Leveraging owner financing to create passive income streams.
  • Transitioning from wholesaling to managing larger real estate portfolios.
  • Building a lifestyle around your investment goals for long-term success.

About Randal McLeaird

Randal is the Managing Partner at Ridgeline Investment Group, a privately held real estate investment fund focused on stabilized and value-add projects in the multifamily and storage facility space. In his capacity as the primary decision-maker at Ridgeline, Randal assumes the pivotal responsibility for concluding investment determinations on behalf of the organization. 

Having successfully overseen more than 500 transactions, he possesses a substantial reservoir of expertise. Randal's judicious methodology, unwavering commitment to safeguarding capital, and emphasis on fostering enduring increments in cash flow and wealth generation have been integral to the consistent and progressive expansion of the firm. 

Randal is also the Founder, Broker, and Realtor at RAM Realty Group which is composed of his companies involved in his real estate business. He focuses on buying, selling, renting, rehabilitating, and owner financing his own properties.

Get 10% discount on your offering 

To connect with Randal and learn more about passive investing, visit www.ridgelineig.com and follow our social media pages below!

Randal McLeaird: [00:00:00] So often you can stuck in analysis paralysis. I'm sure that's a term that, everybody throws around, but it's, it is, you could sit and look and look and look and tell you go actually do something. And you're not going to really know. And that was part of it. It was like, I'm just going to go and I'm going to do it.

I'm gonna figure it out. Luckily my dad taught us how to swing a hammer when we were kids and I knew how to do some work. And I was like, if I have to fix it up, we'll fix it up.

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. Here's your host, Randall. Let's dive in.

Randal McLeaird: Hey guys, this is a quick Friday episode. I guess it's not quick because, it's actually full interview, but I figured, I haven't been putting out a bunch of shows on Fridays, just because [00:01:00] timing and, getting things aired, but, I've started going on other podcasts and thought I could share.

Not only for the guys podcast that I'm going on to, but, also just get on the other side of the microphone, and on the other side of the questions and share that with everybody here on this channel. I recently went on the know your why podcast with Jason Balara. He is a, he's a doctor turned real estate investor.

And, we had a good conversation. He's asking me about my why and why. I got into real estate and how we got started. And, it's just a little bit more of a background on me, in general and what, got me into real estate and how I got to where I am now. I hope you enjoy the show.

And like I said, I'll be on more podcasts coming up. So I will be airing some of these on Fridays going forward. This is coming out, in October. We are about to ramp up. We bought our first property in the Ram Capital Fund. And so we've deployed some capital and that, and I'm going to actually start going out and talking more about that and raising some capital into that so that we can raise and buy more property.

 We're kind of working on some systems and working on a bunch of different things that we were [00:02:00] doing on the backend. And so it's been a long time coming, but we have, Legitimate, bought our first deal. And so it's exciting. I've got some videos that we're probably going to edit and post up on the YouTube channel as well.

And we can put some links in there for that, just so you guys can see the types of things that we're doing that the assets that we're buying. Again, that's a single family, crowdfund we're raising. You can earn up to 10 percent on your investment, simply by, investing with us, we will buy a single family property.

We will rehab it. Turn around and owner finance it to an end buyer. And we manage that entire process and you get up to 10 percent on your investment. So you put 150, 000 in, you're earning 15, 000 per year. So it's a solid, return profile for a single family backed investment, where you are not doing the work.

So anyway, if you want to learn more about that, we've got some links in the show notes as well. And, you can always reach out to me directly. And, or go to RidgelineIG.Com and figure out, in the offerings page, some more information to reach out to us through that website as well. Without further ado, let's jump into the conversation with Jason Balara.

 It's [00:03:00] me being interviewed. Here we go. 

Jason Balara: First. I just want to say thank you. I do appreciate you coming on the show, taking the time out to come talk to me and provide value to my listeners. So thank you very much. 

Randal McLeaird: Thanks for having me, Jason. It's great to be on and I'm looking forward to the conversation.

Like I said, I was going through some of the stuff that you're working on and impressed with what you do. So happy to be here excited for the conversation. 

Jason Balara: Appreciate that very much. Let's start with your story. We jokingly before we started recording and, you know, start back at childhood, start wherever you want.

And and just so people can know, cool. Your background, what brought you into real estate and a little bit of that story and then we'll dig deeper. 

Randal McLeaird: Sure. Really I got into real estate. When I graduated college I ended up working for a buddy of mine who shares the same birthday as me went to high school with me.

And he didn't go to college and I got out of college, went to work for him. And so that's where I started getting into real estate. When I was in college, I was thinking about how nice it would be. I was in new Orleans, how nice it would be to own one [00:04:00] of the houses that all of us were living in.

And so I was thinking about it then didn't have the means, didn't have the knowledge, didn't know how to get into that and grew up from a, modest means family. And so again, when I got out of college and went to work for a friend of mine who, again, shared the same birthday, same school, didn't go to, didn't go to college it was eye opening to me to go see him doing mortgages.

He had multiple properties and lots of toys, lots of things, assets and that sort of thing. And that's really what clued me in. He gave me a book. It was rich dad, poor dad, as many people have read and gotten into. And that opened my eyes to getting into owning assets and things that we'll appreciate over time.

Fast forward, right? That was 2004. And You know Ended up living overseas in australia trying to get into real estate over there doing a few things and finally came back in 2008 and I was like, this is the time I'm going to start buying some properties and obviously 2008, everybody knows what happened.

So I started looking for jobs. I was thinking about going back to [00:05:00] law school and one of the things that I did in preparation to go to law school was I started working for an attorney and the attorney was local here in San Antonio. I met him at a real estate meetup and it opened my eyes to the transactional side of real estate and single family investing.

And I was an escrow officer for him, closing a lot of deals for real estate investors around this time where properties were trading for, 20, 000, 15, 000 that sort of thing. And so decided not to go to law school because I sat in on some classes, didn't really want to go back and do the brain damage that was associated with that.

I really just wanted to, again, get into owning the property and, having the freedom of being a real estate owner. And I remember the very first deal that I did was closing a deal with this lady and she came into the office, it was a 15, 000, no, 12, yeah, 15, 000 transaction that she had under contract with this investor and the investor walked the day of closing, I think I had 10, 000 in my bank account and I wanted to buy a house and the buyer never showed up [00:06:00] and I said, Hey, look, I'm I got 10 grand.

I'll give you 10 grand for the house sight unseen. Never seen it. This guy was going to pay 15. I'll give you 10. And so that was the very first house that I bought. Sight unseen. I remember driving up to it and I was, I had this little white Suzuki, like neat little, still not doing well financially, whatever.

But I show up to this house and there's a massive hole in the roof. And I was like, Crap. What have I done? What did I just get myself into? Anyway, ended up selling that house for a 15, 000 without doing any work to it. And pretty good return on your money.

And that's really how I got started. And yeah, that was one of the first deals. That same owner sold me a lot across the street. What is interesting is what I do now is, Very similar to this other transaction. So she sold me a lot across the street. I think it paid a thousand dollars for the lot.

A buyer came to me and I was going to own a finance a lot. I said, give me a thousand dollars down and then I'll carry a note for 2, 000. And so I got payments on that 2, 000. So I own this lot free clear, basically traded the [00:07:00] money from me to the seller and um, and that's, that's it.

What we have transitioned into a lot right now. So we do a lot of owner finance deals now. So it's been a long road, a lot more to go into that. If you want to dive into some other things, but that's the transition of how I got into real estate from not being in real estate. 

Jason Balara: At the point about, going to work for a friend who.

Didn't go to college that you went to, ends up being a topic, not commonly on the podcast amongst entrepreneurs. And even I have young kids and I'm like, when my son was born, we started a college fund thing for him. And I didn't do one for my daughter, not because I love my daughter less, but my excitement about them definitely going to college is, it's just not there anymore.

And it's just a question of the value. And I think, You could look at it strictly from a time spent, right? You spent four years in college, your friends spent four years [00:08:00] already starting their career, making money, that kind of thing. There are certain things that you need to go to college for to get, a degree as a doctor or an attorney or whatever it is.

But at the end of the day unless you're sure that's what you want to do, it's maybe not, the no brainer decision that I think, at least when I was growing up, like That was what it was supposed to be. And having that perspective, I actually think is pretty interesting and eyeopening.

And then the other piece about this, that always interests me that in your stories is you're on the transactional side of real estate, meaning like you work, For the title company, you work for the real estate attorney, you work for one of those, the brokers. What always shocks me is how few of them are actually investing in real estate.

For sure. Like you have it all right in front of you. Like I've asked brokers this before, like the brokers I've worked with on deals, the brokers I've had on the podcast. I'm like, why don't you just take them? Why don't you do all of the deals? Like the people that are getting, first [00:09:00] access to that, to those good deals.

And I think it just comes down to. Mindset around being an entrepreneur and being a real estate investor and like taking that as that is your sort of lead proposition, if you will you're self reliant right from day 1, you have those couple of examples in your story, but

what about that sort of move into, you took a chance, right? I'll buy this for 10, 000. It, because they didn't have anyone to sell it to in today's real estate market that's not very much money, but when that was all the money that you had, it's still like taking a leap and, having the mindset to do it. What kind of things went through your mind then? What was your thought process? 

Randal McLeaird: To qualify that a little bit. I was heavily involved in many aspects. So in 2004, when I got out of college, I had been a loan officer for three years or so.

So I had seen the mortgage side of the transaction. And then when I was in Australia, I was studying rent to own, [00:10:00] lease option, sandwich lease option, all these different things. And trying to get into it over there. And so again I was learning throughout this process. And then when I got back to the States and I was working for the attorney, I got to see the title side.

So is this title clear? Am I going to get a decent property? That's what it is. So I saw that and I got to see a lot of other transactions that were happening what investors were buying. And at the same timethe attorney Was very encouraging saying, you need to go see as many properties as you can.

Just always go look, you gotta be out there. Go look, no matter if you're buying or not, just go look into our properties. Okay. So I'd been doing all of those things. That said, I'd never seen this house. I'd never been down the street. I'd never been to that side of town. And in 2008, honestly, The first drive I took down this side of the city freaked me out because.

Most of the people had burned their houses down just in lieu of either try to get insurance, right? Because they couldn't make a mortgage payments and they were going to get foreclosed on. So it was like a concrete the [00:11:00] sidewalk and then like a concrete kind of stoop and then, So many houses were just leveled.

All you could see were foundation. So when I'm driving up, I thought I just bought a foundation. So I was pretty freaked out. And then and there were just a bunch of people, homeless people out. There was a bunch of bail bondsmen like shops leading into the neighborhood.

And again, little me in this white Suzuki, it just, it was a comical view. So to speak to, taking the leap of faith to buy something, again, have to address the fact that I had done a lot of groundwork and I got very comfortable with, look, I need to buy something and do something.

But yeah, I may have had, 12, 000 to my name at the time. I'd been traveling. I just got back and I was working for a nominal amount of money. And yeah I think it just takes the ability to know that if you're going to buy an asset, then that asset is unlikely to lose all of its value in the short term so I took a calculated risk saying 10, 000.

Somebody else is willing to pay 15. I knew the other investor [00:12:00] actually and I said, if nothing else, I could probably rent this thing out and fix it up and rent it out. And I'll make some money on this deal. And it's the fact of just getting off my tail and going to do something.

So often you can stuck in analysis paralysis. I'm sure that's a term that, everybody throws around, but it's, it is, you could sit and look and look and look and tell you go actually do something. And you're not going to really know. And that was part of it. It was like, I'm just going to go and I'm going to do it.

I'm gonna figure it out. Luckily my dad taught us how to swing a hammer when we were kids and I knew how to do some work. And I was like, if I have to fix it up, we'll fix it up. So I don't know if that answered your question. Went on a roundabout. 

Jason Balara: I think, in a general sense 

our experiences leading up to it. It's just that willingness to take to, to take a calculated risk. Like you're not necessarily going to win on every single investment. You're not gonna win on every single real estate deal. Ultimately, you gotta start somewhere and take there, there are some risks involved with [00:13:00] it.

So it sounds a little bit like you were. Effectively wholesaling, you bought it and, sold it to someone else with the land piece and did the seller financing. So 2008, 2009, 2010, I guess if you were in real estate before that, challenges were experienced, but I do think then.

After that, we had quite a nice market for a while. How did you, grow and expand your portfolio from there? 

Randal McLeaird: Yeah, I ended up getting my real estate license and my broker license and always with the aim to just acquire property, right? I didn't like the whole wholesale thing aspect of the business.

I always thought it was a used car salesman and it was really taking advantage A seller in a sense And I always wanted to be the 1 that had a product, the product being a house that I could then sell. Yeah, we ramped up and I was, buying a number of properties. I think after that same year, I ended up buying I don't know, probably 4 more houses that we own or finance.

And I still have notes on those today. [00:14:00] And so that was a strategy that I really want. I wanted the cashflow, but I didn't want the issues of tenants and toilets. And so that's the strategy that I came up with and created a bunch of notes around that. And they've been fantastic, right?

2018, 19, we were doing 50, 60 transactions a year. 2020 that sort of thing COVID hit and and then that was when, if you want to talk about, no, you're why, we had, I had kids and all the things that's when things changed. We shut down the wholesale business. We shut down the rehab business and I took a break and I started figuring out what it is, how we want our lives to look, so we can talk about that a bit.

But if you want to talk about the college thing again, in my take on the college thing. Yeah. Do you want to cover that real fast? Yeah. So my, and I tell my wife this, having gone through that experience myself, I want to encourage my kids to really take a moment when they're 18.

Do you want to go travel overseas? Do you want to go see something else? Like you're pretty young and you don't know exactly what you want to do unless you are. Going on the doctor, the one of those routes where, this is what I've [00:15:00] been planning for my whole life. And this is what I want to do.

So I'm very much for that train of thought. And we've even now, there's 6, it's about to be 7, my daughter's 4 I've looked at schools that teach hands on training, building businesses, that sort of thing alternative educations just because I think that's a big thing.

We don't teach our kids enough real world experiences in the current education system. Yeah, we don't have to make this a political podcast 

Jason Balara: or 

no, but 

Jason Balara: It's, they're just a number of times. Like even on this podcast or just in talking to people that I've said,

we don't learn how to be financially responsible. We don't learn about financial freedom. Nobody taught me about money, blah, blah, all this stuff. And it's yeah, there's a ton of other things that are important in life. Also it just makes everything easier. It just makes everything easier if you have an understanding of like real life skills, like things that are going to be applicable to [00:16:00] running a business or being an investor or whatever you can still do whatever you want.

You just have to have that other piece of you that knows about how to take care of yourself financially. So it's not a struggle for the whole life. I guess that's what it comes down to. I don't want my kid's whole life to be a struggle

because they're financially strapped I want them to understand these concepts and do the right thing to keep themselves safe so that they can have choices. And it's something that I didn't really recognize until I was in my 40s and the power of them understanding it in their teen 20s, like it can be really life changing.

So it's all about education and communication over these topics. Yeah, 

Randal McLeaird: I think that plays into what we're talking about a minute ago about being in the service based business, being a broker, being an attorney, not investing in that's because you're either afraid of it.

And so you're risk off and you'd never educated yourself on how to manage that process on your own. And so perhaps if went out and did one of these types of deals, I talk about [00:17:00] this a lot on the podcast. I'm always agents building cashflow. That is what, it's like, how can you turn your commission into a cashflow, right?

And I think again, the education system if you learn that early on and you realize that it's not a big risk, like I bought that house 10, 000, if I would have lost 2 grand, sold it for 8, lost 5 grand, sold it for 5, I still would have gone through the experience and learned it.

And, so you're paying for the education 1 way or the other. 

Yeah, 

Jason Balara: It's an important point. And we're not going to change the education system in this hour, but it's unfortunate. Yeah, but it's definitely something that, that. I think a lot about with my own kids and it's like part of me, I'm like, okay wait, when are they old enough to like, really start to recognize these things?

But you said, Randall, for you, things changed in 2020, how did they change? What shift did you make? I know you said you looked at how you wanted your life to look. So what were some of the things that came into play? 

Randal McLeaird: When my son was born in 2017 I want to say 2020, I was looking at it and I [00:18:00] said, in 10 years, he's going to be 13 years old, I'm going to be 50.

I think that was the other thing. I was turning 40 and I was like, how do I want my life to look at it? Are we going to keep doing what we're doing? And again chasing money. That's the shift. I always be like, we need to make some money coming from my background and how I was raised and not having a lot of money.

I always wanted to befinancially fit and stable and secure and not have to worry about money. When that stress is gone, your life changes. And getting to that point and having, not being stressed financially you can take a step back and look at it and say, am I doing what I really want to be doing?

And do I want to do this for the rest of my life? And the answer to me for me was no, right? We were wholesaling. We had a team and we're, doing a lot of deals and transactions were there. But again, it was not the type of life that I wanted to live and not the reason I got into real estate.

I didn't get into real estate so that I could just do high volume transaction all the time. It was like, I want to go travel. I want to be with my family. And [00:19:00] so whenever COVID hit, like so many people, it gave me a chance to just sit back, reflect. I was, doing woodworking in the garage, building things, doing all kinds of stuff, spending time with the family.

Money is very important for your livelihood for you to provide for your family and to do all the things that you want to do. But again, having children really impacted the way I looked at everything. The most important thing is family. And, if you don't have your familiar relationships andYou don't spend time with them.

To me that what else is there, right there. So that all happened around the same time. And so I sat back and started looking at what I want to be doing and and start looking at commercial real estate, looking at funds and started looking at syndications and just going for bigger transactions. One of the big things that Ialways have had a struggle with and a hard time with on the single family side is Contractor sending you a text invoice, right?

I need to be paid this 15, 000, you're like, okay, this is not run in a professional manner and then they get mad at you and they don't show up. And so it's all these [00:20:00] things that just felt so unprofessional. And I did not want that anymore. I put a pause on all of those things.

And so we, got into learning funds and so we've now launched a fund and we're still doing some single family and we have a crowd fund that we're doing the single family on. But, we have an eye to the development deals into the other larger transactions that we've also been involved in some apartment complexes and that sort of thing.

Again, just dealing with a different type of clientele or different type of professional in the space, working with third party property management companies. So that, it is a business that you're running that you're managing rather than being in the business, like swinging the hammer type of thing, if that makes sense.

Jason Balara: Yeah, no, I know. I completely understand it. That was funny enough. It was 2020 for me when I started. To get into syndication. And it was because my son was born. Are we the same guy? What are we doing here? I know it's a lot of the stuff you're saying.

I'm like, Oh, it's very similar. But yeah it's just the beauty of, scaling your real estate career investment, whatever it can become a [00:21:00] business and a business that you don't have to be, like you said, like swinging the hammer. Because that was like my background in construction and things like that.

1 of the 1st things I thought was, we'll just start flipping houses. And I'm like yeah. That gets me another job. That really just gets me another job, and I won't be spending more time with family doing that. I think it will be fun someday to flip houses with my kids. Just, literally I want them to know those skills, or at least Understand the language around, building a house or whatever.

So if they want to be involved, they don't get taken advantage of at the very least. But it is just larger scale deals, like you said, it just allows it to be. Much more of a business because you have 3rd party property management and you can be working with construction companies and contractors that are used to working on these large scale projects.

And so this is not to say that I even think this is a bad thing, but you're not picking up the guys at Home Depot to come help you for the day. It's not that same [00:22:00] idea. I have picked up guys at Home Depot to come help me four months ago. It's I've met some really good guys and good workers doing that.

But it's not how it operates at the, large scale, whether it's apartment complex or offices or storage, whatever, when you're doing big transaction transactions, you have to be able to do large scale projects at a pace that makes sense as well. The smaller contractors, they're not equipped to quickly turn, 15 or 20 apartments in a month.

They don't have that level of ability. It's just not what they're used to. 

I think 

this is an important thing for people that like you shut down the other stuff to an extent or maybe downsized what you were doing.

So that the idea, at least for me, like the idea is to someday, especially when you talk about spending time with families, like to someday have work be completely optional. So combining passive income with the active income and the active income can be whatever you want it to be.

It can be in real estate or you can be [00:23:00] an attorney but if you're not doing both, you're going to be stuck. Even if you're in that passive world, you need to have had some income to get you to be able to create passive income from.

So you can use real estate for that, or you can use your job and invest in your fund. Sometimes maybe you see it on, on social media or whatever, yeah become a passive investor or become a real estate investor in general. It's going to be great.

You're going to make lots of money. And it does take time. And like your story is, we're talking, Decade plus, and also you said, I'm looking at when my son's 13. So you do have to develop this long term mindset. It's not going to happen overnight. How do you manage that?

How do you maintain, that thought process? 

Randal McLeaird: In the sense of staying motivated to continue the same process or, yeah, 

Jason Balara: You've, I think you have to combine the now in terms of, there's got to be some income producing activity. And then also, like, how do you

 look at it from such a long term?

Because I think [00:24:00] people don't think a lot of people don't and that's where they miss out. It's but what gets missed is you're going to struggle. One way or the other, you're going to struggle for a short time to create, lack of struggle later, or you're just going to struggle forever because you're never going to have that, kind of cushion, if you will.

Randal McLeaird: Yeah. Early on, I don't know, the book I read, it was do the things that you don't want to do. So you can do the things you want to do. There's some kind of quote like that, where it's did the hard things. How do you eat an elephant one bite at a time? It's whatever, like saying you want to go buy it.

I've always looked at it in the lifestyle design. I talked to my wife about this. I'm like, how do you want our lives to look? And she's it's such a big question. I don't know. We have this conversation a lot and it is, but if you don't sit and you don't do that work and you don't.

Really plan out and say, this is how I want my life to look. Then you're just going to end up reactive. You're going to react to whatever comes your way. You're going to stay in your job. You're not going to make any moves to invest or make a change or better your life. Just in general.

That's how I feel about it. You can do some simple math. In [00:25:00] general, if you're like, I want to not work when I'm 50 years old. Okay. How much do I need? How much of a nut do I need in order to invest at what we're ready to return?

Is that going to, simple math is going to tell you what you can do. Unless you start buying assets or businesses that are producing income and they grow over time and appreciate over time and pay you more and more over time. If you're just going to be a passive investor, then you're going to be locked into some sort of rate of return.

I would think. So the way I look at it it's I want to be able to spend as much time with my family as I can currently. And then at some point not have to work, but at the same time I'll continue where I feel like I won't stop working. But I'll be working on things that are interesting.

I heard a podcast the other day RFK juniors talking about his upbringing and how they were brought up. And he was like, in our household, there was no discussion about income generating or what you were doing, as long as you were working on something interesting. And so on my board over here, it says, am I working on anything interesting [00:26:00] because that is really where I'm at, I want to be working on interesting projects.

I want to be working on interesting businesses that keep me active mentally. And yeah, sure. There's some promise of upside income potential. But is it interesting? And so if I have that in the back of my mind, while I'm working on the tried and true prison business, that is the bread and butter of what is produced income for me and my family over the past, then, okay, I know I've got these projects that are just stacked up and I'm just, manipulating this business in order to be less hands on.

Then I have the opportunity and I free up my time so that I can work on all these other things that I really want to work on that are interesting, that are fun, that could produce forever and ever. So that's how I look at it. 

Jason Balara: Yeah, I love that. I definitely had a shift over these last few years of I want to work the way you put is perfect.

But I want to work on interesting things, but also I want to work with who I want to work with. I want to [00:27:00] work with people that are exciting to be around and grow with that. That to me is as big a part of it as anything. And part of that is my family.

I want to work with my family in some capacity, whatever that means. And, it's just such a Important point that you made about lifestyle design, because I would say, yes, it is a hard question. Like I've had this conversation with my wife and it's a hard question for me to answer sometimes.

People like, what's your perfect day? I'm like, 

I don't know. 

I really like to go to the gym in the morning. I want to spend time with my I don't know what exactly it looks like, but I also like when you're working on interesting things. I like a part of the day to be.

Some work because I get growth and stimulation out of that, but as you were saying, talking about that sort of lifestyle design, I'm thinking like, if you don't think about those questions, it doesn't have to be like a perfect set in stone answer. But if you don't think about those things, it's just being designed for you.

So your life is happening one way or the other, and if you don't think about that lifestyle design, then the [00:28:00] design is you work until you can't anymore. Hopefully you have some money for retirement and hopefully you don't run out of it or before you die. That's the traditional model. And yes, you can do the math, but most of that math is based on living 25 years after you retire.

And so that means in order to really be right, you have to know when you're going to die. And you can work up to 25 years You know before even if you manage to set all that side and so it's like having Assets that are continuing to grow and produce income and appreciate over time, whether that's real estate or businesses or whatever it is, whatever you want to use as that vehicle. If you're not doing something like that, then something's being designed for you.

And so I just, when you said that, I was like, yeah, I don't, not even sure if I ever necessarily thought about it exactly that way, but it's, something's being designed. It's just, are you the creator or are 

you, you know, kind of, uh, uh, 

playing a role in that design? 

Randal McLeaird: Don't be an NPC, what is it?

Non player [00:29:00] character? Yeah, don't do that. Yeah, exactly. Design it. Yeah, honestly, man, you gotta decide what you want to do and go after it. It's just one of those things that, yeah I have thought about that a lot and I think it was back in, oh man, I don't know if it was like four hour work week or some book I read way back in the day and I was like, oh,you could do this.

You don't have to, work nine to Oh wow. It's something that clicked in, 

yeah. 

Randal McLeaird: Yeah. You 

Jason Balara: first have to believe it. Believe it's possible. I think this kind of stuff is incredibly important, but just in the interest of not keeping you here all day I'll move to asking you the questions that I ask every guest first ones based on the name of the show being know your why.

So what is your why? What I'm sure, some of this you've talked about, but you've had a lot of success. You've been doing this while, what keeps you going? Yeah. 

Randal McLeaird: It's the family. I was thinking the other day, I was like, it's a morbid thought, but, if I died, what is happening?

What am I leaving behind? What does that look like for my kids? And would they be proud of the things that I've done and what I've left them and that sort of thing? And so it is [00:30:00] the family. It is Being able to spend time with them, being present for their soccer games for my daughter dancing around, letting her paint my face, all the things, right?

That is the most important stuff to me right now and taking trips to the wife and kids. That's what's driving me and anything that I can do that provides that opportunity and lets me afford their schools that they want to go to and the activities they want to do, like that is, that's what it is.

I don't need to be a billionaire, as long as we're all happy and together, then it's great. 

Host: I completely agree. And I think back to the concept of constructing your life, maybe the first question to answer is what is your why?

 If it's family, then what does it mean to me to be present for my family? And, Build around that if your why is some sort of charitable cause or something like that. Okay I'm going to construct around that. What does it look like to make the driver really come true?

And so I think it's just such powerful stuff. If you let yourself open up to it. 

Randal McLeaird: Yeah. 

That's what [00:31:00] happened in 2020, right? We were cranking out doing a lot of work, but we were working all the time. We were always busy.

 And we still spend a lot of time with family all the time, but I really wanted to redesign it. That is how we got to where we are right now, to your point. Yeah. Yeah. 

Jason Balara: When you start to think that way, it's like the idea of me missing something.

Is like devastating. You're like, Oh, one of the kids has X event. And you're like, Oh, I can't be there that day. Cause I'm working. And I'm like, 

nah, 

That's not going to be my answer. That's not going to be my answer anymore. Like it's going to be, I'm going to be in charge of that.

Randal McLeaird: It's fantastic to show up. And then you see the joy in their face, get it on video, you do your thing, and then you can share that moment with them. It was funny. We went to a birthday party this weekend and There's a guy who's friends, his son is friends with my son and he's always up for anything.

He's always up. We go same temple. They like, we're just funny guy. But he's always up for whatever it is with kids because he's very [00:32:00] much in the same boat of I'm going to be present for my kids. Always be there. Anyway. We got a roller rink this weekend and no other dads are out there skating.

Nobody's doing it. And he rolls up. He's Hey man, get your ass out here. Come on, let's go. I was like, all so I jumped out there with him and just being out there with my kids, being, just being up, up for it. And that's the stuff that I want to be able to do. It's always being present, even though that was on the weekend, you can typically make those things, but that's the whole thing, man.

That's what it's all about. 

Jason Balara: Oh, for sure. Yeah, totally agree. Tell us something about yourself that isn't common knowledge, special skill, a hobby, anything to let people know you better. Oh, 

Randal McLeaird: Something common, something about myself. I play a lot of pickleball. I don't know. It's not uncommon for local, but.

Is it new now? I've been playing for probably two years, but it changed my life. Honestly, like it's crazy. I used to play golf more often. I don't play golf. I got set of clubs sitting back there. They haven't moved in a while. Because it's just an interesting transition. [00:33:00] Lender of mine, actually, I don't know, three, four years ago, he was telling me like, Hey man, I'm out here playing pickleball.

What is pickle? I had no idea. And didn't get, didn't start playing until my brother actually got me into it. And and now it's like the only thing, only real sport that I play other than sand volleyball. But it's a very social sport. I don't know if you play, but that is when I look at, am I doing anything interesting?

Like I'm meeting a guy tomorrow, we're talking about real estate, pickleball, real estate, and there's multiple people in San Antonio that I've been talking to about doing something with pickleball on the business side, maybe franchise opportunities to, 

Jason Balara: Oh, yeah. 

Randal McLeaird: And so that's my interesting long term thing that I'm looking at.

Jason Balara: Yeah. I haven't played. I would play. It looks like fun. It's everywhere now. Oh yeah. And I don't know, I'm not even a hundred percent sure. Like when that transition happened, but I play soccer on Sundays and One of the fields that we play at, it used to have tennis courts and they turned like the entire tennis court area [00:34:00] into pickleball courts.

So I go there and I just hear back and forth the whole time we're playing soccer. And it's literally. Always full. Every court is full every time I've been there. 

Randal McLeaird: So here's why I think about it. So we went to Breckenridge this past month, and I had a choice. I could either take my clubs, or I could take, I could have taken clubs, played golf out there, or I could have, taken a pickleball paddle.

Super small, compact, easy can find a game very easily. And I was talking to my father in law about this. He plays golf all the time. And I was like, I would have met maybe one or two people if I played golf and spent four or five hours been away from the family or, I could go play pickleball and I'm rotating.

I met 30 people. We're talking about real estate up there. Like what it's like to own property up there. They're telling me hikes I should go on there, so it's a much more social sport. In the sense of meeting people around the country. If you travel meeting people in your city and being able to play with a bunch of different skill [00:35:00] levels, tennis, huge court, you're chasing balls down.

It's fun. I played tennis a bit, but you miss a ball. You could shoot it over the fence really easily. It's a wiffle ball with pickleball. So it's just, it's a more approachable sport. I don't know, it's just fun. So that's why. 

Jason Balara: That's an interesting, I've never heard that take on it, but actually like I said, I haven't played, but it seems I've played tennis.

I've played ping pong. Like I've played racquetball. I've played a bunch of other racket sports. You pick it up pretty quickly then. Putting it as a, cause I don't play golf. Like I've, Go gone to a driving range. I've been on golf courses before, but I'm terrible. And so it's not something that like, I would never intentionally go golfing because I wanted to like, make business connections because it would just be embarrassing.

But pickleball, I feel like I could probably get out there and. Not be terrible and have those, same interactions with apparently more. So now I gotta get a pickleball. Look, 

Randal McLeaird: I'll tell you, I don't look at it as business at all. That's the fun thing about it for [00:36:00] me. Some of these conversations are happening because I play.

And because I enjoy the sport but it's an enjoyable sport, go out and play. And those things are just a byproduct. I think that's any kind of networking that you do, if you're genuinely interested in, a cause or something, you're going to end up making those connections with people.

But yeah, it's a fun sport regardless. Get out, man. Go play. Go play. Where are you? Where are you located? I'm in Los 

Jason Balara: Angeles. 

Randal McLeaird: LA. Okay. Yeah. I'm sure you guys 

Jason Balara: got 

Randal McLeaird: plenty of courts. 

Jason Balara: Yeah. Like I said, there's this one, I don't, I know what that on Sunday mornings, there's always people there, but yeah, I'm sure there's no shortage of courts around.

When people hear this and they want to reach out to you what's the best way? 

Randal McLeaird: You can go to my website. It's ridgelineIG.Com. Ridgeline. I said, like a ridgeline and then IG for investment group.com. And there's a little chat bot down there. You guys can just. Chat on there. It sends a text message to our team.

If you're interested, we have a crowd fund that we're running right now. It is a single family crowd fund raising 5 million to go and acquire single family [00:37:00] properties in the San Antonio market. And then we are fixing them up, providing nice, stable housing for people who need owner financing.

And so we're owner financing, we're creating those notes and holding those notes. And, 1 of the offerings that we've got going on right now, and that's on Ridgeline as well. Or if you want to check out the pod, you go to the pod, AgentsBuildingCashflow.Com. Yeah, we teach, we do all kinds of stuff. Very similar to what you guys are working on, man.

 I'm looking at the assets you guys have and the things that you've been working on, so I know we're not talking about all that 

Jason Balara: though. I have the talk. I'm on the tick. There you go. You've got you've got one more than me. I don't have TikTok. That's one that I've Always afraid I have to, would have to dance.

So I never, you never got on some 

Randal McLeaird: ice challenge or something. Yeah, exactly. 

Jason Balara: Yeah. This has been awesome, Randall. I appreciate your time. I appreciate everything you shared with us. I think people get a lot of value here and should definitely connect. So thank you for taking the time out today.

It's a pleasure. Good [00:38:00] kitchen. 

Randal McLeaird: 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? If you want to stay up to date, 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. 

People on this episode

Head Shot

Randal McLeaird

Host