Financial Freedom Fast
From ICU Nurse to Financially Free @ 27 Years Old w/ Steven May
Join us on a journey through the world of real estate investment and financial freedom with 27-year-old whiz kid, Stephen May. Starting his real estate journey by house hacking at the age of 23, Stephen now owns five single-family homes and five storage facilities. We dive into the mindset that led him to surpass his initial goals of a seven-figure network and $5,000 in passive income by 30, three years earlier than expected.
Stephen's real estate journey is peppered with astute investments and a keen eye for residential and storage assets. From a 6-acre lot bringing in substantial monthly revenue with minimal expenses, to a 290 unit facility that he acquired for $3.2 million, his tale is a testament to his acumen. We also discuss his career as a realtor, and how his commissions facilitated his transition from a nursing job to focusing on real estate full-time.
The future looks bright for Stephen, with new goals in sight now that he's achieved financial freedom. He shares his dream of traveling the world and maintaining a frugal lifestyle that previously helped him hit the million-dollar mark. He underscores the importance of living below your means to attain financial freedom and provides useful tips on wealth building. Get ready to soak up Stephen's insights and uncover the power of frugality and confidence in your own journey to financial freedom.
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Join us on a journey through the world of real estate investment and financial freedom with 27-year-old whiz kid, Stephen May. Starting his real estate journey by house hacking at the age of 23, Stephen now owns five single-family homes and five storage facilities. We dive into the mindset that led him to surpass his initial goals of a seven-figure network and $5,000 in passive income by 30, three years earlier than expected.
Stephen's real estate journey is peppered with astute investments and a keen eye for residential and storage assets. From a 6-acre lot bringing in substantial monthly revenue with minimal expenses, to a 290 unit facility that he acquired for $3.2 million, his tale is a testament to his acumen. We also discuss his career as a realtor, and how his commissions facilitated his transition from a nursing job to focusing on real estate full-time.
The future looks bright for Stephen, with new goals in sight now that he's achieved financial freedom. He shares his dream of traveling the world and maintaining a frugal lifestyle that previously helped him hit the million-dollar mark. He underscores the importance of living below your means to attain financial freedom and provides useful tips on wealth building. Get ready to soak up Stephen's insights and uncover the power of frugality and confidence in your own journey to financial freedom.
Download my FREE E-Book on Scaling Through Partnerships NOW
CLICK HERE
Apply for mentorship with Matt and the FAST FI Coaching Community:
APPLY NOW
Follow Matt online:
Instagram
Facebook
Youtube
So I was a full-time ICU nurse for a couple of years. I started with a house hack when I was 23 and haven't let off the gas sense, and so here we are now at 27. Yeah, hit the financial freedom number. And so now I own five storage facilities with a business partner and then five single family houses, collecting gross revenue doing well into the 70K 75K plus range monthly.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast, the show that teaches you how to buy back your time and live life on your terms. Learn how to confidently leave your nine to five from guests who've done it themselves. Whether you want to lay on a beach, travel the world or focus on your passions, this show will give you the tools to do what you want when you want. Now here's your host, matt Ammabio.
Speaker 3:What is up? Financial freedom fast, fam. I am so excited to have my good buddy, Stephen May, on the podcast today. 27 years old, he cash flows right about $10,000 a month from his passive assets. He owns 10 assets five single family homes and five storage facilities. Today we dive into a little bit of everything. What is his mindset around financial freedom? How did he get to financial freedom these single family homes? What was the first purchase like? How did he feel going into buying that first purchase? And how did he buy another one only eight months after that? And then, how did he level up and start to buy into these bigger storage facilities? What did the numbers look like? How did he know it was a good asset? What made him feel comfortable doing it? We dive into everything so you don't have to make any mistakes when you want to do this yourself. Guy is so excited to jump in here, so without further ado, let's jump into the pod, Stephen May. Welcome to the Financial Freedom Fest podcast, my Good Buddy and Friend. What's going?
Speaker 1:on, dude. What's going on? Man, I appreciate you having me.
Speaker 3:Dude, I'm excited to have you on. We've been trying to get this going for a little while. You're going back and forth, you're a busy dude, I'm a busy dude, some technological issues here and there, but, man, I got you on the podcast, really excited to dive in today. I think there's a ton of value that our listeners are going to be able to take out of this. We first met, at least in person, out in Nashville, and from our discussions it almost sounds like you and I are like basically the same exact person. But you're like the me of storage and I'm like the you of multifamily. I love that. We're both pretty young, we reach financial freedom and we're both pushing towards that. I don't know if you hit that yet. I know that's the goal, to hit that by the end of the year or something like that. But the $10,000 a month in passive income, we're gunning for it. So, ladies and gentlemen, we've got Stephen May. Stephen, how old are you? 26, right, 26., 27.
Speaker 1:27. Yeah, yeah, 96. So yeah, 96.
Speaker 3:27 cents, mark. Dude, you're an old dog to me, man. You're a whole year older than me, dude, so let's just dive in right now, man, for everyone who doesn't know who you are and what you do who are you, what do you do and where are you at in your life right now, at 27 years old?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely so. Yeah, born and raised in St Louis, missouri, actually I currently reside in Kansas City, missouri. So I've been here oh I don't know four, four and a half years now. It's been a simple but I guess, complicated, complex journey really. So we'll dig into it. But yeah, just standard Midwest kid, grew up in St Louis, went to high school there, ended up just going the typical route, went to a state university, missouri State University in Springfield. I actually got my bachelor's of nursing so I was a full-time ICU nurse for a couple years there and had been digging into bigger pockets, got the real estate bug and started with a house hack when I was 23 and haven't let off the gas since. So here we are now at 27. Yeah, hit the financial freedom number and still just trying to scale up and figure things out as we go.
Speaker 3:Dude, amazing. So what was your financial freedom number when you were doing all this?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it's crazy to look back because obviously I was in school studying for my state board's test for nursing. In the background of my days off from clinicals or hospital shifts, I was literally reading bigger pockets forums, reading bigger pockets books, and of course, most of my classmates are studying hardcore for the state board's test and I'm digging into real estate, financing, lending, house hacking. I knew I wanted to buy real estate, obviously to get started. It's like how do you go about doing that? Once again, I never thought I'd come to Kansas City. I had a group of buddies that were here and my now fiance had actually graduated a semester before me and took a job with a startup here. So I followed her here basically. But it helped out that I had that group of buddies and so real estate was in the back of my mind. I got a nursing job here in Kansas City, basically made one trip here and just basically bought a house that weekend or put it under contract, talked to several lenders because nobody wanted to finance a house for a 23-year-old who had just graduated college with no money and basically had to basically get the loan off of a subject to type basically just a letter from the hospital saying, oh, he's going to be making this much. So, by the way, found a lender who gave me the loan, took a chance on me. That worked out well. House hack with a couple buddies and, yeah, just got the bug. So at 23, at that point I'm in orientation, nursing, becoming a landlord, renting out the rooms in a single family, three bed, two baths, so living for free while building some equity. And at that time I was wanting to keep buying. Didn't know how to go about it. Really.
Speaker 1:Eight months later, bought a second house hack and I think once it clicked at 23, I have two houses. One became a rental. I'm house hacking the other one, I think at that point I sat down, was like, hey, I need to set some goals because I'm going to keep doing this. I don't know what that looks like, but I'm going to keep buying. And so ultimately I sat down and once again, 23. At the time I was like if I could hit seven figured networks, it would become a millionaire by 30, and at the time I wrote down 5,000 a month passive income by 30. I'd be pretty content, would be living for my own terms. And now, looking back, I've blown those numbers out of the water here at 27. So that's how it started, and then, just yeah, scaled up from there.
Speaker 3:Dude, I love that and we'll dig into the financing and how you felt going into those first deals here. So your goal and it's funny because I was the same thing I was like man, 5k, 5k by 30 years old. It would be great, I would be able to hang out and be good. And then you just reach it out 25, 26, and you're like you get it and you see it. But then you're like, yeah, but this, just this, covers like my basic living and like basic expenses. But we got to increase that lifestyle a little bit. If I want to be traveling, go to the beach, like hanging out, doing cool stuff, probably going to need a little bit more and need to buy a bit more. So, before we dive into the assets that you took on after that, tell me about the first house hack. Were you nervous? Were you confident? Why were you confident? Why were you nervous? What was going through your head when you were buying that first one?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's crazy to look back on and think about it. Definitely nervous, but also exciting to get it done. Biggest thing being nervous was I had only been to Kansas City, literally like once, to visit one buddies, and so I knew I wanted to buy a house around the university that they went to. That's literally the only area of the city I knew, so that made me quite nervous and I felt confident at the same time, because I had read all these books. I had literally listened to almost every podcast, bigger Pockets and all these other forums I'd posted. But until you put that first deal under contract, then it really hits up. Oh, I have to give earnest money, I have to get this done. Yeah, what that looked like was literally me coming into town. I had interviewed an agent over the phone, liked her. She showed me the house. It was definitely a C-class area, but at the time I was just like it's going to be me and a couple younger, fit guys living there. So what could go wrong? So it was C-class, but it was also a 2009 build house Mm A three-bed, two-bath with an unfinished basement. I had a huge open grass lot next to it, which I ultimately ended up buying down the line. But, yeah, 115,000 purchase price. That was once again 2019. I put 3% down, conventional on that.
Speaker 1:Did the inspection ended up having the seller basically pay all of my closing costs and supposedly got into that asset or that property? For I think it was like I wrote a jep for about $2,500, $3,000, which is I had $8,000 to my name at the time because I had just graduated and didn't even start working yet. And then I had these two buddies One was playing soccer there and the other had just graduated and was working a job and I was like, hey, I knew them from growing up in St Louis. They were St Louis kids too. And I was just like I got these two open rooms, it's a nice house. They knew the area. I was like 450 a month each rent for the room and the whole house and yeah, my mortgage was whatever 850, 875 and collecting 900 a month. And then we just split utilities three ways and the house was turkey. I think I had to buy an oven that I got off Facebook marketplace. It was just us three 23 year old dudes hanging out in this house and that's how we got started.
Speaker 3:So Dude, it sounds like a pretty good investment. $2,500 out of your pocket and getting the seller to cover those closing costs was pretty clutch in that scenario but $2,500, $3,000 out of pocket, and now you get free rent and you get to live with your buddies for a little while. What sounded really impressive to me in your story, though, was that, eight months later, you went and got a second house hack, which a lot of people like. It could take them years to even go and buy that second property. So what did that second house hack look like? What was the financing like on that? How do you save for the down payment? Tell me about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely so. Of course you get out of college. The typical route is most people go rent or buy a house. Because I was house hacking, really had no living expenses, being fresh out of college, hitting the bars and entertainment on the weekends and be your money, that was about it. I was still on my parents insurance type thing 23. So basically pretty frugal, very low cost of living expenses. So at this point I had passed my state board test, started working orientation as a nurse in the hospital, trying to pick up overtime because I was just hungry to go get another deal. So basically it was just saving literally probably 80, 85% savings rate of what I was making because I'm a mortgage type scenario. And yeah, I didn't know what the next deal was going to look like.
Speaker 1:And then, once again, my now fiance girlfriend at the time was renting a house with a good friend of hers in an area of Kansas City called Waldo, which I didn't know that much about, but I quickly really liked the area with all the amenities it had. In just one day I was at her house and I started getting on wholesalers email list and I think we were just hanging out on a Sunday and I received an email from a wholesaler with that zip code. She was in at the time and it basically was like a pretty solid price than I thought and it happened to be 10 doors down from where she was renting on the same street. So I was like, hey, let's go check out this open house. And so ultimately reached out to this wholesaler, took a tour of the house. It was in good shape. It just really needed to be cleaned up in some cosmetics and it was just at a really good price. I think it was 125,000. Now, of course, it's worth double and it's been just three years or whatever. Didn't have to put much into it. Yeah, took a tour of the house, reached out to the wholesaler and I was pretty straight up. I was like, hey, and at this time, once again just saving all this money I think at this time I probably had 10, 12k saved up type stuff reached out to him. I was like, hey, your price is good, I'll buy this weird scenario. I'm going to actually live in this and owner occupy it, which is definitely probably not a standard process for most wholesalers to sell to. And I was like, hey, on 23, I have this much saved up. Would you work with conventional loan Because I knew I probably wouldn't go FHA because it's just the scenario. So he actually put me in touch with a lender who looked at my financials and was like, yeah, 5% down, conventional, you're good to go. So we got that deal done and then kept house acting so I'm off the wall and fixed this one out. Then I moved in and turned the first one into a rental, moved into this one, stayed there much longer than anticipated but yeah, that's how that one worked out. So, yeah, 5% down conventional, fixed it up Once I hit 12 months of one year of ownership, refinanced of course.
Speaker 1:I had bought it for 125. I kept the 8K into it over the span of a year and it appraised at 185.190. So I refinanced into, of course, like a 3% interest rate, got PMI to fall off and at that time once again my girlfriend and I were paying. Now we were paying like 400 a month to live in that house, which wasn't complete house hacking, but still just like dirt cheap Unabiquity. Opened up a home equity line of credit pretty quickly after that which allowed me to keep scaling. But yeah, still on that one as a rental today. So that's how I quickly went from one to two in eight months. And of course I had even reached out to my original lender and I was like, hey, I'm ready to buy another Like what's lender? So he was like you have to live in the first one for 12 months a year before you can go buy another. But this other lender didn't really care. He was like look, you got the money, let's get it done. All right, let's do it.
Speaker 3:And that's just a testament to not taking no from one person as the end all be all. If somebody tells you no, that's just a no from them. You can go ask a hundred other banks, you could ask a hundred other people and I'm sure someone there will give you a yes. There's so many people that think, oh, you need to season a commercial property for six months before you go and refinance. You need to season a regular residential property for six months. Everybody told me that, but then I was able to do that stuff like two months, three months, because I found the people that were able to make that happen. So definitely a testament to not taking no as that. Final answer question I've got for you. So the values of those properties now you bought the first one for 115, the second one for 125. What are those valued at today?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So the first one, 115, I would say conservatively, once again, c class probably just worth 165, 170. So not a huge equity position. Those same tenants the first tenants I put in there they've re-signed, they are on their fourth year, going for a fifth year, so no turnover cost. So it's been and I've had basically no repairs. So that's been a good play. That second house we actually just moved out of in November last year. So I'm coming up on one year of just moving out of that. So bought that one for 125. Once again, I think I put eight, maybe 9K into it total. If I were to list it right now I'd probably put it on the market for 215. So once again, close to double With that 3% interest rate that I refinanced at on a 30-year AM. It's renting, it's a 2-1. It's renting for 1450. So that one cash flows me, I don't know, just shy of 600 a month.
Speaker 3:Yeah man and you know what, dude, we haven't seen a ton of real estate cycles you or I, really right and the times that we were buying that I think I started buying in 2020, may of 2020. You said you bought your first one in 2019. So give or take a year or so between us, but those times that we were buying in I just saw these numbers and it was so hard to lose and, because of what we've been through, we've had increases, so high increases in rent value increases. We've had inflationary increases all over. Values have skyrocketed, rents have skyrocketed and it has just made us look like real estate and really good. And that's not to downplay what we've done and the hard work that we put in. But I think I try to be very cognizant and thankful and grateful that I got in when I did and I was able to buy up what I bought up when I bought that up. So at this point we've got those two properties. Give me an overview now of what your portfolio looks like today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So that was 23 years old, so that was 2019, because, yeah, I bought that second one December 2019. Full flash forward October 2023. I'm 27. So, yeah, now I own five storage facilities with a business partner that alone is definitely worth eight figures at this point, and then five single family houses. So, yeah, nowadays collecting, of course, gross revenue doing well into the 70K, 75K plus range monthly.
Speaker 3:So, dude, that's awesome and your partner it can set. Yeah, sorry, I cut you off there. Your partner, that's your brother, is it not Right? We're first guys.
Speaker 1:Okay, cousin, we get using a lot. But yeah, it's a great partnership and I'm sure we'll dig into that. But it's a partnership and we started slowly and scale that up too. But we were just talking before this podcast about making another offer on the storage facility.
Speaker 3:So we like the asset class Dude, it's awesome, so let's dive into that now. So you've got five storage facilities, five single family homes. Let's focus on these storage facilities now because that's a pretty good amount of buying of storage facilities. Within the last three years or so, storage has been doing really well. I know you've got like a 290 unit the big oak storage facility, self storage facility. So what got you interested in self storage and how did you first dive into finding your first deals and looking at the numbers and being confident to buy those?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's been a journey. So, yeah, flash forward from where we were talking about to now. So 2019, about those two single families. 2020, weird year. I didn't buy anything.
Speaker 1:Looking back, of course, regret that I was just full time nursing, picking up overtime shifts, trying to save up mid 2021. I was sitting on a decent amount of savings. I honestly thought I was just going to go buy some sort of apartment complex, small apartment complex, or some sort of small multifamily, just let it cash flow. But for some reason, I couldn't tell you exactly when it started, but I just started thinking about self storage. I don't know if it was from the internet or just driving on highways and seeing them, because I've never personally had a storage unit and I was just always in the back of my head. I was like seems like such a simple asset class of Rodgers metal boxes. Of course there's more into it than that.
Speaker 1:But in Lake of the Ozarks is a place here in Missouri. It's about two hours away from Kansas City, two hours away from St Louis. People have seen the Netflix series Ozark it's based around that, so we've been going there since I could walk for summer vacations. It's a great place. So of course, I was like storage will work great there RVs, boats, stuff to that extent. So basically I started listening to AJ Osborn, who's a bigger pockets guy, he's a big storage guy. I read his book, started digging into his podcast, wasn't totally confident in how to underwrite it, but it just seemed simple.
Speaker 1:So then I just picked up the phone and started cold calling down at Lake of the Ozarks and, like the second or third facility, I called the lady in the office answers the phone. I was like can I have the owner's cell phone number, which never people would be like yeah, but she just went ahead and gave it to me. But me and that guy hit it off. He was a much older gentleman, was just ready to let go of it. So we met him down there, walked through it. We just saw the potential, the numbers seemed to work quite well and ultimately we just went into a bay down there nearby a local bank and was just like do you guys do commercial loans on storage assets and what does that look like? And took that first one down. And two years later we bought technically we've bought six. We sold one and did a 1031 into another. But yeah, in basically a two year time span we went from zero to just shy of 700 units in storage. But we're sitting at now.
Speaker 3:Dude, it's incredible and it sounds so simple and realistically it can be that simple. I think we overcomplicate a lot of things with real estate. But you literally all you said is I found some storage facilities in an area that I thought about maybe buying storage facilities and I looked up phone numbers and I started calling and asking for the owner. And then I talked to the owner and then I met with the owner at the facility and guess what? The owner wanted to sell me that property and we talked about the numbers and we went in on it.
Speaker 3:How confident were you with buying this facility, being that you only had single family properties at this time? And this is now a commercial loan, a commercial process where things are no longer based on the market value, they're based on the net operating income of the asset. That's a whole nother game to dive into and for me it was a little intimidating in the beginning. How confident did you feel, based on the numbers, that you were going to be able to get the valuation that you needed on this facility? And let's also talk about the numbers on that facility. What was the purchase price? How much did you have to bring to the table? What did all the financing look like. Let's dive into it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so simple but complicated. Like you said, we walked through this facility. It was a mom and pop brands shop. This guy was a local farmer. He was smoking a cigarette while walking through the facility with us. So it was 106 units. It was fully fenced in with a gate. So we liked to that. But of course for expenses you can have issues with the gate.
Speaker 1:But ultimately, yeah, the purchase price was 330,000, which was the price he gave us, which just seemed pretty low for 160 units. But of course it is storage. He didn't have any true retrol or profit and loss statements, which of course mom and pop owners is standard and somewhat of a secondary, tertiary market. Ultimately, we just looked at it and he was doing roughly 4500 a month putting it all together. So at 330,000 purchase, 400 or 4500 a month, we were like we have a pretty solid gap there of expenses that could go wrong for us not to be able to cash flow. So basically we just took a chance. We actually talked to another storage owner and operator who had more experience than us. We almost passed on the deal because he was telling us you're gonna have to replace these doors and do this and that, but the roofs were new. There's no climate control. So there was just in my mind and in my business partners my rear like what could go wrong here? Of course we're gonna have to increase the rents, which we found by looking at other facilities nearby.
Speaker 1:But ultimately we were confident in it running. I think we were just doing a simple like 25% expense ratio, took the chance, went into the local bank. She was like, yeah, we do these storage deals all the time. We thought we would have to put 20 to 25% down. She was like we actually have a product you can do 15% down. The interest rate will basically be the same. So, yeah, 330,000 purchase, we put 15% down. But we just opened up a business checking account, made an LLC and basically there was no phone. There was a phone number but there was no website. So we put this software in place called Easy Storage Solutions, built a website and, yeah, now that thing is an ATM machine for us. So we just took the chance.
Speaker 1:Obviously was not fully confident, but in the back of our heads we were like this is a pretty simple gig to start and the purchase price to rent ratio made a lot of sense and, of course, 15% down the interest rate was. I think we had a 4.1, 4.2, three year fixed on a 20 year AM. So yeah, flash forward. Now we're doing 5,800 a month. Yeah, loan comes to maturity next August, september. But yeah, that one does well for us, yeah, no probably be valued just like quick math Consolidatedly, we think it's probably double.
Speaker 3:So you're gonna do your refile, you're not gonna have a problem with it because even if you just pull out the full valuation of what you paid for the property initially, you're still only out of 50% LTV, so you're not in trouble. You're gonna have a higher interest rate, so you're gonna be paying a little bit more, but it's not like you're gonna be underwater. Which is why, like you're buying these killer assets, which my motto, my idea, my thought, is that in every single market that we're in, just go buy a good deal, just buy a killer deal. Have something where the cash flow makes sense, where you're buying into some equity. You have some equity built in for yourself, man, which just it just makes sense in every market.
Speaker 3:And another thing I like about this story is that you did not take no as an answer. It's almost like you heard that no thing again with somebody who was like no, I wouldn't do that, you're gonna have a problem here, you're gonna have a problem there. It's like experience. Investors are always trying like down talk. I feel like every single asset I've bought, somebody has always down talked it in some way and I just know in my head that no, this is a good deal and it's gonna work. And you just gotta believe in yourself, believe in your numbers, believe in your calculations and like. All of these things have worked out so far, which is really awesome to hear. So that thing is a cash machine for you. What is that cash flow every single month?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I think that one specifically. The funny thing is, yeah, we almost passed up on it and of course, like a month later we're like no, we need to buy this. So we took that down. I'm trying to think off the top of my head, cause our second one we bought was from the same guy just down the road and we liked that one even better. But yeah, I think right now between the two we take a business distribution just between those two, of roughly 7,500 a month nowadays. We didn't take any money out of the business for a year and a half. So I think that one specifically, I would say, is around 3,000 a month net cash flow. So it was, yeah, looking back a year one, I think it was roughly 60, 65% cash on cash and, of course, the equity now being worth double. It's been a good play for us.
Speaker 3:It's amazing man. I love the whole journey that you have. There are gonna dig into some other questions and stop talking about assets as much, but before we do that, I wanna know what your favorite asset is Like, whether it's your best cash flowing or your best story. With an asset Like, what is your favorite property that you own? How does it perform? What are the numbers? What does it look like?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good question that I don't think anybody's asked me before, because that's hard to, because of course my single families I've purchased them all separately. There's always sentimental value in the first two that I house out the babies, right, yeah. And then I looked back and then I did, like a seller finance deal, that my fourth house I bought was a true complete 100% per. So I eat. It's hard to say that's not my favorite because I literally own a house that pays me 300 a month with no money out of pocket. But then I have. I would say I like storage more than residential at this point. It's got the economies of scale. It's just nothing passive. But I would say it's a little bit more passive. And when you just break it down really of a $200,000 single family house versus a $3.2 million self-storage facility, just even when you really calculate like the principal pay down and what that's doing for you on that scale Right, it's just a house it's mind blowing. So I would say between it would almost be a tie of my two favorite assets that we personally own. Of course I will say storage is my favorite at this point. Of course that has become very populated in a hot asset. So deals are getting a little bit tighter and there's a lot more players in the game, which is what it is.
Speaker 1:But we have two assets. Our second storage facility just basically satellite view of it. We bought it for 750,000 and does 13,000 a month. Literally no expenses hardly. It's just a six acre grab, a lot with no HVAC or plumbing. But then we also have our biggest storage asset, which we basically brought in some private investors and it's not this cash flowing but we're not taking any money out of it because it's a long-term play.
Speaker 1:This asset it's the one you brought up, big Oak. It's a 290 unit self-storage facility. It's got climate control, it's got RV and boat parking, it's got retail. We took it down for 3.2 million. Well, we purchased it. It's been just over a year. We were doing 31,000 a month of revenue. Now we're doing 34,000 a month of revenue with unchanged expenses.
Speaker 1:And the second asset that we bought in the storage, where we were doing 13,000 a month, we have such low debt on it. It's just once again an ATM machine for us. That's great because I love seeing the actual pass of income coming in, whereas this A-class large facility that we're not taking any money because we're paying our private investors quite a bit. Yeah, the long-term play is in four years. If we can get an appraisal to come in at 3.94 million and do a cash out refi, then we're owning basically a $4 million A-class storage facility with $25,000 out of pocket. That would be paying us six 7,000 a month net. So I would say it's a tie between those two because I like seeing the money coming in from the one asset but the second one. If it does what it's supposed to do and we get to that appraisal in four years, that is gonna be a generational wealth, life-changing asset place.
Speaker 3:Dude, and that's the fun that we can start to dive into.
Speaker 3:Once you reach a level of financial freedom, at least, where you have your expenses paid for now, you can start thinking about those future generation assets.
Speaker 3:Right, I think we both, like, we're almost both in the exact same type of position.
Speaker 3:We have the same exact number of properties, we're both in a little bit of commercial, a little bit of commercial, a little bit of residential, and we've got our assets that cash flow us on the front end, that we actually just own, basically whole out. But then we both have these back end assets that, like, we buy into and we bring investors into, not to get us a bunch of cash flow, because our cash flow is basically already covered, our living expenses are pretty good, but, like, these assets are the ones that are going to be good for the future. They're building us equity, they're building us wealth and they're going to cash flow pretty nicely, which is a great diversification strategy that you can use. And it's much easier to do this once you reach financial freedom and you have that level of flexibility. So, dude, let's talk about financial freedom, let's talk about your mindset with financial freedom. What happened? When did you quit your job and go full-time real estate and start doing this whole thing, and how did you feel about doing that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's a good question as well. On that journey, yeah, I graduated in May 2019, passed my board's test. It was like July 2019. So I was a full-time ICU nurse for two full years. At this time, of course, I only had a couple of assets which the passive income was definitely not enough to handle the expenses of living.
Speaker 1:So end of 2020, beginning of 2021, which I know we haven't talked much about I actually got my real estate license to be a licensed realtor. The plan was just to save on commissions if I happen to buy deals on the market. I never planned to be like actually buying and selling for clients, but ultimately started slowly taking on clients End of 2021, that kind of scaled up a little bit. So I went part-time, I think, end of 2021, and not because my passive income was crazy yet, but rather just I found the potential of what you could get paid via commissions if do well as a realtor. And then 2022 was still part-time at the beginning. Then I went what we call PRN, so I was literally working. I guess it's been probably almost a year and a half two years since I've worked as a shift as a nurse, but I went PRN, which means I was working literally like two, three shifts a month and, yeah, looking back, 2022 ended up selling 8 million basically in volume in real estate, which is nothing too crazy but a pretty solid year as just shy of basically 200k income via commissions type situation. So definitely enough to quit nursing at that point, but once again I still have that as an active job, which I've definitely have probably taken my gas or my foot off the pedal as far as pushing for that as that hard.
Speaker 1:But yeah, the passive income once again just shy right now 10k. I'm probably at 10k, honestly, but of course I don't touch all of it, it just sits in reserves account. So I like to tell myself 9,500, so it'll motivate me to keep going harder to get to 10k, but we're probably right there. And then, just right now, the living expenses are probably in between 4,045 a month. So pretty sizable gap there for the passive income and the living expenses. Then still being able to wholesale real estate a little bit here and there, and then once again, just still selling real estate and trying to do basically anywhere from 7 to 9 million a year. So enough to live off of. It's very nice nowadays like once again, wake up, have my cup of coffee, go to the deal and come home, take my go and retriever for a walk and really get to sit and think about what next steps are. This also allows me to self manage my whole portfolio.
Speaker 3:Sorry, yeah, man, there's nothing like being able to wake up whenever you want to. And I remember like you and I connected pretty well, like we are, dude, we're so similar in the way as like going to the gym, like that was one of my main things when I was about to be financially free, or like I was working towards financial freedom Because I was like man, I'm just going to be able to spend so much time at the gym and go to the gym whenever I want to go and go. Do all this, like walking my dog, taking my dog out for long walks every single day, like now it's at least a one hour walk every single day. And these are the things that you don't necessarily have an option always to do when you're working a job, unless you want to sacrifice in other areas of your life, like seeing your girlfriend or your kids or taking out in your sleep. So that is a main pull.
Speaker 3:And, dude, I didn't even congratulate you, man, I saw the pictures on Facebook. Dude, congratulations on the engagement, brother. That is, that's amazing. So, since that is happening now, 27 years old, man, you're pretty good financially. Like you're going to keep buying assets. What do you see as your future, what you got like a next 10 year vision. What do you want to bring into your life and what are you striving towards now?
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, yeah, absolutely, and it's, I feel like for me it's something that's constantly evolving Because once again, I just at this point, I was able to quit nursing, so I don't have that W2 corporate, I have my real estate license, so a 1099 contractor whatever you want to call it self employed, so I get to do that as I please, which has happened to pay me. It's such a weird position to be in Because once again, we talked about the goals of seven figure net worth being a millionaire 10K, 5k passive. Now there, right, I don't necessarily need to work. I hit the millionaire mark before I turned 27. So at the end of 26, of course that hasn't changed anything real like in reality, and so I don't know exactly what steps are. So I think for me, of course I'm going to keep acquiring assets, so for me, just continuing to try and close deals as an agent broker and just pour those commissions into more passive income. Of course, yes, just recently engaged and so planning a wedding at this point, she still works, her. She does very well for herself in the sales position as well. I don't think she really wants to quit, or she jokes that she would like to at some point.
Speaker 1:I think I would really like to travel quite a bit. I know we talked about that in Nashville when we were there, about how I've been out of the country just once, so I feel like there's just a lot out there for me to see. So, trying to figure out how that works for my now fiance soon to be wife and how we can incorporate her taking PTO, bringing the dog along or finding a dog sitter of course, I'm just a frugal guy. I think I get it from my father. I just don't live that lavishly. I don't really go shopping. I have a 2015 Toyota Tacoma. That's basically paid off. I don't have any plans, so I like a crazy nice car. We have a nice house we live in. We're 27 with no kids, so it's a pretty simple gig.
Speaker 1:So for me, I think I'm just going to keep acquiring assets, hopefully travel a little bit more, my more quite a bit, hopefully going into the early 30s and from there, once again, I haven't sat down to create an actual goal. Sometimes I say to myself things of okay, we originally were a millionaire by 35k a month. Now we're 27 and we basically doubled the pass of and we've hit the seven figure mark. Is there a new milestone, a new goalpost by 35? Do we get to like literally 25, 30k a month passive? And I don't even know what I would want for a net worth because I'm more worried about the lifestyle of the passive. So that's where I'm at, just figuring out day by day. But I don't have any huge plans on the horizon. Just keep buying assets and probably within the next five to six years, let go of management and outsource management. But other than that, nothing too crazy on the horizon. Really just keep buying my time back with assets.
Speaker 3:So Dude, it's going to be cool to reconnect in the future and even give this podcast a listen and see where we're at when we're both like 32, 33, 34 years old man, because I'm in that same boat where, right around 30 years old, 32 years old, I'd like to be at that 30K per month mark. I think that gives me more stability to start, raise and bring up a family and be able to be present and have a good time, cause at 10K a month and you know how cash flow can fluctuate from time to time. But at 10K a month you got a family. If, yeah, I don't know if you want kids exactly, but you got the wife, you got two kids. Whatever, it is three kids. That's pretty expensive. 10k is going to be tough For sure, exactly, and lifestyle is going to go up.
Speaker 3:But, man, you hit one important thing and that's frugality, and I put that honestly as the base of all of financial freedom. Dude, when you get to a level where you can be so frugal and I think frugal is you just know exactly what you value and where you want to spend your money, and that's the only thing you really spend it on. So for me, that was like healthy food and going to basically healthy food and going to the gym, and then outside of that you get your house hack. Your house hack pays for your rent. So you don't have the rent anymore.
Speaker 3:If you don't need a big fancy car like my car, I got a 2005 Honda Civic dude. I bought it for three grand cash like four years ago, so it's no car expense. So if you don't have the housing and you don't have the car expense, the only big things after that that you have are really food and then health. So it's like, all right, I'll spend it on food and the gym and that cost me like maybe two grand a month for all those things. I'd still go to play in a fitness for 25 a month.
Speaker 1:They're drinking Goldberg's coffee right now.
Speaker 3:Dude, that's it, man, and it's the base. And then if you only need like five grand and three grand, whatever it is, four grand and you're gonna be financially free, dude, there's assets out there that you can go find that'll make you like three grand, two grand, one grand a month, like this if I was to move out of my four plex I house hack here, the other two units make me two grand right now. Or the other three units make me two grand net on top of mortgage tax and insurance, water bill, all that good stuff. But if I was to move out of this like this, one building is making 3,500 a month. So you can find these things that do this, but it's a little harder nowadays because real estate has become a hot topic. But, dude, last question before I dive into my final questions, which I meant to ask earlier finding a solid storage facility. What are the main things that you're looking for in facilities that you're buying? How do you identify a solid asset to buy?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, nowadays, of course and I will say all of the storage facilities we are in the same market, so it's very easy for us. Nowadays, of course, we love the idea of having a portfolio, of quickly being able to see a rent roll and being like are they atop of the market rents or can we raise rents? Is there a value at play there? For me and this may not be for everybody, but I like to focus on secondary and tertiary markets. First off, they're just better cash flow plays and from, at least from my experience being from St Louis, living in Kansas City, these big cities and these primary AB class markets, it's a very institutional owned so it's hard to even get a true, just, individual owner on the phone. So at that point you're wasting your time in those trade in the four to five cap range, which once again rates where they're at. It's hard to make that kind of crunch number wise.
Speaker 1:When I got started cold calling what I still do, of course first you have to be motivated to pick up the phone and just take no for an answer, get told to piss off and go from there. So that's step one, step two at least. When I started, I basically would find an area or market that I liked. What that looks like is something that you may be close to living wise or maybe not, but once again, on the outskirts of a main city, looking up, basically, storage in a mile radius of where you'd like to be and looking for the ones that have one star Google reviews, two star Google reviews or no Google reviews. And then the first handful that we looked at had no websites, they had no electronic payment systems, and if you're able to drive by these facilities or just even do a Google Street View, are they fenced in? Do they need to be fenced in? How do the roofs look? Are they asphalt versus shingles versus metal roofs?
Speaker 1:We have very different, basically, assets in the storage space of. We have gravel lots, we have asphalt lots, we have concrete lots. Asphalt has to be resealed every couple of years, so, keeping that in mind, of course, that would help raise rents. If you have that opportunity to do gravel, get ready to spray a lot of weeds if it's not well taken care of, because that's something that we've definitely quickly learned.
Speaker 1:If you have a six acre gravel lot, you're gonna have some weeds and then, yeah, just being able to, you can even just call storage facilities. Go get the experience of what it's like to rent. Is it a good experience, bad experience? Is anybody even picking up the phone when, as far as being able to see if it's a new market you haven't been in before? Can you look at the other storage facilities? How far below is the one you're looking at? As far as rates, If you're looking at one that a 10 by 10 unit is 50 a month and you see the person down the road is charging 65, 85 a month, you see the opportunity to slowly raise rents there, which is a huge value at.
Speaker 3:Yeah, those are some of the keys that. I also heard a few extra there from. You added a few extra from what Ben called when I had him on the podcast he was mentioning. One of the big things that stuck out there is the Google reviews. Like, looking on Google, do they have a, do they? If they don't have a Google website, that's probably even better.
Speaker 1:That's probably even better. The first two we purchased they literally had no website, no electronic payment system, which was crazy, cause, of course, we're self managing these from two hours away, so we put in these software systems that are very user friendly, very cheap to use. We've added security cameras so we can keep an eye on things for two hours away. But yeah, there's a lot that either have no Google reviews which, yes, could be a huge thing or they just have one, two star reviews. They trying to find the owners of that, dude.
Speaker 3:That's it, man. And this convenience store I'm buying right now, like it does pretty well itself, dude, but like just different value you can look for. Like their Google reviews they've got like a 1.7 star rating out of 26 reviews online. Man, just rebrand it, make it look good, make it look a little nicer, cleaner, and I'm pretty sure I could increase that revenue more. So it.
Speaker 1:Storage is interesting cause it's we've talked about residential versus commercial. Residential is real estate and then storage, specifically, is a business that's ran and basically assessed like real estate, but it truly is a service based business.
Speaker 3:And making sure people feel like you're gonna get good services is part of that. So, man, love it. Dude, I really appreciate you coming on today, so I'm gonna dive into our final questions here. What is one actionable step our listeners should take today to start on their path towards financial freedom?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would say dig into bigger pockets or join some sort of local mastermind, local group, go to local real estate events. Coming from St Louis to Kansas City, being a nurse owning one or two houses at the time, I didn't know anybody here in Kansas City at the time besides my close buddies that I grew up with and a handful of them there. But I literally just started. I got them bigger pockets, created a profile, started just reaching out to people, asking them to take them out to coffee and trying to learn the business, learn Kansas City and just put my face in front of people and, like I said, it's really paid off. So, just putting yourself out there and trying to learn from people who are far ahead of you Because I was by far the youngest at a bunch of local events here locally and have learned quite a bit and have made some great connections, Dude and being that young hustler man that makes you stand out so nice.
Speaker 3:Dude, I always used my age when I was making cold calls. Hey, I'm a 23 year old, 24 year old investor in the area. I have a few properties. I saw you own a ton of properties and I really wanna be like you when I grow up. I was wondering if you would meet for coffee and then go meet these guys for coffee, man, and build the relationship. Bro, I'm serious.
Speaker 3:Oh man, yeah, bro, so that is a great tip. Bigger pockets can be so helpful to help build your network out and make you feel like you got some people who go to questions, go to with questions. Last question I've got for you, steven what is one question that you wish I would have asked or a topic that you wish I would have covered, and how would you have answered that question or how would you have expanded on that topic?
Speaker 1:And you're saying I didn't know that was coming. What have you asked me? Yeah, I don't know who talked about the frugality of it. I think that's a good topic to hit on more. I think a lot of it has to do with people's upbringing. But, like I said, I know people who get that first wholesale check and stuff like that, or commission check, and they go buy a new car. They slowly scale up their lifestyle and it's just you and I both know, even with the past of income we have now and we talked about it just being frugal and I guess there's nothing that really impresses me too much materialistic-wise. Next thing you get to do is just keep saving money and buying more assets and buying your time back. So I think, despite all of it, despite buying the real estate and figuring out the lending, getting creative, raising capital, networking, whatever it may be if you can just keep the living below your means for a while, I think it's really beneficial to start and scale up.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think so too. That's one of the hardest topics I really try to hit on here is man, don't worry about the clothes or the cars or any of that stuff like trying to impress other people. Because a lot of that stuff that we strive for, to try and go out and buy, is to build almost like a fake sense of confidence within ourself. We might think we want it, but we really want the way that it makes us feel, and the way that it makes us feel is because that's how other people are looking at us and that's the bit that we want. We want that.
Speaker 3:But if you can get yourself to feel that confidence without needing any of that stuff, you're gonna be even better and you're gonna be buying cool ass assets that are gonna make you even more confident on the back end, man. But how can you build your confidence, man? Eat healthy, go to the gym, live a good lifestyle, live a healthy lifestyle. Keep doing things that are making you happy. When you go out and buy these flashy things that are making other people like to impress other people, you're really degrading yourself Because you're saying to yourself hey, I'm not good enough for me as I am right now. So, man, love it, dude.
Speaker 1:One of the first books I read Millionaire Next Door. I'm sure you've heard it. Yeah, I think this kind of brings it all together. I love that book.
Speaker 3:That is a good book recommendation. And they even said I think that's the reason why I bought a Civic. But in that book, actually, what was it? Like a Toyota Camry or like at that time Cause I got the revised edition, it was like at that time when they were writing it, it was like a, either like a Ford Ranger or one of the-.
Speaker 3:Nope, f-150. Right, and then, like, nowadays it's like the Camry or something like that. So man, so cool. Love hitting on all these topics, dude. Love to hear and learn more about your story. Dude, where can my listeners and watchers find you online?
Speaker 1:Yeah, pretty active on social media. I don't have any specific personal websites or anything like that. Well, yeah, Steven May on Facebook pretty simple Steven with a VMA like the month. Instagram Steven May underscore real estate. Do quite a bit of post on my story there. And then LinkedIn. But yeah, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, those are probably the biggest options. I'm happy to drop email and phone number for you to post on the details later on, but yeah, yeah, man, sounds like a plan.
Speaker 3:I already have all that information, so I'll throw it in there. But, bro, it has been great to reconnect with you from the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast. I'm your host, matt Amobile. Today we had on Steven May and we are signing off. Thank you, steven.
Speaker 1:Yeah, pretty.
Speaker 2:Thanks for listening to the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast, the show that teaches you to buy back your time and live life on your terms. Be sure to subscribe to this podcast wherever you're listening, and follow us online at Matt Amobile. That's Matt AMA B I L E. Be sure to tune in Monday, wednesday and Friday for our weekly podcast drops. Thanks for listening. Let's retire together.