[00:00:03] Andrew: Welcome everybody to another episode of Your Wealth & Beyond. Today I am super excited. Couple of points. One, this is our 30th episode today. Secondly, this is the first time we’re doing it live on video. And third, I’ve got a good friend, somebody I respect and somebody I’ve known for a long time. Zack [Kips 00:00:22] on the show today to talk all things real estate, work ethic, entrepreneurship. Zack, welcome to the show. How are you doing today my friend?

 

[00:00:31] Zack: Doing amazing Andrew. Thank you so much for the opportunity of having me on. It’s always great to see you and excited.

 

[00:00:37] Andrew: You clean up so well. I love it. This looks great.

 

[00:00:39] Zack: A special occasion to be with my buddy.

 

[00:00:40] Andrew: There we go. So as the listeners know the your Wealth & Beyond Podcast is built to help each and every one of us build wealth and find purpose. And today we want to talk through with you Zack on how you’ve built a real estate, I’m going to call it empire. But how you came from failure. Where you came from the depths of the great recession, how you picked yourself up and were able to build this through blood, sweat and tears. So that work ethic is something that a lot of us we want to have but it’s not for everybody, right?

 

So entrepreneurship. You’re basically an entrepreneur. You run Zack Ventures. Zack Ventures has been in existence now since…

 

[00:01:25] Zach: 2002. 17 years.

 

[00:01:25] Andrew: Okay. So you’ve been in real estate… How did you get into real estate? Was that a passion growing up for you in Michigan?

 

[00:01:31] Zach: Sure. Talking about entrepreneurs I grew up blessed that I was socialized in a family of entrepreneurs. My father started his own mall business. My grandfathers both had their own individual scrap business and then multiple business on my other grandfather’s side in terms of development and random businesses always looking at different opportunities. One of my grandfathers literally drove around with a check book in his pocket looking at deals ready for execution with the ammunition to go out there and acquire deals or buy businesses.

 

[00:02:01] Andrew: And this was back in the Detroit area?

 

[00:02:02] Zach: Back in the Detroit area, MidWest sky. You’ve been to West Sky, right?

 

[00:02:05] Andrew: I am. The great city of Cleveland. I mean all you guys are now jumping on the Cleveland Browns bandwagon. But I’ve been there from the get go. And it’s funny. My daughter who’s, you know Winter. She’s almost 13 and she’s been for years she’d make fun of me for the, ‘My daddy how do you watch the browns and why are you always crying on Sundays.’ So now that they’re actually have this momentum, she’s trying to jump on the bandwagon. I’m not letting her jump on right now.

 

She’s going to work for it. But I regress. Cleveland, Detroit.

 

[00:02:39] Zach: We’ve got the lions, I can feel your sympathy. It’s been a tough, tough run.

 

[00:02:42] Andrew: Tough, tough but what we learned in those cities is nothing is given to us We’ve got to work hard. So you saw that with your grandparent and your dad is still looking out and working hard but then understanding the real estate business. Is that how you kind of got your full way in to it?

 

[00:02:58] Zack: Yeah, I mean I kept growing and going back to the Detroit days I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I wanted the ability to work for myself. Unfortunately I don’t like people telling me what to do. So I always knew that I wanted to create my own fortune and follow my passion. I had a big old business growing up. I shoveled snow, I would sell bracelets. As a kid you either have it in your blood or you kind of don’t. It was always kind of in my blood and I always knew that I want to create some sort of opportunity.

 

[00:03:23] Andrew: Yeah, we say entrepreneurship there’s a trait that for most it’s missing from other people. And it’s whether we’re crazy, whether we’re not. But we have something where like you said earlier. You can’t work for somebody. You can’t be told what to do. And every day you got to look in the mirror and it’s on you to make things happen which is… For some people they just don’t have it in them. So you moved out here to Phoenix how many years ago,

 

[00:03:48] Zach: Yeah, came out literally 2002 in August. Super-hot. And came off the airplane, I’m like, ‘What am I doing here? This is ridiculous.’

 

[00:03:55] Andrew: But you were young at the time, you didn’t really have responsibility and you just like, let’s see if that works.

 

[00:04:00] Zach: Absolutely. You got to put yourself out there. No risk, no reward.

 

[00:04:04] Andrew: Yeah, I’ve been out here now 20 years. It’s easy for us, we could have ended up in Chicago or Los Angeles or New York. But this is a city that it’s easy living here. You deal with the heat but it’s boom burst. And so what we’ll get into today is on the real estate side especially with Phoenix has been through many cycles. We’ve seen in our time pretty much one major one. So you came out in ’02 and you just like I’m going to just jump right in and that’s when you built Zach Ventures, as such a young lad?

 

[00:04:30] Zach: It wasn’t really… I wouldn’t say Zach Ventures was started… Yeah, Zach Ventures was a piece of what I did from 2002 but I started as a joint venture with cousins and my uncle out here. So I was blessed to have some capital behind me at the time, from 2002 to 2007 till the market basically imploded. As you know as a mid-west guy and one of the reasons I was with you early on, we met I think playing basketball or something at the gym.

 

And the thing that I love about you Andrew and still to these days, you’re a hustler. We’d get up every day and we hustle. You weren’t given your fortune. I wasn’t given anything. And so we wake up everyday with that mindset of getting after it.

 

[00:05:07] Andrew: So if somebody comes to you and says, ‘Zack how do you do that?’ What would you say to them?

 

[00:05:12] Zach: I think it’s more or less an innate ability. It’s something that’s intangible, it’s instilled in you, you have to have that fire and know that hey this is something to risk that I want to take. Some people just like don’t. They want that pay check and they don’t want to think after work. Nine to five and it works for the and I respect that. And just because that’s what they like doesn’t mean in terms of success it is what you make it. Success comes not just in capitals, are you happy? Do you love what you’re doing?

 

[00:05:40] Andrew: And so when you started working with the family, you were out there just looking at deals whether be residential deals, commercial deals but you just jumped feet first and you just tried to learn with the layout of land here in Phoenix and try to figure out what deals are going to work?

 

[00:05:52] Zach: Sure. It was mostly a single family residential. We were looking at distressed stuff early on in the days, that was kind of emulating their business model in the mid-west out here so they were looking for diversification with their business capitalized on another market that was set to boom and it did. From 2002 to 2007/2008 our market went from here to here which was a crazy ride. And it was a lot of fun. You can virtually throw a dart at a wall. You’re going to hit something and you would make money because the market was appreciating so quickly.

 

[00:06:20] Andrew: And as young as you were to come in and have that success you probably think that hey, this is how it is and you could potentially get a little cocky and mix some riskier bets. Is that what happened? You just kept thinking it’s going to continue, continue, continue?

 

[00:06:33] Zach: Yes and no. Obviously when you’re in that wave you think I want to just ride this all the way to the beach. I’m blessed that things happen for a reason, I’m not happy about the market imploding then. But you learn from every lesson. It wasn’t that we got ahead of ourselves and saying we’re going to go from $200,000 homes and go speculate on big commercial buildings, which at the very end we had some options and diversifications with larger deals.

 

But like Warren Buffet says, stay within your circumference of understanding, of your confidence. I believe that today. It’s easy to make a few dollars and you get cocky and you want to start… You think you want to make a million dollars overnight. It doesn’t happen. My wealth was built one property at a time, low income and that’s my niche. It’s easy again go get distracted on a day to day basis and think that maybe throw your money in a stock that you hear as a whisper, could be an amazing opportunity. But again, I’m very conservative and I don’t look to hit home runs.

 

I aim for selling singles and stay again, within my circle of understanding.

 

[00:07:27] Andrew: Again, we’ll talk about the success you’ve had over the last eight, nine years but let’s go into that 07/08. So it effected a lot of people, the great recession. Real estate it obviously in out here it affected a lot of people whether in the mortgage Industry, real estate, developers et cetera. Did you ever sense that it was…? Was it a slow train wreck? When did you finally realize that things are getting nasty out there? And there’s some trouble brewing and how did that then affect you both professionally and personally?

 

[00:08:00] Zach: Absolutely, great question. It didn’t happen overnight per say but in a certain perspective it somewhat did. I mean when you’re out there and you’re on the front lines when you’re in the force you don’t necessarily see the trees. So super important to no matter who you are, whether you’re Andrew Rafal or Zachary Kepes, it’s always have a higher visionary or a picture or a colleague, someone to help you keep perspective when you’re nestled in that forest, to really see what’s going on. Kind of your quarterback if you’re out there playing on the field and you don’t have that full vision and scope.

 

And that’s why it’s important to have somebody like you Andrew obviously giving you that different perspective. So me being on the front lines, being deep in that forest you don’t necessarily see it coming on until you start not getting those phone calls for the deals and obviously the offers are deflected and prices continue and more supply is rising and demand is lower. Simple economics. So it was a very difficult time to transition from a vertical mark going up to a market that stagnated and then starts to implode massively and what do you do in those situations?

 

You want to be as conservative as possible, get out while you can if possible and take care of your debts

 

[00:09:04] Andrew: Were you over leveraged at that time? Were you able to get out?  

 

[00:09:10] Zach: We weren’t overleveraging at the time. What happened to us was we weren’t holding a lot of stuff which was good. So on a flip business model if you’re just buying and flipping you’re not stuck with a lot of inventory. So after the implosion, we’ll get to it but that’s when I started buying when I saw somewhat of a bottom. But during the time, it’s very difficult, it’s like you’re hit with the wave and you’re underwater you’re just swimming to get to the top of that water. It’s a difficult time. Trying as much as you can.

 

[00:09:35] Andrew: Right. And then the capital is just drying up, banks are calling. So I guess the key for this is not being completely over leveraged and not having huge deals that are out there. A lot of maybe smaller deals where some of these developers and land owners. Never in a million years would they have thought that it would have happened the way it did.

 

[00:09:55] Zach: No one can predict that per say and there’s some economics and theories out that may have but again I always say if you can see that we’d be at Vegas playing on the tables Black Jack. Everyone always asks me if you can forecast the future I’ll be at the Black Jack or the craps table.

 

[00:10:09] Andrew: I thought we’re getting on the plane after the show and we’re going.

 

[00:10:12] Zach: I’d love to.

 

[00:10:14] Andrew: So you starting to see obviously, trying to make it through your bills. Things aren’t good and now all of a sudden it’s 09/10 and you start… What’s going on? You start seeing this huge opportunity?

 

[00:10:27] Zach: Sure, lets talk about those two difficult years. Everyone likes to talk about the good times but let’s go to the bad times. Again, gives the experience to kind of see and recognize those signals again of the market shift and the change by hunkering down literally. I rented… My primary hose that I lived in, I rented to a Coyotes hockey player. I living in a second home in a bedroom. I was hunkering down just to pay the bills literally just to cover my debts. It was a difficult time.

 

All I knew was real estate. That’s my background, my blood, and sweat and tears as you talked about. So it was a scary couple of years. There wasn’t a lot of transactions. There was some short sales, you can pick up some ancillary income through representation effect. I represented you on a great deal we picked up as a primary I believe back in that heyday.

 

[00:11:12] Andrew: Maye one of your first deals. Before we get into the deals, like when you’re going through these dark time. It’s not like you were the only one. But like when you’re waking up in the morning or trying to go to bed at night what were you doing to stay sane and know that your bank account is dwindling. You got all these deals outstanding, you got things not moving. What kept you going day in, day out?

 

[00:11:35] Zach: Great question. You got to be always be optimistic. I think health, the mental health and for me it’s physical fitness. Everyone’s got their outlet of stress relief. If I would have done nothing and just laid in bed and fall into depression, that could have been the worst possible thing. Instead I got motivated through sport, through triathlon and fitness. And to me that’s what gets that release and that kind of potential anxiety through the hardships that we were experiencing to get me kind of going, get out of that funk if you will. Because this was a very, very difficult time.

 

But I remained optimistic. I stayed in good health and physical fitness. I cleansed my mind so I could think positively. And focused and just waiting for that opportunity to come back into the market to capitalize on the skills that I’ve acquired and honed in for the last seven or eight years.

 

[00:12:22] Andrew: So listeners that’s great advice. And it doesn’t have to be a time where it’s in turmoil. It’s also a time where you’re running a business. You got to keep your mind and your body healthy and you got to eat right and you got to find what your passion is and focus on that. It’s not always about work. But assume you also kept your network out there too. Your industry, even though everyone is kind of feeling it, keep your network out there not hide into your room and just knock it out there. So that’s important.

 

Did you ever think like… Because I know your brother in law runs a DJ company back then, did you ever think you’d have to go work for him? Was that ever in the mind?

 

[00:12:54] Zach: DJ is not my skill set but at the time you do what you got to do. I was always looking at other opportunities, short term. If I needed to spin some records for my brother in law I certainly wouldn’t be opposed to that. You got to do what you got to do at the end of the day, there’s no harm. Again, I remember going on dates with women. Where are you living? I’m living in a second bedroom of my parents’ house. No shame in that game. It is what it is. You got to hunker down and do what you got to do to survive.

 

[00:13:17] Andrew: And with your thriving personality I’m sure they got through that and they know, hey this guy is going to make it at sometimes. And the ones that didn’t, then they’ll look back and say, hey I should have stayed with the guy. So we got through these somewhat dark times and then you realized there’s this tremendous opportunity… Single family homes. So let the listener know how bad did things get here from the 05/06/07 into then what you were buying through yourself, through investors 10/11.

 

What was that threshold there?

 

[00:13:50] Zach: Sure. Great question. So from 2002 to 2007 we were acquiring homes at $50,000, $60,000, $70,000. We were selling them for $100,000. As the market continued to appreciate it became somewhat of an irrational exuberant market. We started to get every one in four homes, if you knew that statistic in Arizona was bought by some sort of investment company. Because there was a lot of demand. Prices went from $100,000 basically in the lower income and hit kind of a top threshold of $200,000 $210,000

 

Those homes at the $2100,000 we were buying those at the very, very end of the market for $150,000, $160,000 putting in $20,000, selling them for $200,000 maybe make 10 grand, 5%/6% back in the day. On the flip it was decent if you could move that inventory quickly and roll it through the cycle. So then first forward to that times of 2008/2009 where we kind of hit that bottom. Warren Buffet says, ‘When people are greedy be fearful and when people are fearful be greedy.’ We became greedy because those homes that we were trading at $200,000 retail and $210,000, Andrew now we’re trading at $30,000 and $40,000.

 

They talk about depreciation and getting annihilated.

 

[00:14:54] Andrew: So listen to that. So $210,000. And these aren’t huge homes, these are like 2,000 square foot homes?

 

[00:14:58] Zach: Smaller than that. 1,500/1,400 square feet block construction homes. Less than the cost of building these properties.

 

[00:15:05] Andrew: And part of the issue was on those homes with the no money down, on these undocumented loan people just buying three four houses at a time with no real income?

 

[00:15:14] Zach: If you had a heartbeat, you could qualify. Literally for multiple homes. You knew if you go get a haircut and your hair stylist says, ‘I own seven homes in the sub division.’ It may be a signal. Ding, ding. If everyone is buying, start running.

 

[00:15:28] Andrew: That’s the same thing as like we had bitcoin last year. We call it the taxi cab driver, when they started selling, they bought four homes, tech boom burst. So you could almost see that happen, it’s just trying to time. So you this opportunity but now capital for you isn’t there because you’ve lost all this money from these deals. So we talk about our deal, like when you got back into it and realized that hey, I need partners. What was that like? How did you think on what’s going to make sense, are going to do the work and then bring in these partners, walk the listener through how you kind of did that.

 

[00:16:01] Zach: Another one of my favorite quotes, Peter Lang says, ‘You don’t have to buy at the bottom or sell at the top. As long as you get a big chunk in the middle.’ I’m not a greedy person I’m always looking to get a decent chunk in the middle. And again, not hit a home run and not try to swing for the fences. I had a great history of success before. I’ve never burned anybody, I’ve never defaulted on anything and it was all about, it’s called OPM, other people’s money.

 

So I devised a business model where it’s 50/50. I had all the realtor and agent and wholesale relationships to acquire deals, still maintained those relationships that you talked about even in the down turn. You still want to get out, you wake up in the morning, maybe do your exercise, you call your colleagues, you call the title companies, what’s happening in the marketplace? Who’s doing deals? What are the cap rates? What are the returns? So as long as you keep your polls on the market, you kind of watching and staying immersed in that environment then you’re ready to execute.

 

While I was ready to execute when again we saw these homes trading so low with rents. That really hadn’t changed from the $200,000 price point down to the $30,000s. So if rents were $1,000 at $200,000, but that same home you could get $30,000 and get $1,000 in rent, you’re getting an astronomical return 20+ cap rate which is a 20%…

 

[00:17:16] Andrew: Never going to happen again in our life time probably.

 

[00:17:18] Zach: I hope not. If it is that is a buy sign folks, buy as many as you can. That being said, I was stuck. Like you said banks were nervous. They didn’t want to loan on a single family because they just got wiped out like most people. And so it was all out, where can you get available cash. If there’s no loans, you can potentially get hard money, that was super expensive. People are charging an 18-20%. There wasn’t tons of money in that market yet. It wasn’t as widely available as it is now. So it all came down to what affluent high net worth individuals were in my sphere of individuals that I knew, to call them say, ‘Hey, here’s a business model that I’ve created.

 

I’ve put together a fund. And I’ll run the whole thing, take no management fees, not commissions. Nothing. So I’ve a full vested interest in the deal. And every deal we acquire, the investor puts up the capital, do the work, on the disposition side, we sell that property, and then we split the profits 50/50.

 

[00:18:09] Andrew: And that was either if you flipped it or you kept it and the rent income you’d just basically create a little LLC return for them. So that’s an interesting component there. So you had to deal with a lot of mini investors, even though they are high net worth but they trusted you and we weren’t talking huge capitals so people just let you do your thing. And that’s when you started then building this network of… You obviously had a good accountant or CPA to deal with all of those LLCs, all of those deals. But then with doing all the work, what I think separates you from others out there that you’re able to connect and get the right contractors and be able to communicate with them and get your hands dirty.

 

So did you start building relationships with like with one contractor or was it a culmination where you had a lot of different teams out there that were helping you redevelop or remodel or rehab or whatever it maybe to get that house up and running.

 

[00:18:59] Zach: Yeah, it’s all about connections. It’s all about relationships just like in anything. You never want to burn any relationships, even in the downturn, it’s easy to forget about those people that work with you before, constructing the homes and those guys were kind of sitting on the sidelines trying to make it too. So they were super excited because I maintained and rekindled those relationships that I had prior to the burst. And those guys obviously had cousins and brothers and they see the opportunity.

 

So we were running six, seven crews at a time after that market. I mean we were trying again to buy everything that we possible could. I had deals in escrow that were presold and hedge fund started to come in so fast forward a couple of years. And it was just a wild fun time again. This is now what we’re talking about. We were at the right place at the right time and I believe in serendipity in things like that. And good karma. If you don’t screw people, you’re transparent in your business model, you pay your contractors on time, you take care of your investors, you run good clean accounting and you have a recipe for success.

 

And I’m not the smartest guy in any room and my ACT score it’s laughable.

 

[00:19:58] Andrew: So you’re telling me you didn’t have somebody take that test for you, where you’d go Indiana?

 

[00:20:03] Zach: I went to the Kali school of business, fine institution, Indiana University.

 

[00:20:09] Andrew: I thought that’s what they call Miami of Ohio where I went. In the show notes we’ll actually get to the bottom of that. But I do believe that it’s Miami of Ohio. But that’s another podcast. So your ACT must have been okay. So when we think about then why in your industry you’ve been through a lot and you’ve seen a lot of brokers. You’ve seen developers, why do you think a lot of them, the ones that do fail, what do you think that they do wrong or they can do better?

 

[00:20:35] Zach: Sure, I think it’s all about relationships. I think people a lot of times are short minded or short sighted in terms of money. They only think about the capital at hand. If they have to screw somebody, I like to call it a zero-sum game. If one person wins, another person loses, no one wants to do business with you again. If you’re to draw blood every single time… Again, zero sum it doesn’t work.

 

[00:20:57] Andrew: If you take good care of people, be transparent, and be open and honest, a deal is not going to work, you can’t hide from it.

 

[00:21:05] Zach: No. So we’re here for the long term. We’re young guys, aggressive but always fair. I always look for a win-win. If there’s someone in the transaction is going to lose, I will walk away from the deal. It’s just how it has to be. That’s why I’m still here. There is still a lot of guys in business that have got out of business because they only cared about how quickly they can make first buck. Just like real estate, it’s a marathon. It’s not a sprint. So again, I’m not looking to get rich and I wasn’t planning to get rich overnight. It’s a long game. It’s like an ironman.

 

You have to put in the time, the energy, do all the work to get there. You don’t just wake up and become an ironman the next day. You have to go through the training, you have to go through the nutrition. You have to put in the time, the energy, the blood, sweat and tears to get to that finish line. it’s not easy and it’s not for everybody but if you can execute and stay the path then you’ll be in good shape.

 

[00:21:50] Andrew: So 07/08 kind of the debts and then one house at a time, one house at a time and then ultimately you say private equity started sniffing around Phoenix. Sort of capital started to come in, more available, they started lowering the rates to basically nothing or negative. So what happened? How many homes did you have at the high point? Can we talk about that or is that a secret?

 

[00:22:12] Zach: No, there’s no secrets here. This is just an open and transparent environment. So I would say we were flipping up into the markets in 2007 we were doing around 200 deals a year, me my uncle, my cousins and that was a wild time. So of course the market imploded and of course again, we weren’t over leveraged so we really didn’t get hurt. I got hurt because I went to diversified investments thinking okay, I’ll get some passive income outside of Arizona because I was worried about our market and that’s came back to bite me.

 

And that’s how my net worth was good and then it just got annihilated because again, I didn’t have full documentation on some investments and it just didn’t pan out for me. That’s a good lesson learned. No matter where you invest, whatever you do make sure that statue of frauds, whatever you’re doing is in writing, you’re protected and you’re just fully backed on whatever your investment is. What is it collateralized by? Is there a personal guarantee? How’s the company’s liquidity? What if you need a capital? Those are all good questions you need to ask in any investment.

 

Real estate, alternative investments whatever it is, I’m sure when you’re looking at your clients you say what is the downside risk of this deal? What is the upside potential? This is what we’re looking at but also can we lose here? If we can, can we mitigate risk. I’m sure that’s an important factor for you and your clients.

 

[00:23:24] Andrew: So it was I guess your deals that you were actually in control of didn’t really bring you under, it was these outside deals. And so that hits home too, what we talk about with our business owner clients and executives that for companies is you don’t want to have all your eggs in that basket. Like real estate you had all your eggs in that basket. You were diversified in different deals but ultimately it all came back to real estate.

 

So when things hit the fan, then boom, boom all gone. So that’s one thing we preach, whether you know real estate, you know you can turn that dollar into ten times a lot easier then you’re going out doing something else. But you’ve also realized from that I assume, that you’ve got to have your eggs in different baskets and different investments and not just in real estate.

 

And that’s where a lot of people fall off. We see in these executives that have all their money tied in their stock. Obviously we know what happened in ’99/2000/2001. But it’s easy to drink that Kook-aid and be like I know we’re moving ahead and I’m helping the company grow. But then ultimately one bad or two bad orange reports of the private company and everything blows up. So the key is have a game plan so that you don’t make stupid decisions or decisions based on emotions. Well let the markets dictate it and then all of a sudden your hands are tied. You’re getting the margin call or the banks are calling.

 

Private equity then they got involved in more so, they were looking to, you guys have done the hard work, we need yield. We need to put some money to work.

 

[00:24:46] Zach: Absolutely. So it was interesting. I mean these eyes all of a sudden came in literally overnight and you start getting knocks. Any single family home owner that had ten, twenty, thirty homes at the time, these guys were targeting through tax records and public records and knock, knock, knock. ‘Can I help you?’

 

‘Yeah, hi we have $1 billion we’re looking to deploy.’

 

‘Very funny.’ I thought it was a joke.

 

[00:25:07] Andrew: They actually came to your door?

 

[00:25:08] Zach: They don’t literally knock on the door but they were calling on my phone.

 

I was like, ‘Can I help you? This must be a joke.’ Click. Call again.

 

‘No, we’re for real.’

 

‘Great send me a proof of funds,’ and they’re literally sending you $300 million in account A. Guess these guys are for real. And so you got to take, go through the motions and with… There are all these acquisition guys and I met with them and I said, ’Okay, if you guys can pay me X and this is what you guys are comfortable paying,’ which was the top of the market. I’m a seller. Again, you got to know when to hold and when to fold them.

 

If you can buy at the base. Again, we spoke about it before Peter Lynch and now they are offering at the top at the time, you’re a seller. If you can make 200% on your money in three or four months takes some money off the table. Great lesson, don’t be greedy, you hit a home run, move on. What’s called dollar cost averaging to the market. You can sell here but you know you still have relationships where you can buy over here Andrew then it’s a great spread. And if you can continue to do that, it’s a domino effect of great returns.

 

[00:26:05] Andrew: Sometimes it’s easier said than done to do that because pigs do get slaughtered but when you think about the market and how it’s moving, people get greedy. So for you to look at that and say you know what, I’m cool with taking some profits off the table, you can never be mad, you can never look at the mirror and say, hey, I made some money and I took it off the table. Looking back, yeah maybe you’d have held close. You could have had more appreciation but it would also just more headache. So on loading that, and taking some risk off and allowing you then to deploy capital on other deals, I think it’s a smart deal.

 

Especially how many times are you going to have hedge fund be able to come in and say hey, want to buy 50 times one time.

 

[00:26:40] Zach: Correct. They’d do deals ten houses at a time. You take 40/50. I mean at a certain point, yeah I did a 40 home package to a hedge fund, multiple 20s. It’s wild. And the thing is was great about, there’s no emotion. If you’re going to sell to a typical home owner you’re going through all these inspections. They of course did inspections which is fine. But there’s no emotion. When you’re dealing with just Wall street capital it’s not like, ‘Hey I need you to fix this. If you’re not going to put the towel bar, you’re not going to fix the shingle.’ Great, we just wat a $3,000 concession on the price and we’re going to move forward and close.

 

It takes away the emotion. It’s cleaner, it’s easier. You may have left a few bucks on the table. But if you take away that emotional mental aspect of it and you can move that inventory quicker and redeploy that because you know that you’re going to have $4 or $5 million from one quick sale to then go out and then acquire that. Boom! Move on. Again, maybe pick up a few thousand dollars or a few points more on a retail deal but how much time and energy do you expend dealing with that individual age and dealing with the emotional aspect of that buyer.

 

The negotiation, process. So sometimes in this situation it’s much easier when you look at the macro picture to sell to one entity and then continue to grow and redeploy that money in this market.

 

[00:27:47] Andrew: So and we’ll get into the some of your social media that you’re doing now. But for many years you were not promoting, not marketing. So how did you get the Zach Kips name out there, the Zach Ventures all those years and having people bring you deals. What can we recommend to those that are listening? How can we help them make that type of network happen?

 

[00:28:07] Zach: Sure. It starts and then it’s all about reputation and execution. I mean I got say really boils down to transparency, ethics, execution, communication, relationships. That’s what I build from the ground floor, just like our friendship. If someone brings me a deal and is a Midwest guy I like to say that… Again, I sit out here. People are so much lazy in business out in out in the west. We come from that Mid-West hustle come out here and hustle, you’re the first guy out of the house and you call up that agent, I want the deal and I’m sending in the offer, and you execute. People love that. So if you treat people well, you have fun with what you’re doing and again you get it done.

 

You don’t do what’s called retrageting, people want to do more deals with you. They know that you’re going to close the deal. This will mean no headaches and so who doesn’t want to do a deal with people that are executing in that capacity, are fun to work with and are persons of their word and integrity.

 

[00:29:00] Andrew: Yeah, they are getting things done. It’s amazing all the success that you’ve heard and you continue to have. If somebody were to look at you and not know that and just watch you or follow you for a day or two days or a week, they’d probably think this guy is just trying to make it. So, it’s a motivating factor. Financially, you’re independent but it’s like that drive is you must be having funds still, getting out there and doing it, closing the deals, finding the deals, helping people but you’re also putting people to work too, which is cool.

 

Think how many people over the last ten years that you’ve put to work in hundreds of people through all the labor, the construction and the different financing and so forth. So that’s… It’s not like you’re running your own business but you don’t have any employees at this point.

 

[00:29:44] Zach: They are all 1099, I have an assistant, bookkeeper and things like that. Again, we’re all like family. You treat them well, they are all independent. It’s like a big game of Monopoly but it’s real money. I wake up every day, I’m blessed but I got with the mentality, I like to say wake up broke in my mind every single day. So you wake up and hustle. And it’s kind of a unique mentality to keep. You wake up, set the tone for the day to work out. If you look at your bank account and you take one with the zero, and say today if I don’t work I’m not going to eat, you’re hungry

 

You got to make a business decisions, have some fun.

 

[00:30:14] Andrew: What I’ve realized about you over the last couple of months is that you’ve looked at now trying to get the brand out there The Zack Ventures and using social media. Whether it be Instagram of Facebook. Back a couple of years ago I don’t think you’d even do a podcast. So what changed on there and having fun doing it but what’s going on? What are we trying to accomplish with getting you out there and doing those videos and having fun and showing your personality and your work ethics.

 

[00:30:37] Zach: Sure. You got to adapt to the market. I mean social media has always been around but it’s always progressively getting more and more adaptable and you have all these young hustlers that we started when we were early 20s. These guys are out there with the Instagram and the podcast and these big shows. I was always deflective from that. I always liked to stay under the radar and I like to be humble. And you can still be humble with your social media and what not and you don’t have to show your material possessions because no one really cares about that.

 

If anything people kind of get deterred from it. But again, that’s just my opinion. I think like you said, I roll around in my Prius and stay humble. Not a showboat kind of guy, it’s not my thing. But again, I see the success of these young guys have and this is the kind of the wave of the future. You have to put yourself out there and continue to grow your networks. As we progress in our careers, in our business models some of these older people are getting out and these new guys that are in there. And if we’re slow to adapt to this new social media platform, we may be pushed aside too as these guys are getting deals and doing their unique advertising.

 

I’m not advertising to direct home owners. You say what’s the benefit? The benefit is to connect with more wholesalers. These young guys which are leveraging the social media to get more deal volume which is good. Also look when you have good branding, good presence you get referrals from people. People may get a massive deal and may need to raise massive amount of capital. If I’m staying in touch with people and there’s unique opportunity to put together or some sort of alternative fund for major distress portfolio or commercial or apartment building, guess what?

 

Those relationships are there. So you never want to burn any bridges. I continue to grow. Adapt and just think about the future.

 

[00:32:11] Andrew: And you’re able to put your real personality out there. Social media it’s not for everybody but you’re able to do quick little snippets, get people get it. I think I just saw one recently where you did this, you call Trash to Cash. And so you were inside somebody’s house. You had like a suit on. What was that? It was like a hoarders house?

 

[00:32:30] Zach: Literally. I mean we buy… The more distressed it is the better. So we like to create value from the ground forward. So a lot of times if it’s disgusting and there’s hoarders or or cats or dead bodies, we’ve seen it all. So if we can come in there and clean it up and literally create value through rehab, through good economies of scale, that’s how you create value. So trash, literally that we’re buying turning it to cash to create some sort of annuity of cash through rentals. We’re flipping at that’s kind of the real business model and a lot of times I’m always a joke star, as class clown in high school what not. You got to have fun with what you’re doing

 

And so I was making these mockery videos just as a joke on Facebook but people loved it. I mean for every reason they’re attracted to because I’m real, I’m raw and I’m like wait a second. If I do a little more of this, it could just be again, beneficial but in the right taste and the right capacity and I’ve gotten agents who’ve called me and said, ‘I didn’t realize that’s what you did.’ If you get one extra call or one extra deal what does it cost to put a ten second video out in social media. I spend zero dollars on social media. And I pride myself on that.

 

So if you can self-generate deals and revenues from authentic media and social media what a blessing.

 

[00:33:42] Andrew: What you just said earlier is that they didn’t know that you did that. That’s something in any line of business. You got to make sure your clients or your people or your network knows what you do and who you want to work with. Even in our industry let your clients know that you’re looking for like-minded. Not hey, give me three names. But it’s we take good care of you. If there’s anybody that’s out there we’re looking to take on clients like you, making sure people are aware of that and social media allows us to do that.

 

We’re not selling, it’s more of let’s push out good information. Let’s do things like the podcast or different blogs and books and then let people learn about us and learn about you and then they can come to you. So you’re actually starting to see some results already.

 

[00:34:22] Zach: I love it. It’s great when you talk about it naturally. I don’t push anything on anybody. It’s, like to use the word organic. Things just evolve naturally, organically. If it’s meant to be it’s meant to be. You’re going to connect with certain people naturally. If they see that again you’re buying distressed assets and they thought you’re just a realtor or something, they’re not going to call you. But if there’s an opportunity they say… I’ve had a lot of agents that say “hey, I didn’t realize you could pay cash, you can close quickly. My clients are getting divorced, would you be interested in this deal?”

 

And again, simple phone call. We’ll let you know right away

 

[00:34:53] Andrew: Now, when you went to that hoarder house, you weren’t actually going through that crap and those piles. Or were you?

 

[00:34:59] Zach: A lot of it was social media based. But you know what I would help my guys for. I mean I have the suit, I shipped it on Amazon but again I’m not out there doing the work. I credit my guys for that. But I have no shame if someone needs a hand we’ll clean it out for you. I’ll put on the gloves. We’ll get into the thick of things. I have no problem going knee deep into the junk, into the trash

 

[00:35:18] Andrew: And I thought that was cool in that video is that you were the… I think somebody passed away but then with the family you’re like, ‘Whatever we find in here that’s valuable, we’re going to set it aside and we’re going to give it to you.’

 

[00:35:29] Zach: What we did actually is crazy. If I’m buying from a wholesaler and the wholesaler has a relationship with the seller because a lot of times I won’t interface nowadays with the previous owners. So they bring me what’s called ‘a sign me contract’ and the wholesaler relationship which we can talk about later. But I won’t have that interaction so I don’t have the relationship with the seller but I will have that with the wholesaler. But I’ll give you my word if we come across something of value for the family which we did. We found $5,000 of savings bonds that the owner had in a corner in some bucket or something that we sent out the family.

 

It’s an unbelievable story.

 

[00:35:59] Andrew: That’s great. And that’s the type of stuff that sets you apart. It’s how many would have just maybe pocketed that and so forth. Those are the type of things you got to keep doing. So when you think about advice that was given to you whether it’s family, friends, contemporaries what is some of the… Any best advice that has helped you excel in what you’re doing professionally and personally?

 

[00:36:18] Zach: I mean stick to what you know. It’s easy to kind of get distracted in life and you hear about your buddy making monies selling diamonds or your buddy is doing stocks. Stay the course. If you’re good at what you do and you’re passionate about it, there’s going to be trials and tribulations and hardships. But if that’s your passion and you’re good at it, stick with it. I was great at real estate, a very close friend of mine Isaac, I think you know him. Again in that difficult time 2008 I’m like I don’t know. It’s easy to like run or wait for the market to turn, it could have been four or five years. He’s like, ‘Dude, you’re great at what you do.

 

I’ll even invest with you but stick with it. You’re amazing at it.’ So there’s a lot of times it’s easy to get discouraged.

 

Again I like to use the analogy of a Marathon or an endurance event. There’s going to be times during that four hours or five hour or run or eleven hour race that you feel terrible and you just want to pull over and take a nap or just throw in the towel. Keep moving forward. I mean it’s like a lot of times your mind plays games on you saying oh pull over and go but your body has the ability to keep moving forward and executing. Stay the course.

 

Also treat people the same way you want to be treated. Don’t screw anybody. It’s a small world. You do one, can I swear on here?

 

[00:37:27] Andrew: You can do anything you want.

 

[00:37:28] Zach: You do one shitty deal and you burn one person it’s going to come back to you. So I believe in that karma. So if you have a very good reputation, and you execute, you treat people well, the same way like again, when I went out and I lost my money through poor investments and I went out there to raise OPM, the other people money and I’m sitting on this side of the table saying, ‘Hey, I’ve been in your seat, you invested with me before. I’m going to protect you. And here’s the protocols we’re going to put in place to make sure you’re protected.’

 

That’s super important. So you can relate and connect with those people and know that they are going to be secure in that investment.

 

[00:38:01] Andrew: You’re saying OPM not saying OPP.

 

[00:38:03] Zach: Down with OPP.

 

[00:38:05] Andrew: Got it. So I think you’ve done some Ironman in the past. Doing any coming up?

 

[00:38:12] Zach: Nope. Once an Ironman always an iron man. But maybe in the future. It’s a very selfish sport. It takes up a lot of time. I’m just a deal junkie now just trying to continue to grow about how you talk about mission, I want to continue to grow my rental portfolio, do more flips, make sure my guys stay busy. And continue to have fun.

 

[00:38:30] Andrew: You’ve got your dog. You have to have time for the dog. Ironman is just incredible to think that you are able to do it and train for it. I just don’t get it.

 

[00:38:39] Zach: Anybody can do it again and it’s not like it’s some… It seems crazy and outrageous but nowadays it’s very achievable. And again, it’s not like you just wake up and do it. You have to have a plan, just like in business, a system, a coach. That’s why people even myself need people like you to quarter back like I fought a protocol. I didn’t just create my own trainings I’m going to become an ironman. I look at the professionals and said, what are these guys doing? How many hours I need to swim, bike and run? What do I need to eat? Even today I’m heavily invested in real estate and I have some equities but I call you and say “Andrew, What am I missing? Here’s my yields I’m getting today, your investment advice… What piece of the puzzle am I missing?” So it’s important to have a quarterback like you to make sure again that you’re looking over my forest when I mess with that tree is to make sure I can navigate my way out.

 

[00:39:26] Andrew: And our industry it’s changed so much over the last decade. It’s not just about the investment. It’s when you work with a planning firm and it’s helping like you said, ‘Look at the forest or coordinating, it’s actually that quarterback making sure the tax planner is working, the estate planner and looking at ways to help minimize taxes. A lot of our clients, business owners, entrepreneurs on the real estate side, we’re again heavy in real estate but they are getting crashed on taxes.

 

But things setting whether it’s a solo 401k or defined pension plans, how you can put more money in your pocket, much more than hey, did we beat the market overall. We know what the market… The market’s going to do what they do and we know we’re not going to hit the home run, we don’t want to strike out but last quarter tough. But when we have a game plan and you have those pieces together working in unison that’s where you set that value. So you listeners out there when you’re working with your team just make sure you got a trusted team whoever that is and not someone who’s trying to sell you something or one guy over here, a guy over here.

 

Nobody is talking. Nobody is talking how that’s going to help you especially if you’re running and gunning your business owner, you’re an executive. You barely have time for yourself let alone your family let alone getting your retirement plan in place. So it’s on all of those aspects and the real estate field it’s make sure that you connect yourself and put yourself with good people. I’m sure you’ve had people over the years they’re just like, ‘I’m not working with that person ever again.’ Whether they right, wrong or indifferent, they do you wrong or they’re dead.

 

[00:40:50] Zach: A wholesaler guy called me yesterday. He’s like, ‘Hey, I just got a call from this guy he’s looking at buying a home.’

 

I said, ‘Small world, how many he’s looking to buy.’

 

He’s like, ’20 to 30.’ Guy says his name, start running. It’s a small world. You’re not just going to do business with people that have poor reputation. So it’s super important.

 

[00:41:09] Andrew: Another thing, traveling I know is big for you. You try to get out there and see the world?

 

[00:41:13] Zach: I traveled a lot before. I love it, I think a lot of people are ethnocentric, they really just know about the US. I think you learn a lot by individual autonomous type travel. Because it forces you to engage with cultures, societies, foods. I speak Spanish which is very favorable in this market in Arizona because I have a lot of clients, renters that are Hispanic. A lot of the contractors are Latino. So it comes in handy and there’s that mutual respect if you can communicate with them in their language, people love that. It’s a true connection factor.

 

[00:41:45] Andrew: And for you being a mentor out there, young guy, girl getting into the business, something, that’s a passion for you to be able to get out there and help somebody else become successful and teach them the ropes.

 

[00:41:55] Zach: Sure, I’ve had a lot of calls. I’ve had an internship or two where guys have emulated my business model. Came out, taught them some fundamentals. I’m slammed but I’m always happy to pick up a phone, everyone calls, they have advice on a deal or is it a good buy or a bad buy. I’m always accessible and available to help anybody that wants to underwrite. I know the Arizona market so I’ve had call, ‘So hey what do you think of this deal in California or New York.’

 

‘No clue.’

 

You want to find a local expert. It’d be like my buddy telling me hey, go buy this stock. I appreciate the advice let me call Andrew, let me get a professional to evaluate that and make sure that it’s a good opportunity. It’s funny how people can make irrational decisions. I heard that this is a great company, what are the fundamentals. There’s a lot of misinformation out there. Again, so it’s always good to ask an expert in that domain. So you want to talk about single family, distressed real estate in Arizona, give me a call.

 

You want to talk about equities and a quarter back for your whole financial and tax planning, call Andrew. That’s why it’s super important to know who are those experts in those domains and those niches.

 

[00:42:55] Andrew: I mean think about even the last year, 18 months ago so Bitcoin. Bitcoin was one of those boom busts where everybody was seeing all these people making money and they just hey, I’m going to jump in and I’m going to be able to turn my $10,000 into $200,000. And everyone just got crushed. So usually when you hear that type of gulping into it, the top is in, it’s time to run.

 

We don’t know when the next one will be. I know a lot of the listeners out there when we think… I know you can’t predict the market but what are we feeling right now with regards to not just the Phoenix market but what are you feeling in regards to the real estate market both Phoenix, East Coast, West Coast where are we right now in the cycle.

 

[00:43:34] Zach: Sure from macro perspective we’ve seen a lot of appreciation from where we saw at the bottom. So looking at a snapshot of where we were from 2009, first forward a decade later, we’ve seen massive, massive recovery. I think we’re going to see, I’m cautiously optimistic about the market. Again if I could predict it we’re going on a plane to Vegas in five minutes and go put it all on black. But that’s not the case. I always look at what is the downside risk. Forget about Bitcoin. I don’t want to take these crazy risk. I don’t want to try and make $2 million in $0.5 investment.

 

Too much risk for me because the zero-sum game on that I’m going to lose my 50 cents and that 50 cents was important. I care about if the market does turn, whenever I’m buying in today’s market what will happen if the market value decreases? Where do I see the rents going and rents are super strong? Because if less people are buying, there needs to be more renters. There’s somewhat of an inverse relationship. So if there’s a correction in the market, I mean pricing coming down there’s going to be an increase in the rental value because more people are going to be on the street looking for rental opportunity

 

So as long as you can stay the course or you have calculated leverage meaning you have borrowing money from a bank at a reasonable rate and you can outperform that, then you have stability. A lot of people got in trouble before because they’d hoard money at 18%, the market drops, there’s a capital call on it and all of a sudden you’re done or the money is coming in and you’re buying that asset just because you thought it’s going to continue to appreciate. I don’t buy based on appreciation. I buy based on what’s cash on cash return in today’s market

 

And even if it went down in my capital invested what would be my yield? Because if you look at someone who held in 2007 to today they’d have been fine if they would have stayed the course. I think that’s the kind of a theme in anything today, stay the course.

 

[00:45:15] Andrew: Because emotions get in the way and that’s why if you have a trusted partner working with you they can help you not make those rush decisions. One thing we read about these millennials and like they’re never going to own homes, love to get your feedback on that. I personally don’t think that’s the case. They are going to have families. They are not going to want to live in an apartment. They are not going to, what do you think? We as the gen-X are kind of sandwiched between there.

 

There’s over 18 million of them. Do you think they are going to drive this market on the residential side over the next 10/15 years?

 

[00:45:49] Zach: I certainly hope so. I think that our economy is still pretty stable right now. I think that at a certain point they’re going to realize that they’re not really building anything for the future. I have this conversation with a lot of types of those people. Look, I love you and I’m happy to continue to take your monthly rental income but you got a great job. I’m looking at your application.

 

What is your goal? I interface with these people daily and I say, ‘Hey Paul and Julie, what’s your game plan? You want to just rent forever? I mean you’re paying $1,500 for rent. If you were to buy this exact home for example, you’re paying between $1,200, $1,300.’

 

‘Well, we’re not sure.’

 

So there’s kind of that ambiguous delay but I’m a believer that through proper coaching and understanding of wealth building that they will buy. I think they just need to have a little more education out there. But I’m not sure what the fire is for these people. Like you said, they’re just passive or maybe it’s the environment that they grew in or they are fearful…

 

Because they’ll just coming out of our market where they saw the markets tumble and there’s that fear factor. So it’s not for everybody. But I’m hopeful and I try and coach these people and tell them look, again, happy to take your monthly income but I’d love for you to build the house

 

Build something for your family.

 

[00:46:59] Andrew: And rates are so low right now and just this is last pull back we saw in the ten-year treasury rate, rates are down to 4%, 4.25$% even at 5% it’s still historically low. So we want to lock that in but ultimately yeah, it comes down to that decision of maybe they just want to be free and clear and not have to worry and be able to go to the next think but I think overall life happens and you want to lay some routes. You want to have a family. But I guess that will be to be seen.

 

Same thing on like the retiree market. We’re seeing, more and more people that are selling their house downsizing and they’re just like, you know what I don’t need to own. I’m going to have a turnkey, I’m going to have that, I’m going to have the airport, I can go here, I can go here. So we have clients coming to us and say, ‘Hey, what should I do?’

 

We want to walk through and look at the emotions and just know this isn’t so much needs to be an investment for anymore. Or if you got $800,000 in your house should we unlock that and downsize, do you really need the 4,000 square foot house that has the two floors?

 

So there’s a lot of what that’s going to do is change the markets but overall Arizona they’re moving out here, left and right every single month. So they’re building building. Eventually they’ll get to a point where they are like, boom bursts.

 

[00:48:04] Zach: Absolutely. I mean talking about these retirees it’s funny. I have a unique strategy that I’m happy to share. So we have a place called Sun City. It’s a 55+ community, big area, west in the north, West valley. And there’s a lot of homes that are just older. They were build in the 80s or 70s or 60s. And they need massive remodels. A lot of people don’t want to buy because this is a big transfer fee. Even if you’re an investor, you but them at $3,500 transfer fee, you lose up front. So people are fearful of that upfront money.

 

But at the end of the day some people come in and put some lipstick in there. My philosophy is spend money to make money. So I’ll come in there, got these houses. If my grandmother, I wish she was alive was out there and wanted to provide a nice housing for her, I want her to live in a really nice place. If these are going to be her last years on the last home, I want to provide something that’s beautiful that she can enjoy. Doesn’t have to be big, we’re not talking 3,000 square feet. We can talk about 1,200 square foot two bedroom, one bath.

 

Something that’s manageable, like you say. And if she can unlock what you’re talking about, a lot of them are cash buyers. Let them live in a little luxury and enjoy your life for the payment differential of $200 or $300 more. A lot of them are cash. What’s the difference?

 

[00:49:07] Andrew: And they are not going to ever go through their money anyway but it’s just getting them to envision that and some of them grew up in different eras where they just held on to that money. So it’s just teaching them and having them, hey, what makes you happy? Visualize it. What makes you happy? Same conversation we were having with someone who’s getting close to retirement. Financially you’re set but what do you want to do? What’s your purpose? And if you don’t think about that, we have time and time again where someone comes back in six months later like I went back to work.

 

And it’s either because they’ve lost their purpose or they haven’t spent that much time with their spouse for years and it’s like I got to get out or I’m going to lose the marriage. So many different factors there that are involved. So in different life transitions, it means something different. So if I’m in the real estate industry and I’m… Who’d contact you? What would be the person you’re looking for? You’re looking for wholesalers, you’re looking for…

 

[00:49:55] Zach: So for me personally, if you are an agent, you have a client that wants an off market deal, you’re tired of competing on MLS, if you want really quality turnkey product, again I’m of the mindset where we spend Monday to make money. So all my homes are always turnkey, what do you want courts counters, high end cabinets, new flooring, plumbing, roofs, the whole thing. So providing a turnkey product.

 

[00:50:12] Andrew: So when you say off market, walk us through what does that mean?

 

[00:50:15] Zach: Sure. Buying eight to ten homes a month. So if you’re an agent and you’re in my relationship team scope exactly you say, ‘Hey Zach, what homes do you have upcoming?’ I will list them. So it’s they’re off the market until they go to market. Which is the MLS, the multiple listing service.

 

But if your client has the first opportunity because we have a relationship and says, here I have this home coming up on 88th and Boury or 102 and Sun City. And you can bring that to your client prior to the whole masses of the entire Arizona population to see it, you’re providing value to your client based on leveraging our relationship.

 

So that’s really nice. So if you want to be in that team if you will, reach out to me or let me know what you have, what you’re looking for your clients I can buy. I’m always looking for wholesalers, guys that are out there, they don’t have the capital but they have a deal that they can tie up. I’m looking for the agent that has distressed or motivated sellers. They want to make the full commission, I’ll pay them the full 6%. They get paid by the seller but they are going to keep my 3%. I’m licensed but they can keep the full commission.

 

So always looking to get more and more deals, build more and more quality relationships people that can execute just like us, it’s what I’m looking for.

 

[00:51:23] Andrew: If anybody is going it right and do good by you it’s you. So in the show notes below we’ll be ways they can contact. I know some of this will be on your social media as well. But you’re doing some stuff out there and I think you just continue doing what you’re doing. And leading by example and that’s some of these things, these younger brokers and real estate. They can learn from that. That’s a testament to you.

 

We’ve gone through a lot. We’ve talked about our work ethic growing up in the mean streets of Cleveland and Detroit. You pulling yourself up off the ground, 2007/08 when most would have drowned. And you stayed and you said I’m going to do it. And you figured out there was a niche and there was an opportunity and you made it happen and now fast forward eight/nine years from… Looking back you probably never thought you’d be where you are today. But they don’t happen overnight. Just like training for the ironman, but you’ve done it all.

 

And now you’re kind of writing that next chapter. So as we end today, what last bit of advice would you have for the Your Wealth and Beyond Podcast sect?  If you can share with us.

 

[00:52:24] Zach: Again, it’s been fun. First of all it’s great to surround yourself with great people like Andrew. History of influence is always super important. It’s your team. You always want to again have those people that you want to be in that forest with, to help you navigate through those hardships and the trees and the foliage. Execution again we spoke about those.

 

Relationships, maintain those relationships. You never know when those are going to come in handy again. Rekindle old ones that have people in that business. You may have done a deal with somebody, reach out to them, talk to them. One phone call it’s simple. And then stay abreast of what’s happening in your niche if it’s real estate or finance or marketing, whatever it is. If all of a sudden the new stuff is social media, adapt it. Don’t be afraid of it. But embrace it, learn about it, and transition with those movers and shakers. I think that’s super important.

 

And have fun. Like this is a blast. You got to have fun.

 

[00:53:20] Andrew: If you don’t have that passion find it. You don’t want to look back in your last days and be like I should have done that. Make it happen. You can make it happen I know life sometimes gets in the way but like you said, you’ve been having fun since 02. Some of those years it wasn’t fun but you know you were in an industry that you could excel in and that you enjoy and the having the personal relationships and doing the things that make you happy.

 

[00:53:42] Zach: And stay the course. I mean I think that’s the kind of a theme that’s popped up a couple of times. Stay the course I mean again, like anything else, nothing is easy. A stock doesn’t rise every single day. It’s easy to be discouraged by a small fluctuations in volatility but if they have the core principles and that core success, stay the course. Make it happen.

 

[00:54:04] Andrew: Surround yourself with a good team. You can’t do it alone. Family, your contemporaries and then on the professional side people that are smarter than you. I always look at people who are smarter than me, that they can help lead. That’s key. I think we should definitely do this again. This has been awesome. Our flight leaves in about ten minutes or so, so we got to get out of here but thank you everybody for listening to another episode of Your Wealth and Beyond. Stay tuned later this month, well have some great shows lined up. Happy planning everybody.

 

[00:54:32] Zach: Thanks Andrew.

 

[END]