From Foreclosed to Financially Free w/ Chris Charles

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Is fear keeping you from building wealth through real estate?

In this episode of The Wisconsin Investor Podcast, we sit down with Chris Charles—a real estate investor and title company professional with over 40 years of experience—for a raw, honest conversation about what it really takes to build a portfolio and create lasting financial freedom.

Chris shares his full journey:
 ➡️ From renovating "handyman specials" with his dad as a kid
 ➡️ To acquiring multiple rental properties and navigating the ups and downs of the market
 ➡️ Including getting served foreclosure papers during the 2008 housing crash—and how that moment became a turning point in both his life and his investing mindset.

“The next day, the air still breathed the same.”That realization changed everything. It’s one of the most powerful moments we’ve ever captured on the show.

🔑 What You’ll Learn:

• How to push through fear and analysis paralysis
• Why some investors freeze while others thrive
• The rent-to-own strategy Chris used to maximize cash flow and eliminate realtor fees
• Must-know title insurance tips (shared driveways, easements, and more)
• A balanced take on Dave Ramsey’s debt-free philosophy vs. strategic leverage
• How to invest wisely even when your spouse or partner is more risk-averse

Whether you're stuck on your first deal or trying to scale, this episode delivers the emotional clarity and tactical knowledge you need to take your next step.

🎧 Who This Is For:

• New investors afraid to pull the trigger
• Experienced investors reflecting on risk, debt, and long-term strategy
• Anyone interested in rent-to-own, off-market real estate, or building generational wealth

This isn’t just another real estate highlight reel. It’s real talk about fear, failure, and building a future anyway.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode
of the Wisconsin InvestorPodcast.
As usual, I have a good buddyhere today with me, who I'll
introduce here in a second.
But as usual I'm going to do alittle commercial for Wisconsin
Discount Properties, whosponsors today's show.
But instead of doing really aFOMO thing which I tend to do
for you guys tell you about adeal you missed out on, try to

(00:23):
make you feel bad about it sothat you buy more properties,
that kind of thing Today, I'mjust going to talk about real
estate in general.
Yesterday, at the time we'rerecording this, I kind of nerded
out on my AI apps on Grok andChatGPT and I was just curious
what is the percentage of equityfor people who are buying
residential real estate whenwe're looking at getting, say,

(00:44):
like a 4% annual appreciationrate with our current interest
rates?
You know that's one of theroadblocks I keep hearing as
well.
Rates are still too high.
I can't get the numbers to workand that sort of thing.
So I thought you know what?
Let me just run some scenarios,do some math here and see what
happens if you get off thebleachers and get in the game.
And so what I did?
I ran just a little scenariosaying hey, what if you bought a

(01:05):
property that was valued at,say, $375,000?
Now, for some of you guys thatmay be way too high.
Some of you guys that might beway too low.
I just threw a random numberout there and I said what if you
bird that property?
So that means buy, rehab, rent,refinance, repeat, and what
that allows you to basically dois recycle cash, which there's
plenty of episodes about, theBRRRR.

(01:27):
Maybe my guests here today,chris and I, will get into BRRRR
.
I'm not really sure where theconversation will go.
So essentially, you would havea $300,000 mortgage on a
$375,000 property, so you gain$75,000 right out of the jump
from doing this property.
Now, some of you guys might saythat's an impossible deal to do
right now.
I can't find anything like that.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Let's just say so what.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
You got 20 grand stuck into this thing maybe, so
you end up putting $20,000 intothe property above the 300K.
Anyway, running the scenario inthree years, if you held this
property with 4% appreciationand tenants let's say you're
renting this thing, 4%appreciation and tenants let's
say you're renting this thing,the tenants are paying your debt
down every single year on a 20year mortgage, which is a lot of
commercial loans or 20 yearamortization schedules In three

(02:11):
years you would have $145,000 ofequity on a deal that maybe
look like a turd on the surfaceor maybe a base hit, but just by
holding that thing for threeyears you now have $145,000 of
equity.
Now when you get into year fiveyou're at $198,000.

(02:36):
And by year 10, you have$356,000 of equity.
Each year, besides just theequity gain, you're gaining a
big percentage of equity.
So if you have no money in thisdeal it's an infinite return.
But let's say you have somemoney into this thing.
By year three you have gained14% equity on the deal, just
from the loan pay down into theappreciation.
So it keeps going up and up andup.
Point of today's littlecommercial for Wisconsin

(02:56):
discount properties Every weekwe're putting deals out in your
inbox 6 am Monday morning.
A lot of these deals can meetthese type of criterias.
The numbers are going to bedifferent as far as purchase
price, what it's going toappraise that, and that sort of
thing, but we have case studyafter case study after case
study of people who are doingthese bird deals and getting
numbers similar to these.
With that, let's get intotoday's episode.

(03:16):
I got my good buddy here, mrChris Charles.
Now Chris, he is with TownCountry Title, or now Gowie
Title, purchased by Gowie notthat long ago, and Chris and I
have been working together sincewhat?
2019, chris.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
Something like that.
The first deal we did was 2018,as far as what I could find on
some of my old scans 2018.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
So Chris has been processing files for us for the
last how many years is that?
Seven years, chris.
Seven years.
Call it eight, we'll call iteight, and I mean we've done
hundreds and hundreds of files.
We typically do about 140 to150 transactions a year, so you
times that by eight.
Now we weren't always doing thatmany, but we've done a lot of

(03:59):
deals together, chris and I, andmost of the title work has gone
through Chris and his team andhe's done an amazing job.
So before you tune out todayand you say, oh, chris, at Town,
country, title, boring, titles,boring Chris Chris will be the
first to tell you that for mostof us it's boring for us but
it's exciting for them.
We're going to talk about Chrisand his journey because not
only is he just a title uh, rockstar he is also an investor.

(04:23):
So so, chris, welcome to theshow man.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Thank you, sir.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
Yeah, I'm glad to have you on, man, why don't we
start out?
Just tell everybody a littlebit about how long you've been
in this real estate game and howdid you get started.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
You bet.
So for me, I've been in this aslong as I can remember.
So one of the mentors in mylife was actually my father.
So to kind of date myself, Ithink, like Tony Breuer, we'll
be the two guys turning 50 thisyear.
I'm old enough to remember whenmy father would look through
the white pages, the classifiedsfor houses that he would buy,

(04:54):
and he was always looking foryou know, in parentheses
handyman, special needs, tlc,and instead of going hunting or
fishing or working on the oldChevy, he would drag me along on
the weekends to go work onhouses.
He had a full-time job for adepartment store called
Montgomery Wards, but we wereweekend warriors and he, you
know the old cliche, he knowsjust enough to be dangerous.

(05:15):
So basic plumbing, basicelectrical, you know, I'd be the
one maybe crawling in thatbasement or crawl space and
really developed a love for realestate.
In a large part of it wasbecause it was something I did
with my father, that's awesomeman, very cool.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
So you've been in this literally what?
40 years-ish.

Speaker 2 (05:33):
Absolutely.
You know the original goal whenI went off to Eau Claire, you
know, to get that four-yeardegree was to become a teacher,
with the idea of having thosethree months off in summer so I
would have the security of afull time job.
We could debate that a littlebit, but that was the game plan
eight, nine months of income andthen the three to four months
of having the summers off tojust work on a house.

(05:55):
And unfortunately for me, eauClaire was a little bit too much
fun.
Those first two years GPAwasn't where it needed to be for
the school of education but theschool of business.
Chuck Tomkovic was theprofessor at the time.
He was one of the only guysthat was working on a Friday
afternoon in Eau Claire and hesaid Chris, I think you'd be
great in business.
You know sales, marketing andyou know that's one of those

(06:18):
hockey stick moments that youtalk about where things are
maybe flatlining for me.
And that was a huge change.
And where my life took off wasgetting into business and I'm
still again always had that loveof real estate and wanting to
do something real estate related.
So I don't think it was morethan a year or two after I
graduated I bought my firsthouse and before we knew about

(06:39):
Burr it was find a property andback then I mean it was cheap.
I might've paid 20, 25,000 forthis little place in Kewaunee,
stuck maybe 15 into it and thatwas a whole house rehab, put it
on the market.
Maybe it wasn't selling asquickly as I needed for my bills
and the real estate agent said,hey, I got somebody that would

(07:01):
want to maybe rent to own.
So again that whole birthstrategy.
Inadvertently I rented to TammyGronke and maybe a year or two
later, working again to help gether a loan, she was able to buy
that flip from me and that wasthe first of a couple flips that
we did.
Nice man.

Speaker 1 (07:18):
So that was more of a long-term flip then for you,
which has some tax benefits.

Speaker 2 (07:22):
That's the one thing.
And my father, you know, therewere no RIAs back then.
There were no podcasts.
I mean the resources that wehave, the community is just, I
mean, amazing.
So we just kind of figured outon our own.
I mean there was a lot ofpositive influences that my dad
had passed on to me.
You know motivational speakerslike Zig Ziglar and I got these.
You know CDs on how tonegotiate Roger Dawson I still

(07:44):
listen to him once in a while,but those were the resources we
had back then.
So I mean, again, people thatare thinking about getting into
real estate today you have somany opportunities for education
and coaching and community.
That's the reason I go to theRIAs is, again, I had a great
mentor.
I just hope that again, alittle bit of those nuggets of
knowledge you shared with me Ican pass on to other people,
because real estate isdefinitely how my wife and I

(08:06):
were able to attain, I'd say,our financial freedom.
We're not planning on retiring.
I'm still hoping to close 100deals with you for the next 10
to 15 years, but our life isdramatically different today
because of what we did 20 yearsago.
That's amazing man, wow.

Speaker 1 (08:22):
So that's crazy, like you know, to think about.
I got in in 2016 and so we hadGoogle and we had bigger pockets
and we had, you know, all ofthe different podcasts and all
that kind of stuff, Like so, tothink about trying to do this A
with no.
No, zillow Redfin, uh,realtorcom, no, it's what.

Speaker 2 (08:40):
Chad is talking about .

Speaker 1 (08:41):
Hey, yeah, you know I love Chad TPT man, like I just
pulled something off Chad TPTwhile I was Grok, which is
another one of my favorites too,but similar, similar thing.
None of that stuff you had todo getting into this.
So, like what are some of thebiggest challenges you see today
, chris, compared to like whatyou guys had to deal with,
because back in the day you haddifferent challenges than what
investors today have.
What do you see are like someof the you?

(09:01):
You work with tons and tons ofinvestors in this game.
What do you see like as thebiggest challenges for investors
in?

Speaker 2 (09:07):
today's world, I just think the biggest.
You know two big challenges.
I think number one you knowcommunication, like your job,
your life, everything.
You know your marriage.
You know relationships.
You know so much easier ifthere's just better
communication.
It just it is staggering to me.
You know I'll get an email onthe subject line.
I'll say, you know, tomorrow,you know, or closing, or it's

(09:29):
just again you know thecommunication for newer
investors.
You know.
You know that's something thatjust kind of again always
surprises me, like we all havetime just to type in a little
bit more detail in their emailor a little bit different
subject line.
And then the other thing Ithink is just overcoming
adversity.
You know that first flip wentaccording to plan, but we were

(09:49):
pre-2008, 2009.
I had a full-time job workingfor a company called the Force.
That wasn't for me, went to BigBrothers, big Sisters, love Big
Brothers, big Sisters.
That was great.
I was doing the marketing andvolunteer recruitment.
But all of a sudden my uncleEddie calls me up.
He owned a title company downin Milwaukee and, going back to
your earlier point, when heasked me, do I want to go work

(10:12):
for him, for the title company?
I'm like what the heck is titleinsurance it sounds terrible
and insurance, but it was theright time and I made that jump
and through the title company, Iwas connected with a couple of
mortgage guys and gals and westarted buying properties and
unfortunately, 08-09 hit in aportfolio that maybe I thought

(10:32):
was worth a half a milliondollars and I mean, it's no lie,
I'm not saying overnight, but acouple of weeks, maybe a couple
of months.
It was worth half that Like itwas really, really, really tough
and overcoming adversity andI'm not going to lie, I was in a
position where I couldn't sellthis property down in Dodge
County.
Number one, why did I buy aproperty in Dodge County?

(10:54):
I mean, then we could go into awhole podcast about location,
location, location.
But I'm making the mortgagepayment while this kid renting
from me it was another rent toown was not paying me and the
adversity, I just didn't want todeal with it.
And finally my attorney buddywhich again I'm fortunate to
have a buddy who was an attorneysaid Chris, bank of America is

(11:14):
not going to deal with you ifyou keep making those mortgage
payments.
And I thought to myself whatabout my credit?
What am I going to?
You know how am I going to ever, you know, get a loan again?
And he said, dude, how long youbeen making the mortgage
payment for this kid, like youneed to, you know, face some
adversity.
So I did.
I stopped making the mortgagepayment because I really needed
Bank of America to short salethis property.
It wasn't worth, unfortunately,what I owed on it and I was

(11:36):
served.
I had a process server knock onmy door and serve me
foreclosure papers and you knowwhat, the next day, the air
still, you know, breathed in thesame as it did the day before
and my wife still loved me.
You know, like I had two kidsthat I think that's the worst
that you know I didn't want todisappoint them, but you know,
facing adversity because thatold cliche, this is not easy.
Like I love real estate, but ifthis was easy, everybody would

(12:00):
do what we're talking about.
Sometimes, again, the adversity, you know, in the moment is
tough, but again it'll make you,I think, stronger as a person,
as a husband, as a father, justin general.
And that's what happened mywife and I had to have a really
tough conversation about.
We were no longer going to beliving on debt anymore, and we
literally had an option file forbankruptcy or get our budget in

(12:24):
as tight a belt as we could andwe agreed $100 a week in cash.
That's what we lived on.
That was it.
When the hundred bucks was gone, we had nothing else to live on
, so it was beans and rice, riceand beans, with my old buddy,
dave Ramsey, you know would saythis little podcast.
And because of it, though, likewe came out of it such stronger
as far as a marriage and, youknow, as far as a family.

(12:46):
And now, honestly, like I lovewhat I do and I get paid a
really good amount of money,like I am blessed to make the
kind of money that I'm paid, butif something happened and I had
to go to work at Bay Beachwhere my kid works getting 15
bucks an hour, our life wouldnot change Because those earlier
you know investments in realestate ended up paying out for
us.
And then we've pivoted a littlebit out of now buying stuff.

(13:09):
We've invested a lot of thatmoney, I've done some
self-lending myself on dealsthat were right for my risk
tolerance and my wife's risktolerance.
But again that adversity andthat communication.
I had to communicate again withmy wife what was going on.
I to communicate with bank ofamerica and then he had to fight
through that adversity becauseI mean, again, I didn't buy
wrong, it's just a market took ajust nosedive for those two

(13:32):
years, um, you know, but againwe came out of it stronger, I
think, because of it.

Speaker 1 (13:37):
So I think that's so important.
Man like I, that's honestlylike one of my fears is like, oh
, it's just one day, it's justgonna all be.
You know, it's almost like yougot to keep building, keep
building, keep building, becausewhat if this one goes to crap
or that one goes to crap orwhatever.
But I think that's so importantto listen to you say that Like
that's inspiring for me tolisten to you, chris, to say,
like man, I got foreclosed on, Iwent through this thing and I

(13:58):
woke up the next day the sunstill and I was still six feet
above and everything was okayand now you're better because of
it.
So I think for people out therelistening, I think that's a
really uplifting importantmessage here is that there's
only sometimes two things thathold people back, chris, from
doing this on a bigger scale.
It's finding well, three thingsfinding deals, finding money

(14:19):
and fear.
Those are the three things.
They can eliminate the fear.
You know where to find themoney.

Speaker 2 (14:23):
You know where to find the deals.
It's the fear I mean, andreally sometimes fear is good,
right, if it's a hot stove, yourmind's telling you don't touch
that hot stove Right, but Ithink, immersing yourself in
this community, I was able toovercome fear.
Because of my father, I still,to this day, I have very little
fear for real estate.
I think, though, my wife's risktolerance is a little different

(14:45):
, and because I want to bealigned with her, we've had
conversations about you knowwhat her goals were.
So one of them was you know,let's be debt free, and for a
lot of people, like, that's nota goal of theirs, but for my
wife it was, and I said, youknow what, for me to take that
next step, if that's what wehave to do, that's what we're
going to do.
So sell off.
You know, some of the rentalswe had finished, some of those

(15:07):
flips that I was taking a longtime to work on, you know our
house, uh, you know, paid offcompletely, and then she said,
well, most of the two kids, youknow are kind of off to school.
You know we'll probably driveeach other crazy, so then you
can.
The kids were little, you know,I didn't mind working on the
house, but now again, where I'mat an age where my daughter is

(15:29):
17 and my son's 14, you know I,like you know being able to
spend some time with them andnot, you know, running off to
work on a house, which I do lovedoing, like I like working on
the house.
I'm probably not one of thoseguys that would want property
management, you know.
Again, it's like tinkering on acar or going hunting or fishing
, like that's my flipping houses.
That's what I love doing,although the last time my dad

(15:50):
asked me he's doing a littlehome renovation down in Appleton
, so I don't know.
A couple of months ago he askedme to go down there and paint
his new master bedroom, his newmaster bathroom and then the
little hallway I mean I don'teven know 600 square feet.
I was aching and hurting mybody.
I'm like, my God, I could knockthis out in a couple hours 20
years ago and I was hurting.

(16:12):
So I might have to rethink thatand start to invest in some
maybe subs to do some of thiswork for a few years.
That's right it might not be thespring chicken.
I thought I was.

Speaker 1 (16:20):
Yeah, at our company right now we're reading who, not
how, as a team and you thoughtI was yeah.
Yeah, at our company right now,we're reading who not how as a
team and you need.
You got a who problem right now.
Chris, who is?
You know that body nowadays,just it ain't as good as it once
was, as old toby keith oncesaid right, yeah, but yeah to
your point too, though.

Speaker 2 (16:35):
You know like, again, my father is that role model.
Like um, he's been through someadversity himself and I think
you know again you look up toyour parents and seeing again
for him.
You know we moved from GreenBay to Minnesota and then
Minnesota back to Kewaunee andhe bought a hotel in Kewaunee.
It didn't go according to planand there was a bankruptcy in my

(16:56):
father's history, but again,you know I loved him just as
much.
And you know going off tocollege again, those first
couple of years in Eau Claire,like I had nothing, I probably
had less than a hundred bucks tolive on.
And I think again you know,when you're by yourself, you
know you can do with less.
It was the family.
You know not wanting todisappoint the wife, not
disappointing the kiddos, butI've reflected a lot back on

(17:19):
that to say you know what Ididn't love my father, or my
mother any less, because youknow they took a shot on
something that they thoughtwould be best.
You know, for us and that's theone thing about both my parents
my father multiple times hassaid it like he was willing to
make sacrifices for me so thatmy sister and I could have
opportunities that he didn'thave.
And that's, I think, where Ijust kind of find that peace is

(17:39):
that I know my kids will haveopportunities that I didn't have
, not because my parents didn'twant me to have them, but they
just weren't there.
And I think, having nothing andthen growing into something, you
know, and if I went back tonothing I wouldn't like it, you
know, that's probably why I'm alittle bit conservative with
what I do.
But you know, again, it's thatold cliche Always somebody with

(18:02):
more, always somebody with less.
And you know you surroundyourself with good people, good
family, good friends.
You know the rest will kind ofwork itself out.
But I do agree that fear, thatthat's, that's a power, powerful
, you know, I guess, emotionthat keeps people from getting
off the sidelines into this gameof real estate.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah Well, hopefully listening to your story today,
chris, a little bit, we'll helppeople maybe just understand
their fear a little bit and bewilling to take that shot
because your dad's still fine,you're fine, you know it didn't
work out, but you learned a lotand you grew stronger because of
that, because you took the shot.
I just, you know, you thinkabout like people on their
deathbeds and what are theirregrets, right, and sometimes
it's the regret of not takingthat shot, not you know,

(18:42):
somebody else's life and theyjust didn't do it because they
were feared and I thinkhopefully this podcast will get
people some momentum past thatfear a little bit.
Maybe they'll be willing to takethat shot, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (18:59):
Yeah, the best thing I ever did.
I remember you reached out tomy boss again eight years ago,
you know, interviewing titlecompanies.
I remember going to my boss whoin the heck is Corey Raymond
Ray Ray Property?
Like what?
Who is this guy?
He wants to interview titlecompanies.
But again it was that fear.
I mean, did I want to go tothat RIA?
Back then I, probably after ahard day at work, wanted to go
fall asleep on my couch watchingsome TV show.
And there was fear.

(19:20):
I mean, truthfully, I am anintrovert when I really get down
to it and there was fear.
I mean, truthfully, I am anintrovert when I really get down
to it.
So there was fear of going tothat meeting, fear of meeting
whoever you were.
Again, one of the hockey stickmoments in my life overcoming
that fear, just getting off thecouch, going to that RIA, and
maybe not just even going, butthen going back and just again

(19:42):
investing in something.
And again it became really clearGuys like you, you know we were
aligned and I think what wewere trying to do for ourselves,
for our family, you know, forthe community.
And then you know, sooner thanlater you start getting hanging
out with guys like Tony and thenyour brother, and this
community that we have developed.
I was down in Sheboygan for oneof your customers and we were

(20:04):
talking about you go south intoMilwaukee.
You don't have that communitythat it seems like we do have up
here in Green Bay and theValley.
So for people that again are onthe sidelines, embrace this
community, because again I dothink it's rare you don't see
this in Eau Claire, la Crosse.
My daughter's going to be goingto La Crosse in a year and
that's probably the one thing Imight push my wife into buying a

(20:26):
little rental property that Icould fix up for her.
But, again, embrace the fearbecause you do have people that
have overcome it and they'llshare their stories and, like I
said, the coaching you can get,the community you can get, but
the consistency of making surethat you do go to these meetings
and these opportunities that wedo develop the Caffeine and
Cashflow that Zach runs.

(20:47):
Again, we've got some greatpeople that are willing to share
their stories and help people.

Speaker 1 (20:51):
Yeah, and I think there's more and more happening,
from what I hear, for some ofthese things like Caffeine and
Cashflow starting to pop up indifferent spots around the state
, which is great.
Other people are taking it on.
I think it's going to be.
I think there's one happening.
I don't know, claire, maybe Icould be wrong, but you know we
have people all over the statethat listen to this podcast, and
if you're in an area where youdon't have this community like
we have Northeast Wisconsin,where Chris and I are based you

(21:13):
know, start it.
That's what we did, I mean,when it was 2018, we went to
another couple of RIAs.
We didn't love them.
We were like there was too muchsales for me and I'm not
knocking them, they're great togo to and go start.
But there was too much of it.
It was just people out thereselling, in my opinion, and I
wanted the networking and nobodywas doing it.
So we started with a Facebookpost, a Facebook event, and I

(21:35):
said, hey, come down too.
There was a little bar downtownGreen Bay.
We just put a Facebook inviteinvite up it's free, come down.
We had, we talked to the barowners, we got name tags.
So everybody that came in, wehad a little sign that said real
estate, beat up, come here.
We signed everybody in, we givethem name tags.
And we got to meet a bunch ofpeople.
And it was crazy, as we wouldgo to the Ria's and there was
like 10 people at the Ria and wedid this networking thing.

(21:56):
We had like 30 or 40 peopleshow up and I was like, okay,
well, sign that people want morenetworking.
Right, like let's buildsomething and let's just do
something regularly where we doa networking thing.
And then we started our ownbranch of ARIA at that point.
But we made the clause.
We said it was part of anotherorganization and we said we'll
do it, but it's going to be onour terms Like we're going to.

Speaker 2 (22:16):
We will dictate the agenda and so now it's very
similar to what we run with theREI Success Club.

Speaker 1 (22:22):
It was, you know, an hour of a presenter, maybe max.
The rest of the time wasnetworking or forced networking,
and we've always had 40, 50, 60people come out to these things
.
I think our first one, we hadover 90 people show up at it,
which was pretty incrediblebecause the other one was
getting 10.
So if you're in an area and youare not happy with the current

(22:42):
options you have for networking,be the thermostat, go start
something and just throwsomething out there.
It doesn't have to be fancy, itdoesn't have to be extravagant,
you don't have to know what theheck you're doing.
Just take action and go startthe community and then you
become the leader of it.

Speaker 2 (22:55):
I'm sorry too, because my boss is in lacrosse
and a couple of years ago sheasked about one of these
networking groups and same asyou just offered.
Like I said, nancy, if you needme, I will be in lacrosse, I
will go to.
Like I can't go there everysingle month.
You know, my wife lets me outof the house one tuesday uh, you
know a month and you know.
But again, to help get the ballrolling because, like I said,
it is, it is what changed.

(23:16):
You know, you know the titlecompany here, but also, again,
some of the things that I get todo outside of, uh, of that near
nine to five job.
So you have anybody listeningis got a desire to maybe get a
group together but just needs alittle help organizing it.
There are people, includingmyself and you, that'd be more
than happy to help get thatfoundation set for them.

Speaker 1 (23:36):
Well, the same with Zach.
You know, running the caffeineand cash flows.
You know, here was a thingwhere he didn't want to come out
at night because he wants to beat home with his family when
his kids are home and stuff.
And so he's like, well, let'screate something for during the
middle of the day or in themorning.
There it was, he just startedit.
And now it's starting to pop upall over the place and it's been
a great, a great addition for alot of different real estate
investors and a differentopportunity for people to come
out and network.

(23:57):
So again, we talk about it,probably, chris, every episode,
if not every episode, at leastalmost every episode how
important networking is.
I don't know how much more wecan stress it on this show.
People are probably sick oflistening to that if they've
been listening to the show for awhile.

Speaker 2 (24:11):
But if you're listening to it over and over
again, and you're still on thesidelines.

Speaker 1 (24:14):
get your butt in the game and go to the meetings and
so we run one every fourthTuesday other than around
Christmas and Thanksgivingcalled the REI Success Club and
there's a Facebook group calledREI Success.
You can just go join that ifyou're not ready to come out and
network or you're not in anarea, necessarily, where you're
listening to this, where you canattend, but you can still be
part of that community and it'sstill a great community, even if

(24:36):
it's just not on Facebook.
So I encourage everybody to gocheck that out.
But such an important thing,chris talk.
I want to pivot real quick.
One thing I want to get intorent to own real quick.
You mentioned it twice.
For those that don't know whatrent to own is, can you just
explain that type of strategy inreal estate for people?

Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah.
So the mortgage guy that I wasworking with back again, I
didn't know much about it, hewas the one that kind of
structured it, but I would buythe property.
Again, I had the ability topurchase real estate, you know,
whatever access to money, credit, but the person that was living
in the property maybe didn'thave that same opportunity.
So we would get a purchase thatI would own and then we would

(25:14):
get a renter in that propertywith a rent-to-own contract,
lease option, I mean, there's acouple different ways to call it
, but they would make paymentsto me and that would help again,
at the end, apply some of thosepayments as maybe a down
payment, but also, again, partof the caveat, the most
important thing that I did was Iwas working with a lender that

(25:36):
would help that person getwhatever they needed to purchase
that home, whether it was ahigher credit score, cash down,
there's always reasons whypeople were not able to buy a
property and we were talkingsubprime days.
For the older folks like me,subprime basically meant bad
credit and before 08, 09, youcould get loans for people that

(25:56):
had pretty bad credit.
Now, again, they got to gettheir credit up.
But there's some great guys outthere.
A little shout out for AaronKramer at Exec.
I mean, again, these are thekind of guys that somebody can't
get a loan today.
What's the strategy or what'sthe plan of attack to be able to
get a loan down the road?
And I always like rent to ownbecause I own the property.
Those payments that were beingmade to me were going towards

(26:20):
the mortgage and a little bit ofprofit in my pocket, and I
wasn't necessarily a quote,unquote full-time landlord, even
though it was a rentalsituation.
You know, we structured it.
We had good communication wherethey treated the house as their
own.
There were certain things thatdidn't necessarily want them
doing, but there were certainthings that you know if they
wanted to do it.
You know and I give them twothumbs up and in two of the

(26:42):
properties one of them, thetenant ended up having some
health issues and said, hey, I'mnot going to be able to buy the
property.
Well, you know, a year laterthere was a little bit of equity
built up in the property.
I was able to sell thatproperty.
Other one the guy lost his job.
And that was the one again where, eventually, 08, 09 and the
value of that one went down so Iended up.
That's the one I ended up doinga short sale on.

(27:03):
At the end of the day nothingcame out of my pocket.
You know my credit was bashedfor a couple of years.
But again, I probably again inhindsight I probably should have
kept that property, got adifferent renter in that
property and I think over timethat piece of real estate would
have went up in value.
You know the rents, what I was,what I was getting back then

(27:25):
maybe I could have broke even,but rents always go up.
That's the one thing on.
The longest rental I had isabout 10 years.
It was down in Oshkosh by theuniversity.
$300 I was getting for thatthing when I first bought it.
When I sold it it was like 750.
So this property in ClimbingWisconsin, I think the reason I
dumped it was fear.
Like we were talking about youknow location, I want to go down

(27:46):
there and you know I wasn'taware of property management
back then and did I want todrive an hour plus to go show a
property Like no, let's justsell it.
And I think again, you know,every time I turned on the news
you know, or open up some kindof article.
You know real estate market wasgoing to basically go to you
know what.
So again, you know, maybe notthe best decision because I was
letting emotion.
But rent to own I've alwaysenjoyed.

(28:08):
But you do have to get to knowyour tenant a little better than
you know Joe Schmo tenant.
And then to me it was key tohave a lender that I trusted to
work with that tenant to be ableto allow them to get a loan, uh
, to buy that, that propertydown the road.

Speaker 1 (28:25):
Yeah, I love that strategy.
I've done it multiple times.
It's really the only one with along-term tenant where I will
self-manage it Because, like yousaid, chris, most of the time
and the way I set it up withthem is like this is your house,
treat it like it's your house.
Don't call me.
If you have a hole in yourscreen, don't call me.
If you got a little leak in thesink like it's your house, be a
homeowner, fix it right now.

(28:46):
If there's a bigger issue, callme.
I'm still the owner, so I stillhave to fix bigger ticket items
.
But the little maintenancestuff around the house like take
care of it, fix it.
Be a homeowner.
Landscaping take care of your.
Take care of the landscapingright.
Don't don't let it get out ofcontrol.
Or like just sit back like aregular landlord or tenant and
expect somebody else to come andtake care of it.
Do all that stuff.

(29:06):
But the beautiful part, the waythat I do them is I get an
option fee on the front end.

Speaker 2 (29:10):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (29:10):
And so, for those of you that don't know what an
option fee is, it'snon-refundable.
So we've gotten as much as$100,000 as an option fee on a
single family house, which wasinsane.
Like I was like great.
So I broke even on the rentevery month, but I got a
$100,000 option fee.
I was like great, this isawesome.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
On the four that I did, that one in Kewaunee, the
first burr, that was not theoption, but the four with this
mortgage guy, a $5,000 fee upfront and now again back in 05,
that was a lot of money, a lotof money.
You can see in my garage rightnow the John Deere lawnmower the
Walt Chop saw.
You know the table Like that.
$5,000 went a lot to my littleinventory of equipment.

(29:54):
You know today that probablywouldn't be enough to move the
needle but, like I said, eachone of those reminded me five
grand up front to do all thisfun stuff.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
Yeah, and the other benefit to it is you don't have
to pay a realtor fee.
So when you start getting intoyou know 200, 300, $400,000
houses and you don't have arealtor fee in there that adds
up to be a lot of profit on youand you can generally charge a
little bit above retail.
Now, you typically can't go toohigh because when they go to
get that loan it's still goingto need appraise out, which can

(30:26):
be an issue Again.
You could always set it higherif they agree to it and you just
put something in there that,hey, if it appraises lower, I'll
go with the appraised valuetype of thing in your agreement,
but you can generally charge apremium for this and people will
pay because they just want tobe homeowners and they just need
that time and they don't careabout a lot of the stuff that
retail buyers care about and thereason I don't see it a lot.
I think, chris, is just delayedgratification.
Either somebody wants to flip aproperty, so they want the cash

(30:48):
now, which again you can getwith the option fee, but people
don't see that.
Or they want long-term rentals.
They don't want somebody, theydon't want to buy something, do
the work and then sell it.
But it's one of my favoritestrategies in real estate.
I think it's one of the mostprofitable strategies because
you eliminate that realtor fee,you're able to charge a little
bit of a premium, plus you'remaking some rent for a little
while.
So I personally love thatstrategy and I think it's one

(31:10):
that we don't talk enough aboutin what we do.
So anyway, I wanted to touch onthat because, like I said, not
a lot of people are aware ofthat strategy or understand the
benefits of it.
And when you look at capitalgains tax again, I'm not an
accountant, but now when it doessell, you're going to collect
the rest of any profit aslong-term capital gains most

(31:32):
likely if you held it longenough.
Sometimes they turn them quick,like we've had them nine months
.
The guy who had the $100,000,it was like nine months later
they bought the house from us.
So sometimes they can go fast,but most of them work out.
Sometimes they don't.
We had a couple where you knowwe had a couple that was they
were engaged and they were aboutto purchase the house.

(31:53):
They got their lender, they hadthe loan commitment, everything
was ready to go.
We were a week out and theysplit up and so we ended up just
listing the house.
We still made a profit on itand everything else.
It was fine.
We ended up selling to a retailbuyer after that, but it was uh
well that was a situation wherethey didn't end up buying it,
and we had another one where agentleman actually ended up in
prison.
It was a little mobile home onShackton.

(32:14):
Great thing is we went and gotanother person in there paid us
another option fee and ended upworking out just dandy.
Ended up working out just dandy.
So, but now people can do itpredatorily, so we want to make
sure people out there listeningto this do it the right way.
You're not sure how to do it?
Talk to some attorneys.
We've had a couple of attorneyson the podcast that I would
highly recommend you go back andtalk to If you are interested

(32:34):
in the strategy.
As far as making sure you'redoing it the right ethical way
because you can do it in a youkind of set somebody up for
failure and that's not good.
We don't want that.
We don't want that reputationout there.
Talk to me about the debt-freething, Chris.
So by the time this thingrecords, I'm going to have a
little social media post outthere of me burning some Dave
Ramsey materials in a fire pit.

(32:55):
So I think this will beinteresting to talk about our
differences in our belief system.
But I want to hear yourthoughts on the debt-free Dave
Ramsey system.

Speaker 2 (33:06):
No, I think again it is just more of a like we're
doing a conversation.
Obviously, there was a timewhere I had too much debt.
So I think what happens is thatDave Ramsey when I thought I
was in a lot of debt and I'mlike, oh, woe is me I found this
podcast that I think the firstone I listened to.

(33:26):
It was some guy down, maybe inTexas that calls Dave to do his
debt free, scream and like, well, how much did you owe?
And I don't even remember youknow 300,000 or something and
restitution.
And Dave's like restitution,what'd you do?
Rob a bank.
And the guy goes yeah, what youknow?

(33:48):
Again there's some guy thatrobbed the bank because he was
trying to do right by his familyand they put him in jail.
So again it was that whole,again somebody doing better,
somebody doing worse.
And it put me in perspective tosay, you know what?
You know the $30,000 owe to theHome Depot and Chase or
whatever two credit cards I had,and you know some of the real
estate.
Like you know, woe is me Likeyou know hey it's not that bad,

(34:11):
you know.
And then.
But the problem with Dave isvery black and white, you know.
I think, almost like if youwere maybe dealing with somebody
that was an alcoholic, like youcan't tell somebody that's an
alcoholic, well, you can have alittle sip, you know, every
Friday.
So in his world the way heteaches no debt you know no debt
is is is good debt.
So I think for certain peoplein certain times in their life,

(34:32):
that is definitely somethingthat that you know I need it and
some other people might need it.
But if we had an opportunity togo into debt, I guess the, the
the difference would be like forour house.
You know we would use the house, the line of credit.
You know I wouldn't want toborrow anymore.
We're just not in a position.
We've done well with the realestate and then we've taken that
money and we've invested it.

(34:53):
So you know we do have moneyinvested in the market, we've
got money invested in some realestate.
So I would use my own you knowassets to borrow off of.
But again, it's that cliche like, again, if I had a completely
paid off home, would I gomortgage it at where interest
rates are right now no, but ourmortgage when we were paying it

(35:16):
off was two and a quarter.
Like you know, I think it wasTony that slapped me around
because we were paying doublepayments on that because we want
to get out of debt.
Tony's like dude, you can stickthat money in your savings
account and do better than twoand a quarter.
So there's a mathematical partof it that I think you and I and
a lot of people would agreewith.
But then I'll go back into mywife.
She will sleep better at nightknowing that we don't owe

(35:36):
anything to anybody.
Right, and I think our journeybecause we did owe a lot of
money to a lot of differentpeople that's right for us, but
it might not be right for youand it might not be right for
other people.
I think, again, everybody walksa different path and for us,
could I go back into debttomorrow if the right
opportunity presented itself?
Absolutely, and again access tomoney.

(35:59):
Absolutely.
We'd use again the line ofcredit we have on our house and
the equity that we have in thishouse.
There's hard money lenders Icould deal with.
I could go to family members.
I could go to a bank.
I mean, there's options for us,but for right now again.
You know she sleeps a littlebit better at night, which makes
me sleep a little bit better atnight.
Uh, but again, I love dave.
Do I listen to him anymore?

(36:20):
I, I do not.
He's not one of the the youknow 10.

Speaker 1 (36:23):
Not making the rotation.
He's not making the rotation.

Speaker 2 (36:25):
But he was really, you know, influential when I
needed somebody to again kind ofreset.
You know, where was I when Ifelt like I was in a lot of debt
and I'm never going to get outof it.
You know, and one of thoselittle cliches is you don't get
into debt overnight, you're notgoing to get out of it.
He was the right thing for meat that right time in my life.
But, I'm not against it.
It's just again for us.

(36:51):
Right now we're at a pointwhere we don't necessarily need
to go into a lot of debt.
But, believe me, there was anopportunity for me to borrow
some money out to somebody twoyears ago, maybe a year and a
half, and again I had no problembecoming the bank.
I mean, if I'm so against debt,why would I then borrow to
somebody?
But I just think again, at adifferent point in my life, I
needed to call up the TedMiller's and I needed to borrow

(37:11):
money at you know whatever.
He was charging me 12% and nowI became, you know, the lender.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
because again, different, different part in our
journey when it comes to realestate, yeah, no, I and I always
think Dave's fun just to get arise out of some people who are
very, it's like, political right.
If you really want to get arise out of some people, you can
.
If you're left side, you canpost something very left.
If you're right, you can postsomething very right.
For me, like throwing somethingout about Dave, it's just it'll
get a big reaction, right.

(37:35):
Some people and I think theconsumer debt side of what Dave
teaches phenomenal, AbsolutelyLike snowball.
Your credit cards.
Get out of the credit card debtas quickly as possible.
You're paying 25, 26 right now.
That's insane.
You know you're, it's gonna,you're gonna, it's just gonna
pile on and be a mountain youcan never overcome.
Like you said, get out of thatstuff as quickly as possible.

(37:55):
Then, when you start looking atthings like real estate, you
know something an appreciatingasset where you can have a
tenant paying down somebody.
You know the debt necessary.
Like you said, that just makesit just makes too much sense to
not do and I think for a lot ofpeople if they're underneath the
Dave Ramsey mindset, it makesit really, really tough.
They try to start buying realestate and really build anything

(38:17):
of any significance.
If they're trying to just usecash Like it's for us.
We're talking big numbers here.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
Yeah, I, again, I can do that today.
I could not have done that 25years ago, absolutely.
And then gets in thatdefinition of what's good debt,
what's bad debt.
Again, you know, let's datemyself.
When I went to Eau Claire, Igraduated again and I was on
that five-year plan.
I only owed only $10,000 forthe entire five years.
One might argue that that was agood debt.
Because, again, the One mightargue that that was a good debt
because, again, the first job Igot out of college, I think I

(38:44):
was making $35,000.
My daughter who wants to go tolacrosse for medicine, $20,000.
$20,000 for her first year, andluckily we have the ability we
put some money away.
Her first year, not in doubt.
Her second year, we'll see how.
Your number one, you know.
But can I look at that and can Isay that you know again, if she

(39:05):
becomes, you know, in medicine,doctor or whatever she wants to
get into, maybe with that$80,000, let's just say $100,000
.
Can you justify that?
If she was going to go get ajob like me making $35,000 a
year, absolutely not.
That'd be terrible debt, evenif we can cash flow.
It is that a good investment.
So, again, for her, she wouldnot be an ideal person to go buy

(39:28):
a house and fix it up and flipit.
Her road to financial freedommight not be the same as you or
me or some of the peoplelistening to this podcast, but I
do think again.
I don't know if it's as blackand white as what Dave makes it.
It is different each one of us.
You know different times in ourlives where college debt for me
was a great investment.

(39:49):
College debt today, I don'tknow.

Speaker 1 (39:51):
My friend, yeah, I lose sleep over that, yeah, yeah
the value there, unless you'regoing to be a medical
professional attorney, some kindof specialized thing, is.
It's getting tougher andtougher to justify that
investment, in my opinion Iagree with you, you.
I'm not a big higher educationfan over here with today's
current world, and even I lookat mine like I went for
kinesiology and now I do realestate.
You know I mean cool that I gota four-year degree, but I

(40:15):
literally never used it.

Speaker 2 (40:17):
And again, I used to say, you know you learn a lot
more about yourself outside ofthe classroom than you do inside
the classroom, you know, andthat was my thought of college.
But again, you know, at about$2,000 a year.
Okay, you know I might be right, I might be wrong on that, you
know, but if I was wrong, okay,it was two grand, you know, it's
pretty expensive to say, add azero to that, my daughter is
going to learn a lot aboutherself outside the classroom

(40:38):
for 20,000 a year.
Like, yeah, I can have her goget a job again and stick in
that Bay Beach.
She'd learn a lot about herself, you know, for a lot less money
.

Speaker 1 (40:45):
Yeah, throw her an apartment downtown and have her
go get a job.
She'll learn just as much.
Yeah, fellow Blue Gold, by theway, chris, I know we've talked
about that, I know, I know, Iknow that's why.
Maybe why we always got alongso well is because of Blue Gold
People on the podcast areprobably like that would be a
different podcast.

Speaker 2 (41:01):
That's a different one.

Speaker 1 (41:01):
We'll do a whole episode on that.
Yeah, what was that?
Where was I going with that,Chris?
I had another question for youabout the debt oh, the debt
thing.
I just wanted to make a commenttoo.
You mentioned your personalhouse being paid off.
That is one area where I thinkI I I'm starting, as I get older
, to agree with Dave a littlebit.
It's like just paying off theperson.
It's not a good financialdecision at all when you look at

(41:22):
the math on it, especially ifyou, if you're locked into a low
rate right.
It's terrible decisionfinancially speaking, but it's
like that mental, the mentalpiece right when I don't have
another, I don't have anybodyelse paying my personal house
down.
It's me paying the personalhouse down, now my tenants.
I guess I could say thecashflow for my rentals pays for
my house.
But anyway, there's a wholedebate on that of some people

(41:50):
think it's a terrible idea andmathematically it is, but
mentally maybe it gives you thatextra breath of fresh air, that
confidence, and then you canalways pull a line of credit on
it, like you and lend out theline of credit or use it for
your own investments or whateverthe case is.
So it's not like it's going tobe terrible if you pay it off
and you can't ever use thatequity.
Now you can tap.

Speaker 2 (42:06):
Yeah, you know, dylan Cachet, you can't eat your
house.
You know, I do agree with that.
And that's again.
We maybe six months to live on,but again, once you get to that
point, you know I'm with you.
A hundred percent.
Consumer debt, bad real estateAgain.

(42:26):
We would not be where we weretoday without, you know,
swinging and missing on a couple.
But we hit a lot of, you know,doubles and triples that have
got us to the point where youknow again, financially should
not have paid that house off.
But you know, you know again,financially should not have paid
that house off.
But you know, for again, ahappier life, absolutely it just
it was the right thing at wherewe were in our journey.

Speaker 1 (42:45):
And one thing we've done to kind of compensate for
this whole thing is we'vestarted our own little fund.
So the way that we do ourbanking is we use sort of a
profit first methodology.
So if anybody's not heard ofProfit First great book, mike
Michalowicz got a couple ofreally good books out there.
Anyway, the whole idea is inbusiness, a lot of times what
you do is you do sales minusexpenses equals profit, right,

(43:06):
and what he says is sales minusprofit equals expenses.
And so it allows you to putmore stress on your expense line
.
And if you're not taking profitoff the table, everybody else
says I'm shoving money back intomy business, right?
Oh, I took the profits, I putit back in the business to help
it grow.
If you never take profit, thenyou're just a slave to your
business.
You don't make any money, right.
And so we kind of took thatmethodology and we created

(43:26):
different bank accounts for ourown personal life, and so we
have vacation funds, we have apersonal profit account, we have
an extra house payment account,all these different accounts
that we do and then every sooften, once we start to collect
a decent chunk in those, I takethem out of there and I put them
into some kind of investment.
And so what I do is I keep alittle chart of how much we have
, on which I took out of each ofthose accounts, and what we've

(43:48):
done is we're starting to saveup to pay the house off, but
we're investing it right nowinstead of just paying it
towards the mortgage quick andgetting that 4% return on it, if
you will.
We're getting a higher return10%, 12%, sometimes 15% return
while it's growing and it'sgrowing and it's growing and
maybe someday we'll actually paythe house off or we may just

(44:09):
make sure we have enough thereand that that money is growing
and we know it's allocated forthe house if we ever wanted to
actually just pay it off.

Speaker 2 (44:16):
So there's different ways to do it.
Yeah, and I think that's a goodpoint because, like I said, for
me, you know it was ifsomething were to happen to me,
you know, would we have theability?
Because that was again whenTony was talking to me like
making a double payment on amortgage.
He's like, dude, put that moneyin the check, in your savings
account, you'll do betterfinancially.
And you wake up and you justwant to pay it off.
You know you got the money justto pay the balance off.

(44:37):
So you know there was actuallyhaving that kind of cash flow.
And then one other thing Iprobably forgot about it, but
again, anybody that does nothave life insurance.
When I had all that real estate, I had, I think, a million and
a half of life insurance on meand that would have paid off
every single piece of propertythat we had back.
You know, 15, 20 years ago,paid off the primary home and

(45:01):
left my wife with enough, and Ithink it was like a 15 or 20
year term.
Kids again would have been, atleast, you know, 18.
So that's the other thing thatagain, there was peace of mind
back then, even though we werein debt, that if something were
to happen to me, as far as if Iwere to pass, it all would have
been paid off and I wasn't goingto leave that kind of debt to
my wife.

Speaker 1 (45:20):
Yeah, there's some pretty cool life insurance.

Speaker 2 (45:21):
Think about that with .
Again, we had the money to paythat mortgage off instead of
just making the minimum monthlypayment.
Eventually, it was paid off onits own.

Speaker 1 (45:28):
Yeah, and there's some pretty cool life insurance
policies out there.
Nowadays we use a couple ofdifferent ones.
We're actually starting up adifferent one that we pay a
large chunk for five years andthey have a bank that matches it
for five years and then thebank pays another five years of
the premium and then in 15 yearswe can start taking a draw and
we get a draw from it.

(45:49):
It'll be six figures for therest of our life and it's tax
free and all this sort of stuff.
So there's some in it and youget a death benefit with it and
you know, creditors ever want tocome after you.
They can't come after your lifeinsurance.
There's some really cool stuff.
We have another one where itbuilds up a lot of cash value.
You overfund it, it's called,and you build up some cash value
and then you can borrow, youcan take loans against the

(46:09):
policy.
So it still creates a dividendand you're still earning
interest.
You're paying interest when youuse it, but it's a small amount
and you can kind of use it asyour own bank as well.
Plus, you're getting the lifeinsurance benefit and all that
sort of stuff.
So there's cool programs outthere.
And then term, you just want abasic term one.
They're pretty cheap,especially if you're younger.

Speaker 2 (46:26):
If you're young.
I'm shopping for one right now,and that's where my my buddy,
eric, he's like you're not younganymore.

Speaker 1 (46:33):
Policy's going up.
Baby, it season going up.
Baby, it's going through theroom.

Speaker 2 (46:37):
I might be at the gym twice a week.
Now, there you go, there you go.

Speaker 1 (46:41):
Well, chris, let's talk quick about title as we
start to wrap this up again.
No, don't tune out.
People were just about to turnpodcast up.
Don't tune out, because there'ssome really important stuff
here.
There's important things toknow in the title world that, as
an investor, even a beginnerwhat are some of those things,
chris, that you would advisesomebody getting started to at
least know some basics abouttitle, what they're looking for,
and obviously, hopefullythey're working with a reputable

(47:03):
title company, like you guys doa lot of this stuff but what
should they know as the investor, versus just relying on you
guys at the title company for Ithink the biggest thing again is
why are you getting titleinsurance?

Speaker 2 (47:15):
Because you're acquiring an asset and if you're
acquiring an asset you want tomake sure you get it no strings
attached.
So if you're buying a propertyand you know you're going to be
paying cash for it, you want tomake sure there's no other liens
or problems with it.
The thing about title insuranceand probably why it's less than
exciting as an industry we do aton of things before you even
get to the closing table, thatcurative research, that we are

(47:45):
going back 40 years in time andwe're looking at stuff, and the
kicker on it is what we do isyou put together a title
commitment and we send that outto your real estate agent if you
have a realtor, or you if it'sa for sale by owner.
And the only advice I wouldgive to people is take a look at
that.
You know page one, who owns it,who's buying it.
You know, make sure again.
You know if you're buying it,you know your name is or your
LLC is correct.
And then look at those next twopages requirements, what needs

(48:06):
to be paid off and then thethird page or the third section
is exceptions.
And it's so important again tolook at that last exception page
, because if we found easements,we're listing it and there's no
coverage for that If there's ashared driveway.
It blows my mind how often we'llget a call from a buyer after
they bought it and now they wantto sell it and there's a shared

(48:27):
driveway.
Well, you never told me aboutit.
Yes, we did.
It was on that title commitmentand as a title company you can
buy a property and sell aproperty with a shared driveway
and who cares?
But if you're a buyer, you'renow the seller and you want to
have that buyer come and they'reworking with a lender that
might be FHA government loan.
They don't like shared drivesin order to record an agreement.

(48:48):
So look at that stuff.
If there's any kind of specialassessment, you've got to look
at that stuff.
It only takes a second.
And then probably the big, big,big reason to make sure you're
looking at that title commitment, you're saving it somewhere If
you sell that property down theroad.
Guess what that title companywill do if you send us that
paperwork.
If we didn't do the title work,you know somebody else did.
You get that title paperworkand you send it to the title

(49:10):
company.
When you sell it, we're goingto knock about 20% off of your
closing costs.
So get it, look at it and thenmake sure you put it somewhere
so you can forward it to thattitle company when you go to
sell it.
But that's really it.
I mean title companies.
Again, we're doing thatresearch on the backside.
We're putting those closingstatements together.
Our fees are set by the stateof Wisconsin.

(49:30):
So really, if you shop aroundfor title companies, give or
take a hundred bucks, I mean wereally should be within the same
price.
So again, service.
You know, work with someonethat you enjoy working with,
that's going to be part of yourteam.
You know, again, communication,if there's a problem reaching
out to you.
Again that goes back to ourgrowth, where I don't remember
when it was.
But you're like, chris, youknow we can't get these payoffs

(49:52):
in time.
Like you know we're not closingon time.
Like what do we got to do toget these payoffs back?
And then I think myconversation to you was we're
reaching out to your seller butthey're not filling out our form
, and you know.
So then you're like why don'twe get the form signed when
we're having the offer topurchase signed?
You know our team is there, andit was that little bit of growth
.
I think that we you, I meanreally you said, hey, what can

(50:13):
we do to make this process thatmuch smoother for the customer,
ensure that we can get to theclosing table on time, and again
that was impactful for me tooLike, well, let's not just rest
on, you know, okay, everything'sgoing okay.
Like, what can we do to do alittle bit more, do a little bit
better?
And that's always again been my, you know, enjoyment of working
with you.
You know, the growth that I'veexperienced has normally been

(50:37):
because you're like, hey, whatcan we do a little bit better to
better serve our customers, ourbuyers, our sellers, our
lenders?
And again you should bealigning yourself, I think, with
the title company that has thatsame mindset.
What can we do to maybetogether try to make that
experience that much moreenjoyable for customers?

Speaker 1 (50:53):
Yeah, for sure, for sure.
No, that's all really goodstuff and I think that that is
really important, guys, when youare shopping title companies
that you know, Chris mentionedwe were interviewing title
companies back in 2018.
Back then we weren't doingnearly the volume we were doing,
so now I'm looking back and I'mlike I can't believe you were
nervous for that.
We were hardly doing nearly asmany deals as we do now to us

(51:17):
because we had been working withanother title company who had
an attorney on staff and itseemed like every time we were
getting we were trying to getsomething closed.
It would be like the day beforeclosing and then there'd be
some other thing that would comeup and they would be like oh,
we got to push closing now andwe got to push closing and I'm
like you guys, like we give youenough notice on this stuff,
Like we need to find and theyjust didn't seem like they were
very willing to like changeanything in their process and

(51:37):
all that kind of stuff.
And so we needed somebody likeyou.
We, when we found you, we werelike this is great, Somebody who
wants to learn and grow with usand is willing to adapt or do
things maybe a littledifferently than they used to do
and knows the investment worldand all those things.
It can make a big, bigdifference in the quality of
your reputation.
Like for me, our reputationwith our sellers and our buyers
is so important, right, and wedo everything we can to try to

(52:01):
make the process as smoothly aspossible on both sides of the
coin.
And then we have to insertthird parties, which is a title
company, and so they're areflection of our brand, right
Like they're an extension of us,to make sure that they're
representing and they're givingthat seller or buyer a great
experience as well.
And now real estate gets messy.
Not every time we can do thebest we can, and sometimes we're
still going to have sellerswalk away from the table mad,

(52:23):
buyers walk away from the tablemad.
Something didn't go right.
Whatever the case is, it iswhat it is.
But we also then we incorporatesometimes people are using
commercial lenders, so now we'vegot appraisers that we've got
to fill in there.
We just had one where theappraiser on a Saturday
scheduled it for a Saturday atfive o'clock with a rental
property.
It didn't show up till like six, 30 or seven, Didn't call,
didn't text, just decided toshow up late and they were like

(52:45):
no, you're not coming here.
You said five o'clock.
Now the seller's mad at us andwe're like, hey, it's the third
part, like we told them five.
They told us five, we set it up.
They didn't show up, like we'resorry, you know.
So you need those third partiesthat you can rely on and you
can have good relationships withand understand.
This is the experience they'regoing to give to my customers
and this is the standard I want.

(53:06):
And if somebody who's alignedwith that and is willing to work
with you and provide thatexperience.
I think that's so important forpeople out there that are
looking for, you know, not justtitle companies, but everybody
who touches your, your brand,along the process.
So we appreciate that withworking with you guys, chris, at
the title company, and it'sbeen a great experience and we
still are tweaking stuff.
I mean, you and I in the lasttwo weeks we're like, hey, what

(53:29):
about this stuff?
How do we get?
How do we get better with ourteams on these kinds of things.

Speaker 2 (53:32):
Yeah, I just want to take again I, I, you know you
guys great Google reviewsbecause again you do that
customer, that seller, thatbuyer.
We try to again take thatmindset to with our customers
and try to get that positivefeedback.
And you know, as a titlecompany, probably my one of my
lesser moments and again,believe me, I've had an IRS
agent walk in the door, we'vebeen subpoenaed.

(53:53):
You know again like we'redealing again borderline
attorney stuff, but againadversity deal with it.
This is what they want.
Normally it has nothing to dowith us, it's that buyer and
that seller.
But my worst moment, I think,was a Zoom call like this.
I think it was like a managermeeting.
I go on our Google reviewsbecause again we want our
customers to feel we're doingthe best for them.

(54:14):
One-star review.
The guy's name was Gary.
One-star review the guy's namewas Gary and I was so mad he had
reached out to our main orderdepartment about looking for an
easement up in Door County andyou're up in Door County, corey,
you know, looking for aneasement up in those unplanted
lands.
That's not going to take me twominutes, but I didn't get back
to him.
Communication.
I dragged my feet and he hadevery right to leave that one

(54:38):
star review.
Like.
My wife disagreed.
She's like wow, come on, you'rea customer, blah, blah, blah,
blah.
But I didn't get back to himand that's not me.
So I reached out to him, Iapologized and I said Gary, I'm
sorry, you know, if you're stillinterested, I would love to
look for that easement up inDoor County, no-transcript to

(55:31):
absorb it.
It is hard.
It's hard to take criticism,it's hard not to think you're
given everything you possiblycan.
But at the end of the day Iremember trying to remind myself
about that, the job that I do.
I love doing it.
I'm lucky to have people I getto work with.
But again, that's thatself-reflection.
Who are we there for thecustomer?
And without the customer Idon't have a job to come to.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
I might be bagging popcorn at Bay Beach if I start
getting a couple more of thoseone-star reviews.

Speaker 2 (56:04):
Yeah well, hey, your wife would still love you and
your kids would still love you,that's right.

Speaker 1 (56:06):
Yeah, if you get a couple more, yeah, that's right.
Going back to real quick, Iwant to touch on this before we
wrap here.
Chris, uh, you mentioned theshared driveway thing before.
So a couple things that we'veseen shared driveways, shared
wells that's another one that'scommon.
Uh, we see that more than Iever thought I would ever see.
I didn't even know it was athing when I when I was growing
up, that people could sharewells.
Uh, what we've done, and youtell me if this is the right
thing, what we try to do whenwe're negotiating with the

(56:27):
seller or after we've locked upa contract, and when you come
back to us and you say, hey,cory, I can't find a shared
driveway agreement, you know.
So we rely on you, chris.
We We'll call you and say, hey,is there anything recorded that
would show a shared drivewayagreement or a shared well or
any weird stuff that would comeup?
Driveway easements are justlike to get access to property.
Sometimes You've got to have aneasement to get to certain

(56:48):
properties.
Anything recorded, you comeback saying you couldn't find it
, we'll just draft something upor work with an attorney to
draft something up.
We'll have each neighbor signit, if we can, and then you go
ahead and record that.
So then in the future it's notan issue.

Speaker 2 (57:02):
Yep, and that's it.
These agreements may or may nothave been recorded.
I think right now I got todouble check my state statutes.
But these used to be goodforever.
Then I think it was 60 years,then it was 40, then it was back
to a certain date if it wasplatted.
But you hit the nail on thehead If we can't find it.
It's just as simple as whoeverowns the property.
If you haven't closed yet, itwould be the current owner.

(57:23):
And then whatever neighborshares that driveway, shares
that.
Well, get something on paper,get it recorded.
Attorney, would be a good ideabecause if there's any kind of
maintenance, who's going to fixthe road down the road?
Who's going to fix the well inthe future?
Having you draft some of thosedocuments, eh, but again, do

(57:45):
your own due diligence,depending on who you know.
Like I said, I got a good buddywho is no longer my attorney.
He's now a judge in Wood County.
So I'm looking for a newattorney.
So Christine might be hearingfrom me a little more now, but
again, that's simple Document,little more you know now.
But again, that's simpledocument signatures, notarize it
, get it recorded.
It's a public record, move on.

Speaker 1 (58:04):
Yeah, yep, good stuff .
Well, chris, as we wrap here,we always ask a little fun
question.
Part of this is because we havepeople outside of Wisconsin who
are wanting to invest or doinvest here, but don't get here
very often, and so we'd like totell them a little bit about
this wonderful state that welove to call home of Wisconsin.
So give me your favoriteWisconsin tradition or place to
visit.

Speaker 2 (58:25):
I put probably more thought into this question than
anything else you're going toask me.
So, as a Packer season ticketholder, I mean the Packers were
up there, you know.
Again we joke about Bay Beachbut honestly I don't know.
I lived in Minnesota for alittle bit but I think the
supper club vibe that we getgoing here Again fortunate
enough that, being the introvertI am, my wife drags me out

(58:46):
probably once every two months.
We have a supper club group,some of her high school friends,
and we travel all overNortheast Wisconsin trying to
find supper clubs that we havenot been to.
My favorite, although probablyit was the one that I
disappointed everybody, was theBlack Otter.
They have a prime rib as big asmy head and anybody who knows

(59:08):
me.
I got a big old round head.
I could not put that thing downand I mean that was my mission,
I had geared up for that thing.
So again, black Otter, highlyrecommend it, that's in Seymour
In general just the vibe of asupper club.
The two guys that we go out with, Tim and Mike, they always get
the fish.
I'm a Prime River Estate guy.
My wife will get weird and getthe fish, or something.

Speaker 1 (59:32):
Throw a shrimp ball.

Speaker 2 (59:33):
But not deep fried fish.
She'll get the healthy fish,the salmon or whatever.
Yeah, but I just think it'ssuch a fun vibe, atmosphere.
Um, you know, bar slashrestaurant, the salad bar, you
know, like they're just sounique.
So I mean I, I really when,when I see that on our calendar,
always looking forward towherever we're going to be going
to yeah, now blackout.

Speaker 1 (59:52):
Or is that seymour, chris seymour?
Yep, seymour.
Great reason you couldn't do.
They probably filled you up toomuch with old fashions in salad
bars before you got it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:00):
I had my game face.
Okay, there were no carbs in mybody, no breadsticks, no dinner
rolls.
I was ready to go to town onthat.
You had been training formonths for that.
Oh yeah, unbelievable.
I'm disappointed, you know me,I wasn't looking so hot.

Speaker 1 (01:00:20):
Had the meat sweats for days.

Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
That was not my finest moment.

Speaker 1 (01:00:25):
Well, chris, I appreciate you being on here.
Man, hey, if anybody wants toget in contact with you they
have questions about titleeasements, some weird divorce
thing on their title commitment,something, anything they want
to talk to you about.
What's the best way for them toget in touch with?

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
you.
Yeah, I'm going to say email.
I mean again, you know I'm nottoo much on the social media,
although your brother, Monte, istrying to get me with that
ex-Twitter account emailing me.
You know, chrischarles.
And then it's at Gowie Group,so G-O-W-E-Y-G-R-O-U-Pcom, so

(01:00:59):
Town, Country, O-U-P dot com, sotown and country.
Again, that's who I work for,but we are part of the Gowie
group of title companies.
So, chrischarles, atgowiegroupcom.
You know website.
You know you could try to shootme a phone call or a text
message, but I'm one of thoseold farts that I put my phone on
the charger when I get to theoffice and I look at it at five
o'clock and see the 14 peoplethat tried to call and text me.

Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
Beautiful.
Now, last question for you Doyou do title all over Wisconsin,
or is there a certaingeographical area?
If somebody reached out to youthat, you'd be better equipped
to help them, yeah, we'relicensed any place in Wisconsin.

Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
We're also licensed in Minnesota.
We're going to be getting intothe UP.
That's one of our goals for2026.
But I'll cover anywhere inWisconsin what, honestly though,
I would do.
Though, if you're down, like inKinosha, we have offices down
there.
We have an office down in theMadison Janesville office Like I
might, depending on thesituation, put you in contact

(01:01:49):
with one of our managers downthere, because, again, I just
think it's just a little bettercommunication.
They know the market, they knowthe area, but, again, you know,
if they need me to get involvedwith any of the questions,
they'll reach out to me.
Because, again, like, like youknow, but subject to, you know,
double closings, no patient,wholesale, like there probably

(01:02:10):
hasn't been anything that hasn'tcome across our plate and
that's the nice thing, you know,when I was at the just town and
country, uh, old Republic orunderwriter, like I have this
amazing rep, uh, kate Marlin,and, if you know, kate would
look at it and we can get itfigured out like some of those
complex things that you weretalking about earlier with the
other title company, like she'dfind a way and, uh, the merger

(01:02:31):
with Gowey, I was a littlenervous.
But our attorney now we have anin-house attorney, sarah Hetke,
and I mean again just the mostlike customer focused, like what
can we do to get this closed?
So again, as a title company,like I actually see more
opportunity to be able to be,you know, investor friendly as
we move forward.
And if they get into the UP,you know again, we might be

(01:02:55):
doing 200 a year if we get intothat Michigan market there we go
Beautiful, sir.

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
Well, chris, this has been awesome.
Thank you guys all for tuninginto another episode here.
I say this on a lot of theepisodes Now please share this.
I know this is this is thecommon ask here, but if you guys
are still listening aftergetting through the title stuff,
that means you're invested inthis podcast.
You got some value out of it.
If you're still here, pleaseshare it.
Put it on your social media,text it to a friend, somebody

(01:03:21):
else who's looking to get intoreal estate potentially.
Not only does it benefit ourcommunity.
Get more people at yourlistening to this but it also
benefits you as the personsharing, because now people know
you're in real estate, theyknow that you're getting
information in.
That's beneficial.
They want to maybe partner withyou on a deal, maybe they want

(01:03:43):
to JV something, maybe they wantto lend you money, maybe that
you want to lend them money,like.
There's a lot of things thatcan happen just by sharing this
and letting people know thatyou're involved in Wisconsin
real estate.
So please share this episodeand until next time, we'll see
you on the next episode.