July 22, 2025 • 49 mins
What does it look like when a full-time cop and a transaction coordinator on the iBuyWI team decide they’re done waiting for retirement?
Andy Lade and Vanessa Ring are a Wisconsin couple flipping their way to financial freedom, while working full-time, and figuring it out as they go.
In this episode, you’ll hear how they went from zero experience to confidently managing multiple flips and rental properties. From using home equity to fund their first deal to learning how to invest as a couple (without killing each other), Andy and Vanessa open up about the wins, mistakes, and mindset shifts that helped them build real momentum.
If you're juggling life, work, and the dream of building wealth through real estate — this episode is for you.
💡 Inside This Episode:
• How they funded their first flip with home equity
• The mistakes they made early on (and what they learned)
• The transition from DIY to hiring professionals
• Tips for investing as a couple — and keeping the peace
• Building a buy box, running numbers, and refining your strategy
• Stepping into BRRRRs and building passive income
• Honest talk about fear, balance, and flipping houses in Wisconsin
🎧 Whether you’re here for tactical tips or just need a reminder that you can do this too — you’re in the right place.
👉 Visit wisconsindiscountproperties.com to join our buyers list and mention this podcast to receive our BRRRR for Beginners course — a $3,000 value — completely free.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everybody, we're back with another episode of the
Wisconsin Investor Podcast andI'm excited because I have
another couple here with metoday who I'm going to introduce
in a second.
But before I get into that, asI always do, I'm going to talk
about our sponsor, wisconsinDiscount Properties, and last
episode you guys heard me talkabout something new that we're
doing In lieu of giving you guysFOMO on every episode, we're
(00:23):
going to give you a freebietoday, and so what we're doing
is we're giving away our Burrfor Beginners course.
This is a course I created afew years ago and we used to
sell it for $3,000.
Now I was one-on-one coachingpeople along with that, but we
started selling it for $1,500 or$1,900, somewhere in there, and
now we're giving it away forfree just for being a just a
(00:49):
listener of this podcast.
So all you had to do to getthat course go to
wisconsindiscountpropertiescom,put your information in to join
the buyers list and Connor Reesefrom our team will reach out to
you, have a little conversationwith you and just mention that
you're interested in getting thefree burr for beginners course.
They'll hook you up with thatdiscount code and go get started
on burring your way to wealthtoday.
With that, let's introduce oneof my favorite couples.
(01:12):
I've got vanessa ring and andylade with me.
What's up guys?
hi morning morning uh, you guysare have a beautiful background
here for those of them that arewatching this on YouTube.
Where are you guys at right now?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We are located at the Wisconsin Discount Properties
headquarters right now.
Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
In office.
I'm not even there and you guysare there.
This is embarrassing in someways, but also incredible at the
same time.
So I'm excited to have you guyson.
I always love having couples onbecause, as we were kind of
talking a little bit before wehit record, I started this
business with Carrie or Carriestarted this business with me,
however we want to say it and,um, there's a lot of, there's a
(01:54):
lot of things that work reallywell with couples in this
business, and then there's a lotof challenges with couples in
this business.
So I always love interviewingcouples and talking about it,
and you guys are.
Although you have differentlast names, soon you will have
the same last name, correct?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Correct, yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
She plays her cards, right yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
The countdown is on.
We're under 300 days now.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Oh, I'm sure you know the exact amount.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yeah Well, we want this to be evergreen, so we
don't want to date stamp itbecause people may listen to it
later.
But, yes, so you guys are goingto be getting married here soon
.
Uh, and you guys got started inthe real estate investing
business.
Talk a little bit.
First of all, I guess, vanessa,let's start with you.
How did you decide, when wasthat moment where you decided
like, hey, I want to get startedin real estate investing?
(02:38):
What?
When was that?
Do you remember?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah, I don't know if I would say this was my plan at
any point.
It kind of fell into my lap.
Luckily I was in the corporateworld working my nine to five
job, not really loving what Iwas doing.
So I was starting to kind oflook around see what else was
available and I came across afriend of mine who had posted a
(03:01):
job opportunity here atWisconsin Discount Properties
and Fox Seals Home Buyers I buy.
So I kind of thought, okay,maybe that's something I want to
get into.
I knew some of my friends wererealtors and that kind of stuff.
So I'm like maybe this is whereI'm supposed to go.
So I did some interviewing andhere I am.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, and you now did you just cross the two-year
threshold with us?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
I did Yep.
It was two years, in May, thatI've been here.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Wow, that's tough to do with us.
I mean we must kind of like you.
I guess we'll keep you.
No, I'm just kidding.
We have great people on ourteam, andy, what about you?
When was that moment?
Was that kind of a nudge fromVanessaessa that was like, hey,
we should start real estateinvesting?
Or was this on your radar anyat any point before she started
really getting in the industryfor her nine to five?
Speaker 3 (03:51):
no, I think that just because I knew she had the
business side knowledge when itcame into that, that would.
And I tell people all the timelike, when you're explaining
this, this business, to me,please talk to me like I'm a
child, because I don'tunderstand like the business
side of it.
Yeah, so I, fortunately enough,I was in a position where, you
know, I had some, some equityand some properties and stuff
(04:16):
like that and I had the abilityto figure out how to put the
money forward and I said, hey,no one, we discussed it and she
had talked about.
You know, there's other people,um, that she works with, that
are dabbling in real estate andstuff like that.
So it's, it's one of them thingswhere we just like, hey, if
we're ever going to do it, um,let's do it.
(04:36):
And you know there's some otherreasons why we wanted to get
into it.
You know we maybe you know mycareer, I would not.
So for my career I'd have towork until I'm like 65 to retire
and I'm like I need a differentexit strategy here because I
can't do this until that age.
So ultimately, we're trying toget into something a little bit
(05:00):
more so we can find a morecomfortable life.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah for sure.
So let's go to the goal then,andy, because you brought that
up just now.
For you guys, the goal of doingreal estate investing is it
more so of a longterm retirementplays and more so short term,
like let's build up some cash.
And then longterm goal Likewhat?
What was the original?
Like hey, let's do this realestate investing thing.
(05:24):
What was the original?
Like, hey, let's do this realestate investing thing.
What was the original?
Like this is why we want to doit.
Goal for the immediate firstbuy.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
I think it was more looking at retirement um for us
originally.
Uh, you know, we have, I haveone child, he has two children.
We wanted to have somethingthat we could leave our kids
when that time comes and comes.
And we heard a lot that realestate was a good way to kind of
have that retirement that wecould enjoy and you know, leave
(05:55):
behind something for our kids tomaybe get them a jump start on
it too yeah, for me.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Originally I'm like listening to other people that
are doing they like we just made20 grand off of this property
or whatever and I'm like, well,I'd like 20 grand so originally,
but then, you know, once westarted learning more about it,
then I'm like this could reallybe an exit strategy for me to
get out of.
I'm in the law enforcementfield and the way that culture
(06:24):
goes and is continuing to trend,it's something that I think I
want to stay in for another 15more years or whatever.
So I'm thinking that, well,maybe this is a different exit
strategy.
And also, you know, if we getto the point where we have
enough I mean equity and otherproperties under our belt, these
could be form of a 401k,basically, or a retirement
(06:49):
process.
Right, I would imagine, in lawenforcement you would have a
decent retirement program thereright to well into my 50s and
60s and if, if I could, you know, get to where I have properties
that are making money for meand investments that are making
(07:09):
money for us with minimal work?
Yeah, and she mentioned that,uh, um, you know what the
children and stuff like that is.
I always knew that with thatprofession, that I was going to
miss a lot of things and Ididn't think it was going to be
as big of a problem than itturned out to be.
Just other things, just overalltime with our kids.
(07:32):
That, um, it really has becomean issue.
Okay, if I can control my ownschedule and I can be more
present for a lot of thesethings, especially as my
daughter just turned 13 today asa birthday, oh, happy birthday,
um, birthday.
So, um, if you know, if I canbe more present for for all
three of our kids, then I thinkthat's important at this point?
Speaker 1 (07:53):
yeah, for sure, it's so interesting.
I feel like, like I always talkabout this with carrie's like
growing up I always thought likeas we get older it would be
harder in life.
But I think like 20s to 30s,like those two decades are some
of the hardest decades.
If you're raising a familybecause you're trying to start a
career, then you start a careerand you're like, oh, I really
don't like this career, I got togo start somewhere else.
(08:14):
Right, you're kind of startingall over.
Then you're, at the same time,you're trying to raise kids who
are growing.
They don't stop, they keepgrowing and then they get into
stuff.
And then your time just seemslike you're like well, how did I
have time in my twenties, likebefore he had kids, like what
did I even do with my life?
And then all those those twodecades.
It's like trying you're tryingto figure out adulting in your
(08:37):
twenties and thirties.
I feel like and now I justturned 40 this last year and I
feel like I'm finally at a placewhere, like I don't have it
figured out, but I feel like I Iknow the game now a little bit
better and I understand thepriorities.
Right, like andy you're talkingabout like the kids.
But one day you wake up andyou're like holy crap, my
daughter just turned 13.
How did that happen?
Right, it goes a little fast,right.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
And then with that right now.
That is a big problem because,you know, with phones and
everything these days, you keepgetting these memories that pop
up.
And we're like how are we atthis point now, compared to this
little baby picture that Iremember from yesterday?
I'm like this is going way toofast.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Yeah, and then you're like shit, I only have five
more years left, if I'm lucky,right.
If she even wants to hang withdad at all, Five years, right,
and so it is.
It's a challenge, man, and I'mI applaud you guys for starting
to do some things, you know, um,proactively, to give yourself
more freedom and choices, right?
Not that, vanessa, I ever wantyou to leave our company, but I
(09:38):
want you to have the choice.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Andy and Andy the Right, and I'll just keep
working you know I still needher in this business.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, she doesn't get to stop working, I'm yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
That is all about Andy.
This is all.
Yeah, that's what this one.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I'm still in my thirties, so I'm okay, oh you
got time, girl.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
You better grow because it's in your thirties,
right, but I think for theyounger audience that listens to
this, you know, listen to thesetwo stories and like, if you
can start now, in your early EFCor your early twenties you're
still maybe graduating highschool listening to this or
something Like, if you can startthis game now when you're in
your thirties and you'restruggling, like when all your
peers are struggling becausethey're having little babies and
(10:23):
they're stressed out becausethey got to work all these hours
and do all this stuff, you canhave that freedom to be able to,
you know, be there for yourkids, like a lot of us didn't
get to have when our kids wereyoung because we were working
and grinding and trying to, youknow, climb the corporate ladder
and all that kind of stuff.
And I think it's a reallyimportant lesson for the younger
audience out there to hear youguys talk about you.
You know we hear like from theold people all the time like, oh
(10:46):
yeah, like time flies.
You know, just wait, your kidsare going to grow up so quick
and then they do and you're like, holy crap, those old people
were right.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I think that uh, and we talked about sometime is like
I'm actually pissed off that wedidn't do this a long time ago.
Like what were we so scared?
Speaker 1 (11:04):
of.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
Failure Okay, but why was I so scared to risk my?
It's not like I have so muchwealth that I'm going to lose my
entire.
I was a poor public servant.
I don't have much to lose.
It's like what was I so scaredof to begin with?
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Well, let's talk about that because I think
that's important.
This is one of the reasons Ilove having you know.
You guys are newer to the gameand I love having newer people
to the game because the woundsare still fresh right For me.
I've been in it now seven oreight years and I kind of forget
some of the struggles.
Sometimes I think of when I wasstarting and some of those
things, those things.
So it's always interesting forme to talk to people who are
newer to it, like what were someof those big fears you know
(11:45):
before you bought that firstproperty?
What were some of the thingsgoing through your heads?
And I guess I want to hear fromboth of you guys on this.
So, andy, I'll start with youon that.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Sure, I was like well , what happens if the first one
goes bad Like?
you know, we started a flip upnorth a little bit, our first
property where we just kind ofjumped into it and like I mean,
well, am I gonna have to filebankruptcy or am I gonna lose my
house?
Am I gonna?
You know, it's just you.
All you think about is thenegative, right.
(12:13):
So, yeah, it's like plus, it'sjust not knowing, not being an
expert in the business, was areal anxiety thing for me, like,
okay, you know, I don't know,and we're still making mistakes
every day.
We're dealing with some rightnow that we're kind of messing
up.
But it's like how is this goingto affect my personal life?
(12:36):
Because I'm putting my personalI guess my personal wealth on
the line.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
To start out here, Sure, because you're pulling,
you're using equity from someproperties, is what you're
saying, so you're putting thatin that room.
Speaker 3 (12:51):
And that's how we started out.
Obviously, we want to get awayfrom that at some point, but but
that's how we started out.
Is, you know, taking someequity from a line of credit on
my personal house?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
to help a little bit.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
So you know, like, if this goes backwards, like I
don't know, like, do I have to?
Take my house away from me.
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Living under a bridge .
So now that you've been in it alittle bit, you've gone through
.
You guys have flipped one andVanessa, I want to get to you
next on the anxiety piece ofyours but you flipped one, you
flipped another one.
That is, or you flipped andsold one.
You flipped one and it's sold,just waiting to close.
You've got one in process offlipping that you just got
(13:42):
started on, and then you haveanother one under contract ready
to rock and roll.
You just we just got started onand then you have another one
under contract ready to rock androll.
We just got to wait for theclose date on that one.
So you guys are experienced.
Now You've been through some ofthese things.
Right, andy, now that you'vebeen through a few of them, like
okay.
So you said fear was like thehome equity line.
Maybe your house is up.
Are you still in fear mode ofthat or have you now kind of
come to some other realizationthat's helping you guys, you
(14:05):
know, accelerate and buy someother properties well, we
started trending in thedirection.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
That I wanted to is let's start getting some higher
value properties where you knowmaybe the profit margin is a
little juicy juicier right, andbut that comes with his own
anxiety, like the last one wejust uh put off for him was
almost four hundred thousanddollars, that's.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
That's hard for me to swallow a little bit so, yeah,
that, I mean that's anescalation, is what we call that
?
That escalates quickly.
Yeah, yeah, vanessa, stillgives you a little.
Yeah, vanessa, what about youwhen you were before you bought
that first one?
Leading up to that, like, whatwere some of the big fears
around making that leap andgetting that first one?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
yeah, my big thing was failure.
You know, sitting and being inthe position, I am in the
company.
You see all these peoplesucceeding around you and you
want to be one of them.
That shows, hey, I went, I didit myself, I succeeded and I had
that fear of failing and Ididn't want to do that in front
of my peers.
But also the money thing, youknow, making sure that we had
(15:13):
money to do this, that weweren't going to put ourselves
in too much debt, that wecouldn't get ourselves out of it
if we needed to.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Yeah, okay, and now that you've done a few, is that
fear of failure still there?
Has it gone down at all?
Has it gone up, like where isit after you?
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I mean, we're not that far enough in where I think
um that.
That fear is gone yet.
I mean it's still there, butslowly we're, uh, we're getting
better at it.
I think we're really finding,figuring out what we're doing
right, what we're doing wrong.
We're trying and you are.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
I wonder so many things.
I was just on Steve Trank'spodcast, who has called
Disruptors, and he was asking mesome questions about what are
some of the early lessons you'velearned, or like, what did you
learn?
I'm like I don't know, like youjust kind of keep moving
forward, right, you learn thesethings, but it's not like you're
sitting there documenting like,ooh, next time don't do this.
(16:17):
It's like you and I, vanessathis morning and so Vanessa, for
those that don't know know isour lead transaction coordinator
, so she handles all the messystuff From the time we get under
contract to the time it closes.
She's the one in between,making sure everything goes as
smooth as possible.
And we had one that I justmessed up because it was a
foreclosure and I changed theclose date on it and shifted a
(16:37):
couple properties around to tryto play with the lending a
little bit, and turns out now wegot to get all new payoffs for
this property and foreclosurepayoffs take forever to get back
, and so now it's screwedeverything up.
Mental note for me today I'mlike, oh, don't go changing
close dates again on aforeclosure, just leave it alone
, right, and everything will gosmooth, right?
(16:59):
So that was a little lesson,but I'm not going to like
probably write that downanywhere.
It's just something I'm goingto remember and then the next
time it comes up like, ooh, yeah, remember that it might not be
perfect, right, I might make thesame mistake again, but chances
are I'm going to learn fromthat.
That, you know.
Jab and the gut that Ooh, thatwas my fault, shouldn't have did
that, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Yeah, and I think the things that we say we want to
learn from, we're still makingthose mistakes.
We told ourselves we weren'tgoing to do another property up
north, and here we are withanother property up north.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Well, why did you guys do that?
Well, let's talk about that.
What was the thing that got youguys to say yes to that one,
when you said, no, we're notgoing to do another one up north
?
Speaker 2 (17:43):
This one was.
It's actually about 10 minutesfrom my parents' house and
they're watching me or us overthe last couple of years get
into this and I brought it up tothem and I said would you guys
be interested in kind of doingthis with us?
Speaker 1 (17:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
We'll kind of be more of like the what general I
wouldn't say general contractors, but we're kind of the, we're
the money, and kind of the.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
We're the risk.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Yeah, we're the risk.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
And they were like yeah, why not?
You know, my dad goes huntingevery year out in Colorado, so
he could always use some extracash to pay for that or their
trips, to pay for that or theirtrips.
So they saw it as anopportunity for them to make
some money, and we saw it as anopportunity for us to make some
money without doing all the workon it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, so the first one you guys were doing all the
work on up north.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Yeah.
So our first one that we bought, we thought, okay, let's just
do all the work on it ourselves,let's not try to hire out
unless absolutely needed to savemoney.
And that's where I think wasour first failure was thinking
that we could have a property anhour and a half away from where
we are and do all the work onit while still having two
(18:56):
full-time jobs.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, that's a tough one.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
That did not work out the greatest.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
No.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
That was always the goal in my mind is let's get one
under our belt so we can have alittle backing money and then
we don't have to do the workanymore and hopefully, after the
one that's supposed to close onthe first that one's done, then
we don't have to do thatanymore.
Because it real, we realizethat we, we just can't.
(19:23):
we don't have the time, the timeor, you know, we have kids,
both full-time jobs.
We I just don't have time to orthe energy, right frank, to
like to sit here and do all thework on everything.
So that was the.
The idea of why I would agreeto the the one up North again is
(19:44):
that that was supposed to besupposed to be all hands off and
we were just a silent partnerin this.
Okay.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
And that's not how it's turning out now.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
Well, we, uh, once you start getting into a cabin,
uh, you'll start finding thatmaybe the electrical is not
correct or there's more issuesthan you originally expected.
So that's kind of what we'rerunning into right now on that
property and just trying tofigure out, I guess you could
say, the cheapest way to goabout it, but at the same time
(20:17):
you got to have it donecorrectly, or?
Speaker 3 (20:19):
yeah you're gonna be stuck with it.
Lesson two of what we learnedyeah, make things are done
correctly, because they comeback to bite you yeah, well, I
mean, you guys ran into aninteresting spot.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So, for those that don't know the property you guys
bought, we had a full-blowninspection down on.
This right inspector looked ateverything and it seemed fine,
but then, once you startedripping apart stuff, that's when
you guys found out it wasn'tokay.
Is that what happened?
So it'd be really hard, I think, for anybody.
I doubt, if you guys walkedthrough that property yourself
(20:49):
that you would have ever foundthat right.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
They didn't find these issues until we started
tearing off paneling.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
We open up walls and it's.
We learned that from our firstproperty.
The more you open up, the moreproblems you might run into.
So yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
So don't open walls, leave them alone, don't mess
with them.
Yeah, that is true, though Knoband tube wiring is a pretty
expensive thing If you have toreplace that, and you don't have
to replace it unless it'sexposed.
And so if you open a wall now,you got to replace it.
If it's behind that wall, youleave that wall alone.
You don't have to replace it ifit's there, right, which is
(21:27):
another another good thing toknow.
But I want to make that pointbecause one of the things I hear
, like our process at Wisconsindiscount property is we do an
inspection and we do a videowalkthrough, right, and some
people have an issue with thatbecause they want to go there
and actually physically walkthrough the property.
That being said, and the goalis what I hear from them is so
that they can prevent somethinglike what you guys are running
(21:48):
into with that up North propertyWell then I could be able to
see all this stuff.
It's like 90% of us are nevergoing to start like peeling back
a wall or like trying to likeclimb up and examine the
plumbing underneath the shit.
You know like you're nevergoing to do it anyway.
So you just have to understandwhen you buy off market
properties or value addproperties, even if it's listed
(22:09):
on the market, you would gothrough that same process.
You'd have an inspector.
Inspector is going to find whatthe inspector can find.
It's not perfect, they're notgoing to catch everything and
you just got to kind of know.
Know, that's the deal.
The most successful investors Isee out there we call in the
stock market world dollar costaveraging.
(22:30):
Have you guys heard this term?
So you buy the same stock orETF or whatever and you just buy
it at different points, whetherit's up or down or whatever.
Eventually you buy enough of it.
It continues to go up andyou're good.
You're buying on the low side,you're buying on the upside.
It's kind of the same thingwith properties.
If you only bought one propertyever, you need that one to go
(22:50):
perfect to hit your goals.
But say, you guys had four ofthese that you were working on.
One's a dud might break even onit, but the other one's a
$40,000 pop, the other one's a$30,000 pop, the other one's a
10, right, not great, but it'sokay, right, overall you spread
that out.
You know you made $20,000 oneach of those if you average it
(23:11):
right.
So it's one of those thingslike I see that happen.
Sometimes People get so caughtup with like, oh my gosh, I
bought this one property andthen I found this issue and now
I'm ruined, right.
And it's like, well, if youjust had a couple of them going,
you may be one.
It wouldn't, you wouldn't.
Yes, it sucks, but you've gotthree other ones that are going
to be winners.
Right, not every investment isgoing to be a winner.
(23:32):
It's like the stock market youbought five stocks.
You're not expecting all fiveof those most likely to be going
to the moon, right?
Well, we hope we do, but but onegoes bad and the other three
are good.
All right, we're still, overall, making money, right.
If you put all your eggs in theone basket and that stock goes
down, you're screwed, right.
(23:52):
I love that you guys are justcontinually moving forward and
you're doing multiple deals andyou're just continuing to and
you're you're just continuing tolearn and grow and some are
going to be winners, some aregoing to lose.
I think your first two we hadsomething similar, right.
The one that you guys did a lotof the work on maybe wasn't so
great.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
The other one, that you guys had ended up being a
really good one, right yeah,this one that we're supposed to
close right now should be very Imean not very good, but I mean
it was much smoother to closeright now should be very I mean
not very good, but I mean it wasmuch smoother this time around.
It was a better choice ofproperty.
That's another lesson that welearned is how to pick the ones
that we want right, orlocation's huge.
(24:29):
But you know, just, you knowsome of them, you know we get
some.
I know there's some investorsout there that would really like
the ones where they just goright down to the studs and
basically start over.
I don't think I like the oneswhere not so much turnkey, but
it's just a little bit more.
Just, let's just update it tothese times and then put it back
(24:54):
out there.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Yeah, more cosmetic stuff than the old ones.
But yeah, there's differentpeople that like different stuff
.
For sure, just depends.
But the good thing is, you guysare figuring out what you like,
where you like it and what youdon't like.
So now, as you guys continue togrow, your buy box tightens up
a little bit, right, and thenwhen you see one that fits it,
you guys can just strike withoutemotion.
It's just like yep, that onefits.
(25:15):
Boom, this is our buy box box.
Right, it takes all the emotionout of whether or not you
should or shouldn't and moveforward.
Going back to the fear thing,though, one thing I want to
comment on that I don't think itever goes away, right, and and
it's a good thing, right, I mean, we think about why do we have
fear in the first place?
Right, it's our caveman braintrying to connect, trying to
(25:35):
protect us from, you know, the,the saber-tooth, tooth tiger
that's going to eat us.
Right, we have fear over that.
It's healthy, right, and thereshould be a level of healthy
fear.
When we're spending a couplehundred thousand dollars, right,
for most, most people, jeffBezos don't give a rip.
Right, right, the mostAmericans, we, you know, we're
going to go put our name on theline for a couple hundred
(25:55):
thousand dollars.
We probably should have ahealthy level of fear.
But I think, like, as you guysare seeing, maybe the anxiety
drops a little bit now that youunderstand, like it's not so
scary, like once you get into it, it is what it is, you're going
to be fine.
You're not going to live undera bridge and be homeless like
it'll all.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
It'll all work itself out, right hopefully hopefully
I think, I think we'd like toget a little bit bigger of a
nest egg here, a little bit moreof a backing, and that would
you know.
So if something does gocatastrophically sideways here
that we have the ability to,okay, we could take a loss on
(26:33):
one, it wouldn't be bad.
But you know, okay, obviouslywe don't want to.
We're in this business to makemoney, right, but we don't want
to.
But it's not going to put ourLLC in the dumps, you know Right
.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah, yeah.
So, as you guys go, what itsounds like right now, what you
guys are doing, is you're you'redoing flips to build up the
cash and then the goal withowning rentals, or is that?
Am I off base on that?
Speaker 2 (26:59):
That's our goal.
I think we just want a nicelittle nest egg before we kind
of get into that.
So I would hope I maybe.
I think my goal is end of nextyear that we have one under
about the rental, but we'll haveto see what the accountant also
says, I think that's my opinionand, once again, I'm hardly an
(27:22):
expert in this field is I thinkthat should be a market specific
.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
You know if, if the selling market is still strong?
Speaker 1 (27:34):
sure.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
Let's.
Let's sell them and make moneyRight.
If the market starts tostruggle a little bit, maybe
that's the time to hold a rental.
Um and in in my big dreams, Ialso want to get my rentals to
be a little bit higher quality.
I don't want to.
You know, the the nicer theplace you have, the, I guess,
(27:56):
the more attractive rentersyou're going to have.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Wise, but you know just money wise and right Lease
problems.
You know, in a perfect world ifwe could get into some sort of
apartment building it'd be great, but I need a lot more cash to
be able to back that.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Or you just got to know somebody who does Andy.
Right, that's it.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
You have a who problem there I was just going
to say it's the, it's a whoproblem is that your?
Oh, that's a book we just readyeah not how, which we, and that
is a big thing, that, um.
We started out with the how dowe do this, how do we do this,
how do we do this?
And now we're getting is whocan do this for us?
Speaker 1 (28:39):
Yes, oh, I love it that.
That book to me, vanessa, were-read it.
I read it a few years ago andit was good.
I was like, oh, yeah, I get it.
You need somebody to do thisstuff for you.
Yeah, get it.
We already doing that stuffRight.
And now for some reason I don'tdo that.
Because of this I'm like, wait aminute, who do I know that I
(29:01):
could talk to, that could helpwith this.
Like I just met a guy thismorning out at some land.
I've never done a landdevelopment subdivided anything
right.
I had a guy on a few weeks ago,uh, talking about land and
flipping land and developingland and stuff like that.
This is a different guy thatI've kind of met around the same
time as this dude.
But I was just like, hey, Ihave a lead on a bunch of land.
I don't know how to do this,but I know somebody who knows
(29:25):
how to do this.
Let's just partner up and let'sfigure out, like, how to split
this up, if we can even make itwork, and let's just do it
together.
And then I don't have to knowanything about land.
I have the guy who knows aboutland, who knows all that stuff.
I just have to find the dealand that's what I'm good at,
right, and so it's always a whoproblem is what I find out in
most cases of uh of the issue.
(29:46):
Like you guys talked aboutgetting in there and having to
swing the hammers on your firstone right, what you guys had was
you guys had the mindset oflike we got to do this cause we
have to make the most moneypossible, but of like we got to
do this because we have to makethe most money possible.
But really, if you guys couldhave hired that out, made a
little bit less, but had likethree of those going at the same
time, you're going to againsame kind of thing You're going
(30:07):
to make, your dollar per hourgoes way up when you guys start
doing that and it's a lot lessstress and time and everything
else when you start hiring itout.
We had a mastermind a few yearsago and we had Mark and Kara
Truckee who were on early on inthe podcast, and so, for those
that haven't seen that episode,go way back to the start.
They did a great job.
(30:27):
But Mark was one of theexercises we had was what's your
time worth, and so we had themcompare two different properties
that they had, one where theywere in swing of the hammer and
one where they hired everythingout, and either a rental, where
we said how much equity did youcreate after rehab, or a flip
how much did you profit on theflip?
(30:48):
And Mark was using one wherethey made more on the flip than
the other flip where they hiredeverything out.
When he calculated it out itwas rough, roughly his hours.
We, you know he didn't log it,but he just kind of did some
math on it.
He's like, oh my gosh, he hadthis huge.
I'll never forget this.
This is like light bulb you cansee like hanging over his head
moment where he's like look atthis.
(31:09):
He's like, oh my gosh, we made$40,000 on this flip.
But I only made like $300 perhour, which is still really good
.
$300 an, which is still reallygood.
Right, 300 bucks an hour stillget good wage.
But he's like here's one wemade 20 on and I made like 1500
an hour because he wasn't doingall the work.
He was directing traffic.
He was getting people there todo the work and then he was
making sure the quality waswhere he wanted it, but his
(31:32):
profit per hour was like wayhigher, and so he made the
realization hey, if I just canget more properties going and
have my teams doing it all, I'mgoing to make way more money
with less time, right, which iswhat we all want.
A lot less stress too.
Now, contracts can be stressful, let's be honest, but that's a
whole nother lesson that peoplelearn as they get into this.
(31:54):
But it is, generally speaking,a much more efficient way to run
a flipping company than tryingto be in there swinging hammers
yourself, right.
Speaker 3 (32:05):
That goes to.
One of our issues that we'redealing with is the speed at
which we've put these first twoout.
It is not where we want to betaking way too long, so we're
trying to get more efficient atthis.
I'm very OCD when it comes toefficiency.
I got to do things the mostefficient way.
(32:26):
When things don't go the way Ilike it, it takes longer.
That drives me nuts.
So we have to be able to speedthese up, because the longer
they stay out there, the moreinterest we're paying on
financing and everything, themore it's costing us.
We got to get better at movingthese along.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
Yeah, yeah, bang them out, get them out Right.
Right, talk about as a couple.
So now for you guys as a couplewhat are some of the big
challenges you guys had or have,uh, starting this new venture
together?
Because you know, andy, you'relaw enforcement, so your thing
is completely separate thanVanessa's 9 to 5.
Now that you're blending thesetwo together and you're in a
(33:05):
business together, what's thatdynamic look like?
Speaker 2 (33:10):
So for us, I don't really do much of the hammer
swinging.
I'm more of the.
I'll get all the paperworktogether.
I'll make sure this closes.
I'll cash the checks at thebank.
I'll get all the paperworktogether.
I'll make sure this closes.
I'll get you know.
I'll cash the checks at thebank.
I'll do that kind of stuff.
Andy's more of the.
He knows what he's doing inthere.
I don't someone tells me thiselectrical issue and I'm going
(33:31):
to look at them like great cool,don't know.
Don't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
I'm the painter.
There you go, don't know whatI'm doing.
I'm the painter.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
There you go.
So as far as us workingtogether, I stay kind of in my
role and he stays in his, and wetry not to get at each other
too much, but try not to.
We do.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
I mean there's yeah, I mean obviously there's your
share of disagreements and sheknows the business end of it and
that's why I think we make agood team with this.
But it goes back to, you know,some of the REI meetings that we
went to.
You talk about the pillars ofthe business.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
I would be more on the phone getting people to the
properties to been on a job orwhatever.
Um, I'm obviously the, thefinance person you know, the
money backing person, the, youknow, and more of the who's
gonna make decisions on what weneed to do and what we don't
(34:34):
need to do.
Okay, and she handles the hey,this, we should take a look at
this property, or whatever.
She's got the more of theexpertise on the, on the I guess
the, the business side of it,sure, um, so that's a struggle
is you know where we stand onstepping over each other,
(34:54):
because sometimes we don't agreeon that and yeah, um, she
doesn't really.
Um, she doesn't value the riskas much as I value risk okay, so
she's a little bit more, gaspeda little bit.
Right and I always say it's like, well, if this thing goes under
, you walk away unscathed here.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
That's why we're not married yet.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
So, like if this thing goes bad, I'm the only one
at risk here.
You don't understand the valueof risk here, yeah.
That's a big thing that we havesometimes Okay.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Another thing that Andy doesn't always see is like
the little things, like hardwareon cabinets.
I see that where he sees thebig items and I see the little
things that we should switch.
Let's put a new faucet in here,let's switch out this.
All the light bulbs should bethe same color, like that stuff.
(35:50):
Where he's like whatever, it'sfine, just move on to the next
thing and I'm like no, theselittle things are what's going
to.
This is the first thing they'regoing to see when they come in
yeah, so that's created a little.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
That creates a little friction for you guys.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
Yeah, but usually I get my way with it, so it's okay
.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Sometimes the things that create friction in a, in a
couple, in business, are exactlythe strengths that you guys
both have, right, it's whatmakes you guys a good team,
right Cause, again, like you'resaying, but as a year, catching
all the little details, stuff,I'm like Andy, I'd be like
whatever, just get it done,let's move on.
Let's get the next deal Right,where Carrie would be like, well
(36:28):
, these things like it's notgoing to look good, it's not
going to look finished, you know, and I'm like whatever, so that
they can look past that.
It's a nice house, you know,get another market, let's go
right.
So I think that's great thatyou guys have those two
different strengths, and youknow we talk about communication
a lot in the office and, uh,sometimes just about how you
guys communicate it too.
That can can be all thedifference, right, and
(36:49):
understanding each other'sstrengths.
We went kerry and and I readRocket Fuel, which is another
great book, years ago and thatreally helped us understand each
other, because I'm much more ofthe gas pedal, she's much more,
not much more of the brake.
She's got a lot of gas pedal inher too, but she's much more of
the detail.
We got to make sure our I's aredotted, our T's are crossed, do
(37:09):
all these kinds of things andwe would cause friction all the
time because I was like let'sjust go let's just go, let's get
another deal.
And she's no, we have tounderstand where our deals are
coming from and we have to dothis and all the details.
Then I read that book and I waslike, oh, she's like the
integrator and I'm the visionary, oh.
And then she understood oh,this is how Corey's wired, he's
(37:29):
a visionary and I need to belike the integrator, like
putting all the crap togetherbehind the scenes here to like
make it all work Right.
And so once we did that, wekind of understood each other.
We still, you know, not perfect, but it really did help us a
lot, like I remember after thatwe had a good discussion about
our roles and what we're good atand what we're not good at, and
we had kind of a mutual respectthen of each other for those
(37:50):
two different roles.
So for you guys, uh, marriagecounseling, premarital
counseling here, as yourpremarital counselor I'm going
to highly recommend you guysread rocket fuel together.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
There it is there is that's top to bottom, left to
right.
Group words as a sentence.
I don't book.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
You know you can do it on audible, andy, it's okay I
think I'm like a child I needsomebody to read to me we'll see
if they have a coloring bookfor you as well, where you can
just color things in and and andlearn that way, whatever way is
best for you.
I'll just give you a summary youknow what's funny about that,
though?
Literally that's what happened.
I read the one chapter I neededto read in that book about the
(38:29):
integrator and the visionaryrole, and then carrie read the
rest of the book and had all thedetails.
It was so funny I was like, oh,I get it.
I got two chapters.
She's like read the whole book.
So more like Wednesday movie.
That's awesome.
What would you guys give so ifyou had to start this over?
What would you give othercouples out there that are
similar to you guys that arelooking to do this business
(38:50):
together?
What kind of advice or lessonswould you have them do if you
guys had to start fresh from dayone?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
I think our biggest thing was time.
We really make sure that youhave the time to do it, but at
the same time you don't have to.
That's kind of a hard onebecause we don't have time, but
we do yeah.
Prioritizing, but you have tomake sure that you keep
(39:19):
everything on a timeline.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Yeah, I know you talked about the who and
everything like that, and andthat reminds me I'm a big.
I don't know if you follow, uh,or watch any videos or
inspirational speeches by simonsinek.
He talks about why yeah, I'm abig guy and then not the what,
but the why.
(39:42):
So what's the real reason youwant to do this?
What's what's your why?
That's what really sells topeople.
Um, understanding you know whatthe money.
That's the what.
Why, why do you want to do this?
Why do you want to get intothis business?
What's what's you know you talkabout.
What's your end goal here?
and understanding, um, just whatyou're really trying to
(40:05):
accomplish here, um, and thenplease pick a good one to start.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Oh yeah, that's.
You know what, though?
Everybody's journey isdifferent, andy, and sometimes
starting with that rough one isthe thing you needed to do to
put you on a path to get therest of the ones.
It's just whether or not yougive up or not, like my
brother's a good example of that.
He shared his story on here,his first one, I think he lost
15 or 20 grand on, but he didn'tgive up it just for it like
(40:33):
motivated him to go get anotherone, to pay for the first one.
So he could have easily justbeen like ah, real estate
investing doesn't work.
I'm hanging it up.
I don't know how these guysmake money.
This is a scam, whatever.
Instead, he was like all right,I see other people, like you
said early, andy, I see otherpeople are having success with
this.
It's not that it can't be done,it's just maybe I didn't do
things right on this one.
So what can I learn from thatand go do another one?
(40:55):
So it could very well vary.
But the Simon Sinek thing, goingback to that one of the
questions I usually have when Iask people who come into our
ecosystem and they fill out athing on our website and they
want to become a buyer.
We go through, we try tounderstand them where they at,
what are their goals?
And we go through, we try tounderstand them where they at,
what are their goals?
And the what question is whatare your goals?
What are you trying toaccomplish?
Right?
(41:15):
And then the next question iswhy do you want that?
Why is that important to you?
And it's really interesting tohear some of the answers of the
why behind it.
And a lot of times people neverreally sit and think about this
.
I think your advice here forcouples is so spot on.
Like if you can have thisconversation before you start
making offers and making thecontacts and that kind of thing,
(41:36):
I think it's going to helppropel you that much further,
that much faster, if you knowyour why behind the what.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
And the key is putting the why in front of the
what.
You know.
What should be last?
It should be why and how, andthen what, right?
So if you are just thinking, oh, I want, and then what, right.
So you know, if you're justthinking, oh, I want some money
or I want this physical thing,then you, you really don't, I
don't think you have a passionfor because it has to be a why.
(42:02):
You know the wise that's allabout, that comes from your
heart, that comes from deep onon, why you want to get into
this business.
For sure, I'm doing it becauseI want money, okay, well, why do
you want money, right?
Speaker 1 (42:17):
why is that important to you, right, yeah?
And and then what happens iswhen you guys face challenges,
right, if you're strong on yourwhy and you go, you know what
the long okay, so short term is,we're going to flip these
properties.
Oh, we just ran into this issuewith this electrical and this
plumbing Easy to give up.
(42:37):
But then, if you go, why am Idoing this again?
Oh, yeah, it's because I wantthe freedom to be able to not
have to work till I'm 60 toretire.
This is the best vehicle I canfind to do it.
All, right, we got to pushthrough this, we got to get done
and we got to move on to thenext one and just keep chugging
away.
But it's really easy, like yousaid, and if you're not clear on
that of why you're doing thisin the first place, you just
throw in the towel and you'reback to your nine to five and
just going to give up and waituntil you're 65, get an RV,
(42:59):
drive around the country for acouple of years and die.
Yep, and that's not a fun life,maybe for those couple of years,
but other than that, not somuch.
All right.
So one of the things.
Guys, as we wrap here, wealways ask a fun question.
All right and this is one ofthe reasons I started doing this
at the very first episode is Iwanted to reach people outside
(43:20):
of Wisconsin who want to investin Wisconsin, and so I'm going
to know a little bit aboutWisconsin and what this place is
all about.
So for you guys, I always askfavorite place to visit here in
the great state or favoriteWisconsin tradition.
Andy, let's start with you.
Speaker 3 (43:42):
My whole world is cheese.
I don't know she makes mebecause I eat like a block of
cheese before I go to bed.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
I eat it like a snickers bar he literally has a
knife and the block of cheeseand just cuts off chunks and
just sits there you gotta haveyou do.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
You couple that with a douse of uh stool stool
softener as well, so you're onthe can for hours.
Be regular, yeah, okay, okay,there, you go right, vanessa,
what about you?
Speaker 2 (44:15):
I will say, my favorite tradition is actually
hunting.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
I enjoy hunting.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
We're getting our kids into hunting.
Andy's a big hunter.
Speaker 1 (44:25):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (44:25):
So having you know we go up to deer camp, you know
kind of thing, so I think that'sone of my favorite traditions
very bad you have to celebratethe seasons in wisconsin, like
if you do not about this, thedifferent seasons then go to
florida, I mean that's what I dolike yeah, but like I, we enjoy
(44:46):
like snowmobiling, like wintersports, we like all like hunting
in the fall.
I mean we could do withoutspring around here because it's
terrible.
But I like all the differentthings in Wisconsin.
As far as season-wise Summersare reasonable.
I don't know how you do summerin Florida.
(45:07):
No.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
I was just down there for our mastermind.
I think it was the second weekin June and, oh good Lord, it
was hot and humid.
And then I was in Arizona theweek after.
It was 119 on my dashboard anduh, I mean now that was like a
sauna.
So it was a little differenthot than Florida, but it was
still in Florida.
I'll take.
I'll take the Arizona heat,though over the florida summer
(45:33):
nastiness like it's just humidand girls we have the greatest
football team on the face of theplanet ever and probably ever.
Yeah, I mean, there's noquestion about.
There's no question about that.
Yeah if you haven't been tolambo.
What are you doing?
You know right ends of ano-brainer yeah, yeah, I mean,
you haven't lived yet.
You know these rv people.
They're working too hard.
They can't get out of theirnine to fives to come up here to
(45:55):
visit Lambeau.
They got to start investing insome real estate so they can
afford to get up here and spendsome time, right.
Speaker 3 (46:01):
You got level one coming up around Lambeau.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
You know what, if they're not on our buyers list,
andy, they're never going toknow.
So that's a great segue.
I appreciate that, andy.
If you guys are not on thebuyer's list and you want to get
on there, as I said at thestart, go to
wisconsindiscountpropertiescom,plug your information.
And if you're not ready to geton the buyer's list yet and
you're just kind of curiousabout this whole investing thing
, you can just fill out, you cango to contact us on the website
(46:26):
and just put your info in there.
We're having a little phonecall coming in.
She's got work to do, so we'regonna wrap this thing.
That sounds like and um no, Iappreciate you guys being on.
This is awesome.
Like I said, I always lovehaving couples on.
I always love having people whoare newer to investing, because
I think there's a lot oflessons to be learned there.
(46:47):
So anybody that's stilllistening to this, if you're a
seasoned vet, go back andre-listen to these newer ones,
the newer investor people,because you can always learn so
much from you guys.
So I appreciate you guys beingon.
If anybody wants to be in touchwith you guys, they're like, I
really related to you, vanessa.
I really related to you, andy,on this episode.
What's the best way for them toget in contact with you?
Speaker 2 (47:09):
Well, me, you'll probably talk to me first.
Um, you can give me a call hereat the office or, uh, find us
on what Facebook we're on.
So, um, but yeah, probably theoffice would be the best, Um.
I can throw out my phone numberthere if you want it's your
office number is 9 2, 0, 4, 8, 5, 9, 9, 2, 7.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
And she knows that because she just got a call on
it about two minutes Awesome,guys.
Well, thanks for being on.
Guys.
Thank all of you for listening.
If you got some value out ofthis episode, go share it on
your socials.
Again, it's it's notnecessarily just for us.
It does help us.
It allows us to continue tobring great guests on here, but
it also helps you as we talkabout on every episode.
If you want to raise privatemoney, you want deal flow,
(47:53):
anything you got to let peopleknow that you're doing this real
estate investing thing.
And if you're not letting themknow that stuff, or you're not
posting or you're not sure whatto say, sharing one of our
episodes is a great way just tolet people know that you're
involved in real estateinvesting or you want to be.
And we've had tons of peoplenow share this episode or these
episodes and they're telling usthey're getting great feedback
on people hitting them up abouthey, I didn't know you were
(48:14):
doing that, or I'm interested ingetting getting to know more
about it and maybe partner withyou on certain things like
Vanessa's parents, great example, right.
So again, appreciate you guysbeing on, thanks for listening
and we'll see you on the nextepisode.
Hey everybody, we're back with another episode of the
Wisconsin Investor Podcast andI'm excited because I have
another couple here with metoday who I'm going to introduce
in a second.
But before I get into that, asI always do, I'm going to talk
about our sponsor, wisconsinDiscount Properties, and last
episode you guys heard me talkabout something new that we're
doing In lieu of giving you guysFOMO on every episode, we're
(00:23):
going to give you a freebietoday, and so what we're doing
is we're giving away our Burrfor Beginners course.
This is a course I created afew years ago and we used to
sell it for $3,000.
Now I was one-on-one coachingpeople along with that, but we
started selling it for $1,500 or$1,900, somewhere in there, and
now we're giving it away forfree just for being a just a
(00:49):
listener of this podcast.
So all you had to do to getthat course go to
wisconsindiscountpropertiescom,put your information in to join
the buyers list and Connor Reesefrom our team will reach out to
you, have a little conversationwith you and just mention that
you're interested in getting thefree burr for beginners course.
They'll hook you up with thatdiscount code and go get started
on burring your way to wealthtoday.
With that, let's introduce oneof my favorite couples.
(01:12):
I've got vanessa ring and andylade with me.
What's up guys?
hi morning morning uh, you guysare have a beautiful background
here for those of them that arewatching this on YouTube.
Where are you guys at right now?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We are located at the Wisconsin Discount Properties
headquarters right now.
Wow.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
In office.
I'm not even there and you guysare there.
This is embarrassing in someways, but also incredible at the
same time.
So I'm excited to have you guyson.
I always love having couples onbecause, as we were kind of
talking a little bit before wehit record, I started this
business with Carrie or Carriestarted this business with me,
however we want to say it and,um, there's a lot of, there's a
(01:54):
lot of things that work reallywell with couples in this
business, and then there's a lotof challenges with couples in
this business.
So I always love interviewingcouples and talking about it,
and you guys are.
Although you have differentlast names, soon you will have
the same last name, correct?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Correct, yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
She plays her cards, right yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
The countdown is on.
We're under 300 days now.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Oh, I'm sure you know the exact amount.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yeah Well, we want this to be evergreen, so we
don't want to date stamp itbecause people may listen to it
later.
But, yes, so you guys are goingto be getting married here soon
.
Uh, and you guys got started inthe real estate investing
business.
Talk a little bit.
First of all, I guess, vanessa,let's start with you.
How did you decide, when wasthat moment where you decided
like, hey, I want to get startedin real estate investing?
(02:38):
What?
When was that?
Do you remember?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah, I don't know if I would say this was my plan at
any point.
It kind of fell into my lap.
Luckily I was in the corporateworld working my nine to five
job, not really loving what Iwas doing.
So I was starting to kind oflook around see what else was
available and I came across afriend of mine who had posted a
(03:01):
job opportunity here atWisconsin Discount Properties
and Fox Seals Home Buyers I buy.
So I kind of thought, okay,maybe that's something I want to
get into.
I knew some of my friends wererealtors and that kind of stuff.
So I'm like maybe this is whereI'm supposed to go.
So I did some interviewing andhere I am.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, and you now did you just cross the two-year
threshold with us?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
I did Yep.
It was two years, in May, thatI've been here.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Wow, that's tough to do with us.
I mean we must kind of like you.
I guess we'll keep you.
No, I'm just kidding.
We have great people on ourteam, andy, what about you?
When was that moment?
Was that kind of a nudge fromVanessaessa that was like, hey,
we should start real estateinvesting?
Or was this on your radar anyat any point before she started
really getting in the industryfor her nine to five?
Speaker 3 (03:51):
no, I think that just because I knew she had the
business side knowledge when itcame into that, that would.
And I tell people all the timelike, when you're explaining
this, this business, to me,please talk to me like I'm a
child, because I don'tunderstand like the business
side of it.
Yeah, so I, fortunately enough,I was in a position where, you
know, I had some, some equityand some properties and stuff
(04:16):
like that and I had the abilityto figure out how to put the
money forward and I said, hey,no one, we discussed it and she
had talked about.
You know, there's other people,um, that she works with, that
are dabbling in real estate andstuff like that.
So it's, it's one of them thingswhere we just like, hey, if
we're ever going to do it, um,let's do it.
(04:36):
And you know there's some otherreasons why we wanted to get
into it.
You know we maybe you know mycareer, I would not.
So for my career I'd have towork until I'm like 65 to retire
and I'm like I need a differentexit strategy here because I
can't do this until that age.
So ultimately, we're trying toget into something a little bit
(05:00):
more so we can find a morecomfortable life.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah for sure.
So let's go to the goal then,andy, because you brought that
up just now.
For you guys, the goal of doingreal estate investing is it
more so of a longterm retirementplays and more so short term,
like let's build up some cash.
And then longterm goal Likewhat?
What was the original?
Like hey, let's do this realestate investing thing.
(05:24):
What was the original?
Like, hey, let's do this realestate investing thing.
What was the original?
Like this is why we want to doit.
Goal for the immediate firstbuy.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
I think it was more looking at retirement um for us
originally.
Uh, you know, we have, I haveone child, he has two children.
We wanted to have somethingthat we could leave our kids
when that time comes and comes.
And we heard a lot that realestate was a good way to kind of
have that retirement that wecould enjoy and you know, leave
(05:55):
behind something for our kids tomaybe get them a jump start on
it too yeah, for me.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Originally I'm like listening to other people that
are doing they like we just made20 grand off of this property
or whatever and I'm like, well,I'd like 20 grand so originally,
but then, you know, once westarted learning more about it,
then I'm like this could reallybe an exit strategy for me to
get out of.
I'm in the law enforcementfield and the way that culture
(06:24):
goes and is continuing to trend,it's something that I think I
want to stay in for another 15more years or whatever.
So I'm thinking that, well,maybe this is a different exit
strategy.
And also, you know, if we getto the point where we have
enough I mean equity and otherproperties under our belt, these
could be form of a 401k,basically, or a retirement
(06:49):
process.
Right, I would imagine, in lawenforcement you would have a
decent retirement program thereright to well into my 50s and
60s and if, if I could, you know, get to where I have properties
that are making money for meand investments that are making
(07:09):
money for us with minimal work?
Yeah, and she mentioned that,uh, um, you know what the
children and stuff like that is.
I always knew that with thatprofession, that I was going to
miss a lot of things and Ididn't think it was going to be
as big of a problem than itturned out to be.
Just other things, just overalltime with our kids.
(07:32):
That, um, it really has becomean issue.
Okay, if I can control my ownschedule and I can be more
present for a lot of thesethings, especially as my
daughter just turned 13 today asa birthday, oh, happy birthday,
um, birthday.
So, um, if you know, if I canbe more present for for all
three of our kids, then I thinkthat's important at this point?
Speaker 1 (07:53):
yeah, for sure, it's so interesting.
I feel like, like I always talkabout this with carrie's like
growing up I always thought likeas we get older it would be
harder in life.
But I think like 20s to 30s,like those two decades are some
of the hardest decades.
If you're raising a familybecause you're trying to start a
career, then you start a careerand you're like, oh, I really
don't like this career, I got togo start somewhere else.
(08:14):
Right, you're kind of startingall over.
Then you're, at the same time,you're trying to raise kids who
are growing.
They don't stop, they keepgrowing and then they get into
stuff.
And then your time just seemslike you're like well, how did I
have time in my twenties, likebefore he had kids, like what
did I even do with my life?
And then all those those twodecades.
It's like trying you're tryingto figure out adulting in your
(08:37):
twenties and thirties.
I feel like and now I justturned 40 this last year and I
feel like I'm finally at a placewhere, like I don't have it
figured out, but I feel like I Iknow the game now a little bit
better and I understand thepriorities.
Right, like andy you're talkingabout like the kids.
But one day you wake up andyou're like holy crap, my
daughter just turned 13.
How did that happen?
Right, it goes a little fast,right.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
And then with that right now.
That is a big problem because,you know, with phones and
everything these days, you keepgetting these memories that pop
up.
And we're like how are we atthis point now, compared to this
little baby picture that Iremember from yesterday?
I'm like this is going way toofast.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Yeah, and then you're like shit, I only have five
more years left, if I'm lucky,right.
If she even wants to hang withdad at all, Five years, right,
and so it is.
It's a challenge, man, and I'mI applaud you guys for starting
to do some things, you know, um,proactively, to give yourself
more freedom and choices, right?
Not that, vanessa, I ever wantyou to leave our company, but I
(09:38):
want you to have the choice.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Andy and Andy the Right, and I'll just keep
working you know I still needher in this business.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, she doesn't get to stop working, I'm yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
That is all about Andy.
This is all.
Yeah, that's what this one.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I'm still in my thirties, so I'm okay, oh you
got time, girl.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
You better grow because it's in your thirties,
right, but I think for theyounger audience that listens to
this, you know, listen to thesetwo stories and like, if you
can start now, in your early EFCor your early twenties you're
still maybe graduating highschool listening to this or
something Like, if you can startthis game now when you're in
your thirties and you'restruggling, like when all your
peers are struggling becausethey're having little babies and
(10:23):
they're stressed out becausethey got to work all these hours
and do all this stuff, you canhave that freedom to be able to,
you know, be there for yourkids, like a lot of us didn't
get to have when our kids wereyoung because we were working
and grinding and trying to, youknow, climb the corporate ladder
and all that kind of stuff.
And I think it's a reallyimportant lesson for the younger
audience out there to hear youguys talk about you.
You know we hear like from theold people all the time like, oh
(10:46):
yeah, like time flies.
You know, just wait, your kidsare going to grow up so quick
and then they do and you're like, holy crap, those old people
were right.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
I think that uh, and we talked about sometime is like
I'm actually pissed off that wedidn't do this a long time ago.
Like what were we so scared?
Speaker 1 (11:04):
of.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
Failure Okay, but why was I so scared to risk my?
It's not like I have so muchwealth that I'm going to lose my
entire.
I was a poor public servant.
I don't have much to lose.
It's like what was I so scaredof to begin with?
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Well, let's talk about that because I think
that's important.
This is one of the reasons Ilove having you know.
You guys are newer to the gameand I love having newer people
to the game because the woundsare still fresh right For me.
I've been in it now seven oreight years and I kind of forget
some of the struggles.
Sometimes I think of when I wasstarting and some of those
things, those things.
So it's always interesting forme to talk to people who are
newer to it, like what were someof those big fears you know
(11:45):
before you bought that firstproperty?
What were some of the thingsgoing through your heads?
And I guess I want to hear fromboth of you guys on this.
So, andy, I'll start with youon that.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Sure, I was like well , what happens if the first one
goes bad Like?
you know, we started a flip upnorth a little bit, our first
property where we just kind ofjumped into it and like I mean,
well, am I gonna have to filebankruptcy or am I gonna lose my
house?
Am I gonna?
You know, it's just you.
All you think about is thenegative, right.
(12:13):
So, yeah, it's like plus, it'sjust not knowing, not being an
expert in the business, was areal anxiety thing for me, like,
okay, you know, I don't know,and we're still making mistakes
every day.
We're dealing with some rightnow that we're kind of messing
up.
But it's like how is this goingto affect my personal life?
(12:36):
Because I'm putting my personalI guess my personal wealth on
the line.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
To start out here, Sure, because you're pulling,
you're using equity from someproperties, is what you're
saying, so you're putting thatin that room.
Speaker 3 (12:51):
And that's how we started out.
Obviously, we want to get awayfrom that at some point, but but
that's how we started out.
Is, you know, taking someequity from a line of credit on
my personal house?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
to help a little bit.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
So you know, like, if this goes backwards, like I
don't know, like, do I have to?
Take my house away from me.
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Living under a bridge .
So now that you've been in it alittle bit, you've gone through
.
You guys have flipped one andVanessa, I want to get to you
next on the anxiety piece ofyours but you flipped one, you
flipped another one.
That is, or you flipped andsold one.
You flipped one and it's sold,just waiting to close.
You've got one in process offlipping that you just got
(13:42):
started on, and then you haveanother one under contract ready
to rock and roll.
You just we just got started onand then you have another one
under contract ready to rock androll.
We just got to wait for theclose date on that one.
So you guys are experienced.
Now You've been through some ofthese things.
Right, andy, now that you'vebeen through a few of them, like
okay.
So you said fear was like thehome equity line.
Maybe your house is up.
Are you still in fear mode ofthat or have you now kind of
come to some other realizationthat's helping you guys, you
(14:05):
know, accelerate and buy someother properties well, we
started trending in thedirection.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
That I wanted to is let's start getting some higher
value properties where you knowmaybe the profit margin is a
little juicy juicier right, andbut that comes with his own
anxiety, like the last one wejust uh put off for him was
almost four hundred thousanddollars, that's.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
That's hard for me to swallow a little bit so, yeah,
that, I mean that's anescalation, is what we call that
?
That escalates quickly.
Yeah, yeah, vanessa, stillgives you a little.
Yeah, vanessa, what about youwhen you were before you bought
that first one?
Leading up to that, like, whatwere some of the big fears
around making that leap andgetting that first one?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
yeah, my big thing was failure.
You know, sitting and being inthe position, I am in the
company.
You see all these peoplesucceeding around you and you
want to be one of them.
That shows, hey, I went, I didit myself, I succeeded and I had
that fear of failing and Ididn't want to do that in front
of my peers.
But also the money thing, youknow, making sure that we had
(15:13):
money to do this, that weweren't going to put ourselves
in too much debt, that wecouldn't get ourselves out of it
if we needed to.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Yeah, okay, and now that you've done a few, is that
fear of failure still there?
Has it gone down at all?
Has it gone up, like where isit after you?
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I mean, we're not that far enough in where I think
um that.
That fear is gone yet.
I mean it's still there, butslowly we're, uh, we're getting
better at it.
I think we're really finding,figuring out what we're doing
right, what we're doing wrong.
We're trying and you are.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
I wonder so many things.
I was just on Steve Trank'spodcast, who has called
Disruptors, and he was asking mesome questions about what are
some of the early lessons you'velearned, or like, what did you
learn?
I'm like I don't know, like youjust kind of keep moving
forward, right, you learn thesethings, but it's not like you're
sitting there documenting like,ooh, next time don't do this.
(16:17):
It's like you and I, vanessathis morning and so Vanessa, for
those that don't know know isour lead transaction coordinator
, so she handles all the messystuff From the time we get under
contract to the time it closes.
She's the one in between,making sure everything goes as
smooth as possible.
And we had one that I justmessed up because it was a
foreclosure and I changed theclose date on it and shifted a
(16:37):
couple properties around to tryto play with the lending a
little bit, and turns out now wegot to get all new payoffs for
this property and foreclosurepayoffs take forever to get back
, and so now it's screwedeverything up.
Mental note for me today I'mlike, oh, don't go changing
close dates again on aforeclosure, just leave it alone
, right, and everything will gosmooth, right?
(16:59):
So that was a little lesson,but I'm not going to like
probably write that downanywhere.
It's just something I'm goingto remember and then the next
time it comes up like, ooh, yeah, remember that it might not be
perfect, right, I might make thesame mistake again, but chances
are I'm going to learn fromthat.
That, you know.
Jab and the gut that Ooh, thatwas my fault, shouldn't have did
that, you know.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Yeah, and I think the things that we say we want to
learn from, we're still makingthose mistakes.
We told ourselves we weren'tgoing to do another property up
north, and here we are withanother property up north.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Well, why did you guys do that?
Well, let's talk about that.
What was the thing that got youguys to say yes to that one,
when you said, no, we're notgoing to do another one up north
?
Speaker 2 (17:43):
This one was.
It's actually about 10 minutesfrom my parents' house and
they're watching me or us overthe last couple of years get
into this and I brought it up tothem and I said would you guys
be interested in kind of doingthis with us?
Speaker 1 (17:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
We'll kind of be more of like the what general I
wouldn't say general contractors, but we're kind of the, we're
the money, and kind of the.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
We're the risk.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Yeah, we're the risk.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
And they were like yeah, why not?
You know, my dad goes huntingevery year out in Colorado, so
he could always use some extracash to pay for that or their
trips, to pay for that or theirtrips.
So they saw it as anopportunity for them to make
some money, and we saw it as anopportunity for us to make some
money without doing all the workon it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, so the first one you guys were doing all the
work on up north.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Yeah.
So our first one that we bought, we thought, okay, let's just
do all the work on it ourselves,let's not try to hire out
unless absolutely needed to savemoney.
And that's where I think wasour first failure was thinking
that we could have a property anhour and a half away from where
we are and do all the work onit while still having two
(18:56):
full-time jobs.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, that's a tough one.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
That did not work out the greatest.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
No.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
That was always the goal in my mind is let's get one
under our belt so we can have alittle backing money and then
we don't have to do the workanymore and hopefully, after the
one that's supposed to close onthe first that one's done, then
we don't have to do thatanymore.
Because it real, we realizethat we, we just can't.
(19:23):
we don't have the time, the timeor, you know, we have kids,
both full-time jobs.
We I just don't have time to orthe energy, right frank, to
like to sit here and do all thework on everything.
So that was the.
The idea of why I would agreeto the the one up North again is
(19:44):
that that was supposed to besupposed to be all hands off and
we were just a silent partnerin this.
Okay.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
And that's not how it's turning out now.
Speaker 2 (19:55):
Well, we, uh, once you start getting into a cabin,
uh, you'll start finding thatmaybe the electrical is not
correct or there's more issuesthan you originally expected.
So that's kind of what we'rerunning into right now on that
property and just trying tofigure out, I guess you could
say, the cheapest way to goabout it, but at the same time
(20:17):
you got to have it donecorrectly, or?
Speaker 3 (20:19):
yeah you're gonna be stuck with it.
Lesson two of what we learnedyeah, make things are done
correctly, because they comeback to bite you yeah, well, I
mean, you guys ran into aninteresting spot.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So, for those that don't know the property you guys
bought, we had a full-blowninspection down on.
This right inspector looked ateverything and it seemed fine,
but then, once you startedripping apart stuff, that's when
you guys found out it wasn'tokay.
Is that what happened?
So it'd be really hard, I think, for anybody.
I doubt, if you guys walkedthrough that property yourself
(20:49):
that you would have ever foundthat right.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
They didn't find these issues until we started
tearing off paneling.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
We open up walls and it's.
We learned that from our firstproperty.
The more you open up, the moreproblems you might run into.
So yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
So don't open walls, leave them alone, don't mess
with them.
Yeah, that is true, though Knoband tube wiring is a pretty
expensive thing If you have toreplace that, and you don't have
to replace it unless it'sexposed.
And so if you open a wall now,you got to replace it.
If it's behind that wall, youleave that wall alone.
You don't have to replace it ifit's there, right, which is
(21:27):
another another good thing toknow.
But I want to make that pointbecause one of the things I hear
, like our process at Wisconsindiscount property is we do an
inspection and we do a videowalkthrough, right, and some
people have an issue with thatbecause they want to go there
and actually physically walkthrough the property.
That being said, and the goalis what I hear from them is so
that they can prevent somethinglike what you guys are running
(21:48):
into with that up North propertyWell then I could be able to
see all this stuff.
It's like 90% of us are nevergoing to start like peeling back
a wall or like trying to likeclimb up and examine the
plumbing underneath the shit.
You know like you're nevergoing to do it anyway.
So you just have to understandwhen you buy off market
properties or value addproperties, even if it's listed
(22:09):
on the market, you would gothrough that same process.
You'd have an inspector.
Inspector is going to find whatthe inspector can find.
It's not perfect, they're notgoing to catch everything and
you just got to kind of know.
Know, that's the deal.
The most successful investors Isee out there we call in the
stock market world dollar costaveraging.
(22:30):
Have you guys heard this term?
So you buy the same stock orETF or whatever and you just buy
it at different points, whetherit's up or down or whatever.
Eventually you buy enough of it.
It continues to go up andyou're good.
You're buying on the low side,you're buying on the upside.
It's kind of the same thingwith properties.
If you only bought one propertyever, you need that one to go
(22:50):
perfect to hit your goals.
But say, you guys had four ofthese that you were working on.
One's a dud might break even onit, but the other one's a
$40,000 pop, the other one's a$30,000 pop, the other one's a
10, right, not great, but it'sokay, right, overall you spread
that out.
You know you made $20,000 oneach of those if you average it
(23:11):
right.
So it's one of those thingslike I see that happen.
Sometimes People get so caughtup with like, oh my gosh, I
bought this one property andthen I found this issue and now
I'm ruined, right.
And it's like, well, if youjust had a couple of them going,
you may be one.
It wouldn't, you wouldn't.
Yes, it sucks, but you've gotthree other ones that are going
to be winners.
Right, not every investment isgoing to be a winner.
(23:32):
It's like the stock market youbought five stocks.
You're not expecting all fiveof those most likely to be going
to the moon, right?
Well, we hope we do, but but onegoes bad and the other three
are good.
All right, we're still, overall, making money, right.
If you put all your eggs in theone basket and that stock goes
down, you're screwed, right.
(23:52):
I love that you guys are justcontinually moving forward and
you're doing multiple deals andyou're just continuing to and
you're you're just continuing tolearn and grow and some are
going to be winners, some aregoing to lose.
I think your first two we hadsomething similar, right.
The one that you guys did a lotof the work on maybe wasn't so
great.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
The other one, that you guys had ended up being a
really good one, right yeah,this one that we're supposed to
close right now should be very Imean not very good, but I mean
it was much smoother to closeright now should be very I mean
not very good, but I mean it wasmuch smoother this time around.
It was a better choice ofproperty.
That's another lesson that welearned is how to pick the ones
that we want right, orlocation's huge.
(24:29):
But you know, just, you knowsome of them, you know we get
some.
I know there's some investorsout there that would really like
the ones where they just goright down to the studs and
basically start over.
I don't think I like the oneswhere not so much turnkey, but
it's just a little bit more.
Just, let's just update it tothese times and then put it back
(24:54):
out there.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
Yeah, more cosmetic stuff than the old ones.
But yeah, there's differentpeople that like different stuff
.
For sure, just depends.
But the good thing is, you guysare figuring out what you like,
where you like it and what youdon't like.
So now, as you guys continue togrow, your buy box tightens up
a little bit, right, and thenwhen you see one that fits it,
you guys can just strike withoutemotion.
It's just like yep, that onefits.
(25:15):
Boom, this is our buy box box.
Right, it takes all the emotionout of whether or not you
should or shouldn't and moveforward.
Going back to the fear thing,though, one thing I want to
comment on that I don't think itever goes away, right, and and
it's a good thing, right, I mean, we think about why do we have
fear in the first place?
Right, it's our caveman braintrying to connect, trying to
(25:35):
protect us from, you know, the,the saber-tooth, tooth tiger
that's going to eat us.
Right, we have fear over that.
It's healthy, right, and thereshould be a level of healthy
fear.
When we're spending a couplehundred thousand dollars, right,
for most, most people, jeffBezos don't give a rip.
Right, right, the mostAmericans, we, you know, we're
going to go put our name on theline for a couple hundred
(25:55):
thousand dollars.
We probably should have ahealthy level of fear.
But I think, like, as you guysare seeing, maybe the anxiety
drops a little bit now that youunderstand, like it's not so
scary, like once you get into it, it is what it is, you're going
to be fine.
You're not going to live undera bridge and be homeless like
it'll all.
Speaker 3 (26:12):
It'll all work itself out, right hopefully hopefully
I think, I think we'd like toget a little bit bigger of a
nest egg here, a little bit moreof a backing, and that would
you know.
So if something does gocatastrophically sideways here
that we have the ability to,okay, we could take a loss on
(26:33):
one, it wouldn't be bad.
But you know, okay, obviouslywe don't want to.
We're in this business to makemoney, right, but we don't want
to.
But it's not going to put ourLLC in the dumps, you know Right
.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah, yeah.
So, as you guys go, what itsounds like right now, what you
guys are doing, is you're you'redoing flips to build up the
cash and then the goal withowning rentals, or is that?
Am I off base on that?
Speaker 2 (26:59):
That's our goal.
I think we just want a nicelittle nest egg before we kind
of get into that.
So I would hope I maybe.
I think my goal is end of nextyear that we have one under
about the rental, but we'll haveto see what the accountant also
says, I think that's my opinionand, once again, I'm hardly an
(27:22):
expert in this field is I thinkthat should be a market specific
.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
You know if, if the selling market is still strong?
Speaker 1 (27:34):
sure.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
Let's.
Let's sell them and make moneyRight.
If the market starts tostruggle a little bit, maybe
that's the time to hold a rental.
Um and in in my big dreams, Ialso want to get my rentals to
be a little bit higher quality.
I don't want to.
You know, the the nicer theplace you have, the, I guess,
(27:56):
the more attractive rentersyou're going to have.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Wise, but you know just money wise and right Lease
problems.
You know, in a perfect world ifwe could get into some sort of
apartment building it'd be great, but I need a lot more cash to
be able to back that.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Or you just got to know somebody who does Andy.
Right, that's it.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
You have a who problem there I was just going
to say it's the, it's a whoproblem is that your?
Oh, that's a book we just readyeah not how, which we, and that
is a big thing, that, um.
We started out with the how dowe do this, how do we do this,
how do we do this?
And now we're getting is whocan do this for us?
Speaker 1 (28:39):
Yes, oh, I love it that.
That book to me, vanessa, were-read it.
I read it a few years ago andit was good.
I was like, oh, yeah, I get it.
You need somebody to do thisstuff for you.
Yeah, get it.
We already doing that stuffRight.
And now for some reason I don'tdo that.
Because of this I'm like, wait aminute, who do I know that I
(29:01):
could talk to, that could helpwith this.
Like I just met a guy thismorning out at some land.
I've never done a landdevelopment subdivided anything
right.
I had a guy on a few weeks ago,uh, talking about land and
flipping land and developingland and stuff like that.
This is a different guy thatI've kind of met around the same
time as this dude.
But I was just like, hey, Ihave a lead on a bunch of land.
I don't know how to do this,but I know somebody who knows
(29:25):
how to do this.
Let's just partner up and let'sfigure out, like, how to split
this up, if we can even make itwork, and let's just do it
together.
And then I don't have to knowanything about land.
I have the guy who knows aboutland, who knows all that stuff.
I just have to find the dealand that's what I'm good at,
right, and so it's always a whoproblem is what I find out in
most cases of uh of the issue.
(29:46):
Like you guys talked aboutgetting in there and having to
swing the hammers on your firstone right, what you guys had was
you guys had the mindset oflike we got to do this cause we
have to make the most moneypossible, but of like we got to
do this because we have to makethe most money possible.
But really, if you guys couldhave hired that out, made a
little bit less, but had likethree of those going at the same
time, you're going to againsame kind of thing You're going
(30:07):
to make, your dollar per hourgoes way up when you guys start
doing that and it's a lot lessstress and time and everything
else when you start hiring itout.
We had a mastermind a few yearsago and we had Mark and Kara
Truckee who were on early on inthe podcast, and so, for those
that haven't seen that episode,go way back to the start.
They did a great job.
(30:27):
But Mark was one of theexercises we had was what's your
time worth, and so we had themcompare two different properties
that they had, one where theywere in swing of the hammer and
one where they hired everythingout, and either a rental, where
we said how much equity did youcreate after rehab, or a flip
how much did you profit on theflip?
(30:48):
And Mark was using one wherethey made more on the flip than
the other flip where they hiredeverything out.
When he calculated it out itwas rough, roughly his hours.
We, you know he didn't log it,but he just kind of did some
math on it.
He's like, oh my gosh, he hadthis huge.
I'll never forget this.
This is like light bulb you cansee like hanging over his head
moment where he's like look atthis.
(31:09):
He's like, oh my gosh, we made$40,000 on this flip.
But I only made like $300 perhour, which is still really good
.
$300 an, which is still reallygood.
Right, 300 bucks an hour stillget good wage.
But he's like here's one wemade 20 on and I made like 1500
an hour because he wasn't doingall the work.
He was directing traffic.
He was getting people there todo the work and then he was
making sure the quality waswhere he wanted it, but his
(31:32):
profit per hour was like wayhigher, and so he made the
realization hey, if I just canget more properties going and
have my teams doing it all, I'mgoing to make way more money
with less time, right, which iswhat we all want.
A lot less stress too.
Now, contracts can be stressful, let's be honest, but that's a
whole nother lesson that peoplelearn as they get into this.
(31:54):
But it is, generally speaking,a much more efficient way to run
a flipping company than tryingto be in there swinging hammers
yourself, right.
Speaker 3 (32:05):
That goes to.
One of our issues that we'redealing with is the speed at
which we've put these first twoout.
It is not where we want to betaking way too long, so we're
trying to get more efficient atthis.
I'm very OCD when it comes toefficiency.
I got to do things the mostefficient way.
(32:26):
When things don't go the way Ilike it, it takes longer.
That drives me nuts.
So we have to be able to speedthese up, because the longer
they stay out there, the moreinterest we're paying on
financing and everything, themore it's costing us.
We got to get better at movingthese along.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
Yeah, yeah, bang them out, get them out Right.
Right, talk about as a couple.
So now for you guys as a couplewhat are some of the big
challenges you guys had or have,uh, starting this new venture
together?
Because you know, andy, you'relaw enforcement, so your thing
is completely separate thanVanessa's 9 to 5.
Now that you're blending thesetwo together and you're in a
(33:05):
business together, what's thatdynamic look like?
Speaker 2 (33:10):
So for us, I don't really do much of the hammer
swinging.
I'm more of the.
I'll get all the paperworktogether.
I'll make sure this closes.
I'll cash the checks at thebank.
I'll get all the paperworktogether.
I'll make sure this closes.
I'll get you know.
I'll cash the checks at thebank.
I'll do that kind of stuff.
Andy's more of the.
He knows what he's doing inthere.
I don't someone tells me thiselectrical issue and I'm going
(33:31):
to look at them like great cool,don't know.
Don't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
I'm the painter.
There you go, don't know whatI'm doing.
I'm the painter.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
There you go.
So as far as us workingtogether, I stay kind of in my
role and he stays in his, and wetry not to get at each other
too much, but try not to.
We do.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
I mean there's yeah, I mean obviously there's your
share of disagreements and sheknows the business end of it and
that's why I think we make agood team with this.
But it goes back to, you know,some of the REI meetings that we
went to.
You talk about the pillars ofthe business.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
I would be more on the phone getting people to the
properties to been on a job orwhatever.
Um, I'm obviously the, thefinance person you know, the
money backing person, the, youknow, and more of the who's
gonna make decisions on what weneed to do and what we don't
(34:34):
need to do.
Okay, and she handles the hey,this, we should take a look at
this property, or whatever.
She's got the more of theexpertise on the, on the I guess
the, the business side of it,sure, um, so that's a struggle
is you know where we stand onstepping over each other,
(34:54):
because sometimes we don't agreeon that and yeah, um, she
doesn't really.
Um, she doesn't value the riskas much as I value risk okay, so
she's a little bit more, gaspeda little bit.
Right and I always say it's like, well, if this thing goes under
, you walk away unscathed here.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
That's why we're not married yet.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
So, like if this thing goes bad, I'm the only one
at risk here.
You don't understand the valueof risk here, yeah.
That's a big thing that we havesometimes Okay.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Another thing that Andy doesn't always see is like
the little things, like hardwareon cabinets.
I see that where he sees thebig items and I see the little
things that we should switch.
Let's put a new faucet in here,let's switch out this.
All the light bulbs should bethe same color, like that stuff.
(35:50):
Where he's like whatever, it'sfine, just move on to the next
thing and I'm like no, theselittle things are what's going
to.
This is the first thing they'regoing to see when they come in
yeah, so that's created a little.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
That creates a little friction for you guys.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
Yeah, but usually I get my way with it, so it's okay
.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Sometimes the things that create friction in a, in a
couple, in business, are exactlythe strengths that you guys
both have, right, it's whatmakes you guys a good team,
right Cause, again, like you'resaying, but as a year, catching
all the little details, stuff,I'm like Andy, I'd be like
whatever, just get it done,let's move on.
Let's get the next deal Right,where Carrie would be like, well
(36:28):
, these things like it's notgoing to look good, it's not
going to look finished, you know, and I'm like whatever, so that
they can look past that.
It's a nice house, you know,get another market, let's go
right.
So I think that's great thatyou guys have those two
different strengths, and youknow we talk about communication
a lot in the office and, uh,sometimes just about how you
guys communicate it too.
That can can be all thedifference, right, and
(36:49):
understanding each other'sstrengths.
We went kerry and and I readRocket Fuel, which is another
great book, years ago and thatreally helped us understand each
other, because I'm much more ofthe gas pedal, she's much more,
not much more of the brake.
She's got a lot of gas pedal inher too, but she's much more of
the detail.
We got to make sure our I's aredotted, our T's are crossed, do
(37:09):
all these kinds of things andwe would cause friction all the
time because I was like let'sjust go let's just go, let's get
another deal.
And she's no, we have tounderstand where our deals are
coming from and we have to dothis and all the details.
Then I read that book and I waslike, oh, she's like the
integrator and I'm the visionary, oh.
And then she understood oh,this is how Corey's wired, he's
(37:29):
a visionary and I need to belike the integrator, like
putting all the crap togetherbehind the scenes here to like
make it all work Right.
And so once we did that, wekind of understood each other.
We still, you know, not perfect, but it really did help us a
lot, like I remember after thatwe had a good discussion about
our roles and what we're good atand what we're not good at, and
we had kind of a mutual respectthen of each other for those
(37:50):
two different roles.
So for you guys, uh, marriagecounseling, premarital
counseling here, as yourpremarital counselor I'm going
to highly recommend you guysread rocket fuel together.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
There it is there is that's top to bottom, left to
right.
Group words as a sentence.
I don't book.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
You know you can do it on audible, andy, it's okay I
think I'm like a child I needsomebody to read to me we'll see
if they have a coloring bookfor you as well, where you can
just color things in and and andlearn that way, whatever way is
best for you.
I'll just give you a summary youknow what's funny about that,
though?
Literally that's what happened.
I read the one chapter I neededto read in that book about the
(38:29):
integrator and the visionaryrole, and then carrie read the
rest of the book and had all thedetails.
It was so funny I was like, oh,I get it.
I got two chapters.
She's like read the whole book.
So more like Wednesday movie.
That's awesome.
What would you guys give so ifyou had to start this over?
What would you give othercouples out there that are
similar to you guys that arelooking to do this business
(38:50):
together?
What kind of advice or lessonswould you have them do if you
guys had to start fresh from dayone?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
I think our biggest thing was time.
We really make sure that youhave the time to do it, but at
the same time you don't have to.
That's kind of a hard onebecause we don't have time, but
we do yeah.
Prioritizing, but you have tomake sure that you keep
(39:19):
everything on a timeline.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
Yeah, I know you talked about the who and
everything like that, and andthat reminds me I'm a big.
I don't know if you follow, uh,or watch any videos or
inspirational speeches by simonsinek.
He talks about why yeah, I'm abig guy and then not the what,
but the why.
(39:42):
So what's the real reason youwant to do this?
What's what's your why?
That's what really sells topeople.
Um, understanding you know whatthe money.
That's the what.
Why, why do you want to do this?
Why do you want to get intothis business?
What's what's you know you talkabout.
What's your end goal here?
and understanding, um, just whatyou're really trying to
(40:05):
accomplish here, um, and thenplease pick a good one to start.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Oh yeah, that's.
You know what, though?
Everybody's journey isdifferent, andy, and sometimes
starting with that rough one isthe thing you needed to do to
put you on a path to get therest of the ones.
It's just whether or not yougive up or not, like my
brother's a good example of that.
He shared his story on here,his first one, I think he lost
15 or 20 grand on, but he didn'tgive up it just for it like
(40:33):
motivated him to go get anotherone, to pay for the first one.
So he could have easily justbeen like ah, real estate
investing doesn't work.
I'm hanging it up.
I don't know how these guysmake money.
This is a scam, whatever.
Instead, he was like all right,I see other people, like you
said early, andy, I see otherpeople are having success with
this.
It's not that it can't be done,it's just maybe I didn't do
things right on this one.
So what can I learn from thatand go do another one?
(40:55):
So it could very well vary.
But the Simon Sinek thing, goingback to that one of the
questions I usually have when Iask people who come into our
ecosystem and they fill out athing on our website and they
want to become a buyer.
We go through, we try tounderstand them where they at,
what are their goals?
And we go through, we try tounderstand them where they at,
what are their goals?
And the what question is whatare your goals?
What are you trying toaccomplish?
Right?
(41:15):
And then the next question iswhy do you want that?
Why is that important to you?
And it's really interesting tohear some of the answers of the
why behind it.
And a lot of times people neverreally sit and think about this
.
I think your advice here forcouples is so spot on.
Like if you can have thisconversation before you start
making offers and making thecontacts and that kind of thing,
(41:36):
I think it's going to helppropel you that much further,
that much faster, if you knowyour why behind the what.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
And the key is putting the why in front of the
what.
You know.
What should be last?
It should be why and how, andthen what, right?
So if you are just thinking, oh, I want, and then what, right.
So you know, if you're justthinking, oh, I want some money
or I want this physical thing,then you, you really don't, I
don't think you have a passionfor because it has to be a why.
(42:02):
You know the wise that's allabout, that comes from your
heart, that comes from deep onon, why you want to get into
this business.
For sure, I'm doing it becauseI want money, okay, well, why do
you want money, right?
Speaker 1 (42:17):
why is that important to you, right, yeah?
And and then what happens iswhen you guys face challenges,
right, if you're strong on yourwhy and you go, you know what
the long okay, so short term is,we're going to flip these
properties.
Oh, we just ran into this issuewith this electrical and this
plumbing Easy to give up.
(42:37):
But then, if you go, why am Idoing this again?
Oh, yeah, it's because I wantthe freedom to be able to not
have to work till I'm 60 toretire.
This is the best vehicle I canfind to do it.
All, right, we got to pushthrough this, we got to get done
and we got to move on to thenext one and just keep chugging
away.
But it's really easy, like yousaid, and if you're not clear on
that of why you're doing thisin the first place, you just
throw in the towel and you'reback to your nine to five and
just going to give up and waituntil you're 65, get an RV,
(42:59):
drive around the country for acouple of years and die.
Yep, and that's not a fun life,maybe for those couple of years,
but other than that, not somuch.
All right.
So one of the things.
Guys, as we wrap here, wealways ask a fun question.
All right and this is one ofthe reasons I started doing this
at the very first episode is Iwanted to reach people outside
(43:20):
of Wisconsin who want to investin Wisconsin, and so I'm going
to know a little bit aboutWisconsin and what this place is
all about.
So for you guys, I always askfavorite place to visit here in
the great state or favoriteWisconsin tradition.
Andy, let's start with you.
Speaker 3 (43:42):
My whole world is cheese.
I don't know she makes mebecause I eat like a block of
cheese before I go to bed.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
I eat it like a snickers bar he literally has a
knife and the block of cheeseand just cuts off chunks and
just sits there you gotta haveyou do.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
You couple that with a douse of uh stool stool
softener as well, so you're onthe can for hours.
Be regular, yeah, okay, okay,there, you go right, vanessa,
what about you?
Speaker 2 (44:15):
I will say, my favorite tradition is actually
hunting.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
I enjoy hunting.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
We're getting our kids into hunting.
Andy's a big hunter.
Speaker 1 (44:25):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (44:25):
So having you know we go up to deer camp, you know
kind of thing, so I think that'sone of my favorite traditions
very bad you have to celebratethe seasons in wisconsin, like
if you do not about this, thedifferent seasons then go to
florida, I mean that's what I dolike yeah, but like I, we enjoy
(44:46):
like snowmobiling, like wintersports, we like all like hunting
in the fall.
I mean we could do withoutspring around here because it's
terrible.
But I like all the differentthings in Wisconsin.
As far as season-wise Summersare reasonable.
I don't know how you do summerin Florida.
(45:07):
No.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
I was just down there for our mastermind.
I think it was the second weekin June and, oh good Lord, it
was hot and humid.
And then I was in Arizona theweek after.
It was 119 on my dashboard anduh, I mean now that was like a
sauna.
So it was a little differenthot than Florida, but it was
still in Florida.
I'll take.
I'll take the Arizona heat,though over the florida summer
(45:33):
nastiness like it's just humidand girls we have the greatest
football team on the face of theplanet ever and probably ever.
Yeah, I mean, there's noquestion about.
There's no question about that.
Yeah if you haven't been tolambo.
What are you doing?
You know right ends of ano-brainer yeah, yeah, I mean,
you haven't lived yet.
You know these rv people.
They're working too hard.
They can't get out of theirnine to fives to come up here to
(45:55):
visit Lambeau.
They got to start investing insome real estate so they can
afford to get up here and spendsome time, right.
Speaker 3 (46:01):
You got level one coming up around Lambeau.
Speaker 1 (46:05):
You know what, if they're not on our buyers list,
andy, they're never going toknow.
So that's a great segue.
I appreciate that, andy.
If you guys are not on thebuyer's list and you want to get
on there, as I said at thestart, go to
wisconsindiscountpropertiescom,plug your information.
And if you're not ready to geton the buyer's list yet and
you're just kind of curiousabout this whole investing thing
, you can just fill out, you cango to contact us on the website
(46:26):
and just put your info in there.
We're having a little phonecall coming in.
She's got work to do, so we'regonna wrap this thing.
That sounds like and um no, Iappreciate you guys being on.
This is awesome.
Like I said, I always lovehaving couples on.
I always love having people whoare newer to investing, because
I think there's a lot oflessons to be learned there.
(46:47):
So anybody that's stilllistening to this, if you're a
seasoned vet, go back andre-listen to these newer ones,
the newer investor people,because you can always learn so
much from you guys.
So I appreciate you guys beingon.
If anybody wants to be in touchwith you guys, they're like, I
really related to you, vanessa.
I really related to you, andy,on this episode.
What's the best way for them toget in contact with you?
Speaker 2 (47:09):
Well, me, you'll probably talk to me first.
Um, you can give me a call hereat the office or, uh, find us
on what Facebook we're on.
So, um, but yeah, probably theoffice would be the best, Um.
I can throw out my phone numberthere if you want it's your
office number is 9 2, 0, 4, 8, 5, 9, 9, 2, 7.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
And she knows that because she just got a call on
it about two minutes Awesome,guys.
Well, thanks for being on.
Guys.
Thank all of you for listening.
If you got some value out ofthis episode, go share it on
your socials.
Again, it's it's notnecessarily just for us.
It does help us.
It allows us to continue tobring great guests on here, but
it also helps you as we talkabout on every episode.
If you want to raise privatemoney, you want deal flow,
(47:53):
anything you got to let peopleknow that you're doing this real
estate investing thing.
And if you're not letting themknow that stuff, or you're not
posting or you're not sure whatto say, sharing one of our
episodes is a great way just tolet people know that you're
involved in real estateinvesting or you want to be.
And we've had tons of peoplenow share this episode or these
episodes and they're telling usthey're getting great feedback
on people hitting them up abouthey, I didn't know you were
(48:14):
doing that, or I'm interested ingetting getting to know more
about it and maybe partner withyou on certain things like
Vanessa's parents, great example, right.
So again, appreciate you guysbeing on, thanks for listening
and we'll see you on the nextepisode.
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