June 9, 2025 • 35 mins
Don Wenner isn't your typical real estate mogul. Growing up with teenage parents and moving 37 times before age 17, he developed an extraordinary resilience and faith that would become the foundation of his $4 billion investment empire.
From his unexpected entry into real estate at age 20 to building one of America's fastest-growing private companies for 13 consecutive years, Wenner's story defies conventional business wisdom. What sets him apart isn't just his impressive growth metrics—it's his unwavering commitment to purpose. "Too much is given, much is required" serves as both his guiding verse and business philosophy.
At DLP Capital, affordable housing isn't simply an investment strategy—it's the starting point for community transformation. Wenner's approach tackles both housing affordability and what he calls "the loneliness epidemic" by creating environments where residents truly know their neighbors. With thoughtfully designed apartment communities across 17 states featuring full amenities, onsite ministry resources, and programming from Bible studies to financial literacy classes, DLP builds genuine connections that benefit residents while delivering exceptional returns to 3,500 investor families.
Most revolutionary is Wenner's perspective on business itself. "Business is ministry," he asserts, noting that employees spend 94 times more hours at work than church, giving business leaders unprecedented opportunity for positive impact. His "Lion Chaser Manifesto" challenges entrepreneurs to pursue dreams so ambitious they require divine intervention—not just for personal success but to transform lives through thriving communities.
Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, real estate professional, or purpose-driven investor, Wenner's insights provide a blueprint for building organizations that generate both profits and meaningful impact. Want to learn more about Don's approach? Visit dlpcapital.com to discover upcoming events and resources for creating your own extraordinary organization.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
But I sold the company to Jonathan Campbell.
(00:03):
Actually I gave the company toJonathan Campbell and then he
moved the company to RealBrokerage.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
But move them back, get it back.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Yeah, I can play in the house with them, for sure.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Welcome back to Now Making Moves in Real Estate.
This is the General, along withmy co-host C Twist, and today
we're super fired up about thisepisode.
It's episode number 62.
We're sitting down with one ofthe most strategic minds in real
estate and private equity, mrDon Wenner.
He is the founder and CEO ofDLP Capital, a purpose-driven
(00:48):
investment companypurpose-driven, I just want to
repeat that with over $4 billionin assets under management
focused on building wealth andprosperity through real estate.
He's also a best-selling author, top-performing entrepreneur
and creator of the EliteExecution System, a framework
(01:09):
that's helped scale his businessand the lives of countless
others.
So, from leading a nationallyranked real estate team to
building one of the fastestgrowing private investment firms
in the country, he brings arare blend of operational
excellence.
Firms in the country.
He brings a rare blend ofoperational excellence,
leadership, insight and scalablesystems All words we love.
(01:29):
If you're ready to think bigger, lead better and build with
purpose, this is theconversation for you, so let's
get into it.
Welcome, don.
Thank you so much for having me.
That was a great introduction.
I don't know what else I canadd, but I'll try.
I guess we're done.
(01:50):
No, just go.
No, I had the pleasure ofmeeting you and the organization
in St Augustine Florida latelast year, and I just am so
impressed with your leadershipand what you've built.
So if you would please tell ourlisteners a little bit more
about your story.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, thank you, I appreciate that and thank you
for coming and joining us.
That was a really awesome eventlate last year.
But, as you said, my name isDon Winter and founded a company
called DLP Capital.
It's been 19 years now.
So quick backstory.
Lived and grew up in LehighValley, pennsylvania, so about
an hour north of Philadelphia,mainly Bethlehem area.
(02:27):
Mom and dad had me, when theywere 16 year old, juniors in
high school and I'm the oldestof five Mom ran a home daycare
most of my childhood and myfather was a correction officer
most of my childhood and so youknow we had the kind of typical
limited, you know financialmeans.
You know that you would expectwhen your parents are 16 years
(02:49):
old but was raised you know alot of people like to hear those
kinds of stories and like tokind of follow people who've
raised themselves up by theirbootstraps and accomplished you
know business success orwhatever type of success on
their own.
And that's certainly not mystory, although you know I had
limited financial means.
I figured out about 10 yearsago that we had moved 37 times
(03:12):
by the time I was 17, mainly for, you know, financially driven
reasons.
But I was raised in a bigfamily, a lot of love, a lot of
support raised in the church,deep faith and relationship with
the Lord.
From a young age Born in theUnited States as a white man and
maybe the best time to be aliveKind of the lottery, you could
(03:34):
say and the Lord gave me acertain set of blessings and
skills that have put me in aposition to be successful in the
world of business.
And so the verse of my life istoo much is given, much is
required, and I believe I'vebeen given a ton.
One of the things I was givenwas an extreme amount of
(03:54):
confidence, even as a youngperson and moved out of my
parents' house when I was ajunior in high school.
I'd already figured the wholeworld out.
I didn't need to learn anythingfrom them anymore, but knew
what I wanted to do.
At that time, I'd alreadyfigured the whole world out.
I didn't need to learn anythingfrom them anymore, but knew
what I wanted to do.
At that time I thought I wasgoing to go into wealth
management and went to DrexelUniversity studying finance and
accounting and minor marketing.
(04:14):
And then stumbled into realestate when I was 20, going on
21 years old, and I started as aKeller Williams real estate
agent.
I was selling alarm systemsdoor to door as a college
student and that gentleman whoowned the company convinced me
to get my real estate license,never once thought about it
until that moment, took myclasses online, flew to a
marketing conference, left thatmarketing conference with a
(04:37):
message of your home sold in 68days, guaranteed, or I'll buy it
.
And that was October 2006.
And that was the peak of thereal estate market right then.
And there, at least inPennsylvania, was and and so I
did a lot of you know kind ofguerrilla marketing.
I was the.
I was spamming Craigslist thathad just come out.
I was.
I was literally knocking ondoors and getting in front of a
(04:58):
lot of people, put challenges inthe housing market at that time
and started doing a lot ofradio marketing soon after.
And still we still do this thisday across our businesses.
And just got in front of peoplewho had a housing problem,
largely around affordability and, and we'd help people sell
their home.
We step in and buy their homeand sometimes we'd help them
negotiate short sales.
(05:18):
And we do that all over thecountry and, and you know, kind
of help people, one person at atime, thousands and thousands of
times Um and uh, by 2014, um,kind of as Florida you know,
whole time to the success of 14,grew the business sort of out
of fear right, fear of failure.
My dad came to work for memonths into my career.
My mom came to work for memonths into my career.
My stepfather came to work forme soon after my stepmother,
(05:41):
while working the business tillto this day, and after my
stepmother while working thebusiness to this day, and just
kind of grew the business out offear initially.
Then it took all the way to2014 really for me to get clear
on what I've been called to do,which is to transform lives
through the building of thrivingcommunities, which starts with
providing affordable housing,and that kind of led us sort of
reframing up our business andwent from kind of one house at a
(06:01):
time to investing in wholecommunities.
So that's really the journeywe've been on these last 11
years.
So we develop, build, operatelarge housing communities.
We also provide capital toother developers, builders and
operators to build housingcommunities, all of this rooted
in housing that's affordable,but where that is just where it
begins, and our capital has beenfrom individual investors 3,500
(06:25):
families invested with us nowto this day who provide us the
capital that we get to gosteward and invest into housing
that's affordable for workingfamilies.
And so we've grown theorganization consistently now
for 19 years you said written acouple of books around scaling.
We've grown by about 50% a yearfor the last 19 years.
One of the fastest growingcompanies in America 13 years in
(06:46):
a couple of books aroundscaling.
We've grown by about 50% a yearfor the last 19 years.
One of the fastest growingcompanies in America 13 years in
a row.
Last year we did $567 millionof revenue.
We've over and out five and ahalf billion dollars of assets
under management and it's been areally great journey that, god
willing, we're just gettingstarted on.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
I mean mic drop on that.
I mean mic drop on that.
So impressive.
I think.
I mean when we went to StAugustine, obviously we were
just impressed with yourleadership and your faith and
just the environment itself.
But all of the communities thatyou're impacting is substantial
.
How many communities have youfocused on with affordable
(07:25):
housing and rejuvenating andbringing those communities back
to life?
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, that's a great question.
As I said a moment ago, ourpurpose is to transform lives
through the building of thrivingcommunities.
And the first community mostpeople, when they hear us, say
that they think about housingcommunities or local physical
communities, and that's a reallybig part of it, and I'll answer
.
But the first community wefocus on and we believe where it
all begins and and you know thebook I'm writing right now,
(07:50):
it's called building anextraordinary organization and
and um, and the first communityis is our employee base and uh,
so we now have in total, um,about 800 team members across
DLP capital, and then we have awhole banking platform as well,
called DLP Bank, and that's thefirst thriving community that we
invest into with a focus ontransforming the lives of our
(08:12):
colleagues.
And those colleagues, thoseteam members, work at the
physical communities we own inmany cases, or within the local
communities we're a part of,such as here in St Augustine,
florida, where I'm talking toyou from, or Lehigh Valley,
pennsylvania, where we haveoffices, or Asheville, north
Carolina, et cetera.
So we've invested in hundreds ofhousing communities.
(08:33):
We've owned about 150 totalcommunities, each one having
anywhere from 300 to 1,000people living in them, in them,
but then usually it's thephysical community we're
investing in, we're pouring intoour, into our residents in a
lot of unique ways that thenmakes a ripple effect into the,
into the communities they're apart of.
And the really cool part is,you know, we now that's what
(08:55):
we've done directly as adeveloper, builder, owner.
But a bigger side of ourbusiness is finding great
companies who want to buildextraordinary organizations that
build thriving communitiesother housing developers,
builders and operators and weequip them not only with capital
but with resources, tools,education, the elite execution
system you mentioned, helpingempower them to scale and impact
(09:16):
the local community.
They're a part of theiremployee base and the
communities they're literallyphysically developing, building
and operating.
So thousands of communities atthis point in total, which has
been pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Wow, is it like primarily planned communities?
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah, so the easiest way to think about what the
majority of what we've beeninvested in are apartment
communities.
That's the simplest way tothink about it.
But in many cases, thecommunities today are, you know,
build for rent so that's a termfor, you know single family
rental communities, a lot of forsale single family communities
as well, townhome duplexes,manufactured housing communities
(09:53):
.
So I just say, think about itas a place where you know,
hundreds of people live, usuallywith full community amenities,
such as clubhouse, pool,pickleball, walking trails,
fitness center, et cetera, andreal programming to bring people
together.
You know, one of the.
In addition to the crisis wehave around the affordability of
housing, there's a number ofother crises we're focused on,
(10:15):
and one of them is what we callthe loneliness crisis, and you
may have heard the statement.
You know this is the mostconnected society in human
history, but the mostdisconnected and actually
loneliness was deemed a nationalepidemic in 2023.
And the average American todayonly has one and a half close
friends.
Very seldom does that one ortwo friends live in the same
(10:37):
place as you live, and forrenters that's even worse.
We're.
Very seldom do they even knowthe people who live in their
community.
I've been saying for 19 yearswe invest in safe, affordable
housing.
Well, safety isn't the gates oralarm systems or police patrol.
It's knowing your neighbor andthem knowing you and knowing
(10:58):
they're looking out for you.
And that's where we invest inpeople really knowing each other
, serving one another, being apart of a community together.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
Wow, and how many states do you currently have
these communities in?
Speaker 1 (11:12):
right now, we own communities in 17 states, I
believe, today, and then we haveinvestments in a total of I
believe it's 26 states today.
I believe it's 26 states today,so largely across the Sun Belt
states, across the country,predominantly up through
Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
So I imagine there's some criteria around what
communities or what areas youwould consider.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yeah.
So I mean, housing is in manyways, when you think about it
from an investment standpointwhich is where it starts is we
have to be able to generate whatour investors expect from us,
which is double digit returns,regular distributions, liquidity
and peace of mind, and so todeliver those things, we need to
be invested in places that aresolid investment opportunities
(11:59):
and in real estate.
Fundamentals are pretty simplein that it's about supply and
demand.
If you want to be in placeswhere people are moving to,
where jobs are moving to, wherethere's going to be demand for
housing that's affordable, andthen within those markets, we
have to be in the specificplaces where the incomes can
support the cost of housing,which is a challenge across the
country.
So, generally speaking, we'rein the states where people are
(12:21):
moving to.
So Florida and Texas are our toptwo states by far.
Those are the two states where61% of the nation's population
growth is today.
And then we're investing inplaces with at least $60,000,
$70,000 area median incomes,Because the housing we're
investing is not subsidizedhousing.
This isn't for people onvouchers.
This is for your proverbialteacher, social worker, police
(12:42):
officer, people workingstruggling to afford the cost of
living where they live, and itdoesn't matter if you're in
California, if you're inPennsylvania, you're in Florida,
you're in Texas, you're in asmall market, you're in a large
market, no matter where you arein the country, housing
affordability is a problem.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
And what I like.
What you've done with youracquisitions is really not
redoing them, so they're highend, right.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
But they're not that low end.
Where it's, it doesn't feellike.
While it's affordable, it'scheap, well-kept, well-cared for
, clean, no littering, no mess,all the units fresh and all the
common areas well-maintained,with full set of amenities in
almost every property, like Isaid, of clubhouses and pools
and pickleball and walkingtrails and fitness centers and
(13:48):
activity schedules and peoplethere who know you and care
about you.
We have onsite ministryresources at almost all of our
communities today People atwelcome committees, people
coordinating community events,people running Bible studies,
prayer groups, yoga classes,financial literacy programs,
after-school kid programming,parenting classes, you name it.
(14:09):
And then online socialtechnology that helps create
connection points outside of thephysical events, creates
community within the physicalcommunity people live in, but
also then creates a communityamongst the different
communities we own across thecountry.
So somebody has a passionaround.
You know a specific sport orhobby or whatnot.
(14:31):
They can connect with otherpeople across the DLP
communities who share that sameinterest.
So so yeah, very, veryintentional or no way you'd say
these are, these are notwell-maintained communities, but
we take a different approach.
So in apartment communitiestoday and rental communities
today, this surprises a lot ofpeople, but the average renter
moves about every 15 to 16months.
(14:51):
So they're moving almost everyyear and that's one of the
biggest costs the averagefamilies have is the cost of
constantly moving.
That's new security, newdeposits with the electric
company and cable companies,that's moving costs, that's new
security deposits with the newlandlord, you know, et cetera,
(15:16):
very close to that in theresidence we put into our
property.
So we'd rather have residentsstay in our properties, treat
them like they're cared for andlove them, so that they then in
turn treat the property like ahome.
They take care of theirapartment or their rental home
as if it's their own.
So we have lower maintenancecosts.
We have lower turnover costsbecause people are moving all
the time.
We have lower marketing costs.
We have lower vacancy costs.
We have lower delinquency costsbecause our people can afford
(15:39):
the rent.
So guess what they do?
They pay the rent.
All those things lead us to beable to provide better returns
for investors.
But also, generally speaking,our renter may fall but four,
six, eight percent below marketrent if they stay in the unit
and renew versus them moving toanother apartment.
So we're able to give a littlebit of savings to our renters
(16:00):
who stay year after year in ourunits, but ultimately generate a
better outcome for them, forour investors and for the
community as a whole.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Wow, there's so many things I want to ask.
I'm like I talked to my husband.
I'm like I get to see Don today.
I get to talk to Don.
So I don't want to likeoverstep, Courtney, but I was
curious about Asheville.
I know that you have eventsthere.
I know you're very committed tothat community.
What has that community beengoing through?
(16:31):
What does it look like now?
How are you helping?
I'd love to hear more aboutthat.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, so Asheville, northCarolina, is my second home of
the day.
Actually was just there thismorning, just got back here in
Florida a few hours ago and weare doing a big event there in
late June called ourExtraordinary Family Event.
We'll have hundreds of ourinvestors and their kids and
grandkids in some cases there,some of the best speakers,
entertainers in the world.
It's an event all about family,nothing about real estate
(16:59):
investing.
That's just one of the ways wethink of our platform, which we
think our organization is aministry platform, and one of
our communities we're focused onpouring into is our investor
community.
We have 3,500 families that wewant to pour into and this is a
big part of how we do that bypouring into their families, and
this is a big part of how we dothat by pouring into their
families.
But the last event we did inAsheville was September of last
(17:21):
year.
It was actually the day beforeHelene hit Asheville, so I was
there, my family was there, alot of our team members and such
families were there.
Four days before the storm hit,we bought a 312 unit apartment
community in Asheville with 800or so residents and four days
(17:43):
later the storm hits and we werefortunate at that property and
all the rest of our properties,including my home.
We didn't have a huge amount ofdamage, but we lost power and
Internet and so forth for a fewdays.
That was quite interestinghaving no Internet, no phone
service, no power.
But the biggest challenge thata lot of residents faced,
(18:04):
including ours, was no water forweeks.
I think we went three and ahalf weeks with our residents
having no water, and so a lot ofthings we did are bringing you
know tons of porta potties onsite, cooking for every day,
having on site showers, you knowportable showers, keeping the
pool filled with water so thatpeople could use it to you know
put down their toilets and such,having tons of drinking water
(18:29):
on site and just being there toserve our residents around the
clock.
And then we partnered with anumber of great ministries
residents around the clock.
And then we partnered with anumber of great ministries One
that we're actively partneringwith right now.
Actually, who all the proceedswe raised during this event
we're doing in a few weeks iscalled 828 Strong, which is the
area code there in Asheville,which is through a big church
called Biltmore Church in theAsheville area Worked with a
(18:51):
number of great organizationsthat were delivering really
needed relief in the momentdirectly to people, and there
were thousands of people wholost their homes.
There were many people in placesthroughout the mountains there
that they couldn't get in or outof, didn't have access to food,
water, et cetera.
So there's a lot of life-savingactivities that were going on.
The good news, I think, isAsheville is coming back strong
(19:14):
and it's a beautiful place andit'll only, I think, come back
even stronger.
Back strong and it's abeautiful place and it'll only
come back even stronger.
But there's certainly a lot ofthe smaller towns and areas that
were hit really, really hardand it's going to be years for
some of those families, for someof the neighborhoods, to be
rebuilt.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Yeah Well, I want to also ask you, like you speak
about doing this for 19 years.
I mean, for people that arelistening, it seems almost a
little bit of a pipe dream tothink that you could create
something that you've created.
I mean, it is pretty legendaryand it's a legacy, for sure.
And what would you say to thosepeople that want to be able to
(19:54):
dream big and have such anincredible impact on people's
lives like you have?
You've done and you're going tocontinue to do?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, you know, I'd say you know, people often say
wow, you know, it's amazing, how, how fast you've grown is a
common comment we get, and andpeople you know don't realize
maybe it's been 19 years, soit's not like it happened
overnight, right, that it's been19 years.
So it's not like it happenedovernight, right, it's been 19
years of discipline.
You know, relevance what wecall 20 mile march to our
journey.
(20:22):
And so internally it's almostbeen so consistent.
So, to give an example, inc5000 measures the growth of an
organization over a three-yearperiod of time.
We've never been in the top 500.
We've never been below, I think, 3,500.
We've been like 800 to 3,500every year for 13 years in a row
because we've just been verymethodical about consistent
(20:42):
growth.
So now the numbers are gettingbigger.
We're just growing at the samepace we did 15 years ago, but we
stayed at it, we stayedconsistent, we stayed diligent,
we stayed obedient to what whatI believe have been been called
to do.
And so if you want to dream big, one of the things I'd
recommend you do is one read abook called Chase the Lion by
Mark Batterson.
It's my favorite book of alltime.
(21:03):
I read it every year when I doour goal setting.
I read Thanksgiving week everyyear.
You read in there that what'scalled the Lion's Chaser
Manifesto is kind of the themeof the book, and and he
challenged us to think.
Think of dreams that are so bigthat they can only be
accomplished with divineintervention.
And your dreams are aren'tdon't scare you, they're not big
(21:24):
enough.
And uh, you know, I believeGod's called each of us to, to,
to do big things, to not bemediocre, to not accept being
average.
Um, we've all been calleduniquely to be, uh, to make a
big impact, and it doesn'talways mean big dollars or or
revenues or whatnot, but makinga big impact can be on a small
number of people that you impactin a really significant way.
(21:44):
And, and so whatever that thatcalling is for you get clear on
it, and Chase Lyon's a greatbook to help you do that.
And then, if you want to, whenyou get clear on what you've
been called to do, what you wantto accomplish, then I just
encourage you is to put in theyou know, discipline systems to
grow.
So our the books I've writtenin our system we call the elite
execution system, is a, is a isa system for disciplined thought
(22:07):
, disciplined action,disciplined people.
And when people hear the worddiscipline, I think they often
think of it as like a fourletter word, especially, you
know, entrepreneurs.
They think well, I didn'tbecome an entrepreneur because I
wanted a lot of structure.
They think of structure anddiscipline and rigor and process
as the things that will takeaway their freedom, and that's
(22:27):
the exact opposite truth.
So discipline and rigor andprocess is what will give you
freedom, right?
Because, you know, I believewhat's equally as important as
being successful and packingyour dreams from a business
standpoint is, at the same time,accomplishing your goals in the
other areas of your life, andso we call it the eight F's of
(22:48):
life, which are faith, family,friends, freedom, fun,
fulfillment, fitness and finance.
You know, the start of mystatement of what I want to be
remembered most for is I want to, first and foremost, be a hero
in my own home, right?
And if I'm not a hero in my ownhome, I'm not present with my
three boys.
If my family thinks I'm a fraudand you know, people bring me
(23:09):
on a podcast and think, wow, howimpressive my family is, so
that's not really who he is orhe's never present or not home.
What does that mean?
So you need the discipline andrigor so that as you grow and
you go from doing everythingyourself to being able to enable
and empower other people totake on key priorities,
initiatives, you need the rigorin place.
(23:30):
And the longer you wait to dothat, the longer you fight it
and you try to just be, you know, an incredible individual
producer with a bunch of peoplesupporting you, the harder it
will be to make that changelater.
So, putting in discipline, themost common sort of system out
there today is called EOS, thebook Traction, which is kind of
the stepping stone to thesystems that we use stone to the
(23:59):
systems that we use.
But that's a great place tostart.
And having a system or aprocess in place like EOS or
traction, committing to thatrigor and not being afraid then
to hire and to invest in people,to pour into them and empower
them to be a part of going outand achieving the goals you have
set, is really big.
You know, if I didn't takethose steps I'd still be out on.
(24:19):
You know, listing appointmentsall day, every day, right, I
mean that's for a few years Iwas on, you know, three, four or
five listing appointments everyday, six days a week, right.
And then I hired a full-timedriver to drive me so I could be
more effective on appointments,but then I brought him into
every appointment.
So so I could be more effectiveon appointments, but then I
brought him into everyappointment.
So then he learned how to do ithimself, right?
Then we video.
We created a video process sothat other people could go out
(24:40):
there and deliver the samepresentation and train them up
over a couple years.
And then, you know, let me getout of my real estate brokerage,
which I hadn't haven't sold ahome in.
I don't know how many years 12or 13 years and you've done that
.
Our business, um.
So, yeah, if your dreams, uh,uh, doesn't scare you, it's not
big enough and challengeyourself, right, just living the
American dream.
(25:00):
If you're on this podcast, um,I'm sure you have enough uh, uh,
opportunity and skills andabilities and relationships, um,
that you can do more than justachieve the American dream
yourself.
That you can just, you know, uh, have a nice home and live
comfortably.
And that's not enough.
If you're able to get to thatpoint, then coasting isn't
(25:23):
enough.
We've all been called to usethe gifts we've been provided,
the opportunity we've beenprovided to do more.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
So true, one of the things that I'm speaking on this
panel tomorrow and one of thethings that I think I'm going to
just really touch on is justaddressing the fear of you know,
all the things that you'retalking about right, because we
can adopt systems, we canutilize tips, we can make the
investments, we can sell thereal estate.
(25:50):
But if we're not, like,addressing the fear of what's
holding us back so that we canget to the next thing, you're
just going to keep, you know,stalling out, stalling out.
So it's just.
It's just your words just madejust reaffirm what I want to
touch on tomorrow.
So, thank you, because it'strue, as, as entrepreneurs and
(26:11):
leaders, right, like the fear ofhiring somebody, you know.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, it's a big, big fear for a lot of people.
I'm going to if you don't mind,I'm just going to cause you
made me think I'm going to readthis lion's chaser manifesto.
I just pulled it up and so manyof my employees have this as
their screensaver, um and, andthey're um, uh on their computer
desk.
Many people have it aroundtheir offices.
Mark Batterson, the author ofthe book Become a Good Friend.
He was one of our speakers atour event in November.
(26:37):
So this is what the lion'schaser manifesto is.
Quit living as if the purpose oflife is to arrive safely at
death.
Run to the roar.
Set God-sized goals.
Pursue God-given passions.
Go after a dream that isdestined to fail without divine
intervention.
Stop pointing out problems.
Become part of the solution.
(26:58):
Stop repeating the past.
Start creating the future.
Face your fears, fight for yourdreams.
Grab opportunity by the maneand don't let go.
Live like today is the first dayand the last day of your life.
Burn sinful bridges.
Blaze new trails.
Live for the applause ofnail-scarred hands.
Don't let what's wrong with youKeep you from worshiping what's
right with God.
Dare to fail.
(27:20):
Dare to be different.
Quit holding out, quit holdingback, quit running away.
Chase the line and most peopleare held back over fear, as you
said, and reading that book.
I read it at least once everyyear and there's another great
one.
Another great one is PurposeDriven Life.
If you've never read that booknumber one bestselling book of
all time behind the Bible andyou have a calling on your life
(27:44):
that's bigger than you having amore comfortable life, having a
bigger TV, a nicer car, bettervacation You've been called to
do more amazing.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
Well, I think I'm one .
That's gonna be my next book.
Yeah, to read what is?
I have a whole stack of books.
I just got back from summit, soI have all these books I
thought I was gonna read, butthat one's next.
Yeah, and two, I'm gonna printthat out.
Put it in my office.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yeah, so good.
I just video of it so I'm gonnashare it on social media, so
that's gonna go up today.
Um, I feel like there was somuch more I wanted to ask you.
I just want to let you know I'mincredibly impressed with your
organization.
I mean, kelly, she's beenamazing single-handedly.
She is what kept us interestedin your company.
(28:31):
And then going to the eventhands down was such an amazing
event.
I was like John Maxwell.
I told Courtney I'm like JohnMaxwell and I don't know if you
know this, but we brought ourdaughter with us.
She was up there with JohnMaxwell.
I think she was like one ofonly the only child in that
(28:51):
front row.
I'm like we.
She loved it.
She loved John Maxwell.
I thought it was going to likefall a little flat.
Everyone loves John Maxwell.
She loved him, so it just Ijust well done.
We met with multiple companiesand there was zero question that
(29:12):
you, your company, was the onewe wanted to invest with.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
So great job, thank you One thing you know in your
mind I'd love to just add.
So the book I'm writing rightnow.
It says called Building anExtraordinary Organization.
So the first book I wrote whichis written to business owners,
called Building an EliteOrganization.
The first person who ever readthat book was Gino Wickman, the
author of EOS Traction, and hecalled it.
(29:35):
Eos on steroids is what hecalled it, and I want him to
write me write the forward.
He's become a friend and andand.
So the book.
You know I wrote that book nowsix years ago.
So we've more than 10 X the sizeof our organization.
But then we've also helped afew hundred companies implement
at least parts, if not all, ofthe elite execution system.
We have many companies that runour technology and such.
We've learned a lot over thelast six years.
(29:57):
But most important thing I'mdoing is I'm reframing and I
sort of missed the mark in doingthis well on the first book
reframing the purpose ofbusiness.
And so an extraordinaryorganization is an organization
committed to extraordinaryexecution, doing the hard work
to build an organization thatcan endure market cycles,
(30:18):
volatility and senior leadershipsuccession.
An extraordinary organizationunderstands that business is
ministry and for a lot of people.
They get confused right thereand they never thought of that
right.
The more typical story ispeople build their business,
their career, then they retireor sell their company and then
they think, all right, well, nowI'll go make a difference, now
I'll go make an impact, now I'llgo from success to significance
(30:40):
.
But you can do that right here,right now, while you have a
platform, while you have anorganization, while you have
influence.
Our businesses are ministryplatforms.
If we treat them that way, ifwe invite the Lord into our
business and treat our businessas an opportunity of worship,
and if we accept the greatresponsibility and opportunity
to positively impact andtransform lives through your
(31:03):
business, an extraordinaryorganization recognizes that
they have to build a thrivingcommunity with their employees.
First, we own a bank and we'remerging that bank with another
bank right now called RegentBank, and my soon-to-be partner,
sean Copeland, wrote a bookcalled Regent Bank.
And my soon to be partner, seanCopeland, wrote a book called
(31:27):
94X.
And 94X is the math that if oneof your employees or somebody
you work closely with goes tochurch, they spend 94 times as
many hours in their job as theydo in the church, which means we
as business leaders have such agreater opportunity to pour
into and impact the lives of ourteam members than the greatest
pastor in the world can, becausewe spend so much time with them
(31:48):
.
And recognizing thatopportunity and that
responsibility is why BillyGraham said the Great Commission
will be one in the businesscommunity.
So we reframe and realize theopportunity to use our platforms
for ministry.
It changes the whole meaningand can raise up the energy
level to go out there and dobigger things.
Another great speaker was at ourNovember event has become a
(32:10):
really good friend.
Tim Tebow says that a callingis both urgent and divine and so
for a lot of people, especiallyChristians, who feel they know
what they're called to do, theythink that their calling is
enough, that because they'redoing it for Jesus, then they
don't have to really push thathard right.
It's in his hands.
(32:30):
No, once you figure out whatyou're called to do, there's
urgency to go out and do it andmake a difference.
And and that having urgent anddivine both of those together is
is empowering.
And a lot of us have, don't do,don't recognize that we get.
We allow fear to keep uscomfortable, to not go out there
(32:52):
and challenge ourselves to domore.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
So when's that book going to be released?
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Early next year.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Okay, great, we'll look, we'll make sure to get a
copy.
Well, I've read the other onesby then.
Yeah, I definitely want.
Oh, go ahead.
Well, I was just going to say,you know, we ran EOS because we
had independent brokerage beforecoming to XP, and then I
restructured when we came overand have that's kind kind of
we've gotten out of our habitswith our rocks, and so it's just
(33:22):
such great timing becauseMichelle and I are growing an
organization together and we're,you know, ok, it's time to get
back on the wagon, get thatdiscipline that we had Been an
awesome system.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (33:36):
But just the fact of bringing in the ministry to it
One.
A lot of leaders are verylonely and I feel like that
itself is a good reminder.
You're not alone, you're notdoing this by yourself, and
there's just so much morepurpose when you connect the
dots that way.
I love it.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Well said.
Well, thank you so much foryour time, Dawn.
There's still so much I want totalk to you.
Maybe another podcast Soundsgood.
I'm going to get Courtney andher husband and my husband and
we're going to go to anotherevent because it's just they're
so informative for one when itcomes to all of the options with
(34:13):
investing and DLP capital.
It's not just the multifamilyhousing, there's many that we
didn't even touch on.
But, yeah, at some point I wantto get my girl and her husband
to meet you and if you can tellour listeners where they can tap
into you, because you do a lotof webinars, events too, so talk
(34:34):
about where people can reachyou and access all the things
that you have to offer.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Yeah, so dlpcapitalcom is our website.
On there there's an event tabwhere you can see all of our
live and virtual events.
As you said, I also have apodcast called Impact with Don
Wenner.
You can find us in any of thesocial media places as well.
That you look.
And then our next big eventafter this one in June will be
in November, back in Ponte Vigia, st Augustine.
David Green, ceo, founder ofHobby Lobby, will be one of our
(35:01):
keynote speakers and he'slaunching a book on family and
legacy at our event, and someother really great speakers will
be doing legacy and aleadership event kind of back to
back.
So we'll make sure those willbe on our website, if not
already, in the next few days,and we invite certainly both of
you to come join us andencourage your listeners to
check it out and look and comejoin us live or virtual.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
Awesome, all right, thank you, don.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
You too and your family, and continued success.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Thank you, same to you both.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Bye.
But I sold the company to Jonathan Campbell.
(00:03):
Actually I gave the company toJonathan Campbell and then he
moved the company to RealBrokerage.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
But move them back, get it back.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Yeah, I can play in the house with them, for sure.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Welcome back to Now Making Moves in Real Estate.
This is the General, along withmy co-host C Twist, and today
we're super fired up about thisepisode.
It's episode number 62.
We're sitting down with one ofthe most strategic minds in real
estate and private equity, mrDon Wenner.
He is the founder and CEO ofDLP Capital, a purpose-driven
(00:48):
investment companypurpose-driven, I just want to
repeat that with over $4 billionin assets under management
focused on building wealth andprosperity through real estate.
He's also a best-selling author, top-performing entrepreneur
and creator of the EliteExecution System, a framework
(01:09):
that's helped scale his businessand the lives of countless
others.
So, from leading a nationallyranked real estate team to
building one of the fastestgrowing private investment firms
in the country, he brings arare blend of operational
excellence.
Firms in the country.
He brings a rare blend ofoperational excellence,
leadership, insight and scalablesystems All words we love.
(01:29):
If you're ready to think bigger, lead better and build with
purpose, this is theconversation for you, so let's
get into it.
Welcome, don.
Thank you so much for having me.
That was a great introduction.
I don't know what else I canadd, but I'll try.
I guess we're done.
(01:50):
No, just go.
No, I had the pleasure ofmeeting you and the organization
in St Augustine Florida latelast year, and I just am so
impressed with your leadershipand what you've built.
So if you would please tell ourlisteners a little bit more
about your story.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, thank you, I appreciate that and thank you
for coming and joining us.
That was a really awesome eventlate last year.
But, as you said, my name isDon Winter and founded a company
called DLP Capital.
It's been 19 years now.
So quick backstory.
Lived and grew up in LehighValley, pennsylvania, so about
an hour north of Philadelphia,mainly Bethlehem area.
(02:27):
Mom and dad had me, when theywere 16 year old, juniors in
high school and I'm the oldestof five Mom ran a home daycare
most of my childhood and myfather was a correction officer
most of my childhood and so youknow we had the kind of typical
limited, you know financialmeans.
You know that you would expectwhen your parents are 16 years
(02:49):
old but was raised you know alot of people like to hear those
kinds of stories and like tokind of follow people who've
raised themselves up by theirbootstraps and accomplished you
know business success orwhatever type of success on
their own.
And that's certainly not mystory, although you know I had
limited financial means.
I figured out about 10 yearsago that we had moved 37 times
(03:12):
by the time I was 17, mainly for, you know, financially driven
reasons.
But I was raised in a bigfamily, a lot of love, a lot of
support raised in the church,deep faith and relationship with
the Lord.
From a young age Born in theUnited States as a white man and
maybe the best time to be aliveKind of the lottery, you could
(03:34):
say and the Lord gave me acertain set of blessings and
skills that have put me in aposition to be successful in the
world of business.
And so the verse of my life istoo much is given, much is
required, and I believe I'vebeen given a ton.
One of the things I was givenwas an extreme amount of
(03:54):
confidence, even as a youngperson and moved out of my
parents' house when I was ajunior in high school.
I'd already figured the wholeworld out.
I didn't need to learn anythingfrom them anymore, but knew
what I wanted to do.
At that time, I'd alreadyfigured the whole world out.
I didn't need to learn anythingfrom them anymore, but knew
what I wanted to do.
At that time I thought I wasgoing to go into wealth
management and went to DrexelUniversity studying finance and
accounting and minor marketing.
(04:14):
And then stumbled into realestate when I was 20, going on
21 years old, and I started as aKeller Williams real estate
agent.
I was selling alarm systemsdoor to door as a college
student and that gentleman whoowned the company convinced me
to get my real estate license,never once thought about it
until that moment, took myclasses online, flew to a
marketing conference, left thatmarketing conference with a
(04:37):
message of your home sold in 68days, guaranteed, or I'll buy it
.
And that was October 2006.
And that was the peak of thereal estate market right then.
And there, at least inPennsylvania, was and and so I
did a lot of you know kind ofguerrilla marketing.
I was the.
I was spamming Craigslist thathad just come out.
I was.
I was literally knocking ondoors and getting in front of a
(04:58):
lot of people, put challenges inthe housing market at that time
and started doing a lot ofradio marketing soon after.
And still we still do this thisday across our businesses.
And just got in front of peoplewho had a housing problem,
largely around affordability and, and we'd help people sell
their home.
We step in and buy their homeand sometimes we'd help them
negotiate short sales.
(05:18):
And we do that all over thecountry and, and you know, kind
of help people, one person at atime, thousands and thousands of
times Um and uh, by 2014, um,kind of as Florida you know,
whole time to the success of 14,grew the business sort of out
of fear right, fear of failure.
My dad came to work for memonths into my career.
My mom came to work for memonths into my career.
My stepfather came to work forme soon after my stepmother,
(05:41):
while working the business tillto this day, and after my
stepmother while working thebusiness to this day, and just
kind of grew the business out offear initially.
Then it took all the way to2014 really for me to get clear
on what I've been called to do,which is to transform lives
through the building of thrivingcommunities, which starts with
providing affordable housing,and that kind of led us sort of
reframing up our business andwent from kind of one house at a
(06:01):
time to investing in wholecommunities.
So that's really the journeywe've been on these last 11
years.
So we develop, build, operatelarge housing communities.
We also provide capital toother developers, builders and
operators to build housingcommunities, all of this rooted
in housing that's affordable,but where that is just where it
begins, and our capital has beenfrom individual investors 3,500
(06:25):
families invested with us nowto this day who provide us the
capital that we get to gosteward and invest into housing
that's affordable for workingfamilies.
And so we've grown theorganization consistently now
for 19 years you said written acouple of books around scaling.
We've grown by about 50% a yearfor the last 19 years.
One of the fastest growingcompanies in America 13 years in
(06:46):
a couple of books aroundscaling.
We've grown by about 50% a yearfor the last 19 years.
One of the fastest growingcompanies in America 13 years in
a row.
Last year we did $567 millionof revenue.
We've over and out five and ahalf billion dollars of assets
under management and it's been areally great journey that, god
willing, we're just gettingstarted on.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
I mean mic drop on that.
I mean mic drop on that.
So impressive.
I think.
I mean when we went to StAugustine, obviously we were
just impressed with yourleadership and your faith and
just the environment itself.
But all of the communities thatyou're impacting is substantial
.
How many communities have youfocused on with affordable
(07:25):
housing and rejuvenating andbringing those communities back
to life?
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, that's a great question.
As I said a moment ago, ourpurpose is to transform lives
through the building of thrivingcommunities.
And the first community mostpeople, when they hear us, say
that they think about housingcommunities or local physical
communities, and that's a reallybig part of it, and I'll answer
.
But the first community wefocus on and we believe where it
all begins and and you know thebook I'm writing right now,
(07:50):
it's called building anextraordinary organization and
and um, and the first communityis is our employee base and uh,
so we now have in total, um,about 800 team members across
DLP capital, and then we have awhole banking platform as well,
called DLP Bank, and that's thefirst thriving community that we
invest into with a focus ontransforming the lives of our
(08:12):
colleagues.
And those colleagues, thoseteam members, work at the
physical communities we own inmany cases, or within the local
communities we're a part of,such as here in St Augustine,
florida, where I'm talking toyou from, or Lehigh Valley,
pennsylvania, where we haveoffices, or Asheville, north
Carolina, et cetera.
So we've invested in hundreds ofhousing communities.
(08:33):
We've owned about 150 totalcommunities, each one having
anywhere from 300 to 1,000people living in them, in them,
but then usually it's thephysical community we're
investing in, we're pouring intoour, into our residents in a
lot of unique ways that thenmakes a ripple effect into the,
into the communities they're apart of.
And the really cool part is,you know, we now that's what
(08:55):
we've done directly as adeveloper, builder, owner.
But a bigger side of ourbusiness is finding great
companies who want to buildextraordinary organizations that
build thriving communitiesother housing developers,
builders and operators and weequip them not only with capital
but with resources, tools,education, the elite execution
system you mentioned, helpingempower them to scale and impact
(09:16):
the local community.
They're a part of theiremployee base and the
communities they're literallyphysically developing, building
and operating.
So thousands of communities atthis point in total, which has
been pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Wow, is it like primarily planned communities?
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah, so the easiest way to think about what the
majority of what we've beeninvested in are apartment
communities.
That's the simplest way tothink about it.
But in many cases, thecommunities today are, you know,
build for rent so that's a termfor, you know single family
rental communities, a lot of forsale single family communities
as well, townhome duplexes,manufactured housing communities
(09:53):
.
So I just say, think about itas a place where you know,
hundreds of people live, usuallywith full community amenities,
such as clubhouse, pool,pickleball, walking trails,
fitness center, et cetera, andreal programming to bring people
together.
You know, one of the.
In addition to the crisis wehave around the affordability of
housing, there's a number ofother crises we're focused on,
(10:15):
and one of them is what we callthe loneliness crisis, and you
may have heard the statement.
You know this is the mostconnected society in human
history, but the mostdisconnected and actually
loneliness was deemed a nationalepidemic in 2023.
And the average American todayonly has one and a half close
friends.
Very seldom does that one ortwo friends live in the same
(10:37):
place as you live, and forrenters that's even worse.
We're.
Very seldom do they even knowthe people who live in their
community.
I've been saying for 19 yearswe invest in safe, affordable
housing.
Well, safety isn't the gates oralarm systems or police patrol.
It's knowing your neighbor andthem knowing you and knowing
(10:58):
they're looking out for you.
And that's where we invest inpeople really knowing each other
, serving one another, being apart of a community together.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
Wow, and how many states do you currently have
these communities in?
Speaker 1 (11:12):
right now, we own communities in 17 states, I
believe, today, and then we haveinvestments in a total of I
believe it's 26 states today.
I believe it's 26 states today,so largely across the Sun Belt
states, across the country,predominantly up through
Pennsylvania.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
So I imagine there's some criteria around what
communities or what areas youwould consider.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yeah.
So I mean, housing is in manyways, when you think about it
from an investment standpointwhich is where it starts is we
have to be able to generate whatour investors expect from us,
which is double digit returns,regular distributions, liquidity
and peace of mind, and so todeliver those things, we need to
be invested in places that aresolid investment opportunities
(11:59):
and in real estate.
Fundamentals are pretty simplein that it's about supply and
demand.
If you want to be in placeswhere people are moving to,
where jobs are moving to, wherethere's going to be demand for
housing that's affordable, andthen within those markets, we
have to be in the specificplaces where the incomes can
support the cost of housing,which is a challenge across the
country.
So, generally speaking, we'rein the states where people are
(12:21):
moving to.
So Florida and Texas are our toptwo states by far.
Those are the two states where61% of the nation's population
growth is today.
And then we're investing inplaces with at least $60,000,
$70,000 area median incomes,Because the housing we're
investing is not subsidizedhousing.
This isn't for people onvouchers.
This is for your proverbialteacher, social worker, police
(12:42):
officer, people workingstruggling to afford the cost of
living where they live, and itdoesn't matter if you're in
California, if you're inPennsylvania, you're in Florida,
you're in Texas, you're in asmall market, you're in a large
market, no matter where you arein the country, housing
affordability is a problem.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
And what I like.
What you've done with youracquisitions is really not
redoing them, so they're highend, right.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
But they're not that low end.
Where it's, it doesn't feellike.
While it's affordable, it'scheap, well-kept, well-cared for
, clean, no littering, no mess,all the units fresh and all the
common areas well-maintained,with full set of amenities in
almost every property, like Isaid, of clubhouses and pools
and pickleball and walkingtrails and fitness centers and
(13:48):
activity schedules and peoplethere who know you and care
about you.
We have onsite ministryresources at almost all of our
communities today People atwelcome committees, people
coordinating community events,people running Bible studies,
prayer groups, yoga classes,financial literacy programs,
after-school kid programming,parenting classes, you name it.
(14:09):
And then online socialtechnology that helps create
connection points outside of thephysical events, creates
community within the physicalcommunity people live in, but
also then creates a communityamongst the different
communities we own across thecountry.
So somebody has a passionaround.
You know a specific sport orhobby or whatnot.
(14:31):
They can connect with otherpeople across the DLP
communities who share that sameinterest.
So so yeah, very, veryintentional or no way you'd say
these are, these are notwell-maintained communities, but
we take a different approach.
So in apartment communitiestoday and rental communities
today, this surprises a lot ofpeople, but the average renter
moves about every 15 to 16months.
(14:51):
So they're moving almost everyyear and that's one of the
biggest costs the averagefamilies have is the cost of
constantly moving.
That's new security, newdeposits with the electric
company and cable companies,that's moving costs, that's new
security deposits with the newlandlord, you know, et cetera,
(15:16):
very close to that in theresidence we put into our
property.
So we'd rather have residentsstay in our properties, treat
them like they're cared for andlove them, so that they then in
turn treat the property like ahome.
They take care of theirapartment or their rental home
as if it's their own.
So we have lower maintenancecosts.
We have lower turnover costsbecause people are moving all
the time.
We have lower marketing costs.
We have lower vacancy costs.
We have lower delinquency costsbecause our people can afford
(15:39):
the rent.
So guess what they do?
They pay the rent.
All those things lead us to beable to provide better returns
for investors.
But also, generally speaking,our renter may fall but four,
six, eight percent below marketrent if they stay in the unit
and renew versus them moving toanother apartment.
So we're able to give a littlebit of savings to our renters
(16:00):
who stay year after year in ourunits, but ultimately generate a
better outcome for them, forour investors and for the
community as a whole.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Wow, there's so many things I want to ask.
I'm like I talked to my husband.
I'm like I get to see Don today.
I get to talk to Don.
So I don't want to likeoverstep, Courtney, but I was
curious about Asheville.
I know that you have eventsthere.
I know you're very committed tothat community.
What has that community beengoing through?
(16:31):
What does it look like now?
How are you helping?
I'd love to hear more aboutthat.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, so Asheville, northCarolina, is my second home of
the day.
Actually was just there thismorning, just got back here in
Florida a few hours ago and weare doing a big event there in
late June called ourExtraordinary Family Event.
We'll have hundreds of ourinvestors and their kids and
grandkids in some cases there,some of the best speakers,
entertainers in the world.
It's an event all about family,nothing about real estate
(16:59):
investing.
That's just one of the ways wethink of our platform, which we
think our organization is aministry platform, and one of
our communities we're focused onpouring into is our investor
community.
We have 3,500 families that wewant to pour into and this is a
big part of how we do that bypouring into their families, and
this is a big part of how we dothat by pouring into their
families.
But the last event we did inAsheville was September of last
(17:21):
year.
It was actually the day beforeHelene hit Asheville, so I was
there, my family was there, alot of our team members and such
families were there.
Four days before the storm hit,we bought a 312 unit apartment
community in Asheville with 800or so residents and four days
(17:43):
later the storm hits and we werefortunate at that property and
all the rest of our properties,including my home.
We didn't have a huge amount ofdamage, but we lost power and
Internet and so forth for a fewdays.
That was quite interestinghaving no Internet, no phone
service, no power.
But the biggest challenge thata lot of residents faced,
(18:04):
including ours, was no water forweeks.
I think we went three and ahalf weeks with our residents
having no water, and so a lot ofthings we did are bringing you
know tons of porta potties onsite, cooking for every day,
having on site showers, you knowportable showers, keeping the
pool filled with water so thatpeople could use it to you know
put down their toilets and such,having tons of drinking water
(18:29):
on site and just being there toserve our residents around the
clock.
And then we partnered with anumber of great ministries
residents around the clock.
And then we partnered with anumber of great ministries One
that we're actively partneringwith right now.
Actually, who all the proceedswe raised during this event
we're doing in a few weeks iscalled 828 Strong, which is the
area code there in Asheville,which is through a big church
called Biltmore Church in theAsheville area Worked with a
(18:51):
number of great organizationsthat were delivering really
needed relief in the momentdirectly to people, and there
were thousands of people wholost their homes.
There were many people in placesthroughout the mountains there
that they couldn't get in or outof, didn't have access to food,
water, et cetera.
So there's a lot of life-savingactivities that were going on.
The good news, I think, isAsheville is coming back strong
(19:14):
and it's a beautiful place andit'll only, I think, come back
even stronger.
Back strong and it's abeautiful place and it'll only
come back even stronger.
But there's certainly a lot ofthe smaller towns and areas that
were hit really, really hardand it's going to be years for
some of those families, for someof the neighborhoods, to be
rebuilt.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Yeah Well, I want to also ask you, like you speak
about doing this for 19 years.
I mean, for people that arelistening, it seems almost a
little bit of a pipe dream tothink that you could create
something that you've created.
I mean, it is pretty legendaryand it's a legacy, for sure.
And what would you say to thosepeople that want to be able to
(19:54):
dream big and have such anincredible impact on people's
lives like you have?
You've done and you're going tocontinue to do?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, you know, I'd say you know, people often say
wow, you know, it's amazing, how, how fast you've grown is a
common comment we get, and andpeople you know don't realize
maybe it's been 19 years, soit's not like it happened
overnight, right, that it's been19 years.
So it's not like it happenedovernight, right, it's been 19
years of discipline.
You know, relevance what wecall 20 mile march to our
journey.
(20:22):
And so internally it's almostbeen so consistent.
So, to give an example, inc5000 measures the growth of an
organization over a three-yearperiod of time.
We've never been in the top 500.
We've never been below, I think, 3,500.
We've been like 800 to 3,500every year for 13 years in a row
because we've just been verymethodical about consistent
(20:42):
growth.
So now the numbers are gettingbigger.
We're just growing at the samepace we did 15 years ago, but we
stayed at it, we stayedconsistent, we stayed diligent,
we stayed obedient to what whatI believe have been been called
to do.
And so if you want to dream big, one of the things I'd
recommend you do is one read abook called Chase the Lion by
Mark Batterson.
It's my favorite book of alltime.
(21:03):
I read it every year when I doour goal setting.
I read Thanksgiving week everyyear.
You read in there that what'scalled the Lion's Chaser
Manifesto is kind of the themeof the book, and and he
challenged us to think.
Think of dreams that are so bigthat they can only be
accomplished with divineintervention.
And your dreams are aren'tdon't scare you, they're not big
(21:24):
enough.
And uh, you know, I believeGod's called each of us to, to,
to do big things, to not bemediocre, to not accept being
average.
Um, we've all been calleduniquely to be, uh, to make a
big impact, and it doesn'talways mean big dollars or or
revenues or whatnot, but makinga big impact can be on a small
number of people that you impactin a really significant way.
(21:44):
And, and so whatever that thatcalling is for you get clear on
it, and Chase Lyon's a greatbook to help you do that.
And then, if you want to, whenyou get clear on what you've
been called to do, what you wantto accomplish, then I just
encourage you is to put in theyou know, discipline systems to
grow.
So our the books I've writtenin our system we call the elite
execution system, is a, is a isa system for disciplined thought
(22:07):
, disciplined action,disciplined people.
And when people hear the worddiscipline, I think they often
think of it as like a fourletter word, especially, you
know, entrepreneurs.
They think well, I didn'tbecome an entrepreneur because I
wanted a lot of structure.
They think of structure anddiscipline and rigor and process
as the things that will takeaway their freedom, and that's
(22:27):
the exact opposite truth.
So discipline and rigor andprocess is what will give you
freedom, right?
Because, you know, I believewhat's equally as important as
being successful and packingyour dreams from a business
standpoint is, at the same time,accomplishing your goals in the
other areas of your life, andso we call it the eight F's of
(22:48):
life, which are faith, family,friends, freedom, fun,
fulfillment, fitness and finance.
You know, the start of mystatement of what I want to be
remembered most for is I want to, first and foremost, be a hero
in my own home, right?
And if I'm not a hero in my ownhome, I'm not present with my
three boys.
If my family thinks I'm a fraudand you know, people bring me
(23:09):
on a podcast and think, wow, howimpressive my family is, so
that's not really who he is orhe's never present or not home.
What does that mean?
So you need the discipline andrigor so that as you grow and
you go from doing everythingyourself to being able to enable
and empower other people totake on key priorities,
initiatives, you need the rigorin place.
(23:30):
And the longer you wait to dothat, the longer you fight it
and you try to just be, you know, an incredible individual
producer with a bunch of peoplesupporting you, the harder it
will be to make that changelater.
So, putting in discipline, themost common sort of system out
there today is called EOS, thebook Traction, which is kind of
the stepping stone to thesystems that we use stone to the
(23:59):
systems that we use.
But that's a great place tostart.
And having a system or aprocess in place like EOS or
traction, committing to thatrigor and not being afraid then
to hire and to invest in people,to pour into them and empower
them to be a part of going outand achieving the goals you have
set, is really big.
You know, if I didn't takethose steps I'd still be out on.
(24:19):
You know, listing appointmentsall day, every day, right, I
mean that's for a few years Iwas on, you know, three, four or
five listing appointments everyday, six days a week, right.
And then I hired a full-timedriver to drive me so I could be
more effective on appointments,but then I brought him into
every appointment.
So so I could be more effectiveon appointments, but then I
brought him into everyappointment.
So then he learned how to do ithimself, right?
Then we video.
We created a video process sothat other people could go out
(24:40):
there and deliver the samepresentation and train them up
over a couple years.
And then, you know, let me getout of my real estate brokerage,
which I hadn't haven't sold ahome in.
I don't know how many years 12or 13 years and you've done that
.
Our business, um.
So, yeah, if your dreams, uh,uh, doesn't scare you, it's not
big enough and challengeyourself, right, just living the
American dream.
(25:00):
If you're on this podcast, um,I'm sure you have enough uh, uh,
opportunity and skills andabilities and relationships, um,
that you can do more than justachieve the American dream
yourself.
That you can just, you know, uh, have a nice home and live
comfortably.
And that's not enough.
If you're able to get to thatpoint, then coasting isn't
(25:23):
enough.
We've all been called to usethe gifts we've been provided,
the opportunity we've beenprovided to do more.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
So true, one of the things that I'm speaking on this
panel tomorrow and one of thethings that I think I'm going to
just really touch on is justaddressing the fear of you know,
all the things that you'retalking about right, because we
can adopt systems, we canutilize tips, we can make the
investments, we can sell thereal estate.
(25:50):
But if we're not, like,addressing the fear of what's
holding us back so that we canget to the next thing, you're
just going to keep, you know,stalling out, stalling out.
So it's just.
It's just your words just madejust reaffirm what I want to
touch on tomorrow.
So, thank you, because it'strue, as, as entrepreneurs and
(26:11):
leaders, right, like the fear ofhiring somebody, you know.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, it's a big, big fear for a lot of people.
I'm going to if you don't mind,I'm just going to cause you
made me think I'm going to readthis lion's chaser manifesto.
I just pulled it up and so manyof my employees have this as
their screensaver, um and, andthey're um, uh on their computer
desk.
Many people have it aroundtheir offices.
Mark Batterson, the author ofthe book Become a Good Friend.
He was one of our speakers atour event in November.
(26:37):
So this is what the lion'schaser manifesto is.
Quit living as if the purpose oflife is to arrive safely at
death.
Run to the roar.
Set God-sized goals.
Pursue God-given passions.
Go after a dream that isdestined to fail without divine
intervention.
Stop pointing out problems.
Become part of the solution.
(26:58):
Stop repeating the past.
Start creating the future.
Face your fears, fight for yourdreams.
Grab opportunity by the maneand don't let go.
Live like today is the first dayand the last day of your life.
Burn sinful bridges.
Blaze new trails.
Live for the applause ofnail-scarred hands.
Don't let what's wrong with youKeep you from worshiping what's
right with God.
Dare to fail.
(27:20):
Dare to be different.
Quit holding out, quit holdingback, quit running away.
Chase the line and most peopleare held back over fear, as you
said, and reading that book.
I read it at least once everyyear and there's another great
one.
Another great one is PurposeDriven Life.
If you've never read that booknumber one bestselling book of
all time behind the Bible andyou have a calling on your life
(27:44):
that's bigger than you having amore comfortable life, having a
bigger TV, a nicer car, bettervacation You've been called to
do more amazing.
Speaker 3 (27:57):
Well, I think I'm one .
That's gonna be my next book.
Yeah, to read what is?
I have a whole stack of books.
I just got back from summit, soI have all these books I
thought I was gonna read, butthat one's next.
Yeah, and two, I'm gonna printthat out.
Put it in my office.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
Yeah, so good.
I just video of it so I'm gonnashare it on social media, so
that's gonna go up today.
Um, I feel like there was somuch more I wanted to ask you.
I just want to let you know I'mincredibly impressed with your
organization.
I mean, kelly, she's beenamazing single-handedly.
She is what kept us interestedin your company.
(28:31):
And then going to the eventhands down was such an amazing
event.
I was like John Maxwell.
I told Courtney I'm like JohnMaxwell and I don't know if you
know this, but we brought ourdaughter with us.
She was up there with JohnMaxwell.
I think she was like one ofonly the only child in that
(28:51):
front row.
I'm like we.
She loved it.
She loved John Maxwell.
I thought it was going to likefall a little flat.
Everyone loves John Maxwell.
She loved him, so it just Ijust well done.
We met with multiple companiesand there was zero question that
(29:12):
you, your company, was the onewe wanted to invest with.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
So great job, thank you One thing you know in your
mind I'd love to just add.
So the book I'm writing rightnow.
It says called Building anExtraordinary Organization.
So the first book I wrote whichis written to business owners,
called Building an EliteOrganization.
The first person who ever readthat book was Gino Wickman, the
author of EOS Traction, and hecalled it.
(29:35):
Eos on steroids is what hecalled it, and I want him to
write me write the forward.
He's become a friend and andand.
So the book.
You know I wrote that book nowsix years ago.
So we've more than 10 X the sizeof our organization.
But then we've also helped afew hundred companies implement
at least parts, if not all, ofthe elite execution system.
We have many companies that runour technology and such.
We've learned a lot over thelast six years.
(29:57):
But most important thing I'mdoing is I'm reframing and I
sort of missed the mark in doingthis well on the first book
reframing the purpose ofbusiness.
And so an extraordinaryorganization is an organization
committed to extraordinaryexecution, doing the hard work
to build an organization thatcan endure market cycles,
(30:18):
volatility and senior leadershipsuccession.
An extraordinary organizationunderstands that business is
ministry and for a lot of people.
They get confused right thereand they never thought of that
right.
The more typical story ispeople build their business,
their career, then they retireor sell their company and then
they think, all right, well, nowI'll go make a difference, now
I'll go make an impact, now I'llgo from success to significance
(30:40):
.
But you can do that right here,right now, while you have a
platform, while you have anorganization, while you have
influence.
Our businesses are ministryplatforms.
If we treat them that way, ifwe invite the Lord into our
business and treat our businessas an opportunity of worship,
and if we accept the greatresponsibility and opportunity
to positively impact andtransform lives through your
(31:03):
business, an extraordinaryorganization recognizes that
they have to build a thrivingcommunity with their employees.
First, we own a bank and we'remerging that bank with another
bank right now called RegentBank, and my soon-to-be partner,
sean Copeland, wrote a bookcalled Regent Bank.
And my soon to be partner, seanCopeland, wrote a book called
(31:27):
94X.
And 94X is the math that if oneof your employees or somebody
you work closely with goes tochurch, they spend 94 times as
many hours in their job as theydo in the church, which means we
as business leaders have such agreater opportunity to pour
into and impact the lives of ourteam members than the greatest
pastor in the world can, becausewe spend so much time with them
(31:48):
.
And recognizing thatopportunity and that
responsibility is why BillyGraham said the Great Commission
will be one in the businesscommunity.
So we reframe and realize theopportunity to use our platforms
for ministry.
It changes the whole meaningand can raise up the energy
level to go out there and dobigger things.
Another great speaker was at ourNovember event has become a
(32:10):
really good friend.
Tim Tebow says that a callingis both urgent and divine and so
for a lot of people, especiallyChristians, who feel they know
what they're called to do, theythink that their calling is
enough, that because they'redoing it for Jesus, then they
don't have to really push thathard right.
It's in his hands.
(32:30):
No, once you figure out whatyou're called to do, there's
urgency to go out and do it andmake a difference.
And and that having urgent anddivine both of those together is
is empowering.
And a lot of us have, don't do,don't recognize that we get.
We allow fear to keep uscomfortable, to not go out there
(32:52):
and challenge ourselves to domore.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
So when's that book going to be released?
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Early next year.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Okay, great, we'll look, we'll make sure to get a
copy.
Well, I've read the other onesby then.
Yeah, I definitely want.
Oh, go ahead.
Well, I was just going to say,you know, we ran EOS because we
had independent brokerage beforecoming to XP, and then I
restructured when we came overand have that's kind kind of
we've gotten out of our habitswith our rocks, and so it's just
(33:22):
such great timing becauseMichelle and I are growing an
organization together and we're,you know, ok, it's time to get
back on the wagon, get thatdiscipline that we had Been an
awesome system.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (33:36):
But just the fact of bringing in the ministry to it
One.
A lot of leaders are verylonely and I feel like that
itself is a good reminder.
You're not alone, you're notdoing this by yourself, and
there's just so much morepurpose when you connect the
dots that way.
I love it.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Well said.
Well, thank you so much foryour time, Dawn.
There's still so much I want totalk to you.
Maybe another podcast Soundsgood.
I'm going to get Courtney andher husband and my husband and
we're going to go to anotherevent because it's just they're
so informative for one when itcomes to all of the options with
(34:13):
investing and DLP capital.
It's not just the multifamilyhousing, there's many that we
didn't even touch on.
But, yeah, at some point I wantto get my girl and her husband
to meet you and if you can tellour listeners where they can tap
into you, because you do a lotof webinars, events too, so talk
(34:34):
about where people can reachyou and access all the things
that you have to offer.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Yeah, so dlpcapitalcom is our website.
On there there's an event tabwhere you can see all of our
live and virtual events.
As you said, I also have apodcast called Impact with Don
Wenner.
You can find us in any of thesocial media places as well.
That you look.
And then our next big eventafter this one in June will be
in November, back in Ponte Vigia, st Augustine.
David Green, ceo, founder ofHobby Lobby, will be one of our
(35:01):
keynote speakers and he'slaunching a book on family and
legacy at our event, and someother really great speakers will
be doing legacy and aleadership event kind of back to
back.
So we'll make sure those willbe on our website, if not
already, in the next few days,and we invite certainly both of
you to come join us andencourage your listeners to
check it out and look and comejoin us live or virtual.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
Awesome, all right, thank you, don.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
You too and your family, and continued success.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Thank you, same to you both.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Bye.
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