April 2, 2025 • 34 mins
Peter Schvetz, entrepreneur and real estate investor, discusses his dynamic career journey with Kenny. Peter recounts his transition from a traditional banking career to real estate investments, culminating in the founding of his container company, Liberty Containers. He shares how his experience in banking laid the foundation for his real estate ventures, the ups and downs of flipping houses, and how a serious accident led to a reevaluation of his priorities. Peter also talks about the importance of efficiency, strong relationships, and sharing the difficulties of building a business while being present at home as a father and husband. The episode touches on personal highs, lows, and the strategies Peter uses to manage multiple businesses while fostering meaningful connections with family and community.
Peter Shvetz - LinkedIn
00:00 Introduction and Welcome
00:41 Peter's Early Career and Education
03:40 First Steps in Real Estate
06:55 Transition to Full-Time Real Estate
11:28 The Accident and Its Aftermath
16:22 Starting Liberty Containers
22:51 Expanding the Business
25:25 Discussing Family Dynamics and Support
25:57 Balancing Work and Family Life
29:42 Future Business Plans and Efficiency
31:19 Importance of People and Culture
35:18 Parenting Challenges and Rewards
38:46 Networking and Business Opportunities
41:16 Passive Investing and Financial Strategies
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Peter (2) (00:00):
I had a really bad work accident.
(00:02):
Our finishing crew was one manshort.
And so me being the do it allguy that I am, I jumped on a, a
Georgia buggy or a concretebuggy.
the piece of equipmentmalfunction.
And it was going in reverserather fast, and I could not
stop it.
I was trying to hit the brakewhere my foot was, and, the
little lever, just it would notstop.
(00:25):
So before I could do anything, Ifound myself pinned between the
machine that was in front of me.
a concrete truck that had,really pierced through the back
of my leg at that point.
and so I was rushed to thehospital.
A month after, was the worst,october 4th, our second son was
born.
so this was very much a, I wassitting in the wheelchair when
(00:46):
he was born and I was veryhelpless.
Kenny (01:30):
Peter, thank you for joining The Invested Fathers
today.
we're gonna be exploring, whatyou're up to today and your
career journey.
we've gone to college together.
you're my friend.
I enjoy seeing what you'reposted on Facebook about the
family and your wife and all thegood stuff.
And you've had a really, I don'tknow if I could call it a
mountain top and valley journey.
I'm thinking specifically ofyour health and just some scarce
(01:50):
along the way.
I know our audience will be,very interested to hear more
about you.
So welcome to the show, buddy.
Peter (2) (01:54):
thank you so much for having me, Kenny.
Um, I'm honored.
I'm humbled.
I know this has been somethingthat we have talked about.
Hey, I wanna have you on, Iwanna hear more about your
story, and so it's cool that'sfinally taking place, right here
together.
Kenny (02:07):
Yeah, man.
All right.
Peter.
To go outta the gates here.
Give me, you're wearing theLiberty containers shirt right
now.
I remember when I was inSomerville, oh man.
Three years ago, I think.
maybe a little bit longer.
Yeah, I think you were juststarting this was something that
I think you had just a fewcontainers, and I know that's
not all you do, so give ouraudience, a little bit about
(02:27):
your business and what you'redoing today.
Peter (2) (02:30):
Absolutely.
we did have the opportunity togo to college together in, in
Greenville at Bob JonesUniversity.
And so I do remember those days.
That was quite a long time ago.
got done there in May of 2010and, Shortly after that went
into the banking realm and I hada journey in banking that was
probably unconventional, but ifyou remember in 2010, there was
(02:52):
a lot of the tail end of thesubprime stuff going out.
And there was a lot of bankslooking for employees.
So I was one of those lucky fewthat came in on the tails of all
the folks that exited thebuilding with the subprime.
So that was a huge piece of whatI'm doing now in laying the
foundation for knowledge of howto acquire properties, how the
(03:13):
banks think through a lot ofthat.
so I started, got my mortgagelicense, in 2010.
A lot of companies were payingfor that stuff, so they had
people train how they wantedthem to be trained to be up on
the regulations and so forth atthat time.
I remember that summer, I wasgonna be getting married the
following January in 2011, to myhigh school sweetheart that we
(03:37):
met each other at church, inhigh school.
And, went to all four yearsthere at Bob Jones together as
well.
So we got married as soon as shegraduated in December, and I was
working that six months or so,bought our first house and I
remember waking up the nextmorning after buying that first
house and being like, wow, thisis mine.
This is a house.
This is so cool.
I always have wanted to own ahouse and I'll never forget
(03:58):
that, almost just fresh feelingof, of home ownership.
And I assume that most folks asthey own homes, feel that.
And so I, I respect that,whether it's something I'm
renting or whether it'ssomething that someone's buying
that they're gonna wake up withthat same sort of feeling that
goes on.
banking career started fresh,newly married in 2011, and.
(04:20):
I was working retail in thesubprime, originating 13 to 18%
home mortgages at that time tofolks with distressed credit,
but also that just couldn't getapproved otherwise.
learned a ton there.
went I I.
Was at that point where I'mlike, I don't really know what I
wanna do long term, if I wannago back to school.
So I did go back to school.
I attended the professional MBAprogram at the Darla Moore
(04:40):
School of Business, at theUniversity of South Carolina.
That was a two year program, andI was working 40 to 60 hours
while I was doing that.
and that, I learned a lot.
It was more about connectionsthan learning necessarily, but
more than that even, it wasmostly simulating this crazy
lifestyle that I live now andjust being into how do you
juggle priorities?
(05:01):
How do you keep the balls in theair?
How do you prioritize what'sactually important and what's
not?
And so I'm, grateful for thattime.
in early 2015, my wife and I hadlived in our first house for
approaching five years.
we purchased our home that welive in now.
it was a short sale and so Ileveraged a lot of the knowledge
that I had in the realm of.
Finance and so forth to be ableto negotiate that deal.
(05:23):
We got the house, it was inpretty rough shape.
had fun doing the renovation onthat, and we converted that
house that we had first boughtto our first rental property.
and then later that year had anopportunity because it was a
town home, so a bunch of rows ofhouses.
the other end of the buildinghad a town home unit that went
(05:43):
for sale and we ended up buyingit for, similar to the price
that I had bought the house fiveyears before for, so it was a
no-brainer and was able to getthat as our second rental
property.
so we renovated that house.
We moved into it, or the housewe live in now.
And kind of from there, I'll behonest, I had that bug of wow, I
can do this.
the renovation I had, I knewenough at that point to be
(06:05):
dangerous and I was managing acouple different tenants at that
point.
While, I.
Just finished up school, therethe year before and, I was like,
man, this is cool.
This kind of doing thingsoutside of what I viewed my
corporate journey, so to speak,to look like.
The
Kenny (06:20):
corporate journey.
So in your mind at that point,college marriage, homeowner now,
what did that corporate journeylook like in your mind?
Peter (2) (06:30):
Climbing the corporate ladder, becoming
supervisory, go going, to ahigher position within banking.
That was where my mindset waswith an MBA in finance at this
point.
And that was what the trail wasmy mind had me there I think
while I had gone back to schooland the journey that really God
pushed me
Kenny (06:49):
Yeah.
Through, because you're stillworking, you're working 40 hours
a week, you're doing school, youhave this kind of plan in your
mind.
Yes.
But it sounds like along theway.
These rental properties arecoming up, you're transitioning,
you're maybe starting to see,hey, maybe there's like a little
plan B here.
Is that right?
Peter (2) (07:05):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
Okay.
Keep going.
It and things were very much,things were very much not
performance based, that wasintro to I was getting promoted,
but also seeing what the inneroffice politics and the, kind
that corporate side of thingsthat you never really learn
about in the schoolhouse, so tospeak.
Kenny (07:24):
They don't teach
Peter (2) (07:25):
that?
no.
They don't Company.
They might touch on it briefly,Yes, indeed.
It's a very real thing, man.
Yes, absolutely.
at that point, I had, I said,let me, I have a little bit
extra time.
That was before kids, of course,and I said, let me go ahead.
See if I can find a property toflip.
And so I, I remember even in mydorm room at college, I was
(07:47):
always looking at real estateand I did a lot of buying and
selling of cars and things likethat.
But, I was more driven tojumping in at that particular
point and trying to findsomething.
I remember I bought a propertywith the intention to flip.
In hindsight, I definitelyshould not have sold that
property.
I should have kept it and rentedit.
but it was a good learningexperience.
It was a light touch flip.
(08:08):
that was the first one that Idid, and I started doing more
and more.
I think I had probably donethree or so between 2016 and
really in like middle to end of2017.
2017 was a year that I was verymuch searching.
I had left, the job that I hadsupervisory.
At Bank of America and I wentinto a completely different
(08:32):
sales role as a mortgageoriginator for movement
mortgage.
And, was essentially compensatedand the red carpet was rolled
out to be able to go and meetpeople in our immediate
community, mostly real estateagents, real estate investors,
anybody that could potentiallybe a lead for mortgage.
these folks did a great job atgetting me out there.
(08:52):
and that's who I am.
I love being in front of folksand just hanging out, doing
life, learning more about whatthey do and so forth.
Did well within that industry.
But really, again,relationships.
Relationships, that's what thatwas about.
And a couple years they werereally spent digging into
establishing more within thoserelationships.
So in that, in 2017, I met a guythat very much, I was, I jived
(09:14):
really well with.
he had complimentary attributesto myself that I did not have.
He had a contractor background.
he'd been a contractor for 20plus years.
He was about 10 years older thanme.
I knew some things in thefinance realm that, he wanted to
learn.
And obviously I had a lot tolearn in the contracting realm.
So there was a greatrelationship and, what
eventually turned into apartnership for us, he was
(09:37):
strong at what he did.
I was strong at what I did andwe started a partnership.
in 2018.
It became very obvious to methat it was not gonna be lending
to what I was gonna do longterm.
I was spending majority of mytime.
like I, I remember my dayslooked like this.
They was very similar to when Iwas.
Trying to go to school full-timeand work full-time.
(09:59):
I would land in the officearound four to four 30 in the
morning.
I would work on my mortgageapplications for about three
hours, and then I would go outto the field and check in to
make sure that my crews were onsite and that the jobs, the
houses, the house flips weremoving forward and that they had
proper support that they neededand so forth.
that was only so sustainable.
It was very messy.
(10:20):
There were a lot of storageunits throughout town.
There were a lot of, unfinishedprojects, a lot of worked
weekends, a lot of work nights.
I'm preaching to the choir Iknow with you and your audience
here.
but it was very obvious therethat I couldn't do both.
Yeah.
And then once the end of thatyear came around and I looked at
the finances, I said, I knowwhich one is definitely gonna
go.
And it was the thing that wastaking the majority of my time
(10:41):
or the majority of my mental,energy I guess at that point to
do that.
so in.
2018, I decided to leave lendingall together towards the end of
that year.
And, also during that year, ourfirst son was born, our oldest
son, harbor.
he just turned seven this pastweekend, so that was awesome,
(11:02):
man.
A fun milestone.
It's hard to believe that it wasthat long ago because it really
does not feel like it.
so in 2019, the partner that Ihad at the time, and I flipped
just over two dozen housestogether, it was a whirlwind.
It was, a learning experience.
And we got to the end of that2019 and we were just like, man,
we do not wanna repeat thatyear.
(11:23):
It was a great year financially,but we didn't wanna repeat that
year from a stress and justcompeting priority standpoint.
and so we did, and this wassmart, we sat down and said,
what can we do to improveefficiencies?
What can we do to get our legsunderneath us a little bit more?
And we decided to, try to build.
Basically a warehouse, to beable to run out of and have as
(11:45):
our central operating center tosend guys out from in the
morning with supplies and soforth.
And so we started to blaze thattrail.
as 2020 hit, February of 2020actually, we ma packed up our
families.
We went to Orlando and weattended the largest, equipment
auction, of the year that's puton by Richie Brothers.
And so while we were at theauctions, it was a lot of fun.
(12:08):
we sent our families to Disney,did all the things down there,
and, we purchased some equipmentthat we were gonna be building
and having our crews used tobuild our warehouses or
warehouse rather.
And so that was a fun trip.
We got back from that wasFebruary of 2020, late February,
2020.
And literally covid hit like acouple weeks after that.
(12:29):
And it was weird, but also inthe scheme of like exactly what
we were trying to accomplish, itwas like, this actually could be
cool because, we're pulling ourcrews in.
We stopped acquiring.
We did have some holdings atthat point, but, we said this
actually could be cool.
So we still had guys working.
we were cautious of course, butwe still had guys working and we
were making some great progresson this.
fast forward, of course theproject took longer.
(12:50):
It was not something that wewere very efficient at.
'cause we had not builtwarehouses before.
there's a lot of learning goingon.
September 10th, 2020 was aterrible day.
I had a really bad workaccident.
That morning our warehouse wascompleted and we were doing our
final concrete pour.
I think we had six to eighttrucks of mud that we were
(13:11):
pouring that morning.
And our finishing crew was oneman short.
And so me being the do it allguy that I am, I jumped on a, a
Georgia buggy or a concretebuggy.
And, while in transit I hadprobably transported.
20 loads at that point of, ofconcrete from the truck to where
the dump site was, the piece ofequipment malfunction.
(13:34):
And it was going in reverserather fast, and I could not
stop it.
I was trying to hit the brakewhere my foot was, and, the
little lever, just it would notstop.
So before I could do anything, Ifound myself pinned between the
machine that was in front of me.
Fortunately, it was not full ofconcrete.
That could have been a verydifferent story at the time.
(13:55):
and a concrete truck that had,really pierced through the back
of my leg at that point.
and so I was rushed to thehospital.
I was immediately, Put into anexploratory type of surgery to
figure out what the extent ofthe damage was.
And from that particular pointon, I started a journey that
was, about a year and a half totwo years medically.
(14:18):
And then it was longer than thatwith all the workers' comp
claims and insurance andeverything that happened there.
so from that particular point,the business partner that I had
at the time, was very much,things were very different
between us.
I remember some conversationsthat I had even when I was in
the.
Bed basically at the hospital.
(14:38):
yeah, I could just sense thatthere was just a different, the
lack of closeness from that andfrom that point forward, he
wanted out.
it was very obvious he wantedout.
And so we went, from that pointforward, we went through this
long journey, that finally endedin February of 22.
and so I'm gonna take just aminute to talk about that
journey and that couple years,because I, looking back on that
(15:00):
this is healthy, to look back onand I get so caught up some days
in a lot of what I'm doing todaythat I don't look back.
So during that time, I stronglyfeel reflectively that this was
God that was saying, you knowwhat?
You do need to lay out.
I'm not gonna give you theability to be able to go like
you have been doing.
And there needs to be more of atrust.
(15:21):
Put on me and our relationshipand, I, I want you to sit and
examine things on what the nextchapter's gonna look like.
And so during that time, I cantell you I had never had
anything like this happen.
I remember my father, a monthafter, within that month was the
worst, because I was verylimited on mobility.
(15:44):
I had a son at the house, soI'm, I'll mention this'cause
this was critical, in September.
10th was my accident.
October 4th, our second son wasborn.
so this was very much a, I wassitting in the wheelchair when
he was born and I was veryhelpless.
There was a wife that was verypatient with me and all of my
(16:07):
craziness and family stepped uplike never before.
Friends, certain friends steppedup.
but that certain chapter reallyrevealed to me like, Hey, here
are your friends.
Here are the people who aregonna be for there for you when
you're not doing everything forthem.
And it was really, I didn't havea choice, but just to sit back
and be like, wow, thank you.
(16:27):
I, I don't deserve any of this.
I'm not sure why this happened,but that it was what it was.
And um.
lot of surgeries.
I had six different legsurgeries that happened during
that time.
A lot of recovery, a lot ofgearing up for surgeries and
hearing different doctor'sopinions and pt and just the
stuff that just takes way longerthan you think that it will to
(16:49):
get through.
so during that time, obviouslythe question was, so what are
you gonna do?
I was alive, right?
I wasn't sure what the state ofmy mobility would be long term.
Although the doctor said that itwas something that I would be
able to get through and once itbecame obvious that I was gonna
be able to walk and be normalagain, so to speak, then I
(17:11):
started thinking like, Hey, do Iwanna get back to this crazy
real estate construction type ofgame?
And, what was forefront top ofmind was when you get back into
this.
Be more efficient at what you'redoing.
Try to create an ecosystem wheremore of the process is owned,
(17:32):
managed under what I'm able tocontrol and also be in, be, have
the ability to offer somethingto the folks that I really loved
being around and fosteringrelationships with when I was in
the mortgage lending world.
And so what that was, and whatit turned out to be was, I.
(17:55):
A buddy of mine that I had knownfor a few years, he was a
firefighter and part-time, mostfirefighters have part-time
jobs, and part-time he had avery successful, fencing and
decking business.
Did mostly did fencing.
And, he was the guy with me thedays that I would start my
mortgage day at four o'clock inthe morning.
I would try to get over toLowe's by 6, 6 30 some days if I
(18:16):
would need to.
He was the guy opening Lowe'swith me at that time.
we were just the contractor typeguys talking out front and, he
was in my ear and he said, man,have you ever thought about
doing anything with dumpsters?
And I said, oh my goodness, no.
But I had remembered thatdumpsters were always a pain
point in my process when I wasflipping a house, a couple
times.
Couple examples.
(18:37):
Driveways were cracked and itwas just, it was more capital
that I had, it was more fightthat I had to go and can you pay
for this?
And insurance claims, if we hadto go that route.
and then I just remember thelack of customer service.
It was always an 800 number.
It was always a, oh no, checkour website here.
And then the drivers would showup and have no clue what was
going on.
(18:57):
And I was just like, I had thatringing in the back of my mind.
there, there is a need here,there, there is a lack of a
quality service here that isdemanded by folks in our
industry that are high speedfolks.
They're big deadline people.
They need something to turn whenthey need it to turn.
They don't have time to wait onan 800 number or something.
And I had those relationshipswith folks, a lot of them.
(19:20):
anyway, that was in the back ofmy mind.
So I spent.
I don't know, maybe about twomonths.
And I was like, ah, lemme justpassively research this thing.
I'm an all-in guy, so I did alot of research and at the same
time, my friend Adam wastransferred to the Charleston
area.
His wife's in the Air Force, andhe completely moved his family
down there.
So we came up with this ideathat we would start this thing
(19:42):
small.
and I justified it where I said,Hey, this is an asset heavy
business.
I'll be able to have the writeoff here, and I can utilize this
equipment in my business even ifI can't sell a container, a
dumpster room.
we each started with, a trailerand eight containers that we
pulled behind a Threequarter tontruck.
And, the, I said earlier thatFebruary of 22 is when
(20:06):
everything ended, with mybusiness partner and I at the
time.
And so I.
August, or that summer of 21 iswhen we bought all this and set
up our respective LLCs.
the arrangement we have is heowns the Charleston market.
I own the Columbia market.
And we since have another guythat runs, a market for Liberty
containers in the Aiken area,liberty containers of the CSRA.
(20:30):
and so we got going with that, amonth later and I started
thinking, I was like, man, Ijust ordered these dumpsters.
I'm gonna have to park themsomewhere.
And so forth.
A month later, I found awarehouse building that's a mile
from my house, here in the imo,South Carolina area.
(20:51):
And, I approached the lady thatowned it.
She had it listed about threedifferent times.
It had fallen out of contract.
And I just said, this is.
It never happened.
Let me just go and let me talkto this lady just to see.
And I went to her house, nicehouse in the lake, and I sat
down with her and we had aninstant connection.
There was good trust.
She was an older lady with a lotof time.
(21:11):
And so I sat down with her andjust told her my story.
And, we outta that conversationpretty much came up.
We worked out a deal for me topurchase the warehouse that we
now have all of our, businessesheadquartered out of and have
multiple other tenants underthis roof as well.
and so I closed on that a monthafter that, was able to get all
of my equipment delivered here.
(21:32):
And, I spent that time, tryingto till the soil a little bit in
establishing a website and allthat comes along with the new
business with for Libertycontainers here in Columbia.
And then I also took that timeto renovate this space,
completely, to be our officearea.
And then there's a warehousecomponent in the back as well.
The deal closed with, with mybusiness, in February of 22.
Peter (21:56):
And,
Peter (2) (21:57):
I got five properties as my cut of my holdings, our
holdings there.
I sold three of those with a lotof renovation.
two of those were, propertiesthat netted about 1.1 million.
So there, there were bigger,larger projects.
and then two of those I have,I've kept, I've renovated them,
I've kept, and I continue torent those, container company
(22:20):
grew wildly.
On the Liberty container side,and we continued to buy
containers.
I was able to find some usedcontainers and, was running all
of that myself.
Up until that point, I wasrunning the containers to the
landfill.
learning that business, gettingto know my customers really
well, and then also obviouslycontinuing, these renovation
(22:40):
projects on these properties andthen others that I was able to
purchase and work on.
the law that changed, I think itwas two years ago.
Help me here in South Carolinawith wholesaling.
Do you remember that one is,okay, so there's a, law
wholesaling
Kenny (22:58):
has been up and down for, from what I hear from current
wholesalers in regards to is itlegal, is it not legal?
what attorneys should you use tomake this work?
So gimme your scoop on whathappened.
Peter (2) (23:13):
Yeah, so there was a law that came out.
I think it was.
Year and a half, two years ago,basically that said, you can't
do it.
Of course there's a lot ofmisinformation, as you said.
and so I had a lot of friendsthat I had purchased homes from,
that I had helped them withcontainers.
'cause a lot of wholesalers werebuying these things and oh man,
if I can get all the junk out,and then put it on the market.
(23:34):
And so there was a need for myservices there.
they were networking with me andI said, Hey, I think I can get
these things closed.
Or, some of them had them intheir pipeline with a lot of
hair and they would send'em tome and just be like, I wanna
keep these people happy.
I just need to pass'em ontosomeone that I know will treat
them well.
so I actually got a lot of leadsduring that particular time that
I was able to, close in onefashion or another.
(23:57):
so that was cool.
And a lot of those, I weresmaller properties.
They were smaller deals.
but they were pretty much rightthere in this area where I'm at,
that I've turned into rentals.
So that was.
Definitely part of my storywhere growing and saying, no, I
wanna hold some more realestate.
as long as it's on a smallerside.
So we've been very successfulwith that.
(24:19):
I had a friend that approachedme, early part of last year and
he said, Hey, I bought thisfranchise Junk King.
junk King is a full service junkremoval franchise.
They also do dumpster rentals.
And, he said it just isn't agood fit for what I'm doing.
He's a very high speed realestate guy here in our market.
(24:39):
I respect him like crazy.
And he just came to that pointas sometimes we do as business
owners and we just say, Hey,this doesn't integrate well.
I just need it to, I don't wannamanage it anymore.
we kinda went back and forth forabout three, four months.
And the thing that I.
Understood was, I knowdumpsters, I can sell dumpsters,
but I'm, I don't have thebandwidth to take on anymore.
(25:02):
So that was like that.
I knew that there was somethingthere, but I knew that I could
not take on the full servicejunk removal and manage in that
aspect.
friend of mine who owns aparking lot business here in
town, was a good fit for that.
He already manages a lot ofcrews.
and there was a great crossreferral, cross lead opportunity
(25:23):
to be able to acquire the JunkKing franchise here in Columbia.
we closed on that September oflast year and we've been.
Going on there for I guess five,six months now.
And it has grown month overmonth tremendously.
There's been some, like I said,great opportunities for, we
focus on larger containers on myLiberty container side, and then
(25:44):
there's a smaller, morehomeowner friendly type of
aspect to the junk Kingcomponent, where folks can go
online.
They have the technology thatthey can leverage to book
everything same day or next day.
and so instead of referring alot of that business out, which
I was getting, investors sayingI need containers, and then it
was like, oh, and I also needsomeone to fill those containers
(26:06):
too, so we're able to do thefull service junk removal
quoting.
and then we also have dumpstersolutions for those folks that
do have crews and have things,built out at that particular
Kenny (26:16):
point.
Okay.
Let me, that's what I'm up to.
That's awesome, man.
No, that's quite a full journey.
Um, I'm trying to understand andyou've given our audience.
Sort of how you're wired inlight of, you we're busy.
and not necessarily negativelyjust, wanting to get up early,
meet your friend, meet yourcoworker here at a, our partner
at six o'clock in the morning atLowe's.
(26:37):
I have that background as well.
We would just, I really, youstart early, like why wait.
and you've mentioned, I thinkwhere I want to go now is you
mentioned the kids at home and,your son, your second son was
born, while you were in thehospital, that low point, and
you've been reborn in a way.
you were down, I could see it inyour face and you were
describing the recovery time forthese things.
(26:59):
That wasn't just a, hey, put ona movie and in the movie
everything's fine.
it seemed like a lot.
And that's not your normal thingis to sit and wait.
I.
So thank you for sharing allthat.
And I want to ask, as you aresitting here today and your kids
are 7-year-old, seven years old,your first one harbor, and
Charlie's for, the relationshipat home, relationship with your
(27:20):
wife, that's something that Ifeel like is something we don't
talk a lot about in our circles.
Everything we talked aboutbusiness wise, I'd say is very
common to share those things,networking and Hey, how's your,
what's your workload?
But, I'm, I want to create thisculture through this audience of
listeners of, hey, what havebeen the struggles, what have
been the rewards?
what excites you about being adad or, investing in your
(27:40):
family?
So gimme some of the maybe highsand lows of I.
Not necessarily from beginningto end of where you were,
especially during those, thosehar harder values, but maybe
even like today, like in lightof what you're doing today,
what's it like at home rightnow?
Peter (2) (27:57):
Yeah.
first and foremost, I ha I havethe absolute best wife and most
supportive, person that is verypatient as my best friend doing
this thing called Life Next tome, and I'm incredibly thankful
for her.
the last few years have beenincredibly turbulent.
there's been other things thathave happened that I didn't
mention.
Just family things, churchthings, other things completely
(28:20):
outside of our control.
But what the net take from allthat has been is I've got
someone next to me that is rightthere, supportive patient.
And through those trials oflife.
we grow much stronger to eachother, to God, to, those around
us that are on that samemission.
(28:41):
And so that first and foremostis everything.
I think I heard Dave Ramsey theother day say, you protect your
marriage, your relationship withkids work is third and above.
All of that is gone.
And so that, that resonates withme right there, where, in the
house, I'm the type of guy that,I do like to keep folks happy.
(29:01):
I got a lot of folks.
I've got, I two personalassistants, 15 employees, four
businesses.
couple dozen tenants.
And so that's a lot of demandsplaced on my time.
When I'm in home and I'm tryingto be present With my kids, with
my wife.
and so I'm not going to lie toyou or the audience here, I
struggle with that.
That is very tough finding thosepriorities.
(29:24):
No, there's not a way to findbalance in this season, but it's
so rewarding coming home, kidshugging you, daddy, you're home,
wanting you to put a puzzletogether with them, build a Lego
set, whatever.
so just those times are thatmuch more special and there's so
much more rewarding now Iperceive than they would've been
(29:46):
had I not gone through what Iwent through a few years ago.
Kenny (29:50):
Yeah.
I see this, through the people Ibring on the show, there's
always a sense of.
Tug, tug of war a little bit on,I think the word balance, work
life balance, I roll my eyeseven when I say it.
And I say that on the show alot, but, I'm a believer of
that.
That's a myth.
You're you're, you are who youare.
It's, you're not stopping beinga dad.
(30:10):
You're not half dad, halfworker.
and so who you are as a fatheris who you are on the workplace.
and if you're overly doingsomething, you know too much,
there's maybe gonna be acorrection that is painful to
not necessarily get right backto the middle, but, make sure
that you're taking care of yourpeople.
(30:31):
And I've known other businessowners who I would maybe say the
same thing is, Hey, I care a lotabout my employees.
these people are important tome.
You meant, you, you rattled off,the relationships, kinda like
your inner circle, maybe thenext inner circle.
And how it is a struggle.
So maybe what I could ask tohelp know your mindset and also,
we can look back and say, I'velearned this, but the next few
(30:52):
years, as you're growing thisthing, you've mentioned success
after success with the rentalsand the liberty containers and
just those relationships thatare going well and businesses
that are going well.
What does the future look like?
Maybe the next, like three,three years?
Is there a hope to say I'm gonnamaybe offload something or hire
a team?
what are some thoughts of thenext maybe stage for you that
(31:14):
you're excited about or aregearing toward?
Peter (2) (31:17):
sure.
so business wise, and it's asimilar point really, that we
were at with the flippingcompany when we hit 2020, and it
was just like, whoa, we've seenthe volume of business we are
able to fulfill.
We have employees that aretrained up and know what they're
doing.
How can we make this moreefficient?
Whether that's efficiency,better tools, maybe less bodies
(31:40):
or more bodies, more tools, morevolume, just looking at all of
that.
So there's a constant critiquegoing on there.
I'm like, within the last 48hours, I've made some big
decisions.
we are going to be.
Basically selling off all ofour, trucks and containers for
both businesses, and we're gonnabe transitioning to one central
(32:01):
platform, within the dumpsterworld.
And on the franchise side, it'sbeen a challenge getting the
approvals there, but we aretrending well there and they
respect, the experience that Ihave locally and how I've
networked and so forth.
So I'm looking forward to,again, efficiencies.
Yeah, so we'll have one, we'llhave trucks that can run both
businesses, same style ofcontainers.
(32:22):
Right now we're running, notnecessarily a hodgepodge, but
we're running systems that don'tintegrate with each other.
And so if one truck goes down,we're waiting and we have to
depend on other companies.
And, that's not a way to build abusiness.
So efficiencies, long storyshort is what we're chasing
there.
people, I can't say that loudenough.
people.
if you have the right people onyour side that are doing what
(32:45):
they say, And telling youlegitimately upfront what
they're capable of doing.
that, that goes a long way aswell.
But you you figure out what thatlooks like and what it's not
when you're interviewing folksand then whenever a performance
happens.
So having the right people andonce you get the folks in, just
loving on'em and that cultureright there goes so, so far with
(33:08):
folks and that's what we'reabout.
I mentioned that we have a lotof businesses under this roof,
and that is something that I'mhumbled every time I come in
here.
Usually before the sun comes upevery day, just to think
through, man, I've got thesefolks that I get to do life with
under this roof that are,dependent on the identity of
their small business in thiscommunity that they built.
(33:31):
And, we get to pass businessback and forth and just be in
this synergistic environment.
And when I interview peopleanymore.
I pitched that to them and I'mjust like, you know what, do,
what do you wanna do long termif it's punch a clock?
we're not for you.
we're looking for folks that dounderstand, like what we've
built here and what God hasgiven us is that synergy.
(33:52):
And, we want you to springboardfrom that, whether you work for
me or another guy in thisbuilding or whatever, we want it
to be a good fit for you.
But, I think just building thatand, having, we've owned more of
the process on the real estateside with the dumpsters now with
the full service junk removal,getting the right people in the
right seats and get, gettingthings as efficient as possible,
(34:15):
if that answers your question.
Kenny (34:16):
Yeah, that's, Like I said earlier, maybe even before we
hit record, this message ofefficiency, simplification,
time.
You mentioned the time elementof your life and how important
that time is, and that continuesto be a message that I reteach
myself.
And doesn't matter what age youare, whether you're in your
twenties or your eighties, weall have the same, I have 24
(34:39):
hours.
You have 24 hours.
And I feel like the people thatare younger are feeling, you
know what, I can work, sun upsundown, I can do whatever.
I, I'm that invincible mindset.
But as the kids come and themarriage maybe erodes something,
you start really protecting yourtime more so in light of, the
efficiency sake of, like yousaid, the partners you're taking
on, how you wanna grow yourbusiness.
(35:01):
You're not looking just to makea buck.
You're looking for somerelationships, some deep, Hey,
we want to make this thing workso we don't have to reset this
stuff.
what's a big takeaway that youhave, rather failed on recently
or have seen like a huge successin the efficiency at home?
I guess I'm just trying to ask,in light of time being so
important, has there been ratheragain, a failure or a
(35:24):
breakthrough of oh, I can dothis, in, on the personal side
of life and that gives me thereturns that I'm looking for,
Peter (2) (35:32):
if that makes sense?
Yeah.
I think it's going to, revolvelike my answer.
There's gonna revolve aroundpeople and for a very long time,
and I still fight this everyday, I was the type of person
that's I'm the one with thisrelationship.
I'm the one that needs tofulfill, I'm the one that needs
to be doing this work.
And so as I've gotten peoplearound me, especially, the.
(35:55):
First assistant that I hired.
Yes.
she's very honest with me insaying, Hey, you shouldn't be
doing this right now.
or I please respect me when Isay, she says that, yeah, please
respect me when I say Wow.
And and I do,'cause she's no, Ican do that.
I can have someone else do that.
And so getting, that's veryhumbling to hear.
But also reflectively usuallyafter that interaction, I'm
(36:20):
like, she's right.
what, why have I been so proudto not give that up?
Or, to pass that dutyresponsibility, relationship
task even, off.
And so that'll help a lot withefficiencies and it'll also help
with the growth of thoseemployees as well.
Peter (36:38):
Yeah.
Peter (2) (36:38):
going to the house side of things.
Yeah.
really the same type of thingsapply.
When you're parenting, when youhave, our 7-year-old is very
smart, very, he understandswhat's going on now a lot more.
And so when you're like, allright buddy, that's your
responsibility now, it's so coolwatching that little enlightened
mind like, okay, I got this.
(36:59):
so it's been fun.
see that across both.
Kenny (37:01):
Yeah.
I like to ask this questionusually toward the end.
Best part about being a dadright now.
Recent story, recent, I don'tknow, fun, fun moment, memory,
that you can reflect and justshare a feel good moment with
the audience, with me.
Peter (2) (37:16):
Yeah.
It's gonna have to be the timeswe get to make memories, There's
a lot of times just being honestthat I'm there, but I'm not,
just mentally I've got a lotkind of decompressing off coming
off of a busy day.
And, the times that, it evenhappened to me last night where
I got home and my youngest isincredibly tired and he just
came over and just gave me a hugand wouldn't let me go.
(37:37):
And I just looked over at mywife and I was just like, wow,
this is happening.
This doesn't happen very often,but this is great.
I'm gonna soak it in.
And and then just the timesthat, we get to go off and with
the birthday party we have formy son this past weekend and,
just short little trips.
We can't go for long anymore.
just'cause of the ages of thekids and also all the
(37:57):
responsibilities, but, justspending that time and the
closeness there.
Watching them face little fearsand all that, overcome those
fears is fun.
Kenny (38:08):
What's, just to go a little further there, what's a
fear not to put anyone in a badlight, but what are some of the
things that you're experiencingright now that are, hurdles for
your kids that you're helpingthem with?
Peter (2) (38:18):
so we took, our oldest middle of the week last
week up to Great Wolf Lodge.
Oh, yeah.
And he has a big thing aboutfears, about heights with fears,
with heights.
Yes.
And, so climbing stairs on up toa slide and doing things like
once you get there, oh man, it'sthe best thing ever.
But while you're sitting therewith that tense, build up type
feeling, oh, I'm not gonna dothis.
(38:39):
I'm ready to go back down, andjust talking through Hey, I
understand you're scared, andthat kind of thing.
So th those are more of thefears that go on there.
even in the early ages thatthey're in seeing the Fears of.
Peer pressure to a very smalldegree.
I don't wanna see this person,So just talking through gives a
great discipling opportunity,parenting opportunity to talk
(39:02):
through relationships at ahigher level.
And you know how everybody haslittle fears like that.
It's not just you and, how Godgives us the strength to
overcome those things and allthat.
Kenny (39:14):
So that's awesome, man.
I, I've, I had on a guest lastweek, maybe two weeks ago, and
he mentioned how the eight to 10year mark sort of defines like,
who this person's gonna be likeat that point.
they've rather experiencedenough nature and nurture to say
this is who this guy is.
Of course he has to keep, ifyou're training your child in
certain ways, you have to keepdoing that.
(39:35):
You don't just stop.
and he has to decide forhimself, certain things as well.
But, just that importance ofthose formative years.
and.
I love the stories that youshared in that way of him, them
seeing you.
and, another huge lesson that Icontinue to again, teach myself
is these kids, they are, thelessons are caught.
They're not taught.
So what they see is more,important than, what you say.
(39:58):
And I love that story of yourson, younger son just hugging
you somewhat randomly.
yeah.
And that affinity there.
Peter, thanks for your timetoday, man.
Just wrapping up.
I want to give, you theopportunity to, our listeners
are in IMO or, it seems likeyou're very well networked in
the area.
give us how our listeners cankeep up with you or follow you
if there's things that you'reputting out.
(40:18):
what is the best way to keeptrack of what, Peter Schwetz is
up to?
Peter (2) (40:21):
Sure.
I, my wife does a lot ofmarketing and social media type
stuff professionally, with herfamily restaurant here in
Columbia called Maurice's PiggyPark.
so if you're coming throughColumbia, support the family
restaurant.
but that being said, she's muchmore up to tune than I am on the
socials.
so Facebook is really the bestway to get me on that Facebook
(40:43):
page.
She has created a link tree forme where you can connect with
any of my, business handles orlinks, websites, et cetera.
So that would be a great way toconnect with me.
I do post a lot on there, as youmentioned earlier.
I would say if anybody is justwanting to brainstorm, reach
out, introduce themself.
I would love to have aconversation.
I'm a very approachable guy.
(41:04):
what I've learned is any timespent brainstorming with someone
over their business or justtalking through where I bump my
head at, it, I usually walkaway.
Learning something.
So it's never a waste of time.
I would love to start aconversation and of course if
you're doing any business aroundthe South Carolina area
specifically, look up ourcontainer company, Liberty
(41:27):
containers.
we have an operator in Aiken,obviously, low country,
Charleston area like we talkedabout.
I'm in Columbia, and my teamhere.
And then we are interviewing onecandidate for the upstate area
for Greenville right now.
so we're, excited about thatpotential.
expansion for the businessthere.
junk King is a franchise, but weare all local owners to our own
(41:48):
markets.
so if we can help you out withany sort of junk removal type
stuff or if you have any dealsthat you come across, from a,
good rental property or good,wholesale, whatever the new term
for wholesaling is now, let meknow.
and I have a lot of deals thatcome across my desk.
I'll be honest with you.
I've not purchased a lot ofthose deals, but I have pushed
(42:09):
them along to folks that I knoware looking in specific pockets
of our markets.
and so that could be beneficialfor all involved and that's what
I'm about for sure.
Kenny (42:19):
one more question.
I usually ask, and it depends onthe walk of life, but.
Passive investing.
So one of the question, one ofmy goals as a capital raiser is
I want to attract people who aretoo busy and are looking to, and
they have maybe too much moneyor they're not necessarily too
much in my, my, my opinion, butjust they're investing in
(42:40):
something already, but they'relooking for better returns and
they don't want to add anotherjob.
So it sounds like a lot of whatyou've done financially has
actively invested in all thesebusinesses.
And why not?
Because you're young and vibrantand have a lot of things that
you wanna reverse the curse andjust build.
are you doing a lot of itpassive investing right now or
is it mainly like in and whenyou think like building wealth
(43:03):
or building retirement or maybeeven pa cash flow.
Is it like buy another rental,buy put more money into the
liberty or are you doing someother things outside?
I like other audience members toknow what are these dads I'm
bringing on?
Like how are they.
Investing passively more orless.
Sure.
Are you doing any that?
Peter (2) (43:20):
Yeah.
just to be honest with you, alot of my personal worth in
investing money is wrapped up inmy real estate, as I got into
this container world, especiallybeing a brand new business Brand
new guy with just an idea ofsomething new.
nobody would finance anythinglike that.
So I had to put a lot of cashinto buying this equipment.
Yeah.
That's changed now, which isfortunate.
(43:42):
and so I'm able to more focus onthat.
But, to answer your question, Iwould say a lot of the
relationships that have been ahuge eye opener for me over the
last four years have been withother private money lenders and
folks that fit the bill toexactly what you just said.
And those are folks that are.
(44:04):
At a point in life, a lot ofthem really know and understand
real estate.
Some of them have beenprofessionals in real estate for
decades, and they just don'twanna be in the rat race.
They just wanna be, they justwanna sit back.
They want, they know that thisis somebody capable, that is
gonna pay them, that is goingto, they know what they're
doing.
They're tried and true, they'renetworked well.
They run into issues.
(44:24):
They're gonna pick up the phoneand call them, And, so building
that trust with people that arein those shoes.
And I can have reflective phonecalls once a year with them, 20
times a year with them as muchor as little as they want to be
involved.
And they know, I'm giving them agreat return on what their
investment is
Kenny (44:44):
for the reason.
Yeah.
so you use your own moneystarted out, you're still using
private money lenders for yourrentals, but maybe even also
some business stuff as well,because you're just, it's almost
like a transaction.
Hey, give you this much, yougimme this much.
I'm happy.
Don't need to know.
I don't need to be in the weedsof this stuff looking for a
paycheck or looking for a,mailbox money.
Peter (2) (45:03):
Sure, yeah.
Absolutely.
And me specifically, I own allof my equipment outright, no
liens for Liberty except for onetruckload.
Everything else is ownedoutright.
Wow.
Dude.
We're fixing to sell everythingand Yes.
start with new.
So there will be some morefinancing involved there.
Yeah.
But it'll be, in my opinion,it'll be smart financing.
(45:23):
Yeah.
We're trying to get ahead of thetariffs with a lot of our buy,
nice to steal will be impacted.
Yes.
and just having awareness there,a lot of the private money that
I've done has been to get intothe deals, whether it's auction
buys or whether it is,Properties that I've bought just
through contacts and network.
Yeah.
And those are deals as they'vegotta close fast, they don't
(45:44):
want any hair, they don't wantany whatever.
They need to close fast.
Yeah.
So that's when I'll pick up thephone and say, Hey, guess what?
remember that loan we just paidoff?
Let's go ahead and you wanna putit back to work?
Boom.
Peter (45:53):
Yeah.
Peter (2) (45:53):
and but what my long game with the rentals is I am
packaging up 5, 6, 8 rentals ata time, and I'm getting those in
commercial loans, and then I'mpaying off my private money, and
then I'm putting the privatemoney back to work for flip
projects and for, other buyslike I just described.
Kenny (46:10):
Yeah, man.
it's, I have not built, a comp,a business like yours.
Obviously Liberty's its own newbeast for you, maybe even like
the new number one.
And rentals are now number two.
I don't know.
but it's really fascinating toknow the equity, the value that
you're building, especially withthese things paid off that I
would, I think you couldprobably borrow.
(46:32):
Get a business loan from thisbusiness one day and then put
that to work with rentals,payback, it's just it's just
gonna keep growing.
it's just that, that I think fungame, if you wanna call it that,
like liquid versus not liquidassets that are, trapping your
money but making you money.
And until eventually it's okay,I've got a financial free
status.
I don't necessarily need to buyanother, section of the upstate
(46:57):
or whatever it is.
and now you're just hunting forthose, like, where's my best
passive return on another ahundred thousand dollars or
whatever.
And having those probably moneylenders.
I know for me, like I'vehesitated buying more properties
because when I bought a lot ofproperties, I didn't have the
crews in place.
And then also, like if I getmore debt from private money
(47:17):
lenders and things are slow, I'mjust losing money and interest.
And there's been this liketension of, just stay at a
certain size.
and that's what forced me, notforced me, I would say.
Turn my eyes towards syndicationwhere these teams that are
already operating at a scalethat will, I will probably never
be at.
oops, sorry, my phone's ringing.
they're already operating in thereturns that they offer with me
(47:39):
even being inside the deal arelike triple what I've given my
private money lenders anyway.
I would just put a small seed inyour head of and I don't know if
we've talked about syndicationtoo much, but you have got some
great things actively going foryou in regards to investing,
especially with the borrowing ofprivate money, lender money to
do these move with rentals,flips, or, liberty.
(47:59):
Have you, have, we talked aboutsyndication.
Have you done any syndicationyet or know about that?
No,
Peter (2) (48:04):
I don't.
I don't believe we've talkedabout it.
I don't think we've done any,any of that.
No, I
Kenny (48:07):
mean.
And we don't necessarily need todo it right now because I know
we're past time.
But, it's really, when youbuild, when you buy like a 130
unit building or a develop a 200unit, whatever, and you think
these are massive plays andthese are,$10 million,$20
million,$70 million, whatever,it gets a little bit like, okay,
too much to even think about.
But when you're with a teamthat's done it, like 10 times
(48:29):
and it's Hey, you bring a checkof 500,000 or a million dollars
and you get these returns, or ifyou're a passive investor and
you're just like, Hey, I justwanna put in a hundred.
It is really cool to compare, atleast for me, the returns I
make, flipping the house to thepassive investing of a
syndication and scarily enough,they're like almost the same
(48:50):
sometimes.
obviously you shoot for, I don'tknow, 25 plus percent return on
like a flip.
I don't know what your numbersare, but, sometimes a 25, 30 or
more percent.
Return is what you get annuallythrough some of these
syndications.
So I'll put a little bug in yourear on that and maybe one day we
can explore more options there.
But, thank you man.
Anything else I can do for you?
Peter (2) (49:10):
No, man.
I appreciate the opportunity.
I look forward to seeing whatyou put together and, I've
started listening to more ofyour stuff and so it's Oh, cool.
it's fun to be like, oh, wow,I'm part of the crew now.
Yeah.
Kenny (49:21):
yeah, no, it, I'm, shoot every, it's like you're in the
thick of thing.
Like even the last four, eighthours you made this decision,
like it's, you're making moves,you're making pivots, you're
working hard, you're growingyour team, you're.
Doing everything you can athome.
you got my support, man.
If anything I can do for you tohelp at home or in business, let
me know.
let's just keep thisrelationship growing, buddy.
thanks so much, man.
(49:42):
Appreciate all you gave to theaudience today.
And, to my dad's out there,invest wisely.
Thank you.
Peter (49:47):
Thank you.
I had a really bad work accident.
(00:02):
Our finishing crew was one manshort.
And so me being the do it allguy that I am, I jumped on a, a
Georgia buggy or a concretebuggy.
the piece of equipmentmalfunction.
And it was going in reverserather fast, and I could not
stop it.
I was trying to hit the brakewhere my foot was, and, the
little lever, just it would notstop.
(00:25):
So before I could do anything, Ifound myself pinned between the
machine that was in front of me.
a concrete truck that had,really pierced through the back
of my leg at that point.
and so I was rushed to thehospital.
A month after, was the worst,october 4th, our second son was
born.
so this was very much a, I wassitting in the wheelchair when
(00:46):
he was born and I was veryhelpless.
Kenny (01:30):
Peter, thank you for joining The Invested Fathers
today.
we're gonna be exploring, whatyou're up to today and your
career journey.
we've gone to college together.
you're my friend.
I enjoy seeing what you'reposted on Facebook about the
family and your wife and all thegood stuff.
And you've had a really, I don'tknow if I could call it a
mountain top and valley journey.
I'm thinking specifically ofyour health and just some scarce
(01:50):
along the way.
I know our audience will be,very interested to hear more
about you.
So welcome to the show, buddy.
Peter (2) (01:54):
thank you so much for having me, Kenny.
Um, I'm honored.
I'm humbled.
I know this has been somethingthat we have talked about.
Hey, I wanna have you on, Iwanna hear more about your
story, and so it's cool that'sfinally taking place, right here
together.
Kenny (02:07):
Yeah, man.
All right.
Peter.
To go outta the gates here.
Give me, you're wearing theLiberty containers shirt right
now.
I remember when I was inSomerville, oh man.
Three years ago, I think.
maybe a little bit longer.
Yeah, I think you were juststarting this was something that
I think you had just a fewcontainers, and I know that's
not all you do, so give ouraudience, a little bit about
(02:27):
your business and what you'redoing today.
Peter (2) (02:30):
Absolutely.
we did have the opportunity togo to college together in, in
Greenville at Bob JonesUniversity.
And so I do remember those days.
That was quite a long time ago.
got done there in May of 2010and, Shortly after that went
into the banking realm and I hada journey in banking that was
probably unconventional, but ifyou remember in 2010, there was
(02:52):
a lot of the tail end of thesubprime stuff going out.
And there was a lot of bankslooking for employees.
So I was one of those lucky fewthat came in on the tails of all
the folks that exited thebuilding with the subprime.
So that was a huge piece of whatI'm doing now in laying the
foundation for knowledge of howto acquire properties, how the
(03:13):
banks think through a lot ofthat.
so I started, got my mortgagelicense, in 2010.
A lot of companies were payingfor that stuff, so they had
people train how they wantedthem to be trained to be up on
the regulations and so forth atthat time.
I remember that summer, I wasgonna be getting married the
following January in 2011, to myhigh school sweetheart that we
(03:37):
met each other at church, inhigh school.
And, went to all four yearsthere at Bob Jones together as
well.
So we got married as soon as shegraduated in December, and I was
working that six months or so,bought our first house and I
remember waking up the nextmorning after buying that first
house and being like, wow, thisis mine.
This is a house.
This is so cool.
I always have wanted to own ahouse and I'll never forget
(03:58):
that, almost just fresh feelingof, of home ownership.
And I assume that most folks asthey own homes, feel that.
And so I, I respect that,whether it's something I'm
renting or whether it'ssomething that someone's buying
that they're gonna wake up withthat same sort of feeling that
goes on.
banking career started fresh,newly married in 2011, and.
(04:20):
I was working retail in thesubprime, originating 13 to 18%
home mortgages at that time tofolks with distressed credit,
but also that just couldn't getapproved otherwise.
learned a ton there.
went I I.
Was at that point where I'mlike, I don't really know what I
wanna do long term, if I wannago back to school.
So I did go back to school.
I attended the professional MBAprogram at the Darla Moore
(04:40):
School of Business, at theUniversity of South Carolina.
That was a two year program, andI was working 40 to 60 hours
while I was doing that.
and that, I learned a lot.
It was more about connectionsthan learning necessarily, but
more than that even, it wasmostly simulating this crazy
lifestyle that I live now andjust being into how do you
juggle priorities?
(05:01):
How do you keep the balls in theair?
How do you prioritize what'sactually important and what's
not?
And so I'm, grateful for thattime.
in early 2015, my wife and I hadlived in our first house for
approaching five years.
we purchased our home that welive in now.
it was a short sale and so Ileveraged a lot of the knowledge
that I had in the realm of.
Finance and so forth to be ableto negotiate that deal.
(05:23):
We got the house, it was inpretty rough shape.
had fun doing the renovation onthat, and we converted that
house that we had first boughtto our first rental property.
and then later that year had anopportunity because it was a
town home, so a bunch of rows ofhouses.
the other end of the buildinghad a town home unit that went
(05:43):
for sale and we ended up buyingit for, similar to the price
that I had bought the house fiveyears before for, so it was a
no-brainer and was able to getthat as our second rental
property.
so we renovated that house.
We moved into it, or the housewe live in now.
And kind of from there, I'll behonest, I had that bug of wow, I
can do this.
the renovation I had, I knewenough at that point to be
(06:05):
dangerous and I was managing acouple different tenants at that
point.
While, I.
Just finished up school, therethe year before and, I was like,
man, this is cool.
This kind of doing thingsoutside of what I viewed my
corporate journey, so to speak,to look like.
The
Kenny (06:20):
corporate journey.
So in your mind at that point,college marriage, homeowner now,
what did that corporate journeylook like in your mind?
Peter (2) (06:30):
Climbing the corporate ladder, becoming
supervisory, go going, to ahigher position within banking.
That was where my mindset waswith an MBA in finance at this
point.
And that was what the trail wasmy mind had me there I think
while I had gone back to schooland the journey that really God
pushed me
Kenny (06:49):
Yeah.
Through, because you're stillworking, you're working 40 hours
a week, you're doing school, youhave this kind of plan in your
mind.
Yes.
But it sounds like along theway.
These rental properties arecoming up, you're transitioning,
you're maybe starting to see,hey, maybe there's like a little
plan B here.
Is that right?
Peter (2) (07:05):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
Okay.
Keep going.
It and things were very much,things were very much not
performance based, that wasintro to I was getting promoted,
but also seeing what the inneroffice politics and the, kind
that corporate side of thingsthat you never really learn
about in the schoolhouse, so tospeak.
Kenny (07:24):
They don't teach
Peter (2) (07:25):
that?
no.
They don't Company.
They might touch on it briefly,Yes, indeed.
It's a very real thing, man.
Yes, absolutely.
at that point, I had, I said,let me, I have a little bit
extra time.
That was before kids, of course,and I said, let me go ahead.
See if I can find a property toflip.
And so I, I remember even in mydorm room at college, I was
(07:47):
always looking at real estateand I did a lot of buying and
selling of cars and things likethat.
But, I was more driven tojumping in at that particular
point and trying to findsomething.
I remember I bought a propertywith the intention to flip.
In hindsight, I definitelyshould not have sold that
property.
I should have kept it and rentedit.
but it was a good learningexperience.
It was a light touch flip.
(08:08):
that was the first one that Idid, and I started doing more
and more.
I think I had probably donethree or so between 2016 and
really in like middle to end of2017.
2017 was a year that I was verymuch searching.
I had left, the job that I hadsupervisory.
At Bank of America and I wentinto a completely different
(08:32):
sales role as a mortgageoriginator for movement
mortgage.
And, was essentially compensatedand the red carpet was rolled
out to be able to go and meetpeople in our immediate
community, mostly real estateagents, real estate investors,
anybody that could potentiallybe a lead for mortgage.
these folks did a great job atgetting me out there.
(08:52):
and that's who I am.
I love being in front of folksand just hanging out, doing
life, learning more about whatthey do and so forth.
Did well within that industry.
But really, again,relationships.
Relationships, that's what thatwas about.
And a couple years they werereally spent digging into
establishing more within thoserelationships.
So in that, in 2017, I met a guythat very much, I was, I jived
(09:14):
really well with.
he had complimentary attributesto myself that I did not have.
He had a contractor background.
he'd been a contractor for 20plus years.
He was about 10 years older thanme.
I knew some things in thefinance realm that, he wanted to
learn.
And obviously I had a lot tolearn in the contracting realm.
So there was a greatrelationship and, what
eventually turned into apartnership for us, he was
(09:37):
strong at what he did.
I was strong at what I did andwe started a partnership.
in 2018.
It became very obvious to methat it was not gonna be lending
to what I was gonna do longterm.
I was spending majority of mytime.
like I, I remember my dayslooked like this.
They was very similar to when Iwas.
Trying to go to school full-timeand work full-time.
(09:59):
I would land in the officearound four to four 30 in the
morning.
I would work on my mortgageapplications for about three
hours, and then I would go outto the field and check in to
make sure that my crews were onsite and that the jobs, the
houses, the house flips weremoving forward and that they had
proper support that they neededand so forth.
that was only so sustainable.
It was very messy.
(10:20):
There were a lot of storageunits throughout town.
There were a lot of, unfinishedprojects, a lot of worked
weekends, a lot of work nights.
I'm preaching to the choir Iknow with you and your audience
here.
but it was very obvious therethat I couldn't do both.
Yeah.
And then once the end of thatyear came around and I looked at
the finances, I said, I knowwhich one is definitely gonna
go.
And it was the thing that wastaking the majority of my time
(10:41):
or the majority of my mental,energy I guess at that point to
do that.
so in.
2018, I decided to leave lendingall together towards the end of
that year.
And, also during that year, ourfirst son was born, our oldest
son, harbor.
he just turned seven this pastweekend, so that was awesome,
(11:02):
man.
A fun milestone.
It's hard to believe that it wasthat long ago because it really
does not feel like it.
so in 2019, the partner that Ihad at the time, and I flipped
just over two dozen housestogether, it was a whirlwind.
It was, a learning experience.
And we got to the end of that2019 and we were just like, man,
we do not wanna repeat thatyear.
(11:23):
It was a great year financially,but we didn't wanna repeat that
year from a stress and justcompeting priority standpoint.
and so we did, and this wassmart, we sat down and said,
what can we do to improveefficiencies?
What can we do to get our legsunderneath us a little bit more?
And we decided to, try to build.
Basically a warehouse, to beable to run out of and have as
(11:45):
our central operating center tosend guys out from in the
morning with supplies and soforth.
And so we started to blaze thattrail.
as 2020 hit, February of 2020actually, we ma packed up our
families.
We went to Orlando and weattended the largest, equipment
auction, of the year that's puton by Richie Brothers.
And so while we were at theauctions, it was a lot of fun.
(12:08):
we sent our families to Disney,did all the things down there,
and, we purchased some equipmentthat we were gonna be building
and having our crews used tobuild our warehouses or
warehouse rather.
And so that was a fun trip.
We got back from that wasFebruary of 2020, late February,
2020.
And literally covid hit like acouple weeks after that.
(12:29):
And it was weird, but also inthe scheme of like exactly what
we were trying to accomplish, itwas like, this actually could be
cool because, we're pulling ourcrews in.
We stopped acquiring.
We did have some holdings atthat point, but, we said this
actually could be cool.
So we still had guys working.
we were cautious of course, butwe still had guys working and we
were making some great progresson this.
fast forward, of course theproject took longer.
(12:50):
It was not something that wewere very efficient at.
'cause we had not builtwarehouses before.
there's a lot of learning goingon.
September 10th, 2020 was aterrible day.
I had a really bad workaccident.
That morning our warehouse wascompleted and we were doing our
final concrete pour.
I think we had six to eighttrucks of mud that we were
(13:11):
pouring that morning.
And our finishing crew was oneman short.
And so me being the do it allguy that I am, I jumped on a, a
Georgia buggy or a concretebuggy.
And, while in transit I hadprobably transported.
20 loads at that point of, ofconcrete from the truck to where
the dump site was, the piece ofequipment malfunction.
(13:34):
And it was going in reverserather fast, and I could not
stop it.
I was trying to hit the brakewhere my foot was, and, the
little lever, just it would notstop.
So before I could do anything, Ifound myself pinned between the
machine that was in front of me.
Fortunately, it was not full ofconcrete.
That could have been a verydifferent story at the time.
(13:55):
and a concrete truck that had,really pierced through the back
of my leg at that point.
and so I was rushed to thehospital.
I was immediately, Put into anexploratory type of surgery to
figure out what the extent ofthe damage was.
And from that particular pointon, I started a journey that
was, about a year and a half totwo years medically.
(14:18):
And then it was longer than thatwith all the workers' comp
claims and insurance andeverything that happened there.
so from that particular point,the business partner that I had
at the time, was very much,things were very different
between us.
I remember some conversationsthat I had even when I was in
the.
Bed basically at the hospital.
(14:38):
yeah, I could just sense thatthere was just a different, the
lack of closeness from that andfrom that point forward, he
wanted out.
it was very obvious he wantedout.
And so we went, from that pointforward, we went through this
long journey, that finally endedin February of 22.
and so I'm gonna take just aminute to talk about that
journey and that couple years,because I, looking back on that
(15:00):
this is healthy, to look back onand I get so caught up some days
in a lot of what I'm doing todaythat I don't look back.
So during that time, I stronglyfeel reflectively that this was
God that was saying, you knowwhat?
You do need to lay out.
I'm not gonna give you theability to be able to go like
you have been doing.
And there needs to be more of atrust.
(15:21):
Put on me and our relationshipand, I, I want you to sit and
examine things on what the nextchapter's gonna look like.
And so during that time, I cantell you I had never had
anything like this happen.
I remember my father, a monthafter, within that month was the
worst, because I was verylimited on mobility.
(15:44):
I had a son at the house, soI'm, I'll mention this'cause
this was critical, in September.
10th was my accident.
October 4th, our second son wasborn.
so this was very much a, I wassitting in the wheelchair when
he was born and I was veryhelpless.
There was a wife that was verypatient with me and all of my
(16:07):
craziness and family stepped uplike never before.
Friends, certain friends steppedup.
but that certain chapter reallyrevealed to me like, Hey, here
are your friends.
Here are the people who aregonna be for there for you when
you're not doing everything forthem.
And it was really, I didn't havea choice, but just to sit back
and be like, wow, thank you.
(16:27):
I, I don't deserve any of this.
I'm not sure why this happened,but that it was what it was.
And um.
lot of surgeries.
I had six different legsurgeries that happened during
that time.
A lot of recovery, a lot ofgearing up for surgeries and
hearing different doctor'sopinions and pt and just the
stuff that just takes way longerthan you think that it will to
(16:49):
get through.
so during that time, obviouslythe question was, so what are
you gonna do?
I was alive, right?
I wasn't sure what the state ofmy mobility would be long term.
Although the doctor said that itwas something that I would be
able to get through and once itbecame obvious that I was gonna
be able to walk and be normalagain, so to speak, then I
(17:11):
started thinking like, Hey, do Iwanna get back to this crazy
real estate construction type ofgame?
And, what was forefront top ofmind was when you get back into
this.
Be more efficient at what you'redoing.
Try to create an ecosystem wheremore of the process is owned,
(17:32):
managed under what I'm able tocontrol and also be in, be, have
the ability to offer somethingto the folks that I really loved
being around and fosteringrelationships with when I was in
the mortgage lending world.
And so what that was, and whatit turned out to be was, I.
(17:55):
A buddy of mine that I had knownfor a few years, he was a
firefighter and part-time, mostfirefighters have part-time
jobs, and part-time he had avery successful, fencing and
decking business.
Did mostly did fencing.
And, he was the guy with me thedays that I would start my
mortgage day at four o'clock inthe morning.
I would try to get over toLowe's by 6, 6 30 some days if I
(18:16):
would need to.
He was the guy opening Lowe'swith me at that time.
we were just the contractor typeguys talking out front and, he
was in my ear and he said, man,have you ever thought about
doing anything with dumpsters?
And I said, oh my goodness, no.
But I had remembered thatdumpsters were always a pain
point in my process when I wasflipping a house, a couple
times.
Couple examples.
(18:37):
Driveways were cracked and itwas just, it was more capital
that I had, it was more fightthat I had to go and can you pay
for this?
And insurance claims, if we hadto go that route.
and then I just remember thelack of customer service.
It was always an 800 number.
It was always a, oh no, checkour website here.
And then the drivers would showup and have no clue what was
going on.
(18:57):
And I was just like, I had thatringing in the back of my mind.
there, there is a need here,there, there is a lack of a
quality service here that isdemanded by folks in our
industry that are high speedfolks.
They're big deadline people.
They need something to turn whenthey need it to turn.
They don't have time to wait onan 800 number or something.
And I had those relationshipswith folks, a lot of them.
(19:20):
anyway, that was in the back ofmy mind.
So I spent.
I don't know, maybe about twomonths.
And I was like, ah, lemme justpassively research this thing.
I'm an all-in guy, so I did alot of research and at the same
time, my friend Adam wastransferred to the Charleston
area.
His wife's in the Air Force, andhe completely moved his family
down there.
So we came up with this ideathat we would start this thing
(19:42):
small.
and I justified it where I said,Hey, this is an asset heavy
business.
I'll be able to have the writeoff here, and I can utilize this
equipment in my business even ifI can't sell a container, a
dumpster room.
we each started with, a trailerand eight containers that we
pulled behind a Threequarter tontruck.
And, the, I said earlier thatFebruary of 22 is when
(20:06):
everything ended, with mybusiness partner and I at the
time.
And so I.
August, or that summer of 21 iswhen we bought all this and set
up our respective LLCs.
the arrangement we have is heowns the Charleston market.
I own the Columbia market.
And we since have another guythat runs, a market for Liberty
containers in the Aiken area,liberty containers of the CSRA.
(20:30):
and so we got going with that, amonth later and I started
thinking, I was like, man, Ijust ordered these dumpsters.
I'm gonna have to park themsomewhere.
And so forth.
A month later, I found awarehouse building that's a mile
from my house, here in the imo,South Carolina area.
(20:51):
And, I approached the lady thatowned it.
She had it listed about threedifferent times.
It had fallen out of contract.
And I just said, this is.
It never happened.
Let me just go and let me talkto this lady just to see.
And I went to her house, nicehouse in the lake, and I sat
down with her and we had aninstant connection.
There was good trust.
She was an older lady with a lotof time.
(21:11):
And so I sat down with her andjust told her my story.
And, we outta that conversationpretty much came up.
We worked out a deal for me topurchase the warehouse that we
now have all of our, businessesheadquartered out of and have
multiple other tenants underthis roof as well.
and so I closed on that a monthafter that, was able to get all
of my equipment delivered here.
(21:32):
And, I spent that time, tryingto till the soil a little bit in
establishing a website and allthat comes along with the new
business with for Libertycontainers here in Columbia.
And then I also took that timeto renovate this space,
completely, to be our officearea.
And then there's a warehousecomponent in the back as well.
The deal closed with, with mybusiness, in February of 22.
Peter (21:56):
And,
Peter (2) (21:57):
I got five properties as my cut of my holdings, our
holdings there.
I sold three of those with a lotof renovation.
two of those were, propertiesthat netted about 1.1 million.
So there, there were bigger,larger projects.
and then two of those I have,I've kept, I've renovated them,
I've kept, and I continue torent those, container company
(22:20):
grew wildly.
On the Liberty container side,and we continued to buy
containers.
I was able to find some usedcontainers and, was running all
of that myself.
Up until that point, I wasrunning the containers to the
landfill.
learning that business, gettingto know my customers really
well, and then also obviouslycontinuing, these renovation
(22:40):
projects on these properties andthen others that I was able to
purchase and work on.
the law that changed, I think itwas two years ago.
Help me here in South Carolinawith wholesaling.
Do you remember that one is,okay, so there's a, law
wholesaling
Kenny (22:58):
has been up and down for, from what I hear from current
wholesalers in regards to is itlegal, is it not legal?
what attorneys should you use tomake this work?
So gimme your scoop on whathappened.
Peter (2) (23:13):
Yeah, so there was a law that came out.
I think it was.
Year and a half, two years ago,basically that said, you can't
do it.
Of course there's a lot ofmisinformation, as you said.
and so I had a lot of friendsthat I had purchased homes from,
that I had helped them withcontainers.
'cause a lot of wholesalers werebuying these things and oh man,
if I can get all the junk out,and then put it on the market.
(23:34):
And so there was a need for myservices there.
they were networking with me andI said, Hey, I think I can get
these things closed.
Or, some of them had them intheir pipeline with a lot of
hair and they would send'em tome and just be like, I wanna
keep these people happy.
I just need to pass'em ontosomeone that I know will treat
them well.
so I actually got a lot of leadsduring that particular time that
I was able to, close in onefashion or another.
(23:57):
so that was cool.
And a lot of those, I weresmaller properties.
They were smaller deals.
but they were pretty much rightthere in this area where I'm at,
that I've turned into rentals.
So that was.
Definitely part of my storywhere growing and saying, no, I
wanna hold some more realestate.
as long as it's on a smallerside.
So we've been very successfulwith that.
(24:19):
I had a friend that approachedme, early part of last year and
he said, Hey, I bought thisfranchise Junk King.
junk King is a full service junkremoval franchise.
They also do dumpster rentals.
And, he said it just isn't agood fit for what I'm doing.
He's a very high speed realestate guy here in our market.
(24:39):
I respect him like crazy.
And he just came to that pointas sometimes we do as business
owners and we just say, Hey,this doesn't integrate well.
I just need it to, I don't wannamanage it anymore.
we kinda went back and forth forabout three, four months.
And the thing that I.
Understood was, I knowdumpsters, I can sell dumpsters,
but I'm, I don't have thebandwidth to take on anymore.
(25:02):
So that was like that.
I knew that there was somethingthere, but I knew that I could
not take on the full servicejunk removal and manage in that
aspect.
friend of mine who owns aparking lot business here in
town, was a good fit for that.
He already manages a lot ofcrews.
and there was a great crossreferral, cross lead opportunity
(25:23):
to be able to acquire the JunkKing franchise here in Columbia.
we closed on that September oflast year and we've been.
Going on there for I guess five,six months now.
And it has grown month overmonth tremendously.
There's been some, like I said,great opportunities for, we
focus on larger containers on myLiberty container side, and then
(25:44):
there's a smaller, morehomeowner friendly type of
aspect to the junk Kingcomponent, where folks can go
online.
They have the technology thatthey can leverage to book
everything same day or next day.
and so instead of referring alot of that business out, which
I was getting, investors sayingI need containers, and then it
was like, oh, and I also needsomeone to fill those containers
(26:06):
too, so we're able to do thefull service junk removal
quoting.
and then we also have dumpstersolutions for those folks that
do have crews and have things,built out at that particular
Kenny (26:16):
point.
Okay.
Let me, that's what I'm up to.
That's awesome, man.
No, that's quite a full journey.
Um, I'm trying to understand andyou've given our audience.
Sort of how you're wired inlight of, you we're busy.
and not necessarily negativelyjust, wanting to get up early,
meet your friend, meet yourcoworker here at a, our partner
at six o'clock in the morning atLowe's.
(26:37):
I have that background as well.
We would just, I really, youstart early, like why wait.
and you've mentioned, I thinkwhere I want to go now is you
mentioned the kids at home and,your son, your second son was
born, while you were in thehospital, that low point, and
you've been reborn in a way.
you were down, I could see it inyour face and you were
describing the recovery time forthese things.
(26:59):
That wasn't just a, hey, put ona movie and in the movie
everything's fine.
it seemed like a lot.
And that's not your normal thingis to sit and wait.
I.
So thank you for sharing allthat.
And I want to ask, as you aresitting here today and your kids
are 7-year-old, seven years old,your first one harbor, and
Charlie's for, the relationshipat home, relationship with your
(27:20):
wife, that's something that Ifeel like is something we don't
talk a lot about in our circles.
Everything we talked aboutbusiness wise, I'd say is very
common to share those things,networking and Hey, how's your,
what's your workload?
But, I'm, I want to create thisculture through this audience of
listeners of, hey, what havebeen the struggles, what have
been the rewards?
what excites you about being adad or, investing in your
(27:40):
family?
So gimme some of the maybe highsand lows of I.
Not necessarily from beginningto end of where you were,
especially during those, thosehar harder values, but maybe
even like today, like in lightof what you're doing today,
what's it like at home rightnow?
Peter (2) (27:57):
Yeah.
first and foremost, I ha I havethe absolute best wife and most
supportive, person that is verypatient as my best friend doing
this thing called Life Next tome, and I'm incredibly thankful
for her.
the last few years have beenincredibly turbulent.
there's been other things thathave happened that I didn't
mention.
Just family things, churchthings, other things completely
(28:20):
outside of our control.
But what the net take from allthat has been is I've got
someone next to me that is rightthere, supportive patient.
And through those trials oflife.
we grow much stronger to eachother, to God, to, those around
us that are on that samemission.
(28:41):
And so that first and foremostis everything.
I think I heard Dave Ramsey theother day say, you protect your
marriage, your relationship withkids work is third and above.
All of that is gone.
And so that, that resonates withme right there, where, in the
house, I'm the type of guy that,I do like to keep folks happy.
(29:01):
I got a lot of folks.
I've got, I two personalassistants, 15 employees, four
businesses.
couple dozen tenants.
And so that's a lot of demandsplaced on my time.
When I'm in home and I'm tryingto be present With my kids, with
my wife.
and so I'm not going to lie toyou or the audience here, I
struggle with that.
That is very tough finding thosepriorities.
(29:24):
No, there's not a way to findbalance in this season, but it's
so rewarding coming home, kidshugging you, daddy, you're home,
wanting you to put a puzzletogether with them, build a Lego
set, whatever.
so just those times are thatmuch more special and there's so
much more rewarding now Iperceive than they would've been
(29:46):
had I not gone through what Iwent through a few years ago.
Kenny (29:50):
Yeah.
I see this, through the people Ibring on the show, there's
always a sense of.
Tug, tug of war a little bit on,I think the word balance, work
life balance, I roll my eyeseven when I say it.
And I say that on the show alot, but, I'm a believer of
that.
That's a myth.
You're you're, you are who youare.
It's, you're not stopping beinga dad.
(30:10):
You're not half dad, halfworker.
and so who you are as a fatheris who you are on the workplace.
and if you're overly doingsomething, you know too much,
there's maybe gonna be acorrection that is painful to
not necessarily get right backto the middle, but, make sure
that you're taking care of yourpeople.
(30:31):
And I've known other businessowners who I would maybe say the
same thing is, Hey, I care a lotabout my employees.
these people are important tome.
You meant, you, you rattled off,the relationships, kinda like
your inner circle, maybe thenext inner circle.
And how it is a struggle.
So maybe what I could ask tohelp know your mindset and also,
we can look back and say, I'velearned this, but the next few
(30:52):
years, as you're growing thisthing, you've mentioned success
after success with the rentalsand the liberty containers and
just those relationships thatare going well and businesses
that are going well.
What does the future look like?
Maybe the next, like three,three years?
Is there a hope to say I'm gonnamaybe offload something or hire
a team?
what are some thoughts of thenext maybe stage for you that
(31:14):
you're excited about or aregearing toward?
Peter (2) (31:17):
sure.
so business wise, and it's asimilar point really, that we
were at with the flippingcompany when we hit 2020, and it
was just like, whoa, we've seenthe volume of business we are
able to fulfill.
We have employees that aretrained up and know what they're
doing.
How can we make this moreefficient?
Whether that's efficiency,better tools, maybe less bodies
(31:40):
or more bodies, more tools, morevolume, just looking at all of
that.
So there's a constant critiquegoing on there.
I'm like, within the last 48hours, I've made some big
decisions.
we are going to be.
Basically selling off all ofour, trucks and containers for
both businesses, and we're gonnabe transitioning to one central
(32:01):
platform, within the dumpsterworld.
And on the franchise side, it'sbeen a challenge getting the
approvals there, but we aretrending well there and they
respect, the experience that Ihave locally and how I've
networked and so forth.
So I'm looking forward to,again, efficiencies.
Yeah, so we'll have one, we'llhave trucks that can run both
businesses, same style ofcontainers.
(32:22):
Right now we're running, notnecessarily a hodgepodge, but
we're running systems that don'tintegrate with each other.
And so if one truck goes down,we're waiting and we have to
depend on other companies.
And, that's not a way to build abusiness.
So efficiencies, long storyshort is what we're chasing
there.
people, I can't say that loudenough.
people.
if you have the right people onyour side that are doing what
(32:45):
they say, And telling youlegitimately upfront what
they're capable of doing.
that, that goes a long way aswell.
But you you figure out what thatlooks like and what it's not
when you're interviewing folksand then whenever a performance
happens.
So having the right people andonce you get the folks in, just
loving on'em and that cultureright there goes so, so far with
(33:08):
folks and that's what we'reabout.
I mentioned that we have a lotof businesses under this roof,
and that is something that I'mhumbled every time I come in
here.
Usually before the sun comes upevery day, just to think
through, man, I've got thesefolks that I get to do life with
under this roof that are,dependent on the identity of
their small business in thiscommunity that they built.
(33:31):
And, we get to pass businessback and forth and just be in
this synergistic environment.
And when I interview peopleanymore.
I pitched that to them and I'mjust like, you know what, do,
what do you wanna do long termif it's punch a clock?
we're not for you.
we're looking for folks that dounderstand, like what we've
built here and what God hasgiven us is that synergy.
(33:52):
And, we want you to springboardfrom that, whether you work for
me or another guy in thisbuilding or whatever, we want it
to be a good fit for you.
But, I think just building thatand, having, we've owned more of
the process on the real estateside with the dumpsters now with
the full service junk removal,getting the right people in the
right seats and get, gettingthings as efficient as possible,
(34:15):
if that answers your question.
Kenny (34:16):
Yeah, that's, Like I said earlier, maybe even before we
hit record, this message ofefficiency, simplification,
time.
You mentioned the time elementof your life and how important
that time is, and that continuesto be a message that I reteach
myself.
And doesn't matter what age youare, whether you're in your
twenties or your eighties, weall have the same, I have 24
(34:39):
hours.
You have 24 hours.
And I feel like the people thatare younger are feeling, you
know what, I can work, sun upsundown, I can do whatever.
I, I'm that invincible mindset.
But as the kids come and themarriage maybe erodes something,
you start really protecting yourtime more so in light of, the
efficiency sake of, like yousaid, the partners you're taking
on, how you wanna grow yourbusiness.
(35:01):
You're not looking just to makea buck.
You're looking for somerelationships, some deep, Hey,
we want to make this thing workso we don't have to reset this
stuff.
what's a big takeaway that youhave, rather failed on recently
or have seen like a huge successin the efficiency at home?
I guess I'm just trying to ask,in light of time being so
important, has there been ratheragain, a failure or a
(35:24):
breakthrough of oh, I can dothis, in, on the personal side
of life and that gives me thereturns that I'm looking for,
Peter (2) (35:32):
if that makes sense?
Yeah.
I think it's going to, revolvelike my answer.
There's gonna revolve aroundpeople and for a very long time,
and I still fight this everyday, I was the type of person
that's I'm the one with thisrelationship.
I'm the one that needs tofulfill, I'm the one that needs
to be doing this work.
And so as I've gotten peoplearound me, especially, the.
(35:55):
First assistant that I hired.
Yes.
she's very honest with me insaying, Hey, you shouldn't be
doing this right now.
or I please respect me when Isay, she says that, yeah, please
respect me when I say Wow.
And and I do,'cause she's no, Ican do that.
I can have someone else do that.
And so getting, that's veryhumbling to hear.
But also reflectively usuallyafter that interaction, I'm
(36:20):
like, she's right.
what, why have I been so proudto not give that up?
Or, to pass that dutyresponsibility, relationship
task even, off.
And so that'll help a lot withefficiencies and it'll also help
with the growth of thoseemployees as well.
Peter (36:38):
Yeah.
Peter (2) (36:38):
going to the house side of things.
Yeah.
really the same type of thingsapply.
When you're parenting, when youhave, our 7-year-old is very
smart, very, he understandswhat's going on now a lot more.
And so when you're like, allright buddy, that's your
responsibility now, it's so coolwatching that little enlightened
mind like, okay, I got this.
(36:59):
so it's been fun.
see that across both.
Kenny (37:01):
Yeah.
I like to ask this questionusually toward the end.
Best part about being a dadright now.
Recent story, recent, I don'tknow, fun, fun moment, memory,
that you can reflect and justshare a feel good moment with
the audience, with me.
Peter (2) (37:16):
Yeah.
It's gonna have to be the timeswe get to make memories, There's
a lot of times just being honestthat I'm there, but I'm not,
just mentally I've got a lotkind of decompressing off coming
off of a busy day.
And, the times that, it evenhappened to me last night where
I got home and my youngest isincredibly tired and he just
came over and just gave me a hugand wouldn't let me go.
(37:37):
And I just looked over at mywife and I was just like, wow,
this is happening.
This doesn't happen very often,but this is great.
I'm gonna soak it in.
And and then just the timesthat, we get to go off and with
the birthday party we have formy son this past weekend and,
just short little trips.
We can't go for long anymore.
just'cause of the ages of thekids and also all the
(37:57):
responsibilities, but, justspending that time and the
closeness there.
Watching them face little fearsand all that, overcome those
fears is fun.
Kenny (38:08):
What's, just to go a little further there, what's a
fear not to put anyone in a badlight, but what are some of the
things that you're experiencingright now that are, hurdles for
your kids that you're helpingthem with?
Peter (2) (38:18):
so we took, our oldest middle of the week last
week up to Great Wolf Lodge.
Oh, yeah.
And he has a big thing aboutfears, about heights with fears,
with heights.
Yes.
And, so climbing stairs on up toa slide and doing things like
once you get there, oh man, it'sthe best thing ever.
But while you're sitting therewith that tense, build up type
feeling, oh, I'm not gonna dothis.
(38:39):
I'm ready to go back down, andjust talking through Hey, I
understand you're scared, andthat kind of thing.
So th those are more of thefears that go on there.
even in the early ages thatthey're in seeing the Fears of.
Peer pressure to a very smalldegree.
I don't wanna see this person,So just talking through gives a
great discipling opportunity,parenting opportunity to talk
(39:02):
through relationships at ahigher level.
And you know how everybody haslittle fears like that.
It's not just you and, how Godgives us the strength to
overcome those things and allthat.
Kenny (39:14):
So that's awesome, man.
I, I've, I had on a guest lastweek, maybe two weeks ago, and
he mentioned how the eight to 10year mark sort of defines like,
who this person's gonna be likeat that point.
they've rather experiencedenough nature and nurture to say
this is who this guy is.
Of course he has to keep, ifyou're training your child in
certain ways, you have to keepdoing that.
(39:35):
You don't just stop.
and he has to decide forhimself, certain things as well.
But, just that importance ofthose formative years.
and.
I love the stories that youshared in that way of him, them
seeing you.
and, another huge lesson that Icontinue to again, teach myself
is these kids, they are, thelessons are caught.
They're not taught.
So what they see is more,important than, what you say.
(39:58):
And I love that story of yourson, younger son just hugging
you somewhat randomly.
yeah.
And that affinity there.
Peter, thanks for your timetoday, man.
Just wrapping up.
I want to give, you theopportunity to, our listeners
are in IMO or, it seems likeyou're very well networked in
the area.
give us how our listeners cankeep up with you or follow you
if there's things that you'reputting out.
(40:18):
what is the best way to keeptrack of what, Peter Schwetz is
up to?
Peter (2) (40:21):
Sure.
I, my wife does a lot ofmarketing and social media type
stuff professionally, with herfamily restaurant here in
Columbia called Maurice's PiggyPark.
so if you're coming throughColumbia, support the family
restaurant.
but that being said, she's muchmore up to tune than I am on the
socials.
so Facebook is really the bestway to get me on that Facebook
(40:43):
page.
She has created a link tree forme where you can connect with
any of my, business handles orlinks, websites, et cetera.
So that would be a great way toconnect with me.
I do post a lot on there, as youmentioned earlier.
I would say if anybody is justwanting to brainstorm, reach
out, introduce themself.
I would love to have aconversation.
I'm a very approachable guy.
(41:04):
what I've learned is any timespent brainstorming with someone
over their business or justtalking through where I bump my
head at, it, I usually walkaway.
Learning something.
So it's never a waste of time.
I would love to start aconversation and of course if
you're doing any business aroundthe South Carolina area
specifically, look up ourcontainer company, Liberty
(41:27):
containers.
we have an operator in Aiken,obviously, low country,
Charleston area like we talkedabout.
I'm in Columbia, and my teamhere.
And then we are interviewing onecandidate for the upstate area
for Greenville right now.
so we're, excited about thatpotential.
expansion for the businessthere.
junk King is a franchise, but weare all local owners to our own
(41:48):
markets.
so if we can help you out withany sort of junk removal type
stuff or if you have any dealsthat you come across, from a,
good rental property or good,wholesale, whatever the new term
for wholesaling is now, let meknow.
and I have a lot of deals thatcome across my desk.
I'll be honest with you.
I've not purchased a lot ofthose deals, but I have pushed
(42:09):
them along to folks that I knoware looking in specific pockets
of our markets.
and so that could be beneficialfor all involved and that's what
I'm about for sure.
Kenny (42:19):
one more question.
I usually ask, and it depends onthe walk of life, but.
Passive investing.
So one of the question, one ofmy goals as a capital raiser is
I want to attract people who aretoo busy and are looking to, and
they have maybe too much moneyor they're not necessarily too
much in my, my, my opinion, butjust they're investing in
(42:40):
something already, but they'relooking for better returns and
they don't want to add anotherjob.
So it sounds like a lot of whatyou've done financially has
actively invested in all thesebusinesses.
And why not?
Because you're young and vibrantand have a lot of things that
you wanna reverse the curse andjust build.
are you doing a lot of itpassive investing right now or
is it mainly like in and whenyou think like building wealth
(43:03):
or building retirement or maybeeven pa cash flow.
Is it like buy another rental,buy put more money into the
liberty or are you doing someother things outside?
I like other audience members toknow what are these dads I'm
bringing on?
Like how are they.
Investing passively more orless.
Sure.
Are you doing any that?
Peter (2) (43:20):
Yeah.
just to be honest with you, alot of my personal worth in
investing money is wrapped up inmy real estate, as I got into
this container world, especiallybeing a brand new business Brand
new guy with just an idea ofsomething new.
nobody would finance anythinglike that.
So I had to put a lot of cashinto buying this equipment.
Yeah.
That's changed now, which isfortunate.
(43:42):
and so I'm able to more focus onthat.
But, to answer your question, Iwould say a lot of the
relationships that have been ahuge eye opener for me over the
last four years have been withother private money lenders and
folks that fit the bill toexactly what you just said.
And those are folks that are.
(44:04):
At a point in life, a lot ofthem really know and understand
real estate.
Some of them have beenprofessionals in real estate for
decades, and they just don'twanna be in the rat race.
They just wanna be, they justwanna sit back.
They want, they know that thisis somebody capable, that is
gonna pay them, that is goingto, they know what they're
doing.
They're tried and true, they'renetworked well.
They run into issues.
(44:24):
They're gonna pick up the phoneand call them, And, so building
that trust with people that arein those shoes.
And I can have reflective phonecalls once a year with them, 20
times a year with them as muchor as little as they want to be
involved.
And they know, I'm giving them agreat return on what their
investment is
Kenny (44:44):
for the reason.
Yeah.
so you use your own moneystarted out, you're still using
private money lenders for yourrentals, but maybe even also
some business stuff as well,because you're just, it's almost
like a transaction.
Hey, give you this much, yougimme this much.
I'm happy.
Don't need to know.
I don't need to be in the weedsof this stuff looking for a
paycheck or looking for a,mailbox money.
Peter (2) (45:03):
Sure, yeah.
Absolutely.
And me specifically, I own allof my equipment outright, no
liens for Liberty except for onetruckload.
Everything else is ownedoutright.
Wow.
Dude.
We're fixing to sell everythingand Yes.
start with new.
So there will be some morefinancing involved there.
Yeah.
But it'll be, in my opinion,it'll be smart financing.
(45:23):
Yeah.
We're trying to get ahead of thetariffs with a lot of our buy,
nice to steal will be impacted.
Yes.
and just having awareness there,a lot of the private money that
I've done has been to get intothe deals, whether it's auction
buys or whether it is,Properties that I've bought just
through contacts and network.
Yeah.
And those are deals as they'vegotta close fast, they don't
(45:44):
want any hair, they don't wantany whatever.
They need to close fast.
Yeah.
So that's when I'll pick up thephone and say, Hey, guess what?
remember that loan we just paidoff?
Let's go ahead and you wanna putit back to work?
Boom.
Peter (45:53):
Yeah.
Peter (2) (45:53):
and but what my long game with the rentals is I am
packaging up 5, 6, 8 rentals ata time, and I'm getting those in
commercial loans, and then I'mpaying off my private money, and
then I'm putting the privatemoney back to work for flip
projects and for, other buyslike I just described.
Kenny (46:10):
Yeah, man.
it's, I have not built, a comp,a business like yours.
Obviously Liberty's its own newbeast for you, maybe even like
the new number one.
And rentals are now number two.
I don't know.
but it's really fascinating toknow the equity, the value that
you're building, especially withthese things paid off that I
would, I think you couldprobably borrow.
(46:32):
Get a business loan from thisbusiness one day and then put
that to work with rentals,payback, it's just it's just
gonna keep growing.
it's just that, that I think fungame, if you wanna call it that,
like liquid versus not liquidassets that are, trapping your
money but making you money.
And until eventually it's okay,I've got a financial free
status.
I don't necessarily need to buyanother, section of the upstate
(46:57):
or whatever it is.
and now you're just hunting forthose, like, where's my best
passive return on another ahundred thousand dollars or
whatever.
And having those probably moneylenders.
I know for me, like I'vehesitated buying more properties
because when I bought a lot ofproperties, I didn't have the
crews in place.
And then also, like if I getmore debt from private money
(47:17):
lenders and things are slow, I'mjust losing money and interest.
And there's been this liketension of, just stay at a
certain size.
and that's what forced me, notforced me, I would say.
Turn my eyes towards syndicationwhere these teams that are
already operating at a scalethat will, I will probably never
be at.
oops, sorry, my phone's ringing.
they're already operating in thereturns that they offer with me
(47:39):
even being inside the deal arelike triple what I've given my
private money lenders anyway.
I would just put a small seed inyour head of and I don't know if
we've talked about syndicationtoo much, but you have got some
great things actively going foryou in regards to investing,
especially with the borrowing ofprivate money, lender money to
do these move with rentals,flips, or, liberty.
(47:59):
Have you, have, we talked aboutsyndication.
Have you done any syndicationyet or know about that?
No,
Peter (2) (48:04):
I don't.
I don't believe we've talkedabout it.
I don't think we've done any,any of that.
No, I
Kenny (48:07):
mean.
And we don't necessarily need todo it right now because I know
we're past time.
But, it's really, when youbuild, when you buy like a 130
unit building or a develop a 200unit, whatever, and you think
these are massive plays andthese are,$10 million,$20
million,$70 million, whatever,it gets a little bit like, okay,
too much to even think about.
But when you're with a teamthat's done it, like 10 times
(48:29):
and it's Hey, you bring a checkof 500,000 or a million dollars
and you get these returns, or ifyou're a passive investor and
you're just like, Hey, I justwanna put in a hundred.
It is really cool to compare, atleast for me, the returns I
make, flipping the house to thepassive investing of a
syndication and scarily enough,they're like almost the same
(48:50):
sometimes.
obviously you shoot for, I don'tknow, 25 plus percent return on
like a flip.
I don't know what your numbersare, but, sometimes a 25, 30 or
more percent.
Return is what you get annuallythrough some of these
syndications.
So I'll put a little bug in yourear on that and maybe one day we
can explore more options there.
But, thank you man.
Anything else I can do for you?
Peter (2) (49:10):
No, man.
I appreciate the opportunity.
I look forward to seeing whatyou put together and, I've
started listening to more ofyour stuff and so it's Oh, cool.
it's fun to be like, oh, wow,I'm part of the crew now.
Yeah.
Kenny (49:21):
yeah, no, it, I'm, shoot every, it's like you're in the
thick of thing.
Like even the last four, eighthours you made this decision,
like it's, you're making moves,you're making pivots, you're
working hard, you're growingyour team, you're.
Doing everything you can athome.
you got my support, man.
If anything I can do for you tohelp at home or in business, let
me know.
let's just keep thisrelationship growing, buddy.
thanks so much, man.
(49:42):
Appreciate all you gave to theaudience today.
And, to my dad's out there,invest wisely.
Thank you.
Peter (49:47):
Thank you.
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