The Power of Taking Action with Chris and Maricela

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
This show is sponsored by dn tenInsurance Services, helping businesses get the right
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quote d N t N dot ioand remember, when you buy an insurance
policy from dent ten, you're givingback on a global scale. Hello all,

(00:21):
my entrepreneurs and business leaders, andwelcome to the Michael Esposito Show,
where I interview titans of industry inorder to inform, educate, and inspire
you to be great. My gueststoday are both Navy veterans, accredited real
estate investors and have built a personalportfolio valued at over one hundred million dollars.

(00:44):
They've created a significant passive income forthemselves and their investors by finding the
best properties today's market can offer.They're also philanthropists, creating medical missions and
community outreach for the communities they serveand their surrounding communities. They are the
co founders of Uplex Multi Family Investments. Please welcome Chris and Marciela. Thank

(01:10):
you, Michael, thanks for havingthose society's. It's a pleasure to have
you on the show. I knowwe're we're not in studio together, but
it feels that way because Chris,you're actually from the Hudson Valley area.
Would you like to share a littlebit about that. Oh? Sure,
I'm originally from Koksaki, New York, which most people don't necessarily know.

(01:32):
So it was exciting to see thatyou were in the Skipsie area. Grew
up there, left one I wastwenty years old. I joined the Navy
and went back for vacations and seefamily and stuff like that. But I've
not been back to the area longterm. Well, the area misses you.

(01:53):
The Hudson Valley is obviously growing significantly, but you've also grown from when
you left and and what you've you'vebeen doing today. I want to go
to the Navy background, but beforeI do that, I'd like our audience
to get to know Marcella as well, and where you're from and how how
you guys came to find each other. Thank you. So I am originally

(02:17):
from Mexico. I was born andraised there. I came to the States
at age twenty three, and Ilanded in Austin. Most people ask me
why in Austin. It's the alphabeticalorder. When I was given the choice,
you want to go to California,all stay in Colorado, Like,
I have no idea. I askyou, maybe you're familiar with Africa,

(02:38):
but I don't know, like justan whatever starts with A. So I
ended up in all same Thank god, I love it. But actually how
we met where we were both starvedin the Navy at one point in Italy
and we met there in Sicily andoperating room. Yeah, so both of
you served in the Navy. I'minterested in and what drew you to to

(03:00):
serving in the military, and particularlychoosing the Navy for myself. I went
in and I actually spoke with theArmy recruiters and the Navy recruiters and the
Navy guys. I I told themI wanted to do medical and they were

(03:20):
willing to make that happen easier Iguess, I'll say than the Army guys
work. And in the end,I feel like it was a better choice
for myself. You know, wegive we give the other services a hard
time, each of us will giveeach other a little a little bit of
a rouse, but in the endwe're all for the same mission. And
the majority of my career was actuallyspent in joint service, so I was

(03:44):
usually around other services anyways. Soit's all a big brother and brother and
sisterhood for sure. That's funny.My my father's army, So yeah,
I know all the jokes, andit's funny because actually the jokes he I
knew growing up about the Navy andthe Marine and everything. Whenever I meet
somebody from the Navy or the Marines, they tell me those same jokes.
It's just like insert name, insertalways always it's re used, that's for

(04:12):
sure. UM. And uh yeah, my family was a little hesitant of
me joining at a different nations,Navy or a military altogether. None of
my family are military background at all. Um. In fact, I joined
after I was already practicing. Ihad my doctorate degree, and I kind
of bypassed a lot of the UM. I would say, the enlisted training

(04:35):
and boots who did booth company wasa little different. So um, you
know, I was given a hardtime because I came with rank and I
didn't even know anything about it.So it took me but training to do
it by myself. So um,you know. Anyway, then that's how
I joined the Navy. I joinedactually after um my mom passed away,

(04:56):
and my mom was my my feerleader for everything. Um, and when
I when I that was a transitionthat I made and I decided to give
back to this as beautiful. Um, so both of you served from a
medical capacity. Then, I knowyou said PhD. But but you also
do medical missions and serve in thatway. So tell tell me a little

(05:18):
bit more about your medical background.So Maricela is a certified registered nurse and
necessists, so she passes gas foreverybody, she puts people to sleep in
the operating room and uh and forso she was able to come in as

(05:43):
that provider and come in with ahigher rank because of her education. I
came in and lifted. I wasa maybe corman for about eleven and a
half years, and then I wentto nursing school and finished the rest of
my career as UH as a nursein different fields, I worked and then
earned the room. I see youand I finished up in the operating room.

(06:05):
What about those experiences do you feelhave brought you to what you're doing
today? I mean, you know, we're going to talk about the real
estate investing business, and I'm veryinterested in what you do because we see
a lot of it online. It'sit's all over social media on these different
groups that are out there, andso I'm very interested in it, and

(06:25):
I know our audience is definitely interestedin it because there's an opportunity for entrepreneurs
to take part in this and executivesand all levels of where you are in
business, and also a way thatyou can almost turn it into your own
business. So I think that there'sa lot to be learned from there.
But I'm interested in these experiences asserving in the military, serving as an
immigrant, which I know you speakabout and I mean it. It's your

(06:47):
handle for your social media of themillionaire immigrant. I love it. I'm
just interested on these experiences and howthey've impacted what you do today and how
you serve today or so from thelength of time that we were both in
you know, the core values getkind of instilled into you. The honor

(07:08):
that corge, the commitment, theintegrity, and in business, I think
that that goes a long way.You know, your handshake, your word
does means something, not to everyone, but to those that it matters,
it means something. And having comeup through the ranks over time like I

(07:29):
did, I got to meet lotsof people, got to see lots of
different leadership styles and I was ableto develop my own leadership style and how
and how I wanted to deal withpeople and how we want to help mentor
folks throughout different aspects of life.It didn't have to be medical or military

(07:49):
related necessarily, So as far asthe medical side of things go, I
was everything from the guy, youknow, the technician was grabbing the dirty
clothes and changing bed sheets and allthat stuff, all the way up to
the manager of a four person operatingroom or later I was at a major
facility where I had almost a hundredpeople that worked worked with me as we

(08:16):
ran the was it eighteen operating rooms? So we had a lot of different
a lot of different aspects, alot of different growth through there. But
I never forgot where I came from. And you know, we try to
instill those things along the way aswell. Go ahead, no, you
guy to marseill Um, Well,I was going to say that when in

(08:37):
the military, you see a memberas part of the family, you know
that there's that leadership that goes alonewith that relationship, but you will see
it as a whole person, asa holistic person that it comes to do
you care about their families, Youcare about their well being financially physically.
So when we approached that and weused that same the same mentality when we

(09:01):
are coaching somebody, when we're notjust coaching the business, we are looking
to see how are you doing athome? How is the family doing?
How is how are your finances looking? Because it's it's all uh yes,
if one of one aspect of yourlife or your personal life is not doing
well, likely your business is goingto suffer. Um. The other thing

(09:24):
that that I will mention is thatin the military, you you're mandated to
have mentors, and those mentors shouldbe two ranks at least about what you
do, you're all right, andthat is because you don't represent competition to
that there they are there to trainyou, to guide you because everybody seems
the things that you're they are goingto come up as a challenge for you.

(09:46):
So that's exactly what we do.And we mentor some people, we
coach some people. But I wouldsay if anybody and the audience are looking
to find a mentor, make surethat that that mentor has experienced, has
the credibility and it's too right atleast of what you want to do.
So if you're looking for a businesscoach make sure that they had actually created

(10:07):
business right. UM. So that'sthe same culture that we went to or
businesses. And the other thing Iwill mention is established an exo base standard
operating procedures. That's like a religionfor us UM and it has saved so
much time to train other people toimplement a process that it's going to be

(10:28):
documented and it can be revised andimprovised, improved UM. And those are
things that you just learn in themilitary. We are not here forever,
so as a team, you haveto leave those UM goods and those processes
in place so that the mission continuesto be accomplished by somebody else. So
when you said that, I justwant to point out we had a mentor

(10:50):
that told us, if you're goingto do a process more than once,
write it down so that you cangive that process off to someone else so
that you can move on to thenext thing that's going to be the next
income generator, the next the nextbig thing for you. You know,
if it's a process you have torepeat over and over that it's probably a
process that somebody else could do.Yeah, you know, yes, you're

(11:13):
going to add to that. Iwas I was just say, around your
life as a business, you knowhow many times we spend time doing things
that we could delegate, you know, and and everything and and or as
everything can be delegated, but delegatedcomes to the obligation to follow up and
to be there to mentor that personthat is doing it, Otherwise that person

(11:35):
might never get improved. A lotof people, a lot of business owners,
um they want they don't want todelegate because they think they're the best
person to do that thing right.And too is when they delegate, they
quit to blame well that's not beingdone correctly. Well, if there's not
being don't correctly, it's probably becausewe fail to give the right guidance.

(11:58):
So it's always ctibility to yourself.I think that's a very good self reflection
that what you just said there toois that if if, if you're delegate,
if you're delegating and it's not donecorrectly or to your liking, it's
probably because you didn't do the rightgive the right direction. It's a really
great self reflection that's really important asleaders. I just want to speak in

(12:20):
a reflection. I want to reflectback on what you just said about mentorship
because so many people ask me andcome on the show and ask or reach
out to us and ask how tofind a mentor. That's a big question.
I'm sure you guys get it aswell. How can I find a
mentor? How can somebody mentor me? And I think you just shared something
that is really really important, andI'll love for you to expand on it,

(12:41):
but I just want to just reflectback on it on what the military
does, which is really wise inthat putting having reaching out to somebody who's
two ranks above you. And theway that I relate that in the business
world is I remember Tony Robbins talkingabout that of like changing your circle.
I know Grant Cardon and talks alot about that as well, is changing

(13:01):
the circle that you're in, andthat's essentially going two ranks above you.
If if if I want, ifI want to own a car wash,
I don't hang out with the peoplethat are washing in the car. I
hang out with the people that arebehind the desk at the car wash.
Um. It's that kind of mentalityof reaching out to them and speaking with
them and listening and learning. SoI really like that that two ranks above

(13:22):
I think it works. Like Isaid, we know it works in the
business world. Something I want toadd to that is accountability with our mentors.
In the military, there's a tonof accountability, and in the business
world there's a ton of accountability.And I actually have a personal experience that
I'll share with you on on accountabilityin that. Um, I have somebody
who's helping me with my business andhe asked me to do something very uncomfortable

(13:45):
and I actually shared I went morein depth on this on another podcast,
But while we're on this topic,he asked me to do something that was
very uncomfortable for me, and andand he's mentoring me. And a mentor
relationship is not the same as Ithink. Um, what like what I
call my business coach, you know, my business coach, I pay her
for her to listen to me,to help me, to advise me,
to give me a different perspective,a mentoring. And I'm sure that there's

(14:09):
paid mentors, but to me,a mentorship is more of someone who's looking
out, paying it forward, justdoing it as something to be helpful.
So anyway, so that's how he'sdoing it for me. He's not charging
me or anything. He's just helpingme with my business. But this is
what he said to me in termsof mentorship and how it relates a mentorship
is he said, here's what Iwant you to do. It was super
uncomfortable for me. And he said, and if you don't do it by

(14:31):
this date, at this time,then don't bother calling me until you do
it right. And I see yourreaction right now, and I'll love for
you to expand on that is.I mean, that's the military, right,
That's the same thing as there's thataccountability. Absolutely, so I want
to do the first part in youknowle to finish off. So in the

(14:52):
military, over the last couple ofyears, there have been a lot of
talk about smart goals and I knowa lot of businesses that picked up on
it as well. So you makesure that they're specific, measurable, attainable,
realistic, and timeless. So justlike he said, I need you
to do this by this dating time. And and I'm sure that it was
something that you could do. Itwas just a matter that you didn't want

(15:13):
to do it right. And recentlywe heard a little add onto that little
I know that resonated very well withMaricela on it and so not only do
you follow the smart goals, butyou have to make them smarter, so
it by adding the E and theR at the end. Again, most
people fail to revise them and toevaluate them. So so you have to

(15:37):
u when you know and and thenagain it's probably going to be a military
show now, but in the militaryyou you have to stop at some point
and make sure that you still havethe enemy in front of you. Otherwise
don't don't don't you know, don'tshoot anymore. Right, so you had
jugs and and you know, youhave to revise what your plan is and

(15:58):
then make changes up only so weare actually um, there is a book
out there that you will always messit up to a week year um.
And it's a process that he showshow you can actually like should be setting
goals quarterly and revising them because youknow, most people wait until the end
of the year at the beginning ofthe year to do their goal um.

(16:22):
And that and you either forget themor you know, you never get the
opportunity to reevaluate what was working andwhat needs to be changed. UM.
So that when when you do itmore often than that, actually grant cardon
always ad by, you have toread your goals every every night before you
go to bed, and every morningfirst thing where you woke up, whether
wise or attention spam. As humans, he means it's like less than a

(16:45):
fish, the little show fish.It is so and you know, like
he again, Caradon always said thepeople, there's engagement, or your employees
there's engaged. I assure you inthis whoever's listeners to this podcast, if
that's probably longs doing something else,that's how short or light or attention stamp

(17:06):
is. So we have to keepengaged. We have to make noise enough
so that people can stay in tunewith your with your message right. So
as mentors or as as coaches,that is through all responsibility to keep it,
keep you and like keep you onyour plans, keep checking on you.
We have an accountability weekly accounability poem, and we keep saying, oh

(17:29):
yeah, I'm gonna do my tat, I'm gonna do my tast is what
guess what if you come to thatpoe and you haven't done like you said
you want to do, somebody's goingto call you out right. But if
you don't have that place, howyou know how likely you're gonna be to
accomplish things because we're gonna get distracted. That's just the nature of this society.
I feel like solopreneurs are working ata very um there's a little slower

(17:56):
page because you only know what youknow. You're not you're not bringing in
anybody else, you're not collaborating withanybody. Grants collaborations the new currency,
you know. And we can sayit ourselves. From the time that we
met were our business exploded. Youknow, we were both doing our own
thing, followed our own path.And then when we came together, we're
like, wait, we can dothis and this and and I'll wait here

(18:18):
here some more, you know,we can take on some more stuff.
So we've been able to open fiveor six businesses along the way, and
as well as masterminds. That's theother thing. If you can't if you
can't do coaching, don't want todo coaching, you don't want to do
mentoring, join a mastermind because thepeople, and it almost doesn't matter what

(18:38):
business it is, what the backgroundis on the mastermind. You get people
in the same room and you starttalking about your pain points and somebody else
has dealt with that pain point before. Somebody else has a solution in that
room more than likely if you're inthe right rooms. Um, and the
other one that I was going toI was thinking of earlier you mentioned Tony
Robbins. He always says that youwill underestimate what you can do in a

(19:02):
year, or five years or tenyears. And that's where that book comes
in Handy. It's basically taking yourone year goal. It can press it
down to a quarter so you canget four goals done, four significant goals
done within that year because you're resettingher as if the year is twelve weeks
instead of twelve months. Right,Yeah, so it's called so that book
is called the twelve Week Year,correct, the twelve week Year. I

(19:26):
think that that's a good book foreverybody to consider. The power of collaboration
is huge. We're actually witnessing thaton YouTube and in all sorts of social
media channels. So I think anybodywho's watching or listening can can appreciate that
that we're already seeing it. IfYouTube collaborators are gaining views out of collaborating,

(19:48):
just imagine if you do that inyour business and in your personal life,
of meeting somebody who compliments what youdo or can take over what you're
maybe not as strong at. Ithink you know Gary V talks about that
all the time. Is like doubledown on your strengths and find somebody else
to take over your weaknesses. I'minterested in the idea of a mastermind and
if you could, since I thinkyou guys run some masterminds, if you

(20:10):
could, um, just break thatdown for us. I remember the concept
was brought to us from by NapoleonHill and the other ones like Carnegie,
and very interested in what you guysdo in your mastermind and what kind of
value people can gain from it.Absolutely, so it's group you know,
it's we do for our real state. But it can be, like we

(20:34):
said, for any business. Um, just at the point of getting together,
you have pretty much put it inthe hot seats, so you get
to avoid what your your saying pointsare, what problems are you having,
and everybody in the room is ableto give you the feedback and learn from
that. And so we also participatein other people's master minds. Um.

(20:55):
You know, we've been with Cardonslike forty five people in there, and
people that are going to be dedicatedand they want to scale, they want
to propel their business are going tobe in that room. So by nature,
you're still selecting into a room thatis already powerful in the mindset.
So it's almost like no, noproblem is a problem, you know because

(21:17):
people all gets results in those resultsand the other things is that doing it
yourself, you're only thinking in oneway, You're only having the mirror look
at you in one direction. Whenyou have other minds around you. Other
people that are successful or that Iwanted to be successful in their business and
their life are going to have thatdifferent angles point of views that are going

(21:38):
to give you that that direction,and they're gonna your blind spots are gonna
be diminished by having all these opinionsabout it. So we joined the first
mastermind that we joined what's real estaterelated, But like I said, it
ended up being even families problems wereboyd there you know, I'm I'm struggling

(22:00):
with my teenager and then all ofa sudden they have this all this techno
uh strategies that they could implement implementby other parents, and it's it's just
like propelling that has saved was somany years, has savedled so many mistakes.
Um, it has given us informationthat they we can share with other
people. And as you know inany business, that that what you can

(22:22):
help people with. UM. It'swhat you know, it's it's what's going
to put you in a better place. UM. And it doesn't have to
be that they have that pain,but they maybe they do. And bye
by Like you know this the strategiesand advices that we gained from from those
masterminds. UM. Sometimes we don'teven know that we needed that product or

(22:44):
that app or that you know,whatever strategy in the business that that that
we are listening to endem we canimplement it. Yeah, I was gonna
say Tony. Tony talks about UMchanging if you can make one little course
adjustment today the impact that has hisexponential out further. Right, So if
you can get one little nugget fromany meeting, any encounter, any any

(23:08):
other group outside of your own regularthinking, that's going to change your trajectory,
that can from telling you infinitely differentdirection, yes, the future significantly.
And for just for a visualization,I think it was it's a Tony
Robbins or is it UM. I'mthinking of Neil de grasse Tyson who talks
also about like if you just it'ssomething like just a millimeter or something,

(23:33):
and like going into space, allof a sudden you are way off chart.
And it's Tony Robbins talks about itin terms of flight plan. That's
what it is of the flight planof like if if the pilot just deviates
an inch off of course, allof a sudden from going from France,
you're you're going to You're going somewhereelse, You're going to Africa. You're
going completely different, and you're rightwith those golden nuggets. It's it's very

(23:53):
interesting too. I have a coupleof questions, but just um, just
a little insight too. I'm notpart of any large masterminds like you guys
are a part of. But youknow, I have a very good circle
of people and when I speak withthem and I share with them, and
I think, here a little tipfor our listeners too, is like it's
about also being honest and authentic whenyou go and you meet with somebody with

(24:15):
a mentor or in a mastermind,because when you bring and being vulnerable,
because when you bring that authentic self, then others will share their ideas and
their creativity. And so that's whathappened with me and actually this one mentor
on the insurance side. I wassharing with him something that I have an
idea of how I want to expandin terms of branching out or franchising or
whatever. And from that, hestarted sharing with me something that he does

(24:38):
in his business. And right now, like literally right now, how to
call this morning with one of myteam members about this. We're working on
a deal that is kind of likemorphed from the whole branch and from what
this guy shared. And it wasbased off of this, like like you
just said, this little golden nugget. It's not exactly how he's doing it,

(25:00):
not exactly how I had envisioned it, because like I was doing it,
like you said, by myself.But through this collaboration of his mentorship
and guidance and his experience and bringingit with mine, it's formulating into something
that my team member actually understands andsays like, hey, I think we
could bring somebody else involved in this. So um it I mean just speaking
truth to what you talk about there, um Marcella, you and I mean

(25:25):
you also talk a lot about this, Chris, But in what you were
just sharing of your mind, themastermind that you guys are part of.
Um you were just sharing about whenwhen you can help others with their life,
it makes it makes it better foryour life and makes it better for
everything else. And both of youspeak a lot about helping others. And
I know that you know, bybeing in the military, you're serving the

(25:48):
country and you're serving others, andso there's this value system that's driven into
you from that. But it feelsto me, just the way that you
guys have been sharing with me forthe last couple of minutes, but also
before we even went on air,it feels to me that there's something in
in both of you to give backand to be a part of something bigger.
And I'm interested if if you twocould expand on that a little bit
more. Absolutely so. UM,I think I mentioned earlier, I grew

(26:15):
up in Mexico and growing up withyou know we it was my mom brising
eight kids. UM No, itis. In fact, she never learned
she never learned how to read andwrite because that was denied M request about
her family. You know, thatwas just a culture that she grew up
in. And so to say theleast growing up was was difficult financially M

(26:38):
However, Um, there was alwaysenough to give. There was always enough
time and of love and of attentionthat that she could give it. And
it doesn't mean that you have toprovide material things, right Um. So
for us, even with the scarcitythat we have that growing up, there

(26:59):
was always my mom always makes surethat we have a way to give,
to give back, go help somebody, or go help them here. So
that's always been something that's meaningful tous to at least growing up, um,
and then come into again, comeinto America or even in the Mexico.
I was the first person in thefamily to go to college and to

(27:22):
have a real job, you know, so I already consider myself that I
was at the top of the mountainsright there. Um, I was like,
why not give back, Like nowI didn't have anything. Now look
look I have so much, youknow, And I say enough to come
to America. I had pay,you know, pay all the expenses of
a travel and I had a hundreddollars with me when I came to that

(27:44):
to America and I arrived, andI was saying, I didn't know how
to speak to English. And thatwas one of my goals to learn how
to speak English. So now everyany time that I have more than one
hundred dollars in my pocket, I'mI'm already wealthy. I'm like I have
a bund So it just makes senseto continue to give back. Right,
So it really is when we giveback, it builds your back and your

(28:08):
spirits. It gives you more energy. Like when we when I work up,
I want I'm trying to see whatother business can we stand so we
can get more busst income so wecan go back, and he continues to
give. So it just brings joyce, you know. Um. And so
we also are often asked, youknow, when is enough? I think

(28:29):
we need to update or BUYO becauseyou said one hundred million dollars on their
management. We have two hundred andfifty million dollars and then their management that
and people people ask us when isenough? And I will say Cardon always
tells you if you're making enough moneyto leave and say your bills, you're
being selfish, you know, becauseyou need to have that that that way

(28:52):
of giving back and saying your billsis not giving back to anyone. So
that that is a challenge that weyou know, you have to find the
back. Yes, but if ifwe are working so hard to help other
people, whether it's start a business, grow their business, get get started
in whatever project that they want,you know, guiding them that we're als

(29:14):
having the freedom of our time togive back to other people. Um,
it just it just continues to bringthat, bring build our own pockets off
joy. And I think we evensee our business as a way of giving
back because we're helping people who areotherwise busy in their current jobs have an
opportunity to invest passively and continue theirinvesting journey, so they can find that

(29:38):
passive income to help get them outof the office space or out of a
daily grind. Maybe even just kickback one day a week instead of having
the grind every day. So eventhat's a give back even though it's our
business. Yeah, yeah, wecan do that through our businesses. Um
for me, you know, Istarted Downtown, my insurance company, with
the idea to give back and wecontinue to do that. We give back

(30:00):
over one percent of our commissions tonon for profits. So certainly I know
that the three of us are goingto link up after this and talk some
more about that. You brought upwork life balance and and again I go
back to this Mastermind. I wasthinking about it when you're telling me about
the forty five person Mastermind and GrantCardon in there and other people like him,

(30:21):
and just from following him on socialmedia and getting to know him through
those social media channels, and andothers like him, like Ryan Serhant and
Tony Robbins and all of these bignames and these big personalities, Gary V.
I'm always curious on that work lifebalance because they're these guys, and

(30:41):
there's female women like that too,I mean Sarah Blakeley and so many others
who are just tremendous female entrepreneurs.So I don't want to leave them out
of the mix either, But Ido apologize for not naming them in this.
But my question lies in this worklife balance of there. They're these
big personalities, these um they're superambitious, they're tenacious in what they do,

(31:03):
and they're they're leading huge teams ofpeople. They're inspiring people like yourselves,
like me, like like so manyothers, And I just wonder,
how do you fit into all ofthat and then and then be able to
also have a family and have timeto spend with your family and loved ones.
Um. So part of that I'llsay the balance for like our own

(31:27):
time versus work time. We wedo what we call blend and so go
to some of these UM business trips. We will usually tack on a day
or two on the front or onthe back end, so we have some
of our own time as well asUM. It also allows us some extra
time to catch up on the workside of things we may not do as

(31:49):
well when like right now we're here, we're here with family Indianapolis, actually
in a family and they're at worktoday at this time. So this is
a perfect time to have this interview. But this is this is how we
blend our our family time. Youknow, we try to do the work
when those folks are busy, andshortly after they get back, hopefully we're

(32:10):
done with our what we're doing.We have that freedom of location and time
that we can be fairly flexible withour schedule. UM tind to think of
what else I could say in there. I would say that time blocking UM
and I joke around this because srinceis One day he told me like,
I feel like you would kind oflie into people because I don't see your

(32:31):
time blocking UM. For me,I've done it for so long that I
can. I can set a taskto be done, I can work,
you know, I divide already myday like I won't do many hours,
I take off this many hours forthis or you know, even forty five
minutes. So I will say,if if you know your listeners, if

(32:53):
there having a hard time visiting allthe aspects of family, self, business,
businesses, and many people have differentbusinesses right there, teams, So
I will say, make sure thatyou're time blocking and and within that schedule
to make sure that you are timein put in some time for yourself and

(33:15):
your your significant other. We worktogether and we're we're business partners. We
are you know, husband and wife, so by nature we are together most
of the time, you know,so even at that, even at that,
you know, we we need somepersonal time too, you know,
So make sure that you're booking thatthat you're you're communicating with your partners,
um, and and that will serveyou better when you're in control of your

(33:39):
time rather than just reacting to anylast minute email or last minute pull,
you know. So that's that's whatI'll say. Um, going back to
the masterminds for just a moment.You know, we talked about going to
want of Grants, master rights andeverybody saying, oh man, you get
you get this time with Grants.No, you're you this time with sixty

(34:00):
or forty five or sixty other peoplethat are in this room, and which
one of the things that we hadwhere we were at in our business we
were just about to take off thatwe were trying to figure out hiring people
or what's what's the next step forus? You know, and Grant has
this you know, two hundred fivehundred person entity organization that's multi faceted.

(34:27):
Us asking him that question, Ithink he's always further detached from it.
Could he have given us an answer, probably, But the person that we
went to is somebody who was acouple of steps ahead of us in the
same field to get that information.And that person was in the room with
us. And that's where those nationalads time in handy. It's it's great
to be attached to a big name. It brings in bigger and more bought

(34:50):
in people, business people. Butthe people in the room are really what
you're there for. You're you're ableto share and collaborate that knowledge. I
feel like we keep going back tothis word collaborate racious, but it really
is a huge, a huge deal, you know, and it's a it's
a money maker for everybody. Andand it goes right back to the militaries
of two ranks. It's they didn'tsay five ranks above. They didn't say

(35:10):
go to an admiral for our mentorship. They're saying go two ranks above.
Um. So I think that thatspeaks very highly to that too. I
think, yeah, you're you're onehundred percent right, somebody who's running a
multimillion dollars. Well, you guysare a multimillion, but multi billion.
Let's let's go there, right,Let's let's let's go two ranks above you
guys. Right, It's it's gonnabe hard. Yeah, pretty cool.

(35:35):
Um So you you brought up otherbusinesses and and you know, we have
this this idea of giving back whatyou guys do, and and you brought
up other businesses. Um. WhatI've also learned about both of you is
that you're you're serial entrepreneurs. Essentially, you have this real estate business,
but you're doing a lot more.And one that I'm uh that I want
to bring up is the VA placementum and uh, the other things that

(35:58):
you're doing there if you want tojust share a little bit about that as
well. UM. Yeah, sowe are we have created And again if
anybody and the audience UM is wondering, well I want to start a business.
I mean, I think most peoplethat are listening to this, to
the recording as they really are inthe mindset of you know, getting more

(36:19):
information and learning other other ways toyou know, create sources of income.
But I believe that anyone can builda business. In fact, I put
a course with ten things that youcan do to build a business, free
things that you can do to builda business. And because I've done it,
so the businesses that we build areto feel a need that we see.
So again, being in these communitiesare are propelling against material for our

(36:45):
businesses. We saw the need thatmost people are doing the multimillion dollars businesses
and they're still managing their CRRA,and they're still answering their emails, they're
still doing all those little things thatcan be delegated UM. And so we
started hiring virtual assistems for our ownbusiness. And then people are started asking

(37:06):
us, how how is it thatyou're everywhere you're you're here, I see
you're here, you're doing this,you're doing that like well, because we
have a team in place and inour business and our specific syndication model UM,
a lot of the people are doingthis by themselves. So their solopreneurs,
they don't have an assistant because it'sexpensive to say one, especially when
you're not having that the cash flow. So what we've done is we hire

(37:30):
a team virtual assistants that are outsourcefrom um UM different countries, and we
are able to provide affordable prices forthe world that it is just as equals
equality or better that the one Ican provide for sure and UM and so

(37:50):
we are helping their that side oftheir their producing jobs and helping our people
or or or friends or um UMteams to bring them that kind of help
UM and we trained them. Theyare developing sapiece and so one is trained
is left, and then the nextperson comes in and studies all the sapiece

(38:13):
and then get a coaching with theonboarding lead. So we have created this
machine of trained people that are makingor helping our friends and or and our
teams make millions of dollars. Ifyou improve your presence for example and social
media, UM that's that's just goingto propel your business. And if if
if your businesses is set up sothat you can with each lead that you

(38:37):
bring it, it's going to bringyou a source of income. It's that
money that you pay up front shouldproduce you as a result, right,
And so we track all those performanceand so yeah, that's why we trained
our bas and and well actually wereusing um teens the mentality of because we
are licenses for a GRANTR toll aswell, so we're able to bus on

(38:59):
that type of know this to themand yeah, they come with them mentality
of I'm gonna make I'm gonna helpyou the next you miss them. You
know, we hire on the virtualassistant, We get them trained up in
the basics of the applications and thingsthat we use that so that when they
go to the person that that's actuallywanting to utilize them, they they're not

(39:22):
starting from scratch. And that's probablythe biggest problem when people who try to
go out and hire somebody, theythey have to start from scratch on everything
that they're trying to do. Andthese people walk in the door, they
already have a working knowledge of howit goes. Really all they need is
they input of the data? Whatdata do you need to taking care of?
Okay, let me take care ofthat. Book and done, and

(39:42):
I will say that's everything and always. But that's that's been super helpful for
several of the folks that have hiredon folks UM and she talked about real
estate syndications and stuff like that,but we also help some restaurant tours with
the use of a VA for someof those mean, mean task that just
has to be done. You know, you have a new a new menu

(40:05):
out there, you want to getyour your recipes digitalized or whatever it is.
You know, they can take careof those those little tasks that are
just time consuming, and it givesyou back time so that then you can
go back and have that work lifebalance, you can go back and give
to charity, you can do theother things that are going to be more
income revenue generating. And that's that'swhere we see the value of it.

(40:29):
Yeah, I see the value init too. I actually and I did
use a VA for a while andit was very helpful in actually helping me
start with my business, start mybusiness as UM my VA Cecil Pepper.
So I give a shout out toher. It was very helpful and instrumental
in helping the business get going.Of michaelspiso in for the podcast and even

(40:51):
for dn Tent for what I dothere, and then I continue to um,
I wouldn't consider my relationship with withHaynes Marketing and Media as a VA,
although most of our work together isdone virtually because we're doing it through
Zoom. But I mean it's it'sto your point, Marcela, what you
just said of like how are youeverywhere? You know, all the social

(41:12):
posts and everything are done by Katie. She does them for me. So
it does give a very good professionalappearance when you have somebody who knows what
they're doing and is trained well andwhat they're doing. And I want to
go back to that word collaboration.What I got from from working with Cecile
when I was working with her,and then what I get from working with
Katie is this collaboration of they theyhave. They feel like they're a part

(41:35):
of my business and they care aboutmy business. And so when I meet
with them and I say, hey, I want to do a post about
something, they want to understand whybecause they don't want me to tell them
what to post. They're not robots. They want to I'm hiring them to
create it in their own words orto do the job in their own way,
and so they want to understand thewhy behind the task and they take

(41:57):
it from there. And you seemlike you want to expand on that,
so go ahead. We were actuallyyou say that bit about bringing them in
as family almost and U when webrought on our virtual assistance, we also
brought on an office manager for it, and we told them, look,
we really, we really want tobe invested here. We want to help
you with your goals. And sowe went back to them and we set

(42:20):
personal financial, educational goals and stufflike that with them that we revisit every
quarter to make that they're making progress. And that was another another way to
pull them in to feel collaborative init. Yeah, a couple of them
where I'm pears because they share thatthey they're never sit down and throw the
goals. They know, nobody evertold them that. That was the thing,

(42:43):
like they have never in their livesand they're young kids, you know,
we call them kids. We havebrankets but there but imagine not havn't
ever sit down to review your financeseither. So we do a lot of
financial education and we do a lotof entrepreneur um you know, propelling your
business. So they are learning.Like so when they come and do the

(43:07):
review of their volves, they're like, and I want to create a fastive
link ton like everybody using that terminology. So like we and we told them
we want when we hired we hirethem, we want to know their family.
We want to eventually go and vestto them in persons um. You
know, we're actually thinking, uh, because we've been involved with that a
session to help overseas and and wewant to go and do a convention for

(43:30):
for OVAs because they're there. We'rein the country, right we probably know
never gonna allow them, not allowedafford to bring them to the States.
But if we're in their country,why not do a you know, a
meeting with all of them, likeyou know, and and that's what they're
invested in our business. They wantour business to grow. Um it.

(43:51):
Actually they have a Monday chat thatthere's like how is this you know explained?
Use emergence to explain how was yourweekend? Uh? And then they're
just like hey, flex family,Like it just feels so good. Like
when I when I first came upwith a brand or the name for that
business, I never thought of havingthis many people that embrace that terminology and
that way of living stuff. Um, it's pretty amazing. I think we

(44:15):
ended up in another we move alittle degree. Yeah, but well these
degrees are great because you know it'sabout where the where does the conversation take
us? And um, you know, I was going to ask you about
the coaching business, but I'm actuallymore interested now in the name Uplex and
how you how you derived to findthis name, so if you could share

(44:37):
that with us. Yeah, Andso that when I first started investing,
I had a duplex and I wasrented at one side, and I was
like, you know, when growingup, we have to move so many
times, like I went to Ithink every year, we moved to a
different class, to a different school. So I never had that stability to

(45:00):
you know, to just be inone house sold together. Um, and
so having a family living next door, and then there was a school right
next to the duplex, So Iwas like, I want somebody's a kid
to have that house and to liveat that house and and go to school,
and you know, to have thestability. That was my big thing.
So even with when I created thatduplex, I mean that that that

(45:22):
UM duplex. The name UM itcame to Okay, flex is like multiple
right because again coming from Mexico,we don't have duplexes there. So I
was like, okay, I kindof embrace that duplex. I love talking
about the duplex and the duplex andit just got kind of got catchy,
so like I want to bring peopleup with whatever this ends up going.

(45:43):
So bringing people up, you know, the uplex, and that's how how
it arrives. But it's it's thatum it grew into elevating orders, so
elevating orders to a complexity of businesses, and that's what exactly what we do.
We keep adding branches of this isthat at the end, it's all
serving to elevate Elevator investors, elevatorresidents, elevating the communities that we serve,

(46:07):
and it's just all falls into place. Your social media posts are making
more sense to me. It's it'sfunny. Um you know, when I
was I always do research outside ofthe intake form for my guests, and
you you were no different. SoI went on your social media channels and

(46:29):
everything, and I'm I'm reading theseposts and I'm going but they're not selling
anything here, this is interesting,what are they? So? I actually
printed one out and I want tojust kind of read that to to our
audience here because I was going toform some questions off of it. But
with what you just said, Ifeel like this this really goes into it.
And it was your happy New Yearpost and it said you are in
charge of your own life, andyou put these sparkles and stars, and

(46:52):
every decision and action that you doin every chapter of your life, you
are responsible for it. You arethe author of your own life. Live
your life to the fullest as longas you are not stepping on or hurting
someone. Remember wealth as a stateof mind. A positive mindset is the
most powerful tool you can develop.If you're curious about being a passive investor

(47:15):
or not sure how to get startedinvesting, let's connect soon. And you
go on and talk a little bitmore about uplex. But now that's making
more sense to me because like,and all of your posts are very similar,
Like they have all this like highenergy positive, um, they all
start off the same way. Soso all right, So I'm I'm so
that's it's Chris Marcella. Which who'swho's writing these posts? Is it the

(47:37):
vats? Let's get all just kids. No, I still create the social
media content that I think that that'ssomething that you There are so many things
that you can delegate, but beingpresent and being authentic it has to come
with from from you. So Istill take the time to write those posts.

(48:00):
There's all those things in the socialmedia that I do delegate, and
what I do is actually I writeit. I sit down and write and
then I give it to the VAand date schedule it. So that helps
a lot because then you can compileall the tasks instead of having to do
it every day. Again, thetime blocking helps because then you bring all
of those in a week or whateveryou want to do, however you want

(48:22):
to pook that, So right nowor social media, it's already booked and
books or the next month or so. That's brilliant, right, go ahead,
Chriss. You made the comment thatwe weren't telling anything, and a
couple of months back, I thinkwe were at the real estate summit,
Frank Colonel's real estate summit, andwe've got some friends that we've known for
the last year and a half thatwe've been involved in in that system,

(48:45):
and he was like, listen,I gotta tell you, you guys have
an amazing newsletter. Your newsletter isit's educational, it's informational. We tell
about what we've done, who we'veseen, where we've been, and here's
why I and here's something that wetry to educate in there. And then
he goes and there's nothing for sale. He goes, everybody in their newsletter

(49:08):
always has something to sell. Andif you're just being yourself, putting your
stuff out there, people will naturallygravitate to you. You know, if
they don't feel like you're you're outthere just take take taking. It makes
it much easier to have that conversationand and and get that connection. I
think it's funny that that's a mindsetthat I'm interested in in expanding on with

(49:31):
you. UM and that when wefirst came on the Zoom, very often
I have to be very clear onwhat the show is about and that it's
not about selling any products or services. UM. While many podcasts that's why
people are on it, and Iunderstand that there's nothing wrong with it.

(49:52):
I mean that's this is the it'sit's it's content to to be able for
people to learn more about people's productsand services, and that's done here too,
And typically I have to really diginto that just so that people can
understand and kind of break their oldmindset of of what this media is used
for, in this platform is usedfor. And when when we jumped on

(50:13):
together, it was like about fiveminutes ten minutes in, I'm just adjusting
my camera listening to the two ofyou, and I'm going, you know,
I don't need to tell you muchelse, like, let's just get
started, because your your mindsets alreadythere. So the reason why I bring
that up is not just to complimentyou in what you've you've experienced and learned
to get to where you are,but to ask where did you learn that
that mindset of of leading with value, of leading with education, of leading

(50:37):
with information, Because it's with whatsociety throws at us. It's not something
that's the norm, and so it'stotally understandable that anybody leads with the other
side of it. And I believethat it's learned to lead the way that
you guys do. So I'm interestedin where you learned that mindset. You
know, I'm gonna you would backto say way for a minute. On

(51:00):
the other one. I'm gonna goback to my family on mine. On
this one, my mom was asingle mother since I was about three.
I have one brother, and shewas a public health nurse, so she
traveled all around the county to people'shomes and gave them care post hospital care,
won't care whatever. And she justhad this connection to anybody and everybody

(51:23):
in the in the community. AndI just I'll say that that's probably where
I picked this up, is thatthat connection. It followed to me,
It followed to my brother. Youknow, we um, you almost couldn't
get away with doing something to thetown who as a kid because we'll get

(51:44):
back to momow some way. Buteven growing up, I joined as an
EMT to the local rescue squad asa teenager. My brother did it.
He's been in the fire department probablythirty years, um and doing the volunteer
stuff. It's not nonpaid and uhand give it back, it's just always

(52:07):
been part of our lives, partof my life. Anyways, Yes,
um, I would say, youknow, there's always the opportunity to sell
something that is for sure. However, if you're um, if you're out
there promoting, I'd rather hear somebodylike somebody else would say, hey,
go to them because they want tocoach you. Or there there's or that's
been following them, you know,like and we get that all the time.

(52:28):
And we you know we now's likeI guess of the marketing that we're
in proximity with Cardon that he's alwayssaying, you know, you have to
be directed, you have to beh but we have so many products,
like we can't just sit here andlike, oh, let's sell this,
you know. But I think thenthe nature of when when you opened that
conversation, we're like, hey andI heard this for sale, Like immediately

(52:51):
everybody's mind is gonna be like,okay, now, now use that the
level of drugs just went down,you know, like okay, here it
is. They're probably gonna turn offthe the listening the podcast, you know,
because you fail to give your messagebefore we are. We are mentored
by Pete Virgus. And if youdon't know about Pete Virgus, look him
up because he has an amazing frameworkthat helps you connect with your audience and

(53:15):
and brand yourself in a way thatyou people you're gonna people are gonna gravitate
or you because you give, give, give, And he always said if
you're if you're in a speaking engagement, you have to give content. You
know there's there's speakers. I guessthey go on and on and on and
that they're supposed to give you something. And then you felt like nothing happens.

(53:36):
Then it all doesn't move because you'reyou're like, did I miss the
ball? Like that I supposed togain some value of this. So we
always try to add value too,especially the general generosity of you putting this
platform together and opening um or youraudience to to our message. We want
to measure that we're not here tosell anybody anything. Um I would say

(53:59):
it, um. So that's that'swhy we like people going to come to
you. If they see the valueof them, maybe you can bring to
them. UM. I do wantto elaborate a little bit back on the
Mastermind and the reason why is becausemost people is intimidating. It's intimidated when
they said, okay, what doyou mean I have to talk about my
business, about my family, aboutmy everything. So when you're doing a

(54:21):
coach one or one coach. That'sthat's gonna, it's gonna you need to
open it up, right. Butwhen you're in a mastermind, you can
simply sit there and listen and learnfrom others. Like obviously it's best if
you if you are in the hotseat and are you know, get the
opportunity to share your pain points.But it's for most people when they first

(54:45):
started too and this mindset of I'mgoing to join a group of coaching,
it's less intimidating because you can justsit there and listen and observe and get
all the knowledge. But eventually youdo want to be in the hat seat
because that's where you get the mostvalue. But that's like that's a way
to kind of be in the room. And and I don't tell you if

(55:05):
you cannot, if you're not ableto be on the table, serve the
water because in the table, theconversations are going to be at one to
one. I'm going to help you, you're going to help me. But
if you're not able to afford,or if you're not if you're not ready
for it, just serve water tothose time sitting on the table. You're
going to be in proximity and bein a proximity is a very very put

(55:25):
in you at a higher degree ofcommitment, commitment to your goals, commitment
to your business, commitment to yourself. I took a conversation. Yeah,
but you know it relates to somany things. So I'm a toastmaster and
uh and I speak speak about toastmasterson here. Um, it's it's really
I I accredit toastmasters too much ofmy success, if not most of my

(55:49):
success, not all of it,because it's what it's what helped me get
a voice. Um. But toyour point of masterminds and being whether you're
in the hot seat or even servingwater. That's what I tell people all
the time is you know, ifyou're uncomfortable, if whatever it is,
just come as a guest, justbe in the room with us. And
I'm I'm a two time past presidentand I've always shared with the next president

(56:14):
of our club keep an open doorpolicy, and they've all followed suit with
me in that we keep an opendoor policy to our club where we don't
force anybody to join. You cancome three times, five times, ten
times, you can come all yearfor free. We don't care. And
the mindset behind that is because publicspeaking or investing or whatever it is that
we're doing, you have to becomfortable to get started, and I can't

(56:37):
force you to join. But ifyou're sitting in the room, and I
love this analogy, if you're justsitting in the room and you're just serving
water, eventually you're going to workup the courage and want to take part,
and you're there for a reason.And the only way you're going to
learn. And this is the nextstep that I impart on people and that
you're imparting on people is then takeon a small role, ask a small
question, take on something little,and I'm going to relate it toastmasters because

(57:00):
that's where I could really speak tothis is in Toastmasters, we have an
agenda. We have the Toastmaster,who's the MC, which is the biggest
role. We have a we havetwo speaker roles, which are the second
biggest roles. Then we have evaluators. But then we have smaller roles which
are like the humorous which just tellsa joke, or the timer who just
follows the time, the grammarian whojust follows your ums and ohs, and

(57:22):
those are smaller roles that play thatare very impactful in public speaking, but
you don't have to do too much. And if you just take that role,
and this is what I tell them, is take that role as if
it's the speech that you're giving toa ten thousand person audience. Don't just
take it and just do your oneminute evaluation or your one minute timer report.

(57:43):
Take that timer report and treat itlike it's a speech because when you
do that, with that small role, then you'll be more comfortable to then
take on a speech and more andmore, and so back to your masterminds.
That's the whole thing. With servingwater, Go serve a little bit
of water, you know, thenfill the picture. Then start taking no
then start asking a question raising yourhand. Then ask a question about a
friend, ask a question about yourself, and eventually, next thing you know,

(58:07):
you'll be sharing knowledge and sharing information. So I love that you brought
up that that hot seat. Ido want to get into your business though,
because I am very interested and Iknow our guests are excuse me,
our audience is very interested in yourbusiness. I've been fortunate to meet.
I have to give a summer abig shout out over at ten X ten

(58:30):
x platform where you guys come from, are introduced to me by by Summer.
Every time I meet somebody from theten x Stages platform. You're always
about giving back. You're always abouthelping others. Every guest that I've had
on the air has always given value, and we've touched on a lot of
that. But the other thing thatyou all, that's a comment trait with

(58:51):
all of you that have come on, is you're all very successful in your
businesses and you're all earning a reallygreat income. And I'm interested in that
just as much as I'm sure ouraudience is interested in that. So I
want to hear more about this business, this real estate investing business. Um,
what it what it really is about, dismissing some of the uh notions

(59:14):
and people might have about it.I know that you talked a little bit
about it in terms of like whatthe word syndication means and how people get
intimidated by the word. So justkind of just unraveling it a little bit
for us, if you could.Yes. Of course, like I've mentioned
before, I started buying a duplexand that's how we grew a portfolio.

(59:34):
We were doing MOREMTI family. Um, you know, building a thirty five
properties. We were able to build, but that was a local role and
very hard to scale and a lotof liability. So when we learn about
the syndication model, UM, itwas attracted to us because it's it's at
least you're doing the active part ofthe investment. You can do you can

(59:58):
do invest possibly UM. So it'shence off you don't have to take on
the liability of owning that property ormanaging a property, and we like that
as well. So the and theword indication just means that you're buying as
a group. And there's two twogroups that are part of the syndication.
One is the active group, whichis that the group that finds that property,

(01:00:22):
manages manages the manager um and thosethe structuring of the legal legalities and
the day to day operations. Andthen the other group is the limited partners,
which are passive passive investors that bringthe capital to help with the down
payment pretty much so as a asa multiple our partners are passes, so

(01:00:43):
we help them build those sources ofpassive income UM. And the way the
syndication model works and it's actually allowsthose to give the accelerated depreciation that it's
very helpful with the taxes. Soas of this year, I think this
is a dear that we haven't saidat all tactics because of the investments that
we've done. And and so that'swhat we want to share with our with

(01:01:07):
our passive investors. And we dothe active part of the syndication. So
we are building develations and finding thedeal structure and the build with our teams.
But that's a passive investor without experience. Um, it's it's less risky
and uh, and yes, that'sthat's what we do. That The other

(01:01:30):
side that we do is we werethe ones that are acting the business plan.
We come up with the business plan, we do the value add to
the property. If there's something thereto be um deferred maintenance or interior upgrades
or something along those lines, weput together the teams to make sure that
happens throughout the process that results inincreased rents and increased revenue. And along

(01:01:52):
the way, at times we willeven implement things like water conservation, low
flow toilets and things like that todecrease expenses. As as most business owners
will know, if you decrease theexpenses, you increase the revenue, you're
able to gain a better a betterNI and net operating ACME income which leads

(01:02:15):
to a higher cash flow so thatwe're able to give returns back to the
investors um and eventually sell this ata higher much higher price than what we
paid, which also gives a higherreturn back to investors. The easiest way
to explain the money and how muchmoney I get back? You know,
I think that we answer those questionswe are in good terms. So most

(01:02:36):
of the investment opportunities we have asa minimum of fifty thousand dollars investment um
and the goal that projections are betweena one point eight to two times six
E could amost supplier, which meansthe nearly double your money or double your
money and as period of time threeto five years. Holdings of the property.

(01:02:59):
And this property are commercial commercial realstate. There are complexes of UMM
apartments most of them are over ahundred units and a complex. That's that's
our niche and that's that you know, we we do have properties are new
uh they're called a class more likeyou know more um up, not a

(01:03:21):
lot of skill and no more,not a lot of defermaintance. But we
also buy workforce, housing and projectsthat are required um more capital expenditure and
renovations. So in order for someoneto get started, they act deck.
They actually have to have some capitaland uh, there's an entry point that

(01:03:43):
they play into. But then youso you guys come up with the business
plan, You come up with everythingfrom finding the properties to your they're they're
just buying into this investment is essentiallykind of what it is, right,
Yeah, yes, that's correct.Cool. I wish I had fifty K
to give you right now. Well, we also help other people. We

(01:04:04):
we in this year we helped elevenother people that were not not had any
experience with most the families to buytheir first the first deal um. And
that's part of what we coach onwhat you know, which we show them
and some some people can start withoutwithout capital. So the three things that

(01:04:25):
you need to get started is knowledge, capital and time. You know.
So if you if you don't havea knowledge, well that's what we're here
to help. If you have thetime, that's one of the most valuable
valuable assets. So as long asyou're willing to put in the time and
to learn, um, there's alwaysthat possibility. And another thing that I
would like to say, if youhave a network of people that that could

(01:04:46):
have the money, maybe you don'thave it, that's not you know,
a group of doctors, a groupof entrepreneurs, a group of somebody that
that dolse have and then you canestablish the credibility by joining us as a
group that has that datus success andthat can validate and add credibility to you.
You could be the link in factorto bring in those capitals to work.

(01:05:08):
So we have helped people to raisecapital and and that degree and then
we teach them that the business sothey can also take care of their investors.
So you know there's people that theydon't even know what potential they're seen
in UM by having those connections.So never close the door to a possibility.
M. One of the things thatcome to mind for me right now

(01:05:29):
is the word passive income, whichis used so often, and we talk
about social media so often. Onsocial media and there's so many different things
that are out there. I won'tuse any words that kind of disparage what
they do in their business whatever itis UM, but that are probably not

(01:05:50):
as ethical as as your business.So I'm interested in how you're able to
kind of, UM, widen thegap between them, the businesses that are
advertising or promoting themselves as I'll doair quotes as passive income versus a business
like yours that offers or provides apassive income. UM. There with the

(01:06:15):
way we close the gap and establishedthe credibility is by showing what we have
been able to do. I mentionedbefore from my primary job is working at
the hospital doing anesthesia, and Ihaven't been I haven't practiced for over a
year now. And there's that passionof because we have that passive income UM.

(01:06:39):
And so we are passively invested innine syndications and we are running nine
eight others. So yes, there'sa component of passive income coming in one
way. And ideally we want toput everything and to be impassive. Right,
So by showing our investors or potentialinvestors, UM, that's that's always

(01:07:00):
being able to do. I thinkthat goes to the gap play very good,
yeah, and actually were what Iwant to do is actually wide in
the gap between you and the oneswho are are the ones that we are
UM maybe assuming and I'm going touse that just because I want to just
be respectful to anybody out there um, but assuming that their business is unethical.

(01:07:23):
Um. But what I'm hearing aboutyour is that someone that is looking
for an investment opportunity. Um.Or the word or here's the word passive
income in an investment opportunity is thatit doesn't happen overnight. Is what I'm
hearing from you is that you stillworked. You're not into five. You
still worked a job that um,you know, as a nerve, as
both of you as being nurses,UM, that that earns a good capital.

(01:07:45):
It's not you know, it's nota just um, it's not a
minimum wage type of job. Youactually earn a pretty decent salary and take
a portion of that and you investedit in different places. And so the
word passive income. UM, we'regoing to now go into multiple streams of
income, which is what it soundslike we're getting into here because you mentioned
not just one syndication but eight syndications. So Chris, I see you're ready

(01:08:11):
to just jump on that, Sogo ahead and expand on that for us,
please. Yeah. Yeah, Soyeah, you have a lot there
the passive side of this. You'reright. It takes six to nine months,
maybe nine to twelve months, dependingon the business plan and the type
of the market before you start tosee any of that income coming back at

(01:08:33):
you. The annual income that comesback is we'll say anywhere is from three
to seven to ten percent annually,but it grows, so I might start
out at two or three the firstyear, and then as the business does
better, like I said, weincrease, we do the renovations, we

(01:08:53):
increase the rents, we decrease theexpenses. As that that operating income increases,
we're able to provide a better returnback to the investors as the property
stabilize. This right, and thenonce we get to stabilize them run for
a year or two, then wecan sell and um. But the cool
part too it Marcello mentioned earlier wasdepreciation. And there's there's what's called bonus

(01:09:17):
depreciation right now that we can dousing a cost segregation. It's able to
write off that income from your fromyour passive income, it's able to write
that off or whatever that dollar amountis that the bonus depreciation is able to
give you, or the appreciation itselfis able to give you. For those
that are invested into other properties andstuff, they know that and a lot

(01:09:40):
of entrepreneurs they understand the concept Ibuy this asset and I can I can
write it off this year, orI can write it off over three or
five years. That type of thing. That's what you get to do with
the real estate that we purchase.And so we share that with the passive
investors so that they're making income withoutincrease seeing tax burdens and if they do,

(01:10:02):
if they continue to invest, they'llcontinue to be able to write off
the tax burden. Sometimes when wedouble people's money, it doesn't cover everything.
Maybe it only covers fifty percent ofwhat we may do, and so
you're paying tax on maybe fifty percentof instead of the whole double will say,
I think we're trying to um clarifiedthat passive income is not going to

(01:10:28):
you know, start to moral rightbut to decide to invest today. And
I think that is a very realisticpoint to make because we actually do talk
to our investors that part of itis education, Like you invest and something
and you know, don't you buyit real state and wait, don't wait
to buy real stateless in real estate. UM, So that's one and setting

(01:10:53):
up the expectations appropriately when we explainthose investment opportunities to our investors. You
have to be clear that one investmentof one syndication is not gonna make you
wealthy. You know, that's that'sjust not going to happen. So setting
up those expectations, realistic expectations asa prime component of educating our investors,

(01:11:14):
because we don't want to mislead themand to and to believing that that that's
that's going to happen. Now wedo. We had a one investors specifically,
she wanted to have a fact incomeof set thousand dollars so she can
move to the last officials rita.She had this plan already in her mind,
so we gave her the breakdown whatshe needed to do in the next
year and a half and then threeyears and then by five year five she

(01:11:40):
will be tasted hearing ten thousand dollarsif she did what we told her to
do. So there is that,you know, we could create a specific
plan um and then you know,percent up to you now whether you want
to carry on that plan, it'sup to you, right, But that's
what we do. This this umone on one um for more like consultation
to say, okay, why areyour goals? And then and this is
the plan that we can create foryou so that you can achieve it.

(01:12:02):
But you're right, isn't no goingto happen overnight? Now? Some people
we have an investors right now thatit is put into point five million dollars
in one syndication. So it's likelihoodthat he can boldly achieve that goal rather
quickly. Right, So it alldepends on that specific scenario, that specific
person, you know, our business, how they can achieve those goals.

(01:12:26):
Yeah, you see. The otherthing that we do is we sit down
and we ask people, which whatis it that you're interested in, what
your risk tolerance, things like that, and that might be where you're wondering
the ethical side of things somewhat.Maybe the projection that people are showing is
a little higher. It might bea more risky environment. And um,

(01:12:48):
there's things like bland development and buildingfrom ground up that those The weight period
before you see a payout of anysort is much longer, but it can
be much more lucrative down the roadbecause you're starting with land or virtually nothing
on the property and you're developing thisasset that ends up being worth significantly more

(01:13:11):
than what it costs to build.And so there's that potential for a higher
return, but it comes with thatrisk of you have to wait three to
five years, and who knows thatthe market is going to be like in
three to five years, if thatPOE system to still be there, or
what if it's still going to bethat significant. Whereas with a business like
we're buying something are already established.We know that there's going to continue to

(01:13:34):
be renters for this property. Weknow that we're going to be able to
increase the revenue, We're going tobe able to do interior upgrades and such
that are going to help this propertyto do better and perform better. And
then we'll just when the market,when we come back around on the other
side of it, after the stabilization, we're able to sell it at a
higher value. I'm glad that wewent down this road because I think it's

(01:13:59):
not just apply to your business,but to many businesses and to anything out
there, that that nothing happens overnight, and if it does, that's where
we're going into that unethical place.If if you're thinking or if someone's pitching
it to you that way, Um, what what you've described to us as
very black and white, it's it'sthere's a business plan, UM, there's
a needs analysis that happens. There'sthere's a lot more that goes into this

(01:14:20):
than just invest and you're going tobe a millionaire. And I'm really happy
that you guys um shared that withus. And I also I am very
grateful that you were able to UMunderstand the question and be honest and ethical
and UM and authentic in your answer. So I really do appreciate that.
UM. I hope that if anybody'slistening and you're interested in this, you

(01:14:42):
do reach out to Chris and Marcellaabout this because obviously extensive knowledge they are
coaching. There's there's so much morethat you guys do in your business than
just invest money. And we've beentalking about this for the last hour here
in terms of the coaching, thementorship, the guidance, the resources,
the people that you have available toyou, and again just going back to
those little nuggets like I mean thatdepreciation, that bonus depreciation thing, you

(01:15:06):
know that that that's something that's anugget that comes out of a mastermind that
all of a sudden you learn howto use and now you're teaching to somebody
else. And then another nugget.So these things are happening, they're organic,
they're grassroot. I love it.It's beautiful. And so staying on
the grassroot idea, I want toget into a little bit of your philanthropy
and what you guys do in termsof giving back. So with your medical

(01:15:27):
background, you've used that to gooff and do medical missions, and I'm
interested in learning some more about thesemedical missions, how people can get involved,
and what you're doing to help others. Yeah, so I've been doing
medical missions then I don't know,like I thinking that it doesn't sense,

(01:15:49):
you know, it's none of it. But anyway, medical missions to different
parts of the country. While Iwasn't the Navy, I was able to
u coordinate medical I was actually amedical mission for a joint group of military
members I think without like six hundredand fifty military members to Hawaii and then

(01:16:10):
deployed six six clinics. So thatgave gave me also the knowledge and the
structure on bringing that kind of organizationsto different countries. So being from Mexico,
um that's one of the passions thatI have to give back and and
serving the community. However, wealso expand that to community outreaches to better

(01:16:31):
those communities. UM and we've beenable to do recently a Welshare distribution,
we do toy distribution for kids,UM meals prepping or helping organizations that are
ready and placed. So all ofthat is UM and actually I'm writing a

(01:16:53):
book where all of the profits areactually dedicated to help. This is for
China girls, about getting them intoa faith place to leave UM and getting
them education, so that those aresome of the things that we do know
when yeah, we've got a prettygood network of folks that are medical professionals

(01:17:17):
as well that don't necessarily need extraequipment with them to be able to provide
assistance, whether it's physical therapy,occupational therapy. UM. We've had some
other some other specialists as well asskilled carpentry and think electricians, things like
this that could come into the areaand help help underdeveloped places that maybe something's

(01:17:39):
been a little run down, maybethere's some neglect in the buildings or something,
and we can be able to Wewant to be able to utilize our
passive income to pay for those peopleto come in and take care of the
problems that the town people are arefacing. Doesn't just have to be one
or two families. We really liketo help the whole population with something that's
more stable then just walking in andsaying, yeah, here's your equipment,

(01:18:02):
we'll see you later. You know. We want to make sure that we're
getting those repairs done so the peoplewho would truly leading to impact their lives
long term. I'm watching a seriesright now on Netflix. The zac Efron
is traveling to different countries and doingdifferent things, and he was just in
uh, well he wasn't just in. It's just in terms of my mind,

(01:18:23):
because I just watched the episode,but it was he was in Puerto
Rico and he was visiting the townthat was pretty much devastated by the hurricane
had gone through there in uh whatwas it twenty twenty, I think,
or somewhere around there, and therewere so many things that so many people
displaced, as you said, anddevastated, but the ones that were there

(01:18:45):
was one community where a hotel wasactually built, Casa de Soul House of
the sun Um where this guy hisidea was to build a self a sustainable
hotel and having its own water supplyand its own um what's it called,
solar panels, and its own electricsupply and this was five years prior to

(01:19:08):
the hurricane, so he was hewas one of the only places where people
were able to come to and getelectricity and get water, take showers,
get coffee, UM and actually hehelped support that community and he kind of
it was featured in this episode.So the sustain the sustainability in these different
countries is so important to be ableto pass that on one thing, I

(01:19:29):
don't know if you if you haveany knowledge on this UM. I had
somebody on my podcast just recently whowas talking about a doctor who is helping
doctors in Haiti um through virtual becausethe because of what's happening in Haiti right
now, people aren't able to gothere, or if they are, they're
risking kidnapping or other things that arewe won't get into too right now.

(01:19:50):
But so what the doctors are doingis they're actually training the doctors in Haiti
via zoom and via camera over theirshoulders. I don't know, you seem
like you might be aware of that. I know some of it. Even
in the military they do some ofthe virtual UM consultations and even UM I'll

(01:20:12):
say remote surgeries. Yes, that'sexactly what we were talking about was remote
surgeries. Yeah, yeah, that'sthat's been around for a little while in
that in that area of the military. Um that there, they've been able
to develop and help help grow thatsum um. It's actually amazing. People
don't who don't necessarily believe in themilitary, but they don't realize how much

(01:20:34):
um in in in industrial and growthcomes from the military and the things that
they learned, especially during wartime situationsand things like that where they have to
find a better way and they findthat way and then eventually it makes its
way out to the marketplace and people, Oh I hate this free thing.

(01:20:57):
Yeah. Yeah. GPS is oneof them that came out of came out
from military years. Yeah, fordecades before like come into the civilian world,
like like the Hummer. I think, I think we benefit more from
the GPS. I appreciate that one. Yeah. I know. I'm very
grateful for the work that you youboth do and for sharing that I think.

(01:21:18):
Um, you know, it's it'sfunny because you know, doing great
work in other countries and non forprofit work is wonderful, but it starts
at home, and you guys trulyexemplify that by starting just right right with
your team members, with your VAteam, with with the people internally and
the coaching that you do. Itstarts at home. So like when when

(01:21:40):
I'm thinking about our listeners right now, if if you're feeling overwhelmed or feeling
as though like, hey, Idon't have enough to give back to other
countries or to go on medical missions, or I don't have the time.
We all get that, but youcan just give back to somebody that's just
right on your team, just givingthem your time and attention. And you
said that, Marcella, time andattention, right, that's your mom gave
you right, So so much ofthat goes back to there. Um.

(01:22:04):
As I conclude the show, Ialways like to ask for your mantra and
um what you live by, andso I'm interested in both of you,
with Chris or Marcella, whichever oneI'll lead on this one, is uh,
what is your mantra? What doyou live by? What inspires you
to get up every day and dowhat you do. We're a team for
sure, and you know she talkedabout the business and that we exist to

(01:22:28):
elevate others. You know, wereally we really enjoy being able to get
back to people and you know,we do multiple meetups and other engagements where
we're able to have one too manykind of like this conversations and uh an
interaction and you know that's I feellike that's really what drives us, is

(01:22:51):
being able to elevate others. Andfor me, it's to take action actions
that it has to be that actionshould follow your intention um and it's senior
to the intention because you have tobe doing something, yes, having the
intention to reach this or or achievethis, and that it's not going to

(01:23:11):
happen if you don't take action.And I will say that people are here
listening to this. There's so manythings that hopefully that that you can get
inspired to look up and to starttaking action. Um. Like I said,
being being that there is in theposition that we are now financially,
physically, um and and it's spirituallytogether. It doesn't come with with like

(01:23:34):
you don't wake up to this.You know, you have to take action.
You have to be intentional, butyou have to do it like there's
nobody else is going to come anddo it for you, nobody else,
So you're just going to have todo it. It's either that or you're
just going to start dissimilating slowly,so you know, and an action has
to be purposeful. So taking actionand being purposeful, and purposefulness comes from

(01:23:57):
setting up your goal. What's importantto you? Like you say, what
keeps you awake? Like you know, I wake up and and I'm big
and how can I can I helpmore people? How can I make up
bigger impact? I'm you know,being again medical and military? It said.
It was a continuous reminder that weare not here forever you even we've
seen so many people that die onthe table or dice and and and the

(01:24:20):
way it is to the emergency room, like death's going to happen to all
of us, right, So oror way of living or own legacy is
gonna end. When when will youdie? Right? Unless you can fat
enough people that you're they're going toremember you. So my my my um

(01:24:42):
goal was to help fifty people becomemillionaires. That was my my small little
goal. But after meeting mister Cardoonhas definitely sent the next thing that he
wants to impact the entire world population. So I will challenge your your audience,
challenge all of us to say,Okay, what is it that that
that you're thinking too? Small niceand what's going to get you there is

(01:25:05):
taking your taking action. So Iwill definitely say action is my matra.
I love that. What is itthat you're thinking too small on? I
like that. That's a good oneand taking action. I'm gonna give a
little plug here because that's that's thename of my live show that we we
host quarterly is called to Take Action. Uh So it's and it's all about

(01:25:26):
taking action in your life and inyour business, and it's having people like
yourself on my panel. UM So, I would love it you got to
fly in from wherever you are becauseI know you're in Austin, Indianapolis,
going all over the country. Isaw you had properties in Cleveland and all
over the country. UM, Iwould love to have you on my panel
for my take Action events. We'rewe're gonna be starting season two up in
in the spring, and so itwould be be wonderful to have you guys

(01:25:49):
on the panel. Uh. Thisis this has been a tremendous experience.
UM. I want to just goto the legacy piece here, and it's
only because um you mention that aboutlike when we die and I actually attended
today on YouTube my funeral a memorialservice for UM, one of my grandmother's

(01:26:11):
closest relatives, and I was fortunateto be able to attend it because it
was done actually in Ohio. Actuallythat's where her her last resting place was,
and her her sons put on thememorial service today at noon Eastern time
UM and and streamed it live onYouTube. And I don't know if it
was a priest or or whoever wasrunning the service was talking about our legacy,

(01:26:33):
and he was just speaking about howamazing it is that this woman who
died in her eighties has left behindthis legacy of people joining in person that
we're able to attend in person,but also UM that took time out of
their day to view and be apart of the live stream on YouTube and
be a part of it. AndMarcella Chris, it speaks to our legacy

(01:26:57):
that we leave behind. Is likeyou know, I'm I'm for you know
she was She's in her eighties,so obviously she's twice my age and or
wasn't right right twice my age,But this woman had an impact on my
life significant enough that my mother didn'ttell me to join the lie. I
found out about it through my cousin, and you know, nobody told me
I needed to be there. Nobodyknew Oh, I mean they knew I

(01:27:17):
was there because of course I sentthe heart emoji and everything, but nobody
needed to know that I was there. The point is is that I was
there just because of her legacy,because of the impact that she left on
my life. And so I justwant to just put that, like into
perspective for people that we we allleave a legacy on somebody, We all
eave an impact on someone, andso why not make it a positive one?

(01:27:38):
Right? So yeah, I lovethat. Well, I want to
thank you guys so much for joining. I know that you're also on your
vacation, so I want to giveyou time back. I am so grateful
for having both of you on andsharing your knowledge, your information that you
did on your business, but alsojust sharing your time with us, sharing
everything that you have if. Ofcourse, all of this will be in

(01:28:00):
the show notes, but could youplease just share with everybody if they'd like
to get in touch with you,how they could via social media or email
or any other way. The easiestway is to find us on our website.
It's ups dot com, UPDASHPLX.Dot com. You can always email
us at invest at uplos dot comand also has the dash and we're in

(01:28:21):
social media and all platforms. Butin Instagram you can find me as the
Immigrant Millionaire at the Underscore Immigrant UnderscoreMillionaire. I have to make it difficult,
um, but there's there's all theselinks, and we do a lot
of free events. We have oneand over the weekend we have a weekly

(01:28:42):
clubhouse. All of those links youcan find them there and we have a
lot of content that is free againon our YouTube channel. UM that if
you're interested in investment, that thatwill be the place to go so that
you can start understanding like the strategies, but accessible through our website. Yeah.
Also awesome, awesome, Well,thank you so much for sharing everything.

(01:29:02):
Yeah, everything's there on the website, is also on your Facebook page.
As I saw that you have thewebinars and everything that you guys do
for free, which is definitely appreciatedby everyone. I want to thank you
again for coming on the show.It's been wonderful meeting both of you and
also OI. I can't, Ican't, and thank you very much for
your service. Your service in themilitary is very well appreciated here. Thank

(01:29:23):
you so much, Thank you verymuch, thanks for being the thin.
Thank you for listening to The MichaelEsposito Show. For show notes, video
clips, and more episodes, goto Michael Espositoinc. Dot com backslash podcast.
Thank you again to our sponsor,dent Ten Insurance Services helping businesses get
the right insurance for all their insuranceneeds. Visit Denten dot io to get

(01:29:47):
a quote that's d N t Ndot io and remember when you buy an
insurance policy from Denten, you're givingback on a global scale. This episode
was produced by Uncle Mike at theiHeart Studios in Poughkeepsie. Special thanks to
Lara Rodrean for the opportunity and myteam at Michael Esposito Ang

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