How to Scale Commercial Real Estate

Sam Wilson
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How to Scale Commercial Real Estate

Remove the guesswork from real estate investing and establish a clear path for consistent returns. Here, building wealth is straightforward and fun.Discover how commercial real estate investors from all over the world got where they are today, how you too can generate truly passive, tax-efficient income, and confidently invest in real estate, even in the face of risks and unknowns.Real estate has made more people wealthy than any other form of investment. However, it can come with a steep learning curve and high risks if you don’t know what you’re doing.If you are a business owner who dabbles in real estate and wants to grow your portfolio or expand your network, you are in the right place.Welcome to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate. On the show, we expose the most important, needle-moving real estate investment strategies, leading you to maximize your returns. This is your friendly guide to getting past the roadblocks of investing in real estate so you can sail smoothly toward creating the financial and time freedom you’ve been wishing for.The best minds in real estate give you the tips and tricks to scale your real estate investment portfolio. Listen to industry professionals as they reveal insider secrets that helped them acquire multimillion-dollar assets in a strategic way.Hear details about the most crucial and painful mistakes they made in real estate so you know what to avoid and how to plan carefully throughout your real estate investing journey.Learn about leverage, real estate metrics that matter, and gain valuable resources, connections, and tips that will shift your mindset toward an immediately more prosperous, passive income-generating path.Discover how investors build high-performing teams and find the best deals and then implement their advice to build your own robust real estate portfolio. Your host, Sam Wilson, is passionate about helping you fully grasp real estate fundamentals and know what to look for in any real estate deal, whether residential, commercial, short-term or syndication. Real estate syndications are group investments in large commercial assets where you can invest your money passively, alongside dozens of others (including Sam!) and earn reliable passive income through distributions and equity. Sam Wilson is an active investor in self-storage, multi-family apartments, RV parks, laundry facilities and single-family homes, bringing vast industry knowledge from a diverse background to the show. Unlike other established real estate investors, Sam is in the middle of his own growth journey. He invites you to rise alongside him and his team members as, with each conversation, he’s learning too! Sam is the Founder of Bricken Investment Group, where he helps clients find commercial real estate syndication investments that align with their investing and lifestyle goals. Likewise, this podcast guides listeners through real estate’s steep learning curve to mitigate the risks. If you want to be a successful real estate investor without necessarily becoming a landlord, you need real estate syndication investments in your life. Growing and diversifying your portfolio and high-worth network boils down to making the right investing decisions and surrounding yourself with a like-minded, growth-pursuing community. It starts right here. Jump into the discussion of How To Scale Commercial Real Estate with Sam Wilson at https://brickeninvestmentgroup.com/podcast/. Together, we'll achieve life-changing growth and invest in commercial real estate assets ripe with strong fundamentals, leading to the financial and time freedom we’ve been dreaming of.

  1. APR 22

    Exploring the Potential of Credit Trade and Hotel Development in Commercial Real Estate

    Today’s guest is Greg Friedman.   Greg has more than 23 years’ hospitality experience with an emphasis on deal-structure and financing. He successfully has led Peachtree in more than $8 Billion in hotel acquisitions, investments and development since co-founding the company.    Show summary: In this podcast episode, Greg Friedman shares his insights on the commercial real estate landscape, focusing on the lucrative opportunities in credit trade for financing acquisitions, developments, and recapitalizations. He recounts Peachtree's adept navigation through economic downturns like the Great Financial Crisis and the pandemic, crediting proactive investment strategies. Greg also discusses the hotel industry's potential, driven by favorable supply-demand dynamics. -------------------------------------------------------------- Introduction (00:00:00)   Greg Friedman's Background (00:01:07)   Influence of Family and Entrepreneurship (00:02:00)   Navigating the Great Financial Crisis (00:04:29)   Investing During Market Disruption (00:06:39)   Hotel Investment Strategies (00:09:23)   Opportunities in the Hospitality Space (00:12:11)   Investment Risks and Opportunities (00:13:17)   Lending and Financing Strategies (00:16:58)   Target Audience and Demand Profile (00:18:44)   Conclusion and Contact Information (00:20:30) --------------------------------------------------------------   Connect with Greg: Web: https://www.peachtreegroup.com/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Greg Friedman (00:00:00) - Across all commercial real estate. I think the best opportunity set is on the credit side. The credit trade me hands down, is the most compelling trade today. And if you're doing direct lending, you know where you're financing groups to go out and acquire and develop assets or even recapitalize existing assets. And a lot of cases were, you know, ultimately driving from a standpoint of the investments we're making, we're getting, you know, outcomes that are very similar to what we would be getting if we were investing on the equity side.   Intro (00:00:29) - Welcome to the how to Scale commercial real estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:42) - Greg Friedman, thank you for taking the time to come on the show today. I certainly appreciate having you. Come on.   Greg Friedman (00:00:48) - Yeah. Thank you Sam. I appreciate the opportunity to be on the show with you today.   Sam Wilson (00:00:51) - Absolutely. Greg, as our listeners know, normally I give the guest bio there in the beginning, telling all about the guest and where they come from.   Sam Wilson (00:00:58) - But instead, we're going to skip straight to the same question I ask every guest who comes on the show in 90s or less. Can you tell me, where did you start? Where are you now, and how did you get there?   Greg Friedman (00:01:07) - Definitely. so, you know, I graduated from University of Texas at Austin back in 1999. I spent, you know, about eight, you know, 8 or 9 years in banking before I started Peachtree going back, you know, to 2007. And, you know, Peachtree, when I originally started it, it was a, you know, small family office that we were focused on going out and acquiring and developing hotel assets. And like all businesses, we've transitioned through the years and we've transitioned into a vertically integrated private equity firm that invests across, you know, all commercial real estate property type. So we invest, you know, still very heavily across the hotel space. But we also have investments across all commercial property types as well as we have investments outside of real estate as well.   Greg Friedman (00:01:49) - And then as I mentioned, we're vertically integrated. So we own an operation development lending asset management company, so forth.   Sam Wilson (00:01:56) - That is fantastic. Did you grow up in a family of entrepreneurs?   Greg Friedman (00:02:00) - You know, I did. So my my grandfather was a huge entrepreneur. He was a doctor by trade. And he, he also owned a bunch of real estate, like any good doctor that lived in a small town in Alabama, because I grew up right outside Tuscaloosa. He was, you know, he was very focused on not only being a doctor. He was an eye doctor. He was also focused on doing everything from owning commercial real estate, you know, to owning a home building business to owning movie theaters. So he was, you know, very entrepreneurial. So he was a huge influence on my life. And he, you know, owned hotel properties. And that was, you know, that's how I sort of got into the business because he owned a business that owned hotels, but also owned a hotel lending business.   Greg Friedman (00:02:43) - So I personally grew up around the business before, you know, professionally getting into the, hospitality business on the lending side, when I graduated college.   Sam Wilson (00:02:51) - Got it. And so was that. I guess maybe that's the answer, the question that's kind of what gave you the bug early on that said, hey, this is this is kind of the direction we're going to take, but what did you decide to do differently? Maybe, you know, when you launched Peachtree that your family wasn't already involved in.   Greg Friedman (00:03:08) - Yeah. So, you know, at this point in time, when I launched Peachtree, my family was pretty much out of the hotel business outside of, you know, some limited investments. So it was, you know, my grandfather, unfortunately, he was, you know, at this point in time, he passed away shortly after I started Peachtree, but didn't have a lot of, you know, he had sold off most of his investments. And same for my mom, who was a big influence as well.   Greg Friedman (00:03:29) - But, but really went in and, you know, initially thought I was going to, you know, just focus because I knew the hotel business from a professional perspective that was out there financing, capitalizing hotel projects and have financing capitalized over 300 hotel projects across the US when I was on the banking side, so I wasn't necessarily looking to duplicate what the family business had done. I was trying to really create my own legacy. And, you know, with myself and I had a partner that still is involved in the business today. The two of us both wanted to create our own legacies, to go out, you know, acquire and develop hotel properties. And we had, you know, our own capital that we were investing. So, you know, personally was using my capital along with my partner. And then our family members were investing heavily. So my grandfather, my mom and so forth were big investors. Initially when we went out and acquired developed assets, when we set up a business.   Sam Wilson (00:04:20) - Got it.   Sam Wilson (00:04:20) - You launched that in 2007. That seems like the prime time to, get heavily into commercial real estate. How did you weather the next 3 or 4 years?   Greg Friedman (00:04:29) - Yeah. So we're good at picking timing here. So we picked it in May of 2007 when we formed Peachtree. And and that was probably the absolute peak before the great financial crisis. And so we, you know, so we went out and, you know, made about eight, 8 or 9 investments across the lodging space, in 2007 timeframe where we bought some land parcels that we ended up developing into hotels shortly thereafter, or we bought actual hotel assets. And it was, it was sort of interesting, just as I reflect on it, because, you know, it was probably the best lesson, you know, for us on the business side, because we quickly went from, you know, being able to play offense, meaning we were able to make investments to happen to play, you know, truly play defense because we were going through one of the, you know, worst economic situations of all time.   Greg Friedman (00:05:17) - With the great financial crisis that really took hold by the mid part of 2008. And, and we successfully navigated through that environment, not only do we end up producing, you know, decent returns, we, you know, all those investments we made, we actually made positive returns on every investment we made pre, great financial crisis. But we were we were super active. We were, you know, very good about not only playing defense but being able to go out and play offense and buy a lot of distressed debt during the great financial crisis. You know, where we bought over, you know, 50 loans. We bought a lot of hotels that were in distress on the real estate side as well. And we bought, you know, we developed a bunch of hotels from the ground up in the middle of the great financial crisis. So we had a lot of success making new investments as well as playing defense. And, you know, being able to, you know, really optimize and drive the returns across our, you know, our existing investments at that point in time during the great financial crisis.   Sam Wilson (00:06:13) - It sounds like you guys were. What? Let's be brave when others are fearful. Like you guys were brave when others were fearful in in this time. What? What did you guys do differe

    21 min

  2. APR 17

    How to Get Money for Real Estate Deals Without Relying on Traditional Money Lenders

    Today’s guest is Jay Conner.   Jay Conner has been buying and selling houses since 2003 in a town of only 40,000 people with profits now averaging $78,000 per deal. He has Rehabbed over 475 houses and been involved in over $118 Million Dollars in Transactions.   Show summary: In this episode, Jay Connor discusses the advantages of using private money and private lending over traditional banking methods for real estate investments. He shares his personal success story of raising $2.15 million in private funds within 90 days. Jay also highlights the importance of mastermind groups, building a strong team, and the transition from mobile homes to single-family houses. Additionally, Jay promotes his book "Where to Get the Money Now?" which offers a step-by-step guide to funding real estate deals, and he provides a special offer for listeners to receive an autographed copy.   -------------------------------------------------------------- Mastermind Groups (00:00:00)   Background and Journey (00:00:45)   Transition to Private Money (00:02:22)   Deployment of Private Money (00:03:49)   Protection for Private Lenders (00:04:38)   Applicability to Commercial Real Estate (00:05:59)   Building a Strong Team (00:06:52)   Automation and Delegation (00:10:03)   Efficiency and Growth (00:11:48)   Raising Capital Strategies (00:14:31)   Raising Private Money (00:16:35)   Mindset and Rejection (00:21:40)   Book Recommendation (00:22:24)   Offer for Listeners (00:22:46)   The giveaway (00:22:55)   Raising money principles (00:23:39)   Thank you and closing (00:23:56) -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Jay: Web: www.JayConner.com   Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jay.conner.marketing   Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/privatemoneyauthority/   Free Book: https://www.jayconner.com/book   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Jay Conner (00:00:00) - My business started to skyrocket, like overnight when I started joining really good mastermind groups, mastermind groups of where I, fellow like minded individuals are in real estate investing and have been doing it a while. I'm not listening to advice from somebody that hasn't even done their first deal yet, right? I'm listening to advice from fellow mastermind members that are doing 50 plus deals a year. Welcome to the how.   Intro (00:00:33) - To Scale Commercial Real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:45) - Jake Connor has been buying and selling houses since 2003, in a town of only 40,000 people, with profits now averaging $78,000 per deal. He has rehabbed over 475 houses and been involved in over $118 million in transactions. Jay, you've been on the show before. It's really great to have you back for round two. Thanks for coming on today, Sam.   Jay Conner (00:01:08) - Thanks so much for having me back. Talking about my favorite subject in topic. And that's private money and private lending, because quite frankly, that in and of itself has had more of an impact on our real estate investing business ever since 2003.   Sam Wilson (00:01:24) - Absolutely. Jay, I asked this question to every guest that comes on the show, and so I have to ask it for the listeners maybe that didn't hear your first episode in 90s or less. Where did you start? Where are you now? How did you get there?   Jay Conner (00:01:40) - So where did I start? I grew up in the housing business with my dad, Wallace Conner, and at one time he was the largest retailer of mobile homes, manufactured housing in the nation. So I grew up, you know, being around a family that was that helps people own a home. So in the early 2000, the consumer financing for that product went away across the nation. And I knew if I ever wanted to, if I ever got out of mobile homes, I wanted to get into single family houses. Now I've done commercial as well. I've done condominium developments and, shopping centers. But my focus has been single family houses. So how did I get to where I am today? Well, I'll tell you.   Jay Conner (00:02:22) - In short, from 2003 to 2009, I relied on institutional money and local banks to fund our real estate deals. And in 2009 January 2009, I had a rude awakening. I was on the phone with my banker, and I learned that my line of credit had been closed with no notice. January of 2009 I'd done a ton of deals with my banker, and of course, during that time, they were not loaning out money to real estate investors anymore. So I knew I had to find a better and quicker way to fund my real estate deals. So right after that, I was introduced to this concept of private money private lending, self-directed IRAs. I'd never heard of any of that stuff. And so in less than 90 days, I raised $2,150,000 in private money and lending from individuals through connections that I have and had. And since that time, I've not missed out on a deal for not having the money.   Sam Wilson (00:03:27) - That is fantastic. It, $2.15 million in less than 90 days. Yes, you had the context or contacts to do that, but what did you have them invest into? I mean, it's one thing to go out and say, hey, I have, you know, this is the thing we're doing, but where did that money get deployed so rapidly.   Jay Conner (00:03:49) - In single family houses? So I had houses under contract to buy and close on before I knew that, you know, that my, my line of credit had been shut down and so but I only needed, $500,000 or so to take those houses down. So the other $1.5 million we started putting to use on other deals that we were negotiating on, you know, over that 90 day period.   Sam Wilson (00:04:20) - Got it. One of the things I think, that you've always stressed to your lenders is they are direct investors. Their name is on the they, you know, not just a promissory note, but they hold the deed of trust or I guess, you know, depending on what state you're in, I'm not sure how North Carolina does it or the mortgage. is that still the case today?   Jay Conner (00:04:38) - That is the case. Everything that we do with single family houses is what we call one offs. So what do we mean by a one off? Well, a one off is that you've got a private lender, which by the way again we're not talking institutional money.   Jay Conner (00:04:51) - These are individuals. These are human beings just like you and me, using their investment capital and or their retirement funds to invest in our deals. And so you have a private lender or maybe a couple of private lenders that are funding a single family house. And as you said, they get the problem. They get the same protection as a bank, right? They get a promissory note, they get the mortgage or the deed of trust here in North Carolina that collateralize that note. So we're not borrowing unsecured funds. They get named as the mortgage on the insurance policy. That's another layer of protection. We name them also as additional insured on the title policy. So we give them the same protection as the bank. So the private lenders are not having any kind of equity position. It's not joint venturing. The private lender acts in the same capacity as the bank. And it is our entity, our company that owns the properties. Right, right.   Sam Wilson (00:05:47) - And that makes perfect sense. And for those of you who are listening to this, go and wait, Sam, why are we talking about private lending on single family homes? On the how to scale commercial real estate podcast? It's because the principles are the same.   Sam Wilson (00:05:59) - Not only do I think the principles are the same in the in the way that you can utilize this strategy in commercial real estate, because I think, as you mentioned, you may have done that with shopping centers and with other things. but it also could give you something else in your tool belt. Another way to think about how to take down a deal, because there's there's not a one size fits all approach to how we finance and take down assets, even on the commercial. And I think even especially on the commercial real estate side, where you get into some very, very creative financial structures. So this, this may be just one more thing in your, in your toolbox that you can go, oh, here's, here's a way I can plug somebody. And I know that has a lot of capital that maybe could help us get this deal done. So very cool. It sounds to me when you mention all of this, like, you have to have a great team behind you that is able to get all these eyes dotted and t's crossed.   Sam Wilson (00:06:52) - Otherwise this becomes an administrative nightmare.   Jay Conner (00:06:55) - Absolutely. The team is so important. So who are the team members? Well, first of all, it's my opinion. You're not really in business as a real estate entrepreneur or investor until you have a relationship with an excellent real estate attorney. As a matter of fact, our real estate attorney is right next door down the sidewalk, about ten feet, so that's pretty convenient. I've been with the I've been using the same firm, the same group of people, ev

    25 min

  3. APR 8

    From Medicine to Money: Dr. Joseph Ryan's Journey into Commercial Real Estate

    Today’s guest is Ryan Smolarz.   Dr. Joseph Ryan Smolarz is the founder of STOR, leveraging his experience as an entrepreneur and Otolaryngology practitioner to guide people toward financial sovereignty.   Show summary: In this podcast episode, Dr. Joseph Ryan, a former otolaryngologist and founder of Store Partners, shares his transition from medicine to commercial real estate, focusing on self-storage facilities. He highlights the importance of team building, relationship-driven negotiations, and ethical business practices. Dr. Ryan also discusses his podcast, "Medicine and Money Show," and invites listeners to connect with him for educational discussions on investing. -------------------------------------------------------------- Building Successful Teams (00:00:00)   Introduction to the Show (00:00:31)   Dr. Joseph Ryan's Background (00:00:44)   Transition to Real Estate (00:01:10)   MBA and Transition to Real Estate (00:02:08)   Challenges and Enlightenment from Higher Education (00:04:27)   Transition to Self-Storage Focus (00:09:42)   Staying in Self-Storage Lane (00:11:41)   Decision-Making and Deal Selection (00:11:47)   Managing Capital and Acquisitions (00:13:57)   Challenges in Business Growth (00:15:51)   Remote Operations and Team Building (00:19:51)   Finding Deals and Relationship Building (00:20:59)   Building Rapport and Deal Cycles (00:23:26)   Conversation with Potential Investors (00:25:03)   Conclusion and Call to Action (00:26:19) -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Ryan: Web: https://storpartners.com/#/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joseph-ryan-smolarz-4803a81/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: *Ryan Smolarz * (00:00:00) - Where I think the, you know, the Alpha lies in building the teams. we have a big focus on that. And, trying to find people who were who were all rowing in the same direction with. I find that super important. you know, the when you know, you have a good team, when one person on the team doesn't like the decision, but everybody else does, and they are rowing even faster in the same direction that everybody else is.   Intro (00:00:31) - Welcome to the how to Scale Commercial real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:44) - Doctor Joseph Ryan is the founder of store. That's. That's spelled excuse me store. He leverages his experience as an entrepreneur and otolaryngology practitioner to guide people toward financial sovereignty. Ryan, welcome to the show.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:00:59) - Hey, thanks for having me. Sam, this is going to be great.   Sam Wilson (00:01:02) - Absolutely. The pleasure's mine. Ryan. There are three questions I ask every guest who comes on the show in 90s or less.   Sam Wilson (00:01:07) - Can you tell me where did you start? Where are you now? And how did you get there?   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:01:10) - I started in 2017. I realized that, going from room to room as a doctor wasn't going to allow me to retire. And, once I decided that I ended up in a month, I was sitting at a desk in the in an MBA program in Miami. And, so we decided to get into commercial real estate. We, built a assisted living home and started an e-commerce company. Like a lot of people kind of, diversified out. And now we're sort of the diverse offering, if that's a word I'm not even sure, down into more of a focus. And, self storage is certainly one of those. And, where we're going, we want to do right by our investors, raise capital and buy, self storage facilities and, you know, do the best we can for, for our people, our investors, the people who believe in us and treat us well.   Sam Wilson (00:02:07) - Got it.   Sam Wilson (00:02:08) - Now, you're you're an EMT and you decide that you want to do. You said going room to room as a doctor isn't really going to lead us to where we want. So you went to get your MBA? Yeah. It sounds like more education. I mean, you're already super highly educated. So what what was the kind of thinking there or thought process there? And how did you get how did getting an MBA lead you to real estate?   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:02:29) - Yeah. So, when I was what happened was, I woke up one morning and decided I wanted to go on a surf trip, and I had no idea how to get into my bank account to see if I had enough money. I didn't even know what bank we banked at. So my wife took care of all of that. and so I realized that, you know what? Maybe, money is not fun tickets. And I should probably take it a little more seriously. Right? So doing the things that I do, I sort of take it to the extreme.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:03:06) - And I was like, well, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to go all the way. So let's learn how to do business and the whole bit. And so, yeah, the next month I was in that MBA program and, kind of spiraled from there. you know, I realized that I really liked it. And in that moment, I became, an investor instead of a consumer. And I can tell you that that was one of the most powerful things that's ever happened to me. or, you know, my children's birth and and raising them and my wife and the relationships, but just the outlook on life. my thought process sort of switch from thinking about, you know, watches or cars or whatever it was to solving the world's problems and, capitalism. And, you know, how can we take those thoughts and, you know, do something with them and change the world for better? And, man, it was life changing.   Sam Wilson (00:04:05) - Did you do you feel like you.   Sam Wilson (00:04:07) - And I'm going to. I guess when I say this, I don't think of higher education as a place where people typically get enlightened to go be an entrepreneur. Even in the MBA program, how did was just the right school, the right timing? Was that the right people? Like what was the confluence of things that occurred to really inspire this in you?   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:04:27) - Yeah. So, you know, I was starting from absolute zero. I didn't know, you know, how a bank worked. I didn't know what an interest rate was, really. I mean, we had a mortgage on our house, but, you know, I was like, oh, it could have been 12, 15, 100. It wasn't. You know, I don't want to change anything for me. I didn't really grasp the concept of, you know what that meant. And, once I figured out that, you know, if you do understand business and you can, you can put these ideas into fruition. that there was always a place that there was, like, this itch I was trying to scratch, and I never could figure out what what it was that was off.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:05:12) - and almost instantaneously, when I made that, that jump, it was completely different. Like, I didn't have that feeling anymore. And so, yes, the MBA, the MBA program was really meant for people who are in that, you know, business, corporate ladder. But I just use the information in a totally different way. Right? I just took what they were telling me and applied it to where I wanted to apply it. and it really worked out perfectly.   Sam Wilson (00:05:44) - That's awesome. So you've gone from a guy that doesn't even know where he banks to now running funds, buying self-storage, raising capital. I mean, being very, very in the weeds in the finances.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:05:58) - Absolutely. Yeah. We did it, man.   Sam Wilson (00:06:00) - That is that's awesome. So what, outside of the MBA program, how did you then take the next steps to figure out? I know you mentioned the e-commerce business. You mentioned some other things along the way, but kind of give us the, the maybe the modified version of what happened over the last six years to get you where you are now.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:06:18) - Yeah. So I you know, I always had these ideas in my head about things that I wanted the bucket list. Right. What are the things in life that I want to accomplish? And, I had these ideas for some patents. And so, you know, one day I just said, you know what? We're going to write these patents and we're going to push it through the system and see what happens. And so we did, got a patent attorney and, started having the conversations and, wrote two patents. One of them is supposed to launch the product here in a couple of weeks. It's been, you know, almost five, six years of in production. Wow. yeah. So, you know, once I figured out that Wall Street sort of has this language that they don't want retail to know what it means and that, you know, I've been through medical school, got the anatomy under my belt and learn Latin and, you know, all the things that were really difficult to learn.   *Ryan Smolarz * (00:07:17) - I said, you know what? I think that, you know, the stereotype of doctors not being able to learn this stuff is just garbage. it was the same thing in flying a plane. You know, people told me that I couldn't be a pilot. I said, that's just garbage. so I'm going to go learn how to do it. And, you know, being a contrarian and it's just sort of the way I think and the, you know, you tell me I can't d

    27 min

  4. APR 1

    The Power of Delegation and Automation in Land Investing

    Today’s guest is Mark Podolsky.   Since 2001 Mark has completed over 6,000 raw land deals with an average return on investment of over 300% on cash purchases and over 1000% on land deals that he financed.   Free Book: https://landgeek.samcart.com/products/dirt-rich?utm_source=how-to-scale&utm_medium=podcast   October 2021 podcast:  https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/21693923   Show summary:  In this episode, Mark shares his journey from hands-on management to overseeing his business in just 30 minutes a week by building a capable team, establishing efficient systems, and utilizing technology for automation. He stresses the importance of delegation, staying focused on high-impact activities, and operating at a strategic level.    -------------------------------------------------------------- The importance of focusing on your comparative advantage (00:00:00)   Introduction to the show (00:00:39)   Mark Podolsky's impressive track record (00:00:52)   Mark Podolsky's return to the show (00:01:04)   Recent developments in land investing (00:02:08)   Automation and scalability in land investing (00:03:30)   Different methods of buying land (00:05:27)   The value of cash flow in financial security (00:08:51)   Adapting to economic cycles and mitigating risks (00:10:54)   Land as an inflation-resistant asset (00:13:44)   Strategies for land acquisition and investment focus (00:14:55)   Time management and life philosophy (00:16:37)   Scalability and automation in land investing (00:18:26)   Achieving business efficiency and learning from past experiences (00:19:35)   Leveraging comparative advantage and delegation (00:21:10)   Mark's offer (00:22:31)   Link in show notes (00:23:06)   Contact information (00:23:39)   Closing remarks (00:23:53) --------------------------------------------------------------   Connect with Mark: Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thelandgeek Web: https://www.thelandgeek.com/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Mark Podolsky (00:00:00) - Let's say, for example, you are, you know, the best at finding deals, right? Right. Like that's how you're making your money. You're, you're you're finding these deals, but you also type 135 words per minute. Right. And so you're like, well, I can I can hire someone at 80 words per minute. But they're not. I mean, they're fractionally as good as me. I might as well type it for myself. But the answer is no. You're comparative advantage, even though you're might be the best typer is going to be you're only should be focusing on deals, right? And letting everything else go.   Intro (00:00:39) - Welcome to the how to Scale Commercial Real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:52) - Since 2001, Mark Podolsky has completed over 6000 raw land deals, with an average return of over 300% on cash purchases and over a 1,000% return. That sounded like I just hit puberty.   Sam Wilson (00:01:04) - My goodness, Mark, where did that come from? 1,000%. Let's try that again. A thousand. Hey, whatever. We're going to leave it in there. I like this man. You made 1,000%. I don't care how you say the number. That's a lot on land deals that you financed. Mark, welcome back to the show.   Mark Podolsky (00:01:17) - Sam Wilson. Brother. Great to see you again. And look, I. You know, these these little puberty things. That's pretty cool.   Sam Wilson (00:01:26) - It is until you're until you're 42. And,, you know, you don't want to be there anymore. Hey, man, it's great to have you back on the show. For those of you who are listening. Today, Mark came on the show two, two and a half years ago. I don't have the episode number right in front of me. If you want to go back and listen to that, I would highly advise it, because what Marc does in that show is really breaks down the land investing business and what that looks like.   Sam Wilson (00:01:48) - We probably won't spend as much time on the nuances and kind of not the new, but maybe more time on the nuances today, but last time, kind of explaining what the land business is. So go back and listen to that if you want a primer for this episode. But today, Marc, it's great to just have you back on the show. We got lots of things to talk about. So tell me, I guess in the last two and a half years, what's been going on?   Mark Podolsky (00:02:08) - Well, I'll tell you that it's a good time to be a land investor. And the reason being is when we are doing our deals, we're paying cash. And so interest rates can do whatever they want. And it really doesn't matter. And so for us, it's been a great, you know, sort of bull market in in raw land investing. And we've seen our note portfolio increase now., gosh I don't even have the percentage. But it's it's really been exciting last two, two and a half years watching our clients get out of what I call civil economic dependency, which means if they're not personally working, they're not making any money and seeing how they've been able to quit their jobs, it would retire their spouses and have that security, knowing that when their passive income exceeds their fixed expenses, they're working because they want to, not because they have to write.   Sam Wilson (00:03:07) - No, that's hey, man, that's that's a great,, a great thing, certainly to strive for the land business, at least a lot of times what we see and other guests that we've had on the show that talk about the land business, it's a very active. It's like flipping houses, but without the house. I mean, is it how how does how does what we've kind of heard some people talk about versus how you do it, how do those two differ?   Mark Podolsky (00:03:30) - Yeah, that's a great question. So really, the last thing anyone wants to build from this build for themselves is another job. Right. And we see this happen all the time where people come in, they're enthusiastic, but then they don't have the wherewithal to start building systems, processes, playbooks, swim lanes to say, okay, how do I leverage my time for the highest impact activities? So the way that we teach this, and the way that we set up our own business is using software on the front end, inexpensive virtual assistants and software on the back end.   Mark Podolsky (00:04:10) - 90% of this business is automated and is scalable. And so it actually said, I've got my my second book. It's just about ready to come out in a few months. Dirt rich too. The plot thickens. How to scale your land business. And so I talk all about the pieces that you need in order to to grow, scale your lab business without making yourself crazy. And this really can be applied to any business that you're trying to grow., it's just it's just one of those things because. We think, well, we should be doing all of it and we don't scale. And so it kind of gets back to that sort of Michael Gerber E-myth piece as well. And, you know, are you the technician? Are you the,, you know, the other pieces of it and most people are coming in the technician and we want to become the CEO of our business.   Sam Wilson (00:05:08) - Right? Absolutely. Yeah. And the land business is a it's a is a very interesting business because there's a thousand ways you can do it.   Sam Wilson (00:05:16) - Like what I know you mentioned here, you mentioned early on a note portfolio like what's right. If there is any one particular strategy that you like to employ, what is it?   Mark Podolsky (00:05:27) - Yeah. So I like really three buying. Sort of simple ways to start to buy land. The first one is direct. So what we'll do is we'll do county research, we'll pick our county, and then we'll start looking at comparable sales. And essentially we'll take the lowest comparable sale in a county. We'll divide by four. That gives us what Warren Buffett call a 300% margin of safety. And we'll send direct offers to those people. And why are we doing that? Because we don't want to be in the appraisal business. If we send out a blind offer, then next thing you know, we're spending all our time on the phone appraising and negotiating. So this is just an offer. Take it or leave it. Maybe there's some room for renegotiating, but not much. Right. So that's the first way we can buy.   Mark Podolsky (00:06:14) - The second way we can buy is we can totally eliminate the aspect of getting a list, scrubbing a list, pricing a list, mailing a list, and we can go straight to a wholesaler. They've already done all this front end work, and now we're buying it at a premium of what the wholesaler bought it for. But they've left enough meat on the bone because our margins are so high that we can go in and make. Maybe 100 to 300% on our investment. So you've got retail, you've got a wholesale. And then let's say that you're really cash constrained. And you just want to sort of dip your toe in the water or you're just. Your capital is really dwindling. There's something that we have been teaching now called land arbitrage. And so land arbitrage is typically when someone like me will buy a piece of la

    24 min

  5. MAR 25

    Can Self-Storage Strategies Thrive in the Current Real Estate Market?

    Today’s guest is Ben Lapidus.   Ben Lapidus is the Chief Financial Officer for Spartan Investment Group LLC, where he has applied his finance and business development skills to construct from scratch a portfolio of over $500M assets under management, build the corporate finance backbone for the organization, and organize over $200M of debt capital from the firm. In addition to completing over 50 real estate transactions at and prior to Spartan, Ben is also the founder and host of the national Best Ever Real Estate Investing Conference and managing partner of Indigo Ownerships LLC.   Best Ever Conference Code Use code “INVEST” for $300 off any ticket type at https://www.besteverconference.com/   Show summary:  In this episode, Ben Lapidus joins Sam to discuss the nuances of the commercial real estate market, with a focus on self-storage and investment strategies. Lapidus shares his expertise on navigating the current market, the importance of robust business plans, and the challenges of finding attractive yields. They also talk about the Best Ever Real Estate Investing Conference, detailing how it adds value for passive investors and the innovative strategies used to attract them.    -------------------------------------------------------------- Self-Storage Market Insights (00:00:00)   Introduction and Background (00:00:37)   Current State of Self-Storage Market (00:02:03)   Investment Strategies and Passive Investors (00:03:34)   Conversion Deals and Opportunities (00:05:18)   Shift from Office to Self-Storage (00:06:00)   Interest Rates and Debt in Self-Storage (00:07:14)   Pricing Mechanism and Market Response (00:08:36)   Commercial Real Estate Market Overview (00:10:33)   Alternative Investments and Portfolio Allocation (00:11:57)   Best Ever Real Estate Investing Conference (00:13:46)   Strategies for Attracting Passive Investors (00:15:41)   Conference Organization and Team Management (00:18:28)   Closing Remarks and Special Discount (00:20:16)   Best Ever Conference (00:20:30)   Contact Information (00:20:50) -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Ben: Web: https://www.benlapidus.com/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Ben Lapidus (00:00:00) - If your business plan can survive 2 or 3 years of negative leverage, because you can take a low enough IRR that you can store enough cash on the side, then it is a great time. If your business plan is overly aggressive or you're trying to seek a very high IRR at a at a velocity of capital deployment, that's unachievable, then now is a bad time to make an investment. You might want to wait 12 or 18 months to do so. Welcome to the How to Scale Commercial Real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:37) - For those of you that don't know Ben Lepidus, you need to know him. I've known Ben. Now. What? Man? What's been seven, eight years at this point? Yeah. About to go about that. I met you normally, Ben. I love to do a long winded introduction about how great the guest is. You are a great guest. I'm. It's my honor to have you on the show today, but before I give you my own introduction, I'd love for you maybe just to come on the show today and tell us a little bit about who you are, and then we'll get into it from there.   Ben Lapidus (00:01:03) - Yeah. I'm the founder and host of the best ever Real estate investing conference., not the brand, just the conference. And,, was a founding team member of Spartan Investment Group, which bought a half a billion assets under management in self-storage, recently retired, but have a long history of buying single family multifamily self-storage assets over the last 12 years., recently or prior to that,, was in the adtech space, learned a lot about big data, started a study abroad company Costa Rica., and have tried several other startups that failed. So I'm an entrepreneur at heart and can't wait to talk about whatever you want to talk about.   Sam Wilson (00:01:36) - Dude, that's that's a whole lot. I mean, my gosh, that's a lot of moving pieces there. Most recently you were like you mentioned a,, a partner there at Spartan Investment Group where you guys bought an absolute ton of self-storage. Why don't you just give us maybe a high level view recording this? What? Its end of February 2024, high level view of where self-storage is now and then maybe is what you see across the commercial real estate space as a whole.   Ben Lapidus (00:02:03) - Yeah. So self storage still has incredible fundamentals. When you look at the supply demand of self-storage, it's gone from 1 in 11 households to one in less than nine households are leveraging self-storage or consuming self-storage just over the last 5 or 6 years. That's an incredible shift in demand in a 5 or 6 year period simultaneously, construction costs,, going up, interest rates going up have made new supply difficult. So the fundamentals that drive storage is still in a very attractive asset class. That's on the consumption side on the on the,, the consumer side, on the investor side, investors have wised up to it. So it's become incredibly competitive. And the the spread between what you can get on the equity side versus what you can borrow on the debt side, has been radically compressed., and it now mirrors one of the major five food groups. You've got all of this office money, which was the largest component of commercial real estate coming out of office. And it's number one place to place it is self storage.   Ben Lapidus (00:02:59) - And that's just a lot of moving money. So from an investment perspective, the supply and demand,, isn't as attractive as it used to be. So I think what we're going to see over the next two years is do rates compress faster than cap rates?, and do the supply and demand economics on the consumer side kind of create a skyrocket effect of occupancy and rental rates such that it's attractive enough despite the competitiveness on the investment side?   Sam Wilson (00:03:23) - Wow. That's a that that that's an impressive,, impressive insight there. So yeah, I guess, you know, in short, is now a good time to to be investing in self-storage.   Ben Lapidus (00:03:34) - Now, there is never a bad time to be investing in self-storage. To be clear, it's recession resistant. It's always going to go up because of those supply demand economics. It's just is this the best time to generate the cash flow that you need to kind of cross the chasm if you're buying in a negative leverage environment. And so it's really about your business plan.   Ben Lapidus (00:03:54) - If your business plan can survive 2 or 3 years of negative leverage because you,, can take a low enough IRR that you can store enough cash on the side, then it is a great time. If your business plan is overly aggressive or you're trying to seek a very high IRR at a, at a velocity of capital deployment, that's unachievable, then now is a bad time to make an investment. You might want to wait 12 or 18 months to do so, right?   Sam Wilson (00:04:18) - Right. What about what about that conversation with investors like as in passive investors? How does that work when you're looking at deals that may be negative leverage? I mean, is that even a conversation that's being had?   Ben Lapidus (00:04:30) - It is. And that's because you just kind of find a different investor profile as the yield moves from kind of value add to more opportunistic, you have to find the investors who are willing to take the risk return ride with you at the end of the spectrum where those yields are achievable and attractive. If you're trying to get, you know, a 6% cash flow with a 14% IRR on an asset, that's 70% stabilized, that's been in existence for ten years with no expansion potential, that's going to be really tough.   Ben Lapidus (00:04:59) - But if you can find a conversion opportunity or the doughnut hole in a state that is booming with those supply demand,, economics working in your favor on the consumer side, then you can achieve those 20, 25, 30% IRR on a ground up development or conversion deal or an expansion.   Sam Wilson (00:05:15) - What do you say when you say conversion deal? What comes to mind?   Ben Lapidus (00:05:18) - Yeah, conversion is just taking,, a space that is not used for storage today and converting it for,, storage purposes. If you if you like, like a Macy's, a Kmart, a Shopko and just converting it into kind of like how urban air. I don't know if you've got urban air where you are, but I. Here in Colorado, there's an urban air chain, which is like an indoor like,, pre-teen park for trampolines and stuff. And they've just been converting, you know, grocery stores basically into,, urban air adventure parks. It's the same thing with storage.   Sam Wilson (00:05:51) - Same thing with storage. Be it office.   Sam Wilson (00:05:53) - , I know I'm a passive investor in an office to storage conversion project right now.   Ben Lapidus (00:05:58) - Hotel to storage? Yeah, all sorts of things.   Sam Wilson (00:06:0

    21 min

  6. MAR 18

    A Deep Dive into Flex Warehousing with Portal Warehousing

    Today’s guest are Alex Morrison and Andrew Runnette.   Alex Morrison has broad experience across real estate, capital markets and startups. Alex currently is the founder and CEO of Portal Warehousing, an innovative real estate operating company in the flex warehousing space.   Show summary:  In this podcast episode, Andrew and Alex, co-founders of Portal Warehousing, discuss their innovative flex warehousing business. They detail how they provide small industrial spaces to various businesses, emphasizing the flexibility and services they offer, such as logistics support and community building for their members. They share their strategic approach to market underwriting, building selection, and the importance of location in gentrifying areas. Despite challenges in scaling and logistics, they highlight their efficient systems and the high demand for their spaces, evidenced by rapid occupancy rates. The co-founders invite building owners to consider management deals with Portal Warehousing, which seeks to expand its unique model nationwide. -------------------------------------------------------------- Intro (00:00:00)   Concept of Flex Warehousing (00:02:17)   Finding Properties and Plugging Tenants (00:07:17)   Membership Perks and Differentiation from Self-Storage (00:12:27)   Challenges in Scaling and Overcoming Them (00:17:08)   Underwriting Deals and Selecting Locations (00:18:17)   Underwriting Markets and Demand Generation (00:18:59)   Building Criteria and Location (00:20:12)   Real Estate Cost and Client Opportunities (00:21:34)   Minimum Building Size (00:23:07)   Conclusion and Contact Information (00:23:55) -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Alex and Andrew:  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/portalwarehousing  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/portalwarehousing/   Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/portal-warehousing/ Web: https://join-portal.com/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Alex Morrison (00:00:00) - They have very limited options after they outgrow their first space, which maybe is a garage, maybe a bedroom as they get to that next level., the options drop off. They need to sign a five year lease, and there's not a lot of space that's available sub 5000ft². So what portal is doing is being an institutional level provider of small warehousing space.   Sam Wilson (00:00:19) - Welcome to the how to scale commercial real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:32) - I've got Andrew and Alex with me here today from Portal Warehousing. Andrew and Alex, welcome to the show.   Alex Morrison (00:00:38) - Thanks so much for having us.   Andrew Runnette (00:00:39) - Absolutely.   Sam Wilson (00:00:40) - The pleasure's mine. I always asked every guest who comes on the show in 90s or less. Where did you start? Where are you now and how did you get there? And, Andrew, if you don't mind kicking us off by answering that question. And then Alex, I guess we'll have you be up next after that.   Andrew Runnette (00:00:55) - Yeah. No problem. Thanks for having us on., we started the company about three years ago., we just opened our fourth warehouse,, and we've got for,, Salt Lake, Tempe, Brooklyn and LA., it's been a journey, and we're, you know, we're growing and just moving on to the next one as we go. So I'll let Alex take it from there.   Alex Morrison (00:01:21) - Yeah. I mean, the the genesis of the company actually came at the start of Covid when the world changed. And, you know, traditional methods of real estate were kind of changed overnight. And I was based in LA, and the only thing you could, you could tour for the first six months of Covid were industrial buildings., so we looked at buying a lot of industrial buildings for my last,, the company I worked for lastly, which was a real estate private equity company. And ultimately that journey led us to developing an operating company that could plug into vacant real estate and add a lot of value.   Alex Morrison (00:01:54) - And that and that, you know, three years later is portal. And what we do is as effectively,, we're a co warehousing, flex warehousing operators. So we provide industrial space for businesses of all sizes to, to use for all sorts of purposes. But basically the solution is a flexible industrial product that,, serves a lot of needs on the logistics side and the warehousing side.   Sam Wilson (00:02:17) - Okay, that's really, really cool. I love that in the name again of your company is Portal Warehousing going to learn more about it? I think it's join-portal.com. So give me a breakdown on that. Like what's a who's a customer. What is flexible warehousing I know we talked about this before the show. You guys said something along the lines of, you feel like where you are now is where maybe self storage was 30 or 40 years ago. Kind of give us just a broad overview if you can.   Alex Morrison (00:02:43) - Yeah. Like I'd say from a fundamental perspective, if you think about an industrial business or an industrial user of space,, there's a long tail of users that are smaller.   Alex Morrison (00:02:53) - , you know, the Amazons of the world take on 50,000 100,000ft² plus of spaces, but there's a massive amount of companies that just need a couple thousand square feet or less space. And their options are super limited. So the genesis of portal was actually thinking about our network in the e-commerce space and learning, you know, their their kind of supply profile as you as you start a company and think about the last company you saw advertising or purchase from on Instagram, these companies have products they need somewhere to store them and fulfill them out of. They have very limited options after they outgrow their first space, which maybe is a garage, maybe a bedroom as they get to that next level,, the options drop off. They need to sign a five year lease, and there's not a lot of space that's available sub 5000ft². So what portal is doing is being an institutional level provider of small warehousing space.   Sam Wilson (00:03:42) - Got it. An institutional provider of small warehousing space. Is this kind of I mean, we're going to use this maybe not even the right term, but I mean, we see it happening across Airbnb ten years ago, you know, hey, we're working.   Sam Wilson (00:03:55) - We're doing you know, people are renting out their houses on Airbnb. We're seeing it happen in the parking industry where we're, you know, anybody with a lot that can park a semi and some other things those get, you know, turned into,, you know, semi parking spaces. And you guys kind of saw this, I guess same opportunity in again, smaller, potentially unused spaces. And or maybe you're taking big buildings and converting them I don't know. I mean it's that kind of am I thinking along the right lines here.   Alex Morrison (00:04:21) - Yeah, exactly. The thought is there is a massive amount of of customers out there that need a functional place to operate. They don't need the 32 foot clear class A building. They just need an industrial logistics environment with a dock door and loading in a commercial address. And we can take spaces that range from your class A warehouse to, you know, our newest location in Brooklyn is actually on the seventh floor of a multi-story, you know, a true multi-story warehouse that was built 100 years ago with freight elevators and logistics for that manufacturing kind of company.   Alex Morrison (00:04:52) - We can plug our customer in. That just needs a highly functional space,, and some logistics services and basically fill buildings that, you know, are antiquated from today's traditional logistics perspective.   Sam Wilson (00:05:06) - Got it. Okay. That's really, really cool. Tell me, I guess when you you guys are all over the country, you said Salt Lake City, Tempe, Brooklyn, Los Angeles. How how do you underwrite? How do you even figure out if this model will work where you guys are going?   Alex Morrison (00:05:24) - I mean, we there is an enormous demand. We think this product works in, in every city. We have to be smart on location. We're really focused on infill amenities markets. If you think about our customer profile, which Andrew can kind of jump into a little bit, they want to be in a convenient we're really selling convenience as well as space here. The core product is space, but it's also the alternatives are very slim. So our customers are paying for for high quality functional space near where they where they work.   Alex Morrison (00:05:55) - So generally that means last mile locations that are infill. They'd rather be in downtown LA than going out to the Inland Empire, for example. And Andrew, one of you, you know, show Sean some of our story, Sam, some of our,, example kind of customers that we work with.   Andrew Runnette (00:06:13) - Yeah. We've seen a lot of crossover sand between, you know, people doing industrial work but also doing e-commerce work, but also using the spaces where they work out of

    25 min

  7. MAR 11

    Navigating Challenges and Opportunities in Commercial Real Estate Financing

    Today’s guest is Ben Fraser    Ben Fraser is the Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer at Aspen Funds, where he combines his analytical nature with a passion for delivering outstanding client service and strong returns through out-of-the-box investments.   Show summary:  In this episode, Sam speaks with Ben Frazier from Aspen Funds. They delve into the complexities of raising capital and the strategic shifts Aspen Funds has made to adapt to the evolving market. Ben outlines three common scenarios they encounter: providing gap funding for urgent capital needs, facilitating loan assumptions to improve leverage, and offering rescue capital in distressed situations. He explains the intricacies of negotiating with senior lenders, emphasizing the importance of understanding their motivations and the power of being the last money in. Ben also candidly discusses the current challenges in the commercial real estate market, including rising interest rates and an influx of new supply, suggesting that survival through the next few years will be key for investors.   -------------------------------------------------------------- Intro (00:00:00)   Ben's Career Journey (00:01:14)   Evolution of Aspen Funds (00:02:00)   Challenges in Raising Capital (00:03:42)   Adapting to Market Changes (00:04:55)   Navigating Risks in Real Estate Investments (00:05:13)   Building Trust with Investors (00:07:13)   Attracting Capital through Thought Leadership (00:10:52)   Timeline for Capital Attraction (00:12:13)   Current State of Commercial Real Estate Market (00:14:05)   Future Opportunities in Real Estate Investments (00:17:57)   Conclusion of the Show (00:17:57)   Gap Funding (00:18:24)   Loan Assumption (00:19:56)   Distressed Rescue Capital (00:20:52)   Hope for Sponsors (00:23:32)   Negotiating with Lenders (00:26:15)   Conclusion and Contact Information (00:28:52)   -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Ben:    LikedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benwfraser https://www.linkedin.com/company/aspen-funds   Web: aspenfunds.us   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Ben Fraser (00:00:00) - There's something like 9 million accredited investors just in the US, right? For any one of us to be successful, I only need like a couple hundred investors. You know, if I want to go big, a couple thousand investors, that's not that many in the sea of accredited investors. And so my mindset started to shift. We started to position ourselves as thought leaders,, to attract capital to us as authorities in our space, doing a lot more content,, getting in front of audiences virtual and in person and starting to kind of build a,, an attraction mechanism to bring capital to us.   Intro (00:00:36) - Welcome to the how to scale commercial real estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:49) - Ben Frazier is the chief investment officer at Aspen Funds. They're an inc 5000 company, and he's responsible for sourcing, vetting and capital formation of investments. He has prior experience as a commercial banker and underwriter, as well as working in a boutique asset management group.   Sam Wilson (00:01:05) - He's also the co-host of the Invest Like a Billionaire podcast. So if you haven't checked that out, go check that out as well. Ben, welcome to the show.   Ben Fraser (00:01:12) - Hey, thanks for having me, Sam. Absolutely.   Sam Wilson (00:01:14) - The pleasure's mine. Been there. Three questions. I ask every guest who comes on the show in 90s or less. Can you tell me where did you start? Where are you now? And how did you get there?   Ben Fraser (00:01:22) - Yeah. So you kind of said a little bit. I was,, spent some time in banking as a commercial banker, underwriter. Learned a lot. Got to look under the hood of ultra wealthy borrowers of the bank. And my favorite thing was going to look at their personal financial statements and tax returns. Learned a whole lot. Two biggest takeaways were the most wealthy,, borrowers were business owners and real estate investors. And I thought, hey, that's what I want to do. So an opportunity to join Aspen Funds about six years ago now, I've become a partner and,, helping scale and grow the business,, and running running my team.   Ben Fraser (00:01:55) - So it's it's been an amazing ride. And,, just kind of getting started to.   Sam Wilson (00:02:00) - That's really cool. What was the opportunity that you saw when you joined Aspen Funds? Like, what was the gap that you said, hey, man, this is something I can fill and this is the direction we can take the company.   Ben Fraser (00:02:09) - Yeah, well, I kind of got bait and switch that I like to say in a in a certain way, because I was coming on to be the VP of finance. So as a banker, you know, finance MBA. So I was like, I'm going to go kind of the CFO route, kind of help with the the finance side of the business. So I joined, you know, they'd been going about five years at that point, had only raised about 10 million bucks. So it was pretty small at that point. But so opportunity to help scale and grow something. But then very quickly they said, hey, you know, we actually need help raising capital because that's, you know, really we need to scale.   Ben Fraser (00:02:43) - And I'm like, okay, that's not what I really signed up to do. But hey, I want to just help out where I can and, and the and grow. So learned very quickly., I had no idea what I was doing and,, tried all the wrong things. Made a lot of mistakes., wasted a lot of money,, trying to do different campaigns. But fast forward to six years later. We've raised over $200 million in equity from investors. And,, continue doing to to scale up. So it's it's been a fun thing. I have an amazing team. It's not all me. I have about,, six different people that are on my marketing and investor relations team. So we just continue to be able to invest in good people. And I don't do any calls anymore. But still, you know, run that team, right?   Sam Wilson (00:03:27) - No, that's really cool. I'd love to hear a little bit more about those kind of mistakes and things that you say maybe you did wrong early on, but before we get there, let's talk maybe about what Aspen was doing then and maybe what it's doing now.   Sam Wilson (00:03:40) - Like, how has that changed?   Ben Fraser (00:03:42) - Yeah. You know, I think it's important to have an agile business model, especially in real estate and investing, because the tides can change. Right. And what you were doing before,, may not be a good place to be now. And what was really cool at the genesis of Aspen, it was really an opportunistic thing that our, our founders saw, and it was buying discounted distressed mortgages on, on homes. Right. And at that point, coming out of the great financial,, crisis, they saw this opportunity was a great opportunity., but it really launched us. We continue to operate those funds that continue to perform very well, but it's just not the same level of growth that we've seen in the past. And so several years ago, we started to take the same approach that we use to identify really good opportunity sets, really good, what we call macro driven themes. So we're looking at the macro economic picture, trying to find where we think these long term trends are going to kind of carry the next wave and, invest in those verticals.   Ben Fraser (00:04:45) - And so we have a few different verticals we kind of focus on and have expanded into a lot of different,, kind of asset classes from there. And, continue to, to grow those.   Sam Wilson (00:04:55) - Got it. What about the distressed mortgage business? What's that? I mean, what's that look like today? If you guys were I asked this this is kind of a leading question because I'm, I'm an investor in a distressed mortgage fund that is basically gone belly up at this point.   Ben Fraser (00:05:13) - Oh, no. Yeah.   Sam Wilson (00:05:14) - It's not good, man. It's not good. I could I got a front row seat on telling you the wrong things to invest in., but it's gone belly up and I'm looking at it going, and they made some mistakes, I think maybe 3 or 4 years ago where they ended up doing. They took these loans and they did worker work workouts. Work around.   Ben Fraser (00:05:29) - Workouts. Yeah. Workouts.   Sam Wilson (00:05:30) - Yep. Workout. Okay. I'm not in that business. You can tell,, with the borrowers, but they were resetting then, you know, the interest rates at that point in time, like, hey, Ben, cool, man.   Sam Wilson (00:05:40) - We can rework your loan. I know you had 100 grand. We bought the loan for 20 grand., you know, we'll reset it for 70, and you can,, you know, you can take the well and we'll, you know, set it at 3 or 4%. Well, now, nobody wants those. They can't resell them. Like the value of those loans is declined to almost nothing because nobody wants to take a 4% or 3% loan on their books because they're not worth anything, because now it's, what, 7% that's going rate som

    30 min

  8. MAR 4

    All-Cash Real Estate Investment Strategy

    Today’s guest is Joel Friedland.   Joel has 40 years of experience as a broker, investor and syndicator in industrial real estate.   Show summary:  In this episode Joel Friedland  shares his journey from starting as a broker to establishing his own firm. He stresses the importance of specialization and building lasting client relationships. Joel discusses the industrial market's growth due to e-commerce and manufacturing but warns of economic downturns. He advocates for all-cash deals, avoiding debt for investment stability, and highlights the competitive edge it provides. Joel compares leveraged investing to gambling, promoting a risk-averse strategy for long-term security.    -------------------------------------------------------------- Intro (00:00:00)   Staying focused on industrial real estate (00:01:57)   Market swings and the state of the market today (00:06:18)   Types of industrial real estate and market demands (00:09:10)   Positioning in the industrial real estate market (00:11:06)   Reasons for selling industrial buildings (00:15:24)   The no-debt financing model (00:17:53)   Competitive offers and leveraging returns (00:21:29)   Risk Aversion and Leverage (00:23:45)   Gambling in Real Estate (00:24:47)   Balanced Portfolio and Risk Mitigation (00:26:57)   Conclusion and Contact Information (00:27:48)   Closing (00:28:25) -------------------------------------------------------------- Connect with Joel Friedland:  Instagram: @investingwithjoel YouTube: @britproperties Tik Tok: @investingwithjoel LinkedIn: Brit Properties Web: https://britproperties.com/   Connect with Sam: I love helping others place money outside of traditional investments that both diversify a strategy and provide solid predictable returns.     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HowtoscaleCRE/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samwilsonhowtoscalecre/ Email me → sam@brickeninvestmentgroup.com   SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE A RATING. Listen to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate Investing with Sam Wilson Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-scale-commercial-real-estate/id1539979234 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4m0NWYzSvznEIjRBFtCgEL?si=e10d8e039b99475f -------------------------------------------------------------- Want to read the full show notes of the episode? Check it out below: Joel Friedland (00:00:00) - In every downturn when there's been, let's call it agitation of my mental health and my investors. Investment safety. Yeah, it's been because in every case I can prove in every case it's because we had a loan.   Intro (00:00:18) - Welcome to the how to Scale Commercial Real Estate show. Whether you are an active or passive investor, we'll teach you how to scale your real estate investing business into something big.   Sam Wilson (00:00:31) - Joel Friedland has 40 years of experience as a broker, investor and syndicator in industrial real estate. Joel, welcome to the show.   Joel Friedland (00:00:39) - Thanks, Sam. It's great to see you.   Sam Wilson (00:00:41) - Absolutely great to see you, Joel. I asked three questions to every guest who comes on the show in 90s or less. Can you tell me where did you start? Where are you now and how did you get there?   Joel Friedland (00:00:52) - Sure., so I'm 64 today. I've been in the real estate business since day one. I've only had one career, and it's industrial real estate in Chicago. I started out as a broker, working for a family that was in the business for decades, and they had 80 buildings that they owned as syndicators, and they hired me as a leasing agent right out of college, and they trained me and taught me, and they were my mentors.   Joel Friedland (00:01:20) - And eventually I tried to join the family wasn't my family, and they wouldn't let me in. So I started a business with three other guys and we did the same thing. I've stayed close with that original family. I'm so close with them, actually, with one of the one of the sons that today I'm having a call with my advisory group before I buy buildings. I have an advisory group zoom meeting, and he's one of the leaders of the zoom call, and that's from 40 years ago. Same relationship. Still love him. We love each other and he's brilliant.   Sam Wilson (00:01:57) - And that's absolutely amazing. I mean, I don't know if I would put that in the blessed category, like there's there's very few people that can have a single career, not only a single career, but one in a very, very niche asset class without ever looking to the left or to the right. How did you stay on track and avoid temptation to look at other shiny objects?   Joel Friedland (00:02:24) - So I have studied successful people. I've studied people who are super wealthy.   Joel Friedland (00:02:32) - And primarily families that are super wealthy. And I'll tell you what they have done with their business. They've stuck with it. They don't go. They don't go to the right. They don't go to the left. They just stuck with it. I can give you the stories of about 200 family businesses that I've done business with as a broker and as a syndicator, where they invest with me and every one of them goes back decades. I have a company. We're buying a building right now from a family that started a business in 1935. In Chicago. It's called the. The company in the building is called talk. Often they make you know, have you ever been in a parking garage or a university or mass transit place where they've got those posts with the blue lights, with the phone you pick up or you push a button to get security? Yep. They make those talk. A phone makes that. So these two guys started the business back in the 1930s. And now the the family that owns the building that they've been running the business in.   Joel Friedland (00:03:44) - , they are are the grandchildren of the original founder. Why are they so rich? Because they did one thing. Because if you jump around, you don't learn. The ins and outs of the business. When you do something long enough, you learn it. And I'll give you an example, just like a. A metaphor or a or a. I don't know the difference between the, but,, an analogy. So,, my mother had,, kidney cancer diagnosed a few months ago. All right. So who does she go to? She goes to the kidney. Removal urologist. Who's the best in the world, right? You want the best one in the world? Would you go to someone who says, well, I used to do knees and I didn't like that so much, it didn't work out. So I started doing brain surgery.   Sam Wilson (00:04:45) - It didn't like.   Joel Friedland (00:04:46) - That. So I decided to go into being a urologist. And I've done a few kidneys. I've done it for a couple of years.   Joel Friedland (00:04:54) - You know, you could move the frick out of there so fast. Yes, but the person who has done dozens and dozens of kidney surgeries a month, right? Same thing, same thing, same thing. So that's what my mother did. We went, we're in Chicago. She went to the University of Chicago. And Doctor Shalhoub is the guy that she saw. You know what? He removed my dad's kidney 12 years ago. Wow. He's the guy we trust. So. I'm in the same business, industrial real estate in Chicago. The niches, small industrial buildings, class B. With it are occupied by manufacturers that are owned by families. That's my niche. That's it. And there's 16,000 industrial buildings in Chicago. And there's about 20,000 companies in Chicago and industrial one point 5,000,000,000ft². If I can't make a seven figure income by knowing that market really well, I'm a moron. But I'll tell you what. If I go do deals in Tennessee, or I go into the office leasing business, or I go into the retail business or the multifamily, someone who's been in it for 40 years like I have, is going to eat my lunch, right.   Joel Friedland (00:06:15) - So I stick with one thing.   Sam Wilson (00:06:18) - I love it, I love it. That's that is that is admirable. And I appreciate you, given the insight onto your motivation and kind of thought process behind why you have stuck with that one thing, that one thing has seen, I'm sure, in the last 40 years, many different. Comings and goings of both market swings, of industrial appetite, of tenant, types of lease rates, cap rates, the whole nine yards if you will. Can you break down some of that for us? And maybe at the end of that give us a state of the market today?   Joel Friedland (00:06:52) - Sure. 1981, when I started working for the Podolsky family,, there were interest rates out there like you wouldn't believe 17, 17 to 20% makes today's 7% mortgage look like a really good deal. We were in a terrible recession. It rode up after that because there's a recovery after recessions. And then in 1990, we hit another bump and there was a downturn. And through the 1990s it was great.   Joel Friedland (00:07:21) - And then there was another downturn in 2001 when nine over 11 happened. And we rode that up. And then there was another downturn, which is the worst 1 in 2008. And now things have been riding for 15 years, all to the good low interest rates, cap rates coming down. You can't blow it in a market where you can borrow at 4% and cap rates keep going down. But that's changed. And now people are struggling because interest rates are all of a sudden at 7% instead of at 4%. And if you had floating rate debt and a lot of debt, you're screwed. So the market's been great. Industrial has been great for four years. Rents have increased 80% throughout the entire market in North America, including Canada. And that means if your rent was $5 a square foot when you started out five years ago with the lease, today it's nine. So it's been booming because of the internet? Because the internet requires warehouses. And because of manufacturing. Because as manufacturing does well, it requires industrial buildings, which ar

    29 min
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About

Remove the guesswork from real estate investing and establish a clear path for consistent returns. Here, building wealth is straightforward and fun.Discover how commercial real estate investors from all over the world got where they are today, how you too can generate truly passive, tax-efficient income, and confidently invest in real estate, even in the face of risks and unknowns.Real estate has made more people wealthy than any other form of investment. However, it can come with a steep learning curve and high risks if you don’t know what you’re doing.If you are a business owner who dabbles in real estate and wants to grow your portfolio or expand your network, you are in the right place.Welcome to How To Scale Commercial Real Estate. On the show, we expose the most important, needle-moving real estate investment strategies, leading you to maximize your returns. This is your friendly guide to getting past the roadblocks of investing in real estate so you can sail smoothly toward creating the financial and time freedom you’ve been wishing for.The best minds in real estate give you the tips and tricks to scale your real estate investment portfolio. Listen to industry professionals as they reveal insider secrets that helped them acquire multimillion-dollar assets in a strategic way.Hear details about the most crucial and painful mistakes they made in real estate so you know what to avoid and how to plan carefully throughout your real estate investing journey.Learn about leverage, real estate metrics that matter, and gain valuable resources, connections, and tips that will shift your mindset toward an immediately more prosperous, passive income-generating path.Discover how investors build high-performing teams and find the best deals and then implement their advice to build your own robust real estate portfolio. Your host, Sam Wilson, is passionate about helping you fully grasp real estate fundamentals and know what to look for in any real estate deal, whether residential, commercial, short-term or syndication. Real estate syndications are group investments in large commercial assets where you can invest your money passively, alongside dozens of others (including Sam!) and earn reliable passive income through distributions and equity. Sam Wilson is an active investor in self-storage, multi-family apartments, RV parks, laundry facilities and single-family homes, bringing vast industry knowledge from a diverse background to the show. Unlike other established real estate investors, Sam is in the middle of his own growth journey. He invites you to rise alongside him and his team members as, with each conversation, he’s learning too! Sam is the Founder of Bricken Investment Group, where he helps clients find commercial real estate syndication investments that align with their investing and lifestyle goals. Likewise, this podcast guides listeners through real estate’s steep learning curve to mitigate the risks. If you want to be a successful real estate investor without necessarily becoming a landlord, you need real estate syndication investments in your life. Growing and diversifying your portfolio and high-worth network boils down to making the right investing decisions and surrounding yourself with a like-minded, growth-pursuing community. It starts right here. Jump into the discussion of How To Scale Commercial Real Estate with Sam Wilson at https://brickeninvestmentgroup.com/podcast/. Together, we'll achieve life-changing growth and invest in commercial real estate assets ripe with strong fundamentals, leading to the financial and time freedom we’ve been dreaming of.

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