Hey everyone, and welcome to Passive Real Estate Investing. I’m Melissa Nash, your guest host jumping in for now. Let’s dive in. Taylor, welcome to the show. Let’s start your story with how did you get into real estate?
Well, first off, I appreciate you having me on. I basically been in it my whole life. There wasn’t for me, it wasn’t really getting into real estate. I grew up in real estate. So my dad started doing this in the late eighties growing up at the dinner table. We were talking real estate and deals and rehabs and strategies and that’s just how I grew up in it. And then as I got into my middle teenage years, 15, he had me on rehab crews and I was rehabbing and gutting houses. And then I did that through college. And then before I graduated I got into property management and then I got my broker’s license and just kinda went through from top to bottom or bottom to top, however you want to say. It just went through the whole process of learning how all this stuff works.
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Amazing. So interesting because I surround my kids with real estate talk. Yeah. We’re at the dinner table and I am doing everything I can to excite them about real estate and none of them have really caught the bug yet. <Laugh>. I’m wondering what did your dad do to help you? Not that I wanna make my kids invest in real estate, although they do own rentals in their names, but they’re not, they’re just like, it’s a thing over there and somebody else is dealing with it. I wonder what your dad did more.
So, my dad was my best friend and I wanted to be just like my dad. I liked what we did. I don’t, oh, it was fun. And I just, I really wanted to be like my dad <laugh>. Aw,
That’s so cute.
There’s not really what he did or didn’t do. It was just I got to hang out with my dad and I still do he most days he works six feet across from me at his desk over there.
Oh my gosh. So I mean, does he, is he still as involved as he was or have you kind of been letting him retire a little bit? Or what does that look like?
He says he is semi-retired, so that’s like, he left, we left oh about an hour ago to grab lunch and he says, I probably won’t be back today. And I’m like, all right, cool. Go do what you wanna do, man. You put in the time I get. It’s like, I’ve got it here. No problem. <Laugh>.
Yeah. That’s amazing. So, okay, I was gonna ask you about how that dynamic works because multi-generational business is just so unique and it’s just so fascinating to me. So, so you’re the new you’re gonna be, the plan is for you to kind of take over and pass it down to one of your kids baby.
That’s the plan. And you talk about the dynamic. When I went to college, I went, I have a technology degree, so I kind of brought like the new technologies, the new trends and applied that into the business and restructured the business with a technology focus, with the automation, with the systems and, and that allows us to be very efficient in what we do as far to better serve our clients, to move faster on our rehabs, to keep up with the data and to kind of be at the forefront of the information and the technology, keeping everybody informed. And we also, as I took over, we kind of restructured where he was mainly doing flips and selling turnkeys where we’ve gotten into lending, we’ve gotten into insurance, back into property management and so on. So it’s kind of making it where it’s a very efficient process where a client can come in, they don’t have to go vet multiple vendors, they can go through vet me and the lady, her name is Dina, who’s over the property management team, go vet me and her. And that’s a, that’s all they have to really deal with. We try to make it as one-stop shop as possible.
Yeah. Well and I know and I appreciate that by the way, the tech savviness definitely plays a big part in making everybody’s lives easier, especially not only the investors but myself. I work with a lot of investors and I help them and I’m guiding them to mm-hmm <affirmative> different various teams like yourself. And just to be able to have that communication is key. It’s just absolutely automated man. You’ve kind of really built out that that piece of it. Communication is probably the most, it is, well I don’t wanna say the most important, but it’s up there. Right.
So I would say communication is the second most important. The first would be property management, <laugh>,
<Laugh>. Well, and a property manager that communicates.
Yes, absolutely.
<Laugh>, that’s that. That’s actually one of the big red flags is when you have a property manager that is no longer communicating with you. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. Either, either through the backend portal or when you call them, they don’t call you back, they ghost you on emails. Like, that’s bad.
There’s something else going on. But nope, you don’t get that with us. We, I’m not gonna say we answer immediately, but usually within 24 hours we have answers to questions.
Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I think setting that standard is pretty important. And you guys do that up front, honestly. I see, I see all the emails, I see them automated come through. And it’s funny ’cause I even saw one come through the other day and you were like, you, oops, sorry, that was an automated one that wasn’t supposed to go out. Yeah. And I was like, actually that was really cool. Like we’re human and we’re figuring out these systems and especially with the AI world. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> but then there was still a human behind it checking it and you were like, Hey FYI don’t freak out. That was, and it wasn’t a big deal, it was just like something random. Sure. But you were like, no, that property didn’t close. That was an error. And I was just that whole process that I, I thought that was pretty awesome.
Yeah. And I, I’ll tell everybody, we’re not perfect, like we’re gonna make mistakes but we, you’re gonna get with us, we’ll communicate we’ll say, hey, this is, we’re not perfect, but we’re going to be here to walk through every facet with you of this journey. And, and that’s what’s different. I don’t just want to hand off a client and be done with them after the transaction. It’s like I’m here to help them build what they’re wanting to do it. We’re here to build that legacy they have for generations. But that also takes a team and that’s more of what we look at ourselves. We’re part of their team more so than it’s just a business transaction.
Yeah. I love that. It def definitely comes through. Your dad has definitely instilled that cool legacy piece that you’ve been able to carry on and bouncing off of that you are also building a legacy for your family. Absolutely. Going forward, personally out outside of the business side of it, it’s hard to separate it because I’m kind of in the kind of same world as you are is like we have a business of real estate but then we also have a business of our own portfolio for sure. And so you’re building your portfolio business separately and so you’re a dad. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. So let’s just switch to that a little bit. What does financial freedom mean to you?
Mainly the financial freedom part. It’s like, oh I want to go home and see my kids at lunch. I can do that. I want to be able to go to my kids’ events. I can do that. It’s, for me, financial freedom isn’t the ability not to work, it’s, it’s, I’m not tied to working every day for somebody else. And I don’t to just do that nine to five grind just to get by. But it’s like, oh well I’m, I can work a few hours here, I can work a few hours there. And basically the financial freedom of it, piece of it to me is just I’m able to be with my family. I’m not gonna miss the milestones I’m there when they need me.
Yeah. Yeah.
That’s what the financial freedom part, it’s more of freedom of time than it’s freedom of finances for me, but if that makes sense.
Yeah. Well and it’s interesting because you actually live in a market that makes sense to invest in. We all want what you have. We wanna be able to build a portfolio so we have that time freedom and make money in our sleep. But people like myself, I live in California, def definitely doesn’t make sense here. We’re not landlord friendly. Sure. So you actually live in Memphis.
But I live in Memphis.
So you’ve got a lot going on there. But then you also do, you are doing stuff in another market that is a little bit long distance. It is. So let’s talk about that. So, so what is that other market for everybody listening?
So we also sell properties in St. Louis, Missouri. So our headquarters is based in Memphis. We do stuff in Memphis as well. But we have a full team built out in St. Louis. So that’s your property management, that’s your rehab crews, that’s your maintenance crews, that’s your leasing agents, everything you need to run that operation. We have our supervisors on the ground. So you get that full team that you would have if you were in that market yourself. But this allows you to step back and be able to literally manage a portfolio of multiple houses anywhere through our management team.
So yeah. That’s really cool. So interesting because I, it was, it’s funny, I didn’t even know that you were actually based in Memphis until recently. I just assumed because we’ve done so much stuff together in St. Louis and then all of a sudden on the phone we were talking about it and I own a portfolio in Memphis and so I kind of hit you up there a little bit and we’ve got a deal going on right now in Memphis. So what made you guys, why not just stick with Memphis.
For rental properties and for the returns you get? Memphis got where it was a little bit more expensive now it still works in the turnkey model and whatnot, but it just was getting really competitive. It was getting really expensive and we started looking at other markets and we came across St. Louis, which was, or is a still up and coming market. You can find deals out there that give you really good cash flow, really good return. It’s really, it’s really good prices for you to get into. It’s very easy to purchase there as far as the price points goes. They’re not gonna be very expensive houses, but they’re gonna give you that really good return and that really good cash flow. People want to start anchoring their portfolios.
Yeah, yeah definitely. I’ve seen that. I mean the numbers in St. Louis look great. I mean in fact they sell so fast. <Laugh> very fast. I think you got a waiting list right now.
I do. So yes ma’am. And that’s like right now we’ve got a few available that aren’t claimed. So if you got, if you’re looking for a house hit us up, we’ll get you squared away. But if there’s something a little bit more specific, yeah, there’s a waiting list for those.
Okay, perfect. And just to add that little disclaimer in there, we’ll kind of throw it in right now, we’ll throw it in at the end too. But if anybody’s interested in anything that Taylor is talking about, there is going to be a link in the description in the show notes down below. Click that link and you’re gonna be hooked up with myself or somebody else on our team and all you have to do is say, Hey, I wanna talk to Taylor <laugh>, get me the goods and we’ll direct you. We know what to do.
Absolutely. Now I’m pretty available. If something doesn’t work for anybody’s schedule, I’m always pretty flexible on trying to meet with people.
Perfect. So let’s talk about St. Louis A. Little bit more. So you kind of gave us some bigger picture, but what are you guys seeing there? I mean going from Memphis to St. Louis was a big jump and I’m a fan of both markets. I think they’re both great markets. And so what is different about St. Louis that might be interesting, you called it an up and coming market. What should an investor expect in St. Louis in some of these areas you’re investing in?
So you’re going to see like, I mean if you’re gonna compare St. Louis to Memphis, I’m, I’ll kind of go there, but mi like St. Louis as a whole, the market is I would say about five years behind Memphis. So you’re really still seeing these areas being re gentrified, they’re still being rebuilt, you’re still getting a little bit faster appreciation, faster rent growth. So you can just expect for the property you purchase, basically your cash flow, you can expect that to go up faster. You can expect for your values to build faster. And overall it’s just, it’s a market that you can get into it and you can still expect more than just a steady investment. You can expect some pretty steady growth.
Okay. I love that. I, a market that you can tackle both is mm-hmm <affirmative> ideal. I call those my hybrid markets in the markets that I help clients with because we can get some good cash flow obviously important. And then the next one is rental increases for sure. And then appreciation. So and then that kind of gives us those exit strategies where, you know, down the road if we wanna decide if wanna 10 31 exchange it, if we wanna do a HELOC on it, absolutely a cash refinance. We’ve got some money there to work with. So what are those numbers? I mean what type of price point are we talking about? What types of areas are these B class? Are they C class, A class? What would you got for us?
I would start with the class of properties. You can expect anywhere from a C to a b plus. Your average price point’s probably gonna be about 140,000. And then that will go up to anywhere from I’d say a hundred to a hundred and or a hundred to 250,000. But you could expect to see most properties around 140,000, then you could expect the rents on that to be somewhere between 12 to 1400. We’re talking on average for that average price point and then they’ll adjust accordingly to the price.
Yeah. So what, what type of rental increases are we talking about? The national average is about 3% rental increases. Are we talking a similar numbers or a little bit different? What do we got?
So at a minimum you’ll see 3% year over year, but it could be anywhere from that 3% number to a couple hundred bucks. It all like we, every time at renewal we go back and we run the rental comparisons to see where these properties come in at and then we’ll say okay, what do we think the tolerance of this tenant is without making the tenant move? And we’ll say okay, we’re gonna ask for a $250 increase for example. And if the tenant can tolerate, that’s fine. If it’s like, oh I can’t do this. We kind of adjust it between the tenant’s tolerance and what the market can handle. So we don’t run off the tenant and force you into doing a get ready. So we want to keep the tenant there while also increasing your cash flow.
Well I think that, thank you for clarifying that. And I think that’s always something on investors’ minds. ’cause I get that question all the time. They’re like, well what is that process? Because on my spreadsheet, which I have a phenomenal spreadsheet that was actually built by an engineer Michael, it’s like the best out there in my opinion. And it gives me the ability to put rental increases on that spreadsheet. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> So when we’re analyzing the numbers from year one to year 30, we’re kind of looking ahead. We’re not just focusing on year one for sure. And so, because I have that in there where I have like a rental increase and I’ll say, okay, on average it increases about let’s say 3% for sure. Well then people go, well I don’t understand, like how does that happen? Like where, who does that 3%? Where does it come in? Is it guaranteed? Who’s on top of it? And my answer is always, this is why you need a good property manager.
Absolutely. The a good property manager will make or break the investment if you have a bad manager. It just really will ruin the whole operation of things. So that’s why I always trust people, good property management that’s trustworthy, that knows what they’re doing and their experience and has your interest at heart is a property manager need. ’cause You’ll get ones that want to take advantage of you and just make money and that’s not what you’re gonna get. We are literally here to help your investment succeed. But getting back into the, the property management and the increases. So usually about 60 days before a lease comes up, we have it tagged in our system. We use propertyware for our management software and we’ll get reports that generate that. Say, okay, hey this house is 60 days out from renewing and then we’ll start pulling our data and it’s an, we have it in there that says every year this is gonna go up 3% minimum. We don’t guarantee that it’s gonna be just 3%, it’s gonna, the minimum is 3%.
That’s perfect. And you know, you guys listening, this is such a big deal. This is how you can invest passively. I see. I’m on social media, I try not to be, I kind of get a doomsday scrolling sometimes as they call it for sure. And I don’t know, I get of course looped into everything real estate because that’s what my world is and I’m obsessed with everything real estate. And so I’ll see it’s probably, I don’t know if these people really believe it or if it’s click bait, but they’ll be like, there’s no passive real estate investing. There’s no cash flow to be had. Single family is dead and they make all these claims and I’m sitting here going, not true. True. Not true. You can be passive. Very passive. Yes, absolutely. But the trick is you have to have a good team.
Absolutely. And we deal with people that do this all over the world. There’s some people we talk to weekly and there’s some people I probably talk to once a year and they’re like, okay, everything’s going good. You’ll hear from me if there’s a problem. And otherwise we don’t talk to ’em. ’cause Everything just flows. That’s what the, that’s why the systems are important. You just, you get everything set up and literally the properties just produce
The idea of passive investing is alive and well <laugh>, it works real time. So we’ve talked about the importance of working with a great team and clearly that’s why we work with you. So if you’ve got a client that’s just really nervous about investing, just long distance because again, like all the social media stuff and just they’re talking to their friends and their family and a lot of times people look for others for advice. It’s usually people that have never done this before <laugh> for sure. And so they’re just telling people about their own fears. And so what do you say to those investors? Because you talk to a lot of investors all the time and some are ready to go and some are current investors and some are new investors and some are squeamish investors. What is the advice for that nervous investor that nervous Nelly?
First I would say definitely talk to people like me and like Melissa here and just kind of do that. And then if you really want some real world scenarios, we can set you up. Current clients, I’ve set a couple people up with current clients where they can talk to ’em about what their experience has been like as first time investors. But mainly I would say just rely on the team. I understand it, it’s nervous. You’re putting a lot of money into it. Just rely on the team, rely on the education you’re getting, rely on us to, to guide you through this. So we, like I said, we, between everybody, we have over 40 years of experience doing this. We can walk you through this path. But that’s where the relationship of this comes in. Like with us trying to establish that relationship, we’re going to be the team that walks this path with you. Like this isn’t just something where we’re going to do the transaction and be done. We’re here to answer the questions. We’re here for the meetings, we’re here to give you advice. And that’s part of helping these clients is just making them comfortable throughout the process.
Yeah. And one of the things that people have a hard time wrapping their minds around with this type of turnkey investing is, so number one, your team buys the property. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> renovates the property and then you guys are doing the management. So, but there’s a lot of pieces in between that are also taken care for the investor that they don’t realize for sure to make their lives easier. And so number one, these properties are not on the MLS, they come to us directly off market. The price has already been negotiated. So they’re not making offers going out, overpaying for a property. They’re not waiting to hear back with my offer. Accepted property is priced to appraise for sure. And then they’re literally going to be like, Hey, I like this property. Or I don’t, here are the numbers. They’re first come first serve, we have lenders, you’ve got lenders. We’ve hooked them up with phenomenal lenders. So that’s not a question. And lenders are licensed in the market. Then what’s the next step after that? What are the systems that you have in place that are a little bit different than if they were to go out and buy the property on their own, on the MLS? Like what are the turnkey systems from here?
Well that’s like anything we do, we make sure that the property will be as owner and tenant friendly as possible. So that means we go through, we update them up to code, we make sure the roofs are in good shape, we make sure the HVAC’s in good shape and then like it, the house will be renovated to modern trends. So we go through and we take out the headaches of having to go through the inspections to finding the contractors, to finding the tenants. Literally all the investor has to do is identify the house they want, purchase the house, then they get handed off to the management team and that’s it. We place the tenants, we do the rehabs, we do the repairs, we deal with the appraisers, the inspectors. It’s about as hands off as you want it to be, you can be involved or as passive as you want to be.
So yeah.
And and then I was gonna say also, and another thing to keep in mind is these houses do come from our portfolio. If I wouldn’t keep this house myself, I wouldn’t sell it to you.
<Laugh>. Perfect. So on the inspection piece of it, this is where we get a lot of questions. The expectation is it’s not new construction. I mean, if somebody wants a perfect property, there’s no, we’ll go sell them. Yeah, yeah. We’ll go to new construction somewhere that’s at least, again, it’s not gonna be perfect, but it’s pretty darn close. That’s one thing. But with these rehabbed to, what are the expectations of an investor who wants to work with you? What, what would happen on, what are they gonna see on the inspection report rather?
Mainly when you go through this, it’s gonna be, you’re probably gonna see, it’s like, okay, hey you’ve got some rotten wood here. It might be, oh well this window needs to be replaced. Or we didn’t catch that. The hot water tank was older on the front end, but the inspector called it, well we’re gonna go replace the hot water tank. We’re gonna go fix the rotten wood. We’re gonna go fix the window. And basically you can expect it to be a little items like, okay, the door handles are loose, the light doesn’t work. Okay, this switch was defective that we might have missed on the front end. That’s what the inspector’s there for is to double check us. And then we go back and fix it. What you’re not gonna get with us, you’re not gonna get a property that’s got the foundation issues, that’s got these major issues. ’cause If we look for that stuff on the front end and if we identify that on the front end, we don’t even put it in the portfolio to begin with.
So we’re verifying through the inspection, we’re hiring our own inspector, the inspector’s going out, finding everything wrong with the property. When that report comes in, we’re looking for deferred maintenance, like major items, safety items, stuff like that. Then we’re gonna take those items, we’re gonna send it right back to you and your team and we’re gonna say, Hey guys, take care of these at your cost. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. And we want them done before closing. And by the way, we want you to warranty those. Sure. Is that about right?
For sure. And that’s one of those things, ’cause again, you’re dealing with inspectors of that market. We can handle coordinating third party inspectors for you. We have a list we use, again, it, it’s no benefit to us, it’s just we have a relationship with them in the aspect of we do business with them. So we can coordinate all that for you. They send the list to us and then we will go through, take care of those repairs. We offer a one year mechanical warranty, which that we warrant the roof, the hvac, the hot water tank. And basically if anything defective happens in that first year, we’ll take care of that. And we also, after the tenant moves in, we do a 90 day repair warranty. So for that first 90 days, if something defective comes up, we’ll go out and take care of it. So that’s just, we try to put those protective layers in there because the most important thing for us, for our investors that we sell assets to is we wanna make sure that they cash flow and don’t have issues. Especially right after they close.
Yeah. Yeah. And one thing too is, ’cause we had this recently where somebody closed on a property, you guys moved the tenants in. Mm-Hmm. Which you guys moved tenants in very quickly and a couple of things popped up, the tenant like sent a message to the portal and it was like say, hey, like I don’t even know the toilet’s loose. Something like, no big deal. And for the investor, they were like, Hey I, what is this like, but it’s kinda like, what is going on? I didn’t expect to see something and your response was actually perfect. And I agree with this because I’ve done this for a long time and as an investor myself, when you ever, when you have a new house that’s been rehabbed, you’re, they’re, nobody’s using all the things at once. Correct. Right. All of a sudden the tenant moves in, all of a sudden they’re running the sink, they’re running the showers, they’re running the washing machine, they’re, they’re doing all the things. And that 90 day window where you offer that warranty is very strategic because that’s when most of those calls come in. It is. Is that first 90 days?
It’s so after that, tenant’s probably been there about two to three weeks you’ll start saying it’s like, hey, this, the plumbing under the sink’s loose and leaking a little bit. Well, in the next couple next day or so, we’ll have somebody out there get it tightened up and whatever else they give us, everything gets squared away.
Yeah. And that’s what we want. We want the renter to call and complain about something. As an investor, I’m like, I hope the tenant finds stuff because that’s when all that is going on. And that’s when you guys have that. That’s why it’s there. And so it’s not unreasonable. So basically I’m, your response to the in to the investor was very fair and you’re like, it’s okay. We took care of it, it’s done. This is very common. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. And I guess that’s my point is do you guys have a system in place for sure. You find something that there was an issue or because you’ve been doing this for so long, <laugh>, when there’s a problem or an issue and you see it consistently happening, then you create the resolve for that item.
Absolutely. It’s, well, like I said, it is one of those things that we wanna make sure we can take care of the investor to the best of our ability. And part of that is when these tenants get these repair orders in, we try to be very quick to, to address the issue, to keep the tenant happy and not to disturb them as well.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, and the important thing to note here is everything has been done for the investor so far. I mean everything has been done. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. But there is some responsibility and accountability on the owner, the investor. This isn’t just a free ride completely. And yes, we try to make it as passive and easy as possible, but there is something, some things that the investor has to take responsibility for. And I find sometimes that when something does happen, let’s say a tenant moves out all of a sudden and there’s a vacancy and they like to point fingers very quickly and point blame. So what is the advice that you have for the investor that you feel is important in that regard? Like, like where their responsibility lies versus everything that’s already been done for them?
You know it. And we try very hard to put in good tenants. So, but you know, when it comes to getting the property ready, when it comes to like storm damage or tenant damage, that’s the stuff we don’t really cover. Now when it’s tenant damage, obviously we’ll go back after the tenant for damages. But when it comes to like storm damage or, or turning the property, that falls on the owner. And the best advice I can give to an owner is we’re gonna try and do it to the best of our ability with quality, but the cheapest we can do it. And the best thing I can tell you to do is let’s get your funds in, let’s get everything set up, go over the scope of work, what we have to do and let’s get this thing back out to rent. Because the longer you sit on it is the more money you’re gonna lose and the less likely or the longer it’s probably gonna sit on the market because the, the tenants want to get in another property quickly. And if they just see something a little stagnant, it’s the same thing. Like when you list a house, typically in that first 30 days of that house being listed is probably when it’s gonna sell. It’s the same thing for rentals. If they see it out there for a long time just sitting and sitting, you’re less likely to rent it, especially if it’s hasn’t been turned right.
Right. They’re like, what’s wrong with it? There’s something wrong with it, it’s broken. Why is it sitting so long? So yeah. So I know you guys do a really great job with that. Placing tenants quickly, having really good photos, responding to those calls quickly. I mean it, it shows, because I hear from people <laugh> all the time, ed, if, trust me, if there was a property that was sitting vacant for a long time, I’m the first one that they’re gonna tell.
And I’ve got, so, and with that we, we cover vacancies if something happens in that first 12 months. So we guarantee rent for the first, or I say for the first two months. For two months, typically it takes four. I will say we takes four weeks to get a tenant in from when you start from the application to vetting to actual move in, it takes about four weeks. So if the property’s vacant, when somebody closes with us, we automatically give ’em a month of rent. So we wanna make sure they’re cash flowing from the start and that starts their two month rental guarantee. So for that first two months, we’ll say if there’s not a tenant, we pay that first two months of rent for you. ’cause We typically don’t see property sit longer than four to six weeks. So, so we try to make sure that investor’s covered. But say you run into a situation where that property is vacant for four months. I always tell owners, I said, Hey, if you run into a situation where this property has been vacant for longer, then about two months we said call me, email me, email the management team. We’ll figure out a way how to take care of you.
Yeah. Yeah. I haven’t seen that yet. So it’s nice. Those guarantees feel good because if you don’t need it then you don’t need it, but it’s there. So it just kind of gives you that little bit extra security. And for sure. I always tell people that there’s a reason why some of our best partners offer those types of warranties or guarantees is ’cause they’re not paying them out all the time. If you had to pay them them out all the time, <laugh>, you would be, you’d be a poor company, I think you might be losing money.
<Laugh>. Yeah. Rare. We rarely have to pay ’em out. And typically if we do pay ’em out, it’s something that we should have taken care of. Yeah. And we go take, take responsibility, we take responsibility, we’ll own it, we’ll fix it and we will go and take care of you. Like nothing happened.
See, see you guys, listeners, this is a really big deal. This is why we have partners like Taylor because just what he said right there, he’s willing to take responsibility and that is the type of partner that you really do wanna partner with. This is how you grow and scale a portfolio. We want our clients to be able to go deep in a market. We want them to be confident and go, Hey, I’m gonna buy four or five properties in St. Louis and at least <laugh>. And then they go to another market and try a different strategy and own some there. And then go to another market three to four. And three to four is just kind of always been the thing. Three to four properties in three to four markets, just to kind of really diversify a little bit. But to be able to scale confidently, you need a partner that is truly looking out for your best interests. And you, the fact that you have the rehab side and the property management side, they support each other. If you do a bad job on the property management side, then people are gonna be like, dang, I don’t wanna buy another property with him in this market. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. Because it kind of puts a little sour taste in your mouth.
For sure.
Yeah. Even though it’s not your fault, if the property managers messed up, the property’s still good. It, they still, they kind of go hand in hand. So you’re kind of giving yourself a double edged sword.
It’s funny you go into that. So we recently reopened property management probably about two and a half years ago, three years ago. So I honestly don’t like property management <laugh>
Who does, it’s a tough job.
Yeah. I don’t like property management. And we had a partner we were working with and it ended up working out where we’ll just say lightly they were taking advantage of the client and the repairs and they weren’t sending ’em, they were supposed to send ’em back to us and they wouldn’t and they would charge ’em so they could make more money. Well it got to the point where it was counterproductive to business. So we were like, Hey, we are, we’re gonna get back into management, we’ll solve that issue. And what we figured out very easy is like we, we can do it, we can do property management better and we can reduce people’s overall cost.
Yeah. Yep.
And that’s very important with the management is to keep those costs down. Because if you get hit with fees or maintenance or any of that stuff regularly, you’re not making any money. And, and I’ll be honest, I wanna sell you more houses more than the management site. So I wanna keep the management fees and cost low so I can sell you more houses.
Yep, yep. That’s the full circle right there. That’s the perfect scenario for an investor.
So for sure.
Thank you so much. I think we tackled like a lot on this conversation. I think everybody got to know you a little bit better and kind of what you’re all about. So I have one last question for you for sure. Is why is real estate still one of the best tools for time and money freedom?
Because, and this is what I was taught growing up and, and growing up in this industry, and this was what was always preached to me with rentals. No matter what happens in the market, somebody’s gonna need a place to live. Even if the markets go down, the houses will still produce rent and they will protect your portfolios. They can, while you still not make a lot of money on them, when the market does go back up, you still have that asset that floated you or protected you when times were down and, and that’s what really has kept me in it.
Yeah. The old saying that everybody says about real estate, but the housing is not a luxury, it’s a necessity for sure. And people always need a place to live, and so many people are sitting on so much equity in their own houses and yet they see it, it’s there. They know that their houses are going up in value, but yet they can’t wrap their mind around buying investment properties that also do the same thing. Right. Right. So it’s kind of, it’s fascinating to me that correlation kind of, it’s not people’s fault. We’re not taught this in school. I say that all the time, but to make that correlation and go, wow, if this is, if my own house is going up in value, what if I own 10 rental properties going up in value? I that’s wealth. That’s how true wealth is created.
Absolutely. And it will and it can sustain you for a long time and be fairly stable for what it’s worth.
Yeah. Yeah. Especially if you know you’re buying in areas like you guys are, where there is that really high rental demand. About half this, is that the blue? Right?
About half, about half the market rents in St. Louis. So it’s literally like a 50 50 split between owners and renters.
Right. And the jobs, I mean, we didn’t even get into this and we’re hearing, we’re nearing the end here, but Sure. You know, there’s a lot of jobs, there’s a lot of blue collar jobs, there’s St. Louis, there’s a lot of industry from universities to hospitals to all.
Oh and trust scripts, just to name a few. They’ve got a lot of healthcare providers that are based there. They got Anheuser Busch that’s based there. It’s just lots of different jobs, lots of different industries that cover a wide range of things.
Yeah, yeah. We’re not talking about a boom or bust market. I compare those to like the old oil states or the old coal mining states where their one industry just ruled the entire town.
For sure. So yeah, there’s a lot of diversity in the job market.
Amazing. Cool. Well thank you again, Taylor, your time today. Yeah. And then again for everybody, you’re gonna wanna check out the show notes below because there’s gonna be a link and you can just click that button and then you’re gonna get an email sent off to myself or somebody else here at our team. And then you’re just gonna be like, Hey guys, I wanna know about Taylor and I wanna learn more about St. Louis and we will hook you up with the man
Again. I appreciate it, y’all. Y’all have a good one.
Thanks Taylor. Bye.
Thank you, Taylor and Melissa for the wealth of information shared in this episode. If you haven’t subscribed, remember to do so. We’re gonna keep delivering helpful content for you. Anyway, glad to have you as a listener. That’s it for now. Again, thanks for listening. We’ll see you in the next episode.
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