I think that by networking and getting to see a lot of different people and meet a lot of different people and be in private rooms and public rooms. And one-on-one you get to see those different character qualities in the different settings. Welcome back to the art of connecting podcast. This is your host here, Haydynn Fike back with another episode for you guys. And today I have the pleasure of having my good friend, Matt Beans on the show with us today. How you doing Matt? Good, man. I appreciate you having me out here. It's my pleasure, man. It's my pleasure. I'm glad I got to have you. I was thinking of. Just like who in my network. That. I can text and would reasonably say yes to come on a podcast and you came into my mind until I was like mad on the podcast. I appreciate it, dude. I'll like I said, I'll come on a podcast anytime. I'll co-host this podcast with you, like we're, I'm right down the street. Let's run it. And that's a pod ho. Any podcasts, I'll be there. Yeah. A hundred percent. That's wonderful, man. So why don't you go ahead and tell the guests a little bit about who you are. Who's Matt Beans and where you're at right now in life. Yeah. So I'll start young, man. I grew up in a house. Split family. One side was one side of the family was it was rough. Like, you know, had some. Had some siblings on drugs and got to see that whole thing had six, six siblings on one side. And then on the other side, half the time, I was an only child with calmness and serenity. And it was very, you know, is a huge mixture growing up. Kind of confusing to be honest. Got into actually, when I was pretty young, my, my mom got into the rich dad, poor dad thing. And you know, the game cashflow 1 0 1. And I've been playing that since I was 12 years old. Really? Yeah. And so it's pretty cool now because when I play that game It probably connected for me about five years ago, I was like, This is my business. Right. When you draw an opportunity card for anybody that doesn't know, it's a board game. You get out of the rat race by doing deals, capital gains, steel, stippled capital, and then you do your big deals to build cashflow. And then you're out of the rat race, so to speak. To and that's the point where you start buying businesses at cashflow and different things, but. Yeah. You know, like when you draw an opportunity card to invest into a deal, It's like you can use buy this or sell to another player. And I was like, well, that's wholesaling. I do that. When it's the way that I structure my underwriting, like I want a one sheet with the bare basics on there. And it's like, I copied that card of like, this is how much we're buying it for this. Our debt. This is our cashflow is a range that we're going to buy. You know, eventually sell it at we run our balance sheet and our P and L in our business, and I was like, man. This is pretty cool. So I kind of got indoctrinated at a young age. By happenstance of wanting to get into real estate. And so I thought I knew it all and junior year. So I went out and I sent out 15 mailers, which was like so many mailers. I went out and I just kind of looked around my area within an hour of my house or a mile of my house. And I took pictures, selfies in front of these people's houses, print, and gut went to staples, printed them on an envelope and sent a sent mailers 15 Millers. I was like, ah, there's no way I can not, not get a deal. And the first mailer I got back and I stoked, I got a mailer back and it was ripped up and it said F off on like big white on a big piece of paper. And I was like, Well, I'm not cut out for this. Long story short. I kind of understood that real estate for me was a financial game. Right? It's you have an underlying asset, but at the end of the day, the deal structure is what matters. So. Straight out the gate and got into welding group in a blue collar family. Became a loan officer and my value add for loan officer was to go get a videographer, go to open houses, make a beautiful video for them. They can use on marketing and then hopefully they'll refer me business. About six months after I did want it random agents Open house. He calls me up and he was like, Hey. I'm partnering with the guy we're going to go do wholesaling and house flipping and all this stuff. I want you to come work with us. And I was like, absolutely. Like, I would love to do that. Because I wanted to eventually buy real estate and do all this stuff. And after about a year, I was doing the acquisitions and the dispositions. And then I was like, well, I'm doing everything here. I'm only supposed to go spend my own marketing money and do it. And there's a story about how I got into my first deal and all that. But yeah, I left and started flipping houses, flipped 10 houses, project managed another 10 or five properties for another investor just to get some experience. Got out of that, started a bookkeeping business for real estate investors sold that. And over the last year we've been doing land deals. And Tennessee and Alabama. So what, how, how old were you when you started in real estate? When I sent my mailers out, I was probably 16, just 16, 17. When I first did my first wholesale deal. I would have been 22, 23 and then kind of that same age when I did my first flip. So we started around the same time I bought my first house when I was 20. Too. I think. 2122, somewhere in there. It depends on what month I bought the house, I guess. Yeah. And. When, when you start that young. Do you have a lot of older people that you meet? Be like, man, I just wish I had started doing what you're doing now. When I was your age. I hear that all the time. Yeah, there's a mixture of people. I think there's a mixture of There's a mixture of people that admire what you're doing, but don't think they can do it. They're the guys that have done it. That can kind of give you tips. There are some people that are like, you're crazy. The market's going to crash. The presidential administration is gonna wreck everything. This isn't going to be worth anything. And so, like, I think there's a litany of people. And I think the thing that's probably protected my brain the most and my trajectory is just knowing if they don't have, or aren't living a life that I want. I'm only, I'm going to take it with a pretty large grain of salt. There's, I think there's more lessons in talking to people of failures and what not to do. And there's very few people you can learn from of what actually to do, right. The 1%, the 1% for a reason. And when you go meet a hundred people, that one. One dude or one woman is going to tell you. This is what I did, and this is how I would do it again. The other 99. Probably learned what not to do from them. Right. Yeah. That's funny that you mentioned that because I was watching a real, the other day and it was this guy and he was like, I don't take dating advice from people who aren't married. I was like, that's pretty genius. Cause I, for example, I'll say I see, like I had some friends, I was I'm working on gaining weight, which is fine as you. Look at me like, yeah. Right. But I am working, gaining weight. I've gained 10 pounds in the last I guess like six months, which really isn't that impressive, but it's impressive for, for going from one 50 to one 60 or one 60 to one 70, it's been, it's been fun. I did the same. I did the same thing in 23, 20 23. I went into the year at 1 65 and got up to 180 5. Because you told me about that. It's a scrawny guy. It's hard to do, like when your scrawny and tall. It's hard to know that how much it really takes to eat. Yeah. But the working, the working out for me is fun. It's getting in the kitchen and. Eating eating the right things. But yeah. So anyways, I was talking to some of my friends. And we're at the pool and then everybody had their shirt off and there were three or four guys telling me. How to be fit and how to gain weight and how to get cut. And all of them are overweight and their bodies don't look like I want them to look like nothing against them. I love my friends. I love those guys, but like, And then one of them even call themselves out on it. Like guys, we're all fat. Like we can't be telling Haydynn what to eat and how to do stuff. And I was like, great point. You said it, not me. And so I think you really, it takes some retrospection to sit there and listen. To yourself and think about like, I think it's great in the connecting sense of things. Like when you're, when you're out there networking, connecting to people. Listening to what they're doing. Do they live the life that you want to live? If the answer is yes, then listen to their advice. And if you look in the answer is no. Should probably ignore them. Because even though it may be the most wonderful advice you'll ever get is coming from a place of insincere insincerity, because how can they. Mean good advice when they don't even live with themselves. I think a lot of people come from good intention and they probably give good advice. It's easy to give advice. It's hard to live it. And so what I do is I look for patterns, right? So I look for, okay, this is what I believe to be true. That's going to put me on my path. And every single second of every single day, I'm trying to figure out why that's not true. Or support why that is true. So. You know, like, like in conversation, maybe somebody was like CrossFit games, athlete, or a power lifting athlete or whatever. And the lesson that I want to learn from them is I want long, like a long, healthy life. Like I have this dream of cleaning my body weight, like a power squat power clean when I'm 180 or at 180 pounds when I'm 80 years old and power cleaning my body weight. Right. So it's like, I don't just want to be able to lift the most I can today, but I want to learn how to lift. Strong. And be fast and lift a lot of weight now, but also preserve my body for the future. And so I'm always looking, looking for. And I don't know any one person that's done it yet. So I'm looking for this piece over here. Right? Why do the vegans eat vegan? Right. What's the science that supports that what's the science that we're here for the meat eaters. What's the, you know, the power lifting, the strength, the mobility, all of these things. And then how do you put it together in your own, in your own? Way that's going to support you. Yeah. Yeah, that's great. And so let's talk about. We kind of ran into a lot of different things that you've been through in the last few years. And that introduction there. But let's rewind and let's go back to. When Matt was 21 years old doing his first real estate deal. Who were some of the people that were around you that helped you get into the game? You mentioned that guy that was the random real estate agent was like, Hey, we want to come try this thing. Were there any other, like, People that helped you get into the game or people that you went to ask questions to when you first got started. When I first got started, I actually consider my first real estate deal. I'll break this down. I don't know if it's considered a real estate deal, but I thought it was like, kind of along the premise is I was actually welding when I was around 1920 years old. We'd go work on outages. At power plants. And we would get a per diem. So it's$35 a day per diem. If we, if the company covered our housing and it was a hundred, it was 125 a day. If we covered our own housing. So I went out, I bought a travel trailer for$9,000 is a bunkhouse. So there's three bunks in the back queen bed in the front. I stayed in the front lot rent for the we'd be on an outage for a month at a time. The rent a month was like 400 bucks or three 50, depending on where you were at. And so not only did I increase my daily wage,$90 per day that's tax-free, but then I rented out two of my bunks to two of the other guys. So now they're making 1 25 a day extra and I'm charging them each$25 some now up.$140 a day. Right. And I was like, dude, this is awesome. I bought this travel trailer for 9,000. I rented these things out. But the thing that got me to understand that was I mean, I was pretty young. Like at that time I didn't have anybody in my life of like what to do, but I was always looking for opportunity. And so for me, it came down to the foundation of learning and understanding where I could, whenever I could. I had a few friends that had parents that kinda knew and understood real estate. But, I mean, they were doing huge deals. Like they were building buildings and renting them out to dollar general. You know what I mean? And I kind of. They probably knew. And I definitely knew because I felt the insecurity of like, I don't know what I would do with this information. So a lot of what I learned at that time was in just off of YouTube. And we met some young kids the other day and I told them this. I said, if you're looking to get into real estate, the first thing you need to do is go learn. Like take a course, go learn as much as you can on YouTube. Don't pay for a course and go through it because without that fundamental understanding of what an ARV is, or like the basic lingo of the industry, Is really hard to mentor you, right? If I have to teach you what words mean? It's hard to mentor you. So the first thing I did was take initiative and learn on my own what these things meant. So then when I met that guy, And he was able to bring me in. I knew what an acquisition was. I knew what a disposition was. I knew what earnest money was. Right. But he was really, really crucial to definitely getting me. Kick-started. And it came from what you're doing, right. Just providing value, going out. What do people need? And being open to meeting people and seizing opportunity when it presents itself. Like I went and worked at that company for free. Cause I knew that being in the room and being around people that are doing deals. I mean, that's where I first started learning, lease options and sub twos and creative deals and what a bankruptcy was and how the bankruptcy process worked. It wasn't from him specifically, but he had a crew of guys that were working on these things. He had, they had a killer sales team for a real estate education course. And man, I would go sit with those guys and just listen to their sales calls for four hours, every two or three weeks. And just like they were showing me scripts and their binders and how they did that stuff, but that would definitely never happen. Had I not invested in learning myself and then seizing the opportunity when it was presented through that relationship. Yeah. And when I was first getting started as well. I just went to every event that I could to meet people like, and that was where I learned a lot of the jargon was like going to real estate meetups. I would drive to Knoxville for their meet up, go to Kelly's meetup here in Chattanooga. I would go to Nashville to go meet Tyler cobble and like whoever I could to go and learn. And that's where I learned, like the lingo for me. That's where I got it. It was like, You know, being in the meetings and like hearing what a cap rate is, I would be like, I'd have my phone on my lap. Like, what does a cap rate? Yep. Looking at up, and then like, sometimes I would, I would ask too. And it seems like a stupid question. I'm sure. Some of the, like, whenever someone like The. The kids are talking about, they come onto my Video quality at which we English. And they asked some simple questions that most people, you know, like would kind of laugh at, but I was like, thank you for asking those questions because wherever you're talking about sub two. And I think they asked like I think, I think gay bass, like what is What is Now I'm going to forget it. Like arrears, like what does a rears mean? And to me I'm like, oh yeah, here it is. It's like what's owed on the mortgage plus there. Attorney fees and all that stuff. And then I was like, oh, wait, not everyone just knows that. Like, so it was good to have those people around to ask the questions.'cause a lot of times. As a seasoned investor. I go in a room and I just assume that everyone knows what I'm talking about. And then not everyone knows what you're talking about. Everybody knows. Yeah. But I think to that, to that degree, I think it's really good to be around an as a, as I'm getting older, I'm starting to realize it's good to be around the beginners as well as he's an investors, as well as people. At my same level. I think that I think that by being around those beginner level people, it, it forces you to teach and the teacher always learns more than the student. Yeah. And so by being around, I love being around new investors. Because of that, because it challenges me. And it's when, when you. When you have to explain what a rears is and they don't understand, and you have to explain it in a different way because they learn differently. It really forces you to. Create solid thoughts that you can clearly communicate because a lot of times you got to explain that to a seller. Or you're bringing in an investor and you're like, Hey, yeah, there's$30,000 in arrears. And sometimes your investor, like they're a business person, they're doing whatever they do. They've never done a real estate deal or maybe they've done one, but it was like a simple bite off the market. Do you know, turn it into a rental thing. And so even like a lot of guys, a lot of people with money that just aren't in the industry don't know. And so by, by getting those reps in for me, Dude. I think those relationships are very important as well. There I was sitting at my desk over behind us and we're in my, my very fancy schmancy office. I get to work in for the company I consult for. And one of the co-founders of the fund that I w that I work in. One of the founders of, one of the companies they invested in, came up and was like, we just got to know why today. On a project for, for January. And he was like, what's an LOI. And like, This guy has sold multiple companies been extremely successful. And he didn't know what an LOI is. I was like, wow, that's really cool. Cause like, Not not making fun of him at all. Like it's just, he's, he's been so well versed in like all the other things. He never really like. Never got into what at LOI is because his company didn't have that. And it's like, Instead of him just assuming, like pretending that he knew what it was, this guy that's worth. A lot of money was like, what's no Hawaiian. Just ask that question. Because he wanted it to newly know and like, he didn't just pretend that he knew everything. And so. That's such an admirable quality when someone. That you would think would know everything. Just ask like a simple question. And for those that are listening to this, and you don't know what an LOI is, it's a letter of intent and it means that you have the intent of buying something. And if someone accepts it, then you send the contract after that. So, and I think that's really important to notice too, with people that you surround yourself with, when you say, oh, this is what I want to be like. Cause it's easy to do things like your health. I want to weight more. I want to. Be more financially wealthy. I want to pay debt off. I want to be debt free. I want to travel more, whatever. Right. But I think that being around people with character qualities, And a lot of people, you don't recognize it until you see it right. When, when a 19 year old asks, what's an LOI. You're like, of course you're asking that question. I didn't know what an LOI was at 19 right. Or four years. No, I wasn't until I was 23 years old, any of these things, but when it, when that same question comes from somebody worth. Anything north of$5 million, right? When you have a 30, 40, 50 year old asking what an LOI is, and you know, they've made millions of dollars. Exactly what you said it. Is an example of what humility is and you realize, oh, you can grow old and rich and be an asshole. I don't want to do that. You can grow old and rich and still be humble and still learn and still ask questions and, you know, always be learning and and humble enough to be in front of a room of guys that you've invested in their companies. You have no idea what this super simple thing is. Right. Right. And I think I'm very observant of that with people and like how they treat people. I was talking to a lady the other day. She's a lender. And I didn't particularly love her product, but I was like, I don't know. I'll go, I'll go talk to her. And dude, she couldn't look me in the eye. She's like super shifty while we're talking. And I was like, dude, I just don't want. I just don't want to be around you. Right. I don't care how much money you have just as a person. If I don't enjoy being around you and I can't go visit you for your birthday or, you know, we can't go out to dinner and I can't have my family or want to introduce you to people or recommend you, dude. I don't want to work with you. Right. And I think. I think that by networking and getting to see a lot of different people and meet a lot of different people and be in private rooms and public rooms. And one-on-one you get to see those different character qualities in the different settings. Right? And that's what I've been really observant of lately is surrounding myself with people that have some of the qualities that I want to. Grow upon moving forward. So speaking of networking, I would love to talk a little bit kind of selfishly. About the real estate meetup, because that's where we met at my real estate meetups Southeast best. And what drew you to come to that event? Like what, what made you want to drive from Soddy Daisy to come to downtown Chattanooga? To, to attend that? So it's, that's kind of a simple question with a loaded answer because we've, we grew up in Arizona and I went and I traveled in an RV for four months. And when we're traveling in the RV, we're very transient. So you need super cool people, nice people. You want to hang out and have a campfire, cook, some burgers, watch some boxing or whatever we watch and have a good time. But then like tomorrow we leave. So we don't build that relationship. So we did the other, we did it the other way, where we moved to a city in Mexico and it was a very transient city people coming for honeymoons and weddings and bachelor parties and vacation and all this stuff. And they were super cool people. And, and not only were they cool people, but they were in like have fun mode, right? They're on vacation. They just wanna have fun. And hang out and go check stuff out. Which was super great and awesome people, but then they were leaving tomorrow. So we never got to build that community. So when we moved out here from Chattanooga or from Arizona to Chattanooga it was first. We want to get, build our foundation and like make sure we're taken care of, and then. I just know from, I guess, life experience or reading or something that being around people is how you. Grow it's, it's where I find some of my best friendships. I don't necessarily believe in bringing friends into a business, but I'm fine. Making friends with business partners. And I wanted to be around people that I could have a conversation about. Right. Talk about deals, whether they're sending deals to me, or I send deals to them. Or they have a deal on the table and they just need a second set of eyes. I love talking business strategy. I love talking real estate to me. It's not work. It's just part of like who I am and what I enjoy. Like, I look at it almost like a sport. Like we could go play, you know, like we've played ultimate Frisbee since we've been here, but it's like, it's not exciting to me. Like the game ends. I'm not going to go practice and get better, but with real estate or business, it's like, Oh, I did a wrong move here. What w like, why did I do that? And how do I do it better next time? Oh, we lost this deal. Why did we lose it? How do we do it better? Oh, this deal. Did exactly what we thought it would. Why did it do exactly what we thought it would? Was it for the same reasons that. We thought or was it different reasons? Right. And so to me, it's just. To me business and real estate is such a personal development and just a constant reflection in the mirror every day. And then being around people that think. Even differently, like think differently in different roles, with different strategies and how they do it and why they do it to me. I just wanted to be around those people. And then the thing that attracted me to you was. I mean, you're just meeting people. You're talking to them. I love the Hawaiian shirts or Puerto Rican shirts that you wear. I was like, man, this dude's awesome. He's got his branding down. And then everybody you talk to, you're like, oh, I'm going to connect you with this guy. I'm going to connect you with this guy. And to me, I was like, cool, I'm not trying to get anything, but like, he gets it. Like he shares that quality of abundance. He shares that growth mindset. There's no. There isn't scarcity here, right? He's not like, oh, this is my lender. I'm not going to refer him to anybody. It's like, oh, this is my deal source. It's like, no, there's so many. There's the entire earth is real estate. Yeah. And the entire financial system is money. Like there's enough for everybody to succeed because that's how it's designed. Well, I built my whole business out of giving things away. And it's working. Like I make money by connecting people to what they need. And. I think. If more people realize that if you just took the time to listen to what people need and help them find it. There are so many rewards that come out of that. Like, Even if you don't get directly awarded rewarded like that. That moment it's like, there may be something that comes out of that later on, where like, you do have a way where you can shine and help, like. If I connect with you to a land. I connected you to a land lender that I know. I don't make anything off of that. Like, we don't have a referral program together or anything like that, but like, if he's able to help you finance a sale of a property to it, to your empire, like. That's a win to me because the next time you need something where I can help and make money, then you're going to come to me because like you remember that. And so I appreciate that. The nice, the nice comment about the Hawaiian shirt I love, I love wearing my Hawaiian shirts. So I look at so real estate. As a game is a collection of assets. And I look at my job as a collection of people, right. Almost like Ash from the Pokemon things. It's like, I'm collecting people. Right. I need people in my life that I can call when I'm having a hard time. I need people I can call to celebrate. Yo, this is super awesome. Like when I have a kid, I want people that I can call to like celebrate having a child. When I, when I have a deal, I want people that I can call to celebrate getting a good deal. And so to me, it's like, I'm just trying to surround myself with great people. That for events and occasions, and we can be around each other. And the way that you do that, it's like taking care of your family. Right? You're like, yeah, I need, you know, these people need to eat. They need shelter, they need money. They need. Resources, they need community. And so I'm always looking for ways to provide that because I'm like, dude, I've, I've chosen. You. And so I'm going to make sure that you're taking care of. Right. Let's talk about the, let's talk about masterminds. Like I want to, I want to hear your opinion on paying to be in a group. And if you have any experience with the mastermind, like what that's been like by getting into a group of like-minded people. Yeah, that's a good this is an interesting topic because what I did not realize this, not all masterminds are created equal. I think you've got your beginner level masterminds that are either free or relatively low cost under. I'd say probably costs under five grand. And it doesn't necessarily like the mastermind. I, man, we go, we go to one event a year with the option of two and it's only like five or 600 bucks a ticket. But to travel there and get your one week stay and food and all this stuff, it ends up being like five or$6,000. And I've gotten to that three times. But I'm actually at a point myself where I'm, I'm starting to realize, like, these people are, have gone from either blast off, starting out to a million ish. And then after that, there's not really anybody in that group that can really effectively mentor me with the business or life that they have, that I want, that they have. There's a couple of guys in there that have made hundreds of millions, but they don't have a great relationship. They're unhealthy there. You know what I mean? Like it's, it's not like a role model for me. Right. And that's what I am seeking in a mastermind is I want to be able to help people, but I also want to be growing myself. So I think masterminds are super crucial because when you can get in a room with people that you say, Hey, this is my idea. And it's not like family dinner where, or, you know, you're hanging out with friends and you're like, oh, I'm. Trying to gain weight. I'm trying to start a business. I'm trying to, you know, do something that is different from what I'm doing now. And they're like, oh, that's great. We're happy for you. Like okay. I don't really need that. What I need is. I want to tell you this. And I want you to tell me why or why not. It's going to work. Because if you can give me a lesson, that's going to save me six months of not wasting time. Right? Like for your weight gaining, you'd be like, oh yeah, I'm going to eat 2,500 calories. Me having done this. I'd be like, yeah, Hey, that's not enough. You gotta be at 3,500 calories without 200 grams of protein every single day. And at least a hundred ounces of water, like. You know what I mean? But if you weren't in a mastermind where people are talking about these things or know these things, You're going to go waste six months, not eating enough food and not hitting your goal. Hmm. But yeah, the masterminds. I can not say enough. I think you need a mentor or somebody in your life that you can look up to. And that may or may not come from a mastermind, but you need that collective group. To check in at least yearly. So how did, how did you acquire your mentor? And what does that person look like? So I have Mentors in different things and in different forms. So like, My first mentor I would say was that guy from the real estate guy that brought me into his business for wholesaling. He kind of connected me and then I just started picking people out. Right. Even within that group, it's like one guy was really, really good at creative deals. And so I was like, you're my guy for creative until I'm like, maybe I haven't done as many deals as you, but I can explain and understand what you're talking about in a casual conversation when you're throwing out just these crazy terms and deal structures. Then I was like, okay, cool. Now I either need to just go execute this or while I'm executing it, find. The guy that is like nationwide, teach me this stuff. But, I mean, it doesn't have to be crazy. Like, I think so many people want this. Like, I want to be mentored by see bum to gain weight or to powerlift. And it's like, Dude you weigh 150 pounds. You're only trying to get to 180. Like you need a personal fitness coach that can, and maybe a physical therapist that can correct some form. Make sure you're working out correctly. And. Eat correctly, right? Like you really don't need to go from zero to a hundred. You need to go from where you're at to the next step. And anybody that's done that you just need to talk to. Yeah. And be willing to one. You need to talk to them too. You need to be willing to only take their advice. So like once you pick somebody and you pick that mentor. If you hear something that tempts you to go off track you go back to that person. Like, oh man, I heard about this and your suit, you know, you're telling them super excited. That mentor should tell you why it's a good or bad idea. And that's my litmus test for a good mentor. It's like, if I bring you an idea and you're just a yes, man, to everything I say, you've like, you were cut off from being my mentor. And a lot of them do it. A lot of my mentors don't even know they're my mentors. I just put myself in situations where I'm around them enough. To where we can have these conversations. And so what does it look like to approach someone who you want to be a mentor? Like how did you go about doing that? Like when, if you wanted someone to be your mentor. And you want them to know that their mentor, how did that, how do you, how do you go about that? So my first real guy that I sought out intentionally to like learn how to flip houses, dude, I brought him a deal. I was like, Hey, this is a deal, right? I've been wholesaling, I've been underwriting deals. I've been doing all these things. And I was like, I'm going to buy this house in my LLC name. I'm going to get all the funding to fund it. But I want to bring you in because you've been doing real estate flips for 15 years. So I will bring the deal. I will fund the deal. In return. And I will give you 50% of the profits of this deal in return. I want to use your crew and I want you to mentor me through this first flip. How did that flip go? It went great. It was profitable. I didn't have to find a crew. It took us three months to flip the thing. There were decisions. I made that. I was like, oh, I shouldn't have done that. But I was like trying to prove myself or whatever. And he was there to be like, oh yeah, you did it. And it's fine. Like, it didn't kill us. But like, instead of doing that, you should have done this. Right. And so it's still a learning curve. I mean, it was a small deal. Like we bought it for 145,000, sold it for like, 2 65. We made. You know, 35,000 on it, split it in half. Yeah. I learned a lot in that. But even, even with that. So, and then I needed another mentor because in this situation, I didn't know what I was doing. And the little that I know that this guy didn't know what he was doing on the backend. He knew how to flip houses and do business. He didn't know how to do the bookkeeping and the financials. So then I had to find somebody to show me how to set up a P and L and how to set up QuickBooks and have a balance sheet and track all this stuff, not in a spreadsheet and automate it and do all these things. Right. So it's like, There's no single mentor. That's just going to be a one. One trick or, you know, multiple trick pony that can do everything. One mentor is going to lead you to a new problem, or you're going to have to find another mentor to do something. My first flip that I did. In Nashville. I didn't even find out how much profit I made on it until a few weeks ago. And I finished that project like four or five months ago. And until I brought my seat, my CFO on, I had no clue how much money I made on that. I was like, Kayla, I need to know how much money I made on this. Cause like, I, I don't know at this point, And so like, she came to me like a few weeks later after my book, after the bookkeeper had gone through everything, it was like, all right. Yeah, you made. I think I made like. 60 grand on that one. And I was like, okay, cool. Thanks. Thanks for letting me know. I was close. I th I think I came up with that. We made like, 58 or something. So I was like two grand off. Yeah, that's good. But yeah, it was like, You don't know what you don't know when you're first ripping into it. Like when I got that deal. I knew it was a good deal when my parents brought it to me. I went 50 50 with my parents. And my dad's been in construction his whole life. And my mentor in Nashville, he owned a construction company. And so I brought him out to the house and we looked at it together and he's like, Hey, this is a good deal out of bathroom here. Rock and roll, do this. And he told me exactly what I needed to do. And then. I listen, listen to Ted and made money. So Ted got you going right. Okay. Now the question, this is another way that I've built relationships as I just randomly hand people's ins. Because you'd be amazed at how many people are like, oh bro, I would love one of those. And then you just chop up a conversation or you as in guide. No. You know what Tucker Carlson says. Only if it's, if it's three milligrams and occasionally, oh yeah. So I'm a cigar guy like to smoke scars. So sir, as you know, What what got you into the whole networking, connecting people to other people like where you like, where you like a social butterfly in high school and college, or where you like. I don't know shit. I want to make money. I need to go start connecting people. I've always been curious since I was a kid. We're going to curious, like, When other kids would be off playing video games or play with Legos, I would be talking to the adults and asking them what they do for a living. And I'd be. Like, I'd see my friend's dad, Steve pull up in a Ferrari or a Hummer and be like, Oh, that guy's rich. Like, what does he do? And so I always just ask questions. And I always love learning how things tick. So when I was a kid, I had this which, where the Saturn plant back when Saturn was a car brand in spring hill, Tennessee. And we Saturn out of business. No. Sarah has been gone since I wait, dude. Oh, I didn't know that. I didn't like their cars. Maybe 2011 or something like that. Yeah. So but we went to the Saturn factory and it was just so fascinated me. I saw the robots like welding stuff together. And so that's been me since I was a little, little kid was trying to learn how things work. And then. When I was in college. I went to a networking event for the first time. I think I was a junior in college and I saw DJ scuba, Steve. Who was the DJ for the college posts that he went to a new good networking event. And I was like, that looks cool. It's like, actually, like, it looks fun. Yeah. Like it was at the red Wolf stadium. And so it was like nice and fancy. It's like, that's what a networking event is always thought a networking event was like the stuffy, like boring thing. And then I went to the second one that they had, and I, I met like three or four business owners in that one meeting. I was like, holy crap. Like I can go to one meeting. I mean three to four business owners and ask them how their business works. Like this is awesome because I always love meeting owners. I've always, since I was very little, I always loved to like, be able to know the owner of a place. Cause then it's like, oh, it was. Steven is this person in? And it's like, oh yeah, they come out of their office and give this kid some free stuff, you know? Cause they're the owner and they can do that. And yeah, that's what started it. And then as I went along in life, I realized how. Important it is to know the people that run the things. Because if you have a problem at your bank, if you have a problem at a restaurant problem, a place. And you can text the owner I guarantee you, your problem's going to get fixed a lot quicker. Then, if you're texting the mid-level or low-level manager, or if you don't have any connections in that business, you're going to be stuck at the customer service level, you know? Oh a hundred percent. Dude. I started, I used to only want to talk to owners, but I've noticed now, after moving here, a lot of restaurants don't take reservations. So if I get a good waiter or waitress at a restaurant that I like. I'll just like, get their number and like, Hey. I know you guys don't take reservations. But if I were to text you like, Hey, we're coming in with like five to 10 people. And we wanted you, could you like reserve us a table 10 out of 10? Oh yeah. I can do that. And I'm like, dude, that's awesome. And it pays off. Cause I, I brought in an investor and he was like, Hey, me and my wife celebrate every deal we do. Do you like this restaurant? And I was like, oh, I love that restaurant. He was like, cool. You guys want to grab dinner there? And I was like, yeah, no worries. They don't take reservations, but I can get us one. And they were like, what? We've never been able to get a reservation there. And I'm dude, I'm the same way. Like the, just when you're around good PR just always good people. In different positions. I think it goes so far. So I think that's really cool that you were keen on that. Yeah, and I just started realizing. You know, in college, like. If you can know the right people, no problems, too big. If you know the right people, no problems, too big. Cause. I have a story about this. Yeah, go ahead. So in high school we had to do, we had to get like Microsoft. Or whatever the G suite is certified like certified and all the docs and sheets. I think it was Excel. And I went to college and they were like, Hey, you got to take this Excel class. And I was like, why. Well, because we don't, every freshman has to take this. And I was like, dude, I'm certified in this. Like, I could teach this class. And they're like, no, you have to take it. And I just went to the Dean or the Dean and I was like, Hey. I hope I'm not overstepping boundaries here, but like, here's my certification for this. Is there any way that I could not take this class? And he was like, Give me a week. I was like, all right, cool. Dude a week later, I get an email from him and he's like, Hey, we've complete, we've changed. We've made an amendment to our entire school guidelines that if anybody certified in any of these programs, they're exempt from these classes. So you don't have to enroll. And I was like, no way. That was a first time in my life that I like one probably stood up to myself to what seemed like this massive Goliath of like an organization in person. But I think that the thing that you like, your. The reason I think you're successful in networking is because you're just sincere and you're like, you're not trying to cause problem or drama or anything like that. And I think that when you meet people and you have. That type of heart and soul it goes a long way and it attracts like, like attracts, like. I know people say like opposites attract and it's like, no. The only time opposites attract is when villains are fighting superheroes, right? It's like, you don't want that type of opposite attraction. You want. You you attract who you are or who you're becoming. Cause people see who you're becoming. And like when I look at people too, it's like, I'm not just making friends with this person today. I'm making with this person, friends with this person 10 years from now as well. Like my relationship with you as an investment into the future. You may or may not still be in real estate, but you're going to still be doing something and you're a good person. Whatever you do is going to be successful. And if it's not, we'll figure out why. And we're going to be like, Hey, come over. We're going to sip some whiskey and have a cigar, and we're going to fucking figure this out together. And because I'd like you and I want you to succeed. Right. And I think that investing in people in your time with people like the one, this podcast, it's like, when I say, Hey, I want to do this podcast with you. It's not because like, oh, I want to be sitting in a room in a black room with microphones every week. It's because I want to be around Haydynn and I want to help Haydynn. And I believe that I can provide value to people and it's like, yeah. If somebody can come in and we can have real conversations, we can banter back and forth and have a good time. Like. That provides value for Haydynn's podcasts. That gets me around Haydynn, that gets me in the room with, you know, potential investors or business people or other cool people that are in this facility. And it's, it's one of those things where I'm like, Invest in that person, not only today, but also where they're headed. I loved what you mentioned earlier. Oh, I want to kind of backtrack to that and talk about. And this well, I'll ask you the last question. After we go on this little sidetrack. But you talked about how you got your mentor and this is a very similar way to how I got my mentor. And that is like, So when I, when I first met my mentor, I went to his very, very nice house in Nashville. And I just sat down in his kitchen, like 20 foot ceilings above me. And I'm like, I just picked his brain for like two hours. We just sat there and I asked him any question I had and I asked him like, do you know this person? He's like, oh yeah, I'm good friends with that person, like billionaires. And I'm like, Oh, that's cool. He's like, yeah. I put every roof on the gas station that they built. Around the country. I'm like, oh, that that's cool. And just learning from him about his 30 years of business and at the end of it, though. I asked him, I was like, What do you need right now? And he said, Well, I've got about$30 million sitting on the sideline that I want to deploy in hard money, and I want to do hard money loans. And so I took that. I wrote down in my notebook and two weeks, two days, or probably a week later, I brought them to deals. For him to fund. Hard money and he funded them. My friends were super happy because they had this really rich, private money lender. They gave them great terms. And my mentor is happy because. I brought him what he asked for, you know, and he paid me out$500 a loan. Which is like, probably about half of what, like the standard points would be to get paid. I didn't care. I would do it for free. Because it brought me joy to be able to bring him value and any time that I need something. I know that he's a phone call away or a phone call at a few text messages sometimes because he's very busy, but like, I know that if I really needed something, he would, he would come through and help me. And that's invaluable. Like when I tell people that I made$500 in loan, I mean, I got, I got him. He probably funded he's he's funded about four or$5 million of my friends deals at this point. And I made a few thousand dollars off of that. And I tell people I've funded 4 million and like, you could have made a point on all of that. And I'm like, it's not about that. When I tell people my business model that even, even the guy refer business to you right now for my hard money loans for stuff that, that my mentor won't fund. I make$700 alone. And like you could be making so much more, come on, Haydynn warrant, you making more money. I'm like, because we have a great relationship. And he makes my life easy. And he takes those loans from cradle to grave. When I text, I connected him with someone today. I know that if he can get that business, if that deal is possible to get to the finish line. If anyone can do it, Logan can do it. So it's totally worth it to me. I make like three or$400, less. Sure. Whatever. But like, He gets it done and I'll have to do this in one text message. So I kind of went on a rant there, but yeah, I think it all starts with bringing value to people and that's how you build the best connections is just bringing freaking value to people and like, Listening. When, when you ask, Hey, what, what can I do for you? Because I want to have you in my life. I want to learn from you. Listening to what the answer is. And if the person says, well, I don't really need anything right now. Push back on that. There's always something that similar needs. If someone came to me and said, and I, and I, sometimes I say it, I'm like, yeah, I don't really need anything right now. It's usually because I, at that moment, I'm so overwhelmed with everything that I have. I can't even think of something to help have someone help me with now. But, okay, well, I'll ask you in five days. And they texted me five days. Hey, what do you need help with right now? And those are the people I keep around me. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. I love that. So it has been a very, very quick 45 minutes. But I want to ask you the question. I ask all my guests and that is what is a connection to a person or a group of people that change the trajectory of your life or business, for sure joining a mastermind. That was for sure Because what I realized is I was capable from that group. They made me realize I was capable of so much more in my dreams. And my visions were like far below my potential. And so being around them helped me. Everybody's like, oh, they have potential or whatever. And it's like, cool. Yeah, you probably do. But until you're around somebody that can help. But until you're around somebody that can help you get into or recognize the right vehicle, it's always, you're going to die with potential. Until you turn that potential into kinetic. I mean, it's useless, right? If you pull the rubber band back and you just hold it back for 50 years, Cool. You have a stretched rubber band. That's just going to. Dry like that, and eventually never be able to bounce for it. And that's our life. So I think if we, if if you have any level of motivation or, or. Ambition that getting in the room with those people that are pushing and have done it and dreaming big and can help make you realize how to turn kinetic Putin or potential into kinetic. Yeah. That's by far been the best. I want to add something to that as well. Sharing your goals with those people is more important than anything. Because just getting around those people. It's cool. But unless you're sharing your goals and sharing what you're doing. They can't help you. Yeah. Sharing your plan, sharing your strategy, sharing your goal sharing. Like when they ask a question, just being like, I don't know, this is what I think, but I'm don't know. Yeah, sharing every, every detail that you can possibly share with them. As vulnerability, knowing, not being afraid, but knowing it's going to get attacked. Yeah, right. Knowing, oh, I have a goal to make a hundred thousand and they're like, that's stupid. Go for a million, like maybe a milestone is a hundred grand. But, or the opposite where I told you the opposite. And I tell people I'm raising 30 million. They're like, Some very smart people that raise 60 and 80 million in a year. They're like Haydynn. You're trying to go a thousand miles an hour in the very beginning. And I was like, I respect the shit out of these people. It was like maybe text my business partners and reevaluate like, Hey, are we on the right track here? Because I want to do something that, you know, I want to have my. And I hate the word realistic goals. I don't. I don't like the word realistic goals. I think we should have unrealistic goals. Because it's better to aim. Hi. And miss than to aim low and hit, in my opinion. I really agree with that. I hear your thoughts. My thought is that you have a vision. And along the vision see the, the vision is the ultimate goal or like the furthest you can possibly see right. Weather. Let's say it's with a naked eye, or let's say you're looking through a magnifying glass, so you can't see very far, let's say you have a telescope and you can see forever far with every detail. That's fine. And to me, that is just the destination, right? Like, Hey, we want to drive from Chattanooga LA. Okay, cool. LA is the destination. But along the way, we still have to go through Nashville. We still have to go through wherever. And I think that at some, I think that identifying an unrealistic. An unrealistic destination, like you're talking about is wise. I think the more wise thing to do is make it realistic. Right. So if you say, Hey, I want to go do, go raise$30 million. But you, no matter who you talk to or what you do, that it just. You cannot figure out a path to get there, right? Like we could say, Hey, we want to go to Mars. Could we figure out a way to go to Mars? Yes. But is it realistic to do that in the next two years for us? Probably not. So, Hey, maybe we need to only go to LA. You know what I mean? And it's like, if you set a goal. Or a destination that you want to get to and you can't with your. You can't for whatever reason, find the person to show you how to get there or come up with a plan. To execute to get there. Then I say, don't go after it, right? If you, if for your$30 million, if you have a plan, like, Hey. I need to go set this many meetings I need to get in these doors. I need to spend this amount of money and I have the resources to do it. I have the time in my day to have that many meetings and go to these things and do the content that I need to do. And I have a choke hold on the industry here. So it's in that like, It is. If I can execute this plan, it is absolutely inevitable to hit do it. But if you set that unrealistic goal and you can't make a feasible plan to get there. And maybe you don't have the resources immediately, but you identify some resources. Hey, I got to go collect this person or these, this money or this asset or whatever to get there. That's fine. That's just the path. But if there's just like, dude, I could have. 20, I would have to have 20 meetings a day assuming so many clothes, and I'm only going to make 20 million. And if I do 10 meetings a day, I'm not going to have time for anything else. And then you assess is spending the time to do that versus my other opportunities worth it. If the answer is yes, go do it. If the answer is no, then you need to pull that back or restrategize. Right. And through that refining process, if you can't make that plan to make those unrealistic goals or unrealistic destination realistic, Then yeah, maybe you pull it back a little bit. Well, and then it also goes back to the whole equation of who do you know. Right. Like if I knew hundred investors that are liquid. 5 million, a piece that are just looking for something to put it in. It would be an easy goal. I'd probably be shooting myself in the foot to shoot for 30 million. Right. That's not my situation at the moment. So it's like, you've got to. You've got to adjust your goals. Kind of, in my opinion, based on who, you know, And if you don't know the right people. To be able to hit your goal. I look at it this way as a connector, I've got to think about like, Where, what rooms do I need to be paying to get into, to get around people that have done what I want to do 10 times over. So, and then I would say this, cause you're in that situation, you currently don't know those people. Let's go say tomorrow you meet five of them. And five of them say, Hey, I'm not going to invest in this because of X, Y, Z. And your plan is always going to be changing, right? There's detours, there's construction along the way. There's fricking a tornado, goes through and wipes out the I 40 or whatever. You know what I mean? Like all these things happen along the way, and you're always refining and trying to figure out. You know, it's not like you have Google maps just to get there. You have the map to get there and sometimes you have to refine it. And sometimes you've talked to those people and you get in the right rooms and talk to the exact person you need to talk to. And they are going to tell you, Hey, this isn't going to work because of this, boom. Now that's a new piece you need to include in your plan. Or a change in your product or changing your offer. And so, I mean, you're aware of that. But yeah. You know, just constantly evaluating like, Hey, maybe we need to, I think with every goal setting there's, Hey, this is the goal. This is what we're going to do to get there. And at this point, we're going to talk to 10 of these investors that are the perfect ideal match of what we've identified. And then we're going to reassess, but we're not going to reassess before this number because six of them might just be in a pinch or they're in the same industry because you one referred you to all of them and they're all in gas stations or whatever. And for whatever reason, Gas stations are going under in that industry. It's just not working. So until you have a big enough sample size to say, Hey, This is valid quality information. We need to change our plan on you know, just having checkpoints, I guess, is the point of what I'm saying is having checkpoints along the path. Well, we we've got to end it off here. That was a lot of fun. And we'll do an episode with your wife after Thanksgiving and Christmas is I wouldn't bring cat on and talk about like the business side of things. Because we can ramble on about philosophy and, oh, I could talk about this for three ways to do things for hours. Yeah. I feel like Kat would keep us on track. So. We'll have another episode. But if, if people want to reach out to you And learn more. We didn't even get to talk about land at all. Now does land pretty much on time now. So if anyone wants to reach out and learn more about land or just what you're doing, how you got to where you are, where should they do that? Hit me up on Instagram, the Matt Beans. You can shoot me an email. matt@terralumaland.com. I'll even throw my business phone number out there for two three, two, two five two four, two seven. If anybody wants to reach out and say, Hey I offer one-on-one, we can jump on a 30 minute call. Just kind of discuss. Whatever open the business. Real estate, personal development, any of that? So especially new, new beginners, anybody looking to jump into deals? Pretty open to having conversations, jump on a podcast, open to all of it. I love it. Well, thanks so much for coming on today. Guys, if you've made it this far to the end of the episode, please, please, please share this episode with somebody. If you found it valuable. That's the best way to grow a podcast. And also if you found it valuable, and this is your first time, or even maybe your 50th time listening to the podcast. Those reviews matter so much as well. So if you can go up on Spotify to the top and leave a five star review, if you're on apple podcast, scroll down to the bottom. And leave that five star review. That's the best way to help this show grow. So thought of me and said, thank you guys for listening to Art of Connecting connecting podcast, and we'll catch you on the next episode.