Joseph McCabe, a Philadelphia entrepreneur and proud US Army veteran, is the CEO and Founder of The Surefire Group. His leadership catapulted the company to the INC 5000 List in 2022, marking it as one of the fastest-growing in the US. Beyond real estate, Joseph manages home care agencies, invests in Tech, AI, and Healthcare, and contributes to the National Museum of the Army. An IFR rated private pilot and author of ‘Maintain Your Gear,’ Joseph’s diverse interests range from flying to collecting art and powerlifting.
Here’s some of the topics we covered:
- Joseph’s Path Into Multifamily
- Interest Rates In The United States
- The Most Important Principles of Leadership
- KPI’s, What They Are, And How They Help You Grow
- The Importance Of Having a team
- The Biggest Mentors In Joseph’s Life
- Why Most People Fail At Multifamily
To find out more about partnering or investing in a multifamily deal: Text Partner to 72345 or email Partner@RodKhleif.com
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Full Transcript Below
00:00:00:08 – 00:00:18:06
Rod
Hi, my name is Rod Cleave, and I’m the host of the Lifetime Cash Flow to Real Estate Investing Podcast. And every week I interview multifamily rock stars. We talk about how they build, increase wealth for themselves and their families through multifamily properties. So hit the like unsubscribe button to get notified every Monday when a new episode comes out.
00:00:18:08 – 00:00:41:07
Rod
Let’s get to it. Welcome to another edition of Lifetime Cash Flow Through Real Estate Investing. I’m Rod Cliff and I’m thrilled that you’re here. You’re going to get tremendous value from the gentleman I’m interviewing today. He’s been on the show previously. His name is Joseph McCabe, and he runs the Sure Fire Group. And kind of cool. He just told me they just announced that he’s 17th on the INC 500 and he’s number one and Pennsylvania and New Jersey and New York.
00:00:41:07 – 00:00:59:08
Rod
And he he runs several different companies. And so we’re going to talk about leadership today. You’re thinking, well, what the hell does that have to do with multifamily? And I’m going to tell you everything. Okay. So so you definitely don’t want to miss this episode. I’m going to talk about how to build a business, run a business effectively, which he obviously knows how to do.
00:00:59:08 – 00:01:01:01
Rod
So we have a lot of fun today. Welcome, brother.
00:01:01:05 – 00:01:03:08
Joseph
Thank you. Good to see you again. This on again.
00:01:03:10 – 00:01:26:21
Rod
Yeah. I appreciate you coming over. You know, we were both over on the East Coast. I was in Miami screwing around and he lives in Fort Lauderdale. And I’m like, shit, It’s a shame I don’t have a studio over there, so we can do it over there. But we ended up both coming back, so why don’t you take a minute and talk about maybe the first business you started and how it built into these other.
00:01:27:01 – 00:01:34:18
Rod
I mean, I know I can tell just by the types of businesses they are how why you did it, but talk about it in your words and kind of bring us give us a little chronology.
00:01:35:00 – 00:01:53:05
Joseph
Yes. So I started off in my last year of college in 2015 or so, and I started training people at L.A. Fitness. I met this realtor, I started training his wife, and I used to joke with him like, Come on, man. Like, don’t park your Mercedes next to my Ford Fusion, because it’s like, Well, it doesn’t look good.
00:01:53:07 – 00:01:54:10
Joseph
And I said.
00:01:54:10 – 00:01:55:01
Rod
Fusion look.
00:01:55:01 – 00:02:05:16
Joseph
Bad, right? Yeah. And he gave me the typical KW real estate pitch. You can have one too, you know, get your license, join my team. So I did that. I joined his team. I got my license. Keller Williams.
00:02:05:20 – 00:02:06:22
Rod
You know, I had Jay Papis.
00:02:06:23 – 00:02:18:09
Joseph
On the show. Oh, okay. Yeah. You know who that. Yeah. Yeah. KELLER So I was just down with them December last December. Nice meeting with Carrie. Nice. Yeah, it was awesome. Very cool.
00:02:18:11 – 00:02:31:01
Rod
By the way, guys, Gary Keller is frickin rock star. He doesn’t do interviews, or I’d be begging him to be on the show, but he wrote the one thing, which is a fantastic book, and Jay Papazian was it is his coauthor. But anyway, please continue.
00:02:31:06 – 00:02:46:15
Joseph
Yeah. So I just kind of when I was at Keller Williams, I didn’t fall in love with the South Side, but I kind of fell in love with the fact that there were so many different verticals that these broker owners can make money off of. And Keller Williams seemed to do it right. So I couldn’t afford a Keller Williams franchise.
00:02:46:15 – 00:03:02:07
Joseph
So six months into my real estate career, I made like 75 grand. I had a start date for the Philadelphia Police Department. I decided to put that to the side. I was already in the military and I started shopping franchises, which just no one really does that, especially when you’re not a broker.
00:03:02:07 – 00:03:03:20
Rod
I’ve done it, but yeah.
00:03:03:22 – 00:03:22:06
Joseph
Yeah. Then people were like, You’re going to start a you know, you’re not even a broker yet. And I called Remax and Remax was the only company that took credit. Didn’t really care what experience you had. And they were just, they wanted the franchise fee and so we started our first franchise out in Plymouth meeting Pennsylvania, in a high rise, which was my first mistake.
00:03:22:07 – 00:03:29:15
Joseph
REMAX Yeah, yeah. And and now we’re we’re still. REMAX, but we’re partnering with some of the largest K WS in the country. Oh, really? Yeah.
00:03:29:18 – 00:03:31:04
Rod
REMAX Partnering with Keller.
00:03:31:04 – 00:03:35:06
Joseph
WILLIAMS Yeah, it’s not Remax directly, but our Remax brokerage, that silo.
00:03:35:12 – 00:03:54:16
Rod
Okay, is with Oh, interesting. Okay. Keller Williams kicks ass. I mean, they do it for sure. Yeah, of course. E ZP is pretty impressive as well you know, from that with that whole retirement component. Sure that I went to one of their conferences, I was pretty impressed. They were begging me to get going. But that’s like starting a whole new business, you know, I’m not going to do that.
00:03:54:18 – 00:04:00:17
Rod
So. So tell me what happened after that. So you’re kind of give us the chronology of all these different businesses, because that’s so.
00:04:00:17 – 00:04:11:13
Joseph
From there, I bootstrapped it. I found a broker that, you know, was a knew my dad well, he was on it. He was in the police department, too. He was a captain. I used his broker’s license until I got mine.
00:04:11:13 – 00:04:13:04
Rod
Your dad was a cop, too. Oh, very.
00:04:13:05 – 00:04:17:01
Joseph
Cool. Yeah. Fat law. Every one of my family is Irish-Catholic cop.
00:04:17:01 – 00:04:18:23
Rod
Oh, and you’re the you’re the outcast.
00:04:18:23 – 00:04:24:01
Joseph
Because you didn’t do it, huh? I did become a cop in the military. Oh, you did? I did that for eight years, but.
00:04:24:03 – 00:04:26:18
Rod
I was just watching Reacher last night. Oh, yeah.
00:04:26:20 – 00:04:28:02
Joseph
That’s a great idea.
00:04:28:07 – 00:04:34:21
Rod
Or no kidding. Oh, yeah, I love that. His all the lead child books from Richard. Anyway, I’m sorry, I keep distracting you.
00:04:34:21 – 00:04:43:18
Joseph
Keep Now you’re good. So we, we, we we jump then we jump from like, building to building, making all these mistakes. I learned everything, really. The harder.
00:04:43:18 – 00:04:46:16
Rod
You mean. You mean renting at different buildings to do your businesses?
00:04:46:16 – 00:05:03:04
Joseph
Yeah. Trying to figure out what was going on. And I realized that I couldn’t be in a high rise. It was like an office building, like a four story high rise. And I begged Remax to let me get into the city, which is tough because it’s it’s oversaturated with franchises. But they let us go into Manion and the managers in New York, Philly.
00:05:03:09 – 00:05:03:21
Rod
Manhattan.
00:05:03:21 – 00:05:04:06
Joseph
Philly.
00:05:04:11 – 00:05:06:00
Rod
Oh, Philly, Philly. The city of Philly.
00:05:06:00 – 00:05:15:04
Joseph
Got you. Yeah. And in that six month period from when we left Plymouth, meaning went to Antioch, we brought in about 75 realtors. I had maybe three before that.
00:05:15:04 – 00:05:15:22
Rod
Wow.
00:05:16:00 – 00:05:38:12
Joseph
A year after that, the largest Remax in Philly, the owner was becoming sick, so he ended up selling to us. So we we became the largest Remax in Philadelphia with about 200 agents. Now we’re sitting at 300. Wow. And that whole time we were building a mortgage and title company. But they were it was kind of a slow go, especially on mortgage.
00:05:38:14 – 00:06:06:22
Joseph
So I started, you know, really to keep the mortgage and title company alive. I started going out there and doing those partnerships with other brokerages locally and bringing them mortgage and title because there’s a lot of companies that do title insurance, joint ventures, but they charge management fees. No one really does mortgage joint ventures properly. So we go out there and we offer both with no management fees and right now, because of the market compression, like like you were saying, there’s so much compression.
00:06:06:22 – 00:06:19:00
Joseph
And in some markets in our market, that’s like 18% volume down. But in certain parts of Texas, California, that’s 50, 60, 70% depending on the brokerage. So they’re looking for ancillary income.
00:06:19:00 – 00:06:21:09
Rod
Now, I’m surprised you’re only 18% down.
00:06:21:09 – 00:06:22:20
Joseph
Because I yeah, it’s not too bad out here.
00:06:22:21 – 00:06:28:16
Rod
It’s worse than that. Okay. Interesting. Well, I mean, I hate to say it, but I think it’s going to get worse.
00:06:28:16 – 00:06:29:07
Joseph
I think so.
00:06:29:07 – 00:06:54:14
Rod
Yeah. We’re definitely facing a train wreck in the commercial side. So, you know, these interest rates have just I mean, it’s twice as much a mortgage payment as it was a year and a half ago. Yes. So hopefully it’ll come back down. So. So you started the mortgage business, the title insurance business, which you’re obviously complementary to the real estate brokerage, which is why I want you to mention it, and where at home health care come into the picture.
00:06:54:15 – 00:07:11:08
Joseph
So home health care. And it might have been a couple of days after our last interview in 2020, but that was when all the panic started and everyone was selling their businesses online. People were freaking out and I was trying to buy this Dunkin Donuts franchise because I just I love coffee and I was like, Why not? Right?
00:07:11:12 – 00:07:35:20
Joseph
And they turned me down. And this woman in Texas called me back and I had written her an offer to sell her finance, her home health care business and Lake Jackson. She did a million and a half in top line revenue. She sent me the panels and I was like, this is actually a very profitable business. If she got out of the way and she ended up self-financing that to us for one times, even we closed on it.
00:07:35:22 – 00:07:39:04
Joseph
The franchise owners were a couple older guys in New York.
00:07:39:06 – 00:07:47:17
Rod
They love the I’m confused. I’m confused. Yeah. I mean, you just bought it from her. Who are all the owners of the franchise She was referring to franchise.
00:07:47:18 – 00:08:03:10
Joseph
Got. I got it. Okay, got it. Okay. And then when I you know, they do their normal meet and greet like Remax does it you go meet Shane Linenger and stuff like that. And they just kind of love the idea of bringing in new blood because what I had done without realizing it, I knew nothing about home health care.
00:08:03:12 – 00:08:20:19
Joseph
I still joke today that I don’t know if we build Medicare or Medicaid, but it’s one of them. And I just happened to meet the CEO of the Jewish Federation of Philadelphia, who ran their non-medical home care division, and he was describing what he did. And we were at a pizza place like just eating pizza at the counter.
00:08:20:21 – 00:08:44:17
Joseph
I never met him before. And I was like, This is going to be the dumbest thing you ever heard. But I think I just bought a company that does what you do. And he was like, Yes, pretty stupid. He’s like, Yeah, that is what we do. That’s funny. And we ended up, you know, I said, Well, look, I need help running the business because by that time it was only a couple of weeks later the franchise owner was pushing three additional locations towards us from other people wanted to retire.
00:08:44:19 – 00:08:55:11
Joseph
And so we ended up taking that $700,000 location and building it into today a $50 million company. And, you know, basically two and a half years.
00:08:55:13 – 00:08:56:14
Rod
That’s top line revenue.
00:08:56:14 – 00:08:57:16
Joseph
Yeah. Tough line for.
00:08:57:16 – 00:09:20:01
Rod
You. Good for you. Well, let’s talk about leadership, which is really where I want to go with this, you know, because it’s really not a multifamily operation. It’s it’s just multiple businesses that you’ve siloed that complement each other with the exception of the home health care. But so how big is the team for each one of these entities?
00:09:20:03 – 00:09:23:00
Joseph
Yeah, so that the direct leadership team is seven.
00:09:23:04 – 00:09:24:03
Rod
Okay.
00:09:24:05 – 00:09:25:18
Joseph
There’s one over each.
00:09:25:20 – 00:09:31:20
Rod
One over each and over each company, right? And then then you’ve got some other people, obviously, because there’s only four companies.
00:09:32:01 – 00:09:45:06
Joseph
And then so in the the home care company, I have three partners total. Oh I see. Yeah. So two guys are home care career guys. One’s actually up in Tampa, one was in Philly, and then my other partner was our capital partner.
00:09:45:11 – 00:09:55:22
Rod
Okay. Okay. Bryan Capital partner Got it. And so. Okay. And, and do you have like one accounting component for all the companies or they done separately?
00:09:56:00 – 00:10:18:00
Joseph
Separately, which is a nightmare. But we just switched from QuickBooks to NetSuite, which if you can learn NetSuite, it’s great because I can you can kind of aggregate everything up to the surefire group, but then also break out, you know, because we have to do reporting to our partners on title mortgage, obviously, and do shareholder meetings so we can just kind of click on an entity and build a panel based on, you know, so there’s a and that’s pretty cool.
00:10:18:01 – 00:10:23:04
Rod
Okay. Okay. Yeah. Because I could see how you could have some economies of scale if you brought things together.
00:10:23:04 – 00:10:29:10
Joseph
Yeah, there’s about 57 entities that flow up to the Sure fire group all over the West Coast and East Coast.
00:10:29:10 – 00:11:01:02
Rod
Interesting. Okay, so how do you how did you. I mean, like. Like, let’s talk about the brokerage firm and how did you create a vision there to excite agents to come work with you because you jumped from a handful to hundreds? What what do you think was I mean, obviously location help, but how did you go about, you know, communicating a vision and and sharing that with these agents?
00:11:01:02 – 00:11:03:11
Rod
I mean, we talked about that a little bit.
00:11:03:13 – 00:11:17:01
Joseph
So in the beginning of the brokerage, essentially, we were operating as a Remax guy. But all I knew was. KW Right. So there are 7030 and they have a $30,000 cap.
00:11:17:01 – 00:11:32:08
Rod
That’s the by the way, guys, that’s the split they pay on commissions are. Keller Williams So so he’s talking about parallels between these getting a little micro but I’m I want to keep it more higher level yeah so from a vision oh well I guess prioritizing sorry.
00:11:32:08 – 00:11:54:07
Joseph
For yeah keep going Yeah that’s so that’s what I did is I didn’t know. Right. I had never sold an agent on joining a brokerage before, so I said, okay. KW does that I won’t. KW Agents, I’m just going to cut it in half. So we did 85, 15, 15,600 cap. And then I was just I vowed to be there like every morning I was in the office, the typical startup thing, right?
00:11:54:07 – 00:12:12:09
Joseph
I played every role in the company. I paid the agents, I mentored them, I trained them, I went on listing appointments. And so that was how we got the first kind of core group of 75 realtors. The next thing that really set us apart was the acquisition of the largest Remax in Philadelphia. So that really put us on the map.
00:12:12:11 – 00:12:31:16
Joseph
And then once we had 180 575 agents is fairly easy to get to 300 agents. The hard part was because I had made myself the face of that business, which is not very valuable in an acquisition scenario. But because I had made myself the face, it was very hard to get the agents to not go to me anymore.
00:12:31:16 – 00:12:37:08
Joseph
So we had to bring in a GM. We grew to 300 agents and I’m pretty hands off now.
00:12:37:08 – 00:12:38:07
Rod
That’s where it’s at now.
00:12:38:07 – 00:12:38:16
Joseph
Yeah.
00:12:38:19 – 00:12:59:04
Rod
Gotcha. So you brought in and I’m facing that same thing in my thought leadership business. It’s all me. And so I need to, you know, get some help from my successful students to help with training. And I’ve started to do that. And they get a better number. I would say better mount, maybe better, but a different perspective on on the different aspects of the business.
00:12:59:06 – 00:13:11:11
Rod
So so when you started these other verticals, the title insurance, the mortgage business, did you seek out people that were experts in those businesses to partner with? Is that how you did it?
00:13:11:13 – 00:13:30:05
Joseph
Yeah. So our title company initially started as a joint venture of another title company. Okay? We ended up outgrowing them. We didn’t have to buy them out or anything. We just kind of said, Hey, we’re going out on our own. The mortgage company. I had brought in a couple of salespeople.
00:13:30:07 – 00:13:38:09
Rod
Wait a minute, Back to your time insurance, though. I mean, did you have you have one guy that runs that has he been there the whole time or is this somebody new or I mean, we’ve.
00:13:38:09 – 00:13:58:15
Joseph
Had multiple leadership changes. You know, one of the things is that title insurance is typically a very local business. It’s very important that each because that title company typically will service a brokerage full of real estate agents. Right. There’s not a lot of retail title companies, especially up in Pennsylvania on the West Coast. So they’re.
00:13:58:15 – 00:14:01:04
Rod
Pretty much locked into whatever real estate company they aligned.
00:14:01:04 – 00:14:22:15
Joseph
With. Yeah, which means our leadership was used to operating that way, too. Got it. So as we progress and as we added locations, we just hired the woman who set up Zillow’s title company. Gotcha. Which they ended up closing, but she set it off. So we got lucky. We we just hired her, but we needed someone that could kind of obviously know the minutia of title write.
00:14:22:15 – 00:14:29:06
Joseph
There’s a lot of little detail right things, but someone that also could operate at a national level and not get intimidated by that.
00:14:29:06 – 00:14:31:08
Rod
And that’s difficult to find.
00:14:31:08 – 00:14:32:02
Joseph
Yeah.
00:14:32:04 – 00:14:48:12
Rod
Pulling back a little bit, a little higher, how do you manage the metrics on these different businesses? Are they done just by the leadership and they report up to you? Are you involved in these KPIs? How often do you measure? What do you measure? Talk about that a little bit.
00:14:48:14 – 00:15:00:20
Joseph
So are the luckily, the KPIs in all of our businesses are very they’re somewhat somewhat simple, right? There’s not a lot of them. There’s really only a couple of numbers that matter on our really.
00:15:00:23 – 00:15:18:15
Rod
By the way, excuse me, KPIs, a key performance indicator. It’s a metric that you whenever you own a business, you’ve got to have them. You’re measuring whatever. What if you don’t measure it, doesn’t it? You can’t improve it. So you’ve got to measure what you’re doing, what’s happening with sales, what’s happening with marketing, what marketing is working, what do you need to double down on?
00:15:18:17 – 00:15:37:22
Rod
You know, what’s the sales process look like? The other breakdowns, like in the multifamily business, you look at leasing, for example, how many leads are we getting in, how many leads are converting to how quickly those leads returned calls returned, how many those leads result in a showing, how many those showings result in application, how many those applications result in a lease.
00:15:37:22 – 00:15:42:05
Rod
That’s what I’m talking about here. So just to explain. So please continue. Sorry.
00:15:42:05 – 00:16:09:10
Joseph
Yeah, I’ll use the title insurance companies is the best example of of kind of simple KPIs and how we incentivize the growth of those in somewhat of a hands off way. So one thing that was really popular on the East Coast, it’s always existed is every broker in Pennsylvania has a title company. Typically it was run by Title Alliance, who’s our competitor, and they they sold shares to the agents, nonvoting shares.
00:16:09:10 – 00:16:40:17
Joseph
You know, a lot of ways to get them out. Well, once you do that, you can almost expect an 85% capture rate. So, really, you know, if we sell shares to the top 20% of the agents, the bottom 80% are going to follow suit. They’re going to use whoever the broker tells them to. So the part we have to watch on a month to month basis and you try to catch it upfront, you know, you could do different things, but we try to target between 70 and 85% capture rate of every buy side deal that comes in because of pay the buyer side, Realtors, you know, control the title and the mortgage is very similar.
00:16:40:17 – 00:16:49:05
Joseph
You know, we make them shareholders. We target a much lower capture rate because for most people, mortgage can kind of be emotional. And if it’s like.
00:16:49:07 – 00:16:50:14
Rod
When you say capture rate.
00:16:50:14 – 00:16:51:06
Joseph
Yeah.
00:16:51:08 – 00:16:54:19
Rod
The number that you’re trying to capture the deals that are coming to the office.
00:16:54:20 – 00:16:57:00
Joseph
Yes. If they have 100 deals, we want 85 of them.
00:16:57:02 – 00:17:02:18
Rod
Okay. So that’s your metric. That’s that’s your target. Yeah. Gotcha. Okay. In your measuring that, how often?
00:17:02:20 – 00:17:04:17
Joseph
Every month. Okay. Yeah.
00:17:04:19 – 00:17:12:18
Rod
Okay. Are you involved in establishing the culture in these different in these different businesses?
00:17:12:20 – 00:17:38:14
Joseph
So that goes back to the really hyperlocal part, right? Like our core team, my chief of staff, all the leadership in the company were, you know, our culture is very much about building something really big and making a lot of money and having fun doing it. The the culture of the individual real estate brokerages, you know, you have to hire boots on the ground, local manager that understands that market preferably as well known.
00:17:38:16 – 00:17:42:17
Joseph
And they kind of drive the culture along side of the real estate broker.
00:17:42:19 – 00:17:44:09
Rod
Hmm. Interesting.
00:17:44:09 – 00:17:48:13
Joseph
It’s very it’s a and each market is so different.
00:17:48:15 – 00:17:51:14
Rod
Are you doing regular training and all these different businesses?
00:17:51:16 – 00:18:08:20
Joseph
Yeah, we do. So on the health care side, you know, luckily the franchise drives a lot of that on the real estate side. Same thing. You know, we run a different training platform in each company and then we we rely heavily just so that we don’t have to do as much. We rely heavily on like the Land Title Association, the Association of Realtors.
00:18:08:22 – 00:18:11:21
Joseph
They always have training events and we try to plug into those.
00:18:12:01 – 00:18:24:21
Rod
I see. I see. Okay. So each business is out there marketing. And for more business, talk about the different marketing methodologies for each of your different silos.
00:18:24:23 – 00:18:42:14
Joseph
Yeah. So when I was running it, it was very different, right? Because I, I was running all four of these companies initially when we first met by myself, it was, it was just me. And actually you said something on the one podcast. I said, Well, no, no one could do a better than me. And you’re like, I’m going to push you that that is not the case.
00:18:42:14 – 00:18:43:22
Joseph
And you were right.
00:18:44:00 – 00:18:45:20
Rod
No, And it took me a long time.
00:18:45:20 – 00:19:05:13
Joseph
To learn that. Yeah. And so and I got lucky. I hired, you know, the first key position that I brought in was my chief of staff, who was an ex Green Beret, left the military as a major. And I thought, Wow, this guy is five years older than me. He’s been in charge of thousands of soldiers and millions and millions of dollars of CIA, black cash and other types of stuff.
00:19:05:13 – 00:19:23:05
Joseph
I was like, So this guy can help me, you know, manage the staff of the company. And so when I was running marketing, it was volume. It was how much volume can I get out, How many emails can I send to realtors? Can I send them every day, and how many responses can I do? What we’ve started to do over time is get a lot more targeted.
00:19:23:07 – 00:19:24:03
Joseph
So again.
00:19:24:05 – 00:19:27:16
Rod
Are you are you still managing the marketing initiative or you have somebody else doing it?
00:19:27:16 – 00:19:33:10
Joseph
Now? We have so in the title company, we have a director of operations and director of sales. Okay, same with mortgage.
00:19:33:14 – 00:20:02:21
Rod
Okay, So director of, of sales. Is that the person driving the marketing? Yeah. Okay. You combine sales and marketing. Okay. All right. Interesting. So let’s let’s circle back away from the businesses and just talk about business in general. Talk about some setbacks. You’ve had maybe a real stretch, stressful situation and, you know, some something that you think might add value to the listeners as to how you dealt with, you know, of a problem.
00:20:02:23 – 00:20:24:11
Joseph
We had a a key employee in the title company. So back in the beginning I said we we were a part of a JV of another title company and that JV, I had a great relationship with them. The manager was the daughter of the woman who owned the other title company that we were a part of. She was running our title company exclusively.
00:20:24:13 – 00:20:43:08
Joseph
She knew where all the skeletons were in the sense that there’s a lot of messy stuff in title. So we knew we had to let go of her for a good year. And the thing that kept us from doing that fucked us even more in the long run because we were petrified of what we didn’t know because we don’t run title rights.
00:20:43:10 – 00:21:03:05
Joseph
And and it was a mess. I mean, it was a total nightmare. But it turned out that the things that she was covering up were way worse than we should have just let her go. The year prior, we had 800 unrecorded files. We had too much money in our escrow account, thank God, not less. So there were just things like we had a sheet things.
00:21:03:07 – 00:21:19:03
Joseph
So just when you realize someone’s not a fit for the team and it’s not always easy when you’re a small company, right? Because you kind of want to slow fire fast. Exactly. Yeah. And, you know, and it is that dichotomy of like, you want to fire that person fast. You do need them to continue running while you’re looking.
00:21:19:03 – 00:21:41:00
Rod
And yeah, no, that’s always a problem. Well, in that vein, let’s talk about hiring for a minute. So, you know, when you’re looking at key players for your different entities here, what talk about the hiring process. What are you looking for? How do you screen them? How do you kind of vet them? You know, what do you do?
00:21:41:02 – 00:21:44:06
Joseph
We try to put them through the ringer, especially now. So.
00:21:44:08 – 00:21:45:14
Rod
Okay, describe that.
00:21:45:18 – 00:22:09:13
Joseph
Yeah. So we’ll take so we just hired someone to run sales for a mortgage company and we put he was with Allied Mortgage. He was coming over to us and we basically had him interview with me, Derek, my chief of staff, our leadership team, every single one of them. And then most of our real estate broker partners. Well, and, you know, he.
00:22:09:13 – 00:22:10:13
Rod
Got a lot of interviews.
00:22:10:13 – 00:22:28:06
Joseph
It was a lot. And part of what I’m trying to do is say, okay, is this person really committed? Because they know enough about the company. They come we use a third party recruiting service. And so they bring them. They know they know about us. They know what we’re trying to do. They know the mission. And the thing is, are they like before we even bring them on and start paying them, are they willing to go through the ringer?
00:22:28:06 – 00:22:44:17
Joseph
And we try to try to put them through some extra tasks, have them do background checks, have them do personality tests, talk to key members of the staff that they have to collaborate with. And as long as we get the okay from everybody and no one’s unsure. So kind of everyone has a veto card, right? In a way.
00:22:44:17 – 00:22:48:08
Joseph
I mean, if someone is like, I don’t know, then we move on. Yeah.
00:22:48:10 – 00:22:58:23
Rod
Same, same, same here. Yeah. Was there anybody that in your career that either mentored or opened doors for you to people?
00:22:59:00 – 00:23:18:19
Joseph
So the first one was this older guy that I met in the gym. When I first got into real estate. He was 96 year old guy that wore a Rolex presidential, which I didn’t even know what that was back then. And I would bench, I would be on the bench or I’d be on a machine. And the only conversation we ever had was him saying, I’m going to work in over there.
00:23:18:21 – 00:23:37:12
Joseph
Well, it turns out that he owned upwards of 5000 units at one point over time in Philadelphia. Bob Maser, he’s still alive. He’s 96. Today we own a plane together up in Philly. Well, we fly together well. So he was the first guy that really opened me up to well, for I like going out to a restaurant and seeing him over a tip.
00:23:37:12 – 00:23:56:22
Joseph
Like he didn’t calculate 20%. It was just $100, like carrying around a brick of cash. Like it was just a you know, I grew up super middle class, didn’t suffer. I don’t have a sob story, but but I did. I never saw wealth. So he was my first kind of exposure to money in real estate and the South side of it and the, you know, the acquisitions.
00:23:57:00 – 00:24:08:01
Joseph
And then the second opportunity that I had came in in 2020, the CEO of Go Abundance at the time was Chris Ryan, and he called me out of the blue.
00:24:08:03 – 00:24:09:05
Rod
Were you in abundance?
00:24:09:05 – 00:24:09:14
Joseph
I was.
00:24:09:17 – 00:24:10:13
Rod
Okay. That’s a great.
00:24:10:13 – 00:24:26:11
Joseph
Organization. Yeah. And he called me out of the blue and said, Hey, you want to go to Necker Island next week? Cool. And I was like, Next week? Sure. And he’s like, What’s 50 grand? And I was like, Wow, 50 grand for three days. I like, you know, And I didn’t believe that Richard Branson would be there. I was like, I don’t know.
00:24:26:11 – 00:24:42:06
Joseph
It just didn’t sound right. But kind of following Grant Cardone, I was like, Commit first, figured out later went and are 360 was the group at the island and so our 360 is a they’re huge in South Florida Miami Fort.
00:24:42:06 – 00:24:44:00
Rod
Lauderdale.
00:24:44:02 – 00:24:56:07
Joseph
But it’s like a network of family offices, all worth at least 150 million. So I couldn’t figure out why the hell I was there, because I was just me, my wife. And then basically the average person that was there was worth over $400 million.
00:24:56:08 – 00:24:57:14
Rod
That’s a crowd you want to be in.
00:24:57:18 – 00:25:14:23
Joseph
Yeah. And we were super intimidated because I wasn’t anywhere near that. And I get in the, you know, the pool one night I’m talking to Charlie Garcia, who’s the founder, and he base we hit it off and he asks me, like I said, Well, how do I join? Are 360. I didn’t even know about the net worth requirements.
00:25:15:01 – 00:25:36:07
Joseph
And he’s like, well, typically you couldn’t. He was like, But we brought you here because we want you to run our Rising Leaders program. And so the Rising Leaders program is basically, you know, a bunch of rich kids. And the goal is to give them access to things that they were never given access to before and then give them a peer group that they can kind of lean on and get support from.
00:25:36:07 – 00:25:37:00
Rod
And the idea.
00:25:37:01 – 00:25:43:22
Joseph
Yeah, it’s really cool. And so I got to join our 360 as a partner for $350,000.
00:25:43:23 – 00:25:44:11
Rod
Wow.
00:25:44:15 – 00:25:56:07
Joseph
But now I’m around all these people. So, you know, I go to the Palm Beach meetings, the Miami meetings, the New York meetings, the founders of Discover Card are there. Well, people like that. And so for me, it’s allowed you.
00:25:56:07 – 00:25:57:22
Rod
Pay 250 grand to join.
00:25:57:22 – 00:26:16:14
Joseph
Yeah. Holy shit. I’m a partner. Less than 1%. But. Wow. But it’s lifetime because the membership is every three years. 180,000. Wow. So I figured. Make sense, right? You know, join. But it’s been a game changer for me because any problem that I have, it just gets knocked down and knocked out by the best resources that money can buy.
00:26:16:16 – 00:26:18:03
Rod
Give me an example.
00:26:18:05 – 00:26:24:08
Joseph
So I wanted to look at asset protection. Okay. Hillel Presser is based out of Boca. He’s like, he’s.
00:26:24:08 – 00:26:28:07
Rod
An attorney, asset protection attorney. That’s a topic I’m very familiar with.
00:26:28:07 – 00:26:33:08
Joseph
Yeah, he’s like the best guy in the space. So interesting. He helped me there.
00:26:33:10 – 00:26:38:08
Rod
Well, if you can speak about it, sometimes you kind of keep it on the D.L., but would you do some offshore trusts or what did you do?
00:26:38:08 – 00:26:41:10
Joseph
Yeah, Yeah. Offshore trusts. Nieves. Okay. He was in the.
00:26:41:12 – 00:26:44:10
Rod
Yeah, I did him Bahamas. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay.
00:26:44:12 – 00:27:08:02
Joseph
Michael Cole’s in the group. Two is one of the co-founders. Okay. He founded Cressey Capital and it downing it was Wells Fargo. So, like, that is like he’s the premier high net worth trust guy. Like when it comes to structuring that and making sure kids don’t get too much money or just making sure that when you pass, your wishes are passed on, like he’s the guy in that space.
00:27:08:02 – 00:27:09:14
Rod
Interesting.
00:27:09:16 – 00:27:16:01
Joseph
And these people are just friends now. So for me, it was a huge level off that just any barrier that existed in my mind, it’s gone.
00:27:16:02 – 00:27:23:19
Rod
Wow. Wow. That’s extraordinary. You know, who you hang out with is who you become, right? You want to be around people Think what you think is hard is easy.
00:27:23:19 – 00:27:24:11
Joseph
Yes.
00:27:24:13 – 00:27:47:09
Rod
Wow. That’s a great example of leveling up. Probably the best example I’ve ever heard, candidly. So what advice would you give somebody? It doesn’t have to be real estate related. I mean, I know you owned a lot of real estate as well, but what advice would you give somebody that hasn’t taken action on their dreams yet? They’re in a W2 or they’re maybe they’re in the military still or, you know, they know they want more.
00:27:47:09 – 00:27:57:19
Rod
They know they deserve more, you know, maybe out of analysis paralysis or just fear or limiting beliefs they haven’t pushed through speak to that person.
00:27:57:20 – 00:28:05:06
Joseph
Analysis paralysis is one of my favorite terms. I must I probably got it from you. That’s what my entire book is about.
00:28:05:08 – 00:28:15:07
Rod
I Oh, good, good. By the way, his book is called Maintain Your Gear. Talk about your. Okay, Well, first, finish your thought on analysis paralysis, and then let’s talk about your book first.
00:28:15:07 – 00:28:37:11
Joseph
So I think I start the book by essentially saying that I had literally have nothing to sell anybody. Right. Like most people are not going to be someone that we sell to because we’re selling to either geriatric patients or real estate brokers. Right? Those are our clients. I don’t have a coaching program. We have a YouTube channel that’s free and I give away more information in my time than maybe most people do.
00:28:37:11 – 00:28:56:16
Joseph
So I always tell people, Reach out on LinkedIn, reach out, email me, ask me any questions you want. But I haven’t known a single thing about any business that I’ve ever started. I didn’t know anything about real estate except for if I buy it low enough and it makes a profit, it’s probably a good deal. I think a lot of things are common sense, but people do try to overanalyze, they do try to get too much information.
00:28:56:16 – 00:29:03:16
Joseph
They go to these conference after conference after conference, and every single one gives you a different method. And a lot of it’s just.
00:29:03:18 – 00:29:05:21
Rod
Just so you’re getting the parachute after you jump.
00:29:05:21 – 00:29:08:22
Joseph
Out of the plane. And I don’t think there’s any other way to do it, you know, unless well.
00:29:08:23 – 00:29:28:14
Rod
There are other ways to do it. That’s an extreme. Yeah, but but, but I’m not making it wrong because obviously it works, but. Okay. Okay. So talk about your book. Maintain your gear. So that’s a military phrase. I’m you you confirmed when I said that one when I read the title. Thank you for your for the copy, by the way.
00:29:28:14 – 00:29:30:05
Rod
So what do you speak to in here.
00:29:30:08 – 00:29:48:20
Joseph
Yes. Well, maintain your gear. The reason I title it that is when I was in basic training. I just remember hearing that constantly over and over and over and over again. Anytime someone scrubs, maintain your gear, maintain your gear. And that means that at every level of an organization, including the CEO, there are foundational things that need to happen every single day, right?
00:29:48:20 – 00:30:10:09
Joseph
Every member of the team, from the janitor to the title processor to the CEO, needs to be at a basic level prepared, because if the janitor doesn’t clean well now your clients are mad. They’re coming into a dirty office. And so, you know, in a military sense, if you don’t have all your ammo, you don’t have your first aid kit, you don’t have a tourniquet yet, you haven’t maintain those basic things that you need to someone dies, Right?
00:30:10:09 – 00:30:37:07
Joseph
So, you know, you apply that to business and you have some basic fundamentals in place. And it’s really just makes your life a lot a lot easier. But I give true stories in there how I’ve actually done deals, how I self-financed most of our transactions going to Necker Island, where I got money for deals, things like that. So it’s really a step by step guide and like I tell people in the book, if there’s anything in there that you’re like, I still don’t understand that.
00:30:37:09 – 00:30:40:08
Joseph
Reach out because I’m happy to provide any information I can.
00:30:40:08 – 00:30:41:12
Rod
So it’s on Amazon, right?
00:30:41:12 – 00:30:42:09
Joseph
Yeah, it’s on Amazon.
00:30:42:09 – 00:30:53:04
Rod
Okay. All right, cool. Well, I appreciate a copy. I’m looking forward to reading it. Back to my question. They haven’t taken action. Tell them what to do.
00:30:53:06 – 00:31:10:18
Joseph
So the first step, I mean, for me for four is is just sounds kind of crazy, but to literally take action, right? Like if you if you want to make an acquisition, start writing offers, if you want to buy a property, start writing offers. Yeah. One of the best pieces of.
00:31:10:18 – 00:31:28:07
Rod
Advice that’s a great by the way, so I’m going to stop you on that. That is actually massive Action mitigates fear. My most successful students by far, are the ones that take the most action. They’re not the smartest, they’re not the most well-funded. They’re not the they don’t have the biggest the the pedigree. They don’t live in the big city.
00:31:28:07 – 00:31:43:21
Rod
Many of them. I mean, they just take massive freaking action. So I want to salute that that statement, because that’s huge. Now. Now, talk about goals for a minute. Do you do you do your own goals? Do you write goals? I mean, does it start with that? Talk about that for a second.
00:31:44:03 – 00:31:57:01
Joseph
Yeah. So initially so I had kind of fallen into grand cartoon in the massive action thing back back when he did a second growth conference. No kidding. And so that was kind of like my first business.
00:31:57:05 – 00:32:14:12
Rod
Or I just went to the last one. I spent 20 grand front row. You know, I enjoyed it. I don’t want to. I’m not going to I’m not going to negate it. I enjoyed it a lot. Going to see Tom Brady, Sara Blakely, who I knew, and some of these other big hitters. Oh, God, who’s the actor that was there?
00:32:14:14 – 00:32:17:01
Rod
Oh, crap. Well, Hugh Jackman.
00:32:17:02 – 00:32:18:06
Joseph
Okay. Yeah. So there were.
00:32:18:06 – 00:32:20:16
Rod
Some cool people that he brings in. Some cool people.
00:32:20:18 – 00:32:25:20
Joseph
I got to go to the Vegas one when he was still friends with Andy. For Sallah and Ed, my lap.
00:32:25:22 – 00:32:26:14
Rod
I love those guys.
00:32:26:14 – 00:32:29:03
Joseph
I have I have an entire book of notes that are really.
00:32:29:04 – 00:32:36:19
Rod
Yeah, Yeah, they’re fantastic. They’re fantastic. They’re they’re awesome. Guys, I need to get on the show for sure. This one was in Vegas, too, by the.
00:32:36:19 – 00:32:37:04
Joseph
Way, actually.
00:32:37:07 – 00:32:41:07
Rod
Yeah, But anyway, please continue. So you’re subscribed to that massive free connection.
00:32:41:07 – 00:32:50:03
Joseph
Yeah. Just go for it and write massive goals. And write the goals in a way that you’ve kind of already achieved them and maybe something that feels like it’s out of.
00:32:50:03 – 00:32:51:09
Rod
Reach, right?
00:32:51:11 – 00:33:07:13
Joseph
Because what I was doing was writing next year’s goal and I would do that, not New Year’s. That’s too cliche, but around then, right? I write. I write the goal for the year for the company and we would crush it. I was like, shit. Like after I’d found Green Card and I was like, Maybe I’m just not writing them big enough.
00:33:07:13 – 00:33:21:09
Joseph
And that’s exactly what it was. You know, we hit the ink 502 years in a row after starting to write these massive goals and then also having, I guess, more of affirmations. You know, it’s like I’m financially free. I do.
00:33:21:13 – 00:33:27:05
Rod
So you write these affirmations. Do you do you yell out these affirmations? Do you do anything else besides write them down?
00:33:27:05 – 00:33:29:19
Joseph
I recite them every morning. You keep them in my planner.
00:33:29:19 – 00:33:30:15
Rod
Wow.
00:33:30:17 – 00:33:31:08
Joseph
You’re going out with me.
00:33:31:11 – 00:33:32:09
Rod
Wow.
00:33:32:10 – 00:33:37:04
Joseph
And they’re right. They are. They’re, like, on a laminated card, and I’ve got, like, 25 things listed.
00:33:37:06 – 00:33:44:02
Rod
Most of you like. Do you mind sharing a few? Yeah. You got all. You got them with you. Okay. Okay. Fantastic. All right, Fantastic.
00:33:44:02 – 00:33:45:11
Joseph
I’m sure some people just say that, but.
00:33:45:14 – 00:33:49:16
Rod
No, that’s awesome. Yeah. Yeah, of course.
00:33:49:18 – 00:33:56:06
Joseph
So these are actually I mean, these are the old sheets going back to. Oh, yeah, 2019. That’s all I.
00:33:56:06 – 00:33:58:10
Rod
Got to do. I got them. I’ve got them.
00:33:58:12 – 00:33:58:21
Joseph
Everywhere.
00:33:58:21 – 00:34:00:22
Rod
Yeah, that’s awesome.
00:34:01:00 – 00:34:02:09
Joseph
So, so.
00:34:02:11 – 00:34:11:16
Rod
So, guys, this is a clue, okay? He’s got all his goals written down. He’s got his affirmations laminated, typed on a freakin card. All right, let’s hear them.
00:34:11:17 – 00:34:31:22
Joseph
All right. The economy creates opportunity. If I can’t control it, it doesn’t bother me. My personal annual cash flow exceeds 6 million annually. Countless money, good deals and good people flow to me. I own a $250 million company. I’m an IFR pilot, but I’m a private pilot working on some writing. That is very.
00:34:31:22 – 00:34:35:06
Rod
Cool. Yeah, that’s infrared, right where you can. Yeah, you can fly at.
00:34:35:06 – 00:34:43:01
Joseph
Night and whatnot. Yeah. Okay. Exactly. Okay. And what’s another one? I guess. I know I’ll make the right decision.
00:34:43:03 – 00:34:49:20
Rod
Nice, nice, nice. No, that’s fantastic. I used to yell my affirmations out. They were typically I am statements.
00:34:49:20 – 00:34:51:11
Joseph
Yeah. Like, I think I’ve been in the gym.
00:34:51:11 – 00:35:07:02
Rod
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You see, I’m down in the gym, right? That’s the gym is down below here, guys. And I’ve got. I’ve got a whole bunch of them down there. And because they work, you know, in fact I used to yell, I’m running down the street. In fact, my kids this funny. My kids at my boot camps, when they come help at my boot camps, that’s the question they get most often.
00:35:07:02 – 00:35:22:11
Rod
Did you really do that shit? AM like, Oh yeah, I’ve gotten I got an exercise room. Nobody has to suffer through that. But because it works, you know, make fun of it, but it frickin works. You’re a great example of it as well. So let me ask you this. You know, you’ve you’ve I mean, you’re not very old.
00:35:22:11 – 00:35:22:18
Rod
How old are.
00:35:22:18 – 00:35:23:15
Joseph
You? 30.
00:35:23:16 – 00:35:46:14
Rod
30. Jesus, you are killing it, brother. Good for you. So. So in this lengthy journey of yours, sarcasm, talk about some epiphanies, talk about some aha moments where you like, Holy crap, I get it now. I think you’ve given us a couple. I think that group you joined obviously was one. But. But any others that come to mind.
00:35:46:16 – 00:35:47:20
Joseph
People just quit.
00:35:47:22 – 00:35:48:03
Rod
Yeah.
00:35:48:03 – 00:36:03:13
Joseph
And I think that most people don’t have a lot of perspective. Right. Like you, you talk about in 2008 or two six, losing everything. Right? Right. Okay. Well, the hundred and 70,000 I spent on a lawsuit two years ago that felt like the end of the world really isn’t that bad in comparison.
00:36:03:15 – 00:36:07:19
Rod
Contrast is it can be a it can be a helpful thing. It can be a negative thing as well, you know.
00:36:07:19 – 00:36:17:04
Joseph
But but yeah, but I think it’s important to study people stories like that, right? Like I like to read books about audio. I do audiobooks, but books about Churchill and books.
00:36:17:04 – 00:36:19:02
Rod
About, Oh, I just saw my favorite.
00:36:19:07 – 00:36:36:11
Joseph
Roc-A-Fella, Jp morgan Chase, Jamie Diamond, like these people. And just hearing the stories that they’ve been through and things that they’ve overcome. And that puts things in perspective for you. And I think that the realistic side of that is if you persist through anything long enough, it goes away. It’s never as bad as you think it is. Right.
00:36:36:15 – 00:36:57:21
Joseph
And if most people just quit, they really do. Just quit because I going to call him out and he’s a good friend of mine. He was my partner in my first real estate acquisition. I gave him an opportunity to join every single company on that list. And every single time fear stopped him, the market stopped him not having enough capital, stopped him, whatever the hell it was.
00:36:57:21 – 00:37:09:01
Joseph
And that stuff just never stopped me because I realized I didn’t have a choice, right? I was kind of bootstrapping it. I wanted to do this. I was reading those damn goals every day. They were stuck in my head and I was making it happen.
00:37:09:01 – 00:37:16:06
Rod
That’s how you do it? Yeah. You know, what’s the what’s the why that’s driving all this?
00:37:16:08 – 00:37:23:07
Joseph
I probably couldn’t have told you that two years ago, but I can tell you that now that I really think that.
00:37:23:09 – 00:37:24:20
Rod
For an obese. I mean, go deep.
00:37:24:20 – 00:37:33:21
Joseph
Yeah. No. Okay. For me, it really is two part. I’m on the board of Ariel Recovery Group and we do a lot of anti-human trafficking stuff.
00:37:33:22 – 00:37:35:03
Rod
Oh, good for you.
00:37:35:05 – 00:37:37:16
Joseph
I don’t know if there’s anything more fucked up than that.
00:37:37:17 – 00:37:57:03
Rod
No, there isn’t. There isn’t. My wife is huge on that. She just did a video on it. My mom, she’s now my best friend. I say, Hey, this is you know, this hasn’t happened that long ago. Some still use the wrong nomenclature. But but yeah, she did a TikTok video on human trafficking set 5 million views, sexual trafficking, and she’s huge.
00:37:57:05 – 00:38:03:18
Joseph
Maybe I can connect you guys with our with Ariel recovery group. But somebody Britney Turner, she owns one of the islands on Buck Island.
00:38:03:20 – 00:38:06:18
Rod
I know that you know the name for I feel like I know the name Yo, yo, yo. She’s like.
00:38:06:22 – 00:38:07:21
Joseph
She’s 35.
00:38:07:21 – 00:38:08:20
Rod
Wow.
00:38:08:22 – 00:38:19:20
Joseph
She’s right next to Branson’s island. So that’s one driver for me. And last year, we gave over hundred thousand for the company plus our time. Right? Because any military guys can’t do this stuff. So it makes.
00:38:19:20 – 00:38:21:01
Rod
It very cool.
00:38:21:03 – 00:38:24:09
Joseph
But then the other side of it, I had a son seven months ago.
00:38:24:11 – 00:38:25:11
Rod
Oh, congratulations.
00:38:25:11 – 00:38:46:10
Joseph
So freaking fast in my life. Congratulations. Yeah, well, that was a huge driver because it was like, wow, he’s. He’s counting on me. My wife’s counting on me, and on top of that, the thing that drove me, even even prior to that, I think, was this this need to just want to provide anything possible for my family because I think money does have a way of solving a lot of things.
00:38:46:10 – 00:38:48:19
Joseph
Oh, sure. Maybe it doesn’t solve everything. No, maybe it does.
00:38:48:19 – 00:38:53:11
Rod
It can’t buy love, but it can. It can buy, I suppose your opinion. I never meant.
00:38:53:14 – 00:39:14:01
Joseph
To buy the best treatment, so. Yeah, exactly right. Right. And so I think family has always been a driver for me. And now this anti-human trafficking stuff. I think I never got to deploy in the military. I always wanted to. I tried. I joined different units to make that happen. It was never in the cards. So this is a way for me to use what I learned in the military and apply it in the real world.
00:39:14:01 – 00:39:14:10
Joseph
Yeah.
00:39:14:12 – 00:39:16:08
Rod
Most effectively deploying.
00:39:16:08 – 00:39:17:07
Joseph
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:39:17:12 – 00:39:19:14
Rod
Very cool. Well, can I give you a little coaching?
00:39:19:15 – 00:39:20:04
Joseph
Yeah, please.
00:39:20:04 – 00:39:40:22
Rod
Okay. So my biggest regret in life this day was coming home to my, you know, what’s probably now a $20 million mansion, which is literally right across the bay here. It’s kind of funny that I lost, but coming home to that and I’d play with my kids, but I wasn’t there mentally. I was distracted. It’s my greatest regret to this day.
00:39:41:03 – 00:39:54:19
Rod
They, you know, they’ll tell you I was in great dad, but I didn’t live up to my own expectations. So all I would do is tell you are very driven guy. Don’t lose sight with what’s most important. And that’s that seven month old and your wife. Okay. That’s. That’s my coaching for the day. I’ll leave you alone after.
00:39:54:19 – 00:40:06:14
Rod
It’s hard. No, it’s the truth, man. Yeah. So what’s next? What future opportunities do you see on the horizon for you know, your surefire group? Do you have any thoughts.
00:40:06:14 – 00:40:20:05
Joseph
Or in it? You’re. We’re in it. We’re in what we wanted next. I’ve been waiting for this for years because I knew the model made sense. I knew no one was doing what we’re doing. Not the health care, not the acquisitions, not the brokerage, okay. But the partnerships on title and.
00:40:20:05 – 00:40:21:08
Rod
Mortgage interest and.
00:40:21:08 – 00:40:42:06
Joseph
No one was doing that. At least no one was doing both. And they were I would say they were smarter than me. They were charging management fees. I didn’t even know to charge management fees. I was just writing these panels and like, Wow, we’re 20% better than the other guy. And, you know, it wasn’t until one of our underwriter said, well, yeah, you’re you’re not charging fees everyone else charges because of the market.
00:40:42:08 – 00:40:58:18
Joseph
And hopefully for for our sake, I hope it runs as long as possible because we are stacking we’ll have a JV in every state on the West Coast, maybe even two at this point by the end of summer. We’re in Hawaii, we’re already in Oregon, we’re already California. We applied Idaho, Nevada.
00:40:58:19 – 00:41:01:06
Rod
Texas, just getting licensed in these states.
00:41:01:06 – 00:41:10:08
Joseph
So we’ll go into like these are the largest keto views in the country. Okay, So we’ll go into the Keller Williams office, will build a mortgage company and title company will make all their they don’t already.
00:41:10:08 – 00:41:11:20
Rod
Have their ceremony. They don’t know the.
00:41:11:20 – 00:41:17:01
Joseph
West coast so untapped. Wow. Untapped over their east coast saturated.
00:41:17:01 – 00:41:17:19
Rod
Okay, but.
00:41:17:19 – 00:41:22:09
Joseph
We’re chipping away. We’ve already broken away many, many the top KW franchise. So do you have.
00:41:22:09 – 00:41:24:19
Rod
A sales team that’s doing this or who’s doing this?
00:41:25:01 – 00:41:40:22
Joseph
So that’s a nice thing. We’re only going to the broker owner or the principals of the company. So it’s one person. Okay, so we run a very lean team, okay, I’m usually on all of those sales calls. I say the initial call. Well, the second call. Okay. But Alisha has been, uh.
00:41:40:23 – 00:41:47:01
Rod
She says she she does. She sets the frameworks on almost like a set or closer models, just like we do. Like we do on our.
00:41:47:01 – 00:41:53:14
Joseph
I thought I didn’t like hearing. No, she doesn’t hear it. It’s stuck in one ear, out the other. No kidding. Yeah.
00:41:53:16 – 00:42:08:16
Rod
Love it, love it. Nervous. So tell me about a time you got your ass handed to you. Okay? You got your clock cleaned and try to pick one where you can add some value with how it all came about and or how you solved it. A war story.
00:42:08:18 – 00:42:35:14
Joseph
Yes. The biggest war story I have is when I started the the mortgage company. At that time, Remax had rolled out this franchise motto Mortgage and it was supposed to be a similar concept. Seemed like a good idea because Remax was a solid brand. So I thought, Yeah, I’ll be the first mortgage motto. Mortgage franchisee. Well, one, it didn’t take long for me to become a semi expert in everything that was wrong with that franchise.
00:42:35:16 – 00:42:39:09
Joseph
So I was their first franchisee, their first one to break away and the first one in federal court.
00:42:39:14 – 00:42:40:14
Rod
Wow.
00:42:40:16 – 00:42:43:04
Joseph
Now, that seemed like the end of the world.
00:42:43:04 – 00:42:44:14
Rod
Federal court because you broke away.
00:42:44:18 – 00:43:03:06
Joseph
And we were in different jurisdictions. It was governed in Colorado. It was a mess. And at that time I had no money for lawyers. So I got lucky. And I just happened to have this judge in Colorado that I guess felt bad and was letting me represent myself broke.
00:43:03:07 – 00:43:03:19
Rod
Hitting three.
00:43:03:20 – 00:43:08:16
Joseph
Years whole two years before I had enough money to get an attorney and fight that thing and win.
00:43:08:18 – 00:43:09:08
Rod
Wow.
00:43:09:08 – 00:43:24:17
Joseph
But for two years I was like, this is over any day. Hence why I set up these asset protection trust things because I thought I can never be a victim to this stuff ever again. I need to be bulletproof. Right? So that was one time where I literally thought it was all over.
00:43:24:19 – 00:43:33:18
Rod
You just rolled up your sleeves and you went pro say, My God, I can’t even imagine being in a courtroom for that crap. And the the motions you had to try to create yourself. And. Oh, good.
00:43:33:18 – 00:43:35:02
Joseph
We didn’t have to put you back.
00:43:35:02 – 00:43:48:19
Rod
Yeah, no, I mean, I used to own a litigation support company, so I know the law very, very well. It was a big company, 60 employees. We did pleadings, preparation, everything. So I know a lot about it and try to do it yourself on a federal case, no less, because the federal judges do not.
00:43:48:19 – 00:43:49:12
Joseph
Screw around.
00:43:49:17 – 00:43:50:09
Rod
At all.
00:43:50:14 – 00:43:53:06
Joseph
The clerk would call me and she’d say, You just got to tweak this and we’ll.
00:43:53:06 – 00:43:54:13
Rod
Be able to. Oh, no kidding.
00:43:54:18 – 00:43:58:12
Joseph
I’m just getting lucky. I was telling attorneys that and they’re like, This is impossible.
00:43:58:12 – 00:44:02:18
Rod
No, not a federal is just loved to dismiss cases, screw with.
00:44:02:18 – 00:44:03:12
Joseph
People, you know.
00:44:03:14 – 00:44:06:07
Rod
They’re notorious for it. Yeah. Wow, that’s crazy.
00:44:06:07 – 00:44:09:05
Joseph
Yeah.
00:44:09:07 – 00:44:15:02
Rod
Yeah. What’s some of the best advice that you think you’ve ever gotten?
00:44:15:04 – 00:44:31:14
Joseph
So I think one of the best pieces of advice that I ever got was a time where I definitely was not prepared to be, you know, a real estate investor. And it was the first time I went to lunch with Bob Mazer and we’re leaving the restaurant.
00:44:31:14 – 00:44:34:09
Rod
This is the 95 year old guy with a Rolex presidential.
00:44:34:09 – 00:44:56:18
Joseph
Yeah, That’s funny. Yeah. And he actually wears this, like, extra, extra large coat and the pockets, like, shifted like this, and it’s because he’s got a brick, a cash and a Glock. No kidding. Single family owns. Oh, good. Wow. And we’re leaving. And I said, you know, but, like, maybe I’ll leave Keller Williams and I’ll I’ll come work for you.
00:44:56:20 – 00:45:09:12
Joseph
And he said, Why the hell do you think I would hire you? And I was like, Well, I don’t know. I’m just going to sell and I’ll give you a cut of the, you know, the profits. I want to be near you. I want I want to do that. And he said, I’ll tell you what he said, Go sell 25 homes.
00:45:09:14 – 00:45:24:16
Joseph
And when you learn the value of real estate and how to make a deal happen and you do it at other people’s expense and not mine, I’ll bring you on board. And I was like, Oh, okay. And sure enough, I went out there, I sold 25 homes. I brought him, I approved it. I brought him all the agreements to sell.
00:45:24:18 – 00:45:28:11
Joseph
And that day he gave me a 96 property portfolio listing to sell.
00:45:28:16 – 00:45:29:08
Rod
No kidding.
00:45:29:08 – 00:45:52:06
Joseph
And, you know, I think what that did, it just forced me to kind of slow down a little bit more because I was running and I don’t you know, I might be contrary to some of the other things I’ve said, but but that really helped me learn the business a lot more, kind of become an expert in title, mortgage and real estate and also learn to sell because that was our core business was the real estate sales thing.
00:45:52:06 – 00:46:02:00
Joseph
So it helped me with recruiting. And it just I think when someone knocks you down a peg like that, I think it pushes certain people. It definitely pushes.
00:46:02:03 – 00:46:22:06
Rod
It stops most people though. Yeah. And I’m sure that he’s been asked that before and he’s probably answered that way Before I give you an example, you know, I’ve had lots of people, you know, ask me, how do I get rich in real estate now? And I own thousands of houses. And so what I did was I would burn these CDs from somebody else’s real estate class and I’d say, listen to these and come back to me.
00:46:22:10 – 00:46:38:10
Rod
Nobody ever did. Nobody ever did. So so I’m sure he did the same thing. But you did okay. And boom, you know, is there a book that you like that you gift more than others? I mean, your book, The Ten X Rule, it’s grants.
00:46:38:10 – 00:46:39:01
Joseph
Grants book.
00:46:39:02 – 00:46:59:16
Rod
Yeah, Yeah, Grants. Good. Okay, That’s a good one. So have you ever bumped up against fear in any of these businesses besides the example you just gave when you’re getting your butt handed to you in this lawsuit and stuff like that? But. But I’m talking more about the fear prior to taking action on something, prior to buying or starting a business, Has that ever popped up?
00:46:59:16 – 00:47:02:22
Rod
And if it has, how have you dealt with it?
00:47:03:00 – 00:47:23:21
Joseph
It pops in every major hiring decision, in every New Deal and every new market and every new project. And I think that the fastest way to eliminate fear is to make progress. Any type of progress. Just that scares you to spend that salary. I can spend it and it’s then you’ve just got to figure it out. Then you just got to pay for it.
00:47:23:21 – 00:47:30:05
Joseph
And so I get that pit out of your stomach. And the fastest way for me to do that is to take action, take progress, make it happen.
00:47:30:05 – 00:47:47:08
Rod
Yeah, Same here. Any time I’ve got fear, I just take it. I don’t care. It’s the middle of the night. I’ll get up and do something towards it, and then I can go to sleep. Yeah. Otherwise you don’t. You can’t sleep. So what is your ultimate definition of success?
00:47:47:10 – 00:48:28:09
Joseph
So I would use that word progress again. Right. Just constant daily progress. I think for me it’s the ability to build something that not necessarily to leave a legacy, although I hope it will and I hope that it carries on forever after I die and all those things. But to truly, if I can make an impact in my immediate family’s lives and now in this new mission that we’re running in the human trafficking front, if we can start to chip away and eliminate those things and help set some wheels in motion because it’s just amazing that there’s not as much action in the human trafficking space as there should be.
00:48:28:10 – 00:48:31:23
Rod
Well, don’t get me started on that, man. That what’s that movie that just came down to?
00:48:31:23 – 00:48:32:06
Joseph
Freedom.
00:48:32:06 – 00:48:57:20
Rod
Sound of freedom. Yeah. Yeah. And it didn’t. It didn’t. It didn’t show up anywhere, Major. It’s like it’s it’s almost like there’s a movement to prevent it. Yeah, You know, it’s nefarious. Honestly, it’s. It’s kind of nefarious. The fact that it’s not getting traction makes you wonder what’s really going on behind the scenes. How many of these freak pedophiles are really out there, you know, that that are in, you know, positions of power and so on and so forth.
00:48:57:20 – 00:49:03:03
Rod
It’s it’s it’s it’s got a real nefarious bent to it. But okay.
00:49:03:05 – 00:49:17:04
Joseph
And I think it’s easy to get for for the media and all these people to just get the normal civilian to say, oh, that’s far fetched. That’s not true. Right. Because it sounds bizarre. Like, why the hell would do that? No, most people would do that. Right. And so it’s very easy to get people to ignore it.
00:49:17:10 – 00:49:33:06
Rod
Yeah. Yeah. Don’t get me. We could go down a rabbit hole down that we could go down that rabbit hole in a big way. Do you have any favorite quotes that you live by or that you they use as a, as a, you know, like an impetus to get you to move. I know Grant’s got some great stuff.
00:49:33:06 – 00:49:34:06
Rod
Comfort kills.
00:49:34:06 – 00:49:34:22
Joseph
Yeah.
00:49:35:00 – 00:49:38:08
Rod
You know, success is your duty, but any any others that come to mind.
00:49:38:12 – 00:49:58:12
Joseph
So yeah, it’s the biggest one and it is a great quote was that there’s no shortage of money, only people not thinking big enough. And that’s what that quote has got me into. Every single deal I ever did. I thought, well, wait, if I why do I need money? Why do I need good credit? Why do I need cash?
00:49:58:14 – 00:50:14:18
Joseph
If someone will seller finance it, I can refi it. And just being in the mortgage business, I knew, oh, if I refi, I don’t have to put 20% down. I just get 100% financing. And so I started to do all my deals that way because I realized, like, you know, most people just don’t do a deal because they don’t have 20% to put down.
00:50:14:20 – 00:50:21:05
Joseph
You don’t need 20% to put down right? So I started getting creative in a lot of these different structures and that quote helped.
00:50:21:07 – 00:50:21:16
Rod
Nice.
00:50:21:20 – 00:50:28:13
Joseph
Yes. And then I have two pages worth of Ed, my Latin and four seller quotes. And if anyone wants to reach out to me, I’ll send them a picture of yeah.
00:50:28:14 – 00:50:30:02
Rod
I send them to me. I’d love to see them.
00:50:30:02 – 00:50:30:16
Joseph
Yesterday.
00:50:30:16 – 00:50:50:08
Rod
Because, because I live by quotes. I love, I love quoting and using that in my clips that I put out on my podcast. But well, listen, brother, I really appreciate you coming over here. It’s great to see you in person and you know and and and have time with you and just super impressive what you’re up to and need to do it again in a couple of years.
00:50:50:08 – 00:50:55:02
Rod
And I should you probably own Nicorette at that point So anyway I appreciate you coming by brother.
00:50:55:02 – 00:50:55:20
Joseph
Yeah thanks for having me.
00:50:55:20 – 00:51:16:13
Rod
Absolutely. So one other quick thing. We encounter so many people that are frankly frustrated. You know, they’re looking in the mirror and they’re frustrated that they haven’t been able to escape the rat race. They haven’t been able to build cash flow to the point where they’re able to have financial and time freedom with their families, You know, and maybe they see other people buying real estate and creating, you know, incredible cash flow.
00:51:16:16 – 00:51:45:16
Rod
And they think, well, it’s just scary. You know, buying apartments is intimidating. And I get it. See, that’s why we created a Warrior mentorship program. There are coaching students and they’ve had extraordinary results. My students, I’ve been teaching about five years and upwards of 140,000 units now that we know of. Right. And we feel like it’s just getting going now, we’re looking to grow this group and really take it to the next level and honestly believe that the greatest transfer of wealth could be upon us right now with this current economic environment.
00:51:45:17 – 00:52:17:07
Rod
Everything’s going on sale. So we’re looking for people who want to follow a proven framework. Looks really like a blueprint or a map, literally step by step, and then they’re able to leverage our systems and our incredible network to raise money and equity to find deals and close those deals and build partnerships really nationwide. So if you’re interested in finding out more about how you can become more in our incredible network and take advantage of the unbelievable opportunities that are upon us, you can apply to my Warrior Mentorship program by texting the word crush to seven two, three, four or five.
00:52:17:10 – 00:52:32:11
Rod
Or you can go to mentor with Broadcom. And what we’ll do is we’ll set up a call so you can check us out and we can check you out and see if it’s a fit. Now, again, you can go to mentor with Broadcom or text the word crush to seven two, three, four, five to apply, and we will speak soon.
