Ep #159 – Mark Ferguson – Single Family vs. Multifamily
Here’s some of what you will learn:
-Single Family vs. Multifamily
-Typically Turnkey rental properties Someone has already made the profit
-When you have only one or two houses that are thousands of miles away from you live, you have no leverage on your management company.
-Instead of investing in Turnkey properties, invest in multifamily properties for better value.
-How to flip houses to invest into cash flowing investments.
-Single family houses are more liquid than multifamily but are purchased based on emotion while multifamily is all based on numbers.
-When you own properties that are spread out far from each other, they are harder to manage.
-In multifamily, a typical building will have all the same utilities and building materials so its easier to stock up on parts.
-In single family, if someone trashes a house, cashflow could be lost for up to 2 years.
-Average turnover in single family is a minimum of a couple thousand dollars.
-When the market crashes, multifamily will contract, but they will still cashflow.
-When thinking of long term hold, go with multi family.
-Single family homes around the median home price will do better than lower end homes when the market is rough.
-Why D class properties are not worth the hassle.
Why D class properties are only worth investing in when an area is gentrifying.
-When you are a licensed broker or agent, you have a higher level of responsibility.
-Why a broker should be part of your team.
-How to find deals with a retired broker.
-How visualization can get you anything you dream of.
Full Transcript Below:
Ep #159 – Single Family vs. Multifamily – Rod Khleif & Mark Ferguson
Welcome. This is the Lifetime Cash Flow Through Real Estate Investing Podcast. This is where you’ll learn strategies to help you achieve lifetime financial freedom through real estate investment. Your host, Rod Khleif, has owned over 2,000 homes and apartments. And he brings experts in all aspects of real estate investment and management on to the show. Now, here’s your host, Rod Khleif.
Rod Khleif: Hey, just a couple of quick things: You guys know I’m a huge proponent of mindset and the psychology of taking action. And how it’s my belief 80% of your success in anything is your psychology and your mindset, and really 20% is the mechanical stuff, the real estate knowledge.
I even recently did a Facebook Live clip on creating vision boards and how do you use those to get your goals, and things you want. Well, you guys aren’t gonna believe this. You’re gonna absolutely love who I’ve got coming on the show on September 25th.
John Assaraf from The Secret. He’s the guy that showed us his vision boards in the blockbuster movie The Secret. In fact, he’s the reason millions of people now have vision boards. John is that guy. So make sure you check out that episode on September 25th, it will be epic.
I’ve finally launched my course and coaching program. If you’re interested in this business at all I can humbly say it’s the best multi-family course out there. I personally coach you on how to crush it in this business and in your lives. So if you wanna get more information on my course and coaching text the word CRUSH to 41411.
And last, I’ve created an incredible Facebook group for you guys. If you’re interested in multi-family investing at all, already over 800 people on it, I’m sure it’ll be to a thousand here shortly. It’s very active, and all you have to do is go to multifamilycommunity.com and there’s a direct link to the page. So go sign up and peer-mentor, and learn from each other. It’s just an incredible environment. All right, let’s get to it.
Rod Khleif: Welcome to another edition of How to Build Lifetime Cash Flow Through Real Estate Investing. I’m Rod Khleif and I am absolutely thrilled that you guys are here. Now, today is gonna be a unique interview. We’ve got Mark Ferguson on the show, and Mark has his own podcast called Invest for More? Is that the name of the podcast, buddy?
Mark Ferguson: Yep. The Invest for More Real Estate Podcast.
Rod Khleif: Ok, awesome. And Mark and I are gonna banter back and forth about multi-family versus single-family, about flipping versus holding. We’re gonna talk about cars because we both have a massive love of cars. And we’re gonna talk about becoming an agent versus not becoming an agent as it relates to real estate investing. So this is gonna be kind of a unique episode. I’m not gonna say it’s totally geared towards multi-family but I am certain we’re gonna add value to you guys. So, welcome on the show my friend.
Mark Ferguson: Thank you for having me. Great to be on.
Rod Khleif: Absolutely. So talk, give us your bio a little bit. I didn’t do you justice. Tell us who you are.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah. I graduated from the University of Colorado in 2001. I know you spend a lot of time in Colorado as well. I ended up working for my dad right outta colleges as an agent. I couldn’t find a finance job. And he flipped houses once in a while, so I’d help him with that.
Eventually, I found my niche in the REO business as an agent, so I was selling a couple hundred houses a year; foreclosures for banks, then…
Rod Khleif: So you were the broker selling houses for bank-owned properties. By the way, REO means real estate owned, guys. Those are properties the bank has foreclosed on, that they own, and they have to sell. So you were the agent selling the bank’s properties.
Mark Ferguson: Right.
Rod Khleif: Got it.
Mark Ferguson: Correct. Then from there, kind of really revamped the flipping business; built that up and started buying rentals in 2010. So I got up to, I bought 17 rentals, end up selling a couple. Now I’ve got 15, and then lately, just really focused on the flipping, ‘cause our market’s so crazy in Colorado.
I’ve also got a real state team with some agents on it. And yeah, I write a blog, investformore.com. I manage to keep myself busy. [chuckles]
Rod Khleif: Okay. Alright, alright. So are your rentals all in Greeley?
Mark Ferguson: Almost all of them so…
Rod Khleif: Okay.
Mark Ferguson: There’s, what is it, 14 of them are in Greeley, or Evans, which is pretty much connected to Greeley, the same town.
Rod Khleif: Okay.
Mark Ferguson: I’ve got one in Cleveland which was kind of a turnkey rental, pretty much…
Rod Khleif: How’s that turned out?
Mark Ferguson: It’s been okay. It’s not amazing but it’s kind of an experiment with my IRA. I had some money in the stock market, which I hated, so I thought I’d just buy a turnkey and see what happened with it. And it’s been interesting. It’s definitely gone up in value.
Rod Khleif: Okay.
Mark Ferguson: But it’s a Section-8 type of deal, so that’s some up and down with the tenants there.
Rod Khleif: Okay. I’ve had, I’ve discussed turnkeys with some of my other interviews. And I’m pretty against turnkeys for a number of reasons. I’m glad that you had a good experience.
Just to expand on my belief system here, the reason that I don’t like turnkeys is because someone else has typically already made the profit. And if you’ve just got one house or two houses in a market that’s thousands of miles away from where you live, you have no leverage on your management company and you’re at the mercy of your management company. Maintenance and turnover expenses are a profit center for management companies.
In my personal experience, I’ve had some seminars in that genre with other management companies, and that’s kind of my rationale. And I know, there are a lot of podcasters that are real big on turnkeys, but I think if you’re gonna do that, invest the money in multi-family, that’s just my opinion.
Mark Ferguson: I would agree with you on most of that. Like I said, it’s almost an experiment, it doesn’t meet my investing strategy for my normal rentals, ‘cause you can’t get a good deal on them. You know they’re making a profit.
Really, it’s for a certain type of investor who wants to be really hands-off, not be involved, and just kind of park their money for a while in cash flow, because it’s usually not an appreciation bed either.
Rod Khleif: Right.
Mark Ferguson: So I agree with you, and I think there’s a certain amount of people who might be good for it.
Rod Khleif: Well, there’s some people that it’s probably the only alternative for. I cringe when I hear about it, and there’s so many people that are doing it. I just hope it works out. When the market contracts and these properties turn, I mean, when that happens, properties turnover much more heavily.
That’s what cleaned my clock in 2008, was the turnover. That was the biggest problem. And with single-family houses, if it’s empty you’re a hundred percent vacant.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah. Very true.
Rod Khleif: Let’s talk about, I know you’re a big proponent for flipping. You told me before we started recording, you’ve got 14 flips going on right now. I love flips, don’t get me wrong, sell us on flips, and then I’ll come back to you.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, no, I mean I think flips, they take up most of my time right now. I’ve kind of evolved from the agent side to different things, a blog, but flips right now are what I’m focusing on. They’re really fun. So that’s one thing, I like to enjoy my time in life and it’s fun kind of transforming houses and finding deals. I like to say I’m addicted to finding good deals. [chuckles] I love buying those houses…
Rod Khleif: Couldn’t agree more.
Mark Ferguson: But yeah, there’s definitely disadvantages to flips. You’re paying full income taxes on them usually so that’s one disadvantage. There’s no re-occurring income; once you sell it, it’s gone.
Rod Khleif: It’s a job.
Mark Ferguson: Yep, it is a job. I mean, at the same time you can kind of set it up like a business…
Rod Khleif: Sure, absolutely.
Mark Ferguson: Where, I have a project manager, I’ve got other people on my team who help me. I’ve kind of, my job is to really, to find deals and kind of oversee things. Once you get to a certain point with your financing lined up, multiple ways to find deals, it’s kind of like an assembly line where you’re just bringing them through, repairing them, and selling them. It’s always different too. I mean, it’s kind of exciting.
Rod Khleif: I agree with you, it’s a blast. I mean, I love it. I actually love swinging a hammer. I’ve been there one the roof, I’ve been, you know, I love it. I love seeing that, like you say, the transformation in a property.
And every January 1st, you do go back to work. I love it as a vehicle to invest in commercial real estate, be it multi-family or other sectors, if multi-family’s not your gig. Multi-family is my gig but I love it as a vehicle to build cash flowing assets, even if it’s a business.It’s not real estate but using that money that you make to build annuities. That’s my argument.
Mark Ferguson: Yes, and I would agree ‘cause I used a bunch of my flip money in the beginning to buy those rentals. The last couple of years I stopped buying rentals, because of our market. I’ve just kind of taken that money and put it back into the flipping business and built it bigger and bigger.
Eventually, my plan is to start putting that money back into some sort of long-term investment, whether it’s commercial, residential, another state. But it’s just a matter of finding that, the right way to invest that money.
Rod Khleif: Colorado’s nuts right now.
Mark Ferguson: Oh, it’s crazy.
Rod Khleif: I had 500 houses in Denver, and I still kicked myself down the curb all the time when I think about the fact that I sold those houses ‘cause… I was telling you this before we turned the recorder on. I literally would be netting a half a million dollars a month right now if I’d kept those 500 houses because they’d be free and clear. But I used that money to buy 800 houses and actually, 1300 houses in Florida and thought Florida was recession proof and you’ve all heard me talk about that seminar.
So let’s talk about single-family rentals versus multi-family. You’ve got what, 15 rentals right now?
Mark Ferguson: Yep.
Rod Khleif: Okay.
Mark Ferguson: And they’re all…
Rod Khleif: How’s it working?
Mark Ferguson: I love my rentals. A part of it is, you have to get a good deal on them, they have to cash flow. And our market’s been insane, which has helped as well, But the median price in Greeley where I’m at, has gone from 110 in 2011, now it’s 285.
Rod Khleif: Holy Crap!
Mark Ferguson: I know. It keeps going up.
Rod Khleif: Holy Cow! It’s tripled!
Mark Ferguson: Yes, it’s almost tripled.
Rod Khleif: Wow.
Mark Ferguson: And there’s no building here. It’s crazy. ‘Cause water’s so expensive, land’s so expensive.
[00:10:00]
Mark Ferguson: The towns are kind of a pain to work with, so prices just keep going up. But besides that, that’s kind of a luck thing. I never, in my wildest dreams, thought prices would do that when I was buying them. But they cash flow every month. My goal has been to make 15% cash on cash returns with them. So the cash I have invested will make 15%. I’ve financed them with a local portfolio lender, a local bank, and they’ve been really good.
One thing I like about single-family is kind of, state specific to me in Colorado, is multi-family’s even more expensive here than single-family homes when I was buying them. There’s a lot of big money investors in Colorado, a lot of cash investors, and cap rates are… Even when I was buying my properties cheap, cap rates were six, 7% on some of this multi-family stuff.
Rod Khleif: Sure. No, I get it, and I don’t know that there are opportunities in multi-family in Colorado right now. Unless you’ve got an incredible off-market campaign working to get in front of sellers that before they go in the market.
I’m gonna come back at you with my opinion. Because I have an opinion as it relates to single-family houses, having owned a couple thousand of them long term. My only response is you’ve got, and I understand as it relates to the dynamic of Greeley, Colorado, or Denver, or Colorado in general. It’s insane there right now, as it is in L.A., as it is in the city of New York, and some other crazy markets.
But I would rather have 15 units in one location than 15 houses. Now, I will say this: houses are probably more liquid than multi-family because you can sell to an end-user. But they’re purchased based on emotion, and multi-families is all empirical. It’s all numbers.
My experience, and I was mentioning this to you before we turned the recorder on, was I had 800 houses here in Florida when the market crashed and I had some apartment buildings. Because I was spread out, the management was much, much harder than if I’d had them in one or two or three or five locations.
For example, if I had to send a maintenance man up to Tampa an hour away, they’d go to a house, they wouldn’t know what they were gonna get into so they’d have to go to the house first then they’d have to make a material list, go to Home Depot, spend an hour buying parts and then they needed more parts, spend another hour buying parts. What normally would take an hour repair could take all day. And so it’s very, very expensive, as it relates to multi-family.
In multi-family, if you’ve got 20 or 30 units in one location typically they’re gonna have the same stoves, they’re gonna have the same refrigerators, they’re gonna have the same plumbing fixtures, same HVAC, and so you can stockpile parts. You send a maintenance guy, they can do more than one thing in one trip, leasing is much easier. It’s just economically easier to manage.
That’s what I discovered, and when 08 hit and I had a lot of turnover. In a single-family house somebody… Well same with an apartment, if somebody trashes the unit, literally, you can lose your cash flow for two years. And your average turnover in a house is typically a minimum of a couple thousand dollars. So that can really eat into your cash flow. That’s really what crippled me.
I was at a 30% loan to value but with the turnover that we were having the high expenses of managing such a large geographic area and… Did I say high taxes and insurance? High taxes and insurance as well, it just didn’t work. Through that crash what I discovered was my multi-family did just fine. Sure, it contracted but it was still cash flowing. And so that’s really one of the main reasons I started the podcast, was just to put that message out there that if you thinking long-term hold, my vote is multi-family.
Mark Ferguson: Those are valid points, and I agree with a lot of them. I would say too, that in my experience, I don’t, I’ve never had as many houses as you obviously, but I think sometimes with single-family homes if you’re buying, depends on what type of single-family house you’re buying too.
Rod Khleif: You know what, I’m really glad you said that because my stuff was not the higher end stuff. And I’m really glad you said that, that’s a very valid point. My stuff was the lower end stuff which has much higher turnover, more expensive turnover, obviously easier to buy but if you’re in the median home price-type properties you’re not gonna have as much of that as I did through 08 and 09, so no, valid point.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, I always tried to buy right below the median value was kind of where I was, not in the very lowest. And I think you get better quality tenants.
Rod Khleif: No question.
Mark Ferguson: They take care of the house better and then one thing that scared me about multi-family, and I mean it’s a pretty rare occurrence, but there was a big hundred unit building here in Greeley that had a meth lab in it. The entire place got shut down for 18 months. Basically, it was vacant. The owner lost it to foreclosure ‘cause they couldn’t rent it because it was such a bad meth lab they wouldn’t let anybody live there.
Rod Khleif: Wow. No kidding.
Mark Ferguson: So that’s one disadvantage to having all your units in one place, but it’s pretty rare.
Rod Khleif: Yeah, and I’m not gonna let that slide by just to scare my listeners because, obviously, that is an anomaly. That’s not something that would happen very often. I will say this, I mean that’s a horrible story. I feel for the guy that lost his property. That’s really bad news but if he allowed that to happen it must have been a pretty tough area, number one. Number two, chances are the management was substandard, would you agree with that?
Mark Ferguson: I would say the area was not that bad.
Rod Khleif: No? Okay.
Mark Ferguson: It was, there are much worse areas, and Greeley typically is…
Rod Kheif: Not bad.
Mark Ferguson: No.
Rod Khleif: Right.
Mark Ferguson: It was surprising where it happened and they actually ended up tearing down the whole building I think and rebuilding something else there.
Rod Khleif: Wow.
Mark Ferguson: It was just because the cost to mitigate it was so much and it was kind of an older property. Management, I don’t know. It’s hard to say what’s going on there.
Rod Khleif: Yeah. Well, stuff happens. I’ve never heard of that one. That’s one I haven’t even heard of where they actually cause somebody to lose the property. Sure you’re gonna have, I mean I had D-class properties in Denver where literally they’d cut a hole in the door to pass the drugs through until we got them out. They closed, they blocked off the street to slow down the drug traffic.
I’ve had people killed in and around my properties. I’m not proud of that. And that’s why I don’t suggest anybody get into D-class properties. They’re not worth the brain damage.
Mark Ferguson: Right.
Rod Khleif: Although I will say this: there were blocks in Denver downtown that I could have bought for 18 to 25,000 a property that are now four, 500,000 a property.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah. [chuckles]
Rod Khleif: That’s the exception. If you’ve got an area that’s gentrifying, that you believe will gentrify, you suck it up and you deal with those kinds of tenants because the upside is just exponential. Okay, all right. So we’re getting some cool perspectives, back and forth going here. This is awesome.
Now were you an agent? I know you worked for your dad who is an agent, right? Were you one? Because you described something a little unusual when we first started talking, I wanna make sure I’m clear on it.
Mark Ferguson: So I went to the University of Colorado, got a finance degree, couldn’t find a job so I went to work part time for my dad until I found what I really wanna do. That’s how I got sucked into real estate. And I did become an agent right after kind of working with him and realized, “Hey, this isn’t such a bad thing.” So I’ve been an agent for what, 16 years now, something like that.
Rod Khleif: Okay, so why do you think a real estate investor should become an agent?
Mark Ferguson: I think some of the biggest advantages are finding deals. It varies but last year I’d say 80% of the houses I bought were from the MLS – multiple listing service.
Rod Khleif: Wow.
Mark Ferguson: And every time I buy a house from there, I save a commission when I buy it ‘cause I’m an agent. When I’m flipping, I save a part of a commission when I sell it. I think I figured it’s been a couple years but one year I saved 70-some thousand dollars on agent fees by being an agent, and then I get more deals that way.
Because I’m saving that money I can pay more than other investors who aren’t agents. I’m here in the office all day on my computer looking at hot sheet. I can go look at a house, make an offer in an hour or two where other people might have to wait a day or two to get those offers in.
So I know there’s some disadvantages of being an agent with direct marketing, things like that but I also do that as well and I think in some cases I can help too. Just with saying, “I’m an agent but I still wanna buy your house”, sometimes might give me more credibility, with others it might not, but for the most part it’s been a huge, huge boost to my investing.
Rod Khleif: Okay, alright. Is that all you got, ‘cause I’m about to come back at you, my friend.
Mark Ferguson: Alright, we can go back and forth. I’d love to hear what you have to say.
Rod Khleif: Alright. Alright. So here’s my argument against it, okay? And as I told you before we started recording I was a broker in Colorado when I turned 18. I was actually in the paper because I was so young and it was so unusual because I did it through education. Back then you could do it, but now you have to have experience. You have to work underneath a broker for a while but you could do it with education back then.
I would go out, and I would list houses, and buy houses. I would knock on doors of foreclosures, about 500 houses in Denver that way. Literally, knocking on doors of foreclosures, you guys listen to my podcast, I tell you: do what other people aren’t willing to do and you’ll be a success.
Now, one time, I got sued because I bought a property I had listed. And they said I would breach my fiduciary responsibility, which I hadn’t. I fully disclosed everything and it got wiped out. But it made me realize or it brought attention to the fact that when you’re a licensed broker or an agent you have a higher level of accountability. You have a higher level of responsibility.
[00:20:00]
Rod Khleif: Frankly, in my opinion, if you approach a seller and you’re licensed, they’re going to think that what they have is worth more than it is because an agent or broker is actually interested in it. That would be the dynamic I would want to avoid.
Now, as it relates to the fees and the commissions and all that, I completely agree with you, which is why I’ve owned a real estate company for the last, probably decade, and I have a broker on my payroll. So I find it, and so this is my strategy and you can tell me, you can pick this apart. So I get access to the MLS, I can have offers written within minutes and the commissions come into the real estate company.
Now, the broker has to own a piece of the real estate company, in most states, but someone else can own part of the real estate company, like here in Florida you can. And I would guess it’s pretty much like that in most states.
So I’m gonna suggest, for those of you listening, that wanna flip houses or take advantage of this dynamic: go out there and find a retired broker that wants a little extra income and do a deal with them. And they can get the MLS, they can write offers, and candidly, this dynamic saved me 50 grand on one property last year in commissions. And so that’s my rebuttal.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, no, I think that’s a great way to do it too, if you can have someone, an agent or your own company, that’s awesome.
Rod Khleif: Yeah.
Mark Ferguson: One other advantage that is nice is the networking too, because I’ve met lenders, I’ve met title companies, so many other agents by being an agent. And I think two or three properties I had brought to me last year were by other agents who, one of them was like, “Hey, I’ve got this, they just want to sell it, they don’t want showings, are you interested buying it?” I bought it before it was listed.
Another one was kind of the same way where the guy wanted to sell it without listing it and the agent knew I bought houses. He brought it to me. So that networking has been great and then I think that you do have that responsibility and we always have a document signed.
Rod Khleif: Yes. It affects your marketing. You can’t market certain ways. And you have to, yeah, I mean you’re held to a higher standard and I just, to me… I’m sorry I interrupted you.
Mark Ferguson: Oh no, it’s fine. [chuckles]
Rod Khleif: I’m notorious for that. I apologize. But it holds you to a higher standard that to me is not worth it. That’s just my opinion. If you’ve ever had any regulatory crap happen to you, you really, yeah, you realize it. And you get to the point where you just don’t feel like it’s worth it and that was my experience.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, and we always have a document signed that says I’m an agent, I might make a profit.
Rod Khleif: Right. Sure.
Mark Ferguson: And then I think it’s an advantage with some people saying, “Hey, I’ve been in the business 15 years, you can look me up. You can look on the Colorado website to see I’ve been an agent. If I do something stupid you can make a complaint with them”. I think that also bring some credibility.
Rod Khleif: Okay. I’d go with that. I think the things you talked about, networking other agents, I mean, these are things you could do with or without a license, for sure. And branding yourself, you could do with or without a license, which is what you’re basically doing when you’re talking about being licensed, and if you’ve got a brand and a website and you look reputable. But fair enough, that was fun.
[laughter]
Rod Khleif: Alright, let’s see. We were gonna argue one other thing… oh no, we were gonna talk about cars.
Mark Ferguson: Oh yeah! That’s right, yes. You don’t have to argue about those. Well, maybe. [chuckles]
Rod Khleif: No. No, we’re not gonna argue about that at all. So Mark has a Lamborghini, and if anybody wants to check it out, it’s beautiful, I’m looking at a picture of it right now. It’s a blue Diablo, right?
Mark Ferguson: Yup, it’s a Monterrey blue Diablo.
Rod Khleif: Yeah, it’s awesome. I love it. Those of you that have listened to me, I don’t really do it as much on my podcast but when I’m interviewed on other podcasts, I talk about my whole love affair with cars, and how I started out.
In fact, when I was 18, I had a four-door Granada, a Ford Granada because I thought you had to have a four-door car to go out and sell real estate. And I put a picture of a Corvette on the visor and ended up getting a Corvette. Then I put a picture of a Ferrari, Magnum P.I.’s Ferrari, on the Corvette. I ended up getting a Maserati that looked just like it. I talk about visualization and cars are always the best examples ‘cause you know they’ve worked. It’s worked for me. What did you do to get that Lamborghini? Did you make it a goal?
Mark Ferguson: First of all, what kind of Maserati? Was it a Merak or a Bora?
Rod Khleif: It was a Merak, yes.
Mark Ferguson: Ok. A Merak, cool.
Rod Khleif: Looked just like a Ferrari 308 from the front end. It was red, it was gorgeous. Yeah, so talk about what you did to get this car.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, when I was really getting going with the REO business, it was nice but I just realized I wasn’t investing my money very well. That’s when I started buying rentals. But as far as the mental side, I’d have a picture of a Diablo on my phone screen. It’s always there in the background.
Rod Khleif: Love it.
Mark Ferguson: I think about it when I was driving to work and stuff, like imagining myself driving that car instead of the car I was in.
Rod Khleif: Perfect.
Mark Ferguson: And for a while I did the Jack Canfield coaching program, which was like, super helpful for me.
Rod Khleif: Yeah, he’s awesome.
Mark Ferguson: Part of it was writing a dream story for how you wanted your life to be, and I’d listen to that every morning on my way to work. I kind of listened to how my perfect life would be.
Rod Khleif: So you recorded your own perfect life and you listened to your own recording. That’s fantastic.
Mark Ferguson: Yes.
Rod Khleif: I did the same thing. I did it in a meditative place. I didn’t do it while I was driving. I would sit there and I’d say, and you do it, by the way, guys listening, do it from a place of gratitude, as if you already have that whatever it is that you want. I can’t tell you how powerful it is.
This is parallels my story almost soup to nuts, because I’m the guy that had the pictures of the Lamborghini in his bedroom, with the bikini girls. And believe it or not my son when he was eight years old he had all kinds of models of exotic cars. He had about 30 of them, Ferraris, and he had a model of the exact same Lamborghini Black Gallardo that I ended up getting. I mean, it looks like it was made from my car. And I wrecked mine…
Mark Ferguson: Oh.
Rod Khleif: Yeah. Yeah, totaled it. Some old lady here in Florida pulled in front of me, almost killed me, and I still have pain from it. But yeah, that’s awesome, but back to the visualization. You had the pictures in your phone. I mean, I’ve got pictures.
In fact, let me just do this right now, because we’re actually on video right now, you guys can see this on YouTube but I’ve got this day timer planner. It used to be called a day timer, now, it’s called a Franklin Covey planner. I wanna show you something, in the back of this thing, since we’re talking about visualization, I’ve got pictures in plastic that have been in here for almost, I think almost 20 years.
See these are gratitude pictures, my kids when they were young, and then I’ve got the houses that I wanted that I’ve gotten through visualization. I’ve got the watches that I’ve gotten through visualization. There’s the Lamborghini, this is before I ever got a Lamborghini, the Rolls Royce.
All these things that I’ve gotten, that don’t even interest me anymore, frankly. I mean I love looking at them and stuff but I’m more into other things right now. I’ve got other goals and I’ve got pictures of other goals on my wall while here at work and at home.
Guys visualization works, I guess that’s the point let me land the plane here. Visualization absolutely works. If you have goals and you don’t have pictures of them you are making a big mistake. Get pictures, go to Walgreens, CVS, have them blown up, put them on the wall. This stuff works, my friends. So make sure you do it.
Mark Ferguson: I would add to that in some cases you can actually make money with cars too. It doesn’t have to be a losing proposition. It’s not easy but my Diablo doubled in value since I bought it which was nice.
Rod Khleif: That’s awesome.
Mark Ferguson: I recently bought a Lotus Esprit V8.
Rod Khleif: No kidding.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, so that’s such a fun car.
Rod Khleif: What year?
Mark Ferguson: A ’98.
Rod Khleif: Okay, okay.
Mark Ferguson: And it’s a V8, twin turbo, it was $38,000. [overlap talk]
Rod Khleif: And actually when that car came out, that was the fastest off-the-line car at the time, the Lotus Esprit. I remember that. And that’s a beautiful car as well. Awesome. I love cars as well and I’m sure I’m going to get another Lambo at some point just because, I hate the fact that mine got wrecked and at that none of my own doing.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah.
Rod Khleif: But I’ll tell you, it saved my life, I mean, this lady pulled right in front of me and if I’d been in another car it would have been a head-on collision. But those cars turn like they’re on rails and so I immediately turned and it tore the whole left side of my car off and literally, everything, the whole left side was completely torn off. But it would have been a head-on collision so, yeah.
Mark Ferguson: I saw a picture of a Gallardo in a crash where it literally got split in half ‘cause someone hit it, but that’s what it’s designed to do, ‘cause it absorbs the impact and it saves the person. So you destroy the car instead of the person now, instead of in the past, you save the car and destroy the… yeah.
Rod Khleif: Right. Right, right, right. No, awesome. So what drives you, my friend?
Mark Ferguson: Like we said cars are obviously a motivation. Family is always motivation. I have six-year-old twins and a wonderful wife, and just spending time with them. The freedom of real state is awesome.
Rod Khleif: Oh, yeah.
Mark Ferguson: I love to do it. I love to be at work and to do things, but then if I want to, I don’t have to. So I can stay at home, we went to Disneyland last week, so that’s always fun. And I think just building and growing is motivation too. Just building up the flip business more, or building the rentals more depending on markets. Just constantly growing is motivation and it’s just, making sure I’m having fun, and stopping to smell the roses. [chuckles]
Rod Khleif: Yeah. This business is such a blast.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah.
Rod Khleif: This business is such a blast, and you guys have heard me say it many, many times, associate pleasure with it.Look, I equate it to hunting for treasure; you’re hunting for treasure. Associate pleasure with it and if you don’t love it go find something you do love because life’s too short not to do what you don’t love, which is really why I actually started my course and coaching program.
[00:30:00]
Rod Khleif: I know you’ve got one as well and I did that just ‘cause I love it. I took almost a thousand phone calls from listeners. I did these free 30-minute phone calls from my listeners and I got so much pleasure out of it. Adding value to them. I’ve still got my acquisitions team, got four people actively buying properties but I love the coaching and stuff so that’s really kind of changed my life.
I get thank you emails and cards almost every day. It’s really very, very, fulfilling and guys, you’ve heard me talk about this as well: that the success is fantastic but it’s nothing if you’re not fulfilled. So you need to be adding value in some way beyond yourself. Okay? So make sure you’re doing that.
I was just telling Mark we’re having our backpack brigade and I was late on this interview because we’re giving 1500 backpacks to schoolchildren next Saturday. The supplier said that they couldn’t make the deadline. We’ve got probably about a thousand families are gonna be lined up outside the Boys and Girls Club to get backpacks for their kids and they wouldn’t been able to get it. That’s why I was late for this interview but thank God it all worked out.
Again, whatever you do, do something to give back. It doesn’t have to be big like that. Just add contribution to your life and it adds a richness that goes beyond the success. Would you agree, buddy?
Mark Ferguson: Oh, yeah, for sure. I’m glad you brought up the coaching because I started my blog in 2013, had no idea how to write or what I was talking about, just kind of a whim. In the first couple articles I wrote when people said, “Oh my gosh, this actually helped me”, like it was such an amazing feeling, like, “Holy cow, someone actually liked what I wrote and it helped them.”
Rod Khleif: Right!
Mark Ferguson: And it was a jumping board from there into writing books, in doing my podcast.
Rod Khleif: Yeah, and your podcast again is Invest For More?
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, real estate podcast.
Rod Khleif: And his website blog is Invest Four More with for spelled out the number four, and we’ll have all this in the show notes and you’ve written a book or two as well that I’m sure is on your website right?
Mark Ferguson: Yeah. I’ve got six paperbacks now.
Rod Khleif: Holy cow! Awesome, bro. Awesome.
Mark Ferguson: Yeah, I’ve done pretty well. A couple of them are in audiobooks now…
Rod Khleif: Fantastic!
Mark Ferguson: On flipping, rentals, agents, all kinds of topics.
Rod Khleif: Good for you! Good for you. Well listen brother, thanks for being on the show, man. It’s been a lot of fun. We were struggling with how we can add value to you guys and we thought we’d have a little back and forth and I enjoyed it so hopefully you guys will as well.
Mark Ferguson: Nope, thank you for having me on. I had fun too and, yeah, I think it worked out well.
Rod Khleif: Alright. Good to see you again buddy. Thank you.
Mark Ferguson: Alright. You too.
Rod Khleif: Take care. Bye-bye.
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