E15 The Path to Financial Freedom with the Unlikely Investor Grant Francke

[0:00] This is the Wealthy Investor Show, where we don’t just talk about your wealth, we also talk about your holistic health. I’m your host, Matias. And I’m Erica. And this is the Wealthy Investor.

[0:15] Welcome back to the Wealthy Investor. We’re here with Grant Franke. Grant, we got connected through Brandon Turner’s Better Life Tribe, but more specifically, we got connected through a book writing process that you’ve just released. And when I reached out to you, you were about to release the book. So you are a real estate investor. Where are you based out of? I’m in Southeast Nebraska. So I’m about 30 miles south of Lincoln, Nebraska. Okay. And how long have you been investing? I started investing in 2016. So about eight years now we started to go. Okay. And what’s your niche? Have you focused in on one thing? Yeah, we started with small, mainly single families, duplexes. Now we’re kind of working our way up towards those six, eight plexes and 10 plexes.

[1:05] Okay. Awesome. And do you do rehabs to make them into rentals or what’s your strategy? Yeah. So we do BRRRRs. Right now it’s kind of turned into a slow BRRRR with interest rates the way they are. We’ll buy something that’s value add, certainly. Whether the rents are low, the units need updated. Something where we can add value, increase the rents, and then increase the profitability. Sure. That makes sense. It is a lot harder. We are currently working on a house that we are a little too attached to. And the numbers just don’t make a ton of sense rent-wise. It’s just a cute house. And a great location. So the location is kind of what makes us want to hold on to it. What do you mean by it when you say slow BRRRR?

[1:50] So a slow BRRRR for me, like in a BRRRR process, you’re usually trying to do that in a quick timeframe with hard money. For us, like a slow BRRRR is we’ll buy a fourplex with traditional financing or commercial loan. And then over the next five years, we’re going to do that BRRRR process of renovating everything, raising rents, refinancing, and repeating. Where that BRRRR process that’s usually talked about is a quicker thing. This is just kind of a longer play on it. No, that makes a lot of sense. So maybe as a unit were to vacate, you could renovate that unit and get a better rent for it. Right now, I’ve found it’s not a good time to kick tenants out. If you have somebody in there paying that’s even close to market rent, just let it be.

[2:30] And because we don’t buy anything that doesn’t cash flow on day one. So we’re not like losing money as it goes. So if we can buy it at cash flows, let the unit vacate, we’ll renovate it and then raise the rents. I mean, I think that’s what really initially got me into multifamily investing was it was basically what I was doing with single family, but a much bigger scale. And it’s more complicated, especially when you get into like the 20 plus or whatever, you’re looking at the cap rates and playing those games. So yeah, I love it. I love it. Do you ever flip? Have you ever like done just a traditional flip or you? I’ve done one traditional flip with a partner of mine and it worked out well. Like we ended up making a decent amount of money, but it’s just too, it’s not my style.

[3:13] I’m just kind of a slow and steady, like having that demand of that hard money out there and knowing that every day I’m losing so much on interest. That’s not my, my style. So I’m more of the long-term, you know, buy and hold philosophy. Sure. And you would be in probably a more cashflow versus appreciation market. Would that be true? Yeah, you bet. So our main thing is cashflow. Appreciation comes. That’s just kind of the icing on the cake, you know, especially the last, you know, since we started six, eight years ago, everything’s appreciated so much. It’s been a huge, you know, that’s been a gift to us, but we’re not buying for appreciation. We buy for cashflow. Is it pretty easy to find like the 1% rule around your area or do you really have to do a value add to even get close to it?

[3:59] Yeah, it was, you know, prior to interest rates. Now it’s getting tough. Sellers really haven’t come down. They’re still wanting 2020 prices and we’re in 2024, wanting 2025 prices. So we haven’t really made it, made it work yet, but there’s, there are deals that are coming closer to penciling out and then that’s where we get excited. Great. I’m, I don’t know if you know, I’m not. Originally, but I, I lived a couple of years in Kansas. Um, and so I know like at least down in Kansas, uh, cities can be, and towns can be pretty spaced out. What’s, what kind of an area are you living in? Are you in a smaller town or closer? So I live in a smaller town and then we invest in Lincoln, which is the capital city of Nebraska.

[4:41] And then a couple of smaller college towns on the outskirts. So we have a fairly large footprint, but, uh, we’re lucky enough where we, how we manage it. I have a handyman in each town and that can, so when we have an issue, they can help, help out with that stuff. So we’re not, I’m not driving an hour just to look at a toilet type of situation. Oh, cool. Yeah. We drew a hard line on, uh, on, first of all, I’m not very handy. Erica, uh, got a tool belt for Christmas one year and I get to borrow it sometimes, but I, I, he’s really good at laundry though. That’s good. Everybody’s got their strengths. Yeah. And cooking. Um, but no, no, I, I just, that’s not something that gives me joy. It’s not something I want to learn.

[5:21] And I, you know, I, I know that you can, you know, make things cheaper. You can, you can get the numbers to be better if you do a lot of the stuff yourself. But I knew that I would also burn out so much more quickly and I would hate, uh, owning property. So. Yeah. We just don’t also don’t have a time with young kids and running all the businesses. But yeah, it’s tough in the beginning. So like the reason I got in real estate is I was at a W2 job, but just was like too demanding on my time. So this was my ticket to get out. So in the beginning I was still doing all that, you know, fixing toilets, painting, just cause I had to pinch every penny. But I was also, when I was doing that, trying to build the system underneath it.

[6:02] So when we did it to that point, I could step away and it would still run seamlessly. So in the beginning I was totally doing, being that guy that was, they got a leaky toilet. All right, I’ll be there in 30 minutes. But now we built the system up to where we have the guys in place that can help us with that. That’s awesome. And I think that’s a trap people have a hard time getting out of. I think that’s a pretty common story. But yeah, we, we, I was a full-time realtor that kind of started picking up property. So it just, it just, yeah, it was, it was easier to just hire out from the beginning. But I mean, either way, I mean, you gotta, you really just gotta grind for a little bit to get to that point.

[6:38] Right. How many doors are you up to by now? If you don’t mind me asking. So we’re at 104 doors in our area. Yeah. It’s been, it’s been a steady growth. So. I was just curious, uh, what does that number feel like to you? Are you hoping to get more? I guess, I don’t know how exactly to ask this, but what number feels good and comfortable where you want to be? Yeah. So like in the beginning, like I said, I just need to get out of that job. So my number was just a cashflow number. Like I need this amount of month to get out of there. And that was the race. That’s where I was grinding. And I was looking, I was buying the most rundown things. I’m like, I can make this work. And now at this point, it’s just kind of like stable growth.

[7:15] So we’re going to look at everything we can, but I’m not going to take a risk on a D class duplex just to see if it’s going to work. Like I’m not, I don’t need to do that. We’ve got the doors and the income to, we don’t have to do that. So there’s no number I’m looking for of doors. Like, Oh, I want to be like Brandon Turner and have 10,000 doors or whatever. Like I, that doesn’t do anything for me. I just want to have, I just want to have like just easy life, just happy life type of thing. Yeah. I mean, that’s the point of it all. Right. I mean, like that’s what motivates me is the freedom of time and the freedom to live a fulfilled life. Is that, would that be true for you as well? Yeah, for sure.

[7:55] So the whole thing was just so I could be, you know, more, um, around as a parent, as a husband, um, friends and families. I missed a lot of Christmases, you know, 4th of July parties, all that stuff. And I just, you only live once. So I’m not going to do it, you know, at my job with a bunch of miserable people that are not happy either. Eating donuts in the break room. What, what was your job before? So I was a conductor for BNSF railways. So conductor for the railroad, you know, it was a good job. Like it was great when I was younger. I started when I was 19, pretty much right out of high school. Um, but it’s a demanding job on your time. You’re either on call or based on seniority, you know, I’d be on afternoons or midnights and that’s when kids stuff’s happening.

[8:38] Especially when you got babies, you know, then my wife’s home by herself with two kids. It’s just, just didn’t feel right. Your, your wife, Laura, um, does she work outside the home? Is she home with the kids? Yeah, she’s an accountant. So she’s a CPA. So she also works outside the home. So that was the other thing is I was, we were, you know, she has a very demanding schedule as well. And mine was really demanding on time. So after this transition, you know, especially when we flew into COVID right after I left the railroad, um, you know, I was able to be home with the kids doing their, you know, schoolwork at home and while she was able to keep working. So then I’ve taken kind of the Maddiest role of doing laundry and cooking and I do that sort of stuff too.

[9:17] So. Yeah, that’s, that’s tough to juggle. I, I know, I mean, I guess I could just speak for us, but trying to figure out a balance between making sure both spouses feel like they’re getting what they need between fulfillment and, and parenting help and support and all of that is just, it feels like an ongoing conversation that you’re just constantly readjusting depending on where your family is and what’s happening in life. Yeah. And my wife and I, like we’re big on like setting goals. So like once a year, we always try to sit down and talk and be like, all right, this is where the business is at. Like, and then I talked to my wife, like, where are you at with your, you know, how do you feel where you’re at?

[9:53] Do you want to try to make a change? Cause we could get aggressive again and, you know, maybe bring her in full time, but I, you know, she enjoys where she’s at. She enjoys who she works with. So that’s not something we’re super aggressive about, but we always have those conversations to make sure everybody’s on the same page. Mm-hmm. When you have those meetings, is that like a, like a date night that you guys go out somewhere? Do you sit down at home? How do you structure that? Yeah. Typically we do it, try to do it out of the house, you know? So if we take a vacation around that end of the year, we’ll kind of go out for a nice dinner and do that. Or we’ll just go into town and, you know, grab sushi and a bottle of wine and chat through it.

[10:27] So do you guys touch base on things like, I mean, apart from just jobs and how are you doing it? Do you guys touch base on like, how are we feeling about us and where are we and what do we want to focus on and all the things? We have a, I mean, Mariah, she’s phenomenal. Like we have a great relationship. So we’re very open about those kinds of conversations. You know, if one of us is feeling stressed, we’re also fairly good at picking up on each other’s stresses. Like she knows if I go quiet and like, I’m not talking, she’s like, okay, what can I help you with? Should I get the kids out of here? Like, how are you feeling? Like, so we’re very in tune with that. So we can keep those things running smoothly.

[11:04] Yeah, that’s cool. I’ve been talking with a lot of clients actually this week and last week about the rhythm of summer and how, how different it can be based on what they, what they would really love the rhythm of summer to be versus what it ends up being because people, it just summer happens and you get busy, you know, like all the fun stuff happens during summer. People travel, kids are involved in sports and, and you think it’s going to be like this nice and relaxing time, but then you end up just like running all over the place. And usually real estate gets busy too. What’s your rhythm like for your family this summer? What’s it turning into? So it’s, it’s a lot of baseball and softball, some basketball thrown in there.

[11:46] You know, my daughter’s 10 and my son’s eight. So they’re kind of get into those youth sports step situation. So that was a big conversation we had this spring of like, what, what do we want our summers to look like? So like Madeline, she’s 10. So we have eight summers left with her, maybe probably more like six. She’s not going to spend, right. She’s not going to want to spend when she’s 17 and 18. She’s not going to go to Branson with us in camp. So we all, we have a finite amount of summers. Like, do we want to spend them at the softball park or do we want to go on vacation? So we’re really trying to balance in those. And we, we just took the bite. We told the teams like, Hey, this is the weekend we’re going to be gone.

[12:21] Like we’re, we’re going to make these memories because they’re going to remember those vacations more than going to remember those softball tournaments with us. Yeah, it’s true. That’s interesting. You say that because I actually just recently had that thought of like, you know, our oldest daughter’s seven and, and kind of like two more years until we’re halfway done with her being living, living in her house. It’s kind of, it’s just kind of a crazy perspective to think about. And, you know, it can be kind of sad or whatever, if you think about those things, but it’s also super important to like, just kind of keep perspective. Like you’re talking about, like, you know, we need to focus on enjoying the moments, make the most of the time we have now.

[12:58] Yeah, a hundred percent. It sounds like you guys are, are super intentional, um, in general and in your business and your relationships and your family. Um, you it’s, are you self-managing those 108 doors? Yeah. So we manage them all ourselves. Um, about a year and a half ago, we brought on a full-time VA and that’s been, that’s been a game changer. So she handles all of our, uh, tenant communications, uh, maintenance requests, leasing, uh, inquiries, all that stuff. She handles all that for us. So I’m more able to focus like on the business than rather than being in the business. Yeah. Um, so that’s been, that’s, you know, took a lot of weight off my shoulders when she came on. She’s been phenomenal.

[13:39] How, what was that process like going, uh, finding that person, uh, affiliate, figuring out what that person was going to do, training that person. Yeah. So I started out just kind of searching like on Fiverr, like for VAs. And then I was able, I found, came across a company from Florida called Virtually Incredible and they hire and train VAs for property managers. Okay. So when she came to me, she was already trained on fair housing and all the basics. And then those couple of months leading up to hiring her, I was just writing everything I was doing in an SOP. So like when we have a maintenance request in Seward for plumbers, this is who we sent it to. If somebody’s late on the rent by the fifth, this is what we do.

[14:17] So we kind of got an outline of that, a framework of it and kind of handed her that to her. And then she’s been able to actually help me improve that. So we have a lot more systems and processes that she’s implemented for us to improve our properties. And do you use a certain software to help manage those kinds of things? Yeah. So, uh, our property management software is Buildium is what we use for rent collection. And then we just switched over to Property Meld for our maintenance request. Um, the nice thing about Property Meld is it connects the tenant and the service provider so they can set their own time. That kind of takes us out of that. That’s nice. It is really nice. Yeah. So we don’t have to call and be like, Hey, does this work?

[14:56] No, this doesn’t work. They just communicate with each other through the app and then it’s done. It’s off. It’s off of us. So great, man. You’ve done a lot of work setting all of this up. It’s been like, that’s, I like, I love systems and processes. So like that kind of gets me going. I’m like, Oh, how can I make this easier? How can I automate this? So it takes a little bit more stress off of me or off Kay. Think about, uh, like starting on your own and doing all of the work, all the maintenance by yourself and then getting to the point where you have somebody full time and you have all this stuff running the business for you. You’ve really come a long way. That’s really fun to think about.

[15:26] We’re kind of on the cusp of, um, wanting to hire someone on full time and trying to figure out how do you do that? That feels kind of like a big step because now you have somebody depending on you for their income. Um, and it’s a lot of work just to get them started. It feels like it could be. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Like whenever a problem, like whenever something would happen, like I would be like, I don’t want to do this again. What system can I make to prevent this from happening or alleviating me from this system? So like if we had a leaky, leaky plumbing thing in one of our towns, I’d be like, all right, so like just put this in the meld and then we’ll send it to the handy guy and he’ll go out and take care of it.

[16:06] So it would take me out of the, out of the process. Cause I’d like you guys, like, I don’t love doing it. Like I’ll do it in the beginning because I had to do it, but it’s not my passion. Like that’s not, I don’t get anything out of that. So I’m not going to be able to do it the best. I’m not probably not going to do it the fastest. So I might as well have somebody else do it. That’s going to do it right. From the very beginning when you were doing these things you didn’t enjoy, was there a clear end game to that? Like, were you like clear and like, okay, when I am able to get out of, you know, get out of this job, uh, able to afford paying these people, I’m going to, I’m going to do that. I mean, like, it seems like you had almost like a blueprint laid out for you and you’ve just kind of been moving along that path.

[16:47] Is that accurate? Yeah. So like when we were doing renovations, like I was thinking about like the future of like, so next, so in 10 years when I’m doing this, like, is this what I want to be doing in 10 years or I’d rather be underwriting deals and teaching people and talking to people. So I’d always like, that’s what I was doing when I was working. I was just thinking like different processes. How can we make this better? You know, how can I take myself out of this so we can actually grow and scale? Yeah. I mean, it sounds like you do a lot of like working on the business, thinking about the business, uh, and, and very intentional design. Um, which I think again, a lot of people don’t do. And I think that’s kudos to you for, I mean, it’s probably allowed you to scale a bigger.

[17:25] Like if you were still fixing all the toilets, 108 would. Yeah. Like, I feel like we could, like my company could take on another a hundred units, like with no problem. Like it would, we will scale very quickly. And that makes it easier for me to approach other deals too, because I’m not worried about the management side. Like I know it’s, I know the system’s there so it can handle it. Yeah. That’s great. Sounds like you, you think from a larger perspective in general, I think you were talking about your daughter’s, you know, summers that she has left and just how you want to use those as they go. I can see that being really helpful and not, not just, you know, how do you solve the problem right now, but how do I solve it so that it can continue to be effective in the long run too.

[18:02] Yeah. Yeah. And just make it easier next time. Cause they’re going to, you know, stuff’s going to happen. Like things are going to happen in life. Things are going to happen in rentals. So you gotta, it’s going to happen. So you might as well have something there to, to keep you going. When, when those things do happen, when it seems like it’s raining on you from every direction, which I’m sure that happens to you as well. Um, what are your, what are your go-to things to kind of keep your, your mind right? Or to refocus, recenter? Do you, do you have certain practices you do? Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, I kind of talked about my book, but like the big reason I got into real estate was like finding out my why, like, why am I doing this?

[18:38] My why was to leave the railroad. I didn’t like the schedule. I didn’t like how demanding it was. So if I get a, you know, this week we’ve had two ACs go down. That’s not cheap, but I’m like, that sucks. Well, at least I’m not at the railroad anymore. Like it’s fine. We’re going to get through this. We have the reserves. We underwritten everything correctly. So I always go back to my, why, like, why am I doing this? I’m doing this for, to spend more times with my kids, spend more time with my wife, my family, my friends. So that’s, that’s what always keeps me going is that, you know, cause things are going to suck sometimes. You know, we had one hailstorm a couple of years ago that took out like 20 roofs.

[19:14] That wasn’t fun, but like you have insurance, things happen. There’s a process. We’ll just keep it moving. So you can’t get bogged down in those negative things. Cause if you do that, you’re just, you’re going to quit. So you got to know your why of what, why you’re doing it. You know, one change that I’ve noticed since we’ve gotten into investing is just how much more available Matias’s time is with being at home with the family. Cause when he was full-time real estate and that’s all he was doing, there were a couple of years where I, I really felt kind of like a, like a solo parent of a lot of the time. Cause a lot of his time was, was booked up in the weekends and on the, in the evenings.

[19:58] And so, and that was, that was really hard. There’s a lot of strain there. And, and it was, it was just tough to work out of balance because there was just, when the clients call, you got to go. And when they want to see a house, you got to show it to them. And, and sometimes crisis come up and you have to deal with it and run with it. But since we’ve made a bit of a transition into more of the investment side, it’s really felt like it’s, I don’t know, like the time has, has changed in the way it shows up in our family. And it’s been a good thing for us. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s the nice thing. Like I was an agent for like two months, but I was like, this isn’t for me. Like, cause it’s like, it’s a transactional thing.

[20:33] Like if I want to make money on this deal, I have to go now and do this where a rental, you know, I’m sleeping and I’m still making money. Like it’s, it’s always, it’s a constant thing. So it makes it a lot more, less stressful. It’s not as, um, emergency based transactional based. Yeah. When you guys first started, um, was Laura familiar with, with kind of the BRRRR method or, or even getting into investments? Was that new to her? Yeah, it was new to her. So like my dad had like one rental when I was growing up, um, and he was the burnout landlord, you know, climbing on the roof, putting tar on the roof. And just every time the tenants call it’s, yeah, what is, what do they want now? You know?

[21:11] Yeah. So I kind of saw that as a kid. And then when I kind of started getting the itch, I was like, well, I don’t want to do that. Cause he didn’t super love what he was doing, which kind of helped me build my processes and systems. But, uh, so what happened was I, uh, was kind of starting to get into it and I started talking to Laura about it and she’s just always been so supportive of everything I do. Like, I was like, I, I think we should try this and see what happens. She’s like, yeah, let’s, let’s do it. Let’s do it. See how it goes. We’ll try a couple. And she’s an accountant. She’s an Excel master. Like what she does with Excel is crazy. So she was making all these spreadsheets up. We put the numbers in and see the cashflow.

[21:46] And I’m like, well, if we do this, you know, 10, 11 more times that will equal my money from the railroad and we can make the move. So we kind of, she helped, you know, mindset me and kind of make the goals and help me get there. Yeah. What a nice skillset to have for a spouse in this kind of business. Yes. It’s very good. Yeah. I can help him, you know, with his feelings.

[22:12] That’s funny. Yeah. She’s, she’s been really, really helpful with Excel. I don’t know. Feeling she does have a good job too. I can’t complain about that. Yeah. She sounds great. Well, does, how active is she at this point? I mean, I would imagine she helps with your taxes and stuff on that side, but as far as the day-to-day investing, looking at new deals, all that kind of stuff, how active is she? Or is that mainly you? So she’s, she’s actually a book accountant, so she doesn’t do taxes. Okay. So we have an outside firm. So she’ll review my book. Like I still do like most of our QuickBooks. Yeah. Um, our VA is kind of taking some of that over, but like end of quarter, then we’ll go in and review, like we have six LLC.

[22:46] So she’ll go in and review all those balance sheets and profit loss and we’ll tie everything out. Um, so she helps with that. And then once like, I don’t send every deal that I underwrite to her, but if I get to a deal where I’m going to offer on it, I’ll send it over her just to make sure, just have another set of eyes on it, just to make sure it’s what I think it is. And as far as finding deals, are you doing marketing directly to off-market deals? Is that your primary source? That’s been my primary source of, of getting deals, uh, throughout my career. I’m still doing that. It’s just, it’s a lot slower right now. Everybody’s like I said, everybody still wants 2020 prices and you can’t do that with 8% interest.

[23:24] So, but yeah, off-market is kind of my bread and butter. I’m really a big of like a, you know, communication and creating relationships. So if I can create a relationship with an older landlord, that’s, you know, if they’re not ready to sell now, that’s fine. But when you are ready, just remember me type of thing. No, that makes a lot of sense. Um, and, and do you, do you buy lists for those kinds of things? Uh, do you, how do you source these landlords? Yeah. At various ways, like driving for dollars work sometimes, um, a source, a few lists. My VA has kind of gone through it. There’s certain areas in each county I like. So she’s went through and found like all the multifamilies in there. So we sent out letters to them.

[24:03] So it’s kind of got it. You can’t just take one, one way to go to look at it. You know, you just only look what’s on the market, on the MLS. You’re probably not going to find, find much. You got to kind of put the work in on the, on the front end. How involved have your kids been? Um, so they’re kind of starting to get like interested about it. Um, they always know that I like, they, you know, a couple of years ago, they used to think I used to build houses, but now they’re kind of understanding. Like when we drive by an apartment, I’m like, no, we own that apartment. And then they live there and then they pay us money. So they’re kind of starting to figure that out. Um, this summer we’ve really tried to focus on like financial education for them.

[24:38] So they’re reading a lot of books about money and we’re, we’re having more of those conversations of how interest works, how all these sorts of things work. So they’re starting to kind of understand it. And then, so on my book, like on the back of the book, I put a picture of the family instead of just like my headshot. So they just love that. Like, Oh, we’re going to work with that. Yeah. I saw that picture. Actually, your daughter kind of has her hands on her hip. Yeah. She’s all popped out. Have you come across good books, uh, that for children on finances, any that you’d recommend? Yeah. There’s a couple of workbooks on Amazon. I would have to look them up, see what they’re called. I’ll send them to you and you can put them in the show notes or something.

[25:14] And then a rich dad, there’s a rich dad, poor dad for teens. That’s maybe a little bit, a little too high for where my daughter’s at now, but we’re going to maybe try that towards the end of the summer. That’d be, I bet that would be perfect. Uh, I would love to get my kids in that kind of thing. I remember there was a distinct moment where, um, I told my daughter, like, you know, you can save some of that money, you know, maybe one day you could buy a house with it. And she just looked at me, she’s like, you’re not going to give me a house.

[25:41] Cause I mean, as for her, like, especially since I sell houses, you know, like it, like it would logically mean that I probably own those houses to her, you know, every, every house that I’m selling. So like, yeah, it’s, it’s funny, but I think she did then one day. Say that, that she was, you know, she was going to save the money for a house. Like she was really serious. She did. And then my, my brother and sister-in-law just moved into a new house last week. And the kids think they call it the palace. Cause there’s, there’s like, let’s see, one, two, three. There’s four different staircases that go kind of up and around the house. And, and my daughter asked my sister-in-law, like, can I buy this when you’re done?

[26:18] I’m going to save up my money. I’ll just start saving girl. Yeah. We started this, this summer with like chores and stuff. So we pay them for, um, we call them like value add things. So not like making your bed or brushing your teeth, but like, if you want to sweep the garage out or crush cans or pull weeds, something above and beyond, we’ll pay him for that. And then we have three different jars. We have a save jar, a spend jar and a donate jar. So every month then we give them the money and they put them in their jars and they can, you know, the spend money that’s yours, whatever you want to do with it. If you want to take it to the concession stand or my son’s really into basketball cards now.

[26:52] So he’ll go to the card shop and buy some cards. So it’s, it’s kind of fun to see them. They kind of struggle with that. Like, well, I’d like popcorn, but I’d also want to buy this at the store. So what do I do? So it’s kind of fun to see them like have that pain of what they want to buy. Yeah. That’s cool. Do you have a, like, do they choose whether they save or donate any, or is there a required percentage or amount? Yeah. So we do, I’d have to, I think it’s 30% save 30% give and then 40% spend. Okay, cool. Nice. So then on Sundays at church, they’ll take out of their save jar or their give jar and then donate to church. Or we’ve kind of talked about like bigger, like you could save up for a year and donate to get a well-built in Africa or something like bigger than just like the local stuff to kind of expand their mind a little bit.

[27:41] It’s a great idea. We’ve started some of the chores a little bit. We have a, like a paper on the fridge that has little tags on the side of it with the chores and the dollar amount. And then they can tear it off and complete it and put their name on it and put it in a jar and they get paid weekly. And that worked for about a week. And then my daughter decided she doesn’t really care about money. So she’s not going to do it. Yeah. It’s all, it’s all age specific. I mean, you can’t start, yeah, you can’t start too young. And then, cause they get to like where my daughter’s at, like that nine, 10 age. Then it really starts to click. And then she’s like, what else can I do? And we all started like, if they read a book and like write a book report on it, then we give them five bucks.

[28:15] Oh, great idea. She’s like reading books and like actually writing the book report, which is nice. Wow. This is level up parenting. This is great. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. Did she read yours and, and no, she hasn’t got through mine. I think she read like the, the dedication is to her and Brendan. So she read that for sure. She loved that. And then she read the back page or the back side of the book. So, well, speaking of your book, let’s, let’s hear a little bit about it. What, what, uh, it’s the unlikely investor, right? Tell us about the book and what it’s about and who it’s for. Yeah, you bet. So the unlikely investor, it’s kind of a real estate investing. I’m like, how are you, if you wanted to leave your W2 job, this kind of blueprint of how to do it with my story kind of intertwined.

[28:56] Um, I tried to take, like, I’ve read dozens and dozens of books while I’ve been learning and just kind of take all those practical things. And some of the examples that I’ve used over my time and consolidate them into a book. Um, I, like I said, we, my wife and I set goals and we were, I was at the better life, um, summit in Vegas in December. And I was like, I wanted to create a goal that was off the wall for me. Like, I didn’t want to be like, don’t use your phone after five or go to the gym three times a week. So I was like, I’m going to write a book. That’s my goal. So that’s, that’s the whole reason I wrote the book was just as a goal, but it’s, it’s turned into something else. And I’m really happy with how it turned out.

[29:32] Um, you know, hopefully people enjoy it. Yeah. Well, it’s, it sounds like they are. I mean, you, uh, you got the, you had Brandon Turner write a forward. I mean, that’s amazing. Yeah. Yeah. That was a, that was a pretty amazing thing. I’ve learned a lot from Brandon over the years. So to have him, uh, give me endorsement, read it and write it, write the forward is, it was pretty cool. Uh, I couldn’t imagine that feeling that that’s gotta be amazing. So that’s, that’s awesome. And then I saw you were a best bestseller and a few categories, um, you know, or like a, in the new releases, right? Yeah. The new release, I was bestseller in like a real estate investments, real estate sales, and then real estate in general.

[30:08] So, and I got up to like, I think I got into number three on top seller of real estate investments. And then this guy, Brandon Turner was at one and two, but.

[30:19] Darn that guy. Yeah. All right. Yeah. You got to pick your battles. Yeah. Oh man. I sent him a screenshot, a DM. I was like, I’m coming for you. He’s like, all right, bring it.

[30:34] That’s awesome. That’s really, really cool. I mean, it’s inspiring. I think that, um, I think one of the things that I didn’t really think about in the process of writing a book is how you could inspire other people to write a book that might’ve been their dream their whole life or whatever. And, um, I mean, we talked early on when I was starting, um, and I don’t know if I’ve actually fully said on the air that I’m writing a book, but I’m writing a book and I heard it here, folks. Uh, no, but you, you, you spoke to me and you kind of walked me through some of the process and I was, I was, you know, reading the book published and kind of learning more about the process of it. And it just, it just, uh, it becomes more real.

[31:15] It becomes more, uh, maybe feasible seeming, uh, in your own head, uh, to talk to people. So, I mean, good job. Like, I mean, congrats. It’s gotta be such a great feeling of accomplishment and inspiring to a lot of people. So, yeah, I appreciate it. It’s been, it’s been a fun month just kind of seeing friends and family and like, Hey, congratulations. And I had a few people like, I always wanted to write a book, but I didn’t think like I could write a book. I’m like, I wrote a book. It’s not that tough. You can write a book and get it out there. It’s just, it’s just a huge compliment to have to say you’re a published author. So. Yeah. Did you, uh, have anything shift or gain any new clarity for yourself about your own story coming from a conductor and kind of into this business as you were writing and organizing it in the book?

[31:57] Yeah. I had a few moments like, like of like clarity of like stepping back. I was like, Holy cow. Like, you know, the big one for me, like was when Brandon Turner, like wrote, read the book and wrote the four. I was like, Holy cow. Like if you had told me seven years ago when I was in the break room at work, you know, reading his book for the fourth time that he was going to read my book someday and write the four for it, I would have told you you were high or crazy. Like that’s, that’s not gonna, that’s not possible. Yeah. But it gave me a moment of clarity of like how far I’ve come. And like, I took a second to like, actually like be proud of myself. I’m like, okay, like I’ve done it. Like I haven’t done it, but I’ve done, you know, what I’ve set out to do.

[32:36] I’ve become financially free. I’ve always loved teaching and helping people. So now if I can help on that side too, it’s just, it’s been fun. That’s really cool. And that, that experience of pride for yourself as an adult doesn’t necessarily happen very often for, for us, just adults in general. And so it’s really cool when you have a moment like that, where you, you have this overwhelming sense of pride for yourself and where you’ve come. It’s a very uncomfortable feeling too. Like, it’s like, you’re almost trained not to feel that way. Like you’re almost like, I can’t feel proud of myself. I’m like, Oh, I am. Like I wrote a book and it’s out there. It’s on Amazon. So that’s right. Right. Yeah.

[33:13] You definitely should. Yeah. My kids like, they’ll like Google me and they’ll be like, Oh, you’re on like your Amazon things. Number one. When I Google your name, like, that’s, that’s cool. Like my kids can say like my dad wrote a book. So yeah, you’ll have to look at yourself in the mirror at night and repeat five times. I’m a bestselling author. My wife’s going to be like, what is wrong with you? Erica told me to do it. I don’t know. And she’s a therapist. She’s trained to do it. She’s a therapist. Yeah. It’s a prescription. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, come on. Like, I think like, I know that we all, yeah, we’re trained to be humble and we, it’s, it doesn’t, it feels kind of weird to feel good about the accomplishments, but man, if I climbed Everest, I would have to take a moment on top of Everest.

[33:55] Yeah. Yeah. To just be like, I put in so much work to get to this point and I did it. So yeah, that’s so awesome. That’s gotta be such a great feeling. Yeah. It’s been fun. So speaking of books, you mentioned that you, you’ve, you read a few books that kind of inspired you or were part of this book. Um, do you have any, you know, highlights or any key books that you think that were really pivotal for you? Uh, that could be just, uh, you know, personal formation. It could be real estate related. Any, any books you think everybody should give a shot, give a read? Yeah. I got a couple that I could say. Um, the first one is probably what about everybody says, but rich dad, poor dad. Um, that was what just set it off for me.

[34:37] Um, so I was kind of like trying to find a way to get out of the railroad. I was Googling ideas and I found a, uh, I was like, I’ve always been somewhat handy, you know, like I don’t love it, but I was like, I could do that. And then I found a bigger pockets podcast where a guy was a handyman and became a landlord and he recommended rich dad, poor dad. So I was like, I’ll give this a shot. So I drove to Barnes and Noble to buy it because I didn’t want to wait for Amazon. So I went and bought it and I read it in like a day. And then that’s why I took it to Laura. I was like, read this book. And then after that we’ll talk and you can, I’ll tell you what I’m thinking. So she read it and she agreed.

[35:09] And so that’s when we, we started with that. So rich dad, poor dad was just like everybody else. It’s just a game changer. It’s a mindset thing. Um, I, I read that book. I was like, I felt like the book was written for me. Like it was tapping into like everything that was in my heart. Like I, like I, there’s better things out there than what I’m doing right now. So rich dad, poor dad. Um, and then the other one would probably be the one thing. Like Eric Keller, like that’s, that kind of helps me through my day. Like, cause there’s days I can get up and I can just go through minutia of like, I’ll check my email. I’ll do quick books. But then there’s like, what’s the one thing I need to do today?

[35:43] That just makes everything else easier. What’s the one thing I need to accomplish today for the future. Um, and I kind of try to take a look back, like in a month, what’s the one thing I could do today that like grant in a month and be like, good job. Where you get that done. Like this has led to something else. So like, I always try to do those one things. Okay. I need to read that book again. Um, I, that, that one’s, that one’s a good one. And I think it is a good practice because there’s, there’s, he attributes that to a lot of different things too. Right. Like, so like, what’s the one thing I can do to my wife? Like, I think he’d maybe kiss her or something like, um, before he leaves or something like that, that will make the kind of set up, set the stage for the rest of the day to be, uh, better.

[36:24] Um, so yeah, that’s, that’s awesome. It’s like, it could be small things. Like if you have somebody that looks down, like what’s the one thing I do for that person to make their day better? Like just go up and talk to them and say, Hey, like that, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t take any work. It doesn’t cost any money, but you could just change that person’s day. And that, you know, spreads through the world pretty well. So.

[36:46] Well, that, that reminded me that, uh, phone call that you had with us about the book writing process. Um, you didn’t have to do that. We really appreciated it. And it was probably talking to you that helped us, um, kind of get on board with moving forward with it. Okay. You on board.

[37:06] Yeah. Well, that’s awesome. I’m excited to read it. What’s the one thing I could do to get my wife on board? That’s true. Exactly. Yeah. This was more about me. So that one thing that you did was very helpful for me. I’m glad. Yeah. It’ll be, it’s going to be a good book. I think you guys got, it’s going to be, it’s fun. Oh, thank you. Um, and I, going back to rich dad, poor dad, I mean, like, that’s just such an amazing example. And I, you know, I don’t have any ideas that my book will be that impactful, um, as that one has been, but that has been mentioned so often in this podcast alone. And we’re like, you know, we recorded like 15 so far. So it’s going to be your number one answer. I’m sure.

[37:46] Yeah. But, but it’s, but you know, like how much, how many lives has he changed from that book? Like, it’s incredible. Like that, that has made a huge difference to so many people. Um, and so like, you know, we can’t necessarily think we’re going to get to that point, but like, even if we help a few, like that’s going to feel amazing. Right. Yeah. Or like in your guys’ podcast, like you have no idea if like somebody is listening and you may never get the feedback from it, but they might be listening to work, driving to work to one of your podcasts and get one idea. Or you guys could say something or guests could say something that could change their life and that changes their family’s life and their grandkids life.

[38:24] Like it’s just so powerful. Changing generational patterns. Yeah. Yep. The power of ideas, I guess. Right. I mean, yeah, that’s, it’s, it’s crazy. And mindset. Like, I mean, it’s, it’s amazing how much rich dad, poor dad is just that. Yeah. Just a mindset thing, really like seeing things a slightly different way. Um, and how big that can change. Yeah. Generations. Like you said. Well, I’m going to read that one. Yeah. Yeah. We need to get Erica to, to read rich dad, poor dad. I have a long book list from this. It’s tough. There’s so many books. Like I just buy books and there’s just like a stack of them on my nightstand. I’m like someday I’ll actually get through these without buying anymore, but probably not.

[39:06] Are you, are you mostly a physical copy book person then? Yeah. Yeah. I do. I like, I, I used a Kindle for a little bit, but I’m more of a paper guy. I like, I’ve actually, my new hack is reading a paper book while listening to the audio book while I’m reading it. That’s, that’s been a game changer for me. Cause I can like, I read, I’ll just start thinking about other stuff and I’ll just kind of like, Oh, well, where was I? But if you’re, if somebody’s reading it to you while you’re reading it, that’s a, that’s huge. I do that on my phone with the Kindle. Um, the only downside then is it’s not as easy and fluid to take notes and that kind of thing with, as it is with a paperback. But yeah, same.

[39:43] I love that version of reading. And there’s actually, if, if people want a little life hack here, uh, there’s an app called speechify. Um, I think this feature would be a premium feature. Um, but speechify can be a plugin on your desktop browser. It can be a app that you can paste articles in. You can, um, you know, if you’re on your desktop app, it’ll just read, you know, your webpage for you. Um, you can plug it into Gmail. It can read your emails out loud to you. It just basically, you know, reads any text. So you can paste text in there. It also links to your Kindle account. So you can then read, uh, just a Kindle book. It will read out loud to you, um, which is pretty cool. And it actually has, so you could, you could buy the Kindle book and not buy the audible book version and just have it read it to you.

[40:31] Um, and then it also has an AI summary feature, just, just kind of cool. He just discovered this. He told me about this earlier. It’s not, it’s not as in depth as I wish it were, but it will essentially try to summarize the whole book into like a little paragraph, but it would be getting smarter. So maybe I should hold something. I usually just do audio books cause I can do stuff while I’m listening too. But, but there were a couple of weeks ago I was sitting on the couch. We would get up early and have coffee together and I would have like my audio book in and just be holding my coffee, just staring because I’m just listening. And he was like, what are you doing? I’m scared. Why are you mad right now?

[41:15] Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but, but yeah, I think like having that one of the, one of the two, either the Kindle or the paperback version with the audio book, it allows you to then highlight or, or underline or take a note, which I think is, is pretty key for wanting to reference something in the future or even just like to help you remember it better. Like I think even just taking the little bit of time to do that helps you remember. Um, so if people want to follow you on social media, um, or get a copy of your book, uh, what, how, give us some information about that. Yeah. Yeah. So my books on Amazon, uh, the unlikely investor, a path to financial freedom through real estate. If they want to pick that up, uh, social media, I’m getting started on it.

[41:59] I’m trying my hardest on Instagram. Um, it’s grant.frankie F R A N C K E. Okay. So Instagram’s the main one. Got it. Instagram’s the main one. Yep. Cool. Yeah. Well, we’ll definitely link those as well in the, um, show notes here. So people can get a copy of the book and follow you. And I imagine reviews are probably really helpful, right? On Amazon. Super helpful. So helpful. Yeah. Those are the, those are the, that’s the biggest thing right now is just to get reviews. So yeah, those are always appreciated. Yeah. As if you like this podcast and all this amazing information, please go review his book, uh, pick it up and review it, please. That’d be great. Yeah. Well, it’s been an awesome conversation.

[42:37] It’s been really, uh, I’ve really enjoyed hearing what you do more. And, uh, yeah, really looking forward to the Kindle book when I can pick it up and, uh, listen to it through speechify. Sounds good. Yeah. I appreciate you guys having me on. I’ve been excited about it. So. Yeah. Awesome. Thank you so much. It’s been great to talk to you. Yep. You bet.

[42:59] Thanks for listening to the wealthy investor podcast, where we talk about wealth and holistic health. If you enjoy our content, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to hear new episodes every Thursday. If you really like our content, you can follow us on social media at the wealthy investor wealthy spell W E L L T H Y.