From Engineering to Real Estate: Finding Success Through Risk and Resilience with Fernando Corona

[0:00] Welcome to the REI Agent, a holistic approach to life through real estate. I’m Matthias, an agent and investor. And I’m Erica, a licensed therapist. Join us as we interview guests that also strive to live bold and fulfilled lives through business and real estate investing. Tune in every week for interviews with real estate agents and investors. Ready to level up? Let’s do it.

[0:24] Welcome back to the REI Agent. I think it’s fitting. We have a very cheerful and genuine guest today. And that’s good because we have maybe a very heavy intro. We have just gone through a really rough month. And I know that pieces of this have been coming up in our intros in the past month or the past couple episodes. Um, I had pneumonia, which we talked about, and that was a full on pneumonia, not walking pneumonia. That was really hard. Took me out for, you know, almost three weeks. Uh, you know, still, we still haven’t gone back to CrossFit gym, which is like, if anybody knows us, that’s like saying we’re not drinking water at all or something. Um, and I just, yeah, it’s kind of a symbol of how, how much we’ve been thrown off and how, how, how often things have been.

[1:27] You weren’t sick for the, but you just weren’t able to go because I was sick, uh, for the pneumonia part. And then you ended up getting COVID. Um, so that was all really hard, but then, and we talked about that, but, um, then, and I think I may have mentioned this before and that, that, uh, your cousin died and how you were planning on going to the funeral by yourself and how normally we do all those things with the kids. Cause we think it’s important, uh, to, uh, you know, show them the realities of life and kind of have them involved in the difficult things too, even though it’s difficult for us. Um, but, um, after recording that, um, I found out that my, uh, childhood friend really could be better described as a brother, uh, passed away.

[2:14] He had, he went in cardiac arrest around, uh, Christmas time. Um, and then, uh, he came back, uh, to his house and then soon thereafter was, uh, helicoptered to the hospital because his organs were failing. He had some sort of acute, uh, infection, underlying infection. Um, there was hope that that could be treated, uh, but ultimately he ended up dying. I was just in his wedding four months ago, um, which happened to be on our anniversary. Uh, I was a groomsman in his wedding, um, 11 years prior. He was a groomsman and mine the same date. Um, and so, yeah, it, it, it was a very heavy weekend. We had, um, we went up Thursday for a viewing for your cousin. Then, uh, Friday was the funeral. Then we went two hours away.

[3:10] This was both in Ohio, uh, for a wake from my friend and then, uh, funeral the next day. So it was just four days back to back. Drove home late last night and, uh, we got like three hours of sleep. I promise you this is gonna be a fun, good episode though. Yeah.

[3:29] Yeah. I mean, honestly, Fernando was probably exactly what we needed today. Not that he was here for us, but it was really nice to talk to him because, um, the last, yeah, the last month sucked, but, but this episode was really fun to record. Yeah, definitely. And he, he’s, um, again, just very authentic and genuine. Um, you know, it’s, it’s hard to come through with like deep thoughts and reflections this close, uh, to, to things like this happening. Um, it, it’s still very raw. It’s still, you know, waves, you get reminders of the people. Um, so yeah, it’s, uh, definitely reflections are easy to say and, and, and are true that, you know, we, we, we don’t want to take each other for granted.

[4:19] You know, it made us feel closer, uh, made us, you know, express our love to each other. I reconnected with old friends that were also friends with them, with this person and, you know, express our love for each other to, um, express my love to their family that were like a second family to me growing up. Um, a lot of that comes out in times like these and makes you think about your own mortality, you know, all that kind of stuff. But, um, maybe we’ll have a deeper reflection on that in weeks to come. Um, cause it’s hard. I mean, life, life can throw you these things that are difficult. And, um, Fernando talks about resilience in this episode. And I think that’s, you know, really true. All we can really do is keep moving forward.

[5:10] And, um, well, um, if I may, part of, yeah, you’re more trained for this. We, we were both talking about how difficult it was to, um, be present with the waves of grief that were coming with our kids around. Cause they were, um, needing things from us. And I had a, another cousin died two years ago that her, and her funeral was in that same church where my cousin was, uh, where his funeral was. And so going back into that church, I was kind of taken by surprise with how much I was missing my other cousin. Um, and was just feeling that and didn’t really feel like I had the space to do that because the kids were still needing things and calling me, um, to them and, and kind of impatient with my tears.

[6:03] And so we ended up going to a brewery, um, before we headed up to Ohio for the second funeral. And we had a chance to talk and we’re just, just talking about how death is, um, is such a part of life. And it’s just, not that there’s an art form to grief necessarily, but it’s, it’s, um, maybe something to be learned, to be able to be present with it and, and not, not push it away necessarily, but to just to recognize that you can, you can have these waves of tears or feeling the sadness or the grief or missing the person. And then, you know, the next moment, um, there can be a lot of laughter too. And it’s just embracing all of that all at the same time can be really tough because it ends up requiring a lot of vulnerability.

[6:53] And I think you and I have done a lot of that with each other recently, which is maybe why we’ve also felt more connected to each other too. We’ve been through a good bit of loss together. Yeah. Yeah. That’s one of those things that, um, you know, they talk about anger when it comes to, to processing grief and, and all that. Again, you’re more qualified, but, uh, some, some of the things that we’ve definitely felt as anger towards having this much loss and, and just why can we, can we get a break?

[7:28] Um, which is feel selfish to say, but at the same time, it’s just, it has been a lot. So I told Matthias yesterday, maybe that I just, I never want to eat the funeral chicken noodle soup ever again. And I don’t know if that’s just like the Mennonite world, but that’s what’s often served, um, after the funeral for the meal. And I’m just, I don’t need that anymore. I’m done with it. Yeah. So we’re, we’re back. We got back around to this morning and we’re, we’re looking forward to getting back into the gym. The kids all went to school. Um, I was able to get back on a podcast recording, which I haven’t been able to do in about feels like a month or so. Boom. Let’s go. Yeah. And we’re, we’re looking forward to getting back into our normal.

[8:13] We’re expecting to get to the gym and, and to be like that first time you ever do CrossFit sore, which if you’ve never done CrossFit, you may not know what we’re talking about, but we will be not walking upstairs normally to say the least, uh, for a while. But, um, yeah, you know, uh, like I said, you know, well, we can do is keep going forward. And, um, like I said as well, Fernando talks about this a little bit as well. And in his, in this recording, it was really perfect for us to have him today. He’s, uh, yeah, it’s a, it has an infectious personality, um, started lending not that long ago, uh, in the DSCR space and just killed it. And he talks about that, uh, talks about niching down a lot of different strategies, strategies that can apply to, you know, doing entrepreneurship business in general.

[9:08] Um, he is, uh, also has good tips as in regards to the loan process. If, if anybody has any interest and is an investor himself. So, uh, yeah, without further ado, uh, for Fernando Corona.

[9:24] Welcome back to the REI agent. We are here with, uh, Fernando Corona or you, you told me to say it. Fernando Corona.

[9:34] Exactly. Exactly. Hey guys. Hey, thanks so much for joining us today. Where are you coming out of? Right now we are in unfortunate wildfire Los Angeles. So we’re about 40 minutes from where the, uh, the current fires are, but, um, that’s where we’re at Carson, California. And that’s been devastating to see. I have a really good friend that, uh, it sounds like his whole neighborhood burnt down and somehow his, um, hasn’t, but it’s going to be like moving back to like a war zone or something. It sounds really, really devastating. Hmm. Hmm. What’s it like looking at that door right now? Yeah. No, it’s right now. So when, uh, when it was first, like really, really brutal, uh, then like when it was happening in Malibu, we, we live, you know, right down.

[10:22] If you keep going down the coast of Malibu, like you’ll, you’ll hit Carson and like the areas where we are 40 minutes. So when that was first happening, man, it was like the air quality index was like 140, 150, which is like really bad. And then you couldn’t see the sun was like an apocalyptic smoking. Oh, wow. And it was just like very eerie to, to see it outside. And so we, it was kind of, yeah, it was, it really sucked. And I didn’t, I didn’t know the damage until a couple of days later where you start to see like just literally devastated homes and lands and neighborhoods. And it was just like, well, that’s in, that’s like, I know where that’s at. Like I would, I usually drive there and we haven’t actually driven to check it out, but just seeing things on, uh, you know, TikTok or Instagram, it’s been pretty wild.

[11:09] Wow. Are you guys, are you still waiting to see if something’s like, if it’s coming your way or are you feeling like you’re safe at this point? Right now we did get an alert of like a warning, but right now I don’t think luckily the winds aren’t super heavy right now. So I think they are getting more containment, but I think it’s getting worse a little bit more inland where like Pasadena is. That’s where it’s getting even worse. I’m a little closer to the shore, uh, Pacific. So it’s not as bad on this side right now, but yeah, sorry to start off that, uh, with a little somber, but that’s what’s happening right now. Yeah, it is what’s happening. Cool. All right. That’s stressful. Yeah. Well, uh, yeah.

[11:51] Like tell us a little bit about your journey into real estate. Um, what, what started you off? Yeah. So we are, I think, I mean, when I first started getting into real estate as a real estate investor, the main core of it was there has to be another way to make an income. Uh, like the, I graduated as an engineer, but even, even making the money as an engineer, it was just like, you know, is this it? Am I just supposed to do this for until I’m 65? Like, is this what I’m supposed to do? And even the money that you make as an engineer, at least they tell you like, you’re going to make a hundred grand. And I’m like, yeah, in a few years you do make a hundred grand, but you live in California and a hundred grand doesn’t really get you anywhere.

[12:34] And then you start really like, it starts like setting in that like your entire life has been alive, but your entire life is just totally, uh, what your, what my initial goals were. I didn’t have an understanding of what my goals were even going to get me. People just said, you know, go get a good job or get a good job and get a good education and you’ll be set. And I, I think I, I disagree now, you know, I have more awareness. So then from there I was like, real estate is that path. And just to build wealth, you know, my wife and I talk about buying a house for each one of our kids, instead of putting into, uh, the 503 B plan, I think it, or I forget the plan, but the child plan, it’s like, we’ll just buy a house and then we’ll pay it off by the time they’re 18 and they can refinance it and pay for education or they can, you know, like there’s different things that they can do at that point.

[13:21] And now their education is, is tax-free in a sense. Cause you’re, you’re taking debt to pay it. So I thought that was, those are some creative strategies. That’s how, that’s how we, yeah, that’s how we started. That’s really cool. Have you guys done that? Have you bought houses for like thinking about your kids in mind? Yes. So far, well, we have four properties. I think how every real estate investor starts off where they buy one or two and then they run out of money, uh, unless you like are really good at doing the birth strategy. So we ended up partnering on three, three of them. Uh, we have, you know, got her parents, got people on Instagram, just people to partner up with us to buy our, our real estate.

[14:00] And so then the next goal is, yeah, once we have two kids now, how do we buy the next two for them? That’s our, that’s our vision. That’s cool. Yeah. We’ve done some partnerships like that too. We did our first investment, like a flip together with a partner partially because it was somebody who had done this before and we were newbies. So it was nice to do that with somebody else who’s gone through it before, walk us through the fire. Did you guys pair, did you guys pair your money together or just use your money or how did you guys structure the deal? Yeah, it was a generous thing from his end. Um, he, he didn’t probably need us or, um, but, but wanted to kind of pass on the knowledge a little bit, a good friend.

[14:41] And so we, we split things 50, 50, uh, money wise and, uh, you know, kind of split up the managing of contractors and that kind of thing and getting supplies. Um, but just kind of did everything together, split things 50, 50 on the sale then as well. Would you, would you guys do it again or, uh, with, with him or with the partner or multiple by yourself? We have done a couple of deals with him. Um, he’s also a good friend and he’s also a real estate agent and they work together and it’s, it’s been a really good, good situation. It was nice too that I, like we trusted him going into that first one cause Matthias wanted to, he brought this to me. I think I was a couple of days out from a C-section and I was feeling very overwhelmed with making that decision.

[15:28] And so it was nice to have, uh, our friend, uh, somebody that we could trust go in on that with us. Yeah. Okay. Did you guys find the deal or he found the deal? Yeah, no, I did. I found the deal. So that, that helps. Um, I was leading investment, local investment club at that point. We were just having an informal Christmas party and a wholesaler walks in and says, Hey, I got a deal in a part of town that I was like, that would, that would do well. Let’s look at it. Um, and it’s ended up being like a five bedroom house. Um, we, we, that was maybe our most profitable flip too. Um, maybe just like overall, we, we split a 50 50, but it was still pretty good for, for that. And I think, you know, it’s one of those things you get kind of spoiled.

[16:10] When you have massive success and your first one. Yeah. Yeah. But rental properties too. If you just get like a really, really great rental property and your first one, and then you’re like, this is, this is not normal. Yeah, no, totally. Um, but so, so the, you, uh, not only invest in real estate, but you also lend and you kind of have a unique, uh, way of doing so. Can you, can you explain a little bit about that side of your, of your world? Yeah. So I’m just firm believer in, and I didn’t use to believe this, but like niching, like riches are in the niches. So I got into lending a year and a half ago, middle of 2023 interest rates are super high. And, um, you know, nobody, nobody that I really knew was targeting this loan program or investors.

[16:58] Like I saw it, there was a need, which is, is it’s a loan called DSCR loan or debt service coverage ratio loan, and it relies on the future income of the property to debt service. So it does not rely on the income of the investor. So you can like close in an LLC. I don’t ask for tax returns. I don’t ask for pay stubs. Um, some, you know, some lenders that I work with, they don’t even care where the money came from. As long as it’s in your account that they, you know, not the day before, but when you’re in contract or something. So I just saw that, like, I was like, this is a super powerful product, especially for real estate agents, right. Who are, who want to invest. And it’s like, I don’t want to show my pay stubs.

[17:37] I don’t want to show my tax returns. I don’t want to have to worry about my debt to income ratio. Oh, and the DSCR loans, they don’t report to personal credit. So the, the potential impact of it, like hitting your, your DTI, if you ever want to buy your own home, you don’t have to worry about that. So there was just so much like this lender, like this loan product. I was like, why isn’t anybody promoting this or really like talking about it? And I said, okay, I’m going to like niche and sub niche and stuff. And then I just only talked about DSCR loans and yeah, 2024 first full year, did 130 loans. That’s crazy. Wow. That’s amazing. Um, so like going on podcasts, like talking on your social media, like, like where were you marketing yourself?

[18:23] So this is a good strategy for anybody. Um, this isn’t the first business I’ve built. And the strategy that I always believed in was like a one to many. So podcasting is a one to many strategy. You, you do something once and you can get pushed to many. YouTube is a one to many strategy. My DSCR YouTube video has like 30, over 35,000, uh, 35,000 views. So that was really big. Um, and then I just continued to target like real estate coaches and I would go into their networks. Like I’m speaking in February, uh, on a real estate mastermind, right? Like people pay money to these real estate investor coaches, you know, many thousands of dollars to be in that net. So then I network with the top dogs and networking is just a fancy way of like, do we have things in common?

[19:11] Could we hang out? Can I talk to you about my kids? And like, what do you, what do you do for a living? And how can we hang out with each other? It’s really networking. And it’s like, do I enjoy being around each other’s presence and then value? Like, is there things that I can share with people? Um, and we, we give, we give to each other. That’s really it. So I just do that at a higher level. So my skillset had to obviously elevate and you do that enough times, um, and with the right people that you naturally get pushed down to many people. So instead of me having 250 conversations, I have one meaning like deep, meaningful conversation and that pushes me down to everybody else. So that’s kind of how I continued to market myself and build the right relationships.

[19:50] Yeah. So you were mentioning a little bit about the DSCR loan and how, um, it, uh, buying rentals could not, could, could, uh, potentially get you off, um, on the debt to income ratio for a personal purchase. But I was also thinking about how, like, if you were potentially in a position where you were able to depreciate a lot of your, um, income with, you know, let’s say a syndication, um, or with, you know, rental property that you own, and maybe you’re not showing that you make a lot of money. Um, you may be not, you may be denied alone from a traditional route, but from a DSCR standpoint, that doesn’t really matter. Is that correct? Yeah, you’re absolutely right. Um, just as a story really quick, we had an 80 year old eight zero, right?

[20:31] Never hadn’t made income in multiple, multiple years. Uh, he reached out cause he wanted to refinance five of his properties that he owned cash. And most lenders would be like, well, you don’t have an income. Like, how are you going to refinance those? And it’s like, well, we, we have a DSCR loan that we don’t care about your income. So we refinanced five of his properties that he owned cash. And then he bought five more. This is in the span of like three months. And it’s like, you, you don’t, there’s no other way to, to solve that problem, but, but that way. So I thought that was a really cool story. That’s awesome. Wow. Did he come to you specifically because he had heard about you working with DSLR loans?

[21:06] Yeah. The DSCR loans. Yeah, exactly. You, you, you start becoming the only. So I’ve always believed how do you become the only in a market? So it’s to become a solution. And so it didn’t matter if every, you know, agent or investor always told me lender. Cool. Do they do DSCR loans? What’s that? I’m like, well, there you go. So it doesn’t matter to me if you already have a lender. I’m not, I’m not just a lender. Like I only do DSCR loans. And so if you do that to a hundred people, you know, you don’t even need that many clients like that. So anyways, you just need to be the only. So were you married when you transitioned over from engineering into the investing world at that point? I, I was not married when we first got into investing and just a quick, slow tangent where I have been a failing forward entrepreneur for the last six years.

[21:57] And so there’s probably been like five businesses that I’m not talking about on here, but picked up skills along the way. And, but one of the things that I’m really happy about was when just on that note, my wife was a teacher of five years saving. I think she saved $65,000 in five years. So she was like a good saver. That’s incredible. And that’s good. Right. And so, uh, she was like, she, she, she also was like, there’s something else out there. Right. And she was looking at properties in California and I was just, I mean, I was her boyfriend at the time and I was unemployed because I was just trying to figure out my own life and it just didn’t seem like any deals made sense. It was just like, this doesn’t make any sense.

[22:44] And I was on internet one day on Instagram and people were talking about out of state investing and I, it wasn’t my money, but I was like, Hey, there’s this thing where people are investing in other States where property values are like five times less. Something we want to, you want to look into. And she took that, she took a really big, I think she took a big risk and like saying, yes, like that’s something I would be open to looking into because it was all of her money. Um, and I, I know we had joked previously where I was like, Oh my gosh, I’m so nervous about this, not working for her that I’m indebted to her forever. And then what happens if the relationship doesn’t work out now? I’m in, now I’m in debt to my ex.

[23:28] So luckily both worked out, you know, that the property did well and, and we got married and had two kids. The moral of the story is sometimes you gotta take risks. Yes. Oh, that’s what you, that it was a huge, uh, breath of fresh air. I would say, you know, like those, the first time I really felt like, I don’t know. I kind of felt like I was like, Whoa, she really like, yeah, you’re right. She really trusts me or believes in this idea that I came up with. You know, I, I know that was, that was novel to me. And, uh, that obviously speaks volumes to our relationship. But have you, have you guys ever been in a situation where, I mean, it sounds like the first flip you were about to give birth.

[24:09] And Matias comes to you like, I’m going to take this on. I’m going to take this undertaking. You, you handle the baby undertaking.

[24:17] Yeah. Yeah. I don’t, I don’t know if I started out as graceful as maybe your wife did. Be honest. Tell me, tell me more. Tell me more. Now I, this is the good stuff. Tell me more. I’m here. I think at that point, um, I mean, I, I’m more of the conservative side of us financially. And, and at that point I was like, I don’t, I don’t understand this. I don’t know what this means. I don’t even know what that looks like. I don’t know how much money we’d have to pour into it. Like we’re getting into a really expensive surgery. We don’t know if the baby’s healthy, you know? Um, and so that felt like a lot to, to just say like, yeah, let’s go into this blindly and, and see how it turns out. And since, since that point, we’ve done multiple deals and it has got to the point where now he’ll text me or he’ll walk out the door saying, Hey, we might be buying a house today.

[25:08] And I’ll be like, all right, just text me and let me know if we’re under contract. I got, I got to go see this thing now. It’s going to be today. But, but it’s been a journey getting there because we’ve actually had a lot of, um, pretty heated discussions about it because I want to know all the information before I can make a decision. And he, he’s tried to help me understand that sometimes you have to just make the decision really quickly. You don’t have time to like sit on it for a while. Yeah. With some of these deals. Um, and I mean, you know, in the, you know, it was terrible timing. We had been wanting to get a flip a property, some, some kind of opportunity like this for a while. Um, and, and a lot of preparation, you know, it’s like the hard work meets preparation.

[25:47] Um, is, is what luck is right. A lot of that stuff kind of was all in the play. It was just kind of bad timing with the, with the whole, you know, baby thing. But, um, and I was just going to say too, I feel like often in that stage for, I know it’s been true for you, Erica, that, that all you’re wanting to do is kind of like make things comfortable to nest, to get like, you know, the house. Like we’re, we’re usually, you know, we’re painting a room where we’re like getting a room ready. We’re, we’re whatever we’re making everything more comfortable, more ready for this baby and kind of buckling down a little bit. And so to take on a, uh, new, new endeavor like that was, was feeling pretty risky.

[26:25] And, and I won’t lie. I was, I was nervous too, but again, we had been setting ourselves up with equity, equity lines of credit looking for an opportunity like this. Um, and we were, you know, at the end of the day, like it was, it was just a bit rough and, uh, I’m glad you trusted me to, to let, let it happen. Yeah. Well, that was five years ago, December five years ago. And this is, that is the meat that is like so good because I mean, if my wife was listening right now, it’s like, we didn’t always have sunshine and rainbow conversations at all throughout the last, you know, five years of journey. Um, so I, I love that. I kind of want to pick on, I want to ask Matias some jet, like genuine straight up questions.

[27:06] Right. I think this is what people like too. So, so you go to talk to her and she’s like, like, maybe she says like, I don’t think it’s a good idea. Like, we’re literally going to have a baby. Like, what do you, like, what are you thinking or something? And then you’re in your head, you’re like, I hear you. And like, what, tell me how, I kind of want to know how that actually went down and then how you made the decision, uh, ultimately, you know, cause there’s different different decisions that, you know, that maybe you, you were like, I am in the best position, right. Based off of the training that you had, the foresight, the vision of what you had for you guys, you know, even this podcast.

[27:43] Right. Um, and then Erica, you know, me, yeah. Seeing that either then or later, right. Like, you know, she’ll, she’ll catch on like what happened there in the conversation. Yeah. So we, um, it was, uh, it wasn’t like, I’m just going to go ahead and do this anyway. We did, we were on the same page ultimately, uh, you know, and to be honest, like I was nervous about it too. Like it was the first flip. There was, um, a stone foundation that has some like, like pieces out of it. I was like, Oh, the foundation is crumbling. Um, and, and also my partner, um, was a very Latino about it and was like, I was like, what, let’s, let’s come up with like a budget. Let’s figure out this whole thing. And he was like, it’s going to be like $30,000.

[28:33] All right. And he walked me, I mean, he walked me through it a little bit and again, he has a lot of experience. Uh, you know, it, he was right. It was, you know, it was, I forget if it was 30 or not, but, but we, um, what he had estimated was about right. And, um, and so we, yeah, we had talked and, you know, just, you know, really just kind of reminded Erica, like this is, I know this is really hard timing, but it’s just a really good opportunity. Um, the house was, um, I think we bought it for like 90,000. Um, and it’s a five bedroom house and, um, two baths. And we, I forget if it was like 30 to 50, maybe something like that, that we, that we ended up putting into it, but yeah. Sold it for me.

[29:14] And what was the ARV? Uh, like two 50 ish to two to 40. Wow. Exactly. So, um, yeah, yeah, we did really well. I think we got like around 45,000 each. Um, and, and at the, at the time that was, you know, that was just great. And, and, and like, you know, trying to explain to how some of these things, I know that seem risky that we’re risking capital, but also there is the possibility for a really good return that would kind of like make us more secure. Um, how I remember him talking to me about it. And I think, I think it’s really nice. And why is it was, I think I want to say we talked about like on a Friday and I was going in on a Monday to have the surgery. So it was like pretty tight timing, but I remember him coming.

[29:58] Wow. That’s a pretty wild story too. Yeah. Saying, uh, you have to be gentle. You got to walk in gentle. Is the mood right? Hey, baby. You feeling good? You need a back rub really quick. Yeah, no, I know. I totally get it. Cool. The sense I got was, this is a really great opportunity. I’m not going to do it unless you’re on board, but, but it’s such a good opportunity. And I feel like we’re going to miss out on something big if we don’t do it. It was kind of the, the tone. And, uh, that’s so true. That’s really helpful when he talks to me like that. Cause then I can put my anxiety aside and I can kind of lean into that a little bit. We, we got really lucky too on this one. Um, real quick before we move on.

[30:42] Unfortunately, we’re going to spend too much time on this deal. Um, but somehow the, uh, the, uh, wholesaler, he had like, uh, one of the best, uh, inspectors in the area already do a home inspection on it. And which I’ve never, I’ve had a wholesaler. I’ve had a wholesaler kind of do their own like inspection, which actually, I think the ones that around here, they typically try to be very honest and thorough about the problems with the property. And that’s kind of how they base the price. Um, but we had this, yeah, we had this, um, inspection on it. So that, that was also kind of lucky because, um, without that, it would have been a lot harder for me to, you know, just buy something without an inspection the first time.

[31:20] So, um, that was, that was also kind of a benefit or, or a blessing at that time. Yeah. Okay. So Fernando, how do you and your wife tend to have conversations or maybe even in the earlier? Actually that, that was totally it. Like, I know I was like, man, it’s gonna be a, it’s gonna be a little tough to get her to be on board with this, but let me try to massage my way in there. There’s some dicey stuff where I’m like, it’s definitely not the best timing. And like, this is what I think we should do because the opportunity is there. Uh, and it’s been just really genuine conversations. I think similar to Matias, like I I’ve never been like, no, like I’m going to do this no matter what. I was like, I’ve never really taken that approach.

[32:01] Uh, so I really liked that and how Matias handled it. And, and I, I agree, like I’m very similar and she’s now, I’m sure Erica, you’ve seen, uh, Matias take a couple of these swings and they pan out. Um, you know, and maybe some, like some swings I did take didn’t. Pan out, but she’s seen that I’ve taken so many swings and the majority of my swings do pan out and some of them don’t. And so she’s learned how to live in that. Uh, it’s not, yeah. And more so in the certainty that like, I’ll figure things out, which has been really good. And it’s, and it’s not a zero sum game. I think that’s another thing that people often feel like they’re okay. We’re putting in a hundred thousand dollars of capital into this property.

[32:41] Um, I could lose a hundred thousand dollars when the reality is like you, you, you can lose money for sure. And there I’ve talked to people who have lost a good amount of money, but typically like, you know, like breaking even, um, sucks. Cause you put a lot of time and effort and energy and money into this. Um, but you know, it’s, it’s been rare that I’ve gotten really close to breaking even. So it’s rarely, uh, you know, when it’s when, yeah. That’s really good. And you got the more, you got more reps under your belt. So, so yeah, so that was, so that was really cool. Um, and she was kind of in the beginning, we did not have a kid in the beginning. We ended up finding out we were pregnant though, a year after we started dating.

[33:22] And then, um, and then I think we ended up. Yeah, man, it was in 20, 2021. We had our first kid, but 20 December, 2020, we had our first property. And so she, I think she was signing. Oh man. She was signing closing docs while pregnant with our first kid. And she was actually the one that was like, she was like, let’s, let’s do it. Like, you know, like now’s the right time. And then, you know, we ended up having our getting, yeah. Finding out we’re having a little one. And so it was just, uh, it was just like an awesome time where both of us are working really well, really well together. Here’s just one thing I’ll share that from the time we agreed to start investing together, it was about nine months from when we actually bought our property.

[34:15] And then when we, and we told our whole family that we’re buying properties out of state with sight unseen, we’re not, we’re not flying to visit the properties, right? We’re trusting our property managers and our, our inspection reports and our agents, you know, our property, you know, there are, uh, our contractors, we trusted so many people. And then at the launch of our first property, again, when all of our parents told us we were crazy, um, our bottom floor floods. Have you guys ever had, have you guys ever had a rental where like, you think you’re trying to cover all your angles and like, just like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We had a flood, uh, not too long ago. Oh, that’s awful. And, uh, I remember getting the text from my property manager and I’m hanging out with my wife and her parents.

[35:01] And I’m just like, it was the first time I felt like a gut punch of like, remember it’s not my money. And my, my wife doesn’t get these text messages from the property manager. You know, I was the one set up on it and I was like, I got to break the news to her. And like, that’s my first time truly feeling like this fear and, you know, of, of things going wrong. I didn’t know how to handle that type of stuff yet. So, uh, thinking back to it now, like the resilience you have to build as an investor, right? I ended up sharing that with my wife. We both kind of felt it together and then after we figured out how to fix it, we’ve shared it with our, with our parents. Um, but true. I think just on that resilience piece of, you know, going through entrepreneurship, going through investing, even agents, age, the only way you make money, even as an agent, you can only make money if you’re resilient.

[35:55] You’re not going to make money if you’re not resilient in anything. And so we, we had just had to learn how to become resilient together. Yeah. And part of that resiliency, I think for me has been becoming less emotionally reactive to some of those things when they happen and just knowing that there’s a way they can get worked out, which I would say I’ve learned because he’s just like the most non-anxious person I’ve ever met and just going to be fine no matter what. And, and so that’s like over the years when we’ve had different things happen with properties, I’ve come to just know and trust that it’s going to be fine. We’re going to figure out a way through it, even though it’s, it can be stressful in the moment, but it’s not a personal reflection on us or what we’re doing.

[36:41] Yeah. That’s good. That’s good. Well, he’s so calm because he has you, Erica. That’s my therapist. Yeah. You’re the therapist. Easy.

[36:55] Yeah. No, no. Tell me a little bit more about this. The lending side of things for you. If you don’t mind me jumping here. I’m you, you had told me off air that, that you have a nuance to the, the way you lend and, and can you, you’re, you’re not actually broke, have a brokerage license. Is that, is that correct? Or what’s the right term? All right. So, I mean, a broker is anybody who like brings two things together and you’re the middleman. Right. And so you can, you can broker luxury goods. You can broker watches, anything like that. So, you know, in the formal sense of a broker with a license, I am not, and you don’t need one to do what I do. So in about 40 ish States, you do not need a license to broker loans, but they’re only DSCR and hard money loans and SBA loans, self storage facilities, hospitals.

[37:52] Like when you start talking commercial, bigger stuff, retail mall, you don’t need a license to broker all that stuff. It’s literally the craziest stuff. You only, the license only truly came up because of the 2008 crisis where, you know, you had a bunch of loan officers that were scamming or just being very untrue with, um, with primary homeowners. So you’re taking advantage. Usually like the less sophisticated in the realm of real estate, a borrower is the more protections need to need to be in place to protect them. Sure. Right. Cause they were like, maybe you guys have heard of arms or balloons, like an adjustable rate mortgage, balloon mortgages. Right. Um, all those things were terms that a regular borrower homeowner doesn’t know.

[38:35] And so you had loan officers that were just wanting to make a bunch of money and lenders that want to make a bunch of money. And they were giving out a bunch of these types of loans that had balloons or arms and they were adjustable rates and all this stuff. Interest only until it went to fixed. And then it went to a 30 or, you know what I mean? Like there was all these crazy loan products that were out there and they were being sold to the wrong people, to the people that weren’t sophisticated enough to understand them. That’s when they had the whole 2008 crisis balloon. And then from there, that is when the government and everybody started saying, okay, we’re going to require licenses. There’s going to be trainings.

[39:11] There’s going to be ethics boards. There’s like, there’s a lot more stuff, but they only did that for the FHA loans, conventional loans, home equity lines of credits, right? Like the things that primary homeowners are going to be in the game for when you, when you enter outside that world and you go into the investor world or the business buying world, those laws don’t apply. Like I can legally kick back referrals legally because I operate outside in the rules called RESPA and TRID and all that stuff. I operate outside of that world. And that’s, that’s the world that I live in. So I only work with investors. Do I have my licenses? Yes. Did I get them not knowing this? Yes. I got my licenses and then I started doing all these loans direct with lenders and with investors and I started making money.

[40:02] And in the beginning I did think it was illegal. I was like, I was telling my parents, my parents were like, mijo, you know, are you sure you’re doing this legally? And I was like, ma, of course I’m doing this legally. My voice changes when I talk to my mom.

[40:17] So, uh, so I ended up finding out like, no, I mean, again, 120 loans last year were closed without a license. And I, and I did that with multiple lenders, more than 10 lenders. Right. So it does depend on the state and it does depend on the lender. And then obviously it depends on like you, the person and understanding this information. So that’s when I figured all this stuff out and I was like, okay, this isn’t illegal anymore. I started doing my own due diligence. Um, and I realized in what States you can do it or with what lenders you can do it in and how to operate legitly. And that’s, that’s what I do. So I still have my regular licenses. If I want to do conventional loans, I don’t though.

[40:57] I usually just refer them out and yes, on the conventional side, you can’t get kickbacks like that. That is illegal. Um, but it’s just the world I want to play in. Well, that makes sense. Like you said, you, you niche down. Um, and, and the, I found it interesting. I heard that, um, the whole DSCR world was kind of more, uh, larger commercial property, uh, in the past. And then it’s kind of opened up more to, uh, kind of the, the single family rental even. Um, and so really it is, like you said, like you’re kind of buying a business. Um, it’s, it’s the way to look at it, even though it’s a single family house, it’s really switching it to a business mindset because that property has to be able to perform well enough for, uh, the, for it to make sense business wise.

[41:42] And that’s what the loan is based off of. Is that correct? Yeah. There’s a little nuance in there too, that I think would be helpful. So, um, in the five unit and up, right, uh, DSCR loan, you can, you can give a loan based on the net operating income. Have you guys ever heard of that term? You’ll hear people say like, Oh yeah, I bought a five unit or a 10 unit. I, I, uh, I fixed it up and I put more like renters in there and I increased the rents and then I sold it for a million dollars more in that, in that world. And the, when you’re using the net operating income of a property. So if you bought a 10 unit and there was only, it was like a 500 bucks a unit or something. And then you go in there, you, you kick everybody out, you modify the whole property.

[42:24] It’s still 10 unit, but now you put people in that are paying 2000 bucks a month. You’re going to get a substantial increase. Your value add, your appreciation is not based on sales comps. It’s based on NOI net operating income. So, and right now in the, in the one to four unit world, it is based on sales comps. You buy a house, a single family home, you want to buy it under market value. You can only force the appreciation up to its sales comps, right? You can’t get above sales comps. So in the DSCR world, it’s, uh, the same thing though. DSCR, even though you’re basing it, you’re basing the ability to buy off of the rental income, but not the value. So the value will always be capped by the sales comparisons nearby near that property.

[43:10] So you still need an appraisal and then they look to see, well, what did that property sell for? Right. And like similar to square footage, similar bed types and all that stuff. So it’s still sales comps in the one to four unit space. Once you get above the five unit space, different story. Sure. And the, and the, um, comps, so they also factor in like what the rental rate is or could be, um, like if, if you’re buying a house that is not currently rented, um, uh, will that be part of that appraisal process to say, okay, well, the cost kind of a 1%. So there’s two reports on an investment, on an investment appraisal. Maybe you’ve seen them. There’s like a 10, there’s a 10 Oh four, which is a value appraisal report.

[43:55] And there’s a 10 Oh seven, which is a market rental income report. So there’s two reports, 10 Oh four and 10 Oh seven. You know, if you’re buying investment properties or refinancing them, usually always get these two reports. And so the 10 Oh seven, which is the rental market rental data that does give like, what does this property rent for? It’s independent of your 10 Oh four, which is your sales comparison report. That one is how much is this property worth? But the two are exclusive, you know, from each other. They don’t, they don’t actually impact each other. Um, so does that, does that make sense? And then explain the ratio that is needed for most DSCRs, uh, or an example ratio that could be needed, uh, so that, uh, people could understand how like that rental income, how to use it.

[44:43] Then. Yeah. So, so I’m a broker and I’m not committed to one lender. And the reason why I use more than 10 lenders is because they all solve a different problem. So let’s just say you wanted the best interest rates. Okay. And you don’t mind going whatever, 20, 25 or 30% down. Um, and then we would go to a lender that has what’s our, or they would give you a benefit of a, uh, for a 1.2 DSCR. What does that mean? So if you take the rental income and you divide by the mortgage, which is the P I T I a, which is principal interest taxes, insurance, and association dues, if you take, so if a thousand dollars of rental income, and this is not a, not a lease, this is a big distinction. We’re talking about the market rents.

[45:30] What does the market rents on the appraisal say? If it says a thousand bucks, just an example, then the mortgage, the P I T I a cannot be more than a thousand dollars. This is for a 1.0 DSCR. It just means that rental income is equal to the debt it has to pay. And the cool part is it doesn’t factor in vacancies. It doesn’t factor in utilities like water and all that stuff, which I think is actually really cool. So you can buy a property literally if the DSCR is just 1.0. Now, does that make sense for an investor? If their strategy is only to rent it out as a long-term rental? No. But if somebody knows, well, I’m going to do shared living, I’m going to turn this into an assistant. I mean, they’re going to do something with it to make more money.

[46:16] Airbnb, whatever, midterm rental, renting to nurses. It’s just about like, can I buy the property? And then how do I make more money out of it? That’s when I, that’s where I help more. So those types of investors, yes, I help long-term, long-term rental investors for sure. But the money’s made with how are you cash flowing? What’s your cashflow model? There’s different exit strategies for cash flowing Airbnb. There’s one called pad split. There is a midterm rental, renting to nurses. You can partner with insurance companies. There’s renting to sober living communities. So there’s, then you could sign an agreement with an assisted living facility and then they run their business on your property or something, right?

[47:00] For the single family home assisted living facilities. There’s many ways to make money from a property. I was just thinking of one where they focus on renting to military vets, right? And so then they have an agreement with the bases nearby and then they reserve rooms or like areas for them specifically, which is a lot. They’re going to pay a lot more than just a regular rental, but they’re catering to that niche. Does that make sense? Yeah. We talked to somebody in Texas who does that, has contracts with the military, contracts with airlines. And so there you go. Pilots, stewards coming through, they’ll use their properties exclusively through that contract. And they started off as arbitrage.

[47:45] So they didn’t even buy the property to start. But now they’re starting to own the property as well, which I mean, this is better if you can do it, right? If you, if you get started arbitrage, it’s great. Cause you don’t actually have to buy the property, just leasing it and then getting more on top of it from, from this kind of niche work. But yeah, buying the property, then you get to, you know, appreciate, depreciate all that, all that good stuff. You, you had also mentioned a little tip you wanted to explain for any, maybe an agent or investor that’s out there that, that people may not have heard of. So this is, yeah, this is called, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of tips in the world, but the, the two things I’ll just share.

[48:29] One is an easy one that anybody can do. And any agent can talk to a lender so that the agent actually can become like a more sophisticated, you know, person in the lending transaction as well. And like, how do I help my borrower out and talk to the lender? So this is, I’ll just share two tips. The first one is pretty simple. It’s just, if the property appraises for more than what your contract is, then you can increase the purchase price and then ask for the seller concession. You guys know what I’m talking about? Have you guys heard of that strategy before? Matias? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, totally. So you put the, you put the property, you know, purchase contract to 90 and then you go, uh, it appraises for 300.

[49:07] Then you increase the purchase price to 300 and ask for 10 K in seller concessions. That’s like a very easy one to do. And my buyers don’t actually know that it’s possible. And when I talk to the, my buyers agents, you know, when I’m the one suggesting it, they’re like, oh yeah, that’s cool. Like, let’s do that. You know? So this is an opportunity for your, your, your agents that are listening. They can then ask, they can always ask, Hey, what did the appraisal come in at? Even if it’s two or $3,000 above, like it’s worth it. Hey, get that in seller concessions. And I’ll, I’ll sometimes do it upfront. So if I know the property could appraise for 300 and if they agree at 290 value verbally, then I will say, just put the contract in at 300 and ask for the 10 K seller concessions.

[49:51] Don’t, don’t take the 290. Right. You could take the 290. You’re just, your cash out of pocket is going to be higher versus taking the 300, your monthly payments higher by like 30 bucks, 50 bucks. You know, it’s, it’s, you’re, you’re going to make that. It’s better to keep the cash in your pocket as an investor. Right. Cause that’s how you get the highest cash on cash return on investment. I was going to say that. I think that you increase the odds of actually getting the appraisal to come in at that price. If you, if you have the contract price there to be getting 100%, 100%, you, that it’s literally of so many deals that we’ve done. That is so true. A, and a, uh, an appraiser is a human and that appraiser saying, well, the comps show 290, but this offers at 300.

[50:38] I mean, if they think it’s worth 300, then it’s, I think it’s worth 300, you know? And sometimes there’s like a high one that maybe there’s one over 300, so it makes it easier to justify 300 too. Yes. So that’s tip number one. Any questions on tip number one or is that pretty easy for everybody to understand? That’s great. Thanks. So tip number two is, and this is good for the agents to know, you can’t ask for $50,000 in seller concessions. And it’s like, at least with the lender, you can’t do this. It’s like, well, why not? You know, like if they’re willing to give it to me and it’ll appraise like, and it’s because lenders have maximum seller concession limits, depending on the loan type, it’s between 2% and 6%.

[51:23] Uh, it can’t, it can go up to 6% again, depending on the loan type and the down payment. Um, I do have lenders, even on the DSCR side that will go up to 6%. So that’s pretty substantial. You know, if your property value is worth 300,000, 6%, that’s $18,000. Yeah. Con, uh, just quickly share the con to this is you have to use up, you can only use the seller concessions on closing costs. You can’t use it on the down payment. So if your closing costs are only 15K and your purchase price is 300, it doesn’t make sense to ask for 18K in seller concessions, even if you could get 6%, because you’re going to throw $3,000 out the window. So this is again, where the, the, the smart agent or lender knows the limits of the lender and what we can ask in seller concessions.

[52:14] And you structure the deal accordingly. And this is where value really comes in, right? You, this is where I think people have value. Okay. Moving on to tip number two. What if, what if you did want to get a higher concession without it actually being, you know, counting as a seller concession? How can I, how could I get that whole $18,000 assuming that my, my limit or my, my closing costs were only 10,000 or 12,000? How can I get more? That is when you’ve introduced something called an invoice authorization. Now there does have to be, you know, to, there’s a gray area, but let’s just say we’re operating only in the, in the white, like this is just the white space. You want to do things as legitly as possible.

[53:00] Okay. Like how do we do that? So there has to be some work to be done on the property. And I’ve done this like, you know, very legitimately on accident. And then you discover it’s a strategy and you’re like, Whoa, this is actually really cool. The way it works is that your contractor has an agreement with the seller and the contractor sends an invoice to the seller and says, Hey, you know, after closing, you’re allowing title to send me $18,000 of your proceeds to me. This, this is under the assumption that the seller already agreed to $18,000 in concessions. You’re just trying to figure out how do I get this $18,000 and use it for, for my property. Right? So assuming there’s work that needs, that’s needed on the property.

[53:47] The contractor sends an invoice authorization to the seller, which goes to title. Okay. The buyer is, is not even on the contract. The buyer though has another contract with the contractor. And that’s that, that agreement says, Hey, you’re going to get paid $18,000 for the re for the work to be done out of the proceeds of the seller. So that these agreements happen outside of the lenders. Like here, we don’t care about your agreement as a buyer with your contractor. We also don’t care about the seller’s agreement with the contractor. So those aren’t even contracts that we need to see as the lender. They have nothing to do with our buyer. Does that make sense? Yeah, totally. So, so then you close.

[54:36] And then before the money, cause people will say, well, how do I know the seller is actually going to pay the contractor? It’s because the contract between the contractor and the seller goes to title and title will be the one to send the payment. It comes right out of the proceeds. Before they send it, the money to the seller, they send the money to the contractor. Next question comes in. Like, what if you don’t trust your contractor? Well, then you can, you’re, you have your contract. You have your contract with the contractors sent to title that says you will withhold the check payment until you tell them to. And so then now they have a check to pay to the contractor when you tell them to.

[55:13] So again, there’s layers to this. Obviously you can get as creative as you want. Just, just know that it’s been done. And it’s been done at $50,000 plus levels, you know, in, in this type of invoice authorization strategy. So that’s the biggest tip. It seems complicated at first, but if you just dig into mapping it out and like playing it in your head, because of the next question. It’s like, well, how do you pitch this to like the seller and the listing agent? Like all those questions have answers and they’ve been done. So if, if somebody cares enough to really deploy this strategy to help their investor community out, it’s just going to give you that much more uniqueness. Right. Yeah, totally.

[55:57] I think that they’ve covered a couple of really good points. And I think that, you know, having those, that knowledge of those strategies, but also knowledge of the different type of lenders loans there, the, what you’d, like you said, how much you’re able to get in concessions for those loans. It can really actually, cause sometimes, you know, not everybody’s going to be doing a DSCR loan, for example, or there might be a, a, a, a local bank that does an in-house product. That fits a certain niche that you, that, that would work really well for this type of buyer. And I think especially in these high interest, this high interest rate loan environment, I feel like you got to understand that a lot more than before.

[56:34] Like the differences between lenders and, and, and knowing what makes most sense. And I, I mean, so for you, like being a broker to, to, to go to different lenders that are actually providing the loan makes a lot of sense too. Like, you know, you, you, you, you do that for people. And I think an agent, a good agent will be also having a general understanding of that stuff as well to, to be able to direct their clients to the best product for them for that specific house. Yeah, definitely. And, and yeah, a good agent has that knowledge to be of super value to the investor. It’s not only am I helping you find deals, but like I can help you calc, you know, the ARV and, you know, I know what you, I know, I know what your exit strategy is and how you want to cashflow.

[57:15] So maybe I’m doing cashflow models for you ahead of time so that like, I know this deal, I know this fits your buy box, even if it doesn’t fit all these other buyers buy box, because I know your exit strategy, which in my opinion is actually easier. Investors are willing to buy worse deals sometimes if the cashflow is there, like not for flips. There’s, there’s investors for flips, which they want to buy super deep. And there’s investors for cashflow, which they don’t need to buy that deep. They just want like a little bit of a discount or they want help with, with, uh, with repairs and all that stuff, but they’re buying for like a certain cashflow strategy. Those are different types of investors, in my opinion, that agents can niche, can niche into.

[57:58] I know agents that only help investors buy Airbnb properties. I know agents that only help investors buy co-living or shared housing type of properties. Right. So there’s a, there’s niches in the, in the space. Yeah, totally. Um, I do want to ask, uh, about the, uh, favorite book. I got to have that favorite book question in there. Is it one that you were, uh, you know, fun, fun, foundational to you or one that you’re currently really enjoying? I like, um, so yeah, just philosophy really quick. Like my belief is that I am not a loan officer and I’m not a lender. I’m not a broker. I’m an entrepreneur that solves problems. And so having that belief of myself, I’m like, my identity can change into different directions on a pivot.

[58:47] Um, I can solve, you know, different problems for different people because of that. Um, I really just wanted to learn marketing. I needed to learn marketing. I needed to work on my mindset to feel confident tackling anybody independent of what my identity or what I did. Um, just, well, this is why all that matters. Cause when I shared the book, uh, it’s going to, there’s actually, yeah, I’ll just share one book, but people would be like, why would you want to learn that? Why would I read that book? And it’s just because, um, when I got into lending, like again, my first full year of business as a lender, there’s people been doing this for 10 plus years. Right. But me coming in as a loan officer, closing 130 loans, it’s like, well, how did you do that?

[59:29] It’s like, I didn’t come in as a lender or a loan officer. Like my mindset was, how do I be the best marketer? Like, how do I be the best entrepreneur? And an entrepreneur just solves problems. So I came in and said, whose problems can I solve? And then I just started solving a bunch of problems. And then I was like, okay, well, how do I market these problems that I’m solving? Okay, well, let me just do that next. It just so happened that my medium was lending, but tomorrow my medium can change and what, depending on the problems I want to solve, which, which it has right now. I’m, I’m helping investors do their own lending. So they don’t even need me. And that’s back to the, back to the problem solving, um, aspect.

[1:00:09] So the book, I’m going to give you two books. I’m sorry. Yeah, that’s fine. I’m going to give you two books. The, so one book is called mindset mindset by Carol Dweck. Like any, anybody who’s making less than $10,000 a month, even less than 20,000. And it’s usually the mindset. And so like, well, why would a mindset be preventing me? Like go read the book and you’ll, you’ll understand that making $20,000 is, is not, or, you know, it’s $20,000 a month in your business. It’s, it is, there’s a skills associated to it, but even before the skills, it’s the mindset. So I always tell people, you got to work on your mindset. If you’re not even at 10 K a month in your business, it’s just your mindset.

[1:00:51] Like just go, go read the book mindset and then work on your mindset and the money will come inevitably. It’s either you make the money or you stop. So the next book after your mindset book is I like, I like his style. It’s Alex from Mosey, a hundred million dollar leads. Yep. Because the next problem that you’re going to have is let’s say you do have your mindset, right? Now you need skills. And the first skill that you need is how do I generate leads? So if you have your mindset, right, and you know how to generate leads, then that’s, that’s it. And then you go and you just do the same thing until you hit 20 K a month. And then you’re going to run into a different problem, which is operations and stuff like that.

[1:01:30] But those are great. That’s awesome. I, I think I have a hundred million dollar offers that I’m on. Was that the second book? Was the book? Okay. I’ll have to, I’ll have to get that one too. Cause yeah, Alex is, is great. He’s, he’s brilliant and he can just, I mean, I feel like he could ask him to describe a slug and it would be like this brilliant. Yeah. He’d go into the origin story and like crap, you know, he dissects things so well. So yeah, those are the two books. Mindset, a hundred million dollar leads. Truly believe with just those two bucks, you can, anybody could hit $20,000 a month. I love it. And you’re totally right. I mean, mindset is so, so big. I mean, that’s, that’s just a limiting factor that so many people have.

[1:02:14] And like we talked about, or you talked about earlier, you know, we coming, coming from the education system. We, we are not really taught to have the entrepreneurial kind of mindset. It’s, it’s, it’s seems more safe to have a job, a steady job with a steady income, a salary, et cetera. But you know, the more you get away from that world, the more you, you, you know, are thankful maybe that you’re not in it and that you feel, you know, self-sufficient. So you feel more safe, more secure. But yeah, where, where could people, this has been awesome. Oh yeah, you’re right. Sorry. I have one final question. Yeah. If that’s okay. Absolutely. Yes. Sorry. I’m dominating over here. It’s all good. I, I was, I wanted to ask you as you worked through like your startups and, and certain things didn’t work out and then got into the lending and clearly you have learned a massive amount of information.

[1:03:06] At what point did you start to have fun and really enjoy it? Oh yeah.

[1:03:15] I, there was a moment where it was six months into my first business and I had made $300 and that was about $20,000 in credit card debt. It was, this is when I quit my job and I thought I can figure this out on my own. I’d left the six figure salary. I ended up breaking down to my dad and just like crying in front of him. It was the first time I really felt like I was like a tearful person and I was just crying. Just like, I, I can’t do this. Like, I don’t, I don’t think, I don’t understand why I thought I could do this. You know, I, I, I just felt like such a failure. And then my dad was just like, my dad’s good dude. And he just, you know, give me a hug and stuff. And he was like, Hey man, like, just don’t commit suicide and you’ll figure it out.

[1:03:59] Like he basically what he said, he was just like, I think my dad is older and wiser. He might’ve, he might’ve saw this kid, you know, I’m 25 or 26. And like, I’m crying about this stuff. My, my dad, he’s probably like, dude, you don’t even know what life is, bro. You know, my dad, he didn’t say that to me. He, he, he was very caring and loving. And he was like, Hey man, like just, you know, it’s okay. You just gotta take it day by day and stuff. And so he was just, it was nice. The next day I got up and I was like, all right, this is it. Like, nobody’s going to save me. Like I have to figure this out. And, um, and that’s when I, I made a post and I’ll share it with you guys afterwards, but I made a post just about how hard entrepreneurship is.

[1:04:42] And I made the post to my future version of me, the successful version in this future. Even though at that moment I was the biggest failure that in my current life. And I realized that like, I don’t care how much I’m failing or how much I fail and how much it hurts internally and emotionally. Like I’m having the most fun I’ve ever had in the worst moment. I remember thinking this is the most, because I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else. I remember feeling like, I don’t care how badly this hurts. Like I wouldn’t trade this for anything else. Like I’m going to keep going. And then the resilience starts to build. Right. And I just one foot forward, one foot forward. And, and yeah, that was, that was probably it.

[1:05:25] Wow. That’s powerful. Yeah. Yeah. That’s amazing. Um, yeah. What a, what a great mindset shift and what a great practice. I look forward to getting that. Um, if people, you know, are interested in DSCR loans, if people are interested in learning more about you, where’s a good place for them to reach out to you? Or find you. Yeah. On Instagram, my, my handles right there. It’s Fernando Corona. I would say just follow me on Instagram. I, I share a lot about, uh, yeah. Mindset breaking limiting beliefs. Um, family is really important and just trying to, trying to live a good life and being, being a decent person along the way. That’s the goal. I love it. Oh man. Love it. Yeah. Thank you. It’s been a great conversation.

[1:06:11] Thanks for Fernando. Yeah. Thank you for having me on. And I love your guys’s duo, by the way. I want, yeah. I was just like, man, we got a little, a little tangent with you two. I thought that was pretty awesome. So I hope that listeners like that. I think that might be the first time that’s happened. So congrats. You turned the table on us. You’re welcome. You’re welcome. All right, guys. Thank you. Thanks for listening to the REI agent. If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe to catch new shows every week. Visit REIAgent.com for more content. Until next time, keep building the life you want. All content in the show is not investment advice or mental health therapy. It is intended for entertainment purposes only.