SPEAKER_01 0:02

Welcome to the Purpose-Driven Investor, where we build more than portfolios, we build communities. I'm your host, Robert Howell, a real estate investor and founder of Define Communities. Each week we'll explore how purpose and profit connect through affordable housing, land home packages, and impact-driven investing. If you're a lender, land seller, or a partner who believes money should move. With meaning, you're in the right place.

SPEAKER_02 0:39

Today we have Aaron from White Barn Home Buyers on the call. Excited again to this with Aaron. He's the founder of White Barn. He's done over 300 real estate transactions since 2019. He's investing across 10 states and specializes in off-market deals, mobile homes, land, and creative finance. So welcome to the show, Aaron. Thanks, man. Excited to be here. All right. So let's get into it. So for the people here in this for the first time, meeting you for the first time, who are you? What do you do? What do you spend your days doing? That's a great question.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Uh so and that's kind of evolved. So started doing real estate full-time in you know 2019, 2020, somewhere around there. Before that, uh worked in oil and gas in a you know corporate role. Um quit that, kind of decided you know, it wasn't for me, jumped into the real estate thing without much of a plan, eventually got into the whole wholesaling, flipping, that side of things. And that's evolved over the years to a lot of things, um, which we'll probably talk about since since you've gotten me uh into new trailers now, which is now all I want to do. But uh I mean honestly, the main thing is like sourcing off-market deals and then figuring out what to do with them from there. Um so I guess that's kind of mainly I'd say what I do, what my specialty is, is you know, buying good deals, figuring out what to do with them. Um and it's you know, kind of the whole business of just you know, sales and marketing, uh sourcing, you know, good deals direct to seller and everything that comes with that. And that is, yeah, that's evolved over the years. We've done some remote stuff, um, done some commercial stuff, we've done land, kind of everything, but now uh moved to Greenville about a year ago and focusing more in this area on mobile homes and now more specifically on buying lots for new mobile homes. So that was a long-winded answer, but uh hopefully uh kind of got through that a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 2:51

All right. So backing up here to the oil and gas and transition real estate, what how'd you find out about real estate and um what made you say that's that's for me?

SPEAKER_00 3:00

I mean, you like classic, not very exciting story of like found bigger pockets and like obsessed over it. Um which is weird because I feel like that's probably not as common with people getting into it now. There's probably a lot of different answers, but like people who were getting into real estate kind of when I did and probably when you did, the same, you know, it was always like, oh, I found bigger pockets, and I became like obsessed with this. So, you know, I was like every week waiting for that like Thursday episode to drop. Um and just kind of got really into that idea, didn't really have a plan or know exactly what I wanted to do, but was just kind of like, hey, this like office job like isn't doing it. So um quit that, became an agent for a while, which I hated, worked for like a broker who did more off-market stuff, kind of learned from him for a while, then broke out on my own like six months or so later.

SPEAKER_02 3:52

Nice. An agent. I can't imagine that, huh?

SPEAKER_00 3:56

So bad. So bad. I'm like, I like I'm like the worst agent ever and like hate everything about it. But uh it was one of those where like that's like the only thing I knew to do, though. You know, it's like uh and I like when I was about to quit my job, I like planned this, plan it out a little bit, but not well, but I would like and it got to the point like the company I worked for just got bought, and like my job was kind of like I was like, I was like literally trying to get laid off. Like, I'd be like, hey guys, if you need anyone, like I'll take one for the team. But uh, but I just didn't have anything to do, and I would just leave. And I just remember going to like I signed up with this brokerage, and it was like, oh, we have this like mandatory training. And I show up and they're like, Here are the magazines, we're gonna cut out pictures for our vision board. And I'm like, what am I doing in my life? I was like, this is not this is not what I want to do. Uh but then eventually got linked up with a broker that kind of did what I wanted to do. So did some retail stuff, but then quickly realized like not really my thing.

SPEAKER_02 4:58

So you're you're uh really good at acquisitions, and we'll talk about that here in a minute. Did that translate into being a real estate agent too? Like you good at finding buyer leads or listing leads, or completely.

SPEAKER_00 5:11

I didn't know what I was doing at all. I think if I started if I started now, I could probably do it, do better, like it more. Just because I have a better idea of like just sales and marketing and just business in general. Um, but also I was working with like first-time home buyers in like sub 200 price point. So it's like and the thing is, like an agent, like if you're selling a million dollar house or a $200,000 house, it's the same amount of work. Right. And a lot of times it's probably more work on the cheap stuff because like people can't like afford things. You know, it's like the the million dollar house, right? Cool, whatever, take care of it. The you know, $200,000 house, it's like, oh well, like, you know, this broke and I had to spend a thousand dollars this month and I can't qualify for a loan anymore. Or it's like everything's like make or break. Like, so I think if I would have been, I don't know, smarter, more strategic about that, I could have like liked it, done better with it. But when you're you're doing a lot to like at the end of the day, make like four or five K on a transaction. Um but when I see people doing higher price point markets, I'm like, yeah, I could I could see that making sense and you know why that would be worthwhile. That just wasn't wasn't what I was doing.

SPEAKER_02 6:26

Yeah, yeah, understandable. So let's talk about building white barn home buyers. So you've completed over 300 transactions. How'd you build your acquisitions machine? I mean, clearly you're you're good at acquisitions if you can do 300 transactions. Talk about that a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Yeah, so um, yeah, I mean, just something slowly over the years. So I I joined, I've been in a few masterminds, but when I was working for the first broker I worked for, it was kind of just like, hey, so our setup was uh like if we bring him a deal, we get, you know, he gets half of it, and then whoever's on the acquisition side, I think gets 30%. If you dispo it, you get 20%. So if you get a deal, buy and sell it, you'll make half, right? Um, but there was no marketing. There was no, like it was literally just like, hey, go find deals. So I mean, I was just hitting up wholesalers, looking at stuff on Facebook, like um, I heard you could get like a virtual assistant, so I hired a random virtual assistant to cold call people. Just had no clue what I was doing. Um, but was able to somehow like string some deals together. And then each one we made a little more money, and of course, I'm like, well, I'm getting half of this, I would like more than half of this. Um, but the what seemed to be this like unicorn everyone was after was these like direct-to-seller deals. Um, you know, no one really knew how to get them, but like everyone wanted them. So that was this kind of like, if you could somehow figure that out, it seemed like that was a lot better deal than you know, from an agent referral or wholesaler or whatever. So that kind of got my wheels turning a little bit of like, how do I do this? You know, how do I figure this out? Um, and then came across Ryan Dossi's mastermind where he was uh I mean, I feel like pretty early in the you know wholesaling mastermind world. Uh listened to his stuff on direct mail and some other stuff, jumped into his group, and then just kind of grew from there. So did I've done mail, I've done pretty much any type of you know, advertising marketing you can think of. Um and just kind of evolved over the years and have always been one of those of like make some money, I dump it right back into you know, trying to do more, grow bigger, all that stuff. So uh yeah, just kind of slowly um grown that over the years, and just I just become obsessed with that stuff. Like listen to books and books and books on you know sales and marketing and podcasts and and all of that, and you know, it's just kind of slowly grown over the years. Awesome.

SPEAKER_02 9:03

I saw your post yesterday where you said uh some days you want to do a hundred deals, some days you want to do two. Gosh, isn't isn't that the truth?

SPEAKER_00 9:12

Maybe you don't feel that, but uh every day.

SPEAKER_02 9:15

Every day.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

I I know it's like and it's like I know like it's uh it's like such a conflict with me. Like internal conflict of like it like I want to grow things and do more, but then like I don't know, just doing one with like my own money, like you know, at a time sounds really nice. And I know like I have some really good friends in San Antonio um that flip, and that's what they do. They they flip one house at a time, maybe two if they're like feeling crazy, and they'll flip a house, they'll sell it, they'll go on like a two or three week vac v uh two or three-week vacation, buy another house and do it again. And they're like, they do these really nice flips, and like you know, they're making good money, not like anything crazy, but like the lifestyle, I'm like, that just seems so nice. I don't think I can do it, but it seems so nice.

SPEAKER_02 10:08

So I think about like even yesterday, I was thinking about man, what am I doing? I'm so busy, but like you you sometimes you don't know what you're busy on, right? But then I also think back of like, man, what was I making when I had a job, right? And it was good money, and I'm sure the same with you, oil and gas is probably pretty good money. It's like, man, if I could just if I only had to make that amount of money or was happy making that amount of money, then I'll I'd just do three or four deals a year, right? And live a great life. But I I guess that ambition sometimes gets after you.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

Yeah, and I think like the the hard part for me with that has been like once you've seen things you like can't see them. Like, so at my like old corporate job, you know, we would get all those companies are set up where you get pretty big bonuses. So like I was making like 120k a year, but like you know, 20 or 30 of that would be in one chunk as a bonus every year. So you kind of get stuck in this like cycle of like, hey, like raises are this time of the year, bonuses are this time of the year, like you don't really have a window to leave, or it's very small if you do. But it's like no one leaves before bonuses, and that's like what everyone looks forward to. Hey, in April I'm gonna get my bonus. Uh, but then once you've like done some deals and like gotten checks that are like, oh, that's more than the bonus I always like thought about, or you're like, oh, that one's more than my previous annual salary. It's like you you just like can't unsee those things. Um and it's just and it's like I don't know, you get this weird rush. It's almost like you're like gambling or like in Vegas or something of like, hey, I can hop on the phone today, like and potentially make 20, 30, 40,000 from you know a few few conversations if I need to. Um I don't know, and I like love the rush of that. I don't know if that's good or bad or what that says about me, but it's like a little bit of Vegas.

SPEAKER_02 12:00

Better than drugs, right? I guess. I don't know. Um all right, what's your team look like today?

SPEAKER_00 12:09

Uh so it is me. I'm an acquisitions guy, uh, I have a dispo kind of project manager guy and a few virtual assistants.

SPEAKER_03 12:19

Nice.

SPEAKER_02 12:20

And are you um are you doing cold calling, texting, direct mail, combination?

SPEAKER_00 12:27

Man, ask me depends on the day of the week. Uh so right now we are doing a lot of mail, a little bit of cold calling, a little bit of Facebook ads, and about to turn on TV ads. So this time a year ago, it would have been mainly cold calling. I had like 40, 50 cold callers. Um kind of scaled that back, uh, been doing more mail. Um, and that works well. So I don't know. I'm calling kind of all over the place, and some of that stuff is like preference and like what you want your life and business to look like, and some of it's just like I feel like marketing is just kind of cyclical of like, hey, this works really well for a while, it kind of like fizzles out, and then you know, everyone mails, it doesn't work well, everyone stops mailing, it starts working. You know, there's just kind of cycles like that with stuff.

SPEAKER_03 13:16

Yeah. I saw your TV ad. That that looks good. Thanks, man. When's that launch?

SPEAKER_00 13:21

Uh it's supposed to be July, so maybe, maybe it has already.

SPEAKER_03 13:25

Um soon. Nice.

SPEAKER_02 13:29

That'd be good. And that's for that's for houses or houses and land?

SPEAKER_00 13:34

Uh kind of it will probably be mainly houses, houses and land. Um whatever comes from it. It's those you kind of can't really target that well. It's kind of just like because like it's Asheville too, which like I wouldn't I wouldn't necessarily pick, but that's just where the TV stations go. Like Greenville, Asheville are all the same market. Um but the idea there is more brand awareness than anything, and just you know, it kind of helps your other marketing work. And I'm hoping that like we'll get some deals on actual houses in Greenville. Not that I really want to do them flip them, but the actual houses we bought here have just been really good deals and really easy to sell. So um it seems like there's more people with money wanting to invest in Greenville than there are deals. So I like that. Like it. Like it.

SPEAKER_02 14:27

All right, last question on the the white barn side. What what systems have made the biggest difference for you in terms of your success?

SPEAKER_03 14:37

Oh man. Um honestly the only thing is probably just a CRM, uh, which we use recently for that.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

Um we could probably do a lot better in systems because I feel like we're all over the place. Uh honestly, it's pretty it's pretty simple though. I mean, that and then we just do like Google Sheets and stuff for a lot of stuff. Um for projects and for I'd say the one thing recently I started using um relay banking. I don't know if you use them or not. No. Oh, it's like magical. Like I've not been so excited about something. So it's really nice because uh I can set up an account for every project like really easily, like instantly, and then we can like like I can set up like team members with access to all of them of like hey, here like set up a separate card for you for the you know, separate projects, so I'm not always like paying stuff, and then you can control all everyone's access to it. And if we have lenders on stuff and I like need a draw from them, I send them an invoy, like it's just really, really easy um and really simple. So that's been a thing recently that's that's helped a lot as we're doing more projects with more people, just trying to be more organized on all that stuff. Um, but it's like it's like one of those things that you're like, this functions the way it feels like things should function, but don't. You know, where it's like if my you know Bank of America account, if I want to create a new account, it's like a whole ordeal. Where this I literally click like three buttons and it's like, oh, here's your project for this, you know. So that's been that's been really nice.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

Yeah, I'll have to check that out. We use um we've been using rant for paying suppliers and um receiving invoices, and it's incredible. It sounds similar to relay, but uh different functionality, of course. Yeah, that's awesome. All right, creative finance. Um, so are you still doing a lot of creative finance stuff or not so much anymore?

SPEAKER_00 16:35

Uh I've never say a lot, it's just kind of opportunistic, right? So and I've never been the like, hey, I buy all these deals, owner finance. It's more if it makes sense for the situation. Like, we have a flip right now that um we bought owner finance. I guess sub two actually. Uh it's one I wouldn't have bought cash, but we bought it for essentially 250, brought on a private lender for 50k to remodel it. We'll sell it for around 400. Um wasn't something I'd be excited about with a hard money loan or cash or something like that, but it made a lot of sense that way. So we'll kind of do stuff like that. I'm trying to buy more lots and stuff under finance. Um just because with those, it's nice to I don't know. The the cool thing about doing the land home stuff, which of course you understand, is like I can plan projects out a little more than if I'm flipping, like, hey, I need to flip, I need flip, you know, like find something. Like I can almost like earmark lots for hey, we'll do this in the future. Um so some of those I'm just kind of like buying and sitting on, but even then, you're like even at pretty cheap, you're still putting out a lot of money. So trying to get some of these like owner finance where you know, set them up where like we'll balloon in a year, but I can pay a few hundred bucks a month to to own it, and then you know, once I have a lender ready on it, just start the project and balloon it and pay it off that way. So trying to do more of that, but not like a huge focus, it's more just like if the deal makes sense for that, um we'll do it. So I don't know. It's it's fun. Like it's like we've done some cool stuff with like lease options or you know, sub two and some of that, but um and a lot of times it's like it's just a thing of like oh this is just easier, or like hey, I if I can do this not have to put cash in it, like makes it a better deal. Um so we'll do it occasionally, it's not like a main focus, but if the deal makes sense that way, we'll do it.

SPEAKER_02 18:43

Love it. I've been buying mobile home parts, seller finance, um, and try my my goal is hey, can I get the down payment lower than um the tax benefit um on the back end with a you know cost segregation study? So I did one recently where I bought it for $350. I think I put $25k down and it's still cash flowed. Um, but my tax benefit, like my tax write-off was like $50,000 of savings on taxes. And so um I'd bought I'd stopped buying mobile home parts. I bought a ton of them 2021 and 2024, but I was always just like cash for. And so now I'm thinking, like, well, if I can minimize the down payment and still cash flow, then I won't, I mean, I'll probably still be cash for because I've got to come up with some down payments, but not as cash for, right? Uh because I get the tax savings.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Nice. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I don't know. I think there's like there's good options with that, and like a lot of times too, like we'll make offers and I'll like I'll either use a owner or you know, some sort of owner finance creative finance option to like push them to my cash offer, or vice versa, you know. So I like to position things like that of like, hey, I'd really like to buy this owner finance, so I'll I'll go lower on my cash offer. And if they take it, I'm still good with it. But I'm more like using that to like, hey, let's like kind of like nudge you this way, or or you know, vice versa. So of hey, you know, I can I'll buy an owner finance for 100, but it, you know, I could pay 90 cash. You know, if I want to buy it 90 cash, like make that you know closer. Or you can kind of work with that stuff a little bit, but we'll kind of get strategic on some of that and you know, to help us get kind of the deal we want and stuff. Yeah, that's smart.

SPEAKER_02 20:32

All right, let's talk about land home packages. Um let's go. So this is new for you. Uh, how long have you been doing land home packages? Like three or four months, not very long. All right, three or four months. You got your first one. Do you have your first one listed or not yet?

SPEAKER_00 20:48

It's under it's under contract, finally.

SPEAKER_02 20:50

Under contract, that's great.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Yeah, so I say finally, it was 50 days. I wanted it to be like 20 though, so it's fine. What were the numbers? What it would it end up looking like? Uh so after like closing costs and stuff, we'll be selling it like 215. I think we're in it for 145. Something like that. Let's go. 140, something like that. Yeah, so we'll net like I think it's gonna be like just under 60. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

And your um structure with your lender or your your funding, is it your JV kind of structure?

SPEAKER_00 21:25

Yeah, so we are 6535. So we'll make 40 something, they'll make almost 20, something like that. Um and then some of these we're making little fees on the front, depending on what we're buying the land at. So just kind of depends. We kind of my goal with that is kind of backing into I want it to be a net profit of 50k. It's kind of like how I'm presenting these to lenders. So if I get a lot for 5k, like we'll market up a little bit. If I get a lot for 25, we won't. So um it just kind of depends. Or like we have a few right now we're buying from wholesalers. I'm like, I don't I don't have any experience. on this like I don't need to like pay anyone or recoup any money from it so um those we won't we won't put any sort of fee on so it just kind of depends but try to backing into the you know 50k plus projected net profit nice that's good you can get a 50k on every one that's a huge win what um what excites you most about land home packages um they're just more predictable so coming from several things coming from flipping it's much more predictable and I feel like there's there's a lot less surprises and we're we're finding all that out from the land before we close it so like we're we have our land clearing costs we have we're doing all of that on the front end that you know when I think of like a flip things that would be potential surprises you're finding out before you start so that's really nice um the contractors are a lot more professional I'd say because it's stuff that like it requires heavy equipment and like licenses and stuff which a lot of these things do like it's just you get like a higher level professionalism it seems and then also a lot of the like trades are like they're done in a day so it's not like the contractor like where you're hey pay me I did the drywall and it's like well you didn't really or like it's not these like drawn out things so it's kind of like hey you either did the brick skirting or you didn't like you know like there's there's less like hey this is going to take you know three weeks and I need paid on the way. Uh so all of those things have made it really nice. And I think just from a a management like kind of like capacity standpoint is just a lot less. Because like you know you flip a house and they're all different. This one needs a roof this one doesn't you know this one needs walls moved this one you know they're all very different where these are like you know other than like do you need a well or like do you need a step like they're pretty similar. Um and you know a lot of that's just done on the front end. So that's been really nice and I I like the the scalability with it.

SPEAKER_03 24:13

Love it. How many are you gonna do this year? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

Uh trying to add one or two a week is kind of the plan. So as many as we have lots for and lenders for so that's kind of the plan. As long as we in source lots and um kind of all over south Carolina uh we are about to start three in Georgia um Georgia's looking really good for a lot of reasons. Um done some stuff in Tennessee which haven't bought anything there yet. I know we have some we have a lot of lots under contract but that seems for some reason a little trickier than here. We've marketed a little bit in North Carolina haven't done any there yet. So kind of that like those four states but I think it's one of those that'll kind of go anywhere if the numbers make sense. And I think the first one's the hardest and then you get crews and then hey we have our guys for this this and this and then it's pretty repeatable but the first one's like a lot of clawing around trying to figure out hey who does this who does that but then after that it seems like pretty easy to kind of use the same guys for stuff.

SPEAKER_02 25:30

If you'll go anywhere you should go out west go to Arizona New Mexico I mean those guys out there they're making if you can get to land right you're making 100 150k that's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 25:41

I saw a dude in uh one of the Facebook groups the other day in Delaware so I was like I would never Delaware I was like he was like making like 80 90k a house though really and I was like it was just places that you're like hmm I don't know I mean because like at the same at some point it's the same thing. It's just like the land cost is more you know right. I mean even like the stuff here it's like if you do stuff around Greenville it's gonna be cheaper than if you do stuff around like Charleston. Uh yeah you know so I don't know kind of fine in those spots where it's like you know as long as I guess what I'm looking at as long as stuff's selling in like at least the low 200s I feel pretty good about it. You know if we can get stuff that's selling like 220 and above I'm like cool we'll buy stuff there. Come on Google Street View why are you not here? But uh that's funny.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

But no it's been fun. That's awesome. Talk about um so you're looking for some lenders and maybe there's some people listening that have money that are looking for opportunities to grow that money talk about your lending program. I can't remember what you call it what the name of it is but um and how that works in case there's somebody that might be interested.

SPEAKER_00 26:57

Yeah so kind of do it one of two ways. So I have people that uh so I have a site fliptrailers.com that kind of goes through this and the original plan was more to do flips not land home packages but just more straightforward. But essentially uh if you want to do it themselves buy it they'll buy the thing or put up money for it we'll do everything split it 5050. If they just want to be a lender I still own it or like 6535. So which it's funny because I have like people just like different things. There are people like one of my really good lenders he's like so if I just buy this and it's in my name I make 50% I was like yeah he's like I want to do that and but then I have other people that are like no I just want to lend like so it's kind of a honestly it doesn't look I mean I guess risk profile is a little different but we literally do everything either way. So it's just kind of a if it's in my name you're lending I'm gonna take more of a cut if you're buying it you get more of a cut.

SPEAKER_02 27:54

So uh but different people like different things but just trying to you know diversify that a little bit that's awesome listen I maybe I'm just gonna hire you to do all my stuff man and I'm gonna sit back and relax. That'd be great. There you go. All right I'm serious.

SPEAKER_00 28:10

I'm gonna do it um all right so title this podcast purpose driven purpose driven investor um talk about your purpose and what really drives you today oh man that's a hard question uh should have prepared for this more I don't I honestly I don't know um and I think that's changed over time too in the I feel like anyone in the like mobile home space is supposed to be like oh I'm providing affordable housing like that's kind of like the punchline everyone uses and and I've thought about it and I'm like yeah that's like it's an easier sell than like flipping and like gentrifying neighborhoods like there's less ways to hate it but I'm like I don't really care about it which is maybe bad but I'm like I'm like I'm just caring about it being a good deal uh and I don't know I guess my thought is like I would rather just like make good money and you know donate the stuff I care about steward it well. I don't know what my purpose is um and I think that's changed too over the past like year or two and like just have gone through like real bad like business breakup and you know stuff like that. It's just been like brutal. Right now it's literally just like hey let's get this sustainable let's you know stack cash and then no eventually want to do you know more more stuff I mean I'd like to be more involved with the community there's there's different things I I've like planned on doing and haven't like like I want to like volunteer on McDonald's house because like that's been a big thing in like my life my family's life like there's just things like that where I'm like I need to just start doing more of that stuff. But as far as uh man my my purpose like I don't know I I think just as a general thing which I think I heard this on I've thought about this a lot or part of this um on Brandon Turner's podcast when he's like hey what do you want people to like think of you and I think just generally like I just want people to somehow be in a better spot like having like known me interact with me whatever. So that's like I help you investing if that's like something like life wise but like if like the people that work for me are in a better spot because you know they work for me make good money like things like that or if like hey I got into real estate because this guy helped me out so just in general I think uh I want to be that person that people are like hey by knowing this person it made my life better in some capacity. But what that actually looks like more practically right now, I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 30:44

Listen, I you you probably won't know the answer ever, right? Because it always changes right and it's a matter of just how you interact. I thought you were gonna say um that making really good cinnamon rolls would uh be your purpose at least last year I mean that's my new passion project uh so stupid I was like walking the other day and uh well one I'm like annoyed because like I feel like there's not a great cinnamon roll in Greenville.

SPEAKER_00 31:11

Um one of my you know few annoyances with living here but uh I was like walking the other day which normally I'm like listening to a podcast or like I didn't have my phone because I planned on running and it was like my knee hurts I'm walking so I was just like no podcast no phone and I was just like walking I'm like you know I'm gonna get good at making cinnamon rolls that was like the the epiphany I had on a three mile walk so then uh I've started um you know what's your what's your signature uh cinnamon rolled right now I don't know yet I just keep mixing them up uh the I think the best one is because I keep like making like different icing and stuff for them I made one strawberry icing which is really good uh but just like a standard like brown butter cream cheese icing is pretty pretty tasty the real secret is my brother's really good at this stuff and I just like stole his recipe uh my brother like is the kind of person that becomes like completely obsessed with stuff and he'll like you know research all the like different stuff with it and then I'm just like hey can I just have your recipe and he's like this is the best one and I was like perfect that's all that that's all it all you need right yeah it's like he does all the dirty work and I just like take credit for it.

SPEAKER_02 32:24

Um that's great I love cinnamon rolls. My um we used to live in Vancouver British Columbia for a few years and uh there's a cinnamon roll place there on the west side of Vancouver.

SPEAKER_00 32:35

Man it's so good if you ever go there I'll hook you up with the spot a little coffee shop but that's all they're known for cinnamon so let's do some uh rapid fire questions here to close it up what's the best investment that you've ever made best investment I've ever made uh there's probably a few that can fall in this category um the best one I made was probably this house I bought for I think 200k um and it was a lead I had a lead manager who set me up to go look at this house on a Saturday morning and I like wasn't happy about it because I it was like 45 minutes away and I didn't want to go. But it was one of those like he already set up so I was like cool I'll go. Go look this house it's like a you know decent like you know kind of wholeta deal or something I could just buy and throw back on the market. The guy wanted 200 for it and it was I don't know probably worth 250, 260. Nothing that exciting. But I'm like walking this house and and it was so it's like 45 minutes north of San Antonio uh area called like Canyon Lake where there's like big like boating lake and stuff that had it like kind of randomly like blew up in like COVID times from TikTok like TikTok videos and people were like buying up there like crazy. So talking to this guy and kind of like hey like where's your lot line he's like oh well it goes all the way through to that street and I'm like okay and then like gets to talking and it's like okay the house is on six lots. So the house on a lot there's um I think one on each side of it and then two behind it. So essentially buy the was buying the house and four extra lots with it. So bought the house for 200 immediately cleaned it out listed it sold it for 260 sold each of the four lots for like 35 a piece something like that. So um made almost 200k from a single family house. And I've had I've had a a few of those type deals in that same area. It's it's funny too another one kind of the same thing uh I think it was three lots in like a beater house in the same area. But my acquisitions guy who works with me now literally the first house we looked at and it kind of the same thing. We bought it for 60 sold the house for like 120 and in like each of the lots for like 40 a piece. But we sold one to we sold one to the neighbor like for more than it was worth because he didn't want anyone living there. But but it was like but it was literally like the first I mean we probably made like 120 150 something like that I don't remember but it was like his first day with me looking at houses and I was like I was like they're not allowed.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

But it's still new there so maybe it worked.

SPEAKER_02 35:26

I had something um like that other day I was like I promise this is not I was doing some cold calling it was like everybody was answering and everybody was like willing to sell and I was like I promise this is not how it is and sure enough the next day it was like call 300 be when one person answered well that's like I uh recently one of my lenders was like you know wanted to call like industrial stuff and like saw something I posted on it and he's it was literally like the he made one call and got a lead from like a pretty like decent lead I don't think it turned anything but I was like that is not normal like good for you but that's not normal.

SPEAKER_03 36:05

That's awesome. Alright what's your favorite book how to win friends and influence people got it all right what's one habit that changed your life honestly probably just getting up early and working out that's great I got up at 445 this morning I slept in today I was a bum too early too early Tuesdays and Thursdays I I would agree with that.

SPEAKER_02 36:38

Alright what's the last one here what's one thing every new investor should stop doing today stop doing um trying to trying to get my answer to fit this question.

SPEAKER_00 36:54

I I think trying to do things on your own when you don't know what you're doing. Does that answer the question I just I just think a lot of people should when you are getting started partner with someone who knows what they're doing. It's just better for everyone better for the person you're buying it from it's better for you know everyone involved of like hey let me learn from someone who knows what they're doing and make sure like it is a deal and like I am you know giving the seller what they need all of those things or on a flip it's like hey uh maybe I'll make less money but if I don't lose that's good. So I think people um try to do too much on their own when they don't know what they're doing. Got it I would agree.

SPEAKER_02 37:38

All right so let's finish up here if somebody wants to reach out to you where where can they reach you?

SPEAKER_00 37:44

Probably just Instagram so it's just Aaron.beal um you know probably the best place.

SPEAKER_02 37:50

Try to be real with what we're doing run my mouth a little bit but uh it's fun go over to Instagram you can catch the latest on Pace Morby from Aaron and uh my buddy or the latest on cinnamon or lots of different topics lots of different topics running. Um all right well cool man well I appreciate you joining and um I think it has a a ton of value a ton of different strategies that that people could go out and implement.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

So appreciate you coming on thanks for listening to the purpose driven investor. If today's episode sparked an idea or inspired you to make an impact connect with me at howlandsons.com join our community of purpose driven investors who are helping families find stable homes while building real returns because when we invest with purpose everyone wins