How to Systematize a Real Estate Business to Massive Scale with Steve Rozenberg

Mike DeHaan: [0:00] Just a really quick note before we jump in. After this episode, we actually ended up hiring Steve to be our business coach for 2023. If you like what you're hearing this episode and you wanna know what our experience has been like working with Steve, please feel free to hit me up on Instagram at Mike underscore Invest, I'd be happy to make the connection and let you know how our experience has been.

Steve Rozenberg: [0:17] I know we're talking real estate, but when it comes to real estate, it's the same thing. Nobody gives a shit how many doors you own or what you do or, you know, whatever acronym you want to call it to say. The biggest challenge that real estate investors have is they identify themselves with what they do. They don't understand that they are running a business. So when I talk to people, I'm like, what do you do? Like, I'm a flipper. Like, what the fuck does that mean? That's like saying I'm a rake. Yeah. That's just a tool to get you something. Like, that's just to me, that's stupid. It's like, no. No. You own a business.

Speaker 3: [0:49] Welcome to the collecting keys real estate investing podcast with your host, Mike DeHaan and Dan Austin. From wins, losses, horror stories, and tactics for optimizing your business, Mike and Dan take a real uncensored deep dive into the ins and outs of running a full time real estate investment and wholesaling business.

Mike DeHaan: [1:11] What's going on, guys? On this episode of the collecting keys real estate investing podcast, we have Steve Rozenberg. And we just finished up the interview, and I don't know. I need to, like, do a reevaluation of my life and our entire business.

Dan Austin: [1:25] My palms are sweating right now. I'm, like, ready to go.

Mike DeHaan: [1:29] Like, honestly, though, he is just such a powerful personality, and he has a great track record of, you know, how he's sort of, like, grown and scaled and sold a real estate business. And his backstory is fascinating too because he is a commercial pilot, and that's what he, like, started his career doing. He got laid off after 09/11 and kinda got into real estate on the side. And he was like wholesaling properties way back before it was cool, you know, in the early two thousands before you could use ballpoint marketing and CRMs and all that sort of stuff that we have now. He was bootstrapping stuff back then, built up a company, sold it, and now he coaches other business owners and, like, organize his business with, like, the same sort of processes, I guess, that go into being a pilot. Right. And he has so many great examples about how effective that is where, you know, very simply, you get on an airplane, you trust the pilot knows how to fly a plane regardless of where it is. And the only reason that you can do that is because of the systems and processes that go into training and safety and everything else. And he said, why can't we put that same thing into business?

Dan Austin: [2:34] So and it's so helpful because, like, you and I know, like, how important the systems are in our business. And I I think, honestly, I think I said eight words during the entire podcast because, like, he just it was just such gold coming out of him, like, the the whole time.

Mike DeHaan: [2:46] I know. It was actually kind of a funny one because, you know, we we didn't inject Neil as much as do because he was just on such good roles with the stuff that he was saying. And, you know, especially as we kinda get towards, like, the second I'd say, the third third of the podcast, last third of the podcast, he kinda gives us a little impromptu coaching session to help us build and organize our business. And even though it was directed at us, it is 100% applicable to every single person that wants to run a serious business. So absolutely listen to that, take notes. This is one that I recommend you listen to more than once and have a notepad on hand, because he just drops so much gold. I would say maybe, like, the most actionable stuff in this podcast out of any guest that we've had so far. For sure. So, you know, really, really enjoy this episode. Anyways, guys, if you want to start a business and you wanna start finding off market leads, you should go to collectingkeyspodcast.com/free, and you can get our free five step guide, start generating off market leads. That will give you a basis to start operating, and then listen to this podcast with Steve and take all of the things that you learned from our little guide and turn it into a process with what Steve says, and you're gonna be fucking rich pretty quick.

Dan Austin: [3:56] Have a figure business like that. Just like that.

Mike DeHaan: [3:59] So yeah. So anyways, guys, go check out collectingkeyspodcast.com/free. Aside from that, please share this with anyone who might find this podcast interesting. Anyone who's in business, anyone who wants to be serious about real estate definitely will. So go ahead and share it with your circle. And enjoy this podcast, Steve, guys. It is a really, really good one. Enjoy. On the show today, guys, we have Steve Rozenberg out of Houston, Texas, who is, I wanna say, like, maybe the most savage person we've had on the show just in terms of connections, like what you've done, everything you have going on. I mean, you've been on like Ed Mylett and like all these sort of big shows, big personalities. You know, Jordan Belfort, you've met the the Wolf of Wall Street, which even though he has a dark past is kind of like the the sales guy icon. But thanks for coming on the show, man. It's super cool to meet you, and I'm really excited to chat with you today.

Steve Rozenberg: [4:52] Yeah. Thanks for having me, man. Appreciate it. Looking forward to chatting with you guys.

Mike DeHaan: [4:55] Yeah. Absolutely. So one of the things that I love about what you've done is you have crossed I say you conquered the challenge that most real estate investors have, us included, on turning it into a business that is marketable and, like, focusing more on actually making it like a a true tangible business that you're not, you know, having to beat your head against the wall. You're not cash poor. You know, you're optimizing it. Whereas I feel like so many real estate investors, they get into this cycle of they don't actually have money. They own a lot of assets. They have great net worth. I mean, we had a guy a little while ago that had $70,000,000 worth of real estate, but had literally zero cash.

Steve Rozenberg: [5:33] He's broke. He's at McDonald's. Exactly. He's getting happy to go to McDonald's because he's got no cash.

Dan Austin: [5:38] Yeah. And that's not why we all get into real estate. We want money when we get into real estate or cash flow.

Mike DeHaan: [5:42] Yeah. So I'd love to dive into your background and kind of, you know, your your backstory and how you got into real estate in that fashion because I feel like that's really, really unique. And your backstory is just fascinating as well.

Steve Rozenberg: [5:52] Yeah. So, you know, my my backstory, as people that maybe follow me know, you know, I I actually never wanted to be in real estate or or have be a speaker or any of this stuff shit that I do. I just wanted to be an airline pilot as a little kid. That's all I ever wanted to do. I got hired. I was the second youngest person hired at a particular airline. I was gonna retire number two in seniority. I mean, I I was 25 years old Wow. And newly married, and I had the job of a lifetime. I had the dream job. I was flying all over the world, safe, secure company. Everything's good. And then 09:11 happened. And 09:11 was a big wake up call for me and for many people in this industry because two days after the towers fell, I got a furlough notice. Cool. And basically was told, hey, Steve. You know what? That safe and that secure job that you thought you had, it was never safe, and it was never secure. And now you're gonna be on the street with 50,000 other pilots. So good luck.

Mike DeHaan: [6:48] Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [6:49] So to say getting punched in the face after 09:11 and understanding that everything that I'd done in my life until that point was basically useless. And now, I mean, I wasn't even qualified to drive a truck, and you gotta go home and tell your wife, I don't know what we're gonna do. Like, I can't do anything. I know how to fly a plane, and I don't know how long this is gonna last. So I started focusing on on what do people do that are wealthy. Like, what I had no clue because I was in this bubble of being a pilot. I saw that a lot of people were tied to real estate at somehow. Not like today how you can hop on social media. I had to go to that big building called the library. Had to get a library card, had to go and check out books, and I read a book a week. And every single week, I read a book on real estate just trying to understand all about it. The first venture I did was into wholesaling. I was doing option contracts. I was I didn't really have money to buy a property. I didn't know anything. Creative financing was still kind of an odd word that no one knew about. I paid a mentor. I paid him $10. And he said, look. If you do what I say, you will this will work. And I'm like, well, why wouldn't I? He's like, you'd be surprised. I'm like, that sounds weird. Like because I'm coming from an industry of professionals, and you do what you say and all this other bullshit. So he explains to me what a double close is.

Steve Rozenberg: [8:10] I have no idea what it was. No clue. But next, I did exactly what he said. Thirty days later, no shit. Thirty days later, I am in a title company doing a double close on a property that I did. I have no idea what I'm doing. I have the phone in my hand. So when they have a question, I just hand the guy the phone. He's talking to the title company. They're doing all this shit. Next thing you know, I walk out of there with a check for $20. And I'm like That's awesome. I can't fucking believe that that just happened. Like, I'm like, I could not even explain what I just did. And I so I call the guy up, and I'm like, dude, I'm like, I can't believe that work. He's like, it works. I'm like, well, yeah. No shit. I'm like, can I do that again? He's like, dude, you can do it as many times as you want. I'm like and I told him, I'm like, you must make people very, very rich. He goes, you'd be surprised. Majority of people will never do what you just did. Mhmm. And I'm like, but I just gave you $10,000. He's like, I know. He goes, I'm just telling you, people will not do it. So I start I just kept doing it over and over again, and I got better. And I learned that the key well, not only to that, but really in anything in life is to be a communicator. And I got really focused on learning how to negotiate and how to communicate.

Steve Rozenberg: [9:16] And I just kept focusing on that. And I learned I crafted the skills to being a negotiator. And I just got really good, and I was I basically turned it into a business. I ended up getting the job back at the airlines because when you're furloughed, you go back. So I was still flying. Made enough money wholesaling, doing options that I bought an apartment complex with a business partner. Took that apartment complex, then we bought houses after we sold that. And this is where mistakes happen. I'm very, very transparent about my mistakes because I make a shitload of them. But I we started buying low income properties because financially, they look good on paper, but the reality was they weren't. Yep. So after about 40 or so of these shitholes, we started realizing why people don't have them because people start calling because they can't pay rent. They got all these problems. Houses are falling apart. You name it. You guys all know the story. And we almost went bankrupt. And I'm thinking to myself, like, how could this be? Like, we're smart guys. We had the wrong business model wrapped around those properties. And that's when I started realizing that real estate is a business. It's not a hobby. It's not a gut feeling. It's not an emotion. It's a business.

Mike DeHaan: [10:22] Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [10:23] So because our properties were so crappy, no management company wanted them. So we had to start our own management company to manage our own properties and an apartment complex we owned. And we hired a coach. We hired a business coach. And basically, the business coach is like, there's a market, there's opportunity, and you can definitely scale this to millions of dollars. You two are not the smartest people on the planet, and you will be bankrupt in six months because you don't know how to run a business. So we hired this guy. And for seven years, we stay with this business coach every single week, and we learned how to run a business. And what we ended up doing was we took that company, we scaled it to over a thousand properties. We marketed we operated out of three major metropolitan cities. 60% of our company was operated with virtual assistants in Mexico. We got so good that we actually may built our own company in Mexico for virtual assistant placements. And then we ended up exiting and selling our company for well into 7 figures to a venture capital firm where I became a vice president for them. And then I started doing stuff on their behalf with bigger pockets and all the other stuff. And then I kind of I got out of that.

Steve Rozenberg: [11:37] I kind of did my time with the VC firm, and I decided I would start helping people. And so the way that we're able to scale that business was we took my knowledge of being an airline pilot, processes, procedures, checklists, and we injected that into our business. And when you look at an airline and you look at how airlines run, there's no better business when it comes to scaling and systemization. And what I learned is that the challenge with wholesaling and flipping and all the other stuff is it's a job. It's not a business. And if you can't walk away for three days, three weeks, or three months, it's a job, and it's probably a pretty low paying job when you factor in all the time. So my job, what I do is I show people how to systematize their companies. Everything can be systematized. I mean, I hate to say it. No one is that special. No one is that smart. You learn that you are not the most important person. And so that's kind of what I show people is how to I'm kind of going down a rabbit hole here, but that's what I do now is I show people that you can make a business run without you if you have the right tools and people in your life to make that happen. And so all of my knowledge, all of my experience, I still own real estate. You know, we have some mutual friends in the Pacific Northwest, and, you know, I know all the Brandons and all the people.

Steve Rozenberg: [12:52] But I come from a different breed in the sense that I take my airline pilot knowledge, and that's how I look at everything as how would I how do I fly a, you know, a Boeing triple seven with 380 people on board, and how do you inject that into a business? And if you can do that and separate it, you'll be amazingly successful. If not, you'll have a job and you'll either run it into the ground or you'll die with it.

Mike DeHaan: [13:16] Man, we just need to, like, just, like, rewind to, like, listen to that whole bit again. There's so much good stuff

Dan Austin: [13:21] in there. I'm getting some free coaching right now. This is amazing. I I think I might start crying. I'm getting teary eyed. Like, this is speak my language. Oh, that's great.

Mike DeHaan: [13:28] That that was good. And I think so much of what you're saying too is so relevant to people right now, especially with what you experienced during 09:11. I mean, a lot of people experienced that over the last couple years with COVID. Mhmm. You know, where they had this really secure jobs and and lifestyles that all of a sudden went away. And, I mean, we're kind of the victims, I guess, of that a little bit where, you know, I I got laid off from my position when COVID started, we went full time into the real estate business. And since then, I see saw that as an opportunity. And we have made, you know, multi 7 figures in our business because of that. And, you know, you kinda did the same thing, but you did it back when it was even more difficult than it is now, you know, kind of like pre Internet, Like, in, like, modern Internet, you were Yeah. Doing these double closings.

Steve Rozenberg: [14:10] How did uphill? No. Both ways. And, you know yeah. No shoes.

Mike DeHaan: [14:15] Yeah. Like, how did you even find properties back then too? Because, like, that's a whole other ballgame.

Steve Rozenberg: [14:20] That was a whole other thing. Yeah. I I actually you know, believe it or not, when I was wholesaling back then and, you know, obviously, it's it's gotten more mainstream and popular, but I did a lot of expired listings. But I again, it's all in the delivery. I've learned that, you know, somebody will talk to that person. They'll get nowhere. I'll talk to them, and I'll make $35.30, $40,000 wholesaling a property on a $150,000 house. Yeah. Why? Because it's how you negotiate. And let me just let me just touch a little bit when you talk about, I don't believe in the word victim. We'll just say, I think we make our own destiny, and I think people fail because they get either get lazy or they get greedy. When nine eleven happened to me and, again, you know, back when nine eleven and all this stuff, we didn't have the the immediate gratification of, you know, if I'm having a a pouting day, I'll go on social media so people can pat me on the back and pour you know, everybody likes to everybody likes to catastrophize their life so that someone can go, it's okay. You know what? Maybe it's not fucking okay. Maybe you deserve to fucking fail. Right. I mean, I'm sorry, but the reality is is not everybody is gonna get a trophy. That's just life. Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [15:21] And so when, you know, when I got punched in the face in 09/11, there was no one there to be like, oh, sorry. Like, no. You know what? You gotta fucking pick yourself up and figure it out. And the reason I bring that up is after when COVID was hitting, airlines were shut down. People were getting furloughed again. Now, obviously, I'm very senior in the company that I work at, so they would basically have to go out of business, which is not impossible to happen nowadays for me to not work. And let me just say that I fly planes because I love it. Yeah. It's not because I need it. I fly a $250,000,000 aircraft around the world three times a month. Yeah. I get to go where I wanna go, do what I wanna do. I actually coach people all over the world, it's so kind of like a free ride to get over there to coach people.

Dan Austin: [16:01] That's awesome.

Steve Rozenberg: [16:02] Like after we do this tonight, I head to Buenos Aires for two days.

Dan Austin: [16:05] Wow.

Steve Rozenberg: [16:05] It's kind of a cool job.

Dan Austin: [16:06] Kinda.

Steve Rozenberg: [16:07] But one of the things what was interesting is I had somebody reach out to me. He's like, hey, Steve. You know, can I interview on a podcast who's a pilot? I'm like, yeah. Sure. He's like, I don't know who you are, but you were the one of most requested people in the aviation industry about how to deal with what happens when you get furloughed with COVID. And I'm like, okay. So I jump on this podcast show and he's asking me all these questions. He's like, well, what's the difference between you today and you twenty years ago when you got furloughed from the airlines? I said, you know what it was, man? I said, it was massive action. I didn't know what I was doing, but I was not gonna sit still. I took every single day. I did a lot of wrong action, but I took action. I think nowadays everyone is so afraid to look dumb and make a mistake because they think they think they're more important than they really are. Nobody gives a shit if you make a mistake. Nobody cares if I hate to say it, but no if you lost your job, nobody cares if you don't care more than anyone else. And so I'm just like, look, I'm not I didn't grow a third arm. I didn't do anything different, but I think differently. And that thinking got me to take massive action on a massive scale, put it out there, take risk, calculated risk, but I took risks, but I did not let anybody tell me, oh, you shouldn't do that.

Steve Rozenberg: [17:22] You should relax. You should take it easy. Funny. All the people that tell me that are not where I wanna be in life or financially. Right. I'm like, so you want me to be like you, a loser Yeah. And hang out and sip and and drink and whatever, but that's not what I want in life. So why am I even letting you in my world to give me advice? And really, whoever asked you for advice anyways. Anyways, I'm going off tangent. Go ahead.

Dan Austin: [17:42] I love what you're saying because I'm like a strong believer in like this idea of like nobody gives a shit about your problems. They don't wanna hear your problems. They got their own problems.

Steve Rozenberg: [17:49] Who cares?

Dan Austin: [17:49] They're not gonna help you solve them. And the people that like do what you're saying is take action are the ones that appear to have, like, less problems, but you're still dealing with it. You're just taking action and solving shit.

Steve Rozenberg: [17:58] Yeah. They say an overnight success is fifteen years in the making. You know what mean? I don't I don't think of myself as this ultra successful guy. I'm just someone who's out there. And, you know, I coach a lot of people, a lot of business people and real estate people. And what's interesting is I don't hide the fact that I'm still a student myself. I think all of us like a fish swimming, it doesn't have a destination. And I think that we learn things and we take things in as we learn them. But look, I get coached. I get mentored. I mean, I'm a big believer that as soon as you think you've made it, you're dying. You're either growing or dying. And every day, you make a decision whether you're gonna be better or worse. Every day I wake up, I've got a decision to make. Am I gonna be better than yesterday or worse? And if you don't make a decision, you've made the decision. So I'm just a big believer that, you know what? There's nobody cares. Nobody cares. If you guys lost your business tomorrow, which I hope you don't, nobody cares. You'll get a sorry, but even your success, nobody cares. Right. When I sold my business, and again, it was several million dollars, you get pats on the back. Every oh, congratulations.

Steve Rozenberg: [19:01] Press release. All this bullshit. And I thought to myself, man, once we sell this company, we're done. Like, can coast. We can buy whatever we want. We can do whatever we want. We've got all these zeros in the bank. We're good. And what I realized is Monday morning, I tell this story a lot. My wife is like, hey, you gotta take the trash out. And I'm like, yeah, but we just sold the company. And she's like, so? And I and then all of a sudden, I started looking around and I realized everybody was going on with their life. Nobody cared. Yep. I thought I'm gonna be in this, like, new club and this members only jacket and hanging out with Andy Furcella and all like, I'm just in this club. Nobody gives a shit. Nobody cares. And so nobody cares if you lose, but no one cares if you win either.

Dan Austin: [19:46] Man.

Steve Rozenberg: [19:46] It's what it's the experience that you take from it. And, you know, again, I know we're talking real estate, but when it comes to real estate, it's the same thing.

Dan Austin: [19:53] Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [19:53] Nobody gives a shit how many doors you own or what you do or, you know, whatever acronym you want to call it to say. What the biggest challenge that real estate investors have is they identify themselves with what they do. They don't understand that they are running a business. So when I talk to people, I'm like, what do you do? Like, I'm a flipper. Like, what the fuck does that mean? That's like saying I'm a rake. Yeah. That's just a tool to get you something. Like, that's just to me, that's stupid. It's like, no. No. You own a business. You're a business owner, and that business is flipping properties just like you could own another business of dog food. That's like saying, I'm a dog food. What does that mean? So again, just I think people don't understand the definitions of what they're doing. They identify. When I had my property management company and we were one point, we were the fastest growing company in Texas, And people were like, How are you guys doing it? The thing was is we didn't identify ourselves as property managers. We were business owners. And that business, just the product concept or idea that we sold was management, was peace of mind. So when people think that they're flipping, they don't get it. They're looking at the tactical thing of what they do. What is it you're trying to accomplish?

Steve Rozenberg: [21:03] Really, what you're trying to accomplish is a better life when you think about it.

Dan Austin: [21:06] Right.

Steve Rozenberg: [21:07] You're just using real estate. Subchapter real estate is flipping to get you the better life. So what do you do? I create a better life for myself. Right. The business vehicle I use is real estate. The subchapter of that is flipping. Mhmm. But people don't look at that because then I'll go, okay. What's the gross revenue of your company? I don't know. What are your profit margins? I don't know. What's the cycle time, the velocity? I don't know. What's your client acquisition cost? I don't know. Really? In your business? I wouldn't fucking get in your business if you asked me to invest in it if you don't even know the basic numbers, but I'm a flipper. What does that mean? I don't they keep saying that over like it's gonna mean something at some point. So anyways, I don't mean to go on a tangent, but that's but I will.

Dan Austin: [21:47] But I will. No. I love that.

Mike DeHaan: [21:48] It's a interesting viewpoint because like you said, real estate folks, particularly, I feel like are so guilty of this. And I think it's because you can make more than average money being that way. But you're gonna be working like a dog. Like you said, you're gonna create a job, and it could go away in a heartbeat just like everything can in real estate because it is very punishing for people that make poor decisions. So I guess for people that are real estate investors that would fall into that category of, like, they identify as a flipper, you say, you know, they don't actually view it as a business. What do you think the difference is between those that are the like, the flippers or those that run a real estate business? Is it purely mindset? Like, is there something structurally that they do differently? Like like, what's the core?

Steve Rozenberg: [22:30] Yes to both. It's a mindset, which is why they run it structurally differently, if if that makes sense. Yeah. They don't have the right mindset of what they're doing because one of the biggest challenges when people are are solopreneurs and they wanna do everything is it's ego and pride. Right? It all starts with our beliefs of who we are. If I think I'm the smartest person in the room and quote unquote, I started the business, so I know what I'm doing, I, I, I, well, there's nothing I can do to help you because you clearly just stated it's all you. Yep. And that's not what a business is. A business is a team. It's just a basketball basketball team is a business team. Right? They're all working to achieve the goal. The only thing that's a singular in life is school. Everything else is a business. And so it's ego and pride. It's me thinking when I own a business that I have to do it all. You're never as good as me. You're never as smart as me because I started the business. So when you start messing up, let me push you out of the way and show you how it's done because I started the company. So I'm gonna put my cape on. I'm gonna slide down the pole, and I'm gonna go put the fire out. But what you're doing is is what essentially, you are training everyone around you that, know what? If I fuck up enough and I wait long enough, Mike's just going to come in and fix it, so I get paid either way. So, I'll just drag my feet and Mike's going go, Yep, see, you need me.

Steve Rozenberg: [23:49] And what you're doing is you're self sabotaging your own business. You're going like you're basically making yourself needed. So I'll give you an example. You guys I'm sure you guys have flown on airplanes, right? We use You airplane as an get on the airplane, you turn right. You go down. You sit in your seat. You buckle up. Not a care in the world. Headphones on. You're wondering what you're gonna do when you land in whatever city. Have you ever turned left?

Mike DeHaan: [24:17] Only when I am flying first class overseas.

Dan Austin: [24:20] Yeah. So if you keep

Steve Rozenberg: [24:23] going left, if you keep going to the pointy end, that's where we sit.

Mike DeHaan: [24:27] Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [24:28] Think about this. You don't know me. You've never met me. You know nothing about me, but you trust me. As a matter of fact, you trust me with your life and probably your family's lives. Why do you trust me so much when you don't know me? But yet people will hire an employee. They'll interview them. They'll hire them. We'll say they train them. They probably don't. So they work for them. They know them. But as soon as they start messing up, they push them out of the way, and they do all their shit. Look. I've been a pilot for almost thirty years. I've never once had someone come to the cockpit and go like, hey, Steve. You're fucking this up today. I think I'm going to take over and I'm going to fly the plane because you're making it a little bit bumpy and I don't really feel comfortable. If you were on a plane and you saw an engine on fire on the wing, would you sit there and go, man, I wonder if that guy knows what he's doing? Maybe I should get up there and see what's happening. Right? You're assuming, I hope this fucking guy better know what he's doing because my life's in

Mike DeHaan: [25:22] sync. Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [25:23] So think about that. Why are we so trusted as think of the business model of the airline. Why are we pilots so trusted and you've never met us, but there's an inherent trust? There's 12,000 pilots at the company I work for. Right? I fly all over the world. If I get into the flight deck with someone in Tokyo, Japan, Sydney, Australia, London, England, I know exactly that that guy or girl is trained to handle normals, abnormals, or emergencies, and we've never even met. Mhmm. Mhmm. The training system is so good. The business model is focused on team cohesiveness, working together as a crew, and the training.

Mike DeHaan: [26:01] Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [26:01] Think if you could take that and inject that in your business. Wow. How more successful would you be?

Mike DeHaan: [26:08] That's so true. I mean, like, you can't even describe how much more successful. And that was so directly pointed at Dan and I to everything you just said because we're super guilty of that. Yeah. Even though we have, like, a pretty large team, like, we talked about this literally right before we hopped on this interview. We're trying to figure out how to optimize better. And even said to me, he's like, I think kind of the problem is once someone starts to fuck something up, I'm really bad about this. I will go and I will interject, right, or I will try to, like, save it. And why it's that way? I don't know. It's maybe just like controlling nature.

Steve Rozenberg: [26:37] Can I give you guys a little a little co quick coach? Yeah. Real quick.

Mike DeHaan: [26:41] Absolutely. Yeah. Teaser.

Steve Rozenberg: [26:43] So I guess the first question is is do you guys have an organization chart? That would be an It was just That was just a call.

Dan Austin: [26:49] Let's just say no.

Steve Rozenberg: [26:51] And most companies don't, but the organization chart is like the spinal cord of your business. If you broke a bone, you would get an X-ray to see where it's broken. If your business is broken, I would need to see the organization chart to see where it's broken. Now you need to have two organization charts in your business. One is a snapshot of what you look like today. The other is a snapshot of what your business looks like with the sale date when you actually sell it, or it's a saleable asset. So my first question is do you guys have a date that your business is finished and it's a saleable asset?

Mike DeHaan: [27:26] No. No. Definitely not. No.

Steve Rozenberg: [27:28] Have you okay. So think about it this way. You would probably not just if you had nothing to do today, would you just get in your car and be like, know what? I think I'm just gonna fucking head north on the freeway and just go. And don't know where I'm going. Don't know when I'm coming back. I'm just gonna go. You probably wouldn't do that on a daily basis.

Mike DeHaan: [27:43] Yeah. True. True.

Steve Rozenberg: [27:44] If you don't know where your business is going and you don't have an end destination to your business,

Mike DeHaan: [27:49] aren't you

Steve Rozenberg: [27:49] just doing the same thing that you would never do in your car, but yet you're you're spending all of your time being busy, but you're not actually going to a destination. So your business has to have a destination, meaning a sale date. The sale date is when it's a truly sellable asset. Doesn't mean you have to sell it, but it's a truly sellable asset so that it runs without you. And it's running on systems, structures, procedures, and checklist. K? So first thing you have to do is you've gotta figure out what is the destination this whole fucking thing's going to. What is the day, the month, and the year? And at that point, what is the revenue? What is the profit margin? What are we doing? Because if you want to hire people and you say, Hey, let's all get in the car. What's the first thing they're gonna say?

Dan Austin: [28:30] Where are we going?

Steve Rozenberg: [28:30] Where are we going? When are we gonna get there?

Dan Austin: [28:32] Yep.

Steve Rozenberg: [28:33] What does it look like? And you're like, I don't fucking know. We're just driving today. And at one point they're gonna go, these guys don't have a vision. Mhmm. So I'm not gonna follow them. Mhmm. People leave a business because of lack of leadership and lack of vision. So the first thing I would say is you need an organization chart. First, you need to figure out what is the day that your business is completed.

Mike DeHaan: [28:52] Right.

Steve Rozenberg: [28:52] And it is a saleable asset that's running without you, and it's running on systems and procedures. That's the first thing. Figure out that date, and then you reverse engineer it. We know where we're going. Now we need to know what freeways we need to take. What's the strategies to get the business there? So you can say, you know, we want to be doing 50,000,000 a year. We want to be there on 01/01/2028. So you have to have a date. It's got to be a day, month, and a year. And we want to have a 35% profit margin, and we want to be spending four hours a week in our business. Now we know the goal. Right. So now we know, okay, this is where we're going. Now what is the staffing? What does the company look like when it's built out? Well, we're gonna need to have all these dispo people. We're gonna need this. We're gonna need that. We're gonna have marketing. Build it out so that you have a snapshot today, then you have a snapshot of where it's going. Right? So you got these two snapshots. You know what it's gonna take. Okay. Every time we hire, when we grow this many properties, we're gonna need another staff member. So now what you're doing is is you're growing your business proactively and not off of knee jerk reactions like, Man, we just had another complaint. We got to hire another phone person. It's like, No, no, no. Do you have a system problem or do you have a person problem?

Steve Rozenberg: [30:00] And again, this is real estate. This doesn't matter. Right? So now first thing is is let's just say every organization chart has five things, five parts of an org chart. You've got marketing that makes the phone ring, sales that answers the phone, they turn them into clients, which then goes to operations, which processes the order, and they get that client to buy over and over again, which is called the repeat customer, and they create a referral program to get that happy customer to refer people to you. Every referral is equal to 5.7 people. So if you're not asking your clients or people you do business with for referrals, you're missing out on 5.7 sales down the road. Wow. So when you understand the client acquisition cost and you go, every time we get a new client, it costs us $5,000 Well, if that client gave you 5.7 people, it doesn't cost you a thousand anymore. Now you can divide it amongst the 5.7. So you've got to know what that is. You've got to have a referral program. So you've got marketing, sales, operations. You've got accounting. They pay everybody. And the last is leadership. A business is a hierarchy, right? It's not side to side, it's top down. So the leadership's on top, everybody down below that is across and equal marketing, sales, operations, and accounting. Okay?

Steve Rozenberg: [31:19] Now inside of each of those boxes, you have to have four things. You have to have a job description. Marketing. What does this job do in marketing? Well, they're gonna be taking care of making sure the phone rings. They're gonna take care of the the website. They're gonna do this and that. Okay. Now I got a general description of what that job is. Next is roles and duties. What are they responsible for? The marketing guy, you don't go, hey. Don't forget. You gotta sweep today. He's gonna go, that's not even my fucking job. Yeah. You gotta do it. No. No. No. It's gotta be labeled. What are my duties that I'm well, you're responsible for SEO, pay per click, the website, making sure that we're going to networking events. That all has to be detailed in that. So that's job description, roles, and duties. Next are key performance indicators, KPIs. The KPIs tell you if if he's doing his job. I can't just go, you know what? Dan's a dick. I don't like him. I think we should fire him. He's not even doing his job. I'm gonna go, I don't care if you don't like him. What are his numbers? Well, he's hitting all his numbers. Then Dan's not going anywhere. Or you know what? Dan's not hitting his numbers per the KPIs. Again, a lot of times we as real estate investors and all this shit, we take everything personal. Has nothing to do with your emotions or person. It's the numbers and the data.

Steve Rozenberg: [32:32] So you gotta have key performance indicators. Every role should have between three to five KPIs. And the last thing is the DISC profile. That is the purse or whatever personality profile you wanna use. I'm familiar with DISC, but every position is associated with a certain disc profile. Mhmm. So when I work with people, when I coach them, we gotta start at the foundation. If you build a house that has no foundation, it's gonna collapse. If your foundation is not set like what we just did, not you're gonna be able to build a sustainable business because you're not gonna be able to keep people. There's gonna be leaks. Right? And then every business has between eight to 11 systems in the business. Every business is about eight to 11. Property management had about 19. So there's a lot in property management. All of those systems need to be clearly defined. Okay. What happens when the phone rings? They answer the phone. No. No. No. How many times does the phone ring? We let it ring three times. Okay. What is said when the phone is answered? Okay. When the phone's answered, where does it go next? Where does it go next? Where does it go next? The reason you gotta be so detailed is you've gotta be able to have a system that is duplicatable. We we had almost 30 employees virtual assistants in Mexico. The reason we were able to do that is we are so detailed in our systems that we could hire or fire a virtual assistant or a stateside employee because we knew it was very easy to replace them. The reason why we normally keep employees past the date is because we're afraid to get rid of them because we're like, fuck. I don't wanna deal with that.

Steve Rozenberg: [34:02] Like, then I gotta I gotta talk to this new person. I gotta do this. So that's normally bad leadership because we're abdicating and we're choosing not to do it. So I kinda probably went way deep than what you guys wanted.

Mike DeHaan: [34:15] Dude. No. Super helpful for us. I appreciate that.

Dan Austin: [34:17] Yes.

Mike DeHaan: [34:18] Anybody who who's listening, if you didn't get anything out of that, a, go listen again, b, if you're like, these guys are just getting free coaching and that's messed up, fuck you. Yeah. That's what we're getting.

Dan Austin: [34:28] This is our show. Exactly.

Mike DeHaan: [34:29] This is why we have it. Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [34:31] Alright. This is our show and you can have coaching.

Mike DeHaan: [34:33] Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. So cool. So that's amazing though. So I guess it's funny because it comes down to just the fundamentals. Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [34:40] Fundamentals.

Mike DeHaan: [34:40] I I think the the biggest thing that stops most people is they they're in, like, that solopreneur stage where they haven't actually made money yet. Right? They don't have the ability to start bringing on staff and teams. They don't have the cash. But do you think this is something that you can still start at that phase, or is this something where you kinda need to grind and get that nest egg sort of built? I think that's also what causes people to get into that trap is because they were the, you know, the moneymaker, and now trying to pass that off is is where people get stuck because they are fearful.

Steve Rozenberg: [35:12] Well, again, I think it goes back to ego and pride. Right? It goes back to what are you building? Are you building a job, or are you building a business? You know? Right. There's something to be said with delayed gratification of what you're trying to do. You know? Where is it written that just because you started a business, you should be making money right away?

Mike DeHaan: [35:26] That's true.

Steve Rozenberg: [35:27] I don't know. I've never I've never heard that rule. So, you know, again, why do you think you deserve to make money right away? You know, people are like, I wanna do short term rentals, and I want a 45% return. But I'm like, what makes you think that, number one, is that even realistic?

Dan Austin: [35:41] Right.

Steve Rozenberg: [35:41] I don't care what you want. I wanna slam dunk a basketball. I don't see that happening either. But it doesn't mean you know what I mean? So it's like just because you want something doesn't mean it's going to happen. So you've got a planet. Nothing in business or in life happens by chance. Everything happens by design and for a reason. If you started a business and you go bankrupt, there's a reason that happened. That didn't just happen to you. It happened because of you. Mhmm. And so a lot of times when people are not again, if you wanna build it to last, you gotta slow down to speed up. And look, I've built shitty businesses. I've built models that didn't work, but I got back up and I learned the lesson. So you can learn it yourself or, you know, you talk to someone like me and you bypass twenty years of headache and frustration. But at the end of day, I would say you've gotta do it with the destination. Mhmm. What are you building? Are you building something that you want a job? If you do, then great. That's reactive, that's emotional, or do you want something that's sustainable, that runs proactive without you for the long haul? If you want that, that doesn't happen on commercial on the weekends in between football games. It happens because you gotta you know, one of the biggest challenges people have is they don't work on the business. They work in the business.

Steve Rozenberg: [36:53] And what you have to do is you've gotta learn that you've gotta set time aside. I you know, when I coach people, if I coached you guys, I would wanna see at least four hours a week of you guys working on the business. I don't care if it's thirty minutes a day, four hours on Sunday, two on whatever. It doesn't matter. That's when you're creating the systems, the procedures. Initially, you're wearing all hats. I get that. Right? Mhmm. You are because you're you're a one man band. And slowly you go, okay. What do I suck at or what's on fire? Those are the two questions you ask yourself. If you say, you know what, man? I am horrible at bookkeeping. This is not my thing. Then that would probably be the first person you hire as a bookkeeper. Right. Like, that's what you do. If you go, I'm pretty good at marketing. I'm getting the leads. It's not dialed in, but I get it. Okay. Well, then leave that. Don't mess with it. If it's not broken, don't fix it just yet. Tackle the low level, low income tasks that you're doing. Like, I'm a big believer in virtual assistants. Right? Mhmm. And the reason is is if I told you guys for a couple $100 a week, I could free up forty hours every week of your life. My question is is what would you do with those forty hours?

Dan Austin: [38:00] Wow.

Steve Rozenberg: [38:01] Is it worth $200?

Mike DeHaan: [38:03] Yeah. Absolutely.

Dan Austin: [38:04] That's

Steve Rozenberg: [38:04] great. And if you say no, then you don't value your time. The one thing we don't get back is our time. So if you can leverage it, business is all about leverage. You're leveraging people's money, people's time, people's knowledge, people's scale, skill set. So why wouldn't you use that as the starting point? I've had a virtual assistant that's with me. You guys probably talked to her because she set this up, I believe, but she's been with me five years. She runs my calendar. She calls my doctor. She calls my yard guy when I need the yard. Like, hey, I broke a sprinkler. Can you call me? She does everything for me. So it's not just business when you need a virtual assistant. It's everything. And so it's one of those things that you gotta think about it.

Mike DeHaan: [38:41] I love that. Yeah. That's a funny sort of thing with American people too. I feel like they always have, for some reason, like an aversion to having virtual assistant. So we we have a lot of virtual staff. So our team, we have 12. And what do you have, Dan? I think just two American employees. Everyone else is overseas. Overseas. Yeah. Everything from, like, our admins who are, you know, based out of Southeast Asia to we have, like, even high school virtuals. So, like, our our web and graphic designer is from Romania, you know, and he lives over there. He's trained. He does what he just does very well for us. You have him on a salary, but it costs us a third of what it would have cost to have that same person on salary here. And he's significantly more responsive than any American

Dan Austin: [39:21] Work his ass off.

Steve Rozenberg: [39:22] They do. And look. At the end of the day, you know, I think COVID did show people that the ability to work remotely is a possibility. I don't think it's perfect, but there are positions I mean, with 60% of our company was in Mexico Yeah. With virtual assistants. I mean, it it works, but you have to be the right leader. If you're a bad leader, it doesn't matter if they're two feet from you or 2,000 miles or 20,000 miles. It doesn't matter. If you're a shitty leader, you're gonna have shitty employees. Yeah. That's just how it is. If you look at bad employees, I always look at the top because the fish stinks from the head down. And I'll say, okay. Well, what's their training system? What's their in doc? What's their modules? What systems do you have? None. None. None. And they suck?

Dan Austin: [40:01] Right.

Steve Rozenberg: [40:02] Fucking kidding me? What gave you the right to start a business if you don't even know what you're doing? So that's just that's just me.

Dan Austin: [40:08] Totally. No. I think there's a lot in there too. And like I'm thinking in my head as you've talked through a bunch of stuff, now we're talking about employees and staffing and a 100% you can work virtual. Mike and I built our company completely virtual. We have a lot of virtual people from around the world. But also, like, you said something about like, it's like a big lie that corporate America tells people. It's like, oh, you know, this is a safe, secure job. That's not that's just a line of bullshit they tell you to keep you coming in every day. But then the flip side of that is also, I think a lot of people's jobs, we don't need you. When COVID hit and everybody went home and worked and they were working, like, ten hours a week, it's like, hey, we could run our company a lot leaner. So it's like, as a corporate employee, like, what are you doing? This is all bullshit. And you need to, like, actually take a look at yourself. And as a company owner now, Mike and I, it's like, we need to take a look at our company and you're seeing our org chart and seeing what we're doing to keep growing this business in the right direction. Because if some of us aren't necessary and other companies are telling lies that your job is you're such a great person and we need you and you're really not, you're just kind of a piece of shit and you're just a number, like taking a a good look at your life maybe is a good way to just sum all that up and where you're at in a company stack.

Steve Rozenberg: [41:16] Yeah. It's look. Sometimes we gotta do a self check. Just because we started a business doesn't mean we're the people to take the business to the next level. Just because you had an idea of buying real estate doesn't mean you're the person to grow a multimillion portfolio. Mhmm. I mean, look. In good times, everyone's a genius. Right? You talk to all these people. They're they're fucking experts when times are good. That's easy. Yeah.

Dan Austin: [41:35] Right. Absolutely. That's so good. That's so true.

Mike DeHaan: [41:38] Yeah. That's across everything. I mean, all all I'm gonna say is where are all the crypto experts? They're so quiet now.

Dan Austin: [41:43] I'm so quiet. Anymore advertisers on social about that. Yeah. Yeah. And that's why, like, talking before the call, like, we know people. And you said it, Steve, is like, it's so easy to make money when everybody else is making money. The market's good. And if you have poor systems and a shitty business model, don't you exist anymore when the market gets tough.

Steve Rozenberg: [42:00] Exactly.

Mike DeHaan: [42:00] That's awesome. Well well, so much good stuff, Steve. I I really, really have enjoyed chatting with you. This is amazing. As we sort of get towards the end of the show here, I'd love to guess I guess here, what exactly are you working towards now? You know, you've know you're still a pilot. You, you know, obviously sold your company to this VC firm a while back. You know, you're still investing. I know you're speaking and all those sort things, but, like, what are your goals and objectives? What is your, finish line, I guess, as you put it?

Steve Rozenberg: [42:26] Yeah. So what what I do now is I mostly work with coaching is kind of the thing. You know? I think we all go through phases in our life of what we like to do, and I'm kind of at the age or or whatever you wanna call it of just investing passively in deals. So I you know, people like Brandon Turner and these other guys, you know, AJ Osborne, you know, and so I I invest with a lot of these guys because I they're friends of mine. I trust them and, you know, that kind of thing. But what I've realized is that to me, it's a matter of giving back. And so I think a lot of this as entrepreneurs, we can be kind of selfish sometimes. Meaning, we we learn all this education. We learn all this stuff, but we never actually share it with anybody outside of our circle. And so I think that's wrong. I think you should be more abundant. I think we all could be. And so the way I can do it is giving back on the knowledge I have. I think I have a skill set of helping people with my experience of twenty, thirty years of being an airline pilot, building a business, owning real estate, wrapping that all up, there's not many people probably like me with those variables, I'll say. So I coach people. I do very high level masterminds. I do mid level masterminds for people. I just really create communities of getting people involved and understanding that whether you're doing real estate or you have a fencing business or roofing company, we're all the same underneath. Wrap ourselves in a different wrapper, that's fine.

Steve Rozenberg: [43:48] But underneath, we're all kind of the same. And so my job is to really show people how to basically unwrap yourself to be the entrepreneur just like the other people. So I do these high level masterminds where I bring in, you know, Brad Lee and Iron Cowboy and other people like that to to help people understand that there's different sides to being an entrepreneur, but also I show them how to build their businesses. So I show them how to break down their businesses, but more importantly, how to break themselves down. Because if you wanna build a $50,000,000 company, but you're a million dollar CEO mentally, you're never gonna build a $50,000,000 company because you're the block. You're the reason it's not gonna grow. So you have to become that $50,000,000 CEO before you've ever made it. It's kinda like if you're gonna go to sleep, you've gotta lay there and act like you're asleep before you actually go to sleep.

Dan Austin: [44:36] That's so true.

Steve Rozenberg: [44:37] You gotta imagine it. Right? Mean, think about it. Right? So if you wanna be a successful person, you've gotta imagine you're that successful person. And whenever I talk to people, they always have a reason why they're not successful or this or that. I'm like, you don't get it, man. You're missing it. So Yeah. That's kind of the the mistake people have.

Dan Austin: [44:53] There you go.

Mike DeHaan: [44:53] And I guess so I guess what is your, your destination with all that? Like, are you trying to grow this into a large brand? Or are you Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [45:00] I'm looking to grow it into a brand. I'm working with some some people that are helping me brand who I am, what I do, and just see where it goes. You know? I it's kinda nice when you don't need either, when you don't need to fly and you don't need to do this and you just kinda, you know, like, doing these kinds of things and talking with guys like you and, you know, going to events. You know, I go to people's offices. I coach people. I coach teams. Wow. It's kinda fun. Look. It's always nice when somebody wants to hear what you have to say, number one, but it's also nice when you actually see them make changes. I mean, I've I've got people that I coached that have gone from, like, barely knowing they have a business to talking about what kind of jet they're gonna buy. How cool. I mean, that's kind of a cool thing. You know?

Mike DeHaan: [45:36] Absolutely.

Steve Rozenberg: [45:36] The only thing they did differently was think different. That's it. And and, you know, I've learned that it's all about the mindset and investing in yourself. A lot of people don't want to invest in themselves. And I've learned that if you don't invest in yourself, you'll never make money. Because if you're afraid to spend money, you'll always be afraid to make money because you have an aversion to money. People put so much power in money. It's a tool. If I said, hey, give me a dollar, and I'll give you back a $100. No strings attached. You do it. Right?

Mike DeHaan: [46:07] Mhmm. Yeah.

Steve Rozenberg: [46:08] Same thing as coaching. You give me you give me a certain amount of money. I give you back the return. It's a no brainer. And so that's we have an aversion. You add more zeros to it. It makes people nervous.

Mike DeHaan: [46:19] Mhmm.

Steve Rozenberg: [46:19] Yeah. That's a personal thing. Right? And so that's the same thing with the deal. Right? You guys doing a $20,000 real estate deal as opposed to a $20,000,000 deal is just some zeros. It's the same amount of work probably, maybe less at the 20,000,000 mark.

Dan Austin: [46:32] Right.

Steve Rozenberg: [46:33] Yeah. What's the difference? It's your pucker factor to how you feel about money.

Mike DeHaan: [46:37] Right. That's true. It is true. Not wrong. And I've heard that from a lot of people that do bigger deals that started kinda with what we're doing. So now that's super good stuff. Alright. So we're gonna dive into the end of show questions here. And you have three questions that we ask every guest that comes on the show. So the first question, which is always the the crowd favorite is what is your craziest real estate investing story? I know you're an avid investor yourself for a while, and this can be like a good story, bad story, big win, big loss, crazy tenant. Only rule being that you can't talk about finding like a corpse or something in a rental property because we've had a handful of those and so it's

Dan Austin: [47:12] like it's kinda It's a bummer.

Steve Rozenberg: [47:13] Yeah. Sure. Yeah. You said craziest? Yeah. Alright. My craziest is I remember when when we had a bunch of properties, I had a I got a phone call one morning from a detective, and he's like, do you own the property on such and such street? And I'm like, yeah. And he's like, can you tell me who the tenant is? And told him who the tenant is. And he's asked me all these questions about the property. When's the last time you've been to the house? When's last time you've seen him? And I'm like, never really went there. And I said, do you mind if I ask what this about? He goes, well, when we raided the house this morning, we found a hijacked semi full of vodka. What? Found about $2,000,000 in lumber supplies in the backyard. Holy shit. We found weapons, children, and drugs. Wow. So this is about 06:30 in the morning, and I'm like, did you say when you raided my property? And he's like, yes, sir. And he goes, and he goes, he goes, I'm not trying to scare you, but we could confiscate your property because it's been used for illegal activities. And I'm like, wow. When you say raid, like, I'm going back to that word again. Like, when you say raid, let's go back to that again. Wow. And so basically, the guy they were using it as a stash house. It was a property that I had.

Steve Rozenberg: [48:21] Never heard from the guy. It was an old guy. Paid his rent on time. And I remember one time going to the property, and I remember driving by one day, and it was it was on a corner. Good lookout property for stash houses, I learned. And there were bars on the windows. And I was like, that's weird. I don't remember that house having bars. Sure shit. And so that's why. And so they were using it as a stash house. So, again, I learned that you probably should have some sort of mechanism to take a look at properties. And this was probably like and I probably hadn't seen the property in nine, ten months. Wow. And, honestly, I had so many other shitty properties. I didn't care. I was just happy he wasn't called.

Dan Austin: [49:03] That was a quiet one. Yeah. You exactly. Holy smokes.

Mike DeHaan: [49:05] Yeah.

Dan Austin: [49:05] Right. Yeah. Semi truck full of vodka.

Steve Rozenberg: [49:08] Yeah. Yeah. Semi full of vodka.

Mike DeHaan: [49:11] Why were they smuggling the vodka?

Speaker 3: [49:13] You can

Mike DeHaan: [49:13] just go to the liquor store and buy that. Like, was it I

Steve Rozenberg: [49:15] don't know. I have no idea. I was just like Wow. I I mean, I it was like so many things was wrong. So we went there, met the police there at the property. We get to the property, and the cops do their thing, and the cops leave. And then the guy comes it was like a house in the hood. Right? Guy comes walking down the street right after, and me and my business partner and our maintenance guy, we're standing there. He's like, hey, how are doing? And we're like, pretty good. How are you doing? He's like, pretty good. He's like, do mind if I get the rest of my stuff? And we're like, whatever. Get what you want. Yeah. Two minutes later, this truck pulls up with these guys. They load everything up from what was left over. He's like, sorry about the inconvenience. Take care. And I'm like, me and my wife, we're all standing there like, take care.

Mike DeHaan: [49:59] Like That's so crazy.

Steve Rozenberg: [50:01] And we're like, you can't make this shit up. No. You

Dan Austin: [50:03] can't. No.

Mike DeHaan: [50:04] Wow. That's a good one. That that is that is indeed a crazy story. Unique. I'm glad that you didn't get slapped with that too. You hear about stuff like that going sideways and, you know, landlords having to get involved in legal matters. Yeah. No. That's cool. Alright. Next question. So what is the number one tip you would give to an investor who is, like, either a new investor looking to get started or a small time investor looking to grow their business? I have a feeling I know what you're gonna say, but if you just could give just give one tip.

Dan Austin: [50:31] I'm excited to hear

Mike DeHaan: [50:32] it.

Steve Rozenberg: [50:33] I would say slow down to speed up, meaning create the end destination first. Really understand, don't buy properties to buy properties. Buy it for a reason and for a goal. And so buy based on your goals, not based on your emotions or what someone else is telling you is a good deal.

Dan Austin: [50:51] Wow. That's great. Perfect. It's funny because another thing Mike and I were talking about right before this and Mike was like, maybe we should take a step back before we go forward. It's like, there

Mike DeHaan: [50:59] you go. I literally said that.

Steve Rozenberg: [51:01] Dude, I'll you what. There's a lot to be said about sharpening that axe before you swing it.

Mike DeHaan: [51:04] Yep. Yeah. Yeah. So awesome. Simple. Easy. I like it. Alright. Last question, Steve. Where can people find you, follow you, and reach out to you?

Steve Rozenberg: [51:14] Yeah. Obviously, all social media, Instagram. I mean, I I travel all over the world. So if you wanna see some cool destinations and stuff, follow me on Instagram or Facebook. It's my name, Rosenberg Steve or Facebook Steve Rosenberg. My website is probably the best place to see what I'm doing, what masterminds I have, what coaching programs. That's just steverosenberg.com, rozenberg.com. I also have a podcast, High Stakes with Steve Rozenberg. I get some pretty interesting people on there, pretty cool entrepreneurs. But, yeah, look, I'm out there. I get a lot of people because of my affinity and love for real estate and doing stuff with bigger pockets and all that stuff that I get a lot of people that reach out to me. If you reach I'll answer. My opinion is is that if you took the time to ask me, then it's respectful to answer the person who's talking to you. And so I make sure that if you're asking me a question, I'm answering. And so Awesome. If you reach out to me, I it will be me answering you back.

Mike DeHaan: [52:08] That's awesome. Awesome. I love it. Well, thanks so much, Steve, for coming on the show, man. It's been so great chatting with you and and getting to meet you up for this. And you've dropped, I would say, probably the the most knowledgeable, like, episode that we've had just in terms of Yeah. This is fantastic. So many great actionable tips. So really, appreciate you coming on. And, listening, absolutely reach out to Steve. Yes. If you didn't get anything from this podcast, go listen to something else because, like, this is this is about as good as it gets when it comes to, you know, business tips if you are serious about wanting to, you know, do something with yourself. So if you find if you found this helpful, go ahead and share this with anyone else you think might find this helpful. It's a great way to help score the show. As Steve said, a referral is worth 5.7. I think you said other customers.

Steve Rozenberg: [52:53] 5.7.

Mike DeHaan: [52:54] I'm sure that that is the same when it comes to sharing episodes with other listeners as well. So, anyway, guys, go ahead and share this with anyone you find it helpful, and we'll talk to you guys next week. Yep.

Steve Rozenberg: [53:04] Thank you.

Mike DeHaan: [53:05] Thanks for listening, everybody. Please make sure you subscribe and leave us a five star review wherever you listen to your podcast. Also, please make sure you go and you share this with other people within your network. We are really trying to grow this thing, and the best way for us to do so is by you telling other come check us out. You can also follow us on Instagram. I am at Mike underscore Invest. Dan is at investor man Dan. You can follow the podcast at collecting keys podcast. And if you wanna learn how to make real money as a real estate investor or you want to grow your already existing real estate investing business, please go and check out instantinvestorprogram.com and book a call with either Dan or myself, and we will see if you'll

Speaker 3: [53:46] Thanks for listening. Please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. And check us out at collectingkeyspodcast.com for tips and guides on starting your own real estate investment and wholesaling business.