Why You're Already Living the Life You Want

Mike DeHaan: [0:00] The thing is when it comes to money like that, it's so easy to get bought into, like, the luxury stuff that people get into. But most people don't want that, and you don't realize it until you experience it. And you're like, why did I think that I cared about staying at the Ritz in wherever or having the car? Like, there's a reason a lot of super wealthy people are miserable because it's there's nothing beyond that to them, and they don't understand that.

Dylan Koch: [0:21] Did you use the Ritz as a good example? Because our mutual friend was just posted on Instagram of them being at the Ritz in Paris.

Mike DeHaan: [0:28] Oh. Well, totally. So for that guy, like, I do believe that that is something that really brings him a lot of joy. Yeah. And so he he needs to make money to support that. That's great. And that's different for everybody. To some people that is like having the boat. You're you're doing whatever. I learned as I started to make my money that a lot of that stuff I don't care about. Pretty much the one thing that I will always splurge on is if I'm going overseas, which I like to do on a regular basis, I will fly business class because it is a much better travel experience for me. And I will fly business class to wherever, and I will stay in a nice ish hotel. Like, doesn't have to be anything fancy. I just need to feel like it's safe and it's clean and close to stuff I wanna do, but doesn't need to be the Ritz. It's a thousand dollars a night. I don't care.

Dan Austin: [1:10] Yeah. I think you gotta just whatever it is, it's like what you care. If you get satisfaction out of certain things, that's what you have to realize. But you kind of, kind of test those. If you, if you're trying to chase what other people want or like what is, if you're trying to get all this stuff, which is where I think people are unsatisfied, it's like, well, that one will make me happy. That one will make me happier. I see everybody doing these things. It's staying at the Ritz, it's fine business class, it's traveling six months out of the it's all these things, and then you're like, well those weren't cool. Maybe I need to reset my expectation on what's cool. And at the end of the day, it really comes down to, I think for me anyways, it's about the relationships you hold and the experiences you have. Mhmm. It has nothing to do with the material things. Although the material things can make life comfortable.

Dylan Koch: [1:47] Isn't there a good study that says like the people who are on their deathbeds had like three regrets is like or meaningful life was the relationships, the people closest to them, like a purpose, some kind of like having some kind of purpose in life, and then health was the other one.

Mike DeHaan: [2:02] Exactly. And I think the perfect example of how to do things wrong is just look at Elon Musk, who is obviously one of the most miserable people on the planet.

Dan Austin: [2:10] I think that's a leap that he's miserable.

Mike DeHaan: [2:11] I don't know, man.

Dan Austin: [2:12] I don't think he is. He has everything Dylan just described.

Mike DeHaan: [2:16] It's true. Does he? I don't know.

Dan Austin: [2:18] Purpose? His health isn't bad.

Mike DeHaan: [2:21] What's going on, guys? Looking at collecting keys. I'm Mike DeHaan here with your cohost, Dan Austin and Dylan Cook. And I guess to your point, Dan, regarding Elon. I think personally,

Dan Austin: [2:31] if I was you're projecting that he was partnered with Trump, you think he's a bad person, but I actually think he's probably not.

Mike DeHaan: [2:37] No. Like like, most people I'm referring to is around the is multiple failed marriages, his different baby mamas, the stuff the comments that he makes around the relationship with his kids are always pretty negative. You know, there's a lot of things that project unhappiness. It literally has nothing to do with his ties with Trump at all.

Dan Austin: [2:54] I guess, yeah, you could say the things that I'm not advocating for his parenting style or whatever. But if you talk to a random parent on a bad day, they're gonna be like, yeah, dude. My kids are assholes. Yeah. Right? So you can't you know, he's a public figure though. Right? So everybody's gonna hang on everything he says. But

Mike DeHaan: [3:09] Yeah. And he and I have no personal relationship to this person, obviously. So I all I have to go off is the recurring tabloids, which Right. Who knows how true they actually are.

Dan Austin: [3:17] I think he was a Nazi there for a while.

Mike DeHaan: [3:19] He was.

Dylan Koch: [3:19] Yeah. He was. Definitely. Did you see I guess when he smoked weed on, Joe Rogan's podcast that because SpaceX gets federal, like, grants, like, the whole SpaceX employees had to get random drug tested since weed is still a was a classified substance. Funny.

Dan Austin: [3:36] That's hilarious actually. That was a big deal when he did that. And then I think now he's like after that, like when that incident happened, like that was a huge deal and people were like, oh man, what a terrible human being to do that. He can't be trusted with our money. Then he's like, what? Like worth a trillion dollars more now.

Mike DeHaan: [3:51] Is that's such a I don't know. That's always one of those weird things when it's like, you just look at the circumstance of it. I mean, if he was like a pothead, and he was like always just like showing up his stuff baked all the time, you're like

Dan Austin: [4:02] Even then speaking to miserable, like, wealthy people that drink all the time, which is legal and acceptable, but they're just miserable, unhealthy pricks, and they they're alcoholics. Like, I I just don't. The whole drug and alcohol thing, do what you wanna do. I think they should all be illegal.

Mike DeHaan: [4:16] Oh, yeah. I mean, at some level. Move to Saudi Arabia, Dan. You'll, you'll find your people over there.

Dan Austin: [4:22] I'm not saying I wanna do them.

Mike DeHaan: [4:24] Yeah. Yeah. To your point, Dylan, though, like, I don't know. We're talking about finding that stage of life satisfaction stuff. Stretch your comfort level with the money that you have, and then you'll learn what your actual reasonable lifestyle is, like what you actually want. And then you can build your ambitions from there. You know? And I would say for most people, it is more chill, like less expensive than you think it is.

Dan Austin: [4:49] My guess would be

Mike DeHaan: [4:49] you're already doing 95% of what you wanna do in life. Exactly. And that's what makes it hard.

Dan Austin: [4:53] Most of us are. You just have to get your mind around that you're actually doing what you wanna do.

Dylan Koch: [4:57] I think a lot of it too is not even the thing, but I've always been a workaholic, even if it's like aimless work. Yeah. And so what else do you do? I I don't know. And these are all answers people need a question for themselves.

Dan Austin: [5:08] I think we're all kind of like that.

Mike DeHaan: [5:09] Yeah. Well, that's okay though. Like that is you need to do something with your time, You know? And and like there's a certain kind of people that want to just go to the beach every day. Most people are not that. And I would also say that a lot of those people, it's hard to find fulfillment, you know, instead what they find is distractions.

Dylan Koch: [5:27] Well, would they be as happy if they couldn't post their beach on Instagram?

Mike DeHaan: [5:31] Exactly. Yeah. How often do you find that person that isn't advertising into the world for likes? That's how they're getting their dopamine hits. That's so hard. And they are out there. Like, you can go to any random beach destination, and you'll find, like, the people that kinda live there. They don't post anything. They kinda work. They have some money, but they're super happy. Right? I've met people in some places don't even have any kind of social media. They have no idea what's going on in the world. They just live in their zone. You know? But the problem is going I mean, even to the back to the Elon Musk comment. Like, we're just going off of the context that we all have, which is what people choose to present out there, which they do intentionally. Yeah. Especially if there's any sort of message or professional presentation around it, realize they are posting that on purpose for a reason.

Dylan Koch: [6:15] Yeah. There's actually a a old pharmacist colleague of mine that he swiped up one time. He's like, man, you did you did the right thing getting out of this. And I'm like, hey, man. Like, yes. Like I still agree, but all you see is the highlight reel. You don't know the stress that happens behind the scenes. Yeah. Yeah.

Dan Austin: [6:32] There's a lot. Oh, but then also to your point, Dylan, you probably like doing that. You probably like the stress behind the scenes.

Dylan Koch: [6:37] It's definitely, I mean, I don't miss being in the, behind the counter of a pharmacy.

Dan Austin: [6:40] No, no, no. I'm talking about, yeah, like within your day to day business, right? Like it's all sunshine and rainbows, but you, if it was, you probably wouldn't be doing it.

Dylan Koch: [6:48] Yeah. And then it's a financial reward.

Mike DeHaan: [6:49] There's a trade off. Literally last night at pickleball, there's a younger guy that in is the group that I play with. He's, like, 25. And he knows I travel. And so he always asked me. He goes, oh, do you have any trips planned this year? I was like, oh, yeah. We're going to Europe again. We're going to Hawaii. And he said, didn't you go to Europe last year? I was like, yeah. We go to Europe most years, like, almost for, like, a wedding. So I a lot of family stuff over there. And was he kinda asking me about that. And he was like, what do you do again? I said, I was like, if you can, like, you can, like, just set your own schedule. Was like, well, not really. I mean, I have, like, 15 people on staff at this point. So, like, they can do stuff, but, I like, can be flexible. But like when I go there, it's never like I'm just checking out for a month. Yeah. You know? You have to be engaged with things the entire time.

Dan Austin: [7:29] Which is a weird thing to think about doing. Yeah. Like the people that do like, how can you do that?

Dylan Koch: [7:33] I know. There's a meme that perfectly sums us up. That's like, I gave up my forty hour week job so I could work twenty four seven, three sixty five.

Mike DeHaan: [7:40] Exactly, dude. You know? And that that's that's the trade off that you ultimately have is, yes, you have, I would say, for most of my business, you have location freedom. Time freedom is something that kind of goes away.

Dan Austin: [7:51] It's you know what it is? It's it's freedom of choice.

Mike DeHaan: [7:53] You get to choose to do it.

Dan Austin: [7:54] Exactly. Right? And when you don't get to choose anything I liken it to this is a really a Dan Austin use case, like, study. So when I was in military, you would do a lot of fitness and exercising. Right? If you were leading the run, you could take like, if I was the one leading the run, like I was like in charge and I was like, we're going to run for a, an unknown distance at an unknown pace. Much better athletes, I could make them quit. Not because they're mentally weaker or physically weaker at all. They're maybe mentally stronger, but they have no choice. They don't know what's next. They're just getting told we're running until you I get tell you to stop. And you could take somebody who could run 10 miles and you can make them quit after three miles. It's a weird thing. You have no choice. Right? And so in life, when you're working for a company and you have zero choices, like it feels oppressive. Right? So when you have the freedom of choice to choose to work 20 fourseven, three sixty five, it's a different feeling.

Mike DeHaan: [8:46] Yeah, for sure. You have more flexibility, you know, that you've gotten rid of the metaphorical handcuffs.

Dan Austin: [8:51] Yeah. And you might not even have flexibility, honestly. I mean, you and I, like you go to Europe for a couple of weeks with your family, you're choosing to work and to be in, as an entrepreneur. Now, if you were working for a company, you could theoretically completely check out. Right? You're in that situation more flexible when you're on vacation, but you're choosing to do that. So it's just like this weird freedom switch when you're able to make those choices. And then you have like some security and knowledge and understanding that you can take care of yourself and you don't you're not relying on somebody else.

Mike DeHaan: [9:22] Exactly. Well, then also the trade off is on that trip. I can go when I wanna go. I can adjust flights over when they're cheaper. They're better aligned with my schedule. I'm not having to ask for time off to do it. Right. If I decided that I wanted to extend the trip, I could do that. Right? There's a lot of different things that you get with it. But but I always have to be somewhat engaged. Yep. Gotta have

Dan Austin: [9:43] your finger on the pulse.

Mike DeHaan: [9:44] So anyways, Dylan, go spend some money on yourself. Then you'll figure out what you actually want. And do it with something that, like, feels ostentatious to you.

Dan Austin: [9:52] You did buy a car. You you got yourself your

Dylan Koch: [9:54] Yeah. But that's after I got in a wreck.

Dan Austin: [9:56] That's true. You're forced you're forced

Dylan Koch: [9:58] your hand.

Mike DeHaan: [9:59] Did you wreck

Dan Austin: [9:59] your car on purpose? Is that your, like, your thing? Is that your kink?

Mike DeHaan: [10:01] That that's the first time I pulled out in front of

Dan Austin: [10:03] you, isn't it? Yeah. Right. Yeah. That's a crazy story, actually.

Dylan Koch: [10:06] I made myself happy instead of buying the, you know, the the Honda or the Toyota or whatever. I went with the the nicer Audi. So and it's still fun. I'm glad that was a good decision.

Dan Austin: [10:15] Do you get enjoyment out of it?

Dylan Koch: [10:17] I do. Yeah.

Dan Austin: [10:18] So That's cool.

Mike DeHaan: [10:19] Did you have that really fun experience at the car dealership where they ask what your monthly income is? And you tell them and they go, no. No. I need monthly, not annual.

Dan Austin: [10:27] Not annual.

Dylan Koch: [10:28] That's how you need to

Dan Austin: [10:29] fight it.

Mike DeHaan: [10:30] No. No. But Dan and I talked about this recently. Like, at last time I bought

Dan Austin: [10:34] a car, they're like, oh, what's

Mike DeHaan: [10:35] your what's your monthly? And was like, oh, $50. And they're like, no. No. No. I need your your monthly, not your annual. I was like, that is my monthly. Yeah. And it got, like, super kinda weird.

Dylan Koch: [10:43] And they're like, oh, damn.

Mike DeHaan: [10:44] Okay. I'm like, I'm like, because that's that's good, but that's not, like, crazy. It's not like it's like, oh, I'm making $1.50 a month. You know?

Dan Austin: [10:50] Yeah. It's, the context for somebody that I don't know the right way to say this, but the difference between somebody saying $10 a month is actually kind of a lot of money. Right? But the difference between you saying from that person that maybe makes 5 to 10 a month to 50 to 100 a month, it's like there's no context to realizing even though you you're much closer than you think. Making $10 a month and making $50 a month is actually kind of close as far as what your buying power is if you think about it. Taxes, after you pay taxes. And you're obviously smarter with well, ideally smarter with your money, so you're maybe parking some for investments. But, like, the true, like, life cost, it's kinda close. But, like, that is such a weird thing. It's so much different.

Mike DeHaan: [11:27] I think the reason for that, Dan, is because most working adults right now, at some point, they had a job where they made $50 a year.

Dan Austin: [11:36] Yeah. So that's a number.

Mike DeHaan: [11:38] And that's typically like the first job. And so that is burned into your brain as like an annual salary. And then when somebody does that in a much shorter period of time, they're like, holy hell.

Dan Austin: [11:47] Well, think about it. So if you if you what do pay? $30.30 percent taxes on $50 a month? Well Freaking way too much. I guess that's not gonna be your total. But even if it's just say you're out of 50, you're you're probably paying $35,000. Yeah. Like, $15. And then you're gonna park, you know, a little bit away for the future and and security in case you don't make 15 next month. And so you're not that far from 10.

Mike DeHaan: [12:09] Honestly. When you do the math. Yeah. When when you look at all the things that came down the path. Yeah. We're basically all living the same lifestyle.

Dan Austin: [12:15] We're all

Mike DeHaan: [12:16] living in slightly different houses.

Dan Austin: [12:17] When Elon Musk looks at your number, yeah, you are. Dude, that's so true.

Dylan Koch: [12:21] When we bought my wife's car, they we started like, we want this one, etcetera, etcetera. And we already knew the price. We already said that. And we went back to the room and he's like, alright. So, you know, this is our finance options. And I just like wrote a check. You know? I wasn't expecting that. So that was fun. Yeah.

Mike DeHaan: [12:36] Yeah. The last car story and then we'll we'll wrap this up. I wanna hear about why you end up wearing an orange jumpsuit, Dylan. But, the very first car that my wife and I ever bought, we've been in the same cars for through college and everything forever. So we went to buy this Toyota, and we showed up to the dealership. I didn't never bought a car. I had no idea what to expect. So I'm kind of in, like it's like winter. I'm in, like, sweats, whatever I roll in. We're kinda scrubby looking. We get with, like, the old car dealer guy, you know, that's, like, been there for twenty five years kinda thing. And he's like, oh, here come these grubby kids. You know, Dan and I had already started making money. And he's like going. He's doing the whole thing. He's trying to like get us in the payment. Like, this payment's way too much, dude. Like, I don't wanna pay that much. He goes, well, that's the best we can do. And I was like, do I actually need to pay cash for this thing? He's like, you're gonna stroke me a check for $45,000? Was I like, sure. I'll get my checkbook out of the car. And he gave me he gave me this look like this little shit. And he, like, stood up and walked away and came back with exactly the numbers that I wanted.

Mike DeHaan: [13:33] Yeah. That's

Dan Austin: [13:34] great. Dude, that's gonna take you for a ride.

Mike DeHaan: [13:36] I know. And I was like, what is this guy doing?

Dan Austin: [13:38] Yeah. That's all these car guys.

Mike DeHaan: [13:40] I know. But I mean, they'll make commission.

Dylan Koch: [13:42] Well, they make money on the financing.

Mike DeHaan: [13:44] Yeah. Exactly.

Dylan Koch: [13:45] They like Klarna cars now. Like, it's insane.

Mike DeHaan: [13:47] What they actually do, they they do the same thing that we do on the debt business where they generate this debt and they sell on a margin to JPMorgan Chase or whoever.

Dan Austin: [13:54] They'll have these big yeah. Exactly. Like GM Financial.

Dylan Koch: [13:57] But I'm shocked at some of the rate like, of the advertisements like 400 credit, don't care. Like, come get your loan. I'm just like, okay. Like

Dan Austin: [14:04] Yeah. They do. They don't want you paying cash. They want you to to

Dylan Koch: [14:07] Oh, they want you to finance it for sure.

Dan Austin: [14:08] And they're probably gonna negotiate more with you if you get a loan. Mhmm. Honestly, because they have more room. Right? Because they got have all the interest. And then they want you to do all the, what are they? When we did my wife's car recently, the guy just hands me an iPad with like all these, warranties and stuff on it. And I was just like, no. They're all, like, different prices. And it's like the whole, like, a la carte thing of I'm like, no. I'm cool, dude. I don't need to spend another $8 on a warranty.

Dylan Koch: [14:31] Yeah. Alright. I'll tell you how I Yeah. An orange jumpsuit pants.

Dan Austin: [14:34] Yeah. Let's hear about it.

Mike DeHaan: [14:35] Just was it just the pants?

Dylan Koch: [14:36] It was just the pants.

Dan Austin: [14:37] Yeah. Did you get to keep them?

Dylan Koch: [14:39] No. I didn't. I'd asked though when I came out. So I had two evictions. Like, I've done evictions before, but like Hamilton County and Cincinnati is, like, the main county. The other county is Warren County, which we only have one rental, and I've never done an eviction there. So I went down and I'm wearing like, they're nice shorts and a polo, like I wore nice clothes down to the first eviction court, everything went fine. That was at like 10:30 in the morning. Then I go to my next eviction in Warren County at one and I turned the corner and I'm going in the security guards like, do you have pants in your car? I'm like, no. And he's like, we don't let anyone in the courtroom that's wearing shorts. Like, it has to be pants. So court's at one. I'm there like 12:55. And I was like, don't know what to do because my tenant that there is there, like, so I have to go in like, or I can't just like reschedule it. I'm gonna lose the eviction court, the case. And he's like, the best thing I can do is offer you these like convict pants that we have over here in the closet. So I didn't really have a choice. So I took the convict pants, put them on, then I had to wear them during the duration of the whole court proceedings with everyone else that's in there.

Dan Austin: [15:37] That's such a weird thing.

Dylan Koch: [15:38] That's so weird. Their thing is because they want it to be, like, proper. Right? Like, they want you to wear, like, the proper clothes into court. But not only do I look ridiculous in these pants, but there's people in here, like, they have quote unquote pants on because they're jeans, but they're dirty. They're

Dan Austin: [15:53] Oh, yeah.

Dylan Koch: [15:53] Holy. Oh, yeah. Like like, is that really any better than, the nice khaki shorts that I had on? But apparently, is. And so that that was my story.

Dan Austin: [16:02] I don't like that at all. The whole especially around like lawyers and attorneys, I feel like they have like this weird old country club vibe all the time and follows

Dylan Koch: [16:11] That's a 100% of what this is. Yes.

Dan Austin: [16:12] Stupid rules. And I'm like, dude, you're this lawyer over here who's slobby, hasn't slept in three days, he's an alcoholic, probably on Adderall and other drugs, sweating right now with his tie he just looks disheveled. That guy's okay, but I come in here in, like, clean, shorts. I'm healthy. I take care of myself. Like, I'm an upstanding member of the community, and you're gonna tell me to put on orange orange prison pants.

Dylan Koch: [16:33] Yeah. It's crazy. I have this, like, lime not lime green, but a green polo on. So it looked like a Christmas ornament and, like, in this.

Dan Austin: [16:41] Bad choice of clothing, dude.

Dylan Koch: [16:43] Dude, it was.

Dan Austin: [16:44] Yeah. Was that the specific judge's rule or was it the courtroom, like county law?

Dylan Koch: [16:49] It's the court rule. Yeah. Not enough if it's a county law, but it's that courtroom specifically. Like, they even have a sign, like, no hats, no pants. And then they had some other things for girl like, having to, like, revealing of clothing. But

Mike DeHaan: [17:02] No. That is dumb. I really hate that. It's the judge's Courtroom. This this old school judge, I'm surprised it even allows women in there.

Dan Austin: [17:08] Yeah.

Mike DeHaan: [17:09] Exactly. He sounds like one of those

Dan Austin: [17:10] dudes that's super backwards with that. It sounds like some shit you'd hear about in Georgia, dude. Not Ohio. Well,

Mike DeHaan: [17:16] are they that different? I have no idea. My major answer.

Dan Austin: [17:18] Is this part of the Murdaugh trials or Murdaugh murder trials or something like that? You guys are all the same over there.

Dylan Koch: [17:23] Yeah. That, I don't know. But it was ridiculous. It got a big kick online. A lot of people found that humorous.

Dan Austin: [17:28] So I found it hilarious. Like, it couldn't have happened to a better person. Like, I'm so happy. Because I know like you would take it, like you kind of roll with it, but also like, you'd be

Mike DeHaan: [17:36] like, what the fuck? Yeah. Like

Dylan Koch: [17:38] The conclusion was we ended up, you know, granting the eviction in our favor.

Dan Austin: [17:42] But Oh, good. Even though you look like a Christmas tree.

Dylan Koch: [17:44] And then related to this, I guess, though, so this ties into the last thing I had on our little to talk about list. Like, they're gonna get evicted, but they're not out. So we get the writ, and then you have to wait ten days. So they're not out in ten days, and you have to get the bailiff to come out and get them out. That's how it works in a couple different places around here. And I already know that they're not gonna be out. And so I'm just like dreading the amount of damage that there's gonna be done inside this house when they get taken out.

Dan Austin: [18:06] Oh yeah. And there's nothing you can do about it.

Dylan Koch: [18:07] And I know it's gonna be a lot.

Mike DeHaan: [18:09] Are they not nice people?

Dylan Koch: [18:10] Well, they started out that way. And I bought it from a distressed seller and I just With them

Dan Austin: [18:14] in it.

Dylan Koch: [18:15] With them in it. And Yeah. They paid rent for the first couple of months, even though we, it got, you know, pushed pretty severely higher just because it's still below market rent, but they were

Dan Austin: [18:23] Yeah.

Dylan Koch: [18:23] Still not where they needed to be. They got like two months behind before they got caught up and then they sold me like $3,500. And so we're gonna go after them for that part too, but that takes in another month to month and a half to try to do that. So it's just one of those things.

Dan Austin: [18:38] The hidden cost of land, Larry. Oh, wait. That's an actual cost. It's not hidden.

Mike DeHaan: [18:41] Yeah. It's not even in the small print. I know.

Dan Austin: [18:45] Yeah. Part of it, man.

Mike DeHaan: [18:46] Easy money. Come on. You guys are doing it wrong. If you're not just living off of your mailbox money, you didn't you didn't buy right. That's what they'll tell you.

Dylan Koch: [18:52] Well, I don't think it's possible to quote unquote buy right unless you take on some of these problems.

Mike DeHaan: [18:58] Of course. Yeah.

Dylan Koch: [18:59] Like some of the cost, like cost base that I see. Dude, there are four units in Cincinnati right now that are pending at 600 k, which like to me, that is insane.

Dan Austin: [19:07] Wow. That is insane because you could buy that in Spokane. Yeah.

Mike DeHaan: [19:11] Honestly. I mean, there's there's a different buyer pool out there. So we do loans for people like this, and they're typically like MDs that make $800,000 a year. And there's like, I just wanna own properties. So they'll buy these things for like 25% down. And it does fine for them. I don't know.

Dan Austin: [19:27] Yeah. At some point in time, the cash flow and the numbers don't actually make sense. Right? Because

Dylan Koch: [19:32] Until they rely on a property manager. The property manager doesn't do it and then they don't get the return and then it's listed two years later. They're like, fuck this. Yeah. See it all the

Dan Austin: [19:39] time. Exactly.

Mike DeHaan: [19:40] Yep. But, hey, they'll get some, some nice losses on it. Yeah. That's good. They're reducing their payroll. Maybe their their stay at home mom gets a real estate license, get some rep status, some accelerated depreciation on this thing. It's just different different ballgame.

Dan Austin: [19:53] Kinda makes sense. So I guess the one of the things that I was gonna I was thinking about to talk about today was just like buying right now. You made a comment about like, it's really hard to buy right or you can't buy right. Like, what does that even look like? Like, there are still people out there buying deals. How do you do it right now?

Dylan Koch: [20:09] I still haven't bought anything on market in probably over two years. Everything I

Dan Austin: [20:13] On market?

Dylan Koch: [20:14] Yeah. Everything I bought is direct to seller or from a wholesaler. And I still think that's one of the keys is just having your own pipeline, you know, but Yeah. There are other people who buy on the MLS like

Dan Austin: [20:24] Even then that's like, seems like

Dylan Koch: [20:26] I don't know. What are the advantages?

Dan Austin: [20:27] How do you build your pipeline though? Yeah. Like if you were to, if you were to start today, would you just start off market real estate business today with like a large overhead in marketing and all that stuff?

Dylan Koch: [20:37] With the intention of flipping or rentals or does it, or I guess either is applicable. Doesn't matter.

Dan Austin: [20:42] Like just because you like to get a pipeline so you can do something. I'm asking because there are people still buying and acquiring and obviously your investment goals are your own investment goals. Like everybody has their own reasoning to buy real estate or not buy real estate, but

Dylan Koch: [20:55] I mean, I would connect with other wholesalers that actually know what they're doing. I would connect with realtors that actually have off market deals, which is those are very few and far between. And then if you're wanna do some of the grunt work yourself, get any of the major lists, you know, platforms, PropStream or DealMachine, county records, list stack them. So you have two or three motivations on it and then pound the phones yourself, whether that be through a dialer or like a Google voice or whatever. And just be really clear on what you're going after. So that way pattern recognition kicks in and you'd like, okay, this actually is probably a deal.

Dan Austin: [21:26] Yeah. And I think understanding what the opportunity is in front of you, whether it's a is there a development play, which probably is not the best play to do right now. Right? Anything with ground up as far as like, oh, do I add an ADU? Like there's like that little small period of time, which I think it really only worked in a couple markets anyways. But like this whole, like split the lot off or add an ADU in the backyard or this or that. You've got the co living guys out there trying to do co living stuff or the Airbnb guys out there who are still trying to do that. And I think it all works at some level. To me, I guess the reason I asked the question is it is it is it does seem like it's harder to do at scale right now, but I think it's also a good opportunity if this is your game, like if you wanna be in real estate, I think there's a lot of great opportunities out there.

Dylan Koch: [22:05] I think loan assumptions could be good, which I don't think you can do with DSCR, but if someone got like a good commercial loan in 2020 through 2022, 2023, and they're have a sub 5% rate, like you could probably make something happen with that.

Mike DeHaan: [22:18] These are all things that like somebody getting in this space should not do because they're stupid.

Dylan Koch: [22:23] Yeah. That's that's a fair point.

Dan Austin: [22:24] And I'm not even saying the context of somebody getting in this space just in general, because it's like, I mean, I think we could all say like, like Mike and I haven't bought anything. We've been selling real estate recently. We have no desire to buy. I guess it's not part of my investment strategy at the moment. Although I am flipping houses via a person as an investor. So I'm gonna make some money on that. Like, that's cool. It's still in the real estate game. But I'm not doing any of the work or the acquisitions on that. So that's cool.

Mike DeHaan: [22:48] Do you have like as a lender? Or you do you have a a side flipping operation you're funding that you haven't told me about, Dan?

Dan Austin: [22:53] Well, you have the loan on it. Eight Orange. Eight Orange Blossom in Arkansas.

Mike DeHaan: [22:57] Do you have extra stake in that outside of our deal?

Dan Austin: [22:59] Yeah. Well, I

Dylan Koch: [23:00] didn't know.

Mike DeHaan: [23:01] This year you Yeah. This is this is a conflict of interest.

Dan Austin: [23:04] You didn't It's not a conflict of interest. I'll tell you off. I will tell you off. We've talked about this. I'll tell you off.

Dylan Koch: [23:09] This is hilarious for

Dan Austin: [23:10] me to witness for now. It's not a conflict of interest.

Mike DeHaan: [23:13] Yes. It is. You underwrote the loan, and you have a personal stake in it. And it got rejected by our investors.

Dan Austin: [23:18] Now now we're making the whole thing look funky. You're you're making this no. I've talked to you about this many times.

Dylan Koch: [23:24] I will see this in the in the papers in a couple years.

Dan Austin: [23:27] Yeah. Exactly.

Mike DeHaan: [23:27] It's like it's like a $138,000 loan. Worst case, Daniel, just it is.

Dan Austin: [23:32] It is not what it is. But what I my point is bringing this topic up is just like, there's ways to make money. There are people making money. Like, there's gotta be a way to do this, not at scale, but at a way that you make good money because you're supposed to buy when nobody's nobody's buying. Right? I mean, that's the the Warren Buffett rule that everybody lives by.

Mike DeHaan: [23:51] But you also don't wanna be buying when only the dummies are buying. Right?

Dan Austin: [23:54] Yeah. But when is that? Because there are people in real estate making money, I guess is my point, right, that are flipping houses, that are developing land. They're, you know, they're doing all these things. And I think parts of that is the market you're in and what the opportunities are, and you need to adapt to that. I think part of it is, is being patient and making sure you're buying the right deal. That's always the case, right? It feels like you have less reason to try to just do more deals, right? There for a while, like it felt like 2022, 2023, everybody had a goal. I'm gonna flip 50 houses. I'm gonna flip a 100 houses. And it was like, yes, Steve's flipping a 100 houses this year. It made sense, right? You're like, I wouldn't wanna do that, but like that's what he's doing and he'll be fine. But that today does not seem like a goal you should have.

Mike DeHaan: [24:34] It's definitely shifted more towards like a quality game versus a quantity game.

Dylan Koch: [24:37] Yeah. Yep. I think that's a lot of facets. I mean, was not just creative finance, the BRRRR, whole BRRRR strategy was romanticized there for a very long time, which is a lot harder to do today. No investing, people flipping dirt, like, of the niches, I feel like, got very popular. Unless it's just my own algorithm. It's like, okay. He's not interested in this stuff anymore.

Mike DeHaan: [24:53] Yeah. It's still out there because people tell me about it all the time on social media that goes to the show and different things. Like, what's your opinion on this guy?

Dan Austin: [25:00] I'm like, don't

Mike DeHaan: [25:01] have never heard of this guy. I look him up. They have 87,000 followers. I'm like, what?

Dan Austin: [25:05] Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of that out there. You're

Mike DeHaan: [25:07] right. Yeah. But but then also too, you look at it, and the reels have, like, 1,200 views. I'm like, okay. So you bought 80,000 of your 87,000 followers.

Dan Austin: [25:15] Totally.

Mike DeHaan: [25:15] I don't know. It's so hard to tell reality right now and who's actually successful. Because, I mean, we see this on the loan side too. We have people that come through. There are big names. They have holdings. All kinds of stuff. They have no money. They have 35 properties, but they have no cash. I'm like, what are you doing? That's the stories

Dan Austin: [25:32] all the time with real estate investors, though. It's Right? Yeah.

Mike DeHaan: [25:35] It's just a stupid place to be.

Dylan Koch: [25:37] But the thing is is, like, those people historically would have gotten bailed out because interest rates went down for basically forty years. So they could always refinance on a higher value, pull out some cash, it's tax free. And that was their money. You can't really do that right now. So to answer your main question, Dan, of like what people are doing and the timing part of it, if I had to put my pure investor hat on and say, what are the probabilities going forward? I'm still underwriting for prices to slightly go down if I'm looking at a flip or a refi on rental, Whereas other people aren't. So I lose out on a lot of deals still, but like, and that might happen. Those people that outbid me might still make money, but there will become a time where it does flip and then they get screwed and I'm still be left standing.

Mike DeHaan: [26:21] Yeah. You're still standing. And it'll wipe out all their gains. We saw this firsthand in '21 when Dan and I was being competition here. We would look at all these wholetail deals that they were doing. Yeah. And they would be buying these deals that were, like, way too high priced, these pieces of probably. They would just list them on the market as is and make, like, $30. This over and over and over again. We sit there and watch them, like, should we do that? I don't know if we should. Mean, we never we never moved from our principles. They lost multi 7 figures when the market collapsed in '22 and '23. Yep. So all that money they made just disappeared, you know, and then some. And so it's like the sustainability in business, I'd say, you mature as an entrepreneur, you really start to realize how rare that is. You know? And anybody can make a quick buck, but to make recurring bucks over even, like, five or six years is really hard to do and not very common.

Dylan Koch: [27:11] Right.

Mike DeHaan: [27:11] No. That's in that's in any business.

Dylan Koch: [27:13] Yeah. There's a well known flipper here that texted me this morning asking for, like, a loan, and she sent me all the details. I was like, so long story short, it's here. It's like, if things go very according to plan on a 300,000 ARV, you're gonna make 22,500. If things go exactly as you planned. Yeah. Like, I'm not funding that loan. Like, yeah, sorry.

Dan Austin: [27:33] They can't go exactly they won't go exactly as they're planning. It never does. Yeah. Nothing ever does. Interesting. So the next question I would have then when I'm asking this, because I know Dylan will have a good answer. Know Mike, you will too. But I was thinking about this the other day. Mike had actually talked a little bit about the stock market, like equities and stuff like that.

Mike DeHaan: [27:48] Oh god. Is fam

Dylan Koch: [27:50] Well, I I have a a separate thing, but go on. Sorry. It was

Dan Austin: [27:53] like the index fund and mutual fund investing is, like, dead, and now do you, like, need to be just buying individual stocks? And should you have some exposure?

Dylan Koch: [28:01] And yolo ing into them?

Dan Austin: [28:02] Yeah. Not even yolo ing. Like, don't I don't mean that at all. I mean, like, we've all kind of at least, like, millennials and stuff have been kind of beaten into us of, just get the s and p five buy the s and p 500. But we're finding out, and we've known we've talked about this on the pod a couple times. It's not the S and P 500, it's S and P seven, right? They're dragging everybody up. Companies that are seeing meteoric rises are different than the, honestly, the Mag seven. And there's a lot of opportunity out there because of AI. And I, my belief is that AI is dragging the economy along with it. And I don't think that's a bad thing. I just think that's how much money is getting invested in AI and how much growth. And there's it's more than just capital markets at play here. It has to do with, geopolitics about this whole thing. Right? China, US, all this stuff. So I think there's more to it. That's why I say that. But can you pick four or five, like, solid fundamentals, companies, and stocks? And should you pick that so that you can not have to basically be poor by investing in the S and P five hundred? Because to me that feels like you're almost even lose, not just keeping up with inflation, but maybe losing ground with inflation.

Dylan Koch: [29:06] It's a long winded response. But my general consensus would be if you invest in the S and P five hundred now, whether it be VOO or any of the other indices that track it, history would tell you that now is not a good entry point. In fact, the returns over the next ten years are like zero to 1%. If history repeats itself, because of where their valuations are relative to their earnings.

Dan Austin: [29:28] Okay. When you say there, are you saying like the

Dylan Koch: [29:30] max Like S and P 500 in general. And like that's an aggregate.

Dan Austin: [29:33] The indices. Yeah. Okay.

Dylan Koch: [29:35] But picking individual stocks is still very hard. You're still going against people who do this for a living, who are very smart.

Dan Austin: [29:42] Yeah.

Dylan Koch: [29:42] Who still aren't, you know, a lot of them still lose. Like, think that 8020 principle still applies even to money managers and stock pickers. Where I'm putting my money outside of real estate and obviously Bitcoin, you guys know I have holdings there, is indices, but in emerging markets, things that have better valuations. And so like this would be Central America. There's some European exposure. Japan actually has some decent exposure. But that's still the industry, but it doesn't track the S and P 500. It tracks something that has a better valuation at this current moment in time.

Dan Austin: [30:12] Yeah. I hate that. A 100%.

Mike DeHaan: [30:13] You hate it?

Dan Austin: [30:14] I hate that. Not that you're doing it. I hate the I just if you're gonna bet on on a country or a continent, I'm definitely betting on North America, not South America.

Dylan Koch: [30:23] I think that's just a bad take.

Dan Austin: [30:26] No. I've had a hard enough time understanding what would be a good stock to pick in The US. How the hell am I gonna go and invest in Asia?

Dylan Koch: [30:33] That's why you pick the the broad indices. Not that way you pick individual companies.

Dan Austin: [30:37] I don't like it. I think the personal belief, I think that The US has the best shot and the best chance to come out of, like, the next several years as the leading economy.

Dylan Koch: [30:48] I would caveat that with economy doesn't necessarily equal stock market gains. Like Correct. They can be correlated, but they could still have wide divergences at time.

Dan Austin: [30:57] Yeah. That's a good point. But I I I still think I'm betting on America, not South America.

Mike DeHaan: [31:02] I'm just gonna put all my money in Polymarket at this point.

Dan Austin: [31:04] It's a good deal if you have insider information.

Mike DeHaan: [31:06] Let's look it. What should I put how much money should I put on let's see. What's a good one in here?

Dylan Koch: [31:12] I'm trying to log in to my Elon Musk. Robin Hooding.

Mike DeHaan: [31:14] Is Elon Musk gonna have more or less than a 180 tweets by the end of this weekend?

Dan Austin: [31:21] I don't know because I don't track his tweets. But Well, exactly.

Mike DeHaan: [31:24] But if we can figure that out, we can make six to one returns by the end of the weekend.

Dan Austin: [31:29] Yeah. See? Now that I For Brian. I am not denying that polymarket is a good opportunity right now if you in fact have insider information. If you don't have insider information, it's a scam and you're on the losing end of the pyramid scheme.

Dylan Koch: [31:39] Well, you know, there's like high frequency traders, like the citadels that rip off retail investors, like with like the Robinhoods and stuff. You don't think that's happening on Polymarket? Of course it is.

Dan Austin: [31:47] Oh. Obviously.

Mike DeHaan: [31:49] There's a guy going to jail

Dan Austin: [31:50] for the for the raids down in Venice in Well, with

Mike DeHaan: [31:53] the whole thing, you don't have to wait for the outcome either. Basically, as the Oh, you can sell your positions. As the chances change, you can sell your positions. And so there's absolutely people that do that.

Dan Austin: [32:01] So I think part of the American market too. Okay. I did a quick Google search because I couldn't remember if the and I don't know if this is the same quote I was quoting, but according to Google, 32% of The US economy is people's 401ks, which are not they're owned by individual investors, but not traded. So whatever these big vanguards and stuff want to happen, they control a third of the economy based Or on stock I should say a third of the stock market.

Mike DeHaan: [32:27] That's such an interesting thing I actually never really thought about before is you have this huge value that is locked into the market that essentially is never like, isn't gonna be sold for the next little while. And then even when it when they get to, like, retirement, it's only gonna get sold at, like, a slower cadence. They're never gonna be liquidated all at once. It's just not something that'll happen.

Dylan Koch: [32:48] Mhmm. There's a guy out there. His name is Mike Green. He's a hedge fund manager, went to Wharton, very astute guy. But he has a whole theory around retirement accounts and their quote unquote passive bid for the market and how that is the most influential factor in markets because of how big they are and the volume that they control. Because especially the people who are have all the demographically the older people, right? And so if they're just like in these target date funds or buying the S and P 500, they have automatic bids every single paycheck into the stock market and it's market weighted. So it's just a feedback loop on itself. So he's like, there is a point where once these boomers start dying and they're, they basically sell or there's not necessarily selling, but less buying, then if that trend reverses, like it could be trouble, but it could still be five to seven years away.

Mike DeHaan: [33:35] That is interesting.

Dan Austin: [33:36] Yeah. I think that that's interesting because then, yeah, what, where does the money go? Does it, here's a good way to look at it. I guess the way I'm thinking about it is, is so you have all these boomers that are probably hitting their, what do they call it? Where they RMDs? RMDs. Yeah. Where you have to sell and and pull your money out and pay the taxes. So you're probably seeing a wave of that. But then if they die, then it goes to their kids regardless. And I mean, the government's gonna get their taxes no matter what, but like the kids are just gonna spend the money or invest it. So does that just go right back into the economy in two different ways? It either goes in by consumption or it goes in through investment.

Dylan Koch: [34:10] But then it's going into the economy, not necessarily the stock market.

Dan Austin: [34:13] That's true.

Mike DeHaan: [34:14] Yeah.

Dylan Koch: [34:14] So I would say that's a net positive. But the companies that

Dan Austin: [34:17] you buy shit from, like, you go and buy your Tesla, then Elon's talk stock goes up. He gets more rich.

Mike DeHaan: [34:21] I mean, at the end of it, there's so much of the wealth between four zero one k's, stocks, housing, that's held by that higher age bracket, you know, that boomer age bracket. Like, eventually, that's gonna shift somewhere. And, like, there's been this talk forever, like, the silver tsunami sort of, like, happening all at once. Those people are all rapidly approaching the age where they are gonna start dying here if they haven't already. And so that speed's gonna pick up in that Yeah. Transfer. And that'll be really interesting to see what that does because it's going to there are gonna be a ton of people that, like, are our age or, you know, a little bit older that maybe haven't done that well for themselves. Saying, like, they're in their fifties and they're like, they have a comfortable lifestyle, but all of a sudden they get a surplus of wealth. It'll be fascinating to see if they choose to spend it or they choose to invest it. Because I I mean, if you think about it, if you were somebody that's like 55, your parents died, they were in their nineties, they leave you like $5,000,000. Yeah. Why are you gonna just reinvest it at that point at 55? Are you gonna go and do all the shit that you didn't do for the last thirty years as an adult?

Dylan Koch: [35:25] Oh, probably not.

Dan Austin: [35:26] Oh, yeah. You're gonna definitely go have some fun, especially if you're a millennial that didn't do that well, like you're saying. Yeah. Totally. I think ever since, which wasn't that long ago, maybe twenty years ago, nah, fifteen years ago, I learned that the millennial generation or I guess the baby boomer generation was the biggest in history. And then the millennials is the actual biggest in history, right? Like after them, like where is the new biggest in history. So then we've been buying houses while baby boomers have kept and owned their house and then maybe had a second home. Right?

Mike DeHaan: [35:56] Mhmm.

Dan Austin: [35:57] So we've had to build the housing stock to fit the two biggest generations. And you have gen x kind of in there, and you have gen z, and you'll have whatever follow on generations. I don't think that people are having big families. I think the reason why baby boomers and millennials had the two largest is because you have the largest generation who had babies. Right? And they had multiple babies. Right? Well, now the younger generations are having one kid or two kids or less or no kids. So as those two generations, as the baby boomers die off, the millennials already have the house they need, right? Maybe they move around a little bit. They already have the house. What are gonna do with all the extra houses?

Mike DeHaan: [36:32] Yeah. It's just a numbers game. And the real estate question for a while, you know, and there's there also isn't the desire for the same style of housing that baby boomers wanted. No. No.

Dan Austin: [36:41] Yeah. Yeah. People wanna be a little bit more mobile. People like, how many baby boomers do you know that moved like every five to seven years? I don't know No, dude. But millennials? That's me. I've literally this the house I'm in now, I've been in this house six years, longest time I've ever lived in any single spot.

Mike DeHaan: [36:55] Oh, yeah. My parents bought the house that I grew up in in like 1989. And they still live there. Yeah. My parents too. Yeah. My wife's parents,

Dan Austin: [37:03] your parents, my parents, like, same.

Dylan Koch: [37:05] Yep. You guys, remember, like, in 2021, this is going back to the stock market thing. Everyone's like, if I just would put $5 into fart coin, right, I would've I would've retired or whatever. Well, lately, there's two stocks that have gone like vertical. Micron, which is like the data Yeah. Memory one.

Dan Austin: [37:21] That's in our neck of the woods.

Dylan Koch: [37:22] I pulled up my Robinhood account. I bought 42 shares at $36.31. If I would have kept it, big if. It's like

Dan Austin: [37:31] 400 now?

Dylan Koch: [37:32] It's at 934. It's a 20 x So it would have be that $1,700 would have turned into $40. But I sold it forever ago.

Mike DeHaan: [37:41] Yeah. I'm actually looking. I I remember buying Micron in 2014 on my TD Ameritrade account.

Dan Austin: [37:49] Yeah. 2014? For a little bit too.

Dylan Koch: [37:51] That's funny.

Mike DeHaan: [37:52] Yeah. I'm trying to see, like, when that was

Dylan Koch: [37:54] Other one was AMD.

Mike DeHaan: [37:55] Email still.

Dylan Koch: [37:57] AMD, I bought at hold on. Here is this. $5.83 a share. It's at $5.20 now. So that's another 10 x. But I sold these forever ago, like, because I was broken. I was in college. But the what if kind of thing.

Mike DeHaan: [38:11] Yeah. Yeah. I can't find I don't even think this email exists anymore. I probably have one somewhere. But, I mean, I whatever the price was in back then, I remember I had $20, and I was just, like, trading silly socks with it. Micron was one of them. I remember Nvidia too.

Dylan Koch: [38:24] Yep.

Mike DeHaan: [38:24] Because, like, that was something that I recognized because I was a nerd and was into games. And I'm like, oh, they make chips. But the problem is is you're so shortsighted at that point. I'd sold a lot of it because, like, it went up, like, 10% or whatever.

Dylan Koch: [38:35] Yeah. And at that point, was like, I need some money for beer. Like, you know, was 19, 20 years old. And so it's just so much different.

Mike DeHaan: [38:41] I just needed money to freaking pay my rent. You know, do whatever else I was doing.

Dylan Koch: [38:46] See, Nvidia had five shares at 46.0. I just, I should have not done real estate. I just should have picked these stocks and

Dan Austin: [38:52] Honestly, yeah.

Dylan Koch: [38:53] Dicked around for ten years.

Mike DeHaan: [38:54] Yeah. I'm sure it could have would have. You know, I always think that too if I'd started buying houses back when I was 25 and twenty fifteen, how much money more money I could have made. But also the things that you did before you started doing that was kind of what got you to that decision. So what I'm trying to say.

Dylan Koch: [39:10] Yeah. Yeah.

Mike DeHaan: [39:11] Can't change the past, so don't dwell on it.

Dylan Koch: [39:14] Thanks for the life advice there, Mike.

Mike DeHaan: [39:16] Thank you. There you go. Cool. Right on, guys. Anything else here to wrap up?

Dylan Koch: [39:20] I'm good.

Dan Austin: [39:21] Good to go.

Mike DeHaan: [39:21] Alright. Cool. Thanks for listening, everybody. You guys have a great week. I'll talk you guys next time. This episode is sponsored by Sir Lenzalot LLC, also known as SLA Capital, which, if you didn't know, is Dan and I's private lending company. So, yes, we are sponsoring our own show, but what you're do about it? It is our private lending company that offers hard money and DSCR loans to real estate investors of all types. So you can be a new investor, an experienced investor. You can be buying flips. You can be buying rentals, whatever. We can do everything. And not only that, but the rates that we offer are just as competitive, if not cheaper, than pretty much every other company out there. So whatever big company you've been working with, bring us their term sheets, I guarantee that we can probably beat it. We have the same connections they do. We just don't have all the overhead and middlemen. So if you wanna come and check us out, go to slacapital.com/keys, and I will know that you came from the show. And by seeing that you came from here, when you get the closing, you will save $500 on your first loan with us. So slacapital.com/keys, we would love to fund your next deal. Thanks for listening, everyone.

Mike DeHaan: [40:22] If you want more from us, you can shoot us a follow on Instagram. I am at Mike underscore Invest. Dan is at investor man. Dan and Dylan is at Dylan underscore does underscore deals. Choose to follow and send us a DM to let us know what you think of the show.