[00:00:06] Mike: Hey everybody, it’s Mike with Insider Secrets. Thanks for joining in here today. My guest on Insider Secrets this week is going to be Bronson Hill. Hey Bronson, welcome to this show. And would you please tell our listeners what they’re going to be able to hear today on the show?

[00:00:20] Bronson: Sure, Mike, thanks so much for having me. This is a great time with you just talking about the power of focusing in your real estate career. How do you scale? How do you go from doing single family or hosting or other things to be able to raise millions of dollars? We talked a bit about how to raise money. We have a couple of deals we’re working on right now and just the confidence going in knowing that I can raise millions of dollars based on the scale and how to do that. So I think this episode just talks a lot about how you do that. How do you find the right partners? How do you bring value to the multi-family deals that you’re working with? But I think anybody watching this is just going to get great value out of our conversation and of course your [00:01:00] amazing experience as well. So I think it’s gonna be great.

[00:01:02] Mike: Yeah. And you’re going to have to tune in and listen to the rest of this because this show today will knock your socks off.

[00:01:10] Kristen: Welcome to this week’s edition of Insider Secrets. The show that turns multifamily investing into reality. Each show we interview guests who are seasoned professionals, actively closing and managing real estate deals. Your host Mike Morawski has more than 30 years of multifamily, real estate investing and property management experience.

[00:01:32] Mike is the founder of My Core Intentions. And he’s been involved in over $285 million of transactions. Focuses on helping you create short term cashflow and long-term wealth. Here’s your host, Mike.  

[00:01:48] Mike: Hey everybody, and welcome back. It’s Mike, your host of Insider Secrets, and that’s brought to you by My Core Intentions. And I always like to ask you, are you thinking about your intentions? And what are you being [00:02:00] intentional about today, specifically? If you had to stop right now, just think about where you’re at in your life personally or where you’re at in your life business-wise? Because, I always say that your life in your business doesn’t change till you change personally. So I always want to see where you’re at and what your intentions. So did you get up this morning and decide what you were going to do? I hope you did, because that’s what really helps fire your day up.

[00:02:24] I know this morning when I got up and I was intentional about my podcast today and the people that I was going to reach out to and talk to. It just makes your day go so much smoother. And I’m excited about today. My guest today is Bronson Hill. Bronson, would you say hi to everybody?

[00:02:40] Bronson: Hey Mike, really excited to be here with you and your crowd here. So it’d be great.

[00:02:44] Mike: Yeah, I’m glad that you’re here, Bronson. And Bronson, you and I have had an opportunity to get to know each other over the last month or six weeks or so, and really have followed what you’ve been doing. But let me just give everybody a little bit of insight. Bronson understands the investor mindset.

[00:02:59] And he’s spoken individually over the phone with over a thousand investors and he’s raised over $15 million for real estate deals while he’s been doing that. And what’s really even more interesting Bronson, I think that you said you did that in about a 22 month period, right?

[00:03:17] Bronson: Yeah, that sounds about right. Yeah. Basically in a short period of time and just being able to scale fairly quickly to our last deal, we raised $8 million in 24 hours.

[00:03:26] Mike: Yeah. So this is really what we’re going to dig into today is private equity. But through his equity investment company, Bronson equity, he controls over $60 million in multifamily assets.

[00:03:38] Bronson runs a large in-person multifamily meetup group in Pasadena, California. So if you’re ever in Pasadena, you could go meet with them. But that’s called FIBI Pasadena multifamily. And Bronson is the author of the single best investment strategy book during or after a pandemic and is a [00:04:00] regular contributor to YouTube and on bigger pockets.

[00:04:03] Bronson, welcome to the show.

[00:04:05] Bronson: Thanks, man. Yeah, really excited to be with you guys, excited for this conversation. I know with your experience, Mike, it’ll be a good time and we’re looking forward to getting into it.

[00:04:13] Mike: I was thinking when I was reading your highlights, I was thinking, wow, Bronson raised 15 million in 24 months and I raised 18 million in 30 months. Man, we could be dangerous together. Hey, here’s the first question I always like to ask my guests for my listeners is in one word, describe yourself business-wise and personally, too. What one word describes you?

[00:04:35] Bronson: I would say focused.

[00:04:37] Mike: Okay.

[00:04:38] Bronson: Yeah. I’d say the reason for that is just that I feel like I’m a very value centered person and I like to live from a place of, what is really most important. And I’ve realized as I’ve wanted to do things such as raise money for real estate or spend or travel and go on trips and have experiences. These things require quite a bit of focus. You can’t do everything, right? So you [00:05:00] have to really limit what you’re able to do and focus, I think what really helps people to do great things.

[00:05:06] Mike: Boy. That’s interesting. It almost sounds like you have been able to put the shiny objects syndrome to shame.

[00:05:15] Bronson: Oh, I wish I could say that it’s totally done. It happens all the time. I’m actually a guy that has an idea a minute. And it’s been sad I never met a tangent I didn’t like, so that’s been challenging for me, and I think for a lot of entrepreneurs is we have so many ideas, right?

[00:05:28] There’s so many things we could do. We could do this, we could do that. And our eyes are bigger than our stomach, but I think really what it comes down to is this idea of there’s a book called “Good to Great” by Jim Collins, which is a phenomenal book, if somebody hasn’t read it. And there’s this principle in there called the hedgehog principle, and it’s the idea of doing the same thing again and again, day in day out over a long period of time, that’s really how people and companies become successful. Because if you jump to this and you’re like, I’m going to be real estate, I’m going to do wholesaling and I’m going to do multifamily. I’m going to do single family. I’m going to do this. I’m going to vacate.

[00:05:58] You really can’t do everything. There’s a lot of great ideas, but at the end of the day, you have to focus in and say, what is it I want to do? What do I want to hang my hat? And what is it do I want to become really good at it?

[00:06:08] Mike: Yeah. Boy, I’m glad you brought that book up because I think that’s probably one of the best books I read over the years.

[00:06:15] And I’ve probably read like 1500 books in the last 25 years. I like that hedgehog principle, I always have. Because it’s like, what are you really good at? And can you focus on that one thing? So, I’m just going to sidetrack for a minute.

[00:06:28] I was probably three years in the real estate business and somebody said to me, Hey, Morawski, you are so tenacious. And I said, Okay, great. Thank you. Very graciously, I just accepted that, not knowing what the word meant. Went home, grabbed my dictionary and I said, Oh, tenacious. That’s exactly what I am because I continually follow up. I’m focused.

[00:06:48] So if I was going after a listing to sell, I would continually follow up with that seller till they either listed their property or they died. Or if I was raising money, I [00:07:00] followed up with those people until they finished that commitment. I think that you have to have that. Hey, so let’s talk about your backstory.

[00:07:08]I just kind of gave some highlights about you. Fill some blanks in, tell us where you came from and how you wound up in this crazy space?

[00:07:14] Bronson: Yeah. It’s interesting how we get where we are and how things happened, I didn’t plan to say I’m going to take the route that I’ve gone and go into multifamily.

[00:07:21] And I wish I’d figured it out a little sooner, but we all get there when we get there. And I think that’s what’s important. And there’s a saying when the student is ready, the teacher appears, so having friends and mentors, and I think life is a great teacher to show us if we’re open to it, to really learn from people that have been successful.

[00:07:36] For me, my background is I had done medical consulting and medical sales for years. Went into surgery, working with doctors, all kinds of different heart surgical stuff. And then I basically started buying single family houses with a relative and got a small single family portfolio in a couple of different States.

[00:07:52] And basically I have this cousin who is more of a distant cousin. I told him I plan to buy 30 houses in the Cleveland area. I think I just had a few at that point, but to buy 30 houses and to retire with, quote unquote passive income. And so he’s a real estate guy. He does a lot of multifamily and he said, that’s an interesting idea, but it sounds like a lot of work.

[00:08:10] He said, why don’t you do multifamily? And I said, I’d love to, but I don’t have the money. And he said, you can raise the money. And so he started telling me a little bit of his story and come to find out he had, 1400 units and just big time success within multi-family in the last 25 years.

[00:08:25] He’s not really in the syndication world, but he’s kind of gone at it another way. And so he said, check out this book and go to these couple events and you read this, just basically do all these different things. And I ended up doing all that. I ended up starting a meetup.

[00:08:37] I ended up just going, jumping in with both feet and really diving into the deep end of the pool. And I found myself interacting with some really successful people. It was interesting with my sales background, I found that where I really fit was working with people. I could talk to people all the time.

[00:08:52] And so I basically found a partner who was involved in multifamily, but wasn’t really scaling the way they could. And I approached them and said, Hey [00:09:00] what if we created something together? And we did this together and we were able to scale that up very quickly to raise a lot of money.

[00:09:07] So I think the interesting thing about my story really is that more than anything else, and this is a change for a lot of people. I think somebody’s listening and think I do wholesaling, or I do flipping or whatever, but multifamily, in order to scale, it’s a team sport, right?

[00:09:21] You can’t do it yourself. You can’t do everything. If you try to do everything, you’re going to be stuck. You think, Oh I’ve been doing single families, I got to do a duplex or I’ve got to do a 10 unit. I was like, my first multi-family deal after doing these single families was 225 units in Texas. And I raised a small amount of money for a deal and feeling, Oh my gosh, that’s a huge jump, how could you do that? But the issue is, you don’t have to do every part of the deal and you don’t use it. Sometimes I have to raise all the money. You can find a deal, you can operate, but just this idea of almost like a puzzle, you bring the pieces together to help this happen.

[00:09:49] And if you’re willing to learn, amazing things can happen. So that’s kind of my story is just, I’m a quick learner. I work hard and I just felt like there was a lot of value here. I had some good mentors and you get jumped in with both feet and went for [00:10:00] it.

[00:10:00] Mike: So that’s interesting. And I think this is why you and I connect because you say so many things that I believe in and this is what I teach and what my philosophy is too. So I’m really grateful that you’re on the show because my listeners are going to get what you have to say now and go, Oh man, Mike’s right.

[00:10:16] Some of the things like team sport, it’s a team sport. We can’t do any of this ourselves. As small as this industry is, or as large as this industry is, it’s very small. It’s a very knit community, and it’s everybody knows everybody. And even if you don’t know somebody, you can go to somebody and get help or ask for direction, which I think is really cool.

[00:10:34] So let’s talk about raising money, right? Bronson, you don’t know anybody, you come into the space, you’re going to go raise money. You raise money for a 225 unit deal. Who do you go to? Who do you talk to first out of the gate?

[00:10:49] Bronson: So yeah, this is really an interesting question because a lot of people wonder, how do I transition from single family? How do I transition from flipping or wholesaling or other things? How do I do this? How am I just going to go raise money? And so there’s a couple of things that I did initially, and I think I recommend everybody do these things. The first thing was to basically start a MailChimp account or some sort of email account where you can add all your friends and family on there, and you can have kind of a drip campaign, just meaning they get an email every day or every week for a short period of time.

[00:11:20] Just to let them know what you’re doing or what you’re learning about, because if you’re not full-time in real estate or even if you are, and you’re a flipper or you’re a real estate agent, or that people know you. As for me, it was a medical sales Bronson, they knew me as that, they didn’t know me as real estate Bronson, they knew me as something else. So if somebody is a doctor or they’re a teacher or they do something else, they know you people know you as that. So the important thing is you start telling your story. So I started doing that. My first investor actually did not come from my friends or family, which is unique.

[00:11:47] I actually had started this meetup through a mentor of mine who ran a general real estate meetup in Pasadena. It was very successful, been doing it for eight years and she has been a mentor of mine. And I said, Hey, what if we started a multifamily meetup? And we just did it every month at a different time, we hadn’t just focused only on multi-family.

[00:12:06] She said, okay, sure. So I basically came in and said I’ll help set up and do all this work. You always helped me, but I’ll really run this thing. And so in that meeting there were maybe 50 or 60 people that showed up the first time at the first meeting because of this network because of this group.

[00:12:19] So at that first meeting, I met a guy who said, Hey, I’d be interested in investing with you Bronson. Because again, what happens is when you start a meetup and that’s another thing I suggest that every person does is start a some sort of meetup. Obviously in COVID it can be a little tricky, but at some way be able to start some sort of meetup because people see you as a leader in that space. So here at that point, I hadn’t done any deal yet in multi-family, I’d done other real estate, but this guy says, Hey, I would invest in one of your deals. So I basically went and got coffee with him. I had a sample deal that I presented to him. He said, Oh, I’d be interested.

[00:12:47] I’d probably invest a hundred thousand into that deal. And then I basically had also met somebody else who was a syndicator who had a deal who was looking for money. And I basically introduced the two of those people. And so then I basically raised a small amount of [00:13:00] money for a deal and was able to get into my first deal.

[00:13:03] And you can say that was just a small start. Why is that even significant? It was only, it was 3% or it was a small percentage of the total raise, but it got me some experience. And there’s a huge difference between somebody who talks about real estate and someone who’s actually doing deals.

[00:13:15] A lot of people just talk a big game, but they don’t do anything. So the biggest thing I think is just to get your first deal done, to get involved somehow to find that value. So again, the two things are really start some sort of email campaign, friends and family. You can add people to very simple or just even if you’re going to events and you’re learning.

[00:13:32] And the second thing is to create a meetup or start some sort of thing that adds value to people that you can really bring people into.

[00:13:39] Mike: What’s funny is I come from a family that doesn’t have any money. Doesn’t have any interest in real estate investing. Doesn’t want to do any of that anyhow. And so I had to go outside that box, and my friends and some of my friends, but the one question that I always ask people, and I’m sure that you can relate to this, who else do you know? Because it’s in the follow-up it’s and it’s in the referral, isn’t it? I like what you said though, about having a MailChimp account and I equate social media that to this today, but let people know what you’re doing, but more importantly, let people know what you’re learning.

[00:14:17] So isn’t that a great concept though? Hey, already this morning on this podcast with you, I’ve learned a couple of things that I’ve written down that, and I’m like, wow, that makes a lot of sense. So what are you learning that you can convey to somebody else? So Bronson, so tell me how involved you were and you are today on the general partnership side or the limited partnership side?

[00:14:42] Bronson: Yeah. So I’m both. I did start passive investing years ago, both, do some single family, which was a little more active. And then I got involved in some passive investing in multifamily as well. But as far as the properties that we’re doing and the 800 plus units, the four properties, mostly in the South. I’m very involved as far as asset management. I basically am on the asset management calls. Now my primary role is not asset management, which can really be described as managing the property manager and really making sure the property performs.

[00:15:11] So again, own thing a lot of people that’s what they focus on. A lot of people that are really good operators really focus on that. They’ve got great relationships, they’ve got great vendors. They’re able to make sure those things will happen. To me, really my focus, and like we talked about team is really working with investors.

[00:15:28] My passion really is to help busy professionals to discover truly passive income. Because a lot of people think, Oh, I’m going to become financially free and then go buy a rental house or two or five or 10. Literally I’ve talked to people on 10 or more rental houses, and then they think, this is a lot of work or they start buying small multi-families and think, gosh, I’m a doctor, I’m doing this other stuff.

[00:15:47] And I’m answering these calls for toilets, or maybe I have a property manager, but it’s still a lot of work. And so that’s the thing I talked to a lot of people about is just if you can’t scale your real estate or it sounds overwhelming, you’re not really in a passive investment. So a lot of what I do now is educating people and really being a consultant to try to help them to put money in this other bucket, which I call passive income that the ACH deposits come in and basically it’s diligence on the front end.

[00:16:12] And then after that, it’s completely passive. I think that’s really the area that I’ve found that for me has been the most value and that I like to share with people.

[00:16:19] Mike: So let me ask you this, let’s say that you are a passive investor and you don’t want to be involved in the day-to-day activities or putting a deal together, but you have some money that you want to invest passively. What’s the best way to vet a sponsor?

[00:16:37] Bronson: Yeah, that’s a good question. I think for passive investors, a lot of people it can be a little intimidating. For me, when I first discovered it, it seemed like how are people like investing with somebody that they don’t know? They’re in another state, it can feel this little weird, like how does this work, is this a scam?

[00:16:50] I really wanted all this stuff. But I think the biggest thing you can do is really look for reputation. A lot of times, like you mentioned that a lot of the multifamily syndication world is pretty small. Everybody knows everybody and reputation gets out.

[00:17:03] So things like bigger pockets. You can basically see if this person is out there putting themselves out there quite a bit, over time they develop a reputation. So if you can get to know other passive investors, that’s very helpful. There are some forums online where people chat and they talk about different groups to invest with.

[00:17:19] I think, there’s things that really good operators do is the first thing is that typically they’re very conservative, so they don’t come in and say, Hey, we have this, blow it out of the water. Everything’s going to go perfectly in this deal. I love Warren buffet as an investor and as a philosophy, the philosophy he uses and he uses this term called margin of safety.

[00:17:35] So you should, if an operator comes in and it’s man, these numbers look outrageous and there’s way better than anybody else, any other deals, I’m looking at? It’s maybe, they’re being a little overly aggressive. And so when you look at numbers, such as what is the rent growth assumptions, if you’re assuming that Dallas is going to grow at 5% rent growth per year, as it has for the last five to 10 years. I personally don’t think that’s very conservative.

[00:17:56] I think we should use a lower figure, like two to 3%, right? Because what that does is that says, Hey, even if things don’t perform the way we want to see how this deal is going to do, or what is the cap rate when someone’s exiting? So those are a couple things on the underwriting.

[00:18:08] And the other thing is obviously the track record of the experience if they started this, and this is their first deal or their second deal, or it’s been a year, maybe it needs a little more time, but if they’ve been doing this for three, five, 10 years, been through some sort of a cycle, have some exits things like that, you can see assume this is a pretty established operator. They have quite a few units they’ve really been able to scale here.

[00:18:27] Mike: Yeah. And operators are interesting, right? When I first went in the business, I went into business because I followed a company and I watched a company inland real estate that for high school teacher bought their first four unit multi-family building 40 years ago.

[00:18:44] And today they’re the largest REIT in the world. Simple model, raise private money, marry it with a great real estate deal and stay in the middle as long as everything goes okay, everybody does well. And they’re in every asset class today. So you never know, and you and I both know plenty of operators that have been doing this and are just growing and growing as a result of it.

[00:19:05] And it’s a fun business. It’s a good business. There’s a lot to learn. Let me ask you though, how do you make tough decisions? So I’m sure that you are faced or operators are faced with choices and decisions that they need to make in their business, in their life personally and professionally could be an ethical type dilemma or a business decision. How do you calculate those in your own mind?

[00:19:32] Bronson: Yeah that’s a good question. Cause life is not cookie cutter and black and white and things don’t happen very ideally all the time. There’s a lot of gray area and a lot of things that happens, like what we could do this, or we could do that or I’m not quite sure what to do in this situation.

[00:19:44] And so obviously the power of mentors are really helpful and that’s why I am newer in the general sense, I’ve been a real estate investor active and passive over 15 years, but multifamily, it’s the last several years. I’m a little newer to that side. I’m okay saying that because I’m not actually the one doing the operations.

[00:20:00] I’ve got other group people that have been doing this for a very long time. And so I partner in those ways, but I think it’s really important that you work on deals that you are very conservative and particularly when you have investors, I think communication is very important.

[00:20:14] And I think it takes a lot. It’s very challenging. It takes some humility, Ken McElroy, who’s a famous real estate investor. He says, when you deliver bad news, it develops trust. So like the idea of Hey, you know what? We had something happen on the property and this is the consequences of it.

[00:20:32] And we’re not gonna be able to pay a distribution this quarter. That’s something that no operator wants to share. We don’t want to share that. We don’t want to share something bad is happening, but what happens is it gives people the sense that you’re not positioning yourself or trying to just make things sound better than they are. Because the worst thing as an investor, when you look at the eyes of, if you’re active in real estate, how the investor looks at it is if you have 50 or a hundred thousand dollars in a deal, the worst thing that can happen is all of a sudden a sponsor stops communicating or something bad is happening, and the sponsors just not talking about it or it goes underground or it comes out later, it comes out a year or two later. Oh, by the way, all this stuff happened. And I think that really it comes down one of the biggest things I think it’s important, it’s just, how would I want to be treated in this?

[00:21:13] How would I want to be communicated with? And we’re never going to do it perfectly. But I think when we have that approach and we can just be very transparent and say, Hey, here’s what happened. Here’s what we’re doing to take care of it. Do you have any feedback or questions we’re here and just the communication.

[00:21:27] So I think that’s a way that it takes some of the pressure off that, Hey, we’re not gonna be perfect that these deals, they go better than expected. They go worse than expected in the same deal, in different areas. So it’s just kind of this, you hope it, it matches out, but it’s not so clear that it’s this black and white.

[00:21:40] This is what we do here in this situation. It’s like you’re constantly learning and growing and trying to move on from what you’ve got. And that’s why the mentors and the learning is so important.

[00:21:50] Mike: Yeah, there’s no doubt about that. And I think that a lot of it comes down to comfortability with the sponsor, with everybody else that’s involved. Because in a lot of these deals today, it’s not just cut and dry where you have the general partner and the limited partners. But you’ve got a lot of moving parts where you’ve got the general partner, a KP somebody bring in balance sheet to the table, somebody bringing experience to the table. So you’ve got a lot of people involved in a lot of moving parts. How does that work from a reporting point of view? When you have a team that’s sizable like that, you’re the money guy bringing the equity to the table. How do you want to be communicated with by the sponsor? And then how do you disseminate that information to your investors?

[00:22:36] Bronson: Yeah, that’s a good question. Again, I think it comes down to the relationship you have with the co-sponsors.

[00:22:41] So this is the idea too, of, when you do a deal with somebody, you really get to know them, right? You get to know them quite well. How we work together, what are the things that, they do well? What are things they don’t do? Communication is even among the partnership is very important.

[00:22:53] And so I’ve been a part of deals where it works really well. And I’ve been a part of deals where it doesn’t work as well. So I think that in the middle of that, I think being able to give feedback and say, Hey, this is what I like, or this is what it is. And because, in reality if you’re somebody who’s active and you want to get into a deal, sometimes you may just do a deal to do a deal. And I think there is benefit to that, but I think that it is important though, who you’re working with? Who is on the team? Their character, their communication, it’s defined what each person in the group is going to do. And just that there is an open sense of communication.

[00:23:24] I think I’ve had team members that have really inspired me on this. I said my background is sales. Sometimes I can show up and just want to put my best foot forward all the time. But again, like I shared about, Hey, if something goes wrong, we need to talk about that. It’s challenging to do that.

[00:23:37] I know you shared Mike, a little bit of your story and just how communication in those situations can be really critical and even can have other things, consequences and things if it’s not done in a certain way. So I think that in the middle of that, I think it’s just really like a relationship.

[00:23:51] It’s just the relationship can only really be as good as the communication I think. And so if somebody can’t talk about something or they can’t share on certain [00:24:00] things, it limits the strength of the partnership.

[00:24:04]Mike: Very good point. And there it’s no hidden secret my story and the mistakes that I made.

[00:24:09] And I’ve always been big on communication and transparency, which is ironic that I got in trouble for what I got in trouble for, which was not telling my investors or nondisclosure. But today what’s interesting is the things that I’ve learned as a result of that. And so the things I bring to the table as a sponsor, as a syndicator that you can I have enough of that history now that those mistakes won’t happen again. Because I know what they are, right? Where if you get, I’m not saying this to throw anybody under the bus and a new sponsor, relatively new sponsor that doesn’t have that history or that experience could make mistakes.

[00:24:50] Part of my mission is to convey that message to business owners, sponsors, Hey, listen, it’s really easy to get jammed up, be careful. So that’s story for another podcast, but you and I can talk about that some other time. Here’s what I want to know, two or three techniques that you use to raise capital.

[00:25:09] What are your most effective ways to get yourself in front of potential investors? How are you raising capital today?

[00:25:16] Bronson: Yeah. First of all, I just want to say, Mike, I really appreciate that you share your story with your audience and just as we’ve talked, I think it’s amazing how authenticity and transparency, it really builds trust.

[00:25:27] And so I think that’s a way to not just from how we learn and how we really get connected with people. And I’ve just really appreciated that about you. And I know that with your audience, I know they’ll really appreciate that about you as well. Because when we go through stuff, that’s really how we learn.

[00:25:39] As far as techniques, as far as to how do you raise money or what are some ways you do that? I’m really a big fan and there’s people that don’t do this. I love the thought leadership platform what you’re doing, but I’m also doing, I’ve got my website, bronsonequity.com.

[00:25:52] I’ve got YouTube. I’ve got blogs. I’ve got eBooks. I’ve got different things, podcasts, interviews, and I think that’s a great way for people to get to know you. And really the first thing when people invest is they have to get to know you and then they’ve got to trust you. And for me, when I had connected, this is a well known podcast or I met person a few years ago. And I went up and was like, Hey man, how’s it going? And I realized this guy didn’t know me at all. But I felt like I had known him because I’d spent literally, probably dozens of hours with this guy on his podcast. So it’s just interesting, so if somebody is looking to say how can I really expand?

[00:26:24] I really don’t go out and just cold call and work the phones and do that kind of thing, that’s not how I’ve ever raised. We’ve got to raise, we’re doing right now. And what I’ve been doing is, again it’s not hunting, it’s farming. And these are very different models. A Hunter is I’ve got the deal.

[00:26:38] I’ve got to go find the money and just get it done. And in the beginning, there is some of that you have to just find a way to get it done. But after a while, if you have a good list, that’s why your email list is very important. That’s why things that you do when you have a deal you can launch out and then people know you as somebody who’s adding value to this space.

[00:26:52] And that builds trust, right? You’re adding things that are value. You’re giving things away for free. So then people will come in. And so that’s how we’ve gotten sometimes, over [00:27:00] 200, 300 people or more on a live webinar and we’ve raised money so quickly. And so I think it’s creating this thought leadership platform and basically having some process when there is a deal.

[00:27:11] And we’re working through this now of just if we have a deal we’re going to launch, we’re gonna do this series of emails. People are going to go in and it actually gets technical. And I haven’t been much of a techie guy. I’m telling myself, I am a techie guy, I can do this, I’ve got team members now.

[00:27:23] But they’ll go in and basically they’ll fill out a soft commit form on this webpage. It will send them this email. They’ll go through this process, whatever. And just really, cause again, we’ve had it where things just go crazy for a day or two and you get all this interest and it’s being able to really harness that.

[00:27:38] So I think there’s a number of pieces there. I think the biggest thing, and it comes back to that MailChimp account and telling your story and what you’re doing, getting that out there. Because a lot of times friends and family will invest because why? Because they know you and they trust you.

[00:27:51] You may not be that great, but they know you and they trust you. But this whole world out there are people they don’t know you and they don’t trust you. So the ways that you build trust and you get people to get to know you as you have that thought leadership platform and you get yourself out there.

[00:28:04] Mike: They know you, like you and trust you. I heard a thing a long time ago, you lose trust by the bucket full, you get rid of trust by just emptying the bucket, but to fill that bucket, it’s a teaspoon at a time. And I think every time you put a piece of content out there, send a message out there, send somebody an email, that helps.

[00:28:22] I have to tell you that I can’t believe we’re 40 minutes into this already. And the time goes so fast, especially when you’re engaged in a conversation. So I’m going to have you back on sometime at that again. But what advice would you give a new sponsor or a new investor today?

[00:28:40] Bronson: Yeah I appreciate it, the compliment there, this has been a great conversation. Yeah, I think the biggest advice that I would give I think a couple of things, one is to find a mentor, find somebody that you can go to, who’ll help you to look at deals to, what’s the next step I should take? What should I do? A great way to find a mentor is, you can hire a mentor and pay a lot of money and do it. I think there are people that need that, and I think for a lot of people that works. For me, I basically went to somebody that I felt was a person of value.

[00:29:08] And I said, Hey, tell me about your biggest challenge in this area? When I could see a challenge, like basically ask a question about that? And, what would it look like to, if this problem were solved or how could this problem be solved? And the issue was raising money.

[00:29:21] Like how does it going raising money in your particular stuff or in your deals? And if you can be somebody who asks the question of how can I add value to this business, to this person, to this relationship, whatever it is that is going to lead to so much.

[00:29:35] Because what happened from that for me is that, Oh, Hey, maybe we can create this partnership or kind of come on board to help create this content. I create this place where I can have these calls and we can build this relationship with people. So it’s not something that you necessarily, each person has to do themselves, but again, everybody’s got their own gifts of you figure out where you fit.

[00:29:50] So if you’re somebody who can find deals right now, if you can find deals, that’s huge. A lot of people are really having trouble finding deals, but if you’re an analytics person, an engineer, a numbers person, you can sit at the spreadsheet, whatever. There’s a huge opportunity right now for you. If you know a lot of people or you love talking with people, you want to raise money, there’s a big opportunity there.

[00:30:06] So there’s different opportunities. So I would say, figure out where you fit and then just try to find somebody who you could compliment and be able to come in and add some value there.

[00:30:18] Mike: Great points. You know what else I’d like to ask? Just off the cuff here. Are you doing anything socially to impact the world?

[00:30:26] What are you doing to give back either from a philanthropy piece or to make some type of an impact somewhere?

[00:30:34] Bronson: Yeah. I think, what we were talking about before the word focus is really important to me. The number one thing for me is I am not driven by making lots of money and having a yacht and the mighty lifestyle.

[00:30:45] And, I kind of joke around, it’s just about doing nothing or living in luxury. My big why is I want to fight human trafficking. There are 20 to 40 million human slaves today. And it’s sickening and it’s something that’s really bothersome to me.

[00:30:59] And the only way it’s going to change is if everybody starts getting interested in this, starts addressing the things in our culture that cause these sorts of things. So to me, part of my why is to make a lot of money to be able to impact that as well. So that’s a big why for me. But I think that’s one way that I give back.

[00:31:14] And of course there are others things in the community that we do. We have some, a group of my church where we get involved in the community and community service. But the biggest thing for me is just keeping that Why right in front of me, that’s important. That’s a cause to me, that’s much more important than doing deals or raising millions of dollars. But I think the why is really more important than what actually you’re doing.

[00:31:34] Mike: Now for sure, no doubt about that. And that’s one of those things too, that’s heavy on my heart, right? Is that human trafficking. And the thing that I’ve discovered, I used to always just think that was just about prostitution, but it’s more than that, and it’s really just the different ways that people bring people over here, it’s just sad. And it’s still definitely needs to be addressed. And hats off to you. So let’s get off the hard stuff then let’s talk about some fun stuff. So you live in Southern California, Pasadena area, right?

[00:32:04] Other than Disney land, what’s your favorite tourist attraction?

[00:32:07] Bronson: During COVID, there haven’t really been many tourist attractions because they shut outdoor trails down and all kinds of stuff. I really like doing standup paddle boarding. That’s something I picked up during COVID was an inflatable stand-up paddle board, which we just bought on Amazon, you can go and pump it up. It’s a workout to pump up, but getting out on the water is really peaceful and the great thing for me is I can’t be on my phone. I can’t be on technology. I’m just out there for an hour or two, and it’s a real beautiful place. And to just see being on the water is really amazing for me.

[00:32:35] Mike: Yeah. I’m going to have to come out and go with you because that’s something I’ve always wanted to try so.

[00:32:40] Bronson: Yeah, let’s do it.

[00:32:41] Mike: Favorite book you’ve ever read?

[00:32:42] Bronson: Oh man, that’s a tough one. I made a goal last year to read a bunch of books.

[00:32:45] I read 87 books last year and I’m trying to read, more and more. And there’s a few good ones. One obviously “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” is a great book and “Cashflow Quadrant”, those are great kind of real estate books. There’s a book about negotiating that was really good by a former FBI negotiator named Chris FOSS called “Never Split the Difference”.

[00:33:03] That was an awesome book. I also love biographies, there a book, it’s called “The Rise of Theater Roosevelt” and his book reads like he’s a superhero, zero up to 40, and it’s just an unbelievable story. So I love biographies because you can learn so much from the lives of other people.

[00:33:19] Mike: Yeah, that’s for sure. Just a quick side note, I read a biography one time about Colin Powell and talk about a guy I have a lot of respect for, just how he led the country and led the military and just really interesting. Most memorable moment in the last six months?

[00:33:34] Bronson: I think I’ve had some great moments of my daughter, she’s eight years old and just playing in the front yard or running around at the park or doing some just simple things with her, I think just really taking in those moments.

[00:33:44] So I realized she’s not going to be, eight years old forever. She grows very quickly, especially they say, as you get older time speeds up, right? Like it just feels like it goes faster and faster. And so I see that more and more, and I just think really taking those moments and just really taking them in and really enjoying being a dad and it’s a lot of fun.

[00:34:00] Mike: Yeah. Nice, good for you. And I bet she really appreciates it as well. Hey Bronson, if people want to get ahold of you, how do they reach out to you and connect with you?

[00:34:09] Yeah. I’m happy to touch base with people that are active or are interested in being passive investors, either way. So bronsonequity.com, that’s my website. Or you can send me an email at bronson@bronsonequity.com. But yeah, I look forward to being in touch and again, this has been really great, Mike, thanks for having me on.

[00:34:25] Yeah, you bet. How about your book, how do people get ahold of your book?

[00:34:28] Yeah, so you can go to my website, that’s actually an eBook and it’s a 24 page PDF, the single best investing strategy during or after a pandemic.

[00:34:36] And so just talking through, what do we do now with our money and what’s happening right now with the money supply expanding and just some really compelling reasons why I think multi-family is the best place to be in this current environment. So that’s a free download on my website.

[00:34:51] Good. Bronson, thanks for being here. I really appreciate the time and I know you’re busy and just taking the time out of your day and week to spend with my listeners, really grateful for that. Again, thanks for being here. And everybody, tune in next week. I hope you enjoyed today and we look forward to talking to you soon.

[00:35:12] Kristen: Thank you, Mike, and thank you for joining us for another great episode of Insider Secrets. As always, Insider Secrets is brought to you by My Core Intentions. Join us on social media and visit mycoreintentions.com where you can get expert coaching on all things, multifamily investing in property management.

[00:35:30] We’re looking forward to having you back again next week for more Insider Secrets.