E: 11 Top M&A Entrepreneurs - DeAnna Rogers from Affiliate Events to EPIC to Airbnb Entrepreneur

Out It's recording. So today I have a guest, top M&A entrepreneurs, Deanna Rogers, and I call her the glue because you'll see her all the interviews, all the choruses. Here's Deanna. Hi, Deanna. Hi, how are you, John? Nice to be here. Thanks for joining us. I, I, I, I had something with uh Chris Dagle earlier, but I guess the traffic at the airports is so crazy now. That they can't fly around, yeah. Oh wow. Yeah. Well, I'm at home, I'm not in an airport, so I'm good. Good for you. Good for you. So let's get started now. I, I gotta kind of go back a little bit about how you get got started with this whole legs and then to Epic, and how long you've been working with Roland and what's that been like? Yeah, I'm happy to give you my background. So I used to own my own event company. I had a company called AMG affiliate mastermind Group, and um we taught event planners how to run events, how to do joint ventures, how to get um like affiliates and how to grow your business in your event using affiliates and masterminds and things like that. And so I did a lot of more, I was in the real estate space more so. Um, and, um, I worked with Roland Fraser because Roland Frasier at the time was speaking on a lot of stages in the real estate space and so I knew Roland very well and, um, I had my own company and I started doing events for event planners. Now my events were about 200-ish person events and um I had Roland and um his partner Perry Belcher come speak on my stage and uh and then part of they came and spoke to my mastermind. And then a year later, um, they decided that they needed, um, they wanted someone to come in and kind of run their events for their company in trafficking conversion and all those, and so they brought this opportunity to me and I've been with them on that side of things for about 9 years. I've worked with Roland closer to 11, almost 12 years. So, um, but with this in this capacity, um, for about 9 years. Oh, that's cool. So you were, were you, when you joined them, you were still doing, uh, real estate affiliate programs, events, or did they just say, hey, we need you in this area now, and I moved full time. So I was doing my own events. I was doing my own mastermind, my own joint ventures. I'd written 3 books, um, was very, yeah, I was, I was staying very busy. Um, but I knew that if I ever wanted to scale to the level, and obviously, if you know, Roland. Frasier, he's got such a vision. He's a, he's a big visionary and, um, I wanted to scale with him. I wanted to do these bigger events than 234, 500. My biggest event at that time was, I think, 800 people. So I wanted to scale. I wanted to get to that 80 10,000 person event, which is what we've done, um, and I've been so blessed to be able to work with people like Roland Frasier and Ryan Dyce and Perry Belcher, um. But I knew that I had to transition that, and so, um, I, I joined his um company uh 9 years ago. Yeah, did they buy you or just kind of was it aqua high? I released, no, I actually, um, I still actually have the company. I don't do anything really with it. We, we basically, I had a partner, um, that finished out any additional contracts that we had out. Um, the company is still, I mean, I can still do things with it if I wanted to. I haven't just because I've been so busy. Um, however, um, so yeah, I, I, I finished out, I think I finished out like that last year, and then I just didn't take on any. More new clients, so. Yeah, so when did uh Roland bring this legs, I guess it was called Legs on the first one, right? The very pilot program, and then he changed to Epic. Yes, so we started that almost 3 years ago, um, and we were going around, we were doing it in London every quarter, and we were doing, we did them in Vegas and Austin and San Diego, and we were, we were doing legs. It was a leverage, exit, Grow and scale was the name of it. So legs. Um, and we were Teaching that in like two-day classes and we would get anywhere from like 20 to 30 to 40 to 50 people in a room depending, and we try to keep it really small because Roland likes to make it very interactive. Um, so I think our largest was like almost 40 to 50, but he preferred that 25 to 35 and so we would just go around to different cities and do these legs classes and um very, so much fun, got to meet so many people, got to do so many different deals and get to. Know people um and grow in that that legs, um, portfolio that we had at the time but then obviously COVID happened and so we couldn't do events anymore but the training was so essential and we felt like if there was any time for people to be learning this, it was this time. And so we had to pivot. I know that this that word is used a lot, but it had to be pivoted to what could be done virtually, um, so that people could still be utilized. that content, um, but in, in acquiring businesses while people are still working from home or that are afraid to get out or, um, so we moved the name over to call it Epic, ethically profit in Crisis and so it became epic instead of legs and um and then he's just tweaked it along the way, made it so much better, uh, added boom it is mind blowing it is it is like it is awesome yeah it is. And I, I, I will say, um, it's, we've seen so many other people out there that have done it, and I've, I've never seen anyone that does it but quite, quite, quite like what Roland Frasier does. So I, I, yeah, uh, you know, back to the leg thing, it, it's interesting that you guys really brought in early on really heavy hitters. I mean, the guy from real estate and all the other guys were just big heavy hitters. I guess you went to the Ryan Dice group and and digital marker, and the big heavy hitters joined early. As far as speakers or not as speakers, but people that go through the course and say, hey, I need to add this, you know, well, you know, we, we hit our, our friends and family list first on the very first launches. So obviously those are people that are in our wheelhouse, our friends and family, so they were the first ones to jump on and, and go through the program with us, and now we scale it out to everyone, but our original first two cohorts. which was in April and May of last year. Those were that was more internal to the people that we wanted to see that would go out and do this program with us. So yeah, you, you saw a lot more of our friends and family, uh, more so than just, um, you know, other clients that we've acquired through media. Yeah, now you're on Epic 14 or 13. We're on 13, right? 13. I'm gonna date this. This is no longer Evergreen. If I say this, we're we're continuing, yeah. This is awesome. You guys have created incredible deal flow, I think for your group too, but all of a sudden the knowledge shared between everybody in the community. I mean, I'll give you an example. I went to Sharon Brown's virtual copies, where she has the breakout sessions, and I mean, I just like learn more from listening to whatever somebody else is working on. Yeah, there are, if, if you look at the epic alumni group, there are so many incredibly talented people in that group, Sharon being one of those as well. So yeah, very much so, yes. Yeah. So, I wanna talk to you about what you've done on the side. Now you were in real estate and this, and I heard you mention this talking about you're buying properties and now you're turning to Airbnbs. Yes, yeah. How many have you done those? So we're going on our 3rd, so we're working on it, yes. Mhm. Well, I, I looked at things like the economics. this and it didn't really give any numbers, but what's important is the profit potential, uh, the right location, competition and upkeep and expenses. Where are you buying these properties? So, so right now, currently, I will tell you we are currently buying on the coast of Texas. So there's a place called Port Aransas, it's down by Corpus Christi. Um, we've And buying property there. Um, so we, we did buy some existing, uh, an existing home. It was literally about 100 yards from the, from the ocean. Um, and so it was a person's second home, and we turned it into an Airbnb. And it is, we put, we, we bought it in, um, November or December of this last year. And by January we posted our very first Facebook post before we even did paid media and we had filled it up with one Facebook post with $18,000 worth of business with one. We knew it was a hot commodity because people can work remotely so they're willing to go to the beach and, and work in an Airbnb and be on the ocean while they're working and you know, so we knew that that was really important. And so, um, so since then we've bought a couple more places. Uh, we're buying land now and then gonna build is basically we bought in the same neighborhood, um, and, uh, so our family bought two more, uh, so there's a total of 3 on that strip, um, and we're the one that we just bought 2 weeks ago is actually right on the oceanfront. It goes directly from the pier over. Definitely gonna go for a higher price, right? Um, yeah, so it definitely did, um. But I will tell you this. So, you know, we, we did put a couple 100,000 into fixing it up and, and, and making it. But, um, we automatically, when we did the evaluation, we already had what we put into it, into the house. Like, it, it's, it's crazy how just since November to now, how much that, that property has gone up. Um, and we are doing about 9. 90 we do between $800 to $90,000 in recurring revenue each year, so it pays for itself. It doubles, it doubles the pay for itself plus the equity in the property has gone up already 3 times on what we wanted. So for us it just made a lot of sense to, to keep doing those properties. Now what we are looking for also now, um, because the beach homes. They are quite more expensive than what you would find anywhere else that you go by. They're, they're probably 3x more than if I were to find a house. In Houston or San Antonio, so what we are looking now is also across from um hospitals, um, so any type of home in the like across from like a major cancer center or a major transplant hospital and what brought that up was because my husband had a liver transplant that from my son and so we. Had to, um, rent a home for quite a while and rather than staying in hotels, we wanted to rent an Airbnb but we wanted to be across from the hospital because I had to be with my husband and my son in the hospital at the same time, so in our whole family and and and dogs and so we just transplanted our whole, our whole home for a couple of months. So what made us think about that was. You know there's a lot of other families transplant families that would prefer to stay in a home instead of being in a hotel during those medical times and so and and you can get homes a whole lot cheaper than on a beach home like, you know, and so and then we could do the same thing, buy those homes, flip them, turn them into Airbnbs and make an instant profit um and so the margin is is a lot better there so that's our next properties that we're looking at right now. is like across from like Houston and MD Anderson, um San Antonio at the transplant hospital, Dallas uh Transplant Hospital. So any place like that that we feel like children's hospitals where parents need to be, where their kids are, and having it to where it's, it's It's a place for them to go and call home versus being in a hotel. Yeah, well, first question is, how's your husband and your son? I guess. They're both doing well. That was, um, 2.5 years ago, and my son, my son, yeah, my son gave up 67% of his liver to my husband, so yeah. So you only need 43% of your liver to Well, it grows back. It grows up. Yeah, so there is, yeah, so the person that's the donor, his liver grows back, so. Oh, that's interesting. Well, I'm glad to hear they're doing OK. Good. Yeah, thank you for asking. So on these Airb back to these beach houses, now you're Did I know that you have to, this is what I read, that you actually have to furnish them yourself, so you go in there and sign them, yeah. So we go in and um so you have the shell, you know, and we go in and we furnish it with everything from beds to pots and pans to linens to towels to um to uh, I mean, think about everything that you would have in your home, you know, um. everything dishes, not utensils, you know, coffee mugs, like you have to just literally walk through every room, you know, uh, washer and dryer, all those things. Um, and then you take the top of that and you're like, OK, now how can I make this an experiential place? So like what we've done is we've created, you know, we put a golf cart with it and we've created wagons and then go to the beach, and we've done, you know, sand toys for children. And beach towels so they don't have to worry about things like that and toys, uh, we did a barbecue pit. We added a pool, uh, and we had a heated pool so that way if they, it was cold and rainy at the beach, they've now got a heated pool and, um, so we've added new elements that makes our home a little bit sexier than the other places along the strip. And so that, that what, and then we created it as a Google business. So people now, rather than going through management companies, they're googling where, where to go stay in Airbnb. So we are getting about 3000 hits a month on our own property. Are you using some of the expertise you kind of. Of course I digital market. Of course I am. Of course you are. That is awesome. So you're getting 3000 hits a month, yeah, and we're booked. We're booked solid for the rest of the year. Like we don't have, we, that's why we want to build more houses quickly is because we don't have enough space. Like it's book solid. And how do you, is this like, uh, when you're financing this, is it just a regular mortgage or is it kind of a, uh, a different type of loan from a bank? You can only do two homes with your mortgage and then you have to do it as a business. So we created under our SPV as a business, um, so we have an SPV that's that our Rogers Capital Investment, which is our SPV, and then everything that we buy with Airbnbs falls underneath that. Yeah, that's interesting. So what, so what's the goal for you and your family? It's just 1020 homes and you know, I don't know. I think it really depends on what we see the market as right now real estate's hot. The problem is it's, it's a seller's market and not a buyer's market right now here in Texas, so we're paying kind of top dollar, um, whereas Texas knows about ups and downs, don't they? Yeah, and the thing is, is like, for example, a lot. A lot of land, um, you know, seriously, the lot of land in August, just the lot without, um, you know, the house on it was running about 200,000 just for the lot, and now it's about 60-700 just for the lot without no house. So it's very different, um, because it's on the ocean, you know, it's right there at the beach, so. So it's um we're, we're being very careful with that because it is more expensive, um, whereas in, that's why we're looking at other places as far as um investing in places across from hospitals because that you can get a house for like $200,000 250, 300, like nothing hardly, you know, and then flip it, you'll spend maybe 2000 to 30,000 flipping it um if it's already in a decent shape, and then you can get it on the market with. Within 60 to 90 days, and then you get your recurring revenue instantly, just like that. So is that a, that's kind of like, uh, uh, you know, an experience you guys went through for the hospital thing and wanting to be close to the hospital. So, you know, at night, you want to go get food for your husband or whatever it was. Did you also do some research or this is trending towards AB or? No, it was just because we've experienced it. So it may I think like, you know, um, we, because when I, when I did look, when I had, I was in actually in Australia when we found out that my husband had to do the, you know, the surgery real quickly. And so I had to like fly home and get my pack my son and my husband on fly home. No, it was not. It was 24 hours. Um, but on the flight, luckily I had a lot of time to be Googling where to live for the next couple of months. And so, you know, we packed up our family and our dogs and I wanted to, if I was going to be there for a long time. I wanted to be in a house and not in a hotel. So I looked at Airbnbs and what was great was I was looking for how close could I be to that hospital. So that way, if my husband or my son had any issues, I'm right there. If I want to go home, take a shower, if I want to go cook, if I, if I'd like to just be in a home environment instead of a hot, you know, a hotel, there's a, there's a hotel here close to the hospital, and it's just, you know, it's one of those hotels, like, oh, man. You don't want to spend any more than just a weekend there. Yeah, and people don't, and you don't, you don't think about it when it's just a hospital stay, you know, hotels are fine. Nothing against hotels, but if you're an extended for any reason with with a loved one that's in a hospital for a long period, you don't want to be, it's one, it's, it's more expensive to be in hotels, and then you have to eat out every meal and you can't have lots of family, like with the, you know, with the The house with the Airbnb you have 4 or 5 bedrooms and you know you can have a whole family stay with you. You have dogs in the back because we have our 3 dogs, you know, we had dinners and we had our dogs with us. We didn't have to board our dogs for 2 months, you know, and so just things like that that you don't think of that is very important to a family. So for us we. Experienced it, so we knew that is something that people will be looking for. So to us, it just made sense. That's what we want to invest in. You know, that, that's a really important point to tap into, you know, emotions and trends and changes. That's really important. And I look like a lot of that comes from hanging around this whole digital marketer. And environment and Roland Fraser. Yeah, and you know, the other thing too is just looking at like again and also looking at trends like for us um we're also looking at Brocken Ridge, Colorado because it's a, it's a great ski place and the prices, the prices of log cabins up there are not that expensive. You can get a log cabin for about 450, like whatever that number is, right? So, but, but then you have to look at the math and go, well, it will probably only be booked. 5 months out of the year, so the math has to, you know, the math has to work if, if it's only gonna be booked during seasonal times versus whereas if you're at the beach, it can be pretty much the beach like at Port Aransas is about 80 to 90% right. Um, at a hospital you would, you would think it could be 80% to 90% because you're round. So, so when we're looking at those places of where we think those hot markets would be, it, all those seasonals amazing and what might trigger us to still do that is because. You know, personally, we may want to have a beach home and, you know, a home in Colorado and we can personally just write it off and we have it when we want it and then we rent it when we don't but if it's strictly just for business purposes for our investments, uh, we're probably gonna stick to more of anything that can be rented that what we made our family, we made a family decision if it can be running in more than 75%. We'll we'll buy it. So that's kind of what our, our, you know, our numbers were. If we think that this house is, can be rented for 75% of the time, then we will buy it. Yeah, and now with 3000 leads come in, I'm just curious, do you, do you put it in Airbnb and like for sale but what is it, uh, we do, we do we do VRBO, Airbnb, Google, um, but the where we're getting the most is we're just driving our own traffic. So we created our own Facebook page. We have our own, uh, website, uh, we, we drove all of our own, you know, organic. Traffic and it got filled we do have a management company right now um not positive that we're gonna stay with that company um because every out of all of them they only booked one we've booked all of the the business ourselves now I don't want a job, so we did the management company just so that they, they have to mess with it and not us, um, but you can always find someone local if you wanted to pay someone local to. Do it cheaper probably than a management company. So there's ways to look at that. Yeah, is that management company also, I mean when somebody leaves the your Airbnb, they gotta clean up and check. Yeah, they, there, there's also you have to look at every city. Every city does have laws that that allow for short term rentals. Some places will allow you to have a short-term rental without a management company. Some places won't. They require you to have a management company. Because within um I believe it's within 5 miles or 10 miles of your home. That way if something were to happen, there's a management company close by to take care of that property. So it just depends um on the location Houston, San Antonio, you have to look at the city, what the requirements are, um, but, um, management companies are typically going to charge you 20% and so you have to know that going into that, whereas Airbnb and VRBO is 3%. So if you can do it by yourself and save 17% override, that's where you want to save that money. So you have to look at all those little things when you're looking at, you know, what's this, what am I all in for, you know, and, and what am I gonna make as a profit on this? Do you want that 17% margin to be given away or do you care? It may be that you don't want another job like for us we chose not to this year because. Um, we didn't want another job. Um, we wanted someone else to handle that, but we also negotiated. What we did is we went in and we pre-booked everything. We did one Facebook, um, ad, got about 211 and got almost 20K in business, went to the management company and said we'll drive our own business. You drop. Prices. Well, when they saw that, that's a pipe branch, you know, but when they saw that they were like, oh well, would they rather have 10% of everything we have or zero? So it was they said, OK, we'll do 10%. And there was, it was a no brainer. We were giving them money like we had done all the work. Well, well, I'm, I'm actually thinking about creating one, starting my own and competing against them. So don't let, I hope nobody on that group sees this, but, um, I, I don't think that, uh, I think there's a lot of money to be made there, um, that's got a highlight that makes so much sense. I mean, who said it, you know, you buy your costs, and that is definitely a cost, so. It's a 20% markup. It's a lot of money and people don't think about that when you're. Really looking at all the numbers. So, you know, we do have to look at that. You look at that because you have, you know, you've also got, you know, insurance and, and you have um the cost of just upkeep and you've got a pool, you know, pool companies and you've got a trash company and you've got you've gotta have someone clean it every single time. That's 180 bucks every single time someone leaves. So you've got all these expenses that you don't think about when you're buying, but you do need to make sure you're plugging in those numbers and those numbers make really good sense before. You make that investment. So, um, that's why we said it has to be able to be rented 75% of the time to make it make sense. Yeah, how do you know that though? I mean, how do you judge that? We just did the math. We figured out what is it gonna cost if, if we never, if we rented it only just to make the mortgage payment, like whatever we've invested in it plus the mortgage, you know, what is that dollar amount if that dollar amount is. 50k a year annually that we have to have while if you're getting 15,000 a month in rentals then I really only need to rent it three months or so to make it profitable. So the math works really well, right? So that's why you have to just do the math. But if for some reason, um, you know, and again that's where we look at. The cost of the land is costing us more right now. The cost of buildings costing us more, so It's that same house may be a lot more. What's that gonna cost? No, we will charge more, but you know, so you have to really do your due diligence, really make sure that the numbers do make sense, and then make sure that you can cover, um, with rentals, what that is going to, you know, cover, cover your own expenses plus all the other, um, you know, your growth that you foresee. So like we gave ourselves a margin of 25% growth, um, year over year. So as long. As long as we cover the mortgage plus 25% growth, we were fine. We're going to do that, totally fine, but that was what we chose to do because we want to make sure that we're continuing to, to put back into, um, the, the property. We don't want, we want to be able to like add new elements and, and make it better and, you know, do new things. So to keep it, um, a hot market. So. Yeah, I guess I'm a little daft on this, but how did you, you know, you say, hey, I wanna, uh, You buy the property first and then you work out the numbers that you have to make, or is it you, you know I did the numbers first. You know, you do the numbers first, then you bribe, then you go buy a property first. Well, I mean, no, I mean, we were on vacation when this fell on our lap, so we, we were looking at, we had some friends of ours that knew that we were investors and we were on vacation with them and they had just bought and they were like, you should, you should buy this. too, you've got money to invest, so you should do this. And so um we went and looked at it and we found out what the mortgage would be if we just invested, if we paid cash, we knew what we would spend and or if we did a mortgage, we knew how much that mortgage payment would be, then we just, we ran the numbers we spent about um 2 days, I think, running numbers and um by the end of the weekend, we put a cash offer plus some other things that we added that we wanted, so we put an offer in. Um, and so we knew that, OK, if this is what we want, um, this is what it's gonna look like financially, um, plus you gotta add insurance, plus you gotta add management fees, and you gotta add all these things, and plus we knew we were gonna add a pool and we knew we're gonna add landscape, you know, who, who would have thought that landscaping with, you know, uh. Coconut trees and, you know, all these different palm trees would cost $28,000 you know, who knew, right? So you got it, you gotta do the math on that, you know, who knew that the, the pool would end up being $100 more than normal or, you know, so you, you just have to make sure you have all those numbers and you plug it in and go, OK, worst case scenario, X is that number. And um so then what I need is I need if we're gonna rent it for $700 a night. Then because it sleeps 12, then OK, I need it to be rented X amount of time. So then you go and you look at the other other properties nearby and you see what those rent, you know, those rental homes are going for, how long have they been on the market? What are they, what are they doing? Um, and when you see what like we went to the next door neighbor, next door neighbor has a home that's a short term vacation rental, wasn't nearly as nice as ours, and it was making $600 in rentals a year. So we're like, OK. We're fine. All right, we're good, you know, so, so, you know, you just have to do, you have to do your research, um, make sure that it's something that you're worth doing, and then don't be afraid to just dig in and, and figure out how to do it yourself and, and do a lot of it to save yourself the money. Um, that's why I said we did the Google our business and we did our own website and we did all of our own Facebook advertising and we did all that ourselves and it, I mean, literally within a week we were, we, from the moment that we launched it to. I think it was 7 or 8 days later we were booked solid for the whole for the whole season. That's amazing. I mean, if you do that so well, and most like, you know, a lot of these people that do VRBOs or Airbnb, they'll just go to Airbnb and wait for that traffic to come in. Now you're creating a system where 3000 people are coming to your website every, every month. Yeah, that's, I gotta believe there's some value into that. Other people coming to you and say I need that help. Yeah, and, and what we also found too we were, we, we didn't wanna wait on a company to fill our, our home for us like that, that's just not in my DNA. Like my husband and I both were like, we're not waiting on someone to fill this, we'll do it ourselves like, you know, we, we have the skill set. He's a marketer. I'm a marketer, we, we, we can do it ourselves. And, um, and so we did. And then, then we realized how fast it filled and we're. Like, well, now we need more houses. Like we need to keep, keep filling them up. Like we, we have, we found Play Monopoly here. Yeah, so, so now it's like, OK, I need another one. I need another property. So, um, but it, you know, but then we also, we also realized long term that we want to be above everyone else. So you have to look at what are you standing about like when we looked at what everybody else in that area. It was that most of them that live on the beach just had a regular beach home. Well, they didn't have a pool or they didn't have a golf cart that went with it. So then we were like, OK, we'll, we'll invest 50k into a pool. We'll buy a golf cart. We'll, we'll add these elements that makes ours stand out. So when someone's googling and they see our, our property, it's the first thing they want. Then what we did is we created. Um, you know, contest for, um, to see who we could get that would book it while we were still building. Like, so for example, like in the building phase, like we still have the pool going being built, so we couldn't really rent it to people for money, but it was empty while we were building all the. Construction, uh, so we had people that would go and spend the weekends and then write us reviews. Um, so we built our reviews up real fast before it even went on the market. So there's just things that you can do that gets you up to that level real quickly without you really having to do a whole lot. That's cool, and that's, that's for marketing. You learn that from your affiliate days and everything. It's been fun. It's really been, it's been fun to see it, um, grow, and we're definitely growing with it. We're learning a lot along the way, so. Yeah, so, I mean, what's next, because, you know, sometimes you get into business and you first get into it, and you build this foundation goes, ah, you know what, how do I move up and how do I move up, and how do I move up? Is there something different after this? Like, is it still owning all the properties like Monopoly or is it owning boardwalk? Different types of properties. Oh, it's different, different streams of income for sure. Like, um, my son, and you guys know Coach Adam, um, Adam has been my dear friend for many, many years. My son, who's, I have 3 boys, 29, 27, and 24. My 24 year old wants us to buy a gaming store. Uh, through Adam and so who knows that's what that's been on the table about us possibly buying a gaming store, um, we are currently um looking at, um, buying into a partnership and, and doing more so of what Roland teaches with the zero money down but we're gonna do more of an earning interest, um, but we are looking at acquiring. Um, so very interesting. I don't wanna say too much, but it's local and it is down in Austin, they have a place called Rainy Street, and it's just this a street full of different bars and restaurants and uh they have live music and it's just become like the happening place to be. Well, where we live, they've created another one like that and the people um that started it three years ago are struggling. And they don't know how to market it to get it really hopping, and they need a little bit of um investors too um so we're we are in talks with them to I think take that on, which is something random that we've never done before live music and restaurants and alcohol bars so such a different beast. I'm gonna have to learn all those laws because that's a very different beast, um, but it's also in the same field of. It's a, it's a very different um revenue stream and um it's, it's different. I like different, I like doing things that are different and that and really expand us, so. I'm, I'm kind of almost positive we're about to take that one on. Um, we've still got a little bit of more due diligence and meet with their attorneys, but that one's probably gonna come to fruition. Yeah, so you can see immediately what you need to do to that. I mean, that's what the deal with the urnnings. I mean, you, you, they're not gonna invite you unless you can bring something to the table that they can't do, which is the marketing. Well, that one, and this is what Roland teaches. It's all about proximity and getting out there, right? So this one just happened to be, um, that my husband and I, um, had a date night and we went and decided to go watch live music and we sat there and had a drink and we were just sitting there, um, enjoying the band and noticed all these little restaurants and places and we went up to the bar and I could tell that the the one lady and her husband were the owners. You could tell they're probably working around the clock they work and. Yep, and, um, I struck up a conversation with her and it was funny enough that within 15 minutes and it was just a very right, it was just fun conversation. My granddaughter was there running around playing and she's like, yeah, you know, there's so much more we could do to this place, but we need investors and we need, you know, help. And I was like, well, I mean, and it was like all of a sudden, all of a sudden I was like, well, let's have another drink and let's sit down and let's talk about this. And so I mean and then like an hour and a half later and then now we're going on. A month that we've been in conversations and and serious conversations with, you know, property and attorneys and um where that what that'll look like um and so what was so funny was we just went there though for, you know, to have a drink and watch a band. Um, and so it, and again, and then my husband at first was not, you know, no, it's really not our, we're not. We're not looking for anything that we have to have another job and it felt like it when we were watching them, but then when we, we've gone back, you know, I don't know, like 6 or 7 times and we've been watching and I'm like we don't have to work it, we just have to give them the skill set and hire them the right people to have them do it. They just didn't have that. And so there's so much more we can bring and help them and get it scaled and make this huge and make it another big huge um live entertainment place where we live um and uh scale it. So, um, I'm kind of it's actually something I'm excited about just because I've never done that before. I've never had a live entertainment company so or a lot, yeah, so I have you know. You think outside of the box. You gotta think outside the box a little bit, and you just, like I said, it's all about conversations and proximity. So we didn't go there looking for that, just like we didn't look for the Airbnbs when we was on vacation. Like those things, you know, you're doing that. I mean, you're tapping in like you're letting the universe talk to you and say, hey, keep your eyes open for this, and you did it at the hospital, you did it at your vacation, you did it at a restaurant. Yeah. You just have to. Like, once you become an investor in your mind, and you start thinking along those lines is I'm an investor and I want to create revenue streams, different multiple revenue streams, then that's how you think. You're just thinking differently. You're not thinking of, oh, you know, I'm gonna go online and start looking for businesses. No, it, they'll come to you based on you changing your mindset. Be yourself and like going to a restaurant or doing whatever you do, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So do you go to all the the the war rooms and all the other masterminds? I, my, my, my team and I, we put them on, yes. Oh my God, that's uh like the million dollar, billion dollar intelligence you hear going in and out of these things. That's awesome. I'm a very lucky girl to be able to get all that information and still do my job and take it all in. So yes, I'm very blessed. Now your husband, you guys are are copacetic about, you know, the, the, the information that flows back. Do you guys have like the same mindset in that when you're talking? No, we're, well, we're very different, but yet very much alike. We're very competitive. Both of us are extremely competitive and we don't like losing. We, we like to, to run and just do things quickly, um. So that, but we're very different in our minds like he's very skilled in sales and um marketing. I've got marketing too, but I also think differently than him um and so yeah, we, we have a lot that compliments each other but a lot that is very competitive and um very much we hold each other accountable. So, um, luckily for us, you know, when we both knew that we wanted to start investing a couple of years ago, um, we just decided that this is what we want to look for when we do it. Um, and, um, now, not everything, there's things that I find, and he's just like, nope. And then there's things that he's fine, and I'm like, nope. And we are allowed that veto. I just saw some interview with, uh, Charlie Munger just saying, hey, sometimes I get to say, no, that's a stupid idea, Warren Buffett. Yep, yep, right. So we are allowed that, but, um, no, we, again, and we both are very, we, we wanna leave a legacy for our children and our grandchildren and you know, so it's very important for us that, um, we're finding things that will help, you know. Create that for them and give them, you know, their, their peace of mind. And then also, you know, some, we're not spring chickens either, so we wanna make sure that, you know, we're creating that business. So, um, it's been fun. It's been I know is he full time? He full time with you guys? He's a, he's a vice, no, my husband's a vice president of a separate company, so he, we are not in the same company, but yeah, and your, your kids, I mean they're all grown. I mean they're all my kids are grown. They are they're. 29, 27, 24, so. Oh my gosh, yeah, and they have separate jobs or doing entrepreneurial stuff. They are not. Now, um, our youngest, our 24 year old, is entrepreneurial. He actually works with my husband and does sales and marketing, um, for my husband's company, but, um, the 27 and the 29, the 27 year old is actually a stockbroker. He's got a Series 10, um, license. He went on his own path, but he did a very great job. I'm proud of him. Um, so he's, he's does. That and then our 29 year old also um manages companies, but they're, uh, he does more of the automotive companies and so, uh, very different, different skill sets. Um, I would like to see them someday come into the companies that we, we create and help run them, but we'll never make them. It's always something if they want to, great. If not, then that's great as well. Yeah, I love it. I love it. Anyway, we've almost done 45 minutes and I really I really appreciate the time. I really. I mean, I feel like there's so much that you're seeing behind the scenes, like, where do you keep getting the ideas? Well, it's proximity to power, being in the war room and doing your affiliate program and hanging around people that are, you know, doing bigger and bigger things, and you're doing so many different things with this Airbnb, but you're adding a different lay lay layer on it. But you're also keeping your, your, just your mind open to what the universe is telling you. It's like, Hey, this lady needs help. I'm gonna ask. You're almost like that Geico lady at the beach going. Where she said somebody else starts talking about, gosh, I wish I could bundle my home and auto together in my boat. And she runs over there and it goes, I'm gonna have a conversation with them. You know, but I think it's true. Like, I think once you change your mindset to where you are an investor and you're wanting to go do these deals and they just, you, you find it. You, it becomes, it, it falls into your conversations without you, without you even meaning to. You know, I've been on clubhouses. I think I've Mentioned this before on an epic call once that I was on um uh epic call, I'm sorry, I was on a clubhouse um with some friends of mine. We have a business women entrepreneur group that we do, um, it's called Coffee in the Clubhouse every Friday for women entrepreneurs and uh we were just talking and, you know, people know that that I invest and this friend of mine, she also invests, and she does real estate and she's just like me, you know, we just, it just, it just rolls. We're just talking about what we're investing and what we're doing and how we're doing things. It's not like we're targeting anyone in particular, but someone on that call actually was like, oh my gosh, um, I need to talk to y'all after the clubhouse. How can I reach you? And we're like, you know, we gave our information and then an hour later, this, this person reaches out and, and it's like, OK, so my next door neighbor is in Oklahoma. They live in Oklahoma and they have this. Garbage disposal company. And I mean, you asked me if I was ever going to do a garbage disposal company. No, no. The garbage, right? But then she's like, but look, the hus the, the, the husband and wife died. The kids inherited. The kids want nothing to do with this garbage company. And, and I'm like, OK, do you know the numbers? Because I'm not into garbage, you know. And, um, she started spouting the numbers, and the numbers was Incredible. And I'm like, let's have another conversation. So my friend started having this conversation with her and I, my friend is actually gonna do the business and I may jump on it with her, but it's, it's an incredible deal that if it comes to true fruition. It's an amazing deal because the kids just want the cash they want out. They don't want anything to do with this, this garbage company. Their parents died and they just want money. But the business, what they're asking was like less than a million dollars and the company itself is doing $4.7 million a year. Holy cow. I was like, dude. Let's talk, but, but my point of that was, is that that just happened on a clubhouse. Like, literally we're just talking and then before you know it, you know, a couple hours later, we're all having this phone call and it's just gone into different things. So there's, there's so much, I think it's just whether or not you're just thinking differently and talking and letting people know that you're an investor, that you look at, you're looking for deals. And people will just add like, I didn't know who this person was from Adam. I'd seen her on the calls a couple. times, but I didn't know her, and I definitely wasn't looking for garbage company in Oklahoma. Like I live in Texas, you know. So that's what I'm saying about just having your mindset change and letting people know, then things just come to you and you can pick and choose what you think is going to be a good fit or you send it off to your other friends and then maybe you get a piece of the deal. Like there's just so many different ways to do that, but you just have to change your mindset. Yeah, that's good advice. I mean, I, I get a lot of people uh on LinkedIn from Epic reach out to me and said like, hey, how do I get deal flow, and I said, well, it's, it's massive action. I mean, if you're doing LinkedIn, Sales Navigator, if you're doing direct mail, I mean, Jeff Charlton talks about that, if you're networking, you're doing clubhouse, you've gotta do it all till you get that flow in, yeah. And then once the flow starts coming, you're so swamped, then you then you then you create like And affiliate network where you can give it out to other people. But I mean, that's, that's where Roland is the master. Like Roland has created this to where he gets so many deals because they just, they, they just come in all the time. And, and they're big deals and he can, he can be a little bit pickier, pickier on things because he's got so many, but he, it's because he has worked so hard to get in that space and let people know what he does. And he's just a, he's a brilliant, you know, at what he does when. That. So, um, again, but you have to start somewhere, right? So like, I'm not Roland Frasier, but I started somewhere and I'm getting to the point now where things are coming a lot easier. I'm having conversations that are much easier and things are rolling in a different path for us just because I'm thinking on a different level. And everyone have those conversations with a restaurant owner and a garbage disposal owner about the business. That's like two different, but it's the same. It's, it's, it's all the same when you're like, Well, are you interested in in, are they interested in selling? Like, it's all I, that's literally all I ask. Are you interested in selling? That's exactly what I said to the lady on the call. I was like, Well, are they interested in selling? And she's like, Yeah. And I'm like, well then, let's chat. Like it was, it was literally those two sentences. And then here's my phone number, call me when this call is over, you know? And that's all it was. And, you know, the, the restaurant. The, the restaurant thing that we're looking at was literally, I'm standing at the bar ordering a margarita, and I noticed her, and I was like, I knew, you know, people that are owners just have a different look and feel, you know? And I just knew they had to be the owner. So I just happened to walk up and I was like, man, do you own this? And, yes. And I'm like, Man, you've done a great job. I didn't even realize this existed. And I complimented her. And then as she, she's like, Well, I mean, just so, I'm so tired. Like, I live and breathe this. And I'm like, girl, You've done an amazing job. So I started with compliments, and then I was just, I was curious. And I'm like, my mind, I'm curious. I just like to know numbers. I'm like, I'm just curious, how long have you been here? What have you done to get this going? Are you on Facebook? I've never seen you before. And before you know it, she's like, Well, yeah, but me and my husband started this grassroots. We started it with a trailer in the middle of a lot. You know, 3 years ago and we started with $5000. And she's like, and now we're doing this, this and this. And I'm like, Man, I'm like, are you doing this, this and this? And before she's like, No, but I really wish I had an investor that would help. And I'm like, Oh, well, like, well, like a hook and a fish line. I did. And then it just, it just morphed, right? But that's that conversation. I never went in making that conversation awkward. I never went in like in a bull and a china shop and said, I'm, you know, no, it was conversational. And it was me complimenting her on her what she had done. And I could tell she was tired. I could tell that she had worked her tail off to create this. But I could also see from what I was looking at. My gosh, this is like a gold mine that could have so much more. Like you could have a dance floor and you could have more, um, restaurants over here and you could have a play area up here for kids. You could have an outdoor dance, you know, a dance hall over here, you could have this. And I mean, my mind just started and I'm like, I wonder why she's not doing this. And so then as I started thinking those things, I'm like, well, I'm gonna ask her, you know? And, and then it came to it. She's just like, well, I mean, my husband and I just, we just don't have the funds because we're doing this ourselves. And I'm like, Oh, and she's like, but I'm looking for investors. I'm like, Yeah, they're in the business. They're sucked. They are working. They are working it. She's a hairdresser and she, she just turns every bit of her profit into this to make it go, and she needs investors to make it run. But I never would have gotten that information had I not have just complimented her and told her what a great job she was doing because it's an amazing property with all these, you know, all this information. And before you know it, an hour and a half later, she started giving me. Some of her financials verbally, she'd already told me she gave you financials. No, within an hour and a half. And she'd give me the financials of what she was paying for rent on property, what she was charging. She had told me what she was looking for for an investor like an hour and a half later because we just hit it off conversationally. So what I always try to tell people is be authentic, be a real, just let people know that you're investing and don't try too hard. Because when you try too hard, it comes off fake, but when you're generally just looking out there for things, they just fall in your lap, and it's just organic. That's beautiful, and we're gonna end on that. You know, thank you so much for the time. I appreciate this, man, you are really the glue that brings us together, cause I've tried to be that person that goes, hey, could you finish your question off? We need the the next question going, and you do a great job of that. You guys do job of the whole pack. the whole epic course. Thank you so much. You know what, thank you. Thank you for interviewing me. I, I love you guys and it's just such a pleasure to work with all of you epic members. I appreciate you. Yeah, it's a great group of people. Awesome. Well, thanks, John. I appreciate you. Thank you, Dianna. All right, bye.