Systematic Real Estate Portfolio Growth with Buy-and-Hold Investor Shaun Martin

Shaun Martin: 0:00

A really good strategy I think right now in Denver, I've just started visiting with a group that's specific to house hacking. And the Denver market really allows that you're getting FHA loans at 3% down, I think it is still reasonable rate. So you know, the average house in Denver, is $500k - $600k. $15k-$18k if you're serious, I know that's a lot of money. But at the same time, if you're serious about doing it and looking to achieve financial freedom, I do those air quotes. But yeah, to get ahead, I believe that is attainable for anybody that is serious about it.

Announcer: 0:40

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Jason Muth: 1:03

Welcome to The Real Estate Law Podcast. Thanks again for listening. My name is Jason Muth. I'm here with attorney, real estate broker, Rory Gill from NextHome Titletown Real Estate and UrbanVillage Legal in Boston. And Rory, we have a guest with the most delightful New Zealand accent by way of Colorado, Shaun Martin is a real estate investor. He is the owner of Watson Buys. And we're going to dig into a lot of the techniques that he uses to generate leads for his buy and hold flips. He uses 1031 exchanges as a way of moving up the real estate investment food chain. And we're going to dig into search engine optimization to learn more about some of the different websites that he runs as way of getting some of his leads. Shaun welcome to the podcast.

Shaun Martin: 1:50

Yeah, good morning. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Jason Muth: 1:54

We love people that have accents like yours, because you know, we're we talk to people in New England all the time. We've talked to a bunch of people in Colorado on this podcast, and you were born in New Zealand. Is that right?

Shaun Martin: 2:07

Yeah, born in New Zealand a long, well not that long ago, moved to the States about 20 years ago to learn how to ski. And then a girl fell in love, had to get a real job, and then ultimately ended up in real estate, which has been really good to me. A lot of work. And you know, like a lot of things the harder you work the luckier you get. But yeah, I'm definitely a huge fan of real estate in that regard.

Jason Muth: 2:31

How's the skiing in New Zealand?

Shaun Martin: 2:34

Beautiful views. Not so great snow. Yeah. Yeah. And the resorts just not nearly developed. A lot of like, maybe think what the resorts would have been like in the 60s here, like still a lot of T-bars, slow chairs, things like that. I mean, fantastic place to visit to ski things like that. But my top thousand powder days are definitely all in Colorado.

Rory Gill: 2:59

You know, your career in real estate at this point, it is going in a lot of different directions. I mean, you're somebody you could speak to buy and hold to flipping to wholesaling kind of the works. But as we trace your story, what was your gateway, what was the first part of the real estate industry that that you worked in?

Shaun Martin: 3:16

So I read a book, which was basically the gist of it was The 1% rule. You know, if a house is $100,000, you need to be able to rent it for $1,000. And it happened that we were it was around 2008 that I bought that book, and everything in Denver, was was going toward that, and you'd throw a dart and every house that I hit that was for sale was looked like a 1% rule. So I became a buy and hold real estate investor and buy and hold real estate investing is still the backbone of what we do. Even with wholesale deals, the reason I got into finding off market deals was so that I could, you know, maintain our relative wealth by selling our cheapest property, and then getting an off market deal that was a better property but for the same price and using the 1031 to move the money into that property. So the goal being maintain or increase relative wealth without using any more of our dollars. I'm a huge fan of buy and hold. You know, the timing has been really good to me. Appreciation has definitely made me look a lot smarter than I am 2010 through 2022 everywhere. It's been very, very easy to look like you know what you're doing. I think the next couple of years I'm not a it's going to crash and burn. But I think the next certainly couple of years could really thin out what's happening out there, but we'll see. I mean for me, I look at it as opportunity. A little bit of wait and see. A little bit of Be patient. So, yeah.

Jason Muth: 5:04

Yeah, perhaps one of the smartest things that you did even though, you know, you might think that you're the genius that you are, was reading that book in 2008. And investing a little bit less time at the ski resorts and some time in planning, because at that point, this is 15 years ago. And I have a feeling I know, isn't that crazy?

Shaun Martin: 5:25

You just aged me.

Jason Muth: 5:27

You and me both, right. I've heard people say things like, you know, look ahead five years from now, is there a single property that you wouldn't buy today, you know, that you had the opportunity to buy today, in five years? I think that everyone would buy those things today if they could. You know, five years from now, we have to think that the markets are going to push things up in many of the more popular places, and even the less popular places it's a matter of, will there be a double digit appreciation or single digit appreciation? But thinking back to 2008? You know, I mean, you you were starting to learn about this space back when we were entering into the big recession, you know, the subprime problem.

Shaun Martin: 6:02

Yes, and I think 2010, I believe, was the first time we bought a property. So it took me a couple of years to understand what to do how to do. And then to me, it just became so obvious these numbers. Every night, I had to convince myself that it was okay. I shouldn't say it could be this easy. But at that point that that there were many opportunities in regards to the Denver market, I mean, homes were under $100,000. And at that time, were renting for $1,200 - $1,300 for those particular properties. On the being a landlord side, Colorado typically is very favorable. I mean, it's fair, but it's more favorable than other states. It is a good place to be a landlord, the cost insurance is much lower property taxes, these laws in and around property, or just taxes, generally, actually, in Colorado, that limit how much we can be taxed. I think it's called tabor.

Rory Gill: 7:15

So and when we talk about that era, the 2008 to 2012 era is kind of just a goldmine of opportunities. everywhere you looked on MLS, there are properties that you wouldn't be able to find the deals today by any stretch of the imagination, but you know, like anytime it wasn't perfect, there were challenges there too. And part of the difficulty then was acquiring financing. Banks were reeling after too easy with their underwriting series before the crisis afterword was difficult to get loans, which is what was suppressing the market in large part. And I ask this for people who are listening who are at that stage in a different market. But at that stage looking to get that first property, how did you put together the first downpayment and get going with the first financing? Because for a lot of people, that's the most difficult.

Shaun Martin: 8:02

Yeah, I am not the person to tell you how to buy houses with zero money down and that. It was it was hard work. My wife had her job, I had my job, like you suggested earlier, we skied less, we worked more, we saved and bought, put all our money in the middle and bought a single family home. And then very quickly, we saw that it was working. So then we kept saving and would buy another one. So it was very traditional 20- 25% down. The first 10 were under that kind of no, not no questions asked, but you're allowed to get 10. From then we started trying to build a relationship with a local bank that would hold the mortgages in house, you know, they weren't selling them on. Having to pay 0.2 - 0.3 more for the loan. But loans at that point, I mean, it was free money. I'm a believer 5% and lower is very affordable. Right now it yeah, it hurts a little bit. But it's a natural - 7% is not an unnatural number. You know, my first loan, actually, when I was 20, was 9.5% percent. But that was back in New Zealand to that, yeah, a very, very traditional process. For us. There was no creative financing. And then since then, and this is I do need to learn some more about financing. But since then, with the appreciation, it was always I mean, we were we had a lot of equity going forward. So that became easier for us to find more financing when we needed it.

Rory Gill: 9:48

And that's the answer for a lot of people getting started that there's nothing wrong or nothing with using the traditional model of financing. I know kind of a lot of the resources out there talk about 0% down or getting really creative to get started. But that's not how most people do it. Most people get started using traditional financing from a mortgage broker or lender, put down the standard 20-25%. That's, that's the gateway for most people who get into this space.

Shaun Martin: 10:15

Yeah, what I'm saying, a really good strategy, I think right now in Denver, I've just started visiting with a group that's specific to house hacking. And the Denver market really allows that you're getting FHA loans at 3% down, I think it is still reasonable rate. So you know, the average house in Denver, is $500k - $600k. $15k-$18k if you're serious, I know that's a lot of money. But at the same time, if you're serious about doing it and looking to achieve financial freedom, I do those air quotes. But yeah, to get ahead, I believe that is attainable for anybody that is serious about it. And yeah, I mean, it's, there's a lot of underneath that too. I know, but.

Jason Muth: 11:03

Since we're talking about financing, I actually have two questions based on what you just said. The first one is something that not everyone has figured out. And it sounds like you figured it out, along with a lot of people in the real estate space along the way when the rates were really low. Which is, you know, you're buying these properties, they're going up in value, you're tapping into the properties to then buy more properties. Because we had that question, Rory and I with a friend of ours last week, where, you know, we just purchased our, or we have five short term rental properties that we own. And we, you know, and we have some other stuff also. But that is something that we scaled up. And, you know, the question was simple, it's like, well, how did you do that? Like, where did you get the money to do that? So if that question was posed to you, you know, five, eight years ago as your properties, your amassing your ten, and the value should going up, like, you know, what, something - How do you explain that to somebody that doesn't quite get how real estate investors work that way

Shaun Martin: 11:56

To finance out of the property?

Jason Muth: 11:59

Yeah, to finance the properties you know, for the next property.

Shaun Martin: 12:03

Okay, I mean, probably it can I just use numbers, like if I buy a house with 20% down, and it's $100,000. So I have $20,000 in equity, and now I need another $20,000, to buy my next property. So in Denver, we were really lucky that year-on-year from 2012, properties really did increase 10% probably on average, maybe more every year. So after a year, now, my house is worth $110,000. So I have $30,000, in equity. And still, so after two years, it would be worth $120k. So now I have 40,000, then it was a matter of going back to the bank and showing them. It wasn't really proving that it was a business, it was more just showing them, hey, the house is worth this. Look, lots of people will pay it - pay me $140,000. I paid my mortgage on time, could we refinance the loan, so get a new loan with the new value of $140,000? And when we sign all the documents, you would cash out that $20,000.

Jason Muth: 13:19

Yeah, I wanted you to walk people through it also, because people of all levels are listening to podcasts like other ones. And that's, that's kind of exactly how I would have explained it. You know, one thing I'll throw in there is, you know, when you're refinancing a loan, unless you have a magic way to do it with a bank, you know, you're actually taking out a new loan, right? You know, so you take it out for three years, you pay it off for two years, you refinance it at the current rate, you take out another 30 year loan, essentially. So you're going through the whole process of signing all those papers, proving your income, proving all those different things. But that leads into my second question, because you mentioned that you were starting to build relationships with local banks and seeing if maybe they can keep these properties as portfolio loans and not selling them. I think that's what you were saying. Take us through what that process is like, because there might be some people that maybe they've hit that limit of 10, or they've hit that limit of where they can't qualify anymore for traditional financing, and need the banks to look at them as somebody who is investing in these properties. And these properties actually will pay for themselves.

Shaun Martin: 14:20

Yeah, and really quickly, like before I even get into single family, which is where I've stayed, I think that's really why a lot of people go into commercial properties like the larger apartment like four plus, because the bank will actually look at that property as an individual business. So that kind of makes it a lot more simple in regards to getting a loan. On the single family, they're always looked at as kind of residential properties, but building a relationship with a small bank. It's not that personal. A lot of it to be honest, was just longevity. Like they had seen us pay down loans over 2-3-4-10 years. You know, if the same banker was still there, then they understood that, and there was a little bit of leverage. We were, I mean, this is we were super lucky, because our original personal banker ultimately became the president of a very large area of the same bank. And he watched us grow through that period, too. And actually, we've just just reached out to him, because I sent him an email five years ago, in regards to what I thought was going to happen with the economy. I'm not saying that, you know, but basically, it was like, Hey, If this happens, you need to lend us some money, with the ultimate goal that in a couple of years, they'll lend us some money. So consistency, with the same bank, talking to the bank being open about it. There are a number of smaller banks that are very interested in their community. And so they are actually open to looking at a single family home, and do understand if you spend X number of dollars in that community, it will ultimately make the community stronger, and therefore a better place for that bank to be. I did come across that in Indianapolis on three separate occasions. So those relationships, they take time to build, it's not a magic thing. But I think, in real estate, well actually that's networking, building relationships, and real estate is probably what's going to make anybody more successful than they would be if they didn't build relationships. And that goes across lending, finding deals, everything. Do as I say, don't do as I do. I sit in this little room and kind of work on my own quite a lot. I always try to network more.

Jason Muth: 17:06

Yeah, you know, it does speak to the value of relationships, even in banking, you know, when you can be working with a national bank. And they even might have some good feet on the ground. Like, you know, we, we have a relationship with the branch manager here in Newburyport, Massachusetts, where we now live, you know, that I can text him, you know, if I need to open up a new account, right, and this Bank of America, you know, which, oh, really big bank. But you know, small community banks, definitely, you know, they've, especially if it's a bank that's kind of expanding into new towns or new cities, they might want to meet with the local businesses, the local investors, you know, because they also have, they have the impetus to grow their branch. You know, they want to increase deposits, they want to increase loans, they want more checking accounts there. So they are a lot more than just a nebulous, big bank, or a branch that you drive by. These are humans as well, you know, and these underwriters are humans. I mean, I always joke when things go off to underwriting, it just feels like this big bunker downstairs that all these people just don't see daylight. And all they do is look at amortization tables. Exactly. But they're right, but they're humans, right? And sometimes, you know, if you if the human likes you, you can get things done a lot more quickly.

Shaun Martin: 18:21

Yeah, honey, honey to bees.

Jason Muth: 18:24

Yeah, absolutely. So I want to talk about SEO and your websites in just a second. But you know, you did mention that you've done a bunch of 1031 exchanges for some of your properties like do you know how many you've done, you know, what's that experience been? Like?

Shaun Martin: 18:37

Tens, not hundreds, but the experience is pretty smooth and always gets me very excited. If the IRS is listening, I am not avoiding taxes. I am deferring my tax payments. You never want to avoid, you're not allowed to avoid taxes. I guess that's a bad word. You're deferring that. I actually I was very lucky. I was on a Facebook group. I reached out to them and said - anyone got a good 1031 guy. I was introduced to a gentleman named Scott and I haven't shopped around since. You know, there are cheaper guys, there are more expensive guys. But he is the guy that works. Every time I have a property if I'm selling it or or buying it, I shoot him an email and say we're going to run a 1031 and he drives the entire real estate transaction after that. He takes over. He contacts the title company organizes all the documents at closing the time. I'm not allowed to touch the money of course. So at closing he has the money directed into his account will just call it his account. And then I tell him which property we'll want to use that money for. And he then purchases that property for us in that name or in our name. It's that simple. And then the beauty being we don't have to pay that capital gains tax right, then we can pay it later. So therefore we can make more money with that money. That's that's the idea of the 1031 for those listening is that you can reinvest that money instead of giving it to the government right then. I mean, eventually it has to get paid. My goal actually is just to borrow - continually borrow against the asset. So it's going to be somebody else's problem further down then line. Yeah, so 1031 is a great product for people that are looking to trade.

Jason Muth: 20:44

Rory and I have talked a lot about tax deferment strategies. I mean, like he has, since he's a real estate agent he's seen it. I mean, a lot of your clients, if you're working with wills, you're working with people that have had property for a long time. I mean, you know, tax deferment is certainly a strategy that is within the IRS code. I'm not an accountant. But you know, we can all read the same code from irs.gov. And that's all you're doing, you're paying your taxes, you're just deferring the taxes on this particular property. And, you know, it sounds as though the 1031 exchange has probably been a powerful tool for you to continue growing your real estate portfolio.

Shaun Martin: 21:17

Absolutely. It's allowed us to go to different cities, by better properties. I mean, it's still work. So don't just, you know, start 1031'ing everything, I mean, you have to still run the numbers,

Jason Muth: 22:10

Rory, maybe you can explain the 1031 Exchange to everybody as well, because you can do this with horses, can't you?

Rory Gill: 22:16

You can, it's like-kind exchange. So you know, art dealers can trade artwork and sell artwork and use a 1031 exchange to buy a like-kind, which would be another piece of art. But in the context that we all know and love, it is real estate. So if you're selling a property, and you have a capital gain on it, and you just don't want to pay it right now, you can roll the money into a new property. If you don't touch the money, and you follow the time standards to get into the new property, and then you kind of keep deferring the taxes. And you know, what I've seen with a lot of people is if you hold the capital gains all the way until when you die, you get a stepped up basis, meaning that all those capital gains are forgiven for your heirs, which is kind of the ultimate tax deferment strategy for forever. But one thing that I've seen and I do want to ask you about is with the changing market, interest rates, how this, this goes into it, because I'm seeing this with residential homeowners and also with investors, where the higher rates are sort of freezing them in to the properties that they have. Because, you know, they may be invested with a 3% loan and a property, if they were to sell it to do a cash out refinance, even, but even to sell it and do a 1031 into new property, they're looking at an 8% loan. So it becomes a lot more attractive to kind of frees up where you are now. Have you encountered that problem in your investments? And is it something that we really should be worrying about the with the higher rates?

Shaun Martin: 23:40

You have to account for the higher rates would be probably my way to say it, right? So when you're running your numbers, you just have to be real. And you have to plug that 8% cost of carrying that money. You might cringe when I say this, but you make the money on the buy. And that's definitely why I started working more and more at trying to get off-market deals because I needed deeper discounts. Well, actually, I mean, the interest rates only just jumped really, really quickly. But it was it was inevitable. It had to have I thought it was going to happen in 2015. That's how good my crystal ball is. But anyone that thinks the time has passed, maybe this is a good time to say that in real estate, it hasn't. You know, six months ago, we bought a property single family home in downtown Denver at a 10% cap rate. You just have to be a little bit more patient. And that's probably a key at the moment too, is just being patient, being honest with all of the numbers that you run. 8% put that in there. I would also say in that regard, maybe add a little extra on maintenance and things. In a year or two or six months as that inflate mortgage as interest rates hit the market, we'll see the cost of repairs come down significantly. I mean, we're seeing $100 an hour for handymen right now, which is very high. It wasn't long ago it was 20 bucks. So maybe while we'll see you know rates go really high we could start to bring down real numbers on expenditure. I can absolutely appreciate that a higher rate does hurt. It makes it feel a lot harder, but there's still plenty of opportunity. I'm absolutely or I know that for sure. It just takes a little longer to find.

Rory Gill: 25:52

The next question I have is going to bridge to one of Jason's favorite topics, and that's SEO. But when you started everything off, deals were relatively easy to find. And that wasn't the problem. You could, I think you said throw a dart, you know, take a peek in MLS, and you'll find something that would be a great buy and hold return. And gradually over the past 15 years, that has changed, and it's become difficult to find a property that is good for a buy and hold. And you have to either look harder, look differently, you have to be more creative, or really niche down into kind of specialty programs. And I'm sure you've kind of adapted with that along the way. But you know, how have you shifted? And how are you finding deals these days that make sense, when we all kind of came of age in this in an era when we could just point to a house and it would make sense.

Shaun Martin: 26:46

I'm lucky to have grown up in real estate through the period that I have, you know, high appreciation, make a mistake, wait a year, and now you win. And but through that time, I've met a number of people, they I'm very transparent in what I do. I'm also a person of abundance. I think there's plenty out there for all of us. And because of that, I'm grateful that people that are coming up in real estate will bring deals to me possibly to do together. Or if they're not ready, they will let me take those on. So I have a network now of people that will bring me deals, search engine optimization, obviously, we have websites that if someone needs types into Google, I want to sell my house fast for cash, I try to have my website show up for that. And then also a network of real estate agents and other people, just like will say, just like me, you know, at my level are not up here. I'm not down there. I'm somewhere in the middle, not trying to make out that I'm someone and just talking to people letting people know what you're looking for, or I let people know what I'm looking for. And so deals come come that way too. Yeah, spend a lot of time on the computer, just looking at even on Zillow, don't really find many deals on there. But looking at those numbers then allows me to see if what other people are presenting is actually a deal.

Jason Muth: 28:20

Yeah, it's good to look on Zillow and on MLS, because we found deals there. And we've done well with those. Plus it tells you the direction of the market. And those are things that everyone is able to look at. So, you know, I've had I've had friends of mine send me properties on Zillow that were neighboring properties to what we owned, you know, asking our opinion of the area. So you know, if that's the level set, or it's public information, we could all see the same thing. Let's talk about your websites, though, before we get to the final questions that we have. You mentioned your websites, and you mentioned that you're good at Search Engine Optimization. Talk about why you have multiple websites that all lead to you that all have a similar look and feel. It's not uncommon to do something like that. But I think that people that are getting into this space might like to hear the strategy and what's in your head as to why you went down that road.

Shaun Martin: 29:15

I went down that road originally because I bought a house from a wholesaler. And I paid, it was an Indianapolis, $120,000 for that house. And after it closed and all said done, I looked it up and they had signed that contract for $40,000. And I went, oh, that's not fair. And then I went well, you know what, at $120,000 the deal is still great for me. So I put that aside, that that feeling of that's not fair. But I did say one day, I'm going to get that deal. And I started doing a lot of marketing, text messaging, you know, sending thousands of text messages out. Sending postcards, but that heads up really quickly. I know it's a great strategy for some people. But then I was introduced to search engine optimization, and the fact that people search for stuff online. And it made sense to me. I could invest money into a website. And it wasn't just one and done, like I see one postcard and it's out there and then I'd have to send another in another, but if I spent that same money on a website, the website deal would be there forever in some form. And so that's why I decided to go that route initially takes a lot longer. There's not that instant gratification, you can't just start a website and start getting deals. But once you do start getting deals, I personally, I really like that strategy, not for everybody. But if anybody wants to get into it, I would say, do it and do it yesterday,

Jason Muth: 31:05

How many different URLs do you have?

Shaun Martin: 31:07

Not all in real estate, but a silly number. If you can, you can buy a URL for for less than $10. So we do like, just the other day cashpiggy.com became available. I don't know what we'll use it for. But it was just there. It was aged. And it sounded fun. So we scooped that up. I mean, some people oh, I own tens of thousands of websites, somewhere. I have hundreds of URLs, not hundreds of websites. So a lot of them are just parked. And then in the real estate, I would have maybe seven serious websites that are trying to get off market single family property deals for me.

Jason Muth: 32:00

And would you say that that strategy over the past couple of years has, you know, has really panned out? Well, for you with leads with deals? Is this something that you're going to invest more in as we go into, you know, 2023 and beyond?

Shaun Martin: 32:17

Absolutely, it's worked out well, for me. Other people have done a lot better. Again, I don't like to be the guy that says only guy. And but, yes, it's panned out really well. I believe that the internet in some form will be here for a very long time. And it won't just click and become something else. So I think websites and domain names, you know, my real estate website.com, I think that will be visible for decades to come. And my take now is the longer I own the same website, the more authority it will have. And when you're building a website, or authority is what Google likes creating authority creating trust. And one of those signals is that website old, or is it brand new? Right? That's the age of a domain is very important when it comes to Google, or any of the search engines. But right most of the time when you're talking search engine optimization, you're referring to Google because they drive over 90% of all searches.

Jason Muth: 33:31

Yeah, that's also part of the strategy as to why you might buy an older domain that might be a little more seasoned. It's been around for a while, maybe there was a website on it, and maybe there was even traffic on it, you know, and that's why some of those websites cost more than others. But yeah, that's a good strategy, you can redirect the traffic or put something up on the site that just had natural baked in traffic, you know, and a bunch of links coming into it over the years. Yeah.

Shaun Martin: 33:55

Aged domains is definitely a thing of you. I would say if you're new to SEO, it's difficult to there's a lot that goes into an age domain.

Jason Muth: 34:03

Yeah, I was gonna say I was I was looking at, you know, people that have multiple websites, like yourself, you know, and I was like, I cheese. I wonder what the thinking is behind that. I mean, I think I knew it, and you just kind of articulated exactly why you want to do it, because you want to be found in all these different areas. But, you know, sometimes you're launching a new site, sometimes you're taking an aged domain, and you know, putting something new on it sometimes. You know, there's a variety of reasons why.

Shaun Martin: 34:25

A lot of a lot of the reasons that people have multiple domains too, is you will run different strategies on different domains. And you can test different strategies. Because Google as much as they try and tell you, they even when you think you are doing it, absolutely right, Google may come out with an update and your website, that was number one becomes number 10. And number 10 is no good. You have to be top three. Top three gets 73% of all clicks across all industries. So that's another reason for running multiple sites. Once again, if you're gonna if you do want to get into SEO, just buy a domain, buy a site, less than 20 bucks a year, and you can be up and running and start learning start doing. I'm gonna do guy jump over barriers as they come.

Jason Muth: 35:25

Put it up there, keep iterating and making changes as you go on and you'll learn along the way. So, Shaun, why don't we get to the final few questions we have for all of our guests and then you could let everyone know where they can get a hold of you if they want to learn more about anything that we've talks about this podcast, some of your strategies, some SEO work, 1031 exchanges, the Colorado Real Estate Market. If they have a ton of deals for you, they'll send them to you. Let's get the final couple of questions that we ask all of our guests, the first of which is if you can get on stage for a half an hour with zero preparation and talk about any subject in the world, what would that be?

Shaun Martin: 35:55

Can I bring my dad and if I can, we would get together and talk about wind foiling, which is this whole new thing, which is not really that new but hydro foiling on a personalized watercraft to say, like think windsurfing with a hydrofoil and underneath, so you pop that out of the water. And it's, it's exhilarating. And my dad would talk for 29 of those minutes, he is really into it, and I love him for it. And that would lead into somehow trying to ascertain your Why. Why am I sitting in front of a computer? Why am I trying to make money? Why am I doing what I'm doing that leans into a thing for me relationships, particularly with my my dad, with my mom, and my brothers and sisters, I think I would like to talk about that a lot. I am exploring that a lot myself at the moment, because that's just the place that I'm at right now. I'm not sure. Maybe it's me, maybe that's what happens when your eyes go bad at 44?

Jason Muth: 37:05

You're absolutely allowed to bring your dad for that conversation. That comment reminded me of an old holiday party I went to many, many years ago at an old job that I had, where it was a costume party, and you had a dress up and somebody won, you know a prize, it was basically an ad agency. So everyone was super creative. The winner was one of the creative guys who brought his dad and the costume was before and after, or now and later. And hands down because he looked just like his dad. Also it was It wasn't even a question. Second question we have tell us something that happened early in your life or career that impacts the way that you're working today.

Shaun Martin: 37:41

Early to mid, we'd had a lot of appreciation. And then a lot of people were starting to talk about where to send your money. Now surely we're at the end. And this is still 10 years ago, and surely we're at the top. And I actually it really started to worry me because I didn't have an answer for that. And that really got inside my head. A lot of people were talking about, oh, you really need lots of cash on hand now and do this and start making moves. And that really stressed me out. I made some moves. It worked out in the end. But I think what I learned was absolutely what I learned from that, and I'm absolutely applying now is is another cheeseball statement, but no deal is better than a bad deal. And patience is key. And if you're in real estate for 30 years, I am an absolute believer that you will come out on top. Unless of course there's a zombie apocalypse. And everything changes, at which point, you know, we don't even have money or anything. So patience and trying not to make decisions too quickly, I think is something that's really helping me sleep at night now. Especially, you know, you hear all these other markets dropped 10% and 50%. I mean, I read my own personal numbers the other day, and my wealth has absolutely gone down a significant number, because 99.9% of it is in real estate. But I'm okay with that because I can continue to pay the bills. And you know, I project out 10-20-30 years and I'm like, You know what this is going to work out. So it was a horrible lesson at the time. And I'm meeting people now that are feeling that pressure that got in a little bit later they BRRRR'ed there, you know, and I do worry for those people, I would say try and just make sure you got some cash to pay the bills, you know, maybe for the next year or something and just sit back and, and be a little bit patient and be confident. Talk to people too.

Jason Muth: 39:57

Yeah, that's all great advice. no deal is better than a bad deal. And at least your money is not in crypto, so.

Shaun Martin: 40:03

It's cheesy. I know but

Jason Muth: 40:05

No, no, it makes all the sense in the world. Finally, tell somebody you're listening to watching or reading these days.

Shaun Martin: 40:10

Something I am listening to is called Niche Pursuits podcast. It's a lot about what's called affiliate marketing, which is building a website that you make, so that lots of people come to it, and then you can put advertising on it. And so you make money from the advertising or you recommend particular products. And when someone clicks on that product that goes somewhere where you can buy that product. I am not an affiliate marketer. But there's a lot that can be learned about how to do search engine optimization correctly over a long period of time on there, and it's nice because it's actual people doing it. You know, people are excited because the over a year they build a website that's making them $50 a month, you know, it's a side hustle. Further along, some of these people are actually making a million dollars a month. I like it, because it's real people are putting their mistakes out there. They're putting their wins out there. So that's Niche Pursuits. I'm not involved in it. I'm not trying to plug it. I just think it's easy. Listen for when I'm driving.

Jason Muth: 41:30

Well affiliate marketing is certainly a great way to make some passive income if you can do it correctly. And you know, it's not a bad Listen, I'll have to go check that one out myself, because lots of websites have been around for a long time. They made a lot of money through affiliate marketing.

Shaun Martin: 41:44

It is very competitive.

Jason Muth: 41:46

So Shaun, thanks so much for this conversation. We really appreciated hearing some of your insights. If people want to reach out to him, we'll put all this stuff in the show notes. Where can they reach out to you?

Shaun Martin: 41:54

The quickest one would be Watson Buys that's Watson like Sherlock Holmes. watsonbuys.com. You can fill out a form just put in the instead of an address, just put a try to reach out to you. My email is shaun@watsonbuys.com. But if you search for anything about selling property in Denver, there's a good chance you'll end up on one of our websites.

Jason Muth: 42:15

All that great SEO.

Shaun Martin: 42:19

We're trying.

Jason Muth: 42:21

Well, we'll put that in the show notes also and Rory will put your contact in the show notes as well. Rory, where can people reach out to you?

Rory Gill: 42:27

You can google my name? I'm sure you'll find me somewhere but you can find me my brokerage. NextHome Titletown nexthometitletown.com Or my law practice UrbanVillage Legal. That's urbanvillagelegal.com.

Jason Muth: 42:39

Awesome. Well, great. Well, thanks so much, Shaun. Thank you, Rory. We really appreciate this conversation. And if you've enjoyed this episode, if you can give us a great rating, we'd appreciate that as well. You want to reach out to me you can get me jason@nexthometitletown.com or you can leave a comment below and we will respond to those. So on behalf of Shaun and Rory myself, thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next time.

Announcer: 43:02

This has been The Real Estate Law Podcast. Because real estate is more than just pretty pictures. And law goes well beyond the paperwork and courtroom arguments. were powered by next home Titletown greater Boston's progressive real estate brokerage. More at nexthometitletown.com and UrbanVillage Legal, Massachusetts real estate counsel serving savvy property owners lenders and investors more at urbanvillagelegal.com. Today's conversation was not legal advice, but we hope you found it entertaining and informative. Discover more at realestatelawpodcast.com Thank you for listening