Pursue Financial Literacy and Accomplish Financial Freedom – Dave Seymour

Dave Seymour  00:00

Real Estate is not for me to convince them. I would say to them, you’re absolutely right. But some people who wouldn’t agree with you, maybe you should look at what they’ve been doing. And then come back to me if you have any more questions. Also, the other answer is there. If you rely on on your gob, what’s more risky. Welcome to the passive income

 

Greg Lyons  00:17

brothers podcast.

 

Tim Lyons  00:18

Here we take the fear out of real estate investing using real life stories of everyday successful investors. Let’s go Welcome to another episode of the passive income brothers podcast. My name is Tim Lyons and today I am joined by none other than my brother, Greg is Angel day, buddy.

 

Greg Lyons  00:33

I’m doing fantastic, Tim, the leaves are changing. Interest rates are high, what better time to talk about real estate than today. 100%.

 

Tim Lyons  00:44

So let’s collectively take our heads out of the sand and jump into today’s episode with Dave Seymour who I think is going to just bring a lot of energy and a lot of great nuggets today. Because I’ve heard Dave a number of times on a number of different podcasts in a number of different locations. I will say and you know, it’s just every time he talks, it resonates with me in a big way. So one of the main reasons I will tell you guys is because Dave is a former firefighter career firefighter. So obviously everybody here knows that I’m also work as a lieutenant in the New York City Fire Department 17 and a half years. So when I heard this story, I remember saying to myself, I have got to talk to this guy. So without further ado, I want to bring in Dave Seymour, how’re you doing today, Dave?

 

Dave Seymour  01:30

I’m good brother. Real good. In fact, it’s so good to be on here with you. We were busting balls a little bit before we started recording right follow through commitment and good communication. So I’m glad we’re doing this call, man. I hope things

 

Greg Lyons  01:44

will work out on all things we’re working on.

 

Dave Seymour  01:47

And I get to meet you, brother. Is he younger or older than you?

 

Tim Lyons  01:50

Oh, come on, Dave. Well, I

 

Greg Lyons  01:52

mean, look at that watch. And if you’re watching on YouTube, you know, I’m a lot older for whole years. Well, I

 

Dave Seymour  02:00

was gonna go with the lacquer hair. But I figured that was disrespectful. You know what I mean? So I get it. I know

 

Greg Lyons  02:05

our listeners and watchers know what’s going on here.

 

Tim Lyons  02:09

Full disclosure. So Dave, listen, I mean, I’ve heard this story. But I want you to tell the folks take us from the beginning. Right? You were a young 20 Something I think you were from England if I’m not mistaken. Yeah, you land in Boston. So kind of take it from the top man. Tell everybody like kind of where’d you come from? Because where you are today is drastically different from where you were back in when you were 20?

 

Dave Seymour  02:28

Yeah. Thanks, man. Look, I’ll try and be as succinct as I can because I’m talking about my favorite subject. Now. You know what I mean? It’s me. I’m an immigrant. I’m an immigrant to the United States of America. Don’t tell anyone, right. I came to the States back in 86. I’m from London. Originally, I was born in London. I grew up in the south of England, and an overspill town, crazy, crazy stuff, brother gay, sent some pictures. So I was born in 66. I’m not a young chicken, I’m 56 years old, but a guy on Facebook, send some pictures of the housing development that I grew up in while it was being built. And then add some pictures of what those developments were like once they were full. And they were all black and white. They were part of the London architectural school of design, like something in their deep archives. And I’m looking at this thing, and I’m flicking through these pictures. And it’s amazing, like the memories of what I had growing up as a kid. We were broke as a frickin joke. I didn’t know that. Right? All I needed was a football, which was a soccer ball, bit of green grass, couple of mates down the park, forget about it. I was all we did. And in all of those pictures, I found the actual little block that I grew up on. And I think my house was probably I’d say 650 700 square feet. And we could squeeze three bedrooms in there. And it was all brick. It’s a project. It’s the English equivalent of the projects. And screw me if there isn’t a picture of this kid waving as this cameras gone by this phone, USB, it was right there. An eyeball for the cameras on the way back then. But I grew up in a working class family. My old man was in heating and air conditioning, my mom’s secretary at a bank, you know, wealth and real estate and everything that we deal with today wasn’t on a card. So anyway, I go to London, I go to school in London, I fall in lust with an American woman and her visa is running out. I’m 20 years old seemed like a really good idea to emigrate, get married. And back then I was planning on joining the Air Force. So now you gotta picture the culture shock, right? I’m in London, and I land in Long Island. I’m living out on Long Island. I lived in Greenwich Village for a while as well. So I’m feeling pretty good, right? I got the New York vibe going on London to New York. I’m still feeling pretty good. But then we moved to where her family was originated was living which was Wheeling, West Virginia. Should I go from London to New York for wheeling back God West Virginia, beer bellies, bobcats and chewing tobacco. yawns and y’all, it was a shit show. It was an absolute shit show you want to talk about an alien alien in an Alien Nation. It was me.

 

Greg Lyons  05:14

Well, it was a little more cosmopolitan is what you’re trying to say. Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to tell you.

 

Dave Seymour  05:19

If you got any listeners in the Pittsburgh area, like you know, the West Virginia panhandle, like those bibs and braces and Dunker jeans and all of that, that’s some real stuff. This was back in 1986 87. I sold chemicals to Moundsville State Penitentiary Moundsville State Penitentiary was the first bid that Charlie Manson did. Like these were my people. You know, I’m saying these. These were my piece, y’all. What the combined doing here anyway.

 

Greg Lyons  05:53

So you came over from England and got cultures.

 

Dave Seymour  05:57

I did. I got called Perfect. I also got 10 W tattoos. In the first year I was here. I didn’t know what they were. But I got 10 of them in one year. I didn’t know where you were supposed to frame them, or put them on the wall. My first wife said to me, that means you’re unemployable. I said, What are you talking about? She says it reads you can’t hold the job, asshole. I’m like, the guy told me to do something I didn’t want to do what he told me to do. So anyway, we left West Virginia and moved up to New England. We were going to go up to Portsmouth, New Hampshire Pease Air Force Base, but my first wife’s brother in law was stationed. And that’s how I ended up in New England. And to keep the journey short, tried a couple of different jobs in New England, I worked in the sheriff’s department in corrections for a while I worked juvenile detention for a while. But it made sense to me. So once you get one of them good government jobs. This guy was working on a Salem Fire Department, Salem mass. And Ray was his name Reiko Chesky, and racist amigos out when she tried for the fire department. I said, Yeah, I could do that. Okay, it’s a crazy, I get a little edge to me. Let’s try the fire department. So I tested for Lynn, Massachusetts fire department where I live Lynn local 739, AFL CIO. And I also was testing for a couple of police departments. And I look back at that, and there’s a reason why I always enjoy being a part of a team. Right? I really did. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed the camaraderie, I enjoyed the ball breaking. You know what I’m saying? Like, that was good. If you can say I’m a ballbreaker, and break them as well as I can get it. And I like that I like the parry with other guys, and especially in those high stress environments. So I tested for Miami PD, and Lin ft. And then the male came to cards. And they both said congratulations, once said, Congratulations. We’re offering you a job on the limb Fire Department, Massachusetts. And the other one said, Congratulations, we’re bringing you on to Miami PD. And the academy starts in six weeks or whatever it was. And I’m like, Jesus, you’re looking at the big guy upstairs. I’m like, am I going to be Don Johnson? In hallway five? Oh, right. Or am I going to be a firefighter? What am I going to do? I took the fire department. And I frickin loved it. I absolutely loved it. love being a part of the first thing company we were the busiest engine company north of Boston, south of Portland, Maine. I work right in the ship right in the middle of the wackos and the weirdos in the wobblies, you know what I’m talking about? Like, that’s my world, man. I mean, I missed that I missed the medical calls, I miss being a paramedic, I miss going into the door when my jump back and making sure that I gotta pull the right drug at the right dose and get it in the right vein and I got 15 seconds to pull it off. Otherwise, they’re circling the drain. You know, I’m saying like, I love that. Love the job. But here’s the disclaimer at the bottom of the video. With that, I bought all of my financial illiteracy and I know you guys can testify to this. Keeping Up with the Joneses. Do you have a nice bike like the alligator does? Do you have a nice house like the other guy does? Do you have a good second job like the other guy does? Great. Can you keep up? And for me? I was a financial donkey. I didn’t understand credit. I didn’t understand values. refinance my house three times in 18 months going into 2005 and six. And those leeches, those cockroaches that were selling mortgages back then, without any conscience at all. And they prey on us firefighters, they preyed on vets, they’ve you’re a firefighter, you can get you know, 120% of your home’s value on an adjustable rate mortgage. You deserve it. You serve the city and I’m like, Yeah, I’m gonna go guy, give me the freakin thing. I’ll sign it. You’re gonna give me money and my mortgage payment goes down. That’s great. Until it wasn’t great. Until in 2007 I was working 120 hours a week. Fired apart. I’m 4648 on average, construction on my days off for days, nights and weekends Stop and Shop security patrols, police. And I was fucking miserable. I was like, the American dream was more like an American nightmare for me. And it cost me a marriage. It cost me a relationship with my eight year old son. And I was hurting. And I don’t share this very often. But I’m sober. I’ve been sober 33 years in January. And it was the closest I ever came to picking up a drink was at that period of my life because I just made some shitty decisions and some really bad financial decisions. And I’m screaming and shouting in my truck and crying to my God and a commercial comes on the radio, teach me foreclosure, a free one and a half hour seminar coming to your neck of the woods. And I remembered from the construction sites, I remember digging ditches in Boston. I’m on an auger with three Hispanic gentleman trying to get down at a frost line on a four man auger in January. And my iced coffee was becoming a popsicle, my body hurt at work all day and then have to go to a firehouse all night. And this car pulled up. And it was a nice car. I think it was a Mercedes. And there was the hardest. Chicky gets out of the front of this Macy’s with the high heeled shoes on the little mini skirt. Nice makeup, she got a Fendi bag, the boy that was where there was a handsome dude, we’d have you know, that slick suit on ice. It’s one of the guys who sat because they’re the owners. They’re flipping the house. And like where they’re flipping the house. So what does that mean? Where they buy it, they fix it up, they sell it for more money. I said, Well, how much money so we’ll look at a car shift. And I like that game. What are they doing? Right? I asked them a few questions. I realized they weren’t that smart. They really weren’t. They were done. They didn’t understand a lot of what was going on in the market. So when that commercial came over, that’s how I started. I know that was a long story. I hope it brings value. But that’s how I started I started single family homes working in a fire department and trying to build a business from the seminar industry up.

 

Greg Lyons  12:17

Now. That’s, that’s great. It’s sometime it’s like that ding ding ding ding moment we just who? Yeah, I think that may work. So just to recap for our listeners, you came over in 1986, which was a magical year, because the Mets won the 86 World Series. Let’s go Mets. And sounds like you got culture upon coming over here. You were completely unemployable. You’ve alienated our West Virginia are Pittsburgh and our Boston listeners. Thank you. And then and only then, did you hear the commercial that probably changed everything. And what Tim and I do as we raise money for multifamily and self storage properties. Timing is everything. Yeah. Do you want to roll a 1031 into one of our offerings, whether you’re a first time investor, finally getting into real estate investing, timing is everything. And it sounds like the timing was just right for you to become a television star.

 

Dave Seymour  13:22

He’s good, too. He’s good. I like the way pays the road. And then you went off and it’s like, here

 

Tim Lyons  13:28

is the older brother. And um, you know,

 

Greg Lyons  13:29

that’s right. That was my moment. I’m going back to sleep now. But take us through that class. And kind of tell us what happened then.

 

Dave Seymour  13:36

Yeah. That class was instrumental because it was the first time in my life I started to hear a different way of thinking that I’d never heard before. And let’s be frank, right. You’re sitting in the firehouse, the bells aren’t going off. You’re sitting in the recliner, you’re probably watching sports or something. You’re not talking about financial literacy. Right? You’re not talking about the value of good debt and bad debt. You’re not talking about 1031 exchanges working with velocity. It’s not part of our vocabulary, right. So when I heard those things there, I’m going to be frank with you guys. I got pissed. I got pissed when they started telling me what the true value of a 401 K was. Or a company pension, even a city pension, right. Somebody else working my money and making money on my money when I’m the one going first one in the door. Last one out, right? I got pissed off. And it put me into motion to seek answers to questions that I kind of had. Why is that idiot rich? And I’m not that was one of the questions that I would always ask to go back to those first investors. So I went for it the same way we fight fires, you can’t fight a fire half assed. You can’t be timid, right? You gotta go, are you eight, and we know that there are some guys who don’t go and we know that there’s guys that go consistently. They’re the ones that go through the frickin door and get the job done and they kind of look Real Estate the same way. And one of the cultures from that seminar said, you know, reach out to people in your marketplace and begin to build a network and they said, Your network is your net worth. And we’ve heard that a million times. And that’s what I did. And I began to find people in my marketplace who were doing what I wanted to do. And then I needed to bring them some value. I was broke as a joke, so I couldn’t bring them any dojo, right. It was no money to bring, what did I have? I had some limited construction experience, which I suck that, but I also had a lot of connections at City Hall. And the guys that came around me, I said, Look, I’m a firefighter. I know the inspection guys, I can set some appointments up for you. I’m not saying we’re going to cheat, everybody’s going to follow the rules. But maybe I can tell you who to talk to, when to talk to them and what their favorite kind of donor is, I don’t know, right? And I leveraged what I had. And I acted as if up until the point that I was no longer acting and I morphed into it. I started in the seminar business myself, and you’ll appreciate this. There was a guy that was doing an hour and a half pitch at a multi speaker event and he was a firefighter in LA. He was a captain, I don’t know if you’ve ever heard this story, you know, I’m talking about his name was Jeff Adams. I mentioned his name. But he was the LA captain of real estate investing and you know, billionaire millionaire, whatever the frick, but he sucked on stage. He was terrible on stage pitching. I mean, he was donkey with a capital D. Like he had no ability to present his humor was horrific. Anyway, I spent five grand double is shitty websites. And I went up to him afterwards and I’m like, Hey, Jeff, I’m Dave, I’m a firefighter. You’re a firefighter. That, you know, like, I’m trying to build some favors. And I said to him, do Tough crowd, your comedy sucks. And he looks at me and he goes, I go, your comedy sucks. I said, you can’t laugh at your own punch line before you told everybody else what the frickin punch line is. What are you doing? He goes, he goes, who are you? I tell him again, firefighter firefighter. And I said, Look, I also did a little bit of Stand Up Comedy in pubs and clubs back in London. You know, that’s what I’m talking about your lack of comedic skill. Tim, he says to me, you’re my new comedy coach. He says, I’m gonna pay you 1000 bucks and fly it down to Orlando for three days and coach me. And I thought he was messing around. I thought he was busting balls. But he wasn’t. And he opened a door that allowed me to step into an arena that would be closed off for most people. And that was the seminar world. I then ended up being on that side of the fence. And I got to run with guys like Russell Brunson, I got to meet and hang out a little bit with Gary Vaynerchuk. Before he was Gary Vee, there were a lot of really powerful, influential marketer guys that I got to know. And one of them sent me a link in 2000 and say late nine, to a production company in New York, that was making a flipping house show, right flipping house flip, flip. And it was a vanilla application online. And I’d known enough from the market as back then that I had to separate myself from the crowd. Right? So pitching out an application online, you know, fill in the blanks, like a PDF, name of the company. Describe your team, how many flips have you done all that shit, right? So I got a name and a company called fuck yourself, LLC. That’s what I put on there. And then I just continued, I continue to love with profanity right? At the bottom, I thought I’ll look shithead get on a plane train or an automobile. Don’t fucking call me, right. I’m Dave Seymour. I’m a firefighter. We do our real estate the same way when everybody else goes running out, we go running in, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, like, couple more epitaphs on there and few more squares profanities and I hit Send 10 minutes to one to area called New York, right? I answered the phone. I said, I thought I told you not to fucking call me and I hung up the phone calls back kids laughing his balls off laughing his balls off on this farm. And he says you’re either a genius or a lunatic. I said Correct. Absolutely right. I said come on, man. Come on up. Let’s have some fun. Anyway, shot a silly little video on a flip phone. You didn’t even have video on your cameras on the phones back then. And a&e network picked us up. We did four episodes we figured we’d be done with for flipping Boston was the name of the show. We do four we get the best ratings on a Saturday morning in that little block that they’d ever seen. And then we did you know, 29 episodes, four seasons, and all of a sudden I’m taking a leak in Toronto somewhere. And a guy in a urinal next to me goes let me write. I’m famous, a legend in my own mind. So that’s how the TV show started. And at the end of it, to be honest with you, it was a pain in the balls. It really was. It was just we still needed to make a living flipping houses I remember at the same time buying our rental portfolios that we all had as individual guys. So

 

Tim Lyons  20:06

the only other colorful guy we’ve had on the show is so far rod Cleef. And I think you’re blown him out of the water right now. So,

 

Greg Lyons  20:12

can you hear?

 

Dave Seymour  20:14

I had lunch with Rocky leaf. He’s a cool cat. Yeah, he is for sure. Scotch, but he’s Dutch. You know, London. We have a lot more class than that.

 

Greg Lyons  20:27

That’s the third group offended.

 

Tim Lyons  20:28

I mean, we’ll just keep going. This is going to steamroll everybody. Oh, that’s it. So obviously, I think the listeners now know why. When I first heard you on a podcast, I said, I got to talk to this guy. This guy is, you know, my kind of guy. He came from adversity. He came from the low level stuff, right? Because at the end of the day, you had a quote and the other podcasts that I heard you were blue collar guy in a white collar work. And that really resonated with me because the listeners know, I’m a firefighter, I was also an ER nurse at a level one trauma center for nine years. So when you talk about working 90 100 120 hours a week, I mean, that strikes me right to my core, right? Because if I wasn’t punching the clock, if I wasn’t away from my family, my young family, my young wife, right, working overtime, picking up shifts in the hospital. I mean, you didn’t make money, right? And at the time, I wasn’t financially educated. Really. I thought I was I thought I was doing the right thing. Right. I went to school, I got a good job, you know, ended up being a passion job. I’ve always been obsessed with fire trucks since a little kid. But I mean, I put money into my 457 days, right? They told me to do that. And probie school, I elected to go into the supplemental account for a portion. Of course, I walked into the firehouse day one and there was guys with really nice cars in the parking lot. And there was guys with jalopies and lemons. Right? And a lot of the guys who had the nice cars as well, you know what I found out very quickly. They had second jobs, they own tanning salons. They own bagel stores. They did construction. They did HVAC, roofing, you name it. There’s a guy out there or girl. And that’s what they do, right? I didn’t have a construction bone in my body. I’ll say my wife barely left me hanging a picture on the wall because it never works out just right. So you know what? I went to nursing school? I always joke around before I started drinking in college, I was pre med for about 15 minutes. And to me too. Yeah, I try. So I was an EMT at 18. So like all these things from your story really played into my wheelhouse, right? So here’s the thing, like people will try real estate they’ve as like the third or fourth or fifth or final thing. They’ll try stocks, they’ll try mutual funds. They’ll try ETFs. They’ll try dollar cost averaging, they’ll try saving on lattes and clipping coupons and putting it into a name the app right? Then they’ll try day trading. And then they get now there’s a thing called Bitcoin and crypto, which I don’t understand, and probably just going to remain ignorant the entire time because I’m just not into it. Because I don’t understand it. And I don’t want to understand it. But you know, then at the end of the day, people will finally say, You know what, let me try this real estate thing. And then they buy single family home and they get $200 a month, and it just doesn’t move the needle enough for them to say, You know what, this is awesome. And I’m gonna continue with this right? Or they watch flipping Boston with a maniac named Dave Seymour. And they go, You know what, if Dave can do it, I can do it. Right. So then they go flip a house, and they realize that it’s taxed at your ordinary income rates, right? Because that’s not a long term capital gain. And they said that was a lot of work, man. And you know what, I went through 16 different contracting companies, because one sucked and the other one didn’t show up. And the other ones scammed me in this thing. And it’s hard and they say, Do you know what real estate stinks? I’m not doing it. I’m not doing it. My uncle got robbed, or whatever. My uncle lost money. I lost money, real estate stocks. Here’s the thing, Dave, you talked about all the time, personal growth, personal development, education seminars, investing in yourself. Obviously, that’s the way that Greg and I did it. Right. We went to Jake and Gino, big shout out. Oh, yeah. Good guys. And I’ve heard you on their podcast as well. And you’ve done seminars on both sides. You were the consumer, and then you were the producer. So can you just tell us a little bit about like the people who are on the fence right now. They’re accredited. They are whatever they are engineers, small business owners, doctors, lawyers, you name it. And they’re on the fence, their 401 k’s are in the gutter. Uncertainty is out there. Fear is out there. But at the same time, people want to make a yield. They want to say hey, what should I do with my money? Where do people start? Yeah,

 

Dave Seymour  24:32

that’s such a great question too. You know, I can answer that from so many different perspectives, right? You started talking there and you said one of the phrases that you grabbed a hold of me was blue collar guy in a white collar world today. I think it’s the same for you guys. We’re more in finance today than I am in real estate right? So first of all, if I’m in the accredited investors shoes, Just maybe I’ve got capital to invest quarter of a mil right, I got 250. I took a beaten in the stock market. And I watched it. I think the stock market has had the worst run in almost 12 years this past year. And that’s a devaluation of retirements. So I’m not credited investor, I got 250 to invest. And I heard about this real estate thing. I don’t want to be a landlord. I don’t want tenants toilets and trash, right? I gotta do some research. And if you start to Google since the Jobs Act that Obama passed, it allowed accredited investors access to the same quality investments that the one percenters and the institutions have had. And when I learned that term, that was when I went from blue collar to white collar. Because I started to learn things about the velocity of capital. I had a mentor, a coach that said to me, they don’t get out of bed for anything that less than a 20% return on my capital. Right. Now, if you listen to Kramer, Kramer will tell you a 20% return on your capital is fraud. Right? It’s impossible. You can’t do it. If you listen to Suze Armand, she’ll tell you to save your money. Right? And to your point, save on lattes? Well, for me, that was bullshit. Because I saw that there were people who were not doing that they were doing something different. And I learned it. So again, I’m trying to be succinct. I’m the accredited investor, I got quarter of a mil to invest, gotta do some research. And in our world, and you guys can testify to this as well. There’s good guys and this bad guys out there. There’s some bullshit out artists out there that are slinging pro formas, that don’t make sense to guys like us. So get as educated as you can, as fast as you can, as an accredited investor. And then understand this and hear it loud and clear. You are not investing in real estate, you’re investing in the jockey not the horse. That’s who you invest with, I sat down with one of my local guys less than six months ago, and he owns an embroidery and printing business, great business, been in it for 30 years, whatever. And I was showing him an offering that we have on the table. And he said to me, Dave, I understand 90% of what you just shared with me. He said, but to be honest with your brother, he said, I’m putting my retirement and my company investments with you not with that real estate deal. If you just love to babysit, so Don’t f it up, right? Don’t f it up. I’m confident in saying that you guys are cut from the same cloth as me. I won’t take one dime If I can’t, in all honesty and good confidence, make that same investment myself, right? I know the names and the faces and the story of every one of my investors. And the reason I picture it that way or present it that way, is that accredited investor must have that same quality of confidence, right? They got to have that quality of confidence. Because at the end of the day, there are so many options out there, and you just went down the myriad of crap that’s out there, right from Krypto all the way back up and down again. And here’s the other thing I’ll share for that accredited investor, how freely and how easily. They’ve let investment capital go to unknown individuals doing unknown businesses. And that’s your fund structure in the stock market. That’s the financial advisor, right? Who will never mention what we do because they don’t participate in it, and only not hear that they can’t get paid him and look, man, my goal is not to tear somebody else down to build our son. But I’ve said to so many of my investors one on one, why would you give you know, 20% of your own income to that financial company? Without asking any questions. They call they say put it here, put it there. Think about the 401 K presentations we’ve added in our careers. How old are you? Oh, you’re 23 you go over here that’s high risk. How old are you? 35 you go here that’s medium risk. How old are you? Oh, you’re 55 year old fat. You’re right on the line, right? You got to go in the low risk. And we go Who can we don’t ask any questions right. So the accredited investor has to ask questions. One of the catchphrases at our company is very simply this. The more educated investor is the better partner, they are so simple as that. Go to where the source of information is the purist and then make decisions and to simplify all of that. I always say to him, does it makes sense. Does it make sense?

 

Tim Lyons  29:41

So Dave, real quick. You went from wholesaling. You did a $5,000 wholesale deal back in the day fix and flips to some MIDI burst strategy stuffed and taken in some single family homes. But now you’re in private equity. Right so your company does private equity. I think you guys are doing some built around single family develop Millions with some multifamily sprinkled in there on the west coast of Florida. And I think that’s a great place to be. So I highly recommend people hop on the phone with Dave after you hear this podcast. But prepping for today’s show. There’s a podcast out there called capital allocators with Ted Sadie’s. And a couple of weeks ago, right, Greg, you heard this. There was a guy named Matt Brown, I believe from its case, C a is. And what they do is they have a platform for private equity firms, independent Wealth Advisors, stuff like that. And they have private equity type offerings for the raa, broker dealer, wealth management space. And we’re talking billions of dollars, right. And you said in 2012, under the Jobs Act and passed by the Obama administration, it democratized some of these offerings to regular Joe Schmo, some non accredited folks who are sophisticated and some accredited folks. So here’s a stat from that podcast, wealth managers in the US today have about 40 trillion of assets under management. So let that sink in real quick, right? $40 trillion. That’s more than the US debt right now. And they have that kind of capital under management, right. And a lot of these folks just hand it over to these people and say, make it happen. Right? By 2030, they have forecasted by that number will grow to $60 trillion. Right? So on the retail side, which is regular everyday folks, right, so you’re accredited and maybe non accredited, something like that. That’s a retail section of what we do, right, and the private placement and private equity space, two to 5% of their portfolio might be allocated towards these quote unquote, alternative investments. Now, I don’t know about you, but real estate has been around for millennia before there was a stock market before there was anything so I don’t know why real estate still considered alternative, but it is the institutional space, right? That’s where the big money is. That’s where the one percenters, that’s where they live. And we’re talking about pension funds, endowment funds, sovereign wealth funds, private equity funds, right? Where you got to know somebody, or you gotta have a big net worth just to play in that space. Right? They’re allocating 20 to 50% of their portfolios towards these alternative investments. Yeah, they are. So this podcast talked about how the retail side the guys that we deal with the guys and gals that we deal with the people who we know their stories, right, we know their faces, and we’re investing alongside of them. They’re saying that this is going to grow to about 15% of their portfolios by 2030. Dave, I don’t know about you, but that excites me. Right? People need to be clued into what’s available to them. Who can they trust, they don’t trust the vehicle, or they do trust the vehicle, Dave, right, build to rent, multifamily self storage, industrial, retail open every town, they might know the vehicle, but they’re trusting Tim Lyons, Greg Lyons, they’re trusting Dave Seymour, to say, look, I work really hard for my money, and I need to know where to put it. So David, what do you think about some of those stats, and where you are today with your private equity company, and how you’re kind of educating your investors. That’s

 

Dave Seymour  33:11

so good. We pull a lot of data as well to support what we do, right? Business Finance, as well as real estate at the large commercial level is a data driven vehicle. So we look at the Yale endowment, Harvard, you know, those big institutions, New York City, fire department, retirement fund, the big boys and girls, and when you look at their pie charts, pre COVID, which is really interesting. They had a 33% allocation, right to alternative investments in real estate. And we’ve pulled that recently as well. And we see exactly what you just said, the amount of free money and the reason you see those massive jumps, Tim, let’s get a little political, is because when you pump trillions and trillions of dollars of free capital into the economy, the smart money says, Okay, thank you for the free money. Now I’m going to work it in the most velocity stylized place that I can, which is commercial real estate. Look, man, I don’t have to be that smart. All I have to do is surround myself with people who are smarter than me. I think one of the things that have been pivotal in my success is to never put myself in a room where I’m the smartest person I might be the loudest. I might be the most handsome, but I don’t ever want to pay this artist. And this journey of long term growth, capital growth, velocity prize money. A Blueprint has been set out generations before the three of us got on this call back to the Rockefellers back to the industries, the titans of industry in our country. You know, they paved the way I was talking to a guy recently just opened up a really nice Italian restaurant, here in Woburn, Massachusetts, right on the Winchester line, which is a high end community. And I got talking to the guy, he’s a big old Italian attorney, you know, he’s probably from New York originally. He’s in his 60s or whatever. But he spent $8 million, check this out $8 million to build this high end, beautiful Italian restaurant. Now, I don’t know the restaurant business. But if it’s cost you 8 million to build the restaurant, put all the silverware, the design, the menu and everything. It’s gonna take you a while to get that money back. And I had discussions on Yeah, a lot, a lot of US audience. You know what he said, Greg, you look to me, when I don’t care, I go, why he goes, did you look at the Belden, I went, Yeah, kind of like a big office building. He goes, I own the whole building. It’s free real estate dude, it’s like the restaurant is free real estate for him. Because he’s bringing in, I don’t know, a million a month or whatever, from his triple nets on the rest of the building. We I include you guys based off of the information you give me, we would never given that that information, we had to go seek it. So when that accredited investor seeks, they find what they can find is the blueprint that we just described. So when I present any offerings that we have, I don’t have to tell them all or nothing. It’s this and that. Who am I to tell somebody take your money away from somewhere else, etc, etc. Look at the performance over there, gold, silver commodities, whatever it is that you’re into stock market day trading? How’s that been performing for you? I understand it’s a long journey. But what if, what if we could show you a targeted three to four equity multiple over a six to seven year hold? Instead of you hanging out for a 2x? Multiple, over 20 years? Would that be of any interest to you? And if they say yes, if they’re smart enough to hear that question and answer it, then you can begin the education journey and bring them in. Look, man, the opportunities right now. And with the stuff in southwest Florida, where we are after the hurricane came through there, I’m going to share something with you. It’s not to brag, but I’m going to read your text that I got from a group today, buddy of mine, I’ve been to dinner with him a couple of times real cool guy. And he says to me, Hey, can you guys run a pro forma for a fully loaded? Assume he said 250 million portfolio? I know it’s going to be highly speculative. And I’m okay with that, because you don’t have the current inventory. But I’ve got a royal family in the Middle East who’s extensively looking at deploying capital with your company, because they know that Florida real estate offers the better rate of returns. Oh, imagine that dude, can imagine now, this guy puts it together and gives me a $250 million checkbook because he’s already underwritten our company. And now he’s gone out and raise the capital as a VC. It’s a game changer. There will be billions and billions and billions of dollars moving into Southwest Florida. The need for housing was already stretched to the max the supply was crap beforehand. All it’s done now is extended and heightened and grown. The amount of supply that’s needed. Because I promise you we’re Americans, brother, we’re Americans. We don’t want to get emotional. We don’t give up when a tragedy shows up. We kind of flip it the bird, we dust off, we rebuilt. You know, I saw after 911 in New York. You know what I mean? I saw it after hurricanes. We’ve seen it after the fires in California. We’re human beings. We don’t give up we learn from every tragedy, and then we build it better. You know what I mean? So it takes capital to do that. So what if I say to him all the time, brother, what if you just got a little piece of that great big pie? Would that work for you? Would that change your retirement plans? Would you be able to now build something for the kids for the grandkids? Can you be the one person in that family tree right? That 100 years from now they look back down the family tree and they go, it was him? It was Dave Steve Ah, he’s the one who changed the trajectory. Right? It was him not to say that my parents or my grandparents were bad people. They were blue collar. I made the decision to move into a white collar world. So

 

Greg Lyons  39:29

yeah, Dave That is so interesting. And the Wall Street marketing machine has been just railroading. 401, K’s mutual funds, equities and stuff like that for as long as humanly possible. And I think it’s people like you, it’s people like us that have to get to the retail investor and say there is a different way and you don’t have to put your whole life savings into it. But keep getting those little pieces your 50,000 A time Yeah, 100,000 at a time. And that’s where you get involved in alternative assets over the next 10 years, you’re not gonna really change the trajectory of an entire family lineage like you were saying, so yeah, yeah. But you’re right is finding the right people. It’s know like and trust, that’s the most important thing, but just kind of blindly putting your money into a mutual fund, how worried about later, just accumulating, and not worrying about velocity of money. That’s what’s going to change everything for people’s futures, for their kids and all that stuff. So Tim, this has just been such a worthwhile podcast, powerful, because it’s a great story, our YouTube numbers going to be out of control, because not a control, and a and Eastar I look amazing, as always, but you know, like, all these things are just like, it’s gonna be nuts. But it’s all this all lining up. Exactly. So Dave, thanks so much for being on. But we do ask each one of our guests three questions to finish up the podcast. And the first question that we ask every guest is, what do you say to the investor that says investing in real estate is too risky?

 

Dave Seymour  41:09

Oh, great question. I tell them, You’re absolutely right. Look, man, real estate is not for me to convince them. I would say to them, you’re absolutely right. But you know what, there’s some people who wouldn’t agree with you. Maybe you should look at what they’ve been doing. And then come back to me if you have any more questions. There’s also the other answer is this is if you rely on your gob, what’s more risky, you could come home as an Enron employee, for example. And all of a sudden, everything you worked for is gone. If you’ve ever been through a downsizing, somebody else has control. But when you put capital into a large commercial real estate deal, it doesn’t go away. The money is always in the sticks and bricks, or other people are always going to need somewhere to live. So I’m not in the business of convincing somebody that real estate is the right journey, because it’s not for everybody. It’s just unfortunate that they miss out on the return profile that real estate offers, because they came in with blinders on rather than asking questions

 

Tim Lyons  42:14

of that. Dave, the next question has to do with your tribe. Right. And I’m sure you got a tribe you mentioned at least once on this show that you had a mentor and a coach and one of our mentors is Jim Rohn. And just love his books. And I want to hug you right now. Let’s not have heard what I say about these YouTube, these YouTube numbers are gonna be crazy. That’s it love Jim. So Jim Rohn says formal education will make you a living. And as self education will make you a fortune. And I’m actually gonna stack on top real quick. He says, You are the average of the five people that you spend the most amount of time with. So can you just tell me your reaction to those two type of quotes from

 

Dave Seymour  42:59

how’s your mood, I’ve lived it. First of all, when Jim Rohn passed away, I was at the front row in LA for his testimonial, Tony Robbins, and the rest of them whether they’re Jim Rohn was Tony Robbins mentor, that that kind country mentality that I bought was so beautiful. And the story of the Girl Scout, coming to his door trying to sell him cookies. And he told her to go away, or he didn’t open the door, because he didn’t have a single dollar in his pocket, you know, to give her he was devastated at his own ignorance. So I talk a lot about the five people that we hang around with the most. And I think back to the firehouse, there were guys in the firehouse, who would get up and go, there were guys in the firehouse who would do more. And then there were guys in the firehouse that just wanted to get a paycheck, right. They just wanted the city pension and everything that that had to offer. And I remember I was detailed out to one of our slower houses. You know, it’s one of the ones where all the old guys set. And I was in my first six months. And this old guys flipping through the channels. And he goes, this job sucks. There’s nothing on TV said I’m going to bed. That’s what he said, Okay, I never forgot that. This job sucks. This is nothing on TV. I’m going to bed. Now I’d been digging ditches, right. I’ve been doing everything I’ve been doing to grind. And I remember that day thinking to myself, if I want to elevate my game, I gotta elevate the people around me. And I mentioned it earlier, right? That common denominator of the five people we hang around with the most. And today, my equalities, if you will, the people I hang around with. They’re in the billions of dollars in valuation. family office, $2 billion out of Miami came in to one of our recent investments, and they’ve asked us to come down and meet at the offices We can strategize on what’s next going forward. I wasn’t going to get that if I stayed in a firehouse, and it’s not that I didn’t love the firehouse. I did. But it cost me money to go to work. Right. At the end of the day, it was costing my family money and time for me to go there. So always ask questions. Always look for mentorship and guidance. Don’t be a dick jam. All right. Damn. Good. Just asked me dig jams. Don’t be a dick. Jim, don’t be that guy. You know they are they ask you a question. And they answer it just so they can hear themselves. Talk. Be humble. Be humble, Be a vessel, ask questions. Let the answers come in. And, look, we know this man, every decision that somebody makes financially to be with us requires the approval of somebody else. So have those open discussions. Let the husband or the wife pepper us? With all the uncomfortable questions, I welcome them. And the one thing I’ll tell you is this man is that authenticity is the number one currency today, because there’s so much bullshit out there with cars, boats, and leather coats and jets and Rolls Royces and all that shit annoys the crap out of me. Surround yourself with authentic people, people that you would want to, you know, shoot the shit with and have a beer with maybe go to dinner as couples. And if you find, I’m going to tell you

 

Tim Lyons  46:24

that was probably the most unique answer to that question that we’ve ever had. So Dave, I’m great. Yeah,

 

Greg Lyons  46:28

yeah, we’re a few episodes in and that was, you know, don’t be a dick jam. I mean, that’s what it comes down to. Don’t be a dick jam,

 

Dave Seymour  46:37

humble, humble.

 

Greg Lyons  46:38

You’re absolutely right. So Dave, you are in the private equity space. And our last question comes from Robert Kiyosaki, something he said he said savers are losers. And debtors are winners, does that mean to you?

 

Dave Seymour  46:53

So the inflationary rate Core Plus CPI, right 5.59. Something if you include cost of goods and services, whatever those numbers are. So if I’m saving money, I put it in the bank, or one of those spectacular deposits, CD 2.0 Kiss my ass, then I’m losing money, right? I’m losing money. Breaking the cycle of poor mentality around money is an uphill challenge. We have less of those challenges and accredited investors than we do with non accredited investors. But that’s just a perpetuation of broke mentality. Money loses value, if it’s not moving. Money is a tool that needs to not be in resistance. Money is made when money moves, period. That’s how the banks make money. They do a trillion dollar loan in point zero seconds at three o’clock in the morning. And money goes whoosh, whoosh. Nick comes back with you know, on a trillion dollars point 00 5% return. So they’ll take our money. And then they’ll lend it back to us. Right? So let’s take out money in a CD rate of 1.25. And then your mortgage rate now is up to 6% that was making the Vic was making the yield the banks are. So Saving money is good for the bank. It’s not good for the saver. And then the other half of that question was debtors. What how did he put it in debtors are winners that as a witness, if they know the difference between good debt and bad debt, right? I’m signing on a loan for $20 million. Personally, in the next three or four days, right? 20 million. So I’m now going into debt another 20 million. And you know what? I can’t fucking wait. I’m so excited to pull down another $20 million in debt. Why? Because I know how to work the capital. Two reasons. One, I know how to work the capital to my investors are not on the loan. I am. I’m not asking them to put that asset on the line. I’ll put my ass on the line. Right, which goes back to our discussion about you know, back in the jockey and not the horse. Right. Love that. So that’s it. That’s how I look at it. Yeah.

 

Tim Lyons  49:02

I love this episodes. Probably my favorite one so far. I highly encourage our listeners. If you’re driving and you got some value out of this, please, rewind, get the notebook out, sharpen those pencils. Take some notes. Because, you know, this is real life. This is not fantasy land, real estate investing. I think sometimes people think it’s a get rich quick scheme. It’s a Bernie Madoff situation. You know, the guys in the firehouse call me Lieutenant laid off as a joke. So it’s not that right. And listen, if you can dive into Dave’s story, if you just googled Dave Seymour plus real estate or Dave Seymour, flipping Boston, like you’re gonna come up with a lot of podcasts, a lot of YouTube videos. This is real life, right? I mean, scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up to where you are now. I mean, it’s an incredible, incredible journey. So I’m grateful for your time today. Dave. If people want to reach out and find out more about you, how do they do? So? I’m

 

Dave Seymour  49:51

old school man, I actually have a phone and somebody answers it. 781-922-4418 Let my secretary and now Oh, that you heard us on this podcast. So I can give some love back to the lions brothers here. You can go to info inf o at Freedom venture.com Like you said, you can Google me all of the America’s Most Wanted shits gone now. So that’s gonna be pushed down. I can’t find you on Google me. I’m here, look, ask questions, those that seek shell fine, right? We’ve always got offerings, we just put together $100 million fund structure for Suncoast Growth Fund to rebuild the communities that we live in downtown. I mean, my partners are right in the middle of it down there. So we’re going to build it back. And we’re gonna be a part of that. So come along on the journey if you want to sell good either way. So yeah, you can find me

 

Tim Lyons  50:42

love that. So as always, guys, we thank you and we’re grateful for your support on another week of the passive income brothers podcast. So we look forward to seeing you again next week. Thank you for listening to another episode of the passive income brothers podcast. We would be grateful for your support of our podcast by giving our show a five star rating and review and subscribing to our show on your favorite podcast platform. Don’t forget to take inspired action after listening to this show, so that you can start building out your passive income streams. Finally, head on over to cityside cap.com to connect with us and find out more information about how to get started passively investing in real estate