In a revealing discussion on the Raising Private Money podcast, Derek Dombeck and Jay Conner, The Private Money Authority delves into the complexities of real estate investments, particularly focusing on creative financing and ethical business practices. This episode provides valuable insights for real estate investors aiming to thrive by aligning business strategies with personal fulfillment.
Creative Financing Defined
In the realm of real estate, understanding and implementing creative financing can be the key to unlocking lucrative deals. Derek Dombeck defines this approach as a method to solve a seller’s problems by combining different financing strategies to meet their needs. This not only facilitates smoother transactions but ensures all parties benefit equitably. Jay Conner supports this with a personal anecdote where he bought a house ‘subject to’ the existing note, showcasing how stacking strategies can lead to success without traditional bank loans.
The Ethical Edge in Business
An important theme of the discussion is conducting business ethically. Derek stresses the significance of living a visionary life that you love, rather than just striving for financial gains. The conversation criticizes the often misleading advice floating around in real estate circles, advocating for a more grounded and honest approach to education in this sector. Ethical practices not only foster long-term success but also contribute to a healthier, more sustainable market environment.
Private Money: Raising and Managing Investments
Jay Conner, as host of “Raising Private Money,” and Derek, with his impressive accomplishment of raising upwards of $20 million, discuss the intricacies of managing private funds. Derek recalls overcoming the market downturn in 2007 by pivoting towards raising private money, illustrating resilience and adaptability as key traits of a successful real estate entrepreneur. The strategy of storytelling to attract investments, without a direct request for funds, emerges as a nuanced skill that can deepen potential investor relationships.
Relationship Building with Investors
The podcast highlights the crucial aspect of not prejudging potential private money investors. Building trust and establishing robust relationships, particularly with self-directed IRA companies, forms the backbone of successful fundraising. Both Derek and Jay emphasize the human element in financial dealings, underscoring the impact investors can have on transforming retirement years through strategic real estate investments.
Aligning Business with Lifestyle and Vision
Perhaps the most refreshing take from this episode is Derek’s emphasis on aligning business endeavors with personal lifestyles and dreams. He shares his transformative experience of taking a 5-week RV trip, demonstrating the feasibility of integrating significant personal rewards with professional rigors. This section serves as a powerful reminder of the importance of designing a business that supports personal growth and family life, rather than constraining it.
Conclusion: A Call to Ethical Action and Continuous Learning
As the episode wraps up, listeners are encouraged to follow Derek Dombeck for more insights and to access Jay Conner’s private money guide as a resource for further learning. The discussion revisits the themes of creative deal structuring and the benefits of dealing with private lenders over institutions, advocating for a real estate investment model that benefits all players involved.
By prioritizing ethical practices, innovative financing solutions, and aligning business strategies with personal values, real estate investors and entrepreneurs can not only achieve financial success but also enjoy a fulfilling life. The insights from Derek Dombeck and Jay Conner are a testament to the power of responsible and innovative real estate entrepreneurship.
Creating a Balanced Life:
“Live your vision, love your life is our tagline because so many people go out there and build a or try to build a monster business. They work 60, 70, 80 hours a week with the hope that someday they’ll be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, but someday doesn’t often turn out the way they thought it would.” – Derek Dombeck
10 Questions Covered in this Episode:
- How does Derek Dombeck describe the concept of creative financing in real estate, and why is it crucial for solving a seller’s problems?
- What are some ethical considerations to keep in mind when engaging in real estate transactions and raising private money?
- Can you share a personal example, similar to Jay Conner’s story, where you’ve used creative financing to make a deal profitable?
- Derek Dombeck emphasizes the importance of aligning business operations with personal visions and lifestyles. How can real estate investors apply this principle to their own business strategies?
- Discuss the impact of the 2007 real estate market challenges on Derek’s career and how it shaped his approach to private money raising and deal structuring.
- What methods does Derek use to attract private money without directly asking for it, and how effective are these strategies?
- What role do relationships with self-directed IRA companies play in raising private money, according to Derek and Jay?
- Derek took a 5-week RV trip with his family while maintaining his business operations minimally. How can real estate investors prepare their business for such limited involvement and what systems are necessary?
- Discuss the concept of “thinning of the herd” in the real estate industry as mentioned by Derek. How does this affect new and existing investors?
- What are the benefits of working with private lenders over institutions, and how does it affect the terms and success of real estate deals?
Here are three fun facts that were revealed in the episode:
- Derek Dombeck shared his experience of taking a 5-week RV trip with his family, which positively influenced his business and personal life.
- Despite market uncertainties, Dombeck expressed a joyful outlook on the current real estate market, comparing it to Christmas.
- Dombeck has creatively raised $20,000,000 for real estate ventures by leveraging storytelling rather than directly asking for funds.
Timestamps:
00:01 – Raising Private Money Without Asking For It
03:29 – Sharing stories to intrigue and inform investors.
08:38 – Navigating market shifts with experience and creativity.
12:42 – Friend says it’s tough to be financially alive.
14:53 – Challenges in balancing lending company’s loan funding.
19:24 – Teaching real estate investors the latest market strategies.
21:33 – Real estate investment: buying property subject to the existing mortgage.
25:03 – Platform and podcast focused on creating wealth:
https://TheGenerationsOfWealth.com
27:20 – Challenged to take 30-day breaks, life changed.
30:35 – Identify priorities and make a solid plan
Connect With Jay Conner:
Private Money Academy Conference:
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https://www.jayconner.com/MoneyReport
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https://www.JayConner.com/trial/
Have you read Jay’s new book: Where to Get The Money Now?
It is available FREE (all you pay is the shipping and handling) at https://www.JayConner.com/Book
What is Private Money? Real Estate Investing with Jay Conner
http://www.JayConner.com/MoneyPodcast
Jay Conner is a proven real estate investment leader. Without using his own money or credit, Jay maximizes creative methods to buy and sell properties with profits averaging $67,000 per deal.
#RealEstate #RealEstateInvesting #RealEstateInvestingForBeginners #Foreclosures #FlippingHouses #PrivateMoney #RaisingPrivateMoney #JayConner
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Derek Dombeck’s Blueprint for Real Estate Success and Personal Fulfillment
Jay Conner [00:00:01]:
Welcome to another amazing episode of Raising Private Money. I’m Jay Conner, your host, also known as the Private Money Authority. And on this podcast, this is where we talk about raising private money without ever having to ask for money. Well, today I’ve got an amazing guest to join me and quite a background does he have. His expertise, in addition to private money, I mean, for goodness sake, he’s raised $20,000,000 in private money so far. But in addition to being an expert in raising private money, he also has expertise, around the topics of creative deal structuring, wholesaling, flipping, landlording, and all the way to lending and investing, you know, throughout the years. Now he’s been involved in thousands of transactions in his career. And what really sets him apart, like myself, is his love for people and his love for their success.
Jay Conner [00:00:56]:
He co-founded a private lending company and a real estate acquisition company. In addition to that, he founded and ran the Central Wisconsin Real Estate Investors Association. In just a moment, you’re gonna meet my good friend and guest, mister Derek Dombek, right after this.
Narrator [00:01:16]:
If you’re a real estate investor and are wondering how to raise and leverage private money to make more profit on every deal, then you’re in the right place. On raising private money, we’ll speak with new and seasoned investors to dissect their deals and extract the best tips and strategies to help you get the money because the money comes first. Now here’s your host, Jay Conner.
Jay Conner [00:01:43]:
Well, hello, Derek, and welcome back to the show.
Derek Dombeck [00:01:47]:
Wow. Thanks for having me back, Jay. I really appreciate it.
Jay Conner [00:01:50]:
Absolutely. Enjoyed having you the first time. Glad to have you back again. And let’s dive in, first of all, and talk about your experience in raising private money. After all, the name of this show is Raising Private Money. And I love to talk with other real estate investors who have raised their own private money, how they go about it, their favorite ways to raise private money, and how they get the word out. But before we get to those questions, I’d like to hear your story, Derek. Again, I’d like for my audience to hear it as to what was it that happened in your real estate investing business that even caused you to start raising private money.
Derek Dombeck [00:02:31]:
Well, Jay, I, got my butt kicked in the real estate market in 2007, and at that point, my credit took a hit. I was no longer bankable, and I had two choices. Either I learn how to, number 1, learn how to get creative with deal structuring and also raise private money, take on partners, whatever it takes. And that’s the very short abbreviated version, and I know we had gone into it in more depth on the previous show I was on. But the second thing I think that’s important to note is learning how to actually talk to people properly. So as you had mentioned early on, you’re you’re not asking for money. People are asking you, how can I invest with you or through you?
Jay Conner [00:03:19]:
And how do you create a space and that type of scenario where they’re asking you instead of you asking them?
Derek Dombeck [00:03:29]:
For me, it’s it’s really simple. I just tell stories about deals that I’ve done in a manner that would, you know, lead them to ask more questions. So one example, and this was several years ago, a friend of mine, we were driving in a pickup truck, and he was asking me about buying a house in his neighborhood. He and his neighbor were talking about fixing it up and flipping it, and he had never flipped a house before. And I said to him, his name was Mike. I said, Mike, we went through his whole deal. We figured out that they were gonna make about a 10% return on their money if everything went well. And I said, Mike, I pay my investors 10% for doing nothing, and they’re in a 1st position mortgage against the property.
Derek Dombeck [00:04:16]:
And his next question was, are you looking for any more investors? I never asked him for money, but I led him down a path that I had already obviously had a preconceived conclusion that I wanted to happen. And the ironic thing is I think people prejudge everybody else. Right? We’re always thinking I gotta go talk to the high net worth doctors, lawyers, high w two income earners. Mike and his wife, I didn’t know what they had at that time. I just approached him and said, Mike, I’ve got a deal coming up. I need about $67,000. And so he funded that first deal and I asked one question that I always ask. Mike, if I have another deal, should I call you? And he said, sure.
Derek Dombeck [00:05:04]:
So over a period of a year and a half, I put over half a $1,000,000 of his money to work, and that was just cash that they had in money market accounts, bank CDs. And I was able to take his, you know, his return from an average of 2a half to 3%, up to about 8%. So we’re changing people’s lives as well.
Jay Conner [00:05:27]:
Absolutely. You just said 2 things that are very, very important. Number 1 is you’re not asking. Right? You’re sharing, telling people, you know, what you do. And another very, very important thing that you said that I want to reiterate is you didn’t prejudge. I mean, you know, a lot of times the people that look like they got money, got a lot of money, are broke. And the people that are just walking around ordinary people like us are actually got extra cash laying around or they’ve got retirement funds that they are not happy with those returns, which there’s an important point. It’s very important as a real estate investor if you want to attract private money, that is to establish a relationship with a self-directed IRA company.
Jay Conner [00:06:13]:
The one I recommend is questtrust.com out of Houston, Texas. And the reason that’s important is when you’re talking with someone that’s got retirement funds and they’re not happy where the returns are getting. Maybe it’s in the stock market. Maybe it’s elsewhere. And when you learn that, well, it’s very, very important to have that relationship, say, with QuestTrust, to where you can introduce them to QuestTrust or a self-directed IRA company to where they can move their funds over tax-free or tax-deferred, no penalties, no tax consequences, and become a private lender. So I love your I love your answer and your philosophy there, Derek. It’s all about creating win-win scenarios. It’s all about educating other people as to what this world is about.
Jay Conner [00:07:02]:
I’ve got 47 private lenders right now that are funding our deals, and not one of those 47 private lenders had ever heard of private money until I told them about it. It’s all about putting your teacher hat on, which I call my private money teacher cap. You put that hat on and you start teaching them what it is. And now, you know, they’re wanting to become involved. And so you’ve raised $20,000,000 in private money, Derek. What kind of real estate deals have you raised that money for?
Derek Dombeck [00:07:35]:
Well, so previous to, January 1st, I was a co-owner of a hard money lending company, And, my former business partner bought me out of that because for me now, I’m in acquisition mode. I’m really enjoying, the present market we’re in. Some people are panicking. I think it’s Christmas. So I raised a lot of that capital for the lending company. Now I’m raising capital for my own transactions, which are primarily residential real estate, with some light commercial, and also we’re we’re looking at buying some existing businesses right now and RV parks. So that’s what I’m currently doing.
Jay Conner [00:08:16]:
Now you just said something very interesting, Derek. So I want to go back to something you said just a moment ago, and that is there are a lot of people out there panicking. They’re thinking about, you know, where is the real estate investing market going? And you just said you love this market. This is like Christmas. Why do you have that outlook in this market?
Derek Dombeck [00:08:38]:
Well, because of what I went through in 2007, as the market shifted, we started to see us that have been through some downturns or different markets, it’s like knowing that the end of the movie. And we can see things that oftentimes other people will miss. And I guess I’m I call it a thinning of the herd. So the the large number of real estate agents that we have, the large number of, you know, newer real estate investors that didn’t really get educated, they just got in and and possibly got lucky on some deals because anything that they were able to buy went up in value, they’re they’re going to fall by the wayside. And that’s not ideal for everybody, but it is reality. It is business. And for me, personally, I do a lot of creative deal structuring. So I’m, you know, talking to people about taking over their debt or putting options in place, controlling property with leases, as well as just, you know, flat out buying them with cash.
Derek Dombeck [00:09:43]:
And I would say right now, 75% of the leads that I talk to are going down the path of potential creative structures of some sort.
Jay Conner [00:09:54]:
You just said something else interesting, and that is you like this market to where it’s, perhaps looking unstable to folks. It sort of clears the playing field, sort of gets rid of the other investors that are making stupid, crazy offers on real estate deals that keep us from who knows what’s going on to, getting those deals. So, I had a good friend recently say, you know, my favorite time is when times get rough and tough because, again, it clears the playing field. Right?
Derek Dombeck [00:10:30]:
Yeah. Absolutely. And it’s the follow the herd mentality. I like to go the opposite direction of the herd. So the last few years, people have been chasing apartment complexes. I didn’t even look at an apartment complex. I didn’t see any reason to risk my money or my investor’s money on a 4 cap or a 5 cap property, especially using institutional debt, which personally, I haven’t used an institution for any investment property since about 2011. So I like dealing with people, not institutions.
Derek Dombeck [00:11:05]:
And right now that is very, very easy to do compared to the last 4 or 5 years.
Jay Conner [00:11:14]:
Well, the reason I love dealing with people is because, in this world of private money, we get to make the rules. The borrower. We’re the borrower. And how do we make the rules? Well, we make the rules by actually instead of getting on our hands and knees at the bank and putting our hands underneath our chin and begging for the bank to approve our deal and having to raise our skirt up and the bankers looking at our personal financial statement and etcetera. We make the rules. We set the interest rate. We set the frequency of payments. And, you know, the difference between borrowing institutional money is instead of applying or asking for a mortgage, we’re actually offering a mortgage.
Jay Conner [00:11:53]:
And, you know, it’s just a, it’s it’s a win-win scenario where everybody wins. The private lenders win. We win as the borrower. And I tell you, Derrick, Carol Joy, my wife, and I, we have received so many, thank you notes and verbal thank yous from our private lenders, particularly our elderly private lenders. They tell us that we have changed and impacted their retirement years by allowing them to travel, and go where they want to when they want to go. You know, they’ve got a nice chunk of principal investment capital, but they don’t want to touch the principal. They want that principal to work for them so they can, you know, enjoy their retirement years. And you’ve probably experienced the same thing.
Jay Conner [00:12:40]:
Right?
Derek Dombeck [00:12:42]:
Yeah. In fact, I’ve got a good friend of mine. He’s he’s quoted to say it’s it’s inconvenient to be physically alive, but financially dead. And when you start talking people in their sixties, seventies, and eighties who didn’t plan for their financial future, and they have their money sitting in in anything that’s getting less than 6, 7%, they’re losing money. I mean, inflation is arguably much higher than that, but they’re they’re absolutely losing money if they’re tying up their money in a bank CD or or anything small. So I’ve had plenty of people that send me Christmas cards, thank yous, the same thing. In fact, that first story I told you about Mike, you know, he has referred me to other people, but he always says, Derek, you keep my money working first. It’s okay if you talk to this person or that person, but promise me you’ll keep my money working first.
Derek Dombeck [00:13:37]:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Jay Conner [00:13:40]:
Well, I’ve experienced the same thing. You know, I say I’ve got 47 private lenders. Well, if you’re starting out raising private money and working with individuals to fund your deals, you don’t need 47 private lenders for goodness’ sakes. All you need is 1 or 2 to start. And like you said, Derek, I mean, they’re gonna spread the words. You know, private lenders flap their lips and, talk to their friends. I mean, there’s probably not a private lender that I actually raised the money from that they didn’t refer other people to me as well. As a result of that, I actually have not actively raised private money in a long time because that foundational group of people that I actually taught about private money, then just referred other people to us, and those people have referred other people to us.
Jay Conner [00:14:32]:
And as a result, I got a problem. Right now, I’ve got $1,500,000 approximately, what I call just sitting on the shelf from our private lenders that I have not been able to put the work into, and they’re in, like, what I call the queue. And but I’d rather have that problem than, having deals and no money.
Derek Dombeck [00:14:53]:
Well, and the fact that you call it a problem, many of the listeners might be shocked by that, but it is actually a problem. And we had the same challenge when we were running the lending company specifically because we either had too many loan applications and we couldn’t fund the loans or we had too much money sitting on the side and we needed more loans. And it’s a balancing act for sure. It’s a little different now raising money for my own transactions because to raise money for a lending company, we can put it on the street within a matter of days. But now, as you mentioned, we have to kinda get people queued up, then find a deal that works for their scenario that they like, and, hopefully, they didn’t go and put their money somewhere else. So there is definitely an aspect of timing, Jay.
Jay Conner [00:15:42]:
Oh, that’s for sure. And you just said something that reminded me of this. You know, there’s one thing that drives me crazy and, you know, you’ve you have been the person in charge of running RIAs, you know, in the past. So I’m getting ready to share something that I know you’ve heard. You’ve probably heard it over 100 times. I know I’ve heard it hundreds of times. And when I hear educators say what I’m getting ready to say, it absolutely drives me crazy, Derek. And that is, you’ve heard them say, Oh, just get the deal under contract.
Jay Conner [00:16:13]:
The money will show up. I want to throw up. It’s, like, why are you telling people that? Is the money just gonna, like, rain out of clouds or something? And so I practice and I teach the exact opposite. The money comes first. There’s always gonna be deals. There’s always gonna be deals. Get your relationships in place and have that ready to go. I mean, just think how much more confident you’re going to be when you’ve got money burning a hole in your pocket.
Jay Conner [00:16:44]:
How much more confident you’re going to be, how many more offers are you going to make knowing exactly you know where the funding’s going to come from? And quite frankly, Derek, I don’t wanna be going under contract on a deal to purchase, and I don’t have a clue where the money’s coming from.
Derek Dombeck [00:17:00]:
Yeah. Absolutely. Because it’s gonna be egg on your face if you have to walk away from that contract, and that those same educators are just telling those students, well, just put, you know, escape clauses in your contracts and, you know, if you can’t find the money, at least you can walk away. Well, I don’t know about you, but I spent a lot of years building a good
Scott Paton [00:17:31]:
Looks like we lost him, Jay.
Jay Conner [00:17:33]:
It does look that way, unfortunately.
Scott Paton [00:17:38]:
So maybe what we could do while we’re waiting for him to come back on is you could talk a little bit about how you oh, there he is.
Derek Dombeck [00:17:46]:
Yeah. I could hear you guys the whole time.
Jay Conner [00:17:50]:
Okay. Welcome back. Sorry. Well well, let’s just pick up where we were, and, our genius, producer, and team will get it all edited, back in. So, we were talking about, these educators that say, oh, just get the deal in the contract. The money will show up.
Derek Dombeck [00:18:09]:
Yeah. The same educators are telling their students, to just put escape clauses in their contract. And in the event you can’t get the money or you can’t close, you can walk away with no harm, no foul. Except, I don’t know about you, Jay. I’ve spent a lot of years building a good name for myself, and I don’t want that name dragged through the mud because I couldn’t perform on a contract.
Jay Conner [00:18:30]:
Absolutely. Absolutely. I was I had a guest on, the show here recently, and we were having this conversation. And, and I said to him, I said, why do educators, gurus, etcetera, teach that baloney? He said I can tell you why they say that baloney, Jay. I said, please tell me. He says, that because they’re selling a course on how to get a deal under contract and how to find deals, they don’t have a clue how to tell you how to get the funding for it.
Derek Dombeck [00:19:03]:
Absolutely. And they also don’t care. I shouldn’t say all of them, but a lot of them don’t care. It’s a numbers game. They know there’s 5 to 10% of the people that buy their course that are actually gonna succeed, and the rest are gonna fail miserably. So I’m not a fan of any of those educators myself.
Jay Conner [00:19:24]:
Yeah. Well and another thing, like, you know, when I educate real estate investors, the only thing that I teach and share is exactly what I am doing and what’s working in today’s market, you know. So, speaking of what’s working in today’s market, in addition to private lending, you are an expert in creative financing and creative structuring. And, you know, people hear that phrase, but they really don’t know what that means. So let’s unpack that, Derek, and the time that we’ve got remaining. What is creative financing? First of all, what do you mean by that phrase or terminology?
Derek Dombeck [00:19:59]:
My definition of creative financing is not the same as most people’s. To me, if somebody is using subject-to-seller financing options, leases, or anything like that. That is just a form of financing. It’s not creative. What I deem as creative is solving somebody’s problem, you know, a seller in this example, by stacking these strategies. So one quick example is I bought a house, from a woman named Jan. Jan was behind on her payments. She needed $10,000 cash upfront.
Derek Dombeck [00:20:37]:
She would take the remainder of her, sale price in payments over time. The house needed a light rehab, and then my intention was to lease option it. So I needed about $20,000 of cash, to catch up on her payments, and take over subject to her first mortgage. She carried back, her 2nd mortgage at 0% financing for about 6 years. Then I contacted a financial friend, and I’m very nosy about what my financial friends have, and I said, Dan, I need $20,000 from your IRA.
Derek Dombeck [00:21:06]:
I’ll pay you 6% interest only and 20% of the equity when I sell the property in the future. We finished up the property and put a lease option tenant in there. 2 years later, the lease option tenants exercised. Everybody got paid off. We stacked about 5 or 6 strategies in that deal alone.
Jay Conner [00:21:33]:
I love it. As you were sharing that story, it reminded me of a house that I bought on Country Club Road here in Morehead City, the seller of the house owed $145,000 and, they wanted $30,000 in their pocket over and beyond the payoff of 145,000 dollars So I bought that house subject to the existing note. For the sake of our audience, that simply means you, as the real estate investor, are agreeing to make the seller’s mortgage payments, but you’re not assuming the loan, that means the lender would have to approve it. When you buy subject to the existing note, that has nothing at all to do with the lender. The lender is not even involved in the transaction. This is an agreement between you and the seller. Seller’s keeping the mortgage in their name, and you’re making the payments. And you may ask yourself, well, what seller in the world would agree to leave the mortgage in their name? Then I can tell you it’s a seller that wants debt relief is who it is.
Jay Conner [00:22:39]:
And so I bought this house subject to the existing note. $145,000 was the payoff. And then I borrowed, here we are, stacking strategies, as you just shared, Derek. I borrowed the $30,000 from a private lender and I put that private lender’s note in 2nd position underneath the first mortgage. And, in addition to that, I knew I could sell the property quickly for about 250,000 as is. But if I put $25,000 in renovations in it, I could get 325. So what did I do? I bought it for 72 for 145. I got a private lender for 30,000 which equaled the 175,000 purchase price.
Jay Conner [00:23:25]:
And then I got another private lender at 25,000 in 3rd position. And now I got 200,000 in it with the rehab and sold it for 325. So you’re absolutely right, Derek. Once someone becomes skilled and knowledgeable on the different strategies that you can use to fund the deal or to sell a deal, as you just mentioned, selling it on a lease purchase, then you can combine these strategies. I appreciate you sharing that story, Derrick.
Derek Dombeck [00:23:53]:
Yeah. For sure. And and I really like the equity participation structure that I use, because it can keep our payments low, as far as the interest. And they’re participating in the resale of the property or the refinance of the property, which means if it happens quickly, their yield is significantly higher. But if it happens over time or a period of years, they’re participating in the upside and the downside risk. And my investors love it. I’m right now, I’m doing a fair number of deals with 10 and 10. 10% interest only and 10% of the net profits when I sell or refinance.
Derek Dombeck [00:24:34]:
And that’s not a hard pitch to anybody with an IRA.
Jay Conner [00:24:39]:
Absolutely. One reason or one of the main reasons that people get involved in real estate as an investor is they are interested in the wealth. They’re interested in freedom. And I know one thing that you talk a lot about, Derek, is your vision and loving your life. What is your vision? How do you love your life? Why do you talk about it?
Derek Dombeck [00:25:03]:
Well, generations of Wealth, which is my platform, it’s also my podcast, the generations of wealth.com is, for me, a way to give back this knowledge and education that my mentors and my peers gave to us. And that’s really where the the name, the generations of wealth came from. But it’s not just about financial wealth. We do really focus on living our vision for our personal lives first and then structuring our business to support our personal vision. And so live your vision, love your life is our tagline because so many people go out there and they build a or try to build a monster business. They work 60, 70, 80 hours a week with the hope that someday they’ll get, you know, be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, but someday doesn’t often turn out the way they thought it would. And maybe they don’t have their health. Maybe they don’t have their spouse or their kids anymore or a thousand different scenarios that could happen.
Derek Dombeck [00:26:08]:
So I truly wanna live every day as as if it’s my last, and I can make a lot more money if I want to work a lot more hours. But I really do enjoy the time I spend with my family and my friends and doing things like this, Jay. I mean, just having awesome conversations with people like yourself and trying to spread the knowledge.
Jay Conner [00:26:31]:
Be sure and check out Derek’s website, which is www.thegenerationsofwealth.com. Again, that’s www.thegeneration of wealth.com. So what you’re saying, Derek, is business owners and entrepreneurs should not be happy with the leftovers of their business for themselves, but they should actually, as you said, identify what vision and what lifestyle and how they want to live their life. And once that’s identified, have the business support the vision and the lifestyle that they want. In a couple of minutes we’ve got left, Derek, share with the audience what is part of your vision that you have that you are loving living.
Derek Dombeck [00:27:20]:
Well, I had a few years ago, a peer or a mentor of mine had taken a 30-day RV trip with his family, and I told him how envious I was of him. And so he challenged me. He said, Derek, take 30 days off. And that was 2021 the first summer I did it. My wife and I and our 3 kids took actually 5 weeks. And we’ve done so the last three summers. And if you truly actually do that and figure out what is important to you, it’s it’s absolutely going to change your life. I came back from that first trip, and I will admit I was a nervous wreck the first two weeks until I really realized that our staff and my support team and, you know, everything that we’ve built was working just fine without me micromanaging.
Derek Dombeck [00:28:11]:
I came back from that first trip, and two things happened. We changed the entire structure of how we ran our business and my involvement in it. And the second thing was we committed to do that trip every year. And I would challenge all of your listeners, even though right now you don’t believe it’s possible for you to take 30 days off, write it down in your vision, block it out on a calendar, and figure it out, and it’ll change your entire mindset.
Jay Conner [00:28:41]:
What systems did you have to put in place prior to going on that first 5 weeks? Or better maybe the better question is, what systems do you have in place now, that allows you to go on a trip for 5 weeks? How much are you involved at all during those 5 weeks? Are you totally unreachable? What does that look like?
Derek Dombeck [00:29:04]:
Well, the ironic part was we already had all the people in place that we needed. We just have to get out of their way and let them do their jobs and trust them that they can do their jobs without being micromanaged. Currently, again, I exited the lending business. And so when I was doing that last 3 years, I had a business partner. We had a staff of about 7 or 8 people, and they were all very good at what they did. Right now, this year is going to be different. It’s a little bit of a pivot, but my marketing team takes care of all the marketing. I have a full-time assistant who handles everything I don’t like, which primarily is paperwork and scheduling.
Derek Dombeck [00:29:45]:
And I can I can work remotely? And what I typically did, especially that first time, Jay, I blocked off 3 hours each morning of the 5 day work week for work. And we traveled with a 5th wheel travel trailer, and I live in Wisconsin. We traveled west, which means we were in different time zones. Essentially, I was done working before my family was even up and moving, and it worked out very, very well. So I’m not gonna say that I didn’t work at all, but I wouldn’t have had to have worked. It was I enjoy what I do. So there’s still a certain amount of time where I wanna be talking to buyers, sellers, investors, you know, all the stuff that comes with our business.
Jay Conner [00:30:35]:
Really, what it comes down to is you identify what’s really important to you, and you put a plan in place to actually realize it. 100%. I love it. That’s beautiful. Derek, thank you so much for joining me on the show. Again, be sure and follow Derek at www dot There you have it. Another amazing episode of Raising Private Money. I’m Jay Conner, the Private Money Authority.
Jay Conner [00:31:13]:
Be sure and follow if you’re listening on your favorite podcast platform, so you don’t miss out on upcoming shows. If you happen to be watching on YouTube, be sure and ring that bell and subscribe, rate, and review. I look forward to seeing you right here on the next episode of Raising Private Money.
Narrator [00:31:32]:
Are you feeling inspired by the knowledge you gained in this episode? Then head over to www.JayConner.com/MoneyGuide. That’s www.JayConner.com/MoneyGuide, and download your free guide that shares seven reasons why private money will skyrocket your real estate investing business right now. Again, that’s www.JayConner.com/MoneyGuide to get your free guide. We’ll see you next time on raising private money with Jay Conner.