In a recent episode of the Raising Private Money podcast, Jay Conner engaged with Ian Horowitz, a seasoned real estate investor and co-founder of Equity Warehouse. Through a rich and informative discussion, Ian Horowitz shared his journey, challenges, and invaluable advice for newcomers and seasoned investors alike in the real estate market.
The Realities of Real Estate Investment
Overcoming Initial Challenges and Misconceptions
Ian Horowitz candidly discusses the numerous challenges and misconceptions about real estate investing, noting how difficult the process can be for those new to the field. Despite the high reward potential, real estate investment involves a steep learning curve, complex financial decisions, and a significant time commitment. For anyone hoping to transition smoothly into this field, it is essential to approach the process with an informed perspective and adequate preparation.
Embracing a Diverse Investment Network
The Power of Community through CRE Syndicate
Ian also elaborates on the importance of a diverse group of participants in his meetups, the CRE Syndicate, which focuses on commercial real estate investments. The meetups welcome a variety of experience levels—from beginners to sophisticated investors. This diversity creates a supportive and enriching environment where experiences and knowledge are shared, establishing a strong sense of community. These meetups also teach one of Ian’s key principles: to start hosting meetups without overthinking them and to expect initial challenges.
Building Credibility and Community
The Role of Meetups for Real Estate Success
Successful real estate investment is grounded in solid networking, continuous learning, and community building. Ian says meetups don’t need predetermined themes for every session but can evolve based on group interests and feedback. Organizations can ensure better follow-through and consistent engagement by scheduling meetings in advance. Ian co-hosts a monthly meetup at a local firehouse in Pennsylvania, which serves as a platform for networking, sharing experiences, and fostering personal relationships with potential investors. Emphasis is placed on educating the participants without pressuring them into sales, thus building credibility and trust.
Financial Strategies and Investment Opportunities
Ian’s Investment Journey and Financial Evolution
Ian recounted his first venture into real estate, purchasing a property for $25,000 and using high-interest hard money loans for renovation. Though initially lacking financial savvy, he learned through experience, negotiating better terms with lenders and turning to friends and family for funding. His journey wasn’t devoid of skepticism or support; while some colleagues were doubtful, others showed financial interest without wanting operational involvement. Communication and transparency about his work gradually attracted more investment interest.
Ian underscores the importance of offering lucrative investment opportunities and creating mutually beneficial financial arrangements. Equity Warehouse, the company he co-founded, offers co-investment or co-lending experiences, ensuring preferred returns and participation in property equity. Highlighting a recent project, Ian detailed converting a 55,000-square-foot office building into a flex space, funded through a mix of loans and investor capital.
Navigating the Funding Landscape
Private Money and Institutional Loans
The episode emphasizes the critical role of funding in real estate ventures. Jay Conner and Ian examined the contrast between raising private money and borrowing institutional money. Raising private money often stems from necessity, such as needing gap funding, and involves setting terms attractive for investors. In contrast, institutional loans come with predetermined terms set by lenders, offering less flexibility. Ian’s journey involved transitioning from informal loans to more formal securities as he matured his business practices, always ensuring lucrative opportunities for his investors.
Empowering Others Through Real Estate Investment
The Long-Term Vision for Financial Independence
Ian Horowitz’s ultimate satisfaction lies in helping others achieve financial independence, particularly in enabling them to quit their regular jobs. His journey from a firefighting career, prompted by financial instability post-2007/2008 financial crisis, demonstrates the potential of real estate to provide a stable income stream and create long-term wealth. Through podcasts, phone calls, and live events, Ian continuously communicates his business activities, focusing on genuine connections over large social media followings.
Final Thoughts and Call to Action
This episode highlights the multifaceted nature of real estate investment, from overcoming initial challenges to navigating funding options, and from building credibility through community engagement to providing attractive investment opportunities. For listeners eager to learn more about Ian Horowitz’s projects and potentially participating in future investments, visiting https://www.EquityWarehouse.com is highly recommended. Jay Conner encourages listeners to follow the podcast “Raising Private Money” and download the free money guide from https://www.JayConner.com/Moneyguide to further enhance their real estate investment knowledge.
10 Discussion Questions from this Episode:
- Challenges and Misconceptions:
- What are some common misconceptions people have about investing in real estate according to Ian Horowitz, and how can these be effectively addressed?
- Balancing Professions:
- How do participants in Ian’s meetup balance growing their real estate investments with maintaining their current professional careers? What strategies prove most effective?
- Meetup Dynamics:
- Why does Ian Horowitz emphasize the importance of having a diverse group of participants in meetups, ranging from beginners to sophisticated investors?
- Starting a Meetup:
- For someone interested in starting their real estate investing meetup, what initial challenges might they face and how can they overcome these according to Ian’s advice?
- Investment Opportunities:
- How does Ian Horowitz structure investment opportunities through Equity Warehouse, and what are the benefits for co-investors or co-lenders?
- Early Real Estate Deals:
- Reflecting on Ian Horowitz’s first real estate deal, what are the crucial lessons new investors can learn from his experience using high-interest hard money loans?
- Community Building:
- How does Ian Horowitz’s approach of prioritizing genuine connections over large social media followings contribute to his success in real estate investing?
- Communication and Transparency:
- Why does Ian Horowitz emphasize the importance of transparency and effective communication in attracting investors, and what methods does he use to maintain this?
- Face-to-Face Interactions:
- In the digital age, what is the role and significance of face-to-face interactions in building trust and credibility with potential investors according to Ian?
- Financial Advantages:
- What are the tax advantages of investing in real estate syndications discussed by Ian Horowitz, and how do these benefits contribute to building a 7-figure portfolio?
Fun facts that were revealed in the episode:
- Ian Horowitz and his business partner are both career firefighters who turned to real estate investing due to financial instability and job security concerns.
- Ian started his real estate journey with a $25,000 property funded by high-interest hard money loans, despite not having much initial financial knowledge.
- Ian and his team currently own and operate over 700,000 square feet in the self-storage industry.
Timestamps:
00:01 Raising Private Money Without Asking For It
06:03 Prefers real estate investment over other careers.
06:43 Real estate offers passive income and ownership pride.
09:47 Talking boosted involvement; secured major commercial asset.
15:48 Helping others retire is incredibly fulfilling.
17:55 Podcasting builds authority and expands audience reach.
20:42 In-person meetups establish credibility and authority.
22:43 Real estate investment is hard.
28:38 Visit Equity Warehouse for co-investment insights.
https://www.EquityWarehouse.com
29:18 Converting office to FlexWarehouse; funding and returns explained.
32:54 Download Jay Conner’s free money guide at https://www.JayConner.com/MoneyGuide
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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.
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Real Estate Riches: 7-Figure Portfolios with Ian Horowitz and Jay Conner
Jay Conner [00:00:01]:
Welcome to another amazing episode of Raising Private Money. I’m your host, Jay Conner, also known as the Private Money Authority. This is the podcast where we talk about how to raise private money for your real estate deals without really ever having to ask anybody for money. Well, my guest today is a phenomenal capital raiser. He’s already raised in his career over $25,000,000 in private money and private capital from his investors. And we’re gonna dive in deep as to how he’s going about that. How does he start conversations? Where did he where does he, and how does he find these people to invest with him? Well, just a little bit about my guest’s background. He started investing back in 2012.
Jay Conner [00:00:48]:
That’s when he had his first rental property. And then he started broadening out from there. I mean, in addition to rental properties, he’s flipped properties. He’s helped, troubled homeowners stay in their homes. He’s provided housing for tenants that are subsidized tenants. And then in addition to that, he’s been in the self-storage, industry. Currently, he and his team own and operate over 700,000 square feet of self-storage and even expanding all that. Well, in just a moment, we’re gonna dive deep into the mind of my guest and friend, mister Ian Horowitz, right after this.
Narrator [00:01:36]:
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 [00:02:04]:
Well, hello there, Ian, and welcome to the show.
Ian Horowitz [00:02:08]:
Hey, Jay. What’s going on? Glad to be on today.
Jay Conner [00:02:11]:
I’m glad to have you. My lands, I enjoyed being a guest on your podcast, and I had forgotten how awesome and how rich your voice sounds here on the show. So welcome and I’m glad to have you. You’ve raised 1,000,000 and 1,000,000 and 1,000,000 of dollars in private money. But before we get into actually how you’ve gone about doing that, give us your backstory and, you know, what were you doing, you know, before this world of real estate investing in 2012, and what got you interested?
Ian Horowitz [00:02:44]:
Yeah. You know, we took, the absolute longest road possible. We started as career firefighters by business partner and myself. We wanted to be big bad city firemen. We grew up being volunteers at the local volunteer firehouse and decided that was a career path that we wanted to choose. My business partner got hired a little bit before me, and in 2,007 and 2,008, respectfully, respectively, we got hired for the city of Baltimore. Have you ever watched The Wire? It’s all true. You saw the riots that happened.
Ian Horowitz [00:03:18]:
That’s where we worked, the heart of West Baltimore. And, you know, very quickly did we find out that, yeah, it’s an amazing job and what we do for a living, you know, helping people in the time of need, their absolute worst moment, you know, where they’re helping people financially. It might not be the best choice. Right? Like, you know, barely getting out of high school, you know, the career paths that we took. You know, college wasn’t in our future. You know, it was a great amazing job. However, it just was not monetarily a huge, win. You know? And so working for the fire department, it was cool, but, you know, we got hired right around the global financial crisis, and it forced our hands to find another way.
Ian Horowitz [00:04:02]:
You know, we’re looking at you know, we get hired in 07 and 08. By 2009, they’re furloughing us. By 2010, they’re closing companies. 2011, they’re messing with our pension system. 2012, Obamacare comes out. Health care skyrockets. And everything just kept piling on, piling on, piling on. And, you know, typical firemen, we would work 2 10-hour days, 2 14-hour nights at the time, and we all had side jobs.
Ian Horowitz [00:04:27]:
And, we were working 8 days a week to try to make a living. You got your wife at home. You know, we’re starting to hit that age where she’s like, hey. I wanna have kids. And I’m like, oh my god. How do you pay for this? How do you pay for daycare? How do you pay for any of these things? And that’s really what was the catalyst behind us getting involved in real estate. It was really out of a need. It was out of the fact that the fire department forced our hands with no overtime, threats of furloughs, and no job security.
Ian Horowitz [00:04:58]:
Not to mention, you know, you’re risking it all every time you go out the door. You know, we might not come home. And, you know, real estate was a way not only to provide cash flow, to our household, but it was also a way to create a legacy or a life insurance policy that, you know, allowed us to support our families. God forbid something happened to us.
Jay Conner [00:05:21]:
So why real estate? How did you get interested in it? I mean, I know why you got interested in it, but why real estate instead of some other type of, you know, pathway to what you wanted to accomplish?
Ian Horowitz [00:05:33]:
Well, because Monopoly is the coolest game in the world. No. It’s, really what it comes down to is, you know, we were working 2 10-hour days, 2 14-hour nights, and we’d be landscaping, doing construction jobs, laying tile, laying brick, whatever it was to try to make an extra dollar. But, like, you start thinking about it and you, you know, you’re sitting around the kitchen table with these guys that are working 40 years. And I say, hey, lieutenant. You know, you worked 40 years. There was a lieutenant. He worked the riots in the sixties and worked the riots in the early 2000s.
Ian Horowitz [00:06:03]:
And it was like, hey, lieutenant. Like, what are you doing when you go to retire? He said, well, I’m gonna go work for Walmart or Home Depot. And I’m like, what are you doing? I was like, there’s gotta be a better way. So and it was also like, hey. My wife wants to have kids, and god forbid something happens to me. And I start a landscaping business or I start a construction business and I get killed, I get hurt so bad that I can’t complete a job, and my wife’s left with this burden of these people that we took deposits for to go do jobs. Like, that’s not something that I was interested in doing. But what I did know was if I wanted to work a 30-year career and I bought a piece of real estate and let’s just say it was worth 100,000 let’s just say $100,000, and I could buy 10 houses, that’d be a $1,000,000 worth of houses.
Ian Horowitz [00:06:43]:
And over 30 years, if they all paid off and they weren’t worth a dollar more and somebody paid me to pay them off in that same time horizon and I made a couple $100 a month through this process on each one of those houses, I’d have a $1,000,000 when I retired, and I thought that was the coolest thing in the world. And that’s how I picked real estate. It was while I was asleep at work, that I could make money. Like, how could I make the only thing that I could think in my head is, like, around the clock, 247, how do you make money? Well, if someone’s running my house, every month they rent my house, they’re running it for every second of the day. I’m making money money every second of the day, and that’s really, what was my catalyst behind real estate and really what interested me. And, also, it’s such a tactile asset class. Right? Like, there’s nothing cooler than driving by, like, yo, I own that building or, yo, I own that house or I renovated that house. I flipped that house.
Ian Horowitz [00:07:37]:
I wholesale that piece of property there. And, you know, those are all benefits that we learn from investing in real estate over time, of why real estate’s so cool.
Jay Conner [00:07:48]:
Yeah. That certainly makes sense. So let’s talk about the funding of your deals when you started. So when you started, you had rental properties, and you went to do some flipping, etcetera. When you started, how were you funding your properties, or how were you getting them funded?
Ian Horowitz [00:08:09]:
Yeah. So let’s just use the first deal that we ever did. The first deal I ever did, I bought it for $25,000, put, like, $25 into it, and maybe it was worth, like, $75 when we were done. We got $12.50 rent. Cool story. Right? But I didn’t dude, I didn’t know any better. So the very first deal I did was I borrowed honey hard money at, like, 16% and 6 points, and, dude, I didn’t know any better. I put, like, the last 5 or $10 I had in my pocket into the thing, and I did it.
Ian Horowitz [00:08:40]:
And then but I was able to refinance it. And then we did it again, and I got a little more savvy and said, oh, well, there’s a hard money lender that does it at 12 and 2. Cool. Let’s use him, and he’ll give me a 100% financing. And it was like, well, I borrowed money from that guy, but, like, why can’t I borrow it from my friends and friends and family? And there were situations where the hard money lender, you know, as he got more into the business, he was like, well, I know I lent 100%, but how about I lend you, like, 90%. And I was like, okay. Well, I need $10 here or $20 there. So we go to my friends and family.
Ian Horowitz [00:09:10]:
Yeah. Remember, we work in a firehouse. Like, all types of personalities. Everybody’s gotten an opinion on everything. You know, half the dude’s like, you’re you’re an idiot. I don’t wanna curse on your show, but you can imagine the explicit is that, went with those words. You’re an idiot. You’re just gonna be a slumlord.
Ian Horowitz [00:09:25]:
Blah blah blah this. Blah blah blah that. I was like, alright.
Narrator [00:09:28]:
Well, we’re not gonna talk to them guys, but then
Ian Horowitz [00:09:29]:
There were the other dudes that were like, yo, dude. That’s the coolest thing in the world. How do I get involved? I don’t wanna deal with the drama. So a friend of ours bought a house. You know, we showed him the whole thing. He’s like, screw this. This is not for me. How about I just give you a $10 on your next deal? So we would go to him for some gap funding, and then that started to grow.
Ian Horowitz [00:09:47]:
And it took us to our first commercial asset. And I’m only talking about the front side of, like, raising the capital. Like, how do we do it? You know, we would tell everybody about what we do. There’s a reason we have a podcast. There’s a reason we come out here and talk to people because we want people to know what we’re doing, and we want people to be comfortable. Right? So that being said, the more we talked about it, the more we showed people what we were doing, the more people wanted to get involved. And then when we bought our first really big commercial asset, we were raising $1,000,000. And mind you, I had about $1,000,000 of this, like, debt gap funding money on hand already.
Ian Horowitz [00:10:19]:
And when I asked those people to invest in equity, they’re like, dude, you’re crazy. I’m not getting in. We’re not doing that. There’s no way. You’re you’re out of your mind. And then guess what? We did that first deal, and it’s the law, you know, it’s the law of the first deal. And, you know, the floodgates open, and we started getting good returns on these things. And boom, here we go.
Ian Horowitz [00:10:34]:
We’re off to the races. And it’s just doing the right thing every day, getting up, you know, putting the property first, executing on it is really what allows you to have success, and tell everybody about what you’re doing. If you’re not proud about what you’re doing and, look, there’s gonna be ups. There’s gonna be downs. There’s gonna be days you don’t wanna talk about it. If you’re excited about what you’re doing, you should wanna tell everybody. And the more you tell people about it, the more interested, and the more they see your excitement, the more that they’re gonna wanna get involved. So, still to this day, we love every property that we’re doing.
Ian Horowitz [00:11:03]:
It’s so exciting and so fun. But to go backward, when we first started borrowing money from our friends and family, it was like, hey, man. You got $10? Cool. And it was like a handshake deal. And then it turned into a note, and then it turned into a more formal securities document. So, like, as we matured in the business, our, operation matured side by side with it. And so, you know, if you’re just getting started and you’re raising money, there might be that deal where your handshake with a friend. And then that next deal after that might turn into a little more documentation.
Ian Horowitz [00:11:36]:
A little more documentation turns into more sophistication, but all those documents are there to protect you and allow you to have success. So
Jay Conner [00:11:46]:
Yes. So it’s been my observation after interviewing 100 and 100 guests here on my show that raised private money. Everybody’s got their own story that has raised private money and is raising private money from investors. Something happened that forced them, to start raising money. And I think if I understood your story correctly, what motivated you to start raising private money is you needed gap funding, I e down payment money. You had hard money lenders that were loaning you money, but then they changed the rules. Of course, there’s there’s there’s an interesting topic right there, the rules. When we’re borrowing institutional money, the lender makes the rules.
Jay Conner [00:12:34]:
In this world of private money, we make the rules. We set the interest rate. Instead of asking for a mortgage, we’re offering a mortgage or an opportunity. But did I hear that right? What motivated you to start raising private capital was you needed it for down payment money. Is that right?
Ian Horowitz [00:12:51]:
Yeah. A 100%. You know? And, you make an interesting point. He who controls the gold, right, is in charge. But you’re right. A 100%. It was the opportunities that we had to offer to people, and it was gap funding. Dude, yeah, we listen.
Ian Horowitz [00:13:05]:
We started buying real estate in 2,012,021,021, 2014. We started getting our feet wet. 2014, we’re off to the races. We didn’t know it was the absolute bottom, and, dude, it was just like drinking from a fire hose. You couldn’t get enough money. You could wholesale 10 houses and still not have enough cash to do these 20 projects we had on the other side, and it was just it was a warehouse, dude. And we would just crank them out as fast as we had cash coming in, and pour it back into a rental asset. But, you know, I mean, everybody knows the game here.
Ian Horowitz [00:13:34]:
It’s it’s cash flow management, and we needed the gap funding. But you know what we realized looking back on it? Those gap funding opportunities when we fell dead broke was really, like you just said, an opportunity that we were able to offer to our friends and family that they did not have anywhere else to earn a high rate of return, you know, 8 to 10%. They’re like, oh, dude. You’re the best dude ever. It’s like, yeah. That 8 to 10%, it’s like but you guys don’t understand. That’s way cheaper than what I’m paying over here, so it’s a win-win for everybody. But, yeah, 100%.
Ian Horowitz [00:14:04]:
We started with gap funding and worked off of there.
Jay Conner [00:14:06]:
Right. Now you said something interesting just a moment ago, and that was what you said, you just need to tell people what in the world it is that you’re doing. So let’s dive into that. You tell people what you’re doing. That attracts them to be interested in what you’re doing. But over these years, what have you found the best ways to get the word out to people as to what you are doing?
Ian Horowitz [00:14:34]:
You know, it’s, you watch all you know, Hermozy is super popular. All these dudes out there are super popular. Like, find your medium. And I’m like, yeah, dude. Whatever. Like, obviously or maybe not obviously, talking is my medium. I thoroughly enjoy picking up the phone, talking to people, getting out there, and doing the podcast. You know? So with that being said, you just need to find a medium that works for you.
Ian Horowitz [00:14:58]:
For me, it’s getting out on podcasts, talking to people, doing interviews on our podcast, and hosting live events. And those live events are dude, still just the local meetup. Right? That’s why I enjoy it. Right? And that’s where I meet all my contacts.
Jay Conner [00:15:12]:
For other people I’m sorry. Go ahead. No. Go ahead.
Ian Horowitz [00:15:16]:
I was gonna say for other people, it’s writing is their best medium. So they’re trying to get people into an email database. They’re trying to, you know, send them as much information, their social media posters. That’s not my jam. And, I mean, I’ve spent a lot of time, energy, effort, and money to try to build an Instagram and a social media following, but, honestly, I’d rather just have the 100 right eyeballs than having a 100000 eyeballs that don’t care about me. And I don’t need that ego stroke. What I do like is making connections with people. And when you can make that connection and figure out how to resolve their problems, like, there’s nothing cooler.
Ian Horowitz [00:15:48]:
I’m sure you’ve experienced this. We’ve been able to help people retire. Right? For the longest time, I struggled with quitting our w two job as fireman. And the day I did it was the coolest thing in the world. Our business exploded. And now my like, when you for me, when I speak to someone and I feel that energy of, like, yo, I wanna quit or, like, I wanna figure out a better way, and then I get to watch them quit and do that, That’s just dude, that’s equally as motivating as buying another property, and that’s what keeps me going. But that’s why I’m so excited to tell everybody about what we do, how you can do it, go out there and swing the baseball bat. You know, we’re 2 dumb firemen.
Ian Horowitz [00:16:24]:
So if we can do it, anybody can do it. Go out there and do
Jay Conner [00:16:27]:
It. So I want us to I want us to dive in. So if you’re listening to this show and you have an interest in raising private money for your real estate deals, We’re getting ready to dive in on that right now. But in addition to that, if you are listening to this show and you’re interested in being just a passive investor, you just wanna sit back and get high rates of return safely and securely, and be a private lender, we’re gonna talk to you about that opportunity here in just a moment. But first, Ian, I want us to dive into this meetup strategy. I’ve had 100 and 100 guests here on the show that talk about how they raise private money. I have not had one. You’re the first.
Jay Conner [00:17:11]:
You’re the first, in 100 and 100 that have a meetup with the purpose of making opportunity known to individuals how they can be an investor, how they can be, you know, a private money lender. So I want us I want to I want you to go over step by step what happens. How did you start the meetup group? How did you get people to join your meetup? How often do you meet? Why do they come, and what happens at your meetings?
Ian Horowitz [00:17:49]:
Yeah. I think the first thing that we should get out of the way is, like, why do
Narrator [00:17:52]:
you wanna do it? Like, why do you wanna do a meetup?
Ian Horowitz [00:17:55]:
Why do you wanna do a podcast? Right? For me, it turns into credibility, and you’re the authoritative figure at the front of the room. Right? Like, right now, I’m on Jay’s podcast, and I’m out here talking about raising private capital. I’m being exposed to a new audience that allows me to then be the authority figure in this role of talking about raising private capital side by side with Jay, you know, showing his credibility that he has all the friends in this space that raise private capital. We have a win-win here. So while we’re doing this online, I went back recently and said, ma’am, like, what worked for us back in the day when we first got started? My podcast cohost, Jason from Hard Money Bankers and, we used to run a meetup, and we would get hundreds of people in the door. We would meet up once a month, but we wound up with a 6000-person email distribution list. And at the time, I didn’t realize the value in it. But then as we started to grow and wanna raise private capital, I was like, oh, crap.
Ian Horowitz [00:18:51]:
Like, that 6000-person email distribution list is huge. So if you guys want the hack, it’s really simple. We go out. We do once a month. We do the first, the first Wednesday of the month. We do it at a local volunteer firehouse up here in Pennsylvania. This way, it supports the local firehouse at their bar. I host an event.
Ian Horowitz [00:19:12]:
The first few I usually get out there like, the first few I speak, I talk about topics that I enjoy. Like, this month coming up, I’m talking about how we, raise money. We bought a 76-unit apartment building with no money out of pocket on an owner-finance deal. So we’re gonna talk about that case study that, and we’ll have whatever 30 to 40 people there. That’s fine. It’s not a huge audience. I don’t need these 500 people. It’s free to get in.
Ian Horowitz [00:19:37]:
Everything you do is free. You guys need to go out, you know, watch Ramosi, watch Russell Brunson, watch all these guys out there. Dude, everybody is gonna consume the information differently. Give it all away. People pay for the shortcut, and I’m not I’m not selling anything, so I don’t care. I just wanna share my experience with other people, and I wanna bump elbows. So we’ll go do an hour meetup, and then we hang out at the bar and just talk shop. Right? Like, I just know in the fire department, we would go to the bar.
Ian Horowitz [00:20:03]:
That’s where the world’s problems would get solved. Right? Usually, a little liquor always helps. But now it’s like, hey. Let’s go to the bar. I’m gonna present on something. Everybody listens to me, and then off we go, and then we’re gonna hang out and talk shop for an hour afterward. Like, this last one, I had 3 or 4 of my investors there, and then a couple of people came up to me that were noobs newbies and said, hey. I’m, like, I’m I’ve done a couple of real estate deals, but I like my two jobs.
Ian Horowitz [00:20:28]:
I’d rather just invest with someone like you. I said, that’s great. Why don’t you talk to Carlo? He’s here. He’s invested with me. Why don’t you talk to Steve? He’s here with me. He’s invested money with us. And then I got the credibility sources. Everybody’s in the same room, and then you’re never selling.
Ian Horowitz [00:20:42]:
You’re just always educating. And that’s why I like the in-person tactile meetup. And anybody that’s looking to do it, meetup.com does an amazing job, of driving traffic to your meetup and getting people in the front door. So like I said, we meet once a month, and my goal is to, you know, not only meet them in person but become the credibility and the authoritative figure. Oh, and then real quick, side by side with that, as I run out of topics, I’ll start bringing in subject matter experts from the local Philadelphia area that will present, and then it’s, like, the same thing as the podcast. Hey. Here’s my friend. They’re coming in to present on this said topic, and then I get to cosign their experience with my audience which shows that we’re the authoritative figure in the real estate space.
Ian Horowitz [00:21:28]:
So then when they want to invest, their first thought is, well, how do I invest? Well, oh, I go to that meetup. I remember Ian saying something at the beginning of the meetup that they’re doing a new 55,000-square-foot, flex space, syndication. Let me hop into that or let me call him about it at least. Oh, yeah. Let’s meet next month. Let’s grab a coffee and talk about it. And then you’re putting a name to the face. We’re not just some BS syndicator that out here that’s like, hey.
Ian Horowitz [00:21:52]:
Come invest with me and go through my email. And then, sure, at the end of this podcast, I’m gonna tell you my website. Right? It’s the easiest way to cast a net. But in the end, I really wanna be with people that I can hang out. Like, our capital investors, our best demographic for us are people that we can this is gonna sound horrible, but see, feel, and touch. Right? Like, I want that personal relationship with people that allow us to invest, and we know that we’re all on the same page. And that’s why we do the meetup. That’s how we do it.
Ian Horowitz [00:22:20]:
It’s super simple. Don’t overthink it, and, that’s what we’re doing.
Jay Conner [00:22:24]:
So are most of the people who come to your monthly meetup, are they mostly real estate investors who want to learn how you’re doing it? Are they mostly, individuals that want to be passive investors or private lenders?
Ian Horowitz [00:22:43]:
What I will tell you is most of the people who are coming in the door have the idea that they want to invest in real estate. Either they’ve done one deal, they’ve done several deals, or they want to go and do a deal. I wanna show them and I don’t know how you feel about this one, or what other people have said, but real estate’s effing hard. Like, I’m trying not to curse on your show, New Year’s resolution, but it’s hard. And people don’t realize the amount of work that goes into operating real estate. And I think when people do one deal, they kinda get caught up and they’re like, oh, that wasn’t that bad, but shit. That was a lot of work. And then they’re like, oh, I’ll do deal number 2.
Ian Horowitz [00:23:24]:
And then they’re like, you know what? There’s a lot of people out there that like, I was talking to these 2 guys. They work for a solar, energy firm, and they’re like, look. We’re engineers, and we really like our jobs, and we make good money, and we’re just looking for another asset class to invest in. Well, that’s my prime demographic. They’ve done 1 or 2 deals. They love their two jobs, but they still wanna invest in the asset class of real estate, but not on Wall Street. So they came there with the idea that they wanted to continue to grow into real estate, but then yet I threw them this idea of, well, maybe you could invest in real estate. And, look, there’s gonna be guys so it’s a it’s a good mix.
Ian Horowitz [00:24:01]:
I’m sorry. It’s a long answer to your question, but there’s a great mix of guys and gals there from sophisticated to not. And the sophisticated people, that’s fine too because I want the other experts in the room, even if they’re raising capital, I don’t care. I want them there to give the other people a great experience because in the end, what’s the point of the meetup? It’s my credibility that I put the coolest people in a room, and people had a good experience, so then they’re gonna reach out to us to talk about investing. So, yeah, we have all walks of life. However, most people are in the have done a few deals, a deal, or want to do a deal more than the experts in the room.
Jay Conner [00:24:40]:
Okay. What’s the name of your meetup?
Ian Horowitz [00:24:43]:
It’s called CRE Syndicate. You know? So we do it. I have a thing for commercial real estate. I enjoyed doing the the online, like, you know, group game, but I enjoyed it, in person. And CRE Syndicate concentrates on commercial real estate. A lot of people look at single-family and say, that’s not commercial real estate, but it is because you’re buying real estate as an investment. And that’s why I believe so much in the quote word commercial real estate because we’re all looking to invest. I just personally concentrate on commercial real estate.
Jay Conner [00:25:20]:
Gotcha. What advice would you give to an individual who wants to start up a meetup? What are the woes and what are the mistakes to avoid?
Ian Horowitz [00:25:33]:
The mistake to avoid is to think your first one’s gonna be the best. I promise you it’s gonna suck. Right? Like, it’s just it’s just like your first podcast. It’s not gonna be good. Who cares? Just go do it. The best advice I could tell you is to get out there and go do it. The same advice when people ask, how do you invest in real estate? Well, get out there and go do it and just pick a place. Dude, people I know a few people have done it where they just started by saying, hey.
Ian Horowitz [00:25:57]:
I’m going to have lunch at this day, date, and time in this location. I’m going to talk about real estate, and my friend so and so is coming with me. Whoever wants to join, great. And there was a cool meetup when I was down in Baltimore where every Friday, they would just go get lunch at the 1 bar, and they would hang out for the afternoon and just talk about real estate. I was like, oh, that’s cool. For me, I wanted something a little more formal in the evening because of the target demographic that I wanted. Like I said, don’t overthink what’s the best way to say this. Don’t overthink how you want it to be. Just get out there and go do it.
Ian Horowitz [00:26:33]:
Set it up. Go hop on meetup.com. It’s like $500 for the year. Sign up. Pre-plan, 12 dates, and put them in your calendar, put them on there because as soon as it’s on the calendar, you’re gonna have to do them. Put all of them as TBD, and then just come up with January’s meetup. That’s it. That’s all you gotta do.
Jay Conner [00:26:49]:
What does TBD stand for?
Ian Horowitz [00:26:51]:
To be determined. You don’t know what the topic is in February March or April May. Who cares? Just concentrate on the month in front of you. So that’s what I do. I put up all my dates, and then I just put January talking about how we bought a 76-unit apartment building with no money out of pocket. Cool. I don’t know February’s topic till I get in the room and speak with everyone and say, yo. What do you guys wanna learn next month? Oh, I wanna learn how to use my IRA.
Ian Horowitz [00:27:13]:
Cool. Let me find the coolest IRA person or whoever we use. Let me have them come here and speak to the group. Right? Like, that’s how I run it. Other people, like, have it all pre-planned. Jay’s coming into town this month. I have to do this. Ian’s coming to you know, like, I’m not that type of person.
Ian Horowitz [00:27:29]:
I just know if I have it on my calendar, I have to do it, but I don’t necessarily wanna try to guess the topic 12 months from now.
Jay Conner [00:27:36]:
Ian, I got a rider downer for you. I coined this phrase, and it summarizes what you just explained, and that is get it on the calendar. Because once it’s on the calendar to happen So here’s the quote. It’s 3 words, quote, unquote, and successes are scheduled. Successes are scheduled. Right? Success just doesn’t run out of the clouds and say, oh, there you go. We achieved this. No.
Jay Conner [00:28:03]:
It was put on the calendar. In the, in the few men in the few minutes we have remaining, Ian, I want you to speak to the portion of our audience that is interested in what you just talked about. And that is those people that come to your meetup that they’re interested in real estate. They wanna get some nice returns, but they don’t wanna find deals, oversee deals, rehab deals, oversee real estate. They just wanna get some nice returns. So how does that work for you, and what opportunity do you have right now for people to get involved with you?
Ian Horowitz [00:28:38]:
Yeah. The best thing to do is go to equity warehouse.com, and you can see all the case studies of different ways we’ve co-invested and co-lend with our friends and family. Our network expanded past our friends and family at this point, but you can see the case studies of how we work. Because when we co-lend, they’re set up in a certain way. And when we co-invest, they’re set up differently, and it’s a great way for everybody to learn and understand because these deals fill up fast. So, like, I’ll give you an example that we’re finishing up the capital raise. 2 weeks ago, we just finished a purchase of a 55,000 square foot office building that we’re gonna convert into flex space. You know, we enjoy the storage warehousing type space.
Ian Horowitz [00:29:18]:
So we’re gonna take an old office building that was a debt collector for a mortgage company, and we’re gonna convert that into a, into FlexWarehouse. And we got a first-position loan from a life insurance company, and then we’re raising the rest of the capital. We put some money in, and then our friends and family are putting money in. So, generally speaking, you know, I guess I don’t know. Legally, I’m not, look, I’m not good with all your little f, SEC numbers, so I don’t wanna get in trouble. But in the grand scheme of things, the way it’s really simple. The way it works is you put money in, you get some sort of preferred return, around the 8% mark, and then you get to enjoy the upside equity in the property. So what does that mean? You get to share not only in the cash flow, the profits, and the losses.
Ian Horowitz [00:30:06]:
Well, the losses aren’t a good example, but the profits, the paper losses, the depreciation. Right? That’s the paper losses, sales proceeds, and refinance proceeds. You get to participate in all these tax benefits tax advantages, parts of owning in this, quote, unquote, syndication. So that’s how we work. We like to do a preferred return because we want that investment to be real to you. Right? Like, you put money in a deal, and it’s like, hey. 3 years from now, it’ll be worth this. That’s not tactile and real.
Ian Horowitz [00:30:39]:
But when you’re getting preferred return distributions and you’re seeing your account grow, that’s what makes an investment real. So, again, this is another little private capital-raising tip. You know, the more time you touch your investors, the better. So, for us, we like to set up a preferred return, and then everyone gets to enjoy the upside of the property. So that one’s fun. It’s out in, the submarket of Philadelphia, so a nice, stable, geographical area that services the city. We’re, that one there, we’re looking at renting it, or it’s broken up into 11 condos, so we might take those 11 condos to market to sell. So we’re super excited about that one.
Ian Horowitz [00:31:20]:
And if you wanna learn more about that, you can, like I said, go to equity warehouse.com. Learn about what we do. Maybe by the time this podcast gets out, it might be filled up because we generally fill up pretty quickly, but, you know, go check out equitywarehouse.com. Learn about us, and then we can, if it’s a good fit for you, we can convert, converse about that.
Jay Conner [00:31:41]:
If you’re listening to this show and you have an interest in getting high rates of return and doing business with a guy who knows what he’s doing and has been doing it for over 14 years, Go to www.equitywarehouse.com and get connected with Ian. Ian, thank you so much for joining me here on the show.
Ian Horowitz [00:32:03]:
Yeah, man. I appreciate it. It’s been fun. Hopefully, I left some, valuable knowledge to your audience, and, hopefully, everybody doesn’t matter where you’re at in the chain. You took something away from it, and you can go out and execute on it.
Jay Conner [00:32:16]:
Absolutely. There you have it. Another amazing episode of Raising Private Money. I appreciate you being here on the show and tuning in. I appreciate the likes and the reviews and all that kind of good stuff. Follow me if you aren’t already on your podcast platform, so you don’t miss out on upcoming episodes. If you happen to be watching on YouTube, be sure to subscribe and click that bell so you don’t miss out as well. Thank you for joining us.
Jay Conner [00:32:46]:
Look forward to seeing you right here on the next episode of Raising Private Money.
Narrator [00:32:54]:
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.