Brandon Magierowski joins us on Elevate Your Equity podcast today to share how he became a person of trust that made a path to a lot of success. Brandon is an active syndicator and loan broker. On the show, we discussed about building trust and leveraging network to generate referrals and grow capital. He also highlighted:
• His superpower of building trust and what did it bring to his business
• What has building trust enabled for him in his personal life
• His concept about the "If I have a good deal, investors will show up" fallacy
More about Brandon, he currently owns multiple multi-family properties in Louisiana, Texas, and Florida and is a graduate of Multifamily University. Brandon is a native of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, Brandon came to Shreveport, Louisiana in 2004 to join the LSU-Shreveport Pilots Baseball Program. He graduated with his Masters in Business Administration (MBA) in 2013, started his own business that same year, and has been an active real estate investor since 2016.
Thanks a bunch Brandon Magierowski for coming on the show!
Unlock 3+1 degrees of freedom (time, location, financial + health) with our 5 Point Blueprint! https://elevateequity.org/podcastgift
If you really enjoyed this content and are looking for more, you can continue to learn more about us in several different places for free!
If you'd like to have a FREE copy of our 7 Ways Commercial Real Estate Syndications Protect and Build Wealth, simply click the link below. We are here and vested in your long-term success! elevateequity.org/7waysEbook
Unlock 3+1 degrees of freedom (time, location, financial + health) with our 5-Point Blueprint! https://elevateequity.org/podcastgift
If you really enjoyed this content and are looking for more, you can continue to learn more about us in several different places for free!
If you'd like to have a FREE copy of our 7 Ways Commercial Real Estate Syndications Protect and Build Wealth, simply click the link below. We are here and vested in your long-term success! elevateequity.org/7waysEbook
Brandon Magierowski joins us on Elevate Your Equity podcast today to share how he became a person of trust that made a path to a lot of success. Brandon is an active syndicator and loan broker. On the show, we discussed about building trust and leveraging network to generate referrals and grow capital. He also highlighted:
• His superpower of building trust and what did it bring to his business
• What has building trust enabled for him in his personal life
• His concept about the "If I have a good deal, investors will show up" fallacy
More about Brandon, he currently owns multiple multi-family properties in Louisiana, Texas, and Florida and is a graduate of Multifamily University. Brandon is a native of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, Brandon came to Shreveport, Louisiana in 2004 to join the LSU-Shreveport Pilots Baseball Program. He graduated with his Masters in Business Administration (MBA) in 2013, started his own business that same year, and has been an active real estate investor since 2016.
Thanks a bunch Brandon Magierowski for coming on the show!
Unlock 3+1 degrees of freedom (time, location, financial + health) with our 5 Point Blueprint! https://elevateequity.org/podcastgift
If you really enjoyed this content and are looking for more, you can continue to learn more about us in several different places for free!
If you'd like to have a FREE copy of our 7 Ways Commercial Real Estate Syndications Protect and Build Wealth, simply click the link below. We are here and vested in your long-term success! elevateequity.org/7waysEbook
Unlock 3+1 degrees of freedom (time, location, financial + health) with our 5-Point Blueprint! https://elevateequity.org/podcastgift
If you really enjoyed this content and are looking for more, you can continue to learn more about us in several different places for free!
If you'd like to have a FREE copy of our 7 Ways Commercial Real Estate Syndications Protect and Build Wealth, simply click the link below. We are here and vested in your long-term success! elevateequity.org/7waysEbook
Welcome to the Elevate Your Equity podcast where we, as married busy professionals, leverage real estate investing to unlock the three plus one degrees of freedom, health, location, time and financial.
Derek Clifford:Hello, everyone and welcome to the Elevate Your Equity podcast today. We've got Brandon on the call. And Brandon, it's pleasure to have you on how are you today?
Brandon Magierowski:I'm great. Thanks for having me, Derek.
Derek Clifford:Awesome. Brandon's an active syndicator and loan broker and he currently owns multiple multifamily properties in Louisiana, Texas, Florida, and is a graduate of the Multifamily University. He's a native of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, Brandon came to Shreveport Louisiana in 2004, to join the LSU Shreveport Pilots baseball program, which is also an interesting story about what he does with his full time work right now. Brandon graduated with his master's in business administration back in 2013. And start his own business that same year and has been active in real estate as an investor since 2016. Brandon, welcome to the show, man. How are you?
Brandon Magierowski:I'm excellent. Thanks for having me on. And but yeah, so just to elaborate on what you said there there. I came to the United States back in 2004. To play some baseball got recruited down on a scholarship from Canada ended up meeting my wife in 2006. She made me legal, I got my green card. And I ended up coming back to coach where I played baseball for a couple of years. And at that point in my life, I wanted to be a college baseball coach, that's I played baseball, I love baseball, I want to coach baseball. But I quickly realized in my second year of coaching that number one, the money sucked. Number two, you have to move across the country to really follow your dream to get that big job. And we wanted to start a family. So I made the decision after I graduated that I was not going to coach college baseball, but I wanted to make my living in baseball. And that's actually my w two job today is I run a baseball organization called 2D Sports Baseball. And we host showcase and youth tournaments throughout the southeast, we're in 10 different states. And we launched that company back in 2014. And we grow it from four events. And now we do over 100 a year. And as we progress through that it's created some flexibility in my life to do other things that I love, which is real estate. And in 2016, one of the partners in the Baseball Organization was bragging about his real estate portfolio. And at that point in my life, I was like, all I know with real estate is buying a residential home and selling it. I've done it a couple times. I've made some money but I didn't understand how to actually invest in buy rental properties. And he had some short term rentals in Panama City Beach, very successful. And probably the same path as a lot of people is you find someone that's doing it and you say show me how first thing you do is we two books on my desk and said read these two books. The first one was Rich Dad, Poor Dad. And the second one was just a general real estate investing book just to understand about single family rentals, short term rentals, just your basic knowledge. And I said alright, I mean, six months later, we bought a property together in Shreveport. It was a three unit triplex eight months after that we bought a six unit in Shreveport. We still own those properties today. But that was our kickstart, was my kickstart into real estate, small multifamily. The good thing about my mentor at that time, I think you're kind of on the same page. We're very bullish on multifamily versus single family. And I was lucky to have someone that was pushing me on multifamily multifamily economies of scale, go get more doors under one roof, because if I didn't have him, I probably would have went single family and just started growing a single family portfolio. We bought those in 2016 and 2017. And from there, you know, today, we now have over 150 doors on our portfolio. We raise capital for real estate. I do loan brokering for real estate. I wear a lot of different hats inside the real estate game. And I still carry that w two baseball job. It's been quite the ride since 2016. But we've also made some mistakes along the way. I don't know if you want to hear about those. But that's kind of the backstory and how we got started.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, thanks for that, man. This is awesome story. It sounds like a very typical type of story. A lot of people go through this journey. Although, you know, there was one thing that you kind of flew over real quick that I wanted to explore before we start working with your superpower and start talking about how to expand that for all of our listeners on the podcast here. You said that your mentor threw two books on your table or two books on your desk and said read these two. And you said you just glossed over the fact that six months later, you ended up buying your first property right? That's really impressive. So my question to you is, even though you have these books at your disposal, there was something there right something behind all this that was ready for you to start by Agnes, where did that spark come from? Was it the need to create passive income? Or what was it that actually got you motivated so that once you had the material you're able to execute really quickly?
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah, it was two things. Number one, in the Rich Dad, Poor Dad, it talks about the real definition of assets and liabilities. You know, basically, an asset is something that puts money in your pocket. And a liability is something that takes money out of your pocket. It's that simple. Okay, and at that point, I owned no assets. If I thought about it, I always thought my house was my asset. But really, it's a liability, because it's just taking money in your pocket. Sure, it's appreciating, but there's no cash flow there. And I looked at myself, I said, Okay, so I've got this great w two job. And we've got this great baseball business growing. And I said, what happens? If that goes away? We're running a small business and small businesses fail, I think 80% of them fail within five years. Don't quote me on that step. But it's something like that, within five years, they're done. So I said, we're in year three of this thing. What happens if it goes away, I'm back to the drawing board with no other income. I said, I've got to create other income streams, and real estate, it just sparked with me. And because my mentor was doing so well, in it, I said, let's get in the game, I had no money to do it. I had no money for a downpayment. I also had no money to start my baseball business back in 2014. So what did I do in 2014, I called my dad, I said, I need a loan. And then in 2016, to buy my properties, I went to my uncle and said, I need a loan. And I created a one piece of paper, you know, terms, how I'm gonna pay him back the interest rate, and I did it over five years, each of them or five years, I paid them back. And that's how I got in the game. So So for someone to say, the biggest excuse to not get in real estate is I have no money. There's always money to be out to be found, whether it's through family, whether it's through friends, or through partners. But back to your question, it was about understanding what an asset is, and creating a secondary source of income for me and my family.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, this is fantastic. So I love that you address something that most people get held up by, which is, oh, I don't have any money to do this. And, you know, thinking back right now, Brandon, like, Sophia and I, my wife and I, our story started similarly, where we didn't know what to do, because we didn't have the money to put down, you know, $100,000 for a house in the Bay Area in the California bay area where we are living. So what we ended up doing was we went to Sophie's uncle to ask for the money to help us close on this. And then we told them that we would repay it back with interest as time goes on. And also, if we ended up selling it, then we'd give them the money back as well, too. And that's exactly how it happened. We ended up like putting some money into the property and then improving it. And then when we sold it, we gave all that money back. But we had some extra equity that we could roll into a house on our own. So yes, it took time, it took a couple of years, three or four years, actually, while we were holding that property, but it was California real estate and things were just going up. So it was like the Jumpstart that we needed. And so I love that you address this, because people that are looking at and say, well, we don't have anyone in the family with that kind of money, I can guarantee you that if you educate yourself, and you demonstrate that you know what you're doing, by spending the time to really understand this business. Well, you can find someone that has that money. So I just wanted to inject that in there. So thank you for telling that story. Absolutely. Yeah. So let's go ahead and move on. I want to talk about your superpower, which is building immediate trust. At least that's what was discussed when you and I talked at the best ever conference and then also here in the form for the podcast. So let's talk about that a little bit. Can you talk a little bit about when you realize that you have this superpower of building trust?
Brandon Magierowski:Really, it wasn't until I started raising capital for real estate last year, because for 2016 We buy those properties 2019 we go to the Neal Bawa Multifamily University Bootcamp for three days and we go the light bulb clicks on and we go we need to go bigger, we need to go large multifamily, and the bigger you go, the more money you need. And you've got to raise capital. And I really didn't click for me until we had a deal last June, it was our first large deal to go raise capital for we had to raise $250,000 For this deal. And we had nine days to do I think eight or nine days to do it. We came in real late on this property because it was it was one of those ones where someone said they could raise capital, they're getting to the closing table. They hadn't raised the dollar. So they reached out. We connected and we said how much time do we got? And they said nine days we said well, here's our chance. You know, we either make it or we're out. But behind that we've we've spent eight months warming family and friends. We started telling people what we're doing. We started developing relationships talking about real estate. But what hit the nail on the head for me about building that trust is I had two investors put in$50,000 into the deal without even looking at the deal. It was a 506 b deal. And the reason they did it is because they Trust in Me, because of the relationship that I built with them for years building trust isn't about them trusting me on this specific deal. It's about they just know that I'm going to do what I do what I say I'm going to do, I under promise and over deliver. It's really not that difficult to do. But I never understood that until people started telling me that, hey, like, You're very good. For first impression for people to go, man, that guy's got some integrity behind them. And I don't try to do that. I don't try to sell people that, hey, trust me, trust me, trust me, it's just about being a decent human being. It's not that difficult, don't have a trip, don't have a transactional experience, have a human experience, like I met you at the best ever conference. And it's like, Hey, man, what's up? What are you up to cool, I do that too. That's great. You want to go grab a beer, like Dick have a real relationship with somebody and try to get done understand where they're coming from, instead of just telling them what you're up to. So that's how it kind of started for me at Spark last year, you know, now that I know it, I'm trying to just not force it and just to do what I've been doing. And that's just having genuine conversations with people trying to understand Potter put myself in their shoes to understand where they're at financially, where they're at, in the real estate game, see if I can help them. And if I can't, that's great, whatever, like, we'll just continue talking and maybe one day we can, you know, plant the seeds, right, that's everyone talks about planting seeds, everyone wants, everyone wants that money. Now everyone wants that 50k Now for their deal. But you gotta understand that that person may not have 50k Right now, but they're gonna have it in five years, and you're gonna have another deal in five years. So that's where building trust and building quality relationships comes from.
Derek Clifford:Thank you for mentioning all this. I wanted to address something here too, because first of all, everyone is human. Everyone wants to feel that connection. And so when you're connected with someone that is creating an opportunity for you, right, and you're fully trusting them with $50,000$100,000 of your own money. That's why that personal relationship comes in. Could you speak a little bit to the fallacy that most investors face when they first start, which is, you find a deal, that's good enough. And you'll just have investors automatically, can you address that, for us?
Brandon Magierowski:That's a myth. If you're planning on having a deal, and you're planning on raising capital for that deal, you better start now warming people up. And the way you warm people up, is you just start talking about what you're doing and why you're doing it. This is what I'm going to buy in real estate, and this is why I'm buying it. And when I buy it, there's going to be opportunity for investment. That's how you start. And the way you start is, look through your database on your phone, just go through and be like, Who do I know that I have a good relationship with, that I could have a conversation about money in real estate with and write them down, add them to an email campaign and email them and talk to them on the phone and be like, Hey, this is what I'm doing. And we don't have a deal yet. But we're gonna have a deal in about six months. And just keep keep them warm. Keep talking about keep talking about the benefits of real estate, keep talking about the passive income benefits. We've talked about the rate of return, the difference between investing in real estate, investing in stocks, keep them warm, keep them warm, keep them warm. And when the deal comes, or maybe somebody else's deal comes. That's what people forget, is that you don't have to raise capital for just your deal. Yeah, other people have deals that they need capital for. And if you trust that group, you can bring your investors into that group. And that's what happened to us. So start today. Don't wait until you have a deal, because by that time, people are gonna go, what's real estate? What's multifamily and I didn't know you're doing this.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, exactly. I love this servant mentality that you're coming to with all this, right, like being able to say this is I just want to serve, I want to present opportunities and help. And I think that that's one of the reasons why maybe you come across as so genuine and good intention. So I wanted to just point that out there. That's something that I see.
Brandon Magierowski:Well, and to the point about building trust, who is people seem to put on a different cape and a different mask, when they go to start raising money for big deals. Like they go, Okay, we're talking about multimillion dollars. I've got to put on my suit and tie so that people know that I'm professional. And then when you walk through the door at home, you rip it off and you throw on your shorts and a wife beater and you're drinking beer on the couch. Well guess what? People want to relate people. That's what everybody does, like people want to relate to real dads and real people in real life. They want to know who you really are not just who you are nine to five with your suit on. Right? That's how you get people to believe in you because you're just like them. You put your pants on left first and then right. I don't know I'm trying to go the other way but all over but everyone puts her pants on the same way just because you have a different network. worth more liquidity to get more deals, you're still a dad, you're still working a W two most people, you're still work trying to get yourself out of the middle class, the most successful people in any business, whether they're multi million dollars or just getting started, have the ability to rate relate to that person on human level to empathize because you've been in their situation, or maybe you're currently in their situation. So don't be too fazed. Don't be too different people just be you. And you will attract people.
Derek Clifford:I love this. Can you tell us what building trust has enabled for you? I mean, we've already covered the business side. But what maybe that has spilled over into the personal side or into things outside of real estate investing?
Brandon Magierowski:I think I've become more confident in my ability to execute. I think for the longest time, I knew I could do it. But I was always waiting for someone else to come help me do it. I had a business idea. And I was like, Man, I could really do that. But I think I need somebody else to come help me. And now I'm getting to the point where I have some confidence, because I've been through it. And I've done it that I can say, You know what, if I ever wanted to just do some on my own, I'm gonna go do it. And I might go backwards, two steps first. But I know I believe in one person more than anybody on this planet, that's myself. And it took me a long time to get to that point. And there's still days when you have doubts, everybody has doubts. You know, we're under contract on a $1.6 million RV park right now, our first RV park. And the doubts are creeping in. They really do. Because it's like, well, what happens if this fails, and then you got to dial it back and go, Well, look, what how much we've accomplished. Me personally, in our team over the past five years, like, We will not let this fail. So building trust, building relationships, getting good feedback from people on kind of dis re emphasizing what I actually believe in myself and people actually saying it, it just creates more confidence as we as I move forward.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, I could totally see that. And I do love the shout out here to The Gap and The Gain, if you've read that book before, this is like, the seventh time I've mentioned that book, and I even put a post out there on LinkedIn about this the other day, but that Gap and The Gain thinking right there is it's very reminiscent of the self confidence and this trust factor that you're talking about is trusting in yourself and the confidence. I just love that. Thank you so much for sharing. So one question I want to ask you is, how do you suggest our listeners work on developing a knack for building trust? Basically, if someone is starting from scratch and doesn't quite know how to do this, what tips would you have for someone who's just starting down this road?
Brandon Magierowski:About multifamily real estate specific?
Derek Clifford:Yeah, or just building trust in general with people?
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah, I would start in real estate, pick one thing inside of real estate to start with. So if it's going to be multifamily investing, or single family or short term rentals, or raising capital, you know, pick one asset class to focus on and learn as much as you can about it. Because you've got to be able to talk to people intelligently about it. And you've got to be able to talk to people on a Barney style level. So you're gonna read these books, and there's gonna be all these terms that are, you know, like, think you have to have like, the highest IQ in the world to understand if you go talk to uncle Joe about that. He's gonna what the hell is an IRR, I don't give a s***. I want to give you $50,000 How do I get my money back? That's the question you got to answer in a Barney style term is, if you're asking for $50,000. Just tell them how they're going to get their money back, and how you're going to take care of their money. And why you if they asked you if you've never done a deal before, be truthful. I haven't done a deal. But guess what, Uncle Joe, I've been to this bootcamp. I've talked to these mentors. I've been on this mastermind, I've read these books, and we're ready. And that's what you do on your first deal. The first deal is always the hardest, because there is that doubt from investors saying he's never done this. But you know what you can partner with people that have. So to dial back to build the trust, educate first, and be able to talk to people on a just a normal level about it, casual conversation, the second that you start to project, a higher IQ and using these big terms, you're going to turn people off. Because if they don't understand how they're going to put their money into it.
Derek Clifford:In the end, it's all about personal connection, right? There's definitely a component there. But if I look back on all my conversations, Brandon with my investors, right, I would say that maybe 90% of the content we talked about is our kids, you know, family, hobbies, interests, things like that. And then 10% of it was is just how deals work, you know, and my most fervent investors are the ones that we have that relationship with. And when you're trying to build like this network of investors around you, right And originally, like when you first start you should be talking about warm leads or people that already know you. So there's that trust factor that's already there. But when you start getting outside I'd write where you start getting one layer deep. That's where this is super important. Because soon you're going to have the people that know you, they're going to give you referrals, right? And then those referrals are going to start testing you, they're going to start talking to you. And obviously, there's a common connection there. So that's how they got to know you in the first place. And that's what brought you to the point of being able to have a conversation with them, because a lot of people, they'll go out there and just expect to just put material out there on what they're learning and everything and then get a whole bunch of people to flock to them, right, based on what they're learning. But unfortunately, it's a very competitive space. And So has there been any way that you've been able to use your trust building to get referrals? And then how do you handle referrals? Or that in that type of situation?
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah, the question, you know, when you have an investor that comes and gives you money for your deal as part of the deal, the next question you should ask is, you know, who else do you know, that would be interested in real estate or an interest in investing with us? Most of the time, those people will give you two or three names. And the question you should not I don't cold call those people. I say, Hey, can you please give me a warm introduction through a text message or through an email, and be like, Hey, this is Brandon with Real Focus Capital, you might want to talk about real estate, you've got to get kind of the break the ice with that person who knows that person, and then you get on a call. And you say, Hey, this is who I am. Muhlenberg grab coffee, get to know who they are as a person, what do they do for work? Where do they live? What's their family life like? And just you start warming them up again, and you didn't talk to them about real estate and why you do it and how you got started. But that's the question to ask is, who else do you know that would want to invest in real estate.
Derek Clifford:And I think that also your backdrop of coming at it with a servant mentality, and people being able to trust you because you know, what the you're talking about, and that you want to come with a genuine intention to connect and to create opportunities for people. I think people pick up on that. And that's why it's so easy for you to generate success from referrals.
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah. And that's, I think, I read it the day ally, and someone was talking about the fear of raising capital is the fear of asking people for money. And when you're raising capital for real estate, you're not asking people for money, you are offering an opportunity for investment. And there's a big difference. Because you're not going for a loan, you're saying, hey, I need $50,000 for a loan, you're saying, Hey, I've got a deal. If you put 50,000 in, you're going to double your money in five years, or whatever your projections are. That's an opportunity. That's not alone.
Derek Clifford:I love it. Yeah, you're partnering together with someone, right? So you're putting your money in and your effort in and together and creating this marriage, so to speak for a three to five year time period. So very, very cool. Last question that I have in regards to trust. There are some folks out there that I've seen operate in the operating world of multifamily and commercial real estate, have you seen a difference from those that Garner trust and those that do not. And I wanted to get what your take is on how well people perform without having trust versus people that do.
Brandon Magierowski:I think people are going to people are doing it for to fill their pockets and not build a quality relationship of trust or is not going to last very long. They're going to be outed, especially in the multifamily world where everybody knows everybody, and it's a partnership, there's a lot of partnerships going on you over promise on one property and under deliver on your operation. So it's gonna be a short road for you. Be careful on who you partner with, be careful on what asset classes you're buying, be careful on what market you're buying in the market might be the most important piece of that whole conversation right there. Because that's the mistake that we made early on in our investing those two properties I bought first, were in Shreveport, Louisiana, I didn't understand market research back then I was just ready to get in the game. So be very careful on where you invest in because the book that I read told me to invest in my backyard so you can go touch and feel the property and drive to it a little bit. I know, I live in one of the worst markets for multifamily investing in the country at that time. That's what drove me to go to that Neil Bauer conference. If you want to build the trust partner with the right people, do what you say you're going to do, over promise under deliver and over communicate, things are always not going to go perfect. You're going to buy an asset and tell your investors you're going to want to do this, this and this. That's a projection that's a business plan. Things change. If things change, communicate, you're in partnership with these people that give you money for your deal. Tell them what's going on. If things are going shitty. Tell them why and tell them what you're gonna do to fix it. That's all everyone asked for. If I'd given my money to deals just tell me what's going on keep me in the loop. I understand things are gonna go south but how you gonna get him back to go north?
Derek Clifford:Yeah, awesome. You know going full circle on this. I was gonna wait to ask this question, but I feel this is a good time to do this. Can you talk About a few times where things maybe did go wrong, and you're able to leverage this trust that you built with your investors to kind of explain the situation or just help make the whole thing either go away or make it be alleviated gotten easier.
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah. So on the property that we closed on last June, in Texas, there was an issue with the catwalks that we didn't project. So we had to go find an engineer, and there was an capital expenditure in there that we had not projected, because nobody saw it until we closed on the property. And we go a couple weeks in and we go, Hey, that catwalk needs repairing Well, that's not just to call a contractor coming in, that's a civil engineer city, it was a whole process. And that put us behind about eight months on the business plan. And so what you have to do is just communicate, this is what we found, this is our fixing it, this is what we're going to do now this is how we see it playing out After this is completed. And the investors, they're appreciative of it. Obviously, if they're not happy that happened, but he's just communicating, that's all it is, is just communicating and rebuilding the trust, right? If you hide it from them, and you don't tell them what's going on, you're gonna lose their trust.
Derek Clifford:That's awesome. I love this, cool. Well, Brandon, I know that we could continue talking about this all day, pretty much. But what I want to do is I want to bring this to the Rapid Round. And in the Rapid Round, we'll ask five questions of every guest. So it's every single guests that we've had on the show, we asked these questions, and they're meant to be answered in about 30 seconds or less, at least if possible. If not, like if there's a really good story behind it, then I definitely want to hear it as well. But are you ready to go to the Rapid Round?
Brandon Magierowski:I'm ready.
Derek Clifford:All right. Number one, what book has had the biggest impact on you and why? And we ask that it not be rich dad or the Bible, because we get that a million times.
Brandon Magierowski:Can't Hurt Me by David Goggins.
Derek Clifford:Oh, man, such a good book. And why is that?
Brandon Magierowski:The motivation it gave me to challenge myself physically. For the longest time going through sports, you know, you do your workouts, you do what you're told to do. But I've never really gone beyond that. After I was on playing, I just go to the gym workout, blah, blah, blah. So after I read that book, I put on my calendar to run a half marathon. And I ended up actually running a full marathon. And something I hate running, I hate it. But I read that book and said, This pastor can do it, I can do it. And that, when I did that, that's the hardest thing I've ever done in my life ever. If I sold myself, I can do that. And I did it. And I finished with my projected time, I could do anything.
Derek Clifford:Dude, Congrats, man. That's awesome. Yeah, that book just inspires me every time about the nature of the human spirit, and how we always short ourselves, right, and what your body can actually do and what your mind can actually do. And you always have more than the gas tank left. So definitely, yeah, listeners out there, listen to Brandon, because that's a fantastic book. All right. Number two, if people want to emulate your success, what is the first actual thing that they could do to follow in your footsteps?
Brandon Magierowski:Start doing the Miracle Morning, or version of it get up earlier than everybody else, do things that everyone else is not willing to do. And you'll see your income streams, your relationships, everything grow beyond your wildest dreams. And I started doing that actually back in 2020. And you know, I'm not perfect at it. I'm not I'm not gonna sit here and tell you that I do the miracle morning every morning at 4am. But I do a version of it. And I'm going to challenge myself again to do it for 30 days straight. I always do these challenges. But that alone, that book and that mindset of doing it early in the morning before everybody else. That's the one thing I would do right now.
Derek Clifford:Very powerful. Love it, man. Thank you. Number three, what is one tool process or hack in the last three months has helped you save time and or effort?
Brandon Magierowski:Asana Task Management system. I was introduced to it by VFR Capital out of Dallas are one of our partners that we do acquisitions for in the DFW area. They introduced me to Asana. And Asana, they do it for their entire deal pipeline, all their task management. It's very low cost. And it is a time saver. And it holds everybody accountable. All the communications through there. So I know there's a lot of platforms out there, but that one alone has really do we become way more efficient because of it.
Derek Clifford:Yeah. Awesome. I would love to see how you're using Asana because we use it as well for all of our workflows, too. Yeah, definitely. Looking forward to that for the show. All right, number four. If the people that know you had to describe you with one word, what do you think that word would be?
Brandon Magierowski:I guess likable. I mean, I'm very hard to be like that guy's an asshole. Sometimes I am. But I just don't think people are like, I think they're just like, That guy's likable. He's down to earth. I try to be You know, we're very successful. We've had a lot of success in our business and our real estate. I feel like I'm just getting started. But being humble, just understanding where I came from Canada. I'm living in American dream. I really am. I just became a citizen. 10 days ago. Congrats, man. Yeah, I was a resident for 10 years. So I'm just telling you if I can do it, if I can come from a different country, play at a decent college I was at, okay, college baseball player. I graduate, my MBA can't remember anything. I learned my MBA probably right now. But I'm just saying I can do it. Anybody can do it. It's just about being humble, doing things that other people aren't willing to do.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, it's awesome. I have a partner in Canada. Also. He's from Calgary. And I can say that, yes, it's most most people from north of the border are very likable. I really enjoy companies that are down here in the United States. So it's really great.
Brandon Magierowski:Ratings are nice. They say we're nice people. Everyone's nice. We apologize for everything. I don't apologize as much anymore. But that's a different mindset.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, that's the American rubbing off on you.
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah you know, I've been hearing it for, what, 16 years now or 17 years. But.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, it's time.
Brandon Magierowski:But yeah, I think it's just about, you know, being a likable person and being the guy that you want to go crack a beer with and hang out and have a good time.
Derek Clifford:I'd want to do that, for sure. Especially if you're coming out to Vegas here shortly. But I think we may be missing each other.
Brandon Magierowski:I don't know if you're gonna be there. You're gone every three days or more.
Derek Clifford:That's true. All right, number five and last question, what small thing do most people not know about you?
Brandon Magierowski:I can plug this now. I'm actually a loan broker as well. Cool, man. I help commercial real estate investors find loans for their deals. So if you've got a loan amount, that's a million dollars plus, multifamily storage, RV park, whatever it may be. We have a database of very, very good lenders across the country that we use for our own deals for our syndications that we're sharing with other groups. So yeah, that's the plug, centroidlending.com.
Derek Clifford:And just wanted to give the listeners a little bit of a nudge to when you have someone who's a loan broker that's on the team that's able to help with the underwriting and help putting the deals together. That is a huge plus. Because oftentimes, especially in this market, right now, it comes down to what type of financing you're going to get whether or not you can actually get the deal or not. So just to just a little plug for the audience to reveal this one.
Brandon Magierowski:We can go 30 more minutes talking about that. But you're right. The nice thing about our brokerage is that we are apartment syndicators, so we know what it takes to close a deal, because we've done it. I mean, there's a lot of good lenders and loan brokers out there, but they're not they haven't been in the weeds of actually taking a deal from loi to close and going through the Battle of financing. And we have, so we use that experience to help you because we can empathize with everything you're going through. But we could do another podcast or 30 minutes on the debt, and the lending environment, and how difficult it is to actually close a loan. And I see one more post on Facebook, about someone asking for 100% financing, loan, bro up because it doesn't exist people stop putting that on Facebook, and stop liking those comments. Because no lender and no private money person out there is ever going to give 100% financing. They're gonna want skin in the game. So if you don't have the skin, go find it.
Derek Clifford:Yeah, along that same line, I totally agree with you. I think the only way that that would be even remotely possible would be a seller finance situation. But that takes a lot of time to find because if there's someone out there that's looking for that can get into it. That takes skill to manage because if you're going to do 100% financing, most times you may be over leveraging right and so you better know what you're doing in the space so completely agree with you that, Brandon.
Brandon Magierowski:Finding a seller that's going to give you 100% financing maybe they're out there I mean, it's just it's it's small chance but Right. But if you need help with even to chat about lending in the environment we're in and some advice I'm always open to talk to anybody.
Derek Clifford:Sounds awesome. Thank you so much, Brandon. And you know before we end up because we're wrapping up the show right now, before we end the show, why don't you tell the audience a little bit more about how they can find you what else is going on? Because you got your lending business you have syndications, you have your baseball. So where can people find out more about everything going on that is Brandon?
Brandon Magierowski:Yeah, I like LinkedIn. LinkedIn is great. I'm actually becoming much more active on LinkedIn. It's one of my faults is actually being more consistent with social media interaction. It's just I think I need a virtual another virtual assistant of some sort but brandon@centroidlending.com is my email. And yeah, connect with me on LinkedIn or Facebook. We just started a new Facebook group called From Middle Cass to Millionaire. That's one of our new ventures here to attract some You know, everyone that stuck in the middle class looking for a way out, we're trying to create a community to help each other to get out of that rat race. So centroidlending.com and LinkedIn.
Derek Clifford:Love it, man. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show Brandon and really appreciate your time and thanks for sharing all your wisdom too.
Brandon Magierowski:Derek, I appreciate you having me, man.
Derek Clifford:Absolutely. And for you listeners that have listened all the way to the end of the show. Want to thank you as well and please, wherever you're listening or watching this, please engage with us. Like comment, subscribe, do everything you can or anything you want to do. So that we can help get this show into the good favor of the algorithm Gods so that that way we can get more exposure to more individuals and have more fantastic guests on like Brandon, so wanted to thank you as well. And Brandon once again, thanks for coming on the show for you, listeners. Thank you guys. We will see you next time. This is Derek signing off. See you guys!