Hey everyone meet kevin here in this video we're going to confront ben mala in his own spa and we're going to find out how he ended up building up an empire. I was in the united states army. So basically you know i was 18 years old in the army like many young men, okay and i couldn't go to college. That's because i never went to high school.

Nobody told me you had to go to high school and then go to college. I just skipped high school and want to go straight to college, but they said no so anyway. Basically i was in the army uh. I did some time.

You know a few years out of the country they sent me back to california, i'm in the army. You don't get paid much in the army and i was in a very high rank. You know i'm 19, i'm 21 years old, i'm back. They sent me to california, they put me to uh, so they put me to work in an area where you have to go out and find housing for yourself.

Where did i go? Find housing where all the other army and navy and air force guys stayed? So i went what they call military housing and there was a naval hospital wrapped the roads in a place, but i worked in the airport. I had a maid baby, so basically i was in the army. I read the department of this building. I could see the old lady was having trouble managing it and uh, so i usually rented in that apartment building.

My rent was 550 a month 1987. and i seen old lady manager building and it was cool you know, and but she was struggling. So you know i really did have a lot of money. You know i don't even get paid much in the army, so i said: hey you know.

Can i help you around here? Maybe pick up garbage because i saw she would the guy wouldn't come that often whatever she'd be out there poor lady picking up garbage around the pool, it was a square building courtyard apartments, with a pool in the middle and um. So you know she said. Okay, let me talk to the owner and the big shot said: okay, give him 50 bucks a month off his rent. I took it was that 50 bucks was 50 bucks.

Every day before i left to go to work, i'd walk around the building, make sure there's no paper on the ground, pick them up whatever make sure to play slate clean. So now my rent was only 500 a month, so at 21 you are on military. On a military base - and you don't even realize you're building a property management experience, definitely, okay, i wasn't on a military base. I worked in the oakland airport running the mack flights.

All the flights that went out took the soldiers to the all over the far east and my job was to make sure the planes got filled and took off without no problems, and if there was a problem, it was my job to fix the problem. That's what i did in the airport traffic management coordinator, specialist for benjamin mallor at duty, sir. So anyway i lived in a building and i got 50 bucks a month off my rent, picking up garbage all right. Then she started needing help with this and help with that, and then i got to meet the owner and then he saw things are getting better he's making more money.

Next thing you know i'm turning the apartments over for them and i'm you know, but you know i'm making extra money here and there, nickel and dime and he's making more money because he's had less vacancy time. I could easily go to the navy base and and phil to keep the place 100 forward. Soldiers uh - it was, you know, worked out so anyway. She accidentally fell down a flight of stairs and i became a manager.

So i i want to just jump in here. That's what happened really because the lady got old and you know she did whatever she couldn't be the manager anymore, and then i i said: well, i told the owner, i said: listen the army's gon na give me 50 grand was a lot of money to me Back then, if i signed another four-year contract, but the problem was they wanted to send me to start learning about bombs and all this and i didn't - i want a desk job, so you know i really didn't want to re-enlist in the army, but had nothing else Going on in my life, so he said no, no, don't really ask the army come to work for me and i'll pay, you exactly what the army's paying you plus whatever you do for me. You know so i said it and then he you know and then i started. Then after i got the army, he comes and he gives me a big like the jail cell, a ring of keys.

You ever seen the old westerns and he just hands me a giant ring of keys by the way i own, all these other buildings, around town, no paperwork. No, not the guy ran it like a show. He, oh, he did give me something else at the ring of keys. He gave me a 38.

okay hold on hold on before we get into the 38. What's interesting so far, is you didn't even realize that you were getting property management experience at 21? What you were doing is you were working to lower your rent and lower your expenses, but at the same time you were gaining experience, helping other people make more money. You know, i think today a lot of 18 to 22 year olds, getting started. Think about how can i get rich? How can i make more money faster, whereas you are? How can i make this building more money while also making a little bit of money? It's an it's a different perspective.

How do you feel about that compared to the mentality today, you help somebody make money you're going to make money too, and then you become irreplaceable to them. Then you kind of right in the palm of your hand, baby, because what did i do, i took over all those goddamn buildings and they were dangerous. That's why he gave me the freaking gun and i rented the out of him, and i made that guy twice what he was making without me. So i became his golden goose except i was laying apartments.

I was gon na say laying something else cut that out um anyway. Well, you know they got the rent. You know hey, what do you got? Lady, i'm just kidding. I was offered plenty of times all right, so basically i i i started managing all his and uh.

Basically, we became partners eventually. Why? Because he couldn't make that kind of money. Without me, he was just sitting like a big rich guy, all over the world and uh and building big mansions and and then i was in the hood working the out of the apartments that he had and he made money. So we became partners because one day i could say hey it's time for me to move on.

Oh no, don't move on. Let me pay you more there. You go make me a partner okay, and he made me a lot of promises and he didn't really keep him. And then i came back blah blah blah point is what i did was hey.

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So you too can build wealth with real estate and the time to do so is coming up, because i think prices are going to soften a little bit. That's the perfect time to get in, but you got to start by learning. So that way you could start doing. Management was my key, because if you can manage property you can own property.

The only thing you're missing is the money find the money. So i just made a for him that wasn't stupid. If i i started buying little cheap crack houses, you know in oakland and fixing them up every i did what everybody else didn't want to do. Basically and i fixed them up.

I buy something for 27 000. It could be a big old house and it could be like four bedrooms. Another thing is a lot of these big old houses, if they're only three bedrooms and they got a full dining room or a parlor back in those days, you don't need it. Why? Because section they paid by the bedroom and nobody sits in those rooms anyway back then you know so basically i turned two bedrooms into three bedrooms: three bedrooms and four bedrooms.

You get extra 300 a month per bedroom, uh section they paid the rent. Your money was guaranteed uh and i kept buying fixing it up. I buy it, i'd fix it up and then i'd refinance it and then after i ended the year, i got even a better interest rate and refinance did pull cash out because now i had seasoning. I took a property, they called seasoning when you hold the property for at least a year and it's stabilized, then it's seasoned, the banks, will loan you more money and they'll.

Give you a better interest rate. Why? Because the property is less risk, anything else you want to know yeah in the commercial world. That seasoning is important. I want to know, though, a lot of folks might be listening to this and about your story with that property manager just say: well, ben you lucked out, you got that manager.

How would you have envisioned uh? You know finding your way without that push her down the stairs. It's total lie. Anybody who told you that is a liar, never proven uh, and so what advice would you give somebody who's like? How can i find my old lady to you know, help down the stairs? Well, it's real easy. Okay, especially if you have a little extra time, even just on the weekends, if you're a student listen, i have leasing agents that started with me as a leasing agent apartment complex.

Some of them are college students that come in on a weekend and they show apartments uh, you know, and you know whatever, and they did it part-time and they went to full-time and they decided they liked it. Next thing you know they become the uh assistant manager and a lot of them become managers. So you can easily get an entry level position pretty much in almost any business, but in real estate you can get an entry level position and if you're really good at it - and you show a lot of effort and you make them more money, then you become An asset to them and you will grow in property management or real estate. You could start on the ground floor.

You could get your real estate license, you could be a property manager you could get in and you could get a license relatively easy. You know three. Four months of of some flash cards that you're gon na forget all that crap about anyway, but you get your license and then you could go work for a leasing, company or whatever and get your feet wet with real experience. But now there are a lot of folks who watch you ben who they want to get to this property.

They want to live in this mansion. They want to live on this gulf coast. They want to have this lazy river that when you go around it five times, you swam a mile. How can they do that outside of real estate? Should they go all in on crypto? Should they focus on just real estate until they get to a certain net worth? How should they do stocks as a balance to that? What's your take on that, like your ideal sort of balance or just does anything other than real estate even really matter, you got to do what you like.

If you like real estate and you enjoy taking garbage to turn into gold, then you do it. If you, you know, if you have a career in something, if you invest in time to go to college and have a career in something utilize that career and then do real estate in the sorry real estate is great. You could make millions and millions of dollars in real estate without even taking up your time. Okay, it's very possible.

So whatever works for your lifestyle me, i went all the way in i went in, and everybody around me better, be in quick note before i forget. If you want a totally free stock, make sure to sign up for public, you can get a free stock worth all the way up to a thousand dollars, and public is great because they don't take money from payment for order flow standard stock trades are commission, free And they're a social platform where you can see other people's trades, they actually they actually make so it's transparent. It's really cool. All you have to do is go to public.com meet kevin you'll, receive a totally free stock, valued up to one thousand dollars.

Once you open an account and make a deposit really cool so once again, go to public.com meet kevin, receive a totally free stock worth up to a thousand dollars. Once you open an account and make a deposit check them out, public.com meet kevin and that's the way i did it, and it took me about a good, solid, 20 years to get to the level you know with something like this. Okay, so everybody's got their own path in life. I chose the path to buy everything i could and make it worth more money and use the bank's money, and my first loan was a va loan.

Nobody down, okay, first loan. Now, if you weren't in the veteran, if you weren't in the military, you go fha and a lot of places have not only to have fha financing, you can use your own county or city or state might have a first-time home buyers program that will loan you. The money or grant you the money, if you don't have the down payment, everybody can be in real estate. Okay, whatever your financial level, is you just get in there and take the elevator up but get in you know? I i want your comment on this.

I feel that frequently when it comes to stocks or crypto, let's say crypto, you might have a likelihood of success of of going from to become a millionaire to go from 50 000 naira to millionaire the likelihood of success in crypto, maybe what 15 20 the lottery? Folks, stocks over time - hey - maybe 30 40 correct me if i'm wrong, but i feel like in real estate. You start with that 50k. You buy a house, you fix it up. You keep moving on, you buy another one, you add it's almost that 80 to 90 percent of people can become millionaires over time with real estate, with relative ease as a side.

Hustle. Now, don't quote me on the statistics, but my point of that is saying. I think it's four times as likely to make it for sure, with real estate compared to crypto or twice as likely to make it for sure with real estate than stocks, especially since you can get that leverage early on in a non-risky way. No margin calls right.

What's your take on that, i mean real estate, offers you an opportunity to get your hands dirty and create it yourself. Every property i buy is its own little company or business. That's how i look at it: okay, whether it's a 250 unit, uh apartment building or a 250 room hotel, it's its own business and you're gon na work it and make it as productive as you can to make as much money as you can. I mean.

Typically, everybody makes money in real estate. Even homeowners, people purposely buy their house down over 30 years and say: okay well, at least i'll. Have my house in 30 years that i won't have a mortgage on it'll be worth a half a million bucks. I mean you know real estate guarding making.

No more of it. You know that. Well, they are in the metaverse. You know the crypto world crypto world, you see, that's all today's world.

It ain't been around a long time. It's a generation, three generations ahead of me and uh. It's still, you know new, but hey if it works for you work it anything that works for you in life. I don't care if you're renting bicycles at the park, which i try to do once it didn't work out, but it might work for you, one of the things that i see a lot of in your comment, sections or in your q, a or even on my Channel is folks, come to both of us to some degree and and say hey: how can i take 50 grand or 100 grand and quit my job and retire? How do you feel about that? Are people rushing to the exits here? You can't leave your current stable income, i wouldn't do it until you double that income comfortably and safely.

If you match it, you can you're not going to be the same level. You know you know not whatever you know what i mean. I would until you get to a point in real estate, where you can double your normal, stable income. You don't leave and then you also got to make sure there's more opportunities out there.

So you can keep growing right now, it's a very difficult time to grow. For people yeah i'm going to be honest, i had a lot of opportunity. People don't have today. I could pick and choose any deal.

I could choose 10 deals. I was picking the deals that i wanted now i take what i can get, because there's so many people after them is. Is there a possibility in your mind that we could see real estate prices compress here in 2022, and maybe there could be better opportunities in 2023? Or do you not concern yourself with that? So much you know in terms of timing, do you just try to find the best deal that you can at any given point? Listen market goes up. Mark goes down, you know if you find value you're finding value, i can't wait.

I can't sit back right now. If i got a 10 31 because the property i took profit from and say i'm gon na wait, i can't wait. I got a time clock, you know, so i'm in a position where i have to constantly every single day. I'm looking for the deals.

I do reverse 30 ones and buy the deals in anticipation of the future sale that i'm gon na have all right. That's every day, i'm always looking for the new deal constantly, i'm always getting ready. So that's the life i have to live. You know it's a rough life and it sucks, but you know what are you gon na? Do everybody can't be me kevin, you know.

So how do you uh? Here's? Here's. Actually, i think a good one, because i i've got an answer. I'm not gon na change. Mine i'll tell you after you say yours: how long per day do you actually spend looking at new deals it does it take up most of your day or is it sort of a fraction of your day? And - and it's just you look every day, you have a routine and it doesn't take that much time what takes the most of your time or what is it if i'm in my normal zone, i'm not really under the gun? Okay, i get at least 300 emails.

A day of opportunities sent to me why? Because i went to them and said, hey, i'm looking, and this is what i'm looking for. I register with the brokers. I go to all the websites they got. You got c-r-e-x-i, you got encore, you know whatever type of real estate.

You want there's a special person out there. That's what they're selling you need to be in touch with them and register with them and go to their site, see what they got and then they'll start sending you stuff. So now i just sit back and let it come to me and i pick and choose the best ones. I want you know and that's what i do i have to devote before i go to bed every night if i'm busy out in the field.

In the day before i go to bed, i got ta, look and see a few hundred emails and make sure that i don't miss a deal. I went to go, buy a daycare center down the block. It was perfect, it was a six and a half cap in my neighborhood with a great tenant with a long lease and the building was in good shape and a good neighborhood. I made the offer one day after the listing came out and somebody already snatched it up now.

If i would have been in there and made the offer the day it came out, i probably could have got it so it sounds like you might spend 30 minutes to an hour at the end of the day. Looking at deals, maybe if you didn't want to miss something it'd, be twice a day, a good deal. You got to take time and go look into the deal, see i'll skim through all the ones. No, no, no, no, no, but the ones that say.

Maybe you got to put some time into them and then, if they really start looking good, you got ta put more time into them. Okay, so it depends. You know one day could have no good deals. Sent to me.

One day may have a 10 or 20 who knows okay, so it really depends on the kind of deals that are coming to you. So you're always looking, but it's not like a full-time job like you could work a full-time job and still do real estate right. Absolutely absolutely for the average person who's maybe got a job, maybe they're a cop, maybe they're not even happy with their job they're computer scientists, whatever they got their two years work experience. Maybe they're.

Even self-employed they've been working as an agent for a couple years or they do sales whatever they do. How difficult is it to actually start? How much do people need to be stressed out about getting started and what should they buy? Well, you know the first step. Everybody should have, in my opinion, is if they're paying rent stop. Okay, because you're giving money away to guys like me that live in big fancy.

Houses like this seriously, if you're paying rent, you're first and you're stable, and you know you're going to be in the same place for a while at least two years. You don't say: oh i'm not going to be here that long if you're there for a couple of years, you should definitely try to get qualified and buy a property. Now you're going to buy a house for your first time why you could buy two three or up to four units. One to four is residential.

Five or more is commercial. You could buy a fourplex just like the average guy buys a house. It's the same loan and even better the income from the property helps you qualify to buy it and you eliminate in most cases, unless you overpay. The first thing you'll do is eliminate your housing expense.

So if you're living somewhere and you're paying 1500 bucks a month for rent and now you're going to save 1500 bucks a month to rent that's making money, saving money is making money. Now, in some areas, i notice it's really difficult to find those duplexes, triplex's, fourplexes and some folks just never end up buying because they get that analysis, paralysis, the numbers just don't work on them and they don't end up getting in even into that. Like two bedroom. One bath house and then they move to the three bedroom: two they just don't get in, so they stay renters forever.

Is that a mistake, then i mean you got to keep looking. You know you got to keep looking if you can't find a duplex drive like four plus to buy a house. Maybe you can add on to the house. Maybe you can put another little house behind it, but typically, if you're willing to give up the amenities of having your own private home and and live under an apartment with three other people for a year, at least okay, you're gon na find something.

Okay, maybe not in california, where you're at but anywhere else in the world. The country you're gon na find something it's at least going to eliminate your rent. The numbers work. Trust me: do you think folks, you know how many expenses there are in running a fourplex.

You know nothing, nothing yeah, so is it possible that uh folks get too overwhelmed by the idea at all of even just getting started because they want the perfect house that has no defects and the white picket fence and the three-car garage? They want everything perfect because it's their dream, home and they're going to live there forever and they don't want to just get into something. Is that a mistake? Should people just get started already? Listen if you, if you're, only looking to buy a house for a personal reasons for the comfort okay, you get what you pay for. Okay, you want to buy the perfect house you're going to pay top dollar. You want to buy a house that has a little value add in it you're going to make some money it's up to you.

If you've got money to make you don't care, then fine buy a big fancy house like this. We ain't got to do, but if you want to make money, buy something that needs a little sweat equity in it. So what what are your favorite things to do to increase sort of the value of a home or a multi-family building? I mean, as far as a home goes you mean you came and critiqued what you know telling me what to do the other day do this. Do that and i'm taking your advice you came in, you said you know what, if you paint this crown molding white and it offsets all everything being the same.

Color it'll really pop and you were right and then the painter turns around and outdoes you and says: hey: let's do the columns too. Now the place is gon na pop, like the fourth of july baby. Thanks a lot, i'm gon na raise the price of a million bucks on that house, thanks to kevin, so paint carpet and so on. What about multi-family is there? You had a few ideas you ever throw in a pool or you like putting greens.

What are you doing, whatever the need is for the property think about what's going to help you get more rent, okay out of that property, i used to build laundry rooms and put machines in in the unit because it no not in the unit that would that Would hurt well that would be an amenity if it was a demand for that. If i didn't have washer dryers and the guy next door, or i would put a coin operated in there in a storage room somewhere and have it built out with coin operated, and then i collect all those quarters every month and i'd take them to the bank And cash them in baby, i mean, whatever the property you know is gon na help the property, whether it's an amenity. I put dog parks in my apartment buildings because pet lovers love, you know to pay rent, they pay extra rent for pets, bigger deposits, bigger rents, give them a dog park. What is a dog park? You do have a a fence, and you put a freaking bench in there for them to watch the dogs run around in the bark come on as long as they don't on the bark.

Okay, we put the pet things up, we go and we buy the pet stations. Simple costs, nothing we're talking about. Like a 100 unit, complex pooper, scooper stations. There you go.

How do you handle the management intensity of a multi-family versus, say single family? You know multi-family is just more doors. Basically, when you get to a point where you start having maybe 50 units or more, you pretty much need an on-site manager you're going to need somebody there to to make sure the units are getting turned to make sure all the rent's coming in to make sure You're not getting ripped off on your bills, uh and you're gon na need, maybe uh at least a half or a one full-time maintenance guy. The rule of thumb is one per hundred in my world maintenance, guys one manager, one maintenance per hundred units, so i've have a 200 unit complex. We got two in and two out i got two.

Ladies in the office, oh, i said i got men in the office too. I got two people in the office and i got two people outside doing the maintenance and maintaining the place. That's the way it works. When would you say, people should even remotely consider getting into commercial like office triple net leases, retail whatever compared to start with your own home? Stop renting start with your own home, maybe get a duplex to four plex, maybe get a 16 plex.

But when, when do you bridge to that, and is it the next level or do you just do both remember folks, it's natural to have a lot of questions about real estate investing and if you want over 40 hours of content in just one program, a zero-to-millionaire Real estate investing program just look at the itinerary, that is all of the curriculum. That's in the program, all of the crazy, incredibly detailed things you're going to learn about real estate. Investing your confidence level is going to go up for real estate. Investing check out that program, you won't regret it use that coupon code.

You can ask me questions directly if there's content, you feel that you don't have the answer to ask me directly in our live streams boom, we'll get it taken care of, i'm all about adding value to these programs, and i think you're going to love what you Get out of these programs check them out, link down below and use that expiring coupon code? You do whatever makes you money and whatever you can afford to do whatever the most is. You can borrow from the bank whatever the most is you got for a down payment, you do whatever is within your limits with. What's in your ability to do it and the more you do, the more you'll make and so for a newer commercial buyer they might have to put 35 down, but a newer home buyer might have to put three percent down, so they might be able to get A faster start, then, whatever works for that person based on their value what they got, what they can do. You know i mean if it's somebody just starting out a house is always the best way to start stop paying rent, keep the money in your pocket.

Now one thing i noticed is you've got multiple planes, yet you only invest around here in florida, despite the fact that you get all these planes tell me about people who come and say why don't we invest out of the area? Let's go, invest somewhere else. Listen! If you're going out of the area and it's a type of property that requires a lot of management, even with the on-site manager, you got ta have management above them, i mean it's just harder to do when things are spread out, i used to be in texas. I was in california uh, you know and uh florida, so i used to have three states at one time, but to me i'm i've done it for a while. I want to shrink down just to florida.

This way. If i got a problem, i could jump on my plane and i could be in miami in 30 minutes now. We're gon na do rapid fire questions. Okay, do you always raise the rent on your tenants when it's lease renewal time? Yes, if the market demands so is there ever an opportunity to mix tenant relationships with friendship? No, would you always do month to month or annual leases, or does it depend, depends on the unit builds on the type property and so single family versus multi-family? Any rule of thumb there single-family, you know single-family.

If that tenant moves out, you got no money coming in. You know with multi-family. You could have four units. If one guy leaves it ain't, gon na hurt you, it might cost you a few bucks that month, but ain't gon na hurt you so maybe lease on single and maybe that month to month is more okay on multi is what you say.

I mean. Oh, you mean releases, i mean month to month. It depends on. What's the demand everything is about supply and demand if you're in an area where people typically want a one-year lease, you give a one-year lease if you're in a transit area you might want to rent month to month, so market dependent market depended best way to get In touch with good agents, who can actually find you deals or should you just do it yourself and try to cut the agents out, find an agent that's selling what you want always try to find somebody who specializes in exactly what you're looking for, if you, if You're, looking for a fixer-upper go online, look at some fixer-uppers and see a lot of times.

You'll see one agent. He has a lot of listings, okay, he's in the business and he's always moving stuff find an agent that specializes in the type of real estate you're. Looking for i go to triple net real estate agent triple nets. I go to multi-family agency, every company has a division.

Even you go to marcus and miller's shop uh, you know, and they got the multi-family division. They got the uh commercial division. They got triple that division, they got the hotel division, they got storage facility division. It's funny.

You mentioned that. I was just talking about looking for an office and talking to this one agent on the phone about his office, another agent in the office hears i'm looking for an office, so i got one for him. I i think folks get so anxious to say. Well, i'm gon na get my own license and save the two percent commission.

Is that pennywise pound foolish? Listen! If you get your license, you want to make money, it will help you do your own deal, but if you get your license, you got a license to make money on everybody's deal that you're a part of so you're going to use that license to make commissions On a lot of deals going on, that's the reason i have a license. Would you recommend people become an agent, a lender, appraiser anything in the real estate field. You'd say people should stay away from maybe as a career i mean you know, they're all good careers. But if you want to make the big bucks you got to buy, you got ta own okay, the appraiser works for a paycheck, all right uh and it's a service.

I hire appraisers. Just like i hire lawyers. Just like a doctor. Doctors, lawyers, appraisers bankers.

You know what they ought to me: they're service people, not servants, you try to make them into one, but they're service people they supply a service. If you want to supply a service and be in real estate, then you kind of have an edge on people. It's like contractors call me all the time. Oh, i want to buy something and uh.

You know i just built this for this guy and i just built that for that guy. Well, if you're a contractor, you're one step ahead of most of us right, if you are all right, a guy like me, i need a place for up. I'm gon na hire contractor all right. The contractor's gon na make profit on me.

If you, if a guy's, already a contractor and he's gon na, do his own deals, he don't need a contractor. He's got his crew. He's got his crew, he doesn't. He doesn't worry about proper overhead.

He knows how to cut corners he's got uh; no, he knows how to buy materials. He knows the business, he can save money. So you know, if you're a contractor, you should definitely own real estate. People need to worry about starting to have an llc before they have their first rental, or should they just talk to a good insurance agent and then focus on getting a good deal? I mean the reason for having an llc is to protect you from a liability standpoint.

If you get a lot of good insurance and you have a good liability policy and it protects you, that's fine, but when you start getting a lot small when you're small, you don't really get mad at much, but on a large scale. If you it's really to protect your other assets, if you go out when you buy a duplex and you make it an llc and go out for bid, somebody falls down the damn stairs or whatever you got the service for that. But god forbid it's beyond the insurance limits and they can prove that you did something wrong or you didn't fix that step and they come after you for punitive damages or really kind of come after you cause even just more legal fees. Uh, you know.

Basically, it exceeds the insurance limits. They can come after your other assets by having an llc you're protected when they can't go outside the assets of the llc, which is just a duplex very well. Last question: a lot of stocks over the last five months, including crypto, have fallen 80 to 90. How often do you see people who get into real estate investing lose 80 to 90 percent of their money? It's all based on you know.

The risk of the investment that they were in apple has not lost a kind of money. A lot of stocks are sitting at 30 to 40 big companies right now, but if you get more risk means you have a bigger risk of losing money and when the hits the fan more, it's that fan that you would say muni bonds. Right now, i've got millions and millions thousands of meeting bounds. They took about a 10 hit, but luckily okay, when i bought them from the time i bought them, they increased 10 percent in value.

So basically, i just lost all the extra profit that i had for the past several years, but you know it all depends on the instrument. If it's crypto i mean you can lose tomorrow. You know you're in that game. You want to be in that risky game.

You got big rewards, come with big risks. One final ad to that is, i have a rule of thumb and i want to know your comment on this and that's that until people get to a net worth of 500 000, they should focus almost exclusively on real estate, real estate, real estate and then worry About the stocks and all the other speculative stuff, later focus on getting your first one to three properties: first and building that equity getting to know that train, so you can build on top of that. What do you think about that? I always focus on the real estate and then the profits from real estate that i can't put in the real estate market or don't need to. Then i place them in other instruments that hopefully give me a return: stocks, bonds, uh anything preferreds, uh reits.

All that type of stuff, that's where you're putting your war chest and your retirement away at, but you got to take all your money and listen. Let's face it! A million bucks ain't these days right there you go. It's not a million dollars is not a lot. It's not a lot today, okay, so 500.

I go to a million. If i was oh, so what you're saying is get to a million with real estate before you get into anything else, the speculative stuff get to a million dollars a net worth of real estate. You should actually double that and keep putting money in real estate, but when you make a profit put a socket away, you know why? Because if you ever need money, you can always run to that sock or you can leverage against it. I used.

I still can get 90 of my municipal bonds that are going back down to paying four percent. They used to pay five percent tax free baby. I suck a million dollars away in a municipal bond back in the day at five percent tax free. That's like me, making eight or nine percent in california ten percent.

Okay, then i can borrow 90 at a very low rate of about a point and a half margin rate. Whatever it is ben. How can people follow you to learn more, go on youtube to ben mala or go to bedmellow.com, and if you need to get me on the phone go to consult with ben benmallow.com, consult with ben get me on the phone. Let's talk about what you want to do where you're at where you want to go and make some money ben thanks, so much for uh being in your own spa, six inches away from me! Thank you, but i make sure i'm gon na triple the chemical uh treatment tomorrow.

Sorry, it got warm here, i'm telling you now you better pee at my spa and i like you, i like the way you got dressed up. At least that's very nice. Thank you. Thank you all right.

That's good! Thanks! Ben.