Discover the sales strategies that rocketed Ali Charafeddine. His riveting story, full of persistence and breakthroughs, is a masterclass in surviving and thriving through rejection and innovation. Ali's journey will not only captivate you, but also arm you with knowledge about competitive advantages, adjusting sales tactics, and the digital transformation essential for scaling a venture.
Ali opens up about his own foray into sales training and real estate, sharing valuable lessons on the power of mindset and continual motivation. Discover rare insights into the art of staying hungry for success, the impact of effective mentorship, and the use of personal affirmations as a catalyst for achieving greatness in these highly competitive fields.
Discover the sales strategies that rocketed Ali Charafeddine. His riveting story, full of persistence and breakthroughs, is a masterclass in surviving and thriving through rejection and innovation. Ali's journey will not only captivate you, but also arm you with knowledge about competitive advantages, adjusting sales tactics, and the digital transformation essential for scaling a venture.
Ali opens up about his own foray into sales training and real estate, sharing valuable lessons on the power of mindset and continual motivation. Discover rare insights into the art of staying hungry for success, the impact of effective mentorship, and the use of personal affirmations as a catalyst for achieving greatness in these highly competitive fields.
Welcome to the Everyday Millionaire Show with Ryan Greenberg and Nick Kalkas. Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Everyday Millionaire Show. We're here with Ace Sharifuddin. Did I get that right?
Speaker 2:No, Sharifuddin Close.
Speaker 1:Sharifuddin. All right, we'll take it. We're close. I tried three times, I'm sorry. I apologize, man. So where are you coming from? Where are you coming from, ace?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm in Detroit, Michigan.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, middle of the country.
Speaker 2:Yeah, where are you guys from?
Speaker 1:We're over in Maryland.
Speaker 2:Oh, beautiful, Okay cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and this is Nick. So we got linked up. We were just talking about it through one of our assistants reaching out to you. Then we started doing some research on you. Just looking, you know, thought you'd be a cool guest for the show. So why don't you give us like a little background of how you got started in business and you know kind of where you're at now?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I got started in business working. You know regular jobs growing up at a young age. You know gas stations, subways, liquor stores. I could say that I learned a lot of the sales aspects, starting there, just talking to people over the counter, conversating with people, making jokes. I think you even have to upsell in gas stations and liquor stores. You know I used to always try to have my shifts sell the most. So I was very competitive at a young age, especially with some of them being my dad's stores or my brother's stores or uncle's stores that I was working at. I wanted to always be the best. So I'd say some of the sales started there.
Speaker 2:While I was in high school, 17, 18 years old my brothers owned a few wireless toy stores and if you're not familiar with those, back in the day when you needed a cell phone accessory you had to go to the cell phone store, and back in those days I'm talking about Nokia, sony Ericsson, flip phones, before even the BlackBerrys. So we owned those stores and they ended up going bankrupt. The franchise went bankrupt and we were stuck with our life savings and a bunch of accessories. So in 2005, we came up with a move to sell these accessories phone cases, chargers to the C stores, convenience stores, liquor stores, gas stations. I know right now you could think about that and you could say it's common that you find chargers and stuff in gas stations and liquor stores. I don't know how old you guys are, but if you think back to 2005, when you needed a cell phone accessory, you had to go to a cell phone store the concept was not yet introduced to sell these things and regular stores like CVS and gas stations and liquor stores and hotel gift shops. So we actually came up with that concept and at the time there was no navigation. We had to print out a MapQuest and I went out in my dad's Explorer truck and I had to sell this concept to gas station owners and liquor store owners.
Speaker 2:And if you know anything about these owners in the Midwest, it's some of the toughest nationalities out there, including my own. You're talking about Lebanese Arab, you're talking about Chaldeans, you're talking about Jewish Indians. These are some hard people to sell, especially traditional folks that own these stores. So I went out selling behind bulletproof glass and people were telling me I was crazy. You want to sell cell phone chargers in a gas station? That's crazy. Nobody comes here for that Liquor store. You're crazy. Anyhow, long story short, I got about 20 no's on my way back. I ended up getting a yes on my way back when I was just filling gas. I wasn't even trying to sell anymore. I gave up on the idea and somebody asked me what I did and I said I do these cell phone chargers. The guy ends up taking a $1,000 order. Fast forward 10 years, 2005 to 2015. I mean we were nationwide and worldwide within 10 years. So I took that one sale and we turned it into over 60,000 accounts over 10 years.
Speaker 3:So that's pretty impressive. I just want to ask you in regards to the stock that you had left over that you tried to sell once you were able to start selling to those gas stations and CVSs, did you re-up on that inventory to resell to them again?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we started selling and then, once we sold out, we bought inventory and then, with our sale, came servicing. So I would sell you a display for $1,000. I would sell you each item for five. You would sell it for 10. At the time gas stations made like 30 cents a Snickers bar, 15 cents a Red Bull. They weren't making real money. So when I was giving them a product that gets $5 profit per item and I come back monthly and warranty it and service it, yeah, we started servicing. And then as soon as I got 50, 100 accounts and I couldn't handle it, I hired a driver and I taught him how to do the same thing. Then two drivers, then five and 10. And before you know it, I was going state to state hiring drivers opening up storages 10. And before you know it, I was going state to state hiring drivers opening up storages and doing the same exact thing and expanding this thing.
Speaker 2:After five, six years, I remember we got into Las Vegas hotels the Aria, the Hollywood, every big hotel in Las Vegas was carrying our merchandise. And it was a humble beginnings man. We started in Craigslist vans that were broken down on the highways and within five years we got to Mercedes, sprinter, vans, you know, and uniforms and went from paper to iPad. So it was a beautiful journey and really that's where a lot of my sales was built.
Speaker 2:You know, street sales and door-to-door business-to-business is a tough gig, especially when you're doing it in the cold winter in the Midwest and you're freezing in your van and you're filling up a box and you're talking to people behind bulletproof glass and you're trying to get past a gatekeeper. So a lot of that I learned through that business and as we expanded I started focusing on corporate sales. Now, instead of going to a store, I would go to the Holiday Inn franchise buyer and I would meet with him in another state and I would fly out to meet with him and try to sell. You know, 600 holiday ends at the same time. So I started doing corporate sales and that's where I got good at email marketing, text marketing, um and phone sales.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I was actually clicking through, uh like your website today and just, you know, reading up on you doing some due diligence. And one thing that I've been trying to integrate into our business now, just from talking to other business owners, is ClickFunnels, and I noticed that you have a bunch of ClickFunnels on your website. Do you use ClickFunnels like that actual program or do you have your own kind of setup for that?
Speaker 2:Honestly, I've tried a lot of programs and I've tried a lot of third parties and what I've learned the hard way is nobody's going to do it like you. I love to outsource, I love to you know, focus on what I'm great at, which is, you know, motivational speaking, sales training, leadership training, consulting. That's the space I'm in right now. But sometimes you got to learn, even like running ads. I outsourced it to somebody. They did horrible. I took advantage of it myself and took control. I did better than companies that market how to do ads. So right now, with ClickFunnels and all the data I'm gathering and email campaigns, I have somebody that's owning it but I'm very close to it, so I'm very close to the messaging. I'm very close to the lead sources. I'm very close to the data that we're collecting and I'm staying close to it and I'm trying different things right now. So right now, I'm not using any third-party company. I have my own team, but I meet with my team almost daily.
Speaker 1:Nice, yeah, it's something that I want to get into, like, I like how you have it, um, get a free playbook and you got to enter in this form to get that. You know, to get that playbook and then that data, you can start drip campaigns and all that kind of stuff based on that data. So that's definitely something that, uh, I've been interested in in getting involved with yeah, I mean data is very valuable.
Speaker 2:I mean, data is probably the most important thing. You know I have about 50 to 60,000 emails right now. What do I do with those emails? You know I used to just send a mass blast to all of them. Those days are over. It's about custom value. Today, every single person needs a different kind of email depending on who they are and where they are in their life. Even the biggest companies in the world companies that I've worked with, like Rocket Mortgage they have marketing that's so dialed in that, if you just had a baby, you get an ad about someone that's growing a family and the ad only pertains to you. But somebody else that might be single might get an ad about buying their first home, and they have so much data that the advertising is different for every single person. It's kind of like how the tiktok algorithm works. You know, based off your personality, it's going to feed you what you want in real action. Well, that's where like marketing is going. Marketing is going to custom value according to somebody's life so what's more important marketing or sales?
Speaker 2:some would argue they're equally as important. I think you have to know how to sell something to get it started, and I think once you have a good product or service that speaks for itself. I think the next step is marketing, because marketing is what's going to take it. Take it from you communicating and doing the hard work the long way. Marketing could blow you up a lot easier. It's one thing for me to go do a speaking engagement somewhere and fly across the country and talk to 3,000 people at one time, but I could also spend $2,000 in Facebook ads and reach 25,000 people at one time. So I'd say they're equally as important and I'd say you have to get the sales acumen down first, and then you should start marketing right after.
Speaker 3:Do you think the people who were in sales before we had all this technology have an advantage because of the face-to-face interaction versus being able to send out blast emails or blast texts?
Speaker 2:Yeah, A hundred percent. I could tell you that 80% of the companies I consult with and that have purchased my training portal. It's been face-to-face, you know, and a lot of it's referral-based. I'd say that's going to get you the majority of your business, that's what's going to earn you your reputation, and then I think the ads and the marketing comes after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree, you got to start, you know. You got to build a reputation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was like the first chapter. I sold that company 10 years later and I jumped into the mortgage space, which you know. I was a top salesperson year one and year two making life-changing checks and mortgages. I didn't know how much money was really in them until I got into it. Then I became a leader for a Fortune 500 company and a senior leader and I got real good at training people that were struggling and making them all-stars. So they started sending me all the people that were struggling and that's what my team became known as, and then pretty soon I was running all the training and the onboarding for this company. And then that turned into doing it for other companies that started calling me.
Speaker 2:And that's where my Aces Academy was born, where I started going to companies, revamping their culture, creating a virtual training portal for them so you never have to teach the same thing twice. So I give people a portal to onboard, communicate with your people. That way you don't have to teach the same thing twice. So the onboarding and everybody gets a fair opportunity to join your company knowing everything there is to be successful. So it comes with sales training, leadership training, culture training. We customize it for that company. We do videos and tests and it has accountability and reports and metrics and it makes sure that everyone gets onboarded properly. So that's what I moved into doing now and then I do consulting and speeches and I revamp leadership teams, sales teams, build scripts, trainings and pretty much teach anybody how to sell anything and teach any leader how to lead anybody to create a great culture.
Speaker 1:So you were mentioning working for other big companies. When did you make a transition to not work for anybody and just go on your own to start the ACEs Academy? And you know the other ventures that you're doing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it's only been a couple of years. You know, I worked at a mortgage company one of the top mortgage companies in America for a long time, after my accessory company almost put 10 years in the mortgage industry. So I mean I learned from the best I grew in that company. You know you're talking about billionaires are in these senior leadership meetings. So I was fortunate enough to sit with them, see how they think, see how they operate, and I was learning a lot from that business.
Speaker 2:Once I knew I had a talent for training people and developing people, I started. I didn't actually start the business. I got a phone call from somebody that opened a business, needed my help, went there to help them. It turned out to be a success. So that's kind of how it got plotted.
Speaker 2:And then I started doing it on my off time, you know.
Speaker 2:So I would spend my nights, in the mornings, building out courses and making my books and I started putting all my knowledge that I documented into you know notes and drawing out a plan of how could I teach salespeople everything I teach in person in a book, and then how could I do that in a video, and then how could I do that for leaders in a book and leaders in a video.
Speaker 2:So I went one year spending all my weekends, holidays, nights and mornings on building that out. And then the next year I started doing it on my off time. Then the year after that I went part-time in my business and part-time in my passion. And then, once my passion and the consulting started really blowing up and I made some of the biggest checks I've ever made, I said it's time to go full throttle. So I, kind of you know, put training wheels on it and I took it slowly, first in my mornings and evenings I I sacrificed in the weekends, then a little bit of part-time and part-time and my job is still pay my bills. And then, as soon as I proved the concept and I knew I had something going, I went all in so what are the first couple steps when someone comes to you and they want to get some sales training?
Speaker 3:is it, do you have, like um, courses lined up to where, like you know, just watch these courses. Or is there, do you have courses lined up to where, just watch these courses. Or do you have to interview them, in a sense, to see where they're at in their sales journey as well?
Speaker 2:Well, it depends. So I have universal sales training and leadership training on my portal for $99 a month and that comes with weekly coaching calls. So I meet with my whole community every single Wednesday for one hour. They could ask questions, I bring relevant topics to them and it's a chance to get face-to-face with them virtually. So that comes with a $99 membership a month. Plus, you get all the sales content already in there.
Speaker 2:It's from the beginning mindset, introduction, branding, relationship building, presenting, dealing with objections, closing in multiple fashions, getting referrals, bonus plays and hacks. That's the whole sales course and there's a bunch of videos and templates and tests inside of that. So you go through that. It's like a two-week course. Then there's also a two-week leadership course that has everything from building a team name, team standards, qualities of the greatest leaders in the world, how to gain those qualities, pattern, interrupts, one-on-ones, building relationships, moving the needle so many more things for leadership and that's like a three, four-week course that they have available to them and then I update it with bonus material every single week.
Speaker 2:So that's already set and ready for anybody that wants to join. They get all that content. There's an app on the phone and a website, but then there's also an option, once you join the academy that you can meet with me and do custom training. So the custom training is like me and you meet one-on-one, I record the session, I make you your own course inside of the academy where you could re-watch our videos, and that is pretty much custom built. I meet with you, see where your opportunities are, see where your strengths are and we build a plan together.
Speaker 3:How did you learn how to build out your coaching and your academy? And when you first started building it out, did you already know, or did you kind of have to get feedback from individuals that you were bringing in to coach? What did that look like?
Speaker 2:I mean both. I kind of knew what made me successful in my distribution company building that business so a multimillion dollar business taking the same traits that made me successful there and bringing it to the mortgage business, which was more phone sales, and then being a leader in the mortgage business and being a leader in face-to-face. So I was face-to-face in that business and then I was phone sales in this business. So that's two aspects of sales. Combine the two together and take the common traits and that's how I started building out scripts and cause. It's the same, it's the same fundamentals really.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I think one thing, maybe I can reword it. I think Nick's asking too. It's like what kind of palette did you put it on? Did I can reword it? I think Nick's asking too. It's like what kind of palette did you put it on? Did you like you know you didn't write it down with a pencil and paper? Obviously you put it on the computer, like how did you structure? Did you like start a PowerPoint first and then start a video tour? Like where did that like I guess, like outline come from? Did you have that just like in your head and then you put it onto a Google doc? Or like what did that process look like?
Speaker 2:I'm a very good documenter, meaning I could show you every single meeting I've done with different teams for the last 10 years. I could pull it up on my Google drive right now. I got like 20 terabytes in there of stuff. So I document everything that I do and I save everything that I do. So, having everything saved, I just started going back and then I started finding you know, the main commonalities. You know, like every single time I built a new team, what are the steps I took that worked. Is this the right order those steps should have been in? If I could go back in time, what would I change? So, yeah, I started writing it out on just a Google document and just plotting out the way it should look. And then I did a soft launch. I got feedback and still till today, you'll find me three in the morning changing things. You know it's never ending evolution. The world's changing fast, People change fast. So I'm always getting feedback and I think everybody should always be seeking feedback, as long as it's coming from the right people. You know, don't take feedback from someone who's never done it before or gotten farther than you've got, but get feedback from somebody that's done what you want, accomplished. It move farther than it. Build something bigger, like take feedback from those people or take feedback from the consumer. You know I have a sales planner that I made for salespeople. I'm like this is version one. Version two is coming out next week. You know version one.
Speaker 2:I took what's good and what's bad. You know what's bad, Like, some of these boxes are too small in there to write your hot clients, your common objections and things like that. So people told me the feedback was these boxes were too small. So, like, my next planner is going to have an additional page big boxes so you could write in them. Somebody else told me that, like, salespeople need a hot list. So my next planner has a 25 person hot list that you could fill out with your hottest prospects and a box that you could check every single time you call them and space to leave feedback. So even like my planners and my books, I revise and change. So, to answer your question, I built it on the main fundamentals that have made multiple teams successful and multiple salespeople successful through my times. To answer your question, I built it on the main fundamentals that have made multiple teams successful and multiple salespeople successful through my times, but I'm also still adjusting and changing it every single day.
Speaker 3:So, in addition to all of the experience you had growing up with sales, was there any mentors that you looked up to or that you got help from, or conferences that you attended that also helped you in different ways or different aspects of your business?
Speaker 2:I mean, the first thing that's helped me was Tony Robbins was a big influence for me. I went to some of his seminars. There was one, a three-day breakthrough I forgot the name of it. It was like 10, 12 years ago. I went to that. Um, I also did his new year's four-day seminar, uh, so tony robbins programs helped me out, not with the sales aspect of it, but with the motivation, the why, the mindset, how to change people's behaviors. Uh, so that was a big influence for me.
Speaker 2:As far as sales is concerned, I would say just books, man, I used to summarize books on YouTube. If you go to my YouTube and you scroll all the way down, you'll see where I started in 2015. I used to do top 10 takeaways in 10 minutes of a book and I used to read at least a book a month and every single year it'd be 12 books read and most of those books were sales books. You know how to win friends and influence people, uh, the 10 X rule by Grant Cardone. Um, now I have mentors and friends. You know, like Bradley, andy Elliott, these kinds of guys that that work with Bradley, that I get to, you know, meet with. I had a coaching program that I'm in with. You know Andy Frisilla and Ed Milet. They coach me every single week, so I'm trying to keep myself surrounded by those people.
Speaker 2:Whether, when I first started and I didn't have the financial bandwidth to get coaching from them, it'd be through books and podcasts and audios like everybody has access to. But I suffocated my mind with that stuff for almost 10 years now. When I say suffocate my mind, I don't know the last time I played music in my car. You know I rarely play music. I'm always listening to something or talking to somebody or I try to maximize my minutes. When I'm working out, I'm listening to something. When I'm in the sauna, I'm reading my book. When I wake up in the morning, I automatically listen to something positive or something motivational or something that teaches me something. So a lot of it I learned through these free resources that we all have available to us, but I became obsessed with those resources.
Speaker 3:So, in your opinion, where does motivation come from?
Speaker 2:Motivation comes from knowing what you want, why you want it, and knowing that motivation is not always going to be there. Right, Because I say that. I wake up every single morning, I look in the mirror and I tell myself you have no choice, motherfucker, Get to it. A lot of people think that you have to be motivated, Like no, you don't have to be motivated. Like no, you don't have to be motivated. You have to know what you want and your why has to be big enough where you can look yourself in the mirror and say you have no choice today but to get up and grind. You have no choice but to be the best version of yourself. You're tired, you don't feel well, You're not feeling it today. Those are the days that matter the most, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I tell that to people all the time. When it comes to, like working out, like sometimes you wake up you don't want to go to the gym, but when you get there you just do the work because you're there. So it's just getting there, getting started, that's like the number one task and then, once you do it, it'll all fall into place.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know your why has to drive you. I always say, like people say they know their why and purpose, like, yeah, I know my why and purpose. It's my family, it's the money, it's the house. But, like I say, do you really know it? You know, do you really really know it? Like when I ask you on a Sunday morning when you're hung over, do you know it? When I ask you on a Monday when you're hungover, do you know it? When I ask you on a Monday when you're tired, do you know it? When I ask you on a Thursday when your boss yells at you, when you get into a fight with your loved one, when your girl's cheating on you God forbid do you know it? Then, like, does it stay on your mind all the time? And that's not easy.
Speaker 2:So you have to prime your mind for success. How do you prime your mind for success? Well, in front of me here I have this woolly wonka, because my son loves woolly wonka and I tell him that I wanted to take him to a woolly wonka chocolate factory. There wasn't one, so I want to build him one. I think it'd be a great amusement park to have for kids, you know. So I keep that in front of me to remind myself that I am the fucking magician, I'm the sales magician and I could do anything that I put my mind to.
Speaker 2:I have this in front of me right here to remind myself that, you know, venom and negativity is very dangerous. To keep the venom away from me. This reminds me of that when I look at it every single day. I have a candle that I light up that says I'm a successful entrepreneur. You know I have a million that I light up that says I'm a successful entrepreneur. I have a million-dollar chocolate bar that my son got me, but I keep it in front of me because I want to have a million-dollar month. My old goal was $100,000 a month. Now it's a million-dollar month Goals are always changing.
Speaker 1:How do you celebrate? So when you do like, I think that's a problem.
Speaker 2:And then just look at one more thing the lion's looking at me, the ace is looking at me, the Muhammad Ali autograph's looking at me, and like the success poster's looking at me, so like I'm truly primed. Everywhere I look, all I see is like the things that are going to keep my mind focused on what I need to do.
Speaker 1:So how do you celebrate your wins? So I think a lot of entrepreneurs, you know they just keep grinding, they grow. You have $100,000 a month. Then you have a million dollar month. Like, do you take time to celebrate your goals? You know coming to fruition and you actually completing those goals and what's something that you do?
Speaker 2:I was talking to somebody the other day. He's not motivated. I said what are you working hard for? What comes when you work hard? And he told me I'm working hard for the check. I told him the check's not enough. I said if I gave you a $5 million salary right now and I told you, pick what you could do, what would you do? I don't really know. I said, motherfucker, you got five seconds. I'm giving you five million a year. Pick what you want to do. What is it? He's like I would flip houses. I said boom, that's your passion. When's the last time you flipped a house? Two years ago? Boom, that's your problem. You're working for a check. You should be working for a flip.
Speaker 2:How much do you have to make this month, next month and the month after that to put a down payment down on a flip? I don't know. Let's do the math together. You could get an investment home with 25% down. You could get a vacation home with 10% down or you could get a primary home with down to 1% down. I said which one do you want to do? Well, I already have a primary or a vacation home, 10% down. What's your budget for a vacation home? I don't know. I'd like to buy one for two to 500. All right, so you need 20 to $50,000.
Speaker 2:How many deals you got to close this month? I can't do that. All right, perfect Three months. How many deals you got to close each month for three months? 10?, All right. 10, 10, and 10. All right, so you're not working for a check anymore.
Speaker 2:I want you to put a picture of the next flip you're going to do. Look at it for the next 90 days and when you make that check for the next 90 days, you're going veins and your blood. And now you're feeling it again. You're not just working for a check, You're working for a flip and you're living your passion. Then you do two flips and three flips, but then, two years from now, you don't got to fucking be here Because you got 10 flips that you did, you invested it and now you're doing something else. But the issue is a lot of people don't put the reward at the end of the tunnel. So like it's one thing to work for a check, Working for a check does not work.
Speaker 2:What am I working for? I just came back from Florida three weeks ago Like I'll work hard for 21 days. I'll go 15, 16 hours a day, and then I'll have a vacation at the end of the month, and that's what I'm looking forward to. At the end of the year. I have something I'm looking forward to. My next goal is to have a vacation home in Florida, off the water. My last goal is to have a nice home here. I got the nice home here. Now I want a vacation home in Florida. I already have houses in Florida. I don't have a vacation home, though, so I'm always chasing the next thing. So you have to find that next thing that gives you adrenaline and gets that rush going, and then chase it and suffocate your mind with it.
Speaker 1:So are you in? That's our space. So we're real estate guys.
Speaker 2:So are you in the real estate game as well? I'm in the real estate game. I have investments and I also train realtors. I have over a thousand realtors in my academy Nice.
Speaker 1:So yeah, so Nick owns a portfolio of rentals. How many you got now 92. And I own a property management and construction company and a portfolio of rentals. How many you got now? 92. And I own a property management and construction company and a bunch of rentals as well. So that's kind of our game.
Speaker 2:Where's your house out in Florida Palm Coast. I have four there.
Speaker 1:Okay, I have one in Tampa right now and one under contract in Tampa Beautiful. We're mainly investing here in Baltimore, though, so your real estate journey did that just start when you started making money in your other ventures and you're like I need to park some money into something safe and long term? Is that how that kind of got started? Or did you start doing that when you were in the mortgage game?
Speaker 2:I mean, that started when I read Rich Dad, poor Dad, you know, just starting with that book. And then I went to you asked about seminars. Earlier I went to a three-day real estate seminar. I even forgot what it was called and where it was. It was so long ago. But even that I got.
Speaker 2:After reading Rich Dad, poor Dad, going to the real estate seminar, my first dream was I'm like, ah, I figured it out. I got to own 10 properties, free and clear. I'll collect 2,000, 2,500 from each one and I'll retire, I'll drive around collecting my money and I'll travel the world and I could live off 25,000 a month. So that was my first dream. So when I had that goal, I set that goal at like maybe 19, 20, 21 years old maybe. So that's where it started. But I bought my first house and then, simply, instead of selling that house when I wanted to move, I rented that house and I bought my next house. And then, when I was ready to upgrade that house, instead of selling it, I rented it. And then I bought my next house, which I'm living in now. So I had three houses in Michigan. And then I bought my next house, which I'm living in now. So I had three houses in Michigan and then COVID hit.
Speaker 2:And when COVID hit, I also read a book from Tony Robbins about investing, where he said, when crazy shit happens in the world, poke the bear. Don't run from the bear, but poke the bear. And he was talking about the stock market investing heavy when shit collapses and people are uncertain. He also was talking about the real estate market, and I read that book probably in 2017. 2020 happens. The first thing that I remembered was Polk to Bear. So, as everyone was getting sent home from their jobs, I emptied out my 401k, emptied out my check-in and saving, and that's where I bought all four properties in Florida, right in 2020, at the perfect fucking time, because I remembered Polk the Bear. So that was my real estate journey. In a nutshell, I haven't purchased a house since 2020.
Speaker 1:Well, four in Florida in that timeframe definitely got you some nice appreciation. I'll say that it did.
Speaker 2:I built them too. I bought the land and then I built them Nice. And are they? They're all long-term rentals, long-term rentals. Unfortunately, one is vacant right now, but hopefully we find a renter for it.
Speaker 1:Nice, yeah, we're doing. Um, one of mine is a flip right now and the other one is an airbnb, and the airbnb game is is an interesting game down there it it's fairly profitable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know that was one of my goals to do like exotic Airbnbs, you know, and just exotic places across the country. I actually met somebody that has 11 of them in Columbia.
Speaker 1:Oh nice.
Speaker 2:You know, and he runs them out for like $2,000 a night. I'm talking about nice villas that people use for bachelor and bachelorette parties, yep. So that's still a goal, you know, in a night. I'm talking about nice villas that people use for bachelor and bachelorette parties.
Speaker 2:That's still a goal. Colorado, Texas, Florida, California, getting a nice batch Tennessee, Smoky Mountains, those kind of places. I think the biggest thing about the Airbnb game is just to be creative. I coach. I have two people in my academy that are Airbnb. One of them is an investor with a big portfolio. The other one's an Airbnb coach and I actually coach her on how to coach her clients and how to be successful Airbnb hosts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the big thing with the short-term stuff is the management. The management is a lot, you know the people are checking in and checking out and they become needy. So you need to have good people on the ground, good property managers on the ground, and that's the one thing that I've kind of found difficult. If you're trying to buy a bunch of places Like I have a team in Florida of people that I trust, that I know, so you know, when you're buying other places, you got to like look around for good property managers and make sure that they're marketing correctly and setting the property up correctly, cleaning and all that stuff. There is a lot more that goes into it than the long-term rentals that I'm used to managing here.
Speaker 2:Well, also, would you agree that customer service and sales is not being utilized in the Airbnb market?
Speaker 1:and sales is not being utilized in the Airbnb market. Yeah, I mean, that's the whole game, right? Because you're basically waiting for your rating, right, you're waiting for a rating at the end of their stay and the rating is what makes the algorithm like you or hate you. So the customer service part is super, super important and I think that if you got stuck with a bad property manager and you weren't the one you know directly managing whoever they're talking to you could have, you know, you could definitely get yourself into some issues because as soon as those ratings go down, your property is not being seen like it would be if you had five stars, you know, and a super host.
Speaker 2:And so, yeah, this Airbnb coach, he helps with that, making sure their five star reviews no-transcript. Like, for example, when I took my son to Orlando, I stayed in a house for one main reason because the rooms were Disney themed. They had a Woody room, Buzz Lightyear room, Jurassic park room, Perfect. We got a bunch of kids. My family's going let's get this house only because of the rooms.
Speaker 2:It doesn't matter if the house was a shithole or not. How much did it cost to paint those rooms and buy a couple of teddies and stuff like that? Probably not much, right. But that main reason how much more business did they get because they made themed rooms, for example? Right? So stuff like that sells. That's number one.
Speaker 2:My number two thing would be is who's really attacking customers the right way? For example, you rent an Airbnb for me. What if I call you and I say, hey, if you like, the pool heater usually costs an extra 50 bucks a day, but if you post me on social media, you tag it, you put a link for my Airbnb, you could have it for free. That's one example. Instead of you just coming there and taking regular pictures without tagging or linking me, now I'm having you post me to your whole network and I'm giving you the pool heater, for example. Then after that I might check up on you and then maybe I'll ask you for a referral, right, I give you such a great experience. I say do you know anybody traveling soon? Do me a favor, send them a message about this house, Like I can make sales that way, based off the people that come there. Nobody's ever gave me good service. When I've gotten an Airbnb from them, they haven't even talked to me. I've gotten plenty of Airbnbs.
Speaker 1:The one thing that we did when we started ours because we were looking for bookings, looking for five-star reviews and stuff is we actually had an influencer come down like a travel influencer and we just gave her a free stay and the place is real nice, it's called the Tampa Oasis, it's got a beach vibe, it's got cabanas, it's got the pool, and we just let her have it and she posted a bunch of videos, tagged us, put the link in the description and all of her network of people that are looking at a travel influencer is seeing our house.
Speaker 2:That's beautiful. That's a unique idea, right, and you took the loss and the sacrifice to make it happen to. You know, build your viewers and get more business, so I think that's a great idea. We need more of that going on. Even like advertising you know you could advertise to different zip codes on like, facebook and TikTok now, so how about even getting the zip code for the house and doing mass marketing on social media? Like, I don't see a lot of Airbnbs being advertised on TikTok. I see beautiful houses on TikTok and I'm like man, why don't they have a link in here or something Like where is this house?
Speaker 2:You know there's probably a rental house that somebody stayed at. But nobody's even thinking that deep, Like you could make your Airbnb blow up just soft TikTok videos.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, no, that's true, and that's why the social media game and understanding it, leveraging it as much as possible, is huge. I recently, in the last year, hired a full-time social media assistant. That's what he's doing. He's taking content that we get out in the field on these projects, putting it together and blasting it out to the world. That's how you scale. That's the only way to scale.
Speaker 2:Yeah, have you heard of an app called Swimply?
Speaker 1:No, you heard of that no.
Speaker 2:All right. So Swimply is an app that's like Airbnb, but it's only for your backyard and your pool, so you're essentially just renting out your pool and not the inside of your house.
Speaker 3:That's a pretty cool idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I have a pool in my backyard and this house that I'm in right now and I built a bathroom and a shower outside and I used Swimply and I made it a business number one for tax liability purposes because I did a lot of work back there. But number two, I was curious to see because sometimes I take long vacations or I'm working out of the state. So I said you know what? Why not? They're not coming inside my house and I'm not going to do any petty visits. You know, $100 an hour for two hours.
Speaker 2:I only kept it open for big parties where I could charge multiple thousand dollars, right? So, like, my average event was like three to $5,000 for the day and I would rent somebody out on a Saturday for a birthday party or for a college party or things like that. But I tell you that story because when I first put it up there I wasn't getting any sales. Then one day I spent the Sunday and it shows you everybody that's viewed your pool, that hasn't rented it, and I sent a mass text out to them, you know, saying hey, I noticed, you see my pool, what you like, what you didn't like, and then I got like 15, 20 sales and repeat customers. All because I started attacking the customers instead of waiting for them to come to me.
Speaker 3:Right, so you were able to see through the website that you listed it on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're called, they're called fans. You listed it on. Yeah, they're called, they're called fans. So anybody that views your page or saves your page or bookmarks it, they go under your fans and then they allow you to message your fans and what's?
Speaker 3:what's the name of the website?
Speaker 2:again, uh, the app is called swimply, swimply, yeah. So I start sending mass messages out saying, hey, I just got this badass basketball court in the backyard, check it out. Here's a video. And I blasted out to 500 people that viewed my pool. Boom, I started getting purchases left and right, you know, and I'm like even that, like it's crazy, like all the sales stuff follows you everywhere you go.
Speaker 2:Like I don't own a restaurant, I don't like to own a restaurant, but if I did, I would. I would kick ass because nobody cares about service in the restaurant at least restaurants that I've been going to around here. Even DoorDash like when's the last time you got a phone call from the restaurant owner or the chef saying, hey, I hope you enjoyed your meal, or something like that? Something so simple like that would make me come back. But instead, like when I get DoorDash or I order delivery, it's always nasty, cold, you know, like it makes you never want to go back there again. I actually been cooking at home now because I'm just sick of going out there and dealing with bad experiences. So it's very important, man, to have good service and to have good sales acumen in any kind of business that you're in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I agree Absolutely. Well, last thing we're going to get from you is one of your goals for this year, for 2024. So one of your big goals that you're setting this year, you know to come into the new year with what what are one of your goals for this year?
Speaker 2:I'm reading my goals right now. I actually listen to them every morning. I have Siri read them to me every morning. And what do you want? Health, family business.
Speaker 1:Why don't we go one go, one personal and one business Personal.
Speaker 2:So well, this is personal and business. One of my main goals is to fully own time. What I mean by fully own time is be able to do what I want when I want and work on my schedule. And I'd say I'm about 60% to 70% of the way there. And I got a little more work to do as I build this virtual academy, because the beauty of the virtual academy is I can meet with my community from anywhere I'm virtual. So I've been building that up. But I'm still doing consulting, which people pay me to go face-to-face and to fly out and to do in-person events, and I want to lessen the in to be stuck staying in one place or going to one shop or having these face-to-face events. I want to lessen the face-to-face events and go fully virtual or 90% virtual and just do like quarterly events. So that's one big goal I have awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good. Definitely the location freedom and time freedom are, I think, a huge goal for every entrepreneur, so that definitely makes you know that tracks for sure. Well, ace, it was a pleasure having you on, appreciate your time and look forward to somehow connecting in business in the future.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, add me on socials. Anything you guys need in the future, hit me up at any time. I like what you guys are doing. Maybe we'll bring you back on my show. We could talk real estate with you guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely, that's what we're here for.
Speaker 3:All right man.
Speaker 1:Well, good guys, thank you, we'll talk soon.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much.