Have you ever wondered what it takes to pivot from extreme sports to extreme success in real estate and technology? That's the story of Ross Hamilton, our latest guest, who turned a devastating BMX injury into an opportunity to conquer the real estate market. This episode is a journey through Ross's transformation and the strategies that led him to financial freedom, managing an impressive property portfolio, and even making a mark with his tech ventures. His experiences are a testament to the power of focus, determination, and the age-old advice to invest in real estate and see the world.
Ross doesn't just stop at his own success; he's on a mission to teach others how to find their footing on the property ladder. Hear how he went from owning nearly 50 rental properties in his twenties to mastering the art of creative financing and finding discounted properties. He generously shares insights on the importance of bringing value to potential partners and the role of supportive networks in discovering real estate opportunities. This episode is rich with actionable advice for budding investors and seasoned entrepreneurs alike, all served with a side of Ross's infectious enthusiasm for life and business.
But this isn't a story that ends with personal gain. Ross is driven by more than just profit; he's deeply committed to giving back through his initiative Saving Homes, aimed at helping families facing foreclosure. In our conversation, we uncover the heart behind the hustle, as Ross opens up about the fulfilling experiences of running a nonprofit and his aspirations for creating lasting change. If you're looking for inspiration that transcends the bottom line, this episode promises a blend of hard-earned wisdom, warm-hearted philanthropy, and encouragement to make a difference in your own community. Join us as Ross Hamilton shares the highs, the lows, and the legacy he's building—one home at a time.
With 4Freedom, all your communications, internet activity, and app usage are encrypted using multiple layers of robust, military-grade encryption algorithms that surpass the standards used by the NSA.
You can start your secure account today:
https://www.4freedommobile.com?ref=bridgebuilders
Have you ever wondered what it takes to pivot from extreme sports to extreme success in real estate and technology? That's the story of Ross Hamilton, our latest guest, who turned a devastating BMX injury into an opportunity to conquer the real estate market. This episode is a journey through Ross's transformation and the strategies that led him to financial freedom, managing an impressive property portfolio, and even making a mark with his tech ventures. His experiences are a testament to the power of focus, determination, and the age-old advice to invest in real estate and see the world.
Ross doesn't just stop at his own success; he's on a mission to teach others how to find their footing on the property ladder. Hear how he went from owning nearly 50 rental properties in his twenties to mastering the art of creative financing and finding discounted properties. He generously shares insights on the importance of bringing value to potential partners and the role of supportive networks in discovering real estate opportunities. This episode is rich with actionable advice for budding investors and seasoned entrepreneurs alike, all served with a side of Ross's infectious enthusiasm for life and business.
But this isn't a story that ends with personal gain. Ross is driven by more than just profit; he's deeply committed to giving back through his initiative Saving Homes, aimed at helping families facing foreclosure. In our conversation, we uncover the heart behind the hustle, as Ross opens up about the fulfilling experiences of running a nonprofit and his aspirations for creating lasting change. If you're looking for inspiration that transcends the bottom line, this episode promises a blend of hard-earned wisdom, warm-hearted philanthropy, and encouragement to make a difference in your own community. Join us as Ross Hamilton shares the highs, the lows, and the legacy he's building—one home at a time.
With 4Freedom, all your communications, internet activity, and app usage are encrypted using multiple layers of robust, military-grade encryption algorithms that surpass the standards used by the NSA.
You can start your secure account today:
https://www.4freedommobile.com?ref=bridgebuilders
My guess is Ross Hamilton. Ross is a successful entrepreneur and investor of Asheville. From Asheville, North Carolina. Growing up, Ross was an avid BMX freestyler and travel with the legendary Dave Mira, the Michael Jordan of BMX. A severe injury forced him to retire from BMX. From his BMX career, he began searching for a new path by browsing Barnes. Noble Ross found his calling in the world of real estate. In short, Ross had a massive portfolio of 50 residential properties in Wilmington, North Carolina. Just before the real estate crash of 2018, Ross began selling off some of his properties, taking the profits to create Connected Investors, a social network for the real estate investor and private lenders. Ross's tech companies was eventually sold to First America for nearly a hundred million dollars. Ross's new mission is centered around helping advancing the technology and finance to solve the problems of affordable housing around the US through nonprofits. We welcome Ross to the podcast. Well, that's so good to have Ross. How you doing, Ross?
Speaker 2:I am 10 out of 10. Really excited to be here.
Speaker 1:Well, it's good to be there. I'll be here with you. I'd like to ask my guest a question to kind of get to know you a little bit better, and a kind of a warm-up question, although some people say it's not really a warm-up question. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?
Speaker 2:Best piece of advice I ever received. When I was about 18 years old, I was a little lost, trying to figure out what I wanted to be. When I grew up, I started out thinking I was going to be a professional BMX rider, had a really bad injury and had to redefine who I was. Long story short, I sat down this is kind of pre-internet with maybe 2000-ish give or take a year, or maybe even a little before that. I sat down with the most successful people I could and I asked them if you were my age, knowing everything you know now, what would you do? I asked many different people this question. The advice I got was buy real estate and travel.
Speaker 2:Think about this If you buy real estate when you're really young, if you had bought every house you could when you were 18, 19 years old, where would you be today? Traveling when you're young is a lot different than traveling once you have responsibilities other than just survival. That was some good advice. I followed that to a tee. I started virtually investing in real estate, traveling all around the world, opening my eyes, getting out of the bubble that the United States puts around you. It really opened up my mind and helped me make a lot of money because I got into real estate. I did my first house when I was still 18 years old. Wow, I'm always curious about people on their journey.
Speaker 1:Who are some people along the way who serve to inspire you? My competition. I wouldn't have said that maybe a few years ago, but when?
Speaker 2:I've been looking back over my life and my business career and I recently had a huge exit. It was really my competition that drove me to be better. Call them like a nemesis or whatever, whatever it might be, just that thorn in your side. There was a lot of motivation there for me. Now, don't get me wrong, I had some fabulous mentors in my life. I always surrounded myself with people that were light years old. I was a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a life. I always surrounded myself with people that were light years ahead of where I was. Their help has been instrumental. I just wanted to really touch on how important it is to have a competitor and to have people that you're competing with, whether it's directly, in a positive way, in a co-operative way there's all sorts of different ways to have other people help you get the best out of yourself.
Speaker 1:I love that. Tell us your journey. We talked a little bit about the BMX thing, but give us the rest of your story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. I started riding BMX at a very young age. I was very fortunate we had Dave Mira, who is like the Michael Jordan of BMX moved to my town and opened up a skate park when he was still under the radar. He wasn't you know X Games was just kind of coming out really he wasn't mainstream. He was just a normal guy that was really good at riding bikes, that wanted to build a skate park. I got to hang out with them. I got to help him build a skate park. I was his employee for a short period of time Wasn't a very good employee that's another podcast but I got to spend time with this individual and, without even knowing what the word mentor was, he was my first mentor and what he did for me, without even knowing he was my mentor or, you know, officially coaching me is he made the impossible possible.
Speaker 2:He would do tricks that I did not think were possible earlier that day. So what that started to do was it started to help me condition my mind to what was possible and help me break through some of those limiting beliefs, because in extreme sports or business or just survival in the corporate jungle there is, most of the obstacles are between your own ears, you can find things that symbolize them, that are in the real world. But it always really comes down to you and what you're going to do about it and how you're going to react. Because having Dave Mira as someone I would ride with, it brought other great people into town because they wanted to be around him. So I started riding with Dave and I got really, really good very quickly just by being around him. I was okay. And then I went to you know, competing at a semi-professional level in just a few short years, until I had a little accident and I twisted my ankle so far it broke my leg. I could feel the weight of my foot on my skin which sorry for the graphic exclamation it was one of those moments I'll never forget and it put me out of, you know, competition status for a long time.
Speaker 2:And when I came back, I was kind of at that pivotal age to where I had to either double down on BMX or figure out what I wanted to do. When I grew up which ties us back to what I was talking about earlier I had no idea what I wanted to do. I was broken physically, mentally a little bit, because my whole identity was around BMX, and also financially. So, you know, starting off with nothing makes it easy to risk it all. Right, and I, yeah, and I just started talking to people and trying to surround myself with other Dave Miras, with other people that were where I wanted to be, and you know, and I found real estate at a very young age. You know, I went from doing flips on my bike to flipping houses and it became everything I was doing back, you know how you do anything, keith, is how you do everything. Right, when I rode BMX, if you didn't ride bikes, I didn't really have much to talk to you about. You know I have. I'm not the most intelligent individual. I have just the right amount of intelligence to where, if I focus all of it, I can do really well, but I can't do a lot of things at once.
Speaker 2:So once I started investing in real estate, that was it. That was who I was. I was a real estate investor. I was going to make it one way or another. It didn't matter. I didn't have any money or connections or you know experience. I was. I was going to go get all those things and and I did, and I did very well within, you know, a few year period of time.
Speaker 2:Anything takes three-ish years to start unfolding and I was able to, in my early 20s, have almost 50 properties, 50 rentals that were covering my expenses. Now, don't get me wrong, keith, I was, you know, robbing Peter to pay Paul in a lot of the scenarios where I was flipping houses but I needed a new AC over here and I had credit card debt. So there was a lot of shuffling around, but I was able to build a lot of net worth very quickly through real estate and reach kind of phase one of financial freedom being I didn't have to work to survive. Now. Now my expenses were low.
Speaker 2:Right, the house I was living in I rented out at a garage apartment and two bedrooms because I was in college and I was making 600 hours a month living at my house. And then I had few other rentals that were starting to add up. Some were upside down, some were good. I was learning, but I was able to kind of break through and say, okay, great Ross, I don't have to go get a job, I can just kind of keep building off of this. And that's what I did. I'll take a breath here. Yeah, that's how I went from BMX to real estate.
Speaker 1:Awesome. There are a lot of people right now who are trying to figure out how they can break through. Some of them are just kind of trapped in this financial whirlwind where they just can't seem to get their head out of above water. If you had some advice or some do's and don'ts about real estate for somebody, it's like I've been thinking about getting into this, but I want to know. I don't know where to start. I don't know what I should be looking for, what I should avoid. What are some best practices you've learned from your experience in dealing with real estate?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a fantastic question and I'll answer that in a few different ways. First and foremost, it's kind of like planting a tree When's the best time to plant a tree 20 years ago? When's the second best time today? It's the same thing with real estate. So now is a good time. There's market timing with real estate and that did play a decent role in some of my success. But you have to be in the game to win. And my brother is buying his first house right now. He's texting me. We're working through some different strategies for him to get the best deal. But I told him I'm like buy this house, eventually it will be a rental. Go buy another house, do that three or four times and then you'll have your retirement Right. Real estate it's. It's so risky Not to have real estate in today's world.
Speaker 2:I mean, the big corporations are coming in and trying to take it over. You know the day of the mom and pop real estate investor is limited, so that the time is. You know the time is now to get into real estate. So first you just have to, you know, really make up your mind that you're gonna do it. You're gonna figure it out.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of different strategies. There's a lot of different ways to get in and, keith, because when I started the internet wasn't what it was today, you know, I only had three channels on my TV, so I just picked one and went with it. In real estate there's so many channels that Picking one is where people seem to get lost. Do I want to do land? Do I want to do multifamily? Do I want to do commercial? Do I want to do fix and flip wholesale, what's this other thing called? That seems easy. So it's really important to kind of pick your lane. Now the lane that I picked is I just got really really good at finding Properties that could be purchased at a discount. I Know it sounds, you know I didn't worry about the property type, I didn't worry about the price range. I was looking for creative ways to find properties that were mostly not listed on the MLS that could be purchased at a discount. And I just got really good at that because my real estate mentor told me if the deal is good, money will never be a problem, and I latched on to that because I didn't have any money and money was a problem. So the way that money wouldn't be a problem is I had to find a good real estate deal, and that still rings true today.
Speaker 2:If you have a crappy real estate deal, you know a retail for real estate investor that's not a great deal. If you have a retail deal, money is an issue because there's risk associated with it. If the market crashes or corrects, you're underwater instantly. You know, if you can go out and buy Apple stock today at 30% discount, how much would you buy? As much as much as you could, right? So if you can buy, if you can find real estate at a discount or have real estate pay for itself through through rentals, then it's really important to kind of to make that happen for you.
Speaker 2:People do a lot more work for a lot less reward. It's, it's really the best use of your time, energy and effort is to figure out that strategy and do it. Don't overwhelm yourself. Just get one property over the next 12 months, even if it's a piece of land you pay five thousand bucks for. You've just planted a seed, you have options now, right, and then just slowly kind of keep adding on, little by little. And that's what I, that's what I tell all the people I love and care about. If, if they're, if they need to have If they're working toward retirements. You know, the sooner you get into real estate, the better, because I mean, a lot of us are going to be taking care of our parents or taking care of our kids. You know, one way or another, that's what I'm seeing happening with families. Everyone's kind of moving in together Because of real estate prices so you can really benefit from it.
Speaker 2:But the first decision has to come between your ears. Like Keith, when I got in, I was like I'm doing this. You know, like it was just. This is, this is what I'm doing. I'm not maybe doing it and I'm doing it right this second. I'm not doing it tomorrow morning, I'm not waiting until after the holidays. I don't care about what my anxiety in my chest is feeling. This is what I'm doing. And there's there's been a few times in my life where I've made decisions like that and those are the ones that stick. You know, you, you commented on the guitar behind me. I didn't have the same resolve. I didn't have the same resolve when you mentioned that guitar behind me. You know that is hard, right, it's harder than investing in real estate is playing that guitar. So when you make a decision like that. That's when things really, you know, shift.
Speaker 1:So I'm listening to this. If I'm someone on my podcast, I'm going. That sounds really interesting. Look for, look for a discount. But my concern is I don't have the money to buy even the $5,000 a piece of property. So how do I get the money for it? Well, how do I Financially manage that kind of walk us through? Yeah, what are some Some ways to do that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. Um, there's a lot of. There's a few different ways to invest in real estate. You know, there's something called wholesaling, where you're just getting properties under contract and you're selling the contract. Um, now, a lot of people make the mistake in wholesaling. They sell the contract, they might make five grand and they're on to the next deal. Well, that's okay and it gets you in the game. It's exactly how I started. But I quickly realized that when I would take that deal, I would bring it to someone else that would want to buy the property and I would partner with them. They would put up the money. Their risk was reduced because they were buying in a discount. I would help them any way I could and we become Partners in these properties.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of people that have tons of money just sitting around. They want to get into real estate. They don't know how. So it's not all that difficult To find someone that wants to buy a rental house and if you bring it to them and can become partners. You know, one of the rentals I did the most recent one just sold not too long ago. I brought it to them wholesale. The two of them made like 10 grand. It was their rental property. So they got to keep all the cash flow in the rental property. But then when they sold it, I got a percentage of the property when it sold. Now that particular seed I planted was like a 15 year seed, maybe longer than that. It was such a long time ago.
Speaker 2:But you can be very creative in how you partner with people, but you have to bring something to the table. So if you can bring a deal to the table, then you can find kind of the best partner for you. Worst case scenario you just Sell the contract to someone and you know, you see, you say goodbye. But One good partnership, you know, really changes Absolutely Everything in your life. Someone's like I'll put up the if you bring me the deals, I'll put up the money. Right, that's what I was doing when I was young and again I started um at 18, 19 years old.
Speaker 2:No experience. I was just out there just doing it every day. I wasn't shy when it came to Calling people or I had to knock on doors. Back in my day we didn't have these fancy cell phones to call people. I actually had to knock on the door of people Because I knew that one deal would change my life, my financial future, forever. There's an opportunity to make six figures on one deal. How long does it take you to make six figures Right? It's not easy to do that. So that kind of kept me going, and I was just as enthusiastic After I got 10 nos as I was when I first got started, because you're gonna get a lot of nos. Uh, no, no, you know that's, you're gonna hear that a lot.
Speaker 2:But then one yes, you know, is worth a year of the work that you're doing, not to mention all the tax benefits and leverage you get with owning real estate. So wholesaling and creative Partnering. And then there's also Creative financing to where you can buy a property and you can do payments with them and you can find someone else to come up with the money I would. I would do like a sandwich lease options to where I'd get a property under contract To lease it from someone or to buy it from someone with seller financing. Then I would find someone that wanted to do the same for me and they would put down more money than I might have put down $500,. They would put down $5,000. My purchase price might have been $130, their purchase price is $180, and then I'd make $200, $300 a month off that property managing it. So I mean there is definitely a way.
Speaker 2:If you don't have money, you need time and hustle right.
Speaker 2:If you have no money and no time, very, very challenging. I'm not going to lie, I had a lot of time and no money, which is why I was able to go out there and kind of do it. You need at least 90 minutes a day to kind of get things going and it's really important also to have other people around you that are doing it. Like I said earlier, the competition there was another kid in my town who was my age, who was out there hustling and I didn't want him to beat me to that deal. So I got up early. We became good friends. We're still friends now. We wound up partnering together and owning like half of those properties I talked about together, but it just gave me a little bit more fire to kind of get going. So you have to have that fuel in your tank because it's going to suck for a while. You have to find the positive in every negative circumstance and then there's no such thing as a negative circumstance. You can kind of keep moving forward, yeah.
Speaker 1:That's great. So with the invention of the internet probably before you started it's probably a little easier to find maybe some of those properties. What are some sites or locate places I can go to maybe find some of these discount properties? Or is it just going house to house and just tell us kind of what the process is for finding the properties?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. No, there's a lot of guerrilla style marketing. You can do locally A lot of referrals, a lot of talking to people, telling people you're looking to buy real estate. Some of my first few deals people just told me about I'm like, oh okay, right, so there's a lot of like on the ground, guerrilla marketing.
Speaker 2:One of the tactics that I used to use is if I saw a house and I am not telling anyone to do this because I don't know if it's, I don't know if there's any code violations here but if I saw a house that looked like it needed to be bought by an investor and I assume you can probably visualize that type of house in your neighborhood, right and it was vacant, there was no one in it, I would literally put a sign in the yard that said Investor, special for Sale, with my phone number, and I didn't own the house. But I'd get phone calls from people that wanted to buy the house and I'd say, great, we're still working out some details, I'll give you a call when it's ready and I'd write all their names down. Then I would inevitably get the call from the person who owns the house and they'd say what in the heck are you doing? Why is this sign in my yard? And I'd say, oh my gosh, I'm so happy you called. I've been trying to get in touch with you. I would really like to buy your house. And then, after a little bit of back and forth, I'd get them to be like, well, yeah, I would like to sell, and say, great. Then I already had my list of people that wanted to buy it and then I had the person that was willing to sell it and then only had to work one time for me to make 20, 30 grand. And that's how, even in today's world, going analog, going gorilla, marketing like that is sometimes better than the next type of investing that you can do that I'll tell you about, which is more virtual.
Speaker 2:You can use sites like connectedinvestorscom. That was the site that I built and sold to First American. They do title for one out of every three houses, but that platform I built essentially shows every single type of motivated seller or person that might be willing to sell at a discount, all on one beautiful Airbnb user interface. So you can just scroll through and find all the vacant houses, you can find all the foreclosures, you can find everyone who hasn't paid their taxes and lives out of town, people who have inherited properties, people whose properties are going to the bank Anything you've ever heard about or read about can be found through this piece of software. And then you can create your list and right in the software you can see their phone number and email address. That phone number and email address is probably right.
Speaker 2:Now that I'm not with the company, I could say 15% of the time, right, but it's free. You just, you know, pick up. If one's wrong, okay, this one's wrong, which means no one has their phone number and email. So I'm going to go put a sign in this yard, right, this one's right. Great, you talk to them. They tell you to go pound pavement, right, which people might, because they're stressed out, and they got you calling them Right.
Speaker 2:So there's the software element, like connected investors, and then there's just the driving around having a bunch of, you know, for sale signs in your car that you put on properties that look like they need to be bought, going to a Google voice number so you can, you know, collect them all and just and just working it.
Speaker 2:So there's all sorts of creative ways. If you get good at the virtual way, you can do it anywhere in and out of your own backyard. Most people that is a huge, that is very scary to them right To buy a property in Tampa, florida, when they live in, you know, montana or something like that. You don't know the area, right. It's a little different. It's harder to partner with people. There are challenges, but there's a lot of people that have been very successful with that strategy that we used to teach and coach. So, yeah, so I just wanted to give you some on the ground stuff and some virtual stuff you can do. But if you don't have time to drive around, nothing stopping you from keeping some signs in your trunk. And if you have a few hours a day, you can make some phone calls and you know and find someone.
Speaker 1:That's pretty cool. I hadn't thought of any of those ideas before. That's really helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love sharing good, I'm curious.
Speaker 1:you seem very driven, so tell me an assignment to Nick, kind of way. What's your why?
Speaker 2:That is. You know, it's funny, I love providing like Homes for people Like and secure. I kind of deep dope. I did a deep dive into that, spoke with a lot of different people with a lot of different backgrounds and Just I want people to feel safe in there in their homes. Like when I sold my company, I bought, you know, some of my family houses. I've always been house oriented. I have a charity now to where we help people save their homes it's savinghomesorg.
Speaker 2:So I Don't know why that's such a crazy driver of mine. But I just think that Everything starts with a home. It all starts with a safe place to come back to and regather your thoughts. And you know, if you take two families, keith, one that Owns a home and one that doesn't, and you fast forward 30 years, you know the one that owns the home has it paid off. They have options. They can take equity lines out the one that was been renting their whole lives. At some point they're gonna the burden is gonna fall on their kids to take care of them. Like it's just the bills never stop. So I just try to grab people by the shoulders and shake them, which is why I'm so happy my brother is finally buying a house. I've been pushing on him as gently as I can for a long time and he's finally. He's finally doing it. But yeah, you know, I just, I just want to help, help people find a safe, secure spot. Um, yeah, to call home.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's great. So tell us more about your charity. Saving homes you kind of mentioned it, but tell us exactly what your goal is, your vision is for saving.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you know I got my start in real estate kind of knocking on doors to people that were in Financial distress, trying to find a good house to buy. I would smell the dinner on the table, I would see the stress in there, you know, in their eyes and I always wished I could just help them in Kind of a different way. So after I sold my company and I was kind of, you know, I was able to retire several generations of my family. I wanted to give back. So saving homes helps individuals that are on the verge of losing their homes, save them through very Um, simple but clever, you know practices. The same way that I was buying and flipping real estate when I first started, I'm now using a version of that to help people Save their homes now when I looked at what I could do with my influence and my money I have a lot of influence in real estate, I know real estate. So what saving homes does Is unique in the fact that every time we save a home, the money that we use to save that home comes back to saving homes eventually. So when I made a huge donation to saving homes, I got excited because I knew that donation was going to help you know dozens of people and then help Another few dozen and another few dozen. It was going to echo Echo throughout generations. And as someone who gives to charity, I like to know that my money is being well used. So saving homes helps people avoid foreclosure is the first spot that we're starting. Once their home is stable in the future, when it is sold or refinanced, no pressure. The money that saving homes gave them comes back to saving homes. No interest, nothing. It's just. You need 10 grand. Here's 10 grand. We give them financial Counseling and mentoring to help make sure they don't make that same mistake. But we want to make sure that the home stays with the family. It's probably the best asset they're ever going to have. They probably have an interest rate you know at 3% that they're never going to get again. So we want to make sure to save that home.
Speaker 2:And you know, yes, there's people falling to foreclosure for all sorts of different reasons, but the number one reason is an unforeseen medical bill. It's not if any of us are going to have a medical issue, it's just when. And then how big of a hit is it going to be? And we try to focus on Homes that have children in it, just to make sure that the kids can stay in their home. They don't have to lose their neighbor who's their best friends, they don't have to change school districts. Rentals are more expensive than the house they're in, so they don't have to move in with a friend and give away their dog and it's just the ripple effect. Is is horrible and you know, when you there's a lot of studies from the last big foreclosure wave and just the mental health, the spousal abuse, the substance abuse that happens when people kind of get ripped from their homes is, you know, almost always a hundred percent. It's just, it's it's the start of a domino of a lot of really bad things. So even if we can just save their home for a little while, we'll help them not get taken advantage of by investors. Make sure if they do have to sell, they're going to get as much as possible and they can find an ethical landlord.
Speaker 2:So we're just trying to, you know, help a family, one at a time, just like all I needed was one deal back when I was Just starting. You know, I this is a big mission, but all I need to do is help one family, just the next family and we've been gathering and building the team. We helped our first. We're we're helping, we've identified and helping our first family this this month I hope by before the end of the year, but 2024 is the kickoff and, keith, what's great is you know I've started a lot of businesses and to get people to help or to make an introduction when you have a business or share it or do anything positive, you have to be like best friends with the person or Do something with them. But with this nonprofit, everyone just wants to figure out a way to help. They want to either donate a few bucks or they want to make an introduction or they want to share it on their social media. So I've Before I was like climbing and fighting up the ladder. This I feel like I'm getting like pushed up and uh, yeah, it's really nice to be able to help and give back. Um, to give back.
Speaker 2:People also donate saving homes, houses. When I say people, I mean I am the only one so far I donated a house into saving homes for us to give To a family and that feels really, um, that feels really good and there's a lot of tax benefits of donating houses. So if you have one you'd like to donate. Please, um, yeah, please, visit savinghomesorg. We're looking for volunteers and the cool thing is when you see how we save homes. It's the same way that you invest in real estate. You're just making. Just all the money is going back into the family instead of into the pockets of real estate investors Into the future generations of that family. So you get to be part of the real estate transactions, see how they happen and just help a really, um, a good cause. So you know, and I think that's a really good thing, I think that's a good thing to do is to have a good cause. So you know anything anyone can do. I'd really appreciate that. That's why I'm on these podcasts, just for these short little, you know conversations about savinghomesorg.
Speaker 1:So, ross, I'm always curious for my guess.
Speaker 2:What do you want your legacy to be Described it? You know, if I'm able to raise, you know, a hundred million for this charity, that hundred million will keep recycling into infinity, you know, and then we'll just be helping people save homes, getting people into homes for a long, long beyond. You know my short, short, little existence here and you know, keith, I feel very blessed that I was able to do so well in real estate and then we didn't even talk about the tech company, but Connected Investors is my company and to have a huge exit on a self-funded company from a BMX rider that was completely broke, and to do it at 40. You know, I spent the first 40 years, you know, getting myself and my family's head above water.
Speaker 2:Now I'm doing the next 40 years is to help, is to help everyone else. It's a huge sense of responsibility. I feel I threaded a lot of needles, I worked hard, but I also got really lucky and I feel like I did because I'm gonna be a good steward of that good fortune and give back in a way that keeps giving back, and that's what really fires me up. I'm like all right, ross, you know, just really push as hard as you can for the next five years, ten years, and then the echo effects of positivity will last for a very long time.
Speaker 1:Anything. I haven't asked you that I should have asked you.
Speaker 2:I love that question. Yeah, not necessarily, you know. I hope that you know the people that watch this. Just really take away that real estate investing is. You can find a way. It's not gonna be easy, and just really remembering you know how you do anything is how you do everything. You know the way I got good at BMX was I found the best surrounding myself with those people. The way I got good at real estate the same way. The way I got good at tech, the same way. The way that I'm getting into the charity is the same way.
Speaker 2:So it's really important to surround yourself with people, especially in this digital age. It's been very interesting to change that and to keep some of the old you know at the same time. So there is a path forward for you from wherever you are to wherever you want to be. You're gonna be tested. You are gonna be challenged. Enjoy those challenges, because that's you know. That's why we're here to go through those challenges. You know the result. I've been broke and I've been ridiculously wealthy and I'm still the same person inside. So you know money doesn't solve it. Your perspective will solve a lot of what you have going on. That you're pushing through more than anything else. Awesome, Ross.
Speaker 1:Where can people find you and connect with you? On social media, you know.
Speaker 2:I had to disconnect from social media for a little while just to kind of re-center myself, but the best way to connect with me I can actually. What I'll do is I used to sell a lot of courses and books on how to invest in real estate and the proper habits of a successful entrepreneur when I sold my company. I'm not allowed to sell information anymore, but I am allowed to give it away. So all the stuff I used to sell I'll give away. You can just email me. You don't have to. You can send me a note and say hey, ross, you know whatever, but you can just say send me the stuff if you want and then I'll send you back links to all the stuff I used to sell. So if you want to learn how to invest in real estate, if you want to get books, I wrote the book the Inside Guide to Funding Real Estate Investments. That has. You know all the principles that I used and you know it's funny I used checks as bookmarks.
Speaker 2:These are just rental checks. These are just the checks that come in every month whether I get up or not. That one's $2,600. That one $250. This one's $3. This one's my book royalty $3.
Speaker 2:You know, I've been my bookist down. If you want to be rich, don't write a book by real estate. $3 a month, keith, that's gonna keep me going right there. I'll tell you that much.
Speaker 1:I know my book royalty was $26 for three months.
Speaker 2:Good job, good job. Yeah, but my email address maybe put it in the show notes, but it's Ross at successcapcom. That's the one I have set up for this. Ross at successcapcom, shoot me over an email, I'll shoot you back everything. But you can also visit the website savinghomesorg. If nothing else, just go there to scroll around, just to get the site a little bit of traffic. It helps learn a little bit. Reach out. All those forms are going to me direct. I will get back in the order in which messages are received.
Speaker 1:Ross, thanks so much for spending time and giving us some real good insights, because I think my hope is that people who are looking to create for themselves and for their families a generation of they can pass down to their kids and grandkids this is how you can do it. This is so glad. You come on and give us some insights about real estate.
Speaker 2:Yeah, hopefully we built some bridges today, right? Thanks for having me.