The G.E.M Series Building a Foundation for Growth With Taylor Loht
Blake: [00:00:00] Welcome to the G.E.M Series, powered by Rocket level. On this podcast, we empower entrepreneurs to succeed by setting big goals, executing like a pro, and having a fearless mindset. The G.E.M Series is all about investing in yourself. We're here to share the path to getting what you want out of life by sharing the stories of entrepreneurs who have done this themselves, providing thorough research from our team on what careers and habits are yielding the best results, and discussing.
Set what it takes to overcome the obstacles that all future entrepreneurs will face. Investing in yourself starts with putting in the work every single day, and this podcast is here to help you do exactly that. My name is Blake Chapman. I'm the Vice president of the Ambassador Program here at Rocket Level, and I am thrilled to be your host for the GEM Series.
Hello and welcome to today's G.E.M series. I am totally thrilled to welcome today's guest Taylor l Taylor has been killing it in the real estate investment [00:01:00] world. He actively shares his knowledge surrounding what the path to building wealth looks like, and is an expert in raising capital. So me, I'm, I'm personally thrilled to have him share a little bit of wisdom and experience on today's episode.
Taylor welcomes you to the show. How are you? How are you doing today? 
Taylor: Blake, thanks so much for having me. I'm doing great. You know, I'm wearing a sweater here cuz it's starting to cool off and I'm not ready to turn on the heat yet, Not giving up the summer, but uh, I, no, I, 
Blake: I'm right there with you. I, I killed the AC about a week ago.
Been leaving the doors open. Just that's, this is like my, my thriving season. I love it right now, So, for anybody that doesn't know about you, Taylor, would you be open to just sharing a little bit about yourself, a little bit of back 
Taylor: about your back? Sure, absolutely. So several years ago now, I graduated from college with a degree in chemical engineering and, you know, got a big boy job, first big boy job, and, and was making a little bit of money.
Nowhere near, near as much as I wanted to make. And that was the first time. That I hay any money, you know, [00:02:00] we, we were fine growing up. You know, it's not, it was not that I, we had nothing, you know, we were, we were fine. But personally, I, you know, I didn't any, spending money right when I was a kid became an adult, had some, and I was like, Well, I don't wanna just spend all this, you know, I got my needs taken care of.
How do I turn it into more, right? Cause I don't want to trade hours for dollars, you know, the rest of mine. The first thing that I did was not real estate investing. The first book that I picked up, cause I was listening to podcasts at the time, was The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham, which is not one of the books that's behind me here.
And that teaches you, it's kind of like the Warren Buffet value investing method and publicly traded securities. He was Bender and Graham was Warren Buffet's mentor and that got me started down the path of investing and, you know, making money in the stock market. My age, I'm in my I guess mid-thirties now, No longer the early thirties technically because of my age, I just happened to time the market well and it was kind of hard to buy the wrong thing cuz the market had just crashed, you know, at that [00:03:00] age.
And after doing that for a few years and, you know, saving money, put in my retirement accounts, and then I had money left over and just, you know, investing that and living very frugally cuz those early years are really important in terms of investing in building wealth, you know, The longest time you have to compound your wealth.
I was just, I was still doing the math and seeing that this, this is not gonna get me where I want to be in the timeframe that I want to get there, you know, financially. So I started looking around, for other options, you know, how do I earn more money, make more money, build more wealth? Like what, what's the world of options out there?
If anybody that's gotten into it, there's actually, there are a lot of ways to make money out in the world, and there are a few that I kind of gravitated to at that time. The first one was kind of the standard answer that a lot of people come up against who, you know, who have undergraduate degrees is, was gonna go get an MBA.
So I took, took the Gout. I was studying hard at the time, I was flying around the country every week for my, [00:04:00] job, which, was fun. I'm glad that I did it. I don't regret doing that at all. It was a great experience, but I would never wanna do that again because it's just an awful way to live.
I don't, I still don't like flying, even though I was flying all the time. Great time to study for a, a, GMAT test though. So I took that test and got a pretty good score. But right around the time, again, listening to all these podcasts and somebody recommended this one of these books over my shoulder, which we were talking about, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and, you know, Positives and negatives with that whole ecosystem.
The rich dad, poor dad ecosystem. But the book itself highlighted all the misgivings that I had about going and getting an MBA. It was gonna be a matter of spending $300,000 in terms of tuition, room, and board, and opportunity cost to buy me another job. And all those jobs were not jobs that I wanted anyway.
I didn't. Again, fly around the country and be a consultant. I had done that type of thing in the [00:05:00] past. I knew I didn't wanna do it. I don't want to go work on Wall Street in a stuffy office. I don't like wearing a suit that much. So, you know, and as you know, he talks a lot about real estate investing and, you know, it's not the only thing that Kosaki talks about, but that book inspires a lot of people to come become real estate investors.
And the same for me. He, you know, helped set me. The path of investing in real estate. And you know, I can, I can take a pause here and but that's kind of what got me to the point where 
Blake: Absolutely. And you know, for me, something that stands out as you're describing that. I, I appreciate that you, you, you, I, because I noticed this in a lot of entrepreneurs where you run into a roadblock and then you quickly assess, Well, look, something, Maybe there's something else out there.
I don't know. I don't know anything that's on the other side of this ball that's in front of you right now, but I'm gonna find something. Do you think that that was something that you have always been, I've always been, you know, curious-minded growing up and going through life, or what can you a.
That too, you 
Taylor: think? You know, I don't know. That's [00:06:00] a that's an interesting question. And you know, in hindsight it sounds like this might have happened quickly, but this is over the matter, of a couple of years. Honestly. You know what, I took months to study for that test. I only really wanted to take it one time.
Cause I figured if I really study and, and work hard and, and focus like I probably get a decent score. The first shot. And I did it a long time ago now though. And then I did. And I don't know. I just kind of paused like it wasn't quite enough to get me into like the top five schools in the country if I wanted to get into the top five.
Just with my, with my background and my educational background, which I was not, I graduated at the 50th percentile of my chemical engineering class. I was the, I was the middle guy. Now granted a top, top stent school for that, so I'm kind of proud of that. But I wasn't, the top student. I'm not the best, the greatest student.
So I figured, well, I, I don't wanna get an MBA at a so-so school, that's not gonna be a big step up. And if you read around in that, in that area, [00:07:00] really kind of the top five, this, I'm working off the memory here, but like the top five or six are the only ones that make the most sense. And you're gonna be in a really good position if you're.
Top 20 MBA. It's a little, Hmm. You know, maybe and that's kind of where I figured was maybe a top 10, probably a top 20 position. And that, that drove me to take a little bit of a step back and, and kind of reassess which way. I was gonna go. I mean, other things were going on at that, you know, point in life.
It was the job that I, had initially, I hated. I was in a terrible position. Nothing against the people that I was working with. They're great people. They're still there, you know it was just the wrong fit for me. I also, that period so I, I, I hate swimming. I can swim. Not very well, and Around that time, my sister decided she was going to do a triathlon.
And my sister is kind of the opposite of me. She was a champion swimmer. Now she's well outta college and everything. She has been outta [00:08:00] outta high school for a long time. She still holds records at the high school we went to. And it's been, you know, well over a decade since then. She's a super champion swimmer.
She decided she was gonna do it and I was like, I can barely float, but I kind of want the challenge, so I'm gonna do it. And at the same time, so I was, you know, teaching myself to swim, you know, and, and spoiler, when I did go do the triathlon, I almost drowned, but I made it around. 
Blake: Can I, can I tell you something that's kind of funny I'm going through the same thing right now.
I've never been a strong swimmer. I've been giving myself lessons, on YouTube, and I just looked up signing up for the Augusta Iron Man just because of Nice. I, it was just kind of funny. Yeah. Wow. I was like, because I'm like, you know what I got, I got a big chunk of time. I've done long-distance running a little bit of that.
This is gonna be a huge challenge. I might, I might need somebody to yank me out of the water, but I might as well give it a shot. So, but no, that's, that's cool. So you [00:09:00] pushed yourself through to, to, to make that happen, that, that challenge that was otherwise significantly yeah. It was out of your comfort.
Taylor: It, it was an Ironman. No way would I do an Ironman. I forget. Is that like a three-mile swim? Something along those lines. Yeah. Yeah. I had to do half a mile. He was a sprint triathlon. My sister coincidentally. So this is just an idle something about how, how awesome my sister is. So the way it was staged is Basically in the sprint triathlon, the men would go first, and get into the lake.
The lake was super cold, it was awful. And the men would go, and then the women would go and give a pause between the two. Sure. Well, my sister, I went with the woman and she finished before the first man. She, she beat all of us like handily. Oh my gosh. And I almost drowned. So, you know, that's how, how different we are.
So, no, An Ironman would be way out of like, that's too far outta my comfort zone. I'm not, I'm not willing to do that. I, this just the sprint triathlon 
Blake: was enough for me. Well, maybe I'll start emailing you [00:10:00] once a week and I'll talk you into it so I can get a buddy, to hit the Ironman 
Taylor: with me. We'll figure something out,
Okay. 
Blake: No, that's that's, that's pretty incredible. And for you, I mean, I think that that's, that's something that I, I think it's interesting hearing from the perspective, like when I think of like entrepreneurs approaching new challenges, I think it's always interesting whenever folks are like, I don't know what the, I just don't know where the drive comes from.
I guess sometimes, you know, when you're like, What, what am I? What is pushing me to go out of my comfort zone, almost drowning, Try something new? What's yeah, what's been your motivation, kind of getting it? Cause I mean, if you look back at yourself five, 10 years ago, you're probably like, a Radically different person than you were.
I would, I would imagine, you know, in terms of what you were, what you're doing on a day-to-day basis. 
Taylor: I don't know for sure though. Sure. So the triathlon was I think that was about eight years ago that, that we did it. Mm-hmm. . So I would, I would say I'm, I'm different now. I mean, in the, in some ways, definitely in [00:11:00] many ways, you know, I'm still the same.
It's hard to be quite that level. Self-aware, I guess, or self-analytical, at least for me, cuz I, I have a hard time knowing if I'm, you know, analyzing that. And I think I have a little more inner peace now than I used to. But the, you know, in the, in the question of what keeps me or anybody, you know, wanting to push forward is, you know, I like having a challenge.
I like having something, to work on. And especially as an. The time that I was least happy in my life was when the only thing that I had going on was a day job that I didn't like. I didn't have anything at the time in my, in my personal life to just, work on the kind for the sake of just, working on it.
And, you know, since then so after the triathlon, I, I relocated moods and everything. Now I do Brazilian jiu-jitsu. I have a Jiujitsu book right here. Oh, no way. That's. Over, this past [00:12:00] summer I got my purple belt. I've been training a long time and I've, I've had injuries here and there. I, I broke a couple of ribs over the summer and I'm back now.
I'm healed up. But I'm also, I, I haven't my, like, I haven't told anybody this, My fiance knows a little bit, but we haven't like sat down and talked about it. I'm doing 75 hard right now if you're familiar. Yeah, I'm very familiar with it. That, you know, I don't know, I just like having that challenge. 
Blake: Yeah.
Yeah. How deep into it are you right 
Taylor: now? I think, ooh, I have a, like a Google sheet, you know, tracking my progress. I work on Google Sheets. I think I started Labor Day was my first, first day. Wow. So a month and a half. 
Blake: That's awesome. That's cool. That's a challenge I've been wanting to take up too.
I I, my my, my mentor is like, Hey, get the app. Try it out. Like you'll be pleased with yourself whenever you execute it, you know? And it's just like a good. Mental challenge more than anything, I think, 
Taylor: Which thinks so? That honestly, the thing, the only thing I'm not [00:13:00] crazy about with it is taking the pictures every morning.
I don't, I don't need pic shirtless pictures of myself. They're never gonna see the light of day. But I'm doing it cuz I said I would do it. Yeah. You know, they're not getting posted anywhere. Whether I succeed or fail, nobody's gonna see 'em. 
Blake: I'm like, if I do that, I'm gonna put a brown lunch bag over my head.
You know, they don't, they don't need to see the rest of me, you know? That's. No, that's pretty cool that you're going to go into that. I'd be, I'd be curious kind of hearing about all these things that you've, you've done, and the ways that you've pushed yourself. Tell me, let's take it back in time a little bit.
So whenever you were making that transition, Working for somebody else to working for yourself. Like what was your, Yeah, what was your mind going through in that season? I mean, cuz you've kind of expressed it here, like you're, like, you did the day job, you weren't feeling it. Were you, were you nervous or how were you getting ready for that?
You know, 
Taylor: so real. Yeah. So real estate investing for me has always been, and still is, a side hustle. It's something [00:14:00] that I invest my nights and weekends. To the maximum extent that I possibly can. And, and, and that's still till, till today. I do have fu-time employment and I like what I do. Yeah. But I also like investing in real estate and growing my money and that and having something to do that's, that's purely for, you know not it's, there's money involved of course.
Right. I wouldn't do it if it, you know, didn't make money, but Surely. It, it's something to continue to work at and, and move forward on. To me when as an adult, you know, I've lived, this is a number, well over a decade ago now, but I've lived the time, the life where the thing was a day job and then go home and, you know, play video games all evening or watch tv and I was just, I was miserable.
I, you know, cause there's, to me there was nothing really, to work at and continue to improve upon. And those things, you know, nothing against video games. I, there, there's nothing wrong with it, but, To me, I need to have something that [00:15:00] to, to, again, to work on and focus on and put energy into and continue to, to progress and, and learn and move forward.
And also it doesn't hurt that those types of things help you disengage from all the, like all the negativity out there, right? I mean, We don't, we don't have tv, right? We don't have cable. We don't watch the news because, at the end of the day, those things are just sucking, your mental energy away. And you'd be surprised, honestly, how much time and energy you have if you take all of those other, those things away and apply that energy to something you know for yourself.
Mm-hmm. , 
Blake: 100%. 100. So it sounds like yeah, you realize at a certain point you're like, Okay, well I'm feeling kind of burnt out with maybe what the way things are going right now and running this you know, Cause I think everybody does it right where you can [00:16:00] just. You can just zone out for eight hours.
There might be eight hours or 10 hours that you were just throwing away every day and feeding into this cycle of like never making intentional progress. So now that you're kind of balancing, what does your work week sort of look like now that you're like, Dedicating more time? You've killed your tv and, and you're dedicating all this time towards things that are, are, you know, growing you as a, as a, as a person.
What is yeah, what is your work week kind of look like now that you're doing that? How do you strike that balance, you 
Taylor: know? Sure. I think I think everything, everything in life, especially you. Again, years ago I was in a day job where I was, and I  was unhappy. I didn't feel like the growth direction was the direction that I wanted to go.
It also wasn't my, wasn't germane to my particular skill set or interest. So, and, I was incredibly unhappy at that time. And that was, that was a long time ago. It was my early twenties. I [00:17:00] think the best, the most like the satisfaction you can get are when you're doing things where you can see opportunities to grow, opportunities to learn.
Making money is a good thing. Opportunities to add value to other people and me, you know, somebody said to me the other day that we were, we were talking about like satisfaction in life and everything. He was, he was trying to. And he had the best intentions about this. I don't wanna bring it, bring it down.
But he was trying to, you know, help motivate me by, by getting me to, to believe that the position that I'm in right now, just in life in general, is, is the worst case scenario. And I get what he was saying. He was just saying, you know, okay, so this is as bad as it can get. And it's not that bad.
There's no reason not to go for it. And, and I appreciate what, what he was saying, but my pushback there is I've, I've been in a worse place in life and I, I still remember what it felt like to be, you know, that down and to work on [00:18:00] something, you know, that for, for a job at the time, that was not the right fit for me.
And I, I was just completely m. All the time. I was, I was severely depressed. I just didn't have a trajectory in life. There was no way I was ever gonna be able to get a girlfriend, much less a fiance, which I now have, and we're getting, you know, married next year. Congratulations. Thank you. So I mean, that's just been, and this is again, this, where, where we are now is 10 years later.
So yeah, it's been a process, of growth and, and to. You know, you talk about nights and weekends, I mean, when you're doing things in, in your nights and weekends that are fun, you know, and it doesn't necessarily have to be, I mean, exercise is a good thing. I love to exercise, but sure, there you can have fun writing blog posts or recording podcasts or, you know, whatever.
Doing, doing real estate deals and naturally is, you know, what we do in, in the real estate space. But I think those things, They, they, they give you energy. And [00:19:00] to me, if you're, you know, again, 10 years ago I was in a position where I was unhappy with my career. I didn't see a path to growth and the path, well, I shouldn't say that.
I should say the path to growth that I saw was not a path that I wanted to go down. Sure. It was. Just, just the wrong fit for me. I knew it, but I didn't, I don't, didn't understand it at the time. It took me a little while to like, to like figure it out and see a path out. And I think that's the worst, I mean, to anybody out there, if you're, you know, listening right now and you're in a position where you know, you, you completely hate your job for whatever reason, well, you know, work on that.
Work on trying to find something that's, that's better for you to do, that's a better fit for you because I believe. For, you know, most people out there, that thing is that that is available to you. That doesn't mean it's gonna be easy. Right. It took me, sure, it took me years to, figure out what trajectory I wanted to go in and it took trial and error if you will.
Yeah. Yeah. But [00:20:00] that's life. 
Blake: It is. It is. And whenever you are deciding to, I guess, get into, I guess I wanna ask a little bit about this too, because I was like, I think that a little bit of wisdom that people would be curious about, cuz there's tons of people that are like, Oh, I wanna get into some form of real estate investing.
Like, like what you do. I mean, it seems like something that takes some you know just takes some, takes some wisdom to be able to get to a point where you're, you know, what a sound investment is. Do you have any kind of like starting point or strategy or approach that you go at whenever you're looking at if it's worth investing in something or not?
Taylor: So now the point we're. And the point that I've gotten to investing in these deals is, you know, you underwrite the deal and determine, you know if it's a deal that fits our particular strategy or not. But it didn't start that way. You know, we, it took a long time and a lot of work to, to build the partnerships where we're gonna be able to have the deal flow that we [00:21:00] need to be able to have things to invest in, especially.
The market's tight and everything, and you know, deals have slowed down. That's okay. You know, we deal with what the market presents us and, you know, try to make the best decisions. But the people you know, who are just starting, and again, I was just starting years ago and, you know, We're never, we're never completed as real estate investors or entrepreneurs, whatever you wanna call it, as people who are trying to, you know, contribute in some way or, or grow.
We shouldn't see these things as being done, right? I'm learning things every day, every podcast interview I do on my show. I try to learn something and, and walk away from, That's why we were, you know, I was having the conversation with somebody else about what that I mentioned before about the general, you know, satisfaction and, you know, maybe I agree, maybe I disagree with what he was saying, but Okay.
I still, you know, learn something. And again, I got to reinforce within myself, the progress that I've made in my life and the happiness and satisfaction over the last 10 years. But, holy crap, it was 10 years, you know, [00:22:00] It would've been great if I could have done it two years, but sure, I got it done, you know.
So I'm not honestly sure where I was, where I was going with that, but to, for folks that you wanna start investing in real estate, I mean, the first things to do are, you know, look at yourself and determine what you really wanna get back out of your real estate investing. Yeah, I mean, there's, it's a lot of fun to do real estate deals, but the fun isn't, isn't the world's greatest motivator.
Right. Maybe you want. Retire early. Maybe you wanna travel more. Maybe you have charitable causes that you want to contribute to more. I mean, to me, then, you know, my, my priorities have shifted over the years as I've, you know, gone and done more deals and charitable activities have become a lot more important to what I'm doing because I see them, the longer term implications of, of those things and, and, you know, Again, satisfaction.
If you [00:23:00] are contributing to a cause that you believe in, I'm not telling you what you should believe in. Pick, pick what makes sense for you, but I think that just helps propel even faster. It's, it's just more of a. More of a motivator. Yeah. So yeah, a hundred percent determines what you want to get out of it.
And then really the next step is to, to learn and dig in and, you know, spend. I think honestly spend a long time learning about how real estate investing works. I think people who get in trouble early in real estate are. The ones who are looking for a quick fix, get rich quickly. You know, the, how can I make, you know, whatever large amount of money within the 90 days or something like that.
Mm-hmm. and those things are possible if you work at it, but, it may not be a realistic goal. Maybe you work at it for 90 days and you didn't make that, that money Well. Maybe if you keep going, you would end up earning that money. But a lot of people, you know, they get to that 90th day to continue [00:24:00] with the example and they say, Well, I didn't do it.
It doesn't work. Yeah. And that's the next place where people, you know, fail to succeed in real estate is they just kind of quit and they don't work at it. And they don't just continue pushing forward and stumbling and, and learning. I mean, those are the kind of the. Things for newer real estate investors is to, you know, identify your actual goal, what do you wanna get back out of it?
And kind of, you know, set your vision for what it needs to look like. Yeah. To learn how real estate investing works. To learn about flipping, learn about wholesaling, and learn about, you know, burring, learn about raising money, learn about how works, you know, everything along those lines. Learn about different asset classes, you know, not just multifamily in investment and self-storage as.
And then you have to work at it. I mean, that, and I, I feel for these people, but they're people, If you go to local networking events, you'll just see, oftentimes they're called seminar junkies. They're just [00:25:00] constantly, you know, buying the next education program and not applying the lessons. Mm-hmm. and you know, maybe it's a common term a shiny object syndrome when you're bouncing from one shiny object to the next.
I certainly am susceptible to that, and I didn't. Moving forward and making progress until I recognize that and shut out those shiny objects and cut myself off from those shiny objects and focused, you know, that's how I started, you know, making progress, in my real estate investing. So there are so many pitfalls as a beginner, but I think goal setting, education, and taking action are the three.
Core aspects of success and moving forward. I 
Blake: couldn't agree with you more either, Taylor. I. The cause I see it all the time when everybody wants to sign up for this. Yeah, I hadn't heard of the term seminar junkies before, but I, I, I really can that the nail on the head, you know? I, I feel like [00:26:00] it's so important to if somebody's taking the time to share this information with you maybe apply it, see it to the end, work it, you know, and see what actually.
How do you, I guess, when it comes to absorbing information now, how do you, what's your approach to applying a new method and deciding if it's even worth going down that route in the first place? You know, whenever you pick up something new or anything like that. How does, how does that, you know, work for you 
Taylor: typically?
That's a good question. So I think first I need to. When I'm thinking about something in, in the real estate space, whether it's, you know, whether I wanna apply it or not, is I need to think about what, what are the problems or the, what's the problem that I'm facing at any given time? Whatever it is. What's, what's the next thing that I need to do or add to my real estate investing business?
And think about that, that core, you know, Gary Keller's book, The One Thing, What's My One Thing right now? And think about [00:27:00] whether this new thing that I'm considering. Moves me down that path and addresses that one thing or not. If it does, great, but most things don't, You know, the one thing is the one thing that is the one thing I need to focus on.
So, you know, sometimes depending on whatever the thing you're considering happens to be, maybe you just shelve it in your mind and think, Okay, maybe I'll, you know, hang onto that for later. And. Reconsider that down the road. Or maybe I'll write it down. Maybe I'll think about it. Maybe I'll just, you know, wad it up and throw it away and, and, mm-hmm.
and move on. It just, depends on the situation, but I think it, it needs to work in, it needs to work in terms of what's my goal and what can I change or what can I add to help meet that goal rather than finding new things and, and just trying, to apply them. Right. We need to have, Our sales, you know, all pointing in the same direction.
Blake: [00:28:00] Absolutely. No, that makes, that makes I think that's, a great perspective to have. I, I heard recently priorities should not be We shouldn't use them, something to the effect of we shouldn't use the plural form of priority. Right. , Sure. And, you know, and hone in on exactly what it is that you're trying to execute and make sure that everything's pushing in that, in that similar direction.
You know, it's something that I, I, I see kind of the, a term that keeps popping up in regards to like the work that you do. This concept of you know, passive income. People are extremely curious about passive income. It's passive income's kind of interesting too because it's, you know, it means that eventually, you'll have, you know, an income coming to you.
But the problem is, I think you get the seminar junkies and people that are maybe expecting that they'll just hit it big one time and they'll be good to go and they can chill out and do whatever they're, they're wanting to do. How do you define it? When you're talking to people and, and sharing about this, how do you define passive [00:29:00] income and explain that, that concept to people?
Taylor: Well, if you're speaking in, you know, general terms about, say real estate investing, I think, you know, we all talk about passive income is great. You know, we, that's what we want. You know, I've, I've had folks on my podcast, one guy in particular, Who said I think very wisely that passive income is the wrong term.
It, it sounds great, you know, of course, we love it, but it's much more accurate to call, say like real estate investing income, residual income because we had to do work on the front end to get that quote-unquote passive income coming in. So it's more. Residual because passive income a little bit, you know, kind of makes it sounds like something for nothing.
Mm-hmm. , and that's not how the world works. We need to set up these systems or make these investments, you know, for a, if we're just buying a deal, you know, we have, if there's a passive investor in a deal, Okay, maybe you can say that I invested equity and I'm earning passive income from having invested in that deal.
[00:30:00] But it's residual from the sense that, okay, maybe you're a doctor, you had to earn that money in the first place to invest it. Now you're just allocating it to a particular strategy that's gonna put off, you know, some kind of cash flow. So really, I think residual income is, is the most, is the best way to think about it.
Mm-hmm. , honestly, it's a lot less. It's a lot less appealing than passive income, right? Sure. Passive income sounds a lot better. I mean, I love to win the lottery. I don't also don't play the lottery. I never will. Yeah, But the best way to think about it is residual income because real estate investing is work.
It takes work to make money. Again, you know, where people get in trouble, in real estate is thinking that. They can get something for nothing and then they maybe go, for a quote-unquote investment. That was not an opportunity in the first place, just because they were attracted by a particular, you know, sales pitch or something like that.
So, I'd say think about it in terms of residual income. It's a lot less sexy to think about it that way. Sure. [00:31:00] Sure. But I think that's the more accurate way to think about income from real estate. Totally. 
Blake: So I'd be curious, I know we've been talking a lot about, you know, everything that you've been a part of.
If you were to talk about your singular mission right now, over the next couple of years, what, Yeah, what's, what's the mission that you're on right now, you think? 
Taylor: So I have a few missions. So when we talked about the kind of, the reason that I mentioned charitable contribution if you will, is, you know, for me, you know, we were talking before we started recording, my fiance and I have three cats and, you know, honestly, if she had it her way and we're, we're dog sitting this weekend as well for one of my relatives, so it was gonna be a dog here very shortly as well.
And then, you know, that's great. So we, we both, you know, really love animals. She's vegan. I've been a vegetarian since 2015. So for me, my particular charitable action is animal shelters. I, I donate some money to animal shelters, but my goal is to donate an [00:32:00] awful lot more money to animal shelters.
And I'm not, I won't publicly say the number cuz it's a truly ridiculous amount of money. And it's, it's a beyond-the-stretch goal for me. But, but to me, you know, that's, that's what's important. Think of Everybody that I know personally and who I've spoken with, who got to the point financially where they could retire and sit on the beach the rest of their lives.
Some of them who, have done that well, no. I should rephrase every single one of them. Who has done that, who has retired and gone to sit on a beach and thought, I'm just gonna live a life of leisure the rest of my life? Sure. They all get bored. Yeah. Yeah. At, at minimum they get bored. At worst, they get depressed.
It's worse than when they were Yes. You know, having something to do all the time and they, they go back to work in, in some way. And I think that's the that again gets back to that previous discussion about, you know, dissatisfaction, all [00:33:00] that kind of a thing. We need to in, in whatever we're doing.
I think it's good for us to like, seek satisfaction and, and seek to add value to others in, in some way in, in our own, you know, unique way just. Bring up my fiance for an example. She teaches at inner-city schools and she gets, you know, fulfillment and also an awful lot of frustration. Sure. But, and that's mostly from the administration, but, you know, public school stuff she gets fulfillment out of, you know, helping these kids.
And she, she, really, genuinely cares about them. And, you know, for, for folks out there, I think, you know, just think about that for yourself. You know, what, what makes sense for you? I have, you know friends in this space whose, passion is Human trafficking and, and supporting charities that, you know, either go after human trafficking or help their victims in some way.
You know, that's very important. It's an awesome cause I have, you know, friends who are big on adoptions and, and supporting adoptions. That's a great cause as well. I think that having that deeper, Cause you know, that, [00:34:00] that you strive to support is, is more important than for you, for your own life.
Satisfaction is more important than, you know, almost, almost anything else. It's, it's something as maybe lame or, or grandiose as it sounds to say. I mean, it's, it's something to live and, and work for. I mean, maybe for folks out there that's your kids. Well, I don't have kids, so I, I can't give that as an example.
Whatever that means. I think that's the thing to focus on and, and, you know, no, I put some substance behind it. Yeah. 
Blake: And put your money where your mouth is, you know like like that's, that's the thing. I mean, if you have a cause like that, that you can get behind I fully agree that it would drive satisfaction in life just because, I mean, I, maybe there is somebody that says, Hey, once I make 45 million.
I'm good. Once I make 2 billion, I will be, I will be happy and that will be wonderful and I can go to bed. But I, I, I don't think that there's any human that's wired that [00:35:00] way. Even when you look at like, the way that, our brains work, the funny thing is that we don't even get the satisfaction of feeling the dopamine from actually.
Completing the task as much as we do on the hard work that we, you know, get leading up to it. That's where the satisfaction feeling comes from. And I, I don't know, when you think of it that way, it's like, well, dang, I'm gonna hardwire myself to have a goal that I am just gonna go after.
Infinitely. Do you know? So I think that's incredibly powerful that you found that you know, that mission for yourself. And I, I, I think it's honestly refreshing to hear, because a lot of people I know they're like, you know, doing just to do, but at the end of the day, it's like, well you know, you might, you might end up like that old man on the beach that you're talking about. And you certainly don't wanna end up in a position like that at some point. 
Taylor: I'll, I'll, So something's coming to mind as you're, as you're mentioning this old man, I think is what, what spurred it, you know, again, the same person I talked with the other day that I had alluded to [00:36:00] earlier about, you know, satisfaction and worst life and all that.
Well, another thing that he said that I thought was, was great and spot on is what would 90-year-old you say, what would 90-year-old you say to yourself right now? Sure. And you can think, you know, Okay, what would I say to myself? 10 years ago, you know, a decade ago in this example, what, what advice would I give to myself?
Or, or something along those lines, and okay, I can project backward, but I can do the mental exercise of projecting forward, What would 90-year-old me say, you know, to me now? And just think about things, in that way. And I think that that framing of, of. Though how to think about like, decisions, decision making, and what are you gonna do and what are you gonna do with your life?
What are you gonna do with, your day? What are you gonna do right now? Well, okay, I don't mean to crap about watching TV too much. I mean, we, I like The Simpsons. I just don't spend all my time watching The Simpsons. Yeah, but would 90 year old you say? [00:37:00] Yeah. Now go ahead and, you know, take this weekend off and, and don't do anything.
Or would 90-year-old you? You know, keep working, keep pushing forward toward your goals. But also, on the other hand, just to bring up an example, okay, your spouse wants to go on a hike this weekend. Go on the hike. Like your, your relationship with your spouse is more important. You know, those kinds of things.
It's not all about it. Working all the time. That's an example. Cause we, we went on a hike this the other weekend. She wanted to go on a hike and it was a lot of fun. I'm glad we did. Yeah. So it's, it's kind of taking that, that whole thing into account and, and thinking about what you down the road would have to say.
And there's, there's so much going on in the world, you know, right now and, and always and through you, throughout history, there's always something. Big going on. You know, I see people, everybody's worried about what's going on in, in Ukraine, and it definitely concerns me too. I'm, but I have no power over that situation.
Mm-hmm. , I can stay, you know, reasonably informed about what's going on, but if I spend my entire day worrying about what's going on over there, and the [00:38:00] people and the victims and everything, and what's gonna happen, Well then I haven't accomplished anything, You know, I haven't accomplished anything for myself.
I haven't accomplished anything for them. I haven't accomplished anything for, you know, the, let's say the animals that I wanna support or, you know, whatever your thing is. So, yeah, I think it's important to just think about the longer term implications of the actions that you're taking. You know, right now, today, this week, And so on.
Blake: Absolutely. And thinking about, Yeah, I love the idea of thinking about your realm of impact and what you have to do to get to the next stage to, you know, increase that radius or whatever it is. No, I, I also, the 90 year old Yeah, 90 year old me reflecting. That's that's definitely something that I can, I'm gonna, I'm gonna use, you know I'm not gonna go off on a tangent, but I'm convinced that at one point in my life, I, I saw 90 year old me time traveling in a gas station,
It probably didn't happen, but I'm, I'm, I'm convinced to this day, and I, I bet he'd have some, some choice words for me. But Taylor yeah, it's, it's been a pleasure, man. Usually, whenever [00:39:00], I close out, I like to if you were to give one piece of advice to somebody that is going to go down a similar road as you what would that piece of advice be?
Taylor: Commit. Commit and, and I don't even wanna say, and cuz that's, that gets that to one more than one piece of advice, but especially in, in real estate, if you want to move forward, if you wanna make progress, if you want to accomplish things, if you wanna buy deals, you know, whatever. If you wanna make money, in real estate or whatever it is, you have to commit to the actual process.
You know, I don't whether you wanna start a YouTube channel and make money on YouTube. Well, just sitting around thinking about it isn't gonna do anything for you. Yeah, you can, you can learn. Title card strategy and whatever, if that's, that's the way you want to go, but at the end of the day, you gotta go make a video 100%.
And honestly, the first one is not gonna be very good, but that's okay. You have to make that first one to get to the hundredth one. And I think [00:40:00] anybody in this, in, in whatever space, you know the, if you go back and look at your first thing, it was the first podcast interview you did, and listen to it. I know I've done it.
Go back and listen to it, and you just think, Man, I am an idiot. At least, I think that I was like, Why did I say that? Why did I ask that question? You know, whatever. Yeah. Why did I ramble so much? I don't know. I'm rambling here but commit, keep moving forward, you know, whatever your path is.
Blake: Absolutely. Absolutely. Taylor, thank you so much for coming on. Where can everybody find you and follow you and absorb all this knowledge that you're putting in? 
Taylor: out there? So, I host the Passive Wealth Strategy Show available, you know, on all the podcast platforms. I also have a free seven-day video course on red flags in passive real estate investing for anybody who wants to get into the passive side of real estate investing.
That's at passive real estate course.com. Just me sharing seven red flags that I've found that cause more deals to go wrong than anything else. I suppose [00:41:00] in, in my observations, not everything that could go wrong, but it's probably the seven most common mm-hmm. things, that I've come across in my years as a real estate investor.
Excellent. 
Blake: All right, well, hey, it was a pleasure. Thank you again. And everybody checks out Taylor and this podcast will be coming out soon, Taylor. So looking forward to sharing it all over the place. Hope you have a great rest of, your day, and thanks for tuning in everybody.
Thank you for joining us on this episode of The G.E.M Series, the podcast for anybody dedicated to investing in themselves. If you'd like to see the resources mentioned in this episode, learn more about what we were up to a rocket level, or come over and join our team, just click on the links below. Until next time, this is Blake Chapman, and remember to be awesome and do awesome things.[00:42:00]