The Lone Star Capital Podcast E27: Lone Star Capital 2023 Recap

welcome back to episode 27 of the capital Spotlight podcast in person today in the Silicon Valley the heart of the Silicon Valley we're in sanana row uh right now uh of course your host Craig mcgrother the Director of Business Development alongside of course principal and founder Rob Beardsley how are you today I'm feeling good I'm excited to host our little mixer tonight that's going to be a good turnout for for us to pop into the bay area and see a lot of our good investors here absolutely well we're going to be very intentional and we'll get to you guys about that we'll recap our 2023 and our experiences at loan St this year some personal business of course this will be a recap show uh but yes we are we are very excited to enhance what we've been doing uh off the last couple of years which is of course has been hosting investor dinners but considering the growth of the firm and frankly the demand that we've had for a live events but B just for Bay Area events we're hosting a incredible and beautiful uh night tonight at the Sharon Heights Country Club which will'll be hosting around 60 people which we're very excited about so from 10 people last year maybe tops to 60 people this year kind of just shows the growth that we're experiencing a lone star our demand um so we're really pumped to get in front of a lot of people uh get face to face with some of of the great people that I've spoke with on the phone tons of times obviously you've spoke with uh some you know past clients of of your family and stuff so it'll be really fun night there yeah and it also speaks to our commitment to in-person events and events makes it sound a little grandiose yeah even grandos are just kind of contrived it's more so than just hosting events it's also just in-person connections that's actually the important element and we are kind of going away or opposite the grain where people are hiding behind their computer their email their phone call their zooms not wanting to do in person stuff we're seeing tremendous value in in the in-person networking and connections that we can build with our investors and that's actually funny enough one of the big pieces of feedback that we got from our annual survey so every year we send out a survey to our investors and we ask them typical survey questions net promoter scores the first one which is How likely are you to recommend us to a friend uh which is obviously a critical question that all companies ask their customers it's Word of Mouth growth is most important thing you can do in your business but also we ask things how can we improve who did you work with did you have a good experience bad experience all sorts of things just ways that we can level up and one of the feedback pieces that we got was uh we'd love to connect with you in person right so obviously we have investors from around the country so we can't be in person with people all the time but one thing for sure that's going to be improved upon in 2024 is the concerted effort that we're going to make to going around the country and meeting with our investors in person absolutely so when we go to these Texas trips or whatever it may be it's very much so a tough challenge because we aren't trying to linger for forever we obviously want to be efficient on the company dollar and you know that money allocated there also our time we have so much going on usually we're filming at a property or touring properties um but it would be great to maybe moving forward extend just one extra day if we to be there for 5 days or four days what's the extra difference of one day and really making you know clients being kind of the the focal point of the entire trip and kind of squeezing people in there uh throughout the trip and extending it a day as opposed to kind of getting in and out as quickly as possible there is a lot of value in that for sure yeah I mean aside from the value and benefit of meeting with investors face to face there's also value in having the investors meet our properties face to face absolutely right and see see our teams kind of you know maybe if they can meet Aaron obviously Shout Aaron the EVP of Radiance living uh so really tons of value and with that said we're going to be in Texas Houston and San Antonio looking at some of our newest Acquisitions coming up here at the second week of January so we'll be out there for that and you know want to make sure that all our Capital Partners um are invited out there uh to to tour the property and you know a lot of people we just know them for Zoom we know them through maybe a LinkedIn whatever it may be have a couple phone calls but to as you mentioned uh about the V are event but to to be with them in person would be great and I think something I would like to do is make sure that we have a Texas event you know a New York event a Bay Area mixer because hey we're are going to be out in the Bay Area for the kind of this Christmas time regardless so we're me here regardless might as well make an event of it and then if we could have kind of a maybe an H1 event somewhere in Texas that would be cool Newport Beach is also for sure in the running considering all the family offices and the great investors we have and just the appeal to for a lot of people to get to Newport it's not pulling teeth there so yep yep I think we can put together a pretty fun travel schedule and to your point we can build on our existing travel schedule and be more proactive and thoughtful if we're already planning a trip to Houston why can't we wrap around more FaceTime with investors and put together a day where we invite people to come and see the properties meet us meet the team and just get more comfortable absolutely so real quick before we get into the year review as we're looking forward uh if you are a fund manager if you have a 1030 want exchange if you're looking to partner with a group like us maybe LP and deploy some some money into uh some incredible uh multifam Texas opportunities my email is Craig cig ls.com I'm sure you've never heard that on this uh podcast before but once more Craig at lc.com if you're looking to partner with us learn more about our new opportunities we do have ambitious goals in 20204 of $300 million of Acquisitions which basically means we have to do what about 80 million of acquisition positions a quarter uh just a little bit under that I believe it's maybe 70ish I don't know my math might may sound awful if you're doing this in real time but we're off the cuff here but uh that said we're going to need uh more you know uh contributions from our past partners uh and the current ones of course and obviously new ones so uh use going to need all the Firepower we need so if you're looking to partner learn more uh please feel free to reach out to me call me text me whatever it may be my information is out there very easy to find so quick call to action now let's get into the me the meat and potatoes of the show which of course is the 2023 year review which you guys are getting a sneak peek to this because this is coming out on Christmas so by the way happy Hanukkah to those who celebrated and Merry Christmas to you and yours if you are watching the show uh live day exactly yeah so this show is coming out on Christmas day December 25 we're recording this just couple days prior uh but so Craig convinced me to actually walk through our annual letter so I don't know how our Capital Spotlight podcast listeners are so lucky but they are so lucky uh because they're going to be able to hear the contents of our annual letter that goes out in our monthly newsletter on January 2nd but you guys get to hear it on Christmas day so uh exciting stuff I've got the letter here it's almost finished uh but it's certainly ready to to share the highlights so how do you do you want me just to start going ahead through or yeah well you know you wrote it I I uh am seeing this in real time uh with you uh the viewer and listen to it uh live so I'm not too positive to it so I'll let you quarterback this one I know it's something you're not really uh haven't done recently too much quarterbacking it but I'll let you quarterback it this time as well sounds good okay so the first section of our annual letter starts with our Acquisitions so in 2023 our our goal was a bit too ambitious right we we were on top top of the world we closed a lot of deals in 2022 and we thought okay 2023 we can do 350 million in Acquisitions across Dallas and Houston super easy Market to do uh you know $350 million of Acquisitions in as cap rates are you know tight and rates are running up so the market changed as we all know there was a tremendous drop in transaction activity down 80% and so we did not meet that goal so we ended up in 2023 acquiring $145 million in prop prop roughly across 884 units and so even though that is less substantially less than our goal for the year I still consider it to be a pretty successful year we were in the trenches we dealt with a lot of issues and I think being able to accomplish what we did on the acquisition side was still a big win for the firm yeah and let's just talk about real quickly the properties that we did un fortunately have the opportunity to uh you know raise the equity and and procure the debt on so that was candalite Park uh which was a 12 I'm reading off this by the way 128 units not that I don't know this uh top of the head of course but 128 uh units that we closed in March uh this is a you know nice Garden style uh property there in Dallas uh 1980s vintage uh had a lot of original units that need to be remodeled this was just a classic downam the Fairway uh made sense kind of in any psych cycle any point of it um kind of a how could you not buy with incredibly uh small amounts of I know new Supply coming up think like 1% of Supply was coming there which is obviously very rare in Dallas which seemingly has got new construction coming up all over the place so importantly regarding candalite Park this was our first acquisition in Dallas right so Dallas is a market that we've been privy to have been somewhat active in for a while but just never acquired anything just because Dallas is such a competitive market you really need to bring your aame if you're going to compete in Dallas so we made our first deal happen in Dallas which is a big win we have a full-time regional manager who is already in Dallas right now so our team is well positioned to set up and scale further in Dallas and we absolutely intend to do that uh for M multiple reasons number one in my opinion I do think Dallas is probably the best Market in the country I think that you know we're already scaled up in Texas so it's it's a very natural growth place for us and then a big factor as well well as the fact that we have a lot of investors that want to be in Dallas as well so that's a big driver for us so we're excited that we did get our first deal in Dallas and that we should do a bunch more in 2024 there yeah I'm I'm kind of thinking about and being a little retrospective and uh thinking back on that process and that raise and it was actually really easy and of course it was easy for multiple reasons I mean everything's I can't say easy but it was a lot easier than what we endured throughout the rest of the year year remember this deal specifically had an interesting just because it was interesting because it basically raised itself right away there's a ton of interest there wasn't as much friction um and uh that was an awesome opportunity uh a lot change on this deal in the raising environment obviously is a year progress has dollars became a lot tighter and um problems in people's portfolios really started to become uh more uh widely spread and then also you know positive distributions happened which kind of caused investors dollars to get a little scared uh which had a trickle down effect naturally from Capital risers and such so but that was a great deal um I think we're we're all really happy with that it seems as if um I read the monthly reports and the property is doing pretty well it seems so yeah absolutely so yeah and to your point things have continued since then to deteriorate on a fundamental basis slightly but a bit on the Capital Market side things have been very volatile right we saw a big rise in rates and now they've come down a bit short rates remain high right the fed continue to raise rates not lower them yet but as we know the tighter it gets to raise Equity the better the deals are so and and we're seeing that play out now and it's going to play out in a big way in 2024 but let's let's try to Breeze through because I think while Acquisitions are exciting we talk about them a lot and I think there's other elements of the year and of the newsletter of the annual letter rather that are definitely worth mentioning but just to go in order the next acquisition that we closed on was aul which was a 90 unit 2020 vintage deal that we closed on in July this was a super exciting deal and we've talked a lot about it on the show honestly for how small of a deal it is but we talked about the fact that it was adjacent to a property we already owned Park A Champion Forest uh this putting the two deals together was a really great win for us because aul's an awkward 90 units and so the average buyer looking at this deal would have to go oh I'm going to have to stop this with the manager and a leasing agent and two maintenance people and before you know it this thing has a huge payroll and it's only 90 units right and so we have the benefit of already having 230 odd units right next door so now with over 300 units in total it's a very efficient payroll across the two properties it's a huge win and then like we've talked about a lot on the show we did aul entirely with 1031 exchange Equity so I think we had what four or five five total 1031 exchanges and so what that means is investors in our Network were had sold property whether it was a rental uh property or commercial property or anything they had sold the property they entered into a 1031 exchange they identified aul as their 1031 exchange upleg we structured aul as a tency in common so that way our 1031 exchange Partners were able to actually legitimately 1031 exchange into the offering with us and then we were able to hand handle everything for them make it a seamless transition because as many of you know 103 one exchanges are a ton of work and they're very stressful and we have a great team that handles everything from you know Doha to Josh to you and and Kent and everything to really put it all together and make it an easy process so very proud of that and that's uh that's something that we're definitely looking to do more of I know that because transaction activity is down there's just less people buying and selling so there's less 1031 exchanges happening but really importantly thing about 1031 is when you sell a deal and you have to 1031 you have to 1031 right you need to acquire it's the most motivated Equity you could ever run into which is the best right so if you can be that right solution it's a very good win-win so then breezing through something that also we've talked about on the podcast is the Houston three property portfolio that we Acquired and this was unique because this was done at a time where when no one else was doing deals and it it made some headlines because of the fact that nobody else was doing deals right closing a $100 million deal is is it's nice but it's not actually big news right people are closing $100 million deals all the time but not at this time and the reason why we were able to do that was because we actually were able to get a 100% property tax exemption and that made the numbers pencil at a time where people weren't really able to make deals work we had some amenable sellers that we were working with we were able to negotiate price discounts and whatnot so that was a 10-month long process to get those deals done from negotiating with the sellers with the lenders with raising the equity and with of course working with the local housing authority to negotiate and agree and actually get approval approval on the affordable restrictions the property tax exemption we had to work with the mayor's office in Houston to make all that happen so it's it's big business and very stressful when you're dealing with political entities like that and seeking approvals where you know someone can just wake up on the wrong side of the bed one day and change their mind and we are constantly fighting an uphill battle there so I have a lot of thoughts and I know you said want to Bree through this but we're not going to bre through this because it's too significant to the year I feel as if on my end and obviously it's not like I'm the only one raising you obviously do a lot with me but I'm probably a little more in the Weeds now you could easily say you're obviously I'm more macro and I'm more micro for specific deals um but I basically feel like I had to raise twice for this deal the second half once we got the approval and kind of the second half of the year and then the first half and then in addition to that not only did I feel like it was or I raised for this twice but the amount of equity with it being 40 million effectively made me feel like it was like a double raise on top of it so it kind of felt like doing essentially like four raises and one just getting this s of the finish line so I feel like I learned so much about the business and the raising process from likely what will be the hardest transaction will ever up to raise for in our career I mean hopefully we are doing a billion dollar deal where okay the the you know the stakes just get bigger and it's just more Equity but from a I guess stress level and a you know bandwidth level and a Time process level this was just a really big dooy and an undertaking um as I just mentioned due to the delay associated with the deal keeping everyone interested keeping everyone uh down you know moving down the deal because time does kill all deals so you know updating people with the fact l no update but saying hey this is the latest was a lot and I'm just excited to never have to talk about this deal again so that's what I'm looking most forward to in 2024 is to not have to deal on my end obviously the real work is get to start now which is of course you know implementing the uh the rent restrictions and you know the uh obviously the enhancements to the property of course that is the hard work but my work is you know once the raises are basically done uh my hands are kind of wiped clean of the opportunity uh which I love personally uh but with that said this was a you know the the sole premise of basically the first half the year second half the year and dealing with this property throughout the entirety of it was just a very long and unfund process I would say that was you know kind of a sobering experience I had it's like oh yeah the the market is changing in real time uh from a fundamental perspective but then also oh you know Craig welcome to the fun and lovely world of tax payments tax credits and uh affordable uh the affordable Arena which has so many wrinkles and you are due to the complexities to a certain extent at Mercy of you know some of the higher ups the housing authorities um governments uh kind of items of that nature where you know you you really just have to relinquish control um from someone in my position so that was a really great Learning lesson that I uh had to deal with this uh this year and I feel like I got a lot Smart in this deal and as I said I'm excited to not have to worry about nor raise for this opportunity again and hopefully the efforts that we do in the next couple years uh all that will translate into $300 million of deals not you know 105 million of course yeah it was definitely a long drawn out process and time kills deals like you said and that's one of the elements that I'm very very proud of regarding that deal is that we didn't have many investors at all back out of the deal and say you know what I've had my money sitting in escrow with you for x amount of time I'm over this please give me my money money back the fact that our communication was proactive enough and that we had built up enough trust with our investors that they were willing to write it out with us given all the uncertainties and the changing Market speaks volumes so that's a big big piece of that deal another thing that complicated this whole thing was that while we were under contract on the three property portfolio and dealing with all these uncertainties we had another property under contract in Dallas called 101 Ross and so Ross was a midrise asset in Downtown Dallas built in 2003 really attractive deal good location I believe in the growth story Goldman Sachs is developing a huge Tower right near next door it's it's all very exciting stuff when we put that deal under contract the 10-year US Treasury yield was about 3 and a half% it since went on a run to about 4 and a half% which is a huge dramatic difference and obviously threw our performa upside down and we couldn't with the new rates new rate environment we couldn't close on the same purchase price so we attempted to do everything we could from negotiating a price reduction uh to potentially changing the terms with which we are offering to our investors or changing the business plan there was just we exercise basically every angle yeah we tried to do everything and at the end of the day there was nothing that we do so and I you know it's funny I bet that the seller wishes they took a retrade because there's just no way that they're getting the same number just where caps are in Dallas and where they're moving so shame on that person for not taking the opportunity that they had to say hey bird in the hand it's not as if we're the only buyer in town shop in town that would basically do the same thing considering uh the nature of you know Treasures running up like that right so yeah you're totally right they probably should have what we were asking for was modest I mean we're asking for I think at the time around a 10% price reduction so we were willing to squeeze and make it the deal work and compromise and a 10% price reduction would have been great because we've seen cap rates in Dallas as like everywhere else blow out and they've just continued to widen so they're there's no way they're going to be able to sell for that price within the next 12 months I don't want to say no way because frankly Dallas is just that competitive of Market it pretty improbable though to your point yes yes so long story short we ended up making the severe decision to walk away from the deal and we ended up we as in Kent I who are the you know the owners founders of lonar the decision makers the decision makers the principles we put up a lot of money almost a million dollars at risk to to pursue this deal and we ended up walking away from it and what is also painful is we had the money about $15 million sitting there ready to close the deal as well so so we had all the equity in a bank account ready to close the deal but we just couldn't put our investors into a deal that the numbers had changed so dramatically that we didn't believe in at that price in terms so we ended up telling those investors hey sorry we're not going to proceed with the deal and we managed to you know we worked hard to communicate why we're making the decision and to make sure our investors weren't pissed because you know here they thought they were investing in Opportunity they were putting their money in you know basically taking opportunity cost risk uh a lot of those investors did move over to the Houston portfolio which was you know a win-win situation if you will but yeah it was it was a painful decision but definitely looking back on it the right decision absolutely because we we learned from the experience we are in a better position not owning that deal at that price and we're going to move on with our lives and buy much better deals in 2024 yeah I'm a big believer that you know Buy in every Market just make sure the basis is right and naturally we move moved our basis on the Houston 3 property portfolio as kind of treasuries and rates changed um we kind of got a more modern basically pricing on the deal if you will uh but the Ross deal just was really challenging to make it make sense unfortunately and from a basis perspective I think we'll be really appreciative that we did not try to put a square peg in a round hole there and force any you know acquisition just because we want to get a couple fees on the front end knowing that on the back end we'll have to answer for our work and kind of turn that in and get the grade and give the Court card back to her parents if you will which is our investors so uh walking away from there I thought proved a lot about us and you know kind of what we're looking to build and go through here and you know it kind of said to me just as you know an employee of course hey you know the people here at the firm are willing to walk away from a million dollars because they view their business as a billion dollar business and if you view your business as a billion dollar business walking away from a million dollars not that it's an it's significant amount of money but in the grand schema thinks it's you know jumping over a penny you just let it sit there and you move on of course so that was really cool to see that that you know obviously happened and it was the right thing in hindsight and I'm very happy that we don't have the answer for that and four or five years if uh we can't hit the projected numbers that's right yep it's all about long-term thinking delayed gratification all those good things so next step is probably at this point not news to a lot of people but in 2023 in the back half we decided to enter into San Antonio that's a new market for us we have a deal under contract in San Antonio right now and we're really excited about the market there's a lot of reasons to be excited about it it's a great Workforce housing market with a lot of product that we like and there's also opportunities to implement affordable housing strategies uh that we have had success with in Texas that fit our business plan and goals well so we're excited to be making things happen in San Antonio and that means we're in now three markets so we're in three out of the four or major markets in Texas nothing against Austin it's just you can't be everywhere and we'll probably be in Austin at some point yeah there will be a unique opportunity from some sort of inside information not that it'll be legal but inside information the sense that a potential LP or broker or Capital Partner I feel like we Source us something where it's like hey this is kind of unorthodox but I have an opportunity that you know it's a how could you not not make money on an opportunity for a group that doesn't have you know a presence there and that's probably the point where we would go in but yeah I mean I I don't see us getting there anytime soon but it could definitely happen I do think just focusing on what we're doing right now is is awesome um and maybe it'll be in 2 three years when all those units are going to come online and places are getting really or you know units are not absorbing correctly and we can buy a 2010 asset for you know well below replacement cost that is maybe you know high 80s occupancy but it just beaten up right now due to the competition and then it'll settle itself out once uh the new units kind of get figured out so that's kind of ideally where I I'd want to angle that for sure yeah and focus has has been our standout feature we really think that focus is a great pillar of success so if we don't need to be in another Market why right we can if we can be successful with our EX existing Market Focus then let's just stick there and do that so that's that's our approach to growth eventually we will want to scale outside of Texas even and have more diversification because actually going back to our investor survey one of the biggest complaints that we got from our investors was that we don't offer diversification because if you think about it if an investor views us as a 10 out of 10 and they love us how much Capital as a percentage of their total investable Capital can they realistically invest with us right they can't invest a lot of their Capital with us because we only offer a select strategy but if we offer multif family investments in in Texas and then in other markets that are different then that can make them feel more comfortable with more diversification and then they can invest more with us and feel good about it so that's another reason for expansion well selfishly on our end as well a lot of our net worths um at this firm if we stay here long enough will be tied into of course to the real estate that we buy and you know how it performs and so full cycle so on and so forth so at a certain extent if we were too imbalanced and weighted too heavily from our own portfolio in you know said the three markets in Texas that might be a little bit silly so from you know a financial responsibility perspective by the time that happens we'll also probably all be ready and wanting to diversify and put our money in maybe in Arizona a Tennessee something like that perhaps of Carol but my guess would be considering that we already have weather issues here and insurance issues we go for a state that would accommodate an easier structure which Arizona or Tennessee would likely hit that not that I don't know everything about Tennessee I don't know what the the weather stuffs there but I can speak to Arizona being incredibly modest for property taxes as well as uh Insurance costs which is kind of the opposite that we're experiencing uh in Florida and of course in you know select Parts Texas and Southeast some some part of parts of the Carolinas but yeah Phoenix has no issues on the expense side of the p&l for sure so that's compelling to say the least so moving on to the portfolio lonar has acquired 514 million in multi family properties in Texas since we started the company that consists of 3600 units across 17 deals we're very fortunate to own in quality locations this is the whole reason why we buy in Texas is because it's landlord friendly there's a lot of job growth population growth everything is humming along still even at as the US economy on a macro level has slowed down a bit so we're still seeing good fundamentals but I think it's going to slow down as we head into 2024 I think finally all the rate hikes that the FED has done is going to be felt in the real economy and I think that we're going to see something like a could be 1 and a half% increase in unemployment next year which absolutely if you see that many people lose their jobs it's going to trickle down into the rental market and you're going to see a softening of rents increase in concessions vacancy less collections so crime going up too naturally and unemployment goes up crime also goes up as well right so while we're kind of thinking about that and preparing for that we're still seeing good performance in our portfolio which is amazing and what we are also very fortunate to have at this point in time is only three floating rate loans in our portfolio and only one Bridge Loan so with only one bridge loan we have the capacity to stay on top of our portfolio stay in good shape portfolio is in good health we're not going to be in distress whereas if we had 10 20 Bridge loans in our portfolio that would be a very difficult situation to manage and you know I I don't want to speak on other people's portfolios or what could happen but certainly those sorts of things those realities are going to play out over the next year or so where there's going to be Capital calls for closure es rescue capital dilutions and and discounted sales and stuff like that so we're very fortunate to knock on wood be able to avoid those sorts of issues in our portfolio to that end and also just to kind of speak on our proactive nature right and and we've talked about this timeline on the show before but going way back when before the FED even started raising rates I want to say Kent and I we I don't want to say we were preent we we saw the future but we we saw what was going to play out we saw okay the fed's going to they they they made an announcement they're going to raise rates the FED effectively lied to us because just a few months before that they said we promised we're not going to raise rates for two years lower for longer that didn't happen but once we saw that Fed was going to raise rates we just crunch the math and we saw this is not going to play out well we saw that floating rates are going to go up this is what's going to happen to cash flow we have to pause distributions and so we pause distributions a quarter or two before the majority of other firms pause distributions which I know you might have people may may have heard me say this before because we've talked about this Saga before but when you pause distributions first you take a lot of heat you get called out why are you pausing distributions what's wrong with you as compared to somebody else why are you pausing and they aren't right what's different and frankly there's nothing different it's just we paused early because we were proactive so that's Point number one of being proactive Point number two is not accepting reality as it is and just being creative and thinking through how we can come up with out of the- boox solutions and so one of the biggest by far out of outof thebox solutions we came up with in 2023 which was something that we were working on even before 2023 were these affordable housing programs where we were able to get property tax exemptions which is a huge win for our properties because you're eliminating your biggest expense increasing net operating income and you're able to stabilize the assets so we were able to successfully do six of those transitions in 2023 and we did uh fixed rate refinances in conjunction with those properties that totaled over 160 million in refi we were keeping lenders in business someone had to do it it was a single we called it refi hell as we called it so we were very busy doing a lot of refi doing a lot of stuff it was it was a big big lift and here's the thing I I'm not looking for a pat on the back especially not me what did I do right Kent is really The Mastermind and he's did an amazing job and Aaron did an amazing job maybe one day we can afford to get him on the show maybe one day he'll bless us with his presence uh Nate also did a fantastic job so I'm not looking for a pat on the back but what what I want to say is this was a lot of work and we felt genuinely invested and as we should right these are our deals these are our investors but the point I'm trying to make is we're not we didn't necessarily put a ton of money in our pocket by doing this we were just basically not today at least not today at least we were fixing an issue we were enhancing the portfolio we were coming up with a creative solution you literally actually it's funny and we even talked about this before so I'm happy we're doing this in real time we were literally doing what everyone needed to or needs to do right now or last quarter probably second half of 2023 or what they're going to do in H1 q1 and Q2 of 2024 what we just did is what everyone's going to try to do obviously they're probably not going to be able to get the structure that we had but they're going to try to fix and get into a long-term situation where they're going to try to basically avoid having their investors you know Equity get evaporated right um and that's why we did it frankly we did it solely because or solely I mean obviously You' want to get these deals into fixed rate debt but that coupled with the tax payment plans is actually increasing what we thought you know the deal would probably perform like for some I mean some deals we even refi and gave like what 40% Equity back I think on Five Oaks there was a massive cash back a lot of dealers got some positive Equity back but what we were doing in that time kind of the first half of the year and frankly probably I'm sure this wasn't just a couple month thing I'm sure was also about this time a year ago you could speak to that better but getting that sorted out allows us to be in the driver's seat to actually capitalize on good equity and not chase you know bad situations and also more than anything else I think from a psychology perspective we're going to be very very optimistic and happy as a firm um as opposed to a lot of people in 2023 or sorry 2024 excuse me are going to be in hell they're are going to be in a non-fun spot having a lot of unpleasant conversations with not hey I have a new deal hey I have a new update on this deal uh you got to give us 50 Grand or you know we we we have to have a capital call get met or your Equity is about to get deluded well let's yeah and obviously we've talked about these realities and to use a big word vicissitudes that are going to be playing out in the market and to not name any names but we were looking at that investor relations email yesterday right from a competing firm where basically not be anymore moving forward yeah so they're basically sending a notice out to their investors saying hey so sorry the property is getting foreclosed on you're losing all your money which there's no nice way to there's no good way to send that email right that's just a horrible horrible thing and it's and we don't for anyone to lose money in the space because there is you know ultimately an effect that will come our way like anyone's way when the the ships rise up because the Tide is High we all benefit cuz raising money is equ easier but when the other end of the spectrum like this goes on there is a residual effect that we feel too but so but the thing that's crazy and and this speaks to the point that I've been making all year about Capital calls right in that letter I don't know if you read the whole thing it talked about that they actually made a capital call in March of this year and back to your favorite principle right and they're still getting foreclose on and losing the entirety of their investment so basically an investor if they met that Capital call in March they so first they put in let's say 100 Grand then there was a cap to call March where they put in another 20 grand let's say and then that entire 120 is gone I'm not I'm not saying that's exactly what happened I'm just saying hypothetically hypthetically that's perhaps what played out and what is playing out in that scenario and that's a real life scenario of a email going out to investors right so the point I'm trying to make aside from you know we're really thankful that that's not us is the fact that going back to your point that you said which is timing is everything and being being early is better than being late right and even though being early can be painful because you get scrutinized because you're being bold if they made that Capital call perhaps 6 months earlier or a year earlier they maybe could have saved the deal right so to your point if people have their head in the sand and now they're just now waking up and scrambling and in 2024 they're looking to put together a solution by way of a restructuring their Capital stack a capital Call Etc I'm not saying it's too late but it would have been better to early so that is a very good point and also I'll just read well also real quick do before we get into that Saving Face on that if you were early on that do you get more respect from your investors if you deliver that from a time you know hindsight hind exactly so if you were early on that and you kind of called the shot and kind of whistled or blew the whistle wh on it and kind of rung the Bell said hey this is a problem we're seeing rates go up if so X Y and Z happens it's what's going on let me try to mitigate it do you get credit for being Uber Uber early so I think we will at some point but could this person have gotten that and could there could they have maybe even solved for it and not had every cent get evaporated but maybe only you know I guess 10 cents evaporated instead of the whole dollar perhaps right being early is better than being late and I I'll just read this section which just talks about what we've been talking about so we felt that taking decisive action early was the best move to protect the performance of our investments this proved to be correct as the FED continued to raise rates through 2023 and long-term treasuries Rose dramatically making refinancing out of bridge loans virtually impossible heading into 2024 we only have one Bridge Loan in the portfolio allowing us to focus on Acquisitions rather than being bogged down with portfolio problems so that is the happenings in the market and in the portfolio and then one last piece as well that just speaks to our proactive nature and other things that we're working on to create Solutions is we've submitted two applications for low-income housing tax credits one being for the landing at Pinewood Park which is an asset that we own in Leck Texas and salano apartments which is 262 units in Houston uh salano is going to be a really exciting situation we we're putting together I mean fingers crossed knock on wood putting together a very exciting business plan there where we are working with the local Housing Authority there to get a tax exemption coupled with the low-income housing tax credits coupled with State funds arpa funds where they're get basically giving us a grant to renovate the property so we're getting money from Every Which Way and it's going to if it all works out be a huge win so really hoping and praying that all that comes together as that's going to be a big win for our investors where effectively in a down Market Market we'll be able to cash out our investors through new tax credit equity which we don't really have time on the show to get into the nuances of low-income housing tax credit you break out the the textbook on that yeah and this is litech by the way low income housing tax credit lch more people probably preview to that term heard of it perhaps but just to spell it out a bit more this a potential itch program so right right so through the litech program basically you don't actually have typical investors per say what you have is is a bank that will put in the equity that you need to buy the deal but all they really get out of it are tax credits because the the it's a US government program where you get 10 years worth of tax credits by investing into a litec a low-income housing tax credit project and that's what banks do they they invest for the purposes of the tax credits they're not really investing into the deal for the economic returns of it and there's not really any room in this capital structure for typical investors that are seeking return so what we'll be able to do like I said is buy out our existing investors effectively have a sale so what we'll do it's going to I'm super excited if if this works out we'll be able to effectively sell the property on behalf of our investors and then the new tax credit investors with us managing that Venture will be the new buyers and we'll take the old Venture that is the seller and will ten One exchange into New Deals which will be happen in perhaps end of 24 or into 2025 at what could be a very good time to be buying into deals at very attractive prices so with that said if this does work out as beautifully as you just spell out what does set investor who is in this deal potentially get from an IR perspective like a mid teen irr 10% irr uh where is that potentially going to land uh pending you know good results there's a lot of moving factors particularly we've seen treasuries come down a lot over the last few weeks which is helpful for the sizing of these deals because the bonds need to be sized and the uh the financing needs to size well to the treasury rates for dscr purposes so I would say that to under promise and overd deliver mid teens is what we are shooting for uh there that's going to be one of the few deals that was bought and when was this deal bought 2021 this might be the only deal with that financing Associated uh that had a mid teen irr uh on the the deal and if you did have a bridge or floating rate debt deal that exits in this year coming up that was bought in 2021 with the mid- teen return please send that deal our way because we'd love to look at it to see what went so well and use it as a case study and maybe we'll even Deep dive it on the show yeah that's good point open that's an open invite so you know it's not set in stone but we're very excited and we're working on it and it just speaks to the fact that we're not complacent we're not sitting around going oh well the market change sorry you're not going to get the return we promised you right we take it very seriously and we feel genuinely so we we what you're saying is we should bump up our asset management fees to 5% cuz that much that's how much harder we're working on compared to everyone else we we work hard we work hard yeah so we we truly are a partner and as we should be right and we're we're proving it we'll continue to do so no this is just unique and um once more uh you know of course like every firm we have a market rate strategy down the Fairway just normal agency debt no Nuance to it opportunity but we also have our fun tax batement deals um tax credit deals that you know provide a unique angle to maybe get outside returns and if you're looking to learn more about those opportunities once more my email Craig lc.com uh if you want to learn more about partnering with us or some of uh the nuances Associated uh that you just laid out perfect so the next section of the letter talks about team growth and development so we are one one thing we can't fully share all the details on but we are hiring a controller which is going to be a super exciting development it's and it's going to really level us up as a firm so wait real quick we're not talking about Playstation or Xbox here what is a controller in in the in in this regard is it it's basically to my understanding a CFO almost like it's someone who looks at finances is it accounting is it separate kind of for everyone who may not be privy to this what does that position do what's the need of importance and when would a group need to implement said person into their operations yeah really good questions so a controller is a part of the accounting department okay so typically a controller will oversee staff accountants and Report up to the CFO so you have a CFO then controller then accountants so for a small company like ours generally speaking you don't need to go out and hire a full-blown super super dialed in CFO because you just don't have that much stuff going on that is need you don't need that level of expertise uh full-time so a controller is a good happy medium we're also bringing accounting inhouse next year so all the property level accounting is going to be done inhouse uh rather than by a third party so that's going to be a really great way for us to not only save costs but also to have more control and produce our reports faster because we get our k1s out now in February not March no still March 15 is the target but monthly reports which going back to our investor survey one of the complaints that we did get from some people is sometimes our reports are late and that's absolutely a fair critique and that is all obviously our fault but the reason why that happens is because our thirdparty accounting firm could be producing the report 5 days late and then we have to take that report review it digest it and then take it to the next level add in our elements of reporting and then we send it out to investors right so one of the big goals for 2024 for our firm is to completely revamp the accounting to reporting process that means that our asset management department our accounting department and our investor relations all need to work together to revamp that process so that we can go from accounting statements to reports to distribution in a in a faster timely manner and the critical element is it needs to take our team less time because as we're growing the portfolio we have more and more deals that we need to produce monthly and quoty reports on and the we need to just find a solution to spend less time and be more efficient with our time to produce these reports otherwise we're going to drive ourselves crazy or have to hire more people so controllers is going to be a big win they're going to be a part of that initiative to revamp that process we have a lot of other financial and accounting related initiatives right like I mentioned bringing Accounting in house revamping reporting we're going to take a look at HR we're going to take a look at uh drawing a blank but we have some other things that we need to work on and just getting more crisp with and more institutionalized with how we uh account for everything yeah I mean we only did I mean I say only and I say that because it's all relative to what you're doing a lot of groups 150 million would be way outside of their goals to us it was less than half of what we wanted to achieve but I think from a human capital power and perspective kind of Shoring up this side of the business the inter workings of the Lone Star skeleton and nucleus will be incredibly valuable as we scale up our portfolio with hopefully acquiring $300 million next year that's almost that's adding 60% on top of our portfolio so we'll go from 100 to 160% next year so if we do that we need to have just our systems in place so thought it's really exciting to get kind of that Foundation down uh in order to get to you know our next levels and you know unfortunately my job stays consistent I raise money for the deals and then I'm done and then it's the next deal but what our inhouse team obviously has to deal with is what you know and you're kind of probably deal with this less than Kent does you think about everything of course but on that end you know Kent and that team you know my workflow stays constant to a certain extent maybe have a couple raises going at once but theirs could double or triple in the span of a couple years just due to the amount of units the amount of reporting that all needs to go out so um kind of getting that going is going to be really crucial to our growth and expansion to make sure that we can still give everyone a great service because you know maybe you're seeing an email getting sent out from myself or from Dasha but really was created from uh our backend team here so it all kind of flows in that regard so getting that all buttoned up and dialed is just going to be very crucial to the firm and um a great way to expand out yep it's crucial and we want to be able to one Kent and I our goal is not to build the biggest company right and if if anyone's watched our new Founders video our company video I open the video and I say we don't want to be the biggest company we want to be the best and we're not saying that in a cocky way like we want to be better than everybody else what we want to do is it's actually a personal goal it's actually a selfish goal lifestyle we want to have the we don't want to necessarily just enjoy being the best we want to enjoy having the best company and what does that mean it means that we enjoy working at the company we're not too stressed stressed out we're not overworked it's a good Dynamic everyone's happy at the company purpose purpose fulfillment Career Development yeah financial goals obviously and if if people are being driven nuts because we're scaling up adding more properties and we don't have good systems in place to handle additional workload it's it's it's all for not right what's the whole point of building this up if it's not in our vision of be building a I don't want to say stress free right because that's just impossible stress is good for you too stress is good exactly but that's also in line with the goals here so so that's the controller I'm sure as we get integrated uh as we integrate the controller when I do an in-person podcast in New York in March or April we'll give him a shout maybe that person will come on and make a s appearance I think they will I think he or she will so yeah super excited about that them yeah and the next person to highlight as far as team development is Hannah Wyatt so she was brought on recently in December M as our executive assistant which is going to be a big help already seeing a tremendous help in the office everyone's enjoying working with her uh super helpful to have somebody who's attentive and can handle things that we might not be thinking about or just freeing up Ken's time for example because we all know how valuable his time is to creating ton of value for ourselves and our investors so so that's a big level up for the firm it's about time that we have that and that empowers us I think something interesting to shout out is is to do things that are less scalable right because it's one thing to press a button on the computer and send a thousand emails out to investors it's another thing to have handwritten thank you notes referral gifts personal touches and things like that so Hannah is empowering us to do more things like that which I'm really excited about yeah no that's awesome uh she's great and this will also have a an amazing effect for dasha because Dasha kind of gets bogged down with some of the tasks that she was having to do before which probably are things she shouldn't be doing um and then you know if we're really really busy doing you know an in-person event or something it goes to d' and then it goes to me so uh OSHA will delegate some of those things to myself which I obviously want to make her life as smooth as possible and vice versa her to me uh so having just extra support on both of our ends but also uh to kind of uh streamline your life and Kent's life will just have an awesome uh impact so all very exciting and that's uh well needed at this point now that you've got uh you know we're out of the parents basement not the ever in the parents basement but now that we've got a beautiful brick and mortar uh location in the immaculate One World Trade Center uh I think it's super crucial to have that and uh it just totally makes sense to scale up with with someone like that in position and she's a a joy to be with so yep good stuff so I'll skip over kind of some of the the promotions talk about me yeah yeah or yeah well just just everything there I mean I just we we shouted out uh I mean we'll shout out well we shout out Brad honestly we give Brad a shout he deserves one yeah we can give Brad a shout out he was on what was that episode 14 perhaps but so Brad was earlier this year promoted to director of Acquisitions he did a fantastic job as our Acquisitions analyst and he has since really stepped up and taken a lot of initiative on the acquisition side uh handling ER relations touring properties analyzing deals answering my questions yeah which are your questions ultimately helping on investor questions on the nuances of deals specifically and then of course negotiating uh when it comes down to uh you know getting these deals done in three years seem to me because I like my negotiation skills and just how much more comfortable we going to get from my brokerage days to you know where I was am now and you know my negotiation abilities as opposed to where it was you know just a couple years out of graduation he's going to pick it up obviously you know with how smart he is likely quicker than I am but his his ability will be impeccable in a couple of years so that'll be awesome Yep really good stuff there another great shout out is the fun of fun program that we launched towards the end of the year huge so that was a a great win we hosted a webinar on the fun to fun program we have a fun to fun program document that we created so if you're interested in taking a look at the webinar or reading over the document that we put together feel free to reach out to Craig I'm sure by now you already know his email so you can learn more about what the fun of fun program is and if you would like to partner with us you can learn more about that there so that was a big win uh we have a lot of partners that we work with we previously uh had mostly worked with them in a CP capacity some fun of funds but making this concerted effort and and setting up this more institutional process of the fun to fund program is really a level up and will allow us to scale more moving forward it's giving the boutique Capital razor the institutional level tools to scale and to safely be in our opportunities and Deals which is crucial uh it's an exciting new way to allow some folks who just were probably just below our acable limmit that we wanted to have someone come in to raise so now this individual has the opportunity to kind of come into our opportunities where he did before that to us is beyond valuable and something that we think is really special um as there's some people that are you know probably close to our age who their friends aren't millionaires yet but you know they're raising and they're super passionate about it well now hey maybe they can raise a half million dollars but you know in the old system hey a million dollars was kind of what we needed but now maybe they could bring half a million and next thing you know they could use that write that momentum into you know helping their families you know growing maybe something that is a side passion into a full-time you know career so overall just an exciting uh exciting process to implement that system as you mentioned we have a beautiful brochure uh if you'd like me to email that to you have the email and then also if you go to her YouTube you can go to this YouTube page where if you're watching on YouTube or anything there or I can text it to or email to you uh but that document is there under under the Lone Star Fund to fund um I think it's what is it l fund program for the YouTube link something like that very easy to find on the marketing side for 2023 I'd say we had a pretty good year no books were published in 2023 slacker slacker over here but with that being said we at this point have published two books the first one being in 2020 and then I really did slack off in 21 no book and then in 2022 we came back with a vengeance and we released structuring and ra raising debt and equity for Real Estate to date we've sold over 20,000 copies cumulatively uh which is more than I ever anticipated I never really had any goal for writing these books it was just kind of a passion project and then I really saw the Gap in the market and the business opportunity so we have really built a ton of relationships and established a lot of credibility in the market via these books so I'm you know got super lucky honestly with writing the books because it was wasn't a master plan but it turned out to be to have a master return a huge huge return on investment there one thing that I'm super excited about is this right here which is the capital Spotlight podcast so for a lot of PE for for some people they might remember the capital Spotlight as its original form which was back during covid I launched the podcast originally as a way to interview investors and learn from them and get them on the show and build a relationship that fizzled out because it was hard podcast is hard work and it's hard every single week to find a guest to interview them to produce the show and all that so I recorded about 25 episodes and then I went about my business and this year we relaunched the the capital Spight podcast but in this new vision which is now not an interview-based podcast it's me and you a way for us to Showcase more of our personal side and the happenings at lonar which I'm even more excited about and more proud of because I think this is an even better way for us uh to to Market ourselves and to grow our relationships because as people reach out to you every single week they say it really is every week too yeah thank you by the way yeah thank you very much I mean people say that it's a great way for them to learn more about us to feel more like they have gotten to know us they feel comfortable with us there was just a big investor by the way shout out you know who you are just funded into uh the three property portfolio and he and his brother were going through a lot of our YouTubes to just hear what we have to say get more comfortable with us so it's legitimately crazy to think that uh although we may not get as many views as Mr Beast we are converting and you know leveraging this one to many platform into real dollars into our uh you know our offerings which is just I didn't think that we would have I mean I don't know I didn't know I didn't know what to think I just did this For the Love of the Game wanted to do this for the Love of the Game to revamp it with you it just made sense to do at some point but I didn't think that we would actually have such tangible results already and reach the amount of people and have had the amount of conversations I've had to this point in the year so and only being basically a half year deep into kind of revamping this so super flattered and uh it was I think one of the biggest pleasant surprise on my end that I feel pretty responsible for doing because remember was like no we need to do a podcast and like okay let's film and we did it so I feel slightly responsible for that so I feel very uh proud of it it's definitely uh was in my opinion the biggest pleasant surprise to 2023 which was we'll go back uh and the brokage years and Commercial years as the Lost year I really I really think so fair enough so what else do we want to say here oh the other thing to shout out is fund Friday so for those that you don't know that might follow this podcast under the same umbrella Capital spet umbrella Craig also hosts the fund Friday segment where he interviews fund managers capital rais and investors so if you'd like to be a guest on that podcast uh just reach out to Craig and he's obviously doing that on Fridays so you can go ahead and recording can be any day of the week but the show is published and produced and released on Friday that's right so yeah we'd love to to have you on as a guest there I I'm sure things are going great on the fun Friday as well we had a nice Bank going uh as the holidays are coming up here uh but are always looking to have fresh and new uh voices and obviously selfishly it's easier for us to maybe have somebody kind of been introduced to don't know that well but then if we can kind of show them a deal and then I can get on an hourong Forum with them where I can answer them PE Them Questions we get to know each other better and that ultimately flow well into working with lonar so it's all kind of a uh scheme and a a method if you will to you know help kind of just translate um you know into Equity into our deals and obviously build the relationships which are the most important and key uh aspect so yep content into relationships yeah so that pretty much wraps up the annual letter uh we have a little bit of time left on this show to talk about 2024 and also in the letter we talk about looking ahead in 2024 our goal is to acquire 300 million in Acquisitions across DFW Houston and San Antonio We Believe 2024 is going to be a fantastic year to buy deals so we're really excited to make that happen and take advantage it's not going to going to be easy right because if it's if it's a good opportunity it has to be contrarian in some way it means it might be a rougher deal or more difficult time to raise Equity or debt is more difficult to navigate but that's where we'll create the most value for our investors and for ourselves so I I think PE the consensus is it's going to be a great year uh even though we might be in a recession right but that's the Paradox of investing right like they say people make the big money in the downturns and then you reap what you sew when the market comes back so I don't know if you have any other things that you want to say about 2024 and looking ahead yeah I think that we went through a lot of collective brain damage in 2023 to set up 2024 to be a lot smoother I think that although a lot of firms are going to experience kind of their lumps maybe coming up here or just had a slow last year but then fundamentals are get rough they're coming up I think no one's immune to fundamentals kind of hurting the deals but I do think that a lot of the headaches I think hopefully will have been avoided and all actually will just be overall I think just positive in 2024 I think it's going to be a way less friction filled year in 2024 than what we experienced in 2023 that's also partially my own experience due to the fact that I had to overcome the learning curb in year one in this business and the transition of it but I think that it'll just be generally a lot smoother and exciting now that the cycle is basically let's call what it is the cycle has restarted so we're now in that kind of new you know honeymoon phase of a new market cycle deals looking really sweet yields been good you know people feeling good about maybe investing here coming up or uh we'll start feeling good about it so it's just it's just generally exciting I would say very much so so in closing you know for this this podcast and for the letter I'd like to extend my deep gratitude to our investors who have chosen to partner with us obviously there's a million ways that people can invest their money so it's a true uh just amazing thing for someone to pick us and to choose to partner with us and even more so to continue to partner with us as well as refer us to their friends and family so for that we're extremely grateful and that's what really we get up thinking about every single day and what fuels are desire to continue to strive for excellence and Innovation yeah absolutely and I think by 2025 we'll expand the portfolio into a billion so we'll add another comma in there be three commas when we talking about loone start Capital that'll be a lot of fun maybe some exits in in the new year uh with with the maneuvering that we're kind of uh working on so just generally exciting uh what about any for 2023 let's not look too far in the future I think maybe we should we'll have a little bit of that on the next show but mhm what conferences did you like most what's your view and outlook on conferences I think you're you're kind of done with them how many events will you speak at this year strategy what are you kind of looking at on that front well conferences are very valuable but it's Hit or Miss as well uh so like we talked about I was actually just in Miami a week and a half ago uh during our puz for an event that I spoke at and it was a good event it was fun to speak there and and I appreciate being invited to speak but you know it's a commitment to go down to Miami and do the whole thing and all that jazz so it's not it takes time and effort and money of course to travel to conferences and speak and you never know what you're going to get out of it fortunately we did meet a very cool investor that we're super excited to work with at that event so it honestly made it all worth it and that's the crazy thing about networking it's the crazy thing about conferences is you can meet one person or learn one thing and it can pay off 10x or 100x on your investment so that's why I think conferences are certainly worth going to but I think it's important to be selective and to not say yes to everything so that's my goal is just to not say yes to everything because once I when I first got in the game and first started attending conferences I wanted to attend every conference just because what else did I have going on right and I didn't know the possibilities were endless right but then as you get more established you get jaded you get jaded and also even better you start getting invited to speak uh at conferences which is even better way to get more exposure and to build relationships uh so that's really valuable we'll still do that looking forward to race Fest in Phoenix looking forward to best ever in I think April and then I'm actually looking forward to nhhc this year in San Diego that'll actually be fun that'll be really fun that's a good way to just connect with a lot of people and then Ascent in Miami every year is also really good in November so you already have your ticket Got My Ticket set up yes so I'll be a descent my January is very very chaotic than booked I've got uh we have Texas so if you're going to be in Texas we're going to be in Houston then San Antonio the second week of January so hit us up if you're potentially out there and want to connect maybe we'll have a cigar night and meet up um and then I have imn in lagona which is I believe the third week of January and then to close out the month I'll be in uh what's it called again in San Diego for nmhc so if you're going to be at nmhc if you're going to be at the imn private lagona event uh let us know and obviously if you're going to be in Texas let us know uh I'm sure we're going to see everyone in Phoenix uh for raay Fest and then we'll have a little Sonona trip after I believe which will be fun uh but lots of great things to kind of marinate on and it'll be fun to think about goals for the new year personal and work rated uh over the next call it 10 days as the the year Chang is over 11 days it's going to be very slow here coming up which is bittersweet because we've been really fluid and humming um but you know it's exciting the deals that the new deals that we have have been received very well uh so there seems to be uh a lot of people who are excited for new raises and opportunities coming up I agree and it was just feels like a couple was a couple months ago less that we did our annual event our LSC Summit and actually we just finally published the recap video yeah the after video yeah so would love for everyone to go check that out on YouTube and let us know what you thought about that recap video our video team always does a fantastic ftic job they could make the most boring event look like a movie so but this was actually a good event rest ass this was a good event right wink nod nod and yeah very good event so DHA and I are already what we what we typically do is during this quiet period last 10 days of the year we sit down and really grind out the details of the upcoming event so that's crazy just hosting conferences or or a summit is such a crazy task it's it's such a big project we plan the project in December and then we actually host the event in September or October so it's that much lead time to lock in the venue to plan out the agenda the activities the speakers the food food yeah yeah it's just there's so many details considering two menus you know it's not not easy for all of it to come together so Dasha does a fantastic job Dasha actually took Hunter's wife's course I don't know if you knew that but Hunter's wife is an event planner shout out chy and Dasha took her course when she first hosted it and that was a big help so yeah hosting events like we talked about at the beginning of this podcast is a super amazing way to connect with people grow the network and you never know who you're going to meet even at your own event so we're super excited to host what will be the fourth annual LSC Summit which will again be at the One World Trade Center we already locked in the dates and the deposit so we'll be posting information on that soon and so we'd love to see you there uh but with that being said it's going to be just a heads up warning it's going to be a very exclusive event so we understand if you can't make it yeah with that said the year of 2023 was the year of the expert how do you think you exuded that in 2023 how do you think you displayed that so to me year of the expert which also for for people that don't know our our friend group we kind of have these themes about years and so for 2023 it was the year of the expert and so we would call each other out and if we saw one of our friends or one of us doing something that we didn't feel that was in align in alignment with their true goals or their purpose or if they if they had maybe potentially we we could see that they're going to have bad execution on their plans we would gently make uh alterations or suggestions to streamline their said process right so that's what year of the experts all about it's being intentional which is actually funny yeah okay uh so because because being an ex being you know year of the expert is about okay what are my goals and how can I best reach my goals right it's or not even just that but hey what am I doing and what does kind of the and I hate to say this but what does the average person do and how do I become a cut above and everything that I simply do exactly you can't just walk through life doing the status quo thing that is not year of the expert right that's year of the average and so we want to be year of the expert so you know for me it's it's about leveling up the quality of my decisions and I think that that's really what it's all about because your life is a reflection of your decisions and another way that I think about things is discipline or hard work are a given it's not like oh well this year I'm going to work really hard no I mean you're going to work hard no matter what that's a given that shouldn't even be and just set the record straight that to say that it's like that should just be the given like that's table Stakes yeah exactly that that's the the price of admission is simply that yeah the J I always say this the janitor works hard and the CEO works hard the difference is the quality of the decisions that were made right so to say I'm going to work harder this year to me that's not you might need to work harder but that's not necessarily depend where you're at right where you're at and you also say this as well it's funny your Bas on is like this whole bragging about oh I worked 80 hour a week 60 hour a week 7 well that sucks like why that like you're not you're not bragging you're not flexing to us if you're working all these hours if anything it's like well you're kind of the the idiot for doing that with for lack of better words right like we it's like why don't you work 30 hour weeks 40 hour weeks get everything done quicker if you can like that's a cooler thing to us frankly yeah it's like going back to school right and it's funny cuz that's just kind of the the work culture that we have in this country which is oh I worked so hard last night or I pulled an all nighter studying for the exam type of thing well i' prob the kid that just waltzes in and gets the a don't you want to be that yeah the Super Genius me yeah right the Super Genius who answers all the questions in half the time turns in the paper and walks out of class right that's that's really not always possible but what you want to be striving for not oh I work a million hours and that's my only path to be successful right it's the year of the expert it's thinking outside of the box and uh pushing the status quo so it's very similar and I I don't necessarily think it needs to be that different but I don't think it's been solidified but I think 2024 is the year of intentionality we might think of something better if you have something better in mind anybody listening let us know but I really like intentionality because it's in alignment with my ethos of treating everything as work right you hear me say this all the time I'm always working even if it doesn't look like I'm working like if I'm laying on a beach I'm still working because to me life is about work if I'm laying on that beach I'm working hard to maximize my enjoyment I'm not just turning off and doing nothing or if I am turning off and doing nothing it's by Design it's by Design it's it's the best turning off and doing nothing right it's not just happen stance so being intentional with it knowing when you're going full boore knowing when you're shutting things down and relaxing whatever you're doing being intentional about it guess we'll have an official statement next week so we got to actually have this wrapped up before the year ends because obviously there's a little bit of a lag between doing this and Publishing so we need to get sharp and smart on this uh prior to submission of uh the next show which will be airing on New Year's Day so we'll have to think about that one uh indeed uh so that's something to to ponder on and to think about do you have any final thoughts um and wrap-up thoughts for your last wrap-up and last address to the public uh if you will the the audience uh for 2023 no I have something go ahead make sure the math is in your favor because all the deals are getting Capital called math wasn't in your favor so make sure everything in life the math is in your favor uh so yeah that's my uh the tip and the thought of the day yeah that's right all right well thank you very much for listening I'll let you close us out as you do so well yes so of course once more if you're looking to raise equity for a great partner like us and uh would like to have a conversation about what that looks like please email me if you have any looming 1031 exchanges that need A Home of 750k or higher uh let me know we'd love to take care of you and help potentially help that one out and kind of line up all those Ducks get them in a row uh and then if you're looking to get on our mailing list not hard to do go on our website uh but once more just thank you so much it's been a very very uh it's been a very very interesting year in 2023 uh and we're looking forward to a more impactful and better 2024 thank you so much for listening and we'll see you in the new year

Channel: Rob Beardsley – Lone Star Capital

Views: 470

Keywords: rob beardsley, multifamily, real estate, lone star capital, underwriting

Id: kWOfKyBvJy4

Length: 77min 25sec (4645 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 25 2023