Refugee to Real Estate Investor

Mike Hambright (00:01.42)
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the show. Today I’m here with Tristan Pham. He’s actually here in the DFW market as well. Have we met before? Have we talked before? We never met in person before. But we know each other very well because we’re in the same market. I’m excited to. Part of the reason I do the podcast is to get to know people better. But he has an amazing story of escaping Vietnam to be a real estate investor here in the DFW market. And we’re going to share that story today. So Tristan, glad you’re here. Thank you, Mike. Thank you for having me. Yeah, glad to be here.

I follow you a lot on social media. I know you’ve also got some land and I’ve seen you having big like bonfires and stuff like that. Isn’t it fun? I love it. I love bonfire. I love working out in the countryside, you know, where you can set bonfires. Yeah. know, after you work, it’s just fun. Yeah, I went from like, you know, I’ve created some fires that are too big where my wife’s kind of freaking out a little bit, but because we have like 90 acres of timber. And so I’m like, it wouldn’t take much for this whole thing to go on. Anyway.

Yeah, so I’m excited to hear more about your story today. I know you as a Dallas real estate investor and didn’t know the story you’re going to tell us about escaping Vietnam and things like that. But I’m excited to learn more about you and talk about how you got here. And what’s always amazing to me is I’ve never met, I don’t say never, but I can’t think of any real estate investors I know right now that grew up in that business. We all have some.

story, whether it’s corporate America or being a firefighter, whatever it might be. we found our way here. And all the different backstories is always exciting to me to hear, because there’s not a lot of common threads other than we were just unhappy with where we were at. And then we found real estate. So anyway, tell us a little bit about your back story, your background. Well, my background, like I said, I think a little bit. I told you already that I came here as a refugee guy when I was 15, 16 years old.

My journey that came with Vietnam is very interesting. there was about 64 people scrambling into a very small boat. You’re talking about, I said, 34 feet long and about five, six feet wide. And we’ve got 64 people on the boat. my gosh.

Mike Hambright (02:19.854)
pretty much like no water, no food. On the ocean? Yes, on the ocean. gosh. We just head out. We don’t know where to go. We just pretty much headed out there and just let God lead us whatever, wherever He lead us to. And we were in the ocean for seven nights and six days. You know, scrambled like this. And so pretty much I was like,

like this the whole time, right, for six days. I’m sorry, seven nights and six days, no food, no water. And so you can feel that death was almost a guarantee for everybody. none of those people died? None of the people on the boat died. We safely got to an island called Pulau Bidong after the seven days. What country is that? It was in Malaysia. OK.

So it was in Malaysia and then we stay in the refugee camp for more than a year to go through all the screening process legally before we got accepted to America and that was back in 1990. Okay. Right. So that was my story. I came here along with one of my brothers. And so when we came over here, we did not really speak anything at all. No English, no money, no whatsoever. We didn’t know anything.

The only thing we knew is that we have to take care of ourselves. With what we had in mind, the promise that we promised to our family that when we got to America, we will work hard, take care of our family back then, because Vietnam back then was very poor. And so we worked very hard. I went to school, struggling in school, struggling in college.

But somehow, honestly, if I go back, I don’t know how I got through it, to be honest with you. I have no idea. When I look at kids nowadays compared to the life that I lived back then, you know, it’s so much different now. know, kids nowadays, my kids, you know, they are 14 now. They don’t know to do anything. They don’t even know how to cook. You know, we have to remind them of, you know, going to take shower, eat, study, know, that way.

Mike Hambright (04:44.046)
So back then I had no guidance. had nothing. I had nothing. But somehow I got through it. That was in 1990. And so when I graduated from college, I got a job in international business field. And the company decided to move to Dallas, Texas. So I went with them. I didn’t know anything about Dallas at all. Never heard of it in my life. But because I was single, was young.

So nothing really stopped me. I would say I can do whatever I want to do. That was it. then so I relocated here with the company in 2000, worked for that company for a few years, got into IT. My friend got me into IT field. So I was in IT field for few years. And one day decided to just get out of it because W2 job is good.

if you just want to sit in the office and collect paycheck, live from paycheck to paycheck. And I thought, this is not the life that I want. It’s interesting. want to hear, because I talk a lot. I have a 17-year-old son who doesn’t have the same work ethic that I do yet and has had an easier life than I’ve had. I would say that my life was hard.

very blue collar, hard working family, like all those things. But my life was nothing compared to your life of escaping, right? And so it’s interesting as an entrepreneur, because I guess I don’t care if my son’s an entrepreneur or not. He’s entrepreneurially minded. But it’s interesting thinking about our kids, especially yours, how much easier their life is. And you’ve made it that way, right? And I talk about that sometimes too about my son.

One of the byproducts of my success is I have an easier life than my parents did. I pay people to mow my lawn and clean our house and change my oil and do all those things. A byproduct of us having less chores is they have less chores. So we’re off on a tangent here. I have a couple questions. is, do you think, tell me, because I don’t know the answer. How do we instill some of those?

Mike Hambright (07:07.98)
Lessons are those in our kids that they appreciate how hard we work to get here, right? So I I talk to my kids most of the time I almost every single day I have to work my the only thing I want to do is go home and you know spend time with my family Yeah, and I love talking to my kids, know, we spend time every single day talking to them So I always reminded them of how

I was how I was you know as a young kid right we didn’t have food to eat yeah we didn’t have anything we didn’t have enough to close basically we had no option at all of what we want to do yeah right that’s why we have to do what we have to do right our kids now they have a lot of options they you know they are you know they are spoiled I would say yeah really spoiled but I always tell them that you have to appreciate what you have now

They are still very young. They don’t get it, get what we tell them yet right now. But I’m sure later on when they grow up, they would think back and say, you my dad taught me this. Just like I remember, you know, how my dad taught me, right? And I talk to them. I share with them my work every day. You know, I tell them, you know, what I do, who I talk to, what I’m going do today, and what I want them to do. I got two kids. One is…

One is about 14 years old and one is about 12. They got different personalities. One, the younger one, always want to know what I am doing. We always, in the car we’re driving, we’re talking about business, we’re talking about this and this. Whereas the other one is just, know, whatever. That’s what it is. I share with them, I talk to them every single day and that’s just what I would love to do. Yeah. So tell me about your…

passion for more as a real estate. We talked about your work ethic and how you get bored easily. It’s interesting because it would be easy and it’s easy for a lot of people that are born in America even to get complacent and just kind of content with a job. But you came from very, very humble beginnings, right? And got by all intents and purposes were very successful just by having a good corporate job in IT, I presume.

Mike Hambright (09:22.306)
but that just wasn’t enough and you knew there was more. What drove that? Say what? What drove that? What’s allowed you to keep wanting to push forward and driving forward, even though you were already well beyond where you came from? think of however many people came over at the same time as you, I would imagine even at that corporate level, you were probably at the very highest levels of success for that group, is my guess.

that wasn’t enough and you knew there was more out there. Right. I grew up in a family where my mom was working very hard as a business woman. So the business ideas always in me all the time. So when I went to college and after I got out of college, it was more of getting a job taking care of in America. So owning a business is always something on my mind, but it never went anywhere.

Right, so until one day, like I shared with you, until one day I was sitting in my office as a nightie guy, I was looking at houses. I didn’t know anything about real estate at all, but I know that I want to do something. But here’s the thing. I was married, that time I’m still married to my wife.

But back then, my wife looking at real estate is something that I should not get into. I should be going to work eight hours a day, getting a paycheck, and give it to her. Because of the sense of security. Is that what she told you? I mean, not really directly, but that is what most women want. They don’t want you. You you got to.

You know, they think that you get an okay job, so just keep doing what you’re doing, right? Don’t do anything different. It’s too risky. But for me, back up my head, I always want to do something. So one day I just sit in there and look at my real estate, and I was like, I have to do something. So back then in 2014, 2015, there was a website called Hub Zoo.

Mike Hambright (11:33.322)
And then Hub Zoo, I don’t know if it’s still around. It is around and they’re actually sponsors of my mastermind. They’re actually also based here in Dallas. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Very interesting. So I got into the website and I saw like, you know, houses being auctioned on Hub Zoo. So I got in there and it was December close to Christmas time. So I placed my bid. I didn’t have any money, to be honest with you. I’m a high risk taker.

really high risk taker. I didn’t have any money, but I just want to do what I want to do. So I got into the website trying to place my bids and luckily on Christmas day, Christmas Eve, nobody want to work. They want to spend time with the family and nobody. So I guess I was the only one trying to figure out who’s winning, where am I, blah, blah. So I won that bid.

for $83,000. That was my first investment home I wanted. And then I was like, I don’t know what to tell my wife because we don’t have money. Yeah. Well, how are we going to fund this? Right? So I talked to my wife and my wife talked to my brother-in-law. So luckily, my brother-in-law loaned us the money that we sold, we fund the house. So when I got it closed,

I went to the house. Man, was like, man, I wish I never do this. I wish I never place any bet. I wish I didn’t do this at all. Because when you walk into the house, the house was like, man, it’s like you see water falling down from the ceiling, from the wall. No sheet rock. Everything was exposed. And I was like, man, what I am doing.

I don’t know what I’m gonna do, right? But I already got into the game already. I got no way out. I already got the money from my brother-in-law. I have to pay him back. I don’t want my wife to divorce me for $83,000, right? So you just have no point of return for you. So I just had to dive into it and do what it takes, do whatever it takes me to do.

Mike Hambright (13:59.692)
So I call up a lot of contractors. I talk to a lot of them. And I just don’t know how to talk. I just don’t know what to explain to them. I don’t know what they’re going to tell me. So basically, I have no idea of what I want to ask. just want to, in my mind, is that I just want to put the house back together. But I just don’t know how to do it, because I have no idea how they’re going to do it, how we’re going to do this. But anyway, so I talk to a lot of contractors, call up, you know,

people that I know and asking questions and all of that. So I eventually hired a guy, my neighbor, one of my neighbors. I don’t know if he has any experience in construction work, I know, but it’s just that he told me that, he can do it, he can do it, and then I hired him. But throughout the process, man, there was a lot of fight. Every single time he walk over there, he go to my house.

He asked for money. And I was like, man, you didn’t do anything yet. Why are you asking for money? said, like, you know, if you want to, you know, that’s what we do. I mean, if you don’t want it, then I just leave. So I was like, man, I had no way out again. So, but anyway, I got it through somehow. I still don’t know how I got through, to be honest with you, but I got it through my first investment home.

and i made i think a little bit of money i would say about twelve thousand dollars after everything and i thought man money is good twelve thousand dollars suddenly you you’re working on you you’re working on w two and suddenly you got twelve thousand dollars man this is great this is something a good start i was so proud of it i went home and talked to my wife i was so proud of it and my wife was like man don’t do it again

Don’t do it again, you know, because I went through like sleepless night. you know and with all the worries and I was like man doing the doing that time I was like how I’m gonna take care of my kids what I’m gonna do but again I have to go back in the back of my mind doing business or get into real estate is always something in me now looking back I’m glad that I went through that process. Yeah going through of all the struggles that I had and through all of that so I learned

Mike Hambright (16:20.846)
whole bunch, I would say that was the most important lesson for me to know what I want to do, to understand the process of it, or to even know that if this is something that I really want to do, know. So the first one was very important to me, it helped me get through the second one, the third one, and so here I am. So the third one, I decided just one day, I leave corporate job.

I know my wife would never, never, never support me to leave corporate job. I knew it because I talked to her before. So I just one day, I just sitting in my house and my wife came and asked me, how come you’re not going to work? And I was like, I am working. And she looked at it in my face and said, what are you working?

I said like, you I’m working on this. So I show her the house. This is not what you do, man. Get up and go to work. I said like, I have no more work to go to. Where am going go now? So, but anyway. So you quit your job already? Yes, I left my just didn’t know. Just wanted because. That’s how she found out. Yes, that’s how she found out because I know that if I ask her for permission, she would never agree to it. She would never in her entire life let me get out of my.

get out of corporate job and get into a state business because again, like I said, my wife wants to have a sense of security, right? Because get it into something of what you’ve been doing for years into something that isn’t so new to you with no money, with no experience is something that’s a no-no. But anyway, so she was worried, she was mad.

frustrated stressed out for days and days and days but You know, I got through I got through all you got through. Yes. I through I was lucky so I got through it and I love and she loves what I’m doing now Yeah, my kids love what I’m doing now and I love what I’m doing now thus and I find real estate is my biggest passion What do you love what do you think makes why are you passionate about it? Is it the real? Well, go ahead and tell me that

Mike Hambright (18:42.414)
Right, first of all, it gives you the sense of financial freedom, time freedom. mean, it could, there times that I work 12 hours, 15 hours a day, but still, it’s not like corporate job, that you have to go in there eight hours a day, and you can’t call it sick when your family, when your kids are sick, right? Or when you wanna go here and there, travel with your family, you can’t.

So that’s, I feel good about that. And also flipping, was, when I just got in, I did a lot of flipping. And I would, I wanna see, I wanna see the transformation of, you know, how is that need repair into something that, you know, like you transform your idea, you put all your idea, your effort into, you know, your products. And you know, and that you sell it to people and people living in there for years.

So it’s just, it give me a great, it give me a very good feeling, you know, of what I do and what product I’m selling Just sense of pride and sense of pride, Like the transformation. Correct. Yeah. So would you say, is it the real estate that excites you or is it what it does for you? Like what it can do for you? I would say real estate is what excites me. Yeah. Just the idea of real estate. I love real estate. Anything. I can talk to people all day.

you know anything related to her state you know so it’s anything related to her state is really you know excite me all day yeah that’s great and it your wife is not involved in the business at all I don’t imagine her at one point of time my wife left her job she still she go back to her corporate job now I try to you know talk to her that you know maybe you can help me out here but she is not like me she she know she

basically she’s taking care of the kids. She has a lot of work to do, cooking, taking care of the kids, and all that. She’s very, very busy. So at one point, I tried to get her out of it, and she left her job for a few months, trying to help me out, but it didn’t work out for her. She didn’t like it. It wasn’t her passion, I would say. So now she’s going back to her W-2 job. So I’m all by myself.

Mike Hambright (21:05.398)
I’m okay with it. Because I find sometimes if you’re working with your wife 24 hours a day, you already see her at home and then you’re working 24 hours a day. Sometimes it’s not a good idea. Well, that’s what I’ve done since 2008. It has its pros and cons for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn’t… Yeah. We didn’t get married with the expectation to work together, but that’s how it ended up. yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So a couple lessons, like tell me about like do you think your corporate background has helped you and what parts of it have helped you? Because there’s plenty of people that do this that don’t have a college degree even or don’t have that corporate background and I used to think I have all this fancy education and corporate background and I don’t need any of it for this business but I think over the years I’ve realized there are lots of lessons that I learned.

in those environments that have helped me for sure. So do you agree with that? Yes, yes and no. would say yes is when I was in corporate job, I had meeting with my teammates every single day. So basically I learned that how your task, what you need to do, how you’re to do it, what kind of help do you need, if you need any help raise your hand. If you cannot do it, just let people know that you cannot do it. You call for help.

That is what I learned how to communicate with my team now and that is what I apply to my team. That is what I’m telling my full-time employees all the time. If you don’t know how to do it, just let me know. I know that I’m not as good as doing this as you do, but I am the problem solver.

If you let me know that you cannot do this, let me know. I would jump right in and solve the problem. I just do not like the idea of just, I cannot do it and just don’t let anybody know. Right. So that’s just how I learned from the corporate job. Did you manage people in corporate America? No, I did not. I did not manage anybody at all. But I learned a lot from my managers and the president of the company.

Mike Hambright (23:16.744)
One thing that I also I apply it’s like I said yes and no is because I wasn’t really passionate about what I what I was doing as an IT guy. Yeah. I never like it. Like I said again it was more like a job you know go to work collect money go home. So that’s why right now I’m thinking back I said I cannot do it if I want to grow in my business in real estate.

you have to have a passion for it. Once you have a passion for it, you will go very, very far. But if you do not have a passion for what you’re doing, you can give up anytime. If you run into any, let’s say, where to get money, how to find deals, you got lawsuits, you’re dealing with the city, then all the stress will make you give up because you don’t want to deal with it anymore. But once you have a passion for what you’re doing,

It’s more of, you know, that you want to overcome it. You want to get through it and you learn from it and you apply what you just did. And that’s what I said again. Real estate is my biggest passion. I think we share about this before we got in here, you know, that, you know, once you do this, I’d rather right now real estate is, I live with it every single day. If I don’t have anything.

to do related to real estate for a day or an hour, I get so bored. There were moments and there were times that, like again, you scratching your head, you got so stressed out, you got frustrated, you worry, you don’t know what to do, and you confusing all of that, right? But I’d rather live that kind of moment than sit back and have nothing to do. I got so bored and I just hate that feeling.

What role in, I guess, you escaped Vietnam, right? And so tell me about, as an entrepreneur, just the gratitude of the life you live today that you’ve built for yourself. You’ve accomplished so much, right? Talk about the role that that has had on your career today. And I guess it probably has a big role in your, you said you’re a risk taker. I mean, you’ve taken the biggest risk. You risked your life to escape. So this is easy. Just talk about.

Mike Hambright (25:44.824)
How you feel about that? Well, like I’m a very high risk taker. So like I have to go back to how I bought my first house because I am a high risk taker. So if I did not, if I did, if I was in a high risk taker, I would not, I would have not done what I did. Right. You know, going out there and buying a house without knowing where to get money to fund it. Right.

But again, like if you do something and you’re so passionate about it, you will find a way to get through it. So when I came over here, my parents always told me, if you go, if you’re lucky enough, if you go to America, there are a lot of opportunities, land of opportunities. And that’s exactly what we find here, land of opportunities.

When I came over here, again, you know, we, one thing in our mind that we always have to work hard. We have to work hard to take care of ourselves. And once you work hard, you will find a lot of opportunities for you to do what you need to do. And then later on, I’ve realized that, you know, there’s a lot of opportunities in what I want to do. So real estate, I find it, you know, a great opportunity for me to get in it.

I find America, no place else like America that can give you opportunities, can give you a lot of blessing, you can be what you want to be and nothing really can stop you except yourself. Yeah. And not everybody would agree with that these days. There’s so many people that have no idea how much we have here, how much opportunity we have here. Yeah. I find it very sad, Mike. I find it very, very sad. mean, you know.

I don’t know what they’re doing out there to be honest with you. I find it very sad. That’s something that I, you know, I talk to my kids, I said, you know, if you cannot do anything good to your country, to your America, family, do not ruin it. Do not destroy it. You know, if you cannot do anything to help other people, do not ruin it. Do not make it worse. That’s what it is. And here in America,

Mike Hambright (28:10.06)
You know, there a lot of opportunities for you later on. I don’t care what you do. You could be a bus driver. That makes you happy. You can be a businessman. You can be a scientist. Whatever you want to do as long as you happy. But you have to do something to contribute to the society. Absolutely. And your family. And be good at it. Yeah. That’s awesome. Well, thanks for joining us today. Thank you very much for having me. My pleasure talking to you. Yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely, good stuff. Such an amazing, I what an inspiring story. Thank you for sharing with us. Well, thank you. Everybody, thanks for joining us today. No matter how hard you think your life is, you probably haven’t been through as much as Tristan. And I think the important part is to just always keep pushing forward, never quit, always find a way to overcome obstacles. At the end of the day, as real estate investors or entrepreneurs, we’re problem solvers. So no matter how big the problem is, it can be overcome. It’s just a matter of.

Are you willing to push through and do whatever it takes or are going to give up before you get over that hurdle? So, appreciate you guys a bunch. We’ll see you on the next show. Thank you everyone. Thank you, Mike. Appreciate it. Yeah, thank you.