Passion Meets Purpose: Dual Journey in Home & Music

Stephen Schmidt (01:31)
Welcome to the show where we interview the nation’s leading real estate entrepreneurs. It’s your host Stephen Schmidt and I’m back at it again. And I got a cool one in the studio for you today, folks. I’ve got Roger Upchurch here. Roger has been in the home building biz for more than most people have probably been alive. And he brings a real cool experience and just business and and everything to the table that he’s going to share with us today. He’s also got some really interesting stuff. He ⁓ owns a record label.

and is really involved in the music scene and gonna be doing a whole lot more of that. Has a concert even coming up here in July if I recall correctly. And we’re gonna go all over the place and just kind of glean some wisdom here today and talk about the construction side of business, building homes and how it might ⁓ suit some value for you that are out there actively doing deals, flipping properties. And then also some of which is ⁓ a lot of our childhood dreams of what’s it like being in the music business. So.

We’re gonna hop right into it, but before we do, just remember at Investor Fuel, we help real estate investors, service providers, and real estate entrepreneurs, two to five X their businesses, so they can build the businesses they’ve always wanted, in order to live the lives they’ve always dreamed of. With that being said, Roger, welcome to the show today.

Roger Upchurch (02:40)
Well, thank you very much, Stephen. Glad to be here.

Stephen Schmidt (02:43)
Excited to have you. So before we maybe go into some niche details, niche topics about building construction, music business, et cetera, I know we’re gonna go all over here today. Can you give us a little bit of a background on how you got started in the home building space and then what got you to where you’re at now today, starting a record label and everything else you got going on?

Roger Upchurch (03:02)
Well, my dad was a builder in New Castle, Indiana where I grew up and so I

sort of went with him when I was a young kid, 12, 13 years old, helping him. And I really enjoyed the business. And when I graduated from high school, I had a choice like everybody else does, go to college. But I already had a career. I always knew what I wanted to do. And I wanted to be a custom home builder. So I didn’t see any sense of going to college in order to do that. So I grew up building houses with him. Like I we didn’t have subs.

We did everything. I staked the house out, laid the blocks, poured the footer, laid the blocks, framed it, wired it, plumbed it, roofed it. Everything in the house, my dad and I did, and I did that for many years. In 1987, I moved to Indianapolis, was around a reservoir with a lot of million dollar homes and things like that. And I built my first house when I got here.

and I built over 200 custom homes in Indianapolis area. a lot of it I did, when I started out doing a lot of it myself, but then I got a little bigger, so I didn’t do a lot. ⁓ But during that time, I became a mortgage broker as well, and I did a lot of fix and flips during that time, plus commercial work.

Stephen Schmidt (04:34)
Wow, so now at what point did you decide? Because it’s such an interesting completely parallel not even parallel industry to to decide you had this passion for like the music business like at what point did that come into play for yourself as well?

Roger Upchurch (04:51)
Well…

You know, my passion, my first passion was the building business, the construction business. In 2009, the economy crashed. I was a mortgage broker as well as a builder during that time. And then when the economy crashed, there was really no homes to build or no any mortgages to write for a period there. And so I got into some other businesses and maybe we can do that in another podcast, but in this other business, I did make a lot of money.

And with that money, ⁓ I actually, ⁓ I was with a friend and he was a recording artist or technician or whatever you call him. And he said, well, we start opening up a recording studio. So we did, we had the state of the art studio and then it branched out to doing ⁓ promotions for concerts for people. then it promoted, then I had two nightclubs, one in Indianapolis, one in Phoenix.

Arizona and the record label. And I had a lot of prominent people. I had some guys with the Wutane gang. We had a lot of artists in Indianapolis. And I had people from The Voice, American Idol, work with me. And I did concerts with 38 Special, Kentucky Headhunters, all kinds of different artists throughout Johnny Rivers, which

secret agent man so it was really fun we did a lot of that and the the restaurants I did since being in a construction business I remodeled them and worked on that so there’s not a whole lot that I can’t do far as building houses but I enjoyed the record labels so that was my second passion.

Stephen Schmidt (07:28)
Sure. So with the building houses specifically, mean, you talk about you guys didn’t have any subs, like you did everything from the foundation to the, you know, the ridge caps, right? And so like with that, what made you guys decide to not hire out the help? Was it just better profits? Did you see it as a better use of time or what was the reason for that?

Roger Upchurch (07:46)
What?

Well, when I was

growing up building houses with my dad, it was just natural thing that we built the whole house. When I moved to Indianapolis and started building a lot more homes, and naturally I had to subs and electricians and plumbers and HVAC guys. But in Newcastle, when I started, we were building one house at a time, and there were the 1960s 2,000 square foot ranches, so it wasn’t hard to do everything yourself.

got bigger and built a lot of houses in Annapolis area and naturally I have all my subs I didn’t do that all the work then but that’s why I know how to do everything in a house and ⁓ right now I’ve been doing fix and flips and I’ve done seven or eight fix or flips in the last three or four years.

Stephen Schmidt (08:38)
Wow,

what what do you like about the fix and flip process versus like ground up construction?

Roger Upchurch (08:46)
Well, I…

I think I like new construction better, but to fix them flips is rewarding because right now I’m doing a house that’s a 2,500 square foot house built back in like 1920 or something like that. So we’ve done a lot of work on it and it’s challenging to take something like that and turn it into a really nice house. we just had it staged yesterday and we’ve got putting it on the market and things like that.

but it’s a house that I bought for, well this particular house is I’m doing for another investor, I just got one working now that I’m buying it for 65. We’re gonna put about 70 in it. The after repair value is gonna be about 225 to 250.

Stephen Schmidt (09:39)
What would you say was the biggest risk you took early on? Like you worked with dad for a long time, obviously, like basically grew up in the business. But then when you went out on your own, what would you say was the biggest risk that you took early on?

Roger Upchurch (09:51)
Well, probably, you know, when I left in Newcastle, Billy Nowz’s, the economy was down again. That was in like,

1981, economy really went down again and interest rates were like 18%. So once I got a few years later, moved to Indianapolis. My biggest challenge was I wanted to build homes around the lake there, big homes, and I didn’t have like the experience in building big homes there. And I didn’t know if I’d qualify for a loan yet. And here’s the funny story.

A good friend of mine lived in Newcastle and they moved over to Indianapolis. Very wealthy guy and his name was Seymour. And we went out one evening to Red Lobster and I said Seymour I want to build a house here in Indianapolis. don’t know if I can go get a construction loan or not on my own. Would you maybe cosign for me? And he said no I’m not gonna cosign for you. Then he pulled his checkbook out and wrote

me a check for $100,000. I’ll be your banker.” So that started, I built my first house in near Geist and he was my banker and we did maybe 20, 30 houses together and he was a banker. I didn’t go to a bank. He just used his money to build the houses. That’s an interesting story. So that’s basically how I got started building the bigger houses in Indianapolis.

Stephen Schmidt (12:00)
No kidding. Yeah, did.

Sure. Did he, because one of the things I know that some private money lenders will do is they do like an equity split. So is that kind of the structure of how you guys did those deals is he would write a check and you’d do an equity split on the profit once it sold?

Roger Upchurch (12:20)
Yeah, ⁓

I don’t remember all the details of how we did it, but there was a small equity split at the end and he had like, we’ve come up with a certain fee that he used to charge for the money that he used. Today on the fix and flips that I’m doing, I have a hard money lender and they’ll loan so much money, like 80 to 100 % of the purchase price. Then pretty much all of them do 100 % on the rehab.

Stephen Schmidt (12:27)
Yeah.

Roger Upchurch (12:52)
cost up to say a 75 % LTV.

Stephen Schmidt (12:56)
Sure.

Okay. So like how do you decide on that note, like which opportunities now today are actually like worth pursuing with the current economy?

Roger Upchurch (13:09)
Now, let’s take that again.

Stephen Schmidt (13:11)
How do you decide which opportunities today, like with the current economy, are actually worth pursuing?

Roger Upchurch (13:17)
Well, it’s just searching for the right hard money lender, searching for the right property, the right numbers on the property, just where the numbers come out right. Like I said, the one I’m getting ready to do now, it’s purchase price is 65. The rehab cost is about 70. And then after repair value is about 225. So there’s $30,000, $40,000 profit at the end if I get it done pretty quickly.

the lender. ⁓

like I said, they’ll run loan anywhere from this particular line of work now is going to low 90 % so 10 % down and ⁓ There is ways of doing some other lenders ⁓ a gap loan to where you can get in the house at a hundred percent no money down and then no money for us Payments and stuff like that can be at the end So but just depends on that so many different hard money lenders out there the understraits the interest rate on

on a fixed and flipped loan doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t care what’s 8 % or 12 % because that’s not a lot of money if you get the house done quick. the object is to get the house done as fast as possible, say within 90 days. It doesn’t matter what the interest rate is. The points can be little, points can be anywhere from one to six points. And that’s where you gotta really be careful about on the points that the lender charges you.

Stephen Schmidt (14:30)
for sure.

Right. Success Love Speed is something that one of my mentors, long-standing mentors, the last 14 years has always told me. So I can see why you say that. And obviously the goal isn’t to sit on the property for 18 months. So if that’s not the case, get it done, get it out, and go do the next.

Roger Upchurch (15:07)
Well, then

you’re in the Midas category if you’re doing that for 18 months.

Stephen Schmidt (15:12)
Right. Yeah, no kidding. So well on that note, like what types of deals are you avoiding right now and why?

Roger Upchurch (16:03)
I don’t, I really don’t know if I’ve got any deals that I’m avoiding. I wanna actually, with the house I just experienced, I tried to wanna, I’m gonna avoid, I don’t wanna be the first house that’s, ⁓

rehabbed in a neighborhood. I want to be towards the end of the house. I look for other houses around that. I can bring my house up to the standards, but I can’t bring the other houses standards up to my house, if you know what I’m saying. So you’re avoiding the neighborhood that if it’s an up and coming neighborhood and 80 % of the houses already rehabbed, that’s great. But if none of the houses are rehabbed on it, then that’s one maybe I want to avoid because I don’t want to be the first one.

Stephen Schmidt (16:48)
Yeah,

totally. ⁓ What would you say that you’re doing now, today, maybe in the past you wouldn’t have believed was the right thing to do in business? Like what are you doing today that your past self wouldn’t have believed?

Roger Upchurch (17:08)
Well, I don’t really know how to answer that question. know, it’s just trying to make a good living and profit in this business. I don’t know. I don’t know to answer that.

Stephen Schmidt (17:23)
Okay, let me ask you this then, because let’s look towards the future then. So what does growth look like for you in the next, let’s say, 12 to 24 months? I know you got a lot of exciting things going on, so what do you really see for yourself in the next couple years?

Roger Upchurch (17:35)
Well, construction business has always been my passion. really, even today, I enjoy working on houses.

⁓ But I want to get back into the music business and ⁓ I’ve got a charity called Rescue Success. It’s a 501c3 charity that we help other people and ⁓ help people that’s been through the justice system or going through the justice system, people that’s down and out, maybe with diseases or… ⁓

you know, alcoholic or something like that, that we can help. And that’s what I want to do. I work with another charity called Cars for Heroes. We give cars away to needy veterans and we do that mostly at concerts. And I want to get back into promoting the concerts and things like that. I’ve got one coming up with Hennel Lee Summer on July the 19th at actually at the Harley-Davidson in Indianapolis with they have a big stage and everything in the back and a bar and everything.

So the construction business has made all this happen and that’s what I want to pursue in my life after that. I may never get rid of my hammer, so I’ll be in the construction business until I die, but I want to do other things as well.

Stephen Schmidt (18:59)
So when things get tough, because you’ve you’ve been through market crashes, you’ve been around the block, right? And so like when things have gotten tough in business or whatever, like how have you stayed motivated? What do do to stay motivated when things aren’t going your way, let’s call it?

Roger Upchurch (19:20)
Well, things don’t go my way a lot.

I make a lot of mistakes, but I’m a very positive person. I always try to make a positive out of a negative. ⁓ I don’t worry about the past, the houses or something, I’ve lost money or not made a profit on a job. That’s gone. There’s to do about it. I just want to concentrate on what I can do better in the future ⁓ within my life, whether it’s construction business or the music business or whatever.

If you just keep a positive attitude and work towards your goals, to achieve your goals and make standard goals that you can achieve, you can do well.

Stephen Schmidt (20:05)
⁓ So I know you mentioned in the last bit that you probably will never get rid of your hammer, right? Like you’ll be in the business till you die to some extent. Now maybe that might not be as like in an active role you’re actually, you know, in the houses and hanging drywall or whatever. But ⁓ what would you say with everything that you’ve got going on? What do you want your legacy to be?

Roger Upchurch (20:31)
Who am I, my legacy be?

Stephen Schmidt (20:33)
Yeah, what do you want your legacy to be in this space? What’s your mark on this space that you want to leave?

Roger Upchurch (20:40)
⁓ I’m not sure of that either. I just want to be known as a good builder, a good husband. ⁓

good person and ⁓ that I’ve accomplished like a lot of things. I mean, it feels good that I can drive down the street and say, I built that house from scratch, you know. ⁓ So it’s hard to say answer that question, but it’s also good to say that I know Johnny Rivers, I know 38 Special, I know the governor of Indiana, ⁓

Stephen Schmidt (21:04)
Mm.

Roger Upchurch (21:20)
the mayor of Indianapolis. ⁓ I went out of Judd, came to my concert and gave me a big hug. So it feels good that I know all these celebrities and stuff. ⁓ But, you know, that’s it.

Stephen Schmidt (21:38)
So if you

had to go back to the beginning, like when you first got started, and maybe not when you were a teenager, but maybe when you went out on your own, let’s call it, and let’s say you had to go back there, but you could take all the lessons that you’ve brought, all the experience, all the wisdom that you’ve learned over the years, and you had to do something different, and you had to do something the same. What would you do different, and what would you do the same in your business?

Roger Upchurch (22:04)
I would not do anything different because I loved what I did. I loved the building business. I loved doing the music business. I think probably the best thing that I would do different would be a better ⁓ finance person in the business. That’s probably one of my downfalls. I’m not probably the best person to take care of the finances. I’m a generous person and… ⁓

Stephen Schmidt (22:20)
Mmm.

Roger Upchurch (22:31)
I’ve had a lot of money and there’s times I’ve not had a lot of money. So that’s probably my biggest downfall. didn’t ⁓ invest and keep a nest egg like a lot of people do.

Stephen Schmidt (22:35)
Mm.

Sure. Do you feel like moving into different businesses like ultimately was a distraction that you would have done something even bigger like in the space? Had you stayed in it? Is that part of your reasoning?

Roger Upchurch (22:56)
Had it stayed in the music business or the construction business?

Stephen Schmidt (23:00)
Well, because I think the music business is a little bit of a completely different field, but you mentioned like you wish you would have like stuck to it and not got out of it originally. So referring to the obviously the building at first, you feel like if you wouldn’t have gotten involved in anything else until you started doing the music business, because that’s kind of a second passion for you, do you feel like things would have been different had you just stuck with it and stayed in?

Roger Upchurch (23:25)
If, you know, I built my first house, I think in 1972, it was a spec house. That was on my own after building house with that. Again,

probably what I should have done to stick to it. then back in 2009 when the economy crashed, again, I didn’t have a big nest egg to keep me going from everything was down. That’s probably my biggest thing that I didn’t invest my money correctly ⁓ to make a living to retire ⁓ properly. so that’s probably the worst thing that I did not do is, and I’ve

Stephen Schmidt (24:09)
Mm.

Roger Upchurch (24:14)
⁓ I’ve always made a lot of money. I spend a lot of money. ⁓ If I want to go out have a nice steak, I go out and have a nice steak. I’m not a conservative type person that way. So that’s probably my biggest downfall that I didn’t be more conservative on that.

Stephen Schmidt (24:24)
Right.

Yeah, I

like to say that when you’re upkeep When or when you’re when your outgo exceeds your income your upkeep becomes your downfall, right? Because I’m the same exact way, you know, it’s and it’s tough to be in this season too like even my wife and I were looking at how often we eat out and We’re like, you know if we just stopped doing this for a short season of time

Roger Upchurch (24:45)
You’re right. Exactly.

Stephen Schmidt (24:59)
and we just reallocated those funds towards other things. Like we would probably within a few short years and not that we wouldn’t go do it, you know, not that we wouldn’t go do it at all, but like be more strategic about it. Like only on date nights or only here and only that, and then be disciplined like during the rest of the time. Like we wouldn’t have, you know, we wouldn’t have certain other financial pressures of things that would be nice to have that also aren’t necessary, but we would just be able to invest our money better. You know what I mean?

Roger Upchurch (25:12)
Right.

Exactly. Yeah, that’s something I wish I’d done is invest my money better and let it grow. And I didn’t, but again, like I said before, I can’t worry about what’s in the past. I can’t worry about what’s already done. All I gotta worry about today is today and tomorrow and what I’m gonna do after that. ⁓ and that’s where we’re at.

Stephen Schmidt (25:42)
What’s ahead?

You bet.

So if people want to connect with you, learn more about what you’re working on, everything you’ve got upcoming, you want to just do a plug for some of those things and then where they can find you.

Roger Upchurch (25:59)
Sure, can find me. I’ve got three websites actually. rescuesuccess.org is the 501c3 charity and ⁓ you can find all the information there on about the concerts and things like that. And rogerwupchurch.com is basically about me. I’ve got two books written and you can buy them on Amazon or wherever books are sold. So if you go there, then you can see a little more history about me and what I’ve done. And deseretcords.com is ⁓

recording studio that or record label that I’m reviving I had it before and so there’s a three websites and you can see the concerts and leave more about me and even there’s some parts in there about the construction business as well

Stephen Schmidt (26:47)
Out of curiosity, being in the music business, this is personal question. It’ll be my last one before we wrap up. But what is your favorite genre? What do you actually like to bump? Rock and roll.

Roger Upchurch (26:57)
Rock and

Rock and roll, the Rolling Stones, but I’m also a blues guy too. I really like blues. A good friend of mine, which was the best blues artist around, died about a year and a half ago. His name is Gene Deer, if you look him up. ⁓ He opened up for, I did a concert with Johnny Rivers and he opened up for him out in Phoenix, Arizona. But blues, blues and rock and roll.

Stephen Schmidt (27:28)
Love it. Okay. I lied one last question So ⁓ I would say that it’s evolved when I was five years old I I wrote my first country song and Then I actually had a short-lived and you’re gonna laugh at this but I actually had a short-lived rap career when I was in high school and I actually put out four albums that are still available somewhere, but I never tell anybody how to find them

Roger Upchurch (27:30)
What is your favorite genre? Country?

Cool.

Stephen Schmidt (27:57)
⁓ in the actual Well, it was just it was an interesting deal and and the music I created back then I think was was great for who I was then but it’s not necessarily a reflection of who I am now Even though what I like about what I did so it was a it was gospel hip-hop actually too I performed in churches all over Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas growing up and ⁓

Roger Upchurch (27:57)
Well, why not?

Right.

That’s cool, that’s good.

Stephen Schmidt (28:20)
And so it was a really cool experience and what I’m really grateful for is it’s music that I can actually share with my four kids now and I can actually play it for them. And like it’s not inappropriate for them to listen to, know, so it’s kind of cool. ⁓ You know, we’ll see about if I ever pick a microphone back up this one actually that I’m using as a condenser that I recorded some of those songs on. I got the website pulled up. Well, we might have to talk at another time, but.

Roger Upchurch (28:27)
Yeah.

Right.

Well, let’s get you on, let’s get you on the record label. Look up deathinrecords.com.

Yeah. I’m not actually promoting a country artist, Sammy Sadler. ⁓ He’s actually had a book out there called Murder on Music Row, and that’s in Nashville, ⁓

Stephen Schmidt (28:50)
Anyway, so yeah, would say go ahead.

Sounds familiar.

Okay. Yeah.

Roger Upchurch (29:05)
He was his partner was shot and killed and he was shot in arm and that’s why it’s called murder or music road. But look him up Sammy Sadler. He’s a. You know, original country artist. Yes.

Stephen Schmidt (29:20)
Sammy Sadler, I’ll have to look him

up because I do usually what I listen to to and from work is I usually do listen to country so so I’ll check his stuff out but anyways, I man I’m grateful that you came on great for a conversation will have would love to you know have a further conversation maybe on another podcast in another time and And revisit and go more into your story, but I appreciate you being here and for all of our listeners Hope you guys got as much value out of this as I did and we’ll see you guys on the next episode

Roger Upchurch (29:38)
yeah.

Well, let’s do that. like I said, one thing I did not mention, I have a podcast as well, Rescue Discess, and I’d to have you on our podcast as a guest.

Stephen Schmidt (29:57)
We’d love to. We’ll do it. We’ll set it up. We’ll see everybody in the next episode. Thanks Roger. We’ll talk a little more after the show.

Roger Upchurch (30:00)
All right, thanks, Stephen. Bye-bye.

See ya.