From Bad Landlord to Real Estate Success: An Inspiring Journey

Stephen Schmidt (00:03.458)
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 like a bad habit Back again, and I got the legendary James Jones in the house today. That’s right and No, not technically the one that is the most lethal person on planet Earth Although I’m telling you what this guy could kill you with the smile

I’m telling you what, he’s got one of the best smiles, best laughs I’ve had on the show and we’re going to get into a great conversation. He’s been in the real estate space for over 20 years, has a lock tight property management company and doing all of the stuff. And he’s actually achieved so much success within this space that he actually chooses to take contracts and do other work because it’s not challenging him enough, which we’re going to get into as well. I hope I’m not de-edifying him there. I mean that with all the grace and love in the world, but

James Jones (00:26.786)
you

Stephen Schmidt (00:56.162)
We’re going to get right into it. Just remember before we do folks 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 the lives they’ve always dreamed of. And with that being said, the second most deadly Jim Jones. Welcome to the show, James.

James Jones (01:12.654)
Hey, how you doing, Mr. Smith?

Stephen Schmidt (01:15.778)
It’s actually John Jones is who I think I’m thinking of. You know I’m talking about John Jones. Is that who it is John Jones. I love it. Well you’re you’re you’re the second most lethal person with the last name of Jones. We’ll go with that. At least at least we can go that way. You ever get into boxing. You ever do any of that or just real estate and logistics.

James Jones (01:18.796)
Yeah, John, John Bowen Jones. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

James Jones (01:29.592)
Yes.

Yeah.

no, not anything professional, but yes, I love training boxing.

Stephen Schmidt (01:40.61)
Oh, do you really? No, okay. See, I called it. I knew it. I knew it, folks. I can read it. Oh my goodness, James. Well, thanks so much for being here. We appreciate having you on the show, decided to interview you and glean some lessons. But the first question I always have is what got you started in this space in the first place? And how’d you get to where you’re at today where, if it would be fair to say, it’s almost as if you’re

James Jones (01:42.028)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

James Jones (01:52.395)
thanks for the invite.

Stephen Schmidt (02:10.985)
not challenged enough, you’re bored, so you gotta go create other problems for yourself to solve. So, how’d you get to that level?

James Jones (02:18.664)
Okay, it was it was actually pretty easy when I was a kid we had a I Hate to make it sound like that but We’re getting where I am was easy So when I was about eight, I didn’t when I was about eight

Stephen Schmidt (02:24.977)
I what? man this is super easy man. I made one Facebook post and…

James Jones (02:42.702)
I had a vision about what I wanted to do. When I was 16, I experienced what a bad landlord does and what they do. I wrote a whole paragraph and then that paragraph created a whole operation on how I was going to be different and how I was going to affect the whole community. yeah, 16. So at 18, I already implemented it. By 20, I was already moving forward in it. And then you fast forward that by

Stephen Schmidt (02:50.241)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Schmidt (02:59.571)
at 16.

James Jones (03:12.63)
just buying properties, renovating properties, expressing my interest, people looking at what I can do and then buying into the idea. And then you fast forward that by a couple of years. So by 10 years in, we was already pretty much settled. And then the next 10 years, we just continued to grow.

Stephen Schmidt (03:31.841)
Dude, what the heck? So this was like, I mean, I’m sorry, I’ve never met anybody that grew up and was like, my dream is to be a property manager. But like, that’s almost like what happened to you almost.

James Jones (03:45.654)
Because our landlord didn’t, he didn’t treat us correctly. So some people.

Stephen Schmidt (03:52.289)
Can I ask what happened or is that still like a traumatic thing for you to have to live through?

James Jones (03:55.79)
Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it’s not dramatic. So we got a common term in the Midwest. We call them slumlords. Those are people who do the bare minimum to every property and the property suffer, but they still want tenants to pay top dollar. And this guy argued for no apparent reason about his property. His property had broken foundation. It caused a lot of problems. It had water damage and he just wouldn’t fix it. And then he always argued about the rent.

Stephen Schmidt (04:03.844)
huh.

Stephen Schmidt (04:07.796)
Right.

Stephen Schmidt (04:11.583)
Right.

James Jones (04:25.422)
So from then I was like, okay, if I ever get a chance, this is what the opportunity will look like, this is what it’s gonna do, and this is what we’re gonna impact the community in. once I got everything written out, it was actually just executing, executing, executing. And then fast forward was my 18th birthday, and then that’s when everything exploded, because that’s when I did contract.

Stephen Schmidt (04:48.245)
You’re like, I can sign contracts now, it’s off to the races.

James Jones (04:50.7)
Yeah, because I knew what I wanted to do. I knew what I wanted to do. It was clear as day. No one could stop me. My mama, she still had a couple of reservations, but I was already out. I was already out making a lot of waves for myself in the property management field. So by the time you start fast forward, and I was already buying my own property, getting other people to buy into my vision, and then opening up the doors that way.

So later on, surprisingly enough, the last contract I took was I think like six months ago, like in September. So I just took contracts because I don’t really got a lot. I don’t got a lot going on, but you always want to stay busy. Always want to stay on your toes.

Stephen Schmidt (05:34.507)
So, let me ask you this, how many, if you don’t mind sharing, how many doors are you managing at this point?

James Jones (05:41.774)
Right now the the max is 300 it depends on contract. So the max is 300 the low end is just 100

Stephen Schmidt (05:48.874)
Okay, now are these long-term properties or do you ever have to replace them with other stuff? mean you got to 300 and then did you decide hey I’m not going to scale to a thousand because this is what I have capacity for? Is it because they’re all located where you’re at? Tell us a little bit about that.

James Jones (06:11.262)
no, so we’re in three different states currently. it’s just a lot going on. So we’re in three different states. the biggest thing that we do is we start in one city, we buy property in the city, and we hire local people in local areas to improve the money situation in every area. if we buy in, let’s say, Chicago, we hire all Chicago contractors, plumbers, renovators, architects, everybody got to be local

Chicago, we do the same thing in Racine, same thing in Milwaukee. We got something going on in Minnesota, so everything happens that way. And that way we can build, the individual communities can build and grow in their own wealth.

Stephen Schmidt (06:55.445)
Hmm. Wow. So.

So you’re at 300, are these long-term people that have been with you a while?

James Jones (07:03.698)
no, no. it used to be 300. It’s actually reduced now to about maybe roughly 100. And the reason for that is because I believe I expended too fast that some owners wasn’t in line with the vision. And since they’re not in line with the vision, I don’t really need the money. So if they’re not in line with the vision, it’s better for them to hire another management company instead of using our name but not wanting to buy into the vision.

Stephen Schmidt (07:18.166)
Hmm.

Stephen Schmidt (07:33.237)
Yeah, now where’s, I know you’re married and you got some kids, where’s your wife at in all this whole deal? What does she want you to be doing?

James Jones (07:38.99)
She’s at the house. She’s she’s here. She’s she’s chillin

Stephen Schmidt (07:44.586)
No, but like where is she at like with your business and you work in a job at the same time? Well, contracts, right? Taking contract. Where is she at with all this? Like when you got when it’s nine thirty and the kids are down and she’s looking at you and she’s like, James, here’s what needs to happen. Like, what is that conversation?

James Jones (08:03.458)
it looks pretty much like that. Hey James, this will neither happen. I mean, it definitely looks the same. Now, I do get a little more leeway, or I may get a little leeway depending on the day or the situation, but.

Stephen Schmidt (08:07.713)
That’s how looks for me and my wife too, by the way.

Stephen Schmidt (08:22.091)
Mm-hmm.

James Jones (08:22.732)
Yeah, she really keeps, she’s my helping hand that makes sure I stay in line and I don’t go too crazy. Cause I have been known to do 36 to 48 hours of just working and just getting used to it. So she is really, really a helping hand in pulling that in and making sure I like I eat dinner or I go to sleep and I wake up. She’s, yeah, I can definitely get the bacon and bring the meat home. I’m just not a good cook.

Stephen Schmidt (08:29.707)
Yeah.

Stephen Schmidt (08:42.549)
Right.

James Jones (08:52.656)
I guess that’s the best way to put it.

Stephen Schmidt (08:54.143)
I’ve never heard it put like that, but I kind of like it. I’m probably going to steal it too. I can, I can bring the bacon home and I can get the meat, but I just ain’t a good cook. What a great line. That is such a good line. Man. So on that note, what’s, what’s next for you?

James Jones (08:57.006)
You

James Jones (09:06.286)
That’s not a good…

James Jones (09:15.726)
I’ve secretly, well I shouldn’t say secretly, I’ve been trying to take over, not take over, I guess the best way to, I want to partner with a bank to build a bank’s essence from the ground up, build them up into an entity that can actually help out different communities. So that’s where I’m at right now, I’m trying to partner with different banks to see how they can impact the community that they’re in and just give a lot more things back because we don’t.

Stephen Schmidt (09:44.193)
How would you see that playing out? What does that look like?

James Jones (09:47.156)
I would say easy, but I think everything in life is easy. Even nos are easy. I just need somebody to say it. So the way it plays out is, so let’s say a bank isn’t utilizing the right products. Well, if they are to start utilizing the right products, I can shift money into that bank, which would give that bank more collateral to use to invest. it’s more of a friendly partnership.

We can definitely grow the community if I can grow the community through the bank. If the bank is willing to leverage itself to help out the community, then we can leverage ourselves and bring in some of our partnerships and put more money into the bank.

Stephen Schmidt (10:15.105)
Hmm.

Stephen Schmidt (10:28.395)
You talk a lot about.

You talk a lot about doing things in the community. What are some of those things that you’re doing in the community already that you would like to do more of? Or what have you not been able to do because you have a restriction on the right money partners or whatever that looks like? What does that look like for you?

James Jones (10:47.438)
So my biggest, what I’m doing right now is we do a lot of sponsorships. Little League, football, those are, they come to us, we got a lot of sponsorships in that area, different events that may be happening, we have sponsorship programs in that.

Stephen Schmidt (10:53.068)
huh.

James Jones (11:04.238)
On top of that we do speaking engagements to help people have a better financial understanding and financial literacy. We do a podcast every Friday called Financial Fridays that we do on YouTube or Facebook and then that gives people more financial knowledge. On top of that we also do small courses to help people become more financially aware and what I would like to do is find the

right person that I could start who can aid me in doing that because there are I know that there’s a lot of good people out there who are in better financial situations who can also help more people so I really want to empower those people that are out there like you.

Stephen Schmidt (11:52.282)
Mmm, man, I appreciate that. You know, you made a comment to me before we opt on the show and you’re like, man You know, you just like seemed younger than me because you’d like exude all this industry and here you are laughing as you’re talking man Like just big old smile. Like you’re just such a happy guy, man You’re kind of guy you just want to be around, you know, where does that joy come from?

James Jones (12:12.366)
I’m

James Jones (12:16.38)
that’s a, I hate to say it, everything is so easy, but when you get past the struggle, yeah, cause…

Stephen Schmidt (12:22.731)
Cause I just have this perspective that you know what could be a whole lot worse and so that’s why I smile Steve.

James Jones (12:28.83)
I because I’ve been through worse people people don’t understand when When you’ve been through worse and now you got I’m not gonna say everything you think of but people don’t know when you’re struggling. Let’s say when you’re financially struggling You’re you still have character you still have integrity. It’s just you’re struggling financially It’s when you start getting out of those financial struggles and now you just

Stephen Schmidt (12:31.861)
You bet.

James Jones (12:53.774)
You can sit at home all day and like, nope, it’s all good. Or you can speak and you be like, nope, it’s all good. And then that brings like a new level. like, what do you want to do today? Whatever I want to do today. And then that, it just brings like a new level of joy that you’re always trying to help somebody. Cause you got to give yourself something to do. I don’t want to get retired and not do anything.

Stephen Schmidt (13:16.479)
I’m with you on that man. A hundred percent, dude. You know, I’ve, I’ve slept on floors for months at a time and hotel rooms worked the hardest jobs out there, worked a hundred hour weeks. you know, but I’ve, lived it myself and that’s kind of the perspective that I have as well. It’s like what I’m really trying to instill in my kids too, cause some of them are at the age they can sort of understand that now too. And it’s like,

When I get home, there’s just nothing that grinds my gears like a kid after I haven’t eaten literally all day. And I get home and then I’m something after they’ve already been fed. And they’re like, you’re eating that no fair. And I’m like, let me tell you about these kids in Kenya right now, buddy. Okay. I haven’t even eaten all day. You don’t see me complaining about that. And it’s like, what? You wouldn’t even want this anyways. I’m eating a tortilla with a piece of ham inside of it. Like, dude, you had.

James Jones (13:58.286)
Yeah.

Stephen Schmidt (14:11.899)
Gourmet meal your mom put together chicken nuggets. Yeah, I wish I could have had that but we’re out now cuz you ate them But I think it’s just it’s perspective right like it’s the perspective of realizing you could have it so much worse and In seasons of life, you probably have had it so much worse, right?

James Jones (14:27.073)
Yeah.

James Jones (14:32.46)
Yeah, people, but that’s the fun part because no one sees the struggle. They only see the success, especially in this day and age.

Stephen Schmidt (14:39.297)
100%.

James Jones (14:42.606)
When I was talking about it, imagine me at 16 saying, hey, we’re going to take over the Midwest. We’re going do this. And you like, yeah, yeah, that’s those are your dreamer. Right. And then at 18, when I’m like, hey guys, I got this plan. This is how this, I was going to work this out. And they were like, go show me. But then I’m 25 and now I’m, I’m in the process. And some people, some people are getting with the program, but some people are more reluctant. But now when you hit 30 and now the process is going and now I, now I bought out, now I bought out one company.

Stephen Schmidt (14:48.246)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Stephen Schmidt (15:00.043)
right.

James Jones (15:12.56)
And now they’re oh, I think it’s something there. But when I turned 35, it was already too late because you already had years of watching me in action. So now I bought out another company and we’re renovating the company that I bought out and we’re pushing everything out. And that was too late to say, oh, I think you’re doing really well. Like, yeah, that’s, I wanted you to know that decades ago, not when everybody can see it.

Stephen Schmidt (15:34.473)
Right. Yeah. Imagine if you would have came along for the ride. Ha ha. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I’m 100 percent with you there, man. So.

James Jones (15:39.636)
Yeah! That would have been a benefit.

Stephen Schmidt (15:51.531)
Such a great interview. I’m having a lot of fun with this. This is James.

If you could leave your biggest mark on your community, what is it that you really want people to know you?

James Jones (16:11.032)
I was going to add Mike Tyson quote, just know I exist. if I can leave my mark, now I don’t really know how your agri-rules work, my biggest mark is God-centered. So I want people to know that God exists and that out of every crazy thing they got going on, if they just believe and they do what they’re, if they believe in God and they do what God is telling them to do.

and they apply themselves. The biggest thing is to apply. It’s not enough to just know and believe, it’s to apply themselves. That they can achieve a lot more than they think. Because, yeah. Yeah, the world is going out here.

Stephen Schmidt (16:47.553)
100 % man I totally I Totally agree with you on that man And you know honestly some of y’all’s attitude see it when you when you come to Jesus you get to have an attitude like James You know what I mean? And then you get a smile like James some of y’all need Jesus your smiles or your smiles are so so upside down You’d have to stand on your head in order to smile But you know, I think it’s also the perspective being you know, the more conversations I have

James Jones (17:10.573)
Yes.

Stephen Schmidt (17:16.991)
I’ve gotten down a real interesting spiritual journey myself in the last few years. But you know, the big thing for me, man, is like talking about perspective, too. It’s like we know what the end of the story is. There’s old. It’s actually speaking to another guy who if you heard my last episode of that, you wouldn’t have. But some of the listeners may end up listening to it. I was talking to a guy who’s really good friends with Zig Ziglar. And if you’re familiar with Zig, you know who Zig Ziglar is?

James Jones (17:44.61)
Yeah, I have a good idea who’s XZware is.

Stephen Schmidt (17:48.458)
Okay, so like sales trainer for he was he was a little older, older school. I mean, he was back when they made tapes and CDs and all that kind of stuff, not this digital stuff my generation has. But so he was a sales trainer back in the day and he was one of the most influential sales trainers of all time, really, like a Les Brown type or even even Tony isn’t a sales trainer, but like a Tony Robbins motivational speaker, sales trainer like that was his thing.

And he has this story about how he was watching the Cowboys game and his wife came in and they were down and it was like the third or the fourth quarter and like it looked like they were going to lose. And his wife comes in and it’s like, what is wrong with you? Like you’re not electric right now. And he was just calmly watching the game. And he, he told her like, yeah, but they’re going to win. And she goes, you don’t know that. How could you know that? And he’s like, I just, I know they’re going to win. So I’m not upset that they’re down right now. And anyways,

Time goes on a few more minutes and then come to find out, know, she asked him again, like, really, like, how are you having such such a attitude about this? He goes, because it’s a replay. I’ve already seen how the game ends.

James Jones (18:54.126)
You

Stephen Schmidt (18:55.785)
And they went. So to the point of, you know, having a faith based background, right? Like we already know how it works. Like we already know how who wins. So like, what’s the point of having anything in your day at that stage? You know what I mean? Because you get to walk through life with the perspective of like, because none of it really matters at the end of the day anyways. Right. I hope that’s helpful. Anyways, get off my soapbox here.

James Jones (19:18.786)
Yeah, because the biggest mark we can ever leave is to tell somebody there’s something beyond this, beyond all of this. And I know it’s always easy for the person with money to tell somebody just look beyond the money. It’s always, that’s always easy. But.

Stephen Schmidt (19:28.385)
Mm.

Stephen Schmidt (19:34.965)
Yeah, you bet.

James Jones (19:39.384)
People don’t know that I was smiling when I was in the struggle because I think real estate is just a game. And if you play the game successfully, you’ll win. I let all my heart, all the hardships I ever went through, everything that somebody told me negatively, I just helped. I just let it fuel me to do even more and to go further. one real funny story. When I was buying out a company, the owner that I was buying out said that my system didn’t work.

Stephen Schmidt (19:47.574)
Yeah.

Stephen Schmidt (19:58.348)
You bet.

James Jones (20:06.158)
I told her what my system is and they were like, ah that’ll never work. And I’m like, so does the check clear? Did the check clear? Okay, so I just wanted to make sure. And they were so flabbergasted and I was like, I don’t even understand. I’m buying your company and you’re telling me my system doesn’t work. And I was like, okay.

Stephen Schmidt (20:18.465)
That’s hilarious.

Stephen Schmidt (20:26.485)
That’s quite hilarious and ironic too.

James Jones (20:29.984)
Yeah, and I was perfectly friendly. I was like, I just want to know, did the check clear? And they was like, yeah. I was like, okay, just wanted to make sure. Just wanted to make sure. So, I mean, I think everybody has an opportunity to shine and everybody has an opportunity to dim.

Stephen Schmidt (20:40.882)
my goodness.

James Jones (20:49.834)
I just want everybody around me to shine. So I’m going to try to be as uplifting as I can to make sure everybody around me shine. To all the contractors that work with me, to the staff that work with me, to all even the tenants, the owners. I want to make sure everybody is shining. everybody has a… yeah.

Stephen Schmidt (20:50.091)
Hmm. You’re bad.

Stephen Schmidt (21:04.609)
You better be careful James, we might take these people to church. know, this little light of mine. know, hahahaha. I’m gonna let it shine. Tell you what man, pull out on the… For the record, if any of y’all see me in the street, I’m not a model Christian. Just for the record. I just wanna make that clear. Alright, I’m just a son of Satan by grace, okay?

James Jones (21:27.526)
I think that’s the truth about everybody. If they see me, they’ll be like, who is that smiling guy? He’s always smiling. I know he’s smiling.

Stephen Schmidt (21:34.301)
Oh man, my dad who is um My dad is the purest man I’ve ever met in my life. I mean the dude’s never drank. He’s never smoked He’s never looked poor and he’s gone to church since he was 17 years old and he got saved He’s been married to one woman my mom for 45 years now like It took me 22 years to figure out what my dad’s sin was. I’m not even kidding

James Jones (21:48.625)
No.

James Jones (21:55.022)
You

James Jones (21:59.328)
you

Stephen Schmidt (22:01.401)
And my dad told me about this thing cuz I’m a little bit on I’m a little bit more on the rougher rough around the edges side and He told me and this is so funny that it’s my dad putting out He’s like, know, I saw this cute bumper stick with the other day and I was like, oh really? What was that? He goes and said well, I Solemnly swear a lot

James Jones (22:22.024)
Hahaha!

Stephen Schmidt (22:23.905)
It’s like, yeah, that’s a bumper sticker I’d probably put on my truck. Not gonna lie. So, pretty funny. well, let me ask you this, James. So, what are some of the challenges you’ve had to overcome in your business lately? I know that like kind of at the height, had 300 doors, you’re kind of down to 100 now. Like, what do you really see as the next like 12 to 18 months? What does that look like for you?

James Jones (22:27.266)
Yeah.

James Jones (22:45.166)
In the next 12 to 18 months we gotta buy at least two properties. We’re buy two properties before this year. I got a book. I got one book coming, I got one book about to be published. I got another book that will be published. We got a…

On top of that, got to start the next year. We got to buy another two properties for FY26. So we got another, so it’s two properties for 25, two properties for 26. We got two books for 25. I got a speaking engagement that I got to do. And the biggest hangup is, oh, my mentorship. I don’t have enough, I don’t have enough people.

who’s becoming better, who’s becoming more financially stable. think that’s my biggest, because when I do speak, it’s a lot of people who like the attention, and they come out and they look at the fanfare, basically. And they don’t commit themselves to actually becoming financially stable. think that’s my biggest, that’s the biggest thing that if I could turn around.

Stephen Schmidt (23:48.673)
Yeah.

James Jones (23:53.87)
I would I’d be like I don’t want anybody to come unless you’re actually willing to do it but at the end of the day I’d rather have more people come out and they all can hear and those who are motivated are motivated so how do you motivate the masses to become better?

Stephen Schmidt (24:05.727)
Yeah, you bet. Well.

Stephen Schmidt (24:11.381)
When you figure that out, let me know. I’ll be right there with you I’m trying to figure that out for a decade myself. Um I remember one of the most pivotal conversations I ever had with a friend of mine when I was 17 or 18 is He looked at me and he said Steven. I Just want to be average. I don’t want anything spectacular. I don’t care if I ever live in a nice home I don’t care if I ever drive a fancy car

James Jones (24:11.79)
I

Stephen Schmidt (24:39.393)
I don’t want any of it really. Like I just want to live average. I want to go and I want to work 50 hours a week until the day that I die. And that’s just what I want. And I like like this is one of my best friends when I was 17 and I was like talk about immediately instigating an audit of who you’re hanging around. Right. And I just I’m like I can’t even believe that we’ve spent the last five years hanging out and you would even say something like that to me.

It was the craziest thing I’d ever heard. And straight up, dude’s 30 years old. He drinks five beers a night every single day. And he goes, he works his nine to five and he’s happy as a clam. Divorced once, you know, no harm, no foul, whatever, but divorced within three years of getting married for the first time. And she got the house and you know, he’s on to number two. And it’s just like, man, like.

James Jones (25:09.23)
You

James Jones (25:27.608)
Cool.

Stephen Schmidt (25:37.415)
He manifested everything he ever told me he wanted. It’s crazy. And it kind of almost sometimes makes you wonder like, hmm, there’s kind of a beauty in the simplicity of it. I just not for me.

James Jones (25:40.258)
You

James Jones (25:51.086)
my goodness, I don’t the funny part is I can name all of my friends So and all of them are doing well, right? Yeah, I think I think the the the way it works is that You as you as you’re pursuing your friends who just not like they’re not they’re not pursuers Like I call everybody I always say hello to all my grinders out there because I like

Stephen Schmidt (26:00.854)
Really?

James Jones (26:18.188)
I like the grind. just can’t. Me taking a day off is a day. I’m just not on vacation. I’m always about what I need to do. And I got friends starting businesses. I got friends becoming CEOs. I got friends becoming COOs. I got friends being managers. And that’s just the group of guys. I got one guy who does real estate on a whole other level than me. And those are the guys that I…

socialize with. I mean, we went to high school together and we got guys who are DJing, like they got their own company and I think that is, I think it’s a guy named, I forgot his name. I want to say John Bryant, John Hope Bryant. He said, if you hang around nine broke people, you’ll be the 10th. If you hang around nine rich people.

Stephen Schmidt (26:48.321)
All right, totally.

James Jones (27:08.93)
you’ll be the 10th. And that is very true. The people you hang around often influences your ideas. And I’m just fortunate enough, fortunate enough, not say fortunate, fortunate enough that when I was going through my crazy phase, all those friends faded away and all the real friends kind of like, yeah, you can do better than that. And then that’s what grew what I had going on.

Stephen Schmidt (27:26.973)
Right. You got.

Man, your point, it took me a decade, but I’m telling you, out of every friend that I have nowadays, even for myself, if they have a job, it’s because they also have a business. And most of them are entrepreneurs doing crazy stuff. So I am 100 % with you on that, man. It’s the birds of a feather flock together, right? And I just outgrew some of those other relationships from my childhood, you know? And that’s okay.

James Jones (27:54.51)
Yeah!

James Jones (27:59.182)
I mean, people don’t know how hard it is to be the front friend that is always footin’ the bill. The one friend that is always leanin’ like, dude, I like being around people where I don’t have to foot the bill. We all could just pay, or one of us can pay, and it becomes…

Stephen Schmidt (28:08.427)
for sure.

James Jones (28:18.932)
It’s not even a hassle. just we eat food, it’s gonna get paid. Like there’s no, it’s not a bunch of takers. And I think that’s the benefit when you’re with.

Stephen Schmidt (28:23.957)
Right.

Stephen Schmidt (28:27.649)
You bet.

Stephen Schmidt (28:35.329)
Oh, yeah, dude, when we go out to eat with our families and stuff like, dude, all of my friends now, I’m proud to say I don’t think I have a single one where we’re not all fighting over who picks the bell up. You know what I mean? So 100 % with you.

James Jones (28:50.88)
You

Stephen Schmidt (28:54.741)
We lost him again. That’s all right. My team will my team will cut it together. We’re all good. But James, we’re actually over time anyway. So this is just like perfect timing. But where can these fine folks connect with you for more learn about what you’re working on or just connect with.

James Jones (28:55.264)
Yes, that was definitely indifferent.

James Jones (29:09.28)
easy, website is jljpus.com. There they’ll find a host of information. if you go to jljp.com, you’ll get the full name is Jehovah, Lord Jesus Properties. The abbreviation is JLJP. Yeah, yeah, I know. Yeah, I made it all about God. Everything is about God. Everything is about God because everything is centered around the oneness.

So you’re see three keys and the three keys got three names for the three keys. It is Grafai, Logos, and Reima. So those are the three keys for JOJP. You go to the website. Everything you can look for is on there. We have…

JOJP, have MindUs, we have Renovar, we have Oasis, and we have Windows. So those are all individually based. You can go to general, they can go to anyone, and they’re all designed to fulfill what everybody’s request is. So if you wanna just build out an idea, if you need mentorship, you need guidance, you need me to do any logistical projects, everything is on that one website. You go in, type in, and we’ll get everybody situated for you.

Don’t worry. I have a good staff and they they’re really good at what they do

Stephen Schmidt (30:25.921)
You bet.

All right, folks, we’ll go show them some love from the real estate pros and the Investor Fuel community. Appreciate you coming on, James, and looking forward to a long relationship with you and mutually beneficial friendship here. So go connect with the folks. Thanks for being here, and we’ll see you all in the next episode.

James Jones (30:46.356)
Thanks.