5 Key Lessons from an NBA Player Turned Real Estate Investor

Dylan Silver (00:01.742)
Hey folks, welcome back to the show. I’m your host, Dylan Silver. And today on the show, it’s my honor to have Devin Durant, real estate investor and retired NBA player and has been named one of the most 50 influential sports figures in Utah by Sports Illustrated and inducted into the Utah Sports Hall of Fame in 2016. Devin, welcome to the show.

Devin Durrant (00:31.972)
It’s good to be here Dylan, I look forward to visiting today.

Dylan Silver (00:35.67)
Absolutely. Let’s start at the top. And we talked about this a little bit before hopping on here, but how did you get into real estate investing?

Devin Durrant (00:45.38)
Well, years ago, many years ago now, I was playing basketball professionally. And in between two seasons, my wife and I were staying with my brother and his family. And I noticed a book on his bookshelf. And it was entitled Creating Wealth. It was written by Robert Allen. And I just started to read through it. And it changed my world.

I thought he presented a vision that was very attractive to me in that book. And I remember I couldn’t even sleep after reading that book. But I thought to myself, know, I’m still playing basketball, but when that ends, this is something that I want to do. I want to be a real estate investor. And that book was really what set me on the path. I grew up as you know,

to make money I mowed lawns and so this idea that I could buy a piece of property and maybe clean up the yard and make it nicer and sell it and make a profit I really like that idea so grateful to Robert Allen who set me on the course

Dylan Silver (02:02.798)
And so you mentioned you were reading this book while you were a professional athlete, right? At that point in time, are you thinking, well, I really got to wait till I retire to dive in here or are you getting the wheels in motion prior to leaving professional sports?

Devin Durrant (02:20.45)
The wheels were in motion, but it was simply in my head. I thought to myself, this is where I want to land later because things were changing too fast. As a basketball player, you’re getting cut from one team. And in my case, I went and played for a couple of seasons in Europe. And so I wasn’t really able to.

to land in one place for too long. But that was the target. Is once I settle down, then I want to start buying some property.

Dylan Silver (02:58.414)
Do you remember that first deal?

Devin Durrant (03:01.496)
Yes, yes, you never forget your first deal deal right Dylan so This the first one I you know I was I read this book and I was excited about it. I told my wife about it Said we need to buy a property. I finally had a What what my wife would call a real job so we had our own home and and basketball was behind us and

I came home one day and my wife said, the house across the street is going up for sale. And I said, wow, let’s take a look at it. And one thing led to another. We had an opportunity right at our doorstep pretty much. And we ended up buying the house directly across the street from us. And I got to go in and do a little work on it. remember.

sheet rocking this little garage area and and then we we got our first Tenants in there and and had a cash flowing property. It was it was quite exciting. I had a day job as a software salesman and But I love my night job I’d come home and get out the spreadsheet and start running numbers on on our first real estate investment and it went from there

Dylan Silver (04:30.092)
And so you had that property was on the same street that you’re living on. I know this is a good strategy for people that are looking for buyers for properties because I’ve done it. You say who owns property around here? You know, they also own this company or they do this. Would they be interested in buying the adjacent distressed property or vacant land or whatever the case may be? And then you just go to them. And I’ve sold deals. I’m a wholesaler by trade. I’ve sold deals that way. And so

You would have been one of the people that I would have said, I’ve got this home, it’s across the street, do you want to take a look at it?

Devin Durrant (05:05.027)
Yeah, That’s the fun thing about real estate is there’s a lot of different ways to be successful, both as a buyer and as a seller, and just finding that right strategy that will lead to success.

Dylan Silver (05:23.106)
Let’s talk about scaling a real estate business. So you go, you’re a software salesman, retired professional athlete, and now you’ve got a rental property and then a home which is on the same street. At what point in time are you thinking, well, I eventually want to go and do real estate full time. Are you thinking that basically once you got that first property and how did that end up happening?

Devin Durrant (05:50.99)
Yeah, yeah, thanks for the opportunity to tell a few stories. So we now have one property and again, Robert Allen had an impact on me. So I thought, okay, I want to maybe buy a property or two a year. I’ve got my day job and one thing, not too long after that first house, bought a second home. This one was probably three or four blocks away.

And just really enjoyed it. You know, like I say, I’m over there mowing the lawn and planting flowers and trying to make the place look nice. And so now we have two tenants and two separate homes. And I’m loving doing all the financial analysis. But then I made a dear friend at work. I was with Word Perfect Corporation back in the day.

And I was telling him hey, I’m you know buying some properties on the side and he could see how enthused I was about all that and He would tease me he’d say you know you’re gonna lose your shirt You know taking all that risk with real estate and you have to deal with all these headaches and things and I said no, this is I’m really enjoying this but

So we went back and forth and did a little bit about that. But then as time passed, this same person who was one of the key executives at Word Perfect Corporation, he was kind of kicked out of the leadership. And again, long story short, we eventually became partners.

Dylan Silver (07:37.368)
Mmm.

Devin Durrant (07:45.316)
And he helped me scale my business because he and I were partners. He was kind of the money side of it and I was the energy side of it. we worked together for four years and then I bought out his interest. And I’ve kind of been flying solo from about 1993 to 2018 when I joined up with my sons.

He was the perfect partner, he was the key allowing me to to expand and grow my real estate business

Dylan Silver (08:24.462)
And so at that time, I mean, it’s a long time. I think you mentioned, you know, in 1999 until late 2010s, was it single family homes that was the vertical that you were operating in? And did it shift over time?

Devin Durrant (08:40.26)
You know the our focus was student housing from the beginning back in 1993 so that that was the target but Along the way we bought single-family homes We bought land Did some development did some construction so a little bit of everything but but the primary Bread and butter was was student housing

Dylan Silver (09:07.576)
you raising capital for the student housing? Were you taking out large loans for this? How are you getting the funding for, student housing? I’m thinking the large, massive student housing facilities that I have seen, sometimes even high rise facilities, but I’m sure it was maybe different back then. How are you funding these deals?

Devin Durrant (09:26.82)
We did it through financing and then like I say, my partner, just a great guy and also financially strong, so he helped a lot with the financing piece, but we used a lot of debt along the way.

Dylan Silver (09:47.278)
And so let’s talk about, you know, debt utilization. And I think a lot of people, you’re actually the first person that I’ve spoken with in the student housing space. So this is a niche that I’m a little bit of a fish out of water when it comes to, you know, the vernacular to describe the situation. But a lot of people when you look at single family, multifamily, short term, midterm, long term housing, even getting into, you know, we’ve had people who do commercial and industrial, they have a very specific

kind of formula that they follow, whether if you’re doing a fix and flip, you might do like 70 % of ARV minus repairs. If you’re looking at rentals, you might be like, well, it’s got to follow the 1 % rule. And with short term rentals, I’ve heard people say like, well, you ideally want to be able to capitalize at three times whatever the monthly payment is, because you’re going to have some months where you make less. Was there kind of a similar way that you were underwriting these deals? And if so, how did you do it?

Devin Durrant (10:46.628)
Primarily we’re just looking at net operating income, using cap rates. for me, the primary metric was just cost per bed. That’s really what I focused on. And certainly a number of other variables that you’re going to study. But that was the simplest metric. When I looked at a property, the first thing,

That’s question I would ask is what’s the cost per bed and then I developed a little financial tool I call my analyzer and I just quickly plug in the numbers that that I got from from the owners and Then I would just kind of compare that with what I knew the industry standard numbers would be in student housing at least in my particular area and then

That’s how I would make my offers based on cost per bed and then what I thought I could do, what I thought I could generate. And I had a pretty good sense of what the expenses would be and should be in this marketplace. And then that would lead me to the bottom line. That’s how I would make offers on properties.

Dylan Silver (12:06.616)
I want to get a little bit granular here talking about student housing. So in most cases, when I’ve heard about student housing, I’m thinking about, I have to pay the university or it’s rolled into my tuition, or I’m going off campus and I’m looking for kind of student housing off campus, but it’s maybe like affiliated with the university. Right. And so what was your or what is the setup and are the students

paying your company or are the is the university the one that is writing the check to you guys.

Devin Durrant (12:46.532)
Yeah, so it’s been a little different. I invested in Provo near Brigham Young University, but also most recently in Rexburg, Idaho near Brigham Young University, Idaho. And there is a relationship between the school and the private owners. And in my case now, things have changed over time.

in different areas that I’ve invested, but currently, if you want to rent to a student, your complex has to be approved by the university. And so there’s some oversight there, but it’s something that we’ve always welcomed because it’s helped us really operate better. And so there is that relationship between the university and our business, but.

It’s a loose relationship where they still allow you to operate the business as you see fit.

Dylan Silver (13:49.624)
So yes, so the, the,

The students themselves are still acting very much as tenants, right? So it’s not like the university is a tenant, the student is a tenant.

Devin Durrant (14:01.838)
Yeah, and again, we’re not compensated through the university. We have a direct business relationship with each of our residents, to our students.

Dylan Silver (14:12.75)
So for folks who are maybe looking at a similar model and I’ve I’m completely like I said fish out of water with this. Would you recommend that they when they’re doing this they really have to have a you know strong connection with the university first before buying the property or would you recommend that they buy the property first and just kind of say well this is we’re going to make it work whether it’s students or not.

Devin Durrant (14:40.056)
Yeah, that’s a very wise question, Dylan. of the things that it’s student housing is a different animal. And what I’ve said over the years is you can’t really go buy a book that says, hey, here’s how you manage your student housing.

There’s a thousand books on multi-family housing and how to manage them. Student housing is just a different animal. And it takes a little time to get comfortable with that model. But I think those who do so, it can be very profitable for them. So I would just say, if you see an interesting opportunity in student housing,

Go in and do your due diligence and learn as much as you can before you acquire the asset. And just expect a little bit higher learning curve going into student housing. But one of the reasons I pursued it is I love these young kids. They’re great, and they’re good to your property, and minimal headache.

And it’s worked out well, but just be prepared. If anybody wants to give me a call, I’m happy to coach them on some student housing type things. the best teacher as it relates to student housing is not a book because it’s not out there, but it’s just a hands-on experience.

Dylan Silver (16:25.676)
I’m thinking about all the different ways where student housing is not being met. mean, we had COVID, I think we mentioned before hopping on the podcast here, COVID, you know, of course, no students at the school. How are you going to fill the beds? But I remember being a student and I also know from other people who are students now that there never seems to be enough student housing. You’re like, how is there not enough student housing? Right? This is the most important thing. More important than the classroom is where are these people going to live? Right?

And you’re kind of doing, I’m sure you’ve seen this, like a shuffle, like the students are going from one thing to another, from the freshmen to this to this, and it’s like they’re just shuffling around, it’s almost chaotic. And I think it’s ripe for lots of people to come in, and you’re the first guest that I’ve had that’s talked about student housing, so now kind of the wheels are turning in my head, I’m thinking, well, how do we get into like affordable student housing, and you’re the guy to talk to.

Devin Durrant (17:23.32)
Yeah, like I say, this has been my area of focus for 30 plus years at this point. And so we have a system in place now. And I’m fortunate enough to work with my two sons who weren’t even born when we started down this path. And they’ve embraced it. They’ve made our business even more effective.

For those who are looking at purchasing student housing, I’d say go in there and study it out and learn what you can vicariously from other student housing owners. I think it’s a very, it’s an enjoyable path, satisfying path, and it’s also financially rewarding. So keep it open as an option as you go down the real estate path.

Dylan Silver (18:21.152)
Devin, you still follow hoops?

Devin Durrant (18:25.316)
Yes, yes, I do. I can’t really watch an entire game, but I sure enjoy watching the fourth quarter of games. I’m a big Steph Curry fan. I’m amazed at what he can do. And then I’m an alumnus from Brigham Young University, so I love the Cougars.

and we have a great recruiting class coming in, so it should be an exciting season coming up.

Dylan Silver (18:58.828)
You know, I talked to some professional athletes and sometimes I worry because sometimes people just get burnt out and they’re like, I don’t do anything. You know what I mean? And it’s nice to hear when people genuinely love the sport and they’ve continued loving it beyond retirement. So I want to pivot and ask you about hoops. If you can best maybe top three, three to five BYU players of all time.

Devin Durrant (19:28.836)
Well, top for me will always be Danny Ainge. Danny and I played together for a couple of years back in the late, what have been the late 70s, 78, 79 in that area. And he was a great teammate, just an incredible athlete. Really, he may be the greatest athlete in our time because of, he was a Major League Baseball player.

very successful NBA player. He was a great football player in high school. He was an All-American. And so I could talk about Danny for hours. He would be at the top of my list at BYU.

Dylan Silver (20:21.474)
BYU I I wasn’t a competitive basketball player, but I’m from New Jersey. So we’ve definitely I’m from 27 miles outside of Manhattan. We definitely got a hoops culture for sure. I grew up, I want to say Carmelo was with Syracuse and I saw Carmelo in the national championship. I was a little bit too young to really partake and see Jordan play. But of course, every.

kid growing up in the 90s, even if you didn’t get to see him play because you were too young, got inspired by that. But let me tell you, when Jimmer for debt came onto the scene, I don’t know what happened, but everybody just started pulling up from Jimmer range. Wherever you were in the country, you were pulling up from Jimmer range. I was playing rec basketball and rec basketball in New Jersey. And we’re saying Jimmer as we’re pulling up from Jimmer range. I don’t I think maybe people don’t know today, but

Jimmer Range was Steph Curry before Steph Curry was even really doing what he was doing. And so to me, I was maybe not old enough to really see Danny Yange. I believe he’s the CEO of the Utah Jazz now. I think so. But boy, did Jimmer change. It made a huge impact on us. I’m curious what you… Go ahead.

Devin Durrant (21:40.228)
Jim, are you here? I’m sorry, I cut you off.

Dylan Silver (21:44.588)
No, I cut you off. cut you off.

Devin Durrant (21:47.554)
No, Jimmer, I think he’s from upstate New York, if I remember. But he’s a dear friend, just an incredible player. I like what you said, how he impacted the game because of his shooting range. And at BYU, we certainly all love Jimmer for that. He’s just a great guy. And I feel like he really didn’t have the opportunity that…

that he should have had in the NBA. There’s a lot of times, it’s situational. Do you have the right coach? Are you the right fit? But I think Jimmer, if he’d have gone down a different path, could have been very successful in the NBA. But even having said that, he had a great career and terrific guy.

Dylan Silver (22:40.586)
It was amazing. It was a cultural… I mean, there was very few things in my life that impacted me on a sports realm quite like that. I mean, it was insanity. Everyone was tuning into every one of those games, just knowing he was gonna pull up from like five feet beyond half court. I’m not even a basketball player. I’m like, this is crazy watching this. Like, this dude has confidence that he’s gonna make these shots.

I’m curious what your perspective is on where hoops are at today. You mentioned what Steph Curry is doing is amazing, but a lot of times you hear people who played before the current era and they’re thinking, well, basketball is completely different now. There’s like no contact.

Devin Durrant (23:06.533)
yeah.

Devin Durrant (23:22.712)
Yeah, there are certainly differences. think just overall the players are more talented. They’re stronger. They jump higher. But they’re also taking advantage of some of the resources that are available today, know, with nutrition and different workouts and coaching. And so the game

does evolve. You made me think a little bit. This is a good opportunity for older guys, Dylan, to kind of reflect and look back. But I’ll just tell you a quick funny story. Well, it’s not really funny, but I think it’s an interesting story. You mentioned Michael Jordan. And so I was drafted in the same class with Michael Jordan.

So he was number three and I think I was number 25 in 1984. And so as it turns out, I was with the Indiana Pacers and I played against Michael in his very first professional game. It was an exhibition game. The Indiana Pacers versus the Chicago Bulls and we played in Peoria, Illinois. Just a small gym.

And I like to tell people that was the day that Jordan debuted his new shoe, the Air Jordans. billions of dollars later, Michael Jordan has done amazing things. But it’s kind of fun to look back and think, yeah, I got to play against that guy in his very first game as a professional.

Dylan Silver (24:59.875)
Hmm.

Dylan Silver (25:15.534)
I want to ask you, and I think people have different reactions on this, but going from any one career to another is challenging, know, whether it’s, you military out of military or going from teaching to something else. Professional sports to about anything else in life can be like jarring. Did you have this experience? Was this like almost uncomfortable in a way where you’re like you feel like you’re losing a part of who you are?

And how did you deal with that or did you not deal with that at all?

Devin Durrant (25:47.492)
No, I certainly dealt with it and that’s again a very good question because that is reality and you see it. So in my case, I was a professional athlete for about five years and then it became clear that it was time to move on. And so I landed a job like I said with Word Perfect Corporation. I was a software rep.

So I went from a situation where people were wanting my autograph and everybody’s telling you how wonderful you are to a situation where I’m trying to get time with people so I can show them these software products and they don’t really want, they don’t want to deal with me. Basically, as a professional athlete, everybody’s opening all the doors to you.

as a software rep, everyone’s kind of closing the doors to you. And so it was a tough transition. But that was, you know, because as an athlete, you know, you’re always looking for kind of the next high, the next victory. And that was one of the things I enjoyed about real estate was in a way you’re still competing and you get to negotiate. And then if you get a good deal.

You know, there’s reasons to celebrate. so it really filled a need for me. I was in the software world for about four years before I got into real estate. to your point, it was a difficult transition professionally to go through that. But I think it makes you a better person. You just realize, hey, you’re not special. You’re just like everybody else. And it’s time to…

to go to work. And so that’s what we did. And it was so nice that things fell into place in the real estate world.

Dylan Silver (27:52.11)
Absolutely. Absolutely. mean, there’s, there’s so many stories that I’ve heard. Similarly, I mean, just to give you one one, one quick one, I had a skydiving instructor, that was his job skydiving instructor. And he said, Well, I really just like skydiving. But at a certain point in time, I realized, you know, I don’t know if I’m gonna do this forever. But I love skydiving. And I guess you can maybe I mean, I don’t know how long you can be a skydiving instructor for.

And he said, I was thinking about what else I can do. And a lot of the people who were coming out of the planes were lawyers and doctors, basically people with money to spend. And I kept hearing this idea about investing in real estate. And then when I got into real estate, it was a lot like jumping out of a plane. And I go, how so? And he goes, well, there’s a lot of risk in what I’m doing right now. And there was definitely a lot of risk in jumping out of a plane. So I said, well.

Maybe there’s some continuity here in the career paths. But Devin, we are coming up on time here. Where can folks go maybe to learn a little bit more about student housing or to get in touch with you?

Devin Durrant (29:00.196)
Thank you. Yeah, I have a website. It’s called the values Delta calm and It’s it’s based on a book that I wrote by that same name the values Delta it’s a small and simple way to make a Positive difference in your personal and professional life so much of my focus over the years Dylan has been on adding value

adding value to real estate, to properties. And I’ve lectured on that a lot. But in recent years, I kind of shifted from how do you add value to a property to how do you add value to a person? How can we add value to ourselves professionally and in our personal lives and help others do the same?

So that’s the spirit of the book and that’s the website. And it’s been satisfying to reflect on just how we can use our resources and our successes to bless the lives of other people and be a resource to them and help them succeed as they focus on the values and what’s really important to them in their lives.

Dylan Silver (30:24.258)
Devin, thank you so much for coming on the show here today. Congrats on all your achievements and success and to your continued success. Thank you for coming on the show here today.

Devin Durrant (30:35.236)
Thanks for the time for what you guys are doing at Investor Fuel. I think it’s really interesting. I want to learn more about your company.

Dylan Silver (30:46.734)
Thank you so much.

Devin Durrant (30:48.1)
Alright.