Be Weird. Get Wealthy: How Ryan Narus Built Wealth Through Mobile Home Parks

Ryan Narus (00:00)
it’s just, man, it’s funny because entrepreneurship is, in my opinion, and this is a strong opinion, is less risky than working for someone else for a whole slew of reasons. But anyways, how do you do that when you have no money, no network, and no experience? I was a 20-something with nothing. I more student loan debt than I had cash. I was living basically paycheck to paycheck.

And I said, I wanna get into the commercial real estate game, which is a rich person’s game.

Quentin (00:27)
Mmm.

Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host Q Edmonds, and I’m excited to be here today. Have another fantastic guest that we’re going to learn a lot about. And he’s here to actually talk about what is becoming one of my favorite topics, mobile homes. And so very efficient at what he does. I can’t wait for us to glean through his experience so we can learn more about it. And so I am so excited to introduce you all to Mr. Ryan Narus Mr. Ryan, sir, how you doing today,

Ryan Narus (02:33)
I’m pumped to be here man, this is going to be fun.

Quentin (02:34)
Yeah.

man. Yes, indeed. I’m so glad you’re here and Ryan, I’m the type, I like to dive right in. So I would love for you to tell the people what’s your main focus these days. If you could give us a little bit of an origin story, kind of how you got in the space where you are and then tell them what part of the world you’re in. People love to know geographically where you are, especially if you’re close and they like, you know, I can partner up with this person, buy from this person. And so what you’re up to, your origin story and where you are.

Sir, you have the floor.

Ryan Narus (03:06)
Love it. Listen, I’m a Charlotte, North Carolina guy. I’m definitely all over the Southeast. But I’m calling in from New York State right now. The reality is I’m anywhere that the business is something that interests me, I’m passionate about it, and I can make a difference in. come find me. I ain’t hard to find. If you’re a fan of Tupac, you’ve heard that before. I ain’t hard to find. Look, I bought the lie.

I am a millennial and us millennials were told, you work really hard in school, you go to a good university, you get a good job and you stick with it. And gosh, is that just wrong? Like maybe it made sense for our grandparents when pensions were a thing, maybe to a degree with our parents, but by the time it got to us, that was long since over. Loyalty to companies is long gone. I mean, they’ll lay off because it’s Tuesday.

Quentin (03:42)
you

No, no.

Ryan Narus (04:03)
And

it’s just, man, it’s funny because entrepreneurship is, in my opinion, and this is a strong opinion, is less risky than working for someone else for a whole slew of reasons. But anyways, how do you do that when you have no money, no network, and no experience? I was a 20-something with nothing. I more student loan debt than I had cash. I was living basically paycheck to paycheck.

And I said, I wanna get into the commercial real estate game, which is a rich

Quentin (04:31)
Mmm.

Ryan Narus (04:36)
game. And so how do you do that? Well, you gotta be bold. So we were talking about before we started this podcast that I wanted to be 1 % wealthy. And I’m sorry, but you don’t get to be 1 % wealthy unless you do 1 % something. And I ain’t 1 % smart and I ain’t 1 % hard working. And I certainly ain’t 1 % good looking.

Quentin (04:52)
Yeah.

Ryan Narus (04:59)
So what am I, who am I? Like where’s my 1 %? I’m 1 % willing to do what

people aren’t. Right, and what does that mean? What that means is I quit my job, I moved into a mobile home, I served as the property manager, and that’s how I put food on the table while I grew my business low and slow. So that was the past, that was my origin story. Where am I at today? Where I’m going on 11 years in the mobile home park space.

Quentin (06:15)
Yeah.

Ryan Narus (06:16)
Couple RV parks and some other assets too. I’m up to 87 communities, just a hair light of 4,700 doors. So that’s who I am, that’s where I’m at. Now where am I going? What am I excited about? I am excited to inspire the next group of not only real estate entrepreneurs, but entrepreneurs in general. I’m not coming on here trying to sell y’all any products or

pump you up to come to my podcast or my boot camp or the thought, the thought, the thought. I am here to sell you on you listeners. Is the reality is I ain’t that special. We’re about to find out. I’m really not. I just realized that two groups of people win. People who are unbelievable at conventional wisdom, right? So like really, really smart people, really, really talented people, whatever. Number one, or the other group is people who are just weird.

in very effective ways. You can’t just be weird, otherwise you get locked up. If you’re weird in all the right ways, you can do some cool stuff. And so if you can believe it, mobile home parks actually, when I got started, were the weird thing to do. Now it’s kind of a cool kid on the block thing to invest in, but that’s me, man.

Quentin (07:34)
Yeah. Man, thank you, sir. Thank you for taking this journey, telling us where you come from, where you are now. I love the fact that you are trying to sell people on themselves. That’s such an alignment with me. believe that, you know, one of my things that I love to help people recognize what’s already in them, because there’s a superpower that we all have and it’s being developed. And I just want people to understand what they have in them and recognize them.

Ryan Narus (07:37)
Yeah.

Quentin (08:03)
They are at the center of what they do. And so with that being said, I heard you, I was actively listening. I was actually writing as you talk. And so I’m going to regurgitate some things back to you because I’m going to make a statement and ask you a question. So proud millennial, you know, and you, they told you to lie, go to school, get a good job, be loyal to a company, et cetera, et cetera, right? You was 20 with more student loan than you had cash, but you wanted it to be 1 % wealth.

So you found out that you would be willing to do what the, you would be 1 % willing to do what others would not do. So you grew your business low and slow. And now 11 years later, you’re in the mobile part community. Was that a pretty good summary? All right. And so I always say, Mr. destiny has no wasted moments, right? Meaning that.

Ryan Narus (08:47)
Yeah, love it.

Quentin (08:56)
As we build momentum through life, we are borrowing from every lesson learned, every failure. We’re learning just from the hardship, from the good times and success. We’re building momentum to where we are now. When I listened to you talk, you was building momentum until getting to the 11 years you grew the business, low and slow. So I would love to know what has the moments, what has the journey taught you about yourself? Has it taught you discipline, resilience?

Has it give you insight on innovation? Like what is the moments? What has the journey taught you about you?

Ryan Narus (09:31)
everything, everything. But I think if I’m to pick one thing for the purpose of this podcast, it’s how important listening to yourself is. How important being true to yourself is. Because like I said, I’m weird. And when I was growing up, trying to be the cool kid lasted seventh grade. And by eighth grade, I was like, no, I’m just never gonna be the cool kid.

And even if I was really good at being the cool kid, the keeping up with the Joneses, if you will, it just wouldn’t make me happy. You know, I tell folks this, my mother-in-law loves the garden. And 20-year-old me would have laughed and been like, well, that’s boring. And 40-year-old me is, I don’t want to say jealous, maybe that’s too strong of a word, but I’m proud and I’m happy for her.

Quentin (10:58)
Mmm.

Ryan Narus (11:01)
because she’s taken the time to say, don’t really care. Anybody thinks this brings me joy in life. And I think when you live in the United States of America, we get constant pressure on social media and TV and everything to like have this car or date this woman or live in this neighborhood or go to this club. And it’s like, why, if you like gardening, go garden. And so, yeah, I mean, there’s millions of lessons I’ve picked up along the way.

My business and what’s gone right and gone wrong and everything, gosh, it has taught me so much about life and everything. But if I was to communicate one super duper important thing to your audience, it’s that entrepreneurship is so dang hard. Steve Jobs was right. You have to love it with every fiber of your being because some days are so impossible.

That if you don’t love like that’s it. Like it’s not about the money anymore or about this. That the other thing it’s, is you are there for the love of the game. And if you are not 100 % in love with whatever venture you’re, you’re chasing down one day, you’re going to quit one day. You’re going to have a bad enough day that you’re out. And where does that come from? Where does really truly falling in love with something come from? It comes from knowing who you are and being an embracing your weird.

no matter what people think.

Quentin (12:26)
So, so well said. mean, you’re saying so many things that align with the things I talk about here. I tell my audience quite a few times that one of my mentors, they said something I was at a pivotal point in my life. He said, when you know who you are, you know what to do. And so when you talk, knowing who you are, you can be dropped in any given situation.

Ryan Narus (12:30)
Thank you. ⁓

Yeah. Love it.

Quentin (12:51)
But when you know who you are, you know how to operate from a system that comes from the inside, a system that you know is tried and true to you. Your mother-in-law loves to garden. That’s who she is. That’s what she loves. And I tell people, say, you you’re super powerful. All of us, we have different tools that we use and we’re proficient in different tools. You some people, you know, it may be a hammer, it be a drill, but some people have spatula and spices, but your mother-in-law is gardening. We all have our different things that we’re proficient in.

And so when you know who you are, use the tool set that you have developed over the years to power you forward. So you’re literally talking about so many different things that I kind of just align with what I like to talk about here. Man, adversity, that’s a word, powerful word. All of us face adversity. I would love to know within your world, how does adversity look and how have you overcame it?

Ryan Narus (13:45)
Look, adversity is the fun part. I say that kind of to grab attention, but also that’s the correct answer. So there’s a phrase, real, recognize real. And I’m gonna kind of steal the concept of that for entrepreneurship. So real, recognize real means like, someone who’s true to themselves is gonna recognize someone else who’s not BSing themselves and others, right? Like real, recognize real.

Quentin (13:47)
Come on, man.

Yeah. Yeah.

Ryan Narus (14:13)
Entrepreneur recognizes entrepreneur.

Why? Because when you talk to a true entrepreneur, they just, it’s just funny because I interview so many entrepreneurs on my podcast and it’s like, I’m listening to them and they talk about, like I had this guy, friend of mine, Ryan Growney on my podcast and he was talking about how he quit his insurance job to walk dogs while he’s chasing his dreams. And I stopped him in the middle of the interview because he was saying it,

in such a mundane like, yeah, well, you know, that’s what I had to do next. Fashion, that what jumped out at me in that moment, and there’s been tons of these moments is this is a guy who didn’t go, no, I can’t leave my job. Like I got a mortgage, I got kids, I got a business, I got a lot of like excuse, excuse. He was just like, yeah, like I don’t walk dogs.

Right? Like.

That’s an entrepreneur. An entrepreneur is someone regardless, again, regardless, you’re selling coffee, you’re leasing mobile homes, you’re doing, like an entrepreneur is someone who gets excited, or at least not fearful, over just like all the things that are wrong. the, because that’s the fun, the fun part about entrepreneurship is not having the answer.

And it gets even more fun when no one has the answer and people think you’re crazy for trying to solve it. Like that’s how human beings make the world a better place and how we invent things, you know? And like that to me is where entrepreneur recognize entrepreneur. So to me, you know, it’s just funny cause I give away my time pro bono. got charities left and right, and I love helping others.

Quentin (16:21)
Come on, yeah.

Ryan Narus (16:42)
And I just, you just hear folks talk from fear over and over and over over again. And it’s not that I’m gonna write off anybody, because I feel fear, everybody does. You anybody who says they’re fearless, no. Like courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is fighting through the fear, right? I’d rather be courageous than fearless. Fearless is just reckless and stupid. Courageous is bad to the bone.

Quentin (16:56)
Yeah.

Ryan Narus (17:10)
You know, so I’d rather be courageous, but you know, all of this to say Quentin, to me, you know, an entrepreneur is someone who is driving their car. There’s one road into town and they come across a boulder that blocks all traffic both ways. 99 % of people do a three point turn and drive in the other direction and go, well, I guess I can’t go to town. The entrepreneur stops, pulls over and walks around the rock and is like, huh.

Can I drive my car around it? Is it close enough to walk? Is there a bike in the back of my car? Like those are, like if you’re an entrepreneur, you’re wired to just start solving problems in unique and creative and again, in weird ways. And to me, that’s, entrepreneur recognize entrepreneur,

Quentin (17:56)
Yeah, yeah, man, so well said, man, so well said. You know, I often think about trailblazers and pathfinders. know, pathfinders, they jump on a path that somebody already laid. But trailblazers, man, they get the work. They cut down the trees, they cut up the wood, they lay the foundation, they pave the roads. And so, man, when you talk about entrepreneurship, I think about, you know, true trailblazers, know, people who blaze the trail for others to come behind them. They find the way.

Ryan Narus (17:58)
Thank you.

Quentin (18:24)
If there’s no trail, they make the trail. so, man, I love talking about it. ⁓ Now, I know you said what’s next for you is you want to inspire. So give me more about that. What is the vision? is the goal? How do you intend to inspire the next group of entrepreneurs?

Ryan Narus (18:43)
Yeah, look, I want to start by saying I told you I wanted to be in the 1 % wealth. To be fair, I’m technically not. I guess I’m 1 % for my age group, ⁓ which fine. Like what I’ve done is cool. look, again, going back to that gardening example, like I’ve made a little bit of money. It’s not it’s obviously a life changing amount of money, but it’s not something that’s overwhelmingly impressive.

Quentin (18:54)
Yeah.

Ryan Narus (19:12)
when you stack it up with all the conventional wealthy people in the world. Like I’m never gonna be on Forbes and I’m okay with that. And the reason is because, God forbid something terrible happens, I have enough money and I can confidently tell you that I am in love with the life that I have. I love my wife, my two kids and I love what I do and I’m true to myself and I don’t care if people laugh at me.

Quentin (19:19)
Mm-hmm.

Ryan Narus (19:41)
In fact, if I brought you joy at my expense, I’ve brought you joy and that brings me joy. And, you know, my gardening, if you will, like what brings Ryan Narus happiness is quite simply bringing others happiness. And that can be making people laugh. That’s telling a good story. That’s helping people out or buying them gifts. To me, there’s, there’s different types of, of happiness and happiness isn’t

It truly isn’t getting drunk or like chasing women or you know, money falls in that category too, right? Because that’s just a dopamine rush. To me, true happiness, right? Like true happiness is fulfillment and purpose and making the world a better place because you were in it.

And to me, again, I think I’ve made enough money that I don’t, I’m not a flashy guy. Like I just, I’m never gonna be, it doesn’t make me happy. I don’t wanna impress people because I’m wearing something cool. I wanna impress someone because I help them out when no one else would. That’s really where my joy comes from. So being a little over a decade in, if you know, I’m turning 40 here soon.

So like, I had this conversation with myself at 30, because I went full time in mobile home parks right after I turned 30. So I have a conversation with myself at 30, having another conversation with myself about 50 at 40. So like, I’m 30, what does 40 look like? Great, I’ve met or exceeded basically all of that. Now, what am I gonna, wow.

Cause like if I talk to my 30 year old self, I would have more than wowed myself at the human I’ve become. And so the question is at 50 sitting at 40, how am I gonna wow my 50 year old self? And again, it’s not money. I don’t need more money, right? It’s not, I go through the laundry list of things that I’ve done in my life. It’s not another notch on my belt, so to speak. It’s really making people’s lives better.

That’s my calling, that’s who I am, that’s why I’m here today, that’s why I’m gonna continue going on other people’s podcasts and having my own and just, you again, I don’t need anything. I’m not selling anything, I don’t want anything. I want to be a beacon of hope and inspiration for people going forward because selfishly, it makes me happy to do that because I’m being true to myself.

Quentin (22:05)
Yeah.

I love it, man. I often say at the foundation, I believe any sustainable business is servitude. And so, you know, I quote this proverb quite often. It says, when you refresh others, you in return will be refreshed. So when you refresh others, you in return will be refreshed. It’s like a boomerang. You go out there, you got to come back. If you refresh somebody, help somebody, serve somebody, that thing has to come back around to you. And so I’m so glad.

Ryan Narus (22:24)
Yes.

Yeah.

Quentin (22:47)
the fact that you want to inspire. And so I’m a love asking you this question. When you hear the word relationships, what comes to mind to you?

Ryan Narus (22:56)
Well, family always comes first, right? But I mean, family comes in many different arenas, if you will. Like obviously it’s those that we did not choose, right? We didn’t choose our siblings, our aunts, uncles, parents, grandparents, great grandparents, et cetera. But it’s also the people we choose, right? My wife, she’s family, but she’s not blood.

My kids are blood, but I didn’t choose them. They just kind of showed up after, you know. ⁓ Well, that’s for another podcast.

Quentin (23:27)
Yeah.

Please, Ron, please.

Ryan Narus (23:33)
I know, right?

But you know, what’s funny though is like, there’s people in my life that are incredibly important that they are family, even if we’re technically family, right? Blood or not blood, chosen or not chosen, right? And to me, relationships are integral to someone’s happiness. I don’t think you can be alone in this world, truly alone and not go crazy. And I mean,

Absolutely crazy. I mean, I studied this in like prisons with solitary confinement. It’s a real thing, you know, but it’s not just not being in solitary confinement, right? We put up, we suffer our own self-made prisons by keeping people out or not, you know, keeping in touch with friends or family or whatnot. You know, to me, it’s so important for your own mental health to have someone you can go and confide in and tell jokes with. And even if it’s someone you just watch the game with and that’s,

the lane that he or she has for you, that’s important too. And when you can kind of master that, and I’m not saying like you’ve got a billion friends out there, but when you can kind of appreciate someone for who they are and give them grace when they don’t meet your expectations for one reason or another, which by the way is an insanely difficult thing to do for parents and siblings, et cetera. Like, we could talk, that’s a whole podcast in and of itself is like,

Quentin (25:00)
Thank you.

Ryan Narus (25:01)
loving

someone even if you want them to do X and they don’t, right? But that is the foundation of relationships and that 100 % bleeds into business because business is, I don’t care what you say about AI or what you think the future of AI is. Human beings need relationships for our own mental health and we need relationships to do business. Salespeople will always exist because salespeople, despite their many flaws, they understand relationships.

And it’s not just salespeople, it’s business owners too. You cannot necessarily be the smartest or hardest working or most talented. If you can master relationships, you will never be broke.

Quentin (25:42)
I believe healing happens in community. And you so eloquently said that and synthesized that healing happens in community. When you surround yourself with people that are community, common unity, people that are like-minded like you are, and that people that you can lean on that will support you, you will literally find that everything starts to become well. Your mental, financial, your physical.

All things start to be made well because there’s less time to stress, there’s more gratitude, there’s more happiness, there’s more support. And so I literally believe healing happens in community. So thank you for expounding on relationships. ⁓ Ryan, man, I… Yeah.

Ryan Narus (26:25)
Can I jump in real quick and just add to that because that’s wonderful.

Like what you’re saying there is if you invest in a community, a community will invest back at you, right? And so I think so many people get this wrong because so many people are a what’s in it for me. And I’m not saying that in a selfish light. There’s a great book called Give and Take, or is is it Give and Take? Yeah, Give and Take about

Quentin (26:47)
Hmm.

Ryan Narus (26:51)
Where they caught they put people into one of three buckets givers? Matchers and takers and it’s as obvious as you think right a giver is someone who gives and doesn’t expect anything in return a taker is someone who takes and doesn’t expect to give anything right and Then a mattress someone’s like I’ll give you something, but I’m getting something of equal value back, right? I go up to the soda machine. I put in a dollar. I’m getting my coca-cola, right? Where’s a giver? I’ll put in ten dollars and get one soda or

Quentin (26:57)
Hmm.

Ryan Narus (27:19)
Be okay walking away with those, right? Meanwhile, the taker is reaching his hand up trying to steal one. The reason why I bring that example up, Quentin, is because in that book, they guesstimate that about 80 % of the population are matchers. Meaning, most people aren’t trying to rip you off, but most people aren’t trying to just give away the farm just because, right? And what does that tell you listeners about your psychology?

It’s gonna be really, really, really, really, really hard for you mentally as a matcher to go and help your community and not expect something immediate and of equal value in return. And that’s okay. You have to kind of like hack your own brain and fight to continue to help this community under the assumption it will help you back one day. And it can take years. But Quintin, I love what you said right there.

Quentin (28:15)
Talk.

Ryan Narus (28:18)
If you invest in this community, you will never go broke because if you help enough people, they will help you too.

Quentin (28:27)
So sir, that’s what I call the mic drop moment. Man, thank you so much, sir. Listen, if someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, collaborate with you, learn more about what you’re doing, how can they get in contact with you,

Ryan Narus (28:27)
Love it.

Yeah.

Yeah, look, I am hard to find. Just like I said earlier, that’s on purpose. I believe I am the only Ryan Narus in the world. So if you Google N-A-R-U-S, that’s my last name, my LinkedIn, my website, they pop up. Coming on this podcast is my beacon to the world to say, listen, I am here, come find me. If my words have inspired you, if you think I can help you, I don’t need anything from you.

Quentin (28:50)
and ⁓

Ryan Narus (29:10)
Like reach out to me, that’s why I’m here. want, Quentin if I can help even one person from coming on your podcast that reaches out to me, they’re gonna help people too, right? So I might be, you know, it takes a village, right? So I’m one, you know, data point in a whole ocean of data points, but I’m a data point that didn’t exist otherwise. And my hope is if I help one person, they help five.

And then that, each of them helps five more and then it gets exponential. And that’s my goal and that’s the what’s in it for me. I’m a giver if you can’t already tell ladies and gents. So come find me if you liked what I had to say. You are going to get a warm email response from me. I promise, don’t be afraid. I’m here. Thank you Quentin for having me. This has been lovely.

Quentin (29:57)
⁓ man, so let me say three things to you, man, sincerely. One, thank you for your time, because I know you’ve been doing something else with your time, and our time is our most precious commodity. And so, yeah, I know the concept of how the podcasts work, but still, you didn’t have to be here, and you’re here. You’re giving us your time, so thank you for your time. Secondly, thank you for your story. Thank you for your narrative. I really believe stories plant seeds in people.

And we may never see the growth, but the seed is there and the seed may grow two months from now, a year from now, two years from now, but the seed is there. So thank you for coming and planting seeds that can literally course correct somebody’s life. Thank you. And lastly, man, ⁓ thank you for your mindset, the way you think and bringing that mindset to this platform. I greatly appreciate you coming on today.

Ryan Narus (30:49)
Hey, it’s been fun, man. We’re clearly similar people. So I think your audience is going to really appreciate my words. And like I said, I’m here to inspire. And if I inspire one person, it was all worth it.

Quentin (30:59)
Yeah. So yes. So it sounds to me that your story was very inspiring. That’s my, what they call it. That’s my callback moment. Thank you, man. Listen, y’all heard Mr. Ryan. Please get in contact with him. Did you plug the podcast? I hear you? Did you plug the podcast? I can’t remember.

Ryan Narus (31:17)
I need

to, so I got two podcasts, Mobile Home Parks in Real Life and the 30 Day MHP, that’s for Mobile Home Park. Listen, y’all, yes, it’s a Mobile Home Park podcast, but I speak on so much more than that. It’s really a podcast about how to start with nothing as an entrepreneur. And it’s told through the lens of Mobile Home Parks. But look, I don’t care. I’ve started multiple businesses, some from scratch, some leverage buyouts.

Like y’all, it’s funny, because one of my business partners started a bunch of other businesses too, and he’s like, what we learned buying mobile home parks is applicable to internet businesses, is applicable to development, it? Y’all, tune in. I will change your life if you let me. And again, I’m not gonna ask for anything. Go and help others, that’s my ask.

Quentin (32:07)
Well, you heard it. mean, everything he said is in his show notes. Check out the podcast, get in contact with him. I’m telling you, let him change your life. Like, let the tools that he have be applicable for you to literally course correct. So get in contact with him, but definitely make sure you’re subscribed here, because I promise you, we’re going to continue to bring up amazing people, just like Mr. Ryan. So sir, I say thank you again, and everyone else, you’ll have a fantastic day.