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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros Podcast, host Q Edmonds interviews Mitchell Feldman, a seasoned self-storage entrepreneur. Mitchell shares his journey from humble beginnings to becoming a respected figure in the self-storage industry. He discusses how self-storage has evolved into a recognized asset class, the importance of discipline and hard work, and how adversity shaped his character and leadership style. Mitchell also highlights the power of relationships in both business and family, the importance of creating a lasting legacy, and how community plays a critical role in personal healing and professional growth. This conversation is packed with insights on success, purpose, and long-term growth—inside and outside of business.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Mitchell Feldman (00:00)
So when I started in my business, I was at a point where I was about to sell my first batch of storage facilities that I made. I was coming home. Oh, thisis the year. And I started looking at multi-million dollar homes on the water. my wife and I were excited. I said, this is it. This is it. Well, that year happened to be 2008. And in the middle of 2008,
Mitchell Feldman (00:28)
When I had all my stuff on the contract ready to go, I had built a start of a tremendous business. I was about to hit a grand slam home runQuentin (00:28)
Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host Q Edmonds and I am excited to be here today. I have another fantastic guest that’s been listening at this for 25 years. And so he’s going to talk about self-storage and he’s been doing this long enough where he’s kind of seen a transition, you know, from self-storage to kind of been like, it’s kind of forgot about thing. You you pull up to you with just the orange ⁓ doors, like you telling me.
But now it’s so much more sophisticated. It’s his own asset class. And I cannot wait for him to tell you more about it. And so I’m excited to introduce you all to Big Mitch, Mr. Mitch Feldman Mr. Big Mitch, how you doing today, Thank you, Q. Great to be here. Absolutely, man. Great to have you here. And look, Mitch, I want to dive right in. I would love for you to tell the people what your main focus is these days.
Mitchell Feldman (02:53)
HaThank you, Q. Great to be here.
Quentin (03:07)
Give us a little bit of an origin story, man. We love the hero’s journey. So walk us through how you got to doing what you do now. And then tell us what part of the world you’re in, man. We’d love to know where you are geographically. So Mitch, sir, you have the floor.Mitchell Feldman (03:21)
Well, I’m in South Florida and living here my whole life. I’m an OG native. So it’s a Miami, but I, I George25 years ago, but as, as we spoke about, um, we, it’s easy to look at someone today and say, look where they are today, but where we started in the industry and as a
Mitchell Feldman (03:51)
individual, the history of self storage, was the ugly duckling of the industry, of real estate, was sort of a subcategory of industrial and it emerged into these climate controlled storage facilitiesMitchell Feldman (04:04)
and it really grew into ⁓ a well-known asset class and I got into this when it wasn’t sexy and today there’s a lot of money chasing in and it’s very sexy. So I started from humble origins.Quentin (04:04)
Yeah. Yeah. I love it. So what made you choose storage? mean, there’s a different number, million number, maybe not a million, but other asset class you could have got into, other real estate spaces you could have got into. So what about storage that stuck out to you?
Mitchell Feldman (04:34)
As interesting as this will sound, it was a complete accident. was, I was young, dumb, broke. was, I fortunately had an education. I was an attorney and a buddy of mine, him walking into my office, an old friend from college. And he said, Hey, you want to self storage? And I said, sure, let’s go for it. We knew nothing about storage. We had no money. We had no experience and ⁓ we just, we just went for it.Mitchell Feldman (05:51)
It was really just, I would love to say it was a stroke of genius, but the only small part was knowing to say yes.Quentin (05:52)
Yeah, yeah. I love it. I love how, kind of by accident, but I have a, well, it’s not my saying, I picked it up along the way. Luck is just when opportunity meets preparation, right? And so you was attorney, educated. So obviously you had already put some seeds in the ground.Mitchell Feldman (06:14)
Absolutely.Quentin (06:19)
to kind of make you who you are. Like you was already working towards success. It just so happens success turned out to be in storage, right? And so I have this saying where I say destiny has no wasted moments, right? Meaning no matter what we go through in life, it kind of makes us kind of who we are along the journey. And we take those things with us and it kind of makes us, it’s like the mosaic, right? It makes us the beautiful picture that we see the day of success. But I would love to know, you know, the mosaic is just these fragment pieces that’s put together.Mitchell Feldman (06:26)
Correct.Absolutely.
Quentin (06:49)
So what has destiny taught you along your journey about yourself? Like as you just unveil who you are being successful in this, has destiny taught you discipline, motivation, consistency? Like what has it taught you about you along the journey?Mitchell Feldman (07:03)
There’s a lot of aspects to that. And I agree with you 100%. The harder you work, the luckier you get. And it’s, you have to keep building yourself every day. And I think inMitchell Feldman (07:19)
work and your home life, with your marriage, with your children, with your relationships, with community, everything requires effort. Nothing is given to you and nothing is easy. And you know, a lot of times people will focus onMitchell Feldman (07:33)
working hard, but they sacrifice their home life. You need to work just as hard every day when you come home and make your marriage work, raise your kids, participate in community life. So the mosaicis a big picture and all those little pieces come with a lot of sweat and attention, which you have to, you have to feed it or else your life is really just.
Mitchell Feldman (08:02)
playing on a couch and scrolling. That’s the reality of it. And it’s, it’s, there’s a grind of waking up every day, you bang your head on the wall,go to sleep, and then you come back and you do it the next day. And look, I’m, I’m a 58 year old man. I’m doing this for a long time and I still grind harder than 30 year old guys in my office. And that’s how it works.
Quentin (08:15)
Yeah. Yeah. No, I just heard a study. haven’t dove into it, but I was listening to somebody talk about a study is that most people that most successful.Um, year in life, not year, I guess, um, season in life. It’s like in their sixties. And I think the second, I think is in their 70. And I think the third is in their 50. So you’re like, right about to go into that most successful time of season. If that study is correct. Right. And, and I think it’s because how you talk about is just the, the little grinds and every aspect of your life, because just because you’re successful in business.
Mitchell Feldman (09:04)
for sure.Quentin (09:08)
your successful business because you’re a successful person all around. Like you apply, I believe, and of course we just meet each other, but I believe when I recognize people that are successful is because they are successful in every spec, every spec, every aspect of their life. And so I’ll talk about this book quite often, Atomic Habits. I’m not sure if you heard it right. So just being 1 % better every day. Yeah, exactly. And I can tell because when I listen to you, I can tell like a person.Mitchell Feldman (09:25)
Of course, of course I’ve read that. ⁓Quentin (09:35)
that’s being successful for in his family life is carrying that success in every aspect of their life. And that’s just my vision of what I’m seeing. Like I have a saying, when you know who you are, you know what to do. That mean any situation in your life, any facet of your life, when you are grounded with who you are, what’s your why, you know what to do in every aspect of your life. And so it’s no doubt, man, I can see why. I know you said the story was a was an accident.it was like that moment that opportunity met preparation. That’s kind of how I see it. Does that make sense? You have to be ready for it.
Mitchell Feldman (10:41)
You have to be ready for it. You have to be ready for that moment when it comes and then you got to take your shot. And, you know, when you talk about your lie, I have on my, in my bathroom, on my mirror, I have a piece of paper and around the paper, it has a picture of me and my wife. have four beautiful kids around there on vacation in Switzerland and the mountains of Zomat. Andit’s all on there. And I have.
Quentin (11:06)
Mitch, I love this. Because this is what I try to tell people. There are just key ingredients.Mitchell Feldman (11:08)
why the things that are important to me, why I do them, what they mean, what I want to accomplish. And every once in a while I’ll change it and I’ll scroll and add it. But I see it every morning right in my face. And that’s my purpose and my why. If you don’t have your why, you have no purpose.Quentin (11:33)
that we all have to put in a pot to be successful. The dish may look different. The dish, once it comes out, you may be in self storage. You may be a single family home. You may just be in podcasting, but the dish, the ingredients are so similar. And so my wife and I, we have a saying when we say your presence is a present. Like you’ve been here, that’s the present. And so I love how you got that frame on your mirror with your family. And so Mitch, I have to ask you this becauseMitchell Feldman (11:46)
Correct.Quentin (12:01)
We’re painting a picture, right? We’re showing people the journey to success, just not success itself. And so I have to ask you, have you faced any adversity? Like, and if you have, how does adversity look in your world and how have you overcame it?Mitchell Feldman (12:15)
So when I started in my business, I was at a point where I was about to sell my first batch of storage facilities that I made. I was coming home. Oh, thisis the year. And I started looking at multi-million dollar homes on the water. my wife and I were excited. I said, this is it. This is it. Well, that year happened to be 2008. And in the middle of 2008,
Mitchell Feldman (12:44)
When I had all my stuff on the contract ready to go, I had built a start of a tremendous business. I was about to hit a grand slam home runMitchell Feldman (12:55)
I get a call from one of my buyers, best buyer in the country.Mitchell Feldman (12:59)
And he says, it was the middle of, it was like June. And he says, Mitch, I need like another 45 days of due diligence. And I’m like, yeah, no problem. You got it. He calls me back 45 days and he says,Mitchell Feldman (13:14)
I’m out because I’m done. What do mean you’re done? You’re done with my contract? goes, no, no, no, I’m done. Banks stopped funding my construction loans. Everything is finished. All the banks are choking up. You’re going to see in about two months,the whole market’s going to crash like you’ve never seen. I said, what are you talking about? They canceled my contracts. Two months later, the market tanked. Smith Barney gone, bar by bar, the whole thing.
Mitchell Feldman (13:44)
And I lost everything. And I was in, my house was in foreclosure. I had a second loan on my house. had hundreds and hundreds of thousand credit card bills. It was, it was hard. I had no money. I’m just in debt. It wasvery, very difficult. And that’s when you know what you’re made of. You know who you’re married to and you know what type of strength that you could put forward together.
Mitchell Feldman (14:13)
And that’s when you’re tested. And so I was in a position that was beyond horrible. ⁓ I never filed bankruptcy. I actually went to an attorney and I said, listen, I know the whole game on the foreclosures where you try to keepMitchell Feldman (14:28)
them in the house as long as you can until they have to move. I said, no, no, I’m the one guy that we’re going to reset my mortgage. I’m not filing bankruptcy and we’re, we’re going to get it taken care of. And I got through it.Mitchell Feldman (14:42)
And I came back and I crawled my way back out of my hole and got to where I’m at today. So I do live in the multimillion dollar house. I do live on the water. I do have a 50-foot yacht in the back of my house. you know, so Igot back to where I wanted to go.
Mitchell Feldman (15:42)
I’m still like on a trajectory growing.Quentin (15:42)
So Iadore and love when a man starts talking about his marriage and his wife saying, know, who you was married to. mean, the two. you know, there’s a saying, I keep dropping all these sayings, but these are literally sayings that I literally try to live by, right? It’s not always easy. It touches your humility, your integrity. But there’s a saying, two are better than one.
because if the other one falls, the other one’s there to pick him up. And so I think just the two, just with marriage, the two walking together, there’s stability there, right? You can lean on each other. can, know, go through adversity with each other. And so I love when a man talks about his marriage. And again, I love your through line of your why. Like, you know who you are. He I’m not following bankruptcy. Let’s reset this mortgage. And the trajectory, still stay the trajectory.
Mitchell Feldman (16:36)
Sure.Quentin (16:39)
Look where you are right now. So again, it’s proven you when you know who you are, you know what to do. And you’re going to make sure you do that same thing no matter what the adverse time you’re going to stick to who you are, your center. So, man, I absolutely love it. And Mitch, I have to ask you, I mean, you got the yacht, made a multi-million dollar home, but what’s the next goal for you, man? Like, what are you looking to solve a scale next? So it goes to my wife and my wife has my family on it. So everything I do now isMitchell Feldman (16:40)
Boom.So it goes to my why and my why has my family on it. So everything I do now is for
my, for my family. It’s always been, you know, even my goal was always to get married, have children, raise a nice family. I’m very family oriented. And so my oldest son is 26. When he graduated college, we went up there. His graduation was on a Thursday, you know, back, it’s already like five years ago. And, ⁓
Mitchell Feldman (17:31)
Friday, we packed up his apartment, brought everything home. Saturday, we hung out,Mitchell Feldman (17:38)
you know, just hung out, did nothing. Sunday, we had a breakfast meeting. We sat down and I said, what’s your plan? And said, I want to come work. And I said, look, you’ve been already in the interning in the office. You’ve already been interning on the construction sites. And I had him in steel toe boots with the orange shirt and the hard hat during his summers in high school. He knew how to sweat.Mitchell Feldman (18:01)
and carry the water to the roof. And he knew those guys were hard. And he said, I he majored in realestate and finance in college. And he said, I want to come work. And we came up with a salary and a plan at eight 30 in the morning, Monday morning, he was in the office. So that’s my why. My daughter, she’s now in her second year of law school and she’s loving real estate and corporate law. And I have two, uh, 21 and a 20 year old.
Mitchell Feldman (18:30)
finishing college, they’re making real estate and finance and we’ll see where that goes. But that’s my why. So my goal is to keep building,Mitchell Feldman (18:37)
keep growing. ⁓ And one of my whys on my board and on my paper and my window and my mirror in my bathroom says, create a legacy for your family in terms of their security and finance, but also their involvement in the community.and create a real legacy of what they can accomplish, not just in business, but in society
Quentin (18:59)
Mitch, I love it. I think thisMitchell Feldman (19:06)
and helping others and being able to use your money and your connections and your value for good things and just make a better place.Quentin (19:20)
is probably one of my last questions I want to ask you because I got to get your viewpoint on this because I’ve seen so often successful men will sacrifice their family in order to be successful. And it’s not their intention. It’s not the intention, butSometimes the family becomes an afterthought because they say chase success. And so I want to talk about the word relationship because obviously from what you’re telling me, everything you’re telling me, and I believe to be true, you have built a very successful relationship with your family. But I also know that there takes some certain level of relationship within business. So I want to get your perspective on relationship building in a holistic type of way when it comes to business, even when it comes to family, like
I just want to get your perspective on relationship building, if you don’t mind.
Mitchell Feldman (20:11)
So I still have, and we talked about it together before, my first investor from 25 years ago, he was a mentor of mine and he was ⁓ someone I respected. He’s older than I am and I used to go to him for advice and he helped fund me at the beginning and he tooka chance. To this day,
Mitchell Feldman (20:40)
I still call him, I ask him for advice because the questions and the learning never stop. I still go for higher education. I just went through a program at a university and ⁓ I keep going. And I still have a relationship with every seller that I had, every investor that I had, every attorney, every civil engineer. Andyou could do business.
Mitchell Feldman (21:09)
fairly and honorably and still do good in business. You don’t have to be a big tough guy and burn bridges and milk everyone for every piece. I pay brokers, I pay attorneys. Everyone is doing their job. those relationships are important and they come back to you. So the nicer you are to people, theMitchell Feldman (21:35)
nicer they are back. You give, they give.Quentin (21:35)
That word community, man, every time someone says that, it’s it’s an anchor of my soul. I believe that healing happens in community. Common unity. And when you are in common unity with people,Mitchell Feldman (21:38)
you take, they’re going to take from you. it’s all about the relationships are key. And it’s not just business, it’s family. It’s like I keep saying, it’s community and it all comes back to you.Quentin (22:04)
Healing happens mentally, financially, physically, because you are around people in an ecosystem that wants you to be healthy, that wants you, I’m gonna say the word, some people may cringe, but holy, and when I say holy, I just mean set apart, right? Just of the optimal, like, highest function of yourself. And when you in the right community, all these things are working together for your good, you know? And so,Mitchell Feldman (22:14)
Absolutely.Quentin (22:32)
Mitch, I’ll perpetuate the questions. I’m going say this. Is there a topic that I have not brought up that you want to talk about? Or is there any other words of inspiration, motivation, education that you want to leave? Like, is there just anything from the heart or just from business wise, anything that you want to leave? I would love to hear that before we close out.Mitchell Feldman (22:51)
I everyone has, so like we said before, we’re hyper-focused on self-storage development. So when you focus on yourbusiness or one thing, and you do one thing really well, it doesn’t matter what it is, you can be successful at it. I I’ve met people that are the most successful ⁓ potato chip makers in the country, or a guy who makes plastic bags
Mitchell Feldman (23:21)
for the potato chip. Okay. Or a guy who’s from India who, you know, is the king of spices.There’s a sardine guy. mean, like there’s every business or everything you could think of, whether it’s a podcast you could become successful on, anything that you have passion about that you focus on and you have discipline with, you can be successful. So it’s not that someone has to copy a self storage developer. have to copy.
Mitchell Feldman (23:51)
You know, the potato chip guy, whatever you like and whatever you want to focus on, just focus on it. And every day, takethe atomic habits, move forward step by step and it compounds, it compounds exponentially. And eventually you get to hear and it’s much easier to get to hear than to hear. It just grows.
Quentin (24:00)
Sir Mr. Mitch, man. First, let’s do this. 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,Mitchell Feldman (24:27)
Just come to my website, ⁓Mitchell Feldman (24:29)
theFeldmancompanies.com all spelled out. Then you can, you can hit us up more on my Instagram, know, big, big Mitch Miami.Quentin (24:39)
Yes, Big Mitch. Big Mitch. Sir, let me say three things to you. So first, thank you for your time. I think you know time is our most precious commodity. We do things to get our time back. So you could have been anywhere in the world, but you was here today. So one, thank you for your time. Two, thank you for your story.Well, I like to say the gift of your vulnerability, the gift of your transparency and bringing that story, because stories impact us in so many different ways. And so thank you for your story and bringing that to this platform. And lastly, thank you for your perspective. Thank you for your mindset and bringing that perspective to this platform. Mitch, I so greatly appreciate you being here today, Thank you, Q. It was a really a pleasure. Absolutely. So listen, y’all heard big Mitch, y’all heard Mitch.
Mitchell Feldman (25:21)
Thank you, Q. It was really a pleasure. I enjoyed it.Quentin (25:29)
Check the show notes, check him out, get in contact with him. Go to the website. I think it was thefelmancompanies.com, right? So definitely go to the website, connect with him. And listen, I love Mitch. He has done a phenomenal job and what so much value. Definitely check him out, but definitely make sure you are subscribed here because I keep telling you we’re going to bring up amazing people just like Mr. Mitch. So sir, I say thank you again. And to everyone else, y’all have a fantastic day.Mitchell Feldman (25:36)
Yep.Thank you.
