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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Micah Johnson interviews Trevor, a commercial real estate investor who shares his journey from being intimidated by the industry to finding success through passive investing and syndications. Trevor emphasizes the importance of financial freedom, the power of compounding investments, and the value of networking within the real estate community. He discusses current market trends and opportunities, as well as the emotional and financial rewards of investing in real estate.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
K Trevor Thompson (00:00)
And I always thought, okay, I want to be involved in commercial real estate. I like that concept. It more seems more like a business. I’ve been a businessman my whole life. And I I like the concept of being a business, but I believed I had to be a millionaire to be able to invest in commercial real estate.And I went to a real estate conference over a weekend and they talked about syndication. And I thought to myself, my goodness, where have you been my whole life? And the basic concept of a syndication is a group of experienced investors.
buy a property, they raise capital through some investors to be able to take the gap between the bank loan and buying the property, and you actually invest alongside them, and you actually own a piece of that real estate. And it’s, I was blown away.
Micah Johnson (02:26)
Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Micah Johnson. And today I’m joined by Trevor, who’s been making some serious moves in commercial real estate investing since 2018. Trevor, welcome in, man. Glad to have you.K Trevor Thompson (02:38)
I’m excitedto be here. Thanks for having me.
Micah Johnson (02:41)
Absolutely, I’mfor you to be here today as well. I think our listeners are really going to take something away from your journey through real estate investing, from thinking that, man, I can’t do this or I need so much to have it, to realizing, no, I can actually find that freedom in the industry doing it the way I want it, way less than what I thought it took. So let’s dive in on that. For people who may not know you yet, what’s your main focus right now and what markets are you operating in?
K Trevor Thompson (03:07)
Yeah, so my main focus to help people understand that they can passively invest in commercial real estate. They don’t have to do the work. They just have to find a sponsor they know, like, and trust. We’re very heavy focused in the Texas market, but we also have assets in North Carolina and Colorado.Micah Johnson (03:25)
Okay, excellent. let’s back up a little bit and lead us on the journey of how you arrived where you’re at today in real estate. What led you to it? What’d you experience along the way for, again, for someone that’s listening and thinking, okay, I don’t know much and would like to know a little more, share a little bit of that insight.K Trevor Thompson (03:41)
Yeah.Yeah, so I was always interested in real estate, in fact, fascinated with real estate, but I was terrified of toilets, tenants, and trash. And I thought to myself, why would I want to buy a property and then have somebody call me at midnight and tell me their toilet’s clogged? I don’t even like it when my own toilet clogs. So I’ll be honest, I was frozen. I knew I wanted to do it, but I just didn’t know how to start.
And so, know, what happens when you don’t know how to start, you don’t do anything, right?
And I always thought, okay, I want to be involved in commercial real estate. I like that concept. It more seems more like a business. I’ve been a businessman my whole life. And I I like the concept of being a business, but I believed I had to be a millionaire to be able to invest in commercial real estate. And then I managed to get a fairly decent payday through one of our companies being bought and gone went public.
I went bought by Private Equity and I got a really decent payday. So I thought, okay, this is it. It’s time to stop thinking, right? You’re 58 years old, you’re not getting any younger. You’ve been waiting forever. And I went to a real estate conference over a weekend and they talked about syndication. And I thought to myself, my goodness, where have you been my whole life? And the basic concept of a syndication is a group of experienced investors.
buy a property, they raise capital through some investors to be able to take the gap between the bank loan and buying the property, and you actually invest alongside them, and you actually own a piece of that real estate. And it’s, I was blown away.
know, and again, let’s think it through. They’re gonna buy a $10 million property, they’re gonna get a $7 million loan.
They’re gonna raise $3 million from investors. We always heard use other people’s money. That’s the other people’s money. Okay, and again, if you haven’t read Rich Dad Poor Dad Power of Leverage, understand leverage and real estate. And then here’s where it even gets more exciting. You’re buying this $10 million property. The passive investors are putting three million plus up towards it, but they actually own 70 % of the asset. I had no idea. My mind was blown.
And of course, I started investing. literally did my first deal the day after that conference.
Micah Johnson (06:56)
Love that. Love that because it does. Real estate, when you’re on the outside looking in, it’s a huge term and it does have some vagueness to it. A lot of times you think investing in real estate, you’re thinking either I need tons of money or what you were talking about. I don’t want to deal with the tenants. I don’t want to deal with those things, especially if you’re trying to do this industry more passive. A lot of our industry gets talked about as passive when it is not passive. It is a full-time job.⁓ You’re going to have management and do certain things. However, if that’s your personality, do it. When it’s not like you’re talking about, you’ve been in businesses your whole life, you’ve done things, it’s not like you’re trying to create a real estate investing company like other people are trying to do. You’re trying to, okay, how can I actually leverage my money into a market that I feel is more stable, more reliable, can give me a better return and do it in a way that I don’t have to have another full-time job?
K Trevor Thompson (07:26)
It is.Micah Johnson (07:53)
and you are nailing it, man. Syndications is where that really starts to line up. Now you said something in when you’re picking somebody you want to know, like, and trust them. When you’re looking at who you’re gonna work with, what are some things that you could share that you personally, they’ve gotta check certain boxes for you, for you to be willing to put the money in?K Trevor Thompson (08:13)
Yeah,so first of all, you have to like them, right? Just liking somebody is kind of like, I hope everybody likes me, but they may not all like me. But I want them to feel like, okay, Trevor’s telling me the truth. He’s honest. I spend a lot of energy. You know, I have a goal of helping 100,000 people. It’s a huge goal, right? It’s audacious. Started out with 1,000 red print cardone. And then one of my current members said, no, you can’t be 10,000. You’re 100,000. You’re thinking too small.
and this whole concept. you want to find somebody who offers education, right? You don’t want somebody just to say, here it is, don’t ask me any questions, give me your money. And I established relationships with everybody who invests with me, right? They have a direct line, we talk. So again, you want to find somebody that you know, like and trust. And again, that’s why I went and I joined a local real estate group because I was going to see them every week, every month at the meetup.
You know, and I was investing with people that I could see and I could touch and I could contact. And again, I started investing in Texas where I live so I could actually look at the properties. And I remember the first time I went to a property, I walked around and I owned a piece of this. Like it was, it was really cool. And you could see, right? There was, they were making improvements. They did a tour to show us some of the things they did. And it was, it was exciting, but I wasn’t doing the work.
Somebody else was doing all the work.
Micah Johnson (09:43)
Your employees were your dollars. That’s who was doing that work. And it does make you feel cool to walk around a project feeling a part of it, whether you’re swinging the hammer or not. You don’t have to be doing that part, but to know this is all coming to life because I’m actually being a part of it. That’s where real estate has, in my opinion, an advantage over the stock market is because it’s brick and mortar. It’s a real thing.K Trevor Thompson (09:46)
Yeah.Yeah, it really is.
Micah Johnson (10:43)
And it does more than just looking at a digital number for you. That feels nice to see those. There’s nothing like walking that property or being there. And even in the multifamily apartment space, you’re also part of providing a place for folks to live. I guess it’s not just getting paid. ⁓ There’s a level behind it that if you actually care, you’re doing a lot of good while a lot of goods also get done for you.K Trevor Thompson (11:07)
It is, yeah.And you mentioned something I want to really emphasize. You talked about putting your money to work, right? The great Warren Buffett says, you don’t find a way to make money in your sleep, you will work until you die. And I was working until I died. I was going to work every day. I was doing everything. I kept going to work, right? And I kept going around the Monopoly board. How many people played Monopoly? Do you ever win Monopoly if you don’t buy the house and turn it into a hotel? You never win. But I was doing that in life.
I was going around collecting my pay. Now I had a pretty good payday. did good, but I could have done a lot better because there’s so much more power in being able to put my money to work versus trading time for money. And then like so many of us, know, COVID came along and my employer went, well, we’re no longer developing anything after 20 years. Goodbye. And I went, ⁓ dear, that really stopped. And I’m glad I’d started to put my money to work.
Micah Johnson (12:06)
Right, right. And a lot of folks went through it then it was people thinking that their job was never going to go away. And I’m not beaten up on jobs at all. Not everybody’s meant to be the entrepreneur type. Some folks do what you enjoy doing. However, knowing that you just there’s black swan events. There are things that take place that you just never know what could happen. And when you’re taking the time to build that in the background for yourself,Besides the security that you get by knowing that you have money behind that there’s something to fall back on, the action of doing it too also fuels you. You know you’re taking care of yourself. You’re not just eating right and exercising. You’re also doing really good financial practices that allow hard times to know, okay, that’s gonna be okay. I know I’m doing the stuff that’s gonna get me through whether this side or that side, and it just restores.
K Trevor Thompson (12:44)
Yeah. Yeah.Micah Johnson (13:00)
Peace to your life. think it’s where that freedom we all try to go to find in real estate where that really starts to kick in.K Trevor Thompson (13:07)
Yeah, and Iwant to bring up one other thing too, right? Because you want to create this, again, our whole concept is create financial freedom, right? That’s what I talk about. And so I also like another example. So again, our goal is to double your money every five years. And we talked a little bit earlier about the power of leverage with Rich Dad Poor Dad book. So think about this, you invested 100,000 and you doubled in five years to two. You invest the two, you grow it to four. You invest the four, you grow it to eight.
You invest the eight, you grow it to $1.6 million. Think about this, 20 years, that $100,000 grew to over a million dollars. Who here listening to this show, that’s going to change your family’s life. And I’m talking one investment and again, yes, I’m assuming everything always goes perfect and your money is always moving and compounding, but still.
I never understood that concept. I never understood that concept of not only putting my money to work while I slept, but watching my money compound. Again, I’ve mentioned Warren Buffett a lot, but that man lived on compounding his money and just retired now. An ⁓ interesting thing too, did you know that he made 80 % of his wealth after his 65th birthday? Think about that.
Micah Johnson (14:34)
have read that.I have read that. It’s staggering statistics.
K Trevor Thompson (14:35)
Think about that. It’s mind boggling.Why? Because of the compounding, The reinvestment. ⁓ So again, it’s just a powerful way to be able to create something for your family.
Micah Johnson (14:52)
And what I love about that, I couldn’t agree more with you. And what I love about that statistic too is if you’re younger or early in there, there is no rush.There’s not a hurry. There’s not a hurry. Like get started, obviously, if you didn’t start yesterday than the best times today. I grew up in the pine tree world. So we always used to say, when’s the best time to plant pine trees? 20 years ago. When’s the next best day? Today. Like get them in the ground. Get doing something.
K Trevor Thompson (15:53)
Yeah. It’s so true.Micah Johnson (15:59)
What did I kind lost my train of thought saying that it was back on Warren Buffett. If you look at statistics nationally, the most wealth most people generate is in their fifties and after it’s later in life where you’ve done the work, had the time. And for me, when I started seeing that it kind of helped me like take a deep breath, right? We can get super impatient with things and want, know, come on, come on, come on. Everybody in real estate seems to be in a hurry and it’s kind of moving it back a little bit and understand it. Okay.still 40. I haven’t even hit the time yet where I make the most. So what kind of tracks am I laying to get there so that I can take advantage of that moment when it’s arriving?
K Trevor Thompson (16:40)
Right. And one thing I always like to make sure I tell people to real estate is not a get rich quick. It’s a get richer slow. OK. It’s not a get rich quick. A lot of people are looking right. Everybody’s looking you know all of these house flippers are telling you’re going to get rich quick. Right. ⁓ You know that’s it’s a whole world is full of people on each TV. You know I made one hundred thousand dollars on this web and you know it’s unrealistic. Right. The concept isto get richer slow. Time is your friend in real estate. They’re not making any more dirt. And things are, we all know the cost of real estate’s going up. The need for affordable housing is going up.
Micah Johnson (17:26)
It’s all going up. it’s funny because your flippers are right. I always challenge people on what do you mean by rich? Were you just trying to get 100 grand a bounce out of here? Because if you are, that’s not that much money in the grand scheme of things. But fine, have a great time and do it, especially when you’re fixing and flipping it. And this goes back to your person or what we were talking about earlier about why you shifted. You didn’t want tenants, toilets, and trash. That’s not the part you wanted to deal with wherea lot of friends that are flippers, it’s a unique personality type. It’s something that you actually enjoy the work of doing it and they’re gonna not stop doing it. It’s still their get rich, slow scheme. So it’s kind of figuring that out for yourself of what are you getting into the industry for? What’s the point? What’s the goal? What are you trying to accomplish? And then we can work backwards from there. Then we can determine the strategy that you want.
the way to participate, how the people you’re gonna need. Because you were talking about networking earlier, real estate’s relationship business. This is a two sport that we participate in. There is not one deal where one person can do it all. Not one. You’re gonna need a lender, you’re gonna need a title company or an attorney. You’re gonna need folks to get this done even at the bare minimum so it is relationship driven. And that’s where I love what you did. You went to a conference first.
K Trevor Thompson (18:32)
It is.No, no.
Micah Johnson (18:52)
I’m gonna go get that education, teach me how to do it. It’s the most important thing in real estate is knowing how. And like you’ve learned along myself, it doesn’t stop. It is a lifelong learning game, which is one of the reasons I enjoy it is you get to stay curious. If you can remain curious in real estate, you’ll do just fine. Because that is the kind of thing it is.K Trevor Thompson (19:12)
Yeah, it is.I’ll have some calls with some people that are starting to say, know, so I like, man, I don’t even, I’m just touching it. And, you know, and I’m still going to conferences and learning things. You know, I’ve been doing this almost eight years and I’m still going and getting educated. ⁓ You know, and again, for your listeners too, just, you know, it’s great if you want to connect with me, but go find a local real estate group. Start connecting with people in your town. You’ll be surprised.
What a great community it is.
Micah Johnson (19:43)
You I completely agree. Go find out for yourself locally how good the people doing it well actually are. They will share with you if you’re willing to get in there with them and show that, hey, I want to learn. want to know. And it’s not just going once. It’s it’s go make it a point to go be a part of it. Because along with the fact that you are the five people you surround yourself with leveling up your network will it changes your life in more ways than one. I was on a phone call.K Trevor Thompson (20:10)
GoodMicah Johnson (20:11)
earlier today with someone that is from my leveled up network and is now one of my best friends. we are incredibly close because we went to a mastermind and got to meet each other trying to learn something else. And it’s connections forever. So it fills you up more ways than just in your business life. You meet partners, you meet investors, you meet everybody. And eventually you’re going to meet friends. Because the deeper you get into real estate, the more you realize how crazy we all are.and that we all love to talk about real estate and not everybody does. And that’s why we get in little groups together.
K Trevor Thompson (20:47)
It’s true, it’s very true. Yeah, my wife never likes to to anything with me because all we do is talk about real estate.Micah Johnson (20:53)
Right, right. That’s where it’s why I still love masterminds, those kind of groups. Go to the places where people, one, understand what you’re talking about. They know the words and they also like to talk about it as much as you because that’s where the learning comes in. That’s where being involved, how good the community is. I can’t tell you how many people have shared things with me that have saved me massive amounts of time and money, not having to learn it myself the hard way. I’m just willing to say, Hey, think about this. What about that? Even like theevent you went to. was folks just showing you, hey look at this option that you never knew existed that could be the perfect thing for you.
K Trevor Thompson (21:30)
Yeah, it is.Micah Johnson (21:33)
So let’s talk about 2026 real quick. What are you excited for this year? What’s big going on?K Trevor Thompson (21:39)
Yeah, so I definitelythink there’s been stress and you can see it on the news, right? There’s been stress. Never in the history of America has interest rates gone from 3 % to 8 % in like a year and stayed up there, right? So there’s definitely some distress in the marketplace. There was also when interest rates were really low, there was a lot of supply being added into the marketplace. New starts of multifamily construction are down 75 % right now from its peak. It’s insane.
And so there is this big opportunity coming up, right? And just like everything in business, there are some cycles. And I believe that we’re at the beginning of the next cycle to go up. Unfortunately, there was, not going to lie, there’s some things that happened with the high interest rates and some of the stress that put stress on it. You know, but again, one of the Baron Rothschild said the time to buy real estate was when there’s blood in the streets, even if some of the blood is your own blood.
You’ve got to be able to do it, right? You’ve got to keep that money moving. Sitting on the sideline and watching, you’re always going to miss the train. You’re always going to miss the train because the train never goes to a dead stop for you to hop on, right? So at some point, it slowed down at the end of 25 and it’s starting to pick up speed. And if you wait till 27, you’re going to be again, you’ll still be able to do things. just you would have missed a nice window of luck.
And I believe.
Micah Johnson (23:09)
You nailed it. Real estate is cyclical. We never know what the Black Swan event is going to be in particular, but we do know they’re coming. They’re as consistent as they can be, and they create different conditions post each time. Like this one, this is a never-before-seen one. So it did thanks to the market. We haven’t seen it do before. And we still survive, though. That’s the thing. If you’re nervous, just time. The market will shift. Are you positioning yourself for the shift?K Trevor Thompson (23:15)
Yeah. Yeah.Micah Johnson (23:38)
And when you’re doing that, now you’re a pro real estate investor. Now you’re thinking about not, oh, do I do this? I not do it? You’re thinking, how do I do this? What market do I do this in? There’s always a deal. Like national real estate statistics are kind of deceiving in a way because each market is its own thing. You need to understand it hyper local where you’re going because and even the worst conditions, there are booming markets in America. There’s always somewhere you can go find that deal.K Trevor Thompson (23:59)
It is.Yes.
Micah Johnson (24:08)
And let’s dig into that a little bit. So you do some multifamily. What are some other asset classes that you’re into or getting into this year?K Trevor Thompson (24:16)
Yeah, so we do some new build retail. We do what’s called lifestyle type centers and it’s really starting to get big. And so in Texas, for example, we’re doing one. It’s a whole new community, like a 780 square foot new community outside of Houston, because Texas is growing like crazy, just like your Florida is growing like crazy. And so they’re putting in like 165,000 homes. Crazy median income is like $170,000.and we’re putting in a high-end lifestyle. Because one of the things COVID taught us that you still need to go places and meet people. And so when I say lifestyle retail, it’s not like a big box store. This is where you’re going and you’re saying to your friends, let’s go meet here and the kids can go eat here and we can eat there. they’ll be, Santa Claus will be there over the hall. Some sort of more of a gathering place. And then of course there’s all the services for the people in the neighborhood.
the dentists, doctors, the karate place, all the different things. So we’re definitely still bullish on that on markets with a lot of growth that are happening. And then we’re also getting into the senior assisted living space. I mean, we’re in a silver tsunami. ⁓ The baby boomers are all now 65. Okay. And again, we’re all getting older. There’s a whole bunch of us old folks and you know, the government housing and the old folks home as we call them.
They’re just not nice places to be. ⁓ And so we do smaller, much more high touch ratio. Now, again, it’s a super, you need to make sure you’ve got a really good operator, because it is probably the highest end of operational complexity, because you’re caring for people. But it’s also astronomical, the returns that can be made if you really get ⁓ one going.
Micah Johnson (25:58)
for sure.K Trevor Thompson (26:08)
It’s a space that I’m excited about and I want to figure out and then want to own one before I move into it.Micah Johnson (26:15)
Love that, love that. I know someone else that’s in that space and it is truly, it’s very lucrative, especially if you got that heart to serve that community. you can believe in that and understand it and then you see the shortage that’s really there, I get excited for folks in that industry because I know what you’re doing. It’s one of the things I still love about real estate, the service that’s really providing the people that are using it, right? Even when you’re building a lifestyle center, there’s gonna be happy families having dinner there, having,different things there. it’s, that’s something I love about it is you’re, it’s a real place. They’re really going to go and they’re really going to visit. And it’s just the, the balance too. call it the emotional paycheck and the financial paycheck. Like I like getting both that does it for me.
K Trevor Thompson (26:58)
Yeah, and there are so many things you can invest in, right? You just need to find somebody who has an expertise and make sure that they’re on their team, right? I wouldn’t do senior assisted living until we found these folks. They’ve been running one for eight years. It’s literally a few miles from the one we’re by. It’s just, it’s mind boggling, right? Again, it’s all the who, right? It’s all these relationships and the networking, and they’re part of that real estate group I joined eight years ago. I just didn’t meet them until we were started.look to do some stuff together.
Micah Johnson (27:31)
other great reasons to join the real estate groups. And when you get into the good ones, other good folks are therethat lead to opportunities you just would not have seen before. You wouldn’t even know they were going on. And I could pitch that all day. Trevor, man, I really appreciate your time, your story, your perspective today. Thanks for joining us. For those that are listening in that want to learn more about what you have going on, what’s the best way for them to find you?
K Trevor Thompson (27:41)
Yeah. Yeah.Yeah, so LinkedIn
is the best way. You just got to remember the K. So K, my legal name is Keith. I don’t go by it, but I’m pretty distinctive. If you look for K Trevor Thompson on LinkedIn, based in Austin, Texas, ⁓ it’s the great way for me to connect. And I also try every day to post something educational on my LinkedIn page just to help people learn.
Micah Johnson (28:16)
Excellent, thank you for doing that. you’re listening or watching in, please check the show notes. You’ll find Trevor’s links there. Go follow him. Check out somebody who’s making real waves in the industry, getting real things done. And even started at 58. Again, real estate, just get started. If you’re thinking about it, educate yourself, follow someone like Trevor, learn more, and then get into the game. There’s all kinds of ways to do it. Don’t let a story you tell yourself cut yourself out. How about that?Trevor again, thank you so much for being here. Thanks everybody for watching and being with us. If you enjoyed today’s episode, please like it, share it with someone else you think could get value out of it. As always, please don’t forget to subscribe. We appreciate every single one of you that follow along with us. We have more conversations coming up with operators just like Trevor out there building a real business in the industry. Thanks for being with us. We’ll see you on the next episode.
