How to Operate Multifamily Properties After You Buy Them

Bentley Peabody (00:00)
You know, Q there is the, and I have an operator’s lens, right? So it’s like I’ve been an operator for 20 years. I think about things from an operational standpoint. Well, something that I see more and more these days is the real estate investment community talks a lot about how to buy an asset, how to underwrite an asset, how to close a deal, how to fund an asset. They don’t teach you how to operate the asset. But you buy it, you c you close, you pop champagne, you celebrate, you post your pictures online.

And then the next day a resident comes in because their toilet backed up and overflowed. It’s like, okay, you should have a property manager, right? But it’s like there’s there’s no how, there’s the what, right?

Quentin Edmonds (02:12)
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 a fantastic guest who kind of made it hard for me when I was trying to take notes because this gentleman wears a lot of hats. He’s very proficient at what he does. listen, he’s a VP of management and construction. He also has a real estate asset. he’s a real estate asset manager, has a real estate asset firm.

this gentleman operations is his key. So I know this is gonna be an incredible conversation because I love I love to talk operations. And so I’m so excited to introduce you all to Mr. Bentley Peabody. Mr. Bentley, how are you doing today, sir?

Bentley Peabody (02:55)
I’m doing well, Q, thank you. How about yourself today?

Quentin Edmonds (02:58)
you are in you person. I’m doing well too. You know, you ask somebody how they’re doing, and sometimes people say, I’m good in you, or some people say, I’m good, but you’re an in you person. You say I’m good in you. So I appreciate that. I’m doing good, man. I’m doing good. Mr. Bentley, sir. I’m the type I love to dive right in. So I would love for you to tell the people what’s your main focus these days.

And also give us a little bit of a origin story, kind of how you got to the path that you’re on now.

Bentley Peabody (03:28)
So Q, my main focus as a real estate investor is is around asset management and acquisition of generally multifamily assets. largely throughout the Midwest. I live out in California and some of the deals don’t pencil as well here as as I might like them to. So we focus really on the the Midwest. and one of the ways that I tackle this is through asset management. And

Why asset management? I think that’s a good lead into the origin story. So I I like to joke and say I started in the real estate business when I was 11. So my parents bought their first rental property when I was eleven. and in outside of painting, you know, bedrooms on turnover, I didn’t help much, but it’s when we started talking about it at the table, right? It started being become part of the the DNA of what we were as a family. and then fast forward a number of years professionally, I got into the business when I was in my early 20s. and I’ve

Been in ever since. So I’m 20 years as an operator throughout all different areas of the multifamily and rental real estate space. I’ve been an on-site property manager for luxury high-rise buildings and major markets. I’ve been a regional maintenance manager, a vice president of property management. I’ve run an IT project management office that did 100 plus projects a year for a large owner operator. And I’m the VP of maintenance and construction now for a large third-party management firm that has over 20,000 doors under management.

So like the operations is something I think about every single day. It’s like, how can you squeeze one more you know, one more turn out of this this unit? How can you get one more percentage point of occupancy? Can you grow your revenue? Can you grow it? Can you shrink your delinquency? All of those little tiny operational decisions that stack and make the difference between success and failure for a portfolio.

Quentin Edmonds (05:57)
Yeah. Yeah, thank you, man. Thank you, Mr. Bentley. Thank you for letting us know what you do. kind of taking us on a little trip of you know how you got into this space. And I’m I’m gonna ask you some operational questions, but before that, I I want to peek into you just a little bit. And so I I often say, Mr. Bentley, destiny has no wasted moments, right? Destiny has no wasted moments, meaning like nothing is random, everything that we’ve been building.

has been building momentum to the people we are now. It’s building building momentum to why we do what we do now, right? And so I would love to know throughout your journey, what has the moments taught you about yourself? Have they taught you discipline? Have they taught you resilience? Have it changed the way you know you think about innovation? Like what has the journey taught you, sir?

Bentley Peabody (06:44)
My goodness, can I can I distill down twenty years into a few minutes? Right. No, but I’ll try I’ll try, right? So I think a few kind of core lessons that are relevant as an investor. One, patience, which I struggle with this one still every single day, right? I I like to do things and most of the time, doing right away, really valuable, right?

Generally speaking, that’s the case, right? But there are some times when you need to pause and you need to wait. So that’s one I struggle with. the timing to purchase or timing not to purchase, right? Of a new asset. That’s a good time when patience is is important. so being being patient is a big lesson. and then you mentioned resilience, right? That sometimes I call it persistence, but you just you can’t stop, right? The difference between success and failure is just not quitting before you’re done, right? You may not land where you wanted to land, but

You can’t stop until you hit success. Otherwise you’re you’re not gonna be successful.

Quentin Edmonds (07:35)
Yeah, yeah. Ooh, man, thank you for that. I I I r I really appreciate that reflective answer. And I love that you highlighted persistence. Because persistent doesn’t mean that you don’t stop, it means that you don’t quit. Like sometimes you gotta stop, reevaluate, but you are persistent, you get right back at it. And so I love the fact that you highlighted persistence. Thank you, Mr. Bentley. Thank you for the answer, man. I appreciate it, sir.

Bentley Peabody (07:59)
Yeah, you got it. And I mean, I think thinking about it from a resilience standpoint makes sense too. The persistence is probably the the easier version of that. Resilience is post-knockdown, right? You you you know, you’re eighty percent occupancy, you had a ten thousand dollar expense you didn’t expect, you got knocked down. Resilience is you getting back up. Persistence is you just not stopping in the first place, which is important. but you also the you’ve got to be pretty gritty sometimes too.

Quentin Edmonds (08:23)
So well said. So well said. Okay. Here’s my question, sir. What’s one operational thing you put into place the last two years that’s made the biggest difference in the way you do business?

Bentley Peabody (08:39)
Yeah. Systems. Right. I mean, I I know that sounds maybe a little trite, but the the short answer is just like you there’s kind of three core buckets, right? You have your systems, you have your technology, and you have your people, right? People, process, technology. All three of those things together make is how you’re gonna be successful. You the all three are important. You have to have all three of them in there. It depending on where you are in your investment cycle in the size of your business, depends on which ones are more important.

But for me, we’re scaling a business right now. You can’t scale without systems.

Quentin Edmonds (09:10)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bentley Peabody (09:12)
If you do if you scale and you have inefficient systems, you just scale your inefficiency, right? Go back to Peter Thiel’s The Lean Startup, and he talks about that. It’s like if you’re just simply scaling your problems, then your problems get bigger. not again, not by any means like you figure this out yet, but it’s like you gotta you gotta put a system in place to scale. Yeah.

Quentin Edmonds (09:31)
So well said, sir. So well said. when you started talking about systems, you know, I reached one of my favorite books, Atomic Habits. I I love that book, right? And so I don’t want to mess the quote up, but he says we don’t fall to the level of our goals. We fall to the level of our habits or our systems. Right. And so the systems keep everything in place. Now, I man, that was so eloquent what you said about problems. We don’t want to scale our problems, right? And if you don’t have a system in place, you just scale scaling the problems.

I don’t know. That was so well said, sir. So well said. so Mr. Bentley, what’s next for you, man? Like what’s your next real goal? What are you looking to solve or scale next?

Bentley Peabody (10:44)
Yeah. So I keeping the investor hat on and and not the W-2 hat on. the the goal here is to is to build a stronger foundation that I can scale later, right, with my real estate investment. So we we have we’re part of a couple different ownership groups. We have we have pieces of about forty doors throughout the US, right? Stabilize that, add some more and get to a spot where this can become more of my full time focus. And

But you gotta again, that those systems and that foundation is really important. We don’t wanna if you grow too quickly, right, then your foundation is weak and it crumbles. If you wait too long, the opportunity pass you by passes you by. So actively trying to build that foundation and trying to push myself out of my comfort zone a little bit at the same time.

Quentin Edmonds (11:31)
Yeah. Mm. Mm. Again, sir. So well said. I wanna get into some relationships, right? I wanna hear your philosophy.

on relationships, you know, business relationships, partnerships. but also I would love to know who are some people that have has influenced you, who are some people, you know, that you can call on now that really helps you get centered and maybe even offer referrals of you don’t deals with. So I want you to talk to me a little bit about relationships, Mr. Bentley.

Bentley Peabody (12:03)
Yeah, so that’s a good one to think about, Q, because property management and investing is a team sport. Right. It’s like I don’t care how good you are at it, you need teammates, right? And I’ve I’ve been doing this for 20 years. And it’s like I’m not a CPA, I’m not an accountant. Sometimes I try to be, and usually it’s not great results when I am. yeah. So you really need team members to support you, right? And where you fit in that kind of slice really just depends on your preference and your experience and your training. Right. And that changes probably over time. so I lean a lot on

partners I have in the assets that we have. I lean a lot on my property managers who manage our assets, right? That’s a super important role. especially when they’re you’re not close by, tax help is important, legal help is important. Mindset is really important. and having a good community around you to provide to provide that support. Cause it’s like this is a this can be a knockdown, drag out fight sometimes, right? And having someone who says, no, it’s all right. You’ll be okay. Don’t worry about it. Right. Even just the

The cheers the cheer squad can be really helpful too, as well as the advice when you you don’t know what to do next. Sometimes you do and sometimes you don’t, right? And and having some additional insights can be really helpful.

Quentin Edmonds (13:09)
Yeah. Yeah. Now Mr. Bentley, I’m I’m a prod just a little bit because it seems like mindset, you s you just said it and I’ve heard it before when we was having a conversation. Seemed like that’s kind of big to you. Talk to me a little bit about why mindset is so important to you and why it should be important to others, if you don’t mind.

Bentley Peabody (13:29)
Yeah. So the for me, the reason mindset is important is see if I can get this quote right. I was watching Shark Tank founder Robert Herjavec the other day, and he made a comment that once a mind has been expanded, it can’t shrink back down again, which I th I thought that was super awesome. Right. So this thinking once you learn something new, you can’t unlearn it. Right. The and you don’t know what you don’t know and so until you learn it. And then and then you’re there and then you understand it, right? To some at least to some degree.

The in how what you think about affects and how you think about it and what your hope is like affects your persistence and your resilience, right? It’s like you’re not always going to make the right decisions. You’re going to get surprised by things. your interest rate’s gonna change, your occupancy is gonna drop, rent’s gonna drop something’s gonna happen, right? Your roof is gonna leak and your insurance doesn’t cover it, or it’s under your deductible. Keeping the right mindset is the difference between you giving up and you not giving up, right? So on the persistence end. Keeping the right mindset is you

Finding a new deal or finding a new solution that you hadn’t thought of before. So for me, this really helps me keep my my perspective forward looking and broad and it keeps me going. Yeah. So why is this important for someone else? I probably for similar reasons. We’re all gonna run into our own struggles. And if we let them defeat us, they’re going to defeat us. And the difference between that is is not just how you’re thinking about it, is what that mindset is.

Quentin Edmonds (14:30)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Bentley Peabody (15:32)
And maybe another an add-on to that, the I relatively recently read the book called The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. high recommend if you haven’t read it. But it walks through routines, right? Going through your morning routine to set yourself up for the day, right? So like your your moment of contemplation and quiet. I’m not gonna list all six of them, but the exercise, journaling, and contemplation and quiet are three really important things out of the six. The and I’ve found I operate better when I do those.

Yeah. And especially the the more stress I’m under, the more work I’m under. If I miss them, like I don’t operate well. I’m not in a good headspace. I don’t make good decisions and success seems to just be elusive.

Quentin Edmonds (16:11)
Yeah. Yeah. Mr. Bentley, sir, man. Thank you, man. Thank you so much for sharing. one of my mentors, they said to me at a very pivotal pivotal time, I heard him say, When you know who you are, you know what to do. And I think mindset is everything because when you know who you are, when you know your why, when you know what centers you, what powers you forward, it makes you say pause, what makes you say hell yes and hell no when you know who you are.

You know what to do, drop you in any situation and you’re going to proceed accordingly. And so, man, I appreciate this conversation so much. is there anything that you came in with on your mind, you know, business-wise or anything that you wanted to make sure our audience knew? I kind of just want to open up the floor just so you can land that if it was something on your mind and I have not kind of prompt you to kind of bring it up or transition into, I just want to open up the floor if there’s something like that.

Bentley Peabody (17:05)
You know, Q there is the, and I have an operator’s lens, right? So it’s like I’ve been an operator for 20 years. I think about things from an operational standpoint. Well, something that I see more and more these days is the real estate investment community talks a lot about how to buy an asset, how to underwrite an asset, how to close a deal, how to fund an asset. They don’t teach you how to operate the asset. But you buy it, you c you close, you pop champagne, you celebrate, you post your pictures online.

And then the next day a resident comes in because their toilet backed up and overflowed. It’s like, okay, you should have a property manager, right? But it’s like there’s there’s no how, there’s the what, right?

You know what your NOI should be, you know, you should be at 60%, right? NOI. But how do you make that happen? There’s not a lot of guidance out there. and if it was easy, everyone would do it, right? So it’s it’s a complicated business and there’s not a lot of guidance out there.

Quentin Edmonds (18:01)
Yeah, yeah. Mr. Bentley, this has been a great conversation. 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, sir?

Bentley Peabody (18:15)
Yeah, a couple of easy ways. take a look for Mustang Dunes Partners. that’s our asset management firm. You can find me on LinkedIn, Bentley Peabody. I’m I’m relatively active there. probably the easiest ways to to find me these days.

Quentin Edmonds (18:26)
Yeah. Well, sir, let me say three things to you sincerely. One, thank you for your time. I think time is our most precious commodity. So thank you for giving us your time today. I value it. Thank you for your story. Thank you for showing up as your authentic self. Thank you for showing up with integrity. I believe our stories they plant seeds. We may never see the full growth, but the seed is there and it can grow at any given time. So I really believe you prink you sprinkled some seeds today. So thank you so much for that.

And lastly, and I say this and I’m so glad I get to say this to you, thank you for your mindset. Thank you for the way you think and bringing that mindset to this platform. I greatly appreciate you coming on, sir.

Bentley Peabody (19:03)
Q, thank you very much. I appreciate the interesting conversation.

Quentin Edmonds (19:06)
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, listen, y’all heard Mr. Bentley. His information is in the show notes. Please get in contact with him. But definitely make sure you are subscribed here. Because I promise you, we’re going to continue to bring up amazing people, just like Mr. Bentley. So, sir, I say thank you again. And to everyone else, y’all have a fantastic day.