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Show Summary
In this episode of the Investor Fuel podcast, host Leo Wehdeking speaks with Mark Toro, a prominent figure in the Tampa real estate market. Mark shares insights into his design-driven rehab projects, the importance of community and collaboration through his mastermind group, and the adaptability required to succeed in the ever-changing real estate landscape. He emphasizes the significance of building relationships and networking to foster growth and success in the industry.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Mark Toro – Above Asking (00:00)
So, you know, I think it’s for us.Understanding that you really have to get out into the community in person and meet folks face to face to make that connection Right, and I say that because we initially started our mastermind community with this idea of being
and we quickly realized that whenever we did this in-person programming as a part of what we were doing
Connection sparked right the energy just completely changed among the group and now we’ve positioned to you know majority in person programming
Leo Wehdeking (02:02)
Hello everyone, welcome to investor fuel podcast. My name is Leo Wehdeking I’m going to be your host today and ⁓ I’m actually joined by someone that I’ve been looking forward chatting with Mark, who’s been making serious moves in the real estate industry. Glad to have you here, Mark. How’s your day going?Mark Toro – Above Asking (02:21)
⁓It’s my pleasure, my pleasure. Absolutely looking forward to this as well. And the day’s going great. We’re starting it off this way so it couldn’t be better.
Leo Wehdeking (02:29)
All right, perfect, ⁓ Mark, I think our listeners are really going to take something away from how you’ve been approaching your real estate business. So let’s dive in. ⁓ So first of all, for people that may not be familiar with your world, can you give us a short version ⁓ on what’s your main focus these days?Mark Toro – Above Asking (02:51)
Sure, absolutely. So if you are not following my wife and I, can find us at instagram.com slash Tampa Flippers. It handles Tampa Flippers with an S. We’ve been in and around the Tampa real estate industry since 2005, actively investing in Tampa’s urban core since about 2017 when we moved into the city. Our business is primarily focused on design driven rehab projects.Naturally being a part of the space, we touch all different areas of the business. So interior design, retail sales, but our real focus of course is working on houses in the urban core, doing full gut renovations and then bringing them to market as new beautified for store projects. In addition to that business, we also have a mastermind community that we lead 80 active investors here in the Tampa market. They pay to be a part of the community, but we share resources, collaborate on deals, raise capital together.
It’s a learning and collaboration based environment. We’re really proud of what we built with the Above Asking Investor community.
Leo Wehdeking (03:55)
All right, right, all right. And Mark, in what markets are you operating in?Mark Toro – Above Asking (04:01)
So we’re here in downtown Tampa.So we invest in and around the city. So if you’re familiar with downtown Tampa, you have various areas such as South Tampa, downtown, and then the Heights. These are kind of urban core focused areas. That’s where we do most of our investments for our community, of course, covers the entire ⁓ region. And of course we have members that are in other cities within Florida as well, such as Miami, Orlando. So we touch many different areas in Florida, but our business as far as our direct investments is right here in the city.
Leo Wehdeking (04:33)
Alright, love it, love it man. ⁓ Mark, something that actually caught my attention about you was the way that you’ve been able to integrate your design skills ⁓ with your real estate and also converting that into a mastermind community. Can you be a little bit more specific how you’ve been able to build up those three topics and make it a whole?Mark Toro – Above Asking (05:49)
Yeah, yeah, of course, I’d love to touch on that. full disclosure, I’m not a design expert myself personally. That’s really my wife’s expertise in the business. But I take full advantage of her talents.So we discovered pretty early on in 2017 when we moved to the city that if you just spent a little more attention on design and design is both the static design. So pretty finishes, pretty cosmetics, but also spatial design. So making sure that the house has flow and functionality. So that may be adding bedrooms, bathrooms, knocking down walls, really reorienting the entire house. That was a way for us to add a lot of value on a per project basis. So we doubled down on that strategy and really our entire strategy.
at this point has been making, of course, beautiful homes, but highly functional, beautiful homes. So we do lower volume, higher margin activity. ⁓ But as a part of that, we’ve developed a reputation in the city, one for our design, but also just our overall expertise ⁓ in the space. So we stood up a mastermind about a year and a half ago. And largely the mastermind consists of flippers, developers, wholesalers. But I think what we’re really building is a culture of
of accountability, a culture of transparency, and really a culture of collaboration in the master realm. So what we do is we get 80 investors together each and every week with some level of programming, whether that’s in person or virtual programming. We share ideas, strategies, collaborate on opportunities. It’s pretty special, right? And of course, as a part of that, we transfer our knowledge of design-driven rehabs onto the group. But likewise, we learn so much from all of the different domain experts in the group.
That’s wholesalers, dealmakers, developers. It’s pretty cool to see it evolve and grow over time. Naturally, we admire the Investor Fuel community as well and we, of course, try to model some of our programming after Investor Fuel because you guys have done so well. But we love this aspect of community. It’s really changed how we approach business and it’s made it more fun as well.
Leo Wehdeking (07:53)
Yeah, it does it and mark can you tell us what’s being the key to keeping? Your business running smoothlyMark Toro – Above Asking (08:04)
Yeah, you know, I think for us is the ability to not pivot. I say this all the time, right? I hate the word pivot, but it’s constantly reinventing yourself to make sure that you’re able to stay ⁓ ahead of the curve as the market changes and evolves. Right. So what’s working this year may not work the next. And that may take really a true reinvention of your daily activities. What your focus is, maybe the expertise that you have to acquire. So for us, I think the ability tostay nimble and stay flexible. At the same time, focusing on what we do best has been tremendous value to us.
Leo Wehdeking (08:42)
Ok cool cool I like that. ⁓ Now Mark every operator that I know has a moment where things got real. You know maybe a deal that went sideways or not the way that you wanted and you had to reinvent yourself while doing it. I didn’t want to use the word pivot because you told me that you don’t like it so that’s how I change it.Mark Toro – Above Asking (08:59)
Sure.⁓
So I say this all the time, you know, to be successful in this industry for the long haul, you may have to do some things that.
are uncomfortable or you know that feel like they’re below your station and what I mean by that is kind of like this idea of rolling up your sleeves. So you know us we usually manage our business with a project manager or general contractor that way we can focus on other revenue streams everything is kind of feeds into each other and reinforces itself. But every once in a while you know you have to roll up your sleeves and really jump in and project manage and you may have to be a little more active on a construction project than what you’d like to be as a business owner. So I say for us what you know what’s
sticks out to me is really this is over the last year and a half or so we’ve had these really heavy full gut construction projects on historic homes and we’ve really had to step in and do a little bit more of the project management because the construction is so heavy it’s been overwhelming even to the partners that we partner with right so
taking that accountability taking ownership right at a per project basis or at the project level I think has been you know an area of adaptability for us where we really had to reinvent ourselves
and learn the permitting process, navigate those hurdles and get us through the finish line.
Leo Wehdeking (10:57)
Yeah, actually. And honestly, know, the people who actually do that are the ones ⁓ who stay in the game for the long term, you know, instead of those who just dabble around. All right. All right. Now, let me ask you this, Mark. What are you most focused on solving or scaling next?Mark Toro – Above Asking (11:07)
Absolutely.That’s right. That’s right.
So for us, would be the mastermind community. just see so much value ⁓ in building out the community, right? So we can, of course, try to scale our investments at the investment level, continue to raise capital or acquire more projects. But I really think that happens so much quicker, so much faster as a part of a collaborative community environment, right? So as we continue to scale the mastermind and there’s more members, there’s more expertise, there’s more overall activity.
That allows us to grow our investment business that much faster because the opportunities come to us that much quicker. And the same, you know, with our own activity, we can pass on opportunities, ⁓ capital, whatever the case may be to our community members as well. So I think for us, our real focus is scaling the group from today, we’re 80 active and engaged members to 250 members is our ambitious future future state goal. And I think we’ll give it some time to ramp up to that point. But, you aggressive
Leo Wehdeking (12:18)
Okay.Mark Toro – Above Asking (12:21)
aggressively, we are trying to add 10 members a month. I think that’s a good, comfortable number to integrate into the group because we also offer an in-person program every week. So 10 new members, net new members every single month is our goal.Leo Wehdeking (12:32)
Allman, that’s weak, especially when you have already, you know, everything in place. You have your mastermind community in place. ⁓ I think that the next move that you make can either compound things or create chaos, depending on how you play it. You know? Alright, alright. Now Mark, I know that a lot of people that are listening are either earlier in their game or they’re just looking to level up, alright? And I think they will benefit a lot if they hear this.
Mark Toro – Above Asking (12:51)
Spirit. Spirit.Sure, of course.
Leo Wehdeking (13:05)
coming from someone like you. When it comes about building relationships and growing up your network, what’s made the biggest difference for you?Mark Toro – Above Asking (13:17)
So, you know, I think it’s for us.Understanding that you really have to get out into the community in person and meet folks face to face to make that connection Right, and I say that because we initially started our mastermind community with this idea of being
We have kids our kids are now fifth grade and eighth grade So as we were raising though, we really didn’t have time to get out into the community So we thought hey, let’s stand up this virtual mastermind so people can plug in and connect
and we quickly realized that whenever we did this in-person programming as a part of what we were doing
Connection sparked right the energy just completely changed among the group and now we’ve positioned to you know majority in person programming
I’d recommend to any new investor and most of the investors in our group are actually scaling right? They’re going from deal one to five deals at a time naturally We have some you know 17 or 20 active projects Those are the more senior members of the group But I’d say the real you know the real core of our group are those early stage members that are scaling their business or even jumping into their first deal and
Leo Wehdeking (14:06)
Exactly.Mark Toro – Above Asking (14:20)
And what we find is many of them buy two deals for their first deal instead of one because they have the confidence from the community But my recommendation my wholeheartedly recommendation one would be join a community if you can there are free communities in every single city around the country there are paid communities are highly affordable and then there are elite communities like investor fuel right and what above asking is also becoming but getting in person meeting with people connecting this industry is full of self-made entrepreneurs that remember how hard it wasAnd they also remember hey somebody helped me along the way that took me from here to here and they want to help others and bring others up as well You just have to ask right so I’d say get out there connect in person ⁓ Lead with value. Hey, what can I do to you? What can I do for you? How can I help your business? Even if you feel like you have nothing to offer Maybe you have no investment experience, but your corporate finance experience. You have marketing experience You have leadership experience you’re highly organized all of those things can add value to potential entrepreneurs
Leo Wehdeking (15:39)
Thanks, Michael.Mark Toro – Above Asking (16:00)
thatmight take you under their wing or may decide to partner on a project with you.
Leo Wehdeking (16:05)
Alright, alright, yeah. Actually for me, know, when everything that you just said, it, you know, it’s reduced for me in one word. Alright? Relationships. Relationships. You need to learn how to build long-term relationships.Mark Toro – Above Asking (16:20)
Sure, absolutely. Yeah.Leo Wehdeking (16:28)
business relationships because actually that’s something that you cannot fake okay when you do a business for an example yourself alright I’m pretty sure that when you started not everything was as it is right now okay you had to you had to build you had to build up your name you had to build up your company and the only way you can do that is by building relationships with the persons that you were doing business at that time am I rightMark Toro – Above Asking (16:33)
Sure.Leo Wehdeking (16:57)
Correct, correct. All right, Mark. Now, before we wrap up, if someone wanted to reach out, connect with you or even collaborate, you know, with you or learn more about what you’re doing, what’s the best way for them to reach you?Mark Toro – Above Asking (17:10)
Sure.I love this question. So I’m going to give a few avenues to connect with me. ⁓ know, first I mentioned our Instagram handle for rehab business. that’s instagram.com slash Tampa flippers. ⁓ Please feel free to DM us there. You can also find the mastermind community at instagram.com slash above dot asking. So that’s above dot asking. And I’m always open to conversation with anyone. So please, if you, if you want to connect with me directly, feel free to email me at mark.
above-asking.com. that’s mark it above-asking.com. Happy to connect anytime, talk about the community, give any advice that I can give. Like we mentioned, right, it’s this idea of relationships and connecting. So please, I encourage anybody if they want to grow in the space, if they have a word for me to help me, or if they need a word for me to help them, please connect with me on any of those forums and I’m happy to chat.
Leo Wehdeking (18:11)
Alright, alright, perfect. Well listen Mark, I really appreciate your time, your story and your perspective, alright? ⁓ We need more people in this space who are actually doing it the right way. So thanks again for being on the show. And for those of you just tuning in, if you got value from this, make sure you’re subscribed. We got more conversations with operators just likeLeo Wehdeking
okay, who are out there doing it the right way, building real businesses. So until then, see you on the next episode.Mark Toro
Thank you, Leo. It’s been a lot of really appreciate it.Leo Wehdeking
You’re welcome, Mark.
