Unlock Real Estate Freedom: Becoming a Successful Limited Partner

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (00:00)
But one of the biggest gaps, as you kind of mentioned already that I noticed was there just isn’t a lot of information out there to tell you how to be a limited partner in passive investing. And so after we sold the company, transitioned it over to Bigger Pockets,

I’ve really been spending my time trying to build content, build a playbook to teach people about being a limited partner. Cause there’s, there’s a ton, we talked about this. It’s a ton of education to teach you how to flip single-family homes. And you can find that all day. got HGTV shows about it for crying out loud. There’s a lot of stuff to teach you how to be an operator and a general partner. There’s very little content on teaching you how to be a limited partner. And I wanted to build that.

Quentin (00:32)
Mm-hmm.

Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host Q Edmonds and I’m excited to be here today. I have a fantastic guest. There are some guests that I have that just put me at ease. And most of time I’m normally at ease, but you always, you know, I’m not a robot. Like a lot of times I think about just making sure, you know, I’m presenting the right way, making sure I got my…

my focus points together, making sure I’m trying to create a conversation. But it’s some guests that you just know, we’re gonna work together and this is just gonna be great. And I feel like this is one of those guests and I’m excited to have him on. I’m excited for you to hear about what it is that he’s building because I really feel like this closes one of the gaps within this space we call real estate. So I’m gonna let him tell you all about it.

But I’m so excited to introduce you all to Mr. Chad Ackerman. Mr. Chad, how you doing today,

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (03:17)
I’m doing great, man. I appreciate you having me on. Yeah, I feel like we’ve known each other forever now and we met 20 minutes ago. That’s good. That’s good.

Quentin (03:21)
Yeah.

Right, I love it. That’s

good. That’s for me. That’s the best because it shows alignment. It shows synchronicity. And so, yeah, man, I’m excited. And I sincerely say that. I actually told my crowd, no, I got it cool. If I don’t say I’m excited, they know that me and the guests, we might have a little friction going on, which is not too often, which is not too often, but sometimes, you know, sometimes. But anyway.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (03:33)
Yeah.

some right right fair hopefully

hopefully not today hopefully not today

Quentin (03:53)
Not today at all, no sir, no sir. So listen man,

are you on the type Mr. Chad, I like to dive in. So I would love for you to tell the people, what’s your main focus these days? ⁓ Give us a little bit of an origin story if you don’t mind, kind of how you got to where you are. We absolutely love the hero’s journey. And then man, let them know what part of the world you’re in. People love to know where people are geographically. So what you’re up to, the origin story and where you are. Mr. Chad, sir, you have the floor.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (04:20)
Great. you. So, yeah, I think my journey story is similar to a lot of people that are probably listening to this podcast. I was a career W2 person. I was in human resources of all things. So I wasn’t in real estate at all. Wasn’t a finance person or anything like that. I was just HR guy doing compensation work. And I got to that point in my career where I felt like I accomplished a lot of things.

Quentin (04:32)
Mmm.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (04:46)
but I felt gaps in what I was trying to do. And I started looking for alternative income streams. Somebody put me on that beat that I thought, yeah, let me play around with this. I always liked real estate. I started looking at all the shiny objects that come in real estate, single family stuff, GP stuff, whatever.

And my thing I finally clicked with was becoming a passive limited partner in investing in real estate that way. ⁓ And so I fumbled around, found some local meetups to…

get to connect it with some people. And it just took off. I actually got bit by the bug so bad, I liquidated my 401k and moved it over, paid the tax, paid the penalty, did all of it. So I was all in, I burned the ships and moved it over. But I loved it. I still love the space. And that was around 2018. And started a community with a group of people that we were gonna…

form a meetup that was going to get together. Our first meeting was scheduled to be March 18th of 2020 and the world shut down three days before that for the pandemic. So we went on zoom and that was probably the best thing that ever happened to that community because we could just grow from there because we could add anybody we wanted. And that group was called left field investors. And we grew to where we had about 2000 people in our community and ran it for about four years and ended up selling that company to bigger pockets.

Quentin (06:40)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (06:56)
And it’s now called Passive Pockets if you go to their website. So very proud of that journey. But all of that taught me that I love this, I had a passion for this space of investing in real estate, especially as a limited partner.

But one of the biggest gaps, as you kind of mentioned already that I noticed was there just isn’t a lot of information out there to tell you how to be a limited partner in passive investing. And so after we sold the company, transitioned it over to Bigger Pockets,

I’ve really been spending my time trying to build content, build a playbook to teach people about being a limited partner. Cause there’s, there’s a ton, we talked about this. It’s a ton of education to teach you how to flip single-family homes. And you can find that all day. got HGTV shows about it for crying out loud. There’s a lot of stuff to teach you how to be an operator and a general partner. There’s very little content on teaching you how to be a limited partner. And I wanted to build that.

Quentin (07:43)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (07:53)
So I’ve been working, I got certified as a business coach. I’ve blended that business coaching resource and material with my experience as a limited partner. And I’ve been creating a playbook basically to help people get started. Cause I feel like that’s the number one question I hear from limited partners is I’m overwhelmed. I just don’t know what to do. And I could relate. went through those situations as well. So I’m trying to give back to this community by building up that gap.

and giving content that’ll help people with issues that I had when I started. So that’s kind of my current state is trying to help people really get started in this, not be overwhelmed, give them a place to go, some education to get ⁓ that really gets them started on the way. And I forgot to mention I’m in Columbus, Ohio as well. Forgive me for skipping that. There we go. Close the gap. I’m all about closing gaps.

Quentin (08:43)
You didn’t skip it. You wanted you close the gap man. You the gap. absolutely.

Chad, thank you, man. Thank you. I told you, I put a premium on stories. So thank you for walking us through the journey. And you’re about to see why I put a premium on stories. Thank you for walking us through the journey. Welcome us to telling us where you are now, how you got to where you are now. And so as you was talking, I need you to know I was actively listening.

And I was actually writing some things now because I want to reiterate some things to you because I’m going make a statement and I’m going ask you a question. All right. And so career W2 employee, HR guy, actually there’s a HR too. So that’s funny. HR guy, but you wanted to fill the gaps in your life, like what you wanted to do. Right. And so you, you found this passive limited partner. ⁓ You liquidated your full 1k, burned the ships, all in.

started a meetup and then COVID happened, right? And that meetup named left field investors, sold at the bigger pockets. And just, these are some of the names, the things that you named, right?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (09:55)
Yeah, there’s four podcasts and all that by itself.

Quentin (09:58)
Look at that.

And the reason why I reiterate those things back to you

is because I have a saying where I say destiny has no wasted moments. Meaning no matter what we go through in life, the moments are building to where we are now. And we’re borrowing from each moment. We borrow our mindset. We borrow discipline. We even borrow from the failures. And it fuels our passion.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (10:44)
I like that.

Quentin (11:00)
It lets us know why we do what we do now. And so, Chad, I would love to know, as the moment started to build, as you’ve been through this journey, what has these moments taught you about yourself? Has they taught you discipline, resilience? Has it changed the way you think about innovation? Like, what has these moments taught you about you?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (11:03)
Yeah.

I think the biggest thing I’ve learned out of all this journey that I’ve been on, I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. I am doing what I am supposed to do. I found that thing I have passion around and I’ve been able to turn it into what I do for a living. And that’s a wonderful place to be.

I think that’s the biggest thing. I don’t know if I’ve learned discipline still, sadly. I probably need to be better at it still, but it ⁓ is definitely tough because as we sold left field to bigger pockets and I went out and got certified as a business coach, I tried to kick around different business coaching models and it brought me back to coaching in real estate. I’m like, yeah, dummy, that’s what you really enjoy doing. And I just reiterated that, yeah, this is the space I’m supposed to be in.

Quentin (11:43)
You

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (12:09)
Helping people out, giving back, educating people, but doing it in that space that I’m really passionate about being in.

Quentin (12:17)
I love it. I love it. I thank you. I hope you have grace on yourself because the journey’s not over. We continue the journey, right? And yeah, and I love, know, sometimes I think we have to grow into our capacity. Well, at least that’s what I’m figuring out for me, right? I’m just like you. I’ve tried different things. So there’s a story. you know, so I read the Bible a lot. I’m not going to turn this into a religious show, but I read the Bible a lot.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (12:24)
Absolutely.

Yeah.

You

Quentin (12:44)
And

there’s a story, a lot of people heard of the story of David and Goliath, right? A lot of, I that’s, famous, right? Within the pages of those story, before David was about to go fight Goliath, the king tried to put his armor on David. And when David tried to move in it, it’s like, can’t, I can’t move it. He said, I have not proved this. That’s one of the statements he made. So he hadn’t grown into that capacity. He hadn’t proved.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (13:03)
It didn’t fit.

Quentin (13:13)
that armor. Now, everybody probably is going to tell you, you do not want to go fight this giant without armor. Everybody’s going to tell you in business what to do. you’re learning from bigger podcasts. You’re learning from different podcasts. So you try on armor that you just have improved. And I think one thing about the journey is that you prove your fighting style. You prove your superpower. You prove, I am a coach. I like to coach people. This is what I like to do. This is what I’m good at. And so I…

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (13:18)
Hahaha

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Quentin (13:42)
Listening to you. I hope you have grace in yourself and I hope other people have grace on theirself Sometimes you just got to grow into the capacity of what you do And that’s why I asked that question about no destiny in those moments because sometimes you got to reflect and say this didn’t work But all of this led me to where I am now and where I am now and like you just said this is where I am Exactly where I’m supposed to be all the moments have been building to this and so I mean you I love I love your reflection

I love yourself for wearing this. Thank you for sharing,

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (14:13)
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. It’s I mean, it makes a great teaching moment for my kids as well to say, hey, keep your eyes open. Be be willing to pivot. Be willing to be open to new experiences because you never know when something’s going to click. I found mine when I was in my 40s going into my 50s, you know, so it’s not something you necessarily have to have figured out at 23. It’s be open. See what’s out there for you and, you know, tackle it when it

lean into it when you find what it is. That’s kind of been my mentality.

Quentin (14:46)
Man, you’re talking. I can’t remember what Tori’s story was, but they hired a new vice president or something. I wish I could remember which one it was, but the content of the story is that when she took over, she was like, we have to create, we got to get into the kids

So what she did for six months, she told people to go play. They created this warehouse where they will go play and have fun.

and that increased their creativity, increased them getting back in touch with their childhood-like mentality when you just dreamed and played. And just talking about your kids, and even for us, sometimes we can’t lose the ability to play because the ability to play causes us to dream. It causes us to reinvent. It causes us to kind of take the boundaries off where everybody say, you can’t do that. But sometimes you can drop that boundary. Like, you know what? Why can’t we do that? You know what I’m saying?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (16:02)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Why not?

Yeah, absolutely.

Quentin (16:20)
And so I love the place of

just curiosity and just figuring things out. And so again, I just hope we have grace, all of us listening grace on ourself. I’m with you. I’m learning things in my forties that I’m like, dang, I knew this when I was 20. Good God, that mercy is good. Anyway, that’s a whole other story. ⁓ Mr. Chad, man, please tell me, sir, with care, man, what is the next real goal? What are you looking to solve a scale next, Mr. Chad?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (16:25)
Yeah.

Ha! That’s the thing!

Yeah, so with care, it’s all about filling those gaps is what my goal is with this. What I’ve learned as I’ve been building this content, building material to share, the biggest thing I wanted to do was get out of the way of those that are trying to absorb it. I started out as just trying to do one on one coaching and I’m like, Chad, you wouldn’t have wanted to maybe do a one on one coaching job when you were starting out as a limited partner. So I went out and built a bunch of masterclass content.

bunch of videos to let you absorb that way. Well, now I’m converting those videos into a book and that way I can give you this education through one-on-one coaching, through video content, master class content, and through a book. And then it’s, okay, now I have a module of education to help people get started to have the initial playbook. Now I want to go build the 201 level class next and build one-on-one coaching, video content, and a book for it.

Rinse and repeat till I have a library of education available for people so that they can go in, figure out where they want. It’s not going to be necessarily, you can go A to Z, but if you struggle with something and just want some education content, jump to that content that you need help with and make available. And then obviously I’m here, reach out to me and I can help you with whatever you’re stuck on. I don’t want you to be in the quagmire. I want you to move forward. I want you to take steps.

That’s what it’s all about. You’re going to learn more by taking those steps than you are just studying my material all the time. So that’s my goal is to get people up and ready to run and, you know, put the tennis shoes on them to help them run or whatever they need, uh, just to get them going and taking that action. I learned so much by taking action. I studied, I studied this space for probably about three years before I pulled the trigger on anything, just trying to find the right thing.

And then I learned so much from that first deal that I was ready to rinse and repeat it as well. you got to get over that initial hump, I think is the hardest hump to get over in the business is that first one. So my goal with care is try to get people ready to take action, have their confidence built, have them feel educated and get them ready to go.

Quentin (18:48)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, man, love it. I love your spirit. mean, there’s so much through line when you talk, even when you were just talking from jump, there was just a through line of Jews, just helping people, serving people. that’s, mean, that’s what I synthesize. And that’s when I’m bringing up the word service, right? Because I really believe at the foundation of any sustainable business is servitude. You know, I think I told you, you know, I read the Bible again, not trying to make this a religious show.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (19:13)
Yep, yep.

Yep, yep.

Quentin (19:28)
But there’s an

old proverb that says, when you refresh others, you in return will be refreshed. When you serve people, when you refresh people, how can it not come back to you?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (19:34)
Yeah.

100%. I’ll tell you, I’ll give you a story. I’ll give you an exact example why I’m passionate about this and why I it. When we were with Left Field, we had in-person conferences that we did. We did a few of these. And in the very first one we had, I had no less than three people come up to me and say, you changed my life. Thank you for what you built. I’ve never, HR never gave me that experience. You know, I’ve never had that.

short of my kids, but they’re there in that stage still that you know I haven’t I’m ⁓ I’m still dad. I haven’t changed anybody’s life there yet, but we’ll get that. I’m not worried about that. That’ll be down the road, but to have these people come up to me and tell me thank you for what you built with left field. It changed my life like I I wasn’t expecting it, so it caught me off guard, but it was such a valuable moment to me to say what you’re doing is good thing. You’re helping people out, so it’s exactly what you were talking about.

Quentin (20:09)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right.

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (20:35)
of give and you’ll receive so much more. So that’s why I wanted to stay here. That’s why I’m trying to give back still today.

Quentin (20:42)
Yeah, one of my mentors said something when I was at an empath of my life. He made a statement. He said, when you know who you are, you know what to do. And so when you know who you are, it powers everything that you do. And here’s the thing. What I love about you, said, you spent three years. You spent time submerged in this. I think what people…

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (21:07)
Yeah.

Quentin (21:10)
What would benefit people to understand is that a lot of times when you are passionate about something, when you know your why, when you are really true to what you’re doing, majority of the time, the success comes from the overflow of what you do. It’s like, because here’s the saying, people say, you know, do something that you would do for free. You want to get paid for it, but you would do it for free. That means because it’s ingrained in you.

This is the overflow. This is what I do. And so therefore all the things start to align and money started to come. The people started to come. The clients started to come because this is what I do. I would do this for free. I’m not, got a family and I believe in, you know, fair wage and all that, but this is something I would do for free. And so I love the fact that you submerged yourself for three years and that lets me know the through line serving people. And this is, this is true to who you are. With that being said,

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (21:38)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Quentin (22:07)
I gotta ask you specifically this question. I’m gonna say one word, I’m gonna get your feedback on this word. When you hear the word relationship, what comes to mind for you, Mr. Chad?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (22:19)
There’s nothing more important in this business than relationships. And that is relationships with other LPs. So you can network and grow with them. Relationships with the operators because it’s, it is a know, like, and trust business. The biggest risk you have in this business is understanding that operator that you’re going to give money to is going to do what they say they’re going to do. And all that comes from relationships. And then it’s, it’s the mentorships like what I’m trying to do for the community of

helping them build and grow and feel confident and so forth. This is a relationship business. The entire thing is based on relationships. So if you don’t buy into relationships, you’re going to have frustration in this industry because it’s what it feeds off of.

Quentin (23:06)
So well said. want to ask you this before we close out. I want to ask you specifically this question. Is there any topic that I have not brought up that you would like to talk about? Is there any other words of inspiration, education, motivation? Is there anything kind of you came in here with this on your mind? He’s like, I need the viewers to know this. Kind of just want to open up the floor. Again, if somebody like you, I know you were Stuart the message well. I.

I’m gonna open up the floor. Is there anything that you feel like you need to say?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (23:37)
there’s four hours of stuff we could talk about probably if we wanted to, but no, there’s great conversation. I feel like I’ve probably gotten across what I’m trying to do with my business is I want to introduce people to the limited partner space because not a lot of people know what it is. There’s a lot of myths around and people don’t understand really what they can do. If you have a desire to invest in real estate, but you don’t want to become a landlord, it’s a great space to be.

Quentin (23:40)
What?

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (24:05)
if you don’t want to take on another job, because this is a little more passive than being an active person. If you want to look at the tax benefits that come with this space too, all this stuff. That’s what I’m here to help is just get you educated, help you understand that you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to do it. You don’t have to be filthy rich to do it. You don’t have to take on another job to do it. This can be a fruitful way for people to build their wealth, get alternative income streams. And I’m trying to build the education to help them learn all that.

Quentin (24:34)
you. Man, I

appreciate you so much, 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,

Chad Ackerman Real Estate (24:39)
Well, edit it up, yeah?

Yeah, easiest way to go to my website, which is ChadAckermanRealEstate.com, all one word, or I’m all over LinkedIn as well. You can look up Chad Ackerman Real Estate or me and I’m on there at a couple of spots. So