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Show Summary
In this conversation, Lee Yoder shares his journey in real estate, discussing his unique approach to investing in properties in smaller markets, the challenges of managing a growing business, and the importance of partnerships and team dynamics. He reflects on the personal growth he and his wife have experienced through their business journey, emphasizing the balance between risk and stability. Lee also addresses the complexities of business relationships, particularly when friends and family are involved, and shares insights on the importance of building a strong team to support business growth.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Lee Yoder (00:00)
I look back and I’m like, man, at almost all times, I didn’t feel like we were moving fast enough yet.I three years in four years in five years and I look back and I cannot believe how much we’ve done. so that’s kind of amazing to me that the whole time I’m going, I’m not moving fast enough. I’m not moving fast enough. And I look back and I can’t believe how much we’ve done. So how could those two things both be true?
Q Edmonds (01:54)
Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host Q Edmonds. You know what I’m gonna say? Cause I don’t say it unless I mean it. I’m excited to be here today. I have another fantastic guest and sometimes my guests got away a firing me up right before we press play. And this is this gentleman did just to see some alignment with some things, know, visually how we see things, standards, how we got. And I’m just excited because listen, this gentleman is gonna tell you about buying portfolios, right?And I love his approach. love his business approach. I love the way he’s building this business. And so I want to introduce you all to Mr. Lee Yoder. Mr. Lee, how you doing today,
Lee Yoder (02:34)
I’m doing well, Quentin,Q Edmonds (02:37)
Lee, man,so glad you’re here. And listen, Lee, listen, I want to dive right in. So I want you to tell the people what your main focus is these days. If you don’t mind, give us a little bit of an origin story of kind of how you got it started, how you got into real estate. We love the hero’s journey. And then, tell them where you are demographically, what market you’re operating in. And so, Lee, sir, you have the floor,
Lee Yoder (02:59)
Great. Okay, man. ⁓ Yeah, I live just north of Cincinnati, Ohio. ⁓ Wife, two kids. I was a physical therapist by trade actually ⁓ was doing that got in with the company that was kind of startup company was helping build out a division for that company and andI was not doing any physical therapy for that company was more like doing in sales operations, like again, just kind of building this division within a startup company. And I love that work. So I’m like, man, I feel like this is what God made me to do, not physical therapy. So I’m like, what the heck does that mean? You know, I got this degree. So, uh, ended up deciding to get into real estate or I thought I wanted to, you know, I had a friend at church. was in a full time group around construction. My dad’s in construction. So let me, I think this is what I want to do. Um, so I,
I was practicing as a home health physical therapist, which is a very flexible job because my patients would just come to my phone. I get to make my schedule. ⁓ I get paid for visits. So if I’m not doing any visits and I’m out doing real estate stuff, nobody cares because they’re not paying me. As long as my patients get seen, they’re happy. So that’s what I did for. ⁓
from 2016, yeah, for four years I did that. was a home health physical therapist, but I was doing real estate on the side. And I started with a flip in 2017 and 2018. did a duplex 2019 got a 16 unit, an eight unit, and then a 10 unit.
heavy value add projects, put a lot of work into those. I used a property management company, worked with property management company, but I was kind of the GC on those, did a lot of projects, turned those around, sold that whole portfolio, made a good bid on it because that was, you know, after the COVID stimulus boom, right? And the government’s pumping all this money into the economy, real estate takes off. So I benefited from that with this portfolio I had, sold it.
took all that profit, put that into my savings account, convinced my wife that this is like a three year runway for us. Let me jump all in and go all in. So at the end of 2020, I quit my W-2. ⁓ My wife’s a nurse, but she had actually already quit her W-2 to stay home with her kids and homeschool them. So when I quit, had no ordinary income, no W-2 job. So was pretty scary. ⁓
been doing that ever since. So starting in 2021, we started doing bigger multifamily deals, bringing in more investors, which we call a syndication, just a group investment.
So bringing in, to this point, like dozens of investors on each deal. And then we kind of split the deal with them. They’ll get 60, 70 % of the deal. And then me and my team and any partners I bring in, we might have…
you know, 30 to 40 percent or something like that, the equity. And so we’ve been doing that now for five years. We have 930 units in Ohio, in Indiana. We started managing our own properties three years ago. That’s been a big challenge. So we built our own property management company, but that’s been very rewarding. I’m glad we did that. It’s tough, that’s been a lot of fun. It’s fun having good employees, which most of us are really good. So that’s fun.
Yeah. And we’re doing that. I think you, I don’t know if you said something about strategy Quentin, but like what we’re into today. So what we’ve kind of found is our niche is that we are buying, you know, in Ohio and Indiana, but we’re not buying in the, know, if you don’t live in Ohio or Indiana, you probably know like Cincinnati, Columbus, Ohio, maybe Cleveland, and then like Indianapolis and Louisville, Louisville is Kentucky. It’s just across the board. I think of it as Indiana sometimes. It’s actually, but Indianapolis is probably the only main one, you know, in Indiana, maybe Fort Wayne.
But we actually don’t buy in any of those markets. We buy outside of those markets in the more tertiary markets. And we still buy a hundred units at a time usually or more.
but we’re buying like an hour outside of Cincinnati, an hour outside of Columbus, and there’s just less competition there. So we are buying for a much lower price per door. Rent is a little lower, but not much. So we’re just, think we’ve got better economics. Now, we’ll, there may be not as much upside, but I think there’s a lot less downside and we’ve got more cash flow. So anyway, that’s a lot, man. A little more story and a little bit of the strategy we have for today.
Q Edmonds (07:52)
Manly, thank you man. Thank you for taking us through the journey. Thank you for walking us up to what you do now. And as you was writing, man, I’m writing stuff down. Like I’m writing down your resume, man. Like wife of two kids, was a physical therapist, was doing sales, had a friend at church that was in real estate. Then you started buying a duplex in 2019. Like you feel like, you know, God was shifting you to where he wanted to go. Like so many different things that you say. And that’s half of the stuff. I wrote more stuff down that you said.But you hit on something that I often say on this podcast. This is the quote that I say, Lee, destiny has no wasted moments. Meaning no matter what we go through in life, destiny has a way of refining us and it uses everything that we have to make us who we are today. I know you know this, Bible says all things work together for your good. know, so destiny has no wasted moments. So man, I would love to know.
What has these moments within your destination, what has it taught you about you? Has it taught you consistency? Has it taught you resilience? What has it brought out and highlighted to you about you?
Lee Yoder (09:04)
Yeah, man, one, one, the thing that comes to mind first, Quentin, I mean, there’s been a lot of things, as you kind of said, there’s been so many things. It’s been a, it’s been a long, hard journey. It’s been exciting. It’s been fun. It’s been fulfilling. ⁓ but one thing that’s been really neat is, is, ⁓ I was sharing this with you before we started the public. My, my wife is very different than I am and she’s very risk averse. I God just made her different and she’s got her strengths and weaknesses and I’ve got my own strengths and weaknesses. but we’re very different, but you know, so that’s been very frustrating for both of us at times because.because I often feel like she’s holding me back and I want to move so much faster and she feels like I’m dragging her.
You know, she doesn’t feel safe and doesn’t feel, you know, supported and provided for maybe in the way that she thought she would be by her husband. ⁓ and sometimes I don’t feel supported in the way that I thought maybe my wife would, but what’s been neat Quentin and that we’ve learned is that, know, like you said, God, God works all things for his good, for those who follow him. And, as we’ve, as we’ve tried to do that and maybe done that a little bit better as we’ve gone along, it’s cool, man, because my wife had, would say that I’ve
And she’s more comfortable with some risks. lot of the re you know, for her, it’s like, well, she’s smart. doesn’t want risks. Well, but sometimes we’re clenching things too tightly. And sometimes we want to like, hold on to things like it’s ours, like even our money, it’s ours. And as believers, we believe it’s actually all God’s and we make God might be calling us to let it let loose a little bit. Right. And maybe take some risks. Maybe God is calling us, even though it’s
uncomfortable. And so she’s kind of gone through that journey. Meanwhile, sometimes God wants us to chill out a little bit, slow down. Sometimes, you know, he wants me to focus more on my family and not do that next deal or not do three or four deals this year. And that’s hard for me to hear. ⁓ So what’s been cool, man, is like three years in especially, and I’ve been saying this every year since is like,
I look back and I’m like, man, at almost all times, I didn’t feel like we were moving fast enough yet.
I three years in four years in five years and I look back and I cannot believe how much we’ve done. so that’s kind of amazing to me that the whole time I’m going, I’m not moving fast enough. I’m not moving fast enough. And I look back and I can’t believe how much we’ve done. So how could those two things both be true?
How can it be true that like we’ve done so much more than I thought possible, but yet the whole time I was like complaining, we weren’t moving fast enough. And what it is, man, is like, it’s this beautiful picture of like two people that got put together where, cause the cool thing for us, Quentin is like, man left in my own device.
I would have done a lot more deals, but I promise you I would have missed on some of them like I would have had some bad ones and because of my wife we’ve done far fewer deals, but we’ve had no bad ones. We haven’t missed on any of them. So we’ve always been able to kind of take that next step. So that’s what’s been kind of neat about it. Again, frustrating and challenging throughout, but it’s like, man, okay, yeah, God’s got a better vision in mind than what I have. Cause I’m like, man, I mean, dude, I flipped one house and then was like, all right,
And then my wife was like, that’s not what you told me passive investing looks like. Like, that’s not the dream you sold me on, you flipping. You said like residual income and passive income and all this stuff. She’s like, that’s not what flipping was. And I’m like, yeah, you’re right. That’s yeah, that’s okay. So let’s not do that again. Let’s go take the next step into a duplex. The duplex was like, okay, this is a little bit more, you what, what she’s like, what you the dream you sold me on. Okay. But you know,
We don’t want to manage ourselves. You said you don’t want to manage. So let’s get a little bit bigger so probably manage. anyway, man, I’ll stop talking, but that’s it’s been neat how how guys worked it out between my wife and I.
Q Edmonds (13:18)
Man, what a powerful message for me such a timely method our message ⁓ Because for 2026 i’ve been working on just expanding our business and writing up the vision The vision right? Barbara talks about right division make it plain and those that hear it is going to run with it, right? and As a right division, there are some things that my wife is just that she’s not on board with cycle processes when i’m putting in place And I have that same thought likeShe’s slowing me up. But no, what I know in what you so eloquently said, and I’m gonna use this word agreement. We, the two, we are one, we have to come to agreement. So it’s not about her slowing me down, it’s not about me speeding up. It’s about, the whole journey is about agreement. And we looking at the outcome like, well, baby, we leaving this money on a table, this needs to be done. But what he’s concerned about is the agreement.
When y’all have agreement, and like you said, you’re going to look back and be like, dang, we got a lot done. And I thought we was dragging our feet because God is, he’s concerned with the agreement. So man, such a powerful message. So timely for me. And I know we’re talking real estate and business, but I hope somebody caught that nugget because agreement is, it’s such a vital aspect. Accountability is such a vital aspect. Community is such a vital aspect of what we do here within business, whether it be real estate or anything else.
And so, man, I appreciate you, man. I gotta ask you this. What is the next goal? Like, what are you looking to solve at scale next,
Lee Yoder (15:34)
Yeah. So, ⁓ I would love, we want to keep scaling because we’re starting to see like the benefits of, know, managing your own properties has been kind of powerful for us, Quentin, because it’s, it’s giving us cashflow. when we, when we syndicate, we give like all of the cashflow to our investors through at least the first few years. Like we don’t get a lot of that. We own a good bit of the property. So if we do really well for our investors over five years, and then we sell, we will make a good bit of money, but that’s not paying us today. That’s notpaying us throughout the year because we do a preferred return for our investors so like they get the cash flow.
the property management company, you know, charging a fee to each of our properties. That’s allowed us some cashflow. And of course we spend a lot of that money, but we can spend it on people. And so we’re able to build out the team. so that’s the next, that’s the next vision is like, okay, man, now we’re starting to add some really kind of more executive level people and really build out this powerful team. And like, now we’re seeing like, man, that guy, know, he’s doing all this stuff that I can’t even do. mean, we added a controller. He’s an accountant, you know, I, we, we,
we’ve captured the dollars and cents, but I don’t know accounting. So man, the stuff he’s doing, it’s awesome. So that’s really exciting for us. My wife and I really excited, the people that we’re adding and how they’re going to move the business forward for us what they’re going to do for it. And so, you the more we grow, the more we can kind of add those people that just really make us so much better because we, know, we have a few skills and mostly my skills, Quentin are the type of skills that get us started. Like I’m a starter.
I’m an entrepreneur, right? But I am not a specialist. I, you know, I’m not detail oriented. I’m not super organized. I’m actually, not really a very good manager. Cause I just want to be out in front. So I’m learning this stuff about myself. I’m like, man, so I need to hire for those weaknesses I have and bring guys in girls in that are really good at that.
We’ve just started to do that in the past few months and it’s exciting, man. That’s been fun. So I’m excited to see what these guys and girls that we’ve had can do. And then I’m excited to add even more. Again, my wife’s like, pump the brakes. Let’s not spend all our money. It’s fun, man, building the team and having people rowing alongside you. a lot of the time, my wife’s involved with me, but she’s home school the kids.
Q Edmonds (17:44)
Yeah.Lee Yoder (17:54)
She’s, she’s mostly running the household. So there’s just a lot of times I feel like I’m rowing really hard and I’m the only one rowing that hard that like cares that much. Now we’re adding some people that are like, man, like I want to be in this with you and that that’s exciting. Yeah.Q Edmonds (18:08)
⁓ Lee man, I’m loving talking to you, man. love your self awareness, right? Self awareness is a little bit different than self confidence, right? When you self confident, sometimes you steamroll everybody because I’m confident. I’m self confident, you know, but when you’re self aware, you are aware of your strength and your weaknesses and you don’t try to force nothing. don’t steamroll nobody. You say, no, I’m self aware enough to know what I do strong. And then I can invite people that come in to do things that I do weak.And it just reminds us like his strength is made perfect in our weakness, right? That’s a mindset that we have to constantly, you know, kind of practice within our lives. Like, when I’m weak, he’s strong. And also we can take that in our relationships and business with our wives, with people around us is that, okay, when I’m weak, I am counting on the community, the partnership with other people to come in and make us strong. And that makes a holistic
System right and so and I love the way you talk and so I got to get your perspective on relationships like What do you build healthy relationships have relationships served you well? Well, give me your perspective when it comes to building healthy relationships within business
Lee Yoder (19:23)
Hmm, man, that’s a good one because II, I trust a little too early and, ⁓ I always just see the best in people, ⁓ kind of to a fault. my wife’s much more discerning. She, she’s a pretty good judge of character, but, ⁓ so I’ve had a couple of partnerships that didn’t work out and that’s really tough, man, because in both cases, ⁓ it was a, it was a guy, it was a friend of mine, you know, ⁓ one was a guy I worked with and kind of corporate America and we joined and he’s a great guy. ⁓ actually there was nothing wrong ever.
wrong with the relationship, ended up kind of realizing that.
We weren’t like the yin and yang you’re looking for, right? Like we didn’t balance each other that well. it’s like, we’re just, we’re not the right partnership. Yeah. Love this guy. He was so good to me. So honest. He’s just one of the kindest best guys I’ve ever known, but that was hard, man, because we did have a good relationship. But when I started like, man, we’re not the right partners. It was hard to break up, but ultimately for the business, I knew it was the right decision. ⁓ and for both of us, I think it’s been better for both of us. And then I had another one, man. was like a really cool.
close church friend. were family friends and honestly, Quentin, like it did get bad for a little bit. Like the breakup was, bad. ⁓ he moved, but what wanted to keep working with us. And honestly, if he wasn’t a friend, I would have just said like, dude, this isn’t going to work. mean, I live in Ohio. He moved to Florida. wanted to keep working. And I’m like, okay. And his situation was such like,
financially it would really help him if he kept working with us. So I’m like, man, he’s a friend. Let me do that for him. Uh, we did cut his pay a little bit. Cause I’m like, dude, you just can’t do a lot of the things we were going to have you do. You know, he’s kind of helping run the property management company. And then, know, a little further in, like I was cutting him back a little bit more and he really felt hurt by that because he felt like, as a friend, how could you do that? Well, from our perspective, Quentin, I’m like, man, the only reason I’ve been doing so much of what I’ve done is because you’re a friend. Like if you want a friend, I wouldn’t have kept you on this long, you know, so that
That made it tough, man. that’s why some people say business with friends. But I will tell you, mean, a lot of my wife’s family isn’t our business and there are some challenges there, but with, with friends and family, I mean, it’s hard to find people you can trust really, really well. And sometimes that’s people in your family. So we, and that’s honestly, for the most part that’s worked out really well. ⁓ so
Q Edmonds (21:32)
Yeah.Lee Yoder (21:52)
I don’t know, man. I just went on a rabbit trail there. Relationships are hard. We’ve built some good ones, but business does make it kind of tough. And you know, it’s one thing my wife and I have learned is like, man, being the business owner is tough. Like we actually have a lot of ⁓ sympathy, I guess, for business owners. I mean, I think it’s easy to hate on the man, ⁓ guy at the top, right? And like I get some of that there’s a lot of bad ones, but dude, it’s pretty hard.we have to make some tough decisions and, know, ⁓ in relationships can kind of get messy when money’s involved and business involved. So ⁓ overall it’s been really good. we’ve, know, we, man, we just pray about it. And, there’s just going to be some people that are upset with some of the decisions you make, right? So, Yeah. It’s a learning curve for us for sure. To navigate relationships and business and money, cause it can get messy.
Q Edmonds (22:47)
Yeah, no, ⁓ man, when I tell you I hear you, I hear you. And one of the things that come to mind for me when I have to have difficult conversations is how to speak the truth in love. Even in business, that’s my moniker. I have to be honest about where we are because aren’t is supposed to shop in aren’t. And if that’s not happening, then I got to speak the truth in love. right now,We’re not equally yoked when it comes to this. Like how yoking together is not moving us in the same direction. you know, so we had to talk about that. And so ⁓ I love it, man. Again, I absolutely love your self-awareness. I love the messaging that you speak. I was about to preach, but the messaging that you speak, ⁓ because this is very, very refreshing and you and I would see eye eye on just our anchor, where our anchor is, how we just see the England. So, man, I appreciate this conversation, man.
⁓ So listen, let me ask you this. If someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, learn more about what you’re doing, collaborate, how can they get in contact with you,
Lee Yoder (23:53)
Yeah, Quin. I’m pretty active on LinkedIn. I do have someone that puts my posts up on Facebook as well, but I’m just like not active on Facebook. So LinkedIn, I’m pretty active. I like seeing what other people do on LinkedIn. So you can definitely look up Lee yoder on LinkedIn and then jump on our website. That’s our business name, three fold, which is the number three spelled out and then fold. ⁓ F O L D R E I as in real estate investing.com. So threefoldrei.com can connect with us through there. got a bunch of information on us, but that’dthe best spot to go.
Q Edmonds (24:24)
Yeah, when I seen your website, you know how you know, you just do a little bit of research when I seen threefold I already do I bet you I know this guy’s anchor I bet you I know where this guy’s anchor that it’s so I love it bad and so lean let me say three things to you man first Let me say thank you for your time because your time is so precious You know, you could be anywhere in the world doing anything you got businesses to run two kids and a wife Thank you for giving us your time. I appreciate that Secondly, thank you for your storyJesus taught in parables. So our lives, our stories are so powerful to people. It’s able to plant seeds that somebody can come in water and eventually there comes a growth out of it. So please know your story was imperative. It was important. Thank you for the gift of your vulnerability. Thank you for your story. Lastly, man, thank you for your perspective, for your mindset and bringing that mindset to this platform. Lee, I greatly appreciate you being here, man.
Lee Yoder (25:20)
You’re welcome, man. Thank you for that. And thanks for having me on, Quin. I enjoyed the conversation.Q Edmonds (25:25)
Absolutely.So listen, y’all heard Lee. I told you fantastic guests. keep telling y’all. Hope pulled me on the carpet, went a lot. I’m telling you, fantastic guests. We’re going to continue to bring fantastic people up. So definitely looking to show notes connect with Lee, but definitely make sure you are subscribed here because we’re going to continue to bring up amazing people just like Mr. Lee. So sir, I got to say thank you again. And to everyone else, please y’all have a fantastic day.
