Creating Your Path to Rising Toward a Bigger Life with Brianna K. Hunter
Key Takeaways
- Aligning with mentors who are already living the life you want can accelerate your growth faster than any formal education.
- Courage to take action before you feel fully ready is often the difference between staying stuck and transforming your future.
- Strategic investing becomes far more powerful when paired with a mindset of abundance, discipline, and long-term vision.
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The REI Agent with Brianna K. Hunter
https://youtu.be/MifzhQlaZiY
United States Real Estate Investor®
Value-rich, The REI Agent podcast takes a holistic approach to life through real estate.
Hosted by Mattias Clymer, an agent and investor, alongside his wife Erica Clymer, a licensed therapist, the show features guests who strive to live bold and fulfilled lives through business and real estate investing.
You are personally invited to witness inspiring conversations with agents and investors who share their journeys, strategies, and wisdom.
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A Journey Born From Courage and an Unshakable Vision
From the moment Brianna K. Hunter joins Mattias on The REI Agent Podcast, listeners are pulled into the story of a young woman who chose courage over comfort, growth over fear, and possibility over limitation.
Her story is not simply about mastering multifamily investing. It is about deciding to build a life with intention by stepping into uncertainty again and again.
"I saw the freedom that owning her own time gave my mom, and I wanted that for myself."
Brianna’s journey began long before her first investment property. It began with watching the example of a mother who built a life around presence rather than pressure.
What followed became a blueprint for how to design a life rooted in growth, resilience, and the pursuit of something greater.
The Spark That Started It All
A College Student Who Chose Action Over Approval
While many of her peers were busy figuring out their schedules, Brianna was figuring out leverage, equity, and renovation timelines.
She bought her first duplex while still in college and dove fearlessly into learning construction hands-on.
"I moved into the not-so-nice unit and renovated it myself while living there."
Her friends were stocking up on drinks for the weekend.
Brianna was stocking up on tile. She learned to cut flooring, install sheetrock, and swing a wet saw without hesitation.
Her risk rewarded her with cash flow, experience, and confidence that would shape the rest of her life.
Listening to the Right Voices
Breaking Away From Limiting Opinions
Like many first-time buyers during the COVID market shift, Brianna heard plenty of warnings. Prices were too high. The timing was wrong. The market would crash.
She tuned out the noise and tuned into the mentors who were already living the life she wanted.
"I chose to listen to people who were where I wanted to go."
This choice became one of the most defining themes of her journey. She constantly aligned herself with people who lifted her higher, not those who kept her small.
Leaving College and Choosing a Bigger Path
When Success Shows You a Different Road
One moment in a classroom changed everything. A freshman borrowed a branded pen from her and questioned whether it was really hers.
She realized she was already building the future she wanted, and sitting in a lecture hall was preventing her from stepping into it fully.
"I realized that being in that class was holding me back from the business that was moving forward."
Instead of chasing degrees, she began chasing impact.
Selling homes.
Managing portfolios.
Learning from mentors. Growing faster than any syllabus could keep up with.
When Life Calls You to Go
A Leap Across the Country With Only Faith and Drive
Feeling like a big fish in a small pond, Brianna craved challenge. Craved expansion. Craved a new environment that demanded her greatness.
A single conversation with her grandmother sealed the decision.
"If you are going to start over, you better go all the way across the country and do it right."
Within a month, she packed her car, loaded her pets, and drove five days to San Diego with no job, no safety net, and no plan except to figure it out.
Within days of arriving, she was pounding the pavement with a stack of resumes and relentless determination.
Building a New Life From Scratch
From Restaurant Job to Real Estate Investment Company
What started as knocking on doors led to a restaurant job, which led to an unexpected connection with a real estate investment firm.
Soon she was learning acquisitions, fix and flip operations, and broker relations straight from the leaders of the company.
"They took me under their wing, and I learned hands-on and fast."
Her growth skyrocketed. She realized she was ready for more. And once again, she took the leap.
Stepping Into Syndication
Leveraging Vision, Strategy, and Investor Alignment
Today, Brianna raises capital, partners in multifamily syndications, and builds opportunities for others to grow their wealth. She invests alongside her clients because she believes in alignment over sales.
"If I believe in it, I am in it with you."
She evaluates deals, studies markets across the country, and focuses on value-add strategies that force appreciation and build long-term security.
Understanding the Power of Multifamily
Stability, Strategy, and Compounding Wealth
Syndication can feel foreign to new investors, but Brianna makes the concepts accessible. She emphasizes education, clarity, and understanding the difference between accredited and sophisticated investors.
"Education fills the gap between risk and confidence."
Through this lens, real estate becomes more than a transaction. It becomes a long term strategy for freedom, stability, and generational growth.
The Heart of Her Journey
The Golden Nugget That Changed Everything
When asked for her biggest lesson, Brianna did not hesitate.
"Align yourself with people who know more than you and take action even when you do not know everything."
This philosophy carried her across the country, into new markets, through rapid learning curves, and into a life she once only imagined.
Becoming the Smallest Person to Grow Into the Biggest Version of Yourself
Brianna’s story reminds us that life expands when we choose discomfort, mentorship, and belief in what we cannot yet see.
Her path from college student to investor to syndicator is proof that success rewards courage long before it rewards certainty.
"You do not need to know everything. You just need to start."
Her journey shows that abundance is built through bold decisions, aligned relationships, and an unwavering commitment to becoming who you were meant to be. And for every listener hearing her story, one truth stands clear.
The life you want is waiting. You simply have to move toward it.
Stay tuned for more inspiring stories on The REI Agent podcast, your go-to source for insights, inspiration, and strategies from top agents and investors who are living their best lives through real estate.
For more content and episodes, visit reiagent.com.
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Contact Brianna K. Hunter
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Transcript
Welcome back to the REI Agent. We are here with Brianna K. Hunter.
Brianna, thanks so much for joining us.
Thank you so much for having me.
You look like you're a lot warmer than I am.
Yeah, I'm in San Diego, and this is a real backdrop right here.
Oh, it looks amazing.
Yeah.
San Diego is one of my favorite cities I think I've been to, especially now that it's cold outside. So, enjoy it.
Yeah, definitely. I'm originally from Connecticut, so I'm definitely enjoying the sun over here.
Well, Brianna, before we get into your story, can you kind of give us a bird's eye view of what you do in the real estate space?
Yeah, absolutely. In this current moment, my main focus is multifamily investing. So, I help structure syndications, and I help other people who are looking to get into the industry make sound financial choices, and make good returns with their investment strategies.
I love it, I love it. And we'll dive into that here in more detail, but I'm curious what brought you from Connecticut to San Diego, and how you started in real estate to get to this space, because that's definitely like a more advanced strategy. So, yeah, curious about your story.
How'd you get started?
Yeah, it's definitely been a journey. So, I actually bought my first investment property when I was in college. I was young, and I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do, but I grew up with an incredible mentor.
My mom is a broker in real estate. She does residential sales, and she was so present in my life. Anytime I was in school, and I got sick, she was there within 10 minutes, 15 minutes, and really just extremely present, and I know that I'm really blessed to have that experience growing up.
But I saw the freedom that owning her own time gave her, and it was something that I was really focused on chasing and getting for myself as I grew. So, during college, I figured I'd take a big risk and lean on the people in my life who had experience with investing, and I bought my first property, which really changed my world, yeah. It opened my eyes to the importance of what leverage can do for you, and just the ability that investing can give you to be present in your life.
So, that's how I started. I became an agent and followed my mom's footsteps for a while, and I love that part of the business.
This is in Connecticut still?
In Connecticut, yeah, born and raised in Connecticut.
Okay.
So, I worked with my mom, she was my broker, and I ended up doing 12 sales my first year as an agent. Talk about good mentorship.
Yeah, it's great.
Yeah, and really found a lot of success.
That's awesome. Yeah, did you get that investment property? I was curious if it was pre-term key, or was it something that you had to renovate it all?
I mean, so that was a rental to start? You weren't living in it?
It was a duplex. So, I started with your classic house hack. Nice.
It was a fixer-upper. I moved into one unit. I bought it with an FHA loan, and I rented out the second unit, and while I lived in the property, I ended up renovating the apartment that I lived in.
So, I moved into the not-so-nice apartment unit, and then got a lot of hands-on experience through that.
Did you have roommates living with you in your unit as well at the time, or did you just have it by yourself so you could focus on the renovation?
No, I moved in on my own. So, I focused on the renovation. I learned how to put in flooring and tiling, which tiling is actually pretty fun if you have the time to do it.
I was putting sheetrock up and changing out toilets, and I bought a wet saw when I was in college. I was really proud of learning how to do that, for sure, yeah. Lots of hands-on experience, and just dove right into everything I could.
So, most people were out there buying 24 packs of beer, and you're buying 24 packs of tile.
Yeah, exactly, yeah.
That is such a good case study of doing stuff the right way and how you can really leverage that 3.5% down from a FHA loan to get something. So, was it breaking even, the mortgage, the other unit that was rented out while you were there, or did you have to supplement that a little bit?
No, it was cash-flowing, actually. My renter, so my net profit was, after all expenses, was about $200 a month while I was still living in one of the units.
That's amazing.
Yeah, very grateful for that. Yeah, I bought during, yeah, and I will say, it was during the whole COVID market shift, and when I went to buy the property, everyone was so nervous. The prices had skyrocketed, and from those who were closest around me, everyone was saying, don't buy, don't buy, it's not the right time.
Wait it out, prices are too high, they're gonna drop back down. And what was very valuable to me at the time was I chose to listen to people who were at a better place and where I wanted to go. So I had some mentors, and they were the ones that really charged me to take the risk, take the jump, and no matter what happens, I had the capability of figuring it out.
And I did, I made the jump, and all those other people that held back are still holding back and still haven't bought that house. And in the last few years since then, I've been able to appreciate that risk tolerance.
It's so funny, I've heard people projecting the downturn ever since like, I don't know, 2017, around then or so. It's not the right time, it's too expensive, and it's laughable now. And holding a property for 30 years, you're gonna be laughing about squabbling over a couple thousand dollars in the negotiations or whatever, and it's just, time heals a lot of wounds.
Yeah, yeah, I think. Oh go ahead, sorry.
I was just gonna add to that, I think for those people who say that it's not the right time, there is never a right time. You have to choose to want what comes with the journey, right? And so you just have to do your research, make sure you're making a decision with discernment, and lean on the community that knows more than you, and you'll be fine.
Yeah, I mean, just having an opportunity to buy a duplex where half of it's gonna cover in cash flow, your living expenses, it's amazing. And it's probably a lot harder now with the interest rates where they are. But good for you for pushing through and not focusing too much on the naysayers and surrounding yourself with the right people to get you where you wanted to go.
So yeah, so were you still in college then when you got your license as well? Did you sell those 12 while you were still studying?
Yeah, so I was still in college when I bought my first property and when I became an agent. It's funny enough, I actually dropped out, which I'm not sure everyone wants to hear, but I did because my senior year in college, I walked into one of my courses, one of my last gen ed courses that I needed to take, and this freshman next to me had asked for if he could borrow a pen. So I pulled out a pen, and of course, being an agent, that pen had my name and my number on it and my business.
And he looked at me astounded, and he was like, there's no way this is your pen. And I was like, yeah, honestly, I don't know what I'm doing in this class. Because at that time, I had put so much energy into making sure that I had a career that could support the moves that I was making with buying a property.
It really pushed me to become really active with my agency license. And I found so much success that by the time I was a senior in college, I actually realized in that moment that the time I was spending in that course was actually holding me back from further business that could push me forward in the direction that I was moving. So I ended up dropping out and chasing real estate.
Nice, what was your major, what were you wanting to be?
Yeah, my major, well, I started out wanting to be a surgeon. So I was a neurobiology major, and then I transferred to psychology and human development. So still in that science realm, but more in the social sciences.
Yeah, no, I think people, there's a lot, oftentimes people should drop out or just not even go. Because I mean, I think there's, you really, college seems like it's almost like a continuation of high school in some ways. Now, like you're kind of, I don't know if this is true for you, but when I was in high school, it was like kind of like you're fed the line that you need to go to college, people that go to college on average make X amount more money in their lifetime and all these things.
And I think that at the end of the day, like there's so many people that I went to college with or that I know went to college that are not doing anything related to their degree. And then furthermore, I don't think a lot of people actually really sit down and think of their college experience as an investment in their future. And they don't always factor in like, okay, I'm spending X amount of money to get this degree and I'm gonna be doing X.
And that return on my investment is X. And like, I don't think that's really taught or really thought about and you don't need it. I mean, I wouldn't have needed it.
I got my undergrad degree, but you know, I liked the experience I had, I liked the knowledge I've gained, but it's not really, the degree itself isn't really helping me.
Yeah, do you want me to ask you what's your degree?
Psychology.
Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. You know, the way I look at it is college is a metric. There's stats that can, you know, I don't know the stats off the top of my head, but I'm sure show that, you know, those who are more likely to finish with a degree are more likely to, you know, have a higher income compared to the median and all of that.
I think it's an important metric, but I think people forget, you know, what's lying behind that. What's lying behind that is education, right? Knowledge is power.
Yeah.
And also someone's drive to succeed. So whether you're going to college or you're getting your license as an agent or you're joining a mentorship program for whatever, you know, your passion is, I think the internal character traits that charge the metric that college is associated with are the more important ones to be aware of. So it's not necessarily that getting a degree is gonna make you more successful.
I know plenty of people with a degree who have not used it in years, if not decades, right? But, you know, you can't force someone to have that drive, but if you have it, you know, it's really about investing it into a way, into whatever channel makes the most sense for you. So sometimes that's college, if you know exactly what you're looking to gain from that.
But sometimes it's not, and that's okay.
Totally. Yeah, so, okay, from there, you realize, like, this isn't a great use of my time. You dropped out, you were still selling at that point?
Yeah, so I was still an agent. I had started working with investors and some of the mentors that had pushed me to buy my first property ended up giving me exclusive rights to their investment portfolio. So I was helping them operate and stabilize their investments.
And I was just really hands-on in every way that I could be with buyers, sellers, investors, and trying to absorb as much information and help people and learn as much as I could. And I just started scaling, so I ended up buying another property, closing more deals, and business was really taking off from the amount of effort that I had put into it. And I did that for a few years over in Connecticut until I got to a point where I felt like I was ready for another big challenge or another risk that was gonna push me forward in a bigger direction, so.
So what was it, San Diego?
Yeah, I grew up in a really small town and I was building an investment portfolio and a referral network over there. And I was 24, so this was two years ago. And I looked around and I felt like, I felt like a big fish in a small pond.
And I had to really come to terms with the fact that I wasn't sure that's where I wanted my life to stay forever. So I wanted to find an environment where I was the small fish in a big pond, the smallest person in the room who had a lot to learn. And I found that in San Diego.
The environment, the ambition here, everyone enjoys life and is working to have their time so that they can enjoy the weather and the outdoors here. And it really pushes you forward. There's people here with a mindset, an abundance mindset that I didn't see elsewhere, for sure.
Awesome, so did you, I mean, what made you land on San Diego? Did you just visit and like it? Did you find an opportunity to sell, to invest?
I mean, what actually got you there?
Yeah, well, that was a little more of a personal decision. When I moved here, I did not have a job. So I left my entire career with no plan lined up for when I arrived, except for I'm gonna figure it out.
Right? But my grandmother, she's my absolute best friend. She's also just amazing.
I mean, she's got TikTok, FaceTime, Facebook, all of the social media, she's very hip. And I was chatting with her and trying to figure out where I wanted to go and what that next direction was. And she looked at me and as a wise, sound lady, she said, girl, if you're gonna start your life over, you better go all the way across the country and do it right the first time.
And I said, yes, ma'am. You know what? Yeah, I should, I should.
Kill your backup plan, right?
Wow, yeah.
Within about a month, I had packed everything up. I threw my dog and cat in the back seat and I drove five days to San Diego without an idea of what was waiting for me.
Had you been there before? One time.
One time when I was, I think, eight years old. Very different experience.
Yeah, okay, so you probably had a bit of a savings, saved up from your work. Were you, did you hold your rentals? Do you still have them?
I have one. I ended up selling the first property that I bought. Partly just because of the, well, not just because.
It was a mistake. It was a mix of the when I bought it in the market as well as the renovations that the property had undergone. The value was a good enough amount where it made more sense to sell than to hold.
So I ended up selling that property, which, of course, it's leverage. It's just one more thing that helps you move forward. So definitely a great move.
And so was that before you moved or did that happen after?
I actually sold it after, yeah.
Okay. And then, so you get to San Diego and I assume you have a little bit of money, secure rent. I mean, that can be hard if you don't have a job, right?
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, I don't know why I ever got accepted to an apartment here, but I did. I just, I started applying and people were accepting me without a job.
So I think that has to do with alignment. I mean, I took that as a sign that it was definitely the right move.
Awesome. Okay, so then what did you, did you start networking at real estate investment groups? Like where did you go from there?
Yeah, so the first day I arrived, I actually went to Staples and I printed off my resume as well as some letters of recommendations, like a hundred or more, to be honest. And I just decided that if I'm gonna do this, I'm all in. And I went and started door knocking.
Agencies, restaurants, like my goal at that point was just to get my foot in the door somewhere. So whether I started in a restaurant and I built connections through the people that I met, or if that was through an agency and jumping right back into the real estate world, I just wanted opportunity. Opportunity.
So for two weeks, I handed out a resume after resume and I walked the city and I walked everywhere. And I just started getting interview after interview after interview, which led me to just some great opportunities and helped me get established over here, for sure.
Okay, and was that the place that you're at now? I mean, right now you're syndicating, so did that happen later?
Right, yeah. So the first job that I got when I first moved here was actually with a restaurant. Funny enough, one of my investor friends in Connecticut, his childhood friend was the manager of the restaurant and it was this weird connection that I, you know, small world moment.
And so I ended up working with them just to get my foot in the door, meet some people. And right after I had started, I got a offer from an investment company, a real estate investment company to work with them. So I ended up transferring over and working for an investment company over here.
I helped them do fix and flip projects, acquire properties, I did acquisitions. I supervised their broker relations department and I got really close with the founder and the CEO of that company. They, you know, I'm really blessed because they kind of took me underneath their wing.
So I got to join a lot of their meetings, their leadership meetings, and really just see how they ran their business and learn very hands-on and very fast, right? Just absorbed as much as I could and use that. And then I just decided, you know, my goal in my life really was to work for myself and it was, you know, time to make another jump.
So I actually left that job in May of this year and now I just work for myself and I partner with other people in the industry. Wow. Yeah.
Where the hell is the next jump gonna be, Brianna? You gonna jump to the moon?
We'll see, I'm only 26, so it's possible.
That's awesome. So let's get into syndicating a little bit. So you're focused on the apartment sector, you said?
Mm-hmm, yeah, multifamily.
Cool, and is that in San Diego or is that throughout the country?
I would say overall throughout the country. I, you know, I'm currently more focused on the San Diego market, but, you know, I'm part of one that's in Arizona. I've looked at property in Utah and Texas.
So I'm not solely San Diego. There's money to be made in any market. It's just, you know, who you're partnering with that knows that market and the research that you do into it and the strategies, for sure.
And do you have like an overarching strategy for investing? Is this buy and hold long-term where the like capital event would be like a refinance or is this more like a, you know, turning the property over and then selling it as a capital event?
Yeah, great question. Right now I'm focused on more of like a value add, right? So renovating and bringing these multifamily, these commercial multifamily properties up to stabilization within a three to five year time period.
Depending on the market, if it's a more cashflow heavy market and it makes more sense, obviously the goal would be to refinance and hold so that we're, you know, both me and my other investors are really capitalizing on that side of passiving. And then there's obviously other markets. San Diego's a little bit more of an equity play over here.
So, you know, instead of refinancing and holding those properties, it's either cashing out or developing them, right? So building them ground up in a two and a half year time span and then selling for the equity.
Yeah, yeah, I mean, shoot, there could be the, you know, if you're looking at a portfolio as a bigger picture thing too, I could see how holding something in San Diego for a long time, even if it's not a cash cow at the time could definitely benefit with the equity growth.
Yeah, it just depends on the market. There's some markets that make more sense to, you know, bank on the equity and there's some that are just way more cashflow heavy. It just depends on the state and the city, the niche market for sure.
And did you mention at the beginning that you were in kind of more the raising capital side of the operation? Did you say that or am I making that up?
Yeah, no, my focus in the syndications is raising capital and investor relations. So working with those investors, I'm partnered with, well, I know a lot of syndicators across the country. And so really what I do is I try to vet their opportunities that are already under contract, you know, as much as I possibly can to protect my investors and then invest alongside my investors.
Because if it's a deal that I think has checked all of the boxes over and over, you know, and I've fielded so many to get to that point, you know, I want there to be alignment. If I believe in it, I'm in it, I'm in it with you, right?
Yeah, totally. And is that a fund-to-funds model then or are you becoming a general partner as well in those deals?
General partner, general partner, yeah. I haven't explored the fund-to-funds yet.
This might be a lot of jargon for people who are not familiar with syndications, but it is a really, you know, I think there's a great alignment between real estate agents and syndications. And I don't know how many agents understand that world or even have even heard of it potentially, but there is some great benefit. I think that if you are a agent that is out there, you know, if you're making a good amount of money, like let's just say $600,000 a year, you're out there hustling and you're busy and you've got, you know, your clients and you're really good at your craft.
I think investing is super smart to do as an agent for many reasons, but one of them being you are a real estate professional status and that allows you to, well, double check with your CPA. Don't just take my word for it, I'm not a CPA, but that allows you to then take depreciation off of your income, like your commission. So with syndications, typically they are doing a cost segregation study and that is accelerating, they're accelerating the depreciation they can on that asset which can afford some pretty good tax write-offs, especially if you are, again, that real estate professional.
So this, in some ways I see it as like a realtor, like 401k where you're like able to invest in something and, you know, get the tax benefits of like what a 401k would offset your income and then you're getting a return on it. Typically, I would guess a quarterly kind of payment typically on those, is that right?
Typically, yeah.
And then there's gonna be, you know, the cash out that could be a sale, could be a refinance where you might, depending on the structure of the deal, get, you know, money more than what you put in back or exactly what you put in back. I mean, it could be less. But the point is, is that you're getting kind of great opportunities along the way and the tax benefit can be huge.
I like to give the example of a syndication I invested in where I invested $50,000 and got 66,000 the first year as a write-off. In fact, I'd only been invested in this thing for like a month. Yeah, it's crazy.
Yeah, and it got that kind of depreciation result for me and then the next year it was more like, I think like 12 or something like that. But, you know, give it three full years, or four full years and I'll have probably doubled my initial investment and just a write-off benefit. And that doesn't include, you know, all the benefit I'm getting from like the quarterly, you know, payments, the dividends that I'm getting.
And that doesn't factor in if there's a, you know, the capital event. If I get my full amount back and that doesn't factor in that I will, in this circumstance, still have ownership in the deal even after I receive my $50,000 back. And I'll still have like a very small ownership in it.
I won't get near as much money per quarter, but it's still something. And, you know, it's just, it's a great thing. So, yeah.
Did I summarize that?
Yeah, you're compounding your wealth with syndications. And it's so funny because I wish I knew what syndications were when I started. As an agent, I would have grown so much quicker.
You know, some people look at me at 26 and they think like, oh my God, you're so ahead. Well, I look at what I know now and I think if I knew what I know now when I was an active agent starting out, I would be so much further along. And you're right, the tax benefits are insane, right?
The bonus depreciation, cost segregation studies. And that's essential, especially to agents who are working off commission and they're not with a company that does provide a 401k. Even further though, I think, you know, a lot of agents also have an IRA because they're accounting for the fact that the 401 doesn't really exist in this industry.
You know, I have an IRA. And what's great about real estate is you can even invest your IRA, right? You can switch it over to a self-directed IRA.
And I'm not a legal advisor either. So, of course, you know, talk to your CPA. But from what I've seen and what I've seen other people do, you know, you can invest your IRA, you know, have that retirement account and those investments are tax-free, those returns are tax-free because it's all still in that retirement account, right?
So whether you're using this method of investment to, you know, keep more of that commission in your pocket, you know, double your investment overall or grow, you know, your future retirement account, there's so many benefits, so many benefits to learning about it.
Yeah, and if people aren't familiar with the way these kind of deals work and where this all maybe sounds too good to be true, but it's really the power of cap rates is really where this kind of all boils down to. I mean, we're not, when you get into this kind of asset class, you're not, it's not comps that are, you know, making the value. It is whatever the cap rate is for that kind of asset class.
And what they're doing, what the operators are doing is they're looking for opportunities where they can come in and make their business more profitable, which will then make the value go up because of how cap rates work. And the power of that allows for this much, like, you know, giving the existing cashflow allows them to pay the investors when they have their money in, right? And then the building up the better business, like, you know, getting the rents to be higher, getting the operation expenses to be lower, all that stuff will then have a huge impact on what the value is at that scale.
You know, like $25 over 100 different units adds up fast, for example.
Yeah, yeah, and you're so right. You know, we're talking about this like it's, you know, the apple pie of life or something, but there's risk. Like, it's not too good to be true.
There is risk, any investment you make, of course, whether that's in stocks or real estate or something else, there is risk. What I love about real estate, though, as you were saying, the cap rates, it's not just subject to, you know, comps in the market, it's subject to forced equity. So with these bigger properties, you know, if you have one out of 30 tenants vacate, right, it's a statistic that's already accounted for in the operating, right?
So we look at percentages, we look at cost to run the property, how to decrease those, or yeah, decrease those margins to make the property more profitable. And essentially, as we stabilize it and add value to it, whether it's in cutting the cost of the maintenance, whether that's renting the property and adding the value that way, you're literally forcing the value up because the more the property is rented for, the more stable it is, you know, the more it's worth in the long run. And that's where the cap rates come in.
So 100%. It's forced equity, not something that's the same way as residential.
Yeah, and there's a lot of control in the regard of you can, you know, have a really good plan for how to get those expenses down and the rents up. There certainly are variables outside of your control. I know a lot of people, there's blood in the water, speaking of risk, a lot of people that were doing a bridge loans and that kind of stuff where they were getting a property and they needed extra money to get that property, like to do the renovations needed to get the rents up, et cetera.
And that was short-term debt that, as we all know, interest rates have gone up drastically here recently. And that caused, yeah, it to not pencil out near as well. So there's definitely, there is definitely risk involved.
And so I think the operators are definitely super important and having, you know, a good enough understanding, like you don't have to, I mean, the more you understand the better, but like, you don't have to know enough to be like necessarily an operator to be an investor in one of these. You don't have to know anything, you can just throw your money at it, but it's wise.
All right, so when we're talking about investing into these deals, there's two different kinds of investor classes that join, right? We have the accredited investor and then we have the sophisticated investor. And what the difference really is, point blank, an accredited investor is someone that makes over $200,000 a year or $300,000 a year in income or has a net worth of a million dollars.
A sophisticated investor is somebody who understands the risk, the question, the investment that they're joining. And maybe they don't hold accredited investor status, but they're aware of what's going on, right? So we never ever want a new investor to be jumping into a investment that they don't understand, right?
It's our job as the operator to make sure that they have questions that we can answer and giving them questions that they should be asking on any investment, right? So educating them, truly, like when you understand what you're getting into, the risk isn't as risky, right? Education fills that gap for you though.
So think about, you know, when I was an agent, right? And I started helping people buy and sell homes. You know, if I didn't know how interest rates impacted mortgages or how, you know, I didn't know how to write a contract, a contract would feel risky.
I mean, you can dumb it down to more simpler things, but you do need to understand how it is. And those are the people you wanna talk with, those people who are gonna give you answers.
Yeah, I mean, the possibilities with syndication are definitely, there's a lot of them and knowing what you're getting into is definitely huge. So definitely important to do that. I do wanna ask if you have a golden nugget you would like to share to our listeners at this point.
Yeah, I think for me, the thing that helped me, you know, leverage my life is leaning on my mentors and asking questions. So the golden nugget would be to, you know, you don't need to know everything, but taking action and aligning yourself with those who do know more than you is invaluable to success.
Absolutely, I think like to your point, what you said earlier too was, you know, surrounding yourself and listening to the people that are actually in the places you wanted to be. It's just, you know, take a good audit of the people in your life. I think that there are people that just tend to be negative and kind of set themselves or limit themselves.
And that kind of influence will definitely trickle down on you. So even just, you know, friends and stuff can hold you back. But, you know, like you said, like having mentors that are, you know, a lot further along than in the direction you wanna go is so huge and you can definitely, you could be 26 and you could be syndicating in San Diego.
I mean, look at this. I don't know if a mentor is gonna make me 26, but. Anyway, what about a favorite book?
Do you have one that's like a fundamental read you think everybody should or just one you're currently enjoying?
Yeah, I wish I had one that was just like, this is the book you need to read. I'm constantly reading some of the books. Right now I'm reading the Free A Lot of Power.
It's extremely intriguing as the concepts that are discussed in that book are things that I don't normally think about. For that, it really helps you focus internally about what kind of energy you put on yourself, what you're looking for out of life, and yeah, the motivations behind it and how to get there. I think it's looking for a new perspective.
Free A Lot of Power is a great one.
Okay, that one I haven't read. I've definitely seen it, recommended it a few times. It's a bigger book, right?
It's not a picture book.
It's not small. It's not small.
I think, honestly, the size of it is often, yeah, again, I like pictures, but.
It's not a picture book. Yeah, one bite at a time, kind of like.
Cool, awesome. Well, if people are interested in following your journey or want more information about some of the deals you're investing in, where's a good place they can find you or follow you?
Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram are really amazing. I make resources for my social media. I'd love to see you guys in there.
You can look up on Facebook, Brianna Hunter, and then my Instagram handle is @briannakayh, and I'm happy to connect and have a personal conversation and see if I can help you guys with anything for sure.
Awesome, Brianna, thanks so much for being on the show. It's been a lot of fun.
Absolutely, thank you so much for having me. It's been my pleasure.
Thanks for listening to the REI Agents.
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All content in this show is not investment advice or mental health therapy. It is intended for entertainment purposes only.
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