Wealthy AF Podcast
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Wealthy AF Podcast
A Guide to Embracing Credit and Financial Independence
Is your credit card your worst enemy or your best friend? Let Brighton Gbrazia, a seasoned financial and real estate expert, guide you on how to shift your perspective and make credit work for you. An immigrant from Nigeria, Brighton brings his personal narrative of navigating through a cash-based system to a credit-based society—mastering the art of leveraging credit for major purchases like homes, properties, or cars. His unique approach will make you see credit in a whole new light.
From misconceptions to emotional roadblocks, Brighton goes in-depth on the elements that can make or break your financial independence. He underlines the importance of education, understanding cash flow, and the critical role of emotions in successful real estate investing. His experience working with diverse clients has given him an edge in identifying common fears and triggers that can hinder progress towards financial freedom. Brighton's coaching on shifting emotions around money is nothing short of transformative.
Brighton also delves into the fascinating world of mindsets, contrasting the poverty mindset with the wealthy one. He offers nuggets of wisdom on breaking the cycle of poverty by seizing the power to change one's situation and adopting a wealth-focused mentality. He wraps up the discussion with practical tips on leveraging digital platforms and staying politically savvy. Whether it's your first foray into finance or you're an experienced investor, this episode with Brighton Gbrazia promises to challenge, enlighten, and inspire you to new financial heights.
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Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of Latinos in Real Estate Investing Podcasts, where individuals just like you come to learn how to create wealth through real estate investing, entrepreneurship and business ownership. And today's guest is Brighton Brazia. And. Brighton is a financial and real estate expert with over a decade of experience working for some of Canada's largest banks and credit unions as a financial advisor and mortgage underwriter. As the CEO of Wealth Marathon, Brighton provides sound and straightforward financial advice to young professionals and families in Canada to help them create the kind of wealth and financial success that only one come that can only come with long term planning and proper execution.
Speaker 1:Excuse me, Born in Nigeria, Brighton currently resides in British Columbia. When he isn't talking about money, you're likely to find him planning his next international trip or running the nearest half marathon. So you're a half marathon runner, my friend. Welcome, sir. That's right, Matt, Welcome. It was a pleasure to have you on Brighton, so tell us a little bit about yourself. Why don't we start there, Brighton? Where did this journey start of you wanting to focus on real estate and then teaching people on financial independence?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think good question to start off with. For me it started kind of when I started working at the bank. So after university I landed my first show working for the bank. So I was working for one of the top banks in Canada here and during that time I just started having conversation, because when you're a financial advisor you get all kinds of people. So I would have these conversations with Irish people just buying real estate and then I would have conversations with people who own real estate property. And that's kind of where I started, because when I worked with the bank I was more of a stock guy, right, I was more like full in the market. But then I kept hearing the stuff about real estate and how people some of my clients that basically were retired how did it was to real estate. So that's where kind of the box started is talking to these clients. And then they started telling me a little bit why real estate was a good asset for retirement.
Speaker 2:So then when I went to buy my own first personal real estate, that conversations changed the way I approached that real estate itself, because prior to that I was like everyone else and like you know what, I'm a kid from Nigeria. So I was just like you know. It's always been a dream to own a home, right, you know? Because my parents were right to where we came from, Canada, and I was just like you know what I want to own that home. But what?
Speaker 2:By having these conversations with these investors, it changed my perception of what real estate is and like really what you should focus on. So my first property was actually a property which I bought and basically it had a suite in it, so I would rent out the suite to kind of help me produce an income to try to pay out the mortgage. So for me that's where the real estate box started was just like you know, nowadays it's kind of common to do that. But back when I started it wasn't really a thing to buy a home and it rented out the basement suite. But nowadays most people do that when you buy like a principal resident because the price is so high to begin with, right. So that's where it started for me for real estate on this end of power of you know, real estate, leveraging it and how you can produce income for it to set yourself up for retirement. So that'll be where I started when it comes to real estate. It's just my first property itself.
Speaker 1:So, being an immigrant family coming from Nigeria my first mentor was from your country Really feel really lucky and blessed to have Titus in my life. Shout out to you Titus, if you're listening, appreciate everything. What was the biggest misconception you had? What was the biggest shift you had to have in your mindset to become an investor?
Speaker 2:I think it depends where you're coming from the world. Typically what you'll find is like if you're coming from like Nigeria. Back when my family came to Canada, that's predominantly used to be a cash-based system, and what I mean by that is like everything is down to cash. There's really no credit. So when my parents came to Canada, you're coming from a cash-based system where typically people pay for stuff in cash, and then you come to a system where people kind of leverage credit. They don't have the cash, they just have credit. So I think that's the biggest mindset I would say if you're an immigrant coming from Nigeria Maybe not nowadays because there's credit everywhere, they're familiar with it, but I think still people don't fully understand credit.
Speaker 2:They're still thinking in cash terms and really this is a game where you have to understand how to utilize credit and how to maximize credit to get yourself where you are, because ultimately let's be realistic no one's putting out $2 million cash in the property I mean there's cash in the form of their equity you can get out, but no one has $2 million cash per se. So I think that's the biggest mindset shift that I kind of am good at is that I understand that this is the credit world, your ability to be successful, and this that in terms of like to be successful. While you have to understand how do I leverage credit, how does credit work, and understand what are some of the trappings of credit and how do I avoid that, and I think for most immigrants they're too much in the sense of like they're told about yes, you know you should get credit, so, like you know, buy principal res and get credit or buy a car or whatever it is. They're really not focused on understanding like credit needs to be managed in the sense of like. When you're using credit, particularly when you're buying stuff such as a whole or a property or a car, the income really matters because, at the end of the day, you want the credit to be able to service the debt that you're taking on.
Speaker 2:And that's something that people don't understand. When it comes to credit, they just think, hey, as long as I can afford it, I'm going to get it, but it's like really no, you need to figure out how to use credit to join an income stream so you can pay off the balance and then use it more to buy other stuff that produce more income. So I think that's the biggest shift you have to understand when it comes to this game is how do I leverage credit? Because it's a credit game, not a cash game anymore.
Speaker 1:When you say leverage credit to create income streams. Can you elaborate on that and explain to me and the listeners what you mean by that?
Speaker 2:Sure, and I'll give like maybe two examples in terms like how to poorly use it and how to use it.
Speaker 2:So you're an investor, I've been an investor, so we understand that.
Speaker 2:So let's take someone who has, like a principal resident right and they've paid down the mortgage, whatever, and they have a little bit of equity. So most people in my space, when I would do the personal finance or as an advisor, they will come to me to do a debt consolidation. But that means is basically they've racked up some credit card debt somewhere else outside and now they're like oh my gosh, like this credit card debt is too large, the interest rate's really high, but they have this property. It has a little bit of equity in it, so they'll go. You know what? I could take the 50k in my equity and I could pay down the credit card debt and that's a good thing. Any theory that sounds good, but that's the problem.
Speaker 2:I don't understand credit. What you're doing is you're basically leveraging credit the equity you've built up in your home to pay down a bad debt that doesn't produce any income for you and you're basically increasing mortgage debt. Now take the other way for an investor. What an investor will do An investor will go. I've got $50,000 equity in my whole, my principal resident. What they will do is they will take that credit and they use it to go buy either an investment property which can generate income share for themselves, or they may use it to buy a real estate property like a rental property, and I don't know if the US is enough for them to tax them in the US, but in Canada, by doing that taking that money and buying a property, a rental property now you have the ability to write off the interest on that mortgage itself. Now you have the ability to write off the interest on the initial equity you took out because maybe you're paying a loan in that portion of it to write that off as well. And now you have the potential of a property where in the future you're going to put someone in there to write it down, pay down the loan, the potential that's going to become an income share down the road we retire.
Speaker 2:So that's what I mean by being able to understand how to leverage credit. One is most people are going to leverage credit to buy a car, you know, depreciate an asset to pay down their debt Again. They're just increasing the overall debt itself. Or you can take credit, leverage it to produce by property. They can produce you an income stream and give you other tax advantages. So those are two different ways to use credit. You just need to understand like you want to do. The other way, you want to buy an asset that can produce an income share and gives your dear friend advantages when it comes to taxes.
Speaker 1:Okay, great, great answer. Now, I am a person I am a listener that has a family. I'm doing okay, don't have much credit, don't have much debt, my mortgage is halfway through or maybe, with the market having been so inflated over the last three to four years right after COVID, the market haven't gone up so much I find myself with a ton of equity and let's say I have $100,000 in equity and I come to you and I say, hey, brighton, can you explain to me or that listener listening to what you just said on how to take that $100,000 and create a goal, maybe how I can use that $100,000 that I have in equity to go and create and this is not financial advice, by the way, guys. I want to make sure we absolutely, absolutely explain that we're using a hypothetical situation. Okay, just a hypothetical situation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and again, just before I answer that we're not doing financial advice, we don't know your situation. So, guys, I know a lot of times you get the stuff online, which is cool, but we're running through an example. So what you're saying is someone has $100,000 in equity in their home and you're thinking what is the best way to utilize that equity? Now, a couple of things to keep in mind. Most of the times, we have an equity in your home, right, unless you're basically selling that property. Chances are, when you pull out that equity, there's going to be two options. Either you're going to have what we call an equity line of credit, which is basically like thinking about like a credit card, but just like on steroids, that's attached to your home. Or you may take out like an actual loan, so you could just take out like a mortgage loan for $100,000. Either way, they're going to have an interest associated with those products. Right, you're going to be paying back interest once you utilize. Now, on the equity line of credit, you don't have to pay any interest until you utilize it. I mean, you take out the loan, you don't have to pay the interest right away. We've always been going to utilize it. So what that individual could do and the scenario is playing out is they could go okay, I have $100,000 in my home right now. I could keep paying it down, but then that becomes debt equity, right, because it's just sitting there, which is great, you don't have any additional debt, but it becomes debt equity.
Speaker 2:What that individual could do is go look for a property right, another property to buy. They could take that $100,000, assuming they get approved for that $100,000. And then they can utilize that and put it as a down payment towards an investment prop, right? So you would go back to the bank say, hey, I'm looking to buy an investment property. I have $100,000 in down payment Because you have that equity in your home. The bank would view that equity as down payment on the new property. So, effectively, we take the $100,000. So our principal resident is that $100,000, but they were going to put $100,000 down on this new property which is going to bring out the mortgage. We would then do some analysis to make sure that this makes sense. Ideally, the rate that you're going to be generated on this new property would be sufficient enough to come with the mortgage and other expenses related to that property.
Speaker 2:The wall caution. I will tell you straight up, because I see this so many times if you're using an equity line of credit, which means you're pulling an equity line at a principal resident and you're doing analysis on a rental property, it's nearly impossible to generate enough cash flow on the new property, the new rental property, but $100,000 now that it will cover that property's expenses and also cover the expenses relating to your equity line of credit payment itself. So it's really important that you have applied to how are you actually going to cover that mortgage itself, that portion that you've taken out equity, to make sure you don't get yourself in a bad situation. A lot of people forget that, or they're trying to find a property that covers both. It's like that's impossible. You're not going to find a property that generates enough cash flow to do that.
Speaker 2:But by doing that essentially now, every year, we're going to have someone paying down our mortgage right and as the mortgage gets paid down, your rental property.
Speaker 2:You know the balance is going to go down. And what you could do down the road, as I suggest you could do this basically, each time you pay down the mortgage, we call credit moving, you move the balance over from your principal resident into your rental property. So you're kind of flipping the credit around. Effectively, what you want to do down the road is move all the mortgage you have in your principal resident and you want to actually move it to your rental property to have them paying down the mortgage. So that's one way to become yourself Down the road, become completely mortgage free. Or you can just do paying your mortgage, pay down that mortgage and maybe, if the property appreciates your time, you could sell it and once you sell it then you could take that balance to pay off your mortgage and you can call it mortgage free. So lots of different ways to do it, but that's the structure. Take that equity, find a property that makes sense, put that as a doubt payment and then basically now you have rental property that's producing income.
Speaker 1:So I love everything that you just mentioned, except one small little part. I disagree with you in one part. That's the part of that if one takes, it's going to be impossible to take the equity from your house and find a property that can pay for both. I do it all the time, so it's just finding the right deal right. You can find this deal If you find the right deal, if you work with the right off market wholesaler. So I would you know, this is an investor podcast, so we teach people how to find deals.
Speaker 1:And if you're buying on the MLS, completely agree with you, because if you're buying on the MLS, you're competing with the world. We're going to be completely honest. We're competing with most people that don't even remotely understand what Brighton just explained. They have no idea, so they'll overpay for properties. But if you learn how to buy properties and not overpay for properties, and know how to buy them using the 70% rule and learn how to buy them from other investors wholesalers at a discount maybe they need a little bit of work and you buy them at 60 or 70 cents on the dollar of value, then you got yourself a deal and you may even be able to pay the money back on that, on that HELOC, if you learn how to do that. Again, that's all part of the analysis that guys like Brighton does with you.
Speaker 1:But again, something I just want to pre disclose here is go and get educated. When we always talk about that in this podcast is the most important thing is go learn first. Go learn the numbers, go get educated, go get this type of information First before you do anything. Don't just go crazy and start buying just because, hey, I had a podcast. This is what they said. No, go get educated, go to meetups, go ahead, you mean?
Speaker 2:it, that's right, go get yourself educated. Now they just power. They say right, now they just power.
Speaker 1:Yeah, go get yourself educated, Okay. So my next question to you, my friend, is what is the most common misconception that you would find when you was at the bank, with regular working class people wanting to start investing in real estate, what was the biggest limiting belief?
Speaker 2:That's a good question and, to be honest, to top my head, I can't think of one consistent thing. But I think, just talking to clients and what you just mentioned, I think the one thing I would say is just no-transcript, or maybe limitation, just like you're saying, is just limiting in terms of what's possible. Because, again, I always believe like what's possible is reflected on who you surround yourself and what you've seen. So sometimes if you just haven't been exposed to a particular thing, you may just find it not be possible because you haven't exposed to it, you haven't seen it, so then it's not real to you. So I think that the one thing I would say that I do see over time is just, typically, most people want to buy real estate.
Speaker 2:When it comes to owning real estate for themselves personally, they want to live it. But when you start thinking about owning real estate in terms of generating the cash flow, there's this idea that I'm dealing with tenants or I'm having to manage a property and they get very scared because they're so large. So when the first I was to clients, I was like you think I want to be dealing with toilets Any more than you do? Nope, that's why I get a property manager and it's amazing how, when you tell people you can have someone do this stuff for you if that's not your expertise or that's not an area in the space that you particularly like, you can have people that are interested in that. That's their expertise to do that service. So I think in general we just said there's a lack of just understanding how to really create wealth and how you can do real estate in so many different ways. Like the way you do real estate is different the way I do real estate, and that's the beauty of this space.
Speaker 2:Right, there's a variety of different ways to get to the same goal. You just have to figure which path makes sense for you and which path you are likely to stick with over the long term, because, again, in this space, longevity matters for you to get to your success and you need to figure which one works for you. For some people it's buying real estate properties and just repeating the cycle. For some it's footbed In the side. For some it's wholesale buying, like there's a whole variety of different ways to do that and you just need to find a way to get to that. So I think for most people it's just limitation of understanding like it's possible. There's many different ways to make money in real estate. And then also when they have certain things like hey, I don't want to deal with tenants, I don't want to be like they're with toilets. They forget like there's other people you can have, do those things that you don't like. That can now stop you from moving forward from what it goes to happen when it comes to real estate.
Speaker 1:When you think of real estate and you being a guy that helps millennials, young people, families create financial independence, what's the one thing that you find that most people are missing in their thinking or in their structure? The average working class person. What do you find is the thing that is holding most people back in your experience from actually reaching financial independence?
Speaker 2:Oh, that's a long question. It's on digestion. But if I'm going to sum it down, I would say there's two things. One, emotions, because we're human beings, so our emotions get the better of us. And when it comes to money, I'm sorry, there's just no way for emotions. I tell people like this is a human.
Speaker 2:Creative system is designed to work with people who can look at things and make rational decisions based on that information to have at the time. It doesn't reward people that basically try to figure out that one plus one can equal four. It punishes people like that. So emotion is a big part of it.
Speaker 2:But aside from the emotion, when you get into how we think about the system of financial wealth, at the end of the day everyone is going down to just trying to create cash flow. But yet when you go through your entire system, from elementary school, from whatever else you go through you don't learn about cash flow until it actually matters. So most people they only start thinking about cash flow when they get to retirement. They realize, okay, great, we have this $1 million property, but now I'm not going to be able to work, so now what do I do? And the advice is like oh, we can sell the property. Now we're going to generate a cash flow for you. My thing to yell people is like, if the end of the game is about cash flow, why not start building your cash flow early on?
Speaker 2:So a lot of times when it comes to cash flow, people are too focused on acquiring the assets, and again that's a distraction, because it's great you can talk to your pal and your friends about like hey, you know, I bought a rental property. I bought whatever it is, but it's all about cash flow. The quicker you get to the cash flow you need. And then again your cash flow depends on what kind of lifestyle you want to have. Some people want to need a cash flow that basically needs $10,000 a month. Some people could be perfectly happy with a cash flow of $2,500 a month, right. So it all depends on what kind of lifestyle you want.
Speaker 2:And then send a plan to create the cash flow you need, because once you do that, you realize that you've reached financial independence. But the problem is you've got all this different distractions, right. Like you know, go buy principal resident because it was cool, so you spend like way more money than you should and again that eats away your cash flow. So now you're going to that job that you don't like because you're going to pay for this asset, and then you know everyone gives you you know props about, you know it's great, whatever, but you're unhappy because you can do the things that you want. So it's a cash flow game and that means you have to discipline yourself, understand what am I emotionally wanting and what is actually not something that's going to help me financially. So those are the two things that try to help people with is understanding what your emotional triggers are and understand that this is a cash flow Very well articulated Brighton, how do you coach someone to create positive emotions as it pertains to the subject of financial freedom, financial independence?
Speaker 1:Because, as you said, when most people were not taught which you just explained to us in school, right, we're taught to go to school, go to work. We're not taught these things and you got to seek out this. Information, podcasts, meetups, events, pay for coaching this and that. How do you coach? And so most people have negative emotions because they get a job, Exactly what you just said that cycle man. I could not have articulated it any better. That cycle, I went in and I got a house. Because that's a dream, that's the American dream or the Canadian dream? There is such a thing in.
Speaker 1:Canton there is, esther is bad Esther is there, okay, but that's the dream, right, that's the dream. And so you get this house. And now, like you said, man, everything you said in the house I'm a big proponent of my primary residence is not my biggest asset. For most Americans we're taught that it's your biggest asset and actually, my house, my personal residence, where I live, it's my biggest liability, because if that's the only thing I own and I have to go out and work to pay for that thing, that means it's taking money out of my pocket. That means it's my biggest liability. It's not putting money in my pocket.
Speaker 1:So my job is exactly what you said to go find cash flowing, income producing assets that are going to be producing enough cash flow to pay for that house, so that I don't personally have to go out and work and my asset pay for my living expenses.
Speaker 1:Most people don't get that. However, it's a very scary thing and I'm raising my hand here because I've been there. It's a very scary thing. After you own your house and you have equity and you're taught that debt is bad and you just want to pay off that mortgage as fast as you can so you can ride into the sun. I don't have this bill and I can continue to work now so I can go travel and do things, but you're still working to go do this, you're still a slave to something or you still have to be going to that job you dislike, like you said, to do that thing. So it's an emotional shift that needs to happen internally for us to see money and to see cash flow in a different light. How are you coaching me around that topic? How are you breaking this down for me? Like, how are you shifting my emotions around money and cash flow?
Speaker 2:That's a very good question, man, and I've been there too, like with all of us, I think, our investors.
Speaker 2:We've all had that point where, in that crosswalk journey, we're like hey you know things are going good, like, why am I going to take more risk? Right, and I think you hit it on the head is basically like the way I try to coach was to understand, like you said you said it perfectly which is like we all have negative emotions or things that we're dealing with in ourselves, that we're not aware of Limitation, that we've told. So, for me, when I meet someone, I always try to figure out what is your money, what is it that you're trying to avoid? Because there's two ways with money. Right, you either use money to hide the things you all know about you that you're really afraid of, right, and that's why we use things like. That's why it works really well, guys, like you think. Like, if you look at a car commercial, what's the one thing you never really see? Car commercials, traffic.
Speaker 2:That's true, I never even noticed that. That's true, very good. You never see traffic. Think about another example, like, think about liquor. What do you always see when you see like a liquor commercial Friends have already taught you never see that. We've all been there. You never see the next night where you're going. Bad, that was rough. I feel like crap. I missed that appointment I was supposed to go to. I didn't go to that job interview because of Tom Goldberg.
Speaker 2:So what I'm trying to tell you is that, when it comes to human beings, it's all about what we're feeling and the feelings we attribute to the things that we do. So when you go to do an investment like you're trying to take that hundred K to buy your first investment property but we need to figure out, is what is the feelings that you're tripping into that and where are they coming from? Oh man, you know, like I could lose the whole house. Okay, so are you feeling fearful that your family would think you aren't successful? Let's talk about that. Why is that your definition of success, right? Oh man, you know what, if I I lose the whole house, I'm my friends and gonna think like I'm an idiot. Okay, so you're surely con. You really care about or thinking. Let's let's dive in a little bit about what's going on there. Why does it matter what people think about you so much? And these are things that we all struggle with, right, it's just identifying. What is it that feeling? What is that feeling that you're feeling? And that emotion in this case, fear when is that coming from and where am I triggered by that right? Once you get through that, you understand oh shoot, okay, I'm just afraid of, like, the fact that lose the money. Now we identify what the fear is and now we can put a plan around and that's where we can then go. Okay, here's how this work. Here's our exit position if we get in a situation where over leverage right, and we find ourselves that, you know, the market is going good.
Speaker 2:So I talked to my clients about what are your fears and let's figure what the game plan is for those fears, right? So one of the biggest fear for anyone who's doing that for the first time is like, hey, bro, like I got 100k, I got four kids. I can't afford to be losing the 100k. Like. That doesn't work that way. Okay, that's your fear. You're afraid you're gonna lose the money. Let's figure out a plan on how we're not gonna lose the money while we're gonna put a hundred chain there. Now, if we put a hundred key on a property and most rental properties are 25%, historically speaking it's gonna be very red the property, even if they're. You know, even in 08 if you had a property that had at least 70% down. It's very rare that you're gonna have to lose all that. But, furthermore, if we have someone renting in there, we're not relying on our income as much. I'm just talking out while you will go through the strategies to help you Kind of bring that fear down and understand as a planning place which something does happen.
Speaker 2:And that's what I do, because I don't like doing something until I have multiple exit positions. Because I'm the kind of person when I talk people is I like to figure out what not, I don't invest based on best case scenario. I go what is the worst possible thing that could happen? And Am I happy going along with that? If the worst scenario would have come true, can I still hold onto this investment? And if I can, I'm gonna invest based on the worst case scenario Because ultimately I know the worst case problem gonna happen, but if it does, I have a plan that I can go through and make sure I get Stick with the investment. So for me, when it comes to money, is just emotion on this that, like the feelings you have, is based on things that you've associated with those, and Identifying those feelings and then working out a plan to address those feelings itself.
Speaker 1:Why do poor people Dislike to talk about money? Why is it that in Middle-income people and poor people's household the money topic is something frowned upon?
Speaker 2:Man, that's a beautiful question because, honestly, I agree with you a hundred percent. We, my committee know, like me, we're just starting like talking about. Oh right, you know, I think you know I don't listen to hip-hop or whatever, but, like back in the day, ain't no one talking about money. But now it's beautiful. People want to talk about their businesses, they want to talk about what they're doing, you know, and that's great because, again, that's where the young me, when I was young, but that's what I'm listening to. So if you ain't talked about it, why would I have interest in those admirable models, right at that time, right? So I think the biggest thing, why realize why or poor Don't talk, or people who don't another money, is they develop what I call the poverty mindset. I put this in my book, right, the poverty mindset is this man, all these people out here. He's so rich, they go on vacation, they buy it up all the properties. Man, that's BS, man, man, I'm working three jobs, I'm working my butt off and not many working for me.
Speaker 1:Right, I'll reject that. I reject that for you, for me and for the listeners. By the way, Right.
Speaker 2:So so you keep going with them and tell the in the poverty mindset is basically what happens is you spend all your energy blaming all the things that are happening. And it's a really powerful Mindset, because what that means is you start believing that you can't solve your situation Because it's out of your control and, let's be perfectly for all of us getting situations are more dire than others. What I'm saying is, once you allow the mindset that you actually believe you don't have the ability to change your position, then yeah, why would you bother? It doesn't matter what you do, because you can be stuck there. So the poverty mindset is one that you have to get away from. Even no matter what your situation is. You cannot give up the ability to understand that you still have the ability to either meet the right person To talk yourself through a difficult situation. You cannot get that up, because once you get that up, that's we into the poverty mindset, where you stop blaming other people or can annoyed about their successes because you feel the system it is is rigged.
Speaker 2:Put it this way. Let me put a quick example. What I mean by that is a lot of people come to me. They're like man, I should work in this job, man. It sucks, man. Like you know, everyone's getting ahead and I'll look, I'll go through the numbers. I'm like, bro, if you really are serious, you want to have financial success. You got to sell your property. You got to do this. Your plan is right there. Like, you have the option, do it. Your challenges that you don't want to do that so it's not that you don't have the means to get to where you want to go is that you're fighting between one to get to the place you want to go in the matter only, which you think you should be able to get. So that's what I mean by the poverty mindset.
Speaker 2:A lot of times, we're just in trap. And then, when it comes to our community, the other thing is just a lack of education. We just didn't get the education. So that's why we got to meet people within our communities. There They've got the education and bring it back to us so we can start feeling this as like a conversation we can have, because I don't know about you, but my parents and I we didn't talk about money, yeah, right in here. So how am I gonna learn now if you talk to other communities, change start there.
Speaker 2:Does a real estate investor, just like your kid. They're no longer more stuff about this business because they have access to saw who's in it, right. So that's also part of the challenge in the community is, just for all my employees, what's you get people who are good in this space that look like you from the same community? Then, yeah, you have an interest in them because, like man, we're still pretty good. Like, okay, I'm gonna go after that right. Or Brighton, he's doing pretty good, oh, I'm gonna go after that right. But if you don't have those models, the reality is, yeah, we don't have the knowledge. So there, we just keep repeating the same cycle, that previous generation, that which is, we keep consuming stuff but we're not building anything for our community in our family down the road right.
Speaker 1:So, growing up for me, brighton I would hear things like rich people are bad. I grew up in New York City, in the poor side of New York City, uptown, washington Heights. Here people say things like rich people are bad. They have the businesses, they live downtown, they live on Park Avenue. We're here working in the factories, working for them. The Republicans don't care about us, they only care about money. These are the things, that kind of the conversations that that traveled and I reject that, by the way, for you, my listener and myself, but these are the things that I would hear.
Speaker 1:How are you coaching someone that comes from that background? Right, because in our communities and black and minorities, we see that a lot. There's a lot of that. There's a lot of lack of education. There's a lot of misunderstanding. There's a lot of. We see the ballplayers. If you're not in Dominican and I'm Dominican it's either baseball players, the way you make it out. If you're black, your basketball or football player, right. If in your country, it's if you got to become an athlete, run right, be a runner, right. I get. It's just these things and these stereotypes, that what we see is these athletic people that look like us, that are Super successful.
Speaker 1:I'll tell you something interesting. I was watching this video the other day and I just to share your here man-to-man with your brother-to-brother is I was watching this video the other day about top 15 athletes right, really cool, and I want the listeners to top highest paid 15 athletes. Of course, lebron James was in there. You had Stefan, stefan Marbury in there. You had a lot of what's it? A bunch of athletes, right, and I'm looking at their net worth, right, I'm looking at their net worth that these guys are like at the top of their game and like 15 million, and I got friends. I got friends that their net worth is Significantly higher. Fifth, 80 million, right, a hundred and five million. I think Messi was like a hundred and thirty million or something like that. The soccer player, I think he was number one and I'm like dude, I got friends that are real estate people that are close to that or past, not the 130 million. I know developers are, yeah, but like, like, I got friends that are like this, all so achievable for Us, but we're not taught that that's not what we see as young minorities In minority households. Right, we see athletes, singers, rappers, that's what we see, but we can do it in real estate.
Speaker 1:And I'm looking at those numbers and I'm like, hmm, I'm gonna be in that number in five or ten years. Right, I keep doing what I'm doing. You've got three of them. Be at that number. Because I was like I'm going up and I'm going to the next level and I'm playing at the next level, like I'm gonna be at that number.
Speaker 1:So when I look at those numbers today from the, from the education level that I have today about Financing and investing, I look at those numbers and I look at these guys. Those guys have high paying jobs. If they don't invest, they, if they don't get this education, even those guys, if they don't have the right people around them, they're gonna be broke. That's why, within five years, football players are broke after retirement. Same thing for baseball. Yeah, my nephew works for, for MLB, he does. They have like this major league baseball. They have this thing of charity for retired baseball players that are in trouble and dude, I have the stats from him and he's traveling around the world Helping these baseball retired baseball players. They go broke because they never had the financial education.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so looking at these numbers and I'm like, hey, man, I'm gonna be there and like I, like I'm timing it out. I'm looking at the video and I'm like dude, I'll be there in 10 years, 15, 20, 25 year and I didn't have to have this special talent ability, I just had to learn some things about money and continue to have to get better. How are we helping and how can you help the young people? Write, those millennials or zeers, these young people to say, hey man, you don't have to be a Stefan Marbury, you don't have to be staff. It's not whatever. You have to be a LeBron. You don't have to be these guys To be a millionaire.
Speaker 2:So I will only speak to my career because I don't want to offend anyone else. That's I can also be doing myself. So let me put, as a black person growing up in Canada or just in North America in general, all the world, really, if you put it that way. So what I've realized is narratives are really important. You tell a story enough times For human beings. It doesn't need to be true, it just needs to be believable individually, like that's literally it. Things don't need to be true. And that's where starting to realize in this world, like you need to keep a structure and when we decide what is the truth, that you and I need to have a mechanism in which, when we have a disagreement, how are the ways we go about defining what is the truth. Now they're never doing this to the really important, because if you tell narrative over, over, over again, generations, just like they'll previously, just accept that until someone decides when they go. Let me look into that. So what's happened for me in the black midi I realized growing up is that We've been told they've chipping out the whole economic Process, particularly in North, and I would be keeping out of it like they've chipped us out. But now this is going way back and realized that there was a thing called red line in the us. There were basically, like black people couldn't bind to certain communities, right, and if you look at the ways the communities in which black people predominantly are forced to live in, they're not Indescribable or as though nowadays, with realistic kind of everyone's fight for land, those communities are being flipped into newer communities, right, but what I realized is black A person is. I realized that, oh, the story to tell me is that For you to become successful, it's going to be one in two ways Entertain people, right, or go through the sporting group. And again, either way is about entertaining people, Whether you're an interesting people, you're a comedian, your movie star, you're a basketball player. Now, what's really interesting if I'm a young kid, a young black kid? What if I'm not athletic? What if I don't have athletic talent? Well then, the notion is that you can't be successful, you don't have a pathway to become ultra wealthy Because you don't have the talent, and black people are known to be great athletes, greater entertainers. So I guess I can't do that. So I guess I'm just going to go through the normal course of life and go work for somehow Whatever it is.
Speaker 2:So when I came to write in my book one reason I took about a white book is because people like you within your community and myself, you have to show who it's possible. So it's the people talk about the book. It's not really like kind of doing this for like. So I was thinking about that kid. I remember that kid thinking it's got to be something where I played basketball. But I was always different.
Speaker 2:I was always thinking about stuff I was always trying to like okay, like. I focused on like great, I wasn't just playing basketball Was just the means to give me what I wanted to do and, to be honest with you, basketball. The reason I played basketball was to get an education, because my dad always told me like hey, man, they can't take what you've already learned out of your brain. You can't take that. Once you learned something, it's with you forever, right, they can't steal that from you. So when I played basketball, it wasn't to play basketball to, you know, become an NBA star, though as a kid, we all have the dream. But I knew my focus was I'm gonna get a scholarship off this bass, that's how I'm gonna go to free schooling, and that's what I did so.
Speaker 2:When I wrote the book I thought about that shit, who's going, kim blackboat, write books? Okay, doing their own? Yeah, you can do that and you have the means to do that. You don't have to be an athlete, you don't have to be a singer, you can go do other things. And our community Charles Barkley said it in our community, said it best it's like when he goes to school and he's all something I want to be doctors and whatever it is All the other non-black kids will raise their hands like you guys get some white diversity. When he goes to predominantly black school, everyone wants to just be a basketball player and he's going like no, there's other ways to do this.
Speaker 2:And that's what I'm saying is for our communities is we have to start telling ourselves I'm limiting ourselves that we only have one pathway to get there, because then it makes it very difficult for all of us to be successful when we're basically saying the only way we can be successful is only one person for pathway. The other communities Don't think that a kid can be a skateboarder, a kid can be a surfer, a kid can be a doctor. A kid can be whatever it is. They understand there's so many different ways for them to become successful. So they're not trained to just say, well, I guess the only one I'm going to be able to become success is becoming All at all now over sports team. No, that doesn't think that way.
Speaker 2:So we have to start telling Our communities that are young, big kids, you could be whatever you want and whatever path we have to. Let where you're due for your kid and you don't understand it's so impactful is you're showing them it's possible. So whether you become successful 25 years, it doesn't matter. Really, you've shown them it's possible and that's what we have to do with, not communities is show them that it's possible, because showing is way more effective than saying hey.
Speaker 2:So once they see that, then the next year I wish on this that, oh, this is possible, oh, I can go do this if the basketball thing doesn't work out, you know. Or I can go to be a singer. I actually prefer to do this and hey, you can be way more wealthy doing this. So to me from my community, that's what I try to do is just showing like, hey, guys, it's possible, I'm doing it. So when you come up, you can do a way better than I did because you know this and watch earlier age than I did, because I'm telling you right now, guys, find you this at 18, y'all wouldn't be talking to me right now. Well, you would be. You would be talking to me. But you get my point when I'm saying is like you and I always think about this, if we knew this information earlier, man, we'd be. We're helping out the next generation.
Speaker 1:100%, 100%. Last question what's the biggest difference to pertain to mindset you found with poor people and your rich, wealthy clients was the biggest difference in their language and their habits and In there, in the way they think in their mindset because I've dealt with both, I can speak to this Um.
Speaker 2:So, on the personal level, rich people are stingy. They'll feel as stingy, but it's just. They're very good at counting for everything. Um, so that's one term you could say there. That's what they get. That term like. They're very. They watch their pocket. But to be successful financially you do have to watch it pocket. You have to understand where money is coming in, where money is going out. So when it comes to porkywood, they're sort of like hands off with their money.
Speaker 2:A poor person may come to me and say you know what I'm struggling. I don't really know what's going on. Like I don't have enough money to pay my credit card bills. But then you like okay. So like, how much do you make? Uh, how much is your expensive Monthly? So how do you know that you don't have enough money? Well, I just I don't have enough money every month. There's nothing left over.
Speaker 2:A rich person or a wealthy person, I should say, if they have a wealthy and have done it properly, oh, they know why. They're things all working. So when they come to me like bright, I have a cash flow problem. I need to figure out how I can general cash flow on this. So their questions is more specific. Right, they know exactly what the problem is. They're trying to figure out. What do you think or do you have any creativity that I haven't thought about and how to resolve this problem I have right now. They know what it is right.
Speaker 2:Well, it's when it comes to, like poor people. If they don't even know what the problem is, they just know that, hey, it's not working out, but they haven't spent the time to kind of think about the problem a little bit. It's seed to identify what the potential cause might be. So I think that's the difference between in talking to ultra wealthy people and talking to common people. It's just, and you can have the same mind, like a common person can have a wealthy mindset, and that's where they're going to do very well, because they have the same mindset. And you can also, by the way, you can also have a wealthy person that has a poor person mindset, because maybe they've just gotten money from their parents but they don't really understand how it works. Um, so you can have that too.
Speaker 2:But I think the biggest thing is that wealthy people are more specific in their language. They tend to view their problems as not. Oh, this is silly, be being down to them, but they understand my key. This is something I can work through. I need to get the help. Well, it's poor. People tend to feel the poor mindset of such as a poor, my right, and you know. This is terrible. This has happened to me. So I think those are the two different things that would say it's just. One is more I can change things, and the other ones more like oh my gosh, I'm being victimized again, kind of the thing. Right, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So there's a saying that states where your focus goes, your energy flows and results show, and you said it. Poor people don't know where their money is is going and what's happening, while wealthy people Know where their money is at all times. I one thing I have learned from wealthy people is I've interviewed many and spoken to many, have many wealthy friends, and one habit that I've I've actually acquired myself as a business owner is Every day spend some time looking at my bank accounts right, seeing what's going in, what's going out, what's going in, because where your focus goes, your energy flows right. So if you're focusing on on your cash flow and you're focusing on what's coming in and where you're spending your money and what's going out, you can improve. It will get focused on, gets improved where your focus goes, energy slowly also. So if you focus on it, it improves. If you focus on your expenses and your income, it will improve If you're spending in. That's a habit like anything else. If you do it ten minutes a day, I you know, I have, I have friends that they they do it every day. I've picked up the habit is every day they spend 15 20 minutes.
Speaker 1:So I went to a and I'll share this with you. I went to an event, the millionaire mine intensive. It's called the book that T Harbeck had wrote the secrets of a millionaire mine and then in that then there'sa there was I don't know. If you read that book, then there's, there's an event that goes with that book it's no longer I haven't ran, yeah, it's no longer available was through a company called success resources and they have a. They have any event, like I said, the millionaire mine intensive, whatever and one of the things that we I learned in that, in that three-day event, was that you know, you, there's a mantra that they taught us there and is my part-time business is to manage my money every day.
Speaker 1:So you, it's a, it's a, it's a habit, right, millionaires, re wealthy people, manage their money every day. So my part-time, my part-time Business, is to create cash flow with my money. My money makes money for me. So that's a mindset you start to, you start to say that to yourself, you start to behave in that way and you start to take the actions that actually deliver those results. And one of the ways that I From being around real rich people is that they focus on their money, so they pay attention to whether money's not that literally Like they view their money as part-time business is part. Part of what they do is manage their money to make sure their money is constantly making money. My brother appreciate you, man. Thank you so much for coming on here and and oh it was a lot of fun, man oh.
Speaker 1:Before we go to the entire wrong, what's?
Speaker 2:the name of your yes, oh, no, worries, man, just want to make sure we give value to the audience. So we're good, um the boats. Call master your mortgage. What the bank will not tell you about buying the ride home, you can get it on Amazon. So we're just again going Amazon. It's on there, it's perfect, perfect.
Speaker 1:We're gonna go into the entitled round right now where we're gonna ask a series of questions you could justify if you want. You don't have to. If you don't want one word, answers is fine. And are you ready to play, sir?
Speaker 2:Let's go real estate is Real estate is a great asset for creating wealth. My advice to young people is my advice to young people is to focus on cash flow. I've always wanted to travel too. Oh man, that's, that's a tough one, but I'm just gonna. I'm say I've always wanted to travel everywhere, so that's just I'm. I have a list of places I gotta go into, so that's my second hobby. So I'm gonna say ever, I've always wanted to travel.
Speaker 1:I highly recommend people should read.
Speaker 2:There's so many books I'd like. Well, I would say I recommend you read master. Your mortgage with the bank will not tell you about the ride home, but if you're not reading that book, one of the books that I always come to, the start me an investment, johnny was Jack Bogle's book, the little. I think it's called. Let me see it's back here. Yeah, the little book of common sense, invest and that's a really good family or business.
Speaker 2:Family always more time or more money, always more time guys. More time, passion or stability that's a tough one and the reason I'm thinking about is because, like passion can be a dangerous thing, because if you go into a passion that doesn't provide your stability becomes nuts. So the Mike Mahaj says that this is a complicated answer. I'm gonna say, like balls Book smart or street smart, that's a misconception. You need both wine or beer. I'm a wine guy.
Speaker 1:Unlimited free trip to anywhere in the world or win a million dollars every time you run a marathon.
Speaker 2:Well, no, it's got million dollars. There's more on a marathon because I can go anywhere in the world.
Speaker 1:Then Ha ha, that's good. And last, even though you're in Canada, trump or Biden.
Speaker 2:Oh, you know one thing, guys I will sit. That's this question. Money is a political, and I try to be a political either, because my dad told me that there's no sense in only being good and working in one system. You gotta be good working in any system you find yourself, and so learn to be a political.
Speaker 1:Thank you, brian. If people wanted to get a hold with you could connect with you on social. Get your book, I guess, just in general, connect with you, get service, get your services. How do they find you? How do they connect with sure man, appreciate it? So yeah, the best way is go to wealthmarathoncom If you want to connect with me on social.
Speaker 2:Check up the YouTube channel wealth marathon, tiktok wealth marathon, instagram wealth marathon as well. So yeah, those are the Charles and get a hold of me yet. Thank you, brother, appreciate you being here. Thank you for coming out and sharing your wisdom, your insights on your knowledge.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you, my friend.
Speaker 2:No, I appreciate you. Having me on this was awesome you.
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