Ep. 2 - David Pere - From Military to Millionaire - On Risk & The Value of Being Your Real Self
David Pere launched the Military to Millionaire community and is committed to teaching people how to create a lucrative real estate portfolio. With a million-dollar+ net worth at 32 years old, he talks us through the decisions and philosophies that influenced his growth and led to financial independence. He’s a complete open book in this conversation. And we delve into where this crazy market may be headed!
Episode Transcript
Christina Honkonen (00:18):
So, I would love to go back to what got you interested in money to begin with. Were you already, I'm, I'm gonna assume you're already in the military, but tell us a little bit about why, how, when did that happen? And obviously you've had so much success, we've listened to a lot of the content you're putting out there, and you have a lot of drive. It's really, really helpful. You've built this huge community that you're benefiting so greatly, so you've done really great things. But where, where, let's just go back for a second. Where did this all start?
David Pere (00:51):
Yeah, no, and thank you for that. I, uh, <laugh> it started in 2015. So I joined the military in 2008, and in that first seven years, I would imagine that my net worth probably, if anything, it might've gone down. It definitely didn't go up. Um, I blew, you know, I did all the normal Marine Corps things. Oh look, a motorcycle. Oh, that's a cool car. Oh, I like women. Let me go on a bunch of dates and Oh, tattoos. Tattoos are cool, especially when you're drunk. And yeah, I did all the, all the financial mistakes you could possibly do. Right? Every normal service member stereotype other than a Mustang, been there, done that. I bought other kinds of cars. Um, in fact, I remember coming back from a deployment. I bought a truck, a Harley, and a rifle. And, you know, all these years later, the truck's gone. The Harley's gone and the rifle sits, uh, up, up until the last year, the rifle sat in Missouri and I was stationed outta state because I couldn't bring it into the states that I was stationed. So, total waste of money. But, um,
Christina Honkonen (01:50):
Did you have fun?
David Pere (01:51):
Oh, yeah. It, it was a blast, right? Like, I wouldn't, well, I, I would probably go back and change a few things, uh, financially. 'cause I could have had just as much fun and also saved 250, 500 bucks a month and been in a great situation, or even, you know, I was contributing a little bit to my 4 0 1 k, but I'd never researched the funds. So my money was just sitting in the bonds. And so from 2008 when the market tanks, I joined the military as it's like bottoming. And then, uh, you know, it's, it's bottoming, whatever it's from 2008 to 2015, it did very well. And I missed all of it. 'cause all my money was in bonds. Um, so if I, even if I could just tweak that, like, hey, just instead of this fund, put it in this fund, I'd be, I'd have three times as much money in there right now.
(02:38)
Um, and I could have been just as wild and had three or $400,000 instead of a hundred in my TT s p, right? So, uh, yeah, I definitely would change some stuff. But yeah, 2015, uh, ironically, someone was trying to get me into Amway to sell, you know, whatever, multi-level marketing energy drinks and yada yada. And, uh, he handed me the book, rich Dad, poor Dad. I remember telling him that I didn't like to read, and he handed it to, he pulled out a CD from his pocket and handed it to me and was like, well, put this in your car while you're driving. I was a recruiter for the Marine Corps at the time, so I was driving all the time. I mean, two or three hours a day in the car. He's like, just listen to this. And so I listened to it and I mean, it was like, immediately I downloaded Audible and it was just book, book, book, book.
(03:22)
And I, uh, I just kinda got lucky. I, that was probably September, October, and in December, the lease on my apartment was coming due. And so I was like, well, I'm paying five 50 a month to live in a two one apartment. Lemme see if I can find a duplex. And I bought a duplex that it was 6 25 a month to own, uh, two, one on each side duplex. And there was a tenant paying 4 25. So I went for paying five 50 a month to live in an apartment to maybe 200 bucks out of pocket once you include utilities to own a duplex that was bigger and actually had some grass. And, you know, I could paint it if I wanted to without asking the apartment people. And, uh, that was cool. About six months later, I got stationed in Hawaii. And when I moved out, I rented my unit.
(04:08)
And then the first time I got a paycheck, like I, my property manager sent me like 150 bucks and I was like, here you go. And I was like, all my bills are paid. Like this is, yay. This is pure profit. Yeah. And it was just, I was hooked at that moment. It was like, I'm gonna start saving, I'm gonna start buying more. And it took a while to buy the next property 'cause service member, you know, enlisted guy didn't have a whole massive income. And Hawaii's fairly expensive to live in. Uh, so it, it was probably about a year and a half until the next purchase. Um, and then, and then it just, yeah, it's just kind of gone from there.
Matt Honkonen (04:43):
Real quick. I don't wanna stop your train right now, but, um, fun versus savings. I had that same miscalculation in my young brain, like, ah, man, that's for later. Like, if I could go back and talk to a younger version of me, it would be, man, you're not sacrificing anything to be smarter about your money.
David Pere (05:01):
No. And, and every little, that's the thing that now that you look back, right? If I save, so I'm 32 right now and let's just math in public at 32, I would say every I'd have, I'd have to really do the math to make this accurate, but I would say I would probably need to save $300 every month to equate to what a hundred dollars a month would've been equal to when I was 18. Yeah,
Christina Honkonen (05:29):
Yeah. Compound nurses. It's crazy.
David Pere (05:31):
Yeah. So it's like, man, if you just like a hundred bucks a month, like if you eat out twice less every month, or one or two less bottles of alcohol that you probably shouldn't be drinking anyway 'cause you're underage or, um, you know, it, it's, yeah. And, and the crazy thing is, I was stationed in Japan the first two years. We get an overseas allowance, like an additional paycheck. It's not huge, but it's three or 400 bucks a month or whatever. And if I just saved that, just said, Hey, you know, I wasn't earning this much before. Let me just save this difference. Like that would've been a huge chunk of change. But, you know, I got a cool tattoo
Speaker 5 (06:08):
<laugh>.
Christina Honkonen (06:10):
So when did military to Millionaire come into the picture?
David Pere (06:15):
January, 2018. Um, good friend of mine was over at the house. He's, uh, kinda a figurehead in the real estate space. And I had an idea for writing a book about my deployment to Afghanistan. 'cause I kept a journal and a mission log that kind of correlated so I can, I can go back and look and be like, hey, um, this day in September, I drove over a spicy road bomb and this is how I felt that night. Like, and it's kind of cool. So I thought, wow, there's all these Navy Seals books about like the guy who shot Bin Laden and all the cool stories, but there's no book about what, like, the random 20 year old dude who got dropped in the desert was trying to do to like, entertain himself for seven months. And, uh, and a newsflash a lot of really stupid stuff, <laugh>.
(06:56)
Um, and, uh, I thought it'd be cool. So I was like, man, nobody knows who I am. How do I get to where people know who I am? So when I write this book, somebody might actually read it. He's like, just start a blog. Like, okay, what do I write about? He's like, I don't know real estate. I was like, well, yeah, but everybody writes about real estate. He's like, well, you're in the military, so put that spin on it. 'cause nobody in the military talks about this, even though they all buy houses all the time. And, uh, like, okay. So I just kinda started documenting what I was doing and then, you know, probably a year in people started to actually pay a little bit of attention and ask questions. So then when I got the same question two or three times, I would then go and really learn about that subject so I could write about that content to answer that question.
(07:39)
And then probably a year after that, it just, uh, about 18 months ago, it just kind of started to tank like torpedo, not torpedo, the opposite of torpedo, uh, <laugh> exponential. I mean, it, we went, I remember a week, probably like April or May of 2021, where we were averaging about a hundred people a week, were joining the Facebook group. And all of a sudden it was like 200 a day. And I was just like, well, this is weird. What, like, did someone share something? And then it just kept going and it kept, now we're at like, you know, it took two years to get to 7,000 people, two and a half years to get to 7,000 people in the group. And then in 14 months, 15 months, we went from 7,000 to like 46. So it's, it's
Matt Honkonen (08:17):
<crosstalk>. Did you, do you attribute that to any specific thing? Or was it a marketing push you did or a specific thing you did? Or how did you all of a sudden exponentially grow that way?
David Pere (08:27):
Yeah, I think it was almost the opposite of a specific thing. So I, I, I think that genuinely it was because I'm congruent, I'm approachable and I'm not pitching a whole bunch of expensive crap. So while I do have some paid, like a, a mastermind group or a, a fairly affordable course or whatever, I'm not out there like a thousand dollars and I'll talk to you about how to buy a single family house that you could buy with a quick Google. Um, I think between that and the fact that I was just pumping out so much free content people, it was just word of mouth. People were just like, Hey, this Dave guy, he's, he'll answer your questions and he won't charge you for it. And, uh, that's my thought. I don't know, there was nothing, nothing really changed during that time. I think it was just people realizing that like, I've achieved financial freedom. I don't really, like, this is fun for me. Um, I make some money doing it, sure. But I could stop and go live on my farm in Missouri and be fine. So who caress? <laugh>.
Christina Honkonen (09:30):
Yeah, <laugh>. Yeah. That's awesome. Do you have any sense of how many people you've helped at this point? 'cause you also, I'd love to hear about the course you created for the military too, if it's still being used, how that came about. But do you have any way of quantifying it? I know that's hard, but
David Pere (09:46):
Actually let's get real raw. Let's find out be, and I, I say it that way just yesterday, so I'm gonna go into my Google Drive. I, so I had mentioned that mastermind group. So just yesterday I posted a poll in there and I, a form and I said, Hey, I'd like to know how you guys have done since you got in the mastermind group. I'm trying to figure out some way to show like, this is what, whatever. So I have 36 responses in the last 12 hours, and I don't know. So let's see, of the 36 responses, uh, 75%. So the first question is, how many real estate investment deals have you done prior to joining the group? 75%. The answer is one to five, 16%. The answer is zero. Uh, two people said five to 10 and one said 25 or more. And, and then the next.
(10:44)
So after you've joined the war room, how many deals have you done? 40%. One to five, 20%, five to 10, 13%, 10 to 25. Two of 'em have done 25 or more. So all but 15% of 'em have done at least two times as many deals as they had before. Uh, and then, so I asked, let's see, so what was your net worth when you joined net worth when you joined? Uh, man, this is actually a lot of breakouts. So I'll just do the, the basic, uh, 13% had a $5 million net worth. 8% had a negative net worth, 17% had a zero to $50,000 net worth. And then, uh, the biggest group in there is 500 to a million was 20% of people. And then now it is 33%, one to 5 million, uh, 25%, two 50 to 500. Yeah. So I don't, I don't wanna bore you guys with a million statistics, but, um, essentially, oh man, there's a lot of, a lot of good feedback on there. But, but anyway, uh, of the 36 responses, it, it looks very promising that they, uh, they they're getting a lot out of it. So, uh, I don't know that I have a sense, um, that's, you know, 36 people who've responded to something in the last 24 hours, but they all apparently have done a ton of deals, so that's cool. Mm-hmm.
Christina Honkonen (12:11):
<affirmative>, that's incredible.
David Pere (12:12):
Yeah. So it's, it's cool.
Christina Honkonen (12:13):
So I, I, I saw, well actually, I really wanna take a step back before we go any further and talk about your asset allocation currently, um, your net worth to whatever extent you're comfortable sharing, and then we can kind of delve in. 'cause we have big questions about key locks right now and the real estate industry in general. And what do you do if you wanna get into it, because it seems like a crazy time. But before we go there, I think everybody loves hearing these numbers. They're always fun. So share away.
David Pere (12:39):
Yeah. Yeah. So, um, all right, so I do this every month on the first. So I haven't accounted for the last 20 days of stock market losses, but I accounted for June or May's stock market losses already. Um, so not as, not as crazy as you'd think. Uh, 1,094,289. Um, now that's, so I will say, not that it's, not that that's a bad net worth by any means, but I will say that there's a $170,000 worth of equity at a primary residence that I don't count. So, um, no,
Christina Honkonen (13:15):
That's very impressive. And pulling that out like that, I mean, how you said you're 32?
David Pere (13:20):
Yeah.
Christina Honkonen (13:21):
Oh, well done. Thank you.
David Pere (13:23):
Yeah, I mean it's, you know, it's, it's a lot of it's six, 600 k of that, or, or, let's see, uh, 633,000, 600 of that is equity in homes. Uh, and actually I, that's probably, that probably jumped 50,000 a day. 'cause I refinanced a property that, uh, appraised for, uh, we bought it for 3 55. It appraised for 4 25, so it apprais for 70,000 more than we paid for it. Uh, and I'm pulling 20 out, so, um, yay for more equity that whatever, nobody really cares, but <laugh>, um, yeah.
Matt Honkonen (13:58):
Do you pay attention during a time like this? Or do you not pay attention during a time like this?
David Pere (14:03):
Uh, you mean as far as the market?
Matt Honkonen (14:05):
Yeah, market, the real estate. I mean, you, you, you, you speak of it as equity and I think my biggest thing is not looking right now,
David Pere (14:14):
<laugh>. Yeah. Yeah. So I only, the only time I update the tracker as far as real estate goes every month, I, I update the mortgage balance, so the principal pay down gets factored. The only time I adjust the value in my spreadsheet is on January 1st, or if I refinance and have a new appraisal. Um, so all of these values account for last January, so they don't account for the last six months of chaos. So I'm sure I could bump this another a hundred thousand dollars or so. Um, but I just, you know, I don't really care. But yeah, to your point, um, I haven't looked at my 4 0 1 K in the last six weeks because I just know that if I look at it, I'm gonna have some kind of a crazy idea that maybe people were right about moving this into. No, just leave it
Christina Honkonen (15:00):
Alone. Right, right. Just don't touch it.
David Pere (15:01):
Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, uh, I, I'm not, and we're going to get into this, but I'm not super worried about the real estate side. Now, I could be dead wrong on that, but there's a lot of reasons that I think real estate will probably slow, will probably dip, but I don't think real estate's gonna be the piece that I don't think it'll be like oh eight, where all of a sudden the real estate market falls to pieces and the rest of the world's like, what the heck happened? Uh, I, I think that's gonna be, uh, a lot of things. But I, I think real estate's in a weird position where the supply and demand is the biggest driving factor, and there's such a low inventory of housing, and so few, you know, more people need a house every year than they're building. And it's this weird, I don't know.
(15:47)
And then, and then I'm also kind of comforted by the fact that I'm in Missouri, and so, like, the median home price across the nation was 3 23 in March of 2020, and it's 4 29 now, but like the median home price here is still under 200,000. So we're so far under the national average that it, it can't dip too much. I mean, I'm sure it could, but even if I had a 20 or 30% dip in real estate values, um, you know, that's, that's a lot less significant in Missouri than it is in San Diego, or,
Christina Honkonen (16:19):
Yeah, for sure. So looking back, what would you say were the top two, top three, um, contributing factors to this great growth and wealth? I mean, it might have been buying these homes and or what would you say? Like how did you do this?
David Pere (16:37):
Yeah, consistency. Um, the, the, so the first thing I would say is when I had no money or, or no net worth or very low net worth, uh, I took some big risks, uh, you know, high leverage, uh, creative financing, very low down payment properties that had a lot of upside. Um, and, and granted this was 2000 15, 16, 17. So the market still had a lot of room to grow. Uh, but I, I had enough of a cushion and I had the security of a federal job that I knew was gonna stay around to where I was. Okay. Taking a few bigger risks, knowing that if they fail, I will still have, I'll still be able to put food on the table. So it's not, it won't like end my life. It, it'll suck, but it won't ruin me. But if these win, then that'll really, you know, when you don't, when you don't have a lot of money, you kinda, you kind of have to either approach money as a really slow save and hope it grows over time, process, or you have to be willing to, to leverage and, and, and take some, some bigger risks to grow.
(17:41)
So that was, that was one thing. Like I remember I bought a, a 10 unit apartment, uh, 85% bank financing, 10% seller financing, and I brought 5% to the table. Um, and then that thing, you know, that was a risk, right? I'm only, I'm only putting 5% down. This thing's 95% leveraged. Um, but I bought it for 40,000 less than it appraised for. It was cash flowing, it had a lot of room for growth. Uh, I thought it would be a good property long term. And, uh, luckily I was right. I mean, it, it cash flowed for four years. And I recently sold it for, uh, 115,000 more than I paid for it and made money the entire time. Um, and I had two refinances in the middle that allowed me to buy additional properties. And, um, so I think it was just consistency, right? Getting, getting around the right people, people who are already doing what you want to do. Sometimes I had to pay to play to be in those rooms, but getting around people who were very successful in real estate, seeing what they were doing and just, you know, consistently analyzing deals and making offers.
Christina Honkonen (18:46):
Yeah. When did you stop the recruiting job? Was that a decision you had to make, or was it just obvious
David Pere (18:52):
That Yeah, no, so that just happens. Uh, it's three years orders. So I, I started, uh, I left there in May of 2016, and then, uh, jumped into, I'm a, I'm a truck driver for the Marine Corps by trade, so. Nice.
Christina Honkonen (19:07):
Yeah. Very cool. Um, so let's talk a little bit about, um, getting into helping people who are listening get into real estate. So a lot of our listeners have variable income. So a lot of us are creatives. Like Matt and I own our own business. He is a musician. I'm in marketing. Our company services both the same and different clients we work together, and that a lot of our listeners are the same. So they're either in music or they're, um, in some sort of arts. Not all of them, obviously, but a lot of them are. So for someone with a variable income, how would you recommend they get into real estate? <laugh>, we can choose to talk about it through the lens of the market right now, um, but also outside of it.
David Pere (19:52):
Yeah. Uh, the first thing I would say is if you're in the music world and you're in a position where you can make royalty plays, I would absolutely do that. Uh, because, you know, if you can, and I don't, I don't know enough about that world to be able to like really articulate that, but I have a friend who's a music producer, um, and he found a really weird niche where he, he makes commercials, like he does the music for like Taco Bell or, you know, Disney previews or whatever. And he started getting some royalty gigs with it. And he made, um, a significant amount of money passively last year off just residual stuff from what the exact same work he'd been done doing anyway. And it's not like it's sexy work, you know, it's not like he woke up one day and was like, I'm gonna make Taco Bell commercials, you know, but it's something that's recurring and now he can reinvest all that extra money into real estate.
(20:46)
So I think that's cool. Uh, and the music industry has a, a cool ability to have that potential where most people don't. Um, I think I tell people all this time, so this, this is probably like the most cliche thing in the modern real estate world, but the house hack. So the idea that you can buy a duplex, a triplex, or a fourplex, you live in one of the units, you rent the other ones out, and what it does, I mean, your housing's your biggest expense. So if you're paying $2,000 a month for a mortgage, what the only way you're getting rid of that is if you pay off your house. But that's not exactly an easy thing to do. So the alternative is, if you wanna live in the same spot, is you buy a fourplex, which is more expensive, a little bit intimidating to most people.
(21:31)
But the cool thing when you buy a buy like that is you're buying a primary residence. So you can still get an f h a loan three and a half percent down, or, or a VA loan if you're in the military, or 5% down conventional. So you get in with a much lower barrier to entry. But it's, it, there's so many benefits. I mean, you're gonna learn how to be a landlord. Um, you're gonna, essentially, you can live for free or, or very cheap. So if you were paying $2,000 a month for a mortgage and all of a sudden you buy this fourplex, if you're still coming outta pocket $500 towards your mortgage, well you're saving $1,500 a month that you could reinvest. But a lot of people are able to do it where they live, like completely free. Like the other tenants pay their mortgage, their utilities, everything.
(22:12)
And you can save that entire housing allowance and reinvest it. And that's 15, 20, $30,000 a year that you can invest now that you were just paying into rent or a mortgage. Uh, but it's also, you know, you get the primary residence, you get the 30 year fixed rate, low down payment loan, which is really secure, especially if you live in the house. 'cause you're not gonna let the house go back to the bank if you live there. You want a place to live. Uh, but it's also less scary, right? Because for whatever reason, when you start talking about investing, like all the people around you who don't invest in real estate are gonna try to talk you out of it. They're gonna like, oh, this is crazy. You're crazy. The market that there's always a reason. Yeah, there's always a reason not to buy real estate from people who don't own real estate.
(22:55)
Um, but if you tell the same person, like if your mom doesn't invest in real estate and tells you don't do this at all, but she probably owns a house. So if you're like, well, we're not, we're just buying a house, like, yeah, it's a fourplex, but it's just a house for us. Like, that's not as scary. You're gonna have a lot more support. It makes it really easy to get into. So I, I love that option because it's like, okay, low down payment, live for free, reinvest that money, not scary, learn to be a landlord, and then you can decide, wow, this is amazing. I'm gonna keep going. Or holy crap, this sucks. But when you are done with it, at least you know, if you bought it right, it'll cashflow when you move out, or, or you can still sell it for a decent price. So that's
Christina Honkonen (23:35):
Awesome. Are you scared at all about getting into the market right now? Or do you feel like look hard enough and you'll find what you need?
David Pere (23:46):
Yes, <laugh>, uh, I'm, I, I have a feeling, right, like the spidey sense says that there's definitely a change. I don't imagine a massive real estate crash. And I, I know that all of my properties pay for themselves. So as long as I hold onto them, even if there is a crash, it really doesn't matter. Um, so what I'm, what I'm doing right now is, so like I have three renovations underway and I was planning to refinance and hold two of them as long-term rentals, and I'm gonna sell all three. And the only reason I'm doing that is to pay off what little personal debt I still have left in my name and then have an extra 50,000 sitting in cash reserves. And so I have cash reserves for all my properties, but I figure, hey, if I have an extra 50 grand, then if things get really rough, that's enough to carry mortgages for eight months, 10 months, whatever.
(24:41)
Um, that'll probably five months now. But <laugh>, you know, they won't all go vacant at once. They didn't in covid. So, um, you know, I guess the more, more real estate you own, the more money it takes to keep the mortgages going, but, uh, you know, they're not all gonna go vacant, right? Those people still need a place to live. They're still gonna pay rent or somebody will. And, uh, a lot of people I think are gonna be, I think the rental market. It's kinda this weird dynamic because the rental market I think is gonna pick up, uh, as interest rates climb, less people are gonna be buying houses, so what are they gonna do? They're gonna rent. Um, and rents always lag. So, you know, 20 20, 20 21, we saw massive increases in property values, but those rents haven't caught up because the tenant who's in a one year lease hasn't had to renew yet.
(25:24)
So the rent, the rent, rent didn't go up. Well, it goes the other way too. Now that those rents are catching up, even if the market comes back down, that person's locked into a year lease, it's gonna take a while for the rent to, if it comes down, it'll take a long time. So it, it's a good hedge. Uh, real estate's usually a pretty good inflation hedge. Um, I'm, if I can't get into a property and be all in at 75% of what it will appraise at, I'm not touching it. And so I've been doing a lot of off market. Like, I was spending 10 or $15,000 a month on letters and cold callers and um, I actually just sold, I signed a purchase and sale agreement yesterday, so we just sold that L L C. But yeah, with the, with, so with the way we sold it was essentially like, Hey, no sales price.
(26:11)
I want to be able to buy one deal at cost from you guys every month. And so they're taking over everything I built and I have to do no marketing, but I get access to one property a month at cost. So I will still get the ability to buy super undervalued real estate. Um, I'm doing, I stopped doing full gut renovations and I'm doing just some lipstick cosmetic stuff, maybe a bathroom or kitchen, and I'm just trying to take down more conservative projects. So I'm, I'm, I'm definitely not gonna stop buying. Um, I'm actually, if anything I'm trying to pivot, uh, like mobile home parks and RV parks and, and stuff like that.
Christina Honkonen (26:47):
Yeah. Um, with mobile home parks, do you plan to build, would you ever build a park or you want to buy one that's already,
David Pere (26:54):
Man, there are a lot of people out there who would build, if possible. I don't know any municipalities that are letting those get built right now. So that's part of why they're so valuable. Nobody, no, no county or municipality wants more mobile home parks. And so it's a, an asset class that does very well in a recession environments because they're affordable. And so it's like the last straw is somebody goes to live in a mobile home park before they end up, well, hopefully they don't end up homeless, but, um, like that's like one of those places that people view as like, oh, fine, well we'll go live here. So they don't have a problem staying full, uh, in recessions. And so, and they're, they're very weird how they're run. Um, the way most people do it is they sell the home or seller or finance the home to the tenant, and then they just, they just collect a rent for the home staying on the lot. They just collect the lot rent and they do the landscaping. So they have almost no expenses. Landscaping and like lights and like Yeah. The
Christina Honkonen (27:55):
Community if they keep it up and Yeah.
David Pere (27:57):
Yeah. So it's, it's almost no expenses. So it's, yeah. So, so I guess to answer your question right, is, is buy if I can find 'em. And the cool thing with mobile home parks too is that a lot of, um, banks don't lend on them or don't really like to, until you get to like a really big scale operation. And so you can do a lot of seller financing. So you can get like pretty creative deals where you find an owner who's owned a place for 40 years and say, Hey, I'll give you 10% down if you just let me make monthly payments to you for the next 20 years, or, or whatever. So, cool Opportunities.
Christina Honkonen (28:30):
Yeah. Okay. Let's talk about HELOCs because right now it's tempting for a lot of people to pull equity out of their homes. 'cause the way the market is is crazy and you wanna take advantage. Do you recommend them? Do you recommend ever taking a HELOC out and using the money to invest or buy another home or in ways that aren't typical, like updating your kitchen?
David Pere (28:54):
Yeah, I, I definitely lean towards HELOC over refinances right now. So I've, I've been getting that question a lot lately. And you know, the last two years my answer was, ah, don't worry about a heloc just refinance because rates are amazing and whatever, uh, the answer has flip flopped now because if you got a 2.5%, 3% mortgage locked on 30 years, then you should absolutely never touch that. So, yeah, so if anything, get a second mortgage on it and leave the original one at the same rate. But I would prefer the heloc. Um, this is one of those things where it's a good thing. My wife doesn't always listen to these podcasts because she hates that we have a heloc. She is much more Dave Ramsey risk averse than I am. Um, totally like it, I get it. Like I, I, well, I struggle to get it, but I, I try to get it.
(29:46)
I understand why that's a thing. Um, the $72,000 HELOC that we pulled in 2016 has bought me a 10 unit apartment, two house flips a rental. Um, like it is, it has been wonderful for me. I over the, and at, and at a three or 4% simple interest, you know, rate, and you only pay interest on the money you've used, and then you just pay it off and reuse it when the opportunity comes. Um, I love it. And I, I've actually even thought to the point of running my entire life, or an entire business out of a heloc, because my income is, so when you're, when you're flipping a house, you might have one month where you make nothing, and then another month where you make $70,000 and that's great, but if you had like a HELOC to throw it in, you can kind of balance that out rather than like this massive influx and outflux of <laugh> of, uh, profit and loss. So
Matt Honkonen (30:39):
I had a friend of mine from Atlanta in town, and he's very much, if I make a dollar, I'm spending a dollar to make another dollar faster. Like that's his like, bible. And he and I were arguing back and forth because I'm kind of the other way, like, ah, just, you know, I've got what I need, I can do it. I don't need a big team, you know, blah, blah, blah. And, um, as we had this long discussion, about an hour he left, and as he was leaving, I was walking downstairs and I just stopped and looked out the window like, I'm doing it all wrong, <laugh>. It's always another way to do it. Oh, no. Yeah, my whole life has been a sham, <laugh>.
David Pere (31:14):
There's a time and a place, right? So there's, there's, it's, it's, it's a weird dynamic where, you know, it's like you can't go broke taking profit. So if you like, being conservative is good. Um, and, and it's, it's smart, especially when you're heading into a recession, right? It's just also very hard to build wealth that way. So, so
Matt Honkonen (31:33):
Is it a good thing that you and your wife are flips of that coin because people like yourself, I always think of like right when the pandemic hit, or right before the pandemic hit, there were those photos of like all the Amazon, like here's a fleet of 6 million Amazon vans that have been purchased that are just sitting idle. And like, that's the fear is that you dump all your money in right before something happens and oh crap, you have $0 now.
David Pere (31:59):
Yeah, there's, uh, it's probably good. Um, 'cause she, like, she's the reason that I'm forcing myself to like, sell all three of these rather than just one of 'em and build a larger cash reserve and pay off some debt that I don't care about. Like, I'm gonna pay off my car. I have a 3% interest rate on that. I don't care about paying that off. I think it's a waste of money to pay that off. I could make 3% interest return on in my sleep. I could, you know, go shake a tree in my network and go, Hey, who's got a deal? I'll pay me 8% and I'll lend you the a hundred thousand dollars to do your deal and pay me back in six months. You know, like it's, it is very easy to outpace a 3, 4, 5, shoot, six, 7% interest rate, right? So the idea of paying those off is kind of like, eh, why would I, why would I do that?
(32:46)
Like, it, it almost feels like a loss, but it's a guaranteed return. And what it does is if you pay that off, you know, it's, it's, it, especially with like a car where it's a fixed payment, there's this weird like threshold where it becomes more valuable to pay off. So if you have a, I bought my car for 12 grand when I first bought it, putting $12,000 into it to save, you know, I'm paying it off in cash to save $180 a month, made no sense. That's a, that's a bad return, whatever that now I owe like 4,000 on it. So putting $4,000 in to make $200 or $180 a month in perpetuity, that's a lot more reasonable. Like I, it's a, it's a little harder to go find something that I can throw $4,000 at and make 180 guaranteed. Um, so it's, there's a weird threshold there. But yeah, the interest rate on, you know, some of that stuff, it's like, ah, you know, like I don't even mind having a credit card with, you know, maxed out if the money went into a renovation that's gonna turn a profit. But, um, yeah, it, it's the, the, the, the short answer is it's, it's a good thing she balances me out because I need to be a little bit more conservative just because I don't think there's a crash, but, you know, who knows. Um, so better to be prepared for anything than to be wrong.
Christina Honkonen (34:00):
So do you have plans for if there is a crash? Like do you also have proactive plans? Like is that a buying opportunity or you're like, we'll have to reassess when
David Pere (34:09):
Always a buying opportunity? Yeah, I'm actually thinking that the way this manifests in the real estate world is probably going to be market specific. I think that there are very ex very overpriced markets that we'll probably see a pretty, a somewhat serious, uh, you know, correction. And I think there's markets like mine where we might see a five, 10% dip. And so what I've been kind of playing around with is like, okay, how do I figure out where this is manifesting in such a way that I can put funds into those markets that get hi hit hardest? Um,
Christina Honkonen (34:43):
Will that be the market? Like will that be the stock market at all? Yeah.
David Pere (34:47):
Yeah. So that's, that's definitely a thought. Uh, I've been meaning to set up a, a solo 4 0 1 K for a little while that I can invest, you know, you can invest I think like $56,000 a year into that if it's through your business. So I've been meaning to set something up like that. I love index funds. They're, I mean, there's, I don't, I don't have enough of them because it's just, I've been in a weird, for the last five or six years, it's been very easy to make a really, really good returns in real estate. And so I haven't put nearly as much in index funds because as much as they're passive, I know I can outpace it. You know, I can, I've got one right now. I, I locked a property up under contract for $90,500. I called a friend and said, Hey, do you want this property for a hundred thousand dollars?
(35:33)
I'm gonna get paid $9,500 in eight days at the table, and I never owned the property. I'm not gonna be able to do that in the index fund world, right? Like that's a, a 10% return immediately with no work. Um, I'll pay taxes on it. But, so it's been hard to, I, I keep wanting to put money into the index funds and then I'm like, ah, this property looks good. So yeah, I think, I think that'll happen. I think once I have that 50,000 in cash reserves, I will actually, there's a really good chance that I'll take the entire cash reserve, stick it in an index fund because it drops so much lately and say, that's my emergency fund. We'll pull it if we need to. But when it goes back up, I'll be good.
Christina Honkonen (36:12):
Yeah, well, you should sleep well at night because as index fund owners, we aren't <laugh>
Matt Honkonen (36:21):
It.
David Pere (36:21):
It'll come back around though.
Christina Honkonen (36:23):
That's right. We're used to it, but it isn't. It is, it's just a long game. And
Matt Honkonen (36:27):
That's why I, that's why I was asking if you looked or didn't look, because look, looking is just utter torture right now. That's
Christina Honkonen (36:33):
Bad right now. It's
David Pere (36:34):
Ugly. I, I lucked out. So the, the T s P changed their login system and it glitched to where they couldn't reset my login stuff. And so they had to, they had to mail me a password and I only just got it in the mail yesterday and I haven't, I haven't, uh, logged back in. So for the last five weeks, I haven't actually been able to access my account balance, even if I wanted to <laugh>
Matt Honkonen (36:55):
Just light it on fire and get another one in six months. <laugh>, I,
Christina Honkonen (36:58):
Frankly, I think we should all walk away and look again next March, honestly. Yeah. I'm not even,
David Pere (37:04):
Well, uh, have you guys read Simple Past to Wealth by J Collins?
Christina Honkonen (37:08):
Um, okay, so I haven't, but I've read a lot from him and I am gonna order his book. Yeah,
David Pere (37:15):
Do it. Yeah. I just had him on the podcast a little bit ago. I love j l Collins, he's super smart and, uh, I'm glad that we had him on the podcast a little bit ago because it was nice to get that refresher before the market started going crazy, because people are, you know, it's, it's kind of crazy how much, you know, I, I, I see it now as, as a, as a expert in the space, um, all of a sudden people are in my group, what do I do? Where should I move my money in the tsp? What do I do? What do I do? What do I do? And it's like, don't do anything. Stop. Like, if you move it, you're admitting defeat. You lost, you took the loss, you took the hit, you're done. Like, that's it. Now you're gonna miss out when it goes back up. Yep,
Matt Honkonen (37:54):
Yep. Stop being human. So don't, don't act like a human right now. Yeah.
Christina Honkonen (37:58):
Which is hard to do if you're not trained mentally to not sell, which knock on wood, I don't think I ever will. 'cause having lived through the pandemic and I didn't sell, then I'm like, I have a level of confidence that I'll make it because I have, well
David Pere (38:14):
Just look back on the beginning of the pandemic and do the math for how much of a hit you would've to take to get back to zero. And you'll, you'll sleep a lot better then. 'cause you're nowhere near it. That's
Matt Honkonen (38:23):
A really good way to frame it.
Christina Honkonen (38:24):
It's a really good, okay. So I'm glad you brought the podcast up because you also interviewed well Als it's amazing and anybody out there should go listen to it. And, um, you also got the Chance interview. The first person that sounds like introduced you to all this, the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad. Right. Okay. So tell us,
David Pere (38:44):
You guys listen to that one. That one was the I haven't yet.
Christina Honkonen (38:46):
I haven't, I can't wait. So tell us about just your experience. I mean, I'm as much interested in everything you wanna share about military life and the transition you made and growing this community and, um, getting into real estate, your personal success, helping other people have personal success. But I'm also really interested in hearing like, what it's been like for you to go, wow, I just interviewed the person who got me into this to begin with, but yeah, what, what has this been like and what was that experience like?
David Pere (39:14):
Yeah, it's surreal. It's super cool. So I got lucky because the whole reason I started all this, uh, the gentleman who told, who gave me the idea for blogging was Brandon Turner, who was one of the first authors I ever read about real estate. He's, uh, was like a figurehead for BiggerPockets for a long time. Um, and so that was really cool. And so I've gotten to meet a lot of people who I looked up to or, or read books. I, I just interviewed, uh, Jason Drees, who's a mindset coach that has just come out with a book. I've interviewed a lot of really cool people who, it's weird. Like I read their book and then I'm like, oh, this is awesome. And then like six years later, or six months later, I'm like, oh, wow, I get to talk to this guy. Um, Robert was, that is such a wild episode.
(39:55)
So I got introduced to him, I'm not gonna name the podcast, but a friend of mine who produced a fairly large or really large real estate podcast told me, like, I, I was just bugging him. I was like, oh, you had this guy's a guest. Don't you know I'm a marine? He's a marine. Like, where's the introduction man, come on. We were drunk and I was giving him a hard time, um, at an event. And uh, the next day he sent the intro. It was a really nice intro, like a, a two paragraph, super well done intro, and it worked right. And uh, but he warned me. He was like, Hey, just so you know, we've done over 300 episodes. That was the most heavily we've ever edited an episode, and we still put a trigger warning on the beginning of it. So just know you're in for a wild ride.
(40:36)
And so I told my co-host, I was like, Hey, we've never edited a show before. So, uh, we marked explicit on iTunes, let's see what the heck happens. And, uh, we didn't make a single cut. And so it's crazy. I mean, Robert's on the podcast going off about like t tranny and liberals and conservatives and currency. And I mean, at one point he talks about, uh, getting court marshaled in the military for drunkenly, borrowing a helicopter to pick up chicks while stationed in Hawaii. Um, it's great. I mean, it's like, but the, but the whole thing is like, and this is the thing with Robert, he's says very polarizing language and people hate it the same way that, you know, president Trump uses extremely polarizing language and you either love, love, love or you hate, hate, hate. And for whatever reason, polarization like that is very good for growth. Uh, you know, you think Ben Shapiro, grant Cardone, uh, like all these guys,
Christina Honkonen (41:29):
<crosstalk> Oh, interviewed Grant Cardone too. I forgot about that.
David Pere (41:32):
Yeah, I did Same day. Same day. Within an hour of each other. Wow. And it was even crazier because they, their pub, their PR people were like, this is the date and time you get, take it or leave it. And I was looking at it and I was like, oh my goodness, how did this work out? One o'clock we interview Grant one 40, we interview Robert <laugh>. Um, but so, so Robert says all of these really polarizing things, but his overarching message is so simple and so not polarizing. Like his overarching message was essentially, I can say and do whatever the hell I want because I own a jet and I can leave the country and who caress. Like they can't. I have financial get me
Christina Honkonen (42:11):
Now.
David Pere (42:12):
Yeah, you can't. That's a rock solid argument. <laugh>. Yeah. Yeah. His whole argument is like, the reason I wanted financial freedom is so that I could stick my middle finger up and do whatever I wanted and now I can't. Yeah. So I mean, but it was, it was fun. Like I left the Robert interview. I mean, grant was really nice too. I mean, he was a, that show was a total pitch. Like we knew that the whole reason for that show was to pitch a fund. Uh, but he gave us 10 minutes more time than he, than his scheduler told us we had. And he hung out with us afterwards and gave my audience a discount for free access to his, his, uh, sales course. And so he was super cool. And Robert, I left the podcast and was like, Alex, we need to drink with that man someday. Like he is awesome <laugh>. So hilarious interview.
Christina Honkonen (42:59):
Yeah. Well I can't wait to listen to that one. I did listen to the Grant Cardone interview and I agree, it was obviously a pitch, but he did give you a little more than that. And he did say like, it's worth listening to. And I thought it was, and di didn't he proclaim he is gonna run for President
David Pere (43:14):
<laugh>? I I think he he
Christina Honkonen (43:15):
Got that. Yeah.
David Pere (43:16):
<laugh>. So yeah, I don't, I don't dunno. I mean, he's a, I wouldn't put it past the guy. I wouldn't, he's a PR machine, right?
Christina Honkonen (43:23):
Absolutely.
David Pere (43:23):
He had, he had, uh, Donald Trump speak at his last event. So, you know, maybe he's inching that way. Mm-hmm.
Christina Honkonen (43:28):
<affirmative>. Yeah. So you got that one. Um, do you have any questions? 'cause I wanna talk about creativity. Good. Okay. So I've also, I know you've mentioned the power and importance of creativity. And for us, like I mentioned before, we talked to a lot of creatives. We're around a lot of creatives who are, who are literally making things, whether it's music or, or whatever it might be. I think the creativity you are talking about is both inspired maybe by the same things, but in execution very different. And I don't, I think a lot of the people that, you know, we are around, maybe even ourselves included, um, that's just not the type of creativity I think that we need to be tapping into in a business sense. And maybe it is, by the way. I think these things can go hand in hand, but why don't you talk for a second about what you mean as creativity and what that really looks like in execution.
David Pere (44:19):
Yeah. You know, it can really, it can actually, it can really be summed up in a, a concept that Robert talks about in his book. Uh, most people look at a problem and say, I can't afford that. And if you say that, you stopped yourself from finding a solution. So if you just change your wording to say, well, how can I make that happen? Or how can I afford that thing? Uh, that's all it is. It's the creativity, it's problem solving. It's, it's, you know, it, it's interesting to me and it, it actually drives me absolutely bonkers as a creator. Um, people will reach out and say, I wanna pick your brain. And you're like, oh, okay, cool. That's awesome. What about? And they're like, oh, you know, getting into real estate. I'm like, oh, cool. That's awesome. Um, have you read my book? Have you listened to my podcast? Have you read any books? Have you, okay, so just to, just to clarify, I spent nine months writing a book that tells you everything I wish I'd known when I joined the military and answers all of this stuff about real estate. A third of the book is about real estate. You haven't read it after I put the nine months into it, and now you want 30 minutes on the phone to ask me questions that are answered in the book
Matt Honkonen (45:28):
In more detail. <laugh>.
David Pere (45:30):
Yeah. So it's like, if you read the book and then you got questions, great, let's jump on a call. Like, cool. Got it. You know, at least you know how I think you've, you've seen some stuff, you know, it's not all about the book, right? I mean, I give it away for free if you gimme your email on the website if you want the P d F. But it's, it's just, it's a time thing. So it's, it's the same thing. People will, they don't turn to Google, you know, it's like, oh, I have this problem. Well, 90% of those problems a Google search can fix in 60 seconds. And so if you're not willing to think creatively around a solution or around a problem, then you know, you're, you're probably not meant to be spearheading some crazy entrepreneurial journey. Journey. And that's fine. There's no shame in that.
(46:12)
Like, there's nothing, not everybody has, you know, despite what hustle culture wants you to believe right now, like not everybody needs to start their own thing. It is what it is, right? But you've gotta be able to problem solve that. So I mean, creativity in the content sense and, and the, and ar sense and all of that is, is great. It's just you, you also need to be able to think like, Hey, how could I monetize this? Or how could I afford that in a way that makes sense? You know, you, you hear these guys who are, uh, you know, multi multimillionaires talking about their Rolls Royce or their Lamborghini or whatever, and almost every single one of them, the one, the ones who are legit, the ones who are selling you courses, you know, whatever. But the ones who are legit will tell you like, don't buy the Lamborghini, buy the apartment complex and then use that money to buy the Lamborghini. Right? And so
Christina Honkonen (47:03):
I feel like it's the solution oriented that is really, really important that a lot of people that we talk to or who are just starting out and getting into a small business or some sort of entrepreneurial life, miss a lot.
Matt Honkonen (47:19):
You mentioned this earlier. I have one, one question that I will get to, but so I, we are in the royalty game also. So we make a lot of TV music. We, we partner with Warner Brothers Discovery and a lot of other folks, and we do ad work and, and film and television and things like that. And the big thing I tell young producers and young composers is it's not about the creativity or the music, it's about execution. Like, none of that stuff matters. Your song does not matter unless it's placed. And if it's not placed, you need to figure out why. And you need to figure out how to solve that problem. It, it was too long, it was too slow, it wasn't loud enough. The drums suck. The vocals were not relevant to what you were sending it for. Solve those things. 'cause the rest of it is just a skill. The rest of it is a tool set that anybody can learn if they Google it. Anyone can be a producer if they want to be a producer. I'm, I love how you frame that. Like, it's not about, oh, you have $1.9 million. That's not the secret. The secret is consistent mentality and living your life in a certain way.
David Pere (48:19):
Yeah, yeah. It's consistency. It's, I didn't, I didn't do and haven't done anything spectacular. Um, most people I know who are very well off didn't do and haven't done anything spectacular. They just kept going. Right. It's, well, you guys are musicians. What's your, uh, what's your, uh, Matt, what's your instrument of choice? Your
Matt Honkonen (48:39):
First, uh, drums is my instrument of choice, but I do everything now. I was,
David Pere (48:43):
I played a little bit of drums in high school and, and some piano, but not any good. But, but you know, that's kind of the, where I was going with that, right? Like, I don't know if you've ever coached or taught drumming, but if you, if you're teaching, like, I would imagine that most of your students don't make it. They don't play the drums long term. They drop out piano, guitar or whatever, stop with, you know, podcasting. Right. They say 23 episodes, like most podcasts don't make it past 23 episodes. Um, if you pick up an instrument, you give it six months and you put it down. You didn't master that instrument, sorry, is what it is. You look at Travis Barker, who's a pretty solid drummer and he probably didn't do anything spectacular other than play the drums a lot really consistently. And he's one of the best drummers out there, I think. So like, it's just anything you do in life, it's just consistency time, you know, intentional practice. What do I need to work on, work on that thing.
Matt Honkonen (49:37):
I love that man.
Christina Honkonen (49:38):
Yeah. Um, I do wanna ask one more question just about marriage and finding that partner and, you know, navigating money goals and work goals. How has that been for you and do you have any advice for, for young couples starting out?
David Pere (50:00):
<laugh>? Well, the first thing is if you're not married yet, get a prenup when you do. Even if you have nothing. Um, I do
Christina Honkonen (50:05):
You really recommend that?
David Pere (50:06):
Yeah, so I, so I'm also a co-host for the BiggerPockets Money podcast at this point, and they interviewed a guy, we interviewed a guy, they had him on the show, Aaron Thomas, I think is his name, but, uh, recently about prenups and holy crap, everything I thought I knew about prenups was a lie. Like, you know, you think that a prenup is, ah, man, if I get divorced, this person's gonna be able to take me for all my money and I already have money, therefore this is really bad. I, I gotta do a prenup. Um, yeah, that's part of it. But I mean, you can put in there, hey, if we're struggling, we're gonna be required to go to six months counseling before we file for divorce. We are gonna set our funds up so that we each have our own personal account and we have a joint account so all our money goes, or all our bills get paid outta the joint account and then we each get to keep X amount per month.
(50:56)
So if you're really good with money, you can save it all. And if I'm really bad with money, I can spend it all and we don't affect each other. You can have parenting plans already outlined. I mean, you can so many things. And, and the reason I think that's a great idea and I didn't do it, and I would probably be open to a postnup. I don't know that that's something my wife would be open. Yeah, you can do, you can do post ups. It's just, you know, uh, if you're, it's kind of a weird, that's, that seems like a weird one to bring up. Like, Hey babe, I know, uh mm-hmm <affirmative> this going gray. It's rough right around right this week. So, uh, can we sign a, a postnup that says you don't get all my money? You know? Um, yeah. Like that's kind of seems like a losing battle.
(51:37)
But, but on the prenup side, like when you form an L L C with business partners, you outlay every single contingency plan possible because you know that right now everything's great. Sometime heaven forbid that changes and now we're at each other's throats and we're not gonna be rational. So we need to have it outlined now. And that's what happens with divorce, right? By the time you get to divorce, you guys hate each other's guts. You're gonna try to do everything you can to rip each other down. That's terrible. So <laugh> set the boundaries ahead of time, like, Hey, I hate you, but we did agree that we are gonna do this stupid thing, <laugh>, this is what you said. Um, and hopefully it never happens, but yeah. So I recommend a prenup to anyone, even if you've got absolutely no assets, because it's a plan for the future and you can, it's super cool.
(52:26)
Uh, I would, you know, we were kind of a weird, so I bought my house the same month that I married my wife, my first duplex, and she already owned a house. But, um, so when we got married, this side of Dave didn't exist, right? I was not entrepreneurial. I did not have a business. I was not a big real estate investor. So I've changed a lot over the last six, seven years. I, I would say I've grown a lot mm-hmm. <affirmative> that's caused some growing pains. I mean, she's farmer's daughter, grew up on a farm, rural Missouri, super mellow homestead, you know, whatever. Um, which is all great, but you know, we, we view money differently. And so, um, you know, I'm having to learn how to pull myself back a little bit in order to try to make her feel more secure, uh, even if it's not the, the best financial decision.
(53:16)
So like prime example, um, the house I'm standing in right now, it's uh, I Airbnb, the upstairs it's a four bed, two and a half bath that sleeps 12. And then the downstairs is a two one basement walkout, kitchen, you know, whatever. And I use it as my office and uh, it's a great house, great area, great location, whatever. But when I bought it, I just got outta the military. So I was, you know, unbankable, I didn't have a job anymore. And all my real estate taxes, I do a good job writing stuff off. So I didn't qualify for a mortgage at the time, which is hilarious. 'cause I make two or three times as much money as she does, but I can't show it. So <laugh> mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yep. So she, and, and I mean I say make like that's gross, right? But um, you know, so we had to, I had to gift her the 17, $18,000 as the down payment for her to do a 5% conventional loan on the property and it's in her name only so that my debt wasn't pulling us down.
(54:08)
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so she's wanted that off her name for a while, the D t I. And so we just did that refi today and like apples to apples refinancing this house was a terrible idea. I mean, I'm, my mortgage payment just jumped $450 for the next 25 years. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, my interest rate went from three and a quarter fixed for 30 years to 4.5 to seven floating for the next 25 years. Yeah. Um, that $2,200 or 2150 a month that I'm now paying towards the mortgage doesn't include insurance and taxes. And the 19 I was paying did include that. So like wow. Overall pretty expensive endeavor, but it gets her name off of it and it gets some of her debt paid down with the money we pulled out so that she feels more secure. So yeah, I think it's, I think it's that balance, right? Like she's let me do a lot of things and take some risks and use the HELOC and they've paid off. Yeah. Yeah. Now it's time to step it back a little bit I think and be a little more conservative, which, which is good with the market cycle. It kinda makes sense. Anyway, so
Matt Honkonen (55:12):
Yeah. We're over an hour now, David. Thank you. Yeah, thank you so much, so much for your time, man. Your, your enthusiasm is infectious. We absolutely will link to every, every single place people can find you and find your stuff. Is there anything you specifically want people to, to know about you or, or something that you want them to go do?
David Pere (55:31):
Uh, oh, the shameless plug that I should always do and never do. If you're in the military or a veteran, read the book and you can get it for free online. So, or you can audible it. I actually recorded the whole, you know what's interesting as a audio music world guy. Um, so it costs me all in, uh, I think like $7,200 to write, self-publish, edit everything else for the book, right? 4,500 of that was the stupid audio engineer. Like that was so like, not even close. It was the most expensive piece of the entire puzzle by, like
Matt Honkonen (56:09):
You said, hold on. 7,200 total. How much was the audio engineer? Yeah,
David Pere (56:13):
Like $4,500. It was, I think it was like a hundred dollars an hour or something and he had to go through it twice and ugh, like
Matt Honkonen (56:22):
Did you narrate it and then they cut it together for you? Okay.
David Pere (56:25):
Yeah. And I, and I am pretty comfortable on a mic, so I did, I feel like there probably was not nearly as much editing as most people who were to pick up a mic.
Matt Honkonen (56:34):
And <crosstalk> how many, uh, I'm gonna see if I can't deconstruct this for you off air a little bit. How many hours of audio do you estimate? The whole book is?
David Pere (56:43):
Uh, I think it's finished Product is around six to eight.
Matt Honkonen (56:48):
I think we can get you a better deal next time, <laugh>.
David Pere (56:51):
Well, I've got another book or two that I'm, I'm about to start working so I'll have to reach out to you guys. Um,
Christina Honkonen (56:57):
So the book is called How to Build Wealth, get Promoted and Achieve Greatness, the No BS Guide to Military Life. So both can Get It. And I think when I Googled it, it was like literally anywhere. So is there a place a place you want them to go?
Matt Honkonen (57:11):
Yeah. Point 'em to the audible. He spent all of his money on it. <laugh>.
David Pere (57:14):
<laugh>. Yeah. So I mean, Amazon and Audible is pretty much the easiest place to grab it. Yeah. Um, if you want the free p d f, you just go to my website and it'll pop up and give you that option.
Christina Honkonen (57:23):
That's not what you're supposed to say.
David Pere (57:25):
Well, I don't care about the money, I care about them getting the information.
Christina Honkonen (57:29):
Good. Thank you. That's great. Okay. Thank you for everything.
David Pere (57:33):
Absolutely. You guys have a great day. Thanks for having me on the show.
