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Today, my guest is Gary Eastman. Gary is an attorney turned entrepreneur who has built a thriving national surety bond brokerage business into one of the most misunderstood sectors of finance, or in one of the most misunderstood sectors of finance, and in just a minute, we're going to speak with Gary about performance bonding, also known as charity bonding.    https://swiftbonds.com/  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you, Gary Eastman, what is the BIGGEST RISK?   Gary Eastman Okay, so this is a great question, and I think there are two risks that kind of embed themselves in everything that we see today, at least from the surety bond perspective. One financing risk, right? Because those are the you know, the amount of capital available is going down if the cost of capital is going up. And the second part is labor. We are, we're short of labor, and so we're going to continue to be short of labor. So those two things are an interplay all the time. And so we see, you know, bonds being able to help minimize that risk, both, both of those risks. And so if you're a real estate developer, right, your financing risk is set again. It's set up. And how we do it so you get the bond so that you can make sure that the project's done, you can get clients, you know, into the space and start receiving, you know, some sort of return on that. The second part, of course, is labor. You know, you don't want to hire somebody who then turns around and you know, they're all their subs have disappeared, or they're doing something else. And so bonds have, you know, given you a way to basically minimize both those risks. We see that in every part of society now, and places where we didn't see it five years ago. So bonds is a tool, not the only tool that you can use to go out there and start minimizing that risk, mitigating that risk, before it happens. And then, of course, the other thing is, if there is a problem, we like to jump on this quickly to mitigate the risk down so that we don't have massive lawsuits and problems going out there. Yeah, I've been doing this since 2008 and I have been fortunate that I am none of my clients have involved in a protracted litigation, which, as an attorney, warms my heart, but those are the things that we see all the time that we're trying to eliminate, if possible, and then mitigate when they do. https://swiftbonds.com/

Today, my guest is Beau Turner. Beau Turner is the founder of Abundant Mines, a Bitcoin mining company built with one purpose to make passive crypto and infrastructure investing simple, secure and sustainable. And in just a minute, we're going to speak with Beau Turner about demystifying Bitcoin. https://home.abundantmines.com/about-us https://www.linkedin.com/in/beau-turner-445732251/  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you, Beau Turner, what is the BIGGEST RISK? Beau Turner Well, I think the Bitcoin network itself is very challenging to find any sort of risk in, and I think that would be surprising to most people to hear. But part of the reason it is such an incredible innovation is how it is designed to be resilient in almost any case. I mean, like, short of a forever nuclear winter and the Internet going down forever everywhere, there's not really a legitimate way to take this network out. So what I would say the risk is for our business, since we're in the mining space, is that we're actually in the physical world. So Bitcoin is a unique asset among assets, because it is digital. It's theoretically indefinite. It doesn't have a lifespan. It doesn't have a half life. It can exist forever. When you get into mining, people are usually getting into mining to outperform Bitcoin, to get, you know, the tax advantages of depreciating equipment, to get the income stream. But when you enter into the mining space, the risk that you're taking is that now you're dealing with the physical world, whereas you weren't, if you were just doing what you do, which is, you know, hold Bitcoin and cold storage digitally. And so you have to be very careful. And I mentioned, you know, briefly, our story of our first experience getting into mining in the physical world. And so the people that you work with, to me, are the most important risk to account for. That kind of goes untalked about. Your environment matters a lot. So we were, we were hosting originally in Georgia, which is a very hot, humid climate for you to run computers that are going 24/7 so we've, we've decided to locate in the beautiful state of Oregon, where we've got pretty cool climate, year round, lots of renewable power inputs and very low natural disaster risk. There's a pretty good set of reasons why you see a lot of the largest data centers and hyperscalers in the world choosing to make Oregon and the Pacific Northwest a home. That's part of it. And then we mentioned energy risk as well, which I think that's, that's probably the key economic risk. You know, the other things I talked about were more like, Is my asset going to exist? What can, what can, critically threaten me, actually owning this thing and it being safe? The energy risk is more about the business model, insulation. So, you know, energy pricing has gone up for most people, across the board, almost everywhere. The way that we guard against that really is just diversification. So we have sites in many different utilities. We have six facilities right now and building two more, and they all have a totally different energy procurement situation. They're all in different utility jurisdictions. That helps us with mitigating outages, but it also gives us insulation to the energy markets themselves. So those would be the key risks that I would highlight, and the ways that we uniquely tackle them.   https://home.abundantmines.com/about-us https://www.linkedin.com/in/beau-turner-445732251/  

Today, my guest is Andy Matthews. Andy is a real estate lawyer at Stoel Rives LLP in Seattle, Washington, and in just a minute, we're going to speak with Andy Matthews about Real Estate Law.   https://www.stoel.com/people/andrew-l-mathews https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mathews-8716453/  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you. Andy Matthews, what is the BIGGEST RISK?   Andy Mathews Well, that's a great question, and I know you framed it as switching gears from our last topic, but I think there's a way in which it, it is related to the use of things like AI. And my answer is, the biggest risk that I can think of is failure to stay on top of the things that that impact you and your industry or your your realm, and that applies equally to to me and my clients. I mean my clients, like I said, you know, if we're still using the the AI example, ignore AI and its and its offerings to their great detriment. And for me, I mean, AI is one example, but just, I think, I think the the risk that I face as a lawyer. It's really easy to to spend my days, as you alluded to, you know, like, like every other lawyer out there I I charge my day is based around the billable hour, and so anything that that I do that's not a work that that is billable to my client, is something that that is outside of what are the Core expectations of me as as a, as a, as a lawyer in my firm. And yet I my if I were to focus solely on the billable hour, I would be doing both myself and my clients a great disservice, and for that reason, I spend a good chunk, I try to spend, anyway, a good chunk of every day on things that I that I don't have the ability to Bill any client for. But the purpose is to make sure that I'm staying ahead of the game, that I am aware of what's going on in the industry, that that in which my clients operate, so that you know when, when, when a client does come to me with a problem, that I am able to bring a level of expertise to it, that that is helpful to them, and that that is is not just legal advice, but advice based on a business, business judgment and business understanding of how they are operating.   https://www.stoel.com/people/andrew-l-mathews https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mathews-8716453/  

Today, my guest is Michelle Hamilton. Michelle Hamilton spent 30 years as a strategic leader in commercial real estate and the AEC sector, before focusing on one of the biggest challenges in enterprise technology, the gap between AI investment and actual workforce adoption. She founded spark AI strategy to help organizations close the gap, and was recently recruited by answer rocket, a global AI transformation firm serving mid market and fortune 2000 companies to design and lead their new AI adoption and change management division. And in just a minute, we're going to speak with Michelle about how to bridge the AI gap between corporate roadmaps and workforce reality.   https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellehamiltonai/  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you, Michelle Hamilton, what is the BIGGEST RISK?   Michelle Hamilton I think the biggest risk. And it doesn't matter how big of a company you are, you could be a small business, a two person shop, or a 10,000 person shop, if you start investing in AI tools, technology, and you don't invest in your people and teach them how to use it for the outcomes you are expecting, then you will not realize your ROI and waste your money. It is the people that have to be invested in so that they understand how to use this unbelievable piece of technology to continue doing their job, so that they are not only creating incredible efficiencies, but it is also allowing them, as humans, to go back to being humans and not being stuck behind a computer screen for eight hours a day, but actually having their AI work alongside them so that they can continue to build business and build relationships, human to human, you have to invest in the people alongside the technology, and don't assume that your IT department is the one that should be providing that they are there to protect you, not to explain to the Business Development Division how to take it to a conference with them.   https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellehamiltonai/  

Today, my guest is Jens Nielsen. Jens Nielsen immigrated from Denmark in 1996 and after a successful career in IT, he followed his passion for real estate and coaching and became a full time real estate investor and certified high performance coach. And in just a minute, we're going to speak with Jens Nielsen about using systems and mindset to create financial returns and meaningful impact.   https://jensnielsen.us/  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you, Jens Nielsen, what is the biggest risk?   Jens Nielsen Yeah, I mean, the way I look at risk is now is little bit different. I look a lot more protecting the downside. Right in the past, it was all well here, all the ways it can go well and, you know, we can make a lot of money and so on. You know, practical experience has shown that it could also go bad, and if, when it does, make sure you protect your downside, right? So that could be, you know, insurance is one way. I mean, as I mentioned before we started recording, we just had a fire in one of our buildings that shut down the whole building for months. I mean, that's where we have to transfer the risk to the insurance company, obviously. So that's one thing. But even in deals that may not go so well, you know, we try to protect capital and so on. But if that doesn't work, are we actually protecting ourselves through, you know, doing non recourse loans and other things like that, right? So I'm really focused on right now protecting the downside, because the downside is what can crush you, the upside is what gives you wealth, right? And so that's has been that has been more and more in my mind to protect the downside, if that makes sense.   https://jensnielsen.us/  

Today, my guest is Gino. Barbaro. Gino is an investor, certified money coach, entrepreneur and podcast host. As an entrepreneur, he's grown his real estate portfolio to over 1900 multifamily units and 450 million in assets under management, and in just a minute, we're going to speak with Gino Barbaro about multifamily investing and money coach.    https://jakeandgino.com/ https://www.youtube.com/@barbaro-360  

J Darrin Gross I'd like to ask you, Gino Barbaro, what is the BIGGEST RISK?   Gino Barbaro That is an excellent question. I can look at risk from my own perspective in my life as when I look at risk, what is the risk of not doing something? If I had been at the restaurant back in 2008 and I would have said, You know what? It's too risky. I've got a nice little small business. I'm hanging out. I'm doing okay, and that's what a lot of people out in society right now. They have a comfortable job. They're not looking around. They think that there's no risk involved in that. Whatever you do in this world, whether you're working for yourself or you're working for an employer, there is always risk involved. Choose risk accordingly. I had that picture in my mind of, you know, becoming getting into my 60s and being stuck in a kitchen doing something that I hated. What's more riskier than that? I mean, I don't care how much money I lose and doing whatever, but to me, that picture was scary as hell. There was a lot of risk involved in that, and I didn't want to live my life that way. Now, how do you mitigate the risk? I remember being in the laundry room with my wife. It was around 2012 and I looked at her, I smelled like garlic. I just come home from the restaurant, and I said, Julia, I can't take this anymore. I need to leave New York, and I need to get out of the restaurant business. And she looked at me, and in about three seconds she said, Okay. I was shocked that she actually said, okay, but I think she looked at the pain on my face. Now, the reason why I'm telling you this story is what I proceeded to do after was to try to minimize the risk. At that point, I was all in with real estate. I said to myself, If my wife is give me the grace, and is giving me the permission to get into this venture full time. I need to give it my all. I need to learn, and I need to dedicate time and become an expert in the craft of real estate. Forget about single family homes, forget about self storage, forget about Bitcoin. Focus on multifamily, and I proceeded over the next three to four years to really become an expert in investing in real estate, that's probably the best tip that I can give you on minimizing risk, is to become an expert in whatever you're getting yourself into before you put that first dollar into an investment exhaustive join mentorships groups, go out there and learn how to become an. Investor, read tons of books, see what other people have done as far as becoming experts in that specific area. To me, that was the best thing. When she said, Yes, I couldn't let her down. And I knew that, and it's funny, because she had confidence in me. She knew that I was going to work hard. So for me to know that I'm like, I can't let her down. I can't let my family down, so that's why I plowed in. I even ended up opening up the Jake and Gino community because I knew that was a way for me to start learning. I started a podcast because Darrin gross told me would be a great idea. I wrote a book. All of a sudden, I'm learning all of these things about real estate. That's probably one of the better ways to actually start mitigating the risks is by becoming an expert in what you're doing, ultimately, you're trying to avoid the downside risk. And then for us in the real estate space, we created that framework. And I work with frameworks, whether it's buy, right, manage, right, finance, right, whether it's the three pillars of real estate, whether it's a negotiation framework that we use, you have to really understand to limit that downside risk you're looking at it, and for us to limit the risk is to have more of a long term approach. If you're trying to do something with a short window and less time, there's more risk involved in something like that. But we know if we buy an asset, we buy it with good fundamentals, we buy it in a good market that's growing, if we are able to be able to cash flow, put good debt on that. That's going to limit my downside risk going forward. Now.   https://jakeandgino.com/ https://www.youtube.com/@barbaro-360  

Today, my guest is Daniel Daly. Daniel didn't start in real estate, but after he scaled an automotive startup to 600 million, then built a cross border European real estate portfolio. Today, he leads a Portugal Golden Visa eligible hospitality fund focused on experiential assets, and in just a minute, we're going to speak with Daniel Daly about short term rental properties.   https://globalipllc.com/   https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-daly1/  

J Darrin Gross  I'd like to ask you, Daniel Daly, what is the BIGGEST RISK?   Daniel Daly The biggest risk for investing in short term rentals in Europe, from my perspective, it's the same as any other investment in real estate. Maybe Location, location, location. So you know, the biggest risk is, did I pick the right place to invest in? That is the location where everybody wants to go. Am I in? Ring one, that avoids the risk. Ring two, minimizes the risk. Ring three, it's risky, right? You're further away. It's cheaper, yes. But generally risk one avoids risk ring one avoids most of the risk is, I want to be in a location where people want to go to, where people are visiting, where are things that they want to make their trip easily accessible, whether it's train, bicycle, walking. So that was the biggest risk is, what's the location? Do we feel confident in it and minimizing the risk would then just be if, for some reason, we couldn't afford that ring one to go to ring two. But I do everything that I can to avoid ring two. I don't want to minimize the risk. I want to avoid it by being as close as possible to having the perfect location that people want to come and stay at. https://globalipllc.com/   https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-daly1/

Today, my guest is Mark Shuler. Mark Shuler RA is a licensed architect in the states of Washington and Texas with more than 35 years of professional experience as an architect, engineer, business owner and real estate investor as president of SGRE investments, Mark pursues value add opportunities that leverage his professional background and capitalize on his skill sets as an architect and real estate investor, and in just a minute, we're going to speak with Mark Schuler about the reasons why multifamily value add investing make a great investment strategy.    https://www.linkedin.com/in/shulerarchitecture/