The Wisconsin Investor
Each week, we bring you interviews with some of Wisconsin's top real estate investors who share their tips, tricks, and strategies that you can implement right away. This show is dedicated to helping Wisconsin real estate investors elevate their game. Along with interviews, I'll also dive into hot topics in solo episodes and feature experts from various real estate sectors across Wisconsin.
The Wisconsin Investor
Three Decades In Real Estate: Grit, Coaching, & Focus
In this episode of The Wisconsin Investor Podcast, Corey sits down with Chris Hake, a 30+ year Wisconsin real estate investor and founder of Wisco REIA, to break down what actually leads to long-term success in real estate.
They dive into real-world lessons from multiple market cycles and unpack why most investors get stuck — even when they’re working hard.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
• What 30+ years of investing in Wisconsin teaches you about risk and growth
• Key lessons from the 2008 crash that still apply today
• Why focus beats chasing multiple strategies
• How mentorship and paid coaching shortcut years of mistakes
• The danger of shiny object syndrome in real estate
• Why networking and local investor groups accelerate success
• How to decide which real estate strategy fits you
• The mindset shift required to go from learning to actually doing deals
If you’re trying to get started, get unstuck, or build a sustainable real estate business in Wisconsin, this episode delivers practical insight without the hype.
Connect with Chris Hake:
📧 chrishake@gmail.com
🌐 www.wiscoria.com
Hey everybody, welcome back. We are live with my buddy Chris here, who I'll let uh introduce here in a second. Um I'm really excited about this time of year. We're getting into the new year, and uh there's a lot of a lot of this is where a lot of people are opening up right now to some new ideas. So Chris is gonna bring the heat today, I'm pretty sure. Here I'll let him introduce himself in a second. But for those of you guys that are looking for some resources going into this next year and whatever goals you guys have, we have a free Burr for Beginners course. So if Burr is on your radar and it's a strategy you want to do, you can get that course by just going to our website, Wisconsin Discount Properties.com, plug your information in on the website, and somebody from my team will reach out to you, just mention, hey, I heard Corey say something about the Burr course, and I want to get involved in that. How do I do it? And they'll get you a discount code to get that course, which normally we were selling for, I think, $1,500. It is now free. So you can get that by getting that discount code from our team. With that, let me introduce the owner of Wisco Rhea. And what is the uh what's the storage company name again, Chris? Uh just simple storage. Just simple storage, Chris. And how do I say your last name so I don't butcher it, Chris?
Speaker 2:It's that's interesting you even asked that because I just had that conversation with someone else today. It's a uh Haik, just like Cake with an H.
Speaker 1:Cake? Oh my gosh, that's so much easier than it. I've got to be a good one.
Speaker 2:Hockey. I get Lockheed all the time. But it's not I'm like, wait, you say Lockie, Mockie, Rocky, back, you know, no.
Speaker 1:No, my my daughter's name is Kaylee, and it's spelled like, you know, like you would think like a kale, bale, tail, C A I L E Y, right? And people call her Cali all the time, and I'm like, where's the cal? I don't see the cow. There's an I in there. Bale. I know. Yeah, anyway.
Speaker 2:If I was in Germany, maybe, but that's I'm not there.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah. So Chris, Chris is a great. I mean, Chris, you've been in this game for a long time. How many years now have you been in the real estate investing space?
Speaker 2:31 years.
Speaker 1:31. Jeez, dude. You're probably not that old, Corey. That's amazing because you're only 32, aren't you? That's crazy.
Speaker 2:I started young.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I learned right away.
Speaker 1:Can you even remember going back to when you started, Chris? Like, what was that like starting real estate in a totally different world than what real estate is today, right? Like we were just talking a little bit about how a lot of stuff changed, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it it's um it's crazy to think back because back in those days there were no RIAs, there were there really weren't any clubs. I mean, there was a good old boys' club, that was about it. Yeah. And when I got started in the 90s, I mean, I started, you know, like everybody, I went to college and I did all that stuff, and I got out the other side, but I wasn't a school guy. I didn't like school. I was never really a great student, which is interesting because now after I got out of school, school, I've been a student my whole life.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I I constantly call myself uh I'm in student mode all the time. But I I got out of the academia school at uh, you know, at that time, and I really was just going out there punching a clock and I was doing doing the thing, right? I was working the hours and I still remember my first job, made three dollars and fifteen cents an hour. Whoa, big bucks. Oh yeah. Over time, think about that, almost 450 an hour.
Speaker 1:Dang, raking it in.
Speaker 2:And you know, at that time I didn't know anything else other than work hard and try to pay off your debts that you had from school or whatever you were doing. And yeah, I just uh I was I was getting into multi-level marketing, I was starting to check out other businesses, but I really didn't have any path other than I didn't want to go to school. And so I just plugged in, started working, and it was about 1993, 1994, that something I drove by a duplex one day, and it was funny because I actually did a presentation about three years ago, and I actually went and found that duplex and I took a picture of it because I still remember driving by it. It was in my town where I lived, and and I drove by and had a first sale sign there, and I thought, man, real estate, you know that I read it in books, but nobody I didn't know any real estate investors, and so that got my wheels turning, and that was all it took. And probably within a year, then um I just started down that path and bought my first property with my at that time fiance, and uh yeah, it was a little condo, and you know, I I I fixed that up. It was really it was kind of funny because they talk about house hacking all the time, and yeah, it was actually wasn't even a word back then. And I was ultimately I did a condo hack. And we moved in, fixed it up, ended up selling it. We were just talking to my kids last night about it, uh, because we were talking about homeownership, and yeah, still remember how much I paid for it. And I remember when I sold it, and my kids were like, Man, you only paid $65,000 for your you know, your property. And I'm like, Yeah, I sold it for $92,000 or something like that. I was like, Woo! You know, I made a fortune. Yeah, and um, but that got me started and that got the ball rolling, and you know, then I started buying courses, but I had to go everywhere else, Corey, to go find help. I had to go to Florida and Arizona and fly because the only thing that was around me was the good old boys club, the guys who owned apartments forever. Yep, and they were much, much older older than I was. And so I was a young guy in a group of seven people, and it just it got me um to think about different things, but it wasn't really, I couldn't connect with them. I didn't they were so far in a different world than I was. Um, and there wasn't a RIA. There, there might have been clubs, but I didn't know about them. And so I just kept going along the lines of I had to go elsewhere. I had to at that time, oh, what was a big there was a big online uh teaching and and networking company. I don't even remember remember what it was called now, but that's where I started plugging in and that's where I got my education. There was like it was the bigger pockets of 25 years ago. Okay. And I don't remember the name of it. Um some of the people listening may, if they've been around for a while, but uh that's kind of where I got my my start to education, to learning, to buy courses, and that was the start.
Speaker 1:You know what's interesting, Chris? You were talking, and I think there's a lot of people that I know in the real estate space that are similar, they've gone through similar paths, right? Like I was okay in school. I went to college in in Eau Claire and did my my uh I'm kinesiology major, which I use really, really well now in real estate. It really translated well to the real estate space. But I I didn't love, I mean, I liked the social aspect of school, right? I loved the friendships and the and the party and the fun and all that kind of thing. Um and I was like, get me out of here as quickly as possible because I would I was the one paying for my school. Then I got out and I was the same thing. Like I sold fitness equipment a little bit, I did a little bit of this, a little of that. I kind of felt like a failure for a while because I was like, I had this whole path planned. I was gonna be a strength and conditioning coach for the Wisconsin Badgers, the Green Bay Packers. That's what I was gonna do. Once I once I decided I was not gonna play c uh NFL football, I was like, ah, it's probably gone. Right. I was like, well, the next best thing. And then that's yeah, and then I did my internship in Madison, as we were talking about before this, and I was like, I hate this. I was like, dang it, I just went to school for four years for this, and I hate what I'm doing. Like, then I was just kind of bobbling around for a while. We did some network marketing kind of thing. And then it was like I became a student, the same thing. It's almost the same thing. Like all of us degenerates that don't love school. As soon as we get out, we can actually study something that we either is gonna make us money or that we like. We're like, oh, let me learn everything I can about it. But I think that's important because what you're talking about is this you had a lot of grit, it sounds like and and I see that today, like the grit may just be different in the action that people have to do. But the people who are just getting started, like you got to put in that that that grunt work of how do I learn this? Who can I learn from? Where do I find the answers? And and for a lot of people that don't make it very far, I feel like they they just kind of uh I don't know, it looks tough, can't do it, and they give up. Or what you had to do is you had to like legit, like I don't know, I don't how did you even find these places to go in the 90s? Like the the conversation.
Speaker 2:I can't, I I really I rec I can't remember it for the life of me. I haven't thought about it in a long time. But it was it was an online, it was the online source. It it had all the big speakers, all the big names. That's where I met ultimately my coach that I still have today, and and I I met him through there, which I didn't even know him until 10 years later, until after that. But I that's where I ultimately had seen him the first time because he was a presenter through there. And so it was just a huge network that I think people from all over the country, that was the big deal. And I'm sure there were RIAs all over. I just I didn't really know or have that access, uh, at least in Madison.
Speaker 1:Okay. Yeah. Wow, that's fascinating. So then you went through how long did you stay in the residential space? Like I know we just talked about prior to hitting record, you went from 90 businesses then to trying to keep it to whiskerhea and uh and and the storage space, but how long did you how long have you been uh kind of hanging out in the residential space before shifting over into the into the storage stuff?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I would say, Corey, I I got my teeth uh cut on multifamily. So I from I think I bought besides the 94 property that I I kind of condo hacked, I started buying properties then, you know, 96, 97, all the way through. And and then that first three years, I think, up to 99, I think I had like 40 properties, and they were all rentals. And and um, so I really started in the rental. I didn't I actually didn't even have any single family homes. They were uh the first one was a condo, and then I rented it, and then it was duplex, duplex, four unit, you know, you play Monopoly, right? Yeah 224 810 12. And and that's what I did uh because that's what I was learning and and through the the groups that I was going through. And and so I didn't actually even buy my first single family home or residential. I guess one to four multifamily is considered residential, but from a single family standpoint, I didn't even buy my first one until gosh, somewhere in the 2000s. Oh wow. Um because I was on the track of rental property.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And at that time, buying single family homes, I was never taught that. It's kind of interesting, you know, the things you learn, you're kind of tunnel vision.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I learned how to buy that stuff. That's what I courses I bought, and that's what I zeroed in on. Yeah. And and that really, I guess, was is the path that I just stayed on. I didn't really deviate too much. And so I had a lot of that experience go coming up through until the crash. And then the crash on the other side, 08, 9, 10 up to 2020, you know, COVID, that was wholesaling and rehabbing and flipping and you know, all of that stuff, multifamily rentals. So I did a lot of that different stuff during that time. So I think that period of time was really uh where I did a lot of single family stuff. Okay. Okay.
Speaker 1:All of it, the whole gamut. And was that just a product of what what where the market was at? Is that what you were opportunistic in that time frame, or was there any other strategic decision behind why you kind of pivoted over?
Speaker 2:So uh I started the RIA in 2012, and so coming out of the crash, I was trying to get myself back, you know, back on track because the the crash hurt me. And uh, yeah, that's a whole nother story in itself. But on the on the rebuilding side of uh after the crash, when I was started the RIA, I started a coaching program at that time, a formal one. I had been coaching people for years before that, uh kinds of onesie, twosdies, but it was nothing formal. It's just hey, I'm here to help. How can I, you know, teach you what I've already learned? And and then I started something formal in 2012. And when that happened, all of a sudden now all the people that I'm working with are looking for the same things where they're they want to do a flip, they want to learn how to get into real estate, they want to learn how to wholesale. And and so by default, all of a sudden I started doing all that because I was marketing alongside and I was doing all of that stuff. Yeah, and I don't know that I really planned it, Corey. I think it just happened as a byproduct of teaching and training at the RIA, and then also formalizing coaching to go, because people are always asking when you know enough or you've done deals, people always want to know how. We want to ask you questions and pick the brain, yeah. Exactly. Yep, and I've had a lot of pick your brain coffee, beer, burger sessions like you. Yeah, and you know, and I think it just it progressed from there to really intentionally focusing with people who who are serious, yeah. Because unless you monetize it and have a skin in the game type model, most people will waste your time. And I hate to say that because I don't think it's intentionally, but if there's no skin in the game and it's not working for them, all of a sudden the time you put in doesn't matter, but they're like, Yeah, I'm just gonna go a different direction. Exactly. I'm like, I just spent six months with you, what? And yeah, you know, so uh my coach is like Chris, you have a family and kids and a wife, and they're young, and you're giving up time for nothing. Right. You know, you need to you need to have a a line in the sand. And so when I did that, it shifted and changed a lot, but it really got me to to learn the craft, not only by doing, but by teaching at the same time. And that really was most of the 2010 era, I guess that decade.
Speaker 1:Okay. Yeah, yeah. As you as you were talking, Chris, I was just thinking about a little bit about my journey. So I started in 2016, it was when I started really getting into like I want to do real estate, right? Yeah, did the classic read rich dad port ad thing, and and then was like all gung-ho. Uh, did network marketing leading up to that. So, like, as you were talking, I'm like, oh, maybe that's just like the career path for people. It's like do network marketing, then figure out you don't really like it, and then get into real estate. Yeah, um, but I I paid a local person 10 grand to coach us, to my wife and I. And whether the coaching was good or not good doesn't matter. The 10 grand was the thing that got me motivated. That was the best coaching ever, was because I was like, 10 grand to me at that time was a lot of money. And I was like, man, I just put 10 grand on. I gotta at least get my 10 grand back and do it. Yeah, I'm getting my money's worth. So, like, I was willing to do whatever I had to do to do it because I put my money where my mouth is. So I think for the audience out here listening, you know, maybe that's one of those things. Like, you know, Chris, are you still taking money for coaching? Are you still doing coaching right now, like one-on-one stuff?
Speaker 2:Or I coach right now with self-storage, just I I don't I'm not really a promoter of it because I do it more loosely. When I see people that uh you can kind of tell the people that they're they want to get to that next level. I think a lot of people talk about it, but I there's people that actually have the action behind the talk too. And so I I still do some of that, and I I just love teaching and helping other people and sharing what I've learned, especially the mistakes. Yeah, because there's no better place to learn it than from someone who actually stepped on a few landlines.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure, for sure. So I think to that point, though, whether that's you know, somebody like yourself, Chris, go find it, go find a mentor you can pay, go take a court, an expensive course. You know, we're giving the free course away, and almost I'm like, as we're talking, like maybe I should make people pay for that again, as you were saying something, because it was like, then they'll actually do it. That's why I, you know, I had friends and family for a little while, I'd give them a discount on it, but I would still charge them because I was like, if if I give it to you for free, are you gonna do it? I don't know. Right.
Speaker 2:So no, and it's uh you bring up a really, really good point. We could probably talk for an hour on this one topic because uh usually the the question at the very end of any time I talk or when I do stuff is you know, what's the one piece of advice? You know, you always get that question, and it always comes back to finding somebody that you invest your time into and money to to get ahead, to shortcut the the world, the system, to whatever you're trying to do, yeah, find the best of the best and go bring them on board, make sure you vetted, but go pay the pay the price, right? The feed. It's it's no different than going to college. I mean, we blindly people go to college and they spend 10, 50, 150 grand, and it there's just I don't even know half the time where they're going unless they're very specialized, and I get it. Right. Uh, because I've got three boys, and so I've been through that. Yeah. Uh but at the end of the day, I've told all my boys, man, if you decided not to go to college, I would happily pay 10, 20 grand and find you the best of the best coach. Because how did people learn and succeed a hundred years ago, Corey? Right? They were an apprentice. Yep. They went and found the best guy in town, blackmith for free. Yep. They worked for free, learned to earn, and they learned and they went down the road and they learned what the expert did, and then they went and did it to someone else 20 years later, or whatever it was. And so I've, you know, people always say, well, it costs too much and it's too expensive. And when I hear those words, I go, the mindset's already wrong.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because what I want to say is it's an investment, and it's in you getting to a better place, shortcutting the time frame to get there, and not doing yourself because the wheels already been reinvented. The wheel's already been invented. Don't reinvent it.
Speaker 1:Exactly. You the the we learned that really early. So we were we were like on bigger pockets, listening to the podcast, doing these things, right? And I remember there was a lot of frustration because we were taking action, but we weren't getting like any results. And I'm like, I think we just need to do what you know, you hear people talk about that two millimeter shift. I think we just got to shift a little this way, and then we'll be fine. But that shift was we got to get a coach who can shortcut this for us because we'll get there. I'm willing to do the action. My my commitment to it was strong and my desire was there, my intensity level to reach my ultimate goal was really, really high. I just needed somebody who could help me speed that process up and and get me there quicker. And it's so important. And you talked about the mindset thing right away. I think right away there's a couple things probably subconsciously happening with those people when you talk to them, right? Is one, right, they don't believe in themselves probably enough. They think that for themselves they have some kind of limiting belief that they can actually do it if they're given the coaching. And or two, they don't have the right program or they haven't, you know, they don't believe in the coaching or the program that they've got in front of them, maybe. But yeah, those are really two things. Because if you believe in yourself and you think you have the right coach, who cares what the price tag is? This is you're gonna make millions in this business.
Speaker 2:Yep. No, it's uh I couldn't agree with you more. And I I think it's just something that, you know, when you get around the right people, right? It's association. And we have to get around people who can elevate us. Yeah, and and we hopefully can elevate them at the same time. But you know, until we do that, if we're hanging out and we're the smartest guy in the room, you better find another room. Yeah, and that's my number one criteria for any mastermind group I've ever been in, is I ask the person running it, where do you see me fitting in with the other 10 people or 15 people? And you know, you're here or here. And if they ever tell me, oh, you your actually business is bigger than most, and blah, I'm like, this probably isn't for me. I want to be the dumbest guy in the room.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent.
Speaker 2:And I don't mean that in a bad way, but I want to see these other guys and I want to chase them. And I want to climb and go, what did they do? Yeah, and how do I learn from them? And I'm sure I can help them with something, but they're somewhere for a reason. And I want to be the guy that's um uh has to climb the ladder.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah, I just got back from our mastermind group. Uh we meet quarterly in different areas and literally flew in yesterday. And um cool. And one of the businesses I I've got to know, these guys are great guys in the Chicagoland area, and they they were had a similar business to us a few years ago, like around you know, 150, 200 deals a year, kind of a thing. Good business, right? Solid business. As of this year, they're at like 650. I'm like, bring in like 16 million in revenue. I'm just like humbled. I'm like, oh my gosh. All right. I got a lot to learn yet. I got a lot to learn yet. Tell me, tell me your secrets, wise old man here. You know, and they're same age, same age as me.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They're just down there running about just a huge.
Speaker 2:But you said about the, you know, the little shift, the two, I think you said millimeter shift or whatever. But it's really to me, it's like a 90-10 thing. 90% of people have all the things that it takes, and they'll go out and they'll do a lot of it, but they still don't find the success. And I I believe a hundred percent that it's the 10% we're missing. And the 10% is what is the wisdom is the investment in time and resources to go shortcut to how do I get that 10%? Because we don't know what we don't know. Right. Bang our head on a wall for a year and go, I've been working hard. Yeah. How come I'm not ahead? How come I don't have my first deal?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:10%. It's a two millimeters that you said. Exactly. And it's that little bit. That's why I've had I've literally had coaches um, with the exception of an 18-month period, for 27 years.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I've spent more than most people ever even think they'll spend on college education and other education. Yes. I don't even think of it as spent. I've invested my whole life in me and my family through these people. And I continue to use them today. And so as much as I am a coach, I am a student, as I said in the beginning.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I think, and I think obviously you're super successful, Chris. You've been in the business three decades. You know, you're able to give back now. I'm sure your family is well taken care of. You've got probably you have a lot of options, I'm sure, at this point in your life, you know, right? And and it's because you you're a student. And I think that's a really important thing. But you're not only a student, you can learn all day long, but obviously you've taken action on the things you've learned and you've done a lot of different things. You've kind of felt felt out the areas you like, the things you don't like, you've learned the markets. I mean, there's a lot of things that you might not even sit and never think about as I'm sitting here looking at your story. I'm like, I'm like, dang, you like you've got so much experience and so many things that you've pivoted to and done and knowledge. And like, what a blessing for people that get to interact with you at the Wiscons and other places that you coach, that they have access to you as somebody who loves to give back, and you have three decades of knowledge that they can learn from, and they can just come talk to you at ARIA. I mean, this is like incredible an opportunity that people have. And I'm blessed to be able to have you here on the on the podcast, to be able to put your you know, you out and your experience out to the audience here, and just selfishly to learn from you as well. I mean, it's it's great to uh to have a resource like that accessible.
Speaker 2:So we have these conversations, and and that's I tell you, what greater gift can anybody give of stuff you've learned and to be able to give it to others and hopefully help them do it better than you did it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think interesting going back to another thing you mentioned, on my drive back from Chicago yesterday, um, one of the guys on my team, I hired a guy to go out and help me find more commercial properties, multifamily stuff, right, for my own portfolio. And he's been going hard, he's doing, he's taking the action, right? But he's getting frustrated because he's not getting results. And we pay for uh, we have a commercial coach I paid for to help him in this journey. I said, Hey, have you reached out to this person yet? He's like, No. And I was like, Well, dude, I'm paying this guy, you know, two grand a month to go to be there as a resource, like just really a retainer. I'm like, get on, set up some calls, let's go. I'm like, did you talk to this person from our mastermind? No. All right, let's get on a call with that person. Like, we have the network to do it, but like we don't have to do it on our own, basically, right? And I think that's the important piece. So for people out there that are, I think, listening to this, and maybe you're you're you're one of those people that doesn't believe in yourself yet, or you're still in the learning phase of like, I is real estate still a thing I want to go after? I'm not sure. You know, going to a Wisco Rio or we run the REI Success Club, I think that's a great intro to start to feel it out for yourself and figure out do I want to invest in myself in this arena, or am I, am I, do I not have the passion or the desire to go put the put the breader bread and butter down, the cheddar down, you know, to invest in myself in this avenue, find something else you love, right?
Speaker 2:Well, and that coaching part is is really only step one, too, because if you get to that point where you make the decision for yourself to to grow yourself and invest in yourself, and you actually go out and hire a coach or get into mastermind or whatever you do, that's really only step one. That's not instant ticket, you don't have the golden ticket. I mean, you're not there because the next step for what I've seen over the years, and I know I've had to do it in my own world, is you have to be coachable.
Speaker 1:That's so good.
Speaker 2:Then why did you and just spend the money, time, energy, and effort to even go down that road? Because you can do it yourself, then apparently. Yeah, and that's that's the other unfortunate part. I've seen people make the decision and start that journey, but they don't listen to the person that they're you know plugged into. Yes, and I go, I don't get that. And uh it boggles the mind, but it's uh it's the reality of it. And some people the pride, you know, of I they're proud of just I understand, I know, I got it, I got it. Yeah, you know, I'll I'll figure it out. Why? Yeah, why reinvent the wheel? There's someone there that's willing, ready, and able, and they want to help you. Yeah, let them and be open to it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's such a great point. Man, I our our first like online coaching program, this we had the local guy. We did the we did the things with them, then we felt like, okay, we need something more, so we got a national program that we got connected with. And it was like an online thing, and it was like step one, step two, step three. We literally just did everything that they told us to do, and then like three months later, we're like more successful than we've ever been in our life. And we're all the people in the program like, how did you guys do it that quick? I'm like, uh we just we just do this program that you guys are also doing, just follow the steps, don't try to reinvent the wheel, you know, that kind of thing. That's a great point, though. I've I've seen that also where people have come to do the pick the brain thing, but then they're just telling me about how they already have it figured out. So I'm like, okay.
Speaker 2:No, anyone who ever tells me I got it all figured out and I've never had a bad, I've never lost money or I've never, I'm like, all right, yeah, I need to talk somebody else because there's always a story behind the story.
Speaker 1:100%, 100%. Let's talk a little bit about that, Chris. Do you have some uh hard lessons learned? I I think maybe 2008 I want to kind of go to in that era because there's kind of a shift happening in the economy right now, right? Depending on who you listen to and what you're hearing. Some people are saying, man, get buckle up. We're in for it. Other people are saying, well, no, we're still a supply shortage and so on and so forth. I mean, we could we'll probably pivot to that next. But I guess are there any lessons learned from 08 that you could impart on anybody as it relates to maybe where you think we are in today's world?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I just got done doing a presentation that I went around to a bunch of the RIAs and uh spoke on, I don't know, over the last nine months. And it was it was basically titled 30 years of lessons learned, the highs and lows in the landmines. And it was basically all the teachable moments that I could I could put down and talk about in an hour to help other people hopefully avoid some of those landmines and the things that helped me get out of uh bad situations, but also to hopefully avoid some of them to shortcut again, back to the shortcut. And uh so in in 2000, when I transitioned from those 40, whatever rentals I had back in the late 90s into early 2000, uh the market, if well, you weren't in the market at that time, but the the rates were going um at they were kind of clipping up, and then they were starting to uh go back up. And so there was a low point, it pivoted up, and then we kind of went into 05, 6, and 7, which led to the crash. And it just you look back now and it's like wow, you can just kind of see it on a chart uh the way that changed. And at that time, I was selling some of my units only because I had some, I had uh my dad was a partner, and I had another guy from college who had uh partnership with a couple of the units I had, not the portfolio. But at that time I got into a big development project, a really big one, like hundreds of millions of dollars development that um is still there today, but we started it from scratch, and uh I I was not only the realtor who had the listing contract for the entire site, it was hundreds and hundreds of condos and home sites, and it was golf course, it was supposed to be a water park, the whole deal and it's northern Bay, golf resort marina. Okay. If you've ever been there, you know about it. Well, I was on the front lines of that. And long story short, I I was selling all these things and I was also buying them. So I was not only the listing agent selling tons, but I was also, I think I was probably my partner and I were the number one investors in the product that we were buying because it was just the way they were laid out in the market and such. But what happened was uh between 05 and 08 when the water shut off finally and all of a sudden the carnage happened, uh we we were so we were, I don't even know, 15, 20 million dollars in debt. And um, we had all this real estate and everything, and that whole development, along with a lot of other, you know, people in the market at that time, it all imploded. And so I got smoked, like smoked. Down, I went from, you know, I was chasing this millionaire status, and I finally hit it in the early 2000s, and I was like, all right, I made it. And then yeah, we went to the other side and a lot farther down below. Wow, and so it was a really humbling uh, but I teach from it all the time because there's so many lessons learned from that. And you know, it's uh the things we talk about focus, and I was trying to do too many things at one time and and be everything to everybody, and it just doesn't work. Yeah, I mean you can work harder, but if you don't work smarter, it doesn't matter. It's true. And so, you know, I um I went through that time and got off the other side of 08, and and that's when I really built everything back. And that was if there was ever grit in my life, it was 08, 09, 10, 11 to go from nothing when banks wouldn't look at you. And when you have a BK on your record, forget about it. I mean, and I had a portfolio. I mean, I had experienced uh 15 years that I'm showing banks like I know what I'm doing, I've done this over and over and over. They're like, Yeah, we're we can't give you a nickel. And but it forced me to get private lenders, and now my whole private lender, I say, portfolio of people. I've been working with the same people, and interestingly enough, all of them except one have come from the RIA in 13 years.
Speaker 1:Really?
Speaker 2:Through all my relationships throughout the RIA, and um, and they're all the people that are in my different syndication deals with self-storage and stuff I did with multifamily and so many of my single family flips, but that was kind of that journey. I mean, I was all the way up, and then I was lower than low, and then I climbed back up, and it it's really humbling in that side because um it at the time it's failure, right? I mean, when it happens, anyone who's had anything bad happen, your first thing is man, I've totally failed. I've let everybody down correct. Um, you know, the thing that didn't happen is I didn't lose my family and I lost everything that was you could put your, you know it's the material. Yeah, material stuff, which we you can get all that back. And uh all we have to do is use what's up here. They didn't take that from me. Yeah, uh, but they took our money and they took all the other stuff because of things that we just went down the wrong roads. And uh I was being taught to leverage. And when I was learning stuff, flying to Florida and Colorado and all these places for all these years, leverage was a big deal back in the late 90s, early 2000s about well, buy this, leverage it, go to the bank, and you know, da-da-da-da-da. Well, you stack that up and it gets to the point where the market changes, it's a house of cards. And uh, we were on that house of cards. And so it uh it was quite the journey, uh, quite the learning lesson. It's helped it's made me become a better uh father, husband, uh, sibling, son to my parents, uh definitely, I think, mentor, coach to others. Yeah to be able to help people differently uh because you know I look at things totally different when I analyze and and all of that. But that was that was just part of my season and journey of going through all that. So it was uh yeah, it was an interesting time. I've had sure.
Speaker 1:Um so what are you doing nowadays, or what are you telling people that nowadays that are you know in the real estate space? Like if you're we're starting today, yeah, uh, you know, what do you what would your I guess advice be initially for somebody getting?
Speaker 2:Number one thing, focus. Focus, focus, focus, and focus on one thing because I I see too many people come into the RIA and they're RIA lifers, and they've been coming for a long time, and God bless them. And I'm so glad they show up. But if you show up to the RIA and I know your face, and we know each other, and we see each other at Christmas parties, and you've never written one offer in 10 years, there's a problem. Okay, and some you have to something has to be done differently. And I think the a problem for some people is either they don't believe in themselves, they're not willing to spend money instead of invest it. And probably the biggest one, to be honest with you, is they're just not um they're not willing to to do what needs to be done and and and plug in and be consistent. And they get in this world of this academia where the next speaker that comes, they go, Oh my gosh, Airbnb arbitrage. Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. And then the next month is multifamily, and then there's wholesaling, and all of a sudden they have 90 courses. They don't do any of them because they're trying to figure out the last one focus, focus, focus, focus. And I didn't do that in the beginning. I was terrible. I was shiny object syndrome all over the place. I was buying everything and trying everything and multi-family and multi-level and do all this at the same time. And it burned me out, Corey. And until my coaches really beat it through my head to I had to refine and focus. And and that's what I teach people now is look, before you do anything, before you spend a nickel, come to some meetings, go to networking meetups. I don't care where they are, risk-alrea or other. Yeah, and and go figure out what would fit for you. Right. You know, some people may be a natural fit for wholesaling because they understand the systematic and you know, they're great at marketing and they they love talking to people. And so getting that stuff might be a lot easier than being the rehabber, right, who's now got to go out and get contractors and deal with all that stuff. Yeah. Or heaven forbid, being a property manager, landlord, and you hate dealing with people. Well, trust me, that's not the right place for you to be then, maybe to start. Yes. And so I would say focus on that one course, and until you master it and you can do it in your sleep, then don't find number two. Yes. And and that's what I did with our self-storage when I started that five years ago. I started that, it was coming out of COVID, and it was actually right in the middle of COVID, I I should say. And I was going through some health stuff, which is a whole nother chapter, but uh during that time, that storage is what I focused on, and that's all we did. And and we got to the point where we got really systematic and we built it up, yeah. And now it runs itself. I mean, my partner and I do high-level stuff, but we've got a team that takes care of it, and we've got a thousand units, you know, in three different states. And so our property manager is all most of them are in the Philippines. Okay, and and it runs like a top, and we are solid where we're at, but the the frankly, the self-storage market has changed a lot. It was really, really sexy during COVID. And the other one, you couldn't lose. You couldn't miss. You know, and you can miss now.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And uh, and so for that reason, I think the reason um we have been able to maintain and and sustain with the self-storage is because my underwriting is way more conservative. We've probably for sure let deals go that you know we probably maybe could have made, but I didn't want to put the whole portfolio in jeopardy because 08 is a memory that sticks in my head will forever. And I just didn't have the same uh understanding of that. I've been through three market cycles now, and we're in the fourth one, and there's clearly stuff going on in our market right now. And you alluded to some of it there. And is it another 08? It's not another 08 per se, the same thing, but it's it's another market shift correction. We're already in it. It's it's not that it's all the way bad yet or getting the other side, but it's definitely there, it's affecting a lot of stuff, and so yeah, there's there's a whole lot of dynamics on that. And yeah, and uh so my big thing though is focus. If I had to tell anybody, get into one thing and be a badass and go out and kick ass, and then on that one thing, and when you know you're kicking ass and you got systems in place, great. Then go add Airbnb or multifamily or whatever you want to do, and then go be really good at that, as long as number one is kicking ass.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we were just talking about that before hit record today, too, Chris, on this focused topic. And I think that's really sound advice that I'm already realizing again. Like I go in these waves where I realize it, and then I'm like, oh, that's sexy. And then I let my my entrepreneur brain take over and my squirrel my squirrel brain, and then I'm like, oh, I'll go do this thing, I'll go do this. I was I was reflecting on 2025 recently, and I was looking back at this year, and so I sold a couple duplexes last year, 1031 them into some other just other stuff. Like, really, now that I look back, I'm like, it was stupid to even do it in the first place. I should have just refinanced them, pulled some cash out tax-free, and went and used that money for something else. But anyway, I did it, and then I bought this one in Jacksonport up here in Door County where I live. And uh it was a beat-up house. It was like, oh, we could rent o this, and it had a poll building on there. Then I'm like, oh, I could rent that pole building separate and you know, get this thing up and running in Airbnb this thing. And we have Airbnbs already, so it's not a huge addition like it used to be. Um, but I get into it and my contractor's like, yeah, man, I'm already at like 120 grand for rehab on this thing, and I'm not even done with my quote yet. He's like, you might be better off just demoing this and putting a manufactured house on here. And I was like, oh, dude, new construction, great idea. How I just take this one off, I put a new one on, easy peasy. I have so many hours into this thing in the last 12 months, Chris. And that's all because I'm gonna have to hold this thing for probably 30 years to get my money back, you know, by the time I look at how much I'm actually spending on everything else. All I mean, I'll I've learned a lot. So I have I it's not all lost, but I just look at like how many other wholesale deals could I have done, or how much more could I have poured into my team? How much more could I have you know lifted up our brands in different areas in that time frame? From the time I spent putting into this one stupid thing, right? And then I got all these people now. Bringing me land, hey, we should do this development over here. And I'm like, oh, think of the numbers of how big those could be.
Speaker 2:We'd be dangerous together, my friend.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I'm like, well, nope, nope, nope. So I'm trying to say my goal for 2026 is say no to more things and just stay focused on building the best, baddest wholesaling company I can I can do. We already have a really good one. Yeah. We can just we can just turn it up and and just get better and give a better experience to the buyers and the sellers and just stay in our lane. Flips this year, too. We started doing more flips.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Frickin' terrible, man. I've got maybe two or three that we'll actually be profitable on. I've got six on the market right now that I'll probably lose money on. So it's not what I'm good at. Other people are great at it. And I love coaching them on. I know what they should do. I just am not good at it. I'm good at running a wholesale business, you know.
Speaker 2:That's why you have a coach to help you out there.
Speaker 1:Exactly.
Speaker 2:So well the other thing you said too, just to piggyback on that, is the whole time thing. It time, it to me in the beginning, that was the one uh asset that I gave away freely. Because I thought, oh, I got plenty of time.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm only I'm only in my twenties. I don't even have kids yet.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, and then when I had kids, it was like, oh, they don't even know I'm gone. They're too young. And you know, now I look back and go, man, I mean, I did a lot of great stuff with our kids and we have tons of great memories. But could there have been more? Well, sure. I don't I don't dwell on the past like that. But going forward and thinking about that, man, time is our number one most precious asset in the world. And when we when we reflect on projects that we've spent a year on, and just like you were talking about, I've got some of those as well. And I think back and go, I just spent a year doing that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Man, that's not what I thought a year ago. I wasn't, I was thinking something different.
Speaker 1:Yes. I thought this would be easy. So throw a new house on there, move on. No, way harder. So I know what wholesaling is, I'm really good at it. I just need to stay in that lane and let other people do the flips, let other people do the new construction, all that are really good at it or want to go learn that space. But you're right, everybody, I think the uh the thing that we did too, kind of to piggyback on this whole topic. When we started, we did a little bit of, we kind of say we did a buffet of real estate. So I bought a rental property that we rehabbed and refinanced. I wholesaled a deal. Uh, we partnered with another guy on like a subject to deal that we ended up uh keeping for a year and then it panned out. We did a rent to own on our old house that we were we were underwater on, so I got somebody to rent to own, so it worked out. So I had like four different types of real estate transactions in like the first four months of me getting my first deal. And then I was like, man, I really like this wholesale thing. Like I think I'm good at it. I like this. And we bought some more rentals. The whole idea we got started was to buy rentals. We bought some more rentals, but then I was like, I need to just learn wholesaling. And so that's what, and my wife, I I did not say this by the way. I said, let's do everything. My wife said, We need to just do wholesaling and be really good at it. And uh, I was like, no, we can do it all. And she's like, Corey, eventually you'll be able to do it all once we get really good at wholesaling, but we need to become the best wholesalers that we can be first, and later we can add things in there. I was like, Oh, okay, but at least at some point at some point I'll be able to get my fix of all the different things, you know. But uh, but she was so right, and now I'm I'm I dabble back in sometimes like well, flips are kind of like wholesales, they're not, it's a completely different business.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah. 100% you're and you're awesome at what you do on that. And again, if if we have the blessing to be able to do that, man, it's easy to to stray. It just is, especially if you have an entrepreneur blood.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. When you work for somebody else, they tell you what to do, and it's very easy. You stay in your lane. This is what they want me to do, that's where I'm gonna stay. Once you become an entrepreneur and you're on your own, it's like all the world is an oyster. Like I can go do anything I want here, right? So true, man. So true. Well, man, I'm excited to uh have you on here, Chris. I know we gotta we gotta wrap here shortly and get back to spending time with our families, hopefully, and enjoying that time, right? That's and that time that we got. Um, one other book, though, real quick to throw into this. I just started listening to Die With Zero. Have you ever read this book? Uh no, I have not. It's really good. It's along the same kind of topic of a lot of what we've talked about today. I was I was thinking about it as we were just kind of starting to wrap here. So I'm I'm on like chapter eight as of the time we record this, but essentially I've always been like hoard money, keep making more money so that the money makes more money, and then eventually someday we're gonna have enough money that we won't need to invest the money to make the money, right? And my wife, again, in all of her wisdom, is like, Corey, we're gonna die someday. We don't know when that's gonna be. We should experience life today. And yes, we can be responsible, but let's experience life today. It kind of goes along with that coaching thing, right? Too. And I sit there, I go, man, when we started, if we would have died, right, and we have uh all that money we would have spent on coaching sitting in the bank, that does no good, right? Yeah, we used it to educate ourselves, work the brain, and then that bought more experiences in our life. But I think that's an interesting thing as we're as I'm starting to wrap my brain around it too a little bit more. I'm like, man, you know what? Like, yes, be responsible with your funds and all that sort of stuff. But time is our time is our most precious commodity and mem memories are the currency that pays the most dividends, man.
Speaker 2:Yep. No, well said, well said.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Well, Chris, last question for you. Favorite place to visit in Wisconsin or Wisconsin tradition? And the reason we ask this is we we we want to get people outside of Wisconsin who don't really know about the state, it's kind of obscure to them, but maybe they're thinking, hey, I got some cash, I want to park somewhere, I want to put it into some investments, uh, somewhere outside of maybe I live in California, prices are crazy. Where else can I be? We want to let them know a little bit about Wisconsin. So any uh favorite traditions or favorite places you like to visit here in Wisco.
Speaker 2:So when you say visiting, or you're saying from an investment standpoint?
Speaker 1:Well, I'll let you go with it. You take that wherever you want to take that.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, because I would have two different answers. So the place to uh visit if you're coming to Wisconsin. So um I I enjoy a good fermented malt beverage, and so spotted cow is the beer of our state.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying it is, it is very good.
Speaker 2:It's known far and wide. Literally, I have friends of mine from college that still to this day, if I ever travel anywhere, they're like, Can you bring me a six-pack of spotted cow? It's like whatever, crazy. Like it's you know, the fountain of youth or something.
Speaker 1:Memories pay the biggest dividends. Spotted cow's number two. It's number two. It's number two. It's close.
Speaker 2:Uh, but yeah, New Glaris, Wisconsin. They're the brewery at New Glaris, Wisconsin. It's a beautiful old town. It's um it's got little shops, and it's uh just so quaint and cool. It's like you threw back a hundred years. Uh, but the brewery there is just so cool to go through. They spent a lot of money, but that's the the New Glaris. I would tell people to go check that out. Great, great village, great little town. Nice um out in the boons, out in the rurals, uh areas outside of Madison. I just wrote that down.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna do that for the little weekend getaway, I think, with with the bride. Get a good little massager, I'm sure. They got something like I'm sure they got some little place you get a little massage or something in town.
Speaker 2:It's just they probably do, but a great, just a little quaint, old school town. And then they got this big honk and brewery up on a hill, and it's totally cool.
Speaker 1:Awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a great, it's a great thing to see. So yeah.
Speaker 1:Cool. Cool.
Speaker 2:All right, and I throw something in for the the RIA.
Speaker 1:Yes, please. I was just gonna ask you for that. Let's talk about the RIA.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just wanted to, because it's funny, when we first jumped on the call, uh literally within the last 48 hours, uh, we have switched the the model that we have been running for 13 years at the at the RIAs. Uh used to be Madison RIA, got together with Whisker RIA, and now we're all Whisker. But we've got 11 locations around the state, so we're in cities everywhere. And uh our membership model is no longer. It's gone. The doors are open, barrier to entry is zero. And uh we just want people to show up because I know when people show up and they get in the environment, they get around the association, and they can just plug into what people are doing. Doesn't matter if you're just thinking about it and you've never done anything or you've been doing it for 30 years like myself. I get so energized going every single month. I love it, whether I'm doing any presenting of anything or I'm just showing up and I'm in the crowd. Because I always meet at least one person. I go, man, I'm so glad I came tonight because I met Bob. Yes, or whoever. And so uh our doors are open. If you've never been to Whiskeria, you know, networking and education, real estate uh in general, come on out, check our website, and we'd love to see you. Yeah, we'd love to help you on your journey.
Speaker 1:I think I'm we're on the you'll probably be around episode 6570. I haven't checked in a while. Okay. I would say some of those are solo episodes, but I would say literally every person I've had on here has mentioned networking as a key to success. And so you guys offering 11 locations around the state is amazing. We also have the uh REI success club in Green Bay as well. I think I think you guys are on the first Tuesday of every month for Whiskeria in Green Bay. We're on the fourth. So if you do things on Tuesdays, just cancel those if you're in Green Bay, just get out of that. Like if you're on trap shooting league, get rid of it. Move it, start, sign up for Wednesday nights because Tuesdays you're missing all the great networking opportunities in Green Bay, right? Absolutely. Uh, best place for people to check it out. I know you guys have a Facebook page as well. Is it the website?
Speaker 2:We've got actually multiple Facebook pages, but just uh whiscoRia.com. Okay. It takes you right to the homepage, and you can check out all our locations, date, times, and speakers.
Speaker 1:Awesome, man. Well, you guys are doing a great job. Uh that's awesome that you guys are opening that up. I think we charge like a hundred bucks for an annual membership. Okay. Um, as you were talking about it, then I'm like, oh, maybe we should think about doing something different with that too. We donate any proceeds to uh some non-again, it kind of goes back to concept. I was like, right, people don't pay for it, they're not gonna show up, but maybe they'll show up anyway, Chris. This will be a good experiment, I think. This will be cool.
Speaker 2:2026, a lot of new stuff.
Speaker 1:It'll be cool to see uh what you guys notice with membership, but people showing up and um staying consistent. So that's great. Chris, if anybody wants to connect with you directly, uh are you is there any place for them to get a hold of you that you would recommend?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would just say my email really simple, Chris Hake at gmail.com. Chris Hake's one word.
Speaker 1:Easy enough. No dots in there. Beautiful. No, just easy peasy. Awesome, man. Well, this has been a great episode, guys. If you guys want some additional uh education or guidance or coaching and you're you're trying to get into it again, you don't have to join our buyer's list per se. If you're interested in getting some education from us, you can just go to the contact us page on our website at Wisconsin Discount Properties.com. You fill that out and um and get scheduled with a call with us. We're also doing some one-on-one coaching calls now, another free thing that we're doing with Reese from my team. Reese literally every day his job is to have calls with buyers, people, investors, people interested in it. So he's had thousands of conversations over the last few years with people, probably just like you, who he's seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. And um, he's there to help guide you and get you going on to that next step in your real estate investing journey. And again, that's a free value add thing that we'll schedule with you. If you want to get on uh uh that just go to the website and fill something out. We'll get you in the calendar. Chris, appreciate you being on, man. This is a great episode, dude. And uh I'm excited that uh we we finally got to connect on here with you.
Speaker 2:Good fireside chat.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, brother. All right, guys, we'll see you on the next episode.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Card.
