How a Retail Manager shifted to Real Estate Success, w Jon Lopez

On New Year's Day, on a Zoom call - Jon learned that his team was getting laid off. 

Jon knew within the month that it was now or never to go all for real estate, and that's precisely what he did.


Transitioning from Bay Area retail to Las Vegas real estate, Jon's tale exemplifies resilience and adaptability. 

This episode dives into how his retail background enriched his real estate endeavors, spotlighting customer service and team management.

Discover how Jon raised $4 million in two weeks for a 439-unit self-storage venture in Galveston, Texas, showcasing the importance of action and networking at real estate events. His capital-raising adventure didn't stop there, evolving into a mentorship-driven venture - The School of Nine Doors Down.

Lastly, Jon delves into brand development in capital raising, offering practical tips on storytelling and social media to craft a compelling brand that attracts investors.


 Whether you're eyeing brand recognition or investment, this episode is packed with valuable insights. Take advantage of Jon's enlightening transition from retail to real estate.


Connect with Jon and the Nine Doors Down Team below:

Websites

• linktr.ee/ninedoorsdown (Company)
• ninedoorsdown.com (Company)
• schoolofninedoorsdown.com (Company)

Phone

• 8185362121 (Mobile)

Email

jon.p.lopez@gmail.com

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Transcript

Johnny Nelson: 0:02

Hey everyone here at the Investing Stuff you should know podcast, where we bring you expert insights into the world of investing and beyond. My name is Johnny Nelson and today we are thrilled to have our special guest, john Lopez. John, thanks for being with us, man.

Jon Lopez: 0:15

How are you doing, Johnny? Thank you so much. It's an honor and privilege to be on your show, man.

Johnny Nelson: 0:20

Yeah, I appreciate that. I appreciate that. So John and I have known each other for probably over a year now. We've gotten to know each other. He's an awesome dude. He is from the capital self-stored multifamily group Nine Doors Down. We're going to get into all of that. It's not just a story of here's a business and we raise money and buy self-storage or multifamily. There's a really compelling narrative and story of all the things that John where he came from, the discipline actions that he and his team took, and then where they're going now. He's into coaching and teaching others how to do it, how to grow, and we're going to just talk about that whole story. So, john, kick us off here with where you grew up. Again. We're focusing kind of on the story of where people can get some real meat out of this. But give us a little quick where you grow up, where you are now and just a little background of who you are.

Jon Lopez: 1:09

Yeah, so I grew up in a town in the Bay Area called San Lorenzo, just a couple of towns south of Oakland, california. Pretty much raised out there in the Bay Area. But back in 2001, I went to college down south in Los Angeles. So I spent the next 20 or so some years out in Los Angeles, met my wife we have three kids and then, in September of 2021, we decided to move out to Las Vegas, nevada, which is where we're at right now.

Johnny Nelson: 1:44

Awesome man. And was there? Tell us the reason why to move to Vegas versus California? I think California is more cool or better. You get the desert of Nevada, but without the beach or something like that, I don't know, yeah, no.

Jon Lopez: 1:59

There's a lot of things I miss about California, johnny and the weather, my family, the friends. But there's certain things that's going on in California that doesn't quite align with my goals.

Johnny Nelson: 2:09

I love that man.

Jon Lopez: 2:11

I'll let people decode that for themselves.

Johnny Nelson: 2:14

There you go, man. Now we love California. It's a beautiful state, beautiful people, but sometimes, like you said, there are some things that are just hard to mesh with business and other things. But moving beyond that, here you had a background in retail and looks like some maybe some phone sales. It's amazing that actually I've talked to a number of guys that had a background in cell phone or phone service and some other things like that. Why is that and I'm just asking you a question that you obviously are not these other dudes why is it that you guys I've seen this trend You're starting in retail and small retail and services and that and I've seen multiple of your type, of the type that have been in this go to multi-family or real estate? Why is that, john, from your perspective?

Jon Lopez: 3:02

I think so myself.

Jon Lopez: 3:05

I was with AT&T for seven years and then after that I was with another company as a director for cell phone accessories, so I've always been on the sales side of things. I think with the cell phone industry for those that move up into management you learn a lot about leadership how to manage a multi-million dollar business, even though it's not necessarily my business. But some locations I was responsible for 20 to 25 employees. Some locations I'm in charge of seven or eight employees.

Jon Lopez: 3:40

But because it's retail and because it's the cell phone industry, everybody needs to have a cell phone. Everybody has internet. A lot of households they probably have at least seven devices. So a lot of people wanted things quick, wanted to purchase their things quick. You learn damage control, especially if you're customer facing, because you're going to have clients that are happy that they're just satisfied but they're not exactly going to share the gospel with the world and you're going to have a very small percentage that loves your customer service, that they may hop on Yelp and give a good review, but the moment you have a bad interaction with a customer, that customer will go on Yelp and immediately leave a negative comment which is going to reverberate with their friends or circles and the people in that zip code, so spreading that fine line. To have the good reviews, you have to get creative on how to satisfy a customer, because everyone's personalities are totally different.

Johnny Nelson: 4:42

That's fascinating man. And then the link, of course, and the link that I'm trying to draw, which I think we're both operators in the retail space, is that there's demand from whether it's self storage, which is a little less demanding because you're renting it out, but still there's lots of people coming in and going, and then, of course, in the multifamily space too, lots of people that are nice, people that are not nice, and again, that's a small slice of those people, but it really can get negative fast and you can only do so much, you can only get up so many times at 1 AM and there's a fire or a flood or something like that. Clearly, john didn't cause the fire, it's something outside your control, but you're responsible as a manager, as the operating entity whatnot to control it, to fix it, to resolve it Right.

Jon Lopez: 5:28

At 100%. And another aspect that I left out was the team aspect. So I'm in charge of X amount of employees. I'm reporting to an area manager, area manager reports up to a director. So I learned that chain of command and how to cascade information necessary information and some information maybe not as necessary to my frontline employees and in a way it's almost like monthly reports for a certain property. You're cascading information the same way.

Johnny Nelson: 6:03

That's amazing, man. We talked about a little bit of a pre-chat here, john. That was let's talk to the person that maybe is a similar avatar to you, to your journey. I think this makes the story compelling. Somebody can see themselves. Maybe they were doing what you did A manager of some type of I don't know, a chipotle, I don't know subway, it could be cell phone service Obviously they're very different there, but that type of person and there's lots of them Every strip mall there's a manager and all this kind of stuff here. Maybe these people are depressed, maybe they can't find their way out. They don't see a way out. Give us the journey of how you broke through that, found a partner and started and got down the path of real estate.

Jon Lopez: 6:48

Yeah, I credit this all to God. When I slept with W2, I was successful, but unfortunately, I was comfortable. I was comfortable with what I was doing and, luckily, myself, my wife Tony and our partner Anthony we already started acquiring properties, small properties like 20 units here, 90 units here out in Tucson, arizona. This was like a tail end of summer of 2021. I was still working at the time. September of 2021, we moved out to Las Vegas and prior to that, the company that I was working for they got acquired by a much larger distributor, so it was probably like 13, 14, 15 employees that came from the old company into the new one, which I was one of them. Near Z rolls around going into 2022, we hop on a Zoom call and it was a bunch of us sales guys and I thought, hey, great job this year, here's what we're going to do for next year. Happy New Year, guys. Enjoy the family.

Jon Lopez: 8:01

Yes, and I was going to remember that near Z fell on a Friday. Well, while on the call, I learned I was getting laid off For real. So it was myself and about 15 other employees all coming from the old ones. Now that I look back, that distributor that purchased us pretty much used us for the year to acquire our customer database. And when I got laid off, I just remember thinking to myself man, what am I going to do? I'm going to be in Newtown, I've got my three kids, got my wife here. Well, I guess I'm just going to fake it until I make it for this weekend. Let's just show the kids a good time and just enjoy it. But back on my mind, I was feeling down and out. For sure, man.

Johnny Nelson: 8:48

There's very few people, man, and maybe in particular that doesn't affect pretty deeply. It's part of your identity, it's who you are, it's what you do. I mean, there's just so much of our psyche and personality and spirit, soul, body, to wrap that in all those things. And also, just like the rug gets pulled out, you're on your back. You're like, oh, still be a man, still be a father, still act normal. That's not easy.

Jon Lopez: 9:11

Yeah, no, it's not. However, I understood their business move because their sales were going up but the cost of goods coming from China was increasing, so the profit margins it was decreasing. And I remember, even before I got laid off, I remember telling my wife I'm like I have a feeling I'm going to have to make a move in the next six, 12 months. I didn't know it was going to be on New Year's, but I remember it was probably like the Monday, tuesday. Later that day I remember just waking up and I turned on the switch in my head and I'm like I can either get back into the W2, be comfortable and be successful I know I could or do I want to no longer be dependent on an employment to bring in my source of income. Luckily, we already planted seeds with some properties. But it was that Monday or Tuesday I decided I'm going to go full force with nine doors down and let me just see where this goes. And now that I look back the story's still been written. But I think it was probably the best thing that could have happened to me.

Jon Lopez: 10:12

Johnny was getting laid off. That's amazing. That was the catalyst.

Johnny Nelson: 10:15

That was the catalyst.

Johnny Nelson: 10:16

And, like you said, he got to God and I also am a believer in God and the power of his hand and what he can do for us, and that's very powerful. So if you're religious or not religious, sometimes it just can be a major event. But John took it positively, put it to action and it's been incredible since that time Because it goes forward. Like I said, your story is still being written, so that was the catalyst, like you said, john, and then as you go forward, you jump right into, I think, self-storage. Like you said, you already had a few properties. That's smart. Ok, so what is this? Make a kind of a side note in the margins here. That's really smart.

Johnny Nelson: 10:58

I do recommend that, if people are looking for advice, to have a deputy job and then try to acquire with partners as possible Again, that's just my opinion Some real estate. So if you're not just brand new, like all of a sudden you're going to tomorrow I'm going to quit my job and I'm going to start doing flipping or wholesaling Very risky, very difficult to do so try to have some real estate on the side, kind of paralleling your activities, your income and then if some event happens, like you get laid off or there's a job change or you have to move or whatever it is. Then you can actually consider and see whether that's something you want to do and grow into, and obviously you did. So, just moving forward to the story, what was that next? What was the next couple of steps here? And I want to get into the coaching piece and some of the things you've actually leveraged, you know. But let's talk again just kind of the finish the story there.

Jon Lopez: 11:46

If you jumped into self-storage and some other things, so the very first deal that we cap were raised on was for self-storage. It was a 439 unit self-storage out in Galveston, texas, and it was a joint venture structure, and when the deal came on our laps this was probably August of 2021. So we just closed the nine unit and I'm about to get ready to move to Las Vegas, and when my partner, anthony, presented the idea, the catch was we had to raise $4 million for the deal. It was a $10.5 million deal and at that point I was like I don't know if I'm ready to do this, guys. I was like you know, I understand the powers of real estate. I'm an LP in some deals out in Arizona. However, I've never asked anyone for $50,000, $100,000, $250,000, right it?

Johnny Nelson: 12:39

was just my limited. It was my limited. People have no idea. People have no idea how uncomfortable it is. Like it's you know, it's like you're going to ask maybe friends, maybe acquaintances and just like you know, literally like cash, you know, and obviously there's structure and there's legal and it's very protected. It's very, it's very legitimate. It's a very legitimate kind of business. But when you're first getting into it, maybe you're not from that world or that background. That's awkward.

Jon Lopez: 13:05

It's very awkward, man. It's like you know your circle of influence. There are a lot of friends and family, some co-workers, right, you haven't really developed a brand. You haven't really developed, you know, a reputation, right? So it was definitely an uphill battle, but we took it on because we knew that if we did not raise that capital, we could still learn from it and apply it to other deals. However, I'm so happy we did it because, as a group, we raised the $4 million in a span of like just two weeks.

Jon Lopez: 13:38

That's astonishing Granted 2021 is a lot different than how it was right now in 2023. The capital raising conditions are totally different. But we did it. And when that deal closed in February of 2022, you know we had, you know we had we did a virtual high five because you know my partner, anthony, is out in Los Angeles. But we knew we had a good immediate problem at hand. We had about a million dollars worth of oversubscriptions at closing date.

Jon Lopez: 14:10

Combination of guys that like did, just didn't wire in time, they didn't see our communications, whatever it may be, but we knew we had a pool of capital that we had access to. And that's when Anthony had a bright idea to open up a fund. And then, that's why you know, we joined the Black Card program with a Bridger Pennington met you through the program and then, when the fund launched so this was like June of 2022, I thought we were just going to take on a couple of deals. I didn't. I didn't know. We're going to take down total of one self storage deal, three, three multifamily deals pulling like 977 units in last year and then this year we've already closed on two deals close to like 400 units, and then we have another 140 unit that's closing by Halloween all multifamily. We didn't strike any self storage deals this year, but again, you know, everything is a result of action. Your opportunity starts to open up. Yeah, talk about that.

Johnny Nelson: 15:18

And you said something you've been very diligent in and this is everyone recommends it, but do you do it? And that is like go to many media, take the energy, the effort put on webinars, but also it's not easy to every week or every couple of days or whatever that is, whatever the cadence is, to show up to you know some, you put it on yourself, or show up to some real estate event going on. It's actually like you're not getting no one. Get ready to check for John to show up on his own time with the family and kids and spend four hours some evening, wednesday evening, and just hey, like hey, this is what we do Talk about that.

Jon Lopez: 15:49

Yeah, you know, moving with attention is something that we're pretty big on. You know, unfortunately, I see a lot of people going to meetups and I feel like they're just there to just to take a picture Right, whereas those that are successful in this, in this game of real estate, they have intentions of making friends with new people, making contacts. They may or may not be business partners, you know, right away, or maybe ever, but you're making the context and you're learning and you start. You start talking to people and then, when you start talking to people, it creates a dialogue, it creates a discourse. That's when epiphanies start to happen, lessons start to start to occur.

Jon Lopez: 16:31

But I think what separated us from a lot of people is we knew we could learn as much as we want, but all that knowledge is not going to mean anything unless you put it to action. So that was the main difference with us and we weren't scared to dive into it. Like you know, we feel like we just got to know 40% of that business and have an idea, because there's certain things you just can't underwrite. You can't underwrite for a fire, can't underwrite for you know crimes or what happened on a property, but at least you're going in that direction. You're going to. There's going to be lessons that are going to be made. Some are harder to swallow than others, but while you're making those lessons, your equity is still building. That's the big difference, because you're still holding on to the property.

Johnny Nelson: 17:15

For sure, man, that's awesome. Yeah, thank you for sharing that amazing story and how it, you know, come to, it's come to pass, and you kind of grew into that. If you'd share with us. Next, you know, on the how do they? Let me let me back up there. I love it when I see the stories and there's been a few times in my own life where you're doing something and you're maybe hustling and trying to grind and then some kind of new avenue to open up another business that you unique to you, unique to your skill sets and your situation and your partners opens up by having a creative mind, having a nimble mindset, being open to inspiration from others, from God, from just meditating in all kinds of ways that creativity can come into your life and that's what happened to you. Share with us that story, if you would, about you started mentoring some people specifically in the capital raising space and all of a sudden you like got hit the head virtually and like, oh my gosh, this could be a business. Yeah, can you talk about?

Jon Lopez: 18:15

that Absolutely. You know, Johnny, you had a lot to do with it, man.

Johnny Nelson: 18:21

Seriously. I know we're in the pocket. That's ridiculous. I don't believe you.

Jon Lopez: 18:24

No, we didn't coach you right, but we both hopped on that rise. Deal together, right.

Johnny Nelson: 18:34

Yes, sir.

Jon Lopez: 18:35

Yeah, and we're rubbing ideas off of like one another and through that I met other guys, that's on Avestor with the GOB2, the Wanda and Wanda and Greg, yes, sir, and I wouldn't necessarily say I was coaching you guys at one bit, but we were like kind of guiding each other, right. So that was last year.

Johnny Nelson: 18:57

Yeah, that was fun that was fun Just again for the audience like oh, what are they referring to? You know, John and I, there's all these groups of capitalizing groups and masterminds and whatnot, just to keep it simple for folks. And John and I were part of several teams, several groups doing, you know, working on similar projects. So he was raising for a multifamily deal in Arizona and Phoenix and I was as well with another group and we kind of partnered and bounced a lot of good ideas and lessons and best practices off each other. Just to give a little clarity there, Please continue, sir.

Jon Lopez: 19:30

And ironically, that deal, john, that we worked on, our actions, opened up a floodgate for guys on Avestor right, because now we're talking about higher press, higher splits. We didn't get on that specific deal. But if we decided to hop on board on the new one, we can get that if we raise an X dollar amount. But earlier this year a few more, a few guys started approaching us and they were like hey, we want to get into real estate, we like what you're doing. We feel like Niners Down is doing something different and having a source to deal exactly themselves, even though we do source deals ourselves. So we started coaching people over Zoom. We weren't asking for any money whatsoever at that time. We're just like let's help them build their knowledge so that way we could eventually partner up with them and we could raise capital that much more efficiently for a certain deal.

Jon Lopez: 20:27

Right, one student turned into two, three to four. Next thing you know, we're up to five or six. One of the students asked myself and Anthony, what are you guys going to do when you have 20 students? And we were like we wouldn't take it on, because that means we're on Zoom for 20 hours and we still have a business to run with Niners Down. But it was that question that got us thinking we're already doing it. Why don't we just record the content, have it all laid out like videos, have quizzes and everything? And we partnered up with one of my best friends from the Bay Area. His name is Adrian and he's developed courses for several HR departments on the Bay Area, like Alameda County. Sheriff is one of them.

Johnny Nelson: 21:11

So he's got expertise in that. He's got some expertise. You're already doing it. You were leveraging a network, found someone, which is why you grow networks. But also lots of people grow their networks, john, but then they don't tap into the networks, they don't foster those kinds of relationships where, if they need something from John, they can ask John, and you just dump value all over them just everywhere yeah, versus Adrian. And then all of a sudden, this guy. He's got expertise in courses and online and he's done that, which is definitely a skill set and expertise is needed, and you tapped into that and then he came on and it's helping you there, right.

Jon Lopez: 21:41

Yeah, absolutely, and I trusted the guy. He's one of my best friends. I've known him since elementary school. He was my roommate in college. My son is his godson right, but I never connected with him on a professional side of things just yet.

Jon Lopez: 21:58

So we decided to open up a separate company called School of Nine Doors Down and we took on Adrian as a partner, so he has equity share in the company, because we knew, like, as you said, he's bringing something to the table that we have no knowledge experience on, and he developed this beautiful portal. It's, you know, wwwschoolofninodorsdowncom, and we focus strictly on helping others to raise capital, whether they're struggling to raise capital or they're just new to it and just want to learn, kind of like, how to pitch our brand, regardless if you have a deal or not. I think that's something that we've learned coming from the, from the black card program. Right, it's just you're telling your compelling story, because there's a lot of times when I was, I'd meet these people at meetups and there's just like bam, here's the investment summary. The investment summary is great. All these deals that are out there is pretty similar returns nowadays 1.5 X, 2x, multiple, 6 to 8, preff, 12 to 15, our right, everything's the same.

Jon Lopez: 23:02

But what's what separates you? That's holding this been somebody from someone else. For me, if I don't know the person, I'm just hearing a bunch of numbers in my head. I don't hear anything compelling that makes me want to like learn more about that person. So you know which?

Johnny Nelson: 23:17

is, which is basically how everybody sells. We think we're an elite, we think we're analytical and we're gonna perform due diligence and that's how we make decisions all like like robots and Truth be told folks. That's not how, like, 99% of everyone makes a real decision. You know, and you know, john and I are both, you know, business people and can analyze things, but also, like he just shared, if they're just, you know, spitting numbers at someone or he's getting numbers, someone's getting numbers spit at him or something spitting numbers, I'm sorry, then it just there's nothing. There's no emotional bonding, there's nothing compelling to nothing to grab on and remember and move forward with that yeah, or that that person.

Jon Lopez: 23:55

Yeah. So we teach that to our students, we teach your you, we teach the power of the pitch deck, because I am, you know, for those that are not fund managers, I don't think they truly realize the power of the pitch deck. Because of pitch deck, eventually you start to know it so well that you're telling it in story form. You could be, you could be having dinner or you could be at a baseball game and a question will always come up what do you do for a living? And then, when someone asks me that, all I simply say is oh, I partner up with people to acquire apartments and sell storages and I leave it at that. I just I, just so that way you want to leave like a question for that person to want to learn more about you, because eventually you're gonna be pitching yourself, your story, your brand.

Jon Lopez: 24:39

And when you do announce a deal, it's just icing on the cake. People will understand your buy box, people understand your territory, what you buy into a type of asset class and because you've narrowed down your buy box, now you've widened up your pool Within that buy box rather than hey, you know what I'm, I'm gonna learn how to do. You know the flipping, the wholesaling, airbnb, real estate and you know what? Maybe, maybe my fund is gonna do art as well. Right, you start to. You start to. You start to what's the word I'm looking for, start to water yourself down and then, with each category, deload.

Johnny Nelson: 25:16

Deloaded. Yeah, exactly, you don't. People don't know what you're doing. It's confusing. They don't know what. There's nothing to bite on to you, you know. You're just like no amalgamation of a bunch of stuff. And again, like you know whether it's you know same, same kind of thing If there's no personality behind it. But also if the personality is so like you know, you don't even know what you're you. Basically it comes down to a confused mind and a confused purpose. Like there's. There's no one that I know that I've met anywhere in the investing space. It is so broad and is really compelling investors to come in, you know, unless there's some kind of really, really strong, I'm, you know, binding thread with all those things, you know, maybe it's like, oh, social good or some other thing, but typically people want to hear a story. It's got to be simple, it's got to be compelling, there has to be some depth to it that that resonates, because Anthony, or Anthony and John or who they are. And then people like, hey, that's something I want to be part of.

Jon Lopez: 26:09

Yeah, what 100%? And it, just, it, just it makes a world of difference. I think with a lot of. You know, there's a lot of great multi-family schools that are out there, man, like, like they're. I could name a whole bunch just here in the West Coast alone. Brilliant, but there was still. There was still that problem that I was seeing. It was like they can't get to the closing line because for the simple fact that couldn't bring money to the table. You could be the best acquisitions guy, you could be the best underwriting guy, but you still got to bring money to the, to the, to the closing table. You got EMD, you know, is involved now and you have to close it and it would it pain me to see a handful of people losing out on their EMD Because they couldn't, they weren't, they weren't attracting the capital the way that that we started see ourselves Developing. I guess we started developing a style.

Johnny Nelson: 26:59

I guess, yeah, another way of saying that is Pain. It pained you to see them not attract the capital they were capable of, right like they were absolutely capable, and that's what you're teaching right, you're actually enabling them to attract the capital you know is in their circle.

Johnny Nelson: 27:15

You know they can attract, you know they are right, the proper stewards. But they're just, you know, coming from a sales background, and again, who you are and who your team is. That is, that is this deciding factor, that's the differentiating factor in how you can do it versus another team and other individual. And then you're, you're, you're enabling, you're sharing that knowledge, sharing those inside tricks and tricks of the trade to to help them get to that next level, the other piece of the business that if it's not there, it's like no gas in the car, in the tank in the car. Hey, cars that go anywhere, that beautiful car Exactly, everyone likes it beautiful model, is it going anywhere? That's ultimately what people need this thing to do is go somewhere.

Jon Lopez: 27:56

Yeah, exactly, and and there's just people who's done, who've done what you and I've been doing for much longer than we have. We're not reinventing the wheel, we're just taking Well, we'll just take Coca-Cola, for example. We see their ads on billboards on TV, on race cars and whatnot. Every time we see an ad it doesn't mean that we're going to go out and buy a two liter of Coke, right, but that brand recognition is there. So that way, hey, if I go into a gas station, I'm kind of thirsty and even though I don't really drink soda as much, but I'm feeling for a Cola, I'm going to sway towards Coca-Cola because I see that brand always.

Jon Lopez: 28:32

And we want our students to start to think that way. And you don't want people to hear your name just when you have a deal that you announce. Right, and some people, you may not have a deal for 12, 18 months, but from that 12 to 18 months you could still send up educational emails, you could still put out content on social media, things that will provide value to others, but in return, you're now developing your brand, you're developing your story. So that way, when you actually do announce a deal or two on a Vester, those investors are going to be more prone to invest because they understand your story, they know your buy box, they know your territories that you're in, they know your specific asset classes. And so we teach our students to kind of narrow down that bottleneck. Rather than a shotgun approach hey, let's take a 308 bolt action and we're going to go straight, directly into it. So we take on that approach with our students.

Johnny Nelson: 29:31

Just to kind of go into the last part of the show here. But just to say one comment on top of that I think this could actually be applicable to not just real estate. It's not. I think it's absolutely broad. You can broaden it beyond real estate, whether it's you're trying to kick off a, you know, maybe a cleaning business, or you have a brand new idea, kind of like almost you know, burtering on like vendor capital or some kind of brand new startup, and there's all kinds of startup funding and resources there. But what John is saying and pitching and selling and offering and actually offering a service to the community, the people that he knows is that of you know defining your brand and then getting very specific and then showing people that value there. So, yes, he, he and I are real estate guys and the people we know most. Probably most of the audience is also real estate, but it could be it could attach on other things as well here.

Jon Lopez: 30:17

So definitely business agnostic, I guess, is a good, a good description, that's a brilliant summary.

Johnny Nelson: 30:23

I love that, that two word phrase, business agnostic. For the final part here, john, take us out here with how do people get in contact and just see whether it's a deal that you want to or deals that they want to be on the list or kind of just know more about, or if they are in that other space of needing branding, pitching, type of capital raising? I guess that's kind of what you're doing to help there. What are some ways? What's the best ways to reach out and connect?

Jon Lopez: 30:51

Yeah, you know, I think my email is probably the best, best way to get hold of me. It's Jlopaz J-L-O-P-E-Z at NinetoresDowncom. And then we have two websites. So if there's one on the acquisition side of things and you want to partner up with us on deals, that's going to be on NinetoresDowncom, n-i-n-e-d-o-r-s-d-o-w-ncom. But for those that want to learn and learn the art of like attracting and raising capital, that's when we have School of Ninetores Down. You can find us at wwwschoolofninetoresdowncom. And the nine just spelled out.

Johnny Nelson: 31:27

Amazing man, amazing. Well, anyway, folks, thanks for listening to another episode. This has been an exciting episode with John and discussing what he's done. To just a recap, he started out in the real estate space well, actually started out in the retail space, then into real estate and then discovered a new niche even within that and he's still doing the other thing. So this is the life of an entrepreneur, a real businessman and his team, and just excited to share and be part of, to observe those kinds of stories. So thank you for listening to another episode of Investing Stuff you Should Know, and until next time. Thank you, hey John, hey Johnnie, hey Johnnie.