Be Intentional With Your Time
On this episode of Next Level American Dream, Abigail is joined by Melissa Johnson. Melissa is a seasoned single-family investor, hosts a couple of podcasts geared toward women, and is now a Real Estate Investor Coach. Today, Melissa talked about how important time delegation is in Real Estate and how much time freedom she has acquired through being an entrepreneur.
Key Topics
Coaching Tips/Strategies
Time Freedom & Delegation
Her 2 Podcasts
Connect with Melissa Johnson:
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS
business, learning, real estate, coaching, people, American Dream, absolutely, podcast, awesome, entrepreneur, Melissa, read, building, processes, wholesaling, freedom, biggest, multifamily, website, kids
SPEAKERS
Abigail Thomson, Melissa Johnson
Abigail Thomson 00:01
Welcome to the Next Level American Dream Podcast brought to you by Thomson Multifamily Group. Your hosts, Abigail and Sean, will discuss how you can take your American Dream to the next level through real estate investing, business practices, and personal development. Join us as we share our experiences as a father daughter duo who are trying to accomplish our goal of financial freedom. We hope you learn more about how to define and achieve your American Dream. Here's another episode of Next Level American Dream. Welcome to the Next Level American Dream Podcast. We have a wonderful guest for you today, but first, please make sure you go subscribe if you have not already. We also love getting your feedback from likes, comments, ratings, and reviews. Today, I'm having a conversation with Melissa Johnson. Melissa is a seasoned single-family investor who hosts a couple of podcasts geared towards women and is now a real estate investor coach. Today, Melissa talked about how important time delegation is in real estate and her business, and how much time freedom she has acquired through being an entrepreneur. If you found any value from today's episode, please share it with a friend and help us grow. For more information on our sponsor, visit: thomsonmultifamilygroup.com to start taking your American Dream to the next level through passive investing. Hi, Melissa, how are you? Welcome on!
Melissa Johnson 01:21
I'm good. Thanks for having me!
Abigail Thomson 01:24
Absolutely. I'm so excited to have you here. A couple of weeks ago, I did an interview with you for your podcast, and I thought it'd be an amazing idea to have you on because I love your story and your background. Speaking of which, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what you're doing in your business and life?
Melissa Johnson 01:41
Yeah, sure! So, I'm Melissa Johnson. I've been a real estate investor for 18 years in San Antonio, Texas. I have five kids, four girls and a boy. I started out doing mostly flips and then doing some owner financing, buying some rental properties that gradually turned into doing more wholesaling. So, building a wholesaling core of the business out. And then from that just now I'm getting into coaching now and I'm into some software stuff. So, I've been pretty active in the real estate industry for a while.
Abigail Thomson 02:15
Yes, that's amazing. There's a lot for us to touch on into. So, you said you did flips, now you're in a wholesaling did kind of touched a lot of different types of purchasing and investing in real estate. Is this specifically single family for your business?
Melissa Johnson 02:32
Yes, I primarily deal with just single family. I flipped a few duplexes, but primarily single family.
Abigail Thomson 02:40
Okay, awesome. What got you into real estate investing in the first place?
Melissa Johnson 02:43
You know, it's funny, like I had no real estate background or any idea what real estate investing was, it just wasn't on my radar at all. I thought and I had forgotten about this until recently, somebody had asked me that question. And actually, there was a point where I thought it would be cool to be a real that was like a really long time ago, and I kind of just forgot about that. It just seems so glamorous, you know, driving around showing properties all day. But yeah, didn't get into that. But my father-in-law at the time, he was flipping houses he had started out as a contractor was working for this investor in town. So, he kind of mentored him. And then just seeing like, the success he was having. And it really it was like the lifestyle, it wasn't like the money or anything like that. It was, for me, the eye opener was the lifestyle. I was like, you know, here he's got this RV that he's going around in and just kind of taking off whenever and got all these rental properties and, you know, just able to do a lot with the grandkids and stuff. And it just seemed like such a great life. And, you know, when you sit in a cubicle day after day, you know, I was grateful to have that job. But there was no freedom there. There was nowhere to go It was a really was a glass ceiling there for me. I mean, there was no opportunity for growth or anything. So learning about that and learning about the type of lifestyle that comes with it was very motivating. And really what got me into it.
Abigail Thomson 04:09
Yeah, I love that answer. Because a lot of times I hear similar, similar trends and what other people say it's about the freedom. It's about the time that you're given when you're an entrepreneur that really kind of drives you and big part of that is getting to spend time with your children. You want us to have five kids. And right before our interview your son came in to give you a book report. Can you tell us about what you're doing with your son?
Melissa Johnson 04:36
Yes! This little man of mine, just he's the only boy so he's a little special, but not that the girls aren't they are. But he this this child. He's different. He's different a little bit from the other ones and he's very hungry. And I mean, like as a boy, yes, like physically hungry. He eats a lot but he's also like mentally hungry about learning things. And I've noticed this in him. It's like a real passion. I think for him like he really if he wants to know about something, he will research it and figure it out. He's nine, by the way. So I think that it's important to say that because he is so young, but he has this awareness of like, if I don't know something, I'm going to figure it out, or I'm going to research it, I'm going to find out, like, how to do this, how to be the best at everything that I do, you know, he, he had never played soccer in his life, just in his example. And he went on YouTube, and he was watching all these videos, and learning about soccer and all this stuff and practicing and then finally came to me, he's like, I think I want to play soccer, you know, so I put them in soccer, and he just kills it, you know, and then he wanted to play hockey. So he like focused on that and learn about the game and practice, practice, practice. So he's very tenacious. So I saw that as an opportunity to really play into that strength with him. And so he's always asking me for money, right? It's always like, can I have money for Xbox, or robotics or, you know, whatever, all the video games stuff that he's into, so I was thinking about it. And it's like, you know, I could pay him to do some chores, but is that really going to be the best thing for him? Right, and knowing his hunger for learning, and so I thought, I'm just going to have him read some books, like he needs to read the summer anyway. And so something that won't Rob his brain, but something that will teach him about life, things that he can use in the future. And so I did what every good parent does, and I bought him Rich Dad, Poor Dad started out with Absolutely. He read that book from cover to cover, like in a week, he was into it. And then yeah, so I had him, you know, and I was at first I was having him like, talk to me about each chapter as he finished it, because I wanted to make sure he wasn't just like, reading it, just like reading the words, but not really taking in what it was saying that we were having discussions every time he would finish a chapter. And then he read so much over this weekend, I said, Why don't you just write down for me what you learned about the book, you know, kind of go through each chapter again, like visit each chapter. And so he brought me this little book report, with every chapter broken down with like, just a little quick summary of each thing that he that he learned. So he gets 50 bucks, every book that he reads, wow, it's a report on I thought that was more than fair. It was very highly motivating. I read Rich Dad Poor Dad a million times, for 50 bucks.
Abigail Thomson 07:36
That's fantastic. It's a fantastic book. And it's something that got me into real estate as well. So it's really awesome that he's reading it at nine. That's incredible.
Melissa Johnson 07:45
Yeah, you know, it's like, he might not retain all of it. But once you're charged with that knowledge, you know, I feel like you don't forget it, it's sitting in there somewhere. And so something will come up, and that he might pull that information out at the right moment. And it would be really helpful for him.
Abigail Thomson 08:01
I think it's really powerful. Also, my dad did this with me, is having discussions about the book and kind of talking to you about it, because that opens up an opportunity for him at such a young age to have discussions about money and the future and what he wants for his life, not just what do you want to be when you grow up kind of question that most kids are answering at that age, which I think is really, really powerful and incredible that you're doing. And that's awesome. Thank you on that Sunday writing. So I was like, I have to bring this up dinner is incredible. I can't believe he read the whole thing. I was like, that looks kind of fat. I don't know, you're going to be able to get through that. But it's a pretty hefty chapter book for a nine year old, at least I feel like,
Melissa Johnson 08:47
Yeah, I know. I didn't realize I feel like when I read it, it was a lot skinnier. But I think this version has like a study guide and stuff in it to where you can actually take notes in there and everything. I don't think the one I had had that. I swear the one I have is like that thick and his.
Abigail Thomson 09:02
It feels it feels thinner, I guess is you also have bigger hands and a little bit larger human. I also noticed you have a community Facebook group. I'm not sure exactly. But it's a moms in real estate. And I think that's really awesome. So can you tell us a little bit more about that and how that came to be and things like that?
Melissa Johnson 09:25
Yeah, so that's it's a little podcast that I do with three other female friends of mine. We're all very close. We've known each other for many years, and I've been kind of on our journeys, you know, side by side doing different things, but still always friends. So I think that's a really powerful. It's been a really great, powerful thing, I think for women, because we're all in real estate. We're all moms, we've all got these different things going on. And we've got four pillars that we talk about. We talk about mental health, money, marriage, and Oh my god, I always forget motherhood, how can I, that's my pillar. We kind of all you know, we're all kind of we were all good at all of that, I think. But some of us are better than others. So we just kind of took a piece. So my pieces motherhood, because I've got the most kids, I think, but it's been really great. It's been really, it's supportive, you know, it's just conversation, like, let's just talk about what's going on being a mom, and what are some of the challenges that we're facing, being a mother and being in real estate, or being, you know, with your marriage, you know, just like your relationships are so important. And so having a place to really talk about those things with no judgment, and just sharing, I think it's just really, really powerful for women to hear.
Abigail Thomson 10:42
I really like that a lot. I, when I first got into real estate, I felt like I was in such a boys club. And I've slowly started to become more and more part of other communities that are way more female based. And it is empowering, and really inspiring. And it gets me motivated to do the things that I need to do. And I end up meeting connections like you that are just 18 years of experience ahead of me that I can kind of lean on and mentor with. And so I think that's really awesome that you're doing that, especially for women, we can get kind of in our own heads. And entrepreneurship can feel very isolating. So that's nice that we start having those conversations and reaching out for support, because you can really, really suck yourself into a hole if you don't do that.
Melissa Johnson 11:31
For sure. And I think it's just you know, we're all at different points of the journey. And so you know, like, regardless, if you're just starting out, or if you've been doing it for a while, it's nice to have people to lean on that have been through it, you know, they can help you out and to say, Hey, you know, this, I went through that this is how I handled it, you know, not saying that one way is the right way or the wrong way, but just being able to talk it through and get the benefit of that experience.
Abigail Thomson 11:57
Here's a perspective that I have maybe if you don't have it. Yeah, that's really, really amazing. You also touched on that you are getting into coaching. So what is your platform? What are you doing in that space?
Melissa Johnson 12:11
Yes, so I started that last year, it was a COVID project, kind of like my podcast, it started that last year, too. But it was something that I just felt really called to do. And that moment, I feel like there was a lot of people just reaching out and just needing help. And I found myself, you know, on a lot of calls with people just talking, just trying to help, you know, and then, you know, it kind of hit me one day like, would it be awesome, like, if that's all I had to do all day was just talk to people about their business and kind of figure out like, what's going on? What's working for you? what's not working? How can I help? How can I show you, you know what worked for me. And that could be a benefit to somebody else. And so that kind of led into deciding to want to coach so I built a website and kajabi, which I was really proud of, because I'm only building I've built a few websites now I'm getting better and faster at it now, thanks to good website editors. But yeah, it's been it's been really good. I've had the pleasure of getting to coach many different women all over the country at all different points in their journey, some just starting out some who've actually been in this business for a while that just need a little extra help. And they want to scale and grow a little bit and guiding them through that process. It's been great.
Abigail Thomson 13:33
So are you coaching on single family practices and things like flipping, wholesaling, Business, Business Operations type things?
Melissa Johnson 13:41
Yeah, a lot of that kind of stuff. I really like to start with building a strategy for people because I feel like that's a missing piece. For a lot of people. It's just, you know, they're doing things, but they're doing things without a strategy or a plan, really. And secondly, kind of stripping that back, taking it back down to the studs, I guess, you know, for those who already have a business, it's like, okay, you know, these things are broken, you don't have these processes in place. Or maybe you need help hiring or you need to learn how to delegate or, you know, you don't have systems and processes documented at all, just really digging into the fundamentals of your business first, and then taking it to a place where now we can move more into like education specifically into your strategy what you need.
Abigail Thomson 14:26
Yeah, absolutely. It's always starting about your foundation. If you have no systems and processes, you're, you can't delegate or why hire out things because there's you would have to be teaching that person and training them so heavily that you wouldn't even be able to get your job done. So I think that's really important that you go straight to the studs, like you said, and kind of fix what could be flawed and build up your house again.
Melissa Johnson 14:52
It definitely helps you spot those inefficiencies to. Absolutely you don't have that stuff documented and things aren't. You're doing stuff but You're not doing it in an efficient way, once you start documenting a lot of times that helps you see like, oh, there's actually an easier way to do this, or there's an automation for that now, right, you know, or something. So I think that's important to not only implement those, but to evaluate them on a regular basis too.
Abigail Thomson 15:16
Absolutely. So I think what's really interesting is that you kind of look at efficiencies. And I'm curious as to what are some of the things that you have taken away from your 18 years of experience in the space of being a woman and being in real estate, as well as seeing a lot of other people kind of tackle this business and being a really heavy influence or almost or thought leader, if you will, in the space? What are some of the biggest things that you feel like you've learned and have adjusted for or seen growth in your business and in your life, from all of these things that you've experienced?
Melissa Johnson 15:55
The biggest lesson, I think, for me was, or the, I guess, the biggest, like needle mover, for me was delegation and automation. Yeah, and I like to stress that because, you know, as entrepreneurs, we are wearing a lot of hats A lot of times, and we feel like no one can do it as good as us. And, you know, like, we need to be in control of everything. And, you know, I guess that's okay, to a certain point. But that is not a scalable way to run a business, you will become the bottleneck in your business, you won't be able to grow, because you can't let things go in order to grow, you've got to let things go. And you know, and there has to be a process for that it has to be done the right way, you have to have those systems and processes documented, you have to understand what your vision is, what your values are, all that's in alignment, and that you're bringing people into your team that are in alignment with all of those things, that they understand how to work through the system and the process that communications clear that they are in the right seat, that they have all the tools that they need to do the job that you're setting them up for success and not failure. And once you can do all that, you can start to delegate those pieces of your business off so that you can get to that higher level versus sitting down here. And just like busting your tail, you know, 24 seven, because you think you've got to do everything, you'll never get your freedom that way. So that was the biggest lesson I learned because I went years wearing many, many hats in the business. You know, it was just my husband at the time. And I and, you know, you think about this business, right? How many moving parts there are in is two people doing everything. It's ridiculous. Like, it's a wonder we survived as long as we did. But once that decision was made to hire a team and to start delegating, offloading some of the stuff, that's when real growth started happening.
Abigail Thomson 17:43
Yeah, I completely agree. When we started adding people to our team to help us with some tasks that were mapped out and processed, and were easy, or, and we were able to grow exponentially. It was insane, seeing how much delegation and how much having those systems and processes in place, just skyrocket our business because we were, we were three people. And it was overwhelming. We were working 24 seven, and at the time, I was also a student. So it was like, insane. And I also learned a very important lesson of delegation. So that's really awesome. That that was like your biggest takeaway, because I feel like that is very similar to my experience, also. Yeah, that was huge. And then finding opportunities for automation. If you don't, if you're not at that point where you can scale up for hiring people at least find ways to automate what you're doing. Absolutely. There's so many programs out there that help with that. And if you find the right CRMs, and websites and things like that, it can really be beneficial, like so, on top of that, what are some of the biggest benefits? We talked about a little bit of them earlier, when we first had our did my first question, but what are some of the benefits you've seen in being an entrepreneur and kind of scaling your business to where you are now and moving into newer and bigger projects?
Melissa Johnson 19:08
Benefits of being in... there's so many, you know, I think the first one is just having freedom, you know, and it's, it's not just financial freedom, it's like time freedom, which to me is almost more important, like I hate and I and I've talked to enough entrepreneurs now to see a pattern with this, like, we don't like to be in a box for anything. I can't stand that I don't, I need to be free to, you know, mess around over here then mess around with some stuff over here. And you know, it's all it seems a little scattered, but it's really not it's actually pretty intentional because I'm in the same space. But what I found to be a huge benefit of this is that I can do multiple I can have all these different things that I'm doing within the same space. You know, I can be a coach and I can be a house flipper and I can have long term investments, and I can be a CMO of a software company. These are all things I choose to do. And they bring me multiple streams of revenue, which is the key also to being, you know, a successful entrepreneur, you can just have all your money in one pot. I think that like learning those things, and having the ability to do those things is really, it's fulfilling. It's been really fulfilling for me, I think, you know, and having time with my kids, you know, I take my kids to school every day, I pick them up every day. I don't have to miss anything that they're doing, because I can build my schedule around my life instead of the other way around.
Abigail Thomson 20:43
Yeah, absolutely. That flexibility. And, like you keep saying time, freedom is really important. And I think a lot of entrepreneurs lives, which is why they think many of them become entrepreneurs in the first place. It also sounds like to me that you are the visionary of your company, you're kind of the one with all the ideas, and you go, Okay, go make it happen now.
Melissa Johnson 21:05
Yeah, I'm definitely the idea person, I've got a million of them. I say that all the time, like you need an idea, talk to me, because, you know, I can come up with 100 ideas for things. Now, carrying that through to implementation is another thing. And that's why I need people around me that are good implementers. But that's, I think, an important thing to realize, you know about yourself as an entrepreneur, think, like, look within and just understand that, you know, if you're in that visionary seats, you have to surround yourself with doers with the implementers. To make those dreams come to fruition.
Abigail Thomson 21:41
I think that's really important. You talked about putting other people in your business in the right seat. But it's also a really big part of putting yourself in the right seat, you have to make sure you're the one, this is your business, this is your life, you have to make sure you're the one doing, what feels right to you and what you're good at as well. Because then that will also help your business be way more successful and grow. I think that's important to point out.
Melissa Johnson 22:07
You see, your business is a reflection of you, right?
Abigail Thomson 22:11
Absolutely. If it's a mess, you know that up here is a mess too.
Melissa Johnson 22:16
It will show up in your business for sure.
Abigail Thomson 22:18
Exactly, which I think is really awesome that you kind of see that big picture when they think that visionaries are very much easily placed into coaching positions. So that's really awesome that you started doing that, because I think that's a good fit for you sounds like at least especially from the past couple of conversations I've had with you. So my last question for you. And we touched on this a couple times. But I want to do a little bit more of like, future focus in this question. What does the American Dream mean to you, specifically?
Melissa Johnson 22:50
Oh, that's a great question. What is the American Dream mean? To me, I think it would mean for me success and how I define success. So, the way I define success is to be able to do what I want, when I want with whoever I want. And so for me, that's the American Dream. And I totally feel like I'm living that right now.
Abigail Thomson 23:11
Do you have anything set up for yourself in the future, we're coming up, outside of the things that maybe we talked about, or in addition to the things that we talked about, that are helping you kind of take that to a whole new level of having multiple streams of income and potentially becoming more of a passive income streams or scaling your business larger, or whatever it may be?
Melissa Johnson 23:36
Actually, I have a passion project. It's sort of real estate, but sort of not. So it's kind of interesting, but I think we talked about this before, maybe a little bit, my son plays hockey. And we're in San Antonio, and we don't have a lot of ice here have one sheet of ice for us, for a million people. And it's ridiculous. So something that I am working on is working with a partner on building a synthetic ice training facility. Awesome. It's kind of a business. It's well it is a business, but it also fulfills a need for, you know, a space for kids to go to just have training on ice training. And so the synthetic ice thing is really cool because like you don't have to have a Zamboni you don't have to keep it cold. You can skate on it. Yeah, it's a special type of plastic. And they come and they set everything up for you the boards and everything. And it's really cool. But, you know, that came from a need that we have, you know, my son doesn't get a lot of ice time. It's very expensive here. And so a lot of these other kids need he's a goalie. So that's another thing too, they need a lot of extra work. And they're kind of always left behind. So having a space that's specifically for these kids to be able to work and improve their game. So I just feel like that's such a passion project for me because it's not only helping my other kids and his friends to do more But also to have another stream of revenue. That's fun. That's not something different, right?
Abigail Thomson 25:06
That's really awesome. And I think that shows your true entrepreneur core is seeing a need in the world and actually taking the steps to resolve it, especially for your own kids. I think that's really awesome. along with all the other things that you're doing in single family coaching, your podcast, everything because you have two podcasts, right? Yeah, to two podcasts. Yeah, I struggle with keeping up my one. Ah, leading into that, where are some places that people can find you if they want to get in touch with you for coaching or listen to your podcast or anything like that? What are your contact links?
Melissa Johnson 25:51
The easiest one would just be the website. It's themelissajohnson.com -- So on the website at the bottom of the first page or on my social links, so YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, all that. And then also my podcast is up there, all the information about coaching is up there. And then just a little about me. So, if you want to hear other podcasts that I've been on other shows, and things all that is on the website, as well. So that's where you can find me and you can send email through there also.
Abigail Thomson 26:19
Awesome. That's fantastic. Well, thank you so much, Melissa! I think this is an incredible interview, you had a lot of value to share with our audience. And of course, I really enjoyed talking to you again. And this has been a really awesome connection that I'm enjoying having in you. So I'm excited to continue our relationship future. And thank you so much for coming on. It was a pleasure!
Melissa Johnson 26:40
Thank you. I appreciate you!
Abigail Thomson 26:42
Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level American Dream. If you would like to learn more about what we talked about today, want to contact the team directly, or are interested in passively investing and being a part of our deal room, head over to our website at www.thomsonmultifamilygroup.com -- Before you go, please leave a review! Your comments help us create more episodes for you to enjoy.