Carolina Commercial Real Estate Connection

Real Estate Gains and Parenting Pains: Kurt Buchert's Multifaceted Mission

• Tony Johnson • Season 2 • Episode 37

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Ever wondered how to strike the perfect balance between being a disciplinarian and letting your children find their own path? Kurt Buchert, a seasoned real estate expert from Florida with roots in New Orleans, shares his unique parenting philosophy with us. Hear his engaging stories about nurturing his children’s interests, like his son's journey from casual sports to a budding passion for football. Kurt emphasizes the importance of a stress-free environment and the evolving nature of parenting, especially when raising the first child.

Kurt's insights don’t stop at parenting; he brings a wealth of knowledge from his extensive real estate career. Listen as he recounts navigating the tumultuous aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the 2008 financial crisis, seizing unique opportunities in the New Orleans market. From humorous anecdotes about undervalued properties to strategic investment tips, Kurt offers a compelling narrative on capitalizing on market dynamics. We also dive into the evolving landscape of wholesaling and the potential impact of rising interest rates on the multifamily sector.

As if that weren’t enough, Kurt takes us on his personal fitness journey, from running his first ultra marathon to discovering an unexpected love for pickleball. Despite the challenges of inadequate training for a 50k race, he found surprising benefits in daily pickleball sessions. Beyond personal fitness, Kurt and his family launched a successful Pilates studio in Florida, blending passion with entrepreneurship. Tune in for an inspiring episode filled with wisdom on parenting, real estate strategies, and the rewarding intersection of fitness and business.

Connect with Kurt
kurtbuc@gmail.com

Tony Johnson is a Commercial General Contractor.  Timeless Properties Construction Co. has been in business since 2007.  He does all things commercial.  Developing, Building, Upfits, and Renovations for Retail, Office, Industrial, and Multi-family.  Timeless Properties is licensed in North and South Carolina.  Contact them today for your construction needs.  www.timelesspropertiescc.com
info@timelesspropertiescc.com

Discovering his passion for construction when entering the industry over 20 years ago, Tony obtained his general contractor license and created Timeless Properties Construction Co in 2007. The company has performed an Proving that grit and passion can overcome any challenge, Timeless Properties Construction Co navigated the worst real estate collapse in our lifetimes under his leadership. Coming out of the recession Tony made sure he kept a strong focus on building relationships, quality work, honesty, and integrity.  With over 160 million on construction volume to date Timeless Properties Construction Co has grown to an area leader of Commercial Construction in eastern North Carolina.

Tony launched Timeless Capital Investments LLC in 2022.  This company was formed to create an avenue for partners to invest alongside Tony Johnson on commercial development and value add of existing commercial buildings.  Tony aims to help fellow investors take part in profitable projects that they otherwise would not feel comfortable undertaking.  By leveraging his construction and development knowledge Tony offers his partners a leg up against less experienced investors.  

To learn more about Tony Johnson and Timeless visit us at:
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Tony Johnson:

Welcome to another episode of Carolina Commercial Real Estate Connection. Today we have Kurt Bichart with us. Kurt is out of Florida, grew up in New Orleans, louisiana has been in the real estate industry for over 10 years, buying, holding and renting out properties in mainly the New Orleans area. Kurt, thanks so much for joining us.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah no problem. Tony, Glad to be here.

Tony Johnson:

Yes, sir. So Kurt is a very funny guy on social media, which is what drew me to Kurt originally. He's always got great comments, so he's been a great person for me to follow on social media and get to know. He's in a group, gobundance. I'm in and I'm happy to have him on on the show today. Um, one thing, uh, kurt, I I really just wanted to bring up, just because it's awesome to me. I'm a family guy. Um, we both have, uh, four children and, um, you know, a boy and three girls. We both share that. What has been the biggest challenge for you about parenting, or the biggest adjustment that you're making, or the biggest joy you have with it?

Kurt Buchert:

I think one of the challenges of parenting is to know when to be, you know, the disciplinarian versus, you know letting your kids kind of roam and discover them, discover things themselves and make their own mistakes. And that is always a fine line to walk down because you don't want to be that guy where your kids look back and you know dad never let us do anything and he super strict and we were scared of him and all that kind of stuff. But you also don't want I also don't want to be one of those like wimpy dads where I'm like you know we're crying with them every day over something ridiculous and make them too sensitive because you need to be a little bit tough in this world. So that's kind of a fine line to walk. I feel like with children I'm learning my ways there.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, you know, that's one of the big things with me. Is I really, as my kids are now getting older, one of the biggest, I would say, things that I pushed my kids as they were younger and now getting older, I don't know that was the smartest things. I pushed my kids as they were younger and now getting older, I don't know that was the smartest things. I pushed my kids and forced them like you have to play a sport, you have to play a sport, you have to play something, you have to do something. You're not just going to sit around, you know, do nothing. And so my oldest son, the 16th, he's like I hate soccer because you forced me to do soccer for so long. Well, I wanted you to do something. You know, do you have your kids play sports or activities that you bring them into or let them make their own choices? How do you do that?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, so that's a. That's a. That's a great story right there, because my, my son's nine and about a year and a half ago, from age seven and a half under you know, I'd occasionally ask him like hey, you want, want to go throw football or do something with football or whatever, and he never had any desire, he never wanted to. Like I like LSU football and sometimes I watch, used to watch the Saints, and you know I used to ask him if he wanted to watch it with me.

Kurt Buchert:

He never had any desire, like zero desire, like adamantly did not want to do anything with football and then about a year and a half ago, I think, he started playing football at his school with his friends during recess and in the last like year or so the kid has gotten like completely obsessed with football. Like he knows every single player in the NFL. He knows where they went to college, their position, he knows everything. He knows like Super Bowl history, like he watches like random games on YouTube from like years ago, like all these highlights, and he wants to play it all the time. He wants to go throw it in the throw it in the street in front of our house all the time. And I never pushed him ever, just kind of like casually asked him a few times when he was young and I was like okay, I guess he's not interested in that. So that was kind of like an epiphany, like okay, well, you don't have to pressure these kids, they're going to figure it out on their own.

Kurt Buchert:

But I will say like I like to introduce them to things. Like you know, we live in Florida, so, like you know, I've given them tennis lessons. I go out there and I love pickleball. So we, you, we, you know I bring them out there to hit pick a ball with me and you know I usually make a bet with them. Like, hey, if you can hit it, if we hit it a hundred times over the net in inbounds in a row, you know I'll go buy ice cream or something like that. So I kind of like incorporate things like that, but I don't like put pressure on my kids any of that stuff. I don't think that's a good idea.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, I don't think that's a good idea. Yeah, I would say for my experience it was not a good idea. They more rebel when you're pushing, pushing, pushing and so obviously with my younger kids now. So the first kid is always the learning curve they have like the worst. I'll bring it if you're the oldest kid in the family because it's like you're the learning curve for the parents, the first kid going through figuring out when you do everything wrong with the first kid, then for the rest of the kids you do much better.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, I try to look at it mathematically the chances of my kids, or most of our kids, but especially my kids of being professional athletes. It's so low that for me it would just be kind of idiotic to like put pressure on them to do something like that. And then you know, like most of us, I want our kids to, I want my kids to be involved in sport, just because you know being healthy being around teams, you know the social interaction of it is great. So I think all those things are important, yeah getting out of the house like not sitting around playing video games and watching tv that's exactly my premise.

Tony Johnson:

I just want the kids out doing something, right? My, yeah, it's. It's hard. These days the kids get sucked in on electronics and you know it's. It's so bad for their brain and mind just to sit there on the electronics yeah, I mean, that's one thing I'm a stickler about.

Kurt Buchert:

I will literally throw my kids out. You know it's so bad for their brain and mind just to sit there on the electronics. Yeah, I mean, that's one thing I'm a stickler about. I will literally throw my kids out of the house and lock the door. So I will literally say go outside, leave, do not come back. I mean I've had it where, like my son knocks on the door like Daddy, I gotta go to the bathroom, and I say, no, go in in the forest, because we have a forest behind our backyard and you just go in the forest like he doesn't need. He doesn't need to come inside to go to the bathroom that's amazing, my daughter, my daughter's, I probably let them in.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, that's awesome, all right. So uh, let's dive in a little bit. Uh, go back in time and I know it's 10 plus years, but I think you said you had one, was your first property purchased. You said 21 years ago. How long ago was the first?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, 2003 was my first purchase. I was 25, 26 years old. I bought a duplex and that was my first real estate investment. Everybody told me not to do it because it was kind of a little sketchy neighborhood. It was a gentrifying neighborhood but it was a little sketchy. Caught a guy doing crack in the backyard the first night. I stayed there and I thought he was stealing my car. I pulled a gun on him and that was my first night of real estate investing. Was I pulled a gun on somebody?

Tony Johnson:

So that was fun and that was a duplex, you said and actually I still.

Kurt Buchert:

I still own that property to this day so it's you know, I've had it rented for 21 years and it's it's been great, a great investment property so did you have at that age?

Tony Johnson:

I mean, did you just have your buddies move in and pay you rent and or how was? How were you laying that out?

Kurt Buchert:

So I rented out one unit to a couple a young couple and then I lived in the. There was there were both two bedroom units and then I lived on the other side by myself and then I used the spare bedroom as my office. Looking back, I probably should have like, yeah, I probably should have had a buddy of mine move into one of my, to my spare bedroom, and then I would have literally made money owning real estate.

Kurt Buchert:

But like you know, the other, the other couple, the other unit paid my mortgage and a little bit more, um, so I was just out of pocket like insurance and taxes and stuff. So I was like cool, like I was like like I'm a man, I'm, I'm like living for free, basically, and, um, I need to do this again. So I just started doing it again and again, and again, and again.

Tony Johnson:

So you kind of walk me through again and again and again how, what was the timeline? How did you kind of build up? Did it start to snowball at a certain point?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, I mean I was a financial advisor out of college and I read a lot of books on, you know, investing and real estate investing, things like that. So I knew kind of like the basics of it, but I just didn't really have any capital or access to capital. So the you know, the first property you know I kind of had to like beg, borrow, steal to get that property out of my belt. And then there was another house that went for sale like down the block, I don't know two years later, and I just didn't have the money for it. But I had one of my best friends had some money, he was a really frugal guy. So we went in together we did a renovation and then we rented it out. It was another duplex and it worked out well. And then and then he I don't think he was that comfortable with doing that stuff back then and like he was more of a corporate guy, so I don't know we kept that for maybe four or five years and then we sold it.

Kurt Buchert:

But I was buying other properties after that. But what was funny is years later then he kind of changed his tune and then we started buying a lot of stuff together. So you know, you have to. I kind of learned a lesson with partners you have to have people that are like willing and able to kind of get dirty and have that entrepreneurial spirit, because if you know you're doing this with like kind of corporate people they're they're not going to feel that comfortable doing real estate, because real estate you got to kind of get dirty, sometimes A lot of times.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, a lot of times. I agree with that. So this, this gentleman that you've and you've continued to partner, do you? Are you still in?

Kurt Buchert:

business yeah, we.

Tony Johnson:

How do you guys match up with each other? Do you ever do any? I'm very big into like cognitive surveys and understanding people's strengths and weaknesses, and you know as far as partnerships go to make sure you jive. Do you have different attributes that one of you thrives at and the other one you know can use to help with?

Kurt Buchert:

So typically, I mean when I was actually living in New Orleans at the time so I was always like the on the ground guy and, you know, kind of the get dirty guy, and I was a little bit more aggressive, a little bit more of a loose cannon and then he was kind of the guy doing a lot of the back office stuff because he actually lived in Texas. He lives in Texas and he was doing a lot of the the back office stuff. He was a licensed real estate agent so he would do the buying and selling, he would find all the deals and he was like awesome at that and finding the deals and then I would handle all the renovations. Like you know, I was basically subcontracting everything out myself and I would manage the tenants and deal with the leases and show the apartments and all that kind of stuff. You know, now that I've moved to Florida and we're not really doing many projects anymore, we hired like a leasing agent that does our leasing in New Orleans and then I still manage the properties and then he manages like buying and selling stuff being an agent, and then he kind of does more of the numbers and spreadsheets and all that kind of stuff and I'm comfortable with spreadsheets and all that type of stuff.

Kurt Buchert:

That's just not like you know. That doesn't like fill my cup. Really. I don't like love sitting there and staring at spreadsheets. I can, I mean, I have the ability to. It's not like it's Greek to me, but I just don't love doing it. He's a little bit more analytical like that.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, just what you're telling me is, yeah, you can. Those are the different attributes that would somebody be strengthening and, you know, gives you joy and fits exactly what you do, so you thrive at it too. Yeah, you can do the spreadsheets, but it it drains drains all your energy, you don't get energy from it. It's kind of like, yeah, it drains, drains all your energy, you don't get energy from it.

Kurt Buchert:

It's kind of like, oh, who wants to do all this, right, yeah, yeah, I mean I, you know 46 now and like, yeah, that's definitely something you'll learn. If you don't like doing it, you're not going to be good at it and it's it's not going to go well, like you need to kind of enjoy doing it.

Tony Johnson:

What you're doing does not give you energy and give you the motivation and drive to continue doing it and make you happy, then you're not doing the right thing for yourself so and you probably aren't thriving and you'd be better better off doing something else that gives you that energy, right exactly?

Kurt Buchert:

like I like, I like this stuff. He would. He would hate it, he would never go on a podcast, he would just never do it in years so so walk me, because you got in early, so we're right around the same age.

Tony Johnson:

So I was also kind of going and starting things up around 2006, 2007. And there was so much happening and it sounds like you'd gotten in before. That was on the tail end of the dot-com bust, right when you're coming in. And then you've got this build-up what, how was your impact? And how did, how did you guys handle the rise up and then the crash? What? What was your positioning during that?

Kurt Buchert:

so luckily or unlike you know, actually luckily we um, in summer of you know, august 2005, new or Orleans got hit by Katrina, so nationwide that was actually when real estate was still rising a lot till 2007. So we got hit by Katrina, which obviously was a catastrophic event. So we never saw that like huge bubble, like a lot of the rest of the country got, because we had got hit by Katrina a few years before. So when the bubble, the real estate bubble, burst in 2008, that affected us a little bit, but not really much. It actually was great for our business because people just didn't want to have anything to do with real estate. So we were able to buy a lot of properties for really cheap prices.

Kurt Buchert:

There's a funny story there was a property listed for $10,000. And there were so many deals out there that we just had a joke, my business partner and I. We had a joke between us like, hey, let's try to buy a property for $1,000. So we offered $1,000 for this property and it was. You know, it had flooded at Katrina, had a lot of damage, but it had a structure to it. It'd be, you know, it could have renovated and everything. So we made the offer for a thousand. They countered at $2,500 and we said no, and we didn't buy it. So we wouldn't buy it for $2,500. And I think, like I don't know, three years after that it's in the same condition. It sold for like $90,000.

Tony Johnson:

That's how like, that's how much people just did not.

Kurt Buchert:

they had so much inventory in new Orleans of like flooded, messed up properties and that's how much people did not want to deal with real estate back then that we could have got a property for $2,500. And we said no.

Tony Johnson:

That is amazing. Yeah, I can completely remember how, now that you've gone and reminded me of that, you know, just looking at all the X's on all the houses that were just like, yep, this one's fucked, this one's fucked, you know, this is just a mess. So, yeah, there was probably an abundance and then it's just, you know, the mentality is to, oh my gosh, stay away, this is going to be a disaster forever. To where you guys are like, okay, now let's go figure out what we can do to get this stuff as cheap as possible and go dive in, which is still. You know, there's still there. Still there's some hesitancy there, right, and it's like also, how much available capital you have. You could, obviously, if you've got enough capital, you go buy up. It was like what can you really? How much can you afford, right? Yeah, so we, basically we had a hybrid strategy.

Kurt Buchert:

There were some properties we were buying, renovating and then just holding as long-term rental property for the cashflow because that was kind of important to us. But you know you needed capital. So there's a lot of properties we would just sell and we did a lot of like the whole tailing where we would buy from a wholesaler and then we would sell it on the MLS and there was an arbitrage there and a lot of times it was some big, was some big time arbitrage. And there's early days, cause that was kind of the earlier days of wholesaling wholesalers, I don't think a lot of times they knew what the properties were worth. So we made, we had some really good deals on that, on that strategy. Nowadays, like a lot of these wholesalers, I don't even think the deals are that good, to be honest with you.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, these wholesalers service they call me. I'm like I wouldn't. This isn't even a deal. Yeah, why are you even bringing this to me?

Kurt Buchert:

yeah, I mean we haven't bought anything in a while, just you know in years, just because of that. I mean we just don't really see the deals out there anymore.

Tony Johnson:

So yeah, that's why there's a disconnect, I feel like, with the younger investors that are coming in, to the people that have been through this for a while. When you see the market and it goes up and comes down and then the younger generations come in, they just have seen up, up, up, because it's been just steadily rising now for, I mean, unprecedented amount of time, almost 14 years. So what do you feel like there's going to be some type of some event that could come up that could cause a major dip in the market, whether it's multifamily, residential, commercial. Yeah, I mean, we're seeing it already multifamily.

Kurt Buchert:

You know a lot of the. Since the rates have gone up, a lot of these deals that were marginal deals are kind of blown up. So there are. There is some stress in the multifamily Since the rates have gone up. A lot of these deals that were marginal deals are kind of blown up. So there is some stress in the multifamily world out there, especially a lot of these syndication deals.

Kurt Buchert:

Residential man, I don't know. I mean here where I live now we had such a huge run up from 2020 to 2023 that we're now seeing probably 15 percent correction from the high which was probably late 2022, early 2023. We've seen probably a 10 to 15 percent correction from that. But I don't know if residential is going to get hit that hard because there's so many people with low interest rate loans and they're probably not going to sell, so there's not going to be like an oversupply of inventory. But commercial is probably a different story. I mean we've seen it in office and multifamily They've gotten hit pretty hard. So there'll probably be some deals there in the next six months to a year.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, and the thing is when you say that with multifamily, you're seeing the, the amount of new product coming online is also unprecedented. I hire a lot of these. You know we haven't seen the amount of inventory coming online since the eighties. So with the excess new inventory coming on, some of this older product that seems to be at a deal pricing right now. I don't even know if it's a deal, because when you have the new inventory coming on and then they're having to give specials and cut their rates, people are way more amped to rent a new pro or to rent a new product than these older ones. I don't care how you renovate them, it'd be?

Kurt Buchert:

yeah, totally. I mean a new product is going to be much more attractive. But you know some of these new places like there's some places around here that have gone up in the last few years that are like like where my in-laws live, I'm like man, I would live there, like that's nice. They have like an awesome gym, like their pool is like country club type pool, yeah, hot tub, I mean just really nice place to live and porches and everything. And you know some of these.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, some of these dated properties in the 70s and 80s with, you know, eight foot ceilings and a little bit more depressing. Yeah, I don't know how they're going to do, but I mean, I think a lot of it goes back to location. You know, if you're in a, you know if I invest in a passive deal, you know I'm looking for demographic tailwinds. You know a place people want to move to and then in that area, is it a good neighborhood that's people always want to live in, rather than a marginal neighborhood, because we've seen that last few years too. Like you know, some of these, some of these cities, in most cities in the country just seen a big crime increase. So some of these areas that were gentrifying before 2020 have kind of turned the other way and have gotten pretty bad. I mean, we saw it. We've seen it in New Orleans.

Tony Johnson:

So walk me through. So just so people who are looking and thinking about you know, investing passively in someone's deal. I know you kind of touched on a high level. What all do you look for in investing in someone and what they're offering?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, I mean, my first bit of advice would be to be extremely picky. So, you know, I would just say no. Just your default status should be no, I'm not investing in this, and then work your way up from there. So if your default status is no, then you know. You know, if it's a great operator, they've been doing it for a long time. They have an awesome, you know, rate of success.

Kurt Buchert:

You know, maybe you talk to some of their investors, maybe you get to see how their portal works, cause, like some of these guys, just not great with the technology. So you want to make sure their portal works well and it's updated all the time. You know, you want to make sure they you know they have a history of paying their, their preferred return. You know whether they pay that monthly or quarterly or whatever. You know, some of these guys do these deals and they just they pay for a couple of months and they just don't pay for two years and whatever, you know something. Something came up. So, yeah, you just, I mean, you know, and a lot of times you're betting on the jockey, not the horse. So you know, you want to make sure that the operator you're with, first of all. They know how to operate a deal, they know how to run real estate, they know how to manage a property, because there's a lot of guys on the internet that are very good at selling the sizzles and they're just probably not great operators.

Kurt Buchert:

If they have the skillset to be all over social media selling know, selling these, selling these deals, they're probably not going to have the skillset to manage a property. So they either they either need to be partnered with somebody who's a great operator, or they need to be like that unicorn that can also operate a property, which is which is rare, cause I mean operating a property that's tough work.

Kurt Buchert:

Nobody's going to be there with you. You, you high-fiving you when you have to evict somebody, or somebody's squatting or somebody's not paying rent or you got to deal with somebody's dog crapping all over the property. I mean just stuff like that. You need somebody in there that's hardcore and can get after and run a tight ship.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, that's critical and I would 100 is and I would a hundred percent agree with that. It's. It's almost more the operator and the team that's handling the deal, then the deals. Those people are the ones that they either can make or break the deal. So everybody's got, you know, a rosy picture of what can happen, but you know, when rubber meets the road, who's going to actually implement that plan and bring it to fruition and make it happen. So it's all betting on that person being able to fulfill what they're saying and to speak to what you were saying, it's having a track record and you're looking at track record. It's not how great you can sell yourself on the Internet, right, it's. Do you have a track record of success, track record in the industry? You know and know exactly what you're doing, or are you just great on YouTube? And typically, if you're great on YouTube, that's what you've been working on. It's being great on YouTube, not being great at uh properties.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah.

Kurt Buchert:

You might just like you know, seeing yourself on video, which you know, ironically we're having a zoom chat right now. But I mean you get what I'm saying and then I guess, so get what I'm saying. And then also, like there's something to be said for you know, I'm invested in a few deals with a guy out of San Antonio and he just buys in San Antonio and whatever you think about San Antonio's market I mean it's Texas but he's a local San Antonio guy, born and raised there, and he does all his deals there. So he knows that market better than anybody else. He knows every subcontractor, he knows if something goes wrong, he knows exactly who to call to fix it in that market, whereas if you got a guy that lives in Dallas and investing in Atlanta, they might not have those connections there. That's not to say that it might not be a good deal and it might not work out well. It might be a great deal, but it's going to be a little bit harder for that person in Dallas to run that deal in Atlanta or wherever.

Tony Johnson:

It's a much heavier lift when you know if it's, let's say, a market that's in good shape, then typically those trades or the people, the good subcontractors they're tied up with the people that they already have relationships with. So you're getting the bottom of the barrel, calling whoever you can get stuff done, and nor is it crappy work done, or people aren't finishing things or you're getting ripped off. Those are the type of things that you run in when you're just going to these random areas. Even though the area might be thriving, you don't have relationships that take years to build in those markets.

Kurt Buchert:

Exactly. I mean, that's what was great when I was living in New Orleans. I could, you know, something happened. I could get in my truck and be at the property in five minutes and figure it out. I mean that, you know, I can still get in my car and be there in four and a half hours, but it's, you know, a different business now for me. I, you know, have to rely on the, you know, my subs and the handyman and the people that I've built a relationship with over time. But it's, it's nice to get your face out there and see these people face to face and and get your eyes on property too every once in a while.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, and I think it speaks volumes when we're talking about what you've done and this is you're a testament to this is a marathon process. Real estate investing this isn't. You don't just get into real estate for two years and all of a sudden you'd raise all this money, become, get this massive balance sheet, and if you're doing all this in two years and it's kind of, to a certain extent, irresponsible, we're taking people's money. You've just been in this for two years and you don't know enough. You haven't been in this long enough to be responsible to take these people's money. In my opinion, I think it's good Take your time, use your own money, experience it your own way. Slowly start to bring in investors once you have a track record that you can prove and show them that you've done it with your own money, your own skin in the game.

Kurt Buchert:

Right, yeah, exactly, now that's. That's huge. That is huge. I've, I've, I've done some private, I've borrowed from private lenders before on my deals and I love doing that because it's just kind of like you're just dealing with one person and then I've, you know, I've never, never, not paid anyone back ever, like that would kill me if I never, if I missed the payment, or wherever I would go eat dog food before I did that.

Kurt Buchert:

But yeah, there are some guys out there that you know I've experienced it Like they're they did not do what they said and they, you know, stiffed their investors and you know, see them on, see them on social media, still going on vacations and doing their thing, and I'm like man, how could you do that? Like, if I owed somebody money, you know I would not be going on vacation. I would be out there getting it done and getting these people paid somehow, or getting some type of payment plan or promising them that I'm going to pay them back eventually, no matter what. So you kind of learn who are the people out there that live up to their word and all that kind of stuff.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, so definitely you know to speak to your point on that too you know these. Whenever you're investing, passing a deal, this is all you know money that is just set aside, that you are willing to lose a hundred percent of this money. You don't ever want to invest anything in these deals that you can't. And I know people say real estate's not going to go down to zero. Yeah, it cannot go. Real estate doesn't have to go down to zero for you to lose all your money.

Kurt Buchert:

Right, you can lose, right. So that's yeah, that's a huge thing that people have to learn. Just, it's not like the property value is going down to zero. The property, like the debt, could change and you could get zeroed out like you could, you know, lose 20 of the runners and you could get zeroed out. It's not like the property value is going from 10 million to zero. You can get zeroed out in a lot of ways. So that is something to be very concerned about. If I go buy a house in cash for $100,000, yeah, I'm probably not going to get zeroed out unless I get sued or something and just some crazy thing or whatever. But burn down without insurance or something like that but thing or whatever. But, um, you know, burned down without insurance or something like that, but you still have the land value but, in some of these passive deals you can get zeroed out, man.

Kurt Buchert:

Like it happens, it's happened to me, so I know it can happen.

Tony Johnson:

So, yeah, absolutely Be cautious. Well, let's dive into a little of the other things you do, cause you've got a lot of extracurricular stuff. You do a lot of pickleball, you're uh running, you're doing a lot of uh stuff like that. So how did you get into the running and the pickleball and and is uh, you know what are you doing with that coming up this year?

Kurt Buchert:

yeah, so. So running wise, um, I actually don't even like to run that much, but I I've kind of just made it one of those things where, like I'll sign up for a race and then just kind of that makes me train for it, whether I like it or not. So you know, last year I did the leadville marathon in leadville, colorado, which one which is probably the toughest marathon in the country because it's just the altitude you're running, between 10 000 and 13,000 feet entire time. Um, and then last year it was June 17th and it was a blizzard. So the entire race was a blizzard and like my hands were like freezing the whole time. So, like a lot of the times I had to, I had to literally run with my hands in my mouth, like warming up my hands, cause I, I just I don't own hand like jogging gloves, so I don't even like I didn't think about that, um.

Kurt Buchert:

So, yeah, I finished that. I was very proud of doing that. And then, um, and then two months ago, I did my first ultra marathon, which was a 50k, which is a, you know, 30 mile race. That was my first ultra and that was here in Florida. Like, actually, it was actually through the forest in my backyard there's a, there's a 50 K through there race. I'm actually wearing the shirt right now and I don't know they probably had 200 runners and that was a really cool race. That was really tough. But I actually don't even love. I love it after the fact, like I love like feeling the feeling of accomplishment and doing it, and but I don't like love the training routine of it.

Tony Johnson:

So how long did you train for the uh 50 K?

Kurt Buchert:

I did not train nearly enough, like it was super hard, and I actually never ran more than I think. One day I did like a 12-mile run, what? Yeah, it was kind of stupid Like I did not. 30 miles.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, I only ran like a 12-mile but I was kind of. I still had some like inertia from my marathon last year and then I had been playing you know two hours of pickleball every day year and then I had been playing you know two hours of pickleball every day so I was in good aerobic shape. But you know, running 30 miles is a different deal. So that was I was the last few miles.

Tony Johnson:

I was in bad shape now, pickleball is a fun game I've only. I mean I play in my driveway with my kids. But I went to like a little saturday morning pickle pickup game and there was a bunch of old people and I was like, oh, I'm going to work these old people. I mean, I got on the court and just got destroyed. The first game I didn't score a point and they were like you got pickled. I was like what the hell does this mean?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, Some of these old people are good. So yeah, I started playing last, like May, so almost a year now. You know, I grew up.

Kurt Buchert:

I grew up a tennis kid so I had, like that, that racket background. Yeah, um, my grandpa was a tennis coach so, yeah, I just I never even heard of it before like 2023. So I started playing last may and I just kind of got obsessed with it. So I play at least five days a week. You know when play it's at least two hours a day. Um, I played a lot of tournaments. So you know, I started playing in tournaments a few months back so got some gold medals under my belt and, you know, played a couple of tournaments where there were some awesome people and got my butt kicked. But you know, I'm getting better and I love it. I just really like it. It's a lot of fun. I prefer doubles, but I like singles too. So, yeah, I just really like playing and this whole social aspect too. I've met a lot of friends through it. We call each other pickleball degenerates and we like my crew of people, we like to play a lot and play each other and things like that. So it's fun.

Tony Johnson:

That's crew of people we like to play a lot and play each other and things like that, so it's fun. It's amazing. Yeah, I mean it is such an addictive, fun sport you you wouldn't believe I go playing tennis. It is just like the goofiest game on the planet. But it's extremely addictive to where, like yeah, it's literally within like 15 minutes, you're like, oh, this is the funnest thing I've ever done in my life yeah it, it's fun.

Kurt Buchert:

And then, like, as you get more kind of advanced into it you know, now I'm kind of getting into like the 4-5, playing against some 4-5-5-0s. I think I'm like I'd say maybe I'm a 4-5 or right below that it becomes like a chess match, like there's just like a lot of strategy that goes into it. You know, a lot of ball placement, like where, why am I going to put, why am I going to hit this ball this way to this person versus that way A lot of chess going into it when you get into the more advanced parts of it, which is really cool as well. So it's not only a physical sport, it can be a mental sport as well.

Tony Johnson:

Oh man, that's amazing. I love it All right. One other quick thing I wanted to touch on, so it kind of goes along with what I do. So you know we had talked a bit, your wife had been, you know, teaching Pilates and loved Pilates, and you guys opened a Pilates studio in Florida and it's done so well you're opening another one. Could you kind of talk us through that journey and how that's gone for your family?

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, so my wife has background in fitness.

Kurt Buchert:

She's always been big into fitness and she worked at. She worked at a. She was a pure bar instructor for seven years back in New Orleans and then her sister, who's 15 years younger than her, worked at Orange Theory for a bunch of years. I wanted to move out here to Florida to be closer to us and just kind of wanted to move out of Utah and move to Florida. So I was like, well, y'all need to do a fitness studio. And my wife really didn't want to do it because she, my wife, she wanted to be a stay at home mom. So I was doing that, Yada, yada. But she decided like, yeah, that's a good idea. So they, they started talking, they came up with an idea and, yeah, we just ran with it. They found a place, they started the business, we built it out and it's been going really really well. They worked really really hard. They're a great team, it's a great studio, They've built a great community and they've just kind of been a victim of their own success. I mean, their classes are booked all the time, They've added a bunch of classes and they're just doing so well.

Kurt Buchert:

That was like y'all need to do a second one. And then my wife didn't even want to do that so but now that we like the second ones on the drawing board, my wife's talking like I want a third one now. So that's kind of funny. That's amazing. I think she's really getting into it and she really enjoys it. She might not tell you she does, but I think she really does. She finds a big sense of accomplishment over it. But it's been great because real estate's kind of been. The margins for my business have tightened a lot in the last year and a half with insurance, property taxes and the rental softening. So it's been. It's actually been a godsend for us, for our family and everything.

Tony Johnson:

So it's been nice, yeah, and and really the. The biggest boom we're seeing in, you know, the commercial space, as far as what I'm seeing is the wellness and the fitness side of the retail sides of business. So that's where all the growth is. That's where all the growth is. That's where everyone you know, ever since COVID, when people were kind of stuck in people love that environment to be able to go, have the camaraderie of working out together.

Tony Johnson:

The class atmosphere of exercise is really great, you know, and keeps people motivated and keeps them engaged and keeps them going, Not like a general gym where you just come and go and there's a lot of drop off. You know that that class, just like what you're saying with the pickleball, you found the friendship and you build the friendship. It's the same with the class environment for working out. And so to your wife's testament. Obviously she's taking where she's saying she wants a third one. She's taken, you know her, from teaching the bar to now understanding how running a business, obviously turning that and thriving in business, because she's probably not near teaching, near as much Can't teach it all three of them, right. So she's gone from the teaching aspect to now thriving and loving to run business.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, and she had never. She had never run a business before. I mean she she had worked before. She was in sales, so she was great with people. She's got an incredible personality, so she's always been incredible with people. Um, so she has that skill set, but running a business she had never done before. But yeah, she's jumped right in and she's she's been great. I thought I was gonna deal more with like talking to the contractors and all that type of stuff, but she's doing almost all that. I just kind of butt in whenever they ask me.

Tony Johnson:

Oh awesome which is less and less often Right. Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, you know, I think that the studio atmosphere of fitness I feel like it has really it still has a long roadway of going up. So I think there's a lot of opportunity. I think you guys are right in a great niche right now and have a lot of opportunity. So, you know, keep us informed and let us know if that turns into a franchise model as you grow and maybe you compete with your bar down the road.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, we'll see. You never know. I mean, I don't know if we want to. You know, we're huge on having our lifestyle rather than rather than like working a hundred hours a week. So I don't know if that's the future, but you never know. So we'll see.

Tony Johnson:

Well, awesome, well, thank you so much for joining us, man, it's been a pleasure talking to you and getting to know you a bit and find out about your family life, and I just sincerely appreciate you taking the time to sit and chat with us.

Kurt Buchert:

Yeah, tony, it was great man Appreciate it.

Tony Johnson:

Thanks so much, man. Hopefully we'll get you on another time later down the road. Sir. Thanks, so much, sounds good. Thank you, have a great day.