Welcome And Emma’s Big Pivot

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Well, hello there. I've got Emma Hanover here with me today. Hello, Emma. Hi, how are you? Good, thank you. You're one of my um earlier guests now on the show that I've titled Money in the Relationships with Money. So thank you so much for putting your hand up and um wanting to share your story.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

No, this is fine. You're my first podcast. So exciting for me.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

This is cool. This is cool. I've done lots of different episodes, but now I've sort of landed on this topic and it's been resonating with people. A lot of people are curious to learn about other people's relationship with money because then it makes them stop and think about their own relationship with money and how that affected the rest of their life. So Emma, tell me about who you are, where you're at at the moment, and then we'll just go from there.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

So I am Emma, obviously. Currently I'm a property trader full-time and well, I'm a full-time property trader. I'm also a property consultant. So I teach people how to take property trading and turn it into a scalable business. And I founded Funthouse. So that's what I'm currently doing. Before I got into this, I founded a line marking business with my husband, and we grew that to one of the largest in the North Island, like one of the largest privately owned in the North Island, and sold that. And before that, I was a high school dropout.

SPEAKER_01 1:41

Wait, hold on a second. So right now you you've got your knowledge and hands and properties, and before that, you had an amazing business that you've sold, but how did you get there? And then you were a school dropout. Like, how do you go from the school dropout to owning a multi-million dollar business?

SPEAKER_00 2:00

I like to say school's not for everyone. So I have dyslexia and ADHD, which really did mean that school was not for me. So I left school at 16 and started working. And I did I worked on a bakery, culinary arts training, which in layman's terms means I trained to be a chef. Yeah, and then I had my third child, and it was just doing like working in hospitality was not it was not the go, split shifts and things like that. So actually I left that, stayed, was a stay-at-home mum for a little while, and then I cleaned motels, which people kind of look down on. But honestly, I loved it. It was it was quick. I made good money doing it, and I got to be home with my kids at the end of the day. But while I was doing that, my husband was working in a line marking company, and we had he had a health scare basically, and we thought he was gonna lose his job. So we decided to start our own. And we packed up our family and we moved from New Plymouth to Auckland to start our business, just thinking we'd make enough money to support ourselves, basically. Like super not at all ambitious goals. Yeah, yeah. But we very, very quickly became well known for fixing other people's mistakes. And from that we started doing like niche work and we just were outperforming basically all our competitors on our workmanship side. And then when it came to our customer service side, which was where I took over, we just we were providing customer service that no one else in our industry was, so people would take days to get back for quotes and they just were not very customer friendly. Um so it made me stand out like like crazy, and we just grew so quickly.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

Do you think it was due to your working in hospitality before?

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Uh maybe, but I honestly I think a lot of it's just like common sense, right? Like I would treat my clients the way that I would want to be treated. Like if I go to someone to get a price for something, I want a response within a day, two at the most. And some people will take a week or two. And I see that now working with lots of other trades, it happens all the time. And I'm just if someone takes two weeks to get me a quote, they're not gonna get the job. Yeah, like there's there's no reason to take two weeks to get a quote to someone unless you're like quoting an entire build. And so, you know, I would just in running the business, everything I would do would be like, what would I want to see from a you know, from business, and I would then provide that. So it came very naturally. So I don't know if it comes from hospitality, but just more being customer-centric, yeah, and and wanting to provide the service that I would want to receive.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

Yeah, I love that because that's one thing I really struggle with, and it's not just a New Zealand thing. I feel like it's anywhere you go. You're frozen. Yeah, there you go. There we go. Yeah, I was just saying that I do struggle with that, and it's not just in New Zealand, but in a lot of other places as well, that you can suddenly go from you know, experiencing really cool service to something that suddenly isn't, and you know the difference, and you go, you know, I don't like that. I don't want to be treated that way. But it always puzzles me why. Why, why do people not see the absolute, as you said, it's common sense, it's the basics, and somehow yet it's the missing piece in a lot of businesses. But what I want to do with you, Emma, is I just want to rewind a little bit back to your high school days and maybe a bit earlier. What's your first earliest memory of money and how did you feel about that? We didn't have any.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

That was I grew up very, very, very

Growing Up Poor And Hustling Early

SPEAKER_00 6:04

poor, like very poor, living off the food banks and things like that. So we never had money. So my earliest memories are just feeling like there was none there, which then made me want to make it. So I actually started as very entrepreneurial.

SPEAKER_01 6:21

I was about to say, you're a hustler.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

I was a hustler. I was knocking on the neighbors' doors, I was mowing lawns, doing gardening, anything I could do. I had a paper out, like anything I could do to make money. I was like 11 years old, trying to trying to make some money wherever I could. And that was it was all very much the same again, just being very friendly and polite and wanting to provide a service to my neighbours.

SPEAKER_01 6:50

Yeah, I love that. And when you got that money, what did you do with that money?

SPEAKER_00 6:55

Oh, a lot of it went to my family, to be honest. You're gonna make me cry.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

So, did you have a big family, like lots of siblings and stuff?

SPEAKER_00 7:05

No, no, just just one one sister and my mum. We just, you know, single mum on the DPB. I I don't know much about what she knows about money, but yeah, there was just kind of none of it. I think she mismanaged finances, and so we never had anything.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

So Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

So you guys never talked about money, right? No, no, we never talked about money. I just knew there was none there.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Wow. So that's interesting, isn't it? Like I a lot of people I'm talking to, you know, if we go back 20 years, 30 years, I feel like there were a lot of people that were doing it really, really hard back then as well in New Zealand.

SPEAKER_00 7:42

Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think there always has been.

SPEAKER_01 7:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

I think there still are as well. To be honest, there's a lot still struggling, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:50

Yeah, and that's what I see as well, is that some people manage to break away from that cycle. And then others that haven't, I'm trying to work out why they haven't, what stopped them from going, hey, I don't want this life. There is a different way. But you did that. I did that. Yeah. So where is where is mom now? Where does she live with you? Does she live with you in Auckland?

SPEAKER_00 8:19

Do not why do people not do that more? Yes. And I think what what I think is that they don't get shown that they can. So they don't understand that there are other options, they don't get taught how to achieve those like goals or even how how to set goals, like just from the minimum of being able to set a goal and how to do that. I think it's just not taught. It's it's not taught in schools, and then it's not taught from family because family doesn't know how to do it either. So they don't have anyone to look to.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

Yeah. You've mentioned you've got kids. I do.

SPEAKER_00 8:58

How many kids do you have? Three. I have three kids, yeah. How old are they?

SPEAKER_01 9:02

They are 18, 16, and 15. Okay.

Teaching Kids Budgeting And Earning

SPEAKER_01 9:06

And how did you teach them? Well, for one, actually, hold on a second, you look way too young. I have an 18-year-old. I was a young mum. Okay. I was like, wait, that's not it's not mathing in my head right now. No, you're not the first. Okay. But did you teach your kids about money? What did you do differently?

SPEAKER_00 9:29

Um, I have I have a great example actually. I've always talked to my children about money. And yesterday my kids were each given $500 and sent to the mall to buy any clothing that they will need for the next six months. And so, and to teach them how to manage money, because I don't believe in giving my children money, they have to earn anything they have, and then I've given them $500 to say, look, if you need shoes, get shoes. If you need clothes, get clothes, if you need skincare, get skincare. It's up to you to manage that budget and buy what you need. And that teaches them one, how to plan, and two, how to manage money. And out of my two kids that went to the mall, one spent $600 and one spent $100. So, you know, two very different children. One spent $400 on one outfit. So but they they earn their own money. So we teach them how to earn money, we teach them how to budget, how to set goals around finances as well. So, for instance, planning a family holiday, we said if you want to go to this location, you have to save a thousand dollars. And that's just so they have spending money, but if they don't save that money, then we don't go on holiday.

SPEAKER_01 10:53

Wow, that's really, really cool. What about like kiwi savers and shares? Do your kids know much about that?

SPEAKER_00 11:00

They have kiwi savers, they don't know much about it. They can see it, but they don't they just know that they can't use it. Yeah, I do talk to my children about shares, and my youngest daughter has shown interest in setting up a shares account and just you know, drip savings into there to grow her her money. Uh at this point it's just interest in in learning more about it, but I don't like to force it upon them because then they don't want to do it.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

Yeah, and that's what I find as well is that when you, as a parent, you try to teach them something, if it comes to forceful, they're not gonna take it in. And it takes So they'll repel and they'll go the other way. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. But just like you, I've got several children, and I find that they all have different money personalities as well, that one can be an absolute spender and the other one will be an absolute saver, and then not really willing to spend any money, but they're still listening. So they're still they're still learning and they're still growing. In terms of your partner, how do you find you and your relationship with your partner in terms of money? Are you guys quite similar or are you different?

SPEAKER_00 12:07

I think

Couples Money Roles That Actually Work

SPEAKER_00 12:09

we've been together for like 22 years, and early on in our relationship, I took on the responsibility of our finances because when we met he had quite a lot of debt, so he wasn't very good with money, and and so I took on that responsibility, and it's kind of just stuck with me. So I manage all of our finances, and he doesn't even know how much is in our bank account.

SPEAKER_02 12:37

I love it.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

But I do discuss all of our finances with him. So like I'll review our share portfolio and I'll tell him like we this is a return that we're getting at the moment, and when I buy properties, I'll sometimes just tell him I've bought a property, but sometimes I discuss it with him and yeah, yeah, so so he gets to weigh in, but he doesn't feel the stress of you know what is happening there.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Yeah. And what I like about couples like you, if you can find each other's strengths and play to that, that's usually the best sort of relationships instead of trying to make the other person understand things that they're just not interested in or they don't like it, and therefore it creates that resistance. Yeah. But you can balance each other, that's just beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 13:25

It's just yin and yang. If we slot into our slots that we naturally like are good at, then it all just comes a lot easier.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah, absolutely. So let's talk about your property portfolios and stuff, if you don't mind. When did you start property flipping or property?

SPEAKER_00 13:43

Just shy of two years ago. Wow. What made you

Property Trading At Scale With A Team

SPEAKER_00 13:46

do that? I've always had a passion for property, like old homes. And when I sold the business, I had decided I was gonna get into property one way or another. I didn't know how. And I reviewed all the all the options. Was I gonna do buy, rent, and renovate? Was I gonna become a real estate agent? You know, flipping was obviously an option, developing was an option, and I just weighed up on my personality and my risk appetite, what kind of appealed to me. And the idea of buying rundown old homes and getting to renovate them appealed to me greatly. Um and two years and 18 properties later, I'm not regretting it. Yeah. But yeah, it's glad I didn't become an agent. The more I work with agents, the more I'm like, oh, I'm glad I didn't do that. Nothing right, nothing against agents. I just think they they have to work so much harder for their money than what people think.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Oh, totally they do.

SPEAKER_00 14:47

So does your husband help you with that? Yeah, so he came on seven months ago, he quit his job, and he came on to work with me, and he he kind of does hybrid role, I'm gonna say, somewhat project managers a little bit, does some hands-on stuff, so he's just a handy guy, so he'll go and do like door handles and you know, fiddly things like that, and run errands, and sometimes he'll just muck in and he loves doing the demo, to be honest. Who doesn't favorite thing? Yeah, can I go in and smash a kitchen up?

SPEAKER_01 15:21

Like I love it, I love it. And do your kids come and help?

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Uh, sometimes if they want to earn some money, well, you know, I'll I'll say to the kids, hey, we're gonna go demo a house, or dad's gonna go do some demo, you guys want to earn some money? And sometimes they say yes, and sometimes they say no. I've got my my daughter is talking about learning how to do it, so that's quite exciting.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

How do you still sell a property for profit in a declining market? Not as easy as it used to be.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

When I'm buying, but when you buy a property is when you make money on it. Like it doesn't matter what you do after if you've overpaid, you're gonna lose money. So for me, buying right is the only way I'm making money. Where I used to have maybe a 200 between my buy and sell, and now I have like a $250,000 spread because if you hold that property for like two or three weeks too long, yeah, you might miss the boat, you know. So it's a lot harder to sell now. But in saying that, it is a buyer's market. There are so many opportunities out there right now, especially for like your buy and hold portfolios. I work with a lot of investors that do buy and hold, and and they're just creaming it right now, like on the opportunities that are there.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

It's funny when I say this to clients, people think that because I'm a mortgage advisor, they think that I'm trying to promote for them to get loans. But I'm like, no, seriously, guys, this is a good time to buy. Really good time.

SPEAKER_00 16:54

It's a really good time to buy. Like, I I've spoken, I speak to a lot of people within within the industry, and everyone is saying, like, they're telling me to do buy and holds, like, you need to go and buy as many buy and holds as you can. And I'm like, I know.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Like so, do you have uh property portfolio now?

SPEAKER_00 17:12

I have one long-term hold, but that's it for now. I am very selective with buy and holds, so I want it to be the right kind, but in all honesty, I don't like having tenants, so don't want rentals. Fair enough. I am I'm looking to move more into commercial space for like the long-term buy and holds.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

Yeah. And you mainly operate in Auckland area? Uh I also operate down in Taranaki. Oh, okay. So, but that's a bit of a distance.

SPEAKER_00 17:42

How do you manage to do that? I have an amazing team down there. Nice. Yeah, so I currently I have two properties that I'm working on down in New Plymouth. I've done half my properties have been down there. And obviously, it's where we used to live, so we know the area really well. And we started there because the buy price was so much lower. Yeah, absolutely. So it was a lot safer to test the waters. Yeah, absolutely. Did you get any coaching done on it? I did get some coaching. I went to a property coach and I learned some things, but I did find the the biggest thing was actually just finding others that were doing it. Yeah. And being able to crowdsource information. To be honest, for me, it's no different than running a business. It's um project management, which is part of what I used to do, admins, sales, client relations, it's it's no different. It's who you know, right? It is oftentimes it's who you know, and the person that you know might know someone. Yeah, which is where crowdsourcing information is so helpful.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

But how do you go from that? Like, you know, we deal with a lot of um women in the industry, or not even in the industry, but like there's a lot of mums that are struggling, right? There's a lot of people that are struggling and they're going, you know, maybe cleaning hotels, working in hospitality, like they're listening to this right now and they go, Yeah, yeah, that sounds way too easy. I can't do this. How do you change that mentality? How do you go? I've done it, you can do it as well. Like, Emma, what can you say to them to show them how you can transform that life?

SPEAKER_00 19:16

I think that people look at what I do and they think they've got to do all the stuff themselves. I have properties that I've stepped foot in twice when I brought it and when I sold it. Because you have a team in place. This can literally be a side hustle. Like I do six projects at a time. It's and it's easy, it's easy for me to say, right, because I'm doing it. But for a for a mum at home that wants to fit within the school, like you know, school hours, this actually is perfect. If you do one property at a time, you can easily do that. You've just got to find the right team.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

Yeah. What about the funding? Because again, I can hear the questions coming through right now as people are listening to this, going, but how do I get the money for it?

SPEAKER_00 20:03

Oh, now that's that's the secret source there, right? Um

Funding Deals With Investors And JVs

SPEAKER_00 20:06

I work with investors. So I when I started, I used my own funds. I don't use my own funds anymore to do this. I only work with investor capital. Um, so this is why I build a platform for it. But finding finding the funds can be difficult. If you've got funds yourself to start with, it makes things a hundred times easier. If you've got a 30% deposit, it's all you need for a home. And then second tier lenders, they don't income test, they test the deal. So if you find a deal and you've got the 30% deposit and your holding costs, then a second tier lender, uh if you've got the right one, will lend on the deal. Yeah, I love it. And that's something people don't understand. I think they think, oh, but the mortgage said that the bank said I'm tapped out, but the second tier lenders don't care.

SPEAKER_01 20:56

Yeah. Yeah. And and often, you know, if if again, if I promote those things, I may sound like a responsible advisor, but we never because I deal a lot with developers, I deal a lot with people that flip. And look, in the past, me and my ex-husband we've flipped 20 properties in one year, so I know what it takes to do all of that. That's why I was so excited to have you here. I was like, Oh, I found someone just as crazy. This is great. I love it. 20 in one year.

SPEAKER_00 21:21

That's my goal.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

Trust me, that destroyed the the marriage now. Okay, and add four children to that as well. Very, very young children. That was not fun. I think I hardly saw him because a lot of the stuff he wanted to do himself as well. And I think that's where you know you can go wrong a little bit when you do want to, but he enjoyed that, he really, really enjoyed it. So, versus I was more like you, I was like stepping in, stepping out. I was I was the funding member where I would find the money for us to do that, but I wasn't really too interested in actually doing the work itself. And I can plaster, I can paint, I can do all sorts of things, like those things don't scare me. But it wasn't my passion. My passion was finding a good deal, negotiating on a good deal, and then finding the money for it. That's where I'm with you.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

That's what I Find fun and then the before and afters. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Love that. And the I like the design side too, to be honest. But yeah, it's I wouldn't do this if I had to get dirty.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

No, not at all. So when I tell people about the second tiers, I often get questions like, Oh, but isn't the interest really high? Oh, but you know, you pay fees. Yeah, but then at the same time, you're still gonna come away, you know, if the numbers are right, if you do but it's the cost of doing business, right?

SPEAKER_00 22:37

It's like it's like anything else, there's a cost to doing business. If I have to borrow from a second tier lender and I spend fifty thousand dollars, but I make 60, why wouldn't I? Like, if I had the money myself, there's still cost to that, there's opportunity costs and using your own money to do it. Like, people can be very short-sighted with that. And I do see it a lot where people are like, Oh, I don't want to borrow the money, I've got all the money there. And I'm like, Cool, why don't you do four at a time?

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Like, I would love to fly up to Auckland and just hang out with you. I think it's effective we can have offline, like just next level. But you're right, you know, a lot of the time people are very short-sighted, and all they see is that, oh, I'm paying someone 50k, but they don't see that, hey, I'm actually making 60k that I didn't have before.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

100%. I mean, I I have fallen into this trap when I first started. I did not want to do JVs, they were the furthest thing from what I wanted to do. And I'm literally in this situation now. I'm like, well, I can't find an angel, so I'm gonna do a JV. And instead of making $150,000, I'm gonna make like $70,000. But you know what? Otherwise, I'd make zero dollars.

SPEAKER_01 23:49

Can you explain what JV is for a listeners?

SPEAKER_00 23:51

I mean, I know, but so JV is a joint venture agreement where I have found the property and I will fund like I will manage the renovation and the onsell of the property, and the funding partner will just fund the deal. And they there's a lot of ways to structure that, but nine times out of ten, the JV partner owns the home and you have a contract together, and then they that way their money is secured. So they fund the entire deal and you manage it and do all the doing part.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:23

And then you get 50% of the profit.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

I love that. And you're right, like in the beginning, you're going, oh, but they're not doing anything and they're getting 50% of it. I'm doing all the hard work, but then actually without them, uh maybe they're the ones that's gonna be anything. Yeah, maybe they're the ones that are bringing the equity or whatever that that needs to happen to cause that deal.

SPEAKER_00 24:40

Yeah, and I think again, it's just like people being short-sighted and going, oh, but they're being greedy and they're taking so much, they're not doing anything. But they're taking all the risk. Yeah and that's what and that's what I you know I appreciate. Some I've had strangers invest, like people come in and JV with me.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

I love it. So let's talk about now your current project. Tell me more about the business that you're building right now, the platform that you've built.

SPEAKER_00 25:10

So Funtouse has been built out of it's something that I wish could have

Building Funthouse And Better Coaching

SPEAKER_00 25:16

been there, but it wasn't. Well, it is, it is now. But being part of property groups, you see people looking for funding all the time. And I was literally, I was sitting in a hotel room, I was away, I was sitting in a hotel room, and I saw a notification come up, someone was looking for money. Literally, 10 minutes later, someone else put up a thing looking for the same amount of money and offering 3% more. And I was like, oh my gosh, there's just got to be a better way. There needs to be like a Tinder for property investors. I was about to say that did you just create Tinder for people? Yeah. So I built the platform. Well, I outsourced it because I do not do tech. I I partnered with a couple of people and they built a landing page. We saw that it was something that people wanted, and then we launched it since launching the platform, which was just to partner operators and investors. We have since branched out into adding a community because we heard people and they were saying, But we want the community. And I a hundred percent I back that because it was the one thing that I really wanted. And then people have been asking me to teach them how do I do what you do? How do I scale and how do I do four properties at once and all of that kind of stuff? So, along with that, we have then started offering consulting services so that people can learn from myself and people like me. So I, you know, I'm very active within property trading, so I've made a lot of close friends that have been doing what I do. And, you know, we all kind of, you know, we all we've all done the coaching, we've worked with different companies, and we didn't like the way that it was offered. So we're offering a more hands-on organic approach, whereas instead of we'll give you a book and we'll tell you read this book and then we'll spend two days with you. We instead say, come and hang out with us and have access to us for a couple of hours a month, and we will help you find the property, we'll help run through the deals on the numbers on those properties, and you know, help you with the project management side if you need, you know, someone to call you up. Because I think the big thing that's missing in coaching is you know going through the actual properties with the people and being like, well, hey, that looks like it's asbestos, you should get that tested, or this here looks like it may be structural, you should get a you know, a builder's report on this, and actually like actively going through the properties with people because going through two or three properties, you don't learn enough.

SPEAKER_01 27:48

No, not at all. And I love what you're doing, I would love to learn more about it. And um, we're gonna drop the link for our listeners in the podcast notes as well. Because I fully agree with you. I feel like when we were starting out as well, you know, my ex went and paid a ridiculous amount of money for the coach coaching program was um the property investor. And yes, he learned a lot, but at the same time, I feel like damn, there was a lot of money. I think it was like 20 grand or something for that particular program. And yeah, sure enough, we made that money back. But I'm like, but there's there should be a better way to do this without costing people an arm and a leg. Yeah. And again, if you if you started and decided that's not for you, then you don't feel like you've burnt yourself too much.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Yeah, it's and it's hard as well. Like, yes, the ticket price is high. I mean, to work with me is very high, but my partners have made hundreds of thousands. Yeah. But you know, we we have literally tears in our in our service where it's like you can just come for two hours and I can review a particular deal for you, versus you can come and spend a year working with me or working with one of my partners and have that consistent access. And I think that's often what's missing as well. And like talking to people who've done different coaching services, it is you get your one to two days and that's it. Yeah. And then it's like, well, what about the questions ongoing? Because normally you do not find a deal in that time. I I've worked with people that have taken a year to find a deal.

SPEAKER_01 29:23

Yeah, absolutely. And especially when it's your first, it's like the first baby, always compare it to my you know, you have no idea what you're doing. It gets easy afterwards. It does.

SPEAKER_00 29:33

It gets it gets less scary and less exciting, actually. The sad thing is, and I was talking to another property investor that I was having coffee with, and we both said the same thing, like losy excitement, which is a little bit sad. Like, I used to get nervous when I would go under contract. I'd like to get the butterflies, oh, this is so exciting. Oh, am I doing the right thing? And now I'm just like, oh, it's another one.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

Yeah. But do you think, knowing as much as I know about you so far in the last 30 minutes, do you think it's your ADHD as well? Yes, I'm not.

SPEAKER_00 30:09

Yeah, I get very bored very easily, which is why this is good for me because it keeps me very busy. Yeah. And it's different things all the time as well. Like, like I'm under contract on my 19th property right now, running due diligence. And there's things in this property that I've never seen before. And so literally every single property I do, I learn something new.

SPEAKER_02 30:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

And I don't know when that will stop, but I feel like it never will.

SPEAKER_01 30:37

No, it it never will. And that actually answers the other question I had in my mind for you that people often ask me, going, well, at some point, surely we'll run out of properties to flip.

unknown 30:48

No.

SPEAKER_00 30:50

No, no. It's people are always neglecting their homes. Like, I know people that have been doing it for 30 years, they have never run out of homes. And I think the other thing is like within property trading, from what I see, is people will trade for a while and then they'll move on to developments. So it's not like Emma's trading now and I'm gonna be trading in 10 years. Like, I'll we'll probably have moved on to a different avenue by that point. I mean, long my long-term goal is to move to Europe and to renovate, you know, 500-year-old castles.

SPEAKER_01 31:27

So you're gonna be one of those on the program.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Oh, yes, no,

Long Game Goals And Europe Dreams

SPEAKER_00 31:31

not on the program, babe. I like legitimately, I want to renovate all across the Mediterranean coast and set up like a chain of Airbnbs. Like, that is that is my long-term goal, and it's absolutely ridiculous. And I probably will not make money, but I will have a lot of fun doing it.

SPEAKER_01 31:49

I love it. You actually answered, like, you keep answering all my questions before I even ask them. Because that would be one of my questions is like, what's your goal now? What because I know people like you, because you're very similar to me as well, where we're like constantly moving, constantly hustling, you know, it's in our blood, and we get bored, and then there's another thing, and the next thing, and and that was gonna be my question: what is your next goal? So this is epic. I love that for you. What made you think that? What made you wake up one day and go, Oh, I want to do that?

SPEAKER_00 32:17

I've always wanted to live in Europe. My whole life, I've wanted to live in Europe, and I've traveled there several times. I mean, these but care are both from Tuscany. But the big one came during COVID. So my husband let it slip that you could buy a house for one euro during this second lockdown. Oh no, and I deep dived on that looking because I was like, what are we even doing here? Like, just let's just go. And it's not that simple. Never, it's never that simple. But I deep dived on it and I was like, oh sweet, I'm not gonna buy one euro house, but I can buy a castle for like 60,000 euro. Like, that's epic. I'm I'm gonna spend four times that renovating it, but that's still cheaper than buying a house in Auckland. Yeah. So I yeah, I started deep diving on that, and my goal of just like moving to London or Paris or whatever changed from that to actually I love the country life. Like I live in a lifestyle block, I don't like being in the city. Why would I not do that in a nice warm place where the people are friendly and the food is delicious and I can chase the sun? Yeah, and you can travel so much easier there. Just jump on a train and go to Vienna, like yeah, yeah. So that became my goal. And like kids are at an age where it's like within like I can see it. Four more years.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

I love it, I love it. So four to five year goal. This is great.

SPEAKER_00 33:55

Yeah, and probably legitimately, like, I don't think I'll move there full-time, I'll probably like travel back and forth, but yeah, yeah, I'm I'm counting it down. I'm just like dreaming of it.

SPEAKER_01 34:07

I love that. Now, a couple of questions I had in my head as you were talking about your projects before, and because you and I we've been through the hard years, but normally people don't talk about the hard stuff, right? And a lot of people see it as a silver bullet. I'm gonna make quick money, I'm gonna be rich, you know. But you and I both know there is no quick money in life, there is no get rich quick, unless I don't know, you sell your feet and then they blow up. I don't know, you had a much PC version than me. But tell me, what was your biggest loss that you had since you've started? If you've experienced one.

SPEAKER_00 34:44

So my whole, my buy and hold, the property that I've kept

Losses Risks And The Real Market

SPEAKER_00 34:47

is my biggest loss. So I overpaid, I overcapitalized, I did double the value in the home and I have huge equity within it, which is why I have kept it. But I would not make the money back if I sold it today. Also because the market is not favorable to that type of house right now. Yeah. So I lost a hundred on paper, I've lost a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Like if I was to sell it, I would take a hundred and fifty thousand dollar loss right now.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

Is that after renovations as well?

SPEAKER_00 35:20

Yeah, that was after all costs, yeah. But that's why I kept it because I have half a million dollars equity within it. Yeah. So it's not all, you know, rainbows and unicorns. I I have one right now that I will be selling at a loss just because again, I took on a property at a high cost going it's gonna be a quick, easy renovation and an easy sell. And I've got it marketed for 200 below the CV and it's still not selling. Wow. So, you know, it it is a tough market right now, and it is definitely not easy money, and it is not for the faint of heart. You can make a lot of money, but you can lose a lot too.

SPEAKER_01 36:03

Yeah, I love that you said that because I feel like a lot of people out there, you know, make this idea very romantic. You know, they romanticize how easy it is to to do the flips to without even doing anything, you know. This ads constantly pop up on Facebook for me that hey, click this button, you know, you can be become a property flipper, renovator, developer, whatever. And you don't have to do anything. We've got a team that will do it all for you. But I feel like people really need to hear this from people like you that have done it. I mean, 2021 hit us quite badly. I think we ended up with like four properties that we couldn't sell and we had to keep, and then we kept losing money on them, and we're like, oh my god, what we're gonna do. So um, so yeah, it definitely does happen, and it's not for the faint-hearted.

SPEAKER_00 36:47

I think you need to even even just doing the work though, as well. Like, in order to do this, I'm buying the worst houses. Like, I feel like 10 years ago, people could buy a house and paint it and sell it for $100,000 more.

SPEAKER_02 37:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:01

But you can't now, especially when you look at, you know, you can go onto homes.com and you can see what I've paid for the home, right? So I've walked at into the end of an open home and heard a buyer saying, well, she paid $500 for it and she probably spent $300,000, so she's gonna sell it for $800. And I'm like, that that math doesn't quite math for me. Like, okay, so my agent's working for free, I've got no holding costs, and I'm just doing this for free. For the society, yeah, yeah. And and I do it. That's the feedback I get all the time was like buy it, like agents are like, oh, well, you know, they see that you've paid this much for it, and so they've offered you you've spent on it, and I'm like, well, tell them to go and suck an egg, like and because I do this professionally, I do get things done a lot cheaper than others might, but I'm still not doing it for free, right?

SPEAKER_01 38:00

I think the problem in our industry is there's a lot of cowboys that do that do cut corners, that do chip rentos, that don't actually deal with problems with within the property, and then they flip it. And therefore, you know, a lot of buyers have this idea, like you know, like all the real estate agents are bad. Same with the property developers, we sort of think it was the same brush, is that this these people are evil because money is evil, so therefore these people are evil.

SPEAKER_00 38:28

So I I try I choose not to call myself a flipper, even though that is what I am, because I feel like it has that negative like innation to it. People are like, oh, she's taking away first home buyer stock and you know she's inflating the market, all of that kind of stuff. I'm literally buying houses that the bank won't lend on. Like I'm buying meth-contaminated houses, I'm buying houses with structural issues. Like I just completed a huge renovation, it was the biggest drug bust in Fungiparoa. People couldn't buy that house, but I've spent the money and the time to be able to put it back on the market so people can buy that house. And I think that's what is not understood about our industry is we're not actually removing homes from the first home buyer. We're creating homes that they can then buy because the bank won't lend on those.

SPEAKER_01 39:17

No, I mean, some of the properties we ended up purchasing, I couldn't believe how people even lived like that. Oh, yeah, it's actually really sad sometimes. That's what yeah. I actually we did take the kids through it as well, and for the kids to see how other people live, you know, because it's I mean, you would have seen it too. So, so sad. And you've got animals that have been neglected in the house, you've got hoardering issues, you know. But yeah, who's gonna deal with all of that?

SPEAKER_00 39:43

It's actually I've had homes where I've walked in, I've been like, Oh, how long's this been vacant for? And they've been like, they moved out last week, and I was like, You can smell the mold the minute you walk into the house. And I'm just like, this is like yeah, these poor people, but they don't see it, I suppose. Like, you know, but it does, it's very eye-opening the way that that some people are living, and they just don't understand it.

SPEAKER_01 40:09

Makes me very sad because I'm like, New Zealand's supposed to be a developed country, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:14

But you see that it's not when you do this. Yeah, like there's a big part of our country that's like third world.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

Absolutely, absolutely, and that made me very, very sad when I when we started doing this. I I realized quickly how um others live and it's not right. And I think that's why you know what we can bring to the industry is people like you and you know, your crowd, I think better homes, better homes to the stock market that will have more proper stock to sell while we're waiting for the new places to be built.

SPEAKER_00 40:44

Yeah, well, you know, like most people that are doing what I'm doing that I know are turning these homes into healthy home standards as well. Like though they may not be insulated, they won't be warm, they're not habitable.

SPEAKER_01 40:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:58

And like, you know, we're taking the stock and we're we're making it habitable and warm so it's a home.

SPEAKER_02 41:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:04

Yes, there are people that are out there that are like just you know, paint and carpet and and then resell it and like literally lipstick on a pig, but they they won't last long. People get a name for themselves.

SPEAKER_01 41:15

Yeah, I love that. I love that. I love what you're doing, and uh, I really, really want to see I really want to see you in five years' time renovating castles. That's gonna be cool. Imagine in five years time getting another interview and you're telling me all about the castles that you're doing. With my nice beautiful Italian tan. Yeah, exactly. Emma, tell me if you could go back in time and you've got your 11-year-old self, what would you tell 11-year-old Emma?

SPEAKER_00 41:44

Keep going,

Breaking Victim Mentality And Closing

SPEAKER_00 41:45

it'll get better. That's I think yeah. I think I would just tell her to keep going, life will get easier and life will get better. Because it definitely felt like there was no way out when I was 11.

SPEAKER_01 41:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:00

I bet your mom is so proud of you right now. I wouldn't know, I don't talk to her.

SPEAKER_01 42:06

You're really gonna make me cry today. I'm sorry. That's hard. That's hard. I think when you've been through really what feels like the bottom, you're like, well, I've already I already hit the bottom.

SPEAKER_00 42:22

I've been at the bottom, there was nowhere to go down. So and I don't know if I would be where I am now if I hadn't been that person either, to be honest. I think like some people ask me, Do I do I resent the life that I had or like decisions that I made or mistakes I made, but like everything that you do in life creates the person that you are. So growing up in poverty is probably what gave me the grit and the work ethics that I now have to have broken that cycle, to you know, build a multi-million dollar company, to you know, to grow to go on to then teach others how to do that.

SPEAKER_02 43:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:02

Because I think like that is what's important to me. Like someone asked me the other day why like why do I teach people how to do this if I make so much money? Well, because if I can help raise others up, then that's all that that's what matters.

SPEAKER_01 43:16

I loved it. And you know, a lot of people that I interview very much of the same mindset is that if we can lift others, like together we can create a better society. And I find that people that have been through the hardest times and yet come out on the other side of it, they still have so much more compassion for others. It just blows my mind.

SPEAKER_00 43:37

Yeah, I because you see it, you've lived it, and unless you've lived it, you can't understand it.

SPEAKER_01 43:44

Yeah, I love that. Thank you so much. What made you want to share your story today?

SPEAKER_00 43:50

So I've been sharing my story, I share my story on social media and and I've done a couple of speaking spots on stage. And although my my personal story is very hard to share sometimes, I know that sharing it then helps others to see that there is a way to move forward. And so my my big goal is to teach people that you can break the cycle. It doesn't matter where you came from, it doesn't matter if you're dyslexic, it doesn't matter if you're poor, it doesn't matter if your family has nothing. You can actually move on in life and you can you can break that cycle and become a better you, right? So for me it was like getting pregnant at 19 saying I need to raise my life up to raise my child, and you know, I don't know if I would have like become this person without that. I don't know. People are like, Yeah, of course you would, you just had the attitude, but like you know, so I share my story so that I can show others how to do it, or even inspire them to do it themselves.

SPEAKER_01 44:54

Yeah. Now I'm sure like this has been such a powerful interview, Emma. Honestly, thank you so so much from the bottom of my heart. Like, I can totally see people going, this is great. But at the same time, I feel like a lot of people, and I hope the ones that are listening take it the right way that I mean it. We get stuck in the victim mentality. Yep. And I think listening to your stories and stories like yours is helps to get out of that victim mentality and go, okay, life happened, life happened to me. How am I gonna deal with that now?

SPEAKER_00 45:30

A hundred percent. Because if you're stuck in that victim mentality, yeah, you will never grow. You're always trying to blame someone else for your situation or have someone pity you, but like sometimes you just gotta you gotta put your big girl pants on and you just gotta go and do it. And I I don't think I know a single victim like that wears that badge that will grow. Yeah, like you see, we we're all we're all victims, like right, we are, but it's it's just being able to move past that to use that as your power instead of have it hold you back.

SPEAKER_01 46:06

I love it, I love it. Emma, thank you so so much. Please flick me through the details of how people can find you and connect with you, and we'll put it in our um podcast notes, and then obviously you can share this with your audiences as well because I think this is so powerful for people to know and to hear. And uh, and look, part of me is so happy for you that you had the kids so young because look at you now. You're like you still look like you're 19 and 20, and you can go and live in Europe and you know still pull it through. I love it. Yeah, I'm gonna live my best life.