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Podcast

Episode #28 – What The Marine Corps Taught Keith Gillespie About Real Estate Investing

When you think of a soldier, you probably think of admirable attributes: Military men are known for being disciplined, mentally and physically strong and honorable.

And while real estate investing is nothing like a warzone deployment, you can get more leads and close more deals by applying what the military has known for centuries.

Keith Gillespie is an active duty Marine and real estate investor on the Island of Oahu, HI, where he runs Crowne Properties with a small team of professionals. On this episode, you’ll hear him describe how his military career has helped him become a successful investor.

Show highlights include:

– When you feel like you’re spinning your wheels, here’s what you need to do to catapult yourself forward (this is the exact opposite of what you probably think you must do). ([7:25])
– How military systems can help you get the most out of any business partnership. ([10:30])
– How waiting for weeks at a time can lead you to success if what you do isn’t working. ([17:05])
– You can forget most sales tactics and still close a lot of deals if you can do this. ([18:45])
– How to organize your day when REI when you’re not a full time investor. ([29:15])
– To get the latest updates directly from Dan and discuss business with other real estate investors, join the REI marketing nerds

Facebook group here: https://adwordsnerds.com/group
Need help with your online marketing? Jump on a FREE strategy session with our team. We’ll dive deep into your market and help you build a custom strategy for finding motivated seller leads online. Schedule for free here: https://adwordsnerds.com/strategy

Read Full Transcript

You're listening to the REI Marketing Nerds podcast, the leading resource for real estate investors who want to dominate their market online. Dan Barrett is the founder of Ad Words Nerds, a high tech digital agency focusing exclusively on helping real estate investors like you get more leads and deals online, outsmart your competition and live a freer, more awesome life. And now, your host, Dan Barrett.

Dan: Alright everybody, this is Daniel Barrett. I'm here with Keith Gillispie. Keith is from Crowne Properties. He's a real estate investor over in Oahu, Hawaii. Did I say that right? Is that how you say it?

Keith: Repping from Hawaii, Oahu, Hawaii.

Dan: There you go. The website that Keith is from is sellmyhouseonoahu.com. Keith, welcome to the show, man. [0:01:00.3]

Keith: Thank you, thank you for having me. I'm excited to get into this.

Dan: So, I'm going to start the way I typically do. I've known you for a little bit but I don't actually know exactly how you got started in real estate investing. So before we jump down that path; first of all what kind of investing are you doing right now like are you flipping, are you wholesaling? Like what does your business model look like right now?

Keith: So, right now, we're only flipping but we're getting into new builds right now. We're actually branching off of Oahu doing some new builds on the Big Island. But those are just coming to us; we're not marketing for them. The only thing that we're really marketing for and going for is flipping right now on the island of Oahu.
Dan: Okay so flipping is your primary... that's where you're trying to make most of your money.

Keith: Correct, yup.

Dan: So how did you get started in real estate investing to begin with? Did you have a background in real estate? Like what got you into the industry?

Keith: No, not at all. I'm actually an active duty Marine and about two years into my first term, my operational tempo was pretty low, I was getting bored at work. [0:02:07.2] One of my friends suggested – he knew that I like talking about money and finances and stuff, and he just suggested that I read this awesome book that totally changed the glasses that he saw life through, and as you can probably guess, that book was "Rich Dad, Poor Dad." So, I read "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and got totally hooked, completely, same as him, just changed my outlook on life.

Dan: Yeah.

Keith: And it basically told me that I had been thinking about everything all wrong.

Dan: How old were you when this happened?

Keith: I was 19 years old when I read the book.

Dan: Nineteen, wow! All right, cool.

Keith: So, I just got hooked on Robert Kiyosaki's book. From there, I read "Unfair Advantage." That's my favorite book by Robert Kiyosaki. And like a month later, we joined Rich Dad Coaching. A month after that, we started our real estate investing business. A month after that, we joined Fortune Builders.

Dan: Wow. [0:03:01.0]

Keith: We had all this coaching. We had all this network of people around us to really show us the ropes and not screw up as much as Robert did when he was starting. So, we started with a business partner. She was a part of Fortune Builders. She was a member of our church. So, we joined with her. She was also a realtor. So, we just had this huge wealth of knowledge. D.C. is totally saturated with investors which was great. You know, there's a lot of competition, but if you use it to support you, you use it in a good way. You know, it's just a huge amount of networking, a lot of wisdom is out there, and a lot of seasoned investors who have weathered the storm of 2008 to 2011, and so, we just used that to start off. We partnered with our business partner. We flipped a house in Virginia right before we left for Hawaii which is now almost two years ago. Now, we've just picked up the business here on Oahu from where we left in Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Dan: So, I mean, that's cool. [0:03:59.2] The thing I love about that is you said, you don’t have the background in real estate but you just made up for it by surrounding yourself by a whole bunch of people who had really extensive background. Right?
Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And, I think it's like even in the sense of reading the books and joining the coaching programs, it's like you're really digging for that kind of influential, kind of mentor relationship from the very beginning.

Keith: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And actually, I think you probably know him. His name is Brad Chandler.

Dan: Yeah.

Keith: I started. His REI meeting was the first REI meeting that I went to and just a ton of knowledge, and I got totally hooked. I'd like go into all these meetings. So, needless to say, pretty much four days of the week I was getting off work and going to these meetings, driving sometimes over an hour going into Maryland, you know, to other freaking states to go to these meetings just because I wanted to learn from these people. [0:05:06.5] Because I know that I'm young, I'm dumb, I'm susceptible to stupid decisions, and I don't want to make those. I'm smart enough to know that I'm going to make those mistakes if I don't have somebody on my team that can help me out and show me, "hey, if you go this route, it's going to be school or hard knocks, man, so why don't you just learn from my experience. Here's what I would do. I wouldn't get into the deal unless you bought it for this amount" or whatever their advice is.

Dan: Yeah, that's like -- it reminds me of one of my favorite. I don't know if it's Charlie Munger or Warren Buffett. Well, one of them has a quote that essentially says like you know, "Everybody can learn from their own experience. What makes you successful is learning from the experiences of others." I really believe that. Right. It's like you said, like everybody screws up. Everyone's going to make mistakes. It doesn't matter how smart you are. It doesn't even matter how much experience you have, but if you can tap into the experiences of others, chances are people have been through a very similar situation and they can give you a lot more information and give you a lot higher percentile chance, you know, of making the right decision. [0:06:11.7] So, that's a really powerful approach. So like, how did you get down to Hawaii? You were down there with the military?

Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, as soon as I was coming up on the end of my first term in the military, I realized that I hadn't quite set myself up. I didn't have enough money, didn't have enough experience to jump into real estate full time, but I knew that I could be successful in it. So, I wanted to leverage my knowledge, leverage my youth, leverage the things that I had built in Virginia to move on to the next playing field. So, Hawaii was more of a strategic real estate minded move for me, and I basically told the Marine Corps, "I need you to send me to Hawaii. Otherwise, I'm going to get out." So, they moved me here for free. Now, you know, I work here for the Marine Corps, but on the side, you know, the rumors in why I moved here is because numbers in Hawaii are just going to be significant and large that you can add a zero to everything as opposed to the mainland where I would be flipping a house and making $35,000. [0:07:10.6] Now I'm making a little over $200,000 for a flip here in Hawaii, and for somebody of my age, that's really wonderful. You know, I just wanted to start off. I was spinning my wheels a lot in Virginia, and I realized that I kind of just needed to just slow down, build the systems in my business. That way, I could take on these larger deals here in Hawaii.

Dan: Well, because you said this a little quickly, but you're still working full time for the Marine Corps.

Keith: Correct.

Dan: How do you balance that? Because you also had a family, right?

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And so, you've got a lot going on. You seem like you have a lot of energy which is awesome. So, how do you balance the two. Like, it's interesting because real estate investing especially if you don’t' have a lot of systems set up, right. You get calls at weird times. [0:08:02.5]

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: You know, you've got to follow up with someone right away. So like how do you balance those things?

Keith: So, right now it's just me and my wife in the business. So my wife is a real estate agent. She is a Beach Body coach. We have two kids, ages 3 and 1 and we're super active with our church. We're just freaking super busy. Everything is structured. Our days are time blocked. We have our calendars synced. We're both booking appointments for the other person to go on. So like while I'm at work, you know, the military life is demanding, especially in the Marine Corps. You're very loyal to the Corps. You're very loyal to your job, and you want to do the best Corps job you can do. So, while I'm at work, I don’t really have time to do business stuff, but on my way to work, you better believe I'm going to be listening to audio books. I'm going to be listening to a podcast or going through some marketing training or some sales and negotiation training. At lunch I'll be taking calls or if I need to followup with a house or with the escrow company or something, then I'll do some stuff at lunch, but really dude, it's my wife. [0:09:09.5] My wife just has really stepped up and grabbed it by the balls. She is just like a supermom and a super wife, and she handles all the calls that are coming in. She is constantly emailing people, following up with them, following up with a title company, with lenders, contractors, you name it. She does a lot of stuff. So that's just our business right now, and then we have this group of friends with us. One of them is another Marine that I work with. Then I have a friend who is a Navy Cat, and his girlfriend. So we've all kind of teamed up, and the five of us are splitting up what our roles and responsibilities are. So like, my wife takes all the inbound calls. I really love marketing.

Dan: Mmm.

Keith: My other Marine friend is really good with like systems of automation. So we're like getting onboarded right now with Investor Fuse, and he is just totally grabbing that. [0:10:00.0] He's really good at trimming the fat. The Navy Cat is a construction manager, and his girlfriend is wonderful with design and scope of works. She is also an agent. So, collectively due to this team of five is like, we're just taking over. We're doing really good things. It's really helping. We're just learning A, like I suck at this, are you good at that? Yeah, dude, I love doing that. Okay. You know, take it.

Dan: Yeah, that's awesome. So like, business partnerships, right, like people who say like a business partnership is like a marriage. Right?

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And it can be a very tough relationship. It can be a very fraught one. Right? There's a lot of ways for it to go wrong, right?

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: So, do you feel like the military background has helped you guys understand how to work together and how to divide up the work and make sure that things are happening?

Keith: 100%. So much. I feel like I've been completely set up for success, and it's like a cheat. It's a hack for business. Because that's what like as a team leader, as a squad leader in the Marine Corps, your job is to be like all right, I have, you know, three to 15 Marines underneath me. [0:11:08.4] This is the job that needs to get done. How am I going to be up to the task? Who is best at what? You're really good at not being in the business but working on the business. Looking at it with overhead perspective and sending three troops need to go on the left and three troops need to go on the right, six in the front, and three to the rear. This is what needs to happen so that the overall goal and the backup plan can be accessible once. You know, no freaking plan. We have this saying...maybe I shouldn't get into Marine Corps isms, but we have a saying that "No clan ever survives the first bullet." So like, as soon as you start getting shot at, you freaking forget the plan. You just...nothing is going to go the right way, you know. So, you have to have somebody on the top looking at everything, saying this is what we need to do. Somebody is on the radio. Someone's on the comm saying this is what we need to do. So, that's a hack as well as like we're all about correction in the Marine Corps, and I guess in every branch of the service, but like if somebody is not doing a good job, you almost feel like it's your duty to come and tactfully, respectfully, lovingly tell this person, "Hey man, you're just not quite cutting it. This is where my bar is." [0:12:17.8] Also and you're taught like how to give instruction to that person and say you know, "This is what you did. This is where I think you went wrong, and I'd like to see if you can do it this way." Give them a little bit of guidance and a little bit of advice rather than just saying, "You suck, bro, like fix yourself."

Dan: So, do you feel like...you know, like in the terms of the business partnership, if somebody wasn't pulling their weight or things weren't going according to plan, you guys would be like, well, we have a system in place where we know that and then we have kind of like a shared language of how to talk about those issues and get through them without things kind of...

Keith: Exactly. And collectively, we kind of just push each other. So far, we've have very few of those bad talks. Most of the time it's a talk of getting everyone in the room and saying like, "Look, all right, together we're going to raise our standards. [0:13:05.2] I'm going to hold you more accountable, and I want you to hold me more accountable." This is the thing that I want to achieve this month. These are my goals and if I hit these, then that will escalate whatever this business to this level. And I would really help me if you guys would just text me sometime on Thursday or next week and see if I followed through with what I'm going to day, you know, what I say I'm going to do. So that accountability is there, and you feel like there's a sense of duty and a sense of honor that goes into that. And really, there is just a band of brothers and sisters to help grow the team because everyone's focused on themselves. You don’t have to worry about the person working on themselves. We're taught to do that. Know yourself and seek self-improvement is one of the leadership traits of the Marine Corps. So, every one of us is doing that. We're reading books and saying, "You know what, I really could use to learn about this one topic." But collectively, we're throwing ideas into the pot of how we could grow together. [0:14:01.8]

Dan: Yeah. I think, I mean it just strikes me as like a really powerful infrastructure to things because I think partnerships for business...I think a lot of people jump into them without really thinking through how it's actually going to work.

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And you know, it's been tough. We've had clients that like came in with partners and like left without a partner. Like, I only worked for you for like three months. You know. So, it can go pretty wild. But it sounds like you guys have an awesome system. So, like has there been like a culture shock or like a cultural shift you've had to make like investing in Hawaii. Like what is your take on how investing in Hawaii is different from you know the rest of the U.S.?

Keith: It's so different. It's so different. And I don't want to turn this into a political or racial standing at all, but I will just state some facts. And some facts are that the military came in and took over Hawaii. [0:15:02.9] So, they have every right to be bitter against white men and in particular white men that look like me that have my haircut. You know.

Dan: Literally your job description.

Keith: Yeah. Yeah. So, when they're talking to me on the phone, they love me. They love my energy. They love my vision. You know, I'm building rapport. I'm mirroring how they're talking. I do all the right things. I'm asking them about their wife, about the kids, and we really have this personal connection, and then...then it kills me because then I go to their house, I knock on their door, I'll bring them a gift, some local food usually, and they open the door and I see their face fall. That kind of like breaks my heart a little bit because now there's a wall built up in between us, and I'm about to walk around their house and take some pictures. We're going to sit down at the dining room table. I'm going to go over some of their more detailed oriented questions with their family, and now I have to break down that wall all over again because now they realize that I'm white, I'm young, and I'm in the military. [0:16:02.2] Those are three things that here you have to overcome that. So how we're overcoming that is we actually just brought a local guy onto our team, and he's grown up here, his whole life. He is native. He knows everyone. He has been to three of the high schools. He has lived in five different areas on the island so he has, aunties and uncles, everyone who is older than you and of age is an aunty and uncle. So, he has those connections and he's in the culture. He is immersed in the culture. Where my wife and our team, we just got here. You know, the last two or three years. We haven't built that local connection. So, now he's like coming out with us on these acquisition calls, you know, going out to the house and building local rapport, and he's just going out. We call it talking story, but that really helps, you know, overcome that initial like "Oh snap, he's white." You know, so that's how we're overcoming it. It has been quite a culture shock. It's not exactly what I was expecting because D.C. is really fast paced. [0:17:00.7] It's really cut throat, and here, you know, everyone is a little bit slower paced. There's more aloha, you know. So, you have to respect that when you're going out to somebody's house and give them time. A lot of times like in D.C., I'd go to people's houses and basically it was give me a yes or no right now, like I don't want to leave the property without a yes or a no. Either one is okay. I just want to know because I'm going out to another house tomorrow, and I can't afford to buy all the houses from everyone who calls me. But here, I can't play that card, you know, because people need three weeks to make up their mind and come back to us.
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Dan: The scenario where an investor is potentially an outsider? Right?

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: Pretty common one; even within like the continental United States, right? And even if you're like, "Look, I live on this street. I've lived on this street my whole life." You're coming into someone else's house. You're always an outsider in someone else's house. Right, it's like, it's always going to be this kind of thing. It's always been interesting to me that the side of the business where if you talk to people who do it really well, so much of it is just being able to read people and being able to you know walk in be like, "Oh hey, like I noticed your son plays lacrosse," or like whatever it is.

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And just being able to have a human connection because you know what is on its surface, a very kind of mathematical, financial agreement. [0:19:06.8] Right? Like you have an asset. You paid X amount for it. You're going to sell that asset to me for Y amount. I'm going to sell it for Z amount. You know, it's like it seems very cut and dry, but in actuality, it's this really emotional kind of psychological thing. Right?

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: You know, I think it's interesting because yeah, I mean Hawaii is a unique culture within the U.S. exactly the way you put it because of its history of a big annex by the U.S. Right? And so...

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: It's kind of a hype, sort of like a more amped up version of something that kind of everybody is going to have to deal with it in some way. So, I mean I think it sounds like you're approaching it a lot in the right way because I've heard people complain about things like that and just say "Like, well you know, blah, blah, blah. You know, people don't like me.

Keith: Yeah. [0:20:00.8]

Dan: Or whatever. Like, they're not giving me a chance, and it's like they don’t take the time to actually empathize and try to understand why they're in that situation.

Keith: Right.

Dan: An ultimately like any human relationship, that's how it has to start. You have to at least kind of be able to put yourself in someone else's shoes.

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: So that's awesome. You said you like the marketing. I like the marketing. So, what is marketing in your market look like? Like, what
have you been doing? What has worked in the past? What do investors typically do?

Keith: Okay.

Dan: So, we talk about this a little bit like off the podcast, and I know you're the same way.

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: Generally, it's a less tech savvy kind of population than the rest of the U.S. So...

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: Break that down for me.

Keith: So, nobody right now on the whole island of Oahu is running Google Ads. I'm the only person running Google Ads. Everyone has a website, and that's fine. There are all these cookie cutter websites. They haven't really personalized it. They haven't added video. So right now, what I am personally getting into is I am the tech savvy one on the team, so I'm working on the SEO, I'm working on the Google Ads, the Facebook Ads, the Facebook retargeting, having things, and me in my automation savvy person are working on like the automated emails and I guess the workflow of things to happen to turn warm leads back into hot. [0:21:18.1] But honestly, we've done every form of marketing I think that you can do except for radio and TV. So, I have like the signs on my car, the magnets. We've done bandit signs. We've done ringless voicemail. We've done postcards, and we're still doing postcards and ringless voicemail. Not so much the bandit signs. The bandit signs were only bringing in wholesalers which is great, but I have all the wholesalers that I need at this time. I need more motivated sellers. So, once I flip that on myself, then I'll go back to putting out bandit signs. I already have 100 downstairs. So, right now, I'm focusing online lead generation. We still have like ads in the newspaper. I'm trying to go through this list in my head. [0:22:01.8] Posting on Craig's List we do. That brought in a lead last week. So, we're doing pretty much everything except bandit signs, and what's working for us most, I think, is the technology stuff because we're starting to see that shift on Oahu. The island of Oahu specifically is seven to eight years behind the mainland, the continental United States, and the other islands are even further. They're more like 10 to 12 year time, maybe 11 years. So, they're going to see that shift, but right now, we are seeing that shift. So, that's what I'm trying to capitalize on, and as more people are getting smart phones and more people are going to Captain Google to answer their questions, I want to be in front of them. That's where the marketing is trending right now is towards the online lead generation and having your credibility online. Because that's what I have right now, and then our local guy has the aunties and uncles, the local connections and the referrals that he's bringing in that way. [0:23:02.0]

Dan: You know it's funny, it's like you're talking about this, and I was just thinking like, "Man, I would love to go back seven to 12 years technology-wise." I know I make my living doing it but sometimes I'm like, "That sounds great." But it's really fascinating man, and I find it so interesting how different, you know, even within the continental United States, all these markets have these kind of like separate cultures of whether they sell to investors and how they think about investors. I was thinking about Baltimore, Baltimore as being a city where people sell to investors in Baltimore like all the time.

Keith: All the time.

Dan: And it's not a weird thing and there's a lot of urban blight there, a lot of houses that investors are just all over the place and you know, then you've got other markets where it's much more rare and people are much more kind of weary of that.

Keith: They hold it to their chest. Yeah.

Dan: Yeah. I find that really fascinating. Let me ask you. I'm taking a hard left. [0:24:00.2]

Keith: Okay.

Dan: Hard left conversation-wise.

Keith: Got it.

Dan: So, you seem like a very energetic young man.

Keith: I am.

Dan: That's cool. All right. Do you have like a morning routine? Like how overdose you organize your day, because you're doing a lot.

Keith: Yeah man.

Dan: I would say like, I've been very blessed. I've been very successful in my life, but you know, I'm like, I am naturally terrible at everything, and the only way I can get by and do anything well is by just...I can only do one thing well, and that's what I do. You know...

Keith: I agree.

Dan: So, how do you, do you have like a morning routine?

Keith: I do.

Dan: To organize your day to be able to keep all this straight and actually like keep the momentum going?

Keith: So, I have a morning routine. I have a routine when I get in my car. I have a nightly routine, and then I have habits that I've built in. Little white hacks, I guess, to help me do things or memorize and keep things structured. So, I guess I'll touch briefly on those four things.

Dan: Yeah.

Keith: The morning, the car, and the nightly routine all came and were inspired by maybe four people, but it really came from one book, and it was "The Morning Miracle." [0:25:09.8] It's called "The Miracle Morning." It's called the...

Dan: "The Miracle Morning." Yeah, I was just thinking that. I was like...this sounds so familiar, but yeah.

Keith: "The Miracle Morning." So, that book like really, really changed my mentality, and your mentality changes your actions, your habits, and therefore your destiny. So, it all starts with your mindset. Every morning, I have these affirmations; I guess is what you'd call it. I have affirmations in the morning. I have them printed off, double-sided, on a piece of paper in a sheet protector that is thumb-tacked onto my headboard, and it's basically five sections, developing self-confidence is the first section. Achieving health and fitness is the second section, and then creating relationships, achieving financial success, and overcoming adversity. [0:26:01.8] So, those are the things that I talk about in my morning sessions, and I have a lot of like limiting beliefs, right, so I'll just come...I believe like 100% transparency. So, I'm young, and I realize that that is a huge advantage, meaning I have a ton of time to catch up. However, it's also a huge disadvantage because at 23, me walking into somebody's house and saying, "Oh, yeah, I could offer your $800,000." Wait, how old are you? And you say...Yeah, suddenly tons of red flags come up. So, I have to overcome this limiting belief that people are going to look at me and it's not believable. It's really not, and I realize that. So, that's one of the things that I talk about that I can achieve financial success now. I don't have to wait until I'm old. You know, I can be financial free very soon now even while I'm young. Success is imminent this year. [0:27:01.1] I have worked, and I'm currently working so hard to achieve a great level of success, and I believe that it's going to happen soon. I'm expecting to be successful this year and to have it be the most fulfilling year that I've experienced so far in my life. That's just a part of the first thing that I say. So, this was all inspired by "The Miracle Morning," and I took some affirmations, Grant Cardone and Tony Robbins and from kind of the leaders of self-development, business achievement minded people.

Dan: Mmm.

Keith: And many of these affirmations that I do in the car. Basically, I put it. I'm a musician right, so I put it to like a soundtrack. I literally edited a soundtrack just for my affirmations, and the difference between an incantation and an affirmation. So, incantations people are like, "Oh dude, you're weird. Like this is like sorcery and magic, spells and stuff. " Like the only difference is you're getting your body energized. [0:28:01.2] You're moving your body and you're freely creating a motion so the things that you are saying out loud where an affirmation is your body is stale. It's stagnant. It's less effective in my opinion. It's good for reminders, but it's not good to really...like motivation is to create movement. So, to motivate, you have to move and to move, you know, you've got to kind of get in the spirit. So, these affirmations that I do in the car, every time I get in the car, whether I'm going to work, I'm going to the store, I'm going to a seller's house, it doesn't matter. I say these affirmations and I feel like I can freaking conquer the world. When I'm done with this, often times dude, a little secret, I cry. I literally have a single tear. I don’t know why. It happens pretty often now, maybe three times a week. I'll have a single tear coming out of my left eye, just because there's so much passion into what I'm saying that I don't know, I just get emotional on something. So, anyway, I do these affirmations in the morning and then in the evening, and then I do these incantations every time I get in the car and then to organize my day and make things a little bit easier, my wife and I are...She is the better looking female version of me. [0:29:18.6] Okay, so we have the same everything. I don't know. Like people will say like, "Oh, you're in a honeymoon phase." Well, dude, we've been together like almost a decade. I know that sounds weird. We're like high school sweethearts. We're not in the honeymoon phase. We just don't argue.

Dan: Yeah.

Keith: We get over things and we talk to each other. We talk it out. We'll sit down for two or three hours and really discuss things. Really, we have such an awesome, awesome marriage and awesome connection when it comes to the business. So, we like totally life hack. We have access to each other's Facebook accounts. We have access to each other's emails. We completely share everything. So, I'll often answer an email or answer a text message on her behalf, and she'll do the same for me. [0:30:00.4] We have our contacts synced. So, I'm like, "Oh man, I need to get hold of whatever, her friend, and I don’t have her contact. Well, good thing I have my contacts synced with my wife because then I just get on my phone, and I call her friend, and she does not know that I have her phone number." And then we sync our calendar. We have notes that sync. I have this thing called the IKE app, and basically, I think it comes from Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, maybe, where you're like putting your life into four quadrants. Is it time sensitive? Like is it urgent or not urgent and then is it important or not important? And basically, that's how we prioritize my personal life, my Marine Corps life, my business life, my church life, my marital life, whatever. So, we have all these lists, right. And it gives you reminders. Like, I don't believe in writing in a notebook just because that's a one-way communication, like that notebook, unless you open it, it's not going to remind you bro, so like that's a one-way conversation, and I'm really bad, so that'll work for tons of people, and I'm not dogging any of you if you use that. [0:31:00.9] It just does not work for me. I am irresponsible, and I need to have that constant reminder. So I'll set, you know, alarms or alerts and notifications saying like, "Hey, you know, have you made these new ads for your Google Ads? No, I haven't, so it's probably something I should do today." So these things kind of help time block and prioritize what we're doing as well as gather the information and keep it structured so that as a team...like, I don't work individually. I can't work individually. I have to have my wife there. So, it really helps us as a team grow our business.

Dan: That's awesome man. I mean, it's funny like, everything you're saying, I'm completely in line with. I think all that is really powerful. I was just thinking that one time I asked my wife if she wanted to come and work with me, and she said that she couldn't because she would murder me. It's all about just knowing your relationship.

Keith: Mhm.

Dan: Yeah, man. It just sounds like you guys have an awesome team and you know, I think more than anything right, like self-awareness is so critical and all that stuff. [0:32:06.4]

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And it sounds like you guys have got a really good grasp on what you're good at, what you want to do, what you don't want to do.

Keith: We're still married man. It's an everyday struggle. That's for sure.

Dan: Yeah, well yeah, and it never ends. It never ends. But, you know, it's fun man. I've got to tell you, like, you're getting started early, and this life, man, it's this whole entrepreneurial life. It's a lot of fun.

Keith: Yeah.

Dan: And you know, I wish I had gotten started earlier, but I love what I do, and I'm just super, super excited for you guys. So, if people want
to find you or find more about you, learn more about your company, where should they go online? How can they look for you?

Keith: They can go anywhere. As long as they search for Crowne Properties Inc., there is now way that you can't find me, Crowne with an "e" at the end, Crowne Properties Inc. You can find us literally on every platform. [0:32:59.5] It will be built out, but our most active ones will be Facebook obviously. So, you can find me, Keith Gillispie, my wife, Miranda Gillispie, or our business, Crowne Properties Inc. on Facebook. We're pretty active on, especially my wife, on Facebook.

Dan: Yeah, and obviously if the people want to check out your actual investing business they can do that at sellmyhouseonoahu.com which we confirmed earlier and it is spelled OAHU. Hey Keith, man, this was awesome dude. I really appreciate you coming on the show and having this conversation with me.

Keith: Definitely. Thank you.

Dan: I know it's rainy in Hawaii right now, but it is two degrees here.

Keith: I'll enjoy my 75-degree weather.

Dan: Yeah, for sure man. I'll talk to you very soon. Cheers Keith. Thanks a lot.

Keith: Thanks.

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