Pace Morby, Self Storage & 9 Points That Will Change Your Life
Article From Entrepreneur Brain Dump
Happy Wednesday to all my Visionaries and Integrators out there! If you're not sure which one you are, you might by the end and especially after listening to the link and checking out one of the books mentioned. Sorry, that wasn't meant to be clickbait. Genuinely, the 9 points talked about in this weeks newsletter have changed the way I do business and I believe they are worth sharing.
It's an 8min read, but well worth it!
I just spent the week in Coeur D’alene, Idaho for a self storage conference and honestly could have left completely satisfied with JUST hearing this one speaker.
Let’s first back track a bit for and address your question on self storage and why there’s a conference on it.
Arguably the best asset in real estate, self storage has become extremely popular after its success through 2008 and then most recently, 2020.
While that hype is beginning to level out, from an investor standpoint, it is phenomenal.
The three Ts (Tenants, toilets and termites) don’t exist. I’ll leave it at that.
Back to the speaker that blew my mind, Pace Morby.
In the real estate world, Pace is a rockstar. The buzz around the room before he spoke was palpable.
Pace comes from humble, hands dirty, hustling hard, blue collar work.
He wasn’t gifted anything, and he didn’t have a mom or dad that taught him what he knows.
He put himself in the room. He saw the open doors, walked through them and sat down.
“The door is always available to open and walk through, but you have to spend time in the room to change your life.” — Lincoln Roth
Pace tells the story of the origin of his community and the anger that fueled his passion to build.
He wasn’t trying to build a huge following, it grew directly out of the MASSIVE value that he provided and continues to provide.
Years back, before social media was where it is today, he posted to his couple hundred followers about a meet up.
Saturday morning, 6am, Circle K parking lot.
Whoever showed would get to follow Pace around for the day on job sites, talking to owners, brokers, banks and learning by DOING.
6am roles around and … crickets. No one showed. But that didn’t stop Pace. He drove around doing what he had planned to do, but each stop, he took a picture showing his car in the background with the caption
“Everyone here today is getting so much value right now”.
He wasn’t lying. He was getting some awesome value. 😉
Comments began to roll in from those that missed out.
Guess how many people showed up the next Saturday? 3! And there we go, momentum!
One of those 3 early Pace enthusiasts was a high school teacher just wanting to learn a thing or two. Because of that ONE day and actually implementing those lessons, that teacher did some amazing things.
This was over a decade ago. Since then the teacher retired early from his job, fully involved in real estate and brings in several million a year on his properties. All from that one drive along with Pace.
But that was just the start. After those first 3 trusting souls, the next weekend had 65 people! Cops were called thinking it was a mob of homeless in front of the Circle K. Nope, just some overly eager real estate investors at 6 in the morning.
And the rest was history.
Pace was never in it for fame or fortune, but to simply build and share along the way.
Pace came in HOT! He’s a talker and one of the best story tellers I’ve ever heard.
He wove in and out of thought provoking tales that kept you on the edge of your seat and left you satisfied, yet still wanting so much more.
Over the hour that he spoke, he left us with 9 incredibly relevant and impactful points to chew on for the rest of the event.
I’m no Pace Morby, but from his mouth to this blog, here are the points:
1. If you are brand new in real estate, LEARN HOW TO RAISE CAPITAL.
There’s an old saying about the “golden rule”.
“He who controls the gold, makes the rules”.
While this has been a Moto for Pace from early on, a lesson he learned from meeting Grant Cardone has been invaluable.
Pace learned to take care of the small guy.
To focus on long term relationships with those BEFORE they become accredited investors so that when they reach that status, the connection is already there.
All part of his focus on being the best at finding the money.
2. Learn how to lead and attract leaders
The most important person we will meet at an event isn’t the speaker, it’s the other people in the room.
He tells of an incredible story of how he found his most valuable employee.
I won’t do it justice, it was a story that led us down paths I never thought we’d go, but brought us out to such a beautiful ending. If you want to hear it, you'll have to listen to the audio link at the end.
BUT, from this story comes the lesson. Don’t go to an event to hear the speakers. That’s just the icing on the cake.
Your mission should be to meet every single person in the room and for every single person to know you.
Those connections might not be immediate. It might take weeks, months, or even years to come back around… but when they do, it’ll be more valuable than you could have ever imagined.
From personal experience, that has already rang true. My business partner and close friend, Lincoln Roth was a result of a conference.
Since that fateful meeting, we have built many great things together, failed many times and still have just gotten started.
3. Hire an asset manager before being ready
You will grow way faster by hiring people way smarter than you.
What this looks like practically is WHEN you make money, deploy it right back in with this one goal:
How can you use this money to hire someone to run a division of your company in order for you to step out of that division and make MORE more?
On a smaller scale, we were in the grind. Doing everything ourselves. And I mean EVERYTHING.
This was only sustainable for so long.
We knew we needed to scale.
So that’s what we did.
After documenting ALL of our SOPs, we hired a couple VAs to alleviate the workload.
From there, we had more bandwidth to grow. We got really good at hiring and training VAs, so we built out a division to do just that.
Our VAs now run that division and the money made goes right back to hiring, building and growing.
Shameless self promotion:
We’re really good at finding VAs. We’ve done it a lot and help others build their teams. If you want to learn more, you can here. FindyourVAhere.com
Our next move: Hiring a COO to run multiple divisions.
4. Sometimes you have to stop listening to your parents
This is all situational, but the way things were “always done” isn’t always going to be the way you should do it now.
Keep an open mind and if you need to be the one to break the chain and change the trajectory of your family, break that freaking chain!
5. Take ownership faster
Your personal income will never outgrow your personal development.
This is a big one. When you surround yourself with losers, you’re probably going to be a loser.
When the outcome you’re getting in life isn’t what you want, stop blaming everyone else. Take responsibility and figure out what YOU need to do to be better.
Sometimes it’s you doing the thing. Sometimes it’s you hiring someone else to do the thing. Sometimes it’s you not doing the thing anymore entirely.
6. Build a brand faster
A brand isn’t necessarily the hat, t-shirt and logo.
“A brand is what people say about you behind your back”
The way you have to think about it is how would somebody describe you in one sentence OR in an elevator pitch.
Everything you do is your brand.
That is the brand that has deep roots.
That is the brand that stays with you and takes you places OR holds you back.
Stop worrying about the little things that don’t matter. Focus on GIVING GIVING GIVING to your people and watch as the forest grows.
7. Learn creative financing yesterday! If not then, NOW!
Don’t waste time on anything else. Build a huge tool belt of ways that the deal can work. There’s always a way, but it’s so much easier to just go to the bank.
And that’s why people do it.
And that’s why people remain poor.
Get creative, work with the sellers, learn about the sellers and provide an option that meets exactly what they need to sell and what you need to buy.
It’s front loading the knowledge, but when you get it, the world is yours to buy. Literally.
8. The best mastermind you’ll ever invest in is being an LP in someone else’s deal
It doesn’t always have to be YOUR deal to start. When it is, that first deal might be pretty tough. That’s just part of the game and something that everyone goes through.
But a way to avoid some of that pain is to be a LP or limited partner in another deal.
It gives you experience on the entirety of the process with much less risk. It’s not on you, it’s on the GP. So sit back, grab a notepad and soak it in.
9. Learn how to tell stories
Story telling will help you raise capital . Your investors are investing in a story that has a beginning, middle and end.
They’re looking for a Netflix special.
Give it to them.
In a time of massive media consumption, be a creator.
Step out of the masses. Stop your endless scrolling and tell your story. Your audience wants to hear what you have to offer.
They want to hear the build up, the climax, the resolution.
They want to be the hero in your story and to believe in the journey you’re on.
Share it with them.
BONUS:
The definition of success —
The ability to be dropped anywhere in the world, naked with nothing, and still be able to make money.
We are capable of so much more than we allow ourselves to believe. Becoming successful isn’t always about changing everything up and flipping your world upside down.
Sometimes it’s just about acquiring a new definition for success.
And if this speech wasn’t enough, he left us with gold nuggets the whole way through in the form of books that have changed his life.
Here is the book list:
Rocket Fuel — Geno Wickman — Before doing business with anyone, read this.
Nothing Down — Robert Allen — A straight gangsta in the real estate industry one of the earliest creative finance guys. He was challenged by the the LA times and won, then he helped do it with other people in the book the challenge.
The Challenge — Robert Allen — Same author, he literally walked up to an unemployment line and took a few people from the line and helped make them 15k in the next 30 days. These people are still in RE to this day and never in the unemployment line again. 40 years later
Building A Story Brand — Donald Miller — The best brand builder out there helping you tell your story and develop the brand and the way that people speak about you.
Pace Morby Recording HERE (This is a voice memo I recorded while hearing him speak at the conference).