In this episode, Justin Hroch shares his transformative journey from a W2 job to becoming a successful real estate investor and property manager. He discusses the challenges of transitioning from a real estate agent to an operator and highlights the importance of building a company, not just a career. Justin emphasizes the value of integrating family, fitness, and a supportive community into his life, offering insights into how these elements contribute to his success in real estate investing.
In this episode, Justin Hroch shares his transformative journey from a W2 job to becoming a successful real estate investor and property manager. He discusses the challenges of transitioning from a real estate agent to an operator and highlights the importance of building a company, not just a career. Justin emphasizes the value of integrating family, fitness, and a supportive community into his life, offering insights into how these elements contribute to his success in real estate investing.'
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Justin Hroch and His Journey
02:49 Transitioning from Real Estate Agent to Investor
05:44 The Shift to Becoming an Operator
08:44 Building a Company vs. a Career
11:43 Hiring the Right People for Growth
14:35 Integrating Family and Fitness into Business Life
17:44 The Importance of Community and Networking
20:34 Lessons Learned from the Tactical Empire Inner Circle
Justin Hroch (00:00)
Thank you.
@realjeffsmith (00:01)
Welcome to another episode of the Tactical
Empire. Today we have a special guest, Mr. Justin Herrock. This man is a real estate investor extraordinaire out of ⁓ Austin, Texas area and ⁓ owns a property management company and does a ⁓ variety of things. He's also a member of our inner circle, has ⁓ four children and a wife and... ⁓
Justin Hroch (00:12)
So, yeah.
you ⁓
@realjeffsmith (00:25)
prioritizes his family while he does all these things. So I'm excited to get to talk to you today, Justin, and have you tell Sean and I more about your story and what you're up to. So welcome.
Justin Hroch (00:37)
Thanks man, glad to be here.
@realjeffsmith (00:41)
Well, we're definitely glad to have you. ⁓ Tell us a little bit more about your background and ⁓ kind of what you've been working on recently.
Justin Hroch (00:52)
Yeah, so I kind of have a background in real estate primarily as
probably about 10 years ago, was talking with a buddy of mine, ⁓ not enjoying my W2 job and was looking to try to figure out some ways that we could increase our income, have a little more flexibility and freedom in our lifestyle schedule. ⁓ he was a broker and just told me like, hey, what would it look like for you to go ahead and get your real estate license and hawk a few houses on the side? ⁓ And...
I thought that was an intriguing idea. I grew up in a family of kind of blue collar construction workers and spent summers laying hardwood floors with my uncle. So I had had some paradigm for construction and rehab and houses. And so I thought it was an interesting opportunity. And so I went ahead and did that and got my license around 2017 and just started the process of
⁓ of helping people buy and sell houses on the transaction side of things. And so fast forward a few years, got my feet wet, ⁓ really started growing that side of the business to where I had a pretty consistent volume with helping clients in the buy and sell side of real estate. And got into ⁓ doing some spec builds and
capital raising for some bigger projects in Austin. so ⁓ we ⁓ would partner together and I'd help find the ⁓ funds for the project. And then I had a buddy who, a partner who would go and kind of do the build and we'd wait for a return. And so that was like kind of my first step into real estate investing. ⁓ I had some ideas about it, but ⁓ didn't have a whole lot of experience in it. so
My first deal was just like me and three other guys that I knew and I asked them all to put in around $25,000 and we gave it to this guy and he trusted that he would get the job done and you know it gave me my first like little window into what it looked like to rehab and flip a house.
@realjeffsmith (03:18)
Awesome, awesome. And was that one successful?
Justin Hroch (03:23)
Yeah, I mean, it was moderately successful. ⁓ you know, we got all of our money back and we got a bit of a return. ⁓ You know, I think one of the bigger things I learned on that property is like being an operator is probably where the money is at, because you just have a lot more control over the flow of the funds and ⁓ just how it happens. And so really being a ⁓
third party investor and not like an equity partner in a deal ⁓ is more so that you get a return, but it probably isn't the place where you get the highest return in investments.
@realjeffsmith (04:06)
Sure, sure. You went straight into capital raising from a real estate agent. Tell me about what gave you the confidence to bridge that gap or, because I would say a lot of our audience has that question and the reservations of like, where would you get $100,000? Where would you get more than $100,000? And how do you have those conversations? What gave you the confidence to hop in and get 75K together with you and your friends?
Justin Hroch (04:36)
Yeah, I mean, it seemed at the time like, you know, I was, you know, in my mid thirties at that point and ran around just with several guys who, you know, had done well in their careers and were doing all the things that they knew they should be doing from establishing their emergency fund and filling up their 401k and they were even dabbling in the stock market. And, you know, they had some discretionary spending and money.
because their career was going really well. so it really wasn't what I felt like was a pretty easy ask to some of these guys and just said, hey, here's an opportunity, $25,000. If we lose it, it's not the end of the world, but also there's an opportunity to diversify where you're investing your money to make a better and maybe higher return than you normally could just by dumping it into something like the S &P or a bond or just setting it.
sitting in cash. so it was primarily starting with my network of friends, know, guys I drink beer with or go to football games with. And we just saw it as like, hey, let's give this a try and see what happens.
@realjeffsmith (05:53)
Right on. I love it. Sean, what do you got for him,
@shawn_rider_ (05:57)
Well, we're going to jump ahead here. mean, I kind of know where Justin is now. So you got in the capital raising. You did one deal. How'd you make that shift to operator? And then where do you stand today? What does Justin Herock work?
Justin Hroch (06:15)
Yeah, so to round out my story, think, you know, my first few deals were more on this like capital side and I partnered with the same guy where we, he would go do the builds, I'd raise the funds and we did that three or four times, saw some moderate returns. But what I got into as I was doing more of the transactional stuff of helping people buy and sell real estate, as well as some of these flips is I started getting to a point where I realized like, man, I'm always chasing the next deal.
So it's next client who wants to buy a house. It's the next flip that we need to do. And although there's like good pops of income that happened there, ⁓ it wasn't something that was a firm foundation that I could like really rely on as reoccurring ⁓ income to me. And you know, I mean, it's like the ebbs and flows of like entrepreneurship versus W2. We love the W2 because like that paycheck is like super consistent.
every two weeks, it's gonna hit your account, you can depend on it, and it's there. And there's a lot of solace, there's a lot of comfort in that. ⁓ But there's a limited upside to it as well. On the real estate side, it was awesome when it was awesome. And then there were the deep dark moments of like, shit, I need to make a paycheck. ⁓ I remember starting out early in the real estate career, ⁓ you know.
one month you'd make like $60,000 because you had three or four closings, and then all of a sudden it'd be three or four months before you had another deal or anything in sight for it. And so really that transactional nature of it where I was always chasing the next deal or trying to find the next flip led me to a place of saying, how do I create opportunities for my income to be more stable? How do I create something that's like reoccurring? And so I started
exploring what opportunities were like that, particularly in the real estate space because I had my feet underneath me for a while and landed on a mix of things, but more geared towards long-term rentals. So dabble a little bit in short-term rentals, have a few of those that I loathe, but they're still there because they financially make sense. over the last, I 2021 is when my
bought my first long-term rental from 2021 to now about 48 long-term rentals through various partnerships that I have. from there have started up my own personal real estate brokerage, a property management group, and then also a contracting group to help manage the rehabs on all the projects that we do.
@shawn_rider_ (09:06)
So correct me if I'm wrong how I'm thinking about this, right? You definitely talked about the pros and cons of W2 versus non-W2 versus ⁓ working in, let's say, commission-based only ⁓ work, contract work. And then what you did was you went out there and created a business that will mimic consistent flow of a W2 while having the upside of still being a real estate agent, getting in deals as an investor. you're kind of like...
created a trident of consistent cash flow through this avenue, big little pops of cash influx here and then the long term equity play of owning the real estate does does so that's that's amazing and you can go into how you build out teams in order to I hate the word balance, you know, Jeff and I don't like word balance, but you do have a wife, you have kids. So how have you built out a team? And where does where does your ⁓
heart for lack of a better term, where does your heart pull you towards and what part of that you like the most that you kind of control and then hire or outsource the other aspects of that to make that work.
Justin Hroch (10:08)
Thank
Yeah, yeah. So I would say it's been an evolution for me. ⁓ And I've been able to kind of articulate it more recently. But as an agent, what I really felt like I was doing was building a career ⁓ where I had a stable source of income that I was working towards. ⁓ And that's good, but it's highly dependent on you as a person to perform.
you have to go and do the next deal, you have to go and make it happen. And there's a lot of people who like, that's what they do and that's their job. But it's gonna be what they do for the next 20 years. And if they ever stop doing it, it's not gonna be producing that income. And so ⁓ while I was doing that, I hired a number of like, stay at home moms and or ⁓ part-time workers. And what I really found with that is ⁓ people take a lot of time to manage.
and there are a couple different types of people. There are people who need you to give them the whole playbook, like A, B, C, D, all the way to Z. ⁓ And if you give them that, they will be really successful. But that takes a lot of work to do, and that's really hard, particularly for, I think, my personality type. I get very bored maintaining systems ⁓ and trying to keep the ball.
rolling after something's built. If you want to go and start something brand new, I'm all in. I have ideas. I want to figure it out. I want to tinker with it. But at some point, I get to a point where it's like, Oh, yeah, that's done. Okay. And you know, we make 10 15 grand a month on that. And that's fine. And if you keep maintaining it, it'll do okay. And so I kind of had that like, assistant
career-based thing where I'd have people help me, but it never went well because I didn't lead them very well. And about a year ago, I had a pretty big shift with ⁓ my hiring and I had a lady approach me who was looking to change careers. She had seen some of my content on Instagram. We just struck up a conversation, started talking about what would it look like for her to potentially come work for me. And, you know,
I had worked for her I had worked with her in the past in a few different other environments and knew that she was just a very highly competent person ⁓ and I knew like me paying someone $15 an hour to be my assistant wasn't gonna cut it with someone like her and so I had her kind of like hey name your price like what's it gonna take for you to come over and she was like hey I need to make about 80k this year which as a realtor and like kind of doing your own career thing it's like
basically you're saying, hey, I'm gonna take $80,000 of money that I would have made and put in my pocket and give it to you in the hopes that we make this better. ⁓ And that was like a big like shift for me of like, man, can we really do that? ⁓ And ⁓ in a moment of clarity or fate, whatever you call it, I was like, okay, hey, let's like, let's try this. And for me, it was the anecdotal
experience I needed to shift my perspective from career that I was building to company that I was building. And it completely over the last 18 months has changed the way that we look at everything and the systems and processes that we're building. And ⁓ what I really feel like is like, I'm building a company that's no longer going to be dependent on the grind of me. And it's something that we are able to systematize and
hire out so that I can experience the freedom I want, I can do the things that I love to do, ⁓ all while the maintenance of the machine is still running and still going and we can plug different people into it. And so that's been a huge shift from my career to actually building a company.
@shawn_rider_ (14:21)
Well, I've never heard that phrase, but I'm going to steal it from you. So I don't know if you stole it from someone, but, we need to click on one of the Instagram reels. Yeah. I mean, that's huge shifting from a career oriented mindset to a company building mindset. So how did that, let's just talk about that. Cause a lot of people listening are struggling to hire that first, like rockstar employee and by rockstar, like you said, she had great experience, but it really comes down to like investing in someone.
Justin Hroch (14:27)
Yeah.
@shawn_rider_ (14:48)
that hopefully does have the experience, but the ability to get us where we are. So how has that investment brought you an ROI? you know, so many people, so many people want to put a dollar in and get $2 out tomorrow, but what was the tailing and lagging indicate? Like how long did that process play out for you to be able to see a good return, not just financially, but time wise and whatnot.
Justin Hroch (14:57)
Yeah.
Yeah. Again, I do think it turns in or it comes from what kind of leader you are. And the kind of leader I am is one that doesn't love the handholding, doesn't love the like, let me make sure you have everything that you need so that you can get the job done. And I think that depends on the kind of person that you're going to hire. But in entrepreneurs that I talk with, like, you know, especially starting companies young, like
You don't have a lot of money, you don't have a lot of resources, and so you tend to hire the type of person that needs the handholding. And so you spend the majority of your time trying to give them the information they need, the knowledge that you have, and you try to lead them. And they're constantly coming to you and saying, hey, can I get this from you? You give it to them, you have to touch base with them. And you need those kind of people in your company. But what I found is that there's a whole other category of person.
that is a rock star, that does cost a lot of money, but they have the same kind of initiative and drive that you have for your company. And so Haley, who is like my COO, we call her the chief integrator, ⁓ and her whole role is to like basically kind of follow behind me and take the shit systems that I put together.
and build them into like actually something that can be A to Z, right? And so we use the rocket fuel paradigm, the visionary integrator. It's a great paradigm. really unlocked for me, like a lot of the guilt I felt around like, why are these other people not working out for me? ⁓ It's because it just wasn't my personality type to ⁓ lead them well and I'd get bored. And I needed a partner like her to come along.
and actually round out the areas of my weaknesses. And so we have this great working relationship where I'm the visionary and it's kind of like I run into a room and just dump the Legos out and say, yeah, let's build some shit. And then she comes around and she like starts organizing them into the right colors and the right pieces and like putting them in categories that will actually help us build things. One of things I say when I'm starting something new and I still do this, like there's
areas of our company where she has very little purview into because like I'm pioneering it. I'm going out and I'm starting something new. But what I found in myself is like when I go and do this, I can take it from like zero to five and it'll be really great and it'll have some success. But all the systems and processes I built, I built for me and they make sense to me. ⁓ If you had to write down an SOP,
you'd have like step one, do this. And then in my mind, I know the next like six things that are there. And then I would go step two, which is really step seven, because I didn't explain ⁓ two through six to anybody. It was just like up here. ⁓ And so all the systems I build are for Justin, it's for me. And she comes along and she's like, hey, let me build systems for we. And that's where I see her come in and
I mean, we have like in our notion, SOP after SOP after SOP with loom videos and details in it. And what that allows us to do then is that very easy work of ⁓ putting together job descriptions with very specific tasks that either our virtual executive assistants can do and or we just brought on a new property manager who's going to be able to slide right into ⁓ systems that are already working.
and in place that they can process and flourish it. And so I think the overall there is like, man, there's two types of people you can hire and you need both. But the bigger investment one, especially if you're more of a visionary, someone who lacks the competencies to want and desire to invest in people, ⁓ you have to pay more to get that person who wants to maintain and integrate and build the right systems for.
for your team.
@shawn_rider_ (19:37)
So for anyone listening that can foresee themselves going from one property to 50 doors and 100 under management, which is I think about what you're at, what are those systems? What is she doing? And so like obviously you just made the statement that if you're a visionary hire the integrator, what is she doing for you exactly? Pinpoint that.
Justin Hroch (20:01)
Yeah.
So I guess to kind of give you the story, I just started buying the long-term rentals. We started with a fourplex. We moved into a single family that would bought like three properties. And all of a sudden I looked up and we had about 20 properties that I was self-managing. And so I had enough sense to get a kind of property maintenance or property management software.
that we used. And so I had my tenants on there kind of like paying rent, ⁓ submitting maintenance requests, ⁓ kind of doing that thing. ⁓ But what inevitably happened was I would make sure they would pay their rent, but our maintenance queue would just be stacked full because like I didn't have the time or capacity to like get to them. ⁓ And so it wasn't until like there was a major issue or really squeaky will that I would like
they'd go like, oh hey, who do I need to get like in process to do this? And in my mind, I had like four or five guys that I could like run to and say like, hey, can you go fix this or can you go do that? Well, when I hired her, we were around that like 20 to 30 properties and she came in and she kind of looked and she was like, oh, this is good. What vendors do you use? And I was like, well, know, Brian for this and Miguel for that. It's like.
maybe we should put those on a list somewhere. I mean, and it's like simple stuff that like, not that I couldn't do, but I didn't take the time to do. And I wasn't thoughtful about like how one part of the business connected to the other part of the business. And so since then she's come in and she's developed like, we have vendor lists for the several different cities that we operate in from Austin to San Antonio to Waco. And ⁓
we have a process of like tier one, tier two, tier three type emergencies. Like tier one is like water's leaking, gushing everywhere. We need to address it like immediately. Tier two is like, hey, this could be potentially like a safety concern or do further damage to the house. We need to get to it within 48 hours. Tier three is like, we're going to take care of it sometimes this week. We don't know exactly when, but you know, so she's gone in, she's built like all of those systems that we have then hired out.
to an executive assistant who works in the Philippines. And she answers all our phone calls now. When maintenance request comes in, she knows exactly the AB to route it to. So like if it's a plumbing thing and it's in Waco, she's gonna call this guy first and take steps to like deal with it. And so what I would say is like, you know, we're up to, I think it's 48 properties we own and then another, there are a total of a hundred or so that we manage for other people as well.
I don't deal with that at all. In fact, this last two weeks she's been on vacation, this is the first time that I've had to step back into the property management side of things ⁓ in over a year. And it's been eye opening because I'm literally going to our SOPs and I'm like, how do we complete a move out request? And the whole list is there and I just watch a video and I'm like, okay. But it's step by step easy for you to do. And that came from her being able to have ⁓
that competency to go and do that. But she was a bigger investment. And that, I think, is where most people get hung up. It's like, hey, how am going to be able to afford paying someone 80K to do that? ⁓ And she made 80K last year. She's going to make over six figures this year based on some of our profit sharing. ⁓ Because I think the thing that she, what people
miss is when you are running around everywhere trying to plug every hole in your business and you don't have those systems and processes and the right people there, you don't realize how much of time that's taking away from you. And my whole job in our company is to be a revenue generator. And so every moment that I'm not looking at houses to see if they're good acquisitions for us, or I'm not like meeting with clients to see if
we can help them buy their next home, like is revenue lost? And the time that I've gotten back from her being able to do all of these other things that would otherwise have distracted me has generated far more revenue than I would have been able to if I had been distracted.
@realjeffsmith (24:46)
I think people don't understand that Justin, you're going to pay one way or another, right? You're paying with your money or you're paying with your time. And I think that so many business owners having dealt with a bunch of them, as you know, they, they overlook what it takes. Like you would have had no problem hiring her if she said she wanted $50,000. Right. But she said 80 where most people get twisted up is like,
Justin Hroch (24:51)
Yeah.
it.
Thank you.
@realjeffsmith (25:14)
That's really only whatever, like 900 bucks a week. But we look at the macro number and we're like, that's such a huge investment. And I don't know if I can make it work. But ultimately at the end of the day, you're costing yourself time, speed and leverage. And in real estate, that's a huge deal. Because let's use your company that was built in 2021 up until today, right? It took four years to get to where it was.
Justin Hroch (25:37)
See you.
@realjeffsmith (25:44)
If you had done that same thing in 2016 and you were running at this speed in 18, 19, 20, where would your company be as opposed to like... Yes, you would. You'd still be talking to me.
Justin Hroch (25:45)
it's good.
Well, I wouldn't be talking to you guys, that's for sure. I would, I
would.
@realjeffsmith (26:07)
I think
people just don't understand that they're delaying their growth by cutting those corners. now that's not to say you always make the right hire. You go out and you hire the $100,000 resource and like it's always right, but the longer you do it, the more you take your time to understand who you're hiring and what you need ultimately. Cause what you're describing is like a pure integrator. Like somebody that comes...
Justin Hroch (26:31)
Thank
Thanks.
@realjeffsmith (26:35)
back
end and looks and says, we have no systems at all. And let me build these playbooks and these SOPs and stuff like that. And a lot of people aren't wired like that.
Justin Hroch (26:47)
Yeah, yeah, no, and I think it is finding that right person, ⁓ you know, who can compliment you. ⁓ And I don't think I like, in some ways, this was a luck hire for me. You know, it was the right time, right place, right opportunity for her. ⁓ And I didn't know what I was getting. And so I'm not gonna count it all up to skill on my part, ⁓ you know, other than my sheer charisma ⁓ to bring in that type of talent. ⁓
But yeah, there is that. One thing that I heard recently, and it's kind of informed our recent hire of a property manager, was a lot of times you go post your job posting on Indeed, and we did this for this property management position. And we got just shit ton of resumes and people who were interested. And we went through them, and they just weren't very high
Like we were not impressed at all by any of the talent that was out there. And I can't remember who I was listening to, but it was a podcast or something. And they started talking about hiring from the perspective of like, hey, if you're putting your stuff on Indeed and those kinds of places, like you're looking for people who either aren't satisfied in their job or don't have a job. And like, you're kind of at the bottom of the talent pool. ⁓ And like where you really need to be looking is like,
where are the places where people are already employed and how can you go and get them, right? And so there's a guy that I know, we've been realtors together, we've gone to the same church and we like kind of interacted a handful of time. And I knew that he was doing pretty well as an agent over at his side of things, but in a slower market like this right now, the volume just isn't there, right? And so I was able to go to him.
who was already hustling, already had good experience, already was gonna be 10 levels advanced and say, hey, why don't you come and work with us? We're gonna provide you a base that you can depend on, which is a really great thing for an agent because it's so transactional. But then you can still go crush it. We're gonna match your salary cap and we're gonna make sure your splits are the same. And what I found there was just like,
Instead of playing at the bottom of the pool, people looking for ⁓ work, like it's about going and recruiting and finding those people who are already working and trying to add them to your team. So you're getting those A type players.
@shawn_rider_ (29:27)
That was huge. I think there's some takeaways from there. mean, that's when we even looked at when we even looked at our last business, brick and mortar, it was we went out in the in the community where those like kind businesses were and we just became clients of those businesses and saw who did the best job on on staff.
And those were the people that we went after. So there's ways and methods to do that. So I'm going to shift gears here a little bit because Jeff made a comment about like you pay one way or another. You either pay with your time or you pay with money. And then that allows you to, as you said, Justin, be a revenue seeking and revenue generating part of the machine and flywheel.
Justin Hroch (29:47)
Yeah.
@shawn_rider_ (30:08)
None of that goes to say that it's gonna lessen the necessarily the amount of time or focus that we need to put towards our jobs. But in the tactical empire, we make a huge emphasis on ⁓ family and fitness. So fitness is more so for you as an individual and then family is your entire nuclear unit. So how have you been able to integrate your company building, not career, your company building with being a husband and father and then someone that, you
gives a shit about fitness.
Justin Hroch (30:41)
Yeah, you know, fitness for me, at least from the like exercise standpoint, hasn't typically been a struggle. It's kind of, I was always a short guy. I know I look tall on the podcast, but I'm not. ⁓ And so I kind of walked around most of my life with a chip on my shoulder of being the short guy and I found the weight room at some point and... ⁓
found a lot of like encouragement and validity there. so working out has been somewhat of a natural thing. It's ebb and flowed in seasons. And, know, I think, you know, I just hit 40 and one of the things that I've realized, you know, over my thirties as my wife and I had four kids was you have to sacrifice in different ways for your family. And so, you know, my wife, when she wants to work out, I let her go.
She stays at home with the kids all day and she wants to do it in the middle of the day, she wants to go in the evening. It's like, hey, I know you need your time, you go do you. Well, I'm a human being too. I need my time, I need to go do me. But for me to do that with my family, it means waking my ass up at 5 a.m. so that I cannot take time away from them. And so I get up at 5 a.m. and I go to the gym and you know.
At this point, it's a real, ⁓ it's something I enjoy. I don't think anybody loves it when they first get going on it. ⁓ But the thing that I had to make a shift was before we had kids, was like, yeah, we're just running our schedules. I'll go whenever you go whenever that kind of thing. But as kids kind of started settling in and there was more of those responsibilities of like, Hey, I only get this much time in the morning. We get this much time in the evening with them. We need to make those times impact.
And so as a man, like one of the things that I have to do is sacrifice my time in the morning to go get up so that I'm not taking away from like family time elsewhere. ⁓ You know, and so, so for me, that has been really important. ⁓ I think, you know, building this business, we're about four years in, I foresee a time, you know, in the next two to three years where we've built it in a way that
I'm afforded a lot more freedom ⁓ and I see a clear path to that. And so it might not always be 5 a.m. It might be I can dig around after 1 p.m. and do what I want. ⁓ And I would like to probably get there, but I think it's not there yet. Now, as far as like the family front, ⁓ know, I think the curse or sickness of an entrepreneur is like, it's really hard to shut off your brain.
I find that morning, night, whenever, it's really, really hard to do that in a way ⁓ that doesn't take away. And so, I've given my wife freedom to ⁓ pull me out of it. So there's definitely some cues where she helps me put down the phone and ⁓ we make sure that we do family dinner together and phones are away and things like that.
⁓ and then yeah, I think the bigger part of it probably is being in community with guys who are actually pushing you to do that. Cause I think left to myself, I would think about that the least, but being a part of a group like the tactical empire, like I'm constantly having to reassess that area of my life. And I get to hear Sean.
Talk on group calls and see his stupid Facebook posts where he's like hanging out with his kids not like two in the afternoon and That's good for me because it reminds me and Sean remind me that like did my kids are only gonna be in my house for the next 8 to 12 years like that's kind of where we are and So when my son who's six says hey, we play a board game with me is probably more important than the email
I was trying to draft, you know? And, you know, I would like to think that I'd have moments that I would do that, but I have more moments that I do that because I am around other guys who are trying to pursue those kind of things. ⁓ And I mean, I think that's like one of the things why I run with you guys is because it is, it's not like we're always getting the best ideas or like the most, you know, but we're shoulders with each other that are pursuing like a common.
And ⁓ it's benefited me from a finance standpoint. It's benefited me from a fitness standpoint and not wanting to look fat for you guys. And then financially, mean, it's like several of the partnerships that I have have come from ⁓ this group. so I guess I would say, I don't nail it. It's like a target that probably moves around. And sometimes I'm hitting bullseye on those things. And a lot of times I'm not. ⁓
But I haven't laid the target to the side. It's always like right in front of me because I'm being reminded.
@shawn_rider_ (36:08)
Well, thanks for teeing up the end of the episode. I was going to make that shift and you went right for it without knowing what questions were coming. So ⁓ you kind of did a good job summarizing it there, but I'm going to post a question anyways to see if anything else comes to mind. Being a part of the Titer Grand Barrier Inner Circle, and now you're actually one of the longest standing members in our group, right? And we, you know, it's obvious that with any and all groups, people come and people go, ⁓ but...
@realjeffsmith (36:09)
That's awesome.
@shawn_rider_ (36:37)
You've been with us for very long time and I want people to recognize that you don't need something new and fancy every single time you go to a meetup, right? Like you can stay the course in the plan that you have and Justin has and still get things to be taken away from the weekly calls, the...
two times a year meetups and then just being able to message in the group and comment on other people's stuff and doing the critical tasks and the wins every week. But over the past few years that you've been in the inner circle, what other things have you taken away to keep you here?
Justin Hroch (37:14)
Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, when it originally started out, like, it was me talking with Jeff just on his experience because, you know, he was seven, eight years down the road from where I am today. And so ⁓ the original hook was I got to learn from someone who had
And that was like really important for me like early on. I think like what I found as I got into the group was one, what I call the pace setting, right? You're around a bunch of other high powered entrepreneurs who are getting after it. And like, you know, if you're a guy, you get motivated by that, right? If you see a guy in the gym squatting, you know, 400 pounds, you're like,
I want to do that. And I think it's like kind of the same in the group of like, you see someone doing something and it opens up like, if they can do that, then I can do that as well. And so it's like this push and pull of like the pace setting. And then I think like, you know, as you move from like the mentor to the pace setting, like I would say like some of my like most established friendships that I have, you know, from a business networking perspective have been found in this group, you know.
We talked about the Wednesday calls, which are great. The meetups are awesome just because like you're getting to the meetups for me. I don't often take two to three days to put my business like off to the side so that can like dream and think about things. And that's what the meetups are is like gives me space to like think about my business from 30,000 feet, kind of see like what the next steps are, put it in the context of the rest of my life.
And so the meetups are great for that. But I'd say more than that, like, I mean, even this morning, I was texting two or three guys from the group on different text threads that I would never have known them had I not been in this group. And they're guys that like, you know, we bullshit with and send stupid stuff to, but then we talk business and we ask questions to. And so, ⁓ I mean, it really is like a ⁓ really valuable network of guys who have a very like mind.
and culture that want to see you succeed. I want to see Sean succeed. want to Jeff succeed. And I know that they want to see me succeed. And there's not like a, ⁓ you know, yeah, I hope you do well. Not really. It's like, I really like, I feel like when Jeff looks at me he's like, I want you to crush it. Like, and that's like a proud moment for him when he sees the guys in his group, like just crush it. And I would say like, you know,
Purely statistically, if you look at the guys who like when they came in the group to where they are now, I mean, I would say their marriage is probably better, their finances are probably better, and their fitness is probably better. And so, I mean, there seems to be something that you guys are doing that works.
@realjeffsmith (40:21)
Well, dude, like you hit on it. But what I was about to say is that like if you rewind three years ago and then I think about like what you were building, I feel like when you you and I first like we knew each other a long time ago. But when you first started working with us, like I saw what you have now. And I wanted that for you so badly. And I don't even before you could see it. I was like, here's all the systems.
Justin Hroch (40:25)
you
@realjeffsmith (40:48)
because of your background, because of the access you had, because of the people and the resources that you would be able to add, I was like, this is gonna be amazing to watch. And four years, fast forward, what you've got, the reason I'm talking like so pumped up is because I know where you're at in three or four years. And I know what this company looks like. it's like, you're 40, you said you're turning 40, when you're turning 45,
Justin Hroch (40:52)
Thank
Thank you.
Yeah.
@realjeffsmith (41:15)
your family's life is gonna be completely different than probably you can even imagine right now. And like that's so exciting. And like genuinely. Because your wife deserves it.
Justin Hroch (41:20)
Mm.
Yeah. Yeah. No, and I feel it. And I mean, yeah,
she 100 % does for all the shit she has to deal with. I mean, I have this like, you know, you have those core memories, like in what's that movie? Whatever. But you have these core memories, joy and sadness. But one of my core memories is at this meetup where
I had like said, I'm going to buy 20 houses this year. And it was like April and I had bought one. ⁓ and Jeff is up there talking and he's like, like Justin, he wants to buy 20 houses this year. And you do the quick math and you're like, Hey, you got to buy eight this quarter if you want to make it happen. And like why that struck me, it was just like a little thing in my head that was like, ⁓ eight houses. Okay. This quarter. Okay.
And we went and bought 10. And then by the end of the year, we were at 22. But it was like those little moments that we had of like meetups and being in the group and being encouraged. Like that's like where it came from. And so yeah, I'm excited for 45 ⁓ because I do believe like, I mean, that's the trajectory of like where things are going. I mean, outside of World War III, we got this guys.
@realjeffsmith (42:43)
Hey, we're gonna run to that finish line no matter what. It doesn't matter. That's what I tell you guys all the time.
Justin Hroch (42:48)
Yeah.
@realjeffsmith (42:53)
Well, it's been a pleasure, Justin. I definitely appreciate it. I'll let Sean finish it up because I'm interrupting, but go ahead.
@shawn_rider_ (43:01)
No,
that's it. mean, we nailed it. ⁓ You know, if you guys don't know ⁓ enough about Justin, I mean, we definitely find him on on the socials. I'll let him chime in here in a second. But he's doing big things. Like you said, he's partnered with a lot of guys in the group. ⁓ Me being one of them.
That's how much the men in the group trust him on what he's built. And as he's vocalized, know, Jeff kind of opened his eyes and led him along the way. now Jeff or Justin is passing it forward to the other guys in these tech threads and adding value to everyone else, which is what we appreciate inside the intercurriculum. So Justin, how can people find what you do? And if anyone's local to Waco and has investment properties, how can they find your business so you can help them out?
Justin Hroch (43:47)
Yeah, you can find me at Justin Herock on Instagram, Facebook, it's H-R-O-C-H. And then our company is called Dagwood Properties. The website is dagwoodmanagement.com. We probably need to work on that. But Dagwood Properties, our whole pitch is we want to help the investor from start to finish. So from buying the house to rehabbing it to managing it, we want to help them.
With that process so it's hassle free for them. And so we work with investors We work with people who you know aren't ready to sell their house, but are moving on to the next thing ⁓ Yeah, we'd to be a service to anybody in the central, Texas area
@realjeffsmith (44:32)
Boom.
@shawn_rider_ (44:34)
yeah, Jeff, send the people out.
@realjeffsmith (44:36)
Right on guys. Justin, I appreciate you. Thank you for your time today. Sean, I appreciate it. Guys, you can find us at the Tactical Empire on any platform. We've got a free Facebook community and the Tactical Empire community on Facebook and give us a like and subscribe on YouTube. Please, we appreciate you, but we will continue to put out content regardless. Have a great week, kick ass and move your life forward.
Justin Hroch (44:39)
Peace. ⁓
be able to do that.
Thanks guys.