Rick Jarman:
I got caught up in the late 90s and had to start over. So I went from being able to borrow millions of dollars, to I couldn’t get a $19.99 pager in my name.
Speaker 2:
This is Start FM. Now here’s your host, active real estate investor and entrepreneur, Chad Duval.
Chad Duval:
Hey, what’s going on everyone. Long time no talk. We’re back. We’re back with another episode of Start FM. Unfortunately I come to you with a heavy heart, because today’s guest has recently passed away from COVID-19. This is an episode that we recorded back in the second week of October. And it was supposed to be part of the season two production. But we decided to release it today, or this week, in lieu of this information. Very unfortunate information.
Chad Duval:
Rick Jarman, he’s been in real estate for over 40 years. He’s done everything in real estate from building houses, flipping houses. He’s owned apartment buildings. And ended up mostly doing single family homes, long-term rentals in the recent years. I think he, at the time of recording, he had over 100 doors. So Rick is a book filled of knowledge. And if anybody follows him on Instagram, you will understand what I’m talking about. He’s got over 620 something posts. Posts videos, tutorials, answers questions, gives advice on Instagram, daily.
Chad Duval:
And on a personal level, Rick Jarman, I became really good friends with him. I consider him a mentor in my business career. I didn’t really consider him that until this past week or two when I had time to reflect on our relationship. He was just an outstanding man. We met on Instagram when he first started his Instagram journey, I think it was early 2019 or maybe late 2018. But yeah, we used to go back and forth and run ideas by each other and comment on everything that was going on, on each other’s posts, because I ended up switching mine over to more of business and real estate content as well.
Chad Duval:
And even though we never really met in person, it’s really crazy to see and hear of his passing, because up until now, again, a lot of reflection on the relationship. And without Rick, I don’t think that this show, or my real estate portfolio, would have grown, or the first episode would have been released. Rick was the first episode of the show. And having somebody as knowledgeable and willing to help and always there when you need him, it made me more confident. I know it’s made other close friends of mine more confident, the real estate community on Instagram way more confident to actually pull of deals and grow portfolios.
Chad Duval:
But not even just in business, just as a role model for an A+ man that everybody looked up to. He was always willing to help, and just, again, an outstanding man. So Rick Jarman, you will be missed. I hope you guys enjoy this last recorded conversation I had with Rick.
Chad Duval:
Well Rick, welcome to the show. Welcome back to the show. How you doing?
Rick Jarman:
Man, I’m doing great. I’m just so excited to be back with you, because you know you were one of the first people that I followed. And you followed me kind of when I first got on Instagram.
Chad Duval:
I know. A lot has happened in the last year. Because I think it’s been a little over a year since we talked last on here.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. I looked today. You know you can go on YouTube and I was looking and it showed that it was posted in June 2019.
Chad Duval:
Oh wow, it was that long ago.
Rick Jarman:
So yeah.
Chad Duval:
It’s crazy.
Rick Jarman:
It is. And I didn’t get on here until … I guess it was the latter part of February or March. And so I hadn’t been on it long when we did that.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Absolutely. So how you making out down there with the world burning?
Rick Jarman:
Man, we’re doing.
Chad Duval:
It looks like the world’s burning down to the ground right now with everything going on.
Rick Jarman:
I’m telling you man. You know I was telling somebody the other day that it was strange how we adapt. Used to you see one of your buddies or something, say, “Man, I like them boots. Do they wear good?” I was at the drive through teller the other day at the credit union and I asked the lady, I said, “I like that mask. Can you breathe in it good?” We’re looking at masks now.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, no. Exactly. Exactly. I know, and they’re all customized now. How strict is it down there right now with the masks and the social distancing, everything like that?
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. In Tuscaloosa, Tuscaloosa more so than Northport. They’re two joining cities. Tuscaloosa’s mayor’s pretty tough. Our restaurants are at 50% capacity, probably just like y’all’s.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
You’re out in the public, you’re supposed to be wearing a mask. And you wear it into the restaurant to order, and then you take it off to eat. And then you put it back on. So it’s a whole new norm. And my grandkids, they go to a private Christian school, and they’ve started back to school when school started. They’re having to wear masks and everything. It’s a little different. But I guess what I tell folks, all that going on, real estate’s still selling and renting. So that’s the main thing.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, no. It absolutely is right now. I cannot believe. Well I understand why, but the markets around here for residential real estate are going through the roof. It seems like a lot of people are flocking outside the cities and trying to get their own space, and getting spread out a little bit.
Rick Jarman:
Right. Yeah I think it’s all over the country. I’m sure there’s pockets it’s not like that. But I think pretty much everywhere right now, the demand is that way, and the supply. And you get multiple offers when you’re trying to sell something. It’s just crazy. I mean I’ve been at it full-time since 1984, so that’s 36 years this past June, going on 37. And I’ve never seen nothing like it. And I’ve got a friend of mine, he’s about 83 years old … you know I’m 65 now. And this friend of mine he said … He’d been in it 50-some odd years. He said, “I’ve never seen nothing like it.” I said, “Man, I haven’t either.” And he’s a builder like I used to be. So it’s crazy.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Huh. You’re not building right now are you?
Rick Jarman:
No, no. I quit building in 2015, when I turned 60. I’d built for 31 years, approximately 500 new houses. But two weeks after I turned 60, I got up one morning, I told my wife, I said, “The fun’s gone. I’m not building anymore.” Now we’re still flipping. We’re trying to at least flip one a month. But we’re running a couple behind because of the COVID. But yeah, I did that, like I said, for 31 years. And we remodeled and built and whatever. Sometimes people will ask me, “Well don’t you miss building?” I say, “Well yeah, but I can go get in my recliner and it’ll pass.”
Chad Duval:
Yeah.
Rick Jarman:
You know, building’s stressful. I tell people-
Chad Duval:
Oh yeah. There’s a lot of moving parts.
Rick Jarman:
Flipping houses is like being on vacation. And it’s gotten to where to build on the level I was building on, I would have to buy half a million dollars worth of lots, minimum. And each construction loan was going to be $250,000, $300-something thousand, to turn the same profit I can do buying less than a $100,000 flip and fix it up and sell it. You know the worse thing happen on that flip, if the market went to hell and back, I could just rent it. And it’s hard to do with them new … New houses only be once. I tell folks them virgin toilet seats, what I call them, they only be once.
Chad Duval:
Right. Yeah. So you’re not building anymore. Last time we talked, I think at that time you were … Yeah, you weren’t building. You were just managing your properties. You have about 125 houses.
Rick Jarman:
Correct.
Chad Duval:
What are you at these days? What’s some of the updates that have happened over the last year, for everybody who listened to episode one?
Rick Jarman:
Okay. Well, like I said, we quit building in 2015. That was five years ago. And probably about four years ago we started back doing some flipping. But we’ve picked up some houses. We’ve sold a few houses. I had a couple that just got too valuable to keep renting them like I was. One of them became student … Well actually I had two become student rentals, and another one. I think I’ve sold four that I had. But I bought back that many. So we’re still running about the same.
Rick Jarman:
In fact, I was talking with my son today. I’m saying, “Man, I don’t know if we need to buy anymore.” Because I do that, and then in a few days I’ll find one. I said, “We better go ahead and look about this.” You get that happy medium where … I have a full-time office manager that’s my bookkeeper and everything. And then myself and my son. And then we have a full-time maintenance man. Then I’ve got a guy that’s worked with me that helps with the flips and stuff. He used to be an employee of mine, years ago. But he’s been back working with me pretty much every day for six years, in my different companies when we’re remodeling, whatever.
Rick Jarman:
But if we grow our houses much more, then you’ve got to look about adding on another person. And then you’ve got to generate enough money to pay that person’s salary. So I don’t know, we may pick up a few more. I guess time will tell.
Chad Duval:
Are you still in about 125 houses right now?
Rick Jarman:
Yeah, yeah. We’re still there.
Chad Duval:
That’s impressive. You only have a very, very skeleton crew. How are you managing all of these houses with just an admin and a maintenance guy basically, and yourself? And I seems like you’re not completely hands-on on the day to day.
Rick Jarman:
No, I don’t. I still approve every application. That way if anything doesn’t work out, it’s on my back. And my son, for years he ran the new construction, the day to day of it. And so he’s been learning the rental the last five years. So really, truth be known, I usually go in on Thursdays, is about my only day I work a full day. I could probably not even go in the rest of the time, but I like to go in. And then I like to go out and look at stuff. But I’ve cut way back. It’s been hard for me. I tell folks … Because I was 60 before I realized I could take a Saturday of all day without going to check a job, work at the office a little while, unless my family had something going, a ball game. In other words, I just couldn’t stay home and watch TV or something. And I’ve kind of learned to do that the last five years. I tell them I’m getting sorry.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. If you’re able to basically work one day a week with a small team like yourself, how are you managing all of the … Are you using software and stuff right now?
Rick Jarman:
You know, no. The only software we use is we use QuickBooks Pro.
Chad Duval:
Okay.
Rick Jarman:
And we have our QuickBooks setup. That’s what he have all the rentals in. And everybody, they either mail their check or money order in, or come to the office and pay. We don’t do all these pay programs and stuff. In fact, when COVID first started I had some people ask me what we were doing different since COVID. And back then, at first they didn’t know if it was touching door knobs and whatever you could get it. You know I said, “Well the only thing we’re doing, we’re leaving the front door open so they don’t have to open it when they come in to pay.”
Chad Duval:
Oh, there you go.
Rick Jarman:
But we’ve got a plexiglass thing up now. And of course I have low turnover. In fact, I had a tenant, I realized the other day, I asked her … Because she was in the house when I bought the house. And I’ve owned the house for 17 years. I said, “How long have you lived in this house?” And she’d lived there 21 years. But you know, I’ve got a lot of tenants that have been with me 10, 12, 13 years. I don’t get a lot of turnover. You get a certain amount, but not for the number I have.
Chad Duval:
Right. Now how are you managing all of the maintenance requests and stuff like that? With 100-something houses, I’m assuming you’re getting a couple a day or one a day.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah, we get several. Our maintenance guy, he has a company truck and he stays on the road catching calls.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
We have a work order system. Everything that’s called in … Like I know a lot of these folks, these new programs they use, they call in, they write up the work order and they try not to have any communication. We like to communicate. A lot of my tenants like to come to the office to pay. We have a few mail it in. But they usually come by and make a payment. And you kind of get to know them.
Rick Jarman:
But we have a work order system we use. Actually I kind of designed this form when I still worked at the University of Alabama. I left there 1984, so I’ve been using this same form for 36 years, going on 37. It’s a triplicate copy. It’s letter size. It’s a white copy, a pink copy, and a yellow copy. And we keep the white copy at the office. The service man takes the pink and yellow, and they leave one at the tenant’s house when they do the work. And then they turn the other one in. And when we have subs that do the work, they come by and get the key and the work order and we do all that the same.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, and then you just give one copy of that work order to the admin so they can add that to your-
Rick Jarman:
Right. They take two. They take the one they’re going to leave. And on ours they’ll write what they did. And they’ll make a note if it was something we need to bill back. You know we’ve educated our subs. And of course our maintenance man knows. And so it works good. Like I said, I’ve been using it all these years and it’s still getting the job done.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, it’s simple. That’s a huge testament. I know when I first got started, many years ago now, it was a daunting task to even try and come up with systems. And I always thought I had to have all the software for property management and QuickBooks and call centers and all this stuff. But it just seems like it’s … You can totally over complicate it.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. The only thing we have, we have a 24 hour answering service. And there again, we have them trained not to call us, like if an air conditioner goes out in the middle of the night there’s nothing you can do. But we’ve been using them probably 30 years. And they went through a couple ownerships. They do a good job. That costs us maybe $140-something a month because the tenants never have our number. In fact, I think you and I talked about that one time. And I think you were using a Google number or something, you told me.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Yeah. Just so that way they don’t have it.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. Because you never want no tenants have your number.
Chad Duval:
Right.
Rick Jarman:
But the one thing about doing it, we do a work order on everything. Even if it’s a call out and we get it took care of at night or on the weekend, we’ll come in the next day or that Monday morning and we will write up a work order. We always have that history. So it’s so good, because you get a tenant say, “Well you hadn’t fixed this and you hadn’t been to my house and you hadn’t did this.” Well you pull them work orders and there they are. We were here on this day. We were here on that day. We got a simple system, the little old wire baskets. We got a credenza over by the windows in our office, and its got active, in-progress, completed. And you just-
Chad Duval:
It’s super simple.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. Then when you’re through, you go bill them back to one. Just bill them back. And the ones you don’t, you file them away.
Chad Duval:
Right. Right. Yeah, no. Again, it goes back to the simpler, the easier it is, and it holds on. It lasts for 30-something years.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. And I’ve found too, like I said, a lot of people they say, “Oh people can go on and fill out their application online. And they can do this online.” Like they don’t want to have any contact with them. I have trained my people, when somebody comes in, they know to look at the window and see what they’re driving. Not that this is 100%. But you know, somebody drives up an old raggedy ass vehicle sitting on three spare tires and … We have a $35 application fee, and they’re trying to scrape together the $35. Or they bring the kids in and the kids are bouncing off the ceiling and their parent’s right there, how do you think they’re going to do when they get into your house?
Chad Duval:
Right.
Rick Jarman:
So I like meeting and seeing the tenants, I mean the people applying for the housing. And of course the credit check’s the main thing. We have that right in our office. I always tell folks liars get a number, but numbers don’t lie. You can look at that credit report … And I don’t do the beacon score or the FICO score. I do the old style, still through one of the major credit bureaus.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, what are you guys using? Because I’ve used Smart Rental before, or Smart Rent, or something like that, through TransUnion before.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah, I think ours is … I sign it every month, but I can’t remember if it’s … It’s not TransUnion. What’s the one that starts with an A? Anyway, it’s one of the major three credit bureaus.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Yeah. Either Experian or-
Rick Jarman:
And I’m sorry, I can’t remember the name. But it’ll show just what I want to see. Okay, who all they’re paying, who they’re not paying, how many days they’ve been late, if they have any collections, any foreclosures. And when you see all that, you can build a history pretty quick on that person. And it works good.
Rick Jarman:
But like I said, we like for them to come to the office, they pick up the application. We don’t have a website. I had somebody built one for me a few years ago, one of my employees, and left. I don’t even know how to get on it. We get a call every now and then, somebody sees a house for rent, “Oh no, that’s years old.” But we don’t even have a website, man. People say, “Well how do you advertise your property?” We put a sign in the yard. That’s all we had to do and people … Because people are going to be riding around looking where they want to live.
Chad Duval:
Right. There’s a few takeaways from that. For everybody that has never used any of these services, the one that I used to use is SmartMove by TransUnion. It’s pretty cool, because you can actually choose to either pay it yourself. I think it’s either $35 or $45. Or you can actually bill the tenant, and then it just sends them an email with a link where they actually fill out their information. You, as the landlord, never actually see any of the data. All it is is you set your criteria before it, and then it’s either a fail or pass type of credit approval process. So it makes it super easy. I’m assuming yours is very similar to that as well.
Rick Jarman:
Actually they fill out an application and they give us their Social Security number and all that stuff. Then we put it in ourself. Then we print out the credit report. I have a physical credit report I keep on file.
Chad Duval:
Oh, that’s really good too, especially if you end up having to go to court or something like that.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. And see a lot of people don’t realize … I hear people that just go by the FICO score or the Beacon score. They’re missing out on a lot of good tenants. I do C class, so there’s a lot of times a lot of those tenants may not have a checking account, may not have credit cards. They may want to pay with a money order every month. That’s fine.
Rick Jarman:
But if you look and they’ve paid their … We check with the current landlord and the previous landlord. We send out a thing to that landlord. We’ll just send the application, they fill out, they sign something saying we can check their credit, we can check with their previous landlord. They give us the names. We call them and we email them a copy of the form for them to fill out to tell us what kind of tenant they were. We check them pretty good.
Rick Jarman:
And once you do all of that … And I look at that credit report. If they’re paying their water bill, the power bill, gas bill. I don’t care if they have medical, because a lot of people don’t have insurance. I don’t care if they’re behind on student loans. I just want to see they’re paying their landlords and their bills and the utilities, then they’re probably going to pay me.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. I’ve done that as well too. A while ago we had somebody that applied that had a horrible credit score, but it was literally … They paid everything every month, except for they had some back payments on some medical issues. And then I talked to them and they went through a divorce and that was one thing that had to slip. And they had to just not pay that for a couple months while they were going through a divorce. So that kind of trashed everything. So you’re right, if you just go off of the FICO score, or credit score, it’s not showing you the whole picture. There’s always exceptions.
Rick Jarman:
And you’re not selling them the property, you’re just renting it to them.
Chad Duval:
Right. Right. Good point. Good point. But no, I also wanted to mention the fact that you are so involved with your tenants. You’re building a relationship. I know, for me, it’s not typically my default style to do it. I’m kind of like the other guys that you’re talking about. I like to stay very removed, do a lot of things online, make it more transactional, unemotional. But I can see where the benefit is for handling your tenants that you’re doing, because you’re talking to them, you’re picking up the checks every month, they’re coming into the office. And your track record of your tenants, being there for 10, 12, 15 years at a time, it seems like that might be a contributing factor to that. I’m assuming that-
Rick Jarman:
Yeah, it gets to be home. And I tell people, when you’re looking for rental property, a tenant wants the same thing you want. If they’re looking at a house, they want a yard, they want a place their kids can go out and play. They want to feel safe when they walk from their car to the house. They want decent schools. They want the same thing you want. And if you look at it like that when you’re looking at a piece of property, that’ll help you as you’re trying to decide where to buy something, besides just the price.
Chad Duval:
Right. Right.
Rick Jarman:
As the old real estate saying is, location, location, location.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. My uncle is a real estate investor too, and the one piece of advice he always gives me, or he reminds me of every time I see him at the holidays is, “Only buy real estate that you feel comfortable living in yourself.” And that’s such a great barometer as far as the quality of tenants and the ease of management, for sure.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. And I’ll tell you a little story. I had a guy come in the other day to pay the rent, a young man. And I don’t usually collect the rent. I don’t have the day to day, I might be in my office. If I call them, it’s not good. If I get to knowing what the balance and stuff, it means it’s not good. Or if I go knock on your door, it’s really bad. But most the time now my son … I hadn’t had to evict but maybe two or three people in the last five years. Usually I’ll try to work it out. You got to realize, if you’re going to lose two, three months, getting one out and fixing it back up and renting it, you’re better off trying to work with them, work a payment plan, especially if they’ve been with you. I mean, if they’re a good tenant.
Rick Jarman:
I always tell folks I’ve never seen a bad tenant become a good tenant. It just doesn’t happen. Now sometimes a good tenant turns into a bad tenant. But you’ll never find a bad one that’ll turn into a good one. So if you’ve got a tenant that’s been trying, there’s usually something going on if something changes. You talk with them, then you try to work it out with them.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, no. Absolutely. I remember you telling me that earlier, I think in one of our previous conversations. That’s such a good point, I never ever thought about that. If they start out bad, they never really get good.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. If you got a bad one, you get them gone as quick as you can. I do remember what I was going to say now. I got sidetracked. I tend to do that sometimes. This young man come in and I was having to collect money … I tell him, like if my office manager needs to leave and I’m the only one there I say, “Put it on the answering service,” because I don’t want to answer the phone. But I will take that money.
Rick Jarman:
So this young man come in. I said, “Now whose rent you paying?” He says, “You know me, Mr. Jarman.” He told me where they lived. Well the last time I seen him … because I don’t go and about. And I’ve probably seen him since. I hadn’t thought about it. He’s like 18, 19 years old. He was like seven years old when they moved into the house. I mean that’s their home.
Chad Duval:
Oh wow.
Rick Jarman:
They live there that long when it gets to be their home. It’s home to them.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. I don’t know, I guess if you could make it somebody’s … if you can get them to make sure it’s their home, I think they’ll become a pretty easy tenant.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. And if you remember, I only do 15 year mortgages. I’ve always did that. When I was starting out that’s how it was. And to this day. So when you take people staying that long, a lot of them are paying for your property for you.
Chad Duval:
Right, yeah. Especially if you’re saying your tenants are staying there for 15 years. That’s crazy. That’s crazy. Now what’s the reason behind doing 15 year mortgages instead of 30?
Rick Jarman:
Well it was the way it was done when I started. And most of my financing is through commercial banks, like a regional bank or a local bank. And as you know, most of those don’t like to do more than 20 years. You might get 25 out of them. But 15 years was just always that sweet spot. And I still do it. And usually when you do a 15 year rate, if you find a deal … I tell everybody, first, always find a deal. So when you find a deal, that’s helping you some. And then a 15 year mortgage is usually less than a 20, 25, 30. You get a little better rate. So that’s helping you.
Rick Jarman:
In fact, if anybody doesn’t follow me on Instagram go and follow me. I’ve got almost 500 videos on there. It may be 500. For a long time I was doing one a day. I’m down to about five a week, maybe six. And of course now we’re regulars, I’m doing that too. But I’ve got a video on there where I talk about the difference between a 15 and a 30. I actually ran amortization schedules and show you the difference in the payments. Even though I ran them at the interest rate, and it’s not as much different as a lot of people think. But it’s like this too … Now how old are you, Chad?
Chad Duval:
34.
Rick Jarman:
Okay. Say you buy a house tomorrow and you do a 30 … I mean a piece of rental property. You do 30 years, you’re going to be 64 when it’s paid for. But now if you do it in 15, look where you’re at because 10 would be 44, 49 years old and you got all them years that you’re getting the whole money. And of course it doesn’t seem as important today with these crazy low interest rates, but it’s not going to always been like that. It hasn’t always been.
Chad Duval:
Right. Right.
Rick Jarman:
So when you’re looking at a higher interest rate it’s a lot more appealing.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. And I do like the idea of doing a 15 right out the gate, because it always gives you some options too. If you refi later, you could always go to a 30 year to lower your payments if you had to, if it got to a point where you needed some cash flow or something, more cash flow.
Rick Jarman:
You know, there again, if you’re using commercial loans … I know a lot of people get one or two, three, and they’re doing FHA loans, whatever. Well that’s fine. But if you’re going to really grow and up your game, you can’t do those 30 year mortgages. I mean most of your regional banks aren’t going to do that, and your local banks.
Chad Duval:
Oh yeah, exactly. I think the best I’ve ever gotten is 25 year.
Rick Jarman:
That’s it. that’s it.
Chad Duval:
But they usually do 20, and you have to negotiate the extra five out of it.
Rick Jarman:
That’s right. And if you tell them 15, they’ll be smiling.
Chad Duval:
Right. Exactly. Your payment might be higher, so you got to find a really good deal to make sure that it’s worth it.
Rick Jarman:
That’s right. You got to try to get everything in line. But it’s just good. Our real estate portfolio’s, well we’re about $11 million now. And we have debt less than $2 million on it. So, we’re … I’m sorry. Go ahead.
Chad Duval:
No. No. I was just going to say, that’s pretty amazing. You’ve got so much equity there that you can borrow against to buy more, or just sit there and just cash flow.
Rick Jarman:
I’ve got one loan that’s got 46 houses in this one loan. So you hear people say, “You can’t have more than 10 in it.” That’s a crock. This one started out at 50-something.
Chad Duval:
Yeah.
Rick Jarman:
And anyway, it’s 46 houses in it. I owe less than $700,000. So if you do the math, that’s down in the teens. And a lot of these houses are worth $125,000 $150,000, $100,000, $95,000. So my payment on it is $12,000 a month, approximately $12,000. So if I leave it like it is, I set that loan up … I had a bond issue and I moved it and got out of the bond issue there in the recession. So I set it back up after that, probably a year or two. So anyway, I’m probably a little over half way, about eight years into a 15 year note. When I did it, I financed $1,550,000. I paid $500,000 down, financed $1,550,000. So it’s paid down to less than $700,000.
Rick Jarman:
So I was telling my wife the other day. I said, “You realize in about six, seven more years we’re going to get a $12,000 a month raise.”
Chad Duval:
Right.
Rick Jarman:
But what I decided to do, I think, is I’m going to take and pull out 10 houses, eight, whatever it takes, and set a new 15 year loan up on them. And my payment would only be $4,000 something, $5,000 something. And then there’ll be 34, 36, whatever it works out to be, free and clear. And I just started the loan over. So I’m probably going to do that. I’ve already been talking to a banker about doing that. Just been waiting on my tax returns. Us folks that do extensions got to the 15th of October you know.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). I do every year.
Rick Jarman:
Yes sir. I hear people say, “Oh, I got X amount of dollars back.” I said, “You just got your money back. I ain’t giving them no money.”
Chad Duval:
Yeah. You did something wrong if you got money back.
Rick Jarman:
I don’t even file quarterly. I wait until … It’s just a little fee. I ain’t letting them hold my money all year long.
Chad Duval:
Me too. Me too. I want to play with my money. I don’t want them playing with my money for a year.
Rick Jarman:
That’s it. That’s it.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Absolutely. So now when you make that move, is the plan to then just basically make sure that you’re living off those 35, 36 houses, and then just use the other ones to keep growing and growing on the side? Or what’s the reason for doing that?
Rick Jarman:
I just figured I’d be getting about a $6,000 or almost $7,000 a month raise, and have that property that I could borrow against if I wanted to. But I’m about getting them paid for. Like I told you, out of our numbers, we don’t have a lot of debt.
Chad Duval:
Which is freedom. Then you don’t have to worry about answering to anybody.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. Oh yeah. And our rent now is … I kind of set a new goal. I’m all about setting goals. And I’ll start drawing Social Security in about another year, at 66. So I’m not going to retire. I don’t plan to ever retire. I just enjoy doing it. But right now our rents are running about $885,000 a year, gross. So my goal, I kind of set a new goal. I said, “Man it’d nice to see $1 million a year in gross rents.”
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
And with the amount of debt we have … It’s like I told my wife, “We won’t get to enjoy it all as long as my kids and grandkids will, but I’ve got to enjoy doing the deals and making it happen.” And as I told you before, if you remember, I got caught up in the late 90s and had to start over. So I went from being able to borrow millions of dollars, to I couldn’t get a $19.99 pager in my name. So I had to rebuild. But it’s a lot easier the second time around. You’re a lot smarter.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). That’s a common story for a lot of investors that I talk to.
Rick Jarman:
Well the rentals saved me. I sold off every rental I had. At that time, that would have been 1998. So I guess what would I had been, about 43 maybe. I was born in ’55, so that would be right, wouldn’t it?
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
At 50 I’d have had 35 houses paid for, a 16 unit apartment building, a 10 unit apartment building. And I had to sell it all off. But it’s because I got in trouble with my building company. Same time President Trump got in trouble, and a lot of other people, during the savings and loan crisis. You don’t hear much about it anymore. But it was pretty tough. And it hit with the savings and loans. And made some mistakes and rates were through the roof.
Rick Jarman:
And you get you about 25 houses out there and you’re paying on them, nothing’s selling. And back then there was no books or nobody to teach you how to do this. Man I’m just an old carpenter. Come out of high school and went to doing this business. This is all I’ve ever done. So when the recession hit in 2008, I knew what to do and not to do. So we was able to pull back. And I had all my rentals, a good many of them, then, by that point. But they wasn’t in the position I am now. So I could live off of them, but my son couldn’t and everybody else.
Rick Jarman:
I don’t know if you remember or not, but we opened up an interior and antique shop. And my son, he didn’t care anything about it, but he worked there. And his wife had just finished University of Alabama in interior design. And they ran it. And we have built it up to about $150,000 a year, gross, business, in about four years. And what we were doing, buying furniture. I got to play the pickers, like on American Pickers. I had a box trailer and I was just collecting rent. Because you couldn’t build nothing. Nothing was selling. Bank wouldn’t loan any money. So we would buy a $50, $75 piece of furniture, paint it up. I used the process we use on our kitchen cabinets, oil paint and a glaze. We’d fix that furniture up and then we’d sell it for $450, $500. We was having a good time.
Rick Jarman:
And my son, like I said, he didn’t care anything about it. But I enjoyed it because to me it was just like flipping a house, but it’s a piece of furniture. It gave me … I had to be doing something anyway, all the way. That’s what I started to say earlier about Instagram, it’s helped me pull back, or social media, and gave me something to do when I like to knock off in the afternoon about 2:00.
Chad Duval:
Right. Well that’s what’s so weird about this time right now, in 2020, is we’ve got the same kind of crisis in the sense that there’s a lot of people without work and a lot of people getting laid off. But at the same time, real estate is just going through the roof. Definitely residential. Commercial’s a little slower. But yeah, it’s crazy. It’s crazy.
Rick Jarman:
Well and in 2008 there was nothing to help you. The banks wasn’t doing it. You know they passed the thing where the banks had to borrow money, but they didn’t tell them they had to loan it. So they didn’t put it back in the circulation, so it didn’t help you. But the banks basically locked their doors. Not physically, but they wasn’t loaning any money. If you was in the building business … Or I’ve got a real estate agent that’s been with me about 17 years. And she was probably in the top 10, 15, in the whole town here. And she had to take a part-time job. It was tough.
Rick Jarman:
Building, nothing was going on. And they wouldn’t loan you any money. If you had a piece of property paid for, they would not even refinance it for you. That’s how bad it was.
Chad Duval:
Wow. That’s crazy. Yeah, because right now, I’m not having any issues with the banks.
Rick Jarman:
Oh no. They went through a period there for about a month, they were kind of treating it like they were in a recession, because they didn’t know what was going to happen. Nobody knew. But when everything … It’s just food. Everybody has stayed, the market has stayed so hot. Everybody’s just out there looking and doing their thing with their mask on. You know?
Chad Duval:
Right. That’s pretty much the only difference. Yeah. Totally.
Rick Jarman:
But you know, if you remember, the last time we talked, in 2011. So we’re coming out of the recession of 2008. We had a bad tornado in 2011 in Tuscaloosa County and the city of Tuscaloosa. I lost 26 houses total, and a commercial building, plus damage. I had an over $2 million claim. But we had to spend a couple years doing that. So when we got all that back together … And I had insurance, but they don’t settle with you overnight. So that gave us up to about 2014 when we finally got settled on it. That’s when we started back flipping again.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
So we’ve been back flipping.
Chad Duval:
So you’ve had two major setbacks, which is something-
Rick Jarman:
Man, yeah. That one wasn’t so bad because I had insurance and I’d learned lessons in 2008, what not to do. So I rode 2008 out fine. I just pulled back and lived off my rentals. But like I said, I learned a lot in ’98 when I went through the deals. But yeah, I’ve got a video on my site, my Instagram page. I’ve actually been through six recessions. I actually go in and tell them about every recession, how long it lasted.
Rick Jarman:
Now four of them have been since I’ve been in business. Because like I said, I’ve been in business full-time for myself since 1984. But before that there were two of them, one of them right when I come out of high school. I graduated high school in 1973. We had a gas embargo. There was lines at the gas pumps. You was hoping you’d get enough gas to go to work.
Rick Jarman:
You’ve heard probably talking about World War II when they had sugar rations and all that stuff. They were fricking rationing gas.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Yeah. You can only fill up every other day, or even and odd days, or whatever.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. And it lasted for, I think it was about a year and a half. The gas wasn’t that bad the whole year and a half, but the recession was. But anyway, on that video I tell how long they lasted and when they were and everything. I got a lot of stuff out there on them videos.
Chad Duval:
You absolutely do. Yeah, for anybody who hasn’t listened to the first episode that we were doing together, yeah that’s pretty much how we connected about a year, year and a half ago, just through Instagram.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. That’s it. That’s how long I’ve been on there, a year and a half. I’ve put a lot of hard work into it. I’ve studied on YouTube about Instagram. I guess a lot of people think that it just grew. But it’s took work. Every time people … for the first 10,000 follower I had, I’d thank them for following me, if it wasn’t a private account.
Chad Duval:
Right. Right.
Rick Jarman:
And to this day, even though I think … I’m getting about 100 new followers a day. And I’m at 22,600 something. It should be 22,700 probably by tonight when I go to bed. And I still, if somebody comments I try to answer it. It’s getting harder. But I’ve just been enjoying it. And I tell them, “Look, I’m not trying to sell you anything. I don’t want your money. I’m just sharing to help.” And I tell them, “Now if I ever write that book, I’m going to hawk the heck out of it. I’m going to try to sell it.”
Rick Jarman:
I even think about getting me some T-shirts just to make it fun. But I get people call wanting me to mentor them and stuff. It’s just not what I’m doing. I’m just trying to help as many people as I can.
Chad Duval:
Well yeah. And you were just recently on, for everybody listening, he was just on the BiggerPockets Podcast. How did that go?
Rick Jarman:
Right. That was great. That was real good. That was episode 393, I think it was. It was kind of funny, I went to bed … You record it about a month before it comes out. But if you remember, I think I mentioned I wanted to be on that when you did yours. Like I told you, I’m a goal setter. And when I started this whole situation, just to break it down, if we got time.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, totally.
Rick Jarman:
My son introduced me to BiggerPockets Podcast. I didn’t know what a podcast was a year and a half ago. I mean literally I had no clue. I didn’t know what they were. And he let me hear it and I said, “You know, I like that.” I said, “Shoot, I ain’t no expert but I believe some of these folks just did two or three deals. I think I’ve going to something to share.” So I was trying to figure out how you get on there, what you do. Other than FaceBook, I’d been on FaceBook.
Rick Jarman:
So I got to thinking. I said, “Well you know that David Greene, he’s a real estate agent. His number’s out there somewhere.” So I got online, I found his number. And I called him. I never got him. And I’d leave a message or text him. I guess he figured, well this fool ain’t going to go away. So he sent me a message that you go to their website and you go in and fill out a little information about yourself and present it. So I’m thinking, well that’s simple enough. So I go on there and I do all that. I stayed up like 1:00 at night doing it. And dadgum, somehow I was using my iPad and my old big fingers, I lost it. So I got up the next morning and did it again.
Rick Jarman:
So then when I turned it in I said, “Now look, you may have two of these on me. You just figure out the one you like the best and throw the other one out.” But I never heard anything. I just like … If I set my mind to do something, I think it’s going to happen. You’ve got to dream it before you conceive it.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
So I’m thinking, I ain’t heard nothing out of them, I’ll just start my own podcast. So I went on YouTube, learned how to do it, ordered me a mic, got GarageBand. And I was trying to get somebody to set me up a website. And I’m really impatient and I went through a couple people. And of course I’m probably a little tight too. I probably wasn’t wanting to pay for somebody charging a lot. I just tell it like it is. That’s the truth.
Rick Jarman:
I said, “Well hell, I ain’t got time for all this. I’ll start me a YouTube page.” So I go on YouTube and figure out how to do that. And I set me up a YouTube page. And I got a few little followers. And I was thinking, well I must not have nothing anybody wants to hear. Well I think it was my daughter-in-law said, “Well you ought to try Instagram.” I said, “Instagram?” I said, “I thought that was FaceBook for young people.” And that’s about what it is. I tell folks the only person I’ve seen older than me on there is that damn whatever his name is, that billionaire that cusses all the time.
Rick Jarman:
But anyway, so I go on and I started the Instagram thing, and it just took off. My YouTube channel’s still growing. It’s not nothing like my Instagram. But I like the whole layout, the way Instagram works. If I want to pull over and cut a little video and tell what’s on my mind. It just fits me. You know what I’m saying?
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So did you end up getting a … I’m assuming you ended up getting a message back from BiggerPockets?
Rick Jarman:
Oh no, I never heard a word, see. And I kind of got sidetracked, as I sometimes I do, like I told you. So I never heard nothing. So fast forward. But every time I was on a podcast, and I’ve been on a bunch of them, I’d say, “I’m going to be on BiggerPockets one day.” My son said, “Well dad, what do you think’s going to happen?” I said, “Well son, I plan to get big enough they’ll reach out to me.” And lo and behold … This is about two months ago. I get a message wanting to know if I’d like to be on their show. This was on a Wednesday. And on Friday we recorded it. And then it came out. It was great. They were good people. And we had a big time, because if you watch it you can tell, I like to cut up and have a good time. So it was great.
Rick Jarman:
But like I said, I didn’t know when it was going to come out. Usually before I get out of bed in the morning I’ll get my phone, just look at it and see what’s going, if anything I need to answer or whatever. Well I didn’t have my glasses on. I looked and I said, “Man, is that 36 new followers?” All of a sudden I got to looking and put my glasses on, it’s like 300-something. I said, “What’s going on?” And the BiggerPockets episode had came out.
Rick Jarman:
So when I went to bed that night it was 9,040-something people.
Chad Duval:
Geez.
Rick Jarman:
That’s what I had before it came out, 9,040-something. Well by 2:00 that day it hit 10,000. And it is just steady growing. Now it’s just growing now on people, word of mouth, telling about whatever. But yeah, it probably hit 15,000 off of them. And then now, like I said, it just grows on its own.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. That’s so funny. I love that. Yeah, you’ve been putting in so much work, it’s nice to see that you got a win on it and got to talk to those guys, because they have such a great platform. And I’m sure a lot of listeners of this show actually listen to that show and also use all of their forums.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. And that’s what people told me when I first filled that stuff out a year and a half ago. Because it was literally right when I was getting started. Because that’s why I set all this up. And they said you got to get involved in the forum. I said, “The forum? What the hell is a forum?” I kind of knew really, but I was just carrying on.
Rick Jarman:
But tell you another quick story about when I did the podcast with them. I was telling the story how I got David’s number. And in fact, if you listen to the podcast there’s a point I say, “I got a story I want to tell on old David here a little while.” And I never get to tell it. Because I told it, but they cut it out. Because I was telling how I got his number. And old Brandon was laughing. And you could see the horror look on old David Greene’s face like everybody’s going to be calling me now. So they cut all that out. They cut a good bit out. It was a long one.
Chad Duval:
That’s funny. So did they reference your actual application? Or did they make you-
Rick Jarman:
No. I told the story though. They have a producer, I think, that does all that and everything. It’s kind of funny, before it started, because the time difference. I guess Hawaii is what, maybe four hours from central different. I’m not sure. I’m in central.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
So anyway, and then Greene, he’s out in California. So that’s a two hour difference. But Brandon was sitting there eating a bowl of oatmeal, having his breakfast. And it’s 2:00 in the afternoon for me and maybe 12:00 for Greene. It was kind of weird. But it was fun.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah one of these days I’ve got to be on that show and see those guys.
Rick Jarman:
And like I said, I set my goal to do that and it happened. Like I said, I still set goals, and I believe in setting goals. And you never want to stop doing that.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, no. Absolutely. Actually, you know what, that’s actually something that’s been a big part of my life. So is that something pretty much that has happened as a theme throughout your life, that you’ve pretty much set goals. You vision them. You imagine them. You’re working towards them. Or did just a lot of the things just happen by chance?
Rick Jarman:
No. I don’t plan a lot of things out. I set a goal and I work for it. I don’t even write them down. You hear people say you need to write them down. But I think if it’s a big goal, you keep it in your mind, it’s on your mind all the time.
Rick Jarman:
I know when I bought my first rental house in 1981. Well I set a goal there. I said, “Well by the time I retire,” not knowing I was going to go through recessions and setbacks and all that stuff, I said, “I want to be worth $12 million and have 200 houses.” You say how’d you come up with that number? Well back then a three bedroom house, average, rented for $600 a month. $600 times 200 was $12 million. That’s how I come up with the number. That’s just a weird number.
Rick Jarman:
So I tell folks now, “I don’t know if I’ll hit the 200 houses, but I think I can hit the $12 million net worth.” We’re approaching that one. So I don’t mean that as a brag. I just want folks to know in this business that it can take you a long way. I haven’t even talked about my history on here. My dad had a complete mental breakdown when I was three years old. He was in the VA hospital until I was 15. I got married at 18. Well when he first got sick, my mom didn’t drive, didn’t have a job. They lost the house, the car. We were homeless for about nine months to a year. My mother and I lived with one of her sisters. My brother, with another sister.
Rick Jarman:
We had to work. We started working young. I worked at a bottling company. Get out of school, had a hardship case, when I was 13 until I was 16. 16, I worked that summer with the city of Northport, on a garbage truck. Worked my way up to a brush truck. A lot better than a garbage truck. And things didn’t look that good, when you’re riding around hanging on the back of a garbage truck and your friends is playing ball and doing all those things.
Rick Jarman:
But then the next summer I got a job working construction. Because I’ve always liked it. And my neighborhood when I was growing up, there was a subdivision being built. And I’d ride my bike over there and just watch them, all the excitement and the energy. And back then it was hand driven nails, no guns. And they’d be cutting and hammering, and cussing. It was just exciting to me.
Rick Jarman:
So I got to do that the summer between my 11th and 12th grade year. So I knew then that’s what I wanted to don’t. So when I got out of high school, first job I had was at a cabinet shop. But like I said, I knew I wanted to build houses. And we were on break one day … Because I had just turned 18. I hadn’t been 18 a month. And I didn’t have enough sense. I was as green as a cucumber. We was on break and I said, “You know, one day I want to build houses.” And they got the biggest chuckle out of it. And I guess it did sound kind of funny, because there I am, just a laborer, learning how not to cross-sand grain and stuff, on cabinets. And talking about wanting to build houses.
Rick Jarman:
Well that was in 1973. As I told you, I went in business for myself in ’84, built my first house. But from ’73-’84 I was learning remodeling, flipping. Bought my first rental in ’81. So I had been growing. So fast forward it from 1973 to 1993, which is 20 years. I’m building so many houses that my cabinet man can’t keep up. And I needed another cabinet man, so guess who I hired, the man that I worked for when I was 18 years old. I never mentioned nothing to him, but every time I would write his check and sign it I’d think, mm-hmm, whose laughing now? So you know, you never know where life can take you from where you start.
Rick Jarman:
I always tell people it doesn’t matter where you are right now, that doesn’t determine where you’re going to be. Like I said, I just barely got out of high school. I’m not educated. I’m just good at what I’ve learned. When I worked maintenance at the university for 10 years, from 1974-84, when I went in business. I’d slip into the business library and check out books on real estate. And I’d check them out. My wife was a student. I put her through school. I’d get them and I’d read them. You just had to learn it. You didn’t have all the things that people have now.
Rick Jarman:
I tell them, if they could go and watch every one of my videos, I guarantee you they’re going to learn something in every one of them, just about. And it would be good for them. And like I said, I never want to sound like a brag. But I’ve told you, I think, in the past, if you’re a sports fan or whatever, my neighbor three houses up from me is coach Nick Saban, University of Alabama. Well I’m thinking, here I was a maintenance man at the University of Alabama, now I live three houses up from the coach, the winningest coach or whatever he is now.
Rick Jarman:
But I tell folks, in fact I used to tell my wife, I said, “We got doctors and lawyers and a football coach, and now they got them a redneck.” But you know, I tell them, “I may not be the only one in here to start out in a mobile home, but I know I’m the only one that used to work on a garbage truck.”
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Well just bringing it back to goal setting and getting what you’re going after. The fact that you don’t write things down, but you have the passion so much that you don’t have to write it down, is a tell-tale sign that you’re eventually going to get it, if you just can’t stop thinking about it. So that’s some good advice for anybody out there trying to find their thing.
Chad Duval:
Me personally, I have a horrible memory. And I like writing things down. And I reinforce things by writing it down. But I know a lot of people, like yourself, that actually do the same thing. They’ve got a few top things that they’re working towards. They don’t know how they’re going to get there, but they’re just always at the top of their mind. And I’ve seen it come to fruition almost every time. That’s super good advice for people trying to start out in real estate, or any business venture for that matter.
Rick Jarman:
Well you know I tell you all the time when you watch my videos, I can’t spell but I can add like hell. So I had to learn how to memorize things anyway, because I’m not a good speller. I remember back when I first started writing contracts, I used to have a little Webster dictionary I’d carry with me if I’d need to look up a word. I’d tell somebody, I said, “Look, I can’t spell. But if it don’t bother you, it don’t bother me.” And back then you’d write the contracts on the hood of a car.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
But I don’t know. Like I said, I got married at 18 and put my wife through college and learnt my trade and was doing whatever. And we started having kids when I guess I was about 25. I tell folks, if you want motivation … All these people go to all these things to get motivated. When I married my wife and she counted on me to keep a roof over her head, that was pretty good motivation right there. Because I was making minimum wage when we got married.
Rick Jarman:
And I tell folks, she saw something in me … I guess my mama maybe saw something in me, but your mama’s always see it. But my wife’s the only person I feel like’s ever saw maybe my full potential, even back then.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Actually, yeah. Let’s dive a little into that. She’s been with you through this whole ride.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah.
Chad Duval:
How have you guys made that work? I’m sure it hasn’t been all roses and rainbows, for sure.
Rick Jarman:
This past June we were married 47 years.
Chad Duval:
Wow man. Congrats. That’s insane. That’s awesome.
Rick Jarman:
Well I’m not a quitter. You can’t be a quitter. You can’t quit on your dreams. You can’t quit on your marriage. You can’t quit on … I don’t want this to come off wrong, but sometimes you’re going to lose the battle, but you got to win the war. I had setbacks. My wife, we went from starting out in a mobile home, me making minimum wage, to I went full-time in business when I was, like I said, 29. I wasn’t 29 a month. Probably by 32 I was a millionaire, which was … You know a million dollars was a million dollars back then. And then by 43, having to start over.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). That must’ve been really rough.
Rick Jarman:
And she was through the whole ride. Never once did she … She knew what I was capable of. I had a partner in the construction company at the time, and that was part of it. And he left me high and dry. But you know, you can blame it on somebody else, the bottom line is you always got to take responsibility for your own actions.
Chad Duval:
Right. 100%.
Rick Jarman:
But I can remember one time when we were going through the tough times, this guy offered me a job. It was $50,000 a year and a truck and all this. And at this point I’m back working with my tools, just like I did when I was 18, 19, 20 years old. I was still a real estate broker, but I didn’t have the money to keep doing it. I had to make it every week. You know what I’m saying?
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Yeah.
Rick Jarman:
Because you’re dealing with stuff and whatever. And she couldn’t understand why I didn’t want to take that job. I said, “I can do better than that. Just hang in here a little longer.” The first year I was back doing it, it was just me and a helper. And I did $200-something thousand worth of volume remodeling. I didn’t even have a checking account. I had a lady that set up an account for me, and I’d give her 2% cash on everything I charged to have an account for me. You do what you got to do. That’s the thing.
Rick Jarman:
I did a video today that I kind of … Every now and then I’ll do a video where I get on some of these folks. I’m thinking, you say you ain’t got no money and you ain’t got a job, but you want to do this business. What do you do? I tell them to get a job.
Chad Duval:
Right.
Rick Jarman:
You got to start somewhere. But we look back now. Like I said, we’ve been married 47 years. And out of all those years we were going up, up, up. And then we had the setback. And that two years was just a bump in the road now. But when you’re going through it, it ain’t like no bump in the road. It’s like the frigging Grand Canyon.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. So every relationship’s different, of course. But do you guys separate business from your personal life?
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. My wife’s never been involved in my business.
Chad Duval:
She hasn’t. Okay.
Rick Jarman:
At one time she had her real estate license. But still, she just worked for our company, selling a little bit. My wife and I are two different personalities. And of course that’s what makes it work. Everything knows opposites attract, and all that stuff. And my son is a lot like his mother, as far as his … I’m real outgoing and everything. And I mean he’ll talk and friendly and all that, but I’m the kind, I’ll tell you about anything you want to know. Well he’s more private. He and I have been working together for 20 years now. He started at 18, right when he was out of high school. He did just like I did. He got his carpenter’s certificate. Where I went through apprenticeship, he did that at the trade school. And then he got his builder license.
Chad Duval:
I’m assuming you and your son’s relationship is a little bit different than you and your wife’s, because you guys are working every day.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. Sometimes we get into disagreements, not that often, about once a year. But it’s usually my fault, not his. Because I am such a perfectionist. I’m a control freak. I’ll just tell it like it is. And I’ve tried to do better. But he’s kind of running a lot of it now. And he’s very capable, very smart young man. Of course, I say young man, he’s 39 now. And my daughter just turned 40 back in January. I’d have to say he’s my best friend. He’s solid as a rock. I know I can always count on him. I wish everybody that has a son or daughter could work with them side by side for 20 years and enjoy what we’ve had. Like I said, that gave us time … especially when he was younger, when I was trying to teach him things and instill it in him. But I would say probably for the last 10 years, maybe 15 … I guess probably 15, he’s just known what to do and gets it done.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. I applaud you guys. I worked for my dad for 10 years and it wasn’t always the easiest. It gets better the longer you work together. It sounds very similar. My dad’s very, very controlling. I mean I am too, but when it’s his business you kind of have to go along.
Rick Jarman:
Well yeah. My daughter worked for me when she was in high school, one time during the summer. And she’ll tell you, I fired her three times in one week.
Chad Duval:
That’s how my brother is.
Rick Jarman:
So finally … I got a buddy of mine, his daughter came and worked for me, and my daughter went and worked for him. Because she and I are just alike. Of course, she went in the nursing field. She’s a nurse manager. Real organized, take charge. And she runs a big doctor’s office and stuff. But we were too much alike.
Rick Jarman:
But there again, I don’t want my son to be like me. I tell folks all the time he’s the finest man I know. And I don’t want him to be like me. I’ve got too many flaws. And my wife knows, and I tell her sometimes, “I got a lot of good points. So you got to take the good with the bad.” Also, when you’re driven and you want things, it’s like a curse. I used to work with guys when I worked at the university, they could go home, put their feet up. I’d be leaving work, going and doing side work.
Rick Jarman:
I told somebody one day, “You know you’re tired,” I was doing a bunch of side work one time and I was still working at the university. And I’m looking out the window. I was up on the second floor dorm, looking out the window at this big old oak tree. And I’m daydreaming about what it’d be like to be sitting under there, resting. You know you’re tired when you’re daydreaming about resting. I used to couldn’t understand why people couldn’t … I called it the miracle of real estate when I first started learning it, because back then there wasn’t nobody to tell about it. I mean that’s how I got on here, other than my son. When I got on Instagram, social media, I had nobody to tell about it to. So I had all these things that … it’s made me go back and rethink why I did things a certain way. It’s just been great for me. And it’s helped me to pull back on my workload, realize I got these energies I can put in this.
Rick Jarman:
Like I said, I’d call it the miracle of real estate. And I couldn’t understand how these people, why they couldn’t see it and understand. And this is in the early days, when I had read three books. I’d read an article in REader’s Digest. I think we talked about this before.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
And it was an article … This is 1981 or late ’80. The article was called Beating Inflation with Real Estate. Real estate never changes, just the need for it never changes. Its financing changes and things. All these terminologies I’ve had to learn since I’ve been on here. But real estate never changes. People going to rent or buy or live under the bridge is what I always say. And only so many live under the bridge. That need never changes.
Rick Jarman:
But anyway, I got those three books and man it was just like somebody had lit a fire under me. And I couldn’t understand why people couldn’t see this, how you could buy a house, leverage it, tenant’s paying for it. And you do it again, do it again. They call it the BRRRR Method now. I tell them I’ve been doing that since 1981.
Chad Duval:
Well everybody’s afraid that they have to unclog toilets and the crappy side of things. But that’s very rare you have all this stuff. And if you do have that stuff or that problem, then you just call somebody.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. But I couldn’t understand why they couldn’t see, like I said, I called it the miracle of real estate. But what it was, they’re not the ones that were different. I was the one that was different. You’re the one that’s different. I was thinking what’s wrong with them. It ain’t them. It’s us. We’re driven. And it’s like I said, it’s like a curse.
Chad Duval:
Actually that’s a good way to look at it.
Rick Jarman:
You can’t change if you want to.
Chad Duval:
Right.
Rick Jarman:
I mean you got rental property, you work your job, you do your podcasts. And my mama used to tell me … I’d tell her I was going to do something, she would say, “Well when you going to do it between 12:00 and midnight?” For years I never slept more than 4-6 hours a night. To this day I only sleep six. You get used to it.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. I get the same conversation with Holly all the time. Yeah. “When are you going to sleep?” For sure.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah. But you’re driven. And why? We don’t know. It’s just our makeup I guess.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. It’s a blessing and a curse.
Rick Jarman:
Exactly. It can definitely be a curse.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Absolutely. Well man, we’ve been taking for an hour there, Rick.
Rick Jarman:
Is that right?
Chad Duval:
Geez. Speaking of sleep.
Rick Jarman:
That’s right. Let me tell you one quick thing, my wife. You were just asking about us. Sometimes I can … I’ll be complaining about how many phone calls I get. My number’s not just out there, but it’s just when I was building, day to day doing things and handling stuff. I said, “Man, if my phone rings one more time it’s just going to drive me crazy.” She says, “Well just turn it off.” You don’t understand, you can’t just turn it off. We’re running a business here. But that’s her mentality, “Well just turn it off.”
Chad Duval:
I know. I’ve been having the same problems lately. Actually that’s kind of ironic that you bring that up. I actually joined the national do-not call list today, because the amount of calls I’ve been getting that are not work related, just random phone calls. It’s crazy.
Rick Jarman:
It is.
Chad Duval:
Like I’m getting 19 a day. I don’t know what it is, if it’s election stuff or what. But man.
Rick Jarman:
You mine, a lot of them, they would be in work stuff when we was blowing and going. An average day was 30 or 40 something phone calls. Not counting texts and everything.
Chad Duval:
Oh yeah. Totally.
Rick Jarman:
And I think my record was 86 in one day. And it was like, “Gall.”
Chad Duval:
That’s a lot of talking.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. So you get home and my wife says, “You never want to talk when you get home.”
Chad Duval:
I need some peace and quiet.
Rick Jarman:
If you know anything about me, I go to lunch every day at 11:00. That’s the only standing appointment I have. And pretty much, unless it’s a closing or something, I’m going to lunch. Never fails. Now I’ve been married 47 years, been in business for myself 36 years, and never fail my wife will call, “What you doing?” “Well I’m at lunch.” “Oh, oh. Well I won’t bother you.” But then they go ahead and tell me everything she’s going to tell me.
Chad Duval:
Oh yeah.
Rick Jarman:
Or I’ll call her. I say, “Do you want to go to lunch with me today?” “Well I got to go to the store. I got to do this.” “You know honey, it’s a yes or no answer.” This will tell you how we are. That’s how different. But that’s what’s made it work. Nothing bothers her. And I’m like, “Darn, it’s a yes and no answer. Do you want to go or not?” So anyway.
Chad Duval:
That makes it interesting.
Rick Jarman:
You just learn. You just learn to … And she’s had to work a lot harder than I am, because I’m a lot harder to live with than she is. But it’s been good for her too. It’s just like when she turned … My wife’s 22 months older than I am. She doesn’t like me to tell that. She was in college, had a year and a half of college when we got married. And I was playing music six nights a week in her brother’s band at the Ramada Inn. And she didn’t know I was still in high school, because I didn’t look like it. Anyway. When she turned 62 she started to draw … Because she’s a retired school teacher. She taught for 25 years. So when she retired, when I got ready to turn 62 she says, “Are you going to retire?” I said, “Girl you can’t live like you live and me quit at 62.”
Chad Duval:
That’s too funny.
Rick Jarman:
It’s been great. It’s just been a good ride for me. I can say since I was … the summer between my 11th and 12th grade of high school, I hadn’t did anything that didn’t have to do with construction, maintenance, flipping houses, building houses, renting houses. I’ve never had any other job. This is all I’ve ever done for … I’ve been out of high school 47 years.
Chad Duval:
Do you still like it just as much as you did when-
Rick Jarman:
Oh I do. I get just as excited when I buy a flip or if I buy a deal on a rental. Of course the tenants will still drive you crazy, but that’s just part of it sometimes. And you’ve got maybe 5% of all your tenants will drive you crazy. But them 5% can do it. But yeah, I still love it. If I did I wouldn’t keep doing it. I tell folks I never plan to retire. I love to get a deal.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, chasing those deals are fun, man.
Rick Jarman:
Oh yeah. And it’s just when you get to thinking about the numbers and what they can do and how they add up.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). And you’ve had so much experience seeing it happen. So it probably just fires you up even more these days.
Rick Jarman:
Right. And I’ll tell you this, my son … Like I said, he doesn’t like me to tell this sometimes. But he’s done got used to me telling it. When he was 25 I gave him 25% of our Jarman Realty and Construction. And he and I started doing some investing together. He and I own 26 houses together. When he was 25 I said, “If you listen to me, in 10 years I’ll make you a millionaire.” Well we had the recession and all that. So he’s 39 now, turned 39 last month. But anyway, he was 36 and I was working on financial statements. And I called him in. I said, “Come here a minute, son. I want to shake your hand.” He said, “What is it, dad?” I said, “I want to shake a millionaire’s hand.” It was like 1.2 something million. And that’s just the power.
Rick Jarman:
Now this young man, my son, he listened to me business wise on everything I ever tell him. I don’t get involved in his married life or nothing. But he’s just a great guy. Like I said, I strive to be the man he is. But he drove the same truck. He got a new Tundra, a limited Toyota truck right after high school. He drove it for 17 years.
Chad Duval:
Wow.
Rick Jarman:
His wife’s had Lexus’s and Mercedes. He finally got him a new Tundra. And he’s got a nice house. He’s probably got a 3,400 square foot house. Nice house that we built during the recession when we had plenty of time. But he’s listened. But it’s just like me today. I still drive a 2007 Land Cruiser I bought new. But now folks will say, “When are you going to get you another vehicle?” I don’t tell them, I got a 2019 out there in the garage I bought a year ago. But I don’t hardly ever drive it. But you can put your money into something like that or you can go buy three houses.
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rick Jarman:
But I had said when I turned 65 I was going to get me a new one. And I actually got it at 64, because I found a good deal.
Chad Duval:
Is it a Land Cruiser?
Rick Jarman:
It is. It is. A 2019 Land Cruiser.
Chad Duval:
I like those.
Rick Jarman:
Yeah, man. It’s a pretty sporty vehicle. I tell folks, when I need to put the dog on, I got something, I can.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. Absolutely.
Rick Jarman:
But it’s been a great industry for me. Like I said, those two years we had a little bump in the road. It’s what it is now. But like I said, it was the Grand Canyon when we was going through it. But it’s just been great. There’s times you know … I forgot who it was, maybe Getty or one of those folks asked him, said, “If you could wish for anything, what would you wish for?” He said, “I’d like to be 21 and flat broke again.” So I don’t know about the being broke again, but I just hate there’s not enough years left to do it. I want to keep doing it as long as I can. And I’m healthy, so I’ve been fortunate. But it’s just a great industry.
Rick Jarman:
I get so excited when I … People will send me DMs telling me something they’ve done and they saw one of my videos and it helped them out. I had this one guy that he lived out in Texas, had three or four kids and he worked two jobs, was working on a third one. And I helped him figure out how to get a house. That kind of stuff’s rewarding. You know?
Chad Duval:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah, absolutely.
Rick Jarman:
And then I got one guy who’s a follower of me, he’s a preacher over in the Ozarks. And I had a video I did, talking about when you buy a piece of property. I always check the square footage. Don’t go by what the real estate agent says. Don’t go by the courthouse. You measure it yourself. Well he was fixing to buy a piece of property, and it wasn’t as big as they were saying. And he renegotiated, saved $20,000 from one little five minute video. I told him, I said, “That ought to be worth a good box of premium cigars.” And he sent me a box.
Chad Duval:
Anybody who doesn’t know who Rick Jarman is, he loves his cigars.
Rick Jarman:
I wanted Cuban, but he couldn’t get them. That’s all I smoke’s, my Cubans.
Chad Duval:
Oh man. I’ll have to send you some one of these days-
Rick Jarman:
Oh man, yeah.
Chad Duval:
Montreal, when I’m up there, they can get them. So I try-
Rick Jarman:
I kind of got a little old source that’s been getting them for me for a couple years, two or three years now. But yeah man, I love it. I might have told you that. I do love it.
Chad Duval:
Yeah. And I mean I guess that’s a good spot to end this. Where can people find out what Rick is up to these days? There’s Instagram-
Rick Jarman:
Well I’m on Instagram, real estate old school. And I’m also on YouTube, real estate old school. Both places. That’s the only place I’m at. I was on TikTok for a while, but I kind of got off of that. I don’t do good with these folks, the gangsters behind the keyboard. I’m old school. That just didn’t go with me. Because I don’t have trouble with that on Instagram or YouTube.
Chad Duval:
Perfect. Perfect. Well Rick, it was nice getting caught up with you again. And maybe we’ll have to have you on as one of the first episodes of season three, too. And we’ll do an every year update here.
Rick Jarman:
Hey man, that sounds great. And you know, talking about the Instagram. I can remember looking back seeing guys like you and Matt Porcaro at 203.
Chad Duval:
Oh yeah. Yeah.
Rick Jarman:
Jay-Way. And I’m thanking all these folks. And I look back, I think I had just a little over 1,000 followers when you and I did that first episode.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, and you’re crushing us now, man.
Rick Jarman:
Well I’m thinking about, man how can you get to them numbers. But it’s just been a good ride, man. I’ve enjoyed it. It’s been so much fun.
Chad Duval:
Yeah, man. And everybody enjoys your videos. And again, I appreciate you coming on the show. And yeah, everybody check him out on Instagram and YouTube. And let’s get those follower counts even higher.
Rick Jarman:
Well I appreciate it. And you tell Holly I said hello.
Chad Duval:
I will, for sure. Thanks, Rick.
Rick Jarman:
All right buddy. Thank you. Good night.