Episode 208

How Real Estate Agents Build Wealth Through Grit, Discipline, and Relationships

with Dante Royster

Listen on: Spotify · Apple Podcasts · YouTube

How Real Estate Agents Build Wealth Through Grit, Discipline, and Relationships

Most agents spend their careers closing deals for other people while never building a portfolio of their own. Dante Royster wants to change that. A top 1% mortgage broker with more than 23 years in the business, founder of Epic Mortgage, and author of The Ultimate Mortgage Guide, Dante has closed over 1,500 transactions in the last decade and now runs a relationship-first brokerage licensed across nine states. On this episode of The REI Agent podcast, he unpacked how the discipline of a college point guard, a faith-based mindset forged in the 2008 crash, and a stubborn focus on relationships over rates can turn everyday agents into long-term wealth builders. Here are the ideas worth acting on today.

What Can Basketball Teach Real Estate Agents About Discipline?

Dante traces his work ethic straight back to the court. As an undersized point guard, he learned a lesson that still governs how he approaches business: “A short guy has to prove he can play where a tall guy has to prove he can’t play.” That chip on the shoulder became fuel. He had to be faster, more conditioned, and more willing to do the small, unglamorous things just to earn a spot on the floor.

The discipline started even earlier, at home. His father served in the Army Reserve, so structure, schedules, and consequences were built into Dante’s life from the beginning. When he got to organized sports, the rhythm already made sense: show up on time, do the reps, run when you make a mistake. That same daily accountability is what he says separates agents who build real careers from those who fade out after a slow year.

Sports also taught him something agents rarely talk about: how to work with people who are nothing like you. Recruited out of the Chicagoland area, Dante shared locker rooms with teammates who grew up on farms, held different worldviews, and came from entirely different backgrounds. The job was to find commonality and get the work done anyway. That skill, finding common ground fast with very different people, maps almost perfectly onto a real estate career built on referrals, negotiations, and long relationships.

How Do You Survive Real Estate’s Toughest Markets?

Dante got into the mortgage business right before the 2008 financial crisis, when fear flooded the market and fingers were pointed squarely at the lending side. His answer to that chaos was to control only what he could control. “You can only control what you can control,” he said. He wasn’t going to bail out banks, so he focused instead on his own work ethic, one conversation at a time, month after month.

He credits a faith-based mindset for carrying him through. In his view, real estate itself is a leap of faith. You have to believe in what you’re building even when the market gives you every reason to quit. During the crash, some clients simply couldn’t be helped, and Dante had to make peace with that. His mission was to serve the people he could move forward that month and keep grinding, rather than getting paralyzed by the deals that fell apart.

He’s also candid that timing and life stage helped. Younger and without a family to support at the time, he could absorb the risk of a brutal market in a way that someone with kids and a mortgage might not. That honesty matters for agents weighing a jump into the business. Dante himself started with a salary-plus-commission role that acted like training wheels, giving him room to learn and self-educate before he cut the parachute and went straight commission around year five, once he had proven to himself he could deliver.

What’s the First Step to Building Your Own Portfolio?

For an agent who closes deals daily but has never bought an investment property, Dante’s first conversation is never about a specific deal. It’s about the goal. “Let’s think about the end first, and then work our way to what it’s going to take to get there,” he explained. Are you chasing cash flow, appreciation, tax write-offs, or a fix-and-flip? Each strategy demands a different path, and there is no universally right answer.

The mistake he sees most often is what he calls keeping up with the Joneses: copying whatever strategy a podcast or a peer made look exciting, without checking whether it fits your own situation. He urges agents to run a self-audit first. A buy-and-hold rental, a midterm rental, an Airbnb, and a flip are all legitimate tools, but the right one depends on your capital, your risk tolerance, and your timeline, not on what worked for someone else online.

He’s equally blunt about the trap on the other end: analysis paralysis. Plenty of would-be investors read every book and binge every podcast but never actually buy anything. “Real estate is a time game and you got to start,” Dante said, invoking the old proverb that the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago, and the second-best time is right now. Much of his own portfolio, he admits, simply came from owning property over a long enough stretch of time, especially through the money-printing years of the pandemic when values climbed.

That doesn’t mean buying blindly. With today’s interest rates and prices, Dante notes that a straight long-term rental often won’t cash flow, so investors have to get creative. On a recent purchase he loved for its location and charm, the numbers didn’t work as a long-term rental, so he converted it into a midterm rental and it performed. He also points agents toward seller financing, including seller-financed seconds that can shrink a down payment, as an underused mechanism for making deals pencil out.

Why Do Relationships Beat Interest Rates?

If the episode had a thesis, this was it. Dante’s signature nugget is deceptively simple, and he means it literally: relationships outlast and outperform whatever number is on the rate sheet this week.

“Relationships beat interest rates all the time. You know, you really have to build relationships and go deep.”

He encourages agents to get back to networking, whether online or in person, and to genuinely care about people, their families, their motivations, because you never know where a relationship will lead. A co-worker’s friend becomes a buyer; a casual connection surfaces an opportunity you couldn’t have seen yourself. His guiding phrase is “giver’s gain”: lead with generosity and the business follows. Rates move constantly and lie outside your control. The depth of your relationships is something you build on purpose, and it compounds.

That philosophy also shapes how he defines success. Agents love to say the highest compliment is a referral, but for Dante the real prize is repeat business. “If a person does a deal with me and they knew it was good and they say, hey, I want to do it again with you, I know I did a good job,” he said. Repeat clients are proof you served their long-term interest rather than just chasing a single paycheck.

What’s the Difference Between Good Debt and Bad Debt?

Dante offers one of the cleanest definitions you’ll hear. “Good debt is anything that I don’t have to pay, but someone else is paying for me. Bad debt is anything I have to come out of my pocket.” Every property, he argues, should be examined through that lens: how do we structure this so a tenant, not you, is covering the debt?

He frames real estate as a wealth-building machine rather than a collection of transactions, and pushes agents to squeeze the juice out of every unit, first home or investment alike. Given that most people will need seven or even eight figures to retire comfortably, a number big enough to shut people down before they start, he insists the only way there is to start early and let the right tools and time do the compounding.

The host reinforced the point with a concrete example: a 30-year fixed mortgage locks in today’s dollars for three decades while the dollar itself keeps devaluing. A property bought at a local median price of roughly $115,000 in the year 2000 was worth about $350,000 by today, and even after accounting for the down payment’s opportunity cost against the S&P 500, real estate came out well ahead by six figures. A mortgage that felt like a stretch back then looks laughable now, which is exactly the power of locking in today’s dollar on an appreciating asset.

How Does Consistency Turn Everyday Effort Into Wealth?

Dante’s final nugget loops back to the court: consistency on a daily basis. Good habits, done every day, create the opportunities. He leans on the familiar definition of luck as the moment preparation meets opportunity, and stresses that the preparation has to happen first, before the deal ever appears. That means doing the work even when there are distractions everywhere, getting it done today so you don’t have to do it tomorrow.

He also warns against the modern fear of being wrong. In investing there is no single correct path, only the principles and rules you commit to, whether that’s the 1% rule, a cash-on-cash target, or your own criteria. The real power, he says, is the ability to say no to a deal, and you can only do that if you’ve educated yourself enough to recognize a good one. Discipline and knowledge together are what let you act decisively instead of freezing.

For a team to lean on, Dante recommends The Energy Bus by Jon Gordon, a short, feel-good read about surrounding yourself with the right people, your personal board of directors, all pointed toward the same destination. It’s a fitting note to end on, because everything he shared circles the same idea: build good habits, build good relationships, and let time turn both into wealth.

Keep Building the Life You Want

Dante Royster’s story is a reminder that the same traits that make a scrappy point guard, or a broker who survived 2008, are the traits that build lasting wealth in real estate: discipline, faith, action, and relationships that go deep. You can find him through Epic Mortgage, his Epic Spotlight podcast, and The Ultimate Mortgage Guide on Amazon.

Listen to the full conversation on The REI Agent podcast for every golden nugget in Dante’s own words, and hit subscribe so you never miss an episode. When you’re ready to turn these ideas into your own plan, connect with a coach at REI Agent Advisor to map out a relationship-first path toward the life, and the portfolio, you actually want.

Full Episode Transcript

Welcome back to The REI Agent. My guest today is Dante Royster, a top 1% mortgage broker, entrepreneur, author, and podcast host who has spent over 23 years helping families build wealth through home ownership. A former basketball player, Dante brought the same discipline, resilience, and competitive edge to his athletic career into the financial world. He founded Epic Mortgage in 2019, a relationship-first brokerage now licensed across nine states and has closed over 1,500 mortgage transactions in the last decade. He is also the author of The Ultimate Mortgage Guide and the host of the Epic Spotlight podcast. Dante, welcome to The REI Agent podcast. Hey, thanks for having me. One of the things that I have always kind of regretted through like not… I was into basketball as well. You were a basketball player in elementary school, but then when I got into like middle school, I kind of got more to be like it’s like my punk era, if you will, and maybe it was a little too cool for organized sports or whatever it was, or it wasn’t good enough, so I didn’t get on the team. But I saw the like kind of like the discipline I feel like people got when they were doing the organized sports. Also, you know, like the military, I feel like that’s another example of where people can really have life-changing discipline introduced into them. Did you find that true for your life? I mean, what kind of, you know, playing college basketball, what kind of lessons did you learn from that? No, definitely. Well, I mean, it would start off with my dad. My dad was, you know, in the military, you know, he was in the Army Reserve. So I mean, I walked, you know, I came out of birth just in disciplinary, hey, this is what you have to do, you know, here’s your schedule, here’s your habits. And so it made it easier for me to just embrace sports because it was the same thing, you know, hey, you have to be here at this time, okay, if you do something wrong, you got to run, you know, so it made complete sense for me. And, you know, one thing that people sometimes forget about sports is, you know, the team building, you know, not only the discipline, but team building, working with others that may not even look like you, but it doesn’t matter the color of their skin. It’s just a matter of, hey, he’s on my team, I got to work with him. So, you know, a lot of different ideologies, you know, when you’re in locker rooms, you know, people come from a lot of different places, especially in college, you know, you’re recruited. So, you know, I’m coming from the Chicagoland area, but I’m working with people that are coming off a farm, you know, and so it’s like, oh, okay, and we have to find commonality and work together to get jobs done. Now, you mentioned before we got on air here that you’re not a giant tall person, did that put you at point guard? What position did you play? Yes, definitely. I played the point guard. Okay. And what kind of overcoming of, you know, that challenge of, you know, like, I don’t know if like do people overlook you right away when they first saw you or like, I mean, did you feel like you had to like have a chip on your shoulder, if you will, to like kind of like prove yourself? Sure. For that reason? Yeah. I mean, from a, you know, I’m a highly competitive person. I’ve always been competitive, a little feisty at times and, you know, definitely being short, it’s one of those things, especially in basketball, you know, as a short guy has to prove he can play where a tall guy has to prove he can’t play. So, you know, I, you know, I’m not always going to be the first guy picked if I walk into a gym, but then I got to show what I can do, you know, and so I have to be, you know, that much faster, that much in shape, you know, endurance, all those little things and be willing to do the little things to show my way. And I think that carries into business, right? You know, I think that carries into real estate. You got to be a grinder, you know, especially so that kind of maybe helps us out. You know, when I wake up, you know, I know I got to grind, you know, nothing’s going to be given to me. You know, I got to go out and make it happen. And so that is, you know, talking to people, being uncomfortable, you know, all those things, you know, are commonalities that I see from sports into, you know, real estate. Yeah. Well, I mean, coming from the Chicago area, I’m sure Michael Jordan has been an influence of yours over the years. He was a huge one for me, for sure. And I think the older I got, you know, when I was a kid, it was just, this guy’s amazing. This is so cool. The older I got, like, learning about, you know, his work ethic and how much he put into getting to be that good, that dominant, I think speaks volumes. You know, there’s other examples of that. I think, you know, through the years, like, having read Arnold Schwarzenegger’s book, you know, just the theory of, like, putting in, what is it, 10,000 reps, like, you know, you can kind of build in the confidence of yourself that, like, if you put in the work, you can achieve a lot. And so, I think it’s partly, you know, having those role models to kind of guide yourself after, and then also just not letting yourself be a victim and kind of, you know, in this space, you have to hustle, you have to grind. It’s going to be tough when you first start, especially, you’re going to have to push through a lot of adversity to try to get to where you want to be. And I think those kind of role models and having maybe experienced that yourself as well, it’s got to be invaluable. Oh, 100%. You know, it’s one of those things, I’m kind of jealous of people just starting out now because they can use YouTube and see all those, you know, conversations and read those books. You know, we were in that moment where it was happening real-time, you know, and this is before YouTube and before all the highlights, so we were in awe. I remember, you know, my parents had season tickets with a bunch of other families that kind of, you know, broke them out, and so we would go to games, and I remember being at the old Chicago Stadium, and Michael Jordan patted me on my head, and I just went screaming, like, hey, he patted me on my head. I mean, so, you know, we were in awe and didn’t realize just what we were watching, you know what I mean? And now we look back and see the highlights, like, man, this guy was incredible. I mean, obviously amazing. And it’s just one of those things where it’s like, you know, to the point of, you know, I’m jealous because now I can reflect, and hopefully people are taking the time to read those books and to watch those and get inspired of just how, you know, the 10,000 hours, you know, I didn’t, you know, those weren’t really references used back in the 90s or the early 2000s, but now, because of information has gone out, now we know what it takes really to be successful. 100%. Well, when you got started, you got started right before the big recession in real estate, and I’m sure that had to add to the, you know, the difficulty of kind of getting the business off the ground. There had to have been mass fear in the market and, you know, especially probably a lot of fingers being pointed at the loan side of things, right? What was that like? I mean, what got you through that time? You know, I think real estate in general is a leap of faith. I think you take a leap of faith and you have to believe, and so you have to have a faith-based mindset. And so, really, my strength within me, just being confident of who I am and what I’m trying to accomplish, kind of keeping my eyes on the prize. I mean, just, you know, overall, there’s so many different distractions, and obviously that was a serious situation going on, but it’s a distraction, and you kind of have to focus on, okay, what’s important, and you can only control what you can control. So, you know, I’m not going to, you know, bail out banks, you know, my bank account is not big enough for that. So, you know, I can only control my work ethic each and every day, talking to folks. And some of the people I could not help, right? They were in, you know, adverse situations, and, you know, I could say, hey, I’ll call you back. But my mission in my job, especially from a lending perspective, is I have to help the people that can’t qualify and want to move forward in that month, you know? And I have to kind of go month to month and grind it out, but, you know, that’s really what kept me going is just kind of my faith base. And, you know, I was fortunate enough to be younger, so I didn’t have as many responsibilities at the time. You know, I didn’t have the family and the kids and all that stuff, so I was very fortunate in that manner, too. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it does make things easier. The grind phase can be tough, and when I started, you know, we didn’t have any kids, I was married, it was a second job to start. I think that I’m probably a bit, maybe I could have been a little faster if I had gone, you know, full on. But I was certainly full on in my mind, like I was like, you know, completely dedicated, this is what I was going to do. Never lost sight of that, was up, you know, at five every morning, you know, answering emails, everything I could do to build that business. And this was 2014, it was a slower time, it wasn’t, there wasn’t as much business happening. But you know, it was, I think it’s that, you know, showing up for yourself, you know, proving to yourself that you can do it and that determination that can really, you know, make the business eventually work out. I do think a lot of people, it’s going to be hard to start as a second career with this. Were you in a commission only thing when you started? Or was this like, kind of like a salaried with a bonus kind of role? So when I started off, you know, I worked for a company and I was salary plus commission and that allowed me, you know, as I look back now, it was more like training wheels. It gave me the ability to really train and, you know, and self-educate. You know, I think that is the concept that when we graduate college, you know, there’s a level of like, hey, I’m done, you know, I don’t need to study anymore. I’m, you know, all these books, I can throw them away. But really, I think college allows us to, you know, learn the ability to self-educate. And, you know, when we enter our profession, we have to continue to self-educate ourselves. And personal development is so important. And so by the time, you know, probably within five years, I was straight commission, I had a confidence that I could do the job. So, you know, within that first five years of having a salary and having, you know, a little bit of a harness per se, a little bit of a parachute, you know, it allowed me to kind of cut that parachute off and go straight commission, which I’ve been, you know, over the last 20 years because I’ve had a confidence that I can deliver. Yeah, that’s one thing that is difficult as a real estate agent to get into is some sort of position that allows you to have a steady income and then also, you know, sell on the side. So, you know, I talk about in my book that it’s an ideal thing would be to be like an assistant to another agent or something that’s really successful, helping them out as much as they can. Maybe you’ll get some referrals off that as well. But that certainly, I mean, that’s more or less the avenue I took because I didn’t really jump into it full time until I saw, like, you know, I had the business built that would sustain me. And also, we were focused on paying off our student loans. Like we had, you know, a bunch of debt hanging overheads and we’re like, we don’t want to go through the, you know, have kids, go through that whole process. And, you know, we wanted to get rid of that before we jumped into our careers fully like that. But yeah, I wish there was more opportunity like that in the agent space. Now, Dante, your philosophy is that homeownership is a transformation, not just a transaction. For a real estate agent who closes deals every day but has not started to build their own portfolio, what is the first conversation you would have with them about using real estate to build their own long-term wealth? So, I would say ultimately that the first conversation is going to be about what is your goal? You know, a lot of times I see real estate investors, I see real estate agents, they don’t really have necessarily a goal in mind. They, you know, they get excited about the concept of, I’m an investor, but it’s like, what is your strategy? You know, are you looking to fix and flip? Are you looking to cash flow? Are you looking at appreciation, managing the property? What are you trying to obtain? What are your goals? And then we can kind of, you know, reverse engineer that concept, you know. So, I always think, let’s think about the end first, and then work our way to what it’s going to take to get there. Because, you know, it’s different strategies out there. There’s no right or wrong. You know, I’ve seen people invest in properties just for the tax write-off, but I’ve also seen other people looking for the, you know, the positive cash flow per month, and the rest goes on. So, strategy is very important on what are you trying to do? Because I feel like a lot of times, and you can let me know what you see out there, but we have this concept of trying to keep up with the Joneses. And so, we kind of try to follow or mimic maybe somebody in particular that you’ve been watching and seeing, but that might not be suitable for you and your dynamics and your situation. So, you really have to look at yourself, kind of do a self-audit and evaluate the situation and see what’s best for you. Yeah, that’s really, really true. And, you know, there’s different seasons. If you’re just starting off being an agent, you obviously need to know that if you’re jumping into being self-employed and it hasn’t been two years of income, then it’s going to be difficult to get a traditional mortgage. That’s something to note. But then also, if you do look at trying to reduce your taxable income, there’s also a balance there, right? Because, I mean, you have to be able to qualify for a mortgage if you’re not reporting any income to the IRS. Like, it’s going to be hard to get a mortgage, right? Well, it is on the traditional, you know, side. Being a regional mortgage broker that we are, we do have alternative income programs. Yeah. So, you run Epic Mortgage across nine states with a relationship-first, education-first model. What does that actually look like in practice when you’re working with investors specifically? And what are the biggest financial mistakes you see real estate investors make when they’re trying to scale? Yeah. I mean, basically, just sticking to the game plan. You know, sometimes we’re our own worst enemy. You know, our brains, our mind. We constantly are changing our mind. And it’s like, well, hey, we started on this game plan. And it is tough, you know, at times because things may have to adjust. You know, valuations of properties don’t always hit exactly where you think they are going to be. ARV today is not ARV six months from now or a year from now. So, there are some nuances to the game. So, you have to have some flexibility. Sometimes being stringent is not the best case in real estate. You have to be able to be flexible and you do have to learn how to pivot. So, you know, really educating people on just the experience and the journey and just overall knowing that the end of the road is where we’re trying to get to. But it might be some bumps. It might be some, you know, some landmines that we’re going to have to dodge, you know, and we’re going to have to revisit. And, you know, sometimes people like, I want to get this done this year. And it’s like, you know, let’s just get it done. If we can get it done this year, great. But it might take us five. It might take us a decade because of certain situations, depending on everyone’s scenario. So, you know, just giving people more perspective. Yeah, I think what you were touching on in the beginning often happens when somebody gets kind of excited, maybe listening to a podcast, come across a podcast about investing and they think, you know, I’m going to do, you know, I’m going to do buy and hold rentals as my strategy. And then they listen to another podcast like, no, no, no, I’m going to do Airbnbs and kind of flipping the investment strategy. And I mean, it’s good to explore. It’s good to know. I think like, you know, at a certain point, you do kind of have like maybe a tool belt and there’s different situations for, you know, if you come across a deal that might work in this with like a midterm rental or it might work as an Airbnb or something better than it would as a long-term rental. But I do think to your point, I think you really need to kind of like have that focus and actually take action. Actually make steps towards your goal because I think you can get stuck in that analysis, paralysis, keep chasing the next like, you know, popular idea and never actually doing anything. No, agreed. Yeah. I mean, and that sometimes is the action is just getting started. You get a lot of people that want to be real estate investors and they’re reading everything, they’re watching every podcast they can, but they never do anything. And it’s like, you know, the one thing that we have to, you know, that we have to realize is that’s time, you know, real estate is a time game and you got to start. So, you know, the quicker you start, the better you’re going to be. Best time to plant a tree was what? 100 years ago, 20 years ago. Best time is right now. And I think, you know, like that’s the thing. It’s like over what my portfolio looks like is just been because I’ve had real estate over time. Now I’ve gotten some good deals and I’ve done some fun things like burrs and flips and that kind of stuff, which has helped. But, you know, ultimately, you know, I own property through the pandemic and that definitely with the printing of money helps the values go up. And so I think, you know, while we’re on the other side of that, I still believe that, you know, you’re going to see values go up over the long term. So trying to get into some properties and I think now you do sometimes have to get a little creative because it’s harder to make the numbers work as, you know, just a straight cash flow, long term rental. It can be a little bit tricky with the interest rates where they’re at and the purchase prices. So, you know, most recently for us, we found a property that we really liked and we loved the location. We thought it was a cute property. We made it really charming. Definitely was not going to work as a long term with what interest rates we were getting. So we just we made it into a midterm and that’s been working pretty well. So sometimes you got to get a little creative. Yeah, that’s awesome. Flexibility and seller finance, too. I know that doesn’t necessarily, you know, bode well for my company, but I mean, seller financing, you know, a lot of investors, you’d be surprised just how much can be worked out, you know, and sometimes we can offer, you know, we allow seller finance seconds, you know, so that can help reduce some of the down payments and stuff like that. So it is a mechanism that people, you know, you just have to be willing to get going and, you know, get that action. And then you’ll be surprised how we can make some deals happen that you didn’t think we’re, you know, able to do. Yeah. Yeah. And I think to your point, I think, you know, just having the knowledge of these things to like, so, yeah, we’re talking out of both sides of our mouths a little bit like, you know, don’t get into the analysis paralysis, but get educated so that you when you come across an opportunity where like that could be a reality, like knowing that that exists and being able to conflict, discuss what possible terms could be, what the win-win is for the seller as well. You know, I’ve got a deal that did seller financing that, you know, it broke up the capital gains for the owner and it was a great thing for them. And they’re talking about doing another one with me and they are potentially wanting to do 100% down or 100% financed. But again, you have to be careful too, because that sounds amazing and sounds really good, but you need to also make sure that it’s not like, are you overpaying because of those terms? Does it make sense? Like, are you able to weather the storms if there’s going to be, because your cashflow is not going to be as good if you’re going, you know, 100%. And if you have, you know, 15 properties that then, you know, five of them need HVACs in one year, like is that going to be something you can handle, right? So like, maybe you don’t put that money down, but maybe you have it in reserves so that you can weather storms like that when those kinds of things happen. Yeah. I think the best power you can have is saying no to a deal. But in order to say no to a deal, you have to know, is it a good deal? So there is the education that you have to have up front of just recognizing what are good deals? What are your principles? What are your rules? Are you the 1% rule? You know, are you cash on cash on hand? You know, what are you looking to do? So I think it comes down to strategy. So that’s kind of the education we do up front. Hey, these are different things that you can look at and monitor. A lot of investors do it a lot of different ways. There’s no right or wrong. I think that’s what confuses people too, because they all, well, what’s the best way? And it’s like, you know, whatever the best way is. Yeah. No one wants to be wrong anymore. You know, we’re in an age where no one wants to get it wrong. No one wants to make a mistake. And it’s like, it just doesn’t work like that. Like you have to kind of find what’s good for you. So, you know, there is no right or wrong. You get to choose what’s right for you. But as long as you have some principles and guidelines that you can stick to, I feel like there’s more opportunities out there than people actually can ever imagine. Yeah. Certainly a stepping point for people if they want to check it out. If they go to our website, REIAgent.com forward slash deal dash analyzer, you can find a little calculator that you can do some calculations. It’s important to factor in different things like vacancy, repairs, CapEx, property management, if you want it, into the deal as well. Not just, you know, principal interest, insurance costs and the rent amount to see if that property is going to cash flow. And so definitely something to get yourself educated on and definitely use professionals like Dante, people that have experience and understand what this world’s all about and can advise you in a way that’s not just trying to get the deal done. But, you know, so that they want to come back to you again, right? They want clients to have that repeat business, that trust, because they know that you’ve got their long term interests in mind, not just that paycheck. Yeah, I always say the best compliment, you know, realtors say this. They say the best compliment is a referral. But to me, the best compliment is repeat business. If a person does a deal with me and they knew it was good and they say, hey, I want to do it again with you. I know I did a good job and that’s what makes me feel good. So, you know, the best compliment for me is repeat business. And that’s what we aim to do. I love it. Dante, we’ve had some great golden nuggets already, but I’m curious what golden nuggets you brought for our listeners today. All right. I mean, we kind of tapped on it a little bit, but I just, you know, you can’t emphasize it more and more. Relationships beat interest rates all the time. You know, you really have to build relationships and go deep. You want to go deep in your relationships. It starts, you know, you know, it starts in high school nowadays. I mean, these kids have social media platforms when they’re 12 and 13 years old. And you can really, you know, develop relationships because you never know where those relationships will take you. And sometimes they see opportunities for you that you couldn’t even see. You know, I mean, it might be a co-worker that’s actually, you know, working with someone that’s going to buy a house. And then now, you know, the co-worker, you know, is friends with you. And, you know, all of a sudden you got a referral. So, you know, relationships are so important, you know, and they mean more than interest rates. So I really encourage people to get back to networking. You know, and networking can be so different now, right? We can do it over the Internet, which is super cool, or we can do it in person, you know. But however you do it, we need to build relationships and go deep, you know, care about somebody, see how they’re doing, their family, their friends, you know, see what motivates them and always be on lookout. Really, you know, giver’s gain is one of my tips. Real estate, and this is kind of a nugget that I think everyone knows, but, you know, it doesn’t hurt to say, you know, real estate is more than just properties. You know, it is a wealth building machine. And even if it’s your first time home or it’s an investment property, we have to really assess how we can, you know, extract, you know, squeeze the juice out of the orange, you know, what are the possibilities and really look at ways to maximize each and every unit because it’s an asset. And we have to build assets and we have to understand what good debt and bad debt is. And, you know, I always say good debt is anything that I don’t have to pay, but someone else is paying for me. That’s good debt. Bad debt is anything I have to come out of my pocket. So, you know, how can we strategize and make sure that someone else is paying for it? And so I just really want people to look at the property. Hey, yeah, great. You got a property. But how can we maximize it? You know, what tool? Because, you know, we all are going to need, you know, millions of dollars to retire one day. So, you know, we need to start planning on how do we actually get there? Because that number sounds big, right? When we say, you know, we’re thinking seven figures, eight figures and like, oh, you know, sometimes it almost shuts people down when you think of numbers that big because it’s like, well, how the heck am I going to get there? But it’s easier said than done. But it takes time. And you got to use the tools that we have to build it. And then my last nugget is just overall. And this kind of goes back to my sports career. Consistency, you know, consistency on a daily basis. You got to create good habits and do them on a daily basis. That’s going to create the opportunities. You know how they say, you know, luck is when the opportunity meets someone that’s prepared. And then they say you got lucky. But you are always prepared for that opportunity. So you have to be consistent in what you do on a day in, day out basis. You know, and sometimes it stinks. You know, sometimes there’s so many distractions. You know, you got FIFA on. You got soccer. You can watch the soccer games. But you got to get your work done first. You know, you got to get your work done first and then have the fun times because, you know, it’s doing today so you don’t have to do it tomorrow. So those are my nuggets for you. I love it. So true. One of the things that I’ve thought about or one of the ways of comprehending that good debt kind of analogy is if you think about locking in a 30-year fixed mortgage. So a lot of times people will see that interest rate and see how much money they’re paying in interest over the years and just really, you know, it makes them sick to their stomach almost, right? But you’re locking in today’s like dollar amount, if that makes sense, for 30 years. And so like when I did analysis in my local market and looked at what it would have been if you bought the median sales price in the year 2000. If you bought a property in the median sales price, you didn’t worry about any of the tax write-offs. You didn’t worry about the rent income you’re getting from it. You’re just assuming you’re breaking even until now. And that’s it. Now, you know, at the time, I think it was like $115,000, $117,000 for that median sales price. And now it’s $350,000. And if you compare the down payment you’d need to have for that house at the time, and if you would just put that into the S&P 500 for the same amount of time, what the differences in the value would be. Now, we’re not quite done with a 30-year mortgage, but the difference was well over $100,000. I can’t remember exactly what it was off the top of my head. But that’s just kind of not doing the best job of explaining it. But at the time, that was a median sales price. It wasn’t like you’re getting a steal. And that mortgage might’ve felt like a stretch to some people, but now it would be laughable, right? I always talk about when people are squabbling over a few thousand dollars in a deal, if they go back to when their parents bought their house, and they were probably fighting over $20. It was a big deal then, but it’s laughable now. And that’s kind of one of the powers of that good debt is that you’re locking in today’s dollar, and the dollar is going to devalue likely. And so in 30 years, you’re going to take the advantage of that, and you’re going to have that asset that’s worth way more because you locked it in today’s dollar. Got to take action. Yeah, 100%. So what about a favorite book or a fundamental book that you think everybody should read? I don’t know about fundamental, but my favorite book that gets me going was Energy on the Bus by John Gordon. And it talks really more about teamwork. And I feel like everyone should have a financial team around them, people that they can rely on, kind of like your board of directors. Because sometimes you just need someone’s opinion. And so if you have this kind of board of directors, but you got to let people know where this bus is headed. And so you got to have people with the right energy on that bus. Everyone’s got to have the same goals and understand what you’re trying to do and help you get there. And I think naturally, we like to help people. And I think it’s human nature. And if you can find that good circle for you, and they’re going to help you get to where you want to go. So Energy on the Bus by John Gordon. It’s a feel good book, short, sweet, and it gets to the point of just making sure that you’re moving in the right direction. Awesome. Love it. That’s a new one. Now, you have the podcast, which is? Epic Spotlight. Epic Spotlight. The book, you wrote a book, The Ultimate Mortgage Guide. I imagine people can find that on Amazon. Yep. Yeah. Amazon is a place to be. It really was a book, just keep it simple, that I was getting questions in 2002 that I still was getting in 2023 when I wrote the book. And it just reminded me that our financial system doesn’t really, our school system doesn’t really educate us on these things that matter the most. And I think sometimes they say that 50% of people will go with what the realtor tells them to as far as the lender goes. And so that’s 50% of people that potentially may be going to somewhere that they didn’t realize there was other options. There was alternative income programs. Oh, really? You can buy some with bank statements? Wait, I don’t have to prove my income? I thought my tax returns are important. Oh, I don’t need two years of tax returns? There’s a lot of stuff that people don’t know, and I just wanted to make them aware of just what’s out there. Oh, you mean I can do a fix and flip? I don’t have to come out of cash? I can get a loan? Yes, you can. So these are things that people don’t know about that I wanted to make them present as saying, hey, these are products that are out here and things that you consider, and hopefully that’ll help people get going in real estate. That’s awesome. Yeah, thanks for doing that for people. And social media platforms, where are you active? Where can people find you otherwise? I think it’s five platforms, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and I’m probably missing one. But yeah, definitely I’m on those major platforms. Yeah, look me up, Dante Royster or Epic Mortgage. You’ll probably find me there. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for being on the show. It’s been a really fun conversation. I know that our audience is going to get a ton out of it. For anybody listening now, please like, subscribe, follow us on any platform, YouTube, any podcast platform you’re on. I really appreciate it. Leave us a review, help the podcast grow even more. Check out our website, REIAgent.com for some free tools and also blog posts of all the different episodes we’ve had. We’re getting close to 200, so check that out. Again, Dante, thanks so much for being on the show. Hey, thanks for having me. Thanks for listening to the REI Agent. If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe to catch new shows every week. Visit REIAgent.com for more content. Until next time, keep building the life you want. All content in the show is not investment advice or mental health therapy. It is intended for entertainment purposes only.

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