Remarkable Triumphs and Spectacular Failures. Rod Khleif

[00:00:00] Bob Wheeler: Welcome to another episode of Money You Should Ask, where everyone has something they can teach you. I’m your host, Bob Wheeler. In this episode, we are going to explore why we do what we do when it comes to money. As a CPA for the past 30 years, wait, let me say 25, because that makes me sound younger. I have seen it all when it comes to money and emotions.

[00:00:21] And if you think I’m talking about my clients, I’m not. I’m talking about myself. My relationship with money has been, and sometimes still is, an emotional roller coaster. Maybe that’s something you’re also familiar with. Good news. You and I are not the only ones. Our next guest is going to share their money beliefs, money blocks, and life challenges as well.

[00:00:43] Buckle your seatbelt and enjoy the ride.

[00:01:05] Our next guest, Rod Khleif, is a multiple business owner and philanthropist who is passionate about real estate, business, and giving back. As one of the country’s top business, real estate, and peak performance luminaries, Rod has owned over 2,000 homes and apartment buildings, and has built over 24 businesses in his 40 year career, several which have been worth tens of millions of dollars.

[00:01:24] Rod soared from humble beginnings as a young, impoverished Dutch immigrant, to incredible success. From losing 50 million in the market crash of 2008 to the success he enjoys today, Rod’s experience involves both remarkable triumphs and spectacular failures. His work dives into the psychology of success and brings incredible firsthand technical and motivational knowledge and skills to any real estate, business, or success-based discussion.

[00:01:50] Rod also founded the Tiny Hands Foundation, which has benefited more than 85,000 community children in need. Rod, it’s so awesome to have you here today.

[00:01:59] Rod Khleif: Oh, thanks, my friend. Let’s have some fun today, Bob. Really already enjoyed our pre-conversation here. This’ll be great.

[00:02:05] Bob Wheeler: You know, what really captured my eye was “spectacular failures.” And most of us are not running around saying, look at how well I failed. And I have to imagine, if I was sitting with $50 million, I’d be feeling pretty good about myself, hopefully. And then to lose it all, I think, I don’t know. It would get pretty dark for me.

[00:02:26] Rod Khleif: I would love to tell you the story if you want to suffer through it.

[00:02:28] Bob Wheeler: I want to hear it. I’m interested.

[00:02:30] Rod Khleif: All right. It won’t take long. So I immigrated this country when I was six with my mother, Svanche, and my brother, Albert. And was born in the Netherlands, Holland. You know, we just use windmills.

[00:02:40] Bob Wheeler: Nice.

[00:02:40] Rod Khleif: We ended up in Denver, Colorado, and we really struggled growing up. At least in my view, we did. I’m sure people had it harder than we did, but you know, we had expired food cause it was cheaper. Powdered milk with our cereal in the morning cause it was cheaper. You know, clothes from the Goodwill and the Salvation Army all the way through junior high school. Til I lied about my age when I was 14, because I was tall, and got a job at Burger King so I could buy my own clothes and buy a car ultimately.

[00:03:04] But again, we struggled, but I always knew I wanted more. Luckily my mom had an incredible work ethic, so she babysat kids so we’d have enough money to eat. With her babysitting money, she was actually a bit of an entrepreneur. She invested in the stock market, IPOs, made money. And she started investing in real estate. When I was 14, she bought her first house directly across the street from where we were living for about $30,000.

[00:03:27] When I was 17, she told me she’d made $20,000 in her sleep. I’m like, what?! You made 20 grand and you didn’t do anything? Screw college, mom, I’m going into real estate. So I got my real estate license, a broker’s license, actually, right when I turned 18. I was actually a broker, I could have my own office. You could do that back then with education. Now they got smart and you need some experience to be a broker.

[00:03:48] But, so I was a broker and I was going to be rich selling other people houses. Well, my first year in real estate, I made about a grand. My second year, maybe 10 grand. But my third year I made over a hundred thousand dollars. So what happened between year two and year three that caused me to 10x my income?

[00:04:02] Well, what happened was I met a guy that taught me about the importance of mindset and psychology, and how truly, 80 to 90% of your success in anything is just that – your mindset and your psychology. Only 10 to 20% is the vehicle, the technical knowledge. I mean, if it was just the knowledge, there’d be a bunch of wealthy librarians and college professors out there.

[00:04:19] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:04:20] Rod Khleif: It’s the do, and it’s to keep doing, and pushing through fear and all that. And so fast forward to today, I’ve owned a couple of thousand houses I’ve rented long-term, I’ve built 27 businesses. I never call them failures, I call them seminars. That $50 million thing you mentioned was a seminar. I call them seminars, okay?

[00:04:37] Bob Wheeler: An expensive seminar.

[00:04:38] Rod Khleif: Oh, that was my most expensive. I’ve built 27 businesses, several of them worth tens of millions. Most have been spectacular, flaming seminars. Okay? But we fail our way to success. You mentioned that earlier. You know, in fact I’ll mention as a sidebar, I got to meet the billionaire owner of Spanx, the women’s undergarments, you know?

[00:04:55] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:04:55] Rod Khleif: Sara Blakely. Beautiful human being. I met her at a Mastermind, and she told me that her dad used to ask her and her brother once a week, what have you failed at this week? Isn’t that an awesome question to ask your kids?

[00:05:06] Bob Wheeler: That’s great!

[00:05:07] Rod Khleif: And he would be pissed if they hadn’t failed at something. So you don’t fear failure.

[00:05:10] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:05:10] Rod Khleif: Fear regret. Fear being in the same place you are right now a year from now, unless you freaking love where you are right now, right? So anyway, in 2006, my net worth went up $17 million while I slept.

[00:05:22] Bob Wheeler: Wow.

[00:05:23] Rod Khleif: And you’re thinking, wow. Right. And so did I. I’m thinking, wow. Okay. I thought I was…

[00:05:27] Bob Wheeler: Got it made, done!

[00:05:28] Rod Khleif: I thought I was a real estate God, Bob. And you know, I got a head so big I could barely fit it through a door. And you know, when that happens, God of the universe will give you a nice little smack? Well, that was 2008. I lost that 17 million and a lot more. I lost the 50 million bucks conservatively, really.

[00:05:44] So one of the things I’m known for on my podcast and my live events and stuff is teaching the mindset to actually take action, but to recover from loss. And so one of the things I love talking about is the strategies I utilized to come back from losing that much. Well, to have it, to have it in the first place, of course, took strategy, but also to recover from it.

[00:06:04] Some people don’t recover from big loss like, I mean, people jumped off buildings in the great depression and killed themselves in this last contraction as well for losing less comparatively.

[00:06:12] So, you know, love to drill down on any aspect of that you like, brother.

[00:06:17] Bob Wheeler: Well, as you’re talking, I’m thinking about one, the guy that you listened to that said it was about mindset, right?

[00:06:22] Rod Khleif: Mhm, yeah.

[00:06:23] Bob Wheeler: What made you open to that? Cause a lot of people are going to go like, well, that’s not practical. That’s just mindset.

[00:06:29] Rod Khleif: Well, that’s the CPA in you. That’s the CPA response, brother, because you’re analytical. You got to check off every one of those boxes, respectfully. Let me tell you, in my business, I teach people how to buy apartment complexes. And the most successful students that I have are the most analytical. Okay?

[00:06:46] So I’m very in tune with that personality type, but they’re the hardest to actually get to do it, because they’ve got to check off every one of those boxes, even though they’re the most successful.

[00:06:55] And let me brag about something for a minute. I’ve been teaching three and a half years, and my students, the coaching students, direct coaching, now own over 46,000 units. I’m super proud of that. Anyway, how I was receptive, was I loved it. I think I could have been a PhD in psychology, because it’s all about psychology. I just freaking loved it.

[00:07:13] I was surprised by how much I loved it. Since then I’ve spent 20 years following Tony Robbins around the planet. He’s probably the best in the world at it. But I just loved the whole mindset component and having fun with it, and not having fear, and pushing through that fear.

[00:07:27] Bob Wheeler: Yeah. So I’m the practical guy, right? Or I’m the naysayer. And I’m thinking, well, I don’t want to own a whole bunch of real estate. I just want to be more comfortable. And I’m not a salesperson. Right? So maybe this is only for salespeople so that I can close a deal. So I’m not that person. So how is this going to help me?

[00:07:46] Rod Khleif: You got it. Now let me tell you. So my business specifically, okay. Now I’m just going to speak, because that’s my main framework, is I teach people how to buy apartment complexes. My business is a team sport. Okay? You do not do it on your own. You can buy single family houses on your own, flip them, wholesale them, buy and rent them, no problem. But you’re not going to do that in the commercial multifamily space, it’s a team sport.

[00:08:07] Now, the thing about multifamily real estate is it’s primarily empirical. It’s numbers. Okay? You get the numbers right, you ask all the right questions, it’s pretty hard to make a significant mistake. So it requires analysis. Now I can tell you, I’m not analytical. Okay. I can read a P&L, I don’t love it. I, you know, my partner, throw him in a room with an Excel spreadsheet for a raw median once in a while, and he’s happy. Okay?

[00:08:30] Bob Wheeler: Exactly.

[00:08:31] Rod Khleif: That’s not me. But see, what this did, what’s beautiful about this business, it’s a team sport, is very often, the most common dynamic I see in the team is an analytical person that’s more introverted with an outgoing person that’s building the relationships. Because you’ve got to build the relationships with the brokers, the sellers, the investors, all of that.

[00:08:49] So I’ve got a podcast called the Lifetime Cashflow Podcast, and I had these three kids on there in their twenties, okay? And they had about a hundred million approximately in assets under management. Okay. These are the kids in their twenties.

[00:09:00] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:09:01] Rod Khleif: And each one of them was in that partnership I just described. Analytical with outgoing. Of course I had the three outgoing ones on the show, but they each had a partner that was analytical. So that’s how you do it. Okay. You align with someone to take over that role.

[00:09:13] You know, when you have two or three people that get together that are all playing to their strengths, they’re doing what they love, number one, so they’re going to be better at it. And I’m going to, just going to tell you, success is inevitable. Okay? Because everybody’s playing to their strengths.

[00:09:27] Bob Wheeler: So what about fear? So this is really, I’m scared to put in a hundred thousand bucks because I don’t know enough. Right?

[00:09:33] Rod Khleif: Got it.

[00:09:34] Bob Wheeler: What’s going to happen to me?

[00:09:35] Rod Khleif: I mean, here’s how you push through it. If you come to one of my bootcamps, I’ve got one coming up December 3rd, 4th, and 5th in Orlando. One of the first things we do is a goal-setting workshop on steroids. Okay? It’s the first hour and a half, but let me just say, to push through the fear, you’ve got to want it.

[00:09:50] So you’ve got to have what Napoleon Hill in his book, Think and Grow Rich, calls a burning desire. You really gotta have that.

[00:09:55] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:09:56] Rod Khleif: To push through the fear or to push through limiting beliefs. When I was thrown into school when I was six years old, I didn’t speak English. Okay? And I found out what bullies were for the first time, so I got my butt kicked on a regular basis.

[00:10:06] And then my mom, God bless her, proud Dutch woman that she is, thought it’d be a great idea to send me to school in wooden shoes and the leather shorts the Germans wore for October Fest.

[00:10:16] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, nice!

[00:10:16] Rod Khleif: Another ass kicking. And then the bullies would chase me home, and my mom would chase them off with a flyswatter. Another butt-kicking the next day.

[00:10:23] And so I developed this limiting belief that I wasn’t good enough. And so a lot of people have that, you know, I’m not good enough. I’m not strong enough. I’m not analytical enough. I’m not young enough, old enough, whatever. I don’t have enough money. We have all these limiting beliefs. Now there’s a reason that the acronym for belief systems is BS, because 99.9% of them are just that, they’re BS.

[00:10:43] But because we’ve had emotional things happen in our childhood or whatever, our brain thinks they’re factual, and they’re not.

[00:10:49] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:10:50] Rod Khleif: So that’s why the burning desire is so critical. You got to want it. I mean, really want it. And that’s why we do this workshop on steroids.

[00:10:56] Bob Wheeler: Okay.

[00:10:56] Rod Khleif: You push through fear with that. You push through limiting beliefs. Or maybe you’re comfortable. The comfort zone is a warm place, and nothing freaking grows there, right?

[00:11:05] Bob Wheeler: It doesn’t.

[00:11:05] Rod Khleif: So you gotta, the unbelievable life of your dreams is just on the other side of comfort. But you gotta have that burning desire to push you to take that action, to, you know, to push through fear.

[00:11:15] Like I say, most analytical people need to see the whole path. But I’m going to tell you, like Dr. Martin Luther King said, take that first step and the next step will be revealed. You know, Lao Tzu said the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. And, you know, you can drive all the way across this country at night, seeing 50 feet in front of you. And, you know you will make it.

[00:11:34] You may have obstacles, you may break down, but you know other people have done it before you. It’s the same thing with, with, certainly with multifamily real estate, same thing with really any business. If you get the blueprint and you take action, you don’t have to know every little piece.

[00:11:46] I’ve got so many examples of properties we bought, you know, where we had literally 24 hours to make a decision. Did we know everybody? No. Did we know everything about the deal? No. But we took action and you know, these are properties we made 10, 12 million bucks on. You got to take that first step.

[00:12:01] Bob Wheeler: So that involves some trust, right? So here I am, I’ve decided to change my mindset. I’m worthy, I’m grateful, and I want something different, but I’m only making $40,000 a year. I really can’t get ahead.

[00:12:15] Rod Khleif: Well, listen. First of all, I would smack the shit out of you if you said that to me, because whatever you say, your brain is hearing.

[00:12:24] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:12:25] Rod Khleif: And so like, on my wall here, I’ve got, “I am” statements. Let me show you the power of this. You can, show them to you here. I’m the best in the world at what I do. I’m a business genius. I am success. Okay? Comfort kills. Now, these “I am” statements are so freaking powerful. So if you have fear or you have trouble staying focused. Like I’ve got I am focus, I am health and energy.

[00:12:47] Anything you put the words “I am” in front of, is an identity statement. So if you guys are listening, I just showed him some of these signs on my wall that say these things. These are not like, ego, where like, I’m a business genius. This is what I’m aspiring to be. Right?

[00:13:01] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:13:02] Rod Khleif: These are aspirational. But here’s the thing. Anything you put the words “I am” in front of is an identity statement. There is no greater force in our psychology than the need to be consistent with how we identify ourselves. People will die over identity. Okay.

[00:13:16] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:13:16] Rod Khleif: Think 9/11, okay? But you can use this. Like, I will be jogging in my exercise facility here, and I’ll be running, yelling, I am success. And I mean, with every ounce of my being.

[00:13:29] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:13:30] Rod Khleif: You know, it’s really funny at my live events, my kids help me. And that’s the question they get the most often. Does he really do that shit? Does he, you know? Yes. We grew up with that. Why? Again, I know I lost some of you analytical ones, but it freaking works, okay?

[00:13:42] So there you go. That’s how I’ve been able to recover from losing 50 million. And we bought 2,500 units in the last two and a half years with my students. So there you go.

[00:13:51] Bob Wheeler: Here’s, I want to go back to this. This is so important. I believe in affirmations. I think they’re so important. And I think you hit on it. It’s not like, I’m successful, I want a lot of money.

[00:14:00] Rod Khleif: No, no, it’s gotta be high energy, man.

[00:14:03] Bob Wheeler: You got to vibrate it. You got to integrate it.

[00:14:05] Rod Khleif: Every fiber of your being, you emphasize different words. I am success. I am success. I am success. And you just, with every fricking ounce of your being, and it gets into your psyche man, it gets into every cell in your body.

[00:14:20] And you own it! And you start believing it. You know, whenever I’m going through stress, which is the achiever’s word for fear, you know, I’ve got some crap going on. I mean, I am courage. I am courage. And it just gets into you. And I’m telling you, I know I lost some of you guys and like, oh, for God’s sakes, let’s talk about real estate or business or whatever.

[00:14:39] I can talk about that ad nauseum. But this is more important. Okay, I’m, just trust me on this. The vehicle is the least important piece. You got to actually take action. You got to push through this. You got to take that first step. And then when you get your butt kicked, you got to take the next step.

[00:14:54] Bob Wheeler: To me, it’s so important because the other piece of this is, you don’t get to stop. You made your 17 million, you made all this money, and then you lose 50 million. You don’t just get to go, oh, day’s over. You’ve got to pick up. And so I want to really reiterate that even in your success, your current success, you’re still doing the work. You’re not changing the habits.

[00:15:15] And I think for a lot of people, they’re hoping, if I just hurry up and get there, then I can relax, have my margarita, and I’m done.

[00:15:22] Rod Khleif: Oh, let me talk about that for a moment. Okay. So many people feel like they have to achieve to be happy as well.

[00:15:28] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:15:30] Rod Khleif: I’d like to talk about something else first, because it’ll lend credence to this.

[00:15:34] Bob Wheeler: Talk away, share it.

[00:15:35] Rod Khleif: All right. This is the first thing we do in my boot camps, because if you don’t know what you want, how the hell are you ever going to get it? Okay. So this is not just, like doing your New Year’s resolution, which you’ve forgotten by February. You’re going to sit down. So even if you can’t come to my event, listen up because, and if you can take some notes, take some notes, because I promise you, this is an incredibly powerful process.

[00:15:53] So you sit down, uninterrupted, well-hydrated, don’t do it after a big meal, you want high energy, and write down everything you could ever possibly want in life. You start there. All the stuff. Houses, cars, boats, jet-skis, planes, just a simple act of writing it down triggers something in your brain called the reticular activating system.

[00:16:10] And what that is, that’s what they called your subconscious filter that points you in the direction your brain thinks you’re interested in. And it’s completely subconscious. My greatest example, when you first buy a car, you never really noticed them before. And then you buy it, you see them everywhere. Were they there before? Of course they were.

[00:16:25] That’s your reticular activating system. So sit down and write down everything you could ever possibly want. All the stuff. And don’t limit yourself. If you want a boat, a jet, a yacht, plane, whatever, there’s nothing you can’t do, be, or have, you just have to decide and take action. That’s it.

[00:16:40] Then you also want to write down everything you want to do in this lifetime. Maybe you want to have all the places you want to go. Maybe you want to write a book. You want to climb every mountain over 14,000 feet, whatever, write all that stuff down. So it’s not just the stuff. It’s everything you’re gonna do your whole life. Okay?

[00:16:55] Also write down what you want to learn. Maybe you want to learn a foreign language or a skill. If it’s multifamily, for God’s sakes, come spend three days with me. But whatever it is, write down what you want to learn.

[00:17:05] Lastly, write down who you want to help. We’ll do more for others than we’ll ever do for ourselves. Now, this is all the fuel guys. Okay? This is the fuel, but there’s a couple steps that will greatly enhance this.

[00:17:16] So write down who you want to help. And then once you can’t think of another, and those of you analytical ones, which I know you’re listening, don’t sit and analyze every answer. You can always scratch them out later. Keep writing. Don’t let the pen leave the paper. Okay? Very important.

[00:17:30] And now, once you can’t think of another thing, I want you to put a time limit on each goal. It’s just a couple more steps. I want you to put a time limit on each goal. So put a number by each goal, how long you think it’ll take you to achieve it. And again, don’t overthink this. Maybe a 1, a 3, a 5, even a 10 or a 20.

[00:17:45] Recognizing that it’s a human tendency to overestimate what we can do in a year. And we massively underestimate what we can do in 5, 10, 20 years. I’ll give you an example of this. Now, please know I’m not bragging. I’m just going to give you some personal examples that I hope inspire you, okay? That’s it.

[00:18:00] But back when I was 18, I knew I wanted to live on the beach and there’s no beach in Denver, okay? So I would visualize the palm trees and the sand and the surf. 20 years later, I built this $8 million, 10,000 square foot house on the beach, which was unthinkable when I was 18. But I made it happen because I started the process. So that’s what I want to tell you. Don’t limit yourself. So once you’ve, you’ve numbered your goals, pick your number one goal.

[00:18:24] Okay, I mean that goal, when you get it, you’re like, oh my God. You know you’ve arrived when you get that goal. Okay? Put that on a separate sheet of paper. Then pick your top three 1-year goals. Put those on a separate sheet of paper. And we’ll give you a guide if you come to the bootcamp, but you can do this on paper. Leave some room in between them.

[00:18:39] And then at this point, you’re ahead of 99.99% of the people on the planet that do a New Year’s resolution and forget about it. By the way, you can’t do this in your head. Okay. I know a lot of you analytical people like to do everything in your head. If you’re in your head, you’re dead.

[00:18:52] It’s gotta be on paper. Okay. Very important. All right. So, and I’m not picking on you analytics, just so, please know that, you’re the most successful people in my business. But I know how you think. So I’m just throwing that out there. Anyway. So you’ve got your number one goal and your top three one-year goals.

[00:19:06] Now you need to write down why each one of those goals is an absolute freaking must to achieve. Okay? So put a description, put your why’s down, because the why is the most important piece of this. This is the fuel. This is what will get you to get up early. Stay up late. Do whatever you have to do to grind for a few years like most people won’t, so you live the rest of your life like most people can’t, okay?

[00:19:28] So put your why’s down, and use emotionally charged words. Words are so powerful. So I can show my kids what incredible success looks like. So I can show my wife what it means to live a life of amazing abundance, or whatever.

[00:19:40] Whatever’s going to do, so we can have the freedom to do whatever we want, whenever we want, wherever we want. Bring whoever we want. Now whatever’s going to juice you, write that down. Once you’re done with that, I want you to put a little pain in there. Use pleasure and pain. See, as human beings, we’ll do more to avoid pain than gain pleasure.

[00:19:56] So you want to use this, again, this is the fuel. So if you don’t achieve the goal, and make it hurt. So I don’t feel like a failure, so I don’t fail my kids, so I don’t fail my spouse. So I don’t live a life of regret. You know, there was this nurse in Australia, Bob, um, hospice nurse. So she took care of patients when they were about to die.

[00:20:14] And she asked them a question. And the question was, do you have any regrets? And she wrote a book about, it’s called The Five Regrets of Dying. Her name is Bronnie Ware. Know what the number one regret was? Not living the life I could have lived. Living someone else’s life. Not doing what I know I’m capable of. This is what prevents that from happening. Okay? So…

[00:20:31] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:20:31] Rod Khleif: You’ve got your positive and negative reasons why. Last thing is, get pictures of your goals. Okay. Or make declarations. Let me give you an example of this. Jim Carrey, the comedian, the actor, when he was flat broke, wrote himself a check for $10 million.

[00:20:44] For those of you millennials listening, a check is something we used to use to pay for things. Anyway. So he wrote himself a check for 10 million bucks, and he used to go by the Hollywood sign, flat broke, and he’d visualize cashing it. That’s how much money he made for Dumb and Dumber.

[00:20:57] I’ll give you another example. Demi Lovato, the singer. When she was nobody, she was unheard of, not a nobody, but she was not famous yet. About 11 years ago, she posted on social media, one day I’m going to sing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl. Not this last one. The one before. Go see who sang it.

[00:21:12] I’ll give you some personal examples from me. When I turned 18 and got my real estate broker’s license, I figured I needed a four-door car to show people houses. So I got this bone ugly, piece of crap, Ford Granada. Bench seat in the front. Just a real piece of crap. I remember the guy I worked for that taught me about mindset, the first one. He had two Corvettes, and he let me drive one.

[00:21:33] I’m like, oh my God, this is freaking amazing. So I got a picture of a Corvette out of a magazine, this is before the internet, put it on the visor of that Granada. So every time I sat in it, it was right in front of me. Then in a year or two, I had a beautiful Corvette.

[00:21:45] And I’m gonna give you a couple more examples. I’m not bragging. This stuff doesn’t even interest me anymore, but I want to inspire you. So just replace these examples with what motivates you.

[00:21:54] But this is back when the TV show Magnum PI was out. Okay? Detective show, Tom Selleck was the actor. And he drove, first time I’d seen an exotic car, he drove this Ferrari 308 and I’m like, holy crap. That’s incredible. So I got a picture of that actual car, put on the visor of my Corvette, within a year, I had a Maserati, looked just like it.

[00:22:13] Last example. I’m the guy that always wanted a Lamborghini. And you know, I was a guy and I wanted to pick up the girls, and I love the way they looked and all that stuff. And what’s interesting is my son collected models of exotic cars. He had about 40 when he was nine years old, and the Ferraris and the McLarens and all these cool cars, Porsches, he had a model of the exact same color and style that I ended up getting. Which I wrecked.

[00:22:34] But I’ll show you something. So this is my planner. It’s on today. In the back of this thing, just for those of you listening, I’ve got pictures in the back of this planner that have been in here 21 years. Okay? The first pictures are my kids when they were young, my gratitude pictures. Everything starts from gratitude. Anything you want to manifest in your life, you’ve got to start with gratitude. \So these are, my kids are 30 and 26 now, these are when they were young.

[00:22:55] Then I’ve got pictures of the things that I wanted. This top picture, that house I told you about, that house on the beach, that magnificent home. I lost it in all the craziness, but this is what it looked like before, I built it.

[00:23:05] Travertine floors, 10 foot high glass like that. It’s crazy that I had pictures of what it looked like. I live in a compound now. You know, I’ve got six buildings. I’ve got a big, main house, an exercise facility, building a media building with my video studio, cause we had to go virtual. This live event I’m having a December is the first time I’m able to go live again, which is why I’m so freaking excited about it.

[00:23:23] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, exactly.

[00:23:25] Rod Khleif: What’s crazy is this bottom picture, see those white walls in that picture? See the white stone walls? This is my backyard behind me and my backdrop. See the white stone wall? Is that fricking nuts? This was before. So pictures of stupid shit.

[00:23:37] I got a few hundred thousand dollars worth of watches. You know, the Lamborghini before I ever got it. Rolls, Bentley, all the stuff that I thought was important, but I got, because I had pictures. Okay. So get pictures, put them around you. Put them on the wall. You see pictures on the wall near me, here now. The things that are important to me. Put them on your screensaver, put them in your planner. Because they freaking work.

[00:23:58] Bob Wheeler: So this is definitely, see your future, be your future. And I totally think this is so important. It’s something that I did when I was younger, still now, but I intuitively was doing that. But for a lot of people, and I want to stress the slight difference here, because I think this is what you’re saying. You know, the secret says, I’m just going to wish for it. I’m going to wish for it. It’s going to show up under my pillow.

[00:24:20] Rod Khleif: Oh no, you got to take action. That’s the way the secret…

[00:24:22] Bob Wheeler: You gotta work for it. You gotta show up.

[00:24:24] Rod Khleif: You gotta actually do it.

[00:24:26] Bob Wheeler: You gotta get your hands dirty.

[00:24:27] Rod Khleif: You can’t just sit in the corner and go, I want this, to not ever freaking do anything.

[00:24:31] Bob Wheeler: Right.

[00:24:31] Rod Khleif: I love the secret. I’ve gave away thousands of, literally, probably 2,000 copies of that DVD. It’s about the law of attraction. If you’ve never seen the, read the book or seen the movie. And I’m like, holy shit, that’s what I’ve been doing this whole time. I mean, it validated everything that I’d been doing.

[00:24:45] Like you said, you did it intuitively as well. And the missing piece there’s you actually have to do something, okay?

[00:24:50] Bob Wheeler: You have to do something. And the reason I want to point that out is because some people want the quick fix, right? Oh, I’m just going to wish for it. And I’m going to wish really hard. And then the Mercedes is going to show up under my pillow like the tooth fairy.

[00:25:02] Rod Khleif: You gotta take action. But I will tell you, it’s crazy how the universe or God, whatever you believe, works. You know, when you make that decision, it truly does conspire to help you make it happen. But when you get those clues, you got to take action on those clues, okay? So that lends me. I don’t want to forget one really important thing.

[00:25:19] I want to share something, it’s really important as it relates to goals. So let me just share one more quick piece. Cause I think it’ll add value, because we were talking about achieving to be happy. So I built that house on the beach that I lost. Okay. This place was magnificent. It had a 12 foot waterfall, second floor balcony, and the pool, pool was in magazines.

[00:25:35] I had, you know, elevator, wine cellar, big, giant spiral staircase up through the middle. I mean, I’ll just land the plane with this on the second floor, I had aquariums around the staircase that cost me almost 200 grand. So it gives you an idea of the house. So, I worked for that thing for 20 freaking years. Right?

[00:25:50] I thought about it. I dreamed about it. I manifested it. I made it happen. Two months after I moved in. I’m floating in the pool at night. I’m looking up, pool’s changing colors, got fiber optic lighting. And I’m looking up at this testament to my ego, which is really what it was. It was to prove the world I was good enough.

[00:26:04] That’s the truth of it. And I got depressed. And I don’t mean just a little depressed. I mean, I was really fricking depressed. Okay. I’m like, what the hell? I’ve just achieved a success. I had, I had the Maserati and the Benz’s in the garages and the boats and all the toys. And what was happening, there were three things happening. This is one I want to share before I forget.

[00:26:23] One is, first of all, I should never achieve a big goal without having other goals lined up behind it. Like the good book says, without a vision, the people perish. You need a vision for your future. And I didn’t know what I was going to do next. That’s number one.

[00:26:34] Number two is it’s never about the goals. You got to have the goals. They say the happiest days of a boat owner’s life, the day they buy the boat, the day they sell the boat. You need the goals to juice you and motivate you. But it’s never about the goals. It’s about who you become on the path to those goals, and your happiness comes from progress and growth. Okay?

[00:26:51] And I didn’t know what I was going to do next. How was that going to grow or progress at that point? So that was the second thing, but here’s the third big one that ties into it achieving to be successful.

[00:27:00] I had focused on Rod, just on Rod. Show the world I matter. Rod, Rod, Rod, Rod, Rod. Almost narcissistic in a way.

[00:27:07] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:27:07] Rod Khleif: So I bought some books, and one of them was Tony Robbins’ book and I’m like, holy shit. I like this stuff. And so I went and saw him live, and I found out that he feeds families for the holidays. I’m like, what a concept, do something for someone else.

[00:27:18] I’m embarrassed to say I had to be 40 to get that memo. So I decided to feed five families. I called my brother. I said, he was going to Denver for Thanksgiving, I said, let’s feed five families. So he went to his church and found who really needed help. Third family changed my life.

[00:27:32] We’ve got toys for the kids. We got a frozen Turkey. We got food for the dinner. And this woman comes out, lives in this crappy one bedroom with five kids. She comes out, she sees the food, she starts crying. Her kids come out, the older ones start crying. I start crying. I’m like, holy cow, I’m hooked.

[00:27:47] And so I’m blessed to say, and this again, this is not bragging again. There’s a message here, so stay with me.

[00:27:53] I’m blessed to say in the last 20 years, we’ve fed over a hundred thousand kids for the holidays. I’ve done tens of thousands of backpacks filled with school supplies. Astounding to me, we live in the greatest fricking country on earth and kids don’t have supplies for school.

[00:28:05] I’ve done tens of thousands of teddy bears given to police departments for their officers to put in their cars when they encounter a child that needs to be comforted. So here’s the message here.

[00:28:14] Like I said, we’ve been taught to achieve to be happy. But when you are giving back in any fashion, you’re happily achieving.

[00:28:20] Okay? So hear me out here. Find a cause. I don’t care if it’s children like me, if it’s the elderly, if it’s the environment, if it’s animals, whatever it is that juices you, and do something. If you’r not already, do something to give back to it right now. Don’t tell me, I’ll do it when I have money. Do it right now because the money will come faster.

[00:28:39] Okay? But more importantly, you’ll be happily achieving. You’ll be fulfilled. Tony Robbins calls it the science of achievement versus the art of fulfillment. If you want to, achievement really is a science. Like, if you want to learn multifamily, come to my bootcamp. You’ll get the blueprint. You’ll know exactly what to do. You just have to do it. Okay?

[00:28:55] But fulfillment is an art, because you got to find your passion and go after your passion. So thank you for letting me ramble there, but I hope that added a little value.

[00:29:03] Bob Wheeler: No, absolutely. You touch on things that are really, for me, important, because abundance and wealth is just not the number of dollars in my bank account. It’s about my spiritual wealth. It’s about what I’m able to give back.

[00:29:15] And if it doesn’t include gratitude, and if it doesn’t include service to others and giving, to me, that’s just a bankruptcy.

[00:29:23] Rod Khleif: What’s the point? Yeah.

[00:29:25] Bob Wheeler: I believe we’re here to be of service, and not in a indebted kind of way that we have to like, cut off our arms and legs. But I believe we’re here to have impact. I believe we’re here to be of service. And if we don’t have those things, I feel like there’s a big lack.

[00:29:40] Rod Khleif: Anything in the universe that doesn’t contribute actually gets eliminated. That’s the way this universe works. You know, I do this because I love it. I show you here behind my green screen. I’ve got hundreds of thank you cards that I’ve gotten from people’s lives who have been impacted by my work.

[00:29:54] And it’s my greatest gift. I’m sure you get that love as well. And this is not ego. When I tell you I get love probably 10 times a day, a DM, gift, a card, emails, I’m not exaggerating. And so I’m addicted, which is why you hear this passion in my communication. I freaking love it!

[00:30:09] My wife puts up with me working my ass off, working Sundays, cause she knows I just freaking love this, so…

[00:30:15] Bob Wheeler: Well, and when you’re doing what you love and when you’re doing your passion, it’s not actually work.

[00:30:19] Rod Khleif: Oh, it’s not, you never work another day in your life, you know?

[00:30:22] Bob Wheeler: Exactly.

[00:30:22] Rod Khleif: Can I mention my bootcamp real quick before people sign off?

[00:30:25] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, mention it real quick. Yeah.

[00:30:26] Rod Khleif: Cause we’re closing out. So guys, if you have any interest in real estate for God’s sakes, come to Orlando, December 3rd, 4th, and 5th. By the time this airs, it’ll probably be about 600 bucks. I’ll give you a code so you can come for $197. And it’s not a sales pitch, okay?

[00:30:40] I’ll talk about my coaching for about 30 minutes in the three days. The rest of it is full on training, me on stage training, every aspect of buying apartment buildings and buying any sort of multifamily.

[00:30:50] I’ve had thousands of people attend. The only complaint we ever get’s the food sucked or the room was too cold or something like that. It’s never about my training. And credible networking and all that.

[00:31:00] Text the word “multifamily” to 72345. Do it as one word, “multifamily,” 72345. Or you can go to multifamilybootcamp.com. But here’s what you need to remember. Use the code, RodFriend, and you can come for that 197 bucks.

[00:31:13] If you come to me on Sunday, which is the last day, the third day, you tell me you didn’t love it. I mean, forget like it. I mean, freaking love it. I will give you all your money back. No questions asked, no problem. First time for everything, but it’s an awesome opportunity to learn this business. Even if you just want to invest passively.

[00:31:29] Why would you give your hard earned money to someone that did not at least have a basic understanding of the business? Right? So if you want to invest, you know, maybe in a limited partnership capacity in a syndication, or joint venture in a multifamily deal, you want to know it.

[00:31:42] And we go through every aspect of it in great detail, and people love it. They love the networking, and I have billions of dollars on stage with the panelists, and it’s just a kick in the ass.

[00:31:51] So again, text “multifamily” to 72345, and use the code RodFriend. Make sure you come up and say hi to me.

[00:31:58] Bob Wheeler: That sounds good. And if I were around that weekend, I’d be in Orlando at the bootcamp.

[00:32:02] Rod Khleif: You can come as my VIP guest, if you can come. So please, please, please let my team know if you can, brother.

[00:32:07] Bob Wheeler: I’ll get to one of yours. This is so important for people to really shake that mindset and really get on the path.

[00:32:13] Rod Khleif: I spend a lot of time on that at the event. It’s an emotional ride. We go through creating your identity statements. Your identity pulls you in. We deal with fear. We deal with gratitude. We deal with all sorts of things that, it’s not your typical real estate event. You can just trust me on that.

[00:32:27] If you listen to my podcast, Lifetime Cashflow, you’ll get a feel for who I am and how I operate and what you can expect at this event.

[00:32:34] Bob Wheeler: I will just say this. Everybody thinks it’s about the money. It’s not about the money.

[00:32:37] Rod Khleif: Oh God, no.

[00:32:38] Bob Wheeler: That’s why you got to look at all these things, the fear, the mindset, and the goals and all that.

[00:32:42] Rod Khleif: And be grateful. God, we’re so blessed, yeah?

[00:32:45] Bob Wheeler: Absolutely. So we are at our Fast Five, and that is brought to us by Acorns, an app that helps you invest your spare change. So folks, invest your spare change.

[00:32:55] So Rod, if you had a time machine, would you go back and make changes throughout your career?

[00:32:59] Rod Khleif: No. No. Even the pain. Because you know, life is about meaning. And I would’ve never met my wife, who is supermodel beautiful, and more beautiful on the inside, we’ve been together 12 years, if it hadn’t happened. Life’s about meaning, and that’s the meaning I placed on losing $50 million. So again, you can have something super negative happen to you, and put a positive meaning on it.

[00:33:19] Bob Wheeler: Absolutely. What was the last purchase you regret making?

[00:33:22] Rod Khleif: Oh, I bought these two push pedal kayaks. No, no, no, that’s not it. I bought this rowing machine. I thought I’d like it, it was 2,500 bucks with $50 a month through this new service, and I can’t stand it. So it’s just sitting there drawing, making dirt, drawing dust. But I’m big into exercise and health, you know, if you’re going to achieve anything.

[00:33:38] Let’s see, you’ve got a full-time job. You’ve got kids. You’ve got, you know, you want to do a side hustle like multifamily, you’ve got to have super energy. You’ve got to eat well and have that energy, or are you going to do it? I mean, I’ve got students that have retired from very high paying W2 jobs, but it requires that energy to be able to do it.

[00:33:53] Bob Wheeler: Absolutely. How did you spend wisely this week?

[00:33:56] Rod Khleif: How did I spend wisely this week? Yeah, I’ve got kind of a horrific thing happening right now. My daughter has leukemia. We just found out Saturday, and I bought all sorts of books and trainings and courses and you know. And she’s going to be okay, because she’s got me to help and she’s going to get healthy and we’ve been juicing and everything like that.

[00:34:13] So I’ve been doing a lot of purchases around that. Um, I’m even buying a hyperbaric chamber for oxygen treatment when she gets out. So those are the kinds of purchases on top of mind right now.

[00:34:23] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. As a kid, what was your first positive memory around money?

[00:34:29] Rod Khleif: Buying that Corvette. Oh, man. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.

[00:34:37] Bob Wheeler: Are you where you want to be financially, or is there more?

[00:34:40] Rod Khleif: I’d love to fly privately more. I’d love to have a yacht at some point. Is it like a burning desire? No, but the money doesn’t drive me like it used to. Again, I get so much love and feedback and positive energy from the people’s lives that have been changed by my work.

[00:34:55] It’s like, what a gift from God. I know that sounds like foofy bullshit. He’s telling us what I want to hear stuff, but that’s not it, it truly is incredible when people tell you that their lives have been changed. You’d get all that gratitude and everything. So that’s really the driver now, just to be candid.

[00:35:11] And you know, my foundation, and I want to build some schools. I want to do some stuff like that. And so that’s my driver. It’s not financial anymore.

[00:35:18] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, that’s great. So we’re at M & M, Money and Motivation, practical financial tip, piece of wealth wisdom. You’ve given us a lot of great tips, but what would you share with people that’s something that’s worked for you?

[00:35:30] Rod Khleif: Wealth wisdom. Don’t wait to buy real estate, buy real estate and wait. Okay? You want wealth? There’s a reason 90% of the world’s millionaires either made their money through real estate or invested in it, because there’s nothing like it. What else can you buy that someone else pays for? I haven’t paid taxes in years because of now cost segregation, and bonus depreciation, and you name it. So again, don’t wait to buy real estate, buy real estate and wait.

[00:35:55] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, absolutely. And for those people that are listening about going, bonus depreciation and cost segregation, there’s a lot of great practical stuff that you can do that’s legal that can really help you cut your tax bill down. And if you don’t know how to do it, find the experts.

[00:36:09] Rod Khleif: Or eliminate it altogether. I mean, it’s incredible.

[00:36:11] Bob Wheeler: Yeah, absolutely. Well, Rod, listen, I so appreciate this. And I think the one thing that I want to mention is what I didn’t hear along all of these spectacular seminar lessons and successes, is I didn’t hear blame.

[00:36:23] I didn’t hear blame that you came over as an immigrant. I didn’t hear you say blame that your mom was buying expired food, right? And again, this place of gratitude and service, it’s so important.

[00:36:36] Rod Khleif: The other piece of what you just said, you’ve got to own your freaking life. 100% responsibility for everything that happens to you, positive or negative, you own it. It’s you. Not your dog, not your cat, not your wife, your kids, it’s you. And when you do that, it’s actually freeing.

[00:36:50] Bob Wheeler: Yeah.

[00:36:50] Rod Khleif: Okay? But if you blame, you’ll never have that freedom.

[00:36:53] Bob Wheeler: Yeah. Self accountability. Self accountability. So Rod, where can people find you on social media, online? And we’ll set up obviously, on the course, the bootcamp.

[00:37:03] Rod Khleif: Thank you. Yeah, again, that bootcamp, if you can make it, God, you’ll be so glad you came. I promise you, if you go to multifamilybootcamp.com and you look at the hundreds of raving testimonials, unsolicited, you’ll see why you need to be there.

[00:37:14] But again, “multifamily,” text that to 72345. Remember RodFriend. I have a website, rodkhleif.com, but nobody can spell my name. So you can go to realestatewithrod.com. It’s a direct link to that site.

[00:37:26] There’s so many free resources there. My books and articles and videos. Just all kinds of great stuff that’ll help you start acclimating to this business. Again, that’s realestatewithrod.com.

[00:37:36] And lastly, come listen to my podcast, even if you’re not interested in multifamily, I do these clips every week called Own Your Power, and they’re just motivational. They’re like three to five minutes, and there’s hundreds of them there. And they’ll juice you. I promise you I’ll juice you. There’s music played to them, you’ll freaking love them. I promise you.

[00:37:52] So, even if you’re not interested, it’s Lifetime Cashflow Real Estate Investing is the podcast. But again, listen to those Own Your Power clips. And I promise I’ll give you a charge once a week if you do.

[00:38:01] Bob Wheeler: I so appreciate you coming on and giving us some inspiration. I’m so grateful, and I also wish much quick healing for your daughter.

[00:38:09] Rod Khleif: Oh, thank you, my friend. Thank you.

[00:38:11] Bob Wheeler: That’s always a stressful journey, but yeah. Thank you so much. I think you really shared a lot with us, and I hope people will all meet you at the bootcamp and go run up and give them your name.

[00:38:20] Rod Khleif: Thank you, buddy.

[00:38:21] Bob Wheeler: Thanks.

[00:38:28] We hope you enjoyed this episode. Did you learn something new about your relationship to money today? Maybe you have a friend who has some financial blocks or beliefs that are holding them back. Please share this podcast so they, too, can get off the rollercoaster ride of financial fears, and journey towards financial freedom.

[00:38:45] To learn how to have a healthy relationship with money, visit themoneynerve.com. That’s nerve, not nerd. We’ll be back next week with another perspective on money and the emotions that bind us.