What My 10-Year-Old Thinks About Building Wealth Through Real Estate | Ep 80

James: Welcome to the Furlo Capital Real Estate Podcast, where we dive into the intricacies of passive real estate investing. And our mission is to equip people to invest wisely in both properties and peoples, no matter what their age, so that together we can build wealth while improving housing. I'm James.

And this is not my wife, but my daughter, Elinor. Hi. Hey, welcome. So why are you here today? '

Elinor: cause you asked me if I wanted to do this. Yeah. And I said yes to see what it was like.

James: How come? How come mom's not doing it?

Elinor: Because she's sick.

James: Yeah. We don't want to breathe in all over our microphones, huh?

Elinor: Yeah.

James: Yeah, exactly. So what I thought I would do since I got you, would be to ask you some questions. Mm-hmm. And just kind of see what you think about the whole money and investing and business stuff. Does that work? Yeah. Cool. So my very first question is, what do you think it is that I actually do for work?

Elinor: Well. You do a lot of meetings.

James: Mm. Yeah.

Elinor: And you,

James: what do you think I'd do in those meetings?

Elinor: Maybe talk about a bunch of properties.

James: I don't know. You talk about a bunch of properties. No, that's fair.

Elinor: And money and stuff because sometimes like once you're done with the meeting, you come in and then you say, guess what?

I got a place for guess how much money? And we're like, I don't know, like 50 bucks. And then you're like, Nope. Like $1. Oh

James: yeah. Yeah. I did have one of those. That's right. Oh, totally. So do you think my job is fun or boring?

Elinor: Kinda, I would say like in the middle, because like sometimes it's fun because like you get money or like you just like get to see all the houses.

Mm. But then like you have to like count the money and like sometimes you gotta like go to places and do all those meetings and so,

James: yeah. Yeah. So when you hear me say like, Hey, I gotta go do a property tour or a property walkthrough, what is it you think I'm doing? Like what do we do today?

Elinor: Well, you did go to a property.

Mm-hmm. Well, like a house that you're gonna buy. Yeah.

James: Gonna manage it. Yeah.

Elinor: Yeah. Well, I think you do like, well, you walk around and you talk with the person that's there and you, I think like, sometimes you ask them questions like, I don't know,

James: just questions. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm asking 'em questions about their, about their house.

And maybe what they like about it, what they don't like kind of some, what their goals are for it. Yeah. Ask 'em, stuff like that. Yeah. Totally. So I got a question for you. Mm-hmm. Would you rather live in a castle, a tree house, or a spaceship? And why?

Elinor: So a castle, a tree house, or spaceship?

James: Yep.

Elinor: Probably a castle.

James: Yeah. Why is that?

Elinor: Because, well. If I were to live in a tree house, then it would be kind of like, I don't know, I would say like, I wanna use the word like dirty, I guess. And like they're probably, yeah. Okay. I don't know. And then like a spaceship, like I don't, it's like there's like not like. I don't wanna be like Apollo 13.

James: Yeah, that's fair.

Elinor: And a castle is like, it's really big and there's like, it's like nice. It's like, there's like nice rooms and Yeah.

James: Yeah. Okay. All right. That makes sense. So maybe if you could build your perfect home, what would it have? And like feel free to dream big, like don't hold back.

Elinor: Okay. Well, I would let's see.

So it would be kinda like as big as this house that we live in right now. Okay. And then, except the color would be like aquamarine of our house.

James: Aqua Marine, huh? Yeah. 'cause that's my

Elinor: favorite color. Okay. And then I might do like lights around it to make it like stand out because once I saw this like purple house with like lights and I thought it was like really cool and so I might do that and then inside I might like do like carpet except probably not our carpet since it's very old, but like, yeah.

James: Fair enough.

Elinor: Like pink and white carpet.

James: Ooh, interesting. Kinda like your rug that used to have,

Elinor: yeah.

James: Okay.

Elinor: I still have it.

James: That you still have?

Elinor: Yeah,

James: somewhere

Elinor: in my

James: room. Okay. Is it in your room?

Elinor: Yeah.

James: Oh, okay.

Elinor: Well my stuff is on top of it.

James: Oh, that's right. But

Elinor: anyways, so I would have that and then I would have like a couch we have now, but instead it would be the color purple.

Oh, and it would have like, really like bright colored pillows. Like light blue and light pink and light purple. Nice. Nice.

James: Would you have a lot of windows or not a lot of windows?

Elinor: Kinda like the amount we have right now. Okay. Like yeah, like,

James: okay. What about, how many stories would it be? One story, two stories, 10 stories.

What are you thinking? Three stories. Three stories. Oh, that's very specific. Why Three stories.

Elinor: Because I think it's fun to have stories 'cause you get to go up and down the stairs. Oh, that is fun. And yeah. And then like I was also thinking, so I'll have a dog.

James: Of course.

Elinor: Yes.

James: What kind of dog?

Elinor: Oh, I have to think.

James: Oh, okay. That's all right. If you don't know.

Elinor: But it, it will, it will be a really cute dog. That's all I know. Okay. Then like, makes sense. One night I was just dreaming about like having this thing. It was like in our house. But like. It was kind of like, you know, like one of those things that you run on a

James: treadmill?

Elinor: Yeah, a treadmill, uhhuh. It was kinda like that, but it kind of went like slow and you're like, it had like a doggy door and then your dog would go through and then it had like a treadmill. Your dog wouldn't work out, but it would like go and it took your dog up those stories and down your stories. Oh cool.

And what it would do is it had like lights in it and it would have like, like a coffee shop, music, you know? Mm-hmm.

James: Yeah. Yeah.

Elinor: And then it would have like dog treats and like, there was like arms that would massage the dog.

James: Dang, this dog would be pampered. I like it.

Elinor: And then I would kinda like dress up the dog.

James: Okay.

Elinor: And then, yeah.

James: So that sounds like an amazing house. Mm-hmm. I love your dreaming. Yeah. What what is the best house that you've ever been inside of and what made it special?

Elinor: I've been in a lot of houses.

James: Yeah. Do you have one at you remember, like, oh, that was a cool house.

Elinor: Let's see.

James: Yeah, I know our house is cool, but yeah.

Maybe something else.

Elinor: Can you remember? I don't know. I really like such a Coba sister's house. Oh. What do you like about that house? Just like. Well, they have like now they have like a really big couch, so I think that's cool. It has like a lot of space that you can go in and like their rooms are Yeah, kind of nice.

Except I did really like Jada's house because it's also like really nice and she has this. Like cool room where like there's like mini stairs and then leaves like this tiny room with all of her Barbie stuff and she has a really big bedroom like me and Sam's bedroom combined with a bathroom.

James: Dang, that is a big bedroom and a bathroom.

That would be nice, huh?

Elinor: Yes.

James: But you gotta clean it. But that would be nice having all that space. Yeah, I remember I was, I was looking at a house to manage and I was with Samson when we did it. Oh yeah. And their living room is almost as big as our whole house. It was so big. It was amazing.

Elinor: Wait there, wait, where did you go?

James: It was a place that I was looking to manage. It was a really big, big living room. Yeah. So their

Elinor: house was probably like huge.

James: Yeah. Their house was two and a half times our size. So it was big and it was single story

Elinor: that is like a palace. Hmm. It felt that

James: way. It would feel that way. For sure. Yeah.

So thinking about my rentals, do you remember walking through one of my rentals?

Elinor: What's a rental?

James: Ah, that's a good question. One of the places that I rent out to other people. So like we went to that apartment today, remember where we were setting up that device and we went inside that one. What unit?

Remember we were talking to that guy? Oh yeah. Yeah. So that's a rental. Or one time, remember, on a Thanksgiving we were across the way and you helped me paint the wall. You were pretty young. You may not remember, or, yeah, I don't remember. Okay. All right. So thinking about today, right, we were in that rental, was there anything that stood out to you about it?

Like versus say, our house, anything different? It

Elinor: smelled pretty weird. I was like really putting my hand over it, like, and I was like, it, it doesn't, it doesn't, it doesn't smell

James: good. Oh,

Elinor: okay. And there was like,

James: for the record, we are having cleaners coming later this week, so Oh, good. We'll take care of that.

But. All right

Elinor: there and there. Like, there are some rooms and they like, they sounded very quiet, but they were like rugs, like kind of old rugs, so,

James: mm. Yeah. So,

Elinor: yeah. And then like, and like one of the rooms that that guy was like taken, like, like why was he taken apart some of the wall?

James: Oh. 'Cause we had a leak with a pipe.

Oh. And so we'd hired some plumbers who went and replaced the pipe. Now his job was to repair the wall, and so when he is done, you won't be able to see that pipe anymore.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, that's what he was doing.

Cool.

Yeah, it is pretty cool. So let's say you're a landlord, so you know who a landlord is?

That's what I am. I think so. Oh yeah. As a person who, who has the, the rental and then is in charge and then you have a tenant is someone who lives in the rental. Does that make sense?

Yeah.

So if you were a landlord, what's one rule that you would make sure all your tenants follow?

Elinor: That if they schedule a meeting to keep the meeting, because I know that you've had some times where it's like, and then you talk to mom, you're like, guess what? It's scheduled for next week. And it's like, guess what? Tuesday. And so like I would say like. And then like when you like come in and it's like, okay, you have a meeting next week, then like, I keep kind of think in my mind like mine, like, huh, maybe we should make a rule.

Like if you say you need to, like, if you're gonna do a meeting, then you should like keep what you said because Yeah, that's a great rule.

James: I love that rule.

Elinor: Yeah.

James: Yeah. Okay. Like the place would be a happier place if we all kept our meetings. I'm with you. We're just committed to less meetings maybe. Yeah.

Also be good. I like it. So would you ever wanna own a bunch of properties like, like mom and I do when you grow up?

Elinor: I don't know. I've always wanted to be an actor and a singer when I grow up. Mm-hmm. So I don't know, but like. Wait is what, what is it again? Did I One

James: time, so, so we own a lot of different homes and rentals.

Yeah. Okay. So would you ever wanna own a lot of them or maybe just some or maybe one or two? Yeah,

Elinor: maybe like, what's your one or two? Is it a like an Airbnb?

James: That's an example of a place, but ours are more like, they live there for a long time, like a year or more.

Elinor: Okay. And then. So then

James: like, but Airbnb, is it other type where it's all furnished and people go for like the weekend and Yeah.

Elinor: So would you be interested in one of

James: those?

Elinor: Maybe. But like, what my question is, is like if you rent out a house, would you get to live in it?

James: Oh no. Someone else would live in it. You'd have your own house. Yeah. Then I like, what if you're like us, right? You, we have a house that we live in. Yeah. Then you have other places that other people live in?

Elinor: Yeah. Then I might wanna own an Airbnb.

James: Really. Okay. All right. Okay. Apparently I'm now on the hunt for an Airbnb for Elinor, so that's good. I like it. What, what do you like about the Airbnbs?

Elinor: Well. Well, first I like asked mom what an Airbnb was. Mm-hmm. And she was like, oh, where'd you hear about those?

And I'm like, well, my friend Irene at school, she is going like to like the coast because her sister had a graduation for high school or something, uhhuh. And so they were like. Staying somewhere and they were going to an Airbnb and I was like wondering what that wa what that was. And I heard you and mom talking about it a lot.

And so she's like, well, it's kinda like it's a place where you stay, like for the weekends or like overnight or something. Yeah. And so then I'm like, oh, that sounds kind nice. 'cause I really like hotels. Mm. Because, and so like,

James: would you ever want to own a hotel Someday? Yes. Really? Okay. All right.

Elinor: Ask

James: one I should connect you with, okay.

Elinor: Yeah. So an Airbnb is like. I feel like that's kinda like a hotel. So

James: Yeah, it kind of is. It's kind of a, it's like a in between, right? It's like a home. Yeah. But it's also like a hotel where you just stay. And so we're gonna go like, it's nice to an Airbnb in December with my whole family.

Elinor: For how long?

James: Like a week.

Yeah. So you get to see one, wait, it's a big house. There's plenty of rooms for everybody.

Elinor: Well, yeah. 'cause it's like your whole side of the family almost. Yeah. I think there's like

James: six rooms. Something like that.

Elinor: Where some of us are gonna share rooms,

James: We're gonna put you and all the other cousins in a room.

Yes. Yeah. So it'll be fun. I think it'll be fun. We may quickly change our mind on that. Oh, but, okay, so you would wanna, you, you buy hotels. Interesting. Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Okay, cool. Good to know. Change and talk topic a little bit. What do you think money is for

Elinor: to. Buy things. Okay. And to give to churches. Mm-hmm.

And sometimes to give to the board.

James: Yeah.

Elinor: Okay. Nice. And like to give to schools and stuff.

James: Mm. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. So you can buy stuff and then you can give it to other people. Mm-hmm. Is there anything else?

I don't know. Just asking

Elinor: you use it for. Painting project.

James: I don't know. That's true. Fits for buying paint. Totally. That makes sense. So if I gave you a hundred dollars right now, what would you do with it?

Elinor: Well I would probably buy shoes, definitely. Really? Okay. And maybe. Buy some clothes. 'cause I love shoes and clothes like a lot.

So I might buy some stuff that I want. Yeah, that's okay. And then like I might save some for church to put in the box. Okay. And

James: yeah. Yeah, those are great answers. Okay. But let's say you wanted to save for something really big. Okay. What would you do to save for it?

Elinor: Well, I probably, like, I might actually, like first I might spend some of my money because like if I have a lot of money, I'm gonna wanna get something. Well, I'm saying like right now,

James: let's say, I don't know. Let's do, let's do an example. Let's say you're getting $5 a week and you want to save up for.

A pair of shoes that's maybe like a hundred dollars. Okay. So, so it's gonna take 20 weeks if you say that. How would you like, like,

Elinor: get money faster, like get more money?

James: Maybe that's an idea. Yeah.

Elinor: Okay. Then I might like you get money

James: faster. Or you could, you said you could maybe spend some save something.

Like what? Like you gotta get to a hundred dollars. What would you do to get there?

Elinor: Well, I might ask like. I might wanna like go to a house Uhhuh and like ask them like, is there any chores you need help with doing? Oh, interesting. Well, actually I don't know if I would do that because sometimes I get scared to go to house and just ask.

Mm. Yeah. So

James: it can be scary.

Elinor: Yeah. Because I don't want them to like say like, no. Or like.

Yeah.

James: Yeah. No. Yeah, I've, that's scary for me too. Sometimes I gotta call people and ask for things and they tell me no, it's no fun. So I get that. I get that. Do you think you could be, do you think you could save for let's see, 20 weeks is like half a year, six months-ish. Wow. Do you think you could do it?

No. It's honest. That's fair. That's fair. You're not alone. So let's say that you, you know, someday you might have kids. Okay. What is one money lesson that you would like to teach your kids?

Elinor: Spend it wisely and save wisely. Mm-hmm. Like, maybe I might do the spending thing that we keep forgetting to do. Yeah.

It's like I could say, okay, so we, let's go to the Dollar Tree. Pick out like three bags that we like, like little and supply. Fun bags. Mm-hmm. Then like, once they pick out what they want, we can like write in a pen. Like saving, giving and then spending. Yeah. And I'll do like their, like I'll start them out with like one quarter and then I'll be like.

I think this is what we did. Like, I'll be like, okay, so how many quarters do you have in each bag? And they'll probably say like, one in each bag. Yeah. So then I'll give them $1. Or is it like we just give them, we each give them $3 and then they put what they want and, and they have to at least put one in giving for me on Sunday.

And we have to, and then I can put. Like either two in spending, two in saving or like just one in each? Yeah. Okay. But they have to at least put one in giving. I like it, so I'd kind of do what we do.

James: Okay. Yeah, I like it. That's good. That's good. Do you think that we as a family we, do we talk too much, not enough, or just the right amount about money?

Elinor: Well, I'm gonna say just the right amount because like, I don't really feel like. We're like talking too much, like, oh my gosh, like, look at how much money we have or like, we don't have enough and like, or like, I have like this much money to spend for this. Like, what should I do? Like, we don't really talk a bunch about money, but like, we also don't talk like a lot less like, like once a month.

Like, oh hey, this is how much we have. And then like, yeah, I think we talk just the right amount. 'cause like if we need to talk about it. Then we can say like, oh, okay, so this is how much we have, this is how much we need. Or like, I think we have enough. Okay. So like, we like just talk about it. Like just, yeah.

James: Yeah. I like it. I like it. So

what's something you've learned about business? Just from watching me.

Elinor: Will that, I think that you like talking about it.

James: Mm, I do like talking about business.

Elinor: Yeah. And that it may not

James: about me, like just about business in general. Yeah. What have you learned about business from me?

Elinor: By just watching you?

James: Yeah. Or just in general?

Elinor: Well that you have to work with numbers a lot.

Mm, that's true because I remember we were on a walk and. We started like this whole numbers talk and like you were asking me this question that you had to do, and it was like this really complicated question. It was like, I don't know, but it was like really hard. And I'm like, wait, you have to do all that?

And and you're like, yeah. And I'm like, what?

James: Yeah. Yeah. No, that's fair. That's fair. So you have a business idea, right? Yeah. What is it?

Elinor: Wait, what?

James: What's your business idea?

Elinor: To be an actor and a singer when I grow up. Oh. Or hotels?

James: No, I thought you wanted to be a hairstylist.

Elinor: Oh. And, and that, yeah. And that,

James: I like it.

You wanna own, you wanna own and run hotels. I feel like we just, we just unlocked that. Yeah. Take care of people while they're traveling.

Yeah.

I like that idea. You initially had talked about being a hairstylist as well, right? Yeah. Why did you, like, why do you like that idea?

Elinor: I. Because I think, well first the name of it would be Ellie Ru Dos because like, oh, that's a good name.

Hairdos. Like hairdos. Yeah. And then Ellie Ru is like kind of my nickname on mom's side of the family. So yeah, I could do Ellie Ru dos, that's, and I could be the boss.

James: Like it. I like it. That was actually my next question is what would you name your company? Yeah, the boss. And

Elinor: another reason it's like, wait, how do you get Chosen?

Chosen to be people? What do you mean? Like, does a person just start a company and then obvi and then they're, they're automatically the boss? Like how do you get Yeah.

James: Oh yeah. Okay. I see what you're asking. So if you, if you go work for another company, someone else is the boss and maybe you can like work your way up the company to becoming the boss.

Or if you start your own, you can become the boss day one.

Elinor: Yeah. Yeah. That's what I wanna do.

James: Yeah, that one. That's cool. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, it is fun. It's a lot of work, but it is fun. Yeah. Okay. Awesome. Awesome. I got two more questions for you. Okay. What do you think makes somebody rich?

Elinor: Well, if they like, oh, actually that's like kind of hard when you think about it.

Hmm. Well, like in some movies like. Like some movies that I've watched, like Richie Rich, he is really rich. Yeah. I don't, well if they're rich and they have like a lot of stuff and they kind of like wanna use the word like they have pride.

James: Oh, okay.

Elinor: I don't like, I don't know, I think like maybe they work, like they do a job and they just like earn a bunch of money or. People just give them money, you know? I don't really know.

Yeah.

James: Okay. So having a lot of money makes you rich?

Elinor: Well, sometimes. Sometimes. Usually.

James: Usually. When you say sometimes, like, is there a time when it's not

Elinor: well rich? I dunno. Okay. All right. That's fair.

James: Let's ask about the other thing. What do you think makes somebody happy?

Elinor: Sometimes like, I wanna say like, not money.

James: Mm.

Elinor: Like probably, how do I say this? Maybe accepting Jesus because that's like one thing that can make you like really happy and.

Like spending time with your family and friends going to school.

James: Yeah, I know. I'm happy when I'm working. Yeah. So working. It's weird, but yeah. Yeah. Good.

Elinor: Yeah, I'm happy when I do school.

James: It's interesting. So it's not always about money. It could be other stuff. Yeah. That makes sense. That makes sense. Do you have anything that you wanna share with anybody Listening?

Elinor: Like what?

James: I don't care. Anything you want.

You don't have to

Elinor: wait, but I have a question for you.

James: Sure, yeah. Ask me anything.

Elinor: So for like acting or singing, are those jobs,

James: Typically, yeah. Okay. You could star in your own films and therefore you're the boss. Of what? Of what you're making. Yeah.

Elinor: And do you get paid to do like, to be an actor?

James: Ooh, interesting question.

Some people do, some people don't. Kind of depends on how big of an audience you get watching that

Elinor: at Studio C, do you get paid?

James: I think they got paid a little bit. Oh, I really? Yeah. Studio. Yeah. So, so how about this? So you can make videos on YouTube and if you have enough people watch it, then you do get paid from YouTube from ads.

But if you don't have a lot of people watching, then you don't get paid. So you wanna make things that a lot of people or, yeah, you wanna make things that a lot of people like to watch or to listen to. And then you'll get paid. And what's cool about it is you'll know really quickly if you've made anything that people want or don't want.

'cause they'll tell you by not watching or watching a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Very cool. Well, thank you so much for letting me interview you and just learn a little bit more about what you think about real estate and money and sharing a little bit about what you see for your future. You're welcome.

Thank. Yep. Yep. And if you'd like to learn more about me, not just Elinor, you can check me out. At at my website, which is furlo.com. How do you spell our last name?

Elinor: F-U-R-L-O.

James: There you go. Dot com. Check it out.

Elinor: Yeah. Dot com.

James: Thank you, Elinor, for joining me today. And You're welcome. Thank you for listening.

Elinor: Oh, and also another thing about me is I love puppies a lot.

James: Ah, yes, that is true. Awesome. Thanks. All right. Have a great day.

Elinor: Bye.