Speaker 1: And I found the most amazing, kind, wonderful family and
they're going to care I've went to the house up
for a year. They'll care for that house for a year.
They take care of the utilities, the pool costs, the
electric bill, the heating, whale bill, all of that and
the rent they pay me is terrific. And I'm actually
here in Portugal right now, and we'll be traveling through
to Europe for the summer, Latin and South America starting
in the fall and the winter, and basically my cost
of living is right around zero.
Speaker 2: Right now, you are listening to Carrie Let'sa's Financial Survival
Network where you get valuable information you just can't find
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Speaker 3: And welcome you are listening to and watching the Financial
Survival Network. I'm your host, Kerrie lutz A. It's six
six twenty five. You know, I stopped giving dates a
long time ago because certain things are evergreen, and when
you give a date, it makes you think that basically
it has a shelf life. Well, what you're about to
hear is something I am going to do. It is
the ultimate house hack. And they call them stackhouses all
these other things. Gary Brodie's with me. Gary, you have
decades of financial experience. Your website Deep Knowledgeinvesting dot com.
I love your headline. The one thing we never hedge
is our opinion, which means you are a truth teller
and we don't have enough of you. Arbitraging your house now,
I've been thinking about this very subject but couldn't really
figure out how to do it, but you have found
a way to do it. First, tell us what arbitrag
in your house is, how you can do it, and
what kind of returns you can get?
Speaker 1: Terrific Kerry, Thanks so much for having me so all.
This started about ten years ago. I was living in Manhattan,
had a great apartment there and just sort of had
enough of living in the city. Sold at the high
in New York and bought a terrific home in West Court, Connecticut.
Speaker 4: When property prices there were distressed.
Speaker 1: I refinanced the house in late twenty twenty one, just
before interest rate started to go up. I like you,
I'm a finance guy and was watching that market. And
so basically what I had was a really large, really
valuable house. And property prices, of course, went up a
huge amount during COVID and have continued to go up
in the.
Speaker 4: Last few years.
Speaker 1: But because I bought well and financed it well, I
had relatively low expenses. But it was more house than
any one person needed. It was much too large for
my needs. And also I was spending way too much
time caring for it. You know, a lot of my
weekends we're spending cutting the grass, I said, ed Jay
and timmain bushes and getting up on a ladder and
cleaning gutters, and you know, it's not bad work, but
it wasn't fun. And so I decided that what I
wanted to do was rented out. And I found the
most amazing, kind, wonderful family and they're going to care
I've rented the house out for a year. They'll care
for that house for a year. They take care of
the utilities, the pool costs, the electric bill, the heating
whale bill, all of that, and the rent they pay
me is terrific. And I'm actually here in Portugal right now,
and we'll be traveling through to Europe for the summer,
Latin and South America starting in the fall and the winter.
And basically my cost of living is right around zero
right now, and I don't have to cut the grass.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: And they're doing all the maintenance and everything. I guess
if there's a major repair over one hundred bucks, you've
got to pay for it. But less than that they
pay for it. Is that how this is working?
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's exactly it.
Speaker 1: So you know, if it's if it's a little minor thing,
you know, these are terrific people with you know, they're
financially secure. They're not going to call me about a
fifty dollars something or other. Obviously, you know, if there
were to be a major problem, like if the authent
appliance were to fail, that's not their fault. And you know,
that's the kind of thing that I could call Best
Buy or PC Richards or somebody from here and you know,
have that appliance put in. I can manage all of
that from here. But that wouldn't be an expense that
I would expect them to.
Speaker 3: Pay, right, All right, how long you've been doing this?
Speaker 4: So just a moth.
Speaker 1: I was officially homeless starting May first, but you know,
I'm homeless with other people's money, which is the happy
kind of homeless. And I spent the whole first month
traveling around the US, seeing people who I really care
about and love. But you know, there were people who
I hadn't seen in a couple of years, and I
think it's really important. You know, I spend all day
thinking about investing in the stock market and how to
make more money, but it's also really important to invest
in relationships.
Speaker 4: And so, you know, I.
Speaker 1: Traveled around and saw people that I cared about, and
I saw clients in person who I talked to regularly,
but it had never met face to face, and it
was it was terrific. And then at the end of May,
I got on a plane. I flew here to Lisbon.
I've been here for a week, and Carrie, I did
something that I have never done at any point before.
When I came to Lisbon, I had a one way
plane ticket. People keep asking me how long I'm going
to be here, and my answer is, I don't know,
We'll see. And after a week I'm starting to think
I might want to stay longer.
Speaker 4: And the beauty is.
Speaker 1: I don't have to restructure anything. I don't need a
different plane ticket. I can just call my airbnb host
and say, hey, I really like it here. Any chance
you guys would consider having before another week, another month, whatever.
Speaker 4: Feel right at the time. All right, So.
Speaker 3: I find it really fascinating here. And so basically you're
traveling around Europe for virtually nothing, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I took a look, and I know,
you know, if I spend a certain amount per month,
which is more than I need to live happily and comfortably,
my cost of living is zero.
Speaker 4: But you know, think about it this way.
Speaker 1: If I go over by one thousand dollars a month,
at the end of the year, it will have cost
me twelve thousand dollars to live at in half a
dozen different countries and have the adventure of a lifetime.
Speaker 3: Well I'm envious here, man, Like I am serious, I'm
going to do it. Just figuring out the logistics. How
do you find a high quality ten intire that isn't
going to turn your house into a party scene every
Saturday night.
Speaker 4: So part of it was a little bit of luck
and obviously some good screening.
Speaker 1: And I have a real estate agent, patche who I
actually love, and I have a great relationship with Pax.
She was the one who helped me buy my house,
and she's somebody at trust and it took her, I think,
all of six days to find me the right people.
And I don't want to give names to violate their privacy.
But when this couple was walking through the house with me,
you know, they're the same age as me, and they
were just fun and interesting. We were sharing stories. Clearly
we got along. And then you know, near the end,
we walked into the downstairs study. My office is upstairs,
but there's a second office on the first floor, and
they said, hey, any chance we could turn this into
a bedroom and I saw, of course you could.
Speaker 4: It would be very easy.
Speaker 1: Man asked why and their answer was, well, we need
a room for our live in maid. I said, you
have a live in maid? They said yeah.
Speaker 4: And at that point any.
Speaker 1: Concerns that the house wasn't going to be cared for
was instantly gone. And I thought, my god, I want
these people. I don't want to rent to anyone else.
I want them. And throughout the whole process they were fun,
easy to deal with, easy to negotiate with. We were
all kind of accommodating with each other. We didn't really
negotiate hard with each other on either side, and they're
just really terrific people.
Speaker 3: That's so good. And so you're going to do this
again next year.
Speaker 1: You know what's really interesting as this cumble was walking
through the house, they said, you know, we really wanted
to rerlease, and my response was, you know what, as
of today, I'm happy to commit to one year, but
everything's negotiable. Let's talk. Why don't we see how you
like living here and why don't we see how I
like living everywhere else? And you know, we'll get together
and form on six months, am months, whatever it is,
and we'll talk and figure out what makes sense. But
if they want to stay and I'm enjoying it here,
I definitely would, you know, Carrie, one thing I think
is really worth relying is the emotional side of it.
I thought it would be really hard, you know, it
can be scary to give up your home, your possessions,
to basically look at a bag and say this is
what I have for a year. And when I did
the deal, I expected to feel anxious, worried, upset, you know,
concerned about my stuff, and instead I felt happy in
light And it's really interesting for me because as somebody
who I've spent my whole career focusing on how do
I make more money?
Speaker 4: How do I get more?
Speaker 1: And there was our possessions can weigh us down, and
there was something really free about just letting go of
everything and saying it'll all be fine, this will all
be fine without me, and I don't need so much,
and I'm living in comfortable places. They're just smaller and
it's really been amazing to let go.
Speaker 4: It's made me feel more free.
Speaker 3: Hey man, I love it. Man, this is such a
great story here. And so if somebody wants to follow
your example, is there a way to do it logically?
What's the first step?
Speaker 1: So I think the first step is, first of all,
figure out yourself what kind of life do you want
to have, where do you want to live, and then
look at the finances of it, right Like, for example,
you know, if you live in a part of the
world where rental prices are very low and you want
to go live in like Monaco or Berlin or other
places you know, or in London, places that are really expensive,
that may be hard. In my case, I was coming
from a place where property values are very high and
you know, I wanted.
Speaker 4: To come to Portugal, where life isn't what's.
Speaker 3: Uh Northeast forget about it. You know, it's it's insane there.
I lived not too far from you in Westchester County,
and we had the privilege of paying the highest property
taxes in these here United States.
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: And so you know, when you it works if there's
an arbitrage, If the place you want to live or
go or in my case travel is less expensive than
the place that you're renting out, you have more flexibility.
Part of it also is you have to figure out
do you want to rent furnished or unfurnished. In my case,
I really didn't want to have to pack up my
whole house, and part of my deal was I'm renting furnished.
Speaker 4: If anyone wanted the place unfurnished, I.
Speaker 1: Told them they could pay to pack up all my
stuff and store it and put it back.
Speaker 4: Nobody wants to do that. Packing is a pain in
the but.
Speaker 1: Obviously I got my personal stuff out of the way.
You know, people aren't living with my stuff in the closet.
But you know, I just negotiated with people and said,
you know, listen, I'm going to take one closet to
put boxes in.
Speaker 4: I'm going to put some stuff in the garage.
Speaker 1: And I wanted one day in the garage for my car,
and they were kind enough to say, sure that works
for us, and they took the place furnished. And because
of the kind of people I'm renting to, I'm really
not worried that I'm going to come home to a
destroyed couch. And you know, I think you were the
one who asked me, you know what, like what if
they break something? And the truth is, yeah, they might
drop a dish and break it and want it'll all
be fine, and too if I were at home, maybe
i'd drop aedition break in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you never know, never know, So you lock up
your really precious things in the storage.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I have safes in the house. I
had other places where I could put things.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: The truth is, other than you know, some watches and
you know, some some sentimental jewelry for my grandparents, I
don't necessarily have a lot of high dollar value possessions,
you know, I would. Nobody's going to steal the TV.
It's not worth that much anyway. And I'm just like
I said, I got lucky enough to find people where
I felt light and easy and like I could let
go and just not worry about it so much. But listen,
for the people listening to this, this is something you
want to do, and you really are worried about stuff
like that, then that's okay. You know, you can pack
up your stuff and store it and it'll cost you
something and need your margins a little, but there's nothing
wrong with doing that. A lot of people prefer to
rent unfurnished anyway, and it may give you the choice
of or a larger choice of the potential renters.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, And so you have to plan it out.
You can't just say one day I'm going to do
this and then you do it. It doesn't work that way, right,
But so what kind of if you pay like virtually
nothing for your house, I mean, it's the ideal. It's
kind of like you're taking on debt and then you're
letting your tenant pay the pay your mortgage for you
effectively and your taxes. And if you pay eighty percent
of it, you're that much further ahead. And you got
to do it for you got to do what you
really wanted to do, right, It's an amazing fit.
Speaker 4: I mean, I love that's exactly that's exactly right.
Speaker 1: So when I did the math on this, I said, okay,
you know monthly rent is X. From that, let's subtract
come taxes because you have to make taxes on the
rental income. And then we subtract property taxes and my
home insurance and a reasonable estimate of what maintenance will
be for the year, Like you said, you know, hey,
I have an appliance breaks who's let on.
Speaker 4: Of course, there's the.
Speaker 1: Mortgage, and then local property taxes, which are maybe a
little bit lower in Westport than when you were in Westchester,
but they're not free. And so I did the math
on all of that and said, wait in a minute,
even when I subtract all of these things, so all
of these expenses will be paid for by my tenant,
and that leaves me money left over to live on
and enjoy. And so that part has really been fun.
The other thing, too, is, you know, my home in
Westport is it's large, and so the electric bill is high,
and the heating oil bill is high, the pool costs
are high, and all of a sudden, it's very nice
to be able to pass those expenses on and have
somebody else take care.
Speaker 4: Of it, all right, it's not just income, it's a
reduction of expenses.
Speaker 3: Yeah, which you know, that's one of the best ways
of making money is saving money. Many of you don't
realize it, but every dollar you save is a dollar
that can be put elsewhere, whether it's retirement funds or whatever.
And you could basically if you feel like you want
to travel three months of the year, you do it
for three months.
Speaker 4: Right, that's exactly right.
Speaker 1: And you know, just as an example, I've had winter
months where you know, I think it's really whole. My
heating oil bill at times has been fifteen hundred dollars
for a month.
Speaker 4: One time I had a one thousand dollars heating bill
for one week.
Speaker 1: It was just freezing cold outside and the boiler was
running constantly. To not have those expenses ticking against me, right,
to have somebody else taking care of that while I'm
you know, here where it's seventy five degrees and sunny
and doesn't get dark till nine thirty at night has
really been amazing. The other thing that's worked for me
is and I've had a lot of practice at this.
When I set up the Anowledge Investing I decided I
never wanted to have an office. I set up the
firm so I could work from anywhere and regularly. Over
the last five years have traveled. I go away for
a month or two at a time. I've lived in
different countries. That's been amazing. And what I've found is
that I am not only as effective, I'm actually more
effective when I'm on the road. Something about the excitement
and friction and different experiences I have spark some creativity
in me, and I write more, I think more, I
see things differently, and so you know, when I've been away,
I've actually done more and better work than when I
was at Hall.
Speaker 3: Amazing, and you're happier right to Yeah, you're away from
the rat race.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's in.
Speaker 1: I mean, just as an example, I've gone out every
night this week. You know, remember here the the market
doesn't open till two thirty. It doesn't close it till
nine o'clock, which is a really normal time in Lisbon
to go out for dinner. Yesterday, I was at a
coworking event. Tonight, I'm going to a social event. Two
nights ago, there was a digital marketing event the night
before there was an event for expats to play board
games like there's there are just constantly things went on.
And here's one thing that's just completely different. Walking around Lisbon.
I'm I'm walking up and down these hills for a
mile or two every day. I'm healthier and living better.
And Andrew, Hey, I got to tell you like funny story.
I took May off, I should say April. The month
of April, I went to Spain, went to Thailand, came back,
hung out in Spain for a few days. And of
course that was when we had the blackout, which you
guys had also. And unlike in New York, where everything
hits the fan, god forbid, you don't have lights on.
Speaker 3: I mean, life can't go on. Well, I was fortunate
my hotel had a backup generator. But I walked that
day twenty five thousand steps Gary. When I got home,
I had lost four pounds on a vacation.
Speaker 4: How does that happen?
Speaker 3: Huh?
Speaker 4: Yeah, that is amazing.
Speaker 1: And obviously, you know, in a place like this, European food,
the portions are a little bit smaller.
Speaker 4: I've lost weight as well.
Speaker 1: And one of my favorite things to do a lot
of times, people like to stay, you know, wherever it's
closest to the center of town. I'll often stay a
mile out. You can get a nicer place. Yeah, with
a little more distance. Yeah, But here's the beauty of it.
You want to go to breakfast, mile there, a mile back.
You want to go to dinner, mile there, a mile back,
you have to walk two miles. Rather, you get to
walk two miles just to go ab a me all
and that is terrific. And on Sunday, I'm supposed to
meet somebody for a.
Speaker 4: River cruise down at the river.
Speaker 1: That's a thirty minute walk from here to get down
to the pier, and it's going to be a thirty
minute walk up hills on the way back.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: I love it. Man. I'm coming back as Gary Brody
in my next life.
Speaker 4: It's a pretty good life. And interesting that you mentioned Thailand.
Speaker 1: I have been there several times since I started Deep
Knowledge investing. A couple of years ago. I went there
for a month and just loved living there. It was terrific.
And then earlier this year I took a two month
trip through Thailand, Vietnam and Korea and was just great
to go back and you meet people and visit some
of the same people in some of the same places.
Speaker 3: All right, man, hey, so this's just one example of
all the hacks you have created, finance hacks, ways to
save money, ways to make money in the market, and elsewhere.
Just tell us where do we find you, How do
we connect with you on the web?
Speaker 4: Thanks Kerry. Best place to go is Deep Knowledge Investing
if any of you want to reach out to me.
Either I are at Deep Knowledge Investing dot com.
Speaker 1: I read everything that comes to that email and respond,
or if you go to the website the Acknowledge Investing
dot com, there's an ask Gary button. Just click that
and type in whatever you want to know. I get
those messages, respond to them, and then on social media,
I spend most of my time on x that's Gary
Underscore Broadbrode.
Speaker 3: All right, excellent, Gary, really appreciate you coming on. The
link will be in the show notes of this interview
on Financial Survival Network dot com. Urge all of you
to go over there. Don't forget the book The World
according to Martin Armstrong Conversations with the Master Forecaster is
for sale. You'll find a link in the show notes,
and you can always just go to Amazon and put
in World. According to Martin Armstrong, sold over fifteen hundred
copies in just over three weeks. Really happy with the
sales and they can continue coming in one after the other. Gary,
great to have you on. We will talk to you
again soon.
Speaker 4: Thanks, thanks for having me Caring, Congratulations on the book.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to Carrie Letz's Financial Survival Network, your
solution to today's trying times. For the latest, go to
Financial Survivalnetwork dot com. Financial Survival Network now more than ever,