#238 Tyler Dunagin (TurnServ) — Curiosity, Leadership, and Entrepreneurship in Multifamily

Speaker A [00:00:00]:
I still reflect back this and it's been three years but I still some sometimes ask myself like how did how am I an inventor on a product, no chemistry background, you name it, but it does speak to there's enough resources in the world today. If you have enough drive, you can figure it out. And if you work with smart people that are willing to help you, you could really make strides. And that is my approach. That's my mentality behind it. I could not have done it on.

Speaker B [00:00:25]:
My own welcome to the Lay of.

Speaker C [00:00:28]:
The Land podcast where we are exploring what people are building in Cleveland and throughout Northeast Ohio. I am your host Jeffrey Stern and today I had the real pleasure of speaking with Tyler Dunnigan. Tyler is the founder and CEO of TurnServe, a Northeast Ohio based platform company behind brands like apartmentpainters.com, apartmentflooring.com and liquid liner, each rethinking a critical piece of the residential turnover and value add process for property owners and operators. In our conversation, Tyler Traitor traces his journey from early curiosity in real estate and the unlocking of his entrepreneurial spirit to building a multi brand platform that now partners with some of the largest property managers in the country, which has earned Turnserve a place on the Inc. 5000 list of America's Fastest Growing Companies as it continues to expand its presence across Ohio and beyond. In this highly fragmented industry, we explore why speed and convenience matter more than ever in multifamily and how a chance encounter in an apartment bathroom led Tyler down an unexpected path, learning chemistry, working with labs and ultimately inventing Liquid Liner, a patented surface restoration coating that's 30 times thicker than traditional sprays and is now used at scale to renew bathtubs, tile cabinets and countertops without replacement or specialized tools. We also dig into Tyler's evolution as a leader from owner, operator to coach. We explore purpose, culture, capital and long term value creation and also his deep pride in building from Northeast Ohio.

Speaker C [00:01:56]:
Tyler brings a wonderful mix of humility, ambition and thoughtfulness to everything he's building and I had a great time learning from him in this awesome conversation. So please enjoy my discussion with Tyler Dunnigan.

Speaker D [00:02:07]:
Lave the Land is brought to you and is proudly sponsored by Roundstone Insurance, headquartered in Rocky River, Ohio. Roundstone shares Lay of the Land's same passion for bold ideas and lasting impact from our community's entrepreneurs, innovators and leaders. Since 2005, Roundstone has pioneered a self funded captive health insurance model that delivers robust savings for small and medium sized businesses. They are part of the solution to rising healthcare costs, helping employers offer affordable, high quality care while driving job creation and economic growth throughout Northeast Ohio. Like many of the voices featured on Lay of the Land, including Roundstone's founder and CEO, Mike Schroeder, Roundstone believes entrepreneurship, innovation, and community to be the cornerstones of progress. To learn more about how Roundstone is transforming employee health benefits by empowering employers to save thousands in per employee, per year health care costs, Please visit roundstone insurance.com Roundstone Insurance built for entrepreneurs backed by innovation, committed to Cleveland so Tyler.

Speaker B [00:03:12]:
I have been looking forward to our.

Speaker D [00:03:14]:
Conversation, I think really since the first.

Speaker B [00:03:16]:
Time we met and I got to hear a little bit of your journey. I knew at some point we'd make it here to share it with a broader audience, and I'm thrilled that point is now upon us.

Speaker A [00:03:28]:
Likewise, I'm excited to sit down and get to talk to you. And if you remember back how we met or how I became aware of you was I had a few buddies that kept on asking me, did you go to the Lay of the Land event? Have you talked to Jeffrey yet? And I was like, no. And by the third person, I was like, all right, somebody's got to introduce me. Somebody introduced me to Jeffrey because when you hear that twice, it's like, oh, that's weird. But a third time, like, all right, something's got to give here. And so, yeah, when I met you, I was probably overly excited, and you're probably like, oh my gosh, this guy's excited to meet. I was like, oh, it's you. It's Jeffrey.

Speaker A [00:04:00]:
It's because I heard about you so much. So I too am excited to meet you and do this.

Speaker B [00:04:04]:
The universe conspired to bring us together and. And here we are. So I know you're, you know, a fellow and real entrepreneurial enthusiast, and I'm always fascinated to understand where that kind of fascination comes from. So I'd love it to kick us off if you could kind of take us back to earliest memories you have of kind of discovering that own passion from within yourself and where you feel that drive and passion comes from.

Speaker A [00:04:35]:
Absolutely. I think it's one of those things to where I have a few things wired in me that kind of pointed me in that direction. Know, I'm naturally very curious about something and I'm a little bit rebellious and I feel like when you have those two things going on, you're gonna like, look and explore and try to do things a little bit better, a little bit differently or what have you. Like, early on and, and I also played sports, you know, all through childhood and in, in my early 20s and whatnot. So I've been always been competitive as well. But I think, like, looking back, I did not like just, you know, being told, you have to do it this way. Here's why, you know, young rebellious me was like, no, no, I'll find a better way to do it. And then it.

Speaker A [00:05:15]:
That kind of translated to a curiosity. I quit being so rebellious and now I just realized, like, hey, like, what could this be? Like, why do we do it this way? So I'm just naturally curious, probably more so than the average person. And also I had all those things and had played sports. Curiosity, little like a rebelliousness, so to say. And my father also owned a company. And I remember growing up watching him, I was fascinated. I didn't even know what he did at first. But I just remember like, he would wake up and it would be 5 o' clock in the morning and there'd be some days I would just wake up to hang out with him and like, Power Rangers were on and he was doing his thing.

Speaker A [00:05:50]:
And I, I just remember like, where are you going today? And he owned a residential building company for a while and he, he did like custom kitchens and, and similar work on, on residential houses. And I remember like, I just remember younger, like watching him, he'd get up and do his thing. I thought it was so cool. He built his own schedule. He did like, he was doing it. Whereas all my other friends, dads, they were like, I'm going to work today. I'm going to the office. Like, I'm watching my dad, like, enjoy his coffee and make his route for that week.

Speaker A [00:06:17]:
And I'm like, this is so cool. Like, I want to be just like this guy. So I think early on I, you know, that left a big impression on me and I think this sticks out the most in, in, in relating to him. And watching him, I was already like, really high on, on what he did. Like, I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. Well, then one day he, he came up to me and I was a huge Cleveland Indians fan as a kid. Um, and, you know, we'd go to the games and whatnot. And he came up to me one time, he's like, guess where I'm going? I was like, like, what? What are you doing? And he's like, I'm going to Jim Tomi's house.

Speaker A [00:06:47]:
And he got, and Jim told me was a Indians player at the time, since obviously the Guardians now, but hall of Famer, potential hall of famer, if he's not already. And I just remember my dad telling me that. I was like, you're joking with me. He's like, no, I'm. I'm doing his whole kitchen. I was like, no way. And I just remember hearing that story I must have told a thousand people at school. Like, my dad's at Jim Tony's house today.

Speaker A [00:07:07]:
They're like, oh, okay, sure. Like, sure he is. But that stuck out to me, you know, that stuck with me. And I think some of that early, you know, just all those things I mentioned and my dad and like, listening to those stories and remembering that feeling of just being proud of him, I think that kind of stuck with me and that just kind of transformed me to want to explore this route of entrepreneurship.

Speaker B [00:07:27]:
Yeah. How did you find your curiosity guiding you as, as you kind of came up? Did you, did you have a sense of, like, real estate was the area that you knew, you know, you were going to get into or how did it kind of arrive at, at, at that?

Speaker A [00:07:43]:
So I think my, so my pathway leading up to this was I was in collegiate athletics. I played semi pro football, and that was going to be my life. I was curious at that time. You know, I was a bit of a nerd. I'd read a lot of books and whatnot, but I was, I was also the sports guy and that was my whole world. Well, I ended up having a kid quite early and, you know, and Trey, he's my 12 year old today. But I remember the second I found out I was, I, I was going to be a dad. Kind of these, these things from, I'm going to make it and get paid a lot of money to play sport.

Speaker A [00:08:15]:
Like, right away, I just remember hitting me like a ton of bricks. And I was like, okay, something's got to change here. And so I was like, all right, I need to, I need to make money. I don't know what to do, really, because this was going to be my whole path. And I, I talked to a few mentors and I just said, like, hey, I'm not sure what to do with. Nine out of ten of them said, well, most people make a lot of money in real estate. I said, okay, cool, like, I'll try it out. And, and to, to kind of answer your question, I didn't know anything about residential real estate.

Speaker A [00:08:43]:
I, I watched the shows like we all see on TV. Like, you know, here's. They bought it for 200, sold it for 380, and you realize very quickly that's not realistic a lot of the times. But my curiosity kind of led me to this thing because when they first said it I was like, yeah, that's, that's for people that have connections or money or things. And I was like, yeah, I can't make that work. And then I got curious like, well, if I had to make that work, how would I do it? And I started off doing Candyman services, kind of like mirroring my dad's company, but it was way smaller scale and I would work for real estate agents. And I just started, you know, I started just doing handyman, like call out, like gutters or windows or floors. And then little by little, like I kept on talking to people, just curious around what, what's the next steps.

Speaker A [00:09:25]:
I ended up doing full fledged house flips. You know, I owned an investment and flipping company. I had all these out of state investors and we, you know, we were doing, you know, multiple houses a quarter and that's, I kind of climbed that ladder. And then again, curiosity took over. I realized that, hey, I was starting every day at that house or I was at Home Depot and I was, I just told myself, something's gotta be different here. Like I, I can't keep doing this, you know, like, there's gotta be something else. So again, that curiosity kind of took over almost out of necessity, but also curiosity showed itself. And again I talked to my mentors and said, hey, this real estate thing is cool, but it's, it's, there's too many variables.

Speaker A [00:10:04]:
And that's eventually what led me to get into multifamily management. At first, because they recommended like, I learned how to do multifamily. And they said, hey, learn everything you can about multifamily. Single family is great. You build a good foundation. You need to get into apartment complexes. I said, okay, cool. I didn't know anything about it.

Speaker A [00:10:19]:
So I started working in the industry and I learned the ins and the outs of it. And I ended up building my company today. Turnserve was built to serve the needs that I had in multifamily that I could not find in the market. And so that's what kind of led up to this whole thing. And a high level story of what led me here and how curiosity served me was really just based off of, well, I was told this is next, I can't get there, but how can I? Or I was told this has to be the path, but it's probably not, how else could I get there? So I just kind of had that mentality and went step by step and one foot in front of the other. Next thing you know, like today we have what we have multiple locations, all these employees. But when I first started there was no, I did not envision this going this way at all. But that curiosity kind of kept me on the path.

Speaker B [00:11:03]:
Yeah, well and maybe just to paint the picture knowing we'll, we'll kind of trace the steps back. How would you just describe turnsev today and where, where it is and, and kind of the, the scale that you have achieved.

Speaker A [00:11:17]:
So turnserv what we do is we, we partner with some of the largest management companies in the nation and there's so one half of all renters move every year. So 50% of renters in apartment complex will move out every single year. And you can imagine the challenge that brings. The average complex has 250 units. The average management company has 8,000 units under management. And there is a dire need and trade shortage that's going on everywhere. And so the need for reliable vendors is very high. So you know what we, we come in between renters.

Speaker A [00:11:51]:
We'll get the facilities rent ready, we'll do products supply. We are essentially a platform of self born service companies. Example apartment painters.com, apartment flooring.com Liquid Liner, our bathtub product. You know we've launched all these companies on our platform because we have the client base to do so. And so high level turn serve helps management companies get rent ready between renters and we do it quick. You know we, we come in, it take three days versus the average 21 days and we're built for it. We're built for scale. You know today we're in five locations and expanding outward.

Speaker A [00:12:24]:
We have certified installers all over the nation and we got some private equity funding in 24 and we have just been expanding ever since. Who knows what, what we'll do next year. We have a lot of good plans but it's just, it's been quick, it's been fast and we want to make sure that we make an impact at scale. So that kind of our size, our purpose, our why, all those kind of things and really if we can make our, our customers lives easier and make that facility a little bit more rent ready for the people moving in there. That's our mission, you know, that's what we're focused on.

Speaker B [00:12:57]:
So you mentioned turnserve originally was kind of meant to fill the void and the problem space that you encountered within multifamily as you were learning about the industry and just kind of exploring it. From within, how did you come to understand what the market kind of looked like and what those problem spaces were and why no one had solved those problems before the opportunities that even existed? You've told me about the Liquid Liner founding, and I would love to hear that story because these are problems lying in plain sight that thousands of folks encounter every single day. But no one evidently stops to take the time to understand why that problem exists in the first place and what it takes to solve it. So just kind of with curiosity as your compass, take us through the early days of the platform and how you kind of approached which problems to solve.

Speaker A [00:13:51]:
Yeah, so initially it did start off. I was trying to serve the needs I had in management at first. You know, I managed around a quarter billion in assets, all multifamily complexes. And I couldn't find the vendors to show up or the ones I did. It was like it was a phone call and it was way weak get back. And you know, I had to do this time and time and time again. I was like, there's gotta be a better solution here because we had a matter of days to do things, not weeks. So initially I was like, hold on, there's gotta be a better system.

Speaker A [00:14:19]:
So that, that's what I built early on, was to serve that need. But then fast forward, when we're actually like serving clients at this point and, and the transition there just really quickly was I was doing it for the portfolio I was managing. And then I had friends in the industry that said, hey, do it for us. We can't find, you know, the solutions for this, this and this. No problem. You know, like, here you go. Then it got to that infliction point to where there was so much demand for it and I was still managing the properties and I, I kind of completed my consulting gig in management. I was like, it's time to, time to do it.

Speaker A [00:14:48]:
Here we go. And so what that, that just natural step of, I'm sure I, I have to solve it for me, then I solved it for friends. And then there was other people that, that we had to help out as well. And we did. But, you know, here's, here's an example and, and how we led to liquid liner and painting and flooring and all these kind of things. I think the hardest thing at first, it sounds so silly, but speaking the multifamily language is probably important for vendors in our space. You have to be built a little bit different. When you think of construction, for example, you think of inspections, you think of blueprints, you think of permits and a process that takes months and months and months multifamily does not move that that slow.

Speaker A [00:15:27]:
You know, we have a matter of days. And so really just structuring this in a way where clients have convenience with us. They schedule with their hands, with their using their smartphones, and we're already in the building and just providing solutions at scale like that. That's kind of been our guiding compass at first. But then we started off doing everything, like, we'll help with your carpet cleaning and your painting and all these things. Keep in mind, we were a small company and it was just me and my significant other. And early on, like, we're like, wow. Like we can't find people to do all this work because it's so scattered.

Speaker A [00:15:58]:
We're doing everything here. I need to find a specialist to do everything. I was like, that's not. That doesn't exist. And so I looked at what we were doing well and what was a viable business and we said, hey, the painting is actually like the one that does the most, you know, revenue and, and had brings the most impact. And so we started telling our clients was, hey guys, we're turn sir, but we're just painting. And like the third person told us like, well, you should change your name. Then I said, you know, you're probably right.

Speaker A [00:16:23]:
Let's talk about this. And they said, if you're not doing full fledged unit turns and if you're just painting, be specific about it. I said, okay. So I literally found, I got on GoDaddy and I was like, there's no way that a keyword exists for this space. Sure enough, there was a lot of them. There's no longer because I bought all of them. But apartment painters.com was available and I had just got done reading Brian Scudamore's book Ordinary to Exceptional. And he is, for those that don't know, he is a guy that started 1-800-got-JUNK and you see his cars everywhere.

Speaker A [00:16:52]:
I thought it was such a cool concept that he, that he made that his name. And I, I was like, I was hyping this guy up. I'm reading this book. I'm like, yeah, let's go, Brian. You know, I was so excited for him. And so I, I kind of had that mentality going into trying to name what we did and being specific. And I wanted to make sure people understood we just do apartments. And so that, that was like the, the real focus at first because it's so nuanced and so niche.

Speaker A [00:17:15]:
But then, you know, we were Doing the painting. And then our client would ask us, hey, like, what can we do? Like, we have these needs, guys. Do you know anybody that refinishes cabinets? Do you have this? You have that? And. And we're like, yeah, like, not really, but we could try it. And then we would build a viable business out of it and expand it. So that's kind of like how we just went step by step and offered a little bit more to our clients. And that's why we had all these brands and kind of fragmented from apartment flooring.com, because we did. We did flooring only for a little bit and then painting only with apartment painters dot com.

Speaker A [00:17:45]:
So, you know, we. We did a couple things like that and how we got into liquid liner. If you want, I can tell you this. The. The quick story of how we kind of saw.

Speaker B [00:17:53]:
Okay, So I think it's a great story. So.

Speaker A [00:17:56]:
All right, here it is. So keep in mind, at this point, we're. We were only apartment painters dot com. We had a bunch of good clients. We had a good, good group of technicians that work with us and did life with us, and we took care of each other. It was a great arrangement. My lead guy, Tony, was at one of our properties that we. That we do routinely every day.

Speaker A [00:18:18]:
You know, we're there, we know the staff well. Everything goes smooth, as smooth as it can. No hiccups. It's. Everything is really on point there. Well, one day, Tony calls me and he says, boss, I can't service this unit. Something's wrong. I said, no problem.

Speaker A [00:18:30]:
What is it like? And he says, that just smells funny. I said, that is interesting. I was like, tell Jim, the maintenance guy and just move on. Like, it's all good, no problem. And he says, okay, cool. I was like, let's. Let's reschedule it for tomorrow, the next day. So we reschedule it and keep mine.

Speaker A [00:18:43]:
This is my best guy. One of our best properties that we service. And so it was an outlier, but, hey, stuff happened, so I didn't think twice about it. And then we reschedule it. And 48 hours later, whatever it is, the 24 hours, Tony calls me again, and he says, I don't know what it is. He's like, there's something really wrong with this space. And he's like, it smells awful. Like, it's loud.

Speaker A [00:19:02]:
And I was like, are you comfortable looking inside the actual unit? Because he's just in the hallway at this point. He's like, I will. I was like, put your mask on. Look in there. And like, he's FaceTiming me at this point. He opens the door, there's like a cloud of smoke that like, kind of goes everywhere and, and it's, there's air movers and whatnot. And I was like, I was like, dude, get out of there. And again, like, we talk about, like, curiosity.

Speaker A [00:19:21]:
I have no idea what's going on in that unit. I had. Don't have a clue. And all I knew was it was, it was an outlier. I have never seen it in the space before. I was like, what are they doing? Why can't we do our job there? There's got to be something going on. So I drove up to the property right then and there and like, I put my mask on and I went into that, that apartment unit and there was a technician there. He was in a full hazmat suit and there was air movers everywhere.

Speaker A [00:19:44]:
He had drapery outside the window to move it, and he had all these plastic drop cloths, you know, taped up everywhere. The apartment's full of tools and toolboxes and drop cloths and you name it, and you can't see anything. It smells atrocious. It smells like nail polish remover. And there's. It's a cloud. And so, like, I have this mask on. I'm like, all right, something's.

Speaker A [00:20:03]:
Something's going on here. Let's see what it is. There was this astronaut looking technician because he's fully outfitted and he was. The bathroom door was off and he was standing in there. There was no toilet in there. It was just tile T. Etc. And I remember he was like, spraying over the tile.

Speaker A [00:20:17]:
I was like, oh, that's fascinating. Like, wonder what he's doing. Like, how is he using regular paint to do that? He sees, eventually he sees me just watching him and I don't, I don't say anything to him because he's just in the mode, you know, and he's, he's spraying and it's loud and all these kind of things. And he finally, like, sees me and I, I give him like a little subtle wave. I didn't know what else to do. So I waved at him and he stopped. He turned off his, his machine. He's like, what are you doing? And I was like, I, I took my mask off for a second.

Speaker A [00:20:42]:
I was like, I was going to ask you the same thing. And like, we go outside in the hallway and. And I. After I convinced him that I'm not a weirdo, I was like, I was like, man, just help Me understand. I've been in management for a while. I've been in turnover work for a while. I was like, I have no idea what you're doing. I was like, I could assume, but how are you doing this? And he was like, oh, I'm refinishing the.

Speaker A [00:21:00]:
The tub and tile, and here's what it is. Like, I was like, dude, it's messy and it's loud. He's like, yeah, it sucks. And I was like, but you're saving the client a lot of money by not replacing. He's like, yeah, absolutely. And then I. I asked him a few unit economic questions because, again, like, we don't want to do everything. We have to be able to make a business out of this.

Speaker A [00:21:17]:
Like, you know, it's not a charity. So I just. The One of the. I asked him if he liked his job. He said, no. I asked him, like, how long does this take you to set up and do? And he was like, I don't know. It just depends on the job. And then I.

Speaker A [00:21:27]:
The last question I asked him, I said, well, I was like, let's just. We're cool with each other. And at this point, I had offered to. To help him carry out his tools to his car and back, and we made like, four trips. So keep in mind that's the only reason why this guy's still talking to me is because I'm helping him carry these toolboxes and I'm talking his head off as much as I can. And the last thing I asked him, I said, hey, like, we know each other now. We're. We're good friends.

Speaker A [00:21:48]:
I was like, how much money did you make today? And he just said, I don't know, like, 800 bucks. And I was like, and how long were you here for? He's like, in this unit, I don't know, like, four hours. I was like, interesting. Unit economics in the multifamily. Service space are very tight. They're. They're. You know, it's a volume game for sure.

Speaker A [00:22:06]:
So when somebody tells me, like, there. There's that kind of spread. And then also additionally, knowing he is saving the customer exponentially compared to his cost.

Speaker D [00:22:14]:
The.

Speaker A [00:22:14]:
The. The cost of replacing a tub, you have. You have rent delays, you have construction demo permits, you have all these things, it could take two weeks, and he's able to do it in a day to a day and a half at most. And so he's saving the clients thousands of dollars, and he's still making a good amount of margin per unit. And so I just. That was the last thing I asked him. And right away, just click with me. I said, one, his process is awful.

Speaker A [00:22:35]:
Two, like, there's a better way to do this. Three, I'm going to call Sherwin Williams and talk to them about this right now. And so I did. I called Sherwin Williams on the way out the door. All of our reps, you know, shout out to Sherwin. You guys are great. And I asked him, I said, hey, this guy was refinishing a bathtub. Tell me all you know about it.

Speaker A [00:22:52]:
And my. My. My rep, he's like, oh, this is what you do. Here's why, et cetera. I was like, cool. What do I need to do it? And he goes, oh, you need this, this, this, and this. I said, cool. Order it for me.

Speaker A [00:23:00]:
He says, okay, it'll be there in four days. Like, no, no, dude. Like, I need it right now. What store am I going to? And he was like. He's like, well, he's like, I'm sorry, but the closest store is Indiana. I said, I don't even care. Send me the address. I'm going.

Speaker A [00:23:11]:
I literally left that property and I drove to Indiana, and I picked up the sprayer, everything else we needed, because something had to give. Probably not the most economic decision I ever made. Like, it was impulsive, but I. I remember I drove out there and I got this stuff. I get. I get back, I'm exhausted. I just drove for I don't know how many hours, and I got all this stuff. And then I got it back, and I was so thrilled with myself.

Speaker A [00:23:30]:
I'm like, oh, look at all this stuff. I just got. Then I realized, because at this point, it's like two in the morning, and I just slept on the office couch for a little bit, and, like, I got it all. Then I called that rep back at, like, seven in the morning, and I said, hey, come show me how to use all this stuff. And he's like, okay, dude. Like, that's fine. So I impulse bought all this stuff, and he showed me how to replicate the results. And I just started, like, training and trying.

Speaker A [00:23:50]:
I'm trying to replicate what I saw going on there. And the reps were great. They're helping us out. They're like, when did. Like, why did you get in this? And I told them that story. They're like, how long ago was that? It was like. It was like two days ago max. And when they looked at me, they said, why do you have all this stuff here in your office? And why are you trying to refinish your drywall.

Speaker A [00:24:07]:
I was like, dude, like, it doesn't matter. I'm just trying to make sure I could do this. And so, like, fast forward. I ended up replicating the results. And we did those. We did it for clients, but the goal was to make it better. I didn't want to just do what. What I saw.

Speaker A [00:24:20]:
And so, like, I remember going through all these products that were on the shelves. I remember, like, trying everything. I ordered stuff off, offline, and whatnot. And keep in mind, it's a very specific paint that you use. It's an epoxy. It's. You can't use regular paint on tub and tile. It'll just peel off.

Speaker A [00:24:33]:
And so I remember, like, trying all these different products, and all of them had weird characteristics or needs, you know, and not to knock them, but if you go to the store, you get a product that's high voc, it's thin, and it takes three or four coats. That's fine for the DIYer if you're doing your own house, but when you have residents and you have a half a day to do a job, like, for us, we don't. We don't have the affordability to go back four times to one work order and try to make it perfect. We have a half of a day or a day at max. The only downfall was none of these solutions exist on the market to fit our business model. And so what I did from there, after I tried every market or every product on the market, I literally, like, I made a few phone calls. I had no idea what I was doing, by the way. And I wish this was a better story.

Speaker A [00:25:18]:
And I don't think people understand, Like, I'm truly honest when I say this. I literally googled labs near me. And that's a very vague thing to start off with. And then I kind of honed it in. I said, okay, coding's lab near me. And then, like, epoxy coding. Like, I kept on just narrowing down this list, and Google showed me, like, like, six different people around Northeast Ohio that, like, that are affiliated with that space. I called all six of them, and four of them kind of said, I have no idea what you're talking about, dude.

Speaker A [00:25:46]:
I don't know what you need. And luckily that. That fifth guy, he told me, he said, hey, here's what you need to ask for when you're asking about making your own coding. Here's who you need to call. Here's what you say. I said, oh, dude, thank you so much. Like, you know, that's, that's, that's way more helpful than what I'm doing. And then that sixth call was, I literally said, hey, I'm trying to form an epoxy.

Speaker A [00:26:06]:
I have some samples of things that don't work. I need you to help me make what does work. And here's my assumptions. And they, they, right away they thought I was crazy because they said, hey, like we normally work with big manufacturers from Fortune 500s and like people that like, are very, very specific on they have a government contract, they do, you know, automotive contracts, something. And they're like, what do you do? I was like, oh, I paint apartments. And they're like, all right, man, like, we'll take your money. You know, like, let's. And.

Speaker A [00:26:36]:
But that's kind of what started that process. And I told them about the products that, that we had success with in burst. Like, hey, this product showed this and this was great. This one has this characteristic, but it has this, so it won't work. And I literally told them, I said, guys, we need to build a system that it's one coat, there's no smell, it's the thickest product on the market, there's no peel, and we can do it in a half of a day. And like, I just remember like, it was like, like a meme, like a clipboard moment. Like somebody just like kind of like throwing the clipboard up in the air, like, all right, like, listen, it's going to be a long one. Like, you know, you know, better get ready for this.

Speaker A [00:27:13]:
And it was for the course of a year. I learned more about chemistry and epoxy in that year than ever before in my life. I could speak the language now, within reason, but I leaned on some very talented chemists and partners to help formulate what would become liquid liner. And today, and just for, for reference, 72 iterations was how many it took at first before we finally said good enough. We knew it was better than anything on the market by iteration, probably 20 or 25. And we just wanted to keep on refining it. And today we, we have a lot of government contracts that only use liquid liner because there's, there's low voc, it's one coat system, there's no noise. You can literally use hand tools in a backpack to apply this.

Speaker A [00:27:57]:
Anybody that could literally like pour water onto a bathtub and kind of like spread it out could use our product. It's all self leveling. You name it, it's great. But that's what we were trying to get to. And that's what we finally did. It took over a year, but that started off with being hyper curious about what is this guy doing this bathroom, why does it smell like, you know, like, like perfume and nail polish remover. So that's, that's how we got into liquid. And just for reference for today, we still only serve our own technicians and certified installers.

Speaker A [00:28:27]:
We still only sell it to them. We have recently partnered with Sherwin Williams to be able to sell it through their stores as well. It's early on that, but if we look at it, if we can make an impact in the industry and if more people can get safer results because of our product, they deserve to have it in their hands. And that's our mentality around it. But it has been a whirlwind. We went from doing a couple bathtubs a month when in our early days and I was a technician, to now we probably hundreds a week. You know, we just, it's, it's endless. Like we're all over the place doing it.

Speaker A [00:28:56]:
And I'm excited to see the impact that it's making. And it's kind of been a whirlwind to watch it take off like it has.

Speaker B [00:29:02]:
Yeah. Well, I love that story because I think it is demonstrative of not only your deep curiosity and alacrity to try and figure out how to do it better, but the relentless pursuit of figuring out how to build something systematic, scalable, that you can kind of blow up. And it's an amazing story. I can't imagine you thought you would know anything about chemistry as you got into multifamily 00.

Speaker A [00:29:32]:
I. I still reflect back this, and it's been three years, but I still sometimes ask myself, like, how did. How am I an inventor on a product, no chemistry background, you name it, but it does speak to. There's enough resources in the world today. If you have enough drive, you can figure it out. And if you work with smart people that, that are willing to help you, you can really make strides. And that, that is my, my approach. That's, that's my mentality behind it.

Speaker A [00:29:57]:
I could not have done it on my own. It took a lot of capable people. But it, it, it is fascinating looking back and saying, like, I can't believe, like, we have this much product going out every single day. And it's kind of crazy and bizarre to see where it is today, but it is exciting.

Speaker B [00:30:10]:
Yeah. And I think it's gotta be at the heart of, or at least part of the reason why you've been able to to grow as fast as, as you have, I guess. How would you outline the chapters of Turn Serve over the years and what do you feel were kind of like emblematic of each of the stages of growth?

Speaker A [00:30:30]:
Yeah, at first I was the owner, I was doing everything and it was just me and I was trying to make it work and my significant other was helping me in these apartments. And then I wanted to be an operator and I couldn't do that. I couldn't be the coach and the player at the same time. And so that got us. That lack of me being able to split myself into 20 people led us to apartmentpainters.com and then that led us to Liquid Liner. You know, and in the middle there somewhere, apartment flooring popped up because we had so many customers asking for it. And all these, all these things kind of happen. It's, it's been long, but it's also been short.

Speaker A [00:31:06]:
It happens all of a sudden. And now today those are kind of the steps and the hoops leading up to where we are. And now that we have this platform and we have the access to our clients, now we're back. It's so funny to see it come full circle. I started off marketing as turn serve and it changed to apartment painters and flooring liquid and whatnot. Now we're back to marketing as Turn serve and it's like a one stop solution. And now we could actually do it. Whereas before, like, yeah, we're one stop solution, but we only paint.

Speaker A [00:31:31]:
And now it's like, hey, we're truly a one stop solution. We'll help you. From carpet to carpet cleaning to cleaning to painting and you name it, countertops, cabinets were everything. So it's, it's kind of a cool moment to reflect on it and see it come full circle. And that really only started happening, happening probably within the past six months where we went to marketing in his turn serve and 26. That's, that's our whole GTM, you know, like that's, that's really our compelling offer for people and it's going to bring a lot of benefits. But that, that's kind of the steps and how we got there. And it's cool to finally be back to this spot seven years later where we're all actually able to offer what I envisioned early on.

Speaker B [00:32:04]:
Yeah. And it was the vision, this kind of nominative determinism almost to aspirationally where you knew you would get someday, somehow, some way.

Speaker A [00:32:13]:
Yes.

Speaker B [00:32:14]:
Yeah. So what in your mind inspired or catalyzed or just where the opportunity to bring in outside capital came in and how you kind of thought about that decision and how you'd grown the business to that point in time and just how you thought about equity and the owner's mindset and ultimately what your vision was and why you decided to do.

Speaker D [00:32:37]:
That at that point.

Speaker A [00:32:38]:
Sure. So before I left corporate America, the management, you know, managing all the, all the apartments and whatnot, before I made the plunge, I asked myself, what's at the tail of this? Like, what's, like what's the best case scenario here? And I had read a bunch of books, and I think the one that there are so many, but one that really stood out that was easy to comprehend was a book called Finish Big. And it talked about building your company with the end in mind. And so that really kind of gave me a perspective of this is so counter, like versus, like what I thought. This is completely different. I would never assume to start backwards and build it, you know, to the front, but I did. And it's because I initially wanted to solve a big problem. But day one, I said, hey, I'm going to build this, I'm going to scale it and I'm going to sell it or IPO it.

Speaker A [00:33:24]:
Right? That was kind of my aspirations. And so getting capital, getting working capital was somewhere in that book, in that playbook. I knew it was going to be part of the journey. I just didn't know that it would happen so fast. You know, when, when we were that the first two years, three years, growing through Covid really showed me that what we had built has a huge need. It's predictable, it's scalable. All these things that you look for, all the salient features of a market that you want to exploit and get into to, to make a big impact and, and honestly make a good amount of margin at scale. This industry showed it all.

Speaker A [00:33:58]:
And so we scaled like, like, I, I, I don't even know what the rate was the first few years, but it was, it was astronomically high. And I remember talking to some, some friends that were in the space. They, they're also their supplier in the space. And I said, hey, like, you know, we're in this building now. We just got into the Lumen in Cleveland. We just did this new building. We're here, we're here, we're here. And I like, it was just me in marketing and sales, and we didn't do any of it.

Speaker A [00:34:24]:
Like it was me calling or cold emailing people or dropping messages on LinkedIn to these management companies, and they're like, wait, you're a vendor and like, you're kind of like, you have your stuff together, like, come try. Yeah, like we'll try you out. And so we kept on getting these buildings and I remember I talked to my, my friends in the space. They have a family owned business. It's. They, you know, pretty large company doing supply only. And they're like, they said, ty, how, how are you getting in here? I was like, you understand the barrier to entry for us is a lot lower. It's a lot less competitive.

Speaker A [00:34:52]:
And there's, if you wear your uniform and show up on time, that's three quarters of, of the need. And they've, they spent a lot of money on marketing and sales because they have a different business and whatnot. But I remember they kept on saying like, hey, can you introduce some of our sales team, some of the buildings that you're in? And that immediately was like, wow, this is kind of cool. Like, you know, like we could benefit these guys. They've been, they've been around so long and they're huge. And there's, you know, our company that's young and scrappy that we're able to get these buildings. And we did that arrangement a lot. They introduced us to clients, we introduced them to clients.

Speaker A [00:35:23]:
We pulled them in with us. Hey, like meet so and so from our team and we also part with, with these guys, like, they love to talk to you, so we're just helping each other. It was beautiful, man. It was so nice. And then that same, the same family owned business, like, eventually, you know, we're getting more and more buildings. They asked me one day, they said, hey, like, you're scaling like crazy. Have you ever thought about growth capital? I was like, yeah, but like, we're not anywhere near that. And they said, well, hold on a second.

Speaker A [00:35:45]:
Like, let's look at your numbers, let's look at your growth. We were kind of at the point to where if we put capital on it, it would expand even faster because we had processes built out so that the first rung that we did, I didn't know what I was doing. I had no idea valuation or anything like that at all. I had a really good lawyer shout out, Dave Mateus, appreciate you, dude. But I remember I approached him and I said, michael, you got to help me. I have no idea what I'm doing. And I'm trying to look confident. And he's like, just be honest.

Speaker A [00:36:13]:
I was like, all right. So I told the groom, I was like, guys, I have no idea. This process. I was like, let's walk through this together. And they said, cool, let's start with evaluation or assumption or what you're going to do with it. So they really took the time to walk me through that initial infusion of capital. And it wasn't huge by any means at that point, like it was, but it was a lot for us and it helped us get to that next level. Fast forward, we, we grew in that process.

Speaker A [00:36:35]:
And this was like, that was early on, like friends and family, kind of, kind of what we did early on. And then we got introduced from the same family to our partners today, Colleague Capital. And these guys, you know, they have been great for us. You know, that whole thing of if more capital on this thing would help expedite the growth, why not? And the partnership with these guys has been absolutely just everything I'd hoped for. And also it's been one of the most challenging things that I've ever kind of gone through. And that's not because of them, it's because of the pressure I put on myself and the things that you just don't know. You can imagine going from owner operator and like base level finance knowledge to partnering with people that truly understand how the economics of business works from how to do a proper capital raise and distributions and reporting and the weeklies and all of these, the VVAs, you name it. I didn't know 70% of the things I talk about today, just 18 months ago.

Speaker A [00:37:30]:
And it's one of those things to where if you stay consistent with it enough and you live through it enough, you speak their language and they're patient with you, that's the biggest thing. If you find, like what I learned is in this capital path, if you find a partner that is there, yes, there's an agenda and a goal, but that might be around impact, that might be around community growth, that you have no idea exactly what it motivates everybody. If you find the right partner, that's going to guide you, that's going to challenge you, that's going to tell you when you're making a stupid decision and they're honest with you. And there's that collaboration, that's what makes a capital partner successful. And that's what I was so lucky to get with these guys. So I probably hit a home run when it comes to raising money from friends and family to our growth round and whatnot. I hope that that's the case for everybody, but I don't know that for sure. Just make sure like when you do that, I guess is my advice.

Speaker A [00:38:15]:
Is make sure that there's a natural connection. I talked, I had spoken to some people. It was just a check. They didn't want to know the business. They didn't care what the struggles were. They just wanted to report. And they said, hey, like how much you want, like now, like listen, like I appreciate that, like I understand your narrative and I respect it, but that's not what I need right now. I need.

Speaker A [00:38:32]:
So I need a value at partner. And luckily that's, that's what we got out of it. But all those things said, like you just don't really know what to plan for. You can have a really good idea and a game plan, but if you go into an open minded with that collaborative mindset, you're going to get much further versus this is my path and this is what I'm doing. I'm never going to stray from it. The whole concept of a value add partner is take what they know to fill your own blind spots and work together on a bigger solution. And I'm just so fortunate that that's, that's what I landed on.

Speaker B [00:38:58]:
That's been a blessing you mentioned with, with the end in mind. You know, I'm curious how you do think about success, where you want to take this business. What do you find is motivating and driving you today and what that the impact that you would like to have is. Looking back from a place of retrospect.

Speaker A [00:39:19]:
When you, when I first started the business, you start with the end in mind. You, you fantasize about how much you can sell this thing for. Right? Like that's, I think that's why we all start a business most of the time, or maybe not all of it, but that's a contributing factor. Obviously you don't want to waste your time and you want financial stability, financial security and all those things. So at first it truly started off, hey, like I wonder how much I could sell this thing for if it got up to speed. And you just, you convince yourself to go from a 2 million exit and you're like, well if I get to 2 million, I can get to 200 million. Then it's like this climbs, right? And so that path was cool at first and then you started working on the human component of the business. The second that it got beyond myself, I needed to make sure that I was considering others around me and understanding the impact of having an aligned team.

Speaker A [00:40:06]:
And that kind of changed the dial for me. To be honest with you. At first it was let's get the money up, let's Go, go, go, go, go sell. That's cool. If that's your narrative, like, no judgment, that's fine. For me, it changed when I started working closely with my team. And then when I got growth capital and I thought like it was, I went into it like, this is just a transaction. Don't overthink it.

Speaker A [00:40:25]:
And then I got around the people that actually contributed and I understood, like, hey, they're much more relationship based than I thought. Like, so are these guys. And, and it just kind of changed for me as I went. And then like, you just build this deep, deep connection with your team. You care about their families as much as your own and you just want to make sure that things fall into place. And for us, like, I, I just realized that our focus started talking about our mission more. The impact that we make, the convenience that we bring, the, the, you know, if we could help somebody, less stress a day, you know, or bring down the overwhelm or whatever else it is, those are the little wins. Because I'll be honest with you, the, the finance side, it's just numbers out loud or on a screen like those, those things come and go.

Speaker A [00:41:06]:
What, what I think sticks with people is, is how they feel at the end of the day and how they feel with you. And that kind of became the, the guiding compass for us is we started talking about our purpose. At first it started monetary, but then it started talking about purpose and impact. And we actually hired a coach to come in with us because I, I had felt like there was a lot more. Like I just, I didn't want to tell people all we did, like turn apartments. I was like, there's more to the story. My team had a voice. Like, we all had these ideas.

Speaker A [00:41:32]:
We brought in a coach, Rodolfo Carrillo, and he's been amazing to work with from a leadership standpoint, from a identity standpoint to a purpose standpoint. And he really helped us dial in like the things that we, our core values and our purpose and not just, you know, words on a wall, but like why we do what we do. And so at some point it transitioned from, I went from start it, grow it, sell it, and now it's, you know, make an impact and expand outward, help as many people as we can. And I don't mean that from a charity standpoint. Obviously we're in it, we have to make money. But if we can make an impact in our customers lives or the, the residents that fill in or live in a spot for a year or 10 years or 20 years, if we can make their lives a little bit easier or they enjoy where they live or they feel safer because of it. That's what we look at. When I see that we, we, we went up to 62 employees and for us that was a lot.

Speaker A [00:42:22]:
And I, I stopped it when I stopped and counted that one day, like somebody told me, I'm like no, count it, count again. Like that's not right. The last time we did it was like 30 or something like that. And I was like, and I, I almost had a second, like a second of over overwhelm. I was like hold on. We have 62 employees and, and it's just one of those things like you, you don't stop and think about that until it's said to you. You're like wow, like that's 62 families that rely on, on this business. That's just our perspective.

Speaker A [00:42:49]:
We have over 250 B2B customers that rely on us every single day. We have thousands of residents that rely on us every single day to make their, make sure that their spot is rent ready. And those kind of things like, like I said, they kind of push the, the financial motivation not all the way out the window but they, they put it to the back of the room, you know. And so for us like that, the impact that we make, the purpose and our why, that's what guides us more today than ever. And it's beyond myself. I think at some point you just have to be realistic as a founder. If you are forward facing and it's you and you' and near everything that's cool and all like if that's your, your take, that's amazing. But I think it's going to be short lived because it takes a team to make the impact that we all think that we can make most of the time.

Speaker A [00:43:30]:
And that's what I've learned on, on this path and that's what we're shooting for today. So yeah, we want all those things. We want to make a big impact and a big splash and I want to reward my investors for taking a swing on us and all those things. That's it kind of went from priority one to priority five to be honest with you. Now it's all those other things that I mentioned and it feels a lot better working towards those things versus does this get us closer to an extra not so kind of changes as you go in my opinion.

Speaker B [00:43:55]:
Well, in parallel to the evolution of success for the business. I think you've spoken around this already and just your mindset and how you Approach problems. But I'm curious if you reflect on your own evolution as a leader and just how you think about leadership. I think you've spoken to some of the things around delegation, you being the bottleneck at some point in the life cycle of the business, just how you've evolved as a leader and some of the lessons that I feel salient to you when you reflect on that.

Speaker A [00:44:30]:
I think when you are considering starting something or leading something, no matter what it is, I think the idea of leadership, I think that it starts off as extremely selfish and it's, how am I going to be, how am I going to operate? I'm going to make sure I get these results. I'm going to make sure I show this. But when you become a leader and it grows leader, it becomes selfless, right? And I think that's probably the biggest change. You know, like, yes, there's times to where in leadership sometimes being a leader is making those tough choices and making sure things go as planned and handling them if they don't. But as I have progressed, I think I'm more aware than I ever have been before. I think that I have a lot more empathy for things that happen because anything and everything can happen. And also I think I transcend. And again, it's that perspective of, of, you know, transcending from or transitioning from, from player to coach.

Speaker A [00:45:19]:
And that's a hard thing for entrepreneurs a lot of the time, because the whole reason why you got in the arena a lot of the times is because you're a good player. Like, you're an all star. You wanna, you wanna battle, you wanna do kind of these kind of things. But then in a weird way, you almost have to put yourself on the back burner and you say, okay, cool. How could I get these results to other people? Like, what does it take for them? Like, what do I need? Who, who do I need to be in order for them to be them to be better? And a lot of, I think a lot of the change for me in leadership has been that transition and that journey of I'm not the, I'm not the, the guy in the arena all the time. Right now I got to make sure my team around me, they go through the same growth, make sure that they're equipped, that they could see things, and I serve their needs as much as possible. That's probably one of the things that shifted for me. And I think the other thing that has really switched.

Speaker A [00:46:06]:
And again, this is like, this is like the second phase of growth and leadership for me. At first, you go from. From this very, very rigid leadership style. It's this or nothing. It's black or white. It's here it is or nothing. And then you kind of evolve and like, hey, let's talk about the results. Hey, how did this happen? Right? And it's almost the opposite extreme, right? And then you kind of find this middle ground, and here's.

Speaker A [00:46:26]:
Here's kind of where I'm at in my journey right now. As. As you scale and you have more people and you make a bigger impact and you identify your purpose, your core values, your reason for doing what you do. A lot of people frown upon the idea of defending those things, but it's super essential because that team that you grow, the team that grows with you, that gets you to a certain spot, you might not realize it at the time, but there is a cohesiveness with you that's almost unsaid until you say it. It's that collaborative teamwork with that mission in mind, whatever else it is, you know, and then I think at some point you just assume that's going to be a thing, because if the team's small enough, you're like, hey, like, I know him, I know her. Like, here we go. Like, it's everyone's aligned. But as you add more people in, as you make tougher choices, as you decide, like, hey, accounting needs, like, these very minute things.

Speaker A [00:47:13]:
They can't change. It's 1 or 2. But sales need something completely different. But then customer support needs something different, and then our installers need something different. You kind of have to just get to this point to where you can no longer, like, over, accommodate for everything. And you have to decide, all right, for me, what makes the biggest impact and how do I defend it. So today, like, at this stage of leadership that, that I'm at, it's defending our purpose, it's defending our core values, it's defending the team that we have. And sometimes that makes.

Speaker A [00:47:41]:
That means making a very tough choice. If somebody's no longer engaged, if somebody's no longer receptive, if their needs change or what have you, protecting the people around you by making those tough choices. Sometimes, like, and. And really just hiring and firing based off of core values, making the decisions based off of your purpose and. And making sure that your decisions align with why you do what you do. That's kind of like where I'm at on this path. So first it was rigid and sharp. Then it was like the opposite end to where it was kind of lax and trust the people around you.

Speaker A [00:48:10]:
And then you kind of meet in the middle. And it doesn't mean you lose either one of those. It just means that your motivation changes a little bit. And it's more so for the people around you that you operate as a leader. And that's probably changed the most for me. And that's, again, that's through coaching, that's through experience. That's who getting humbled, that's who getting excited, all those kind of things. But for me, that's been the transition of leadership so far.

Speaker A [00:48:31]:
Well.

Speaker B [00:48:34]:
You'Ve been on a pretty remarkable journey. If you zoom out, it's certainly up and to the right. You mentioned just there some of the maybe humbling parts of that journey along the way, there's always bumps in the road. And I'm curious, when you reflect on those parts of the journey, what comes to mind as some of the hardest earn lessons that, that you have?

Speaker A [00:48:55]:
Oh, man. Like, I think there's more of those than anything else. And at some point for me, like, you just kind of got used to them. Like, you just realize there'd be some things I would sit in and I'd like, I would just dread, like, oh, my gosh, then you kind of learn to embrace that feeling. I think a lot of the times, if I, if I'm being honest, like, I. I think that sometimes people's best things is normally their worst thing, depending on the situation. And for me, I am a very much. I.

Speaker A [00:49:24]:
I quickly check and once I kind of like, feel confident because I talked so and so or I got perspective here. I looked at numbers. The second I know something, I go, you know, like, it's full speed, and if it's the wrong path, it's gonna be really, really bad. And so I reflect on a lot of the things that, that I have messed up, and a lot of it has just been from just being relentless. And, hey, this is where we're going full speed. I very, very seldom now, I do it more now, but I very seldom would tiptoe into things. And I, I think a lot of the times you want that urgency, you need an outcome. And for me, I'm a firm believer that, you know, momentum, Momentum normally gets things rolling and, and get them, get them into a spot versus we whiteboard it out for two months and then we try it out and all these kind of things.

Speaker A [00:50:09]:
So I'm under the, Like, I, I operate with just, hey, let's. Let's get it going. We'll figure it out as we go. And I think sometimes that's Been really good. But I also think it's. That has cost us severely in other situations from shutting down like services in the portfolio or moving too fast over hiring, anticipating change, nothing really came of it like and do this anytime I feel like I'm trying to make sure reality matches my energy I get myself in trouble and so like it's cool to have energy and all these kind of things but I'm learning more so checks and balances for myself and, and really just going through the process versus doing what I want to do. Man I, I think back to like how many times I've stumbled and wrong choices and I, we wear them on a sleeve, you know. Like I think that's the cool part about our team.

Speaker A [00:50:54]:
I, I mess up weekly. My team like you know and we're pushing the envelope so it's expected but we have this cool atmosphere where, where as long as we're honest about it and we say guys like this is the line over here. Don't cross this line because I just messed this up. We use it as a guiding tool. But there's been numerous things from, from the, you name every category of the business to sales to finance to service lines started and stopped and expansion plans and halting the brakes. Like man I, I could write a book on the things what not to do but a lot of those characteristics come back for me just like barreling into things and getting them done. But then like I said in other situations that's probably my best feature. So it depends on the situation.

Speaker B [00:51:32]:
Right. Liquid liner doesn't happen unless you drive out of state to that Home Depot.

Speaker A [00:51:36]:
Exactly, exactly. I'm glad you see it.

Speaker C [00:51:38]:
Yes.

Speaker B [00:51:40]:
No, it's always a double edged sword. How do you balance it?

Speaker A [00:51:44]:
Always. Absolutely.

Speaker B [00:51:46]:
If you were to pull out your curiosity compass today, what do you find yourself drawn to?

Speaker A [00:51:53]:
Convenience for humans. Let me explain what I mean by that. I think that we're kind of entering this territory of and we've been there but I think more and more industries are going to start exploring this and adapting it, adopting it. I guess another way to say that, you know, and here's what I mean by it. I'm, I'm, I firmly believe that in any interaction like a partnership, a sales meeting, an investment, whatever it might be, it doesn't matter if at the end of the day if you can, can bring, if you bring somebody convenience and the results that they want, you're going to win. And I think naturally as humans we're guided by, by two concepts and, and on the, the PSYCH the extreme psychologies part of it. You know, I think from a survival instinct we're driven by fear or greed and it's normally like a middle bar that we operate in there. But then on the other side what we want to give to others is we want to provide them convenience.

Speaker A [00:52:45]:
And sometimes that means appeasing them or bringing them quality of life, whatever else it might be. And so I think like we look at like fragmented spaces, like services has been historically muddy boots and concrete trucks and those things are essential. Like I love blue collar workers. I, I, I've been one, I still am depending on the day of the week. Like I like to get my hands dirty and do things. So it's not a knock on the, the people like the world relies on, on, on people like in the, in the trades and, and, and similar and whatnot. But I think we go back to this whole thing of how we communicate and how we request things and how, how people work. You know, we talk about the gig economy and, and just for reference like people that want to make more money, they, they can drive for doordash or you know, like they could pick up a cleaning job or be a fractional X, Y and Z.

Speaker A [00:53:32]:
I am scale like the trade world construction, you name it. Not all the way like it's going to be a journey and evolution but I really think that's fundamentally going to change of how we request things and how who shows up less, less like less W2 and more fractional so to say more 1099 gig economy workers and whatnot. And so like you look at things like in the multifamily space, like all right, how does that translate? Well, quite easily. You know, I would say like we're probably building one of the only truly like tech enabled turnkey solutions. There's other competitors so not pretending we're the only ones, but there's other people in space but like from being able to just autonomously fit into somebody's life and have them not do a ton of extra steps and still get what they need. That's where the world is going. That's where we're focused on. We're focused on the convenience and the automation and the predictableness, the analytics.

Speaker A [00:54:24]:
That's, that's where we're focused on. I think the whole world is, is kind of moving to that, migrating to that, that results are important but also human convenience is important too. And I think that's what drives most of our innovation is we're trying to get things faster, better, more accurate, less strenuous. You name it. So if we can mock that or mimic that in our, our efforts, I think that's what, what's going to create these new dynamics, new industry standards and whatnot. That's where I see the multifamily space going, the construction space going and beyond. I think it all comes back down to just trying to make somebody's life as comfortable as possible. Hmm.

Speaker B [00:54:56]:
When I ever think about convenience, there's a Bezos quote which I'll probably butcher. But it's something to the effect that it's like difficult to imagine 10 years from now that people will want higher prices and slower delivery. Like it's just not ever going to be the case that that's true.

Speaker A [00:55:15]:
Wow. Yeah. It's fascinating. I was going to ask you, did you see Bezos back? You see him? He's co CEO of whatever AI company that is now. Do you see that?

Speaker B [00:55:25]:
I did, yeah.

Speaker A [00:55:26]:
That's fast.

Speaker B [00:55:27]:
And it, I mean it dovetails actually to what I want to ask you about, which is I don't imagine when people think multifamily, they think technologically leveraged and enabled. And you know, like, I don't think technology and multifamily are like people think about those in the same sentence. How do you think about that in the work that you do?

Speaker A [00:55:49]:
Yeah, I think it brings a fascinating opportunity. Multifamily is its own ecosystem and it's fits. Every single trait of human beings lives in one spot. You have the vendors, suppliers, you have management, investment and beyond. And then you have the building ops, facility ops, all these other things. And you have so many needs. It's a weird conundrum because I think multifamily is one of those unique spots. It's essential for people.

Speaker A [00:56:17]:
Think about where you live, think about what goes into that. Think about what we do in our own homes or where we want to live at or feel safe at, secure at, you name it. And then do that at scale. You know, there's more renters in the world than homeowners in the world and that's going to continue in that trend. And so you look at that and you say, okay, pretend take away the houses and just take out the actual asset type and put in what how human beings interact with one another. What do they expect where they live? Multifamily has been historically under innovated and there is so much opportunity on that side that a lot of people don't stop to think about. They don't consider like a lot of the times, if you're a runner you don't know the back end all the time. You might know that you have a maintenance technique condition that helps you when your drain gets clogged.

Speaker A [00:56:59]:
But you don't understand how big that ripple effect is and how one need takes probably 10 to 20 different variables coming together to serve you that. And so you look at the opportunity that's in front of us in multifamily. I mentioned my story before where it was get on my cell phone, try to text to my BlackBerry at the time, like let's see what contractors are here or available, wait for days, finally corral them, see who shows up, up, then tell them again for the 20th time what the work order is or where to supply things or drop things off at. And then three weeks later, after probably all this effort, we get the result. And now like if that backtracks a little bit, we talk about automation software, right? We talk about predictive, hey, like your units, you know, you haven't swapped out your water heaters in 14 years. Based off of your data, here's a checklist for you. We're going to send somebody to preemptively schedule a maintenance check in, you know, like to double check these kinds of things. So all of those things said from, from maintenance to supply to living to food delivery to security to, you name it, every facet of human life happens in multifamily and more.

Speaker A [00:58:03]:
And so I really think that it's going to come down to automation. In a quick story. So everybody in multifamily, the largest property management system is called Yardi. Everyone lives off of it. It's like work orders and leases and whatnot. It is a data collecting machine. That is One thing that Mr. Yardy, founder of that did really well is he has all of the data, he has all the information and we have it all in this box and all that data comes in and property managers live off of it, business owners, or I'm sorry, building owners live off of it.

Speaker A [00:58:35]:
They make changes to Yardi and then they have to do the human output, they have to do the manual calls, they have to see who's where that is starting to get updated. So now if there's a maintenance request there could be preferred vendors that, that automatically gets transmitted to. No longer calling, no longer texting. So that's starting to automate. But then eventually the next leg of that, if you think about what's next in that sequence is autonomous. And so when unit 200 gets on notice to vacate with a 30 day or 60 day notice that somebody's moving out. It'll automatically schedule the vendors needed based off of previous data and assumed needs as well. And you think about like, hey, that sounds good and we're truly right there.

Speaker A [00:59:12]:
Like we, we could do those things like in 2026. We're working on things right now to, to get there there. And you think about the quality of life again. You talk about convenience for people and timeliness and whatnot. If I as a property manager have to do two clicks in my normal and, and do my ordinary normal routine and automatically I could have somebody show up and take care of the back of the house stuff that I no longer have to worry about. But it gets done right. That's quality of life, that's convenience and that's what's going to make people thrive. And I think software and tech, AI, all of these things will slowly start to get in the space more and more because it's going to bring that convenience and predictiveness for I see so many opportunities and that, that's, that I tell everybody that like if, if you are considering building out tech and if you want an undertapped market, look at the multifamily apartment space because there is so much opportunity and not a lot of players in the space yet and that needs it the most.

Speaker A [01:00:04]:
So please like send all your resources and innovate in the space because it is prime for and it's already starting.

Speaker B [01:00:11]:
What, what, what are you most excited about? Looking forward.

Speaker A [01:00:14]:
I think that one from the, from the business side, I am looking forward to bringing more convenience. I mentioned how at first we had fragmented like service offerings and whatnot. I am excited about bringing more impact to our customers with less, less touch points. And here's what I mean. Like if, if I need to reach out to five different people for five different needs, if I could reduce that to one touch point and get somebody back that much of their day, that's what I'm excited for. And so I'm excited to continue to scale. I'm excited to help our clients at large. We have a lot of big partnerships.

Speaker A [01:00:44]:
I've, I've been in a lot of rooms that I don't know how we get in there sometimes, but I'm happy that we do because we're with people that are doing some fascinating things. I'm excited to work on software in the space. I'm excited to expand and help more clients at large. But I'm really excited to see what happens in the industry and beyond. Like I, you know, those things I am super thrilled for and Every year I go to Apartmentalize and all these other conferences and I see the innovation going on. That makes me optimistic and excited because it brings quality of life for people. People. So I'm excited to see those things.

Speaker A [01:01:11]:
Can't wait to see like, outside of that, obviously. Like, we're all like, I, I don't want to speak for everybody. I have a ear on the ground around crypto24.7 and DeFi and whatnot. Like, I, I have so many fantasies and fanciful ideas around that, just like probably everyone else does too. So I'm excited to see what happens there and just beyond, beyond the business side of the street. I mean, I am excited like, like I said on, on the personal side. So I have three kids and from, from kids of basketball and whatnot. I'm excited to watch them grow and, and have them also be impacted in a positive way from every.

Speaker A [01:01:42]:
All the growth going on outside. You know, Like, I'm excited for my sons to. They're going to live in a completely different world than what you and I saw, you know, and they, they already, already are living in that in a lot of regard and they're just reflection or representation of other people that are also going to pos. Experience positive things in the world because of tech and software growth and all these kind of things. So I'm really fascinated by what could be. And I, I know that the next five years are going to be astronomically different than anything else in history. And I think the 10 years beyond that, it's going to be a completely different world. So I'm excited to see what it evolves to, to be honest.

Speaker B [01:02:15]:
Lots to be excited about there.

Speaker A [01:02:17]:
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Speaker B [01:02:20]:
What are your reflections on building in Northeast Ohio and just kind of the pride of place that you have?

Speaker A [01:02:29]:
You know, I think it's. It's one of those things that it feels like it's a close group of friends that are like, doing stuff together. I think for a long time people probably counted Ohio out, Northeast Ohio out. And I don't think it was just because they didn't like us. I just think because there's a lot of assumed things that, you know, there's not a lot of growth. There's not a lot of opportunity. There's, you know, there's not many people doing things and they, they kindly like. There's so much going on in Northeast Ohio.

Speaker A [01:02:53]:
Like, they're just ill and Forbes, to be honest with you, like, and I look at the, the relationships in the people that I know, the people that support me the people that I support, it is a, a truly close, just this kind of just collaboration and connectedness that, that we have here. And it's. In a weird way, I feel like all of us have this little part of us, like we want to show others, like, what we're capable of, and we're starting to get that recognition because we're doing more and more cool things. But I definitely think, like, you think of like all the other big hubs in the world or even the big cities that are doing some cool things and cliche to say, but, like, Silicon Valley is known for certain things, New York and whatnot. I don't think you, your first thought or your 10th thought is probably Cleveland, Ohio, you know, But I do think, like, there's been the founders here. There's a lot of, there's probably a lot of innovativeness going on and founders working on real, real world problems that don't always get headlines, so to say, but are for the essential world, the built world and beyond. People like working on things in healthcare and finance and you name it. There is such a close community in Northeast Ohio, even competitors, like, we come together.

Speaker A [01:04:01]:
Like, it's, hey, what are you working on? Cool. Hey, hey, don't do this. I tried it. It did not work. There's just this weird unity around Cleveland that a lot of outsiders probably don't see. And I think that's probably one of my favorite things about Cleveland and Northeast Ohio is just this collaborative group. I think of your, your events that you host. And I, I, it was so cool to see that many people working on things in one room.

Speaker A [01:04:23]:
And I'll always be appreciative that you host those because you talk to founders working on things you have no idea even existed. You're like, what is that? Like, that sounds so cool. Let's talk about it. It. But I think Northeast Ohio as a whole, we're starting to get our shot, you know, like, we're starting to really kind of emerge, but it's, it's going to require all of us just going arm in arm and collaborating and wanting to see each other win and keep going on that before we kind of pop out of that and really have a fighting chance, like, you know, compared to. But I, I do think it's just this cohesive collective group that is truly just want, wanting to do cool things. But it's under the radar, you know, like, we're not ever going to get those headlines until we do something fascinating. But I do see it more and more, and I see the Community coming together more and more, and I think all sorts there.

Speaker A [01:05:05]:
Yeah, well, I think we've covered a.

Speaker B [01:05:08]:
Lot of ground here. I always like to kind of pose a Greenfield question, which, you know, of all the things we've talked about, is there something we've omitted or something we haven't talked about yet that you feel is particularly important when you reflect on your journey?

Speaker A [01:05:24]:
Yeah, I don't think so. You talk about the business evolution, but we talk deeper than that too. We talk about the people, the community. I mentioned psychology a little bit and this founder journey and how important it is to have people around you that support you. We covered a lot there and, and I, I think that's important. I, I, I, I'd say like to, to kind of put a bow on that. Just emphasizing on this concept of we are all figuring some things out together. We might be experts in one field, but nobody knows everything.

Speaker A [01:05:50]:
And that's probably what I've learned the most on this journey of just really like, people just being open with me and just like taking a leap and being okay with certain things. Like, that's probably one thing that I, I could probably just say kind of encapsulates. Encapsulates. My journey is just, just, it's okay to get support. It's okay to have people around you, like, help carry you sometimes. Like, that part's been cool. So I, I think we covered most of it. You know, feel free if there's anything else that you want to cover.

Speaker A [01:06:16]:
But honestly, on ours, we covered left, right up and down, man. Like, I think that this has been pretty thorough. It's been good.

Speaker B [01:06:22]:
Yeah, no, it's been a blast. A lot of fun. I'll hit you then with our traditional closing question, which is for a hidden gem in Cleveland. Cleveland.

Speaker A [01:06:31]:
Hidden gem. So Cleveland, Ohio, you absolutely have to go to Constantino's Market. And at first look, probably not a big, like, why, like, hey, just a little grocery store. You walk in there and this, the history, the how everything is, they have hot and ready food, they have cheese and wine. They have this, this local community feel. And you just feel a little bit different when you go there. I take my family there sometimes and we, we literally get like a buffet style dinner from like not ready and whatnot. And it's, it's not due to like, the food is good, don't get me wrong.

Speaker A [01:07:04]:
But like, it's not like Blue Point or, or what have you, you know, it's, you don't go there for like a $80 steak. You go there because it feels like community and it feels collective, so to say. And it just feels like it. It takes you back. You absolutely have to go to Constantino's regardless what you need, either either some sort of groceries or quick food or whatever else. We just, every time we're in Cleveland, we make it a point to go there and at least get a beverage because we just love the history. It looks so cool inside there. Have to check it out.

Speaker A [01:07:30]:
Amazing.

Speaker B [01:07:31]:
That's perfect. Well, Tyler, I just want to thank you very much for coming on, sharing, sharing your story. Like I mentioned, I was very much looking forward to this and grateful to have the opportunity for you to come on and share.

Speaker A [01:07:41]:
I appreciate it, Jeffrey. I'm looking forward to more Lay of the Land events and hanging out and collaborating with you. Thanks for having me. This has been a lot of fun.

Speaker D [01:07:49]:
Absolutely.

Speaker B [01:07:50]:
If people had anything they wanted to follow up with you about, learn more about what you're building.

Speaker A [01:07:55]:
Where.

Speaker B [01:07:56]:
Where would you direct them? On the. On the Internet.

Speaker A [01:07:58]:
I'm always active on LinkedIn. Just Tyler Dungan on LinkedIn, make sure you say, hey, saw you on Jeffrey's podcast. Because, you know, make sure that I separate you from the AI messages. But also, if you need anything, call Turn Serve. You know, go to turn serve.com and. And find me there. But even outside the industry, I love collaborating. Find me at an event.

Speaker A [01:08:16]:
Find me at one of Jeffrey's events. I just love talking to people and doing stuff.

Speaker B [01:08:21]:
Awesome. Well, thank you again.

Speaker A [01:08:23]:
Thanks, Jeffrey.

Speaker D [01:08:27]:
That's all for this week. Thank you for listening. We'd love to hear your thoughts on today's show. So if you have any feedback, please send over an email to jeffreyofthelandfm or find us on Twitter oddleftheland or Sternfa J E F E. If you or someone you know would make a good guest for our show, please reach out as well. Well, and let us know. And if you enjoy the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on itunes or on your preferred podcast player. Your support goes a long way to help us spread the word and continue to bring the Cleveland founders and builders we love having on the show.

Speaker D [01:09:00]:
We'll be back here next week at the same time to map more of the land. The Lay of the Land podcast was developed in collaboration with the UpCompany LLC. At the time of this recording, unless otherwise indicated, we do not own equity or other financial interest interests in the company which appear on this show. All opinions expressed by podcast participants are solely their own and do not reflect the opinions of any entity which employs us. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions. Thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you next week.