Helping Busy Physicians Earn Passive Income: Brett Riggins, Founder of Physician Wealth Systems

Michael Carrese: Hi everybody, I'm Michael Carrese welcoming you to Raise the Line with Osmosis from Elsevier, an ongoing exploration of how to improve health and healthcare. 

Most people associate being a physician with financial security, but according to a recent report issued by Medscape, only about half of physicians in the United States report having a net worth of over $1 million. That's where today's guest comes in. 

Brett Riggins founded Physician Wealth Systems in 2022 to help doctors achieve financial security through real estate investments that generate passive income. Brett is also the founder and CEO of Connect Home Buyers, a real estate solutions company based in Michigan. Osmosis co-founder and Raise the Line host Shiv Gaglani was recently a guest on Brett's Real Estate M.D. podcast. And Brett, we're happy to welcome you to the program here today.

Brett Riggins: Yeah, I'm excited. I've been looking forward to this. 

Michael: We always start the show——because we have a younger audience who like to hear about the career paths that other people take—with getting some professional background. So, what got you interested in real estate and investing?

Brett: That's a great question. Really, my path started in construction, in construction and design, and it led me to architectural design and construction management. That's where I went in school. My parents had attempted to build a house when I was about seven years old. It lasted for about seven years and unfortunately, they actually lost it; were forced to sell it on a short sale. So, there's pieces in that that really build a foundation for me now, reaching out and direct to seller into real estate because I'm working with a lot of sellers and families who may be in some of the worst times of their lives and I have that connection with them. But ultimately it was the renovation side, the design side that really fueled the fire for us. My wife has got the eye for design. I'm more of the sticks and studs kind of guy, and she's the colors and blankets, and really ties it in together.

Michael: Oh, so you're a joint business, you and your wife both?

Brett: Absolutely. I could not be where I am in this world and in this business world without her. She is the better half for sure.

Michael: That's great. Obviously all that comes to play when you acquire a property, you guys renovate to the extent you need to, and she contributes all the design ideas.

Brett: Yeah, it was fascinating. You want to test the relationship, renovate your house. And then it’s multiplied. We were doing six flips at a time and we're adding the layers of being an entrepreneur and business management. At one time we had thirteen employees. So, really testing the relationship, but learning. At first, I was running the numbers and I was coming from a high-end design build firm that I had started. But that's not how we're going to make money, flipping properties. 

Michael: So, this might already be out there -- I don't know all of my reality and home improvement shows -- but it sounds like you have a premise here for a show, could be “relationship advice through renovation.”

Brett: Absolutely! When we were doing those, we had media around us shooting. But to be completely honest with you, it was so stressful, not with the cameras and stuff, but the more you got into that, the more people that you depended on to do this. And let's be serious: when we're in certain price points around certain contractors doing certain things, that's not really the circle of people that are going to lift me up in my life. It could be, but it's just not likely.

Michael: So, with all this experience under your belt, what is your basic outlook on real estate investing? What are some of your takeaways from all this experience and the best way to first get involved?

Brett: The asset class is amazing, and I always try to share as much of my experience as possible without trying to shape anybody's opinion to move into it. But I always find myself saying, “everybody should own real estate.” It's such an amazing asset class. And inside of that asset class, you ask me what's a good way to get started? It just depends on what's your final “why,” understanding where you want to go. More than just,” I want passive income.” What does that mean? What do you want your time for? What are you going to do with your time? What are you going to do with more money? How are we going to use this stuff? That helps you decide where you are going to get in at and where you want to be at in five or ten years.

Another thing that I think about this question too, is it's cyclical. Your entry point may be kind of directed on where it's at in the cycle. Residential trends affect cycles just a little bit differently than commercial trends affect cycles The next thing you know, as a physician, you're just getting bombarded with capital raise and general partners and all this stuff. Flipping is cool and then somebody's going to sell you a wholesaling program for $50,000. So, trends will follow those cycles as well. Ultimately, it's going to come down to who you're surrounding yourself with and then leaning on those relationships to build your own knowledge. 

Michael: Well, it certainly is clear that people need some advice getting into this because as you're describing, there are so many different ways to do it, and it can obviously be a very complicated space. So, what's your approach to physicians who have no experience with this?

Brett: That seed is the biggest thing. Planting that seed in your mind. I've got a podcast too, so many times a book that gets referenced on our show is Rich Dad and that seed is planted in your head. Real estate could be that ‘means to an end’ kind of thing. It could produce this situation where it allows me to separate my time from my money. Once you have that seed planted -- real estate can do that -- then leaning on these other assets: books, podcasts, the relationships we talked about earlier, to help you understand how that's going to happen. Those are the biggest pieces to make these changes in your life.

Michael: So, give us the basic rundown of Physician Wealth Systems, and I'm curious about how you geared it particularly for that audience.

Brett: I didn't come from money. I didn't walk into these opportunities. It took a lot of hard work. The limiting beliefs I was telling myself in the beginning were, “I don't have the money, I don't have the time.” We hear this all the time. But I overcame those. Limiting belief was keeping me from having the conversations I needed to have with the people who did have the money. And there's a lot of physicians out there who may not necessarily be wealthy. They may have high incomes, but no time and so they are looking for places, in that particular scenario, to invest money. 

The original relationships we had were with physicians who were private money lenders. That private money lending scenario is a way that you can invest in real estate, but as we started working with physicians, we always heard, “Hey, how can we get equity? We're doing debt loans, how can we get equity? How can we get deals like this?” Well, at that time I just couldn't do it. That's how I was feeding my family. 

Within the last year and a half, again…these cycles, these trends, being able to lean on the relationships that I was building and say, “Wait a second, there is a way that we can plug physicians into our acquisition machine, into our systems, our processes, our power team, and give them the ability to have equity in these deals.” So, in those scenarios, the client for Physician Wealth Systems would be someone who has the deployable capital, has the interest in building a single-family portfolio. I think that’s a great entry point, but the interest is to build a single-family portfolio. The deployable capital can now plug into these systems leveraged from these years and years and years of experience of what to do, what not to do. All the things that you hear about real estate -- chasing down renters, fixing toilets all of this stuff -- I've lived that. It doesn't mean that I'm not going to live it again. I've just developed these systems and processes and built a team to help mitigate us from those instances. And it makes me think of Osmosis. I just had a guest on the show yesterday telling me how grateful he was for Osmosis. 

Michael: Oh, really?. 

Brett: Yeah, it was awesome. 

Michael: Oh, that's great. 

Brett: He’s just very grateful. He was in medical education as well. Okay, we're going to do twelve properties in twelve months. That's a very substantial velocity. So, in order to get there, I’ve got to make sure that I'm compressing all of this stuff.  Say you come in and you didn't know a lot about real estate. Well, I need to compress that because you're a physician. Not, you personally, but the listener, you're a physician. Your time needs to be other places, not in this.

Nobody's going to care more about your money than you do. You may not know everything you need to know about the asset class, about the investment, but you need to know what questions to ask. You need to know who to be around to ask those questions. What do I need to ask? That's important. So, building that system and process -- because even though it's a turnkey real estate investment business, I want the knowledge base of asset management, asset performance…I want that to be instilled -- it's compressing that like Osmosis does. Showing you a short video, showing you the bullet points, “Hey, we've got this now. Now what's next?” So that, Six Sigma approach, kind of figuring-it out approach. 

Michael: Fascinating. So, say I am a doctor and I'm really interested. What would be the next step? How do people start getting integrated into this?

Brett: The biggest thing is building relationships and one way that you can do that, whether you do work with Physician Wealth Systems or not, is there's a platform: physicianwealthsystems.com. I'm trying to be as transparent as possible, provide as much value and resources for everybody as possible because I know I won't get to work with everybody. And to be honest with you, I don't want to work with everybody. That's such a blessing to be like, “Okay, this feels good. Let's work together.” There may be time, there may be money, but there's different restrictions that would keep that from happening. But I want to have this platform where I have a lot of opportunities to speak with a lot of amazing people, investors, coaches, CPAs, other physicians, entrepreneurs.

And that's where I'm sharing these resources and building out this platform to say, “Hey, it's not just this. I would love to work with you if it's a good fit for both of us and it aligns with your why,” but even if that's not the path, I want to build something to give back and raise the line. I mean, it's exactly why we're talking about stuff like this on shows like this. So, thank you, you guys. Thank you guys for putting this together because the physician path is difficult and it's just going to continue to be compressed by things that probably a lot of other more educated people can speak better about. If we can share stuff like this, compress what it takes to get here, we can raise that line and allow physicians to practice with passion, not practice because they have to.

Michael: And maybe reduce some of the stress that's contributing to burnout. I think a lot of people are thinking, “Well, I need to know a lot about real estate to do something like this because otherwise I could be misdirected or am I going to be able to follow what's happening?” What do you tell them about that?

Brett: Do you need to know a lot about real estate to get involved? No. Should you? Yes. There's a starting point. We all start somewhere, and we all start at some point whether we have a little bit of experience or knowledge or not. Again, I'm going to lean back on the relationship equity that you build with people and making sure that you're with genuine people who have full-cycle deals, have experience, or if they're going to be transparent and say, “Hey, I'm just getting started. This is what I'm doing, this is what I'm seeing, this is the risk.” If they're transparent with you and you can tolerate that risk, then you're building on the equity of that relationship with the transparency that's there. You don't have to have Tiger Woods’ kind of experience to go golfing with me. We all start somewhere. 

So, the best time to buy real estate is twenty years ago and today. That comes from the proverb, that the best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago and today. So, there's no better time than now. Everything's cyclical. That aligns with the knowledge too, and you're not going to have that experience until you take action. Just make sure that you're building the right associations; make sure you're limiting associations. That can be just as important too, from the people who say, ”Oh, you shouldn't be doing this. You should only be doing this. Don't ever do that.” The negativity. So making sure you're limiting associations too. Again, nobody's going to care more about your money or your investments than you do.

Michael: So what does it look like for a physician? Say they're working with you, and they are somebody who really wants to be hands off about it versus somebody who wants to get more involved? What kinds of things would they be participating in terms of decision making?

Brett: On an acquisition, we're doing everything on a turnkey real estate investment business. This is not just a turnkey real estate investment. This is not a single family; this house has got a tenant. You go over to the property management company; they've got 4,000 units they're managing. It's not that scenario we're setting up and the systems and processes for the business completely. So how the money's coming in? Where's it coming from? But this goes completely through the process of finding the property. We have some really cool technology we're building out to do this. “Prop Tech” I think, is a great way to put that. We're finding it. We'll acquire it. We assign it to the client's LLC at close. So they're maintaining equity. Then we renovate it. We get the tenants and get it marketed.

At the same time we're marketing it, we have the lender that's coming in doing the appraisal. All this is to have it stabilized. Once it's stabilized, it's with the property manager. We help as an asset manager with the client saying, “How's my asset performing?” Make sure we're asking the right questions each month. 

What this looks like for a client is a green light on the front side and as involved as they want to be. And for the listeners out there, I think it's great to be as involved as you can, to understand where these different instances may occur if you're working with us or anybody else. Understanding the insurance process, “What is being covered? How am I covered?” So really diving down. Once you set into it, you're going to learn, you front load your knowledge, right? You front load your time involved in this. The next time is going to be a little easier. But looking at HUD, which is the ALTA, the settlement statement on the acquisition. All of this stuff is frontline. Once it's stabilized, things flatten out and it takes a lot less time. But ultimately, it’s building a scenario, so a physician can manage a 12-property portfolio, or a single family portfolio within an hour or a month.

Michael: That's what I was going to ask you. Even at the least level of involvement, how much time would somebody have to spend on it?

Brett: The most time comes from the financing part, and that's the piece where my hands are tied behind my back. I can't sign documents for you; I can't provide statements for you. So the time that does come in is front loaded in that regard. But ultimately, it's going to break down to that target of one hour a month upfront. We say in the first month we're targeting for about eight hours for the entire month. And that's to get through these applications just to get stuff up and rolling, understanding the process, understanding the investment objectives. So about eight hours in that first one, and then month two is going to cut down. It cuts down to right about three or four hours, month three, right around three hours. And then from there, we're shooting back down to that one hour a month.

Michael: So as a class of employees, physicians, as we've all heard, are loaded with debt and they're often twenty years down the road before they've paid it off. So, that seems to me, limits your pool of prospects a little bit because they have to get that behind themselves before they're looking to invest. But what I'm getting at is even in that circumstance where you have a good amount of income, but you still have student debts to pay off, is there a reason for folks to be thinking about this sort of investment earlier on?

Brett: Yeah, I talk about this a lot. If you're in med school, where are you staying? If you're staying in a house and paying rent, can you find a place where you can arbitrage the rent? Meaning that if I'm paying a thousand dollars a month and I've got two bedrooms, can I rent out one of those bedrooms? Can I make more money in renting out pieces of my rental? Does your lease allow you to do that? 

Another thing that you can do is house hack. I've heard of a lot of scenarios where you have a couple different options of getting money while you're in school. I'm not going to name anything in particular, but there are ways to get money while in school where you could use that money to acquire a place. So, even as you're acquiring this debt, you could be planting the seed and nurturing this perspective, removing these limiting beliefs that I can't do this. So there's arbitrage rent, Airbnb arbitrage, there's house hacking. So many of these things can be done while you're in school because you're going to have expenses anyway. Why not start shaping your perspective to turn those expenses into income?

Michael: That's fascinating. So much food for thought. And speaking of learning, as you know, we're a teaching company. We love to fill knowledge gaps. One of our favorite questions on these podcasts is to give our guests an opportunity to say, “This is kind of a pet peeve of mine, that people don't understand X or I keep hearing myths about Y.” Is there a knowledge gap that you're particularly interested in that you would say to us, Osmosis, you guys should make a video about that or a course about that?

Brett: Absolutely. And it is an amazing opportunity that I have to speak with a lot of physicians on the podcast. And I hear all the time, pieces about business, about entrepreneurship, and the language of money. Those things really get a miss. If you think about it, how many physicians come out, maybe come into a W2 practice, some go right into private, but it's more likely they're going to come into W2. How do I get out of here? I'm starting my own business now what does that mean? Where is it? There's so many things that are tied into that. I know I've seen a couple of turnkey outfits that offer services to help you do that. Again, nobody's going to care more about your money than you do.

Having this base understanding of profit and loss balance sheets, certain things, as an entrepreneur, it's brought tears to my face learning these things. How can we compress these things and show them, “Hey, everybody's going to have their own journey.” And along that journey, we're going to stack these experiences up. These verticals are going to be called opportunities. And when we can take those opportunities and create a patent, create a new process, create a new way of treating patients, there's that twist. We're talking about raising the line. That's how we're doing it. And if we can have these videos that help us understand business management without having a full master's degree, if we can understand what it means to be an entrepreneur, how painful is it going to be? Where are the steps, the missteps, how many times is it going to take?

And then ultimately, all this is going to be mindset. Mindset is huge. I don't know if in the Osmosis platform there's a mindset piece in this, but it's related to this business entrepreneur piece. I can't compare myself to anybody else. I have to understand where I'm going, how I'm getting better. I have to understand what my limiting beliefs are. And so much of that can be an elevating platform, just kind of like packing stuff under physicians who are coming through because it's so vital to what we're doing and how we're progressing.

Michael: A couple of building blocks are missing in finance education in the United States. It's not done in K to 12, not college, unless you're studying it, and in med school, it's something that's touched upon maybe at best. So, as we wrap up, Brett, as I've mentioned, we have a younger audience and we always also like to give our guests an opportunity to provide their wisdom drop on building a career.

Brett: Some of the inflection points in my life have been when I've invested in myself and invested in mentorships, surrounding myself with the right people. But ultimately, when those moments of inflection of growth come, they come in moments of self-realization. No matter what profession you're going into, whether you stay in medicine or not, self-realization is the biggest piece of separating yourself from who you used to be and understanding where you want to go, understanding why you want to go there. You need to know where you're at. You need to know, what do I need to do, to improve myself. So, I'm comparing myself to myself yesterday, nobody else, not Instagram, not the doctor next door. Myself to yesterday.

I need self-realization to get there. But reflection is what makes experience valuable. So, self-realization and reflection — that's how we continue to improve every single day. Constant and never-ending improvement.

Michael: Very well put and it's been a pleasure to talk to you. We wish you all the best, Brett Riggins from Physician Wealth Systems.

Brett: Awesome. Thank you so much for your time.

Michael: I'm Michael Carrese. Thanks for checking out today's show and remember to do your part to raise the line and strengthen the healthcare system. We're all in this together.