[00:02:18] Patrick Donley: I’m really looking forward to it. I know that you’re a big podcast listener and one of my favorite shows lately is called The Founders Podcast. with David Senra. And what he does is he, I don’t know if you’re familiar with it, but he’ll read biographies on like the world’s greatest entrepreneurs and leaders and athletes people like Michael Jordan, John D.

[00:02:36] Patrick Donley: Rockefeller, Steve Jobs, those kinds of guys. And then just synthesize like their life lessons, basically. And I heard him say that often in childhood, these guys had like this, almost this belief in themselves that they were destined for greatness. And you’ve had this 10 year NFL career, you’ve won a Super Bowl, Pro Bowler, you now have this successful real estate career.

[00:02:57] Patrick Donley: I just wanted to hear a little bit what it was like growing up for you and did you have this unwavering self confidence growing up that you were going to be in the NFL, you were going to do all this business stuff that you’ve done? Talk to me a little bit about that. 

[00:03:09] Cliff Avril: Oh man. I wish I could follow up with something like Michael Jordan said he knew from the jump he was gonna be Michael Jordan.

[00:03:14] Cliff Avril: No, that was not necessarily the case for me. Both my parents are Haitian. Both of ’em come from Haiti, so I’m very proud Haitian. But growing up for me was a little bit different from a culture standpoint. I had to battle this. I’m American, but I’m also Haitian lifestyle. And from a cultural standpoint, when I’m at home, I’m speaking Creole, I’m eating Haitian food.

[00:03:34] Cliff Avril: But when I walk out those doors, I’m American. I speak English. I’m trying to balance the two out my entire life was just an interesting battle, but also made me great because I was able to pull from both cultures, right? I was able to. pull the Haitian work ethic and understanding the mentality that they had, but then also being able to do the same thing from the American side.

[00:03:56] Cliff Avril: But growing up, man, I honestly thought I was going to be an NBA, like Cooper. That’s, that was my thing. I thought I was going to the NBA. I love basketball. I actually love basketball a little bit more than I went football. But one summer I grew five inches. So in my head, I’m like, man, I’m going to the NBA.

[00:04:12] Cliff Avril: There’s no doubt in my mind. What’s the NBA, but it never resonated with me that my mom was only five, two. So that was all she wrote. Like I hadn’t grown since I’ve been six, three, since I was in 10th grade but I only started playing football because I didn’t start playing football until high school only started playing football because all my.

[00:04:28] Cliff Avril: Teammates from basketball were playing football. So I was like, I don’t have anybody to hang out with. So let’s go try this football thing out. And it was brutal the first time out. And basketball players don’t necessarily like getting hit. You know what I figured it out. Started playing ball and figured it out.

[00:04:43] Cliff Avril: And I had a heck of a junior year and started getting scholarship offers. So that’s how it all started. But as far as for going to the pros, for me, honestly, I just wanted to go to college and get a degree and come right back home. And that’s one of the main reasons I picked Purdue because. I knew I had a great shot at being able to play early and be able to get back home within four years.

[00:05:03] Cliff Avril: That was my ultimate goal. But as I started playing and started getting better and some of the guys that were playing across from me were getting drafted and we had the same stats. I’m like, Oh, I actually might have a chance to keep playing this for it but I’m super, super competitive.

[00:05:18] Cliff Avril: And I think that’s what actually drove me. To get to the NFL, to be able to fortunately have a decent career in the NFL is because I love to compete. I don’t like to lose at anything. I don’t let my kids beat me at anything. I don’t let my wife beat me at anything. And I think that’s the driving factor for me, whether you talk about sports, whether you talk about business or whatever case may be is.

[00:05:39] Cliff Avril: I love to compete, and I hate to lose. I hate losing more than I actually like winning. 

[00:05:44] Patrick Donley: I love it. So I heard you say you made this comment that like the self confidence that’s necessary to make it in the NFL, it can often become like an Achilles heel, like after a football player’s career is over. Talk to me about what you meant by that.

[00:05:57] Cliff Avril: So I think sometimes our self confidence, I’m going to say ego for lack of better words, that you need to be successful in the league because the league is cutthroat. You have a new batch of guys every single year that’s coming to get your job. Every single year I was in the NFL, great season, Pro Bowl season, franchise season, whatever season I might have had, they drafted somebody at my position.

[00:06:18] Cliff Avril: You have to have some kind of self confidence to be able to get you through those types of situations and show that, hey, I deserve to be here. Now, that same ego sometimes does not necessarily work in the business world when you’re dealing with everyone else, right? And it can come off a little different, but also it doesn’t allow you to ask questions because of the ego.

[00:06:38] Cliff Avril: It doesn’t allow you to be humble to go ask questions to those that are doing really well. Now, for me in particular, from very from the jump, going to college, but also going to the pros, I’ve always tried to surround myself with the guys that I wanted to be like. I wanted to be like the veterans, so I hung around the veterans to see.

[00:06:56] Cliff Avril: How they operated, how they went about their business as professional athletes. So I’m okay going into any space and asking questions because that’s the only way you’re going to learn. But unfortunately for most athletes, we’re so used to being on top that we didn’t necessarily have to ask questions. We knew what we needed to be done.

[00:07:14] Cliff Avril: And so when you go into the real world. That’s unfamiliar territory for you at times. 

[00:07:20] Patrick Donley: Yeah, I wanted to talk about the ESPN 30 for 30 broke, which I’m sure you’ve seen. I forget the exact percentage, but it’s like a huge amount of professional athletes after their career end up bankrupt. Like across the board, whether it’s football, basketball, it doesn’t matter, boxing.

[00:07:35] Patrick Donley: We had Devon Kennard on the show and he was great. He actually drove his high school car. I think his first two seasons in the NFL, which I thought was great. Like that level of frugality. And I think it’s really challenging for when a young man comes into this newfound wealth, that’s super difficult to handle and to know how to manage.

[00:07:54] Patrick Donley: Does the NFL provide financial literacy classes, talking to you guys about like how to invest, how to save your money, how to just be financially responsible? 

[00:08:05] Cliff Avril: They do have courses, right? They have they’re like the 101 Hey, this is how you should budget. Hey the small stuff and I think guys need to take advantage of those types of things because a lot of times most of us come from nothing.

[00:08:19] Cliff Avril: A lot of us come in fresh out of college where you get your Pell Grant. I remember getting my Pell Grant would get 2, 200. I was the richest man on campus. You could not tell me I wasn’t the richest man on campus. You go from that and then somebody tells you they’re going to write you a check for 400, 500, 000.

[00:08:35] Cliff Avril: You’re apt to do some stupid stuff. You’re 22 years old. And I don’t care if you’re an athlete or not. If somebody writes you a check for six figures, you’re going to do some, you’re going to make some mistakes. And unfortunately, because you’re in the limelight, people are going to pay, you should do better and all these different things.

[00:08:53] Cliff Avril: But what I do know is along the same lines with DK, like for me. I lived with my mom during the off season. My first three seasons, I lived with my mom. Like I’ll go back to Jacksonville and stay in the same bedroom, twin size bed. I’m an NFL guy living in my first three seasons. Because what I realized was the money really isn’t as much as you thought it was.

[00:09:16] Cliff Avril: Taxes and everything else, agents fees and all this other stuff comes out of it. I remember talking to my agent and he’s Hey, you’re gonna sign for, I think it’s 1. 2 And all I hear is 1. 2 million over three years. I’m like, oh, okay, cool. But the only thing guaranteed is that the Sorry bonus, which I believe was like 300 and some thousand dollars in my salary for a year, which was 295, 000 I get off the phone.

[00:09:41] Cliff Avril: My, oh my gosh. We’ve made it and I’m like, I’m going to give my mom 50, 000. I’m gonna get my dad. I’m making a checklist of all these things that I’m going to do for my parents and my family. And then I get my first check and I call my agent. I’m like, Hey, when do I get the rest of my money? And he’s Oh, how much did they send you?

[00:09:57] Cliff Avril: I’m like, I think it was like 200, 000 or something like that. And he’s no, that’s everything. I’m like, what do you know? You told me my assignment bonus was like 400, 000 or whatever the number was. He’s no, there’s taxes. There’s, I’m like, who the heck is this FICA person? Who was like, who just took all this money out of my tax, like my check or whatever.

[00:10:16] Cliff Avril: And he’s Oh yeah. On top of that, you still owe me my percentage too, my 3 percent as well. So now I’m like, wait up, I’m not getting that entire that whole pot that you guys told me I was going to get. Don’t get me wrong. 200, 000 is a lot of money, but for a 22 year old that hasn’t bought a house, hasn’t done anything, it really doesn’t go that far.

[00:10:35] Cliff Avril: I hadn’t, I didn’t buy a car or anything like that. So that’s when I went into the mode of Oh wait, appearance. I got to wait. Y’all got to like. It’s gonna be a few more years before I can give you anything. I’m actually coming home during the off season to live with you guys, right? Those types of experiences if you don’t come from London, you don’t know.

[00:10:51] Cliff Avril: And for me, fortunately, I didn’t blow through all that. Now, I did make some mistakes. I bought a brand new car, which I shouldn’t have. But fortunately for me, I was able to bounce back from that. Most guys don’t 

[00:11:02] Patrick Donley: wasn’t your first job at Krispy Kreme. Is that true? 

[00:11:06] Cliff Avril: Yes. Yes. Yes My first and only job actually or was that Chris actually I lied I worked somewhere else for a summer for a short period of time.

[00:11:14] Cliff Avril: But yes, I worked at Krispy Kreme I was making like 10 an hour. I was 15 years old and at the time 10 an hour was unheard of And what’s funny is I worked there for a month, maybe six weeks or something like that. And spring football was rolling around and so I’m like, Hey, I’m going to be missing some days.

[00:11:33] Cliff Avril: I don’t know how the work environment works. I’m just like, Hey, maybe I could take days off when I need them. I’m like, Hey, I’m going to have to tailor back on some of my schedule. I’ll just work weekends. Like spring football is trying to starting up or whatever. I took the first day off and boss was like, okay, but look you’re gonna, you’re like, can’t keep missing days.

[00:11:50] Cliff Avril: And I remember I missed another day. Look, you can’t keep missing days. So I talked to my manager, I said, Hey, I think we have to quit, man. Cause obviously the schedule doesn’t work for you guys, but I want to keep playing football. And my manager looked at me, I’m 15. He’s probably 16 or 17 at the time.

[00:12:04] Cliff Avril: He looks at me. He’s you’re going to quit making 10 an hour to go play football. What are you thinking? What do you think you’re going to make it? And if I was to see him today, he probably wouldn’t even remember this, but. I’m like, yeah, I’m going to take a chance. Like I want to have fun. My parents told me I didn’t necessarily have to work.

[00:12:18] Cliff Avril: So I quit and I play a football and it’s the best decision I ever made. 

[00:12:23] Patrick Donley: But your mom was not into you playing football initially. What is that right? She was I’m not sure if football is the thing for you to do. 

[00:12:30] Cliff Avril: Yeah. No, even when I quit Krispy Kreme, she thought I was still playing basketball.

[00:12:35] Cliff Avril: So in the Haitian culture, football at that time was barbaric. That’s the American sport. Like you’re not playing that. On top of that, I’m my mom’s only child, right? So she’s there’s no way my child is going to be playing football. Like I thought you’re going to play basketball, play soccer.

[00:12:49] Cliff Avril: You’re going to do all these other things, but that football stuff that lead that to the Americans almost. So I played my sophomore year, but I wasn’t really playing much. I played my junior and I broke my leg, but she thought I broke my leg playing basketball this whole time. She’s thinking I’m playing basketball.

[00:13:02] Cliff Avril: And then my senior year, somebody from work comes in with a newspaper and she’s Hey, is this your son? And she’s wait, do you have a newspaper? You’re telling me my slight, nothing but negative stuff is coming through her hair at this point, right? And she’s He’s looks like he’s a really good football player.

[00:13:19] Cliff Avril: She’s like football player. My son doesn’t play football. He plays basketball. And the lady’s no, he got player of the week. This is your son, right? And she’s Oh my gosh, that is my son. Cause I had a picture of me and everything else. She comes home is just furious. What is this football stuff that you’re doing?

[00:13:32] Cliff Avril: What are you talking about? Like, why are you playing? I’m like, mom, like I’ve been playing, I’m good at it. They’re telling me I could probably go to college for it. And she’s like college like we had no clue how we’re going to pay for college. I’ll probably go to a junior college or something like that or community college of some sort.

[00:13:46] Cliff Avril: She’s you can go to college. Like they’ll pay for it. And I’m like, yeah, that’s what it sounds like. If I continue to keep playing, she’s like, all right Hey, just make sure you’re careful out there. I can’t I can’t believe I’m even agreeing to this, but make sure you’re careful out there.

[00:13:58] Cliff Avril: And again. One of the best decisions both of us made was allowing me to keep playing football. 

[00:14:05] Patrick Donley: You’ve had a great career. Ten years won a Super Bowl, Pro Bowl, what, in 2016? Sixteen, I believe. But you ended up getting hurt with a neck injury, and I’ve heard you talk pretty openly about mental health stuff and therapy.

[00:14:18] Patrick Donley: My wife is a therapist, and we actually own office buildings where we rent out office space to therapists that are in private practice. That’s… That’s kind of part of my world. It’s like the whole therapy counseling world. So I wanted to hear what that was like for you. You just come off of a Pro Bowl, I believe you’ve had, have this neck injury where it seemed like maybe you were paralyzed.

[00:14:38] Patrick Donley: I don’t, I want to hear the full story, but I just want to hear about like the challenges mentally, psychologically that you went through dealing with that. Cause that’s a rough thing. 

[00:14:48] Cliff Avril: Let me paint the entire picture for you, right? Cause this is. I don’t even know if I’ve ever even said this on a platform, but I have to say it’s a family members, but so this is such a whirlwind and such an up and down type of situation.

[00:15:00] Cliff Avril: So in 2015, we went to the Super Bowl. We lost the Super Bowl 2015. Also, we found out we’re having a boy. But the same weekend we’re finding out we’re having a boy, my dad passes away. So it’s the same he passed away on Friday, on Saturday I find out I’m having a boy. The next season, 2016, 2015, 2016 season, I ball out.

[00:15:22] Cliff Avril: I’m killing it. But it’s to not think about all the crazy stuff that was going on. So we go from Super Bowl, find out I’m having a son, to my dad passing away, I’m crushing it in football. The next following season, I crush and go to the Pro Bowl and then I have a career hitting injury and it was such a freak accident at that, right?

[00:15:41] Cliff Avril: All of these things have happened probably within a 3 to 4 year time for 3 year time frame and like that, my career is over with. The play in itself actually was a play that I’ve probably done a thousand times trying to click the guy’s heels. But unfortunately, his heel came up and hit me up underneath my chin and it felt like whiplash almost.

[00:16:02] Cliff Avril: And both arms went numb. Now, to me, the sensation that I got, I’ve gotten before, but just in one hour, we usually call it a stinger. So I had, I thought I had a stinger, but it was in both arms, but the psychological piece of all that I’m on the floor and I try to push myself. I’m on the turf. I try to push myself up and I couldn’t.

[00:16:22] Cliff Avril: So I’m like, man, I need to hurry up and roll over because I don’t want them to think I’m concussed. Cause I wasn’t. So I don’t want them to think I’m concussed and also it was a Sunday night game and I know my mom’s watching. So I don’t want her worried either. Like all these things happen like immediately.

[00:16:38] Cliff Avril: So I get up and if you watch some of the footage, you see me shaking my hands because I started getting feelings back in my hands and the guys were like, no, you need to lay down. We want to bring a card out to a stretcher and take you off the field. I’m like, first off, if I can walk I’m not letting you.

[00:16:51] Cliff Avril: Put me on a stretcher on a Monday, on a Sunday night game where my mom’s watching and she messing around and freak out and poor thing. So I walk off to the field, but you see me shaking my head or whatever and end up going to the hospital or whatever that evening and MRI test after test after test.

[00:17:09] Cliff Avril: And we go through this fat where they just kept asking me, are you sure you feel okay? Are you sure you feel okay? My man, guys, stop asking me. I’m feel fine. I feel like I’m going to play next week. And then they find something like, Hey the reason we keep asking me, because most people do not walk in with this injury.

[00:17:25] Cliff Avril: Most people are paralyzed with this injury. My whole life. And that’s when it hit me that, okay my career might be over with. So we go through all that process. Go do I have a, I actually have a plate in my neck about this big. That’ll be in there forever. I had to get a fusion done essentially in my neck.

[00:17:39] Cliff Avril: And that’s when I started thinking about, okay, what the heck is next? Because I’ve been playing football up until that point, I’m 33 years old. I’ve been playing football for 15 years, 60 years of my life. So more than half of my life I’ve been playing football. So now it’s the transition piece, but I’ve always had in my mind that.

[00:17:55] Cliff Avril: Football is what I do, not who I am. That’s the only occupation, because you’ve been doing it for so long, it becomes one. But most people like, no, it’s just your job. This is how you feed your family. This is what you need to do. But it’s not who you are. So I’ve always had that mindset. So I’ve always prepared myself for whatever that might happen.

[00:18:13] Cliff Avril: So that whole offseason, like I just continue to just. Making relationships and figure out what the next move might be. So I tried media, I had my own radio show. But the entire time I was in the league, at least the last four or five years I was in the league, I was also doing real estate things, right? I was investing in different funds.

[00:18:29] Cliff Avril: I was doing syndications, but I wasn’t necessarily doing anything on my own. And then after doing some media, doing ESPN, I was doing stuff in overseas and all that stuff. And real estate just kept calling, real estate just kept calling me like, and then I just decided to open up my own real estate company and start to buy more real estate.

[00:18:47] Cliff Avril: And I’m sure we’re going to dive into it, but that was just something that just kept calling it. I’m a big believer in chasing passions, not the money because that’s what got me this far. I genuinely love football. And money just started coming behind it, right? And money started happening. So it’s the same thing with real estate and everything else that I continue to do.

[00:19:04] Cliff Avril: I just will chase my passion and there’s a financial benefit behind it. We’ll take that too. 

[00:19:09] Patrick Donley: What was the first inspiration for real estate? Was it a book, a podcast, a mentor, somebody that got you involved? I just want to hear how you like found that passion. 

[00:19:18] Cliff Avril: So fortunate enough, after we went to Silver Bowl, I’m not joking right here.

[00:19:22] Cliff Avril: After we went to Silver Bowl. I’m fortunate to be in Seattle. You get to meet so many entrepreneurs and different people that are doing some really cool stuff. You get to meet the CEO of Microsoft, you get to meet CEO of Zillow, you get to meet all these CEOs and all these people that are doing some really cool stuff, all of them own real estate.

[00:19:40] Cliff Avril: And I used to always ask myself, like, why, like, why do y’all own real estate? Your company’s worth whatever. And you’re making this much money. And as I dove deeper into it, when we started talking there’s a lot of tax benefits. There’s a lot of, it’s a wealth builder. It’s, it appreciates over time all these different things they were telling me.

[00:19:57] Cliff Avril: So I’m like, okay maybe that’s something I need to look into even more, right? The cash flow aspect of it you want the mailbox money. That’s how I got into the syndications and funds and different things like that. So I started getting the itch there and then Rich Dad Poor Dad. Honestly, I didn’t read that until I retired.

[00:20:13] Cliff Avril: And so once I read Rich Dad Poor Dad and I started reading Rich Smith and Babylon and all these different books about finances, because that was another fear of mine is you hear the sex, you hear. guys going broke. You hear all these different things. So I didn’t want to be a part of that.

[00:20:28] Cliff Avril: So I started doing my own research, started going to class and going to different conferences and just started building from there. 

[00:20:34] Patrick Donley: Were you friends with DK at that point? Have you guys talked about your investments at all or anything like that? Or did you have anybody in the NFL that was like, Hey they helping you out.

[00:20:44] Cliff Avril: There was a few guys like in Dominic and Sue, he was a teammate of mine in Detroit. He’s big into real estate and he was somebody that I would converse with a lot. DK, no, I didn’t meet him. I met him actually at a real estate conference, a real estate event and it come to find out he’s into it.

[00:20:59] Cliff Avril: We had some mutual friends and then we’ve been cool ever since. I just spoke to him recently just talking about what he’s thinking about doing now that he’s retired. what I’m working on as well. And just to Laban and I’m about different strategies and different ideas. 

[00:21:13] Patrick Donley: I wanted to hear about as an NFL player, there’s people that just want your time, your money, your attention, all of that.

[00:21:19] Patrick Donley: How do you go about finding the people that you trust in whether it’s real estate investments, whatever it is talk to me a little bit about that about because you got to find like people you trust. If you don’t, it’s rough. 

[00:21:31] Cliff Avril: I think I have a little bit of a different unique situation in comparison to most other athletes.

[00:21:36] Cliff Avril: I give this example all the time, it’s if you think of some of the smaller markets, the Detroit’s, maybe not Detroit, but Jacksonville, the Cincinnati’s. Stephen Cleveland. The athletes probably are some of the top earners in those cities. In Seattle, we might not come top 2, 000 and I’m not even joking.

[00:21:53] Cliff Avril: You know what I mean? You just got all these tech money out here, right? You have some of these different real estate companies and so there’s a lot of money flowing through the city. For me, I have comfort in that because some of these guys don’t need my money. Somehow I’ve literally had conversations where guys, they didn’t necessarily laugh, but they chuckle like, Oh, you made how much over your career?

[00:22:11] Cliff Avril: Oh, cool. We made that last year, so like from an ego perspective, it could probably hurt your feelings. But for me, it’s that’s comforting because you don’t need anything. I had. So now I can actually pick your brain and you actually are giving me real information that’s not biased.

[00:22:25] Cliff Avril: There’s not a need behind. There’s no handout behind it. That’s comforting for me and I’m big on networking. I’m big on meeting different individuals. And that’s how I’ve been able to build my, community of business folks that I can rely on for advice. 

[00:22:40] Patrick Donley: So walk us through like your first couple of investments that you did.

[00:22:44] Patrick Donley: You ended up running to NFL players, didn’t you? 

[00:22:47] Cliff Avril: That’s correct. That’s correct. So the first real estate play that I’ve ever made was buying my mom a house. And then I’m like, Oh, that’s one of the best investments I made. Because going back and looking at it now, it’s like it’s doubled in value since then.

[00:22:58] Cliff Avril: But the actual investment that I bought was I bought the same year I got her maybe three or four months after I got her. Cause I was very much into the whole real estate play was I bought a condo and I was like, you know what? I know NFL players need places. Like I know what they need. So I bought a condo that was maybe 10 minutes away from the practice facility.

[00:23:19] Cliff Avril: I furnished it, washing dryer. All the players needed to do was come with their clothes. And they’re set, right? Cause I know their schedule. I know what they need. So I bought that back in 2018 or maybe 2019. And it was cashflow and it was doing well. Cause you’re getting a premium on it. You’re at 9 month rentals or even 12 month rentals.

[00:23:37] Cliff Avril: You’re getting a premium because it’s furnished. And then I’m like, you know what? This is good. Let me buy another one. So I bought another condo. Not too far from that, but same criteria. 10 minutes away from the facility, fully furnished. This one was a 3 bed, 2 bath, a little bit bigger. just in case somebody had a family or whatever.

[00:23:52] Cliff Avril: Same thing. Just printing my, I’m saying printing money, essentially. I’m like, Oh man. Okay. Now let’s try to do this, but in another city now because my best friend is a general contractor. I’m like, okay. I trust him. He was in my wedding. This is my best friend. So I’m going to try something in Chicago.

[00:24:09] Cliff Avril: This is my first time investing out of state, something low far, but now I have a structure of kind of what I want, a criteria of what I want, what I’m looking for. So I bought another condo out there and then bought another condo. So now I’m like, okay, these condos are great, but these HOAs are killing me.

[00:24:22] Cliff Avril: They’re killing the bottom line a little bit. So now I go from single. So now I went and bought a triplex out there as well, and that was going well. We’re renovating value add play, same kind of concept. I went big after that one and bought like a 50, a unit from there. And we’ve been buying bigger from there.

[00:24:39] Cliff Avril: So that’s been the trajectory you hear all these gurus, all these guys that are killing it in the game, they’re like, man, just go big. Immediately. I’m a big believer in crawling before you walk, so I let the journey in the route that I’ve taken, because I’ve gotten to learn through the process.

[00:24:55] Cliff Avril: But when I have learned is. Just as much energy as it takes to take care of a three unit, the same as it goes into a 58 unit, right? But again, I like the way I went about it because. You get to learn the game with less money involved. I like the way, the journey I took, but I can understand why people say go big early before leave the single family stuff alone and go big.

[00:25:17] Cliff Avril: I can see why they say it, but the route I took is, it made more sense for me. 

[00:25:22] Patrick Donley: To your point about walking before like crawling for a while, I was listening to a podcast yesterday and the guy was comparing real estate investing to getting a black belt in taekwondo or karate or Brazilian jiu jitsu, whatever.

[00:25:35] Patrick Donley: You start out as a white belt, right? And same in real estate. You got to start off as a white belt, work your way up to the black belt. And that takes many years and you can accelerate that and go big eventually. But I do think what you said is exactly right. You got to crawl, learn at when the stakes are low and then advance as you go.

[00:25:51] Patrick Donley: So talk to me about that, whatever, earning your brown belt or whatever, when you did that 58 unit. That, that’s the big next step. What was that like for you? And where was that? 

[00:26:01] Cliff Avril: So this one was in Huntsville, Alabama, actually, which is doing a really good job of right now. So it’s probably one of our best performing assets, but this opportunity actually presented itself from what I’ve realized with real estate real quick is real estate is the ultimate team sport.

[00:26:15] Cliff Avril: You can’t do any of it by yourself. And football is a team sport. Like I think, and I implement a lot of the things that I learned in football to my business, because Russell Wilson is a great friend of mine and he was a great quarterback. But Russell Wilson can’t do any of it without a good running game or offensive linemen, right?

[00:26:33] Cliff Avril: Offensive linemen in front of them to protect them. Tom Brady, same exact thing. Drew Brees, same thing. So it’s a team sport. Now, certain guys get the credit for it, but it’s a team sport. And it’s the same thing with real estate. You have to get out and network and kind of build your team. Whether you’re talking about brokers, lending brokers, whatever the case may be.

[00:26:50] Cliff Avril: And that’s what I was doing. I was emerging myself into that space. And you start meeting different people. And one of the, one of my, he’s a good friend of mine now. He’s our lending broker. He’s Hey, I have a lady that owns some property in Huntsville. She can’t take the deal down by herself.

[00:27:06] Cliff Avril: Would you be down to partner up with her? I’m like, yeah, send me your resume. But then also I want to Talked to her cause partnerships are like a marriage. Yeah like you’re locked in. We communicated and we had some really good conversation. We were aligned in kind of what we were looking to do.

[00:27:21] Cliff Avril: And I pulled the trigger. With her, she already owned 120 units or so in the area. She already had the infrastructure, she had the team, she had the property manager we wouldn’t go see her properties and see how the management was going. And it just made sense. So that made that next jump a little bit easier for me because I was also partnering up with someone and I was able to pick their brain and their experience of owning bigger assets than what I was used to at the time.

[00:27:46] Cliff Avril: So it ended up working out really well. 

[00:27:49] Patrick Donley: So I saw that interview that you did with her. Tell me her name again. Is it Nellia? Nellia. Yeah. So tell me some of the things that you learned from her. She’d been in the game for several years. It sounded and. was in Seattle, had this project in Huntsville.

[00:28:04] Patrick Donley: Talk to me a little bit about what you learned from her. 

[00:28:07] Cliff Avril: Nellie is awesome. I think the biggest thing is she actually taught me like having a team is important, but having structure is even more important, right? We have monthly calls. She’s essentially like the asset manager, right? So we have monthly calls.

[00:28:22] Cliff Avril: She talks to the property managers probably weekly, if not every other week. Cause she has other assets as well, but I would say the biggest thing with her is making sure your structure for your company is correct. It’s on point. Make sure you have the meeting set up. Make sure your team understands what your expectations are.

[00:28:40] Cliff Avril: The property we bought, it was a big value add property and watching her. Direct traffic and obviously I’m a part of those conversations and I’m telling her, Hey, we should probably do it this way. It’s a teamwork, right? She learned from me, but I’m more so learning from her and how she manages all of those different individuals, whether it’s contractors, whether it’s property managers, whatever it may be, the bankers, whatever it may be.

[00:29:02] Cliff Avril: Just understanding how to navigate in that space. I think it’s been huge for me because I’ve been able to implement that with all my other assets that I have as well. 

[00:29:10] Patrick Donley: So talk to me a little bit about the partnership itself. Were you 50 50 partners and how did you divide up the work? It sounded like she was.

[00:29:17] Patrick Donley: The one with the experience that knew how to do the value add. Were you primarily the financial backer or just talk a little bit about how the partnership works? 

[00:29:26] Cliff Avril: No. So I don’t care what kind of partnership it is. You’re going to have some skin in the game when you’re dealing with me. You’re going to have to put some money into it too.

[00:29:35] Cliff Avril: But she was very much willing to do but what we ended up doing was We agreed to how much she would be able to put in and I would make up the difference or whatever the case might be. But then I gave her a little bit more equity because I knew she’s going to be the asset managed and she had to get us to the finish line of the refinance for that to actually kick in.

[00:29:52] Cliff Avril: So we put it basically like an NFL contract. Again, there’s incentives, right? To be able to get to the finish line, but also to own more of the asset. So that’s how we structured it. She became an asset manager. We gave her I think I would say we gave her an extra 15 percent that wouldn’t kick in until we actually refiled and got the property stabilized.

[00:30:09] Cliff Avril: And it’s been great. It’s been great. And that structure, actually, I just learned it from, I used to listen to podcasts and it just made sense in that particular moment to be able to implement that. But she definitely has some skill in the game and then has a little bit more equity for her role as well.

[00:30:24] Patrick Donley: You mentioned the podcast and I know you, when you work out, you listen to real estate podcasts. I’m just curious who you listen to, what you like to listen to. What you’ve been into lately, anything that stands out? 

[00:30:35] Cliff Avril: Oh, man, it’s funny. So I used to, I went from listening to music to listen to the podcast when I work out, but of course you start off with the bare pockets all there and they have so many different podcasts that you can listen to for beginners all the way through syndicators.

[00:30:50] Cliff Avril: I listened to actually Rod Khleif. I actually just went to one of his events last week. I think it was, I listened to, what’s her name? He I can’t remember her first name. But the cashflow podcast there’s quite a few of them that if we thumb through it, I can list them all, but it’s quite a bit.

[00:31:06] Cliff Avril: And that’s literally all I listen to every day, all day. I don’t know what the highest music is out right now. I don’t know what the nicest, the hottest, the movies that are rolling out because I seriously only listen to podcasts day to day out to just learn. It’s just a great opportunity to be able to learn from other people’s experiences.

[00:31:22] Cliff Avril: And then at some point you just got to go hit blue man. 

[00:31:25] Patrick Donley: Yeah, exactly. Are you on real estate Twitter? Do you follow any of the guys on real estate Twitter? 

[00:31:31] Cliff Avril: There’s a real estate Twitter? I’m not really on Twitter to be honest with you. 

[00:31:35] Patrick Donley: I tell you what, check out real estate Twitter. It is a gold mine.

[00:31:38] Patrick Donley: Absolute gold mine. And it’s like a really super giving community. If you follow the right guys, like there’s a handful of guys that you can, you’ll figure out who to follow. But I’ve been just really impressed with the real estate community on Twitter. 

[00:31:52] Cliff Avril: So I am a part of a few different groups like on Facebook and different things like that to one, it helps with deal flow, but then also just again, to see how people are taking down deals in this environment right now too, right?

[00:32:03] Cliff Avril: So I’m a big believer in just immersing yourself into that community and just learning from people’s experiences learning, like I said early, right? When I walked into the locker room, I looked for the veteran players in there because I wanted to learn from them and their experience.

[00:32:19] Cliff Avril: There’s no different with the real estate. 

[00:32:21] Patrick Donley: One thing on real estate Twitter, now that I’m thinking of it, was I learned about cost segregation on real estate Twitter, maybe last summer. So I’ve been doing deep dives into cost segregation. I had a guy on, Mitchell Baldridge is his name. He’s got a company called Cost Seg Solutions, I think it’s called.

[00:32:37] Patrick Donley: It’s really interesting. He said in the interview that only three to 5 percent of real estate investors. Take advantage of cost segregation studies, which kind of blew my mind, but yeah, it is crazy. So I know that you’re into it. Can you talk to me a little bit about your experience with it? 

[00:32:52] Cliff Avril: Yes, cost seg I think is one of those things that it’s a goldmine once you find out about it, right?

[00:32:59] Cliff Avril: Because Especially if you’re a real estate professional I think there’s so many ways to be able to use it. And I’ve had nothing but a great experience with it so far. I’ve done a cost tag on every one of my properties to be able to roll all those essential, essentially tax credits, write offs, whatever you want to call it.

[00:33:16] Cliff Avril: Upfront. And then you get to use those against any earned income or whatever else too. So I’m big on it. I know they’re gradually trying to phase it out right now, but hopefully somebody gets an office. It kind of changes that, but yeah, no, I’m a big proponent of Carl Sagan.

[00:33:32] Cliff Avril: I just think that if more people knew about it and understand it, because at the end of the day, I don’t care what space you’re in financially or occupational profession, what are the biggest expenses you’re going to have is going to be taxes. And I know, I feel like most people would like to mitigate that as much as possible.

[00:33:50] Cliff Avril: So if you, if there’s legal ways of doing it, you should probably do it. You should probably do it. I would rather get that extra tax money and deploy in the way that I feel needs be whether it’s cause I do a lot of charity work as well. Like I would rather have that extra income to do the charity work that I want to do.

[00:34:05] Cliff Avril: Instead of giving it back to Uncle Sam or whatever the case may be. So I’m big on being able to try to save legally, of course, as much taxes as possible to be able to deploy and get back to the community as I see fit. 

[00:34:17] Patrick Donley: Yeah, it’s huge. It’s something that I just did a study and I’m eager to keep doing more, but just so for our listeners that don’t know, it allows you basically to front end a lot of the depreciation expenses.

[00:34:30] Patrick Donley: So you take a ton of expense in the first year or so. You can do a hundred percent bonus depreciation, as you mentioned, they’re phasing it out to 80% and 60%. I think right now it’s at 80% of Yep. For this year. Yeah. And I have seen whatever you talks about in a Senate or whatever, talks about getting it back to a hundred percent.

[00:34:48] Patrick Donley: So we’ll see. Fingers crossed that that happens. 

[00:34:52] Cliff Avril: I hope so. I hope so. I think collectively, right? ’cause we have a housing issue in the country. There’s not enough housing for everyone in America right now. So having little incentives like this. Allows people to get back into the development game, allows people to get back into want to get into all of the assets that I own are value add assets.

[00:35:11] Cliff Avril: So I want to get into certain communities, but we’re getting to certain pockets to be able to upgrade and add value. To whatever property I end up purchasing, these different individuals and tenants love the property, and I also get a tax benefit from that as well, right? So I just think that’s a need, that’s a must for both parties, the people that are putting these projects together, and also the tenants and everybody else, the housing issue that we have.

[00:35:37] Patrick Donley: I wanted to hear, have you explored Opportunity Zones at all? Have you been involved in any Opportunity Zones? 

[00:35:44] Cliff Avril: I’ve looked into it, but I haven’t pulled the trigger on any of them. I had an opportunity to invest in the Opportunity Zone Fund. But I didn’t pull the trigger on that either, but it’s definitely interesting.

[00:35:54] Cliff Avril: I just there’s so many ways to make money in real estate, and what I realized, especially early on, cause I was definitely the guy that was chasing every shiny, I had the shiny object syndrome. Oh man, industrial, oh man, multifamily, oh man, single family there’s just so many ways to do it.

[00:36:12] Cliff Avril: And I just had to hunker down. I can’t play quarterback in a defensive end at the same time. You know what I mean? I need to focus on being great at this thing right now. I tell my wife all the time you can’t be great at multiple things at one time. You can be great at something and then move on to something else to be great at that.

[00:36:27] Cliff Avril: But you can’t be great at all of them at the same time. There’s not enough time to know that I had to hunker down and say, I’m going to just do value add, multifamily, properties. And then once I get this kind of going, I’ll start to look at other ways with the opportunity zones and learning the rules and regulations of that, which I’m sure I could do that with what I’m doing now.

[00:36:48] Cliff Avril: I just don’t have the bandwidth to like completely take on something like that right now. 

[00:36:53] Patrick Donley: I hear what you’re saying about the shiny object center. I’ve got the same thing like doing this podcast. I’m exposed to so many different people doing so many different strategies and it’s it’s a real thing.

[00:37:02] Patrick Donley: It’s a real danger. 

[00:37:04] Cliff Avril: Oh, it is. It is. And then you just end up, honestly. Going in circles a little bit and never really good at what did he say? The jack of all trades, a master of none or something like that. That’s a real thing. And I just feel like you don’t really get, you don’t push your potential as much as you could.

[00:37:19] Cliff Avril: If you just are were down in just got great at one thing. 

[00:37:23] Patrick Donley: Yeah. Focused on your niche. So right now it’s multifamily value add. You’re you’reyardsville? Are you in other areas? 

[00:37:30] Cliff Avril: I’m at Huntsville. I’m in Chicago and I’m in Seattle and I know some people, I win certain cities because. Some are tenant friendly, some are landlord friendly, Huntsville is very much landlord friendly, Chicago’s tenant friendly, it’s more of a tenant friendly type of city, but there’s still opportunities, right?

[00:37:47] Cliff Avril: There’s still opportunities, you gotta get out and get creative a little bit, but those are the three marks that I’m in right now and I’m looking to get more assets in the Southeast region for sure. 

[00:37:57] Patrick Donley: What about Columbus? I heard Nelia, she mentioned Columbus, Ohio in your interview, I believe. 

[00:38:02] Cliff Avril: She did.

[00:38:03] Cliff Avril: I like the Midwest. It’s funny because in 2020, when I was really getting things going, they’re like, Oh man, the Midwest is one of the markets you should probably stay away from. They don’t appreciate, they don’t do this, they don’t do that. But come to find out over the last three or four years, the Midwest, certain pockets, of course, whether you’re talking about Chicago, you’re talking about Columbus, Indianapolis, all those, they actually were the more stable regions in comparison to of course, everybody was down in Texas.

[00:38:28] Cliff Avril: Everybody was down in Florida and now things are tapering off in those areas, but things continue to keep rising in the Midwest, it’s been interesting watching kind of the progression of all these different regions. 

[00:38:41] Patrick Donley: Cliff, I just wanted to ask a little bit about the projects with your wife.

[00:38:44] Patrick Donley: I know you guys have done some luxury spec homes in Seattle. Tell me about those. Tell me about like your strategy, how you think about doing those projects and then how you’re, once the project is complete, what are you doing with the funds at that point? 

[00:38:56] Cliff Avril: Yes. So it is, Working with the wife can be interesting nonetheless, because you can’t communicate with them like you would like to when it comes down to some of your other business partners, but I think after some trials and tribulations, I think it’s all about having assignments, right?

[00:39:12] Cliff Avril: And knowing your position. I’m the defensive end. You’re the DB. Like we do two different things, but we work together. So once I got that in perspective, there’s You know, her role essentially is interior decorating her and my business partner’s wife as well are both interior decorators. So they come in once we get the process going, have the house drywall and all that good stuff.

[00:39:34] Cliff Avril: They pick up the material for the floors and whatever other access that we might need. So that’s her role in the grand scheme of things. And then with the luxury homes, what we tend to do is, obviously we flip them, we sell them. Most times than not, we try to pre sell them, to be honest with you.

[00:39:51] Cliff Avril: Just, it’s always good to have a buyer already during the process because you don’t have the stresses of trying to put it on the open market. Might take a little bit less, but. That’s okay. Cause I rather I’m all about guaranteeing money. Even when I played in the NFL, it’s about guaranteeing money.

[00:40:05] Cliff Avril: I didn’t care how big the contract was. It was about how much money is guaranteed to come to me. And that’s how I approached this. And then once we get the proceeds, that’s what we use to go buy multifamily properties. We go buy our distressed properties with those proceeds. And then we keep the principal there and try to flip it again with another house.

[00:40:23] Cliff Avril: And we tend to do that probably every 18 to 24 months. It’s our timeline as far as for. being able to get a project going, flipping it and looking for multifamily properties in the meantime. 

[00:40:37] Patrick Donley: And so the multifamily stuff is outside of Seattle, right? The distressed properties you’re looking at, you mentioned Huntsville, Alabama.

[00:40:43] Patrick Donley: Are you finding anything else out there right now? Is there anything on your radar? 

[00:40:48] Cliff Avril: So Huntsville, Alabama, I’m actually looking at a project right now out there that’s a real big value add property. We’re running through the numbers right now. I love Huntsville market. It’s one of the fastest growing markets in the country.

[00:40:59] Cliff Avril: A lot of jobs, a lot of occupations there as well. I like Chicago as well because I like the Midwest. Let me say that. But I like Chicago in particular, because I have a team out there. I know the area. I know the market. I went to school not too far from there. Some of the. The rental things that you would typically try to shy away from out there is out there, but I like the market because I can add value and enforce appreciation.

[00:41:23] Cliff Avril: And then I’m looking, I love the Southeast region of the country, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama. I’m looking for some different assets there in particular, Jacksonville, Florida. I’ve been looking and poking around there, but I think some opportunity will present themselves here in the next.

[00:41:41] Patrick Donley: And that’s home originally, right? Jacksonville. 

[00:41:44] Cliff Avril: Yes. I think it’d be pretty cool to own something back at home. I actually looked at trying to purchase the apartment complex that I grew up in actually. Yeah. A few years ago, but they wanted way too much for it. So I’m waiting to see when those numbers have come down, but I think it’d be really cool to own something at home, but also me starting my real estate business.

[00:42:03] Cliff Avril: And I mentioned this early on is it’s also about helping family and friends be able to invest in real estate. For generational wealth and I think something being close to home would help them understand the process a little bit more as well. So that’s why another reason why I’m looking at Jackson 

[00:42:19] Patrick Donley: is your mother.

[00:42:20] Patrick Donley: Is she involved a little bit at all with the real estate stuff or do you want to get her and draw her in a little bit? 

[00:42:25] Cliff Avril: She’s my biggest investor. She’s all in. She wished I would have started a little bit earlier because she’s getting, she just turned 65. So she’s looking to her retirement plan outside of me, she wants to have some money put away and she’s always Hey, let me know about the next project. I got a couple dollars saved up. Please let me know. I want to get some cash flow going and all that good stuff. So she’s definitely involved from an investor standpoint. 

[00:42:49] Patrick Donley: That’s awesome.

[00:42:50] Patrick Donley: Are you looking at any other asset classes at all, like self storage or industrial or anything like that? Does anything like that interest you at all? Are you going to stick to multifamily and like you said, stay in your lane? 

[00:43:01] Cliff Avril: Exactly. That shiny object syndrome is real. When you first get started, I’ve looked at.

[00:43:07] Cliff Avril: Single family, multifamily. I’ve looked at self storage, development, all those different things. And again, I go back to football. I can’t be a great quarterback and a defensive end. It’s either or like you can’t do both. And I’m a firm believer that you just can’t be great at multiple things at once.

[00:43:23] Cliff Avril: I think you’d be great at something. And then move into another space and try to excel in that. But I don’t think you can grow and be great at two things at the same time. So I try to stay focused with the Multifamily Value Act. I’m still building out my criteria, but that’s for sure the lane I want to be in.

[00:43:39] Patrick Donley: That’s such a good point. I wanted to hear a little too about, do you have any NFL superstars that have gone on to a career in real estate that you admire, that you want to clone, that you want to copy their career at all? 

[00:43:51] Cliff Avril: For sure. There’s a couple in particular. Elvis Ville. He was a heck of a athlete, heck of a defensive end played, I don’t know, 10, maybe 12 years in the NFL.

[00:44:02] Cliff Avril: And he’s doing some big developments down there in Miami south, south Florida. And he has a huge development maybe three or 400 units or something crazy like that going on out there. And he’s been crushing it. He’s doing his thing. And then a guy by the name of Terrance Murphy, he’s actually like a mentor to me.

[00:44:18] Cliff Avril: Terrance Murphy. He started off as a broker and he’s built his company out to do, I wanna say. Over a billion dollars in sales or something like that. Now he’s in the acquisition phases of his career and he’s doing a lot of cool things. So I would say those two guys in particular are guys that I’m paying attention to, but I know quite a few other guys that are in the real estate space.

[00:44:40] Cliff Avril: Those two guys in particular are like taking it to another level. 

[00:44:43] Patrick Donley: Is that something you consider for yourself, like brokerage? Does that interest you at all, like the sales side of things or no? 

[00:44:50] Cliff Avril: I don’t know. And I understand why that’s the route he took because his career ended a little early. We actually had the same career ending injury.

[00:44:59] Cliff Avril: And that’s how we got connected or whatever. And I think he went in that phase. He went that route first because the capital piece of it, being able to accumulate some capital to be able to go out and buy and hold some things. And that’s where he’s at now in his career. I think I could bypass that piece a little bit and just go right into being able to I’m just big into just being able to own something.

[00:45:21] Cliff Avril: and being able to get cashflow. I think wealth is cashflow. I don’t think buying and flipping outside of taxes and all that other stuff, for me, buying and flipping isn’t necessarily the game plan that I want to have. I think that’s a great game plan once you get started, to be able to accumulate and get some cash, to be able to go buy some assets that you can hold on to.

[00:45:38] Patrick Donley: I wanted to switch gears a little bit here and talk about Pickleball. You, I hear you’ve, you’re into Pickleball, you’ve gotten into, did you buy a team? Tell me about your Pickleball adventures.

[00:45:49] Cliff Avril: D. C. Pickleball team, baby. I’m all in on pickleball, man. I play every morning. Played this morning. Got a group of us that play at five o’clock every morning to get our cardio in.

[00:46:00] Cliff Avril: And I didn’t start playing pickleball till this summer, actually. Or this spring break. During my kids spring break, the guys we went to a resort and some guys that I knew were there. They’re like, hey man, come play some pickleball. Needed something to do. I went out there. Haven’t stopped playing since.

[00:46:15] Cliff Avril: And I thoroughly enjoy it. I like it so much that obviously I invested into a pickleball team, but one of the main reasons why I invested in the pickleball team was because I was playing this summer in Seattle. I was playing at a court in the middle of the day. It’s probably like 12 o’clock, one o’clock.

[00:46:33] Cliff Avril: And I see about 20 high schoolers come there to play. I’m like, if the kids are playing at such an early age, it’s true. It’s a real thing to look into. And then come to find out my son has been playing for two or three years as well at school. So I’m like, Oh, it’s a no brainer. If the kids are playing, this is the route I need to go in.

[00:46:53] Cliff Avril: So I thoroughly enjoy this sport. It’s fun. 

[00:46:56] Patrick Donley: So how does that work? Buying a team? Is it a doubles team? Like how does the whole thing work? I know Tom Brady has bought a team. LeBron has bought a team. Kevin Love, I think. 

[00:47:06] Cliff Avril: We’re all in the same league. So originally I was looking to own, try to find a franchise here in the Seattle market, but somebody already owned that.

[00:47:14] Cliff Avril: So for me, I actually partnered up with a group that already owned the team they were already a part of the MLP and it’s major pickleball league MPL. So I just messed that up, but MPL and I was fortunate enough to meet these guys. I started to letting people know that I wanted to get into our ownership group and these guys in particular, I’ve already known them, already had a relationship with them.

[00:47:35] Cliff Avril: So it only makes it so it’s myself, Odell Beckham, Katie Upton, I believe, and a couple of other big name individuals that are in it. And it’s pretty cool. 

[00:47:45] Patrick Donley: That’s awesome. So what’s your level? Like when you play, are you playing like three, five, four? Are you like higher than that? I imagine. 

[00:47:53] Cliff Avril: No, again you start seeing some of you go to some of these matches, right?

[00:47:57] Cliff Avril: You go, like I went to a tournament last year, right after I became a part owner. And not last year, but this summer. And I thought I was getting good until I seen some of those pros play. I think my Duma rating is like a three, five. It’s nothing too crazy just yet. But once you get to that four or five, you get to the fives, those guys are on a whole different level but I’m training and I definitely want to get above a four at some point, but.

[00:48:24] Cliff Avril: I don’t know if I’d practice enough to get to that level, but I, like I said, I thoroughly enjoy the sport. 

[00:48:30] Patrick Donley: That’s awesome. My cohost, Robert Leonard, who you originally spoke with, I think he’s actually going to start a pickleball media company. So doing podcasts, doing a newsletter, doing events, stuff like that.

[00:48:41] Patrick Donley: So 

[00:48:43] Cliff Avril: he should never do it. And when he does, please reach out to me and I’d love to just get on there and talk shop because. You see some of these different athletes now they’re making some real money too, but they just were signing guaranteed contracts and different things like that now, but to see the sport grow and to see some of these athletes and what they’re able to do and that ball’s moving fast, man, I said, it’s a different pace.

[00:49:03] Cliff Avril: It’s more fun than people think those are, I told some of my NFL guys Hey man, play pickleball. Now they’re looking at me like, what are you talking about? You’re not playing basketball anymore. And then some of them get, they get into it and then they fall in love as well. 

[00:49:16] Patrick Donley: Yeah, it’s addictive.

[00:49:17] Patrick Donley: It’s a blast. My dad’s 81 years old and he tries to play like about three times a week. And my wife and I will play against my mom and him and they beat us. Like they, they’re, they play all the time. And it’s just like a lot of touch and skill. And there’s a lot of strategy to it.

[00:49:33] Cliff Avril: Patience. Oh man. And that’s why I try to like, I’m thinking it’s the new form of golf, to be honest with you. You know how you can play golf till the end. Pickleball is somewhat of the same, like you go out there and you see some of these 60 year olds, 65 year olds, they will dominate you.

[00:49:48] Cliff Avril: So it’s I like it for that, for the longevity piece of it. 

[00:49:53] Patrick Donley: Wasn’t Pickleball, was it founded around Seattle? Like somewhere in that area, right? 

[00:49:59] Cliff Avril: Yes, in Bainbridge Island. It’s like it’s a, you take a ferry to it, but yes. Come to find out some of these people have been playing pickleball for the last 40 years.

[00:50:06] Cliff Avril: You know what I mean? I heard Bill Gates, he was like, yeah, I’ve been playing pickleball like, what? This is all new to us, so it’s huge out here. It’s huge out here. 

[00:50:15] Patrick Donley: That’s good stuff. I’ve seen franchises like it’s, we have one in Columbus called Pickle and Chill. And it’s like a Topgolf concept where it’s pickleball, but you got drinks, food, that kind of thing.

[00:50:25] Patrick Donley: It’s just entertainment in general. Do you have anything like that? 

[00:50:29] Cliff Avril: Nothing out here, the group that I’m a part of, the investment group that I’m a part of, we are looking at franchising something very similar to that pickle and chill but they’re going to be popping up a little bit of everywhere.

[00:50:41] Cliff Avril: I think that, that concept is going to be huge. Whether just being able to go out, have some food, have a couple of drinks and still get out there. And play. I think that there’s going to be a lot of that going on. It’s all about who market it the best to be able to take off like a top golf though.

[00:50:59] Patrick Donley: It’s pretty cool. That’s awesome. I love hearing about the pickable investment. So good luck with that. I hope it goes well. 

[00:51:05] Cliff Avril: Me too. Me too. I’ll admit, I typically don’t do passion investments. You know what I mean? Because business is business at the day. But I feel like, although I love this sport and I like it a lot I do think there’s room for it to, it’s gonna, it’s gonna boil down to how do you market it on TV?

[00:51:22] Cliff Avril: How do you watch it on TV? Once they figure that piece out, I think it takes off. 

[00:51:27] Patrick Donley: Yeah. I know personally myself, I’ll get on YouTube and just watch doubles it’s I love it. Like I did a tournament last Christmas and I just like before the tournament, I just was watching. Hour after hour of YouTube pickleball stuff.

[00:51:40] Cliff Avril: You go down rabbit hole, you go down rabbit hole, who are you to man? 

[00:51:44] Patrick Donley: I wanted to hear too about your philanthropy stuff. You’ve got a family foundation. I know you’re really involved with that and that’s super important to you. Can you tell us about it? Tell us about just the mission of it and how much time you’re devoting to it.

[00:51:57] Patrick Donley: Some of the good stuff that you’ve been up to. 

[00:51:59] Cliff Avril: Yeah, so we have the Cliff Abel Family Foundation. We actually just celebrate 10 years of some of the work that we’ve been doing is geared towards juvenile diabetes, but also the education system and health system in Haiti as well has been our mission, but we do a wide range of different things.

[00:52:16] Cliff Avril: And I’m just grateful want to do something like this for 10 last 10 years, but we host football kids and Jacksonville. We’ve host football kids in Haiti as well, have health fairs. And different things like that, but the biggest thing we’re doing right now, one of the big missions that we have right now is called the Cliffs Crew, which is 10 black and brown boys that I’ve been mentoring since they were in third grade.

[00:52:38] Cliff Avril: Now, they’re all in 8th and 9th grade, and it’s all about exposing them to different professions that are just here in their backyard. But in general, unfortunately most black and brown kids in this country, they only see themselves as athletes because that’s all we see on TV. But I took him to like the Seahawks for facility as an example, I took him to the Seahawks facility and when the Seahawks, you just think of the athletes.

[00:53:01] Cliff Avril: You just think of the guys on the field, but there’s so many more occupations that are there in that building. Whether you talk about engineers, architects lawyers, chefs, doctors, the list is long, but you don’t know that. And every one of those guys, when we won the Super Bowl. All of those guys got a Super Bowl ring too, because they play a big role in the success of that organization.

[00:53:23] Cliff Avril: But if you don’t know that you can’t dream to be a part of that, right? You don’t if you don’t know that you can’t aspire to do these types of things. So I’m excited about that. And my goal is to take them all the way through college and hopefully go to their weddings when they get older or something like that.

[00:53:37] Cliff Avril: It’s been pretty cool being able to to be a part of these kids lives and try to again, expose them to different opportunities and different professions that they can become outside of being an athlete or entertainer. 

[00:53:48] Patrick Donley: That’s so awesome. So you’ve known these kids since they were in third grade and they’re in eighth now?

[00:53:54] Cliff Avril: Yes, I’ve been with them since third grade. We meet every other week. During summertime, we take trips. I just took them to DC, Washington, DC this last summer for a week and it was all about, again, being able to go to different organizations, lobbyists and different professions that are there in DC to just exposure.

[00:54:10] Cliff Avril: Went to the FBI did a whole bunch of cool stuff. It was great. 

[00:54:14] Patrick Donley: That is so awesome, man. It’s how many kids that you’re involved with? 

[00:54:17] Cliff Avril: 10. 

[00:54:18] Patrick Donley: 10 gets 10 of ’em. That is so cool. That is a great idea. 

[00:54:23] Cliff Avril: Thank you. No it’s been great. It’s been great. Shouts out to my team Jeanette Oa, who runs my foundation.

[00:54:28] Cliff Avril: She, she keeps, she does the day to day stuff while I try to build this real estate stuff out. 

[00:54:33] Patrick Donley: Yeah. That’s so great. Just that exposure is so important like for anybody there’s so many things in the world that you can get involved in that you don’t know about. 

[00:54:41] Cliff Avril: Oh yeah, for 

[00:54:41] Patrick Donley: sure.

[00:54:43] Patrick Donley: I want to hear what’s next? Like 10 years down the line, if we were to talk what are you going to be up to? I want to hear too, like your why, like what is all this about for you? 

[00:54:52] Cliff Avril: All right. I’ll start off with my why, then I’ll get to my 10 year plan. The 10 year was pretty easy. I want to be retired, like actually be retired.

[00:54:59] Cliff Avril: But my why is it’s multiple things. My why is I don’t want to be a statistic, right? When it comes down to athletes and we all hear the stories and I think it’s misconstrued a little bit at the end of the day, I still don’t want to be a statistic. I want to be able to leave my kids something.

[00:55:16] Cliff Avril: I can’t leave them the helmet. I can’t leave them the pads, right? I want to leave them something that they can go out and continue to build and grow off of. And then along the same lines is. Although I’m retired from one profession, I think it’s extremely important for my kids to see me get up every single day and go to work.

[00:55:32] Cliff Avril: I don’t want them to ever understand and believe that this just happens without putting me in work, right? So I think it’s extremely important for them to see me every day. Again, they see my routine. It’s go work out. It’s take them to school. And if they’re off, they see me go to the office or be in my home office and working.

[00:55:52] Cliff Avril: My son goes to the projects to my sites with me. Take them to Chicago to see some of the projects that we’re working on here in the next couple of weeks. So I think it’s extremely important to get for them to see it, exposure, right? Seeing put work in, and these are the results that you get. And then the last thing is, again, I want to retire and I want to be like, I want to have enough cashflow coming in to sustain my lifestyle.

[00:56:14] Cliff Avril: Again, I think cashflow is true wealth. Being able to have, I joke with these guys all the time, it’s I’d rather have 100, 000 coming in a month than have 5 million just sitting in the bank. See what I’m saying? Like that’s true wealth to me and that’s what I would like to have. And I want to be in South Africa somewhere and that’s still being generated.

[00:56:34] Cliff Avril: So that’s my ultimate goal. That’s my why. Those are my why’s is I want to make sure the biggest thing is making sure my kids understand and see work being put in. and seeing the results of it. 

[00:56:46] Patrick Donley: And you’ve got two sons, right? Xavier and Xander. Is that, did I get that right? 

[00:56:51] Cliff Avril: Xavier and Xander.

[00:56:52] Cliff Avril: Yes. My two boys, 12 and then my youngest turns eight here real soon. 

[00:56:57] Patrick Donley: 12 and eight. And the oldest, you take him to the projects and see what you’re up to. I take both of them. Take him both. Okay. 

[00:57:03] Cliff Avril: Cause my oldest, he actually got to be a part of my career pretty much his entire life as far as for the NFL.

[00:57:09] Cliff Avril: Up until I retired, my youngest. He’s dad, why do people know your name? Like you’re just dad to me so it’s important for both of them because they both have two vantage point, different bench points for both of them to see me doing real estate because honestly, the odds of them, I don’t know if they want to play ball or not, but I understand the odds is very slim, but one thing I do know is this real estate thing, you can have a good startup platform to be able to Scale and do some special stuff as well.

[00:57:35] Cliff Avril: So I think it’s just extremely important for them to go to the projects, see what’s going on, see how the numbers are ran. My oldest is starting to learn how to performers work and different things like that as well. 

[00:57:46] Patrick Donley: Awesome. So would your hope be for them to get into real estate or do you leave it up to them to decide their own path in life?

[00:57:52] Patrick Donley: It’s a tough role as a father. Like how much to push and guide and let them follow their own North Star. 

[00:58:00] Cliff Avril: I think the core principle of it all is to make sure you work for yourself. And create for yourself. Don’t be dependent on anybody else. That’s the core principle of what I want to show them and teach them.

[00:58:11] Cliff Avril: If they went into real estate, that would be great. What I’ve realized is what your plans for your kids are, what the plans actually becoming is two different things. But I do want this to be an option for them. If this is the route they want to go in, I want this to be an option for them.

[00:58:26] Cliff Avril: But I’m not going to force it on them, just like I’m not going to force football on them. I want to give them options. As a father, my job is to give them options. And then they figure out what it is that they want to do and exposure, right? So if they took, if one took over, that’d be cool. If they don’t we’ll sell it and hopefully they go create the next Amazon or something like that.

[00:58:43] Cliff Avril: I don’t know. 

[00:58:45] Patrick Donley: Yeah. Who knows, right? So the, you said the 12 year old, does he hang out with any of the guys that you mentor, the Cliffs crew? Does he spend time with them? 

[00:58:53] Cliff Avril: Both of them do. They both, yeah. When we go on these trips, they both go to them. Whenever I have my meetings, they both go to them cause.

[00:58:59] Cliff Avril: There are certain things that I honestly, I talked to the Cliffs Crew guys that sometimes I forget to even communicate with my kids sometimes. So I think it’s important for them to be a part of all of that. But my 12 year old is very much, he’s more in it than say my youngest one, but they both are very much part of the Cliffs Crew.

[00:59:15] Patrick Donley: That’s awesome. So Cliff, this has been really great. Is there anything that we haven’t touched on that you wanted to talk about at all today? 

[00:59:22] Cliff Avril: Oh, no. I think we hit on everything, man. I’m just grateful that I was able to join you, talk about a wide range of different things, talk everything outside of football, right?

[00:59:31] Cliff Avril: And most times a night it’s going to be a football base, but I appreciate you guys having me. I look forward to. Hopefully 10 years from now telling you how great I was talking about this 10 years ago with and continue to keep building. So I appreciate it. And people can keep track of the journey as far as to the real estate stuff on Tik TOK.

[00:59:48] Cliff Avril: That’s mostly all my real estate stuff. And that’s just at Cliff Avril. And then I’ll post from time to time stuff on Instagram as well, which is again at Cliff Avril. 

[00:59:58] Patrick Donley: And if you get the chance, check out real estate Twitter. I think you’d love it. 

[01:00:02] Cliff Avril: Yes. I have to check it out. I have to check it out.

[01:00:04] Cliff Avril: I definitely will. Just to see what everybody’s talking about. I’m real estate. It’s funny because the same approach I had with football, which allowed me to have a little bit of success and I’m hoping it does the same. I’m real estate everything. I’m paying attention to different markets, trends, everything, just saying, just staying in the loop on everything.

[01:00:22] Cliff Avril: I think that’s the only way to get better at this. 

[01:00:24] Patrick Donley: Yeah. It’s so much I can carry over from football, the practice and watching game film and all that can. All carries over to real estate, whatever you do, like you can apply all those skills that you develop from whatever started and you started what high school, right?

[01:00:40] Patrick Donley: So you got a late start, but like it worked out great. 

[01:00:43] Cliff Avril: It worked out. So let’s try to do it with real estate. 

[01:00:48] Patrick Donley: Yeah, absolutely. Thanks, Cliff. This has been awesome. Really appreciate your time and best of luck with you. 

[01:00:53] Cliff Avril: Thank you. Thank you guys for having me. I appreciate you guys. 

[01:00:56] Patrick Donley: Okay, folks, that’s all I had for today’s episode.

[01:00:59] Patrick Donley: I hope you enjoyed the show, and I’ll see you back here real soon.

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