WIN Ep166. Why Hard Assets Are the Key to Generational Wealth with Ben Reinberg

Intro speaker: Welcome to the Westside Investors Network. WIN, your community of investing knowledge for growth. This is the real estate professionals investing podcast for real estate professionals by real estate professionals. This show is focused on the next step in your career, investing. Thank you for listening.

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Trent Werner: Welcome back to another episode of the deal deep dive segment on the Westside Investors Network podcast. I'm your host, Trent Warner. In this segment, our future guests will share their unique stories on a specific deal they've invested in. We will dive deep into finding the deal, financing the deal, writing an offer, and the due diligence. Do us a solid and smash that subscribe button, leave us a rating, and share this episode.

And now let's dive deep. Welcome back to the WIN podcast. I'm your host, Trent Werner. On today's episode, we are joined by Ben Reinberg, the founder and CEO of Alliance Consolidated Group of Companies. Alliance manages investment funds across different real estate asset classes and focuses on medical office investments.

Ben is considered an expert in medical office and commercial investments as he has years of experience helping investors achieve their investment goals. We're also gonna talk about Ben's new book, Hard Assets and Hard Money for Hard Times. In this book, Ben lays out a blueprint for how investors can accumulate, grow, and defend their wealth for future generations. We also touch on certain questions and research topics that investors should be doing when they are searching for experts in these certain fields. Now let's welcome Ben Rineberg.

Ben Reinberg, the founder and CEO of Alliance joining the Win podcast today. Ben, thanks so much for being here. I'm excited for our conversation on not only Alliance and what you guys do, but also your new book coming out in about a month from now. Ben, thanks for joining the show.

Ben Reinberg: Thanks, Trent. I really appreciate being here. I look forward to adding a lot of value to your audience and talking about investments and how to how to build hard assets for your for your audience and and how to really maximize the wealth.

Trent Werner: Now I think this is the first time I've had a TV show host on the Win Podcast. Do you wanna you wanna share what TV show you are on and what that TV show is about?

Ben Reinberg: So we started a podcast called Ben Rienberg, I Own It. And we did a tremendous amount of podcasts over the years. And we realized that it'd be more beneficial if we have a topic. So we turned it into a TV show, our podcast. And so the first season, Trent, is called Leverage.

It's leverage from all different walks of life, different types of leverage. Then secondly, what we decided to do for season two is called Obsessed because in order to be wildly successful, you have to be obsessed. And so it'll be streaming soon. It's gonna be downloading soon and streaming soon on a bunch of different networks and streaming across the world. I'm really excited about it.

It adds value. It's a great call to action. It will help investors learn. It'll help people learn business. And we have wonderful guests.

We interview about 13 guests per episode, and it's all about the topic for the season.

Trent Werner: Very nice. Well, we'll definitely stay tuned and be on the lookout for that. Now, Ben, tell me what Alliance does. I know you you guys are in the real estate space, investment space. What does Alliance do specifically in real estate, and how do they help or how do you guys help investors grow their wealth?

Ben Reinberg: So Alliance is what we call fiduciary of capital, Trent. We raise capital from high net worth individuals as well as family offices. And what we do is we're a fiduciary of that capital. We invest. We're experts in office, industrial and retail.

We just opened a multifamily division. And because we see a lot of opportunity in multifamily coming, and we can explain that. We are one of the leaders in medical office investing. So we have a new fund that we've been raising money for, the Alliance Medical Fund. At the March, we'll have seven assets in the fund.

We have new asset we're acquiring this month, which we're excited about. And so the fund's doing well. Great assets, great cash flow, pay between 68% current return. And then you get equity when we sell the fund or individual properties and along with tax benefits. So we've been doing this trend for three decades and we have two hundred plus years of leadership team experience outside of Ben Reimberg myself.

And so long story short, we have a great platform. We give a seven star experience to our investors, and it's white glove service.

Trent Werner: And for these funds that you guys manage, are they evergreen or do they have a expiration date on them?

Ben Reinberg: Well, there will be an expiration. We'll sell them we'll sell it within five years. Usually, there's an expiration date, and we sell the fund usually in five to six years. Makes sense.

Trent Werner: So, Ben, you mentioned something about, I guess, future opportunities in the multifamily space. I feel like the multifamily commercial real estate in general is kind of a topic around the country right now. Multifamily in what I mean, that's our focus. So what I've seen is there's lot of people that are I don't wanna say scared of multifamily, but they're having a hard time finding good deals and good opportunities in the multifamily sector specifically. So when you say that there's opportunity there, what do you mean by that?

Ben Reinberg: Well, there's Trent, there's trillions of dollars come of loans coming due in '25 and 02/1926. And that's going create a lot of opportunities, especially in the multifamily space. We know sponsors and colleagues of ours that put financing on that's coming due. Now in a rising interest rate market, you see what the ten year is doing, which just has a strong foothold in the multifamily space. We've seen that there's going to be some sponsors that are going to give back properties or be forced to sell their properties.

So that's what I mean by good opportunities, we see some good buying opportunities in the multifamily space.

Trent Werner: Have you looked or researched at all about potentially placing funds in a I guess, to save deals? I can't think of the name off top of my head, but, you know, like Lifeline Capital where people may be struggling in their deals and bridging that gap to help them

Ben Reinberg: get We started and we opened a hard money lending division for commercial real estate because of lack of liquidity in the market. So if people need a hard money loan, we're looking at those opportunities and seeing if it fits our box. We do low leverage, high high money lending, hard money lending.

Trent Werner: Okay. And then you guys have in house asset management, so I'm assuming these these buying opportunities would just kind of fit right into your guys' portfolio then?

Ben Reinberg: That's correct.

Trent Werner: And do you guys have any current or multifamily assets currently?

Ben Reinberg: No. We just opened the division in 2024. We should be buying our first round assets shortly, we're really excited about it.

Trent Werner: Okay. How does how does your current investment portfolio in, you know, medical office and all these other niches that you focus on translate into multifamily?

Ben Reinberg: Well, we we're opportunistic, And so we understand how to manage multifamily. We have people that have managed multifamily for years that have joined us. We also open up a division where we have a gentleman running it who's been doing it for twenty five years. And so we're fully integrated to take on a multifamily property and manage it very well.

Trent Werner: And then from an investor, limited partner or investor standpoint, I guess what type of investor would fit your new fund in multifamily? And and what type of investors fitting your current funds, or are they the same person or same Same same

Ben Reinberg: They want same avatar. They want diversified. They want tax benefits. They want current cash flow, and they want profitability, and that's what we offer.

Trent Werner: Right. And do you do you think the returns on these different asset classes are in the same ballpark?

Ben Reinberg: It just depends on the risk. And so medical office is very conservative. So we'll probably hit a high teens IRR track record, it's 24% IRR. But that's what we're looking at. Trent, one the other things in multifamily, it's conservative as well, but it just depends on the asset.

We're buying existing assets with cash flow.

Trent Werner: Right. What about value add multifamily?

Ben Reinberg: Right.

Trent Werner: You guys do guys do any of that? Or will you guys do any of that?

Ben Reinberg: Yeah. I mean, we're looking at core plus and value add type multifamily. That's part of our acquisition criteria.

Trent Werner: Okay. Because that's in at least in our research and our underwriting right now, it seems like there's still a pretty decent spread in the bid ask on some of these value add multifamily deals that we're looking at. And it's I don't wanna say it's impossible, but it's definitely harder to get some of these deals to pencil from what we've been seeing in our underwriting.

Ben Reinberg: Yeah. I mean, multifamily is tough because a lot of people are financing on these deals and the tenure is moving and, you know, and the there's a gap between the bid and the ask, and so you can't make it work. And so, you know, assets are devalued with rising interest rates. And so that's why there's gonna be opportunities because there's gonna be opportunities people are gonna have to sell.

Trent Werner: What do you what do you see the market doing when that time comes? With all these all these trillions of dollars worth of debt coming, is it gonna be just a full on fire sale panic mode? Or

Ben Reinberg: No. There'll be there'll be some workouts. There'll be people that will sell. There'll be people that have to sell. There'll be some lenders that take back properties.

There's different product type. And you have to pick and choose what you wanna buy if if where the opportunities are, you know.

Trent Werner: It's it's interesting that you you mentioned lenders taking back properties because I've seen it already on, you know, a few different news stories that I've read where I don't wanna say it's predatory lending, but it seems like these lenders are taking back some pretty good assets at really good prices for themselves. Do you think that's gonna be the majority of what goes on?

Ben Reinberg: Well, I wouldn't I wouldn't speak in a box. I mean, when you say majority, what does that mean?

Trent Werner: I guess is that gonna be do you think there's gonna be more of that than people selling before it gets to that point?

Ben Reinberg: Well, I mean, I don't know if that's the case. I think what lenders are gonna do is they're gonna appraise out their properties and see if they have equity in the properties, and then they'll make a prudent decision what they wanna do.

Trent Werner: Right. It seems it's just from the articles that I've read, it seems like some of these lenders are adding some assets into their portfolio that are gonna perform pretty well for them.

Ben Reinberg: Yeah. I mean, it's look, if they see an opportunity and they could take back a property and there's equity in it, they might take advantage of it. You know, it just depends on the lender and what they're they're borrowing and and their and what's internally going on at the bank or the lender.

Trent Werner: Right. So Ben, you said before before we start recording, you said you have a new book coming out.

Ben Reinberg: Mhmm.

Trent Werner: It's tailored to limited partner investors and people wanting to place capital. Is that correct?

Ben Reinberg: Yeah. I mean, it's it's really for anyone. You could be broke to a billionaire. It's called Hard Asset Trent and Hard Money for Hard Times. And I want to write this book because every day I'm asked to take a look at someone's portfolio and give feedback on investments or ask how does someone get into real estate, especially commercial real estate.

So it's been going on for decades and I quickly learned that most people do not understand how to generate wealth. And so I took a step back and I said, well, they don't understand assets, they don't understand money and time and time is your most valuable asset. And these are all tools to build wealth. And so I also realized that most of all people didn't understand how medical, how to invest in medical properties. So I was determined I'm going to be the go to expert in medical real estate, which I am.

And I was surprised how many doctors didn't know about investing in medical. And so once I wrote the book, need to I need to realize I need to take another step. I had to go a little bit deeper and further and teach people how to build a hard asset empire. And so the hard asset empire is a place where someone can generate, retain, defend, and compound their wealth. So once you start generating assets, how do you how do you defend them, compound them, and grow your portfolio and make sure you could generate for future generations as well?

It's generational wealth. So I created this vehicle in the book to help people build and create generational generational wealth for their families. And to make this easy, Trent, for everyone, doesn't matter what level you're at, I provide a hard asset blueprint in the book. And now here's a word from our sponsor.

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Ben Reinberg: And so so why do hard assets matter? Right? Like, why why why pick up the book? Why does it matter? Well, in a world of uncertainty that we've lived with, economic volatility, inflation, if you think about inflation and geopolitical volatility, makes traditional investments riskier than ever.

And so what do hard assets provide? Stability, predictability, long term wealth. Well, hard assets could be commercial real estate, could be real estate, could be gold, silver, platinum, cryptocurrency, stocks, bonds, list go on and on. And throughout history, I realized the wealthiest individuals and families secure their legacies through hard assets. Like I mentioned, real estate, precious metals and private lending opportunities.

And so what's the problem today? Right. We ask like, what is the issue going? Well, most people don't have a roadmap of how to build and develop this hard asset empire that I've been able to do in my career. And they lack the methodology, the strategy and the blueprint.

And that's where this book comes in. And so, you know, it's this visual framework that I created that simplifies complex financial concepts that go on in our life into actual steps to build, grow, and protect your wealth. And so it's for everyone. That's what I wanted to do. I want for everyone you could take off your bookshelf and use it every time you need it and have to look at it.

So whether aspiring investor or a seasoned professional, this book is for you. It gives you all the tools to diversify and secure your portfolio to give you security. And it's also empowering independence. I wanna empower people, Trent, that the methodology allows realtors to, like, take control of their lives, their financial destiny rather than rely on their financial advisers or uncertain markets. And so so people ask, like, why do I need to read this book?

The Hard Asset Blueprint. Why do I need to to really take down this book and and do this for myself? Well, you want a crisis strategy in your life. You know, you want you wanna weather economic downturns and bank classes and market crashes by anchoring their portfolio in tangible income producing assets. That's what I teach.

And I give a personalized road map. It's not a theory. It's what's been proven over time in my career as well as other my colleagues. And it's proven tactics, like I just said. And so if someone's looking to create multi generational wealth, that's why I wrote the book.

You know, and hard assets are timeless and they provide opportunities to pass on wealth to your kids and your family. And a lot of people want control and security. And that's why I've been asked for numerous decades, Trent. And so to have freedom and peace of mind and knowing your wealth is secured by tangible assets, because we talk about the blueprint looks like a fortress. It looks like a castle.

So you have your capstones, your keystones, your walls, you have a floor plate that's your foundation, you have vaults. Like no one talks about security and data. We do. That's one of your vaults is how do you protect your assets? How do you protect your data?

So we we allow people to think, and I want people to think. So why is this book different? Why has it never been done before? Because it's something that people don't wanna talk about in detail, I feel. And so it's visually engaging and actionable.

That's why I did it, and that's what it's great about. It's accessible to all, like I talked about, no matter what level of life you're at. And it's a true companion guide because it's not gonna be a one time read. I wanted to make it evergreen. And it's a resource that readers will revisit as they build their empire, adjust strategies, amend them, compound them and grow in their portfolio, learn how to defend them as well.

So you're gonna have to constantly bring it off to be able to revisit it frequently. And that's what I want. I want people to be able to use it as a tool to save them time and increase their their financial wealth. And so, you know, if your listeners out there and you just feel tired of uncertain about your financial future and you want to take control and build something tangible that lasts, that's what this book is about. That's why it took me a year to write Trent, and I'm very proud of it.

Launches at the March, and everyone's blueprint awaits for them. And people say, well, I don't have money. When do I get started? You get started right away. You start building hard assets to build wealth.

And I don't care if you have $10 in your pocket. You figure out how do you generate wealth and invest. Maybe it's a stock, a bond. Maybe you can invest in other crypto or whatever you need to do. Start pull that trigger and start building.

Don't wait. And, you know, empires aren't built overnight. It's it's one it's with the right blueprint. It's one step at a time. It's one brick at a time.

And then as you keep building, it's an it's inevitable that you'll build your empire. But you have to be consistent. You have to focus on your niche. You need to invest in smart money. So for example, I'm a commercial real estate expert, Trent.

That's what I do for a living. That's my bailiwick. And if that's my bailiwick, that's my focus. I'm gonna invest in other people's smart money to build my empire. Cryptocurrency.

I'm gonna invest in specialists in private equity. Maybe I'm gonna invest in, you know, stocks and bonds. Maybe I'm gonna invest in companies, whatever it is, tech, technology, you name it. Well, there's only so much time in the world. And if there's only so much time in the world, who has the time to go up the learning curve of every one of these hard assets?

So I encourage people invest in smart money.

Trent Werner: Yeah, Ben, I have a mentor of mine that has in a summary, he said there's a few phases in terms of wealth, your wealth journey, your wealth career. There's the accumulation phase, the growth phase, and then the conservation phase where you're trying to keep it and defend it and not lose it, especially like you said for multiple generations to come.

Ben Reinberg: Right.

Trent Werner: In in this book, or in your opinion, does it actually flow in that timeline? Or are there different detours that people have to take in their blueprint in their journey to wealth accumulation?

Ben Reinberg: Wealth accumulation, you're gonna fail. You're gonna you gotta be persistent. You're gonna make decisions. I say, show me your friends, I'll show you your future. Look at who you're surroundings yourself with.

Build good resources, and keep going, keep being persistent, and that will hit your formula you're talking about. But throughout your journey, you're always defending, you're always compounding, you're always preserving, you're learning, you're growing. So you have to continue to grow as well.

Trent Werner: Yeah. And and, like, like you said, if someone has $10 in their pocket, maybe they're investing in crypto or or stocks, something that's a little bit lower barrier to entry. But how do they get from $10 in their pocket to, you know, having real estate and other private placement, private business investments? How do they get from $10 in their pocket to really building generational wealth?

Ben Reinberg: Well, you're gonna, let's say you're younger. And let's say you're an employee, you start pulling money out of your paycheck and start saving it and redeploying it. That's how you start. Or you start your own business. And so you take your focus, and that's gonna start building your hard asset empire.

So if my focus commercial real estate, that's how I started building.

Trent Werner: Right. And it sounds like you have a fairly conservative investment approach and and and plan. So if someone is a w two employee and they've been dumping money into their four zero one k and all of a sudden they have a decent decent sized four zero one k, how does someone go from that to diversifying into other asset classes?

Ben Reinberg: Well, you can put money aside for other investments. You can invest through an IRA, you can invest in different vehicles, you can say, hey, I'm gonna take $1,000 this year and invest it in a mutual fund or whatever you need to produce cash flow. You wanna buy assets that produce cash flow, especially when you're younger.

Trent Werner: Right, but you're not recommending self directed four zero one ks's and leveraging against that.

Ben Reinberg: Let me be very clear. I am not recommending any investment vehicle, that's not my job. My job is to educate you on how to build a hard asset empire. I say focus on your niche. And so I don't make recommendations or warranties or expressions about investments.

I know our investments. If you want to build wealth or commercial real estate, feel free. You know, you can go to AllianceCGC.com. So click invest now, fill out the form, and you can start investing with us, which a lot of people do. But as it pertains to vehicles and how people need to do it, it's just really a matter of what's your plan.

I say surround yourself with a good attorney, good accountants, good advisors, and that will help you accumulate wealth.

Trent Werner: And how does an investor that, let's say, they focused on stocks specifically until this point, how does investor go about finding someone that's an expert like you or other people that are experts in their fields?

Ben Reinberg: Well, I mean, we live in a digital world now. It's pretty easy. I mean, we're all over the place at Alliance. I mean, you can go to our website and start investing with us. So you could Google and you'll find us.

As it pertains to a book, you go to benreinberg.com and you go to benreinberg.com/book, you'll learn all about us. You'll learn all about me. So the social media and online is pretty prevalent where you can find different resource investments. And you ask, you ask people that your advisor, where do you invest in? Where do I find resources?

Trent Werner: In in a digital and social media focused world that we're in, it is it is easy to access the information. But in some cases, it may be more difficult to verify that information

Ben Reinberg: Right.

Trent Werner: And and know that the person or people that you are communicating with or planning to invest with are legit and have a you know, an actual track record that you can trust, what would you say to someone that, you know, yeah. Hey. I found someone that sounds like an expert. How do I verify that? How do I trust that what they're telling me is accurate and true?

Ben Reinberg: Well, you gotta you gotta look at their track record, you gotta understand how they deal with challenges, how long they've been in business, you need to ask questions. So asking questions like for us, we have two hundred plus years of leadership team experience. We have a great track record. We've been in business for thirty plus years. So it kind of stands on its own.

So when you're younger and getting started and you're gonna raise equity, you're gonna have to immediately go to friends and family. You're gonna have to go to people that know and trust and like you to start. And then you can go out to the masses like we do.

Trent Werner: Do you have a question or a couple questions that limited partners should be asking people that they're planning on investing with?

Ben Reinberg: I would say the best question is how you deal with challenges. That's number one question. Anyone can pay a preferred return. But when the chips are down, how do you deal with it? Those are the people I'm investing in.

That's why people invest in alliance.

Trent Werner: Someone who's who's felt the pain a time or two and and come out stronger on the other side.

Ben Reinberg: Been through different cycles. Yeah. He's been through different cycles and has been through different deals. You know, the more deals you go, the higher on the learning curve you are.

Trent Werner: And do you are you able to know the book's not out yet, but are you able to share? Sounds like a fantastic book through and through, but are you able to share, you know, one or two, pieces from the book that you think will really connect with, we'll say, newer investor?

Ben Reinberg: Well, we talk about not overleveraging properties or assets that you're acquiring. And that's something we touch on in the book. And when you read the book, you can understand why that is. Because commercial real estate is about the ability to hold, ability to hold, ability to hold, and how you do that. The book outlines examples of why that's important.

Trent Werner: That's very interesting because there are plenty of people out there that a guy whose initials are are GC will tell you, you know, when you get capital, get rid of it, leverage your leverage your assets to keep growing and and, you know, make sure that your new assets are covering your leverage. Right. I think a lot of people subscribe to that model of going fast and and hitting the ground hard.

Ben Reinberg: Mhmm.

Trent Werner: But they fail to realize that there's a lot of inherent risk when you do it that way instead of protecting your assets and defending your your wealth.

Ben Reinberg: Right.

Trent Werner: That's interesting. Because not many people, especially the newer people in this in this business or these investment industries will tell you, hey. Let's be conservative. Let's let's let time do its thing and and stick to your plan. Everyone wants instant gratification, and they're trying to figure out how can I get there faster?

Ben Reinberg: Yeah. Well, that's why you need to diversify. You need to invest with smart money.

Trent Werner: And know how to defend.

Ben Reinberg: Yep. It'll always be the case. But building hard assets is the best way to build wealth.

Trent Werner: Absolutely. Well, Ben, is there anything else you want to share with our listeners today or where they can connect and learn more from you and your company?

Ben Reinberg: Well, if they go to alliancecgc.com, alliancecharliegeorgecharlie Com, and they want to invest, they click on invest now, fill it out, we'll have someone reach out to them, and we'll qualify them if they're a good fit for what we do in our funds. If they want to learn more about me, go to benreinberg.com. You go to benreinberg.com/book, Pre order a new book. We have thousands of people that wanted to order a book. It's coming out soon.

And learn how you can build your hard asset empire. And follow me on all different social media platforms. Go to benreinberg.com. I'm all over the place on social media.

Trent Werner: Very nice. Well, Ben, thank you so much for sharing about Alliance and your new book coming out. I will be on the list of preorders as soon as we're done with our conversation today.

Ben Reinberg: Thanks, Trent. Appreciate it. Thank you

Intro speaker: for listening to this episode of the Real Estate Professionals Investing Podcast on WIN, your community of investing knowledge for growth. We hope that this episode has increased your knowledge and added value to your path to freedom. If you would, please take a second to rate us so that we can get more great investors to interview. If you or someone that you know wants to be on, please visit westsideinvestors.com and fill out our form to be on the show. Thank you again, and enjoy your day.