Most real estate investors believe the path to wealth is owning more properties. But what if the greatest opportunity isn’t in the buildings themselves—it’s in the notes behind them? In this episode of Build It to Billions, Brett Swarts sits down with note investing pioneer Eddie Speed to reveal the “invisible” real estate market, where investors generate passive income by becoming the bank instead of the landlord. With more than 40 years of experience, Eddie shares why mortgage notes, seller financing, and creative financing strategies have quietly created wealth for savvy investors for decades.
Together, Brett and Eddie explore how note investing can provide consistent cash flow, reduce the headaches of property ownership, and complement broader wealth-building and tax-planning strategies. Whether you’re a real estate investor, business owner preparing for an exit, or someone looking to diversify your portfolio, this episode offers valuable insights into an often-overlooked investment strategy that could change the way you think about building long-term wealth.
Episode Highlights Here:
Brett
Before we jump into this episode, I would invite you to join our community to help you become a better steward, scale to billions, and ultimately give more or all of it away. All I want you to do is to click the subscribe button right now. I love your support, it’s incredible to see your comments, and we’re just getting started. I can’t wait to go on this journey with you. Thank you so much for subscribing. It means the world to me. Welcome to the Build It to Billions podcast, where we guide successful entrepreneurs and investors on their journey from millions to billions. We believe the key to scaling and compounding your wealth and life starts every single day with a mindset and practice of stewardship over ownership and applying billionaire biblical principles. Our ultimate goal is, if you scale and compound your wealth and life, so you can give more all the way to help MVPs. My name is Brett Swarts. Each and every episode, we’re joined by the world’s top entrepreneurs, millionaires or billionaires, where they share their secrets with us, insights and wisdom, so we can all level up to make a bigger impact. And we’re going to talk about passive income through note investing today with our guest, who has closed over 50,000of these note deals, 40 years plus of experience, and helped 2000 investors achieve their goals through Note School. He spent the last 40 years doing this, and he started with almost nothing, living in a mobile home, and has now closed all this business. And so, let’s, let’s go to school today. Let’s, let’s bring our guests in Eddie, Eddie Speed to the to the to the show. Eddie, how we doing?
Eddie
I’m great. How about you?
Brett
Excellent. Thank you, sir. For our listeners getting to know you for the first time, would you give us just a little bit more about your story and your current focus?
Eddie
Well, in 1980 I was living in a 10 by 40 mobile home, and I was introduced to this idea by a gentleman that later became my father-in-law, and he was a real estate investor. He had retired from the fire department, and he started basically teaching me this idea of Stella, instead of buying property, buying the loan on the property, and becoming the bank,
and that’s how I got started.
Brett
That’s amazing. Let’s dive right into the number one secret to note investing. What is it, and or the thing that’s mostly unknown? And let’s keep going from there.
Eddie
Well, most of us know what the note business is, because we’ve paid off a note, we bought a car, we bought a house, we’ve done something, and we signed a document that says I promised to pay, usually it was the First National Bank, or so and so finance, or so and so mortgage, and we signed a document, and many of us, most of us have signed a document, and it said I promise to pay for this house that I’m buying, and I’m going to pay x percent interest, plus I’m going to pay back the principal, and I’m going
to pay the First National Bank of who knows where. Right now, they have the first mortgage on the house, and I own the house, but if something doesn’t happen right, then they end up with my house, and they don’t want that to happen to me, and I don’t want that to happen to me, but it’s way better than having a plan with no backstop, right? This is a backstop if things don’t work, and if you, if you look at your situation, Brett, think about your house, and just pretend you have a mortgage on it. I don’t know if you do or you don’t, but let me guess this, and I bet I’m right, that you owe way less money on your house than it’s worth. That’s a cushion factor. That’s a cushion factor. That’s a cushion factor for your lender, that if something happens to you that they’re owed way less money than what their collateral is worth, what the property is worth, and so that’s what I teach people how to do, is buy the loan, and so think in terms of what we, everything we know about business and in life, it’s all about timing, something that was great in one era isn’t great in the other, I used to have a Blackberry, okay, and it was the cat’s meow, but not anymore, right? And so, an example of people that bought rent houses, and that was their thing, and they were going to renthouses, are going to be great, and the problem is, is that inflation changed the math of rentals, rental expenses went up two and a half times more than rents went up, and that has changed the card game. So, one of the things I show people how to do is to take their rentals and turn them into a lending situation, take the same house and go be the bank versus a landlord. About two and a half times the net income is usually the math that comes out the other end. You can net two and a half times more income with being the bank on the same house you’re renting. Now, some houses don’t fit, and it’s not every situation, but it’s pretty. Widespread, it’s pretty common. The other thing is, I just show people how to buy a loan, and I built a marketplace, and I help them go do that. So, you know, most like most things in life, I stumbled into ideas, you know? I just, I fell forward.
Brett
So, if you like this little, short clip of the interview I just did, click over here to watch the full interview, and please don’t forget to subscribe. Thanks so much, everybody.
Watch the episode here:
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About Eddie Speed
Eddie Speed is one of the nation’s leading experts in note investing, seller financing, and creative real estate finance. With more than 40 years of experience in the mortgage note industry, he has built a career helping investors create wealth by buying, selling, and structuring real estate notes. As the founder of NoteSchool, Eddie has educated thousands of investors on how to generate passive income by becoming the bank instead of owning physical properties.
In addition to leading NoteSchool, Eddie is the founder of Colonial Funding Group, where he has participated in tens of thousands of note transactions throughout his career. Recognized as a pioneer in the note investing industry, Eddie is passionate about helping entrepreneurs and real estate investors discover alternative investment strategies that can provide cash flow, diversification, and long-term financial freedom.
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