One of the most requested topics we've ever had in The Wise Network is alternative assets.

Laundromats.

Car washes.

RV parks.

Mobile Homes.

If social media is any indication, these businesses are apparently printing money while their owners sip margaritas on a beach somewhere.

When we announced our Hot Asset Summer series, the response was immediate. Women were excited. Questions poured in. Everyone wanted to know if laundromats and car washes were really the cash-flowing gems they kept hearing about online.

So we invited two women who have actually owned them.

And let's just say the conversation didn't go exactly as expected.

In fact, it was better.

One of the things I love most about The Wise Network is that we don't spend our time selling investment fantasies. There are plenty of people online doing that already. Instead, we try to pull back the curtain and show women what investing actually looks like.

Sometimes that's exciting. Sometimes it's messy. Sometimes it's both.

Our guests, Mandy McAllister and Lexi Teifke, did exactly that.

Mandy shared her journey from multifamily investing into owning a motel and later a car wash. Like many investors, she saw an opportunity. What she discovered was that owning a car wash isn't simply a matter of collecting quarters and watching profits roll in.

There are employees to manage, equipment to maintain, customers to serve, and problems that seem to arrive at the most inconvenient times possible.

The asset itself wasn't bad. The business wasn't bad. It simply wasn't as passive as many people assume.

At one point during the conversation, I found myself laughing because every time someone says, "I want passive income," what they often mean is, "I would like the income without the business."

Unfortunately, the business usually comes with the income.

Then Lexi started sharing her experiences with laundromats.

Now, if you've spent any time on social media, you've probably seen the videos.

"Buy a laundromat."

"Collect cash."

"Retire early."

Simple.

Except nobody seems to mention dealing with cash management, operational issues, machine maintenance, customer concerns, or in Lexi's case, drug-related activity around the property.

Suddenly, the glamorous image of passive income starts looking a lot more like business ownership.

Imagine that.

The more Mandy and Lexi shared, the more I realized that the biggest lesson of the day had very little to do with laundromats or car washes.

It had everything to do with expectations.

Every investment looks easy when someone else is doing it.

Every deal sounds amazing in a sixty-second social media video.

Every asset class has people claiming it's the greatest investment ever created.

Until you own it.

Then you discover the things nobody puts in the marketing brochure.

The midnight phone calls.

The equipment failures.

The difficult customers.

The unexpected expenses.

The problems you didn't know existed because you had never operated that type of business before.

Oops.

That didn't go as expected.

But here's the part I found most encouraging.

Neither Mandy nor Lexi presented their experiences as failures.

They presented them as reality.

As investors, we learn. We adapt. We make decisions based on what fits our goals, our skills, and our lifestyles.

Sometimes we buy an asset and love it.

Sometimes we buy an asset and realize we'd rather own something else.

Both outcomes have value.

The true failure would be investing in something because a stranger on the internet told you it was easy.

That's why conversations like these matter.

At The Wise Network, we want women to hear the good, the bad, and yes, occasionally the ugly. We want them to learn from people who have actually done the work. We want them to understand what they're buying before they write the check.

The goal isn't to scare women away from investing in alternative assets.

The goal is to help them invest with their eyes wide open.

So if your takeaway from this session was that laundromats and car washes aren't passive income machines, you're right.

If your takeaway was that they can still be great investments for the right person, you're also right.

The real lesson is that every investment comes with responsibilities, challenges, and surprises.

And sometimes the most valuable thing you can hear is not "Here's how much money I made."

Sometimes it's "Here's what I wish someone had told me before I started."

Thank you to Mandy McAllister and Lexi Teifke for being willing to share the real story. Our members walked away with something far more valuable than hype.

They walked away with wisdom.

Dedee Boring
The Wise Network