You always hear stories of rappers who rose to fame quickly, made a ton of money, but years later are dead broke. One who immediately comes to mind is MC Hammer. Rarely do you hear about rappers who invest wisely.

One of Hammer's peers of the 90s has a story along the lines of the later. His name is Rob Van Winkle, better known as Vanilla Ice.

In early 1990s, the rapper shot to stardom with his debut album To The Extreme, which sold 11 million copies and became the fastest selling hip-hop album of all-time. All those sold albums translated into cash ... a lot of it.

Instead of spending it solely on depreciating assets like cars, Ice bought a ton of properties, not knowing he was setting himself up for financial longevity.

It was a smart move, but today, he admits it wasn't a business decision at all. During an interview with Florida real estate publication, The Real Deal, Van Winkle elaborate.

"I bought a bunch of houses when I was 16," he explained. "I bought several houses, not as investments, just to have a few houses around the country -- one in L.A, one in New York, I lived in Laurel Canyon [in Los Angeles] for a while, and I had a house in the ski slopes of Utah and another in Miami. Then, I realized that that was ridiculous that I could only live in one house. So I sold the houses when I was about 19 or 20. They were just basically collecting cobwebs. So I realized at a young age -- I sold them and I made a lot of money, and I profited on all of them."

That's how he got into flipping homes, and continued -- as a hobby, at first -- over the years. Ice said he'd buy, develop and sell real estate properties in Florida, including a mansion and a development for car fans called Car Lofts, in Delray Beach.

"I built homes, I bought lots," he said. "I own a bunch of land in Florida that I bought way back in the day, and I also have commercial real estate I bought way back in the 1990s that has done real well for me ... I just kind of 'lego'ed the whole thing, one step after another step, basically started flipping homes. I bought homes on vacant lots, profiting when the market was really good. Just rolling."

When the market began to decline in recent years, the rapper said he didn't give up on real estate. So, he found out other ways than developing land ... learning the techniques from a seminar.

Today, Ice buys foreclosed properties, fixes them and re-sells them on the market. He says things are picking up and turning around.

"I've got several foreclosures I'm making good deals on [in Florida]."

Ice is so into the real estate game, he's actually

For those interested, Ice will be debuting a reality show on the DIY network this fall called "The Vanilla Ice Project". It will be a 10-episode, 30-minute series that follows Ice and a crew of contractors, as they renovate rooms in a 7,000 square foot Palm Beach mansion.

At press time, an air date was unknown.