You ever have one of those weeks which I sure you have where you have so much on your plate and you can't seem to get anything off . That's me this week , this past week . I have to say I've never been so challenged in a specific role in my professional life as I've been as an entrepreneur .
And people will say then why are you an entrepreneur , why don't you just go back working for somebody else ? Because I'm not just going to give up on what I'm doing and what I love , and in the end I will persevere and be successful in what I'm doing . And just at this point I'm a little overwhelmed . There's a lot going on in all aspects of my business .
There's a lot going on in all aspects of my business and at the same time I'm trying to balance out my personal life with some stuff going on there , but then also trying to connect with myself and my family and really understand life . And I know that's a loaded question , but it truly is . Because in the end , what do we have to live for ?
Family , loved ones , friends , animals , passions , travel , whatever it is . But if all I'm doing is working , and working myself to death , what is that going to accomplish ? Absolutely nothing , and I know as a solopreneur , entrepreneur we wear many hats , if not all the hats , and I don't know how many hats I wear .
To be honest , I've lost count eight , 10 , 12 , maybe more . And the one thing I can always come back to and it's a barometer every single year my mom asks , sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas if I had to do it all over again , would I actually go back to corporate America ?
And every single year , for the last eight years , I say no , Even when I'm getting my butt handed to me . I'm getting beat up . I've got a ton of stuff on my plate . I still don't , because I can control my own destiny . I'm able to work through everything that's happening . But I'm frustrated at times .
I'm nervous , I'm anxious , Just like everybody else in the world . We just got through an election Left . Whatever you are , at least we now know who's going to win or who's going to be in the White House . Now you got to see what happens . And then we have to play that game .
Whether I agree with his policies or not , I have to figure them out to make my business grow and succeed , and I don't just want to survive , I want to thrive . So if the other party would have won , then I'd have to figure that process out . So now we're figuring out how to do this process out .
So now we're figuring out how to do this , and as we add more layers of complexity to the business , the more I have to deal with on a daily basis , and I'm I don't know if it's a fear of handing it off , which I don't think that is because I'm that's . That ship sailed a while ago .
I really think I'm nervous about bringing people on and then having that additional overhead to where now I've got extra cost , extra pressure , and I'm worried about what happens if this doesn't take off the way I think it is .
That's where I'm at this week , guys , is how to scale your business effectively by leveraging others , but also being able to find creative ways to have these people work within your business and be able to help you grow . And we're looking at a couple of things . Vas are the very first thing I'm looking at .
I'm also been testing several AI platforms to do outbound calling , messaging and so forth . It's not quite there yet . There's a couple that I would say are getting there . It's not quite there yet . There's a couple that I would say are getting there , but it's still not human-like .
It's close , but it needs thousands upon thousands of calls , which costs a lot of money , and I think I've run about 500 or so calls in and I would say solid . On a scale of one to 10 , I would give it a seven , so it's roughly a C . Right now it still messes up and it needs to go through some other aspects .
But what other tools are out there , guys ? And I'm asking you this what other tools are out there to help you grow your business , scale it , without having to bring on a ton of human capital and put yourself in a position to where you're stressed about making payroll and also paying people , whether it be benefits , all the overhead ?
If I could hire a commission based sales team of five to six people , have a leader and they came in and just sold the heck out of our developments , I'd be in . I'd be willing to share a significant amount of dollars with them , percentage wise , to make it all happen . Just has to be the right match Now .
Could there be some type of draw schedule based upon performance or something that would give them a little bit of a base ? Yeah , I can work on that , but having somebody come in and have a full base and no upside or no how should I say this no ability to help themselves grow . So basically they got to be hungry and that's what I'm looking for .
And I've struggled with finding those individuals and I'm just putting out there to you guys if you know somebody that's commission base that knows the real estate space , the real estate investor space , family office space .
We're looking to connect with several of those people because we've got plenty of builds to come along , Love to use private money on these to where we have a single investor on a property . They get 10 to 12% return in six to nine months . Build the house .
We're able to either sell it or we're able to refi out of it , pay the investor off , call it a day , move on . It's just a quick process to run through , but it just seems like I'm struggling with finding those individuals that want to hustle , that want to be able to get the job done .
Most of the people not all , but majority of the people that I've spoken to over the last probably 90 to 120 days , maybe a little bit longer all want these huge bases and then they want a piece of what they raise . I get that , but there's no performance in that .
So basically , you're going to be safe with a base and then you're going to get a piece of what you raise . Why can't you get a piece of what you raise as your actual base or as your commission ? Are you not confident enough that you can actually pull it off ?
Because the other side of that is , I'm willing to share in the back-end profit when we actually cash the investor out . So either we sell the property or we refinance it out when it becomes a long-term hold , a rental property . All that we can actually cash out and share in that profit . I have no problem doing that .
I just am looking for people that want to do the work upfront . They want to build a team and be able to grow something together and not just come in and unfortunately have their hand out and say you need to give me $10,000 a month to do this job .
A lot of people have I keep on saying a lot , I'm going to back myself up there is a good handful of people that I've spoken to that want $100,000 plus a year in base to do the job and my response is that's great , but what can you do for us for that price ? And a lot of them can't even cover their salary .
So in raises or private fundings or family offices , whatever the case is , so it's a loss for me .
So someone has a proven track record , that has a book of business that they can solicit and be able to bring dollars to the table , I'm willing to pay and work with that person and figure out something that works for both parties , because it can't be one sided but it can't be . Give me $100,000 plus a year and I'll make everything happen .
That doesn't work because ultimately that's a lose-lose situation , especially once you go into somebody's portfolio and you figure out he or she might be able to raise you 50 to $100,000 . Guess what ?
At $100,000 , let's say they do raise a hundred thousand I still got to pay payroll , I got to pay taxes , I got to pay overhead expenses , any type of technology fees .
So by the time we wrap everything up and call it a day , I'm probably 20 to 30% in the hole on the actual deal , which makes sense for the employee but doesn't make sense for me as the owner . So , guys , I'm going to wrap it up . I know it's a little bit short this week , two weeks in a row , but these are things that are just on my mind .
That got me stressed a little bit . I'm not going to lie anxious and stressed to where it's affecting my sleep , because I know there's somebody out there that I can work with on this topic that can actually help us get to the finish line and be able to start knocking these out .
We've got some great opportunities in some other cities that are just waiting for us to jump on board and go , and it boils down to is capital raise . I'm not the professional capital raiser and I know that's where I'm lacking , so I need to be able to find a person or a team that we can create .
That's all they do is knock it out of the park , excuse me , knock it out of the park all day long and we just keep building and going and going like the Energizer Bunny . But we'll see where that goes . If you know somebody , please leave us a comment , Feel free to reach out to us .
But I'd love to be able to connect and hear what you guys are saying on the topic . But also , have you guys faced this in your own business ? And , if you have , I'd love to be able to figure out and hear how you figured it out . Have a good one , guys . I'll see you guys on the other side .