On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. I'm not the dumbest guy in the world, but I I don't wanna live like this anymore. What can I do? Where can I get an additional stream of income? Because the the old logic is just work harder. Just work harder. And I thought to myself, how how I can't work any harder.
You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe featuring fellow 78 and even 9 figure business owners who have real battle scars from business and life, but have prevailed as the king that they are designed to be. We welcome high performing entrepreneurs to the stage in order to reveal the real of the real on what it takes to build a successful business today.
We dissect the good and bad decisions they've made along the way Chaz give a true and accurate picture of the journey of success and how too can get there. Through this dialogue, you will learn the value of growing your network and surrounding yourself with power players and keys like today's guest. Grab your pen and notebook because we're about to dive in. What's up, everybody? I'm Chaz Wolfe gathering the Kings podcast. Today, I've got Stuart Gethner here on the King stage.
My brother, Stewart. How are you? Hey. Great to be here. Thanks for having. I'm excited. Well, I appreciate you being here. The excitement is is mutually founded, but, you've got some experience. You've got, different industries. You get to touch a lot of industries now in your current business. So I'm excited for you to be here and share your wealth knowledge. Tell us what kind of business do you have now? Right now, I own a real estate investment company.
We're a small boutique company located in Phoenix, Arizona. And we invested small multi family up to a 100 units. Mainly, we've been here in Arizona for the past 20 years. We've now started to expand outside Arizona into Cincinnati area and subparts of Florida. I love it. I love it. All the, all the, well, I guess my, the Cincinnati is gonna say all the warm places, but Yeah. Florida Florida Florida is good for real estate. I'm excited to be able to jump into some of this.
I've got a background in some real estate. We've had some cool real estate guests on the show. You've got a little bit of a of a background, though, that's different than real estate. We'll get to that here in a second. Sure. What's your why? What's the burning deep desire before we get into the nitty gritty of the story? Who's Stuart? Why are you doing this? What's the bigger picture? So my immediate more recent why is my my kids. So I wanted to make sure that I was able to provide for my kids.
They're now grown adults. I had I had a son and 2 daughters, and my goal was to get them to college age, not on drugs and not pregnant or getting any better. That's a that's a good checklist. Check check check check check. Yeah. And and I was able to check the boxes, which is, I'm I'm proud to say.
Yep. But, ultimately, When I was a kid growing up, I always wanted to be a major league baseball player, so I couldn't make it in the major leagues, but I used to watch this guy on television guiding Dave Delgado, guiding Carol Sheets, and I watched these guys build these real estate cash flow empires, At nighttime, they would collect their rent checks. And the daytime, they'd be surfing in Hawaii, and I say, you know, one day, I'd like to be doing that. Yeah. Yeah. So here we are. Here we are.
Are you surfing today, or or is that tomorrow? Surfing in Hawaii, but I'm able to create passive cash flow the the red checks come in the 1st the month, you know, a 100% of them don't always come in a 100% of the time, but for the most part, it it it's a pretty good game. Yeah. I mean, we're recording here on May 2nd. So rent rent rents coming in as we speak. No question. No question. I've got notifications about our properties here in the last couple of days. Some people pay early.
Some people pay a little bit late, but it always comes around the first. As you mentioned, Yes. Love love that part of it. Okay. So so you got kids. You got another leg. You got, like, another layer, a legacy, or or something to leave behind. Yeah. What's up? Like, are they involved in the business? Like, how how are they connected, if if anything, to what you're doing there physically every single day?
So, again, with my with with with my kids, I wanna make sure that they knew how to make a living, how to make money, re regardless of what relationships, regardless their education level, So I would take them with me when they were little Chaz I would be putting banded signs on the ground. I'd take them to clean up properties. I would take them. I would take them. They're not in the business, but I can honestly say they're all independent. They're all doing Wolfe.
And one owns a couple of UPS stores in the valley. The other's a national sales manager out of Chicago, and a youngest one does professional rodeo. So they all Okay. Got 2 different things. But to get my eyes their success, so I'm extremely proud of them. Yeah. No. I love that. And I think it's a good distinction. It doesn't mean that the kids have to be in the business.
I love what you said, though, is that you you took them so that they would learn, right, so that they would learn how to do deals or learn what properties are or the value of assets, all these things. Yes. And now they have their own their own road to go. So I think as Kings, this is this is a question I've got young kids.
So this is a question that I often like to ask, especially folks that Chaz have gone through the deal with kids, how, when would you do, you know, all those fun things that Chaz we'd like to know. So let's get to your story. You you had a previous life before real estate or or maybe Chaz you're building your real estate. Talk about that. Talk about how we came to the moment we are now. Chaz I mentioned, couldn't make it a major league baseball. And my dad was a pharmacist.
My grandpa was a pharmacist. Michael Maxwell was a pharmacist. So with nothing else left to do, I went to pharmacy school in Saint Louis, graduated, moved out to Arizona, could not stand the the cold weather back in the Midwest, And so landed here in the Phoenix area and started working as a pharmacist.
One of the challenges that I had was, and I think this is true with everyone, No matter how much money you make, if you have if you have a credit card that gives you a 5 or $10,000 credit limit, you tend to spend that as well. So if you make 50,000 a year, you got a $10,000 credit card limit. It's been 60. If you have a 100, spend a 110, 200, 210, whatever whatever that is. That's kinda where I was.
I was in Chaz up to my ears in credit card debt and had these 2 little girls at the time And we we used to go to this thing called the Renaissance Festival. It's out here in the middle of the desert, and they dressed in Joust, and they dressed in medieval times. And my little girls like to go and get those head of tattoos. Oh, sure. So I knew I was up to my eyeballs of credit card debt specifically by Discover card.
So I went to the grocery store here at Fry's, which is a Kroger, to buy the discounted tickets because they didn't wanna pay full price at the door. I remember taking my kids to the to the Renaissance festival until they got those big turkey legs that you try to bite and all kinds of horses and gear and Kings and queens and all kinds of stuff, and we had a great day to do the henna tattoos, and we're on our way back. And I'm on the highway.
And I noticed that my my gas light yellow starts to flicker a little bit, and I looked down at my dashboard, and I'm running low on gas. And I'm thinking of myself, I I Chaz probably make it home. We're about 45, maybe 55 minutes away. And my I'm looking at the bed seat. My kids are sleeping because we're on the highway. Their crash and their car seats. And we get on we we we change eggs to get another highway. And this flashing light turns solid yellow. And I'm thinking to myself, okay.
I'd I know what this is. I read a loin gas. Let's get off of the next exit and and fill up. So I get off of the next exit, and I take up my Discover card knowing that I'm at my credit limit. And I put it in the little machine and I pull it out. And I'm thinking of myself Chaz I look, my kids are still asleep. I remember my I have my gym bag in the back seat. And I think I have a couple dollars in that just in case my credit card gets declined.
And I look over to the machine and Bing, it says approved. You can lift the lever. But as a call, ain't god, Discover. So I put the I put the nozzle of the gas tank. I fill it up all the way, and and it shuts down. I say, I I know I met my limit. I I'm not sure what I'm gonna be able to fill up again. Let me just top this off. So I start squeezing the nozzle to top it off and bam. Gas just backfires and spills old.
And it I like to smell the gas, but I don't like it when I'm covered in the kinda head to toe. So I put back the nozzle, and I remember thinking of myself. Man, there's gotta be a better way. I I I I'm not the smartest guy in the world. I'm not the dumbest guy in the world. But I I don't wanna live like this anymore. What can I do? Where can I get an additional stream of income? Because the the old logic is Just work harder. Just work harder.
And I thought to myself, how how I I can't work any harder. I stand on my feet as a pharmacist filling prescriptions trying to help people. What can I do? And I remembered, as a kid, I wanted to be doing this real estate investing, so I started to educate myself.
I hired myself a coach and mentor to teach me to cut off the timeline of what I was gonna be able to do, and I was so thankful that the coach was allowing me to make payments to him because I really didn't have the the it was $4000 at the time, to be very honest with you, and it was probably the best money I've ever spent.
So with that, I was able to start doing and done some wholesaling, did some fix and flips, done some buying vaults, and be able to create Not just immediate cash flow, but I've learned how to create long term cash flow as well. And for me, that's where you create wealth. Long term cash, pacific. Yeah. I love it. And and not only are you doing that for yourself, but you also help others do the same now. Right? That's right.
So for 15 years, I taught at our local Ria, our real estate education real estate investment advisory. I also have 15 online classes for the National Ria I was very fortunate that Forbes real estate put me under real estate council. Yeah. So my that's a passion of mine is trying to help others to show them how to create this You know, it's I I always say that the concepts did the same. When I was a kid growing up, I used to watch this cartoon called the Flintstones. Don't get hurt of them.
Right? And and Fred Phillips don't used to work down at the rock quarry. And and and he had a his boss was mister Slate. And mister Slate used to say when he would get frustrated with Fred, he would say, Good help is hard to find. And so I would always joke. Good help is hard to find in the bedrock era. Good help is hard to find today. Concepts stay the same, but the times change.
So for us who do real estate investing, maybe the color of the Cabinets change maybe the countertops, the flooring changes, but the concepts Yeah. They stay the same. Yeah. What are those concepts, Stewart? What what stays the same in real estate that to someone who has never done real estate before getting started today could could guarantee themselves or or would be able to count on. Absolutely. So so that's a great question, by the way.
So all of the off the top and in the beginning of any business, real estate or any retail business, you make your money when you buy. I cannot control. You know, the joke is my crystal ball broke. Right? I don't have it anymore. I can't predict the future. But what I can know is is if I buy right and market goes down a little or goes down a little bit more, I'm still gonna be okay. You don't bet on the comp.
You don't bet at the today's prices, paying today's prices, hoping hoping hoping That that's a bad idea. So the first concept is you make your money when you buy. Yeah. Love that. Love that. And and I loved how you also said that that that's applicable for businesses as well. It doesn't, you know, if you're gonna buy a business or or really, I guess, anything. Right. So but but specifically real estate.
Yeah. But but any business, so when when when I was in pharmacy, one thing that I learned was is that the consumer's not stupid. Right. So if you're selling your Tylenol or your aspirant for $5 a bottle and Wolfe word is selling it for $4 or $3 a bottle, Chaz she's gonna go to Walmart where she can buy it for less. The consumer's not stupid. So if you wanna be competitive, you have to buy it better in order to be competitive in the marketplace.
Yeah. Yeah. That's a great like you're saying, a a great concept to realize across across industry. I think that's super applicable. Okay. So inside the weeds of you starting to put together cash flow, this is not something that just, you know, hey. I decide today to become a real estate investor, and now I'm wealthy. Like, this this takes a little bit of building. It takes a little bit of time. Right? Would you agree? Yeah. It's it's not getting rich quick. Okay?
So that's a great comment, Chaz, but I'll tell you what. It's get rich slow. Works every time. If you have a plan and you're methodical about your plan and you go step by step, it it it it it's not rocket science. It's something that you not only can you do once, but you Chaz scale once you learn the basic fundamentals. And and when I work with my clients, I especially those that are beginners, I find the biggest challenge that they have is pulling the trigger, the fear.
And what ends up happening is they find a deal We evaluate the deal. We walk the property. Whatever that is, they can't pull the trigger for for whatever reason, right, and someone else does. Yep. And then they look back at that and go, I knew it. I knew it. And so that's what they need to give them the confidence Chaz they have the wherewithal to be able to pull the trigger on the next opportunity.
Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes that lost opportunity can Chaz give us some confidence or, you know, for some, it's a it's a swift kick in the in the heiney or or the front side, maybe. But you realize you're like, oh, bummer. And then that takes you into action or or it takes you into a downward spiral, which obviously wouldn't be a great case. Okay. So it's a so not get rich quick, but a get rich for sure is what I'm hearing you say. Yes. Which I love that. I love I love to get rich sure.
Been doing real estate for for a while now, and I like real estate deals. I like analyzing deals. I've held back on not pulling on a trigger. I'm done a deal that didn't make me money. I've done deals that made so, like, there's there's a mix. Right? Like, there's all kinds of stuff that happens, especially in real estate, because you could be so creative. Like, we could do this. Like you said, little bit of wholesaling, little bit of fix and flip, little bit of hold, little bit of multifamily.
Yeah. Obviously, you've got a little bit more of a of a of a focus now, but Through your journey, you said I'm working my plan. I wanna know what was a good decision that you made inside of that plan? That we could replicate in a business or in our real estate investing if we're listening. So for me, and this is just for me, Having so much so so you're always good as your team, and you can't go at it alone. And and by the way, I tried going at it alone.
And what I learned was that there are people out there that actually want to help you. And and reminds me of a story by mom. My mom was 99. And and she's probably not gonna listen to this podcast, so this is gonna get started to tell. My cousin, Judy, always likes to make meatloaf and bring it to my mom. K. So she's coming one day to bring meatloaf to my mom, and my mom says to me, you know, I really don't like her meatloaf. Maybe I should call her and tell her not to bring it.
And I said, mom, you know, this is something she enjoys doing. This makes her feel important per contribution. Don't take that away from her. Yeah. So that's the same with people in our lives today. When we wanna get started in something, there are people, professionals who have done this already, who Wolfe who are willing to help and assist.
And so trying to go at it alone is really hard, especially when you're new or when you're trying to scale, even when you're established, It's you're only as good as your professional network and being being able to pick up the phone and call someone for information because Even though I've been doing this for a while, Chaz, I don't know at all. And by the way, when you know it all, things change anyway. Right?
The market changes, the banks, the fed, all the inflation, unemployment, all the stuff that we cannot control. But what we can control is our strategy and our network. So for me, light goes on when I found someone and was able to pay them to help mentor me and get me through the weeds, You you know, they say you never get hit by the bus to see common. And when you're first starting out, even when you're established, they're buses. You don't see common.
So get Chaz assistance getting that wisdom that knowledge of mentorship has tremendous value. Yeah. I love how you you give a distinction whether you realize it or not of reaching out because a a paid scenario or a free scenario. They're listening to you right now with no cost. Nope. But you need both is the point. You can't in my opinion, you can't just or let let me say it like this. I free loaded for a long time. And it wasn't because I didn't have the money.
It was because I was watching YouTube and listening to podcasts and I was listening into books, and I was doing all the free stuff, which is great. At some point, though, when you put your money where your mouth is or where your desires are, would you agree that things tend to change a little bit more rapidly. No question. Well, you're we we we but now you're financially vested. Right? Now you can go out of pocket. And and you're right, Jesse.
You can go on YouTube University and pretty much learn anything you wanna learn. But what I think what makes our services unique is that I hold your hand. I work with you shoulder by shoulder. It's not some, books and tapes that you gotta listen to and then a manual with a company. Go do it yourself. Yeah. You get me. So and and I like to create success stories. So even though people think I'm a nice guy, I'm a good guy. If we don't create a success story for you, we failed.
And I don't wanna sail. Yeah. Yeah. No. That's good. I think that that's a good distinction as Wolfe. Between the paid and free is that you've got that next level of implementation or hand holding or do it with you or having someone in your pocket. You know, even guys that I've thought about where I've met, you know, one time, two times.
And I paid this sometimes scenarios where they didn't even ask for money, and I sent them a check, you know, because I wanted to be number 1, appreciative, but also then I wanted to hold myself. Like, I paid that dude $3000 for that lunch. You better take those notes and put them into good use. Right?
And so, anyway, regardless of all that, I think what you're saying for the listener, they're paying attention, that they need to build a network, the things that they can control, which include, listening, going to conferences, I'm sure, but then also hiring a mentor coach. Anything you wanna add there? Yeah. And and not being afraid to make mistakes. And so, you know, Warren Buffett would say, rule number 1 is don't lose money. Rule number 2. See rule number 1.
And so and and and and and and you were you were very honest and straightforward, Jasmine, you said, not all your deals are home runs. And so not all my deals are home runs, you know, and and not all my deals are perfect. However, the role of a good leader is to be able to make decisions. And sometimes when leaders make the wrong decisions and they realize this is the wrong decision, That's why their leaders, they could twist it and turn it to make it the right decision.
So sometimes people think like not making a decision at all is making a decision, and it's not. Great leaders make decisions. Yeah. It's good. Yeah. Obviously, I believe where we are today is based on the decisions that we've made. I mean, that's what it's a a large reason why I bring up a good and bad decision. So I wanna flip the coin here on you and talk about something that maybe hasn't gone super or maybe it's something that you've learned.
Of course, we we know how to turn our failures into wins. Like you just said, every good leader does, but what's one of those failures for you? Give us give us some detail. Well, I I've thought during the pandemic, it might be a good idea to look at some more commercial property as Even though we we weren't out able to go out and visit retail when things were going when things were really tight, you still needed to go see a dentist if you wanted to get your teeth cleaned.
You still wanted to go to the chiropractor to get your neck adjusted. There are still places that you had to do in person. And as I looked to doing buying a medical building and being being a pharmacist, I thought, well, you know, I can talk the talk and walk to walk with these guys. One of the things I learned was it's a different beast than doing multifamily.
So I've done some commercial deals, but one of the struggles I had was buying a medical building where everybody's leases were staggered, and we had one big there was gonna be one big tenant, and there was uncertainty whether that tenant was gonna renew their lease or not. So here I am thinking I know what I'm doing and walking the walk and talking the talk and all that stuff.
And at the end of the day, I'm like, I really don't know what I'm doing here, and I should probably bow out before I before I lose more money. You know, we had put earnest money down The money went hard. I had inspection. And I realized I think I'm in a little bit over my head. Yeah. Wolfe, okay. So so the failure or the loss there is that you lost some money. You lost probably a little bit of, like, a cloud, a little bit of ego, like, little ego hit.
Some investors may have thought, well, man, I thought we're doing this deal, but now we're not. So maybe there was some confusion or maybe a little bit of, like, uncertainty about where you were taking things. But I want for the listener to pay attention to what everything you just said. Even though all those things were happening, you had the honesty to look inside the mirror really inside yourself and go, Okay.
I either I either stop now and hit all of those things that I just said, or potentially down the road, I take all of those things at a 100 x level when this thing goes south, and I'd I make a deal really, really bad. Is that kinda what you were thinking? No question. So you you and You know, we and I I and I think for the listeners, we all make mistakes. Right? We we all try to go outside our box.
And and and if you're not going if you're not uncomfortable with what you're doing, then you're not growing. And so I I I learned from that experience that if I if I had pulled that trigger, I I I probably could have figured out a way to make things right. But my challenge was that big tenant, and I didn't know how to solve that problem. And I knew that I didn't know how to solve that problem. I did have the relationships and that would have been a terrible cash flow tragedy.
Had had they decided not to renew their lease, and they move out, and I'm stuck holding the bill for on the mortgage coming out of pocket. So you hit those right on the head. How do how do entrepreneurs today? Maybe some that are listening right now. How do they take this dynamic of on one side being uncomfortable.
You just said in order to grow, I have to put myself in situations that I'm But then on the other side of that coin is, like, I need to stay in my lane and I need to do what I'm comfortable with so that I can win. It's How do we play that back and forth? Like, it's like it's like a line we're teetering. That's great.
You know, and and it reminds me of the example of you wanna hire someone with experience, and the person Chaz no experience, but how does that person get experience unless you give it the opportunity? Right. So that's that's the ultimate dilemma, right, is not a problem we can easily solve. In my opinion, the answer is partnerships, joint ventures, strategic alliances, I did a fix and flip many years ago, and we made a $180,000 over the fix and flip. I had a business partner.
She took 90. I took 90. I paid off some debt. I went ahead and invested some of the property. I think I went on a vacation. At some point in time, that 90,000 was gone. Maybe taking me a month, 6 months a year, whatever that is, it was gone. And so now I didn't have the money, but I wanted to stay in the game. So I still found deals. I still found opportunities, but I didn't have the money.
So now I have to find a partner, someone to joint venture with, that does have the money that sees the vision that I can work with, and they'll invest in not just the project, but they'll invest in me. So finding others to work with on your as a teammate, it could be permanent, it could be temporary, but it's a great way not just to get started, but it's absolutely what you need to scale because everybody comes to the table bringing something.
And and at some point in time, I'm gonna need other resources. A Gigawork example. I I also property with a gentleman named Art Scott and a gal named Tamara Peterson. We go property together. Art is a general contractor Tamara is a bookkeeper. I own a property management company. When the tenants call and the water is leaking out of the faucet, or the air conditioning is not working or whatever the problem is, I call ARC. ARC doesn't go there a week from Thursday because he's busy.
Our goal is they're on his way home because that's his investment as well. Right? And every month we get monthly reports on our properties from Tamara, We meet quarterly. We do quarterly distributions. That's what Tamara does. So I've been able to leverage my skill sets not being a contractor, not not not being a bookkeeper, by having a partnership and joint venture with others, And we've been in this joint venture for over 10 years. Yeah. So that's what I would say to your listeners.
Starting or wanting to scale, it's hard to do it alone. And being able to establish some professional networks about outside relationships, and others are willing to help. Art's willing to help. Tamara's willing to help. And so that's, in my opinion, how you really can get started and scale. Yeah. I love I love that answer more than I can say other Chaz, gosh, darn it. I love that answer. But here's my follow-up. Stuart, what I have found in real estate, this is a normal thing.
You you had an operator. You have an investor. You have a con or you have a, you know, the a mix of of of partners. I'm in several of these as as just as you described. But in the business world outside of real estate, It's like, oh, you know, stay away from partners. They don't work. You know, do it alone. Like, why do you think that that is? Number 1, And number 2, how do how do we transcend that? How does how does a business owner today who's not in real estate take what you just said?
Because you didn't say anything about real estate. You said this guy has this seat, and this guy has this seat, and this gal has this seat. And together, we operate the business. That's right. Right? Right. So so here's my thought on that. Right? And and and that is my experience has been And when I go to the different Chaz and I see people sitting together talking and they like, oh, you wanna do fix and flips? Yeah. Let's go grab a cup of coffee together and and let's talk about it.
And and they go off work. They go to denny's. They go to McDonald's. They have a cup of coffee, and they laugh at each other's jokes, and everything seems wonderful. And they say, let's go into business together. Right? And when you go into business with someone, honestly, it's like being married. Right? So you wouldn't marry someone just by going for a cup of coffee at a Denny's or McDonald's.
Right. And so I I taught a program on establishing partnerships and joint ventures and strategic alliances And one of the pillars is is that we have to establish the foundation of our business to make sure not just that we're a good fit, but also define some of the roles.
And I my experience has been that with people going to these partnerships that you speak of that stale, right, they haven't done enough due diligence, not just on the other person, but on their own relationship, their own escort, their own LLC. Who did the defibrils? Who's gonna do the books? Who's gonna do the marketing? Who's gonna do this, that, or the other, and being able to you know, we use the expression. I don't want you playing in my sandbox.
So if I'm responsible for these tasks, Right? I'll share them with you, but this is my domain. So my and let me add this. When I was with the the Arizona Real Estate Investors Association, we we would offer for free the opportunity to look at your business plan. No charge, look at your business plan, and my job, our job was to poke holes in it. In the hundreds or maybe thousands of business plans that I've looked at, not one of them.
Not one of them said, I'm gonna get divorced at the end, and I'm gonna go to severe depression and lose Right? Yeah. Not one of them ended with. My business partner's gonna drain the bank account, and I'm gonna have to go bankrupt. That's right. They all have happy endings. Every single one of them. Correct? Right? That's right. And so for our our responsibility as entrepreneurs is and I said this before, nothing ever happens according to plan. But you wouldn't know it if you didn't have a plan.
So we have to start with the plan, and we have to be flexible with it. But at the end of the day, just like marriages, They don't always work out, but I found if you do your due diligence up front and establish rules of of the relationship up front Those relationships last a lot longer than just getting together over a cup of coffee at Denny's or McDonald's. Yeah. Yeah. You gave a lot there. I I want the listener to just hit the pause button, rewind, and listen to that again.
No no wonder that you taught classes on this. The biggest thing that I can, like, agree with is that it's a marriage. And so, okay. Fine. Like, I mean, I I don't know the last time someone dated, like you said, for a cup of coffee or even a or a month. Yes. We all know those fairy tales happen, but not really. Really, it's a it's an intentional effort to get to know each other and to make that there's alignment, like, real alignment just like in a marriage.
Like, I'm not planning on getting divorced to my wife. Well, and then on top of that, there's, like, a commitment. I I am not getting divorced to my wife. Right? So if I if I enter a business relationship in the same way, obviously, there needs to be a plan on how to act if something were to happen, because in a business, you can exit, but the it can't just be roses, you know, just because we're we're we're buddies is what is what I'm hearing you say. Yeah. Did that no no question.
And all relationship, businesses, marriages, friendships, they all go in cycles. They all have their highs. They all have their lows. And just like you said, the commitment, when I do partnerships with and I do joint ventures, One of the things that I say flat out is let's agree to leave our egos at the door, and let's do what's best for the business. I don't have to be right. We don't have to take my idea. I just want the business to be successful. So I find sometimes the egos get in the way.
And let let's agree, you and I, Chaz we'll leave our egos at the door and look out for the business's best interest. Yeah. Love that. That's it. Those are great guiding principles. What what do you use now Chaz far as guiding principles? What do you use now to make good decisions? Obviously, we talked good and bad here. Something comes across your desk today. Well, how do you analyze it? That's a great question. Let me tell you what I learned. I've been doing this for a little while.
For the first lesson I learned is no knee jerk reactions. Good. So if something comes across my desk, if it's a real estate deal and I need to do it down and dirty and evaluate it right away, I'll evaluate it right away. But at the end of the day, I I use this expression, and I'm sure you've heard of it. Let me sleep on it. Yeah. Let me sleep on it.
And I find that if I give myself a little time to digest it and get my subconscious mind, opportunity to let it sink in, Chaz I'll come up with questions, solutions, other thoughts, other ways to look at the same thing that I may not have thought of at that moment. So for me, giving myself a little bit of element of time, I have found has really helped me navigate to the woods and come out on the right side. Yeah. I love that answer.
Being a a decisive and quick action taker myself, I've had to learn how to add a little bit of time. But that doesn't necessarily mean weeks or months or procrastination. What I'm hearing you say is poise. And and I've I've brought this out in a couple couple of other listeners or other guests. What would you say, though, to the listener right now who's going, uh-uh, but, like, if I wait, then I'm gonna delay. Or if I wait, then I end up procrastinating. I ended up not doing it. Alright.
It's always a, like, boom. Just make the decision and roll. That's kinda how they operate now. What would you say? Yeah. And so so and and I tell this to my clients all the time. Now Wolfe they call me? I'll tell them to trust your gut. Trust your gut. At the end of the day, there's the pit of your stomach. You got you you've kinda got a feeling, and I would trust that feeling. And if the opportunity slips by, there's always gonna be another opportunity.
Whether you're a flipper, a business owner looking to buy some merchandise, whatever that is, There's gonna be another salesperson coming into your business. There's gonna be another opportunity. This isn't the no all be all. No matter how important or big it seems at the time, There's always gotta be the next opportunity. There's always gonna be the next deal. Yep. Understood. Understood. Sometimes it's we have to fight off the FOMO in that moment of missing the deal or missing the opportunity.
But Yes. When you've been in the game long enough, you understand that the opportunity train comes, pretty regularly, and it's just it's not my matter of necessarily missing it. It's a matter of, do I align with this one? Does it help me get what I want? All the things that you kinda just mentioned, and then taking a little bit of time, have a little bit of poise to this scenario. Don't don't rush something. I I I talked about this.
Actually, I'd love to know your thoughts on this because we're kind of in the same vein here. I had a podcast guest a couple months ago, and we were talking about, you know, this this rush and hurry word and how that's different than speed or fast. Right? And so, you know, if if I'm rushing to make the decision, then I'm hearing you say there's confusion and maybe I don't give my subconscious a chance to really process and get all the things out that maybe it does.
But if I can give give myself a little bit of, you know, pause or poise, it gets rid of the, like, the rush and the angst but then it it actually allows me to go faster. Can you can you give us some thoughts on that? Yeah. That's a great analogy to bring up to us, business owners, entrepreneurs, or any person out there. And what I've learned, excuse me, from my experience, is there's a difference between taking a risk and taking a chance. Hey. Thanks for your chance.
Is when we go to Vegas and we bet it all on red. Let's take it a chance. Risks, we can hedge our risks. We could educate ourselves. We can go to others to look at the same thing and ask for advice or wisdom. And whatever it is they were doing that's probably precedent it's been done before, going back to YouTube University or searching the internet or some type of historical perspective is always helpful. So you're right.
Taking a chance and and just, you know, just throwing money into the wind versus hedging your risks. I'd rather take and there are risks in any business. There are risks. But we can hedge our risk. We can take calculated risks as long as I'd rather do more than chances. Yeah. I love that to that that there's slight change of word there. Words are powerful, and I think that you hit it right on the nail there. What do you think about?
I'm gonna I'm gonna ask you a question about KPIs, metrics, What would you think the one metric that you would track inside of your real estate investing world? If you can only pick 1, what would that one be? That you attract forever and ever. How many offers they have to write in order to get a deal? Why why is that the one that you pick? Hey, Kings and Queens. Chaz Wolf. I wanna talk to you about something that's super important to me. We put a lot of time and effort.
We, meaning myself and my team, into this podcast into the content that goes out every single day. And if you have been getting any sort of value or insight from this, we want it to be able to reach other business owners too. So we would love if you would like, comment, share, leave a review, post, share again, all of the things. On social media, on all the different platforms, or even on the podcast mediums of Apple and Spotify.
We would love to be able to get our content into more hands more entrepreneurs so they can grow their business as quick as possible. Together, we are building a community of like minded entrepreneurs who are committed to growing their businesses to new heights. So let's do this. Let's help each other. Let's help each other grow. Because that's the one that leads to the most money. We metric. We do KPIs and everything. How many phone calls? Do do we get an opportune?
How many how many offers do it? How many business do we have to make? How how on our direct mail on our marketing? What makes the phone ring. But, ultimately, for us in real estate at the end of the day, is getting an offer accepted. Doesn't matter whether we're wholesaling, blip in, or buying and holding, Nothing happens until we write an offer and the offer is accepted.
So for us tracking the offers and I'll tell you this, go a step further, Our KPIs are we gotta write about 12 to 16 offers in order for to for one to get accepted. So I had about when we first started, and about 40 or so offers that were rejected sitting on my desk. And I and this was a quite a few years ago when everything was done in paper. Now it's all digital. They were litters on my desk. And I didn't know what to do with them. And I'm like, well, do I shred them?
Like, what do I do with them? And then my lovely bride is a realtor, Stephanie. And I said to her, can you do me a favor? Can you just look at these 40 or so offers and just see if they were accepted if they sold it, they didn't sell. I'm just kinda curious as to what happened with them. She had some downtime, and she said, sure. So she went through, there's, like I said, 40 use of offers. 2 of those offers sold for less than what we offered.
That's just 2 of those offers sold One was for 500 above what we offered and another one was for 1500 above what we offered. Yeah. And so I I looked at that pile not knowing what to do with it. I now know what to do with it. We recycle those and we stay in touch with those sellers. Every 30 or 45 days. And so our close rate, our KPIs are higher in the follow through with the offers that weren't accepted, Chaz our original 12 to 15 written offers to get one deal.
So tracking your and knowing your numbers is important, It it it's it it's a guiding light, but but here's here's the challenge. So so for us, we need about 30 to 40 phone calls to get a deal. That's what we need. That's what it is. And we think we're pretty good. And we'll get those phone calls. Quit sending me this stuff. I'm never gonna sell. I'm dying it at this point. We get those as well. That counts as a call.
So I hired an intern, Diane Kyle, who's now one of my clients, and I'm sure he'll listen to the podcast. True story. And he knew it was 30 to 40 phone calls, and he was in charge of answering the phone. So 30 phone calls come in no deal. 40 phone calls come in no deal. 50 phone calls come in no deal. Okay. He's just walked around the office. Happy to be here. After 60 phone calls, no deal, He's walked around the office talking thinking, this guy doesn't know what he's talking about.
I think he's slower crap. Right. Phone call number 66 Was a deal? Phone call number 67 was a deal. And so even though the KPI say 30 to 40, when we hit 30 to 40, it doesn't mean that that's, you know, it's it's an aggregate. Yeah. That's right. So when you look at your numbers, you have to it's one thing to have the numbers It's another thing to understand that. That's right. And like I said, Kyle's a client today. He's killing it.
He's got he's got a a business in Southern California, a business in Seattle, And I and I tell that story and he smiles and laughs and he says, you're right. You never know when the next one's gonna come. It's just a numbers thing, but you can't get discouraged. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's important to know what the numbers are so you can measure. And, also, I think this is good for the reverse too because Kyle, in that example, was the person running the number or or doing the the action.
And so the the entrepreneur listening right now may not be the guy making the phone call or whatever the action inside of their business. But here's what we do sometimes as entrepreneurs is that we don't understand the number either. We understand that at 30 to 40, like Kyle did, when our new guy has made, you know, 60 or a 100 phone calls, we're gonna immediately, like, nope, out in with the new. And And then that they're they're they need to be replaced. Maybe. I don't know.
I'm not necessarily saying give people chances longer than they need. What I am saying though is that Sometimes the numbers work. Like what you're saying in a just a in a in a different format, maybe it's training, maybe it's a different thing that's causing the the number to to not show up. It could just be that bang, bang, double deals back to back on 66 and 67 And then you look back and you're like, oh, yeah. Well, 32 and a half calls per deal. Wow. Would you look at that? Right.
You're you're spot on. So it's it's one thing to have the numbers. There's nothing to understand that. And that's one of the things that I do with my clients, and I'm very, very strict about it is every quarter we go over numbers. We do quarterly meetings. And we we we take a look at and so if you just started with me, then we don't we were gonna make some projections for the next quarter. Right. And then when that quarter ends, we're gonna just like you were driving a car.
You're gonna look in the rearview mirror just for a little bit, see what were those projections? How did we do? What does it look like? And then after that, We're gonna start making projections going forward, and that's where we're gonna spend most of our time is looking in the front window windshield, but we gotta have some kind of metrics in order for us to know that we're on the right track. Yeah. I love that.
What would you say is a good book or maybe just a resource for a business owner trying grow their business or maybe who's interested in real estate investing. Yeah. So I'll link a couple of books. Well, one is the illusions of a reluctant messiah. I think it's a great book written by Richard Bach. He wrote John of the Livingston Seagull, and I think that's a great mindset.
I think one of the biggest challenges we have as as humans, whether your entrepreneurs are whatever whatever shield you may be in is mindset and being able to have a mind shift and being able to work on your attitude. So I to me, that that's a very important book Chaz far as being as creating a success getting inside your own head and to get to being able to create more success and scalability. Love that. Love that.
What do you think about networking or master mining with other entrepreneurs or real estate investors? I think that they're good. And I'll give this piece of advice. When I go to when I ain't joined one of those groups, I wanna be the dumbest guy in a row. Yeah. I love that. And so I find that when you go to BNI or you go to some of the networking groups Chaz they're all there to sell you their stuff. It was the realtor. There's the this. There's the that. And they have their own agenda.
That's right. And so if I'm gonna be joining a mastermind, I wanna make sure that I I I wanna contribute. It's all Of course. You know, those things, those are contribution, but I wanna make sure that those people understand what I'm trying to accomplish and the scale that I'm at. And so that I could be able to get get get opportunity and get knowledge and get insight, get wisdom, different perspectives when I'm done for the day.
Yeah. I love I love I mean, in essence, for me, what you just did is it gave a a a description or an analogy of of networking versus Master Mining. One of my very first clients inside of Gathering King's mastermind, we had our first event. This was a year or more ago, but after the event, he was like, you know, it was the first time I've met with people in in a room that didn't want my business. Like, they weren't soliciting me. And it was, like, an incredible feeling.
Now I think most of us at this point have have felt that at some point or another, but the reality of what you're saying is you gotta get into a room. That's number 1 genuine. But number 2, some big enough thinkers and big enough doers that can can see what you're trying to do and then push you that thing that you're trying to do. Would you agree? No. You're spot up. And and there's there's a plethora of them out there.
They're they're all over the place Chaz you go to meet up You go into your church. You go into wherever wherever you socialize, and there's always opportunities. I think our most valuable asset is our time. And so we need to be very judicious about our time, MG, you know, and and pick the one that we think things can serve us best and and know this the the the mastermind groups that I've been in, even though many have been made very successful, they just don't last forever.
Sometimes it lasts about 2 or 3 years. And then it's just time for a change, and that's okay. And that's okay. Yeah. Yeah. You you do life with pea people that continue to push you forward. So I would say for me, at least, that's that's what's changed always in the past for me Chaz if I've if I've run the course, if I if there's no one in this circle that's pushing me, then then now we're just friends, which is totally fine, and I'm all about friendships.
I'm even okay with paying for friendships. But if I'm there to push my business forward and that's not happening, that's the the key indicator for me. So I'm hearing you say the same thing. Same from the spot. What would you say about you you mentioned, you know, the the kids earlier and bringing them into the business. My my question for you about family is there's this work life balance that I think is just bogus. What I like to say is work life obsession. Right?
So what we've done in our business has been obsessed. We're we're obsessed with deals. Right? Like, I know how many calls. I know how many deals we gotta make offers on. Like, you're obsessed. Same thing happens for our family. If we're not obsessed with our family, then we're not successful. So how have you done both over these years with with kids and businesses and investments, all this stuff? Have you done it all? Yeah. So I did a terrible job.
So in the beginning, when I owned pharmacies and and worked as a pharmacist and started in real estate, I use the rationale. Oh, I I'm working this hard to provide for my family. Yep. We've all set. If I miss this, it's okay if I don't go to this wedding. It's okay if I don't fly back to Chicago. They'll understand because I'm working. Right. And as time Chaz gone on, I I have missed those opportunities. And now I kinda go to the other extreme as I I want to attend.
And so when someone hears a retirement party, a birthday party, whether it's for an infant, a two year old, or an eighty year old, I I want to attend. And so you're spot on. We we try to create the balance. At the end of the day, we're kinda married to our business. It's our lifeblood. You know, Brian Tracy, the business philosopher once said, when you start your own business, he would say, you get to work half days. And then he'd pause.
And he'd say, but the good news is you get to pick which 12 hour shift you want. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. And that's I love that. Right? And that's true. It's a hell of pleasure. Leave the office doesn't mean I'm done for the day. I might take something hold with me when when I did pharmacy, I would look at our inventory sheets over dinner. So that's the commitment we make to be successful. Anybody could work 40 hours a week. Right?
Jim Rowan would say, if you whistle while you work, McDonald's will give you 25¢ an hour more as opposed to if you don't whistle while you work. So anybody could do the 40 hour thing. It's it's being able to come early and stay late and making those relationships Wolfe at the same time making the same commitment to your family And I gotta be honest. It it's not easy. It's Chaz it's hard. Yeah. It's honest. It's real. I love I love that question for that exact reason.
I appreciate your vulnerability there. I have one last question here for you, Stewart. Sure. I gotta know if you had a Chaz, to whisper in the younger stewards here. What would you say? Man, that's a great question. So it reminds me of tell you a story.
It reminds me of a story that was done in the 19 fifties, early sixties, by some students at Harvard, and they interviewed all the living real rich what the the the rocker's dollars, the fords, Martin Luther King, all the all the known JFK, all the the past presidents, of of what they would do. Right? And and and the most common answer was they would start sooner. K? But doctor King and mother Theresa, they had the same answer, and it wasn't start sooner.
And so if if you read the article, at the end, it tells you what their thoughts were, and their thoughts were to think bigger. And when you think of doctor King and mother, Theresa, and how many lives they touch Throughout generations, they're both no longer with us, but I'm sure all your listeners know exactly who they are. You'd say to yourself, How could these people think bigger? I mean, they were pretty big. And so that's what I would be with our listeners today? Yes. Dark sooner.
But at at the end of the day, I'd like you to think bigger because the only limitations that you have are the limitations that you put on yourself. Back to the mindset, mindset, shift, concept. And so I I would leave with Chaz, and that is think bigger. How how does I'm gonna take you. I'm gonna I I love that. First off, thank you for that. How do we take that? And What would you say practically to the younger Stewart in order to get him to actually think bigger? What what does that look like?
Over the last 20, 30, 40 years of Stewart, you know, from 20 all the way up, thinking bigger. What would you have done differently? I think my biggest fear was was failure Chaz I didn't wanna fail or lose money. That's an opportunity. And so I I I would whisper in my gear that I have the confidence. I have the wherewithal, and Go with every mistake I make. We'll figure it out. That that that's the biggest challenge. And and Tony Robbins talks about this in in your six areas of of needs.
His his first need is certainty, and then the second one is uncertainty. And so a lot of us as humans, we like certainty. Yeah. Like going that you're gonna stop at the red light when my light is green. We we we need certainty in our lives. It's our ability to handle the uncertainty of what the future holds. What if this doesn't work out?
What happens if, right, Chaz it and that's And and and that's a tough thing to tough pill to swallow is being comfortable with uncertainty, but having the confidence in yourself and knowing that no matter what, I'm gonna I I'm gonna figure it out. I'm not gonna try to figure it out. I'm gonna figure it out. That's right. That's where the dilemma lies. Hey. I wasn't sure what would come with that follow-up answer, but, man, it's straight gold. So I appreciate you digging into that a little bit.
Let me press on you. How can the listener find you? Number 1, if if they're interested in real estate investing and they don't have anybody to teach them, you can teach them. How can they find you? Or if they're just interested in finding you and connecting with you as a business owner, how can they do that? Thank you so much for that opportunity to to promote myself. So about the website context, Stewart, contact you or just my website. I'm happy to go there.
And and I I think your listeners Wolfe be surprised because when the phone rings, I kinda answer my own phone. We're not this big giant conglomerate corporation where I've so far removed Chaz that's that's not what I think successful entrepreneurs work. So if they wanna reach out, insert an email, they wanna reach out through a solo 480 or 434500. That's my phone number. 480 44345100. If I don't answer right away, it's probably because I'm on a podcast or help me somebody up to that time.
But other than that, I return all my phone calls and and I may get my business to give everybody at the time to listen to see what I can do to help them. We call that in our office. We call it a 30 minute momentum session. I give everybody a 30 minute momentum session whether for free, whether it's to just just get started or whether they're looking to scale, I I work with Jay the home buyer.
He's been able to scale his wholesale business to over 40, 50000 a month, but at the end of the day, with our 30 minute move into session, it's not a sales pitch. Yeah. It's us getting to know each other, see what I can do to help you. And then here here's what I found. A a third of the people will take that information. If you if you wanna do seminars and webinars, a third will take it, and they'll go do something with it. And I meet on air for the from years. And that's happened.
They come back and they thanked me. And they're like, oh, I took this class. And then a third of the people will do nothing with it. Whether it's just not for them or they just get caught up in their own head. Right? And then the other third, they're gonna need some help and assistance. Yep. And those are the ones that I'm here to help.
Yeah. I love that knowing knowing that there's purpose in in what we do, even here today, did hear you, obviously, before we got started here, you let your team know, hey. I'm gonna be on a podcast, hold the calls. Uh-huh. And so I think that that's incredible that you would offer that a type of intentional connection point as we call it here with Gavin King. Appreciate, your opportunity to to share with us your story, your your experience, the whole deal.
We wish nothing but bless the deals that you're gonna do in 2023, your your kids that you talked about earlier, your team, everything. We just appreciate you being here. Thank you. And I I feel like I've been blessed. And and thank you for having me. Appreciate it. Thank you for listening to gathering the Kings today. I hope that you were able to pull out a few nuggets to go apply into your business right away.
More importantly, though, I hope that you're realizing that it takes more doing it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself. What I have realized, not only in my own journey from malt businesses in multiple different industries and now interviewing literally over 2 or 300 other very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is that It's tough to do it alone. And so gathering the Kings literally exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs.
In fact, we are putting together 1 1000 kings, specifically who are grateful, but not done. We're intentionally assembling kings who fight tooth and nail for their business, family, and communities, and here's what we believe Chaz in the pursuit of excellence in those areas, that it ignites within us the responsibility to govern power and forge a lasting legacy.
So if that relates and and resonates with you, and you know that you need people around you, sharp, qualified other very successful business owners. I want you to go to gathering the king's dot com. I want you to take a look at what we're doing and see if it makes sense for you to be part of our pursuit to 1000 kings. Talk soon.