On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. Don't act on eco and stick to your guns, and that's what we do now. We don't act on emotion Chaz makes sense. Let's do it if it doesn't on to the next. You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe Gathering 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 reel of the reel on what it takes to build a The The and how you too can get there. Through this dialogue, you will learn the value of growing your network and surrounding yourself with power players and Kings 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 King's podcast. We've got Sean Winslow on the Kings stage today.
My brother, how are you? Chaz, I'm great. Thank you so much for having me. Love your show. It's an honor to be here. I appreciate the great feedback. We think it's pretty great too, but when other people tell us that it makes us feel really good. You got you got like that authentic radio voice. It Chaz Yeah. I appreciate that. My my podcast coach was a friend before, and he just told me for a long time.
And I've heard it obviously outside of that too, but he's like, dude, we gotta get you a So, okay, Sean, tell us what kind of business that you have, brother? Yeah. Greenbrier Capital Group's my company, and we focus on investing in multifamily apartment communities across the country. And so we come in with a group of investors, and the goal is to invest in something we'd call value add.
So we wanna have a property that maybe just the previous owner just didn't give it a lot of love and attention, and it and it needs that love and attention. We come in, revitalize the community, really make it a place where people love to call home. And then it's a win win. The residents, they have a great place to live, and then our investors make a great return. Yeah. I love that. Multifamily is as a an amazing vehicle.
And then I love that you're making it available to investors, and I'm sure probably just people even learning about it through your podcast, and I'm sure plenty of other resources that you have. So I just love what you're doing. Before we get into your story, because I think you got I think you got a great story tell. We all do, but I think yours is from a perspective of college and how it comes different, but we'll get into that here in a second. What I wanna know now is Why?
You're a young guy. Clearly, you got a good bit of money. You could probably sail into the sunset. Why are you still pushing? Man, probably a few reasons. 1, I just wanna take care of those that took care of me along the way. I just wanna it's like my parents and family friends that were just there for me, especially my parents, they sacrificed along the way, and I just wanna be able to give back to them, especially in retirement let them do the sailing off while I continue to work.
And hence why the company I have now is called Greenbrier Capital Group, Greenbrier's name in the street I grew up on. So that's the driving force. And on top of that, it's also just to help others that can help themselves. So we it's one of our missions to give at least 10% of our profits away every year. And we specifically focus on 2 categories children because children were never asked to be brought into this world in 2 they don't have a lot of power to help themselves.
So we wanna help them. And then 2, my partner, his wife's families from Venezuela, and we all know what's going on there. So we're we wanna create an initiative to help first bring her family back, but then other families that that want some help get out of the situation they're in. So The those are the driving force.
And then you the third one you alluded to was the fact that I love the fact that I can help everyday people get into an investment that was traditionally just for the ultra wealthy. I come from a finance background and worked in financial services. And even myself back then, I didn't know at that time, I didn't know this was a thing for everyday people, and I was in the business. So the fact that I can share this with everyday people, because it's an amazing investment. That's the other driver.
Yeah. A lot of a lot of purpose driven thoughts there. I really appreciate that. I think that's the the the Greenbrier name, obviously, reminds you every day of where you come from. I really love that that portion of it. I think that we all have those things that kinda keep us dialed in. And, of course, I'm sure as you continue to grow and expand. Those things will change. I'm sure they have over time, but love the perspective. Tell me, you you were involved with financial services.
I know that you come from a family of entrepreneurs or at least some something like it. So I wanna know about that. Tell me a little bit about Chaz, but then you didn't get into business right away. So I wanna know the journey here you've got. Yeah. It's funny how things happen, Chaz. So I was a young Kings, grew up in a small town in Vermont, family of entrepreneurs, my grandfather, my father, my 2 uncles, all entrepreneurs. And so you think I would be destined for that right out of the gate.
Right. Even started that way, I wanted a new bicycle. This was back when mountain bikes first got shocks or the front suspension, and that was, like, the hottest thing. I wanted it so bad, Chaz, and my dad goes, okay. I will pay for half, but you gotta figure out a way to pay for the other half. And I'm first, I'm so glad he did that. It just instilled that work ethic and that nothing worth having should be given to. You should work for it. And so I did.
I started mowing lawns, my families, my neighbors, and then in the winters, because I'm from the northeast would do snow removal. Shovel. So I did Chaz, and I was you think I would be on the path to entrepreneurship. However, just what I think happens to a lot of people in our society is you get condition. Society conditions you that you gotta do well in high school so you go to college, do well in college so then you can get a nice 9 to 5 corporate job and work for someone else's dream.
And so I did that for a while in financial services. And don't get me wrong. I love finance. I love investing, but at the end of the day, I was working for someone else's dream not my own, and they were more worried about aligning their pockets than our investors. So it just didn't mesh. And when you wake up every day and you're trying to go sell or push a product that you personally don't use or believe in. It it's just not it's, yeah, it's not rewarding, and it's tough. Right?
Yeah. Like, you wanna get up and be excited to attack the day, and that just wasn't the case. So I knew I had to make a change. And so I educated myself was I went and took a real estate finance course at Boston University that during nights when I was at school, listening to podcasts, read books, went to meetups, just just try to learn as much as I could. And then I knew how to make change.
And I found out about the world of syndications, which we alluded to earlier, how we can let every day people invest And it was funny how it happened. I was in that real estate finance program, and one of the guys that was in it with me, he came from the occasion world. He was working for a syndicator out of Boston, and he was going to this program to leave. And I was going to the program to get out of the corporate Wolfe, and he taught me about syndications and no. I'm going to do that.
That's my calling, and so that's how it started. Wow. So many different pieces The. A wise in the road. I think every young entrepreneur, especially on the male side, if you grew up in the Midwest and or in the northeast, You mowed grass and you shoveled snow. So I think we can all relate to that. I am curious to know, like, when you said in that moment, when you heard or when you learned about syndication, It was like, that's what I'm made for.
What what did you hear in that moment that resonated so deep with what you're calling your purpose? Yeah. It's Chaz I didn't need to be ultra wealthy out of the gate. Didn't need to know the right people or be from some, whatever you wanna call it, upper echelonal society. Or have the experience that all it really took was just hard work and discipline, and The I could help everyday people get into this type of investment.
I would always drive by apartment complexes and be like, I wish that could be me. I wish I could invest in that thinking it was just some big institution that owned it, and now I could think I can do that. I just need to go work for it, and that was the big light switch right there. Yeah. I think every entrepreneur especially the ones that are listening now, the ones that wanna be better, the ones that wanna level up, they're here to get a nugget from you.
I think we can all relate to that moment where we realize, like, Wolfe. What this is what it could be and what our version of freedom could look like. Because that's really what I heard you say. I heard you say you got a glimpse of what freedom really could look like for your for yourself. Yeah. And even though that maybe looked different than how you've been training college and what the finance path is that you were on, it struck you in that moment like a pound of bricks because it was truth.
It was your truth. It was for your freedom. Think every entrepreneur can resonate with that moment, but then it's okay. Now what do I do? It's the steps that I gotta take, and then there's the action, and then it's the Oh, man. There's the good and bad decision. So that's where we are here in the show. I wanna know something that you did that was a good decision that led you that you can strategically think back. He was like, this one decision right here is so big to where you are here today.
Oh, I got it. I actually did a podcast episode on this the other day. Love it. The handwritten letter that changed my life. Like I alluded to earlier, when I wanted to make the transition in the into finance, I just educated myself. I did this again when it came to syndications. I just started reading, listening to podcasts.
And back then, there wasn't as much as there is out there, so it wasn't a lot to take in, but What I wanted to do is I wanted to find a mentor, someone not only that was living the life, I wanted to live and Chaz the business that I wanted to create, but also had the same type of values, morals, and all that because I'd already been down the corporate world where those weren't aligned, and it makes it so much harder.
Yeah. So I found that individual, and I didn't know how to get in contact with them. I figured, oh, they're probably always getting calls and emails. So I thought back to a time when I used when I had wrote a handwritten letter before, and the response I had gotten to it. And so I was like, I'm just gonna write this guy letter. Handwritten. I found his his home address online, which is creepy and crazy when you think about it, but found it and fired it away. And he called me.
He was very impressed and appreciated it. And he said, that's actually my trick. I do that. So that actually resonated with him. And he was my first mentor. There's just so much so many Kings. But, okay, so for let me break it down. Your thoughts to yourself. I need to get some education. Which is great. I think a lot of people think that, and but then there's a lack of actually going and doing it. So for you, it was podcasts, trainings.
I'm sure conferences, there's all kinds of stuff on real estate, special syndication, at least now. Like you said, it was maybe less The. Where in that education piece did it, like, click for you that I need someone down the road that can look back and mentor me. How did you come across that realization? Luckily, it was early on because Yeah.
I've suffered from, like, a lot of people probably do the analysis paralysis where you just think you need to keep educating yourself and you need to know everything before you you need to start, and that's just not the case for people that any and this is not just in real estate investing. It's anything. Just take action. Right? We're all gonna fail, but as long as you fail forward, 1, it's gonna be a lesson, but you gotta start somewhere. And so luckily, I realized it early on.
It was a vividly remember it. It was a podcast that I heard this individual on, and you're just explaining the life that investing afforded him. He came from he he's a rags to riches story, grew up actually in Missouri. So Midwest and and he grew up on a farm, didn't have a lot. And he took now he owns 100 of 1,000,000 of real estate, and at that moment, I was like, I want that, and I'll do whatever it takes to get that. And I don't need to I just don't need to keep educating myself.
Like, I'm a smart guy. I've been in finance. I took this real estate finance program. Like, I know what I need to know at this point. Now I just need to take action. And so that's when I decide I just need to get ahold of this guy. So for you, if action was the step, obviously, action led you to write the letter, which Yeah. Great idea. Yeah. Nobody sends anything in the mail anymore. Unless you're you or me and this other mentor of yours, how did getting to know this guy specifically?
How did that help you take action? Like, well, how did, like, I'm because The person who's listening right now, they've heard someone say, you gotta get a mentor. Right? You gotta take action. They've heard these Kings, but somewhere in there in your brain, I'm trying to extrapolate the detail of taking action meant I need to get in relationship with mentor. What how did how did you get The, or why did that make sense to you in that moment? The whole mentor Gathering.
I just I'd heard so many people talk about how just surrounding yourself with the right people will elevate you. I've I knew someone in the past, actually, my my grandfather, successful entrepreneur in his own right, and he would always tell me stories of how he would surround himself in in one mentor in particular that changed his life and his business.
So I think those things just clicked at the right time, and I knew that if I wanted to get somewhere, why go out on my own when someone's already gone through the path and they could help me get there and and hopefully go around mistakes that they had and not do the the same mistake. So I knew from that The, that if I could do it on my own, but I would not be where I am today. No way. I would be behind. And Yeah. And I continue to try to surround myself with those type of people Yeah.
It's just rocket fuel to whatever you're trying to do. I don't know if that answers where you're Oh, yeah. No. There's no direct question say. I'm just trying to get mindset from you, and I hope the listeners are paying attention. You're giving good stuff. Thank you for that. I wanna know in Chaz moment, so the good decision for you was to reach out. You wrote this letter. It changed your life. It obviously brought you into connection with this guy.
What was the if you could dwindle it down into one thing that this mentorship or this guy or get right in this letter, Chaz has it led you to the most, or what's been the biggest result out of that action? It's probably what I previously alluded to is The to keep surrounding yourself with people that are above you. And think it's better to surround yourself with people that are 1 to 3 notches above you. You don't want someone that's 10, 20 notches above you because it's harder to relate.
Sure. If you have the opportunity to meet with them, yes, do it 100%. But Right. Like, in your immediate circle, I think it should be people that are on your level or just a little above so they can help pull you up. You can relate to The. And so that's what he did for me because at The time, he wasn't too far ahead of me and I could relate. And so what I did It was just a sponge. Anything he told me to do that he thought I should do, I did.
It doesn't mean it's gonna work, but why would I not try it? Like, it obviously worked for him I'm reaching out to him because I wanna be where he's at, so why wouldn't I try it? So that's what I did. I just soaked in everything and gave it a try. And, obviously, I put my own spin on it because you gotta be authentic, but, yeah, it works. Of course.
Yeah. It's funny that you said that you just give try, you do it blindly because you've already put this trust or this value in this person and not knowing necessarily that it's gonna work, but knowing that they're gonna they've been through some things. And even though it might not make sense in this moment, it's one less thing you've gotta learn potentially. Long as you guys have to do it.
I I've got the same experience when I had mentors when I was probably 18, 19 in a program Chaz was a part of, and it was I think I was just too young. To I mean, I was listening. I was doing action, and I appreciated that perspective. And so I look back. I'm like, I just did what I was told. And and which was great from, like, an angle I trusted. And I just went for it. It took me to places. I understand things about myself because of those Kings.
But I also think that there was maybe call it ego, maybe call it just immaturity where I wasn't even though I was hearing the things, I wasn't really hearing it. You know what I mean? Happens to all of us, though. It's it's just what, you know, it it is what it is, but you we gotta do our best to get over Chaz. But, yeah, I'm with you. That that's definitely happened to me. Yeah. 100%. Okay. Let's flip the The.
Sean, let's talk about a bad decision that you've made that has resonated through time. What can we learn from you? It goes to that ego thing. At the beginning, I thought I had to do it all myself. Right? I thought this was Sean show at first and that to be a truly successful entrepreneur, you had a self made. And now I know that term is just a lie. There's no such thing as a self made person, but At the time, I thought that's what you had to do. And so I did it.
And then my business, The of major categories are one, you gotta find the deal. Right? So that's generally either by on the bigger stuff, it's generally by broke commercial broker relationships, The you gotta find the money. Right? So you gotta make relationships with investors. Yep. And then there's the operation side. And now there's a bunch of other things, but those are the 3 main so I thought I had to do all of that. And can I do all of it? Yeah. But can I do all of it effectively?
Of course not. And so I thought that's what I had to do, and that really stunted my growth out of out of the gate. And then it it changed once I got over that that mind block and that ego, and I brought on a partner. I'm actually reading the book, Who Not How right now, and it's really resonating with me because, yeah, it's a phenomenal book.
It just brings me back to that moment when I realized I needed to make a change and that it's not how to do it, but who can, 1, do it for you and who actually likes doing those things that you may not like doing. So my partner is he's a engineer by trade, so he loves doing all the technical stuff. Underwriting the deals. I like underwriting, but I like underwriting when it's already at the point of all the data input and manipulation, and I can go in there and just work it.
Yep. He does all that stuff. And made my business grow and then using assistance as well. Yeah. It just, you know, you don't even think about it. You think, like, having assistant book your travel. Like, at first, I was like, I'm humble enough to do that myself. I don't need someone, but that's not what it's about. It's it's you remove that, and it's about it's giving you more time so you can help more people.
It's not that you're taking advantage of someone else or that you're too good to do it, it's that you can actually then go help people. Yeah. That's Yeah. It's great. Great perspective, actually, I think Chaz a a lot of people listening, it it resonates because they're in that six figure place where they haven't scaled, which means they probably have maybe a team member or 2 or 3 or 5.
But they really haven't figured out how to put put people in place and really the factor behind behind the who not how. And it doesn't necessarily mean you have minions in that you're this orchestrator. It means that you're literally putting people in the skill set that they love the most, that they're gonna find the most joy and value in and then they're gonna return the most value to you, which because it's something that you wanna want and need to give away.
I love the humility perspective there as well. Because I think a lot of guys think, oh, I'm not on nothing. I didn't come from anything. I don't need somebody booking my travel or Yeah. Interviewing somebody for me on a podcast. Like, you you got on a call with somebody on my team, and we interviewed you. Yeah. I used to do that. I don't anymore. It's not because I'm not good or that I'm too good. It's just because The can be a there can be better utilization of time.
100%. Hey, Charles Wolf here. As many of you know, I have been on an absolute mission to help entrepreneurs from all across the country in many different industries, level up their game and grow their business, and intentionally connect with other entrepreneurs. We do Chaz, obviously, through the podcast, but we also have a peer to peer mastermind group specifically for 7 to 9 figure business owners.
We are bringing some of the best and most successful entrepreneurs and minds together in a regular and a super intentional way to not only grow our network, but to be able to leverage.
And at a certain point in business, success becomes about leverage, leveraging time, leveraging resources, leveraging key relationships, The is exactly what we're doing inside of the peer to peer mastermind group called Gathering the Kings specifically for 7 to 9 figure business owners So if that's you, if you're ready to level up your 7 to 9 figure business even to the next level and get around other big hitters just like you, I want you to
go to gathering the Kings dot com, flood a short application, and, it'll come to an application, call with me and I wanna chat with you, see if it might be a good fit. Talk soon. So I love the perspective. What do you think you you alluded to your partner and then him taking over certain Kings and you, but what's been really, like, the result of that catalyst? I know you said you've grown, but give us some more information there.
Give me give us a a maybe longer version of the story of the result of all that. Yeah. So just like in anything, it's a numbers game. So for us, it's about submitting as many offers as possible, especially in the last few years where we all know real estate's been a crazy hot market so that it's a lot of competition. So it's all a numbers game. And but to be able to submit an offer, the deal's gotta work for us. We're not just gonna submit off or anything. It's gotta make sense for us.
We have a fiduciary duty to our investors or steward of their hard earned money, and so we take that very seriously. So it takes a lot of underwriting, which is, for those not familiar The the term, is simply just analysis. We're looking at deals and making sure it works and fits our criteria, and it's a sound investment. So in order to submit an LOI, we gotta look at a lot of deals. Could I have done that?
Yeah. But then if I had focused on my time, they would have pulled away from my capital raising, and it would have pulled away from the operations of the assets we already own. And so by bringing him on, he solely focused on that And this guy is just doing one of those Excel gurus, those wizards that can just do anything with Excel. I thought I was good. I can kinda hold my own, but once I'm Chaz saw what he did Chaz yet. No shot.
But, yeah, he just cranks out underwriting and good underwriting, and it allows us to submit more offers and have a better chance of getting them accepted and let The which that then allows me to focus more on operations and capital raising.
Eventually, we're probably gonna bring on an asset manager that will focus on operations and then eventually investor relations that will focus on the relations raising capital The then I'll solely be working on, like, the book E myth of working on the business, not in it. I'll be focusing on more on that vision a 100% of the time. Yeah. Yeah. No. And you've obviously got a road map. I think that's really good for the listener to hear because it doesn't all happen all at once.
No. You know, all of a sudden yeah. Exactly. We're all super impatient. I also think it's important for them to hear you talk about the relinquishing. You gave certain things away, but what that enables you to do, really, is then just go to the next level. Because he was able to do task ABC and you're able to do EFG, then it allows actually both to focus and dial in and press harder and really go to the next level.
Which means more deals submitted, more money raised, they you're gonna you're gonna get more done. More assets under management wins it for everybody. Yeah. I will add too. I didn't just bring him on. I could have just hired him and not give giving him an ownership in the company and that'd be a partner. The reason I did it was twofold.
1, we did a smaller, actually, 2 smaller deals together Chaz were separate of my company, just personal investments in real estate, The not that I had this plan, there's no intention, but what came of it was awesome. It was kinda like a courtship, and I got to see The know, 1, how he operated and how we operated together. And I realized we just work really well off each other. Like, I'm good at certain Kings. He's not, and he's good at certain things that I'm not.
We work really well together, and his work ethic is amazing. And that's why for the partnership because, 1, I know they're it would work. And, 2, I know it would give him more incentive to to work even harder. Yeah. 100%. I I love the analysis there or the breakdown because you're right. A lot of times, I'm going through this in one of my companies right now, giving same similar opportunity with to someone to be a partner.
And the other reality is Chaz I could just replace them with another employee, another team member, but that's not really the mindset that I'm after long term. And as long as I've got the right person, and we've been together for a while now, I can see what they can do. They they can do what I can do. And and if it makes sense, then the entrepreneurial partnership, to me, just allows for The concurrency or an alignment to run really hard together. 100%. I Kings agree more.
The discipline or the process that you have now, I'm super curious, especially with now a partner, or before you were growing and it was just you, How does that like, when you're making a decision, obviously, our target is to make lots of good decisions. What sort of discipline or process do you have Yeah. I do my best to take emotion out of it, and, obviously, I'm not perfect.
So it's never a 100% out, but and the way I do that at least the way I try to do that is through just looking at the data. Obviously, there's a little bit of gut when it comes to real estate, and I can get into that later where didn't follow my gut on a deal early on. It not ended up going well, but it was a long, long process. But, anyways, I dig so what I started to do in order for the data is really just to track everything.
You know, the the saying they say what's not measured is not managed, and it's so true. It just keeps you disciplined And so we track how many deals we underwrite, how many brokers we talk to, both new and existing relationships, how many investors we talk to, both new and existing. And we have one column Wolfe be the goal we're trying to hit and then the actual And that just keeps us really disciplined.
And then when it comes to actually making an offer, like, sending that letter of intent, what we call an LOI, is essentially just the offer. We have strict criteria. And if it doesn't meet it, then it doesn't meet it. And we gotta go on to the next one and doesn't matter if we just looked at a 100 deals and we might have to look at a 100 more. Yeah. That sucks, but at the end of the day, that's how you win. And I'm excited to what's to come.
So I think a lot of people in the last few years were not acting that way, and they were acting out of FOMO and emotion and probably made some decision they shouldn't have, and I think there's gonna be some opportunities coming. I think you're right. I think that there's gonna be a sale if you will. Okay. Well, tell it. I mean, you kind of alluded to a sticky period of time there. Why why don't you just go ahead and tell us that story before we move on to the speed round?
Yeah. So it was early on. And this was be before I started Greenbrier, and this is when I was building my personal portfolio. So I could have somewhat of a soft landing when I left financial because I needed a little bit of income coming in. Right? I know I knew I couldn't completely replace it out of the gate, and that would take too long.
And from, I couldn't just start growing Greenbrier because I was licensed under FINRA and the SEC to sell securities for one firm, and I couldn't do it for another blah blah blah. So what happened it was I can't remember the year now, but what was my goal to get by the end of the year to twenty doors on my personal portfolio? And I think I was I think I was at 18, and I was looking at a triplex. And went The, looked at it, wasn't in the best shape, but I was like, hey.
This could be a great value add. Just put some money into it. The market wasn't the best. It was like a a smaller market outside of The, like, a tertiary market. The guy, the owner, he just gave me some weird vibes. But I just wanted to get it was the ego thing we're talking about. I wanted to get to 20 doors. Wanna check the box. Yeah. And I wanted to get the extra depreciation. It was about to the end of the year. And so it was day of closing, which was December 31st.
So last last day of the year, and we went to go check the property before we buy it or before we sign the papers and, actually, I had never done that up until that point, but for some reason, they asked me to do that. I was like, alright. I'll drive to the property first. And once I got there, I realized why. The parcel above was empty, but this lady wanted to put a house up there. And so she had to put a driveway in, and it was an easement through my property.
What that did is redirect The water flow. Right? And it created a trench through my backyard. And it was and then the owner had his guy come and dig it out to redirect it. So it was huge crater in the back of the property.
Now there was nothing wrong with Chaz with the building, right, because the water was taken away from it, but there was still gonna have to be some some money to fix this issue, and he was telling me how of a pain this neighbor is, this lady, she's bling she's not taking, you know, responsibility for Chaz. And but the ego again. I wanted those 20 doors. Damn. So I asked him for 5 k off? He said yes. And we closed that deal.
And I'm sure he's still doing cartwheels to this day for getting rid of that property because what ended up happening is these tenants were just terrible. And Chaz. Oh my god. It the one of them stripped the plumbing out of the place after we finally evicted them. It took forever because they weren't paying rent. Took the heating system out of the 2nd unit. At one point, he had his buddy up there that was in an RV and a lean to Kings drugs wouldn't leave.
He was burning his furniture in the backyard. It was just a crazy nightmare. And the finally, we got him out there, renovated at blah blah blah, but the point of the story Don't act on eco and stick to your guns, and that's what we do now. We don't act on emotion. If it makes sense, let's do it if it doesn't on to the next. Yeah. Such a good lesson.
I think that even folks not in real estate, we all have ego, and we all got goals, and we all wanna check the box But I guess The, really, the lesson there outside of even just sticking to your box of the way that we should do things, not necessarily the target box, but is making sure that it makes money, making sure that it makes sense. Like you just said, if it makes sense, great. If it doesn't, then we we walk away no emotion. And I think that we lose sight of that.
Even in some of the grind, we lose sight of that because we're willing to do things. We're willing to not give things away because of our limited thinking. That's all it is. It doesn't really make sense. We hold on to it or we make bad choices, whatever it is. So you've done an articulate job of sharing that. In the speed round here, my first question is around metrics. You talked about tracking things.
I wanna know if you take the whole business and you dwindle it down into one trackable metric. What is it? Oh, that's okay. That's I there were so many I wanted to answer with. I'm sure most people say that, but the one trackable is it depends if we're talking on health of the business or if we're talking about scale, I like to look at I really like to look at how many people we've helped, but that's not really a trick to the business itself.
It's just I like to see many units returned, how many lives we've improved, and how many I really look at the investor list, right, and what's that growing to how many investors we've gotten into the deal because that's more people I've helped, and I'd like to look at our total return from that list. No. I I I think you did a great job again of articulating 2 Kings.
And one, the people aspect of what you do, helping people, And then also, obviously, if if you're returning money to them, you're helping them. And so it's The number one is that if there's no if there's no return or sales or rev, or margin profit, whatever you use, or do you wanna use? There is no business. What book would you recommend, Sean, for a 6 figure business owner who's trying to figure this thing e Myth is the first one that comes to mind. Like, I I said earlier that it's working.
It really tells you how to work on your business and not in it. How to set up systems, processes to really scale, take yourself out of it so you can really grow. And the thing about growing and scaling and being able to hire more. Like, we we talked about this with the who not how is, yeah, it's helping the business, but you're also helping other people by employing them and giving them opportunities to grow their career, grow their life.
So it it's a selfish of you not to do those things in my opinion. And it but it took me a while to realize that. Yeah. Yeah. And giving them the opportunity to shine in the area that they shine best in. It's so much more of a strategic play than a selfish play, for sure. K? Do you intentionally network or mastermind with other entrepreneurs? Yes. It's one of my favorite things. When I started doing Chaz, my business, my life, just completely changed. You just gotta surround yourself.
Now you've heard everyone's heard of The the average of the five people you'd spend the most time with. If you wanna have a good average, you better surround yourself with some rock stars, like, Chaz, and I'm part of a mastermind. I probably I would like to join probably 2 to 3 more in the next year or so. I just I think it's the best thing. I was actually talking to my friend the other day.
It's not only our it helps you scale and grow your business, but Everyone listening here is probably an entrepreneur. Right? And we all know that we can't relate to people that are not entrepreneurs. At least it's hard to. They don't understand the struggle roller coaster. We have our good days and our bad days, and some of The, sometimes those bad days are really bad. And so to me, masterminds are also, like, therapy sessions.
Like, my one of my buddies was in a mastermind with me called me the other day because he was just having a bad day, and I could help bring him up and people have done the same thing for me. And Yeah. It's just a it's a great group of people that seems every measurement I've been part of, that it not only do they wanna win, but they want you to win too, and that's just a great place to be. Yeah. When it's shared Chaz way when when there's a give and take and there's a a win win attitude.
I think you're a 100% got a I got an operations question for you. I didn't put it on the list. That's gonna surprise you. But if you only have 1 hour each week to work on the business, how would you use that 1 hour? To successfully run your business like you do now? That's a great question, Jess. Wow. It's even harder than the 4 hour work week. Yes, sir. 1 hour. That's it. That would definitely it'd be checking those key metrics I mentioned earlier.
Checking the tracking documents we have, and then meeting with the given people that are responsible for those and to check-in with them to see. If they met it great, what are you doing? If you didn't, why not? And how can I help you to get there?
And then probably the remaining few minutes I would have would or several minutes I'd have would be really focusing on the vision and really projecting that vision to everyone else in the business, because I think that's what it is about being a leader. You you can create a vision, and I'm guilty of this, is that you internalize it. Yeah. You might write it down on a piece of paper, but or type it out, but you don't share it with anyone.
And Right. One thing that I realized when you share it, not only The one year employees understand it, and see where you're Kings. But even people outside your organization will see it. And the weirdest thing happens, Chaz, where I'm sure you've seen this, they wanna help you get to that goal. K. Chaz they see what you're trying to do, and they wanna be a part of that win, part of that success. So I would probably spend a lot of time doing that if I only had an hour. Yeah. Great answer. Love it.
Last question here for you, brother. If you lost it all, what would you do? Oh, man. If I lost it all, I would just start again tomorrow. It's so simple in your mind. Yeah. I I know a lot more than I did now. Obviously, I'd know more now than I did back when I started, so I wouldn't know exactly what I need to do. The relationships I need to make. And The systems I need to set up and the people I need to hire might even be easier. Maybe I should just do that.
Yeah. The one thing I got from Chaz's podcast is I Yeah. Funny. You're not the only person that has had with that revelation in the moment of, you know, how that'd be actually fun. Yeah. Which has led, it it resonates with my heart because as a serial entrepreneur. I've wondered so many times about why do I do this over and over and because there's a crazy love to okay. Now I know what to do over here. Let me see if it works over here and then then over here and then over here.
Well, a lot of people if The rewards in the journey, a lot of people I know it's cliche to say, but, like, a lot of people, it's a lot of people don't realize that. And and so it's over, and they're like, wow. I got to my destination, and it's that's not the fulfilling part. So I get it. I'm about to start another business, and we haven't really talked about this, but I also, and the vice president of sales in my family's business, I have an ownership of that as well. So I'm with you.
I like building teams. I like doing different things. And I just like helping other people win and being along for the ride. Yeah. No. You're I'm with you. We're cut from the same cloth in that regard. It's funny when you said about the The, and I think we all we hear that. We're like, yeah. But for me, just real quick here, I met my dad when I was 24. He didn't know I existed. I thought somebody else was my dad.
And so for the last 10 years, 11 years, almost We've been building a relationship, but how we've done that mostly has been through elk hunting. I've never hunted a day in my life. He's hunted elk for 3 decades. And so I've been grafted into this, like, really special Gathering, but the cool thing about elk hunting is that it's, like, really hard physically, mentally. And then even more so, if you do it with a bow, it's like, basically, you have no chance of success.
So to get where they are and then to get where they are and The very specific right time in a close enough proximity with nothing blocking you from an arrow shot is basically a 1 out of 10 Chaz. And and but a lot of people do it. And so I've learned through that through him, through elk hunting, really what that actually means. Even though I've had a little bit greater success than 10%.
Probably mostly because of my quote, unquote mentor, my dad who's put me in the right position a lot of times, but that that journey of going and being in the midst and just getting to hear him or see him or play back and forth with him, The journey becomes the result. His becomes the enjoyment or the value. So everything that you just said about business is the same. I just know that a lot of listeners have heard it over and over again, but it's real. And you got 2 Kings saying it's real.
So pay attention to the things that you're doing right now. It's part of the journey. Shot, how can someone connect with you? They wanna get to know you. They wanna do a deal with you. They wanna invest. Like, how can they find you? Yeah. Yeah. So if you wanna see what we do, what Greenbrier does, just go to greenbriercg.com. Tons of resources on there, and it'll just show you what we do. And you can actually if you wanna get on our list. We have you can get on our newsletter.
You can also create a profile on our investor portal, and you can see any we'll build a relationship, and then you can see deals that we put out. But then to communicate with me, probably the best way is either on Instagram, it's Sean Kings, r e I, or on LinkedIn, just search Sean Winslow, and you'll find me. And I'm active on those too. I love it. Yeah. I love the little play on there, Sean Wins. I love the little little tag there.
I wanted to do Sean Kings, just Sean Kings, but some guy has it, and it's an inactive account. And I can't oh my god. Too bad. It's not like a domain. You can reach out to him and be like, dude, let me buy it from you. You know, Sean has been incredible having you here. Just, again, the time frame alone of you giving it, but then just all the mindset, the finance, the decisions, Super incredible and practical. Thank you very much.
I look forward to hearing more of your success coming with all these new deals that you're doing. And even your other new business, I'm curious to hear what that's about too. Thank you for being here. Chaz, thanks for having me. It's been a real pleasure. Yeah. 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 to be successful than just being by yourself Kings it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself. What I have realized, not only in my own journey from multiple businesses and multiple different industries and now interviewing 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 exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs.
In fact, we are putting together 1000 Keynes specifically who are grateful, but not done. We're intentionally assembling kings who fight tooth and nail for their business, family, 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. 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.