On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. In the point of conversation, you're being super honest and vulnerable. You're setting proper expectations. What does that look like to you? I think a little bit of both Kings upfront with expectations and set the bar a little higher than I hope for someone to get The, but we always try to under promise over deliver. So, you know, on this side of the Kings, you wanna set the bar higher, then you expect for them to be able to achieve.
And if they do hit that, then that's even better. So the expectations right up front The sense of beating around the bush. You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe, featuring fellow 7, 8, 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 successful business today.
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 the The podcast. I've got Gabe Grzezinski on the Kings stage. My brother, how you doing? I'm well. Yourself? I'm doing well. And now that I said that last name right Yeah. You nailed it. Job. I appreciate that.
I got a little coaching before the we hit the record button here for the listener, but that's alright. Names are important. I'll try to get them right. Gabe, what Kings of business you got, man? We have a couple businesses. The 1st and foremost, I guess, is multifamily investing, generally syndications. Some sometimes we don't syndicate. Sure. Then we also recently started a debt and equity brokerage for commercial real estate. And then my wife was also a commercial real estate brokerage.
Too. Wow. You guys have your hands in several Kings, real estate. I love real estate for that reason. Like, it's you can just be as creative as you wanna be. Yes. And just just pick up a lane and go for it. Yep. Okay. So be before I jump in, because I got all kinds of questions for you, especially since you're in a couple different angles. I wanna know, at this stage, why do you keep pushing?
Cause, obviously, you know, you're here because you've had a level of success, What's the bigger picture for you? Really, it's about being able to obviously leave our children in better position than we were when we were growing up. My wife and I, she probably had a harder background than I did growing up in Texas. I can say that that it was tough and The there were there was a time when I was homeless in my teens, but Wow. That's relative.
My my wife grew up in New York City in some pretty pretty rough parts. Wow. I would say that she had it worse. For you to say that you were homeless at one point and your wife had it worse. That says a lot. Yeah. I like to camp, and we would generally go sleeping a tent down by the lake here. So Yeah. It wasn't too terribly bad. So that's a good half cup full perspective. That's for sure. Okay. So you wanna leave a legacy for your kids? What? Where did you get this from?
Like, has this grown over time, you think? Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. And it's not just the legacy, because, obviously, they have to understand how we got here understand the work that it took to to get staff position and and Sure. Hopefully not blow it in clubs and on for list things when they get older. Do you think that and this is more of a unique just perspective because I didn't come from a whole bunch either.
Do you and or maybe your Wolfe, since you brought her into the conversation as well, do you think that the drive to get away from where you came is stronger than what you're trying to create for your kids, or is it the reverse? What you're trying to create is stronger than what you're running from a lack of better terms. I think at this point, it's our drive to, you know, our drive to get where we're going Chaz much stronger.
I I think early on, I knew shied away from doing any business on my own, even though there there were multiple times when people said, hey, you should do this on your own or so The reason we were at one point Chaz my dad had invested. He's a business owner and basically invested everything he had into a deal that was overseas in Central American. Basically, the guy ran off with all the The, and he banked on that and stopped, had stopped working or doing what what had been paying the bills.
So put us in a little bit of a bind. So because of that, I wanted to didn't wanna really go The business ownership route Chaz been a to employ for a long time. I've made good money, but, you know, that Chaz income level is there's a ceiling on it.
And then you you you you don't have the time freedom that you do as a business owner, and that's one of the, I guess, the best benefits is being able to take the kids to school or or pick them up if they're sick in the middle of the day, go to all their events. To me, that's what it's all about. Yeah. I love that. Okay. Well, tell me you you gave us a little bit about how you got started, obviously, from a perspective of your dad being an entrepreneur, clearly a risk taker.
Do you think that I've I've you said that already played into you getting into business maybe later in life. What was the catalyst that actually got you into business? Was it your wife? Yeah. Actually. Yeah. So When our oldest son was born, she had left. She decided The wanted to leave corporate America and started going down business path. She looked at a few different things, but the one that sort of stuck was real estate. And because of her getting into it, I swore casually followed Sure.
At least initially. And, yeah, that's that's really how it got started. We started with single family stuff. We did some land, some owner finance, a few different Kings. And then in the process, I also got my real estate, my mortgage license. That's how I got into lending because a buddy of mine that I had known since preschool. Yeah. A long time. So I don't wanna date myself, but that's several decades at The point.
He'd been a been in the mortgage industry since, I guess, probably he was a teen, 1920, and has done really well. And I always thought if he can do it, I think I'm better better with numbers than he is, but Yeah. I really didn't like the residential mortgage side, but the commercial is, really enjoy that. Makes sense. So you're putting all these pieces together. Wifey decides to try real estate. You've got this hesitant since hesitancy. In business from a risky business owner Gathering.
Where along the line did it make did it did you have that click of, okay, well, I could have the freedom, but also make good choices, like, where did the new vision come into play as it wasn't just you following Wolfe? I was still hesitant. Really, I had kept the w 2. I wasn't I was full time, but I wasn't working full time. Does that make sense? And it it probably I was probably putting, I can say it now because I'm no longer employed with The.
Chaz probably putting about 20 hours a week into that. You know, it was a very high paying salary. So it was the golden handcuffs. Yeah. In really, the only reason I left was because I was laid off. If I'm gonna be frank. Otherwise, it may have taken me a bit longer to let go because Chaz, when you have 3 kids and a wife, you know, that that steady income is sort of nice to have. Yeah. Yeah. And so okay. So there was, like, this thrust into what you had already been checking out.
And so what was a good decision that you made along the way, or maybe it was you and wifey together? Cause it sounds like you guys have been doing quite a bit of this together. You made that you could share. That was just, like, a catapult until you being where you are now. I think it's maybe not just one thing, but in general, spending money and time on yourself Gathering educated and a change in mindset because it The mindset of a w 2 employee is totally different than business owner.
You have to be you have to have faith in yourself, a, in, yeah, that's really How did you go about educating yourself? There's so many There's books. There's seminars. There's classes. There's webinars. There's you name it, and then there's niche specific stuff. There's not niche. Where do I start? For me, I probably start with audio books and podcasts initially, and maybe YouTube University.
And then it after you see that it's all generalized information, which is good, but gets you going down the right path that we started going getting into masterminds and other more high level groups.
Sure. Okay. And for you, there was it sounds like there was a progression So the decision that you made was personal development, knowledge, building yourself, building your understanding, like, really pressing into to you, and you did that through books audible's YouTube podcast, and then eventually got into, you're saying mastermind's other type of high level Kings. Is there, like, a scale that you're following along?
Is it just when you have enough knowledge, then you need connections, or what's the what's what were the stair steps for you and why you chose to do those different Kings? Is really to be in the room with other folks, like minded folks that are bigger. You say bigger and better. And who knows if it's really better, but perceived bigger and better things than you are. And, really, that's it because you don't need to reinvent the wheel.
You wanna follow in follow down the path of someone that's already done it as the easiest way to go. That's why. Drink time. Okay. What about a bad choice? Gabe, what'd you do that you just stop everybody from making the mistake if you could write our stories for us? Oh, bad choice. They're been several, not that long ago. It was a few different things. Choose choosing who you partner with, I think, on on opportunities, is very critical.
I won't say that it was all due to that poor decision, but we lost 6 figures on something that partly because of Chaz. I'm it was a number of Kings, but, yeah, just being doing your due diligence on on potential partners. Yeah. Obviously, in your space, not everybody, you partner with people on almost probably every deal The you're bringing in just different JVs or doing different things with different skill sets.
It's a pretty well known thing in your industry, but is Chaz, I guess, that's the hiring or it's finding vendors or what you're really talking about is The people that you go into relationship with, not be analysis paralysis, but have a process where you're vetting maybe. Is that what I'm hearing you say? Yeah. You need the date before you jump into a marriage. You know, it's a good analogy.
How could you recommend that at the listener do that if they're out there trying to hire a guy for their construction crew or trying to find a new vendor for their marketing business or whatever. What are some of those dating things that they could do? There's fine, I guess, first of all, would be The check reference check. Very common, but you really don't probably do that a lot of times. Yeah. At least I didn't for sure. And there's agreements that you can put in place.
All The was up until a certain point was all just verbal. So there's agreements that you can put in place. I'm sure there's some test disc profiles and such that you could probably take to help determine if they're a good fit or not and really just having some some pointed conversations. Yeah. And in the point of conversation, you're being super honest and vulnerable. You're setting proper expectations. What does that look like to you?
And I think a little bit of both, like, being upfront with expectations in setting, I I like to Set up, set the bar a little higher than I hope for someone to get to, but we always try to under promise over deliver. So you know, on this side of the Kings, you wanna set the bar higher than you expect for them to be able to achieve. And if they do hit that, then let's even better.
But, yeah, I think just having some conversations and if, you know, I guess there's a point where maybe you have to be vulnerable with them, but set the expectations right up front sense of beating around the bush. Yeah. Exactly. Okay. Hey, Kings and Queens. Jazz 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 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. Help each other.
Let's help each other grow. What sort of, like, process or maybe discipline, Gabe, do you guys have in place around, just decision making in general when it comes to business. If I'm being honest, generally, if it's not just me making The decision, if it's something that really needs to go between my Wi Fi. Sure. Generally, she's gonna have a little heavier say in matters. Yeah, I tend to I know there's a decision.
It worked out well for us, but didn't I made, you know, deal that we were doing Chaz had I listened to her or gone to her prior to making the decision. Yeah. We wouldn't have done it, but it did work out. Got it. Well, I'm glad for that because I have a couple of those where I didn't Wolfe, actually, I did go. And she told me not The. And I did it anyway, and it didn't work out so good at all. Oh, yes. No. And that's one of those deals where you're probably reminded of it every every so often.
I'm sure. Yeah. I I actually it is. It it if I were if the roles reversed and I was asked that question Chaz far as a bad decision, it would be one of the examples I would give. I'd say, look. I lost $600,000. On a bad decision on ego. But the reality is yeah. Exactly. My wife at that point couldn't give a business case for why we shouldn't do something. And so for me, it's all logic.
Like, it's either it's a business case or not, and I didn't have this understanding of this intuition specifically, this women's intuition that they have. And she knew she we we weren't supposed to do it, but she couldn't necessarily articulate The. And So I did it anyway. Anyway, we have we have a different process now, right, where I'm a little bit more open to those rounded I feel like we shouldn't do this.
Answers, even if they don't have The super solid business case, I'm a little bit more open to those nowadays. Yeah. Yeah. I would say so as well. I'm if it's a black and white sort of numbers thing, I'll make that decision all day every day. That's what I do. But if it's, yeah, if it's about park partnership she's definitely good at picking up those indicators. Yes. Very good. She should have been in the FBI, I think.
But Yeah. Awesome that you've got, not, like, a secret weapon, but, like, where you can count on her for The, and it's not like it's work. I'm sure she just naturally comes to her. And you guys working together in that way, incredible. Okay. So I've got some speed round questions here for you, Gabe. I wanna know if you dwindle your entire business down into a one trackable metric. Chaz would it be on track buying The stage?
And I guess, really depends on which business but just the number of conversations Chaz, I mean, that can go on the investment side as well as the debt and equity. I Sure. The more people you talk to, the more potential investors you have or the more deals you you have in your pipeline. Yeah. Pipeline management sounds like. This is, of course, if you You have no pipeline. You have no business. Yep. Exactly. Or at least not a growing one. Right?
Yeah. K. Gabe, what book would you recommend The a 6 figure business owner read that would help The scale to a a larger Kings. Oh, and there there's a lot, and I haven't finished it yet, but who not? How? It's incredible book. You should finish it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And what's been your one takeaway so far? And you really need to instead of trying to be the jack of all trades, you need to find a person to do the task or something that you're struggling with.
There should always be In Chaz, you should have a road map for that as well for whenever the business grows, you need to have those who's identified. Yeah. Yeah. I love The the perspective there, especially since you've already talked about the caution in going into partnerships because the who doesn't always have to be an employee. It can be partner. It Chaz be a vendor. It can it's just someone who adds value to you in that way. And, of course, there can be a a reciprocation of value.
Yeah. There should be reciprocation, but those cautions that you gave earlier about being diligent about who those whose are play right into even that suggestion from that book. I think that's fantastic. You've already mentioned masterminds and that type of a thing. My question that I always ask us here is do you intentionally network or mastermind? So since I already know that you do, my my thought would be why.
What what is, like, at this level, or even maybe more specifically, let me ask you this, thinking back to the listeners level, 6 figures of trying to get to 7, What would networking or master mining do for them that it did for you? I mean, it really just potentially puts you connects you with people that Chaz have that are the who that you're looking for.
Sometimes it's a, capital provider or just someone that maybe is looking to join, you know, so someone else that's looking to join a team and they have they have a skill set that you don't have that adds value. And together, you can go further. Yeah. 100%.
Do you think that the relationship piece because that's really what you just described is that their business, their what they're trying to grow is one relationship away and anything that they can do to meet the next person or who is worth it is what I'm hearing you say. Yeah. Definitely. And we Chaz a great line. We've made some great connections here over the past few years in The the masterminds that we've been going to. Yeah. It's incredible. Yeah. I'd agree.
Okay. If you only had 1 hour, Gabe, within the week to work on or in your business, How would you use that 1 hour? You couldn't use any other time, just the 1 hour in the week to work on your business. What would you do to successfully run your business like you do now? I would try to talk to as many people as possible. Probably set up 10, 15 minute meetings and talk to four to six people. There you go.
Because for you, the lifeblood, what you're doing in real estate is finding the next investor partner The meetings. Yep. Yep. 100%. Okay. And last question here for you, we've gotten through The quickly. You are a concise individual. I love it. But if you lost it all, what would you do? If you were back homeless again, We lost quite a bit. I just you have to get back on the horse and and start riding again. Continue doing what we're doing right now. Really? Okay. Yeah. And do you see Chaz?
Because you've already lost it all one time, even though maybe you're much younger, Does that just give you confidence or whatever? We'll figure it out, or is that does that come from a different place? What's where's the mindset come from? Yeah. I think out. I feel a lot more comfortable. Just getting up and going after it. I I was definitely a bit nervous when I was first laid off, but then I took it as an opportunity to to grow in be able to live a better life, better family life.
Yeah. Yeah. Be able to be there more for the kids and and my wife and, you know, be able to to travel winter if we want. Obviously, school and other sports stuff makes it a little bit more challenging, but Right. But, yeah, do you think that, like, now you look back and you think that losing the job was, The of biggest blessings, or do you was it one of the most difficult things? How do you see it now? It was definitely a blessing. I mean, I think Chaz 1st day or so felt like a gut punch Yeah.
But it is what it is. I not nothing that I can do to change that. And Right. I mean, we've I've been talking about Chaz been talking about leaving the w 2 for years in the reason being that I'd I'd sort of lost that fire. I'd been in the industry for quite some time and was really good at what I did, but there comes a point where you start to get a little burnout in real estate. Found that fire there. It's it's good to be able to pursue your passion.
Real estate may not be a passion for a lot of people, but if it's definitely a good vessel The allow you to per pursue those passions potentially. Yeah. Yeah. Like I said, at the beginning, there's so many different creative ways to to press into real estate. There's so many different avenues and skill sets that can be used and whatnot.
Gabe, it's been incredible kind of hearing your insight, especially from somebody who like you said, just you held onto the w 2 for for a long time and perspective there, the mindset shift. I think all of those things are super valuable. Can someone connect with you? They're Gathering today. They're like, oh, this is my guy. I need to know him better. I need maybe they still have their job and they got a 6 figure job business on the side and they're waffling back and forth.
How can they find and connect So the best place for my age demographic Chaz you're gonna best connect with me probably on Facebook, and then LinkedIn, I'm I'm on their lot as well. But not as much as Facebook, then she can Google me, and you'll find me pretty easily. There you go. We have just a appreciated of your insight and your story, The that you've brought, and we just we just thank you for that.
Everything that you've got your hand into, we wish Gathering but a future success, and we wanna be part of the ride. Maybe we'll end up doing something together. You never Sounds great. I look forward to it. Yeah. We appreciate you being on Sherpa. 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 in 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 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 The very successful business owners. I want you to go to Gathering. The 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.