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What’s going on, everybody? We’re actually going to do today’s show, I’m just going to do it a little differently today. One of the things that… I was doing a podcast, I don’t know, a week or two ago, I was getting interviewed on a podcast, and somebody asked me for my story and I went, “Well, it’s not really all that interesting,” and I kind of just told a little bit of my story. And he comes to me afterwards and he goes, “Dude, if you haven’t told that to your listeners yet, you need to. You need to. So then they kind of understand where you’re coming from.”

So instead of actually giving you guys data a little bit today, if you guys will allow me, I’m going to be a little bit more raw. I’m going to be a little bit more… I usually get a little emotional when I talk about this. I’m going to try not to, but I’m just gonna kind of tell you my story. So sit back, relax. We’re just going to tell a story real quick.

As a kid, I was always pretty successful when I put my mind to something, and I was always entrepreneurship, always. I remember between fifth and eighth grade man, I would cut grass and cut grass and cut grass. I was that kid that was always cutting somebody else’s grass, making money, right. I think that’s probably why I hire someone to cut my grass now, is because I cut enough between fifth and eighth grade for like my lifetime. I don’t have to cut any more grass. I don’t want to cut any more grass. So, but I would cut grass, I’d make some money, of course in seventh grade, I’m going to spend some of it, but I always saved a little.

And what I did was, I went with my folks down to Sam’s clubs, right? Because they were gonna buy some bulk items, and I would buy that thousand pack of fireballs. Now, for those of you who are thinking, I was in seventh grade, I’m not talking about liquor. I’m talking about those little cinnamon, spicy jaw breakers. Remember those? And I figured it out, if you bought it in bulk like that from Sam’s, that I could actually pay about 10 cents. So I would pay about 10 cents for the fireballs, 10 cents a piece. But then I would take them to school, and I would sell them. I would put about 15 in my pocket, go to school, and pop one in my mouth. And that’s marketing, right, marketing. And I would sell the 10 cent fireball for a quarter. And then I would come home, after selling 10 or 15 of them, take some of my profit, walk down to the local gas station, that sold the little Blow Pops. Remember those little Blow Pops? I think they still have those. Suckers. And I’d pick up about 10 of those for a quarter a piece.

And the next day I would go to the school, and I would still have my 15 fireballs that I could sell for quarter piece. But I would also have about 10 Blow Pops for a dollar a piece, and I paid a quarter for. It’s a good mark up, right. But I learned there, it was kind of location. I knew that the school wasn’t going to sell them, and since I was the only game in town, that worked, honestly, between fifth and eighth grade. I had some people come in and try it sometimes, but they just wouldn’t stick with it long enough. So yeah, that was fifth to eighth grade.

I say that I was pretty successful a lot when I put my mind to something. It wasn’t schoolwork that’s for sure. I didn’t care about school work. I went enough just to pass, but I didn’t care. I don’t care what the difference is between a male and female pine cone in biology class. I just don’t. So, I didn’t do all that well there. I did enough to pass, but that was it. I was definitely a C student.

Get into high school and I really got into sports. And not to say I wasn’t, you know… Middle school, I was playing rec league baseball and football, but in high school I got into basketball, okay, I got into basketball. And I loved it. And I sucked, horribly, like bad. They used to call me my freshman year, they called me Brick, because I would, instead of, you know, throwing the ball lightly, I would throw it up like I would hit the baseball, it would hit the backboard and bounce off, never touch anything else, not the rim, nowhere close to the net. So it would just brick over and over and over, all right. I did that, I sucked, but I loved it. And so I knew if I put my mind to it, I can get better.

And sure enough, the next four years, I did get better. I got quite a bit better. So much so, that my senior year, we had a really good team. Our team actually won Nationals that year. We won a championship and I was selected for the All Star Team that year. So I went from being Brick, to an All Star in the county in four short years. Because I’d never picked up a basketball until my freshman year. So I saw that success fairly early.

After high school, I did military time. I actually got promoted faster than I should’ve. I saw success there. It just came easy, right? It just came easy. I was getting promoted six months a year faster than I should have. All of this while I was starting to get into financial services, real estate, and mortgages. I was doing it on the side, still getting promoted faster in the service, all right. So success came easy. I know that one of my biggest successes that I had, was convincing my wife to marry me. That was a huge success, all right. But success came easy, it just did.

After I did my military time, I got into college, and I’m not saying I didn’t work. When I grew up, those fifth to eighth grade years growing up, we’re going to call it, I grew up in an income challenged household, all right? I was taught hard work, all right? You work. So when I got out of the military, I got into college, and I was working hard. I was literally taking double the amount of classes. There was a semester, I took seven classes and a lab. And if you know anything about college and undergrad, four classes is considered full time. Some people take five. I had to get special permission from like the Dean, in order to take the class load that I did. But I told them, “I’ve got to get this done. I’ve got to get this degree, I gotta get this done.” So I did, all right, seven classes and a lab.

That lab was… We’re back to biology again. That lab was in biology, and I couldn’t get it. The lab, you know, I just couldn’t get it. We’re meeting seven classes, it’s meeting twice a week or once a week. And then a lab was supposed to be once a week, but about halfway through that semester, I went to the instructor and I said, “Hey, I’m not getting this. So how many times a week do you teach this?” He said, “Three.” I said, “Do you mind if I come to the extra ones?” He said, “No, I don’t mind if you come to the extra ones at all.” I said, “Okay, I’m gonna come to the extra ones.” So I did.

Now I’m taking seven classes and I’m doing the lab three times a week, right. And I know that, I know that, I know that, I should of failed that, that lab, because if you know in undergrad, a D is failing, you know. I figured up my grades, I probably should’ve got a 68, which was a D, which means I should have failed. But I think that instructor just felt sorry for me and passed me, because I got a C minus, minus. That’s fine, I passed. And then I got the rest of the stuff. So I got… I did fine on the rest of the classes. All those seven classes I did fine on. Graduated a little early there. So I saw success early. Success came easy. That lab, not so much. I had to work, I had to put in the work, but success came easy.

Got out of college, got full time into mortgages. As I get full time into mortgages, right, I worked a solid seven months for a company that I worked for, solid seven months, so long career, until I figured out I knew everything, didn’t need them anymore. So I left and opened up my own mortgage company, seven months into the business.

Unfortunately, about three months later, the owner of that company actually passed away, suddenly. Non-suspecting. It was just… At the funeral, the people that I worked with, my coworkers, at that guy’s funeral were coming up to me going, Shane, can I come to work for you? And I’m like, listen, this is not the place or time to talk about this, but I will call you. And I did.

And I basically took over that entire company because they all just came to work for me. That company was going to shut down anyways, it was a one person owner. So success came easy. I actually went out and bought another mortgage company, right, merged it into this one. Wound up having over a hundred loan officers working for me at one time. Success came easy. Boy, I just figured it all out. I knew that I’d figured it all out by this point, right? It was all done. I’m 29, 30, 31 years old and I’ve got life figured out. It’s grand. I made… You know, I’ve got two good kids, fantastic marriage, I’m making 50 to $100,000 a month. This is perfect. I’m getting interviewed on stages. I’m getting asked questions, I’m getting asked to speak. I’m getting asked to write articles in national publications. I’ve got life figured out. I don’t know why they said life was so hard.

And then, 2009 happened, and if you know anything about 2009, it was the Great Recession. That’s when mortgages died and I went… I almost lost everything. And I say almost because, the one thing that I’m still, to this day, grateful for is that I did not lose my marriage, I didn’t lose my marriage.

She was with me when we had nothing. We were stationed in South Korea and we had nothing. There were nights we didn’t have enough money to pay the heat. We had to buy oil to heat water, then run the water through the pipes underneath the floor, and that’s how you heated the house. It was a steam system. But it was the 13th and I hadn’t gotten paid yet. I don’t get paid till the 15th. We didn’t have money to do that. And it’s January in Korea, which is on that same latitude, I think as Maine, it’s cold. Well, she was with me when we had nothing. So thankfully, when we went back to having nothing, she stayed.

And so, that’s been a big success. But that next year after that happened, after that entire crash happened, I wallowed in self pity and sorrow. I was working for somebody else, hating it, hating everything. But I tried to get out of this arena just because, I blamed it, I didn’t blame me, I blamed it. Real estate failed me, I didn’t fail it. I couldn’t have possibly done anything different with the money that I made. I couldn’t possibly have taken responsibility and actually built a plan to build in something like a cushion. No, no, no, that’s all real estate’s fault, not mine.

So I spent an entire year, and a lot of sorrow, and a lot of pain. It hurt right here, especially for me as a provider. I’m the head of the household. I’m the one that’s supposed to be taking care of us all. And, you know, don’t get me wrong, I was… I sold stuff, you know, that we paid $10,000 for, I sold it for $500. When we lost our home, it really, it hurt, it hurt. And I told myself I wasn’t gonna cry.

So I remember going to an event, and I don’t even remember what event it was, but I remember a couple of guys coming up to me, and they said, “Shane, you’ve got…What’s wrong with you? What is wrong with you?” And I’m sitting there looking at them going, “What?” You know, remember my mental point, my mental state at that point in my life, right? I’m in just despair. So much so that I’m not even appreciating the fact that my wife stayed with me. That’s how much despair I was in at that point. It was just pure and utter despair.

And so they look up and they go, “Hey, what’s wrong with you?” And I go, “What do you mean, what’s wrong with me? You know, kiss off, what are you talking about?” They said, “You have seen so much, you have got experience that most of us will only dream of. Why are you not sharing that, not only with customers and clients in your real estate practice, but outside of it, other real estate agents, other people? I mean you’ve… How many thousands and thousands of files have you seen where you know someone’s credit score is this and you gotta get them to here, and you know how to do that. You know that path. How many bad loans have you seen come across your desk that you knew you could have fixed to begin with? How much marketing have you studied? You’ve got a flipping MBA in marketing, and how much marketing have you studied to ensure people can actually differentiate and market their house differently? And how much negotiating contracts have you done? Thousands. Tens of thousands.”.

You think about that? I had a hundred some odd loan officers processing, I don’t know, five, 10, 15 loans a piece, every month. So when I say thousands, I’m not exaggerating. I saw it. Because by the time they got to my desk, it was usually the problem files. I was the one that had to negotiate through, and these guys are like, “Why are you not sharing more? Why are you not doing more?” And it really kind of, it hit home with me. It hit home with me hard. I went, “Well you know what? Okay, alright.”

So I remember coming back from that event and I sat down and I actually created some courses, right? I created this credit repair course, and I created this investing course where you were talking about, not just investing in real estate, but also derivatives, because I know that you can build wealth through it. How do you invest in tax lien certificates inside of a 401k that builds wealth and pay 16 to 18%, or what are the different loan packages, and all of these things, and I was ready to go, just on the clients, and I hit a wall. I hit a wall. The wall was both internal and external. Internally there was a voice inside my head that just said, “Who are you? Who are you? This is… Have you forgotten your biggest failure already? It’s not that long ago. Who are you? Who are you, who do you think you are?” And boy that hit me. And the next one was the external thing that hit me. This happened on the same day, within hours of each other.

I had a list of about 9000 people that had reached out to me over the years, about some type of real estate. So I had this list, right, 9000 people. And I said, “Okay, you know what, I’m gonna to shoot a quick email.” I’m going to say, “Hey guys, I’ve got this credit repair course that I’m putting together, I know you guys probably don’t need it, maybe some of you do, but what I would like for you to do is just take a look at it, if you don’t mind, just take a look at it, give me feedback. I’m going to charge a couple of hundred dollars for this, but I will give you the whole course which you can share with your family. Don’t share it publicly, that’s the only thing I ask. But if you’ll just give me some feedback, help me get it prepped for market.” So it was like a prelaunch if that makes sense.

So my goal out of 9000 people, 9000 people, my goal was half of 1% I wanted 45 people to go, “Yeah, sure.” 45. I would have been okay with 30. But that same day where that internal voice was telling me, “Hey, you’re not good enough. You’re not good enough. Who are you? Who are you?” That external, you know how many people have raised their hand? One. I had one person raise their hand. And when that data came across my desk, I seen the one, I was like, “Wow, maybe I’m not good enough.” Actually I had to go check and make sure it wasn’t my mother, because you know she’s there to support me at every step of the turn, she’s there. But it wasn’t, there was one person. So now I’m like, “Well maybe I just don’t belong in that way. Maybe this isn’t right. Maybe I don’t have what people are looking for outside of our little niche. Maybe I’m not good enough.”

That was a while ago, and I can tell you now that when I pulled up the numbers before I did this, we’re sitting… I’m sitting the number one Florida agent in my office by far, by far. And I’m in the top 50 in the area and I’m competing with teams, and I’m just a single agent, meaning it’s just me. I’m the only one licensed in the area. And what I really found was that a lot of this has to do with two things. One: Mindset. If you don’t destroy that voice that’s telling you you can’t do it, every day, it’ll haunt you. And that’s a voice you’re just gonna have to destroy every day. But two: The big epiphany that I had, is that real estate is not about transactions. It’s not, it’s just not. It’s about people. It’s about helping my customers, helping my clients, achieve what they want to.

I can’t tell you how many people I have said, “Now is not a good time for you to sell.” And I have people look me in the eye going, “Wow, you’re about the only broker that’s ever come over here and told us not to sell. Everybody else says it’s great to sell.” I’m like, “Well, in your situation, it’s not.”. It’s about people.

I get frustrated when I hear loan officers that, two days before closing go, “Hey, we need a few more days to do this so just get an extension of five days.” I’m like, “Guys, I don’t care about the check. My paycheck has nothing to do with this aggravation. What I’m telling you is that all of a sudden you’ve got somebody moving, and now they’ve got to reschedule movers, that may not be able to make it there, all because you missed a deadline? Do your job.” Because it’s about people. But to somebody as a loan officer, and I have to admit, I was one of them at one time. Where it was just the transaction. I think the big thing now, the big epiphany I’ve had now, is that it’s all about people.

So, okay, that’s my story. Yeah. Getting a couple of comments. Hey Terry, what’s going on? Yeah, it’s all about people. So I know I normally give data. I normally give some updates on the market, but when my friend over at the podcast told me that I had not shared this story yet, I just thought maybe you guys might want to hear a little bit about where I’m coming from. All right, thanks for watching guys. Have a great day.