EntreLeadership - Is It Okay to Go Into Debt for This?

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

Today, we’ll hear about: •             A business owner unsure if it’s the right time to purchase a building •             A father hoping to create a business his kids will want to join •             Dave’s perspective on good versus bad conflict •             A young businessman struggling to find talent Next Steps: ·      📞 Have a question for the show? Call 844-944-1070 or send us a message: https://ter.li/ask-us ·      📚 Learn about the EntreLeadership System: https://ter.li/system-p ·      💻 Get EntreLeadership Elite for your business: https://ter.li/elite-p ·      ✉️ Sign up to receive tactical tools, advice and resources in your inbox every week: https://ter.li/enl ·      🏢 Attend EntreLeadership Summit: https://ter.li/summit  ·      🎤 Attend EntreLeadership Master Series: https://ter.li/masterseries  ·      📖 Order Dave’s new book, Build a Business You Love: https://ter.li/b4kru2   Connect With Our Sponsors: ·      💼 Go to Belay Solutions or text ENTRE to 55123 for their free resource! ·      💻 Visit NetSuite today to learn more. ·      🧾 Visit Payority for a free consultation! ·      📈 Grab Sales Gravy's free resource to help you hire and lead better. ·      📝 Use code ENTRE15 to get 15% off your first year of Trainual.   Listen to More From Ramsey Network: 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show💰 George Kamel   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, this is the Entree Leadership podcast, where I take calls from leaders like you about what it takes to win at any stage of business and leadership. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host with over 30 years of experience leading in the trenches, just like you. If you've got a question you want to ask on the show, you can fill out a form at Entreeleadership.com slash ask and we'll make you a caller. Or you can just call. Leave us a note. The numbers 844-944, 1040.000. 70. That's 844-944-1070. John is with us in Austin, Texas. Hey, John, how are you? Hey, Dave. I'm doing good, man. I am the owner of a fabrication company based in Austin, Texas. We have 14 full-time employees, and we did around 3.5 million in revenue last year. Good for you. Thank you. Thank you. We're consistently running into space limitations in

our current shop and it's beginning to restrict our ability to take on more work. My question for you is I'm wondering at what point does it make sense for us to stop leasing and to start considering purchasing a commercial property. Number one, at the point you can pay cash, which I'm guessing you can't. We cannot currently pay cash, but we can pay a decent amount right now. That would be the only way I would do it, number one. number two, when you start buying real estate that your business is operating in, you're now in two businesses, the real estate business and the business that you're in,

the fabrication business. And so I own the building that we're in, and I owned the last building that we're in, and I still own it. It's full of tenants now. The problem will be when you outgrow the next one. if you go buy something twice as big as you have now and you look up in a few years and you're back in the same situation now your real estate starts telling your business what to do instead of your business telling the real estate what to do if you're not real careful when we outgrew the building before this one

um i found myself working awfully hard to utilize my real estate instead of working on my business now so we had it end up renting adjacent properties and leasing of properties and that kind of stuff until we built a super large building that we're in now, which should house us for many, many years and all of it, of course, was done with cash. So, you know, sometimes your business is probably more like mine in that it probably is not that location sensitive, but if you were in the restaurant business and you built your own building and the city grew past you and the neighborhood started to deteriorate because the cool kids were out a few more miles, you know, then all of a sudden you've got the restaurant

in the wrong place. Oh, and I own the real estate. You see what I'm saying? This stuff starts to conflict with good business decisions if you're not careful. I don't think you're going to run into that as much because you're in a manufacturing setting. So large warehouse type facilities are, you know, fairly easy to land and where you are doesn't matter that much. It's a destination. We just got to come to work over there, right? Yes. Yeah, that's exactly the case. So how many square feet do you think you think? How many square feet do you have now? We have about 10,000 square feet split between two properties that we're leasing.

So you probably need 20? We need 20, yep. Yeah, to give yourself some wiggle room, or maybe 30 if you could afford it. And that way you could make one move and you'd be there at least a decade that way. How long you had the business? We've had the business for about eight years now. Okay. So what can you buy 20,000 feet for, do you know?

You've been out looking? Yeah, we've been looking, and right now we need about three, three and a half million dollars. And you got a million and a half? We got a million a half to spend on it. Okay. I just guessed, look at that. Okay. And so you're two million short.

Okay, I'll tell you what I did in that situation on the last building, not this one. I leased a building that's 55,000 square feet, and we took two floors of four floors, and I was a tenant, but I was his biggest tenant. In order to entice me to take that much square footage, I talked the owner, which was a local guy, into giving me an option to purchase for five years. Okay.

And so I had a lot of the cash, but the other thing I did was I used some of my cash to do the leasehold improvements so the owner didn't have to put any money into it, which he really liked. Okay? So we went in and fixed up the building with our cash, and that gave me a reduction in rent, and I got an option to purchase the building at that time many years ago was $5 million. The interesting thing was at the end of the five years,

I had barely enough cash to buy it right before I ran out, and right before I ran out of time, and so I was closing on it at $5 million, by then the building was worth $12 million. So I ended up with instant equity. You follow me? Yeah, definitely. So if I'm you, I'm going to go in and try to do some kind of a five-year lease

with an option to purchase if you want to move now, or just plan on leasing for a little while for five years, and then by then have the money saved up. Yep. Because if you can expand your capability and your only limiting factor, you can expand the size of your business and your dollars in profit, and your only limiting factor is space, then just go rent if you have to.

Okay. I would do that and just make a move and go rent something 20,000 feet and make a move. And, yeah, I mean, yeah. Because owning the real estate is not your goal. Your goal is profit. Yeah. So that's where we're going. So lease if you have to, if you can do a lease option,

that's probably your coolest possible idea. And, you know, other than that, but no, I would not buy on debt ever. And be careful, the whole first part of the segment is, be very careful that the real estate does not become the tail that wags the dog. Because too often we fit our business to our real estate instead of our real estate to our business once we own the building. And I actually struggled with that too. And I knew better. But, you know, we were able to work through it and work around it without doing damage to Ramsey.

But wow, what a deal. What a deal. Absolutely amazing. Hey, good question, man. We appreciate you calling in. Hey, most of you didn't start out in sales. So when it comes to hiring and training a great sales team, well, maybe that's not your rodeo. That's why you need sales gravy. Sales gravy gives small businesses the same premium training that Fortune 500 companies get without the Fortune 500 price. Sales gravy was founded in 2006 by 16-time best-selling author and thought leader, Jeb Blunt. And now they're a globally recognized leader in sales training solutions.

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Jonathan is with us in Kansas City. Hey, Jonathan, how are you? I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I have a small residential construction company. We average about a million dollars a year with a couple employees. And my question is, how do I build a business that my kids will want to work with me in, given that they want to do that kind of thing. Obviously, if they want to be an engineer, they're probably not going to work for me. But, like, how do I build a business that they will want to be a part of? Well, I guess the experience they have with their dad as he runs it will inform them.

So if they never get to see their dad because of the business, they'll learn to resent the business. Right. If their dad comes home frustrated and angry and cussing every night, who would want to be part of that? You know? And so, you know, are you enjoying yourself? Does it give you meaning? And are you enjoyable to be around while running this business?

And there's times I qualify for that. There's times I don't. it threw out the scope of 35 years of doing this Ramsey thing, okay? And so there's times that, you know, you're pissed off at the world, and, you know, you just want to go hide in the corner when you get home. And there's other times that it was a wonderful day, and we helped a lot of people, and God's been good to us to give us work that has meaning, right? And so, you know, you've got to have more of those days than the others

to have somebody want to work here. we taught our kids not come into our business unless they felt like God was calling them to. And my oldest daughter, Denise, did not. She went to work for a ministry for several years when she came out of college in the nonprofit sector. After several years, we invited her to run our family foundation, which is what she's done for the last 15 years, and is not technically a part of Ramsey. She's one of the owners, but she doesn't have a full-time job at Ramsey. She runs a family foundation, which is different, okay?

Obviously, Rachel Cruz is one of our personalities and has been engaged in this for a very, very long time. And then my son Daniel came up and entered in the entrepreneurial side, and he's been entrepreneurial. So he was cut for it. So the Bible says train up a child in the way he should go, and when he's old, he'll not depart from it. the old king james says in the way he is bent so how's the kid wired if the kid is wired in such a way that they need to be an artist then they don't need to be running a construction company right yeah and so if the kid is wired in such a way that they need to be a speaker and be on stage they need to be

rachel but she doesn't need to be running the the gears of ramsie because she hates that kind of stuff Yeah. And Daniel doesn't want to be on stage either, by the way. So, you know, the kids fell into positions within our organization or around our organization that fit the way they were bent, the way they are wired. And so that's what you're looking for. And then you make it winsome or appealing by the way you behave and react around the business. And do they want to work with you, you know, kind of a thing?

And so. And, you know, and so if you're going to build a generational business, you have to build a generation. And so one of the things we found as we've investigated, family business studied it for probably 20 years now, off and on. And that family businesses are no more functional than the family is functional. a dysfunctional family will 100% of the time create a dysfunctional family business. Yeah. And so, I mean, if y'all are all nuts, then you're going to be nuts at the office. You know, I mean, that's what amounts to.

And so we run into that all the time when we're dealing with folks. It's like, you guys, you know, when we're coaching people in Entree leadership, we run into stuff where, you know, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree thing. So anyway, all of that's what I would do. and then I would just talk, you know, what I want for you, my son, what I want for you, my daughter is what's best for you. And if joining me over here is something that fits your wiring, fits God's call on your life, and you and I get to work together to do some good things in the construction world together, that would make me really happy. But I'll be happy if you're

successful doing something else also. My happiness is not, my love for you is not contingent upon you working here, you know. Yeah. Part of my, or main impetus for this is that

I mean, I'm a bit of an older father and I don't really want to just see my kids on holidays and stuff. And if I could be with them, in something daily. Like, that's part of my, I guess my question could be more like, as you saw your kids, their tendencies and where they were bent,

did you suggest to them, you have these tendencies, you could do this for Ramsey? Yeah, Rachel, I did immediately. I mean, Rachel was on stage doing stuff at 15 years old. And so when she was home on summer break from college, we had her doing speaking gigs. But she's the one that we discovered her fit the earliest of the three. She's the middle kid.

But we knew early what she was going to do. But, I mean, this is the kid that came out of the womb with a cigar and a bottle of champagne. She was ready. You know, she was ready for the stage the day she was born. And so, you know, and so the Daniel has always been entrepreneurial, but he's also always had this streak that he wasn't going to be, you know, he's a completely wired personality style different than me. And so he couldn't visualize himself doing what I do from the CEO perspective

because he doesn't function like I function. And so he's calmer, much calmer and wiser and all that kind of stuff. And so that's, you know, it took him a little while longer to find that groove, so to speak. And I had to just lay back and let it happen. which was really kind of hard, to be honest with you. Because I knew the more I push, the more I'd push away rather than in. Yeah. So how many kids you got?

I have three, 10, 8, and 3. So I have some runway, you know, to get before they would really be involved. Well, mom and daddy were in the real estate business when I was growing up. I got my real estate business when I turned 18 years old, my real estate license, the three weeks after I turned 18. Dad built some houses while I was growing up. And so I was on a construction site when I was 12 years old, 10 years old, driving the truck up and down, shoveling the junk out of the houses

and swinging a hammer on minor things that I couldn't tear up and that kind of stuff. So, you know, we had the opportunity to work in and around the business. And I still love real estate and construction and probably for that reason. Yeah. Yeah. And I do kind of some of the, like I take them with me at times. and, you know, when there's, when I feel like it's my, maybe something they will enjoy or sometimes it's just whenever you have to go with me, your mom needs some time away from you. Yeah, yeah, I'm going to put you to work today.

Yeah. That kind of thing. So, yeah, cool stuff. Hey, I'm going to send you a copy of the book, Building a Business, you love, the five stages of business. The fifth stage in business is the succession stage, the legacy stage. And you're really starting to talk about this at the right time while they're little. You can't start your succession thinking and planning too early. It's impossible to start it too early.

Even if the plan is that none of them work there and we're going to sell the thing. That's still a plan. So you can begin to think about how it's going to function and what we're going to do early and often. And I suggest that. So hang on. We'll have the team pick up and make sure we get that shipped out to you. That's a really good question. Solid, solid stuff, Jonathan.

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for leaders at netseweet.com slash Ramsey. That's netsuite.com slash Ramsey. Right in question of the day from Jason and Michigan. Dave, leading a team means conflict is inevitable. I understand that, whether it's over vision, or personalities. When tension arises between team members, what's your approach as a leader? How do you know when to step in directly versus letting the team work it out? And how do you keep culture strong when things get messy? Well, we have some rules, principles, I guess I should say is better, for conflict.

One is conflict and arguments are invited. as long as we're arguing about which play to call to get the touchdown to win the Super Bowl. Conflict that is personal where you're putting someone else down or stealing someone else's dignity, that's another problem. Then now we've got a problem with you if you're doing that. And so that's a coachable, teachable moment then for a team member. member that needs to learn how to argue ideas without tearing everybody down like you're in some kind of a political race or something. And so if you have to destroy the human being on the other

side of the argument in order to win the argument, your idea sucks. So the only thing you can do is destroy the person. And now we've got other issues. So if you're winning at all costs, because all we're trying to do is win the game. We're not trying to do. We're not trying to win by beating each other up. That's not the purpose of it. And so that's a principle here. And so if two of our team members are going at it on a personal level, then we have to sit down and intervene in that because that's not a culture we're going to allow to function

here. And so, no, you know, we have to come to a closure on that. And so, and I just can't. work with him means you can't work here, not him, because I'm not firing him unless he did something wrong. So just because you got your little feelings hurt and I can't work with him, if he's not done something personal or inappropriate of some kind, you just don't like the person or you don't trust the person and I trust them, then you're the one that's exiting when you say stuff like that. So when someone says something like that, I say, okay, you need to rethink that

because one of the things we're all going to do around here, we might not like the style of someone else, but we have to trust that their intent is the same as ours, which is to help people outside these walls and serve the customer. If you are questioning their intent, then you're questioning their character. And I'm not questioning their character, so you're the one that'll be leaving. Not them. If I have to question their character, they got to leave and you'll get to stay. That's fine. But we're not going to have two people who disrespect each other's character. I just don't think he has no, I think the guy over there leading that area has no integrity. Well, I have not observed that and I don't agree with that and I own the place. So that means

you have to leave, not him. That's what I mean by that. That's when I would intervene, and that's how the conversation would sound. Now, if we're just arguing and arguing inappropriately, then we can just have some coachable moments, teachable moments on language and on tone, and, you know, stop, you know, hey, here's an idea. Maybe your just idea isn't as good, and maybe, you know, maybe you need to learn how to accept someone else's idea on something. Or let's try it this way.

If it doesn't drive that way, then let's try the other way. That's okay. There's lots of ways to work through idea argument. or concept arguments without getting, without personally questioning someone's character, integrity, intent, those kinds of things. But if you think their intent is to screw somebody over, to be a crook, then what you're saying is, if I'm willing to leave them here, then I'm endorsing a crook. So now you're not questioning them, you're questioning me, which is time for you to leave.

and so I've had that conversation, can you tell? And not lately, but I've had it. And so, you know, well, I believe in everything we do here except these two things. Well, that's a problem because these two things are two of the things we do here. And so you don't get to departmentalize your integrity. It's not how this works. And so, you know, it's a really good question you pose, Jason. So the culture is strong when things get messy if we come out of it,

respecting each other more, even if we don't completely like the approach. Okay, case in point might be I've got a big technology team and they're all by nature, very analytical and very detailed. I am not. So my angle is to throw a grenade in the middle of something, and theirs is to spread fishing line all over it. I don't know, whatever the detail. I mean, lots of detail, lots of detail, lots of detail.

That's just two different approaches. One is not integrity and the other one's lack of integrity. That's not the question. One of them is not a person lacking in character. One's just a more detailed, methodical approach to a problem and the other one's a bull in a china shop. And there's a time for a bull in a china shop, and there's a time for a methodical answer.

So the only question is, which one is the best approach in this particular situation? And we can argue about that without being personally insulting and without questioning someone's character. So when things get messy that way, you know, that's one that cleans up itself pretty quick because we still like each other. We still, I still respect those guys that think differently than I think. I've got a bunch of Gen Zs and they think different. They grew up with an iPhone in their hand. I didn't.

I had a rotary dial phone with a cord to the wall in my hand. So my brain works different than theirs works. They have to respect that I know some things they don't know because I got socks older than them. And I have to respect that their native language is digital and I'm in a digital world, so I ought to learn from them. So we can just because we come from two different generations, drastically different views on how products work,

how customers receive and hear things, all of that. I can learn a lot from them. They can learn a lot from me, and now we can work together. And we can have good, healthy arguments about all that without impugning and saying, oh, everyone in Gen Z is an entitled Snowflake, because they're not.

That would be an inaccurate statement. They have their share, but that's, they don't work here. The ones that work here are missional. They're wonderful. and so anyway how do you know when to step in directly when the team members are being personal and their question they're impuging character or when they haven't got the emotional maturity to work through the conflict without some assistance and so sometimes dad or mom so to speak has to step in and help them you know have to be the referee and guide them through this so

Okay, the rules are it's not personal, it's not a character impugement, or arguing ideas. Ideas are good to argue. It's smart to have conflict over ideas. That's good mental health for an organization. It's not good culture for everyone to question everyone's character at the core. And that does, we don't, we just simply, that's a deal breaker. You cannot stay here if you cannot trust someone in the organization's intent or character. if you've got proof that they have bad character, we may move them along.

But if you don't have proof and you just don't like them, then that's on you. Because I'm not firing them because you don't like them. That's not how this works. So that means, again, you're making the choice if you're in that seat to exit. So, yeah, you're going to be more involved than you ever thought you would as a leader in these things. if you're going to keep your culture pure and clean. I used to laugh in the early days. I said, I feel like I'm running a dead gum beauty parlor.

You know, I mean, the dadgum stuff is just drama all the time. But nowadays, it's not nearly that bad because we've been functioning with a high-quality culture for so long that people that want to just beat drama queens, they self-select and exit. And so they don't, because they don't fit in. And the rest of the team doesn't want them around and they know it. and so that's helped but in the old days when it was just me trying to sweep the corners out it was like golly i was just trying to get some work done i'm over here dealing with a bunch of four-year-olds

so you do have some of those days where you're pissed about it like that that's that's part of it but yeah intervene if they're questioning character intervene if they're questioning your character and intervene if they don't have the emotional skills the emotional maturity to work their way through something properly and you have to have something properly and you have to have the emotional skills the opportunity to coach them up on that. And that's regardless of their age. Emotional maturity is not an age. It's ability to play well with others. That's what that comes down to. Man, Jason, that's a great question. Thanks for writing that end. I love that. If you're on the fence about attending an entree leadership event, you've got to watch our free sample talk and Q&A.

You'll get a glimpse of the tactical leadership strategies we pack into every event and experience one of our most popular sessions about how to identify and raise up potential leaders in your company. To watch it now for free, go to Entreeleadership.com slash sample talk or click the link in the show notes if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. Guys, if you like the show, we appreciate you hanging out. You can help us out by simply following. Click the follow button, the subscribe button, that kind of stuff. That's a big deal. That helps us a ton.

Of course, you can leave a nice five-star review. that's helpful and you can share the show click the share button or cut the link out and send it to a friend tell people we're here we would appreciate that very much it changes our life it changes the numbers on the internet a bunch of you have been telling people about this show we know that because our numbers are way up and that doesn't randomly happen and we know we're not spending a bunch on marketing so it has to be you guys so again thank you thank you thank you for sharing following subscribing reviewing five stars all that kind of stuff thank you thank you thank you Andrews and albuquerque new Mexico. Hey, Andrew, what's up? Hey, Dave. It's an honor to be on your show. Well, I'm honored to have you. How can I help?

Thanks. Yeah. So, I'm the CEO, co-founder and part owner of a prototype machine shop that my dad and I started a little over five years ago. My dad's the main founder and is also a part owner with my mom, who's our bookkeeper. We have grown now to work. We have grown now to where there are 11 of us total working in the company with the top line just over 2 million. Wow, good for you guys. Yeah, thanks. And my question is, given that we are $1.6 million in debt, how do I go about adding more skilled team members in an environment that is increasingly becoming more difficult to find talented workers with rising wages and a commitment to pay off debts while not losing the big mo in the process.

Well, I mean, skilled workers require pay. And if you're going to grow that side of the business, you're going to pay for them. It's that simple, because they're not going to work for half of what they could work across the street for. And so that's a simple equation. In your world, it's a machinist. in our world it's a technology person usually

you know software engineers and such for years we were short on those we've about gotten ahead of the curve finally but for many years we couldn't get enough technology people in the building as fast as the initiatives that we had to roll out we were always short of skilled labor so to speak so the so the first thing we had to do is we had to say can

we be profitable paying market or slightly above market wages for that position? Does that position, does that position ROI? Can you make money adding a machinist on that machinist today at today's rates? Can you? Yeah. Okay. So you can ROI the position. You can get a return on investment by bringing on these people, right? Okay. So now we know you can pay. And so rising wages is a non-issue, rising wages just means rising prices of my product because I've got to charge enough for my product to pay my people and still make a profit. And so wages are built into product price 100% of the time. No product is produced without wages built into the product price. And so when you increase the cost it takes to build a car at Ford, then you can expect Ford sticker price to go up in the

window, 100% of the time. and it doesn't matter if you say the word union or not. It's still 100% of the time, part of your cost of goods sold is labor. It's an accounting math thing. So anyway, all that speech aside, then how do you find them? We have found them by using the ones that we have that are good

to spread the word in the community. Because your machinists know the other guys in the machinist world. They know the other ones that work at the other places, and they know the ones that are not good. They're people a bad character. They don't want to work. They steal. They're lazy.

They're toxic. They know them, and they know the guys that are really good men. This is a good family man. He takes care of his family. He goes to church. He's a good man. He works hard.

He's good at the machine. They know those guys. And, you know, I would pay them a bounty. I do pay them a bounty for bringing them in. And basically, and it's very weird that these communities of skilled workers do, they do stay in contact with each other. They know each other from the last three jobs they were on. And so that's the first thing is I would pay them a bounty. If you've got a guy that's an absolute thoroughbred on your team and you want more that look just like him, tell him. I want some more that look just like you. And I'll pay you $1,000 if you send one over here. And they stay, if they come over here and they stay 90 days and they came here because you referred them and you tell me that, I'll give you a thousand bucks.

that's what we do. And so thoroughbreds attract thoroughbreds and hang out with thoroughbreds and know other thoroughbreds. They also know what a donkey looks like and they'll tell you to stay away from them. Yeah. The second thing you can do is you can get into the world of recruiting. We've never had much luck with outside recruiters. We do have some staff recruiters that work for us that recruit. And I've got two or three of them that are excellent. They'll just start working the phones and just start calling people in a given, you know, a given field that we're trying to, you know, we need a project manager, we need a platform engineer, we need a software engineer, we need a whatever position it is we're trying to fill. And they just start working the phones and start

getting in touch with those people, work LinkedIn and other stuff and try to dig them up, get in touch with them and say, hey, you know, we've got a great culture over here. It's family-owned and operated. We're successful. And we're adding to our quality team. If you want to work with quality people, not a bunch of people that are, you know, stoned on the job, which is dangerous in your world and that kind of stuff, right? Then, you know, we run that kind of an environment. We don't hire people that want to do drugs. We hire people that don't want to do drugs. And so that kind of stuff. So that's, you know, if you want to be a part of something like that, come on over here. And so then the reputation of your company and the character of its owners starts to be an attractive

thing for talent then because they want to work in a sustainable, stable, non-toxic environment. And that's how we've recruited and built our skilled team over the years, is those are the things we've done, is we've created an environment that they want to be in and plugged them into that. That's a really cool question, and you're very wise, especially, you know, at your stage with 11 people on $2 million to do that. And, of course, if you can get an ROI on them, meaning they, you could, make more with hiring this machinist than they cost, then that gets you out of debt.

You know, because you're making more profit, and the more profit you make, obviously we can throw it at the debt. So that's how it works. Good question, man. We appreciate you hanging out with us. Hey, folks, remember better a weary warrior than a quivering critic. This world needs more high-quality leaders, so take courage and lead. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host.

Thanks for listening to the Entree Leadership Podcast.