The Home Service Expert Podcast - Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

In this conversation, Austin Zaback shares insights on entrepreneurship, the importance of commitment, and the evolving landscape of real estate and home services. He discusses strategies for building a sellable business, the challenges of navigating the real estate market, and the significance of mentorship and company culture. The dialogue emphasizes the need for execution, the value of saying no, and the impact one can have on others. Austin reflects on personal growth, the importance of enjoying the journey, and the lessons learned from both successes and failures. Don’t forget to register for Tommy’s event, Freedom 2025! This is the event where Tommy’s billion-dollar network will break down exactly how to accelerate your business and dominate your market in 2025.   For more details visit freedomevent.com   00:00 The Importance of Commitment 02:58 Exploring Home Services 05:46 Building a Sellable Business 09:13 Real Estate Insights and Strategies 11:58 The Evolution of Wholesaling 14:56 Navigating the Real Estate Market 17:58 The Future of Real Estate and AI 20:41 Challenges in Home Services 23:54 The Art of Saying No 26:46 Creating a Positive Company Culture 29:50 The Role of Mentorship 32:55 Defining Success and Impact 35:50 Advice for Future Generations 38:36 The Value of Execution 41:46 Final Thoughts and Reflections  

How you do anything is how you do everything. And I think that applies to every aspect of, you know, when we look at relationally, financially, physically, emotionally, spiritually, right, go into every single thing that you do and give it your 100 percent. Welcome to the Home Service Expert, where each week, Tommy chats with world class entrepreneurs and experts in various fields like marketing, sales, hiring and leadership to find out what's really behind their success in business. Now your host, the home service millionaire, Tommy Mello.

Before we get started, I wanted to share two important things with you. First I want you to implement what you learned today. To do that, you'll have to take a lot of notes, but I also want you to fully concentrate on the interview. So I asked the team to take notes for you. Just text, notes, N-O-T-E-S

to 888-526-1299. That's 888-526-1299, and you'll receive a link to download the notes from today's episode. Also, if you haven't got your copy of my newest book, Elevate, please go check it out. I'll share with you how I attracted and developed a winning team that helped me build a $200 million company in 22 states.

Just go to elevateandwin.com forward slash podcast to get your copy. Now let's go back into the interview. All right, guys, welcome back to the home service expert. Today I got Austin Zabak in the house. Did I say that right? Zabak. It's all good. Zabak.

And he's an expert in real estate sales and business. He's now in Pe house. Did I say that right? Zabak. It's all good. Zabak. He's an expert in real estate sales and business. He's now in Peoria. He was in Scottsdale, but he's local here. Founder of Zabak Group, president of Space Real Estate and founder of One Roof Investments. Zach is a real estate entrepreneur and founder of Zabak Group. He's also the president of Space, a fast growing real estate team with hundreds of agents across multiple states Zayback is known for his work as a mentor and educator helping others buy and sell real estate and young agents overcome their fears He's also the host of a podcast where interviews he interviews high achievers from various industries It's a pleasure to have you here dude pleasure to be here, man. I appreciate you having me It's funny how many people we know.

I mean, I guess I just think the world keeps getting smaller. You mentioned Cody Sperber. Back in the day, the old clever investor, I used to go meet up with those guys all the time, and now we're doing business together. So cool. Yeah. Cody was my first mentor that I ever hired in 2014 to mentor me in wholesaling, you know.

And well, I hired clever investor, right? And I didn't know Cody at the time. I got a mentor assigned to me. His name is Torsten. And a year and a half, two years after me getting into the game, then me and Cody eventually became partners and good buddies. And one thing kind of led to the next. So pretty, really small world.

Yeah, I was born here though, too. So I feel like in Arizona, it's even a smaller world. Oh, yeah. Yeah, if you're born here, you know everybody. Yeah, I was born here though too. So I feel like in Arizona, it's even a smaller world. Oh yeah. Yeah. If you're born here, you know everybody. Yeah. Pace Morby was just sitting where you're at. Not that. Okay, cool. Yeah. I know Pace real well. I was at his house in Montana a few months ago and that's cool. Yeah. Great dude. Love Pace. You know, it's funny. I wanted to talk about this because you said, look, I'm getting into the home service niche very soon. And it's funny that all the people listening are mostly home service people that are come to me and they say, how do I invest in real estate?

And all the software guys that I know, the SaaS companies are like, I'm getting into home service. And it's like, we all want what we don't have. I mean, look at Cody getting into the flooring stuff. So what do you think it is? What's attracting you to home service? Why is it that you've got a very successful real estate investment business and now you're looking home service?

So I own two main real estate companies. You mentioned them in the beginning. You know, one roof real one roof investment group is a is a wholesaling company. Right. And we're one of the largest wholesalers in the nation. We wholesale nationwide. And that company does really well. And it's a cash cow, right? But it's not a sellable company, you know, really.

Maybe you could figure out some creative way to sell or finance it or some, you know, to somebody. But ultimately, it's just a cash flow company, right? We built it for cash flow. It's great at what it does and nothing more, nothing less, which is cool, right? Space, which is the retail real estate team that we own, is one of the largest in the nation. We're in four different states right now. And so that company will do about 2,000 transactions

this year, closings. So we have 2,000 clients a year right now that already like, trust, and respect us, buyers and sellers, we already bought or sold for them, represented them, and the first person they call is us for all their home service referrals. So they're asking us, you know, throughout the transaction process, right? Who's a good pest control company? Is that local? No, that's in Texas, Florida, Arizona, California.

Okay. Yep. And so, you know, we already have all that whole book of business that we already refer other home service companies to. So what we do currently is we partner up with other guys like A1 Garage or whoever, right? And we'll create some sort of agreement where we'll say, hey, you'll be our preferred vendor in for that company for us. You know, anytime somebody asks us to, you know, for to fix the garage door or whatever, we'll refer a one garage in return, you know, then we'll make a deal with you, whatever that looks like. It's different for

every, yeah, an affiliate deal, whatever, right. And so my whole thing is, I want to now, obviously, I can't do them all. I'm the only you know, we're entrepreneur, we got to be careful not to chase too many rabbits at one time. But I knew that home services was the future for what we were trying to do because I want to build a company that is sellable, right? Not that I will sell. Maybe I will. Maybe I won't. But I want to at least build a company that I can have the opportunity to sell. And we already have that book. So why not? You know?

Every business I touch will have a five-year plan or less to sell. Yep. That's what we're doing. Yeah. Three to five years, no matter what. Three years better. Yep. And so that type of thinking causes a bigger, better dream. And it allows you to reverse engineer faster and move quicker. I think a lot of people are like, man, I live the greatest lifestyle. I pay for my boat. I pay for this. I pay for the chef. I got the plane on this. And I'm like, yeah but the multiple, it's arbitrage, you're missing the boat here. And I think people think if they sell their business, and I'm curious what you think, but a lot of people think they lose their identity, like that's their purpose. And they act like, man, I'm

just used to going in being the guy, and I've got a pretty good easy lifestyle. But, you know, you build a $10 million business at a 12X, that's 120 million, and you can still roll equity into that, and then go three, four exit again pretty easily. And I always ask this question, if you were gonna sell in a year, what would you do? And they're like, well, I do this, this, this, this.

Why don't you just do that now? Yeah, totally. Yeah, I mean, look, I agree and disagree, right? I think maybe it depends on the type of person. But I think that for me, at least, and it sounds like probably for you, I'm just a natural entrepreneur. Like, I it doesn't matter. Like, I'm not going to retire. Like, I don't see myself just going and hanging out on the beach. Like, I would do that. I would be bored in 48 hours.

And my wife can tell you she's sitting behind the camera. I can maybe lay on a lawn chair for an hour. And I hate my life. Like, I'm like, we got to go scuba diving. We need to jump out of a helicopter. Like we got to go do something. Right. And so I think I am addicted to building companies, uh, you know, providing value to the marketplace.

That's what we do in America, right? We're a capitalist economy. I think it's really cool to take an idea, you know, and to bring it to the marketplace, to provide real value value a good product or service Whatever that is and to see the fruit of that labor on the back end And so if I were to sell a company I would just go start another company Right, like it would just it would lead to something else Like my identity is in the fact that you know, I it's in other things

It isn't in one said company if you were right, you know, and I think there's a lot of people that try to do that one said company, if you will. Right. You know. And I think there's a lot of people that try to do that. Well, Richard Branson does, is he says, I'll never be the CEO, kind of like Warren Buffett again. But I'm going to hire the best top down instead of bottom up, like your first company where you had to go do all the work.

So you get the right team, the who, not how, which is Dr. Benjamin's, Hardy, it's his book, and Dan Sullivan. It's get the right people on the bus. Let them go do it with your guidance, your connections, your network. Totally. So valuable, yeah. You know, this economy, I hear good, bad, and indifferent. What do you think is going to happen here

in the next year or two? Yeah, great question. I mean, nobody's got a crystal ball, right? I do, however, think that in the next couple of years, the overall economy is going to look pretty good. It's just my opinion. I'm very optimistic, actually, about the next three or four years.

I think there's a lot of turbulence right now, but I think at a certain point, a lot of that is going to calm down. The markets are going to stabilize. And then the real estate market, we just need interest rates to come down. The only X factor when it comes to real estate is that they say for every 1% that rates come down, a million new buyers will come into the market on a national level. But I think that, and this is pure speculation, but I think a million sellers will come to the market too, because of everybody who's locked in right now.

So what will that do? I think initially supply and demand will just cancel each other out is my kind of theory. And then over time, demand will outpace supply and we'll see appreciation again. And again, it'll be sub market by sub market, right? California is going to look different than Arizona, which will look different than Atlanta, Georgia. Right. You know, for the listeners, I know quite a bit about wholesaling. And there's a lot of ways to acquire customers, you can send them handwritten letters, you get door knockers, you go to the courthouse and you look for overgrown property, you go to hoarders, you go to a place for mom.

There's ways to get through to these people that are looking for a cash offer. How do you generate? Just go through the business model a little bit, what you've learned in the model and how you acquire leads. So I've done it all, great question. I've done the door knocking, the cold calling, the texting, the paper click, paper lead. I mean, you name it, right? And you know, the only thing I haven't done is TV and radio as of yet for that company in particular, right? So I've never dabbled in that. I do

eventually want to, like I know Doug Hopkins, I know you've done, I mean, like I know, you know, people who could get the door open for us. But here's what I'll say. I've spent a lot of money on direct, we call that direct to seller marketing, right? Meaning we're going directly to the homeowner to get a property under contract below market value then flip that paperwork, right?

Do you ever take it down yourself or you just? Yeah, all the time, yeah. We don't do much lately because- So you do the remodeling and everything. We've done a lot. And now you're just flipping it to the next day. Now we just wholesale mostly. Because that's all the Doug does, yeah.

Yeah, because look, flipping can be really cool. It's a pain in the ass to scale, right? Sure, if you want to flip one or two houses at a time, be my guest, right? I've done that, but I've gotten to a point where we had 15 or 20 flips going on at a time. This doesn't make any sense. We make the same amount of money

wholesaling the paperwork that we do on the flip when it's all said and done and the whole the the wholesale deal takes five minutes And we never have to leave our office, so we like wholesaling better Flipping is cool. You know for some people like five or ten major buyers that you're just feeding We have a lot of buyers Yeah, but you know I would say we have our VIP buyers is what we would call them nationwide We probably have a thousand like really good buyers that just buy deal after deal after deal. But I'd say 50% of our deals sell to new buyers every month too.

But to answer your question and come full circle really quick for the listener, what we do now more than anything is we don't spend a lot of money on marketing anymore. What we do now is we have really two main ways that we bring in deals through real estate agents and through other wholesalers Where we'll just co wholesale right it costs zero dollars in marketing Okay So our overhead like our overhead is minimal and we can operate a profit margin on that company of 55 or 60 percent When we do that at a high level and there's Thousands of wholesalers in the market today that don't know how to get a cash buyer.

They don't know what the hell they're doing. They stumbled across the deal because they went door knocking or driving for dollars or whatever the case may be. And they need our help. They need the list of buyers. Right. They need the list of the thousand good buyers. And we'll just split that deal with them 50-50.

And you started about 12 years, 11, 12 years ago. I started wholesaling in 2014. How old were you then? 18. Yeah. That's a good way to get started. So I love people that go out and they figure it out. I would tell anybody listening, do not get into wholesale if you're in home service.

Stay focused. The one thing by Gary Keller. Agreed. Not saying don't do it, but I'd rather go to a guy like Austin here and say let me become an investor in the business and let me figure out a way because you know real estate could be good. We all know Grant Cardone. We all know cash flow is everything. Robert Kiyosaki, cash flow, cash flow, cash flow. I don't necessarily agree with just

cash flow because you know my deal we did I got a couple hundred million. And the next deal, I'll get a billion next year. And not to mention all the other businesses you add up, that's 500 million more. I love cash flow. But you know the cash flow is when you invest a billion dollars and a good PE deal, 22% IRR. That's a billion dollars at 22% IRR is 220 million a year. Cash flow is great, but like you said, it's hard to find a buyer for that. So you don't get rid of that. You worked hard for the last 11 years to build that. So that's the cash flow to build up these home service companies. And just remember what I told you. Figure out the business, analyze the business, find out what they're selling for, find out how you're going to scale it. Because certain

businesses are getting a lot more like our friend, Cameron. Pest control has got the highest because Terminix went public. And now they can pay crazy multiples, whereas, you know, a window company or front door company is not a demand-driven business. Right. So you're not going to get as high a multiple. Totally. Yeah. No, I mean, and that's why I'm excited to get into home services. What if you have, from what you got now, a couple thousand clients, whatever, what one gets you excited the most?

Which home service company? Yeah, which home service. I think I'm going to start with Pest. Pest Control. Yeah. Well, that's what, so I go speak at all these events, and I speak to inspectors that went out to massive inspector show, and all these guys have pest control companies

because that's the easiest one to sell. Yeah. Like, that's how they build their business. The barrier of entry is easy. Landscaping would be good if it was higher end. Agreed. And then pool cleaning. Pool cleaning.

So I wanted to do pool cleaning really bad, okay, because I owned a pool company when I was a kid. A little baby pool company, right? But I understand pools at a very high level. I could teach it like with my eyes closed. Like, I get it, right? And Cameron, being the good friend that he is talked me out of it. He's like, listen, pools are great,

but you did it at a really small level. Like I'm telling you, when you scale it, like it becomes very difficult. Technicians are impossible to train. You need repair guys on the road all the time. Like it was a dip, cause he owned pineapple pools obviously, right? And so the good friend that he is,

I just trusted his kind of thing on that now eventually I might do pools I own a couple of domains You know I could get into the pool industry But and correct me if I'm wrong maybe you know more than I do there isn't that high of a multiple on the pool company for whatever reason Well, it is it's kind of like landscape pools pool and landscaping are very similar whereas pest control is your in-and-out. Yeah and it's like you see nasty, nasty stuff. And within pest control, you could do pigeons, you could do roof rats, you could decide you're

going to do— Bad bugs. Bad bugs is a big one. I was on a podcast like seven years ago with a guy that had trained dogs to go into hotels and find bad bugs. So these German shepherds would go, they know exactly what bugs have them and the dogs would go in. It's crazy.

What do you think is going to happen? I was in the 70-72 sold. We went to dinner with Greg Haig. Yeah, Greg, great guy. And he thinks the real estate market is going to completely change. He's like obviously the buyer agent commissions have kind of came down. It's the seller's agents that there's new rules coming in and he's like, I'm just going to be very transparent and free, but I'll sell all these other services. Like he'll be the title company, he'll be the inspection

company, he'll make all the money on an ancillary things. What is your take on the future of what real estate looks like? So we already do a lot of that. I own a title company, I own an insurance company, we own a mortgage company. So we already make money multiple times on every deal. With that being said, I agree with Greg. I think that, look, for your average agent you're Unfortunately the industry of real estate agencies 1.8 million or whatever there isn't in the US right now according to NAR The majority of them are not very good at what they do

That's just it's just the reality of the situation right that you know 5% of them are really good and 95% of them kind of suck ultimately Right and so those are the ones that are struggling to fight for that commission because the law did change and now you have to Negotiate before the seller's agent would just tell the seller Hey, we're gonna pay the but if a buyer if a buyer's agent brings us the deal We're gonna pay him 3% are you okay with that? Okay, cool sign here. You're gonna pay me three We're gonna pay a buyer's agent three if I happen to also be the buyer's agent I'll get six right and it was pre negotiated

So when a buyer's agent went on the MLS to find their client a deal, then it was just like you would ask the seller, hey, what am I getting paid? It would be right on the MLS. It would tell you, it's say 2.5% or 3%. You knew immediately what you were going to make. Now it's not on the MLS anymore. So if you're a buyer's agent, right, you need to call that seller's agent and say, hey, if I bring you a buyer, ready, willing, enabled buyer, and I write a contract, will your seller pay me a commission? And have a verbal conversation,

and then you actually have to negotiate that commission and try to get the seller to pay for it. And the seller can ultimately say no, right? And then if they say no, then you gotta go to your buyer and say, hey, well, do you wanna pay me? Or do you, like, or I can't represent you? Like, you know, I don't work for free type of thing, right right and so you have to be a really good agent to have those conversations now

We're really good at it and my team is really good at it So our believe it or not our average commission as a company when NAR rolled out that lawsuit and it took effect Went up not down right so our average commission went up by about point two percent so point two oh down. Right? So our average commission went up by about 0.2%. So 0.20. And you know, that's just a result of us being really good at what we do and being able to have that conversation at really high level and get those sellers to pay our buyer's agents what they're worth. Right? But you know, the industry as a whole, yeah, dude, I mean, look, AI, technology, I mean, in five or 10 years, and that's why I'm getting into home services ultimately, right? I love the real estate agent, you know company that we've built and it's an amazing company

But I'm not naive to the fact that AI is going to redefine The majority of these types of jobs and it's not a matter of if it's just a matter of when right? And I think every agent watching this should also have a backup plan, right? Hey Spend less than you make and go buy rental properties. Like go, you know, if you make in 200 grand a year right now, stop spending 200 grand a year. Spend 80 grand a year, spend 60 grand a year, drive an old beat up car so that you can afford to invest. And, you know, if something does happen to your job, you're not freaking out on the street. 100 percent. You know, it's funny, we're looking at a bunch of real estate deals.

And I don't know where I'm at yet but I want to be diversified in the way that there's a few guys I know, Bigger Pockets, Brandon. Yeah, Brandon. Beardy, Beard to Brandon. Big Red Beard. He and I went out to do a podcast on it to Hawaii. And that's a really interesting model. He has a ton of real estate. I think he's got a couple billion under contract.

Yeah. And he gets paid on the, you know, after a while. Yeah. His is all later in the game. But I love that idea of, are you big in the- It's all syndication, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, are you big into like single family, or do you think there's a real big game for multifamily? I think there's a huge game for multifamily. I think for me right now, I'm 30 years old, right? So I have to kind of look at what I have built so far. We've mastered the single family game so much so that I have these two main real estate companies will sell a few thousand houses a year and growing. And I'm hardly even involved, which is what is allowing me the time to go get into home services, right? Because I have such good partners and such a good team

that I'm able to kind of venture off and do more things, which is why I'm doing that. For me right now, it makes more sense for me to get into home services because I can, I'll make more money quicker at the age that I'm at and for what we have going on, right? Like the multifamily game would just, it's a great game for me, but it's a game that I could get into when I'm 35 or 36 or 37. Like, it's not going anywhere, you know? I'd love to go try to sell a company first and put $100 million or so or whatever in the account and then go and venture into what that might look like. So from what you've heard, you've been putting the feelers out there.

What do you think your biggest challenges are going to be when it comes to home service? I mean, you know, hiring, I think we're really good at culture. You know, like we have over 500 people between our companies right now. So like I understand how to build good culture. I understand how to bring the right people and put them in the right seats. I understand systems and processes. I would just say the mechanics of the industry itself will be the biggest challenge, right? Like learning, like I personally am going to go get in a truck and I'm going to

go spray, right? Like I'm going to find somebody that will take me and show me, you know, and because I need to be able to understand it 100%, every aspect of it. That way I can stand at the front of the room and teach the technicians and really, and they can actually respect me. Right. So like I've literally told my partners, I'm like, I'm going to disappear for a few months and I'm going to go learn past. Like I'm going to learn everything about it. Right. Cause the backend won't be as hard for us. Sure. It'll be difficult, right? It's everything, but business is difficult. We're used to that, you know,

but in terms of like finding people, putting out ads, like building the truck, you know, wrapping the truck, the decals, getting the product, you know, and then building systems and processes, getting the right CRM, putting everybody in Slack, like that stuff's not that difficult for us. So yeah, I think learning the mechanics of the industry will be the hardest. So here's a piece of advice for the the listeners out there what I would do is Cameron knows a lot of the same guys I do but you find the top bankers Yeah in the industries you're looking at and they've done deals. They've done terminex deals They've done the biggest best deals and say look a lot of these There's information out there to find out if you're on the wrong CRM, you'll take

a 2x multiple less. If you didn't build your models correctly, like if you did door to door, you're worth half as much versus because the door to door, the clients turn over quicker. So I'd go say, who sold for the highest multiples that are public? And can I get a look at their balance sheet and income statement so I got to understand where my cost of goods need to be, I got to understand where my lay, all these different things. And that way you could have kind of an architecture, I call it R&D, rip off and duplicate. Just reverse engineer what that is and there you know what the golden star is. I love that. That's great advice.

And what I'll also tell you is I pay to play. I've got more consultants for every 40 podcasts I do I hire a consultant. Mm-hmm. And the last guy I hired is about to fire me because he's not taking on any more clients And he said I'm done Dan Martell. Yep, and he's like Tommy I've never told this story, but I'm actually cropping the video and sending it to people He goes I'm going through this phase of knowing my life and he goes goes, this is a $500,000 watch. And I'm not telling you that to brag. He said, I remind myself who I am with this 30 cent bracelet. But he said, it's a $500,000 watch.

You know why I'm wearing a $500,000, not a 600 or $400,000 watch? Because a $500,000 an hour is what makes a billion a year. And he goes, so you're not going to pay me $500,000 an hour. I have a path to get there. And I'm in this stage in my life where I'm saying no to anything that's a distraction. And as much as I try to help people out, it's not always about money for me. It's about networking, meeting the right people. The network is your net worth. But it meant a lot to me because I tend to say yes.

And if I say yes to you, I'm saying no to my fiance. I'm saying no to my potential kids that are coming, hopefully, once we get married. And I'm saying no to a lot of my family. How do you deal with that? It's hard. I mean, you just, I think Dan Martell's right on the money, right? You have to get good at saying no at some point, you know? And I think what's interesting about entrepreneurship, and tell me if you agree, when you're first starting out, like for people who are watching who are

Just starting out as an entrepreneur to say yes to everything right and somewhere along the way You have to completely 180 and say no to almost everything and that's actually a difficult transition to make I don't know if you could pinpoint the exact moment where you had to make that transition But I can remember where I you know because you have to in the beginning you just have to say yes to anything that comes Your way because like you're just trying to freaking you need to make it. We need to make a living right you to make payroll So, you know, but then at a certain point it's the polar opposite of that and it's it's actually a hard transition I would say more than anything mentally because you're so used to mentally you have to kind of like retrain your brain to be like To think the opposite way that you've always thought as, as, you know, a startup entrepreneur.

So I'm at a point now similar to you, you probably say no to slightly more stuff. Obviously, you're older and more wise and ahead of where I'm at. I'm 30 years old at the end of the day. But I am embarking on the journey of saying no, and I'm getting pretty good at it. You know, I would say for me right now, the biggest thing I have to say no to is any business opportunity that doesn't vertically integrate with what we're already doing. Like, if you really look at every company that we own, right? You look at, from my media company to my two real estate companies, to title mortgage insurance, and then now, you know, getting into pest control,

they all go hand in hand. They all vertically integrate. They all talk to each other and feed each other. You know, if a wholesale deal, somebody doesn't wanna take a cash offer, it goes to my retail company. If my retail company's out on a listing appointment, they wanna cash offer, it goes to my wholesale company. Both those companies we send to our title company,

we send to our mortgage, our insurance. And now we're gonna say, here's our preferred pest control company. And so for me right now, if I get approached with an amazing opportunity that I could look at and it's like that would make me a ton of money, but it doesn't vertically integrate, I have to say no. Like I just I can't, I don't have the bandwidth. I can't say yes to something that doesn't vertically integrate to what I'm already doing because it

would take me, it would actually pull me in the wrong direction. Well, that's a great thing for the listeners to hear because, you know because there was a time where I was flipping real estate. A1 would have grew way faster. It took 18 years to get to this point if I didn't get distracted. And I said this idea of an entrepreneur, this visionary idea is I can do anything I put my mind to, but it still takes time. It takes effort.

It takes energy. It takes money. So I love essentialism, the one thing, those are two books that the listener should be reading if they want to learn to focus. And yes, we can make anything work, but you're robbing Peter to pay Paul. Is this like you got to really do this spreadsheet analysis and say, if this thing goes well, how much am I making per hour? And some of the stuff I do, I don't make anything.

Like literally, I go speak at an event, sometimes I don't make anything like literally I go speak in an event Sometimes I don't even charge. Mm-hmm, but I'm up there Meeting people yeah and networking and there's certain people there that I go and intentionally wanting to meet and those people sometimes turn into Consultants sometimes they turn into really good friends So I would say never give up this opportunity to go out and network and meet the people because that's I think the best Opportunity that you should be spending your time. And be very purposeful in who you're going to meet. I agree. Yeah, especially if you're the visionary of the company, right?

Which I assume most of your listeners are. They're probably not the integrator. They're probably the visionary. I mean, obviously, you can be both, but the majority of people are one or the other. No. Yeah, there's a lot of people I know that think they're both. Yeah. Look. You still lean one way. Oh hundred percent. I've met a lot of people that read You know a few what is it rocket fuel? Yeah. Yeah, Gina Wickman and Mark Winters I had both them both on the podcast and the deal is It's like yeah, I can do both. Yeah, I'm like, but trust me once you get the right integrator

I mean most of us with ADHD that are visionaries that are founders are not the guys we could do it I've had to go down to build the compensation plans and shoot I was in the truck for eight years and I was forced myself to do it, but I didn't have as much fun Mm-hmm. I need help getting these ideas fulfilled. Yeah, and when you get the right integrator you start sprinting and the hardest part I'm gonna tell you this right now the best advice I could give you in the home service industry Form an EIP equity incentive program. I'm writing a book on it right now It's called pay them what they're worth and to be able to attract people with a stake in the outcome that are running that say I'm an owner

But let's say you build a business to where it's worth five million bucks And then you say I'm building this program that five million is yours Mm-hmm, and then they get 1% in the business sales for 100 million. They get 950,000. Got it. That makes sense. So it doesn't have to be rolled out the day you start the company.

It does need to be rolled out the same day. And I wouldn't do it the same day. I'd do it when there's value there for yourself. And the other thing I can tell you what happens with it is you could recruit way stronger people. Camera's got to not compete. But you can start going after people that have made a lot of money,

and they say, wait a minute, you build a great business, but if I come turn a few dials here, I could 10X this business, but it's expensive. You give me a couple hundred grand, but I want an ownership. And it's earned. And it works, every private equity company does this, every public traded company does stock options. But the home service companies haven't figured this out yet.

For whatever reason. And here's the deal. You make a mistake with this. You gave away half your company. It's a really bad thing. It's not something you play lightly with just handing equity to everybody. I did it. I probably made a few mistakes, but I'm glad I did it. I reverse engineered. I whiteboarded doing it versus not doing it. And it was fun because a lot of people became millionaires, 22 people. And hindsight, some of them maybe didn't deserve it. Some of them probably deserve

a little more. It's not a perfect plan, but it's a great plan. Totally. I agree. Big advice. You founded a lot of companies. What do you think? You talked a little bit about culture. Culture used to be a bad word when I first started. I'm like, these these guys are smoking. They're getting in accidents or stealing my stuff. But I didn't have the right infrastructure and I didn't reward them the right way. I didn't come up with the right compensation programs. What do you think?

What do you think? What makes a culture go well? What are the things you've learned in the last 10 years? Well, it starts from the top. You know, I mean, you know, as a leader, you have to lead by example. You have to set that example every single day of your life. I really believe that. And eventually, when you're so big, if you're not the guy,

then like your leadership team has to be that those people. Right. Like it, it all starts at the very top, you know? And so I think you have to build it that way. And then I think a lot of it is paying people well. I mean, truthfully, right? It's like you said it a little while ago, frickin pay people what they're worth or more than they're worth for that matter. Right.

Like I've, I've actually in a lot of my companies probably overpaid people, to be frank with you, I mean, I've probably actually like not paid myself as much money as I could have paid myself or that the company could have just profited because I actually Paid people too. Well, I paid them above what the market would have dictated that I would have had to pay them Right, but they never leave because they're getting paid a lot of money people can say oh, it's not about the money But at the end of the day, it's like I mean, come on my employees show up to work because if I stop paying them They're not gonna work for me. So it's clearly about the money I mean I get that they also want to...

Everything else is really important too, right? Take your executive team to Cabo, buy them dinner, take them to Mastros, you know, have incentives, you know. It's kind of the collective of all these different things, I think, that equal culture, in my opinion. I'm sure you would agree. Yeah, I think that there's no one word to describe culture, but what I do think is you gotta get the whole family on board.

You come home from a hard day, you're greasy, you're smelly, it's been a long day, maybe the day didn't go right, and you got your significant other to say, look, they treat you perfectly. Today was a tough day, but last week you made a ton of money, they take you on these trips, they take us to a park. Some people are like, I can't afford to do all the stuff you do. I was like, can you afford Bisquick? Can you make pancakes? Yeah. Everybody's got a reason why they can't. When I usually say this in

the podcast is, I always say like, my goals are massive. My dreams are really big. Like, my dreams got to be big enough to fit everybody's dream inside. But don't have my dreams. Like, why? I'm 42. I've never been married. I don't have any kids yet. I had to sacrifice a lot to get to this level. And the fact that I didn't get married was because duty calls. I mean, I'd walk out of a theater on a first date with a chick and say, I gotta go run this call. I'm sorry. And if they wanted to date me, they'd have to go run calls with me. I mean, that's, you know, over a decade ago. But, you know, I think what people should do, and this would be a great exercise for you.

You're never gonna stop. I can see that in you. But to reverse engineer, just say, look, mom, dad, sister, brother, whoever it is, I got an uncle, I got this grandma I wanna help. Figure out who are all the things, what do you wanna do for them? What do you need to do for your family? Do you wanna set a trust for your kids?

All these things. And have a number. That doesn't mean you're over. It just means I was it people like I'm never going to sell. I'm like, well, how do the people in your company win? How does your family win? Yeah, they're going to watch you work for 10 more years. So you're never going to buy the boat that you promised them you were going to go fishing every summer. You're never going to be able to take them on that trip you promised. And some people have enough cash flow to do some of these things. But if you do an EIP program that doesn't come to fruition until the company changes

control. So I think it's selfish to not want to sell. I agree. Yeah, I agree. I agree with everything you said, even the part where you talk about bringing in the spouse and the significant other of the person. We've actually interviewed people before where we're like, hey, we want you to bring your husband or your wife to the interview. Like we want to interview you with your husband and wife in the room. Like, because we want to we want to make sure that when you when it it becomes a good fit and we get through this interview and it's a win win that you already have the approval of your significant other.

Like, we don't want you to try to go home and convince them and then they're not on board and this and the other thing. So I agree with you completely on that as well. So it's funny because obviously I just got engaged six months ago, but we've been dating for a long time. It was overdue. And Dave Ramsey talks about four things when you get married. Yep. Guess what the four things are. I'm just curious. You got to make it.

You can take a stab. I actually am not sure. I don't listen to Dave Ramsey and I don't really listen to him a whole lot because I believe in maximum leverage. The opposite of. yeah, yeah. I mean, talk about, you know, your finances probably, it's probably, it all has to do with like being transparent, I'm sure about like, do you have credit card debt? You know, how much money do we do each of us make? Who's doing what in the household?

Like come into some sort of agreement, I would imagine. Well, the money's a big one. How you're gonna raise your kids? Somebody's Mormon, somebody's Catholic. Sure, of course. How's that gonna come together? The other one, politics. Yeah. I mean, think about it,

if you got a raging left Democrat and a raging right winged skinhead. Hopefully you would find that out by the first date. Yeah, no, that's a big one. And then the last one is in-laws, believe it or not. Okay. Because an in-law could come in and really change things up. Yeah, because you're marrying them too.

With the way you parent, with the way, what they believe. I mean, you know, I could tell you stories about that, but not I love, I love her. Yeah. I'll love my in-laws, but there's, I've seen families come apart because it's just, my grandma was pretty tough on my dad. My grandma on my mom's side was really rough on my dad. So my COO, an amazing guy, and I don't think he'd care if I shared the story, he was kind

of in a really bad relationship. He had kids and they worked it out and they're still civil with each other, but he's remarried. And I've never seen he's in the best shape of his life. You can talk to her about work, she's always smiling, she supports him, and it changed who he is. Like, he developed so fast. He's like, what book do you want me to read this week? I just listened to this podcast.

Can I go on you in this shop tour? And it's just crazy. It's the most important decision you'll ever make. Totally, I agree completely. Yeah, I, yeah, it's why I picked the one that I picked. Yeah. You better say that. She's right here.

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All right, back to the episode. What's the best advice you've ever received, and from who, and how did it impact your life? Well, one of the pieces that comes to my head immediately is how you do anything is how you do everything. You know, like brush your teeth like a freaking champion. Make your bed like a champion. Like what do you do? Like, you know, wash your car.

Like I'll interview people and I'm like, let's pull your car up. Let's go. I just on the first interview because I don't want to tell them that in advance. I'm like, let's go look at your car. If they have trash and stuff all over the car, dude, they are not a good fit for our organization. I'm telling you that right now. If they got a tidy, clean car, that's what I'm looking for. So how you do anything is how you do everything. And I think that applies to every aspect of when

we look at relationally, financially, physically, emotionally, spiritually. Go into every single thing that you do and give it your 100%. Too many people are walking around planet Earth, given 50% here, 20% here, like they're like, they go home, they give their, their spouse their leftovers, they go to their, their company and they give their employees that leftovers like it's just like, then why are you doing anything like just Yeah. And the other thing is I realize a lot of people don't feel, they don't feel right. Their bodies aren't working anymore. And that's just, they don't want to go to the doctor. They don't want to exercise. They don't want to do anything.

They don't get enough sleep. They don't want to eat healthy. And that's just when I see people change that piece where they're on that, like, whether it's something to do with your estrogen or testosterone levels, or maybe it has something to do with your digestive system, leaky gut. Sure. But when you get that stuff fixed, especially when you hit 40s and 50s, you find that your time is actually a better effort. Like some people are like, well, listen,

I don't like to work out. Can you go for a walk? Here's a quick joke. So this guy's in this interview and he goes, why don't you give me your worst quality? And he goes, well, kind of think of it as probably that I'm too honest. And he goes, well, I don't really consider me your worst quality?" And he goes, well, kind of think of it as probably that I'm too honest. And he goes, well, I don't really consider that a bad quality. And he goes, well, I don't give a damn what you think. I mean, I say the joke differently,

but since we're podcasting. That's actually funny. So yeah, the advice, how do you decide who you're gonna take advice from? They have to have what you want in whatever area it is that you're trying to get advice from. What I will say on that, though, very quickly, is that, you know, you don't want a mentor doesn't have to be a mentor in every area of life.

You have to be very careful. I've had a lot of mentors in my life that knew how to make a lot of money, but I would have never gotten a relationship advice from them. Right. Yeah. Their marriages were or their, you know, they were everything. It was just garbage. right? Their friendships, or maybe somebody knows how to make a lot of money, but they don't have the same faith that you have. It's like, I'm not going to go to you and ask you about scripture from the Bible, because that's just not right. And so I think I have different mentors in my life that feed

me different things. So I might have a spiritual might have a spiritual mentor, a financial business mentor, right? I might have, you know, a physical, right? A trainer, yeah. A trainer, you know? So I think that's important. Too many people, they go to their trainer and they get freaking relationship advice. And it's like, you're talking to a single, like, you know,

it's just like, you've got to make sure that when you get advice from somebody, that they have exactly what you want to have. If they don't have what you want, why the hell are you taking advice from them? No, you're right. And a lot of people, like if you're going to go to a trainer, you want them to have the body. Maybe you would consider having. If your trainer is 100 pounds overweight, you're probably not going to hire them. I'm sorry.

I like, you know what I mean? Like you're not. Why would I hire that guy? If he knew how to do what he's telling me How to do why isn't he doing it right? Now it's smart and when it comes to Merrell device parenting there's I always say success leaves clues I'm not gonna read I will read books on parenting, but the fact is I was in the couple recently Brendan mark we were in Jackson hole and their kids They'd run up and give me a hug. They were laughing the whole time.

They were very obedient. And Brynn would be like, don't talk like a baby, and at like two or four year old, and she'd be like, okay, mom, I'm sorry. And just very respectful, and I'm like, you guys are gonna give me parenting advice, because these kids are phenomenal. And that's what I mean is like,

if the kids were crying the whole time and angry and weren't listening and on their iPad the whole Time I'd be like probably not Yeah, no, and you can see it right like that's why I think people are silly when they're like when they get bad advice There's something cuz it's like it's pretty clear Whatever whatever person you're trying to get advice from like if they have what you want or not for the most part money might be The only one that maybe somebody could fake I guess you know But other things it's pretty hard to fake, right?

Like you're either a man of God or you're not. Like if you're at the club every weekend all the time, 24-7, like I'm probably not going to come to you for like spiritual advice. Yeah. You know, it's pretty clear. Money is the one thing where it's like, you know, there are you there. I don't think you can fake it forever, but there are a lot of fakers out there. Unfortunately, people, yeah, where it's just all leverage and credit cards and debt and whatever. See, you got to be a little careful, I think, with the financial one, like try to make sure that they have what you want to have.

You know, because I've seen people that look like they they have what I want. But then when I really get under the hood, I'm like, dude, you don't have what I want at all. Like you're you're stressed out. You're like, you know, you spend every dollar you make like whatever. Right. I think those people are chasing a lifestyle. And once you reach a certain lifestyle, it's hard to move back. And I see a lot of people, their biggest mistake is the business starts making money and they go, hey, listen, they talk to their wife or husband and they say, we deserve.

Yeah, we deserve. We worked hard. We deserve. And you got to live below your means for a while Yeah, it's almost like a snowball you pack it you put it down the hill once it gets big enough You could do like I've done a lot of nice things the last couple years, but ultimately I mean it wasn't that long ago I was living in a thousand I own the apartment complex, but it was a thousand square feet I watched a video of yours the other day where you said you drove for I don't know how many years you can say So you drove an old an old vehicle for a long time wasn't important to me, right? And I knew like hey if I put this back into the business and plus I didn't know what was gonna happen because people do look

At you a lot differently and it's it's a good thing and it's a bad thing Sure, cuz I try to stay super humble I was in Idaho and we brought my chef and my driver with me people were like and it's Idaho Yeah, they were like wait what and I were like, and it's Idaho. They were like, wait, what? And I'm like, it's kind of embarrassing, honestly, but they really help us out a lot. And this allows me to be way more focused at work. I don't enjoy driving, I don't hate it.

I don't cook that well, especially the healthy cooking with the seed oils and all this stuff. So I got a guy that does this so much better and he does stuff perfectly. And it's so much easier. People are like, man, it must be easy for you to say, I'm like, go back and live my life before you say that. Everybody wants to have used, but no one wants to take the hike.

Yeah, dude. We get awarded for public for the work we did in private, you know? And at the end of the day, any public accolade that anybody's ever received, all they're doing is receiving an award for decades of work that they did behind the curtain that nobody ever saw and that they never got an accolade for. So, yeah, people are silly when they say crap like that, right? It's like anybody that's truly successful put in a lot of years behind the freaking curtain

where they didn't, they never got praise, they never got an accolade ever. Anybody. I don't care who it is. I've never, you know, one of the other. Maybe some of the Bitcoin kids. Maybe, but even then, dude, like, didn't they lose their money? Because their financial thermostat's not where it needs to be. So like, Pete, there's no such thing as fast money. I really believe that. That's why almost every lottery winner, 90% of them, they go bankrupt, right? Because remember, their financial thermostat was at 100 grand a year or 60 grand a year.

They knew everything about 60 grand a year. Now they have 100 million. They don't... Their thermostat didn't... Bob Proctor used to talk a lot about this, right? Like, your finances will just come to match whatever your thermostat didn't Bob Proctor used to talk a lot about this, right? Your finances will just come to match whatever your thermostat is set at. But anyways, yeah. So with your podcast, I'll tell you when I started my podcast now, this is the eighth year. And I actually used it.

I didn't realize when I was starting it. I felt like I had a lot to say of the mistakes. I didn't want to go in there and say, God, look what I did. What happened is every podcast, I'd be able to get, like I'd have a problem with HR, I'd go find the number one person in HR in the world. They'd get on the podcast for an hour that they might charge a hundred grand for that. They'd be glad to come on. For free. And I'd get all my questions answered. And people listen to the podcast are like, dude,

you, your questions were like, when you were at 10 million, it was all the questions I had at 10 million. And then I listened to it, and I got to 30, and you were asking the questions at 30, and yes, the technology has changed a little bit, but overall, it's the same advice. What did you start the podcast for? What are some of the biggest takeaways? Dude, you nailed it, bro.

I mean, that's literally why I started it. I started to be frank. I started it very selfishly to do exactly what you just described, right? It was an excuse to talk to cool people that I wouldn't otherwise be able to talk to, I started it very selfishly to do exactly what you just described. It was an excuse to talk to cool people that I wouldn't otherwise be able to talk to. And then it evolved. And then it became about the other people. It became about just networking in general, providing value to the people.

But it didn't start out that way. And I think it kind of goes hand in hand with being an entrepreneur. Every entrepreneur, I always tell young people, it's okay to just want to make a lot of money when you're brand new at entrepreneurship, because I know for a fact, it'll change over time. You see so many people that are like, don't do it for that. It's like, no, dude, you can have a goal of making a lot of money, right? And I think that goes hand in hand with the other thing too, right? It's like, it's okay to be honest and say, hey, I did this for a selfish reason, but then it turned in to a selfless act.

Yeah. Right? And that's really what it has done for me as well. Now, you know, I bring— Dude, I connect so many people. I have people that come on my podcast, and I'm like the connector now. Or I try to be, right? It's like I'm literally thinking about who do they need to know,

and then as soon as we're done filming, I'll send like three group texts. Oh, yeah. And I'll be like, dude, you got to meet this guy, blah, blah, blah. And I'll just provide value, value, value, and I won't ask for anything in return. Right? And you know, maybe one day, five, ten years from now, sure maybe I will make a phone call and ask for a favor, right? But that's not my intention. No, it's great. I love that. Connect, I have about five connectors that basically could give me access to anybody. Yeah. And I use it only when I really, really need it. Some

of them are too big of connectors, or they'll send me 20 names. I'm like, just give me the top one. I really got the specific need. And it's very interesting, because when you get that, that's so true when you really start to network and take care of people and ask for nothing in return, it comes back full circle.

Zig Ziglar said, you could have anything you want in life if you help enough people get what they want. Love that. And it's so real. It comes back full circle. Zig Ziglar said you could have anything you want in life if you help enough people get what they want. Love that. And it's so it's so real. It is. What's, what's the most difficult time that you've had to go through in business? There's been a lot of difficult times. You know, I think just all the times over the last 11 or 12 years where, you know, you'll have a great year. and you really start to think that

you're you know making it happen or whatever the case might be and then the next quarter or year or whatever is just garbage you know and you go backwards and the first thing that entrepreneurs do by the way is they stop paying themselves right it's the first thing that I've that comes to my mind if we had a bad month right now let's just say hypothetically the first thing I would do is not pay myself that month. I wouldn't fire, like, you know, I might do that the following month

if it doesn't improve, right? But the very first thing that I'll do is make, is I'll be the one to suffer before anybody else suffers. And I think that's just the natural instinct of a true entrepreneur, right? And so I've had a lot of years like that, you know? There was a lot of years where I didn't pay myself a dollar, you know, and I went from like making a ton of money to like zero again. And then you go back to it's

like a roller coaster. You know, I think people think success is linear, but it really is not linear at all. Right. We've all seen that meme floating around. Yeah, literally. Yeah. And that's the reality of being an entrepreneur. So I don't know, you know, to name one particular instance, I'm not sure, probably getting into bad partnerships and stuff, just that didn't work out and you gotta start from scratch, get rid of your, divorce your business partner,

separate everything, go rebuild it all over again, like hiring the wrong people. I've had a lot of seasons where you bring in one bad apple and then all of a sudden next thing, you know, you got to fire like 20 people because they've contaminated everything. You know, so like those seasons are really hard, right? Because it's like, you really do feel like in that moment,

like you took one step forward to take five steps backward, you know, and to be frank, you know, you want nothing more than to quit, but you and I both know better than anybody, we're not capable of quitting. You know, it's in my DNA to not quit, to not give up. Right. I would go sleep in a car. Dude, I grew up in a garage. I grew up in my grandpa and grandma's garage, and I ain't afraid to go back. Yeah. And I think that's the scariest thing of a competitor is somebody

that started with nothing is like, hey, what's the most you can take? Literally. Yeah. I wanted to ask you, so. nothing is like, hey, what's the most you can take? Literally. Yeah. I wanted to ask you, so with partnerships, I don't think anything in life is 50-50. I don't even think marriage is 50. It's great if you can get to somewhat like 49-51. I always think there's give and take in a marriage and there's other things that you don't even realize are going through.

And same thing with partnerships, but I think it's all in how you define the operating agreement and how you could wind it back. And there's expectations built into it. And I don't love lawyers, but they're a necessary evil to do it the right way. I mean, what do you do now when you look for a partner? I mean, obviously, you probably vet it, you talk to their last partners and things like that. But how do you make sure you're getting? Look, I did a deal with Cody, you know, and I know he was going to hustle and we've got meetings on marketing, I got my team helping out a lot. I've now put a

ton of effort because quite frankly, I kind of want them to fail. Yeah, and few things. I don't want them to fail at all. Right. But I want them to learn the lessons smaller than I had to learn. Sure. And when they're ready and for the next level, I'm like, I don't want to pour a bunch of leads when they can't keep up with the ones they got. And there's all these things that happen early in business. It's less than a year old. So they don't mind that they fall forward, they get back up. This wasn't a big mistake. They come to me when they're ready. They go, we're ready for more leads. We're ready to start the TV buys. We're doing this. We're doing this. We're doing this. And I've used every contact I have. I've been using my network.

When I jump in, give them more time, it's going to be tough for me because they're going to go, well, we don't want to do that. And I'm going to say, well, how much do you want this business? I said, you want a $30 million business, the worth, the net worth of the business, you want a $300 million business. He said, $300? I said, that's not going to happen overnight. We're going to have to crawl a little bit, then we're going to walk, then we're going to sprint.

But that type of business is a lot different. $30 million, I could get you there in two years. And they do trust me. And I do have a lot of the mistakes they've made. So it's one of those things where I was okay moving slower. They don't have these high expectations of me, but I've used the team. I've got a family office with a lot of guys that could do the software side and got the financials and get the reporting and figure out the tax benefits of doing things a certain

way. That's somebody that the missing thing that you'll probably need, if you're like me, is the best CFO in the world if you get the best CFO. Yeah There's so many crazy things accelerated depreciation things you could do hundred percent bonus depreciations back. It's a beautiful thing It is a beautiful thing. I'm not in the jet. Yeah. Yeah, you know, we've got a what is it? Not net jet but one of the such at or It's there's a few of them. Yeah, I forget what it's called, but, you know, we... Sentient? Not sentient. It's JetLinks.

Oh, yeah. And what I've learned is what I don't want. Because they always give us these light jets. And I'm 6'3". And I'm like, okay, we're going to have to get something bigger. And by the way, the goal is that I bring my friends, my neighbors, the A1 staff, my co-workers. I call them a set of employees I want to bring them with me everywhere. I want to live in Gulf Stream. I do I think the Gulf Stream

I think I'm like I'm in a perfect world of g6. Those are about yeah 50 to 60 Brand new which is a lot of money you get amused. I have probably go used You know, I still you can take the guy out of the trailer park Yeah, I can't take the chamber got other guy hundred percent and I'm not the kind of guy that I need to post at all You know we post some of the stuff, but I told everybody I built this house in Idaho because everyone's gonna be there Yeah, family friends and my co-workers. That's it and business acquaintances like all the time Yeah, we didn't build this house for me and breathe would have been a third of tenth of the size you get bored Yeah, and I'm the type of guy, I spent my first seven years kind of,

when my mom and dad got a divorce after seven, I was alone all the time. I had my dog Max, my best friend, and I went to a private school so I didn't have any neighbor friends, and that slowly changed, but I'm like, I don't like to be alone anymore. Yeah, I'm with you, I hate it.

I love company, I love entertaining too. And if you could, I feel like you should. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. Shit, yeah, shit. That's why I love having a boat. Right? Because it's like a boat is one thing you get to like see the joy of other people when you bring them on your boat. Where do you- And you show them a good time. You know, it's like a cool thing, right?

It's like, I don't want to be on the boat all by myself. I want seven or eight people on the boat that I can show a good time to, you know? Like seeing them have fun and Sir from whatever the case may be is like why it's like that same concept right of having a cool house They were where you can entertain and have your team over or whatever you know so you what is your goal this house of Peoria? Fry it three to five year house. It's not our forever house You know but it's we were living at the Optima for a little while because we had a different house and then we sold that moved into the opera Optima thinking it would be temporary

Ended up staying there for like three and a half years And then we were like, okay, we're like I I got sick and tired of the Optima. It's beautiful. We were blessed Don't get me wrong Definitely the nicest apartment in the state, you know, but but we ready to just like, we have a dog and it's just like a pain in the ass after a while. Yeah. So we got a good deal on this house. We got to, you know, kind of essentially build it almost from the ground up. We got involved when they were like, they'd already poured the foundation and done some

of the stuff. And then we got involved. We kind of took over the project, picked everything out, move some stuff around, you know, but we have a, I have an 1800 square foot garage, which is like bigger than anything I've had yet. Yeah. Which is really cool. So enough for some car lifts and stuff like that. You know, huge car guy, love cars.

I don't own a lot of cars right now, but I've owned a lot of cars in my life. Right. Just not at one time. But yeah, so, you know, stoked for that. And then obviously we're right by the lake, which will be cool. So we can go out and play. Like Pleasant?

Yeah. You have a slip out there and a lift and everything like that. You get smoker and wifi. Oh yeah. That was so fun. Bree had a boat that she bought from her grandpa. We just didn't go to Lake Pleasant enough. So CM Point Idaho and Ponderay Lake is where we're building a boat.

Which is really, I mean I'd love to eventually have a lake house. In Idaho, like Coeur d'Alene, I mean dude. Coeur d'Alene is 45 minutes. We spent a lot of time there. Yeah. And everybody's from Paradise Valley. But I heard Coeur d'Alene like now is it's like too expensive. Like it, like the prices just went out of control. So we moved 45 minutes to Ponderay Lake. It's a bigger lake. It's a, in my opinion, it's a really cool lake. I love going to Coeur d'Alene to go to Gaza, which is the golf course. It's the who's who's in Coeur d'Alene. If you want to be seen, the Kardashians, Justin Bieber.

There's a lot of famous people there and I don't really care for them. It's not that I don't like them. It's just Mark Wahlberg, that'd be a guy I'd hang out with. He seems to be a genuine person, but I'm not like the paparazzi, like, let's go see. A couple more questions and we'll wrap it up. If you could go back in time and give yourself advice at 20 years old, what would it be? Believing yourself, probably, you know, just, just...

And don't be too hard on yourself. You know, believing yourself, don't beat yourself up. Give yourself grace. Like, you know what I mean? Like, be patient. Like, work hard, work your ass off. Like, you know what I mean? Like, be patient. Like, work hard. Work your ass off. Like, be, I think there's a difference

between being patient, and I'm still not good at this, but I still haven't mastered this, and my wife can tell you. But, you know, but I'm better than I was, right? Like, I don't think any entrepreneur is patient. Like, I don't think those two go hand in hand, but I think we can learn the idea of patience, and we can do our very best, right?

But ultimately, you know, things don't happen overnight and you've got to you've got to slow down Enjoy the journey a little bit It's hard dude because guys like us. I mean I can speak for myself You know, we tend to just like move the field goal post right? It's like oh I'll celebrate when I get to this thing, you know And then I always change and then you immediately get there the goal immediately changes You don't celebrate at all. You don't even slow down for five seconds to celebrate, right? You're like God's being you like kind of beat yourself up over it's like what what used to be a goal now You've achieved that goal and then in that moment of achieving that goal. I'm actually hard on myself about it typically, right?

It's like oh, yeah, but I could I should have done better. I should it could have been bigger It could have been more, you know, so I think that would be my advice, you know back then it's just like enjoy the journey, right? Cuz like at the end of the day we could die tomorrow, right? Like we don't know what we're guaranteed to live here, you know, so you got to enjoy it a little bit I mean you gotta I'm not saying go out and party all the time But like slow down have a beer go go do whatever it is that you want that a person wants to do go to Australia I don't know but like try to enjoy the journey every so often, you know? Yeah, I guess I enjoyed the journey

probably too much this last week. I think a vision board's a great idea for a lot of people. They could move that, like make it a magnet board and move it to an achievement and have, what are you gonna do to celebrate? What are you winning? Like, even if you get to the body fat you want or you hit a big goal,

it's like, not a big fan of like, hey like hey let's eat a cheesecake but like do something cool. Yeah. You got to celebrate the wins. I agree. And celebrate the wins with the team too. So what about you know this is not a pleasant thought it talks about Stephen Cubby, seven habits of highly successful people. What do you want to be known for? When at that the last breath there's people around you are hopefully a lot

of family and friends are there to celebrate your life it's not a fun way to think about things but it's a great way to reverse engineer who you want to be known for i think it's cliche but impact right like what was my contribution to the people around me you know what what positive impact did i have on everybody at that funeral you know know what I mean? And I want them to party, by the way, so they better say this. They go outside, nobody wears black, and throw fireworks. Yeah, freaking party, man. If I die tomorrow, I want everybody to party. But, you know, I want them to celebrate my life. But ultimately, I think that I try every single day of my life to genuinely help people

in whatever capacity I possibly can. If somebody calls me and asks me for advice, I'll sit on the phone with them for as long as I have to to make sure that they feel like they got good advice from me. And I just, if I interact with my team, my people, you, anybody, you know, I just, I want to try to leave a positive impact on people, right? It's all about giving, not getting, you know? And I always ask people, like, on Christmas morning, which Which one feels better you giving the gift or you getting the gift and I think everybody can agree which one it is

Well, well, I would say it changed when I turned about 12. Yeah, they really like getting gifts Well, I think every kid like you get what I mean. Yeah As you get older and here's the other thing that I've kind of learned is you ever ask somebody? They call you up and they want all this free advice, but they never do the advice. Dan Martell's like, how much free advice do you take? I'm like, no, the more I pay. The better you'll implement.

The more I implement, the more I'm like, I gotta do this. I paid a lot to learn this stuff. And I love giving free advice. I just find the same people keep coming back for free advice, and they never move. Don't let them keep coming back. You got to like, you got to have something to say.

Yeah. It's like, hey, did you execute on that last advice I gave you? Like, you almost have to call them on it, right? Yeah. It's like, you know, because you can't do that forever. I mean, at the end of the day, you want to see them win, so if they're not winning, I think it's our duty as a mentor to be like, hey, what the hell, bro?

Like, I'm going to call you out. Call them up. Call them up. Yeah. You know, like, not in a bad way, but like? Like, I'm going to call you out." -"Call him up. Call him up." Yeah. You know, like, not in a bad way, but like, -"Hey, I want you to go take action. Like, you need to go execute. Call me once you've executed." Like, you know, if you had a bunch of free tickets to a real estate show, it'd fill up halfway. You start charging $1,000. People are not canceling that. Yeah. I agree.

The more expensive the tickets, I don't think people understand that. Like, why do you charge? Well, I have a team I need to pay. Yeah. And the better the team, the better results you're going to get. Yeah. And by the way, even with my help service freedom group, I don't take a paycheck.

I don't. I don't even want to. I want to be able to pay my team more and get it better for everybody that's in it. Totally. Yeah, I agree. What, if someone wants to reach out to you, Austin, what's the best way to do that? Any platform. Austin's Day back on Instagram. Austin, what's the best way to do that? Any platform. Austin Zabak on Instagram.

Probably Instagram would be the best way. Yeah. You can tell we're at different ages because mine's Facebook. Facebook's a good too. I'm on YouTube. I'm just at my first and last name on every single platform. There's no weird underscore or anything like that. Give me one book that's not, you know,

a mainstream book that really impacted your life? Probably John C. Maxwell. The Leadership Bible. Okay. Yeah. Phenomenal book. You know, I think of that book for any entrepreneur, any visionary, anybody trying to build a company. I mean, it literally is like, you have like the Bible should be like, if somebody is a person of faith, obviously, that's like your number one book, right? And then your number two book should be like the Leadership Bible. It's a big thick book. And there's a lot of value in there.

I like John C. Maxwell a lot. He's a really smart dude. And, you know, I mean, obviously they're all good, right? Dale Carnegie is great. Bob Proctor, you know, Jim Rohn, you know, Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins. Right. But I mean, you know, I think that's, that would be my number one book. And this is the last question I always ask. We talked about a lot of things and we probably didn't touch on every topic

you wanted to hit. So I want you to leave the audience with the final thoughts. Maybe just go take action or whatever it might be. Don't be afraid to fail. You know, don't be afraid to fail, right? Like that's the one thing, man, like you got to get out there and execute. We were just talking about executing, right?

The people who don't execute are the people who have analysis paralysis. They overthink. You see people, they go to every seminar, they go to every event. Like I went to a Joe Dispensa event, right? I'm sitting in the, you get to know some people. It's like a retreat where you do like meditation and stuff. And it's pretty cool. Lewis Howes was there with me and or not with me, but he was in our event and multiple other high level people. And you talk to some of these people and I'm like,

how many of these have you been to? They're like, oh, this is my ninth one. I'm like, your ninth one? You didn't learn how to meditate after the first, like maybe two, three? I mean, what do you mean you're on your ninth one, right? And so you see these people that they just are always learning and never

doing. Right. It's like, dude, I would rather you learn nothing and just go frickin try than you learn. Like I think we're actually at a point in time in our day and age where there's too much information out there. It's like turn at some point, you got to turn it off and go execute. That would be my advice. Such good advice. Austin, it was a pleasure. I will say that I start out all my conferences going, you guys, I want you to take the best notes ever, but don't put it under your pillow for the note fairy to come grant you all your wishes. You gotta actually,

because they take really good notes. I've seen their notes and I'm like, how much of this have you applied at the last three events you were at of my events? So great advice, great doing a podcast, man. I appreciate you being here. I really appreciate you having me on. This is fun, man. Yep. Thanks, everybody. Oh, by the way, go leave us a review. If you love this podcast, you got to ask. My favorite three letters, ask. If you love it, share it. Leave a review. If you hate it, keep it to yourself.

Hey there. Thanks for tuning into the podcast today. Before I let you go, I want to let everybody know that Elevate is out and ready to buy. I can share with you how I attracted a winning team of over 700 employees in over 20 states. The insights in this book are powerful and can be applied to any business or organization. It's a real game changer for anyone looking to build and develop a high performing team

like over here at A1 Garage Door Service. So if you wanna learn the secrets that help me transfer my team from stealing the toilet paper to a group of 700 plus employees rowing in the same direction, head over to elevateandwin.com forward slash podcast and grab a copy of the book. Thanks again for listening and we'll catch up with you next time on the podcast.