0:00 [music] Who are you? And where are you going? [music] What do you want? Hello and welcome to People Making Money and our miniseries money in motion with my colleagues John Rabino and John Clark Jr. You know, John, John, I've been calling you JC, but I guess I should be calling you like JCJ.
0:32 >> Yeah, there you go. JCJR. How about that? You're in here. [laughter]
0:37 >> Yeah.
0:38 >> So, we are, you know, coming to this is uh I think the second to last episode of the miniseries that we've been doing on wealth building and we've covered a wide variety of subjects. If you are tuning into this miniseries for the first time, I invite you to look go back and look at the past episodes. You can view them on my YouTube channel, The Way to Wow Shows, or you can as well as on Spotify and uh Apple podcast and and there's a lot of additional information there.
1:13 Some of the background we'll we'll be referring back to some of that I think as as we talk today. uh but to get the overall picture of what what we're hoping you will learn uh really would be a good idea to go back and and and review those episodes if you haven't done so already. And I I would say too because I I think I've forgotten to mention this. If you know someone who would benefit from learning more about wealth building and investing, maybe shoot them, you know, shoot them a link or share one of the episodes uh with
1:50 them and say you there's these three guys. They're they're pretty much insane. Um one of them got to wear he wears increasingly loud shirts. Today he's featuring a Robert Graham, which I I I have I have to admit I I have an affinity for Robert Graham stuff. We were before we started the recording, uh JC and I were talking about how we both have a Robert Graham dinner jacket.
2:16 >> Yeah.
2:17 >> You know, uh I I John, you know, we got to get you up to speed here, man. Just just because you [laughter] have doesn't mean you can't
2:24 >> in the 80s, man. His wife wouldn't recognize him when he came home with a loud shirt.
2:33 >> Who are [laughter] you?
2:34 >> She'd throw him out is what she
2:37 >> absolutely [laughter]
2:38 >> look look he you know he he married a very intelligent woman. So you know he's he's hanging on by the you know
2:45 >> hanging on as we go.
2:48 >> He's doing everything he can.
2:49 >> All right. So I' I've nailed both of you. you've both been very kind and not you know shooting back I guess you know host privilege guess it's called but uh before we get into today's topic uh why don't each of you take uh just a you know just a brief time here to introduce yourself or reintroduce yourself uh you know so people know from who you are and from whence you come [clears throat]
3:13 >> for it Johnny
3:14 >> you have John
3:14 >> all right you go first
3:16 >> go go go
3:18 >> okay I'll go first um John Rabino here. Um, you know, it's been fun being with everyone over the last couple of episodes. Uh, I live here in Northern Virginia with my wife Stacy of 24 years and our four kids. Uh, I own and operate a a p a a passive real estate investment company. So, you can come in and invest with us and not have to deal with tenants and toilets and contractors and management and all the stuff that, you know, uh, all the folks that do that for a living, keep them up at night. and you can invest and be part of some great projects. Uh we've been in business for
3:53 over 13 years. We've raised $45 million and we've got a great family of investors as we refer to them about 200 plus. And uh we also educate and coach and uh we enjoy what we do. So we're happy to be here. I'm happy to be here to share more and uh be part of a a great cadre of gentlemen that we have here today.
4:15 >> And those are some of your projects behind you, right? Yeah, we've got s few of our projects here. We got one in Richmond and then here in DC and up here in DC and yeah, we've got them all over the all over the wall here.
4:28 >> And you still get good returns without having to do all the work. John does all the work.
4:33 >> John and David do all the work and then everybody else makes the money.
4:36 >> We just count the money.
4:38 >> You just make the money. That's all we want to do for you. That's right. [laughter]
4:41 >> There you go.
4:43 >> Over to you, Johnny.
4:44 >> Good. Hey, man. Thank you so much. And I think both uh both Kevin and I are participate with John and what he offers. Got great stuff there. And then I'm blessed to be similar to these gentlemen in the way of yeah self-employed working for our customers, our investors. I also run a private equity firm and several of the companies that we invested in and built from ground up as we build a real estate ecosystem. And now I think what all of us are doing on this show and we already do it in our daily lives but this is a great thing to come together and do is offer up some of the stuff that we have
5:20 learned these important elements that we've learned that we've applied that we've benefited from ourselves we've observed from others and share them with you guys on this minieries and hopefully as Kevin said connect with you outside of this as you have desire and needs. So thank you so much.
5:38 >> Yeah. So just just to kind of set the stage here between the three of us, uh we have roughly a hundred years of investing experience and you know
5:51 >> John has 90. You and I have 90 and each of you [laughter] have five.
5:57 >> I found a hair, you know.
6:00 >> That's right.
6:01 >> But the cool thing is you actually have hair. Trust me. Oh my hair. Yeah. [laughter]
6:07 >> That's all right. You can't tell how old John is. He's like Yoda. You don't know because there's no hair markings. [laughter]
6:13 >> Oh man. Like Yoda. I'm not even I'm not sure whether that's a compliment or an insult.
6:20 >> He's smart like Yoda. But you don't know how old he is. How about that? There you go.
6:24 >> All I want to know is can he levitate a building out of the, you know, muck of a [laughter] using his brain then?
6:32 >> Why do you think Stacy's with you know what I'm saying? [laughter] I I actually don't. And I think we're gonna move on to our topic because
6:40 >> Yeah. [laughter] We're starting to dig the hole too deep here, gentlemen. [laughter] Sorry.
6:47 >> So So the topic for today is how to structure investments in in the best way. And and John, why don't you get us started on this? um you you have um quite a bit of experience in putting together the various ventures that you've done on a on a on a sophisticated level and then you know JC and I will make sure that we you know we lower the tone of the conversation as as
7:16 >> Yeah absolutely I mean so first and foremost whenever you're starting to invest you have to figure out what type of investor you want to be do you want to be an investor that's in for the long game do you want to be an investor that's interested more an appreciated growth on an asset or an investment. Do you want to be in in a cash flowing investment that's either red replacing or substituting income? So, there's a little bit of a decision you got to make and you've got to write that down and say, you know, what's my goals as far as being an investor. Uh once you have that figured out, you need to figure out where's the money coming from from where
7:51 I'm going to invest and how is that going to be set up. So, you know, obviously you have your discretionary capital. If you have a savings account or you're making enough capital where it's built up in in an account that you can pull from and invest, you can uh invest through a self-directed IRA. If you have a Roth or a 401k solo IRA already set up and you have an excessive amount of capital there, you could take some of that out and move it into a self-directed IRA, which we'll talk about. that gives you the same power of investing through those IAS in the traditional sense but using it through
8:26 the self-directed where you can then decide where you want to invest that given the parameters and terms of that vehicle. The other option which Kevin deals with every day is investing through a trust. You can utilize your trust to invest into passive investments, alternative investments, and things that you're attracted through to where you have assets and you can capture it inside the trust as the vehicle. And then the the most the le the last one and definitely not the least is you can stand up an LLC as either a pastor entity uh as a partnership with other folks. So that's
9:01 kind of the how do I invest after I identify how I am going to be a person to invest what am I going to invest in how do I invest is the money and then what's the structure that I would want to come into on not only with my money but also for the project that I'm investing in right so are you investing in one asset are you investing in a multitude of assets um are you investing in multifamily housing? Are you investing in car washes? So, every investment type, regardless if it's real
9:37 estate, Bitcoin, oil and gas, has an entity that's kind of the formation. Even if you buy a stock, you're going to be investing in a business, right? And have a structure. So, you want to make sure the structure is uh um ideal for your investment uh philosophy and profile. And then you also want to make sure that you understand where you sit in that investment, who is participating along with you in what we call the capital stack or how the money aligns. And then how is your money exposed from a risk standpoint and given that risk, what is the level of return that you
10:13 should be receiving given that level of of risk. Yeah, I'm gonna chime in here too and and and just just so people understand, we're talking about entities and such from a business perspective, a business facilitation perspective, risk perspective. There are accounting issues, there are legal issues and and and that may impact how you structure the how you structure an investment. But you need to talk to your your lawyer well your accountant on the accounting issues your lawyer on your legal issues and that can have an impact as well. So
10:50 uh you know when when John for example talks about using an LLC so that that's a very efficient example from a business standpoint because on the one hand it's a separate entity from you right and there are lots of reasons why uh let's just take the example of owning real estate. There are lots of reasons why you don't want to own real estate in your own name beyond the the legal liability issues. I one of my clients,
11:20 >> don't know why she did this, but she [clears throat and snorts] um she went directly on title to um the a piece of real estate and she had to register something and she put her home address in the registration which can be publicly accessed. and
11:43 >> someone got a hold of that information and started calling her. And then she called me up and said, "Why is this going on?" And I quickly looked. I said, "Oh, well, here's what's here's how we got your information." She's like, "What do I do about this?" And I said, "Well, first thing you do is you take, you know, you take that information off of there. You form an entity, put the property in an entity so people won't bother you." And by the way, th this was fortunately this was not some, you know, crazy guy. He was turned out he was a real estate broker trying to get a listing. But um you know, you can have tenants tenants are sophisticated. They
12:18 will find your contact information and if they don't like something that's going on, you know, they'll they'll call you, you know, 2 o'clock in the morning and that probably is not one of the reasons why you want to have that investment. So there are lots of very sound business reasons why you wouldn't want to invest in your own name. Uh you know beyond the the legal and accounting reasons.
12:45 >> Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. I guess uh you know we can pick up on that point. I also wanted to kind of address one of the first things that John said, but you know I agree. I have at least seven or eight reasons that I usually list out to folks that I work with as to why you want to do it. Why do you do what? Well, why you want to have a structure period like John's talking about there's a holistic idea of of structure. And then there's also these entities, you know, which entity, and I agree with you, Kevin, that there needs to be a well-rounded perspective on which type of entity I form and take in multiple in information from different
13:22 professionals and come up with what's the best. there's probably never an ideal one or maybe there's an ideal one for one particular type of investment and when you go to do a different one you might want to select a different choice there or if you have a different goal and that kind of brings me back to John's first point of
13:39 >> what type of investor are you who are you as an investor I think a lot of things in life we've talked about this a lot uh change is inevitable yet principles and patterns are impertuity it seems right that you know so there's there's themes and principles that run through and patterns that run through life that are 100 200 2,000 years old and then there's every day is a new day and things are always on the move so we have to find a balance between those and that's where I think structure gives you a lot of that
14:15 ability to actually uh engage strategy and come to some kind of identification i.e What kind of investor am I? Well, what am I today?
14:26 >> I might [clears throat] grow and and change and evolve over time. And as I do, so does what I invest in because my knowledge is growing. The financial awareness and education, which are some of the cornerstones of the uh financial strategy that we've been discussing. And then identifying who you are now and what you're about uh is very very important because then it sets the tone for the rest. But some people might have a hard time doing that. So then what happens? Help defining exactly who they are. They have some specific goals that are easy to identify such as I want to
15:01 retire early. I want financial freedom. I need more income. I want to build a separate business to have protection against job loss or health conditions or you know there's just ongoing or I received an inheritance. I know you deal with people like that Kevin. And so whatever's going on something stimulated it. That's easy to define, but then to say, well, who are you as an investor if they're new at it? I don't know. You know, maybe they know certain things. And so then what ends up happening is when you move into this idea of forming the overall legal structure of an entity. And then John
15:37 also referenced where you might find the money. uh and he gave an idea on where you can find the easiest money, the money that you already invested before when you're at an employer or, you know, hoping for the future, didn't really know what you're doing and someone slid a form in front of you and you put down a percentage and you picked a few things on a piece of paper and said, "Well, I guess I'll do this." They didn't ask a lot of you. They didn't ask you to form an entity. They didn't ask you to say what kind of investor you are. They're like, "Just fill out the form. You're an employee. We need to know what you're going to contribute." Right? and they have money from the past and then they've moved on to another job and that money is sitting there from the past.
16:13 That's easy money to move over once you identify who you are into that self-directed IRA he's talking about and then you can make more wise choices. The one theme that I think is consistent and I'll get off my soap box is the idea that you do need to get counsel and advice from a myriad of people. Some people aren't probably worth getting advice from. So, you have to be a little careful. But, you do want to make sure that you have a team of advisory people around you that have experience, knowledge, and have gone down the road before to give you some tips. I know when I've talked to people about
16:49 building structure and what type of entity and how they should do it, all of the sudden it actually helps [clears throat] it make it more clear. they they kind of define easily what they don't want to do, what they're not in for, and then it makes it easier to figure out, okay, well, so this is what you're about right now. So then we can make some recommendations and they can start to build the structure that John was referencing.
17:13 >> Yeah. And I think using the pyramid, using the pillars that Kevin captures in his three pillars, the wealth pyramid, I mean, that's structure, right? We're structuring a strategy that is built around education, right? It's reinforced by familiarizing yourself, getting yourself up to the point where you understand how things look and how you can identify opportunities at a basic level. Not to talk down everybody just because it's it's it's a starting point. And then we start with that growth of income. We want to build that income up so that we know that that's coming in. And then when we move into the
17:48 investment world to take that income, take those assets and to grow those into wealth, we're now thinking what is the best way to do that given my resources, my time, um what I'm interested in, what my goals are, what my board of directors are helping me with. from the accountant to the attorney to the financial advisor to the wealth strategist. All of those folks are participating and doing what they do well. And then it allows you don't leave the
18:20 >> you got these days the insurance agent,
18:23 >> your estate attorney. Yeah. Your estate folks that help you with your estate. So these are all people that are going to be involved in your life at one stage or another. So, it's always great to have that team and then going forward with the confidence to know that, hey, I I have the resources. I know what my goals are. Now, let's look at what makes the most sense for me from an investment standpoint. And that's when we get into things like what kind of location? Uh how long do I want to be in an investment? Do I want to be more liquid
18:59 than illquid? Do I want to be less risky or more risky? um am I willing to travel two hours or do I want to have the property that I want to invest in around the corner from where I live? So these are all the different things you've got to think about and then getting into the legal documents, right? like what do I look at when I get these legal documents whether it's
19:19 >> so before before we get into I'm copy before we get into that kind of granularity I want to pull the aperture back here for a minute because I think as as I've been listening to our conversation
19:30 >> we've been using structure in actually in several different ways and so I want to try and and and and bring some structure to our structure if you will right so first of all there's the structure of our thinking and our strategy that we need to have in place and we've we've talked about that in previous episodes and and you know your your wealth pyramid John I think helps people figure that out. Not nobody's structure is probably going to be exactly like somebody else's but in terms of the education the back you know
20:05 the experience etc. We need to in our own minds I think have an idea of how all that works as we funnel it through to our investment objectives. So that's one kind of
20:18 >> Yeah, I agree. Yeah, I definitely agree. There's the macro level and then we get into the investments.
20:23 >> Let me get through the levels. So then the next level is is to have the structure of our advisors, our team if you will. That's a that's another part of our structure that needs to be in place and that is going to evolve over time. So the members I the people I need to have on my team when I'm just starting out are probably very different than the people I need to have on my team when I'm I'm a more advanced investor when I'm getting into more complex uh deals etc. Then there's the the structure I think as we started out
20:58 talking about it which is
21:01 >> what is the entity or I think probably better spoken is what is the first of all what is the the the structure of the vehicles through which I'm investing. So, so for example, if you look at investing through a trust, that trust may be the central investment vehicle. It may have subtrusts or it may be one trust of a group that's part of an overall estate plan and and so there may I I have one client
21:36 for example, they have four trusts that make up their estate plan for various reasons. Part of it is is tax efficiency, part of it is
21:46 >> issues, personal issues with their family, etc. But then within those trusts, there are substructures. So I would be remiss in my duty as as the sort of you know individual who oversees everything for them to let them pile everything into a trust and and and let's say you know somebody slips and falls in a building and now they're suing the owner of the building and the owner of the building turns out to be the trust and so now every other asset is exposed to that liability. Right? So we need to cordon off liability by
22:23 having an entity specific to that investment in this case real estate that that then protects the other investments in the trust. So there's there's lots of layers to this. Now somebody again somebody starting out they're not going to they're not going to have those layers. They don't need those layers. You know, when I was when I was
22:42 >> not yet
22:44 >> six years old when I started my first business, I was judgment proof because they weren't going to get anything from it. I had nothing for them to get,
22:53 >> you know, right? As we grow and build wealth, all of a sudden now we have a lot at stake and now we've got to have insurance and and all these structures. we've got to have uh you know people advising us and and and and we've got to you know widen our aperture and and and add on complexity.
23:12 >> So
23:13 >> so if I could interject right there because Kevin you and I were thinking similarly what John was talking was same idea. And I'm thinking if there's a 35 a 30 to 45 year old out there who has done the traditional stuff, has worked their career, got a great degree, has developed their themselves to earning 250 to $500,000 a year or more, and they've they've filled all the regular buckets. They've maxed out all their regular traditional plans. They have extra or like John said, discretionary funds. They've been piling it up and they have it monthly. Like you just
23:49 said, Kevin, I was thinking the same thing. Like all of a sudden they're like, "Wait, I need to have seven or eight members of a team. I gotta have all these structures." Like, "Oh, not to get started." No. Uh I think you do need to look at some of that and find So where does a person like that start? They need to find someone like one of the three of us. And it's not meaning as a commercial, but it's more like the standpoint of saying you need to find a trusted person who has more of a holistic view probably further down the road on age and experience uh at least experientially and has been exposed to a couple different things and maybe has
24:24 failed and then has won. I think we talked on a couple episodes ago about, you know, coming through COVID and learning from the people that made it through and learning from people's mistakes, both sides of that. and and so going with someone to get started to have this kind of conversation at least sit down and have a conversation and begin the process and I think like you were saying Kevin the unfolding and the development of a plan if it starts well with a good foundation you can build up all these things one or two layers at a time as needed or maybe right before
24:59 they're needed preferably uh so that you avoid gaps but the idea is having trusted advisors that can talk to you about this and grow with you and help you because it's hard. I think a lot of families don't know how to do this in the family and therefore they don't hand it off well to the children and all of a sudden the children are on the millions of dollars a year. Let's say in the state that you live in, Kevin. That's kind of common. And now what do I do? I can't even call mom and dad. I trust them and I love them, but they've never even had a million dollars. Now I got two or three. what am I supposed to do?
25:35 Where do I go? If you go to the traditional financial advisor, all they have in the most part is this these normal tools that you're already familiar with and probably already have. So then it's all you're doing is just swapping fee structures or things like that. And what we're discussing is like advancing beyond that, giving you an opportunity to get involved in alternative investment which has a lot more horsepower, stability, and strength to especially when it's diversified with maybe some traditional investments and you have a good combination. So that's I think you got to start at the beginning and then we're so into it that we can
26:12 throw all these terms around and people can
26:15 >> I want to pull John into this because John actually said something and I'm I'm I'm betting that a lot of people watching this they heard it but they didn't hear it in the context you meant it John and that is you you referred to a board of directors right we think of a board of directors as being someone who you know basically has oversight of a business and I I you Knowing you as I do, I don't think that's how you mean it. Why don't if if you would
26:41 >> talk about what you mean by a board of directors because I think that that's a particular use no matter where someone is at in their investing career.
26:51 >> Yeah. They're they're the people in your sphere that are that provide a service based on their expertise and it's and when it comes to financial investment um you know growing wealth there are certain people that you have to have around you positions that you have to have around you that they're your trusted advisors they're your board of directors they're your find your five I sometimes call them where it's the position that is needed to help you in your in your kind of journey down that
27:26 road. So, you know, you have to have an accountant to start who can do your tax returns, but as you grow a little older or you start getting larger wealth and you're growing, you need to kind of look at more of a tax strategist accountant that can talk about things like depreciation and passive losses and recapture so that you're you're kind of moving in that direction as you grow to bring in that right flavor that John mentioned. that's kind of more in tune to what you uh currently you see yourself at or where you're at when it
28:02 comes to wealth. So, it's that grouping of of um you know position service providers that are essential to your success. And for me, the most important person and that is you because you have to be the one that starts off. You have to be the one to decide what's right for you. You have to decide where you're at and which direction you're going. And then the next person in that line I feel very important about is having that mentor. Having a mentor, someone that can walk you through that process because they've been there, they've experienced it. Like John said, they've had failures but got through and can
28:38 persevere. So it's really important to have yourself on board to say, "I'm doing this." And next having that mentor who can start you out. I love meeting with people to be the one and walk through it with them to then say, "Yeah, you need to get with this tax strategist because they need to go through your last four years of tax returns to get you in a position to maximize your returns to give you protections on your business income, you know, like. So, I'm not necessarily the person that's going to do that, but I'm going to point you in the direction to someone that I know is going to be able to help you and even
29:13 maybe help you bring in that person if you want to work with me. That's up to you. Um, so that's what we mean by the board of directors, Kevin. And again, it's it's it's purposefully upfront in that process as you're starting out because those are the folks that are going to help you because that's what they do. So, while you're sleeping, they're making you money. They're protecting your money. They're protecting your assets. They're putting you in position.
29:39 >> I put a little twist on it because I think um I know in my board of directors, not everyone is in essence a a compensated advisor. So I have certain people who I look to um you know when I'm working on any particular whether it's an investment or a business issue or whatever and we in in most of the cases we've known each other for a long long time. We know what our experiences are and and I can reach out to them and and say hey here's what I'm working on.
30:15 You know what do you think? And
30:18 >> in a similar circumstance, they'll reach out to me. Typically, we're not in the same uh area. So, my friend Deepa, for example, you know, she has a long history on Wall Street basically um ba basically in, you know, in the investment banking world and and I have knowledge of that, but nothing like I I will never have as much knowledge as Deepa has. The flip side is when it comes to real estate, again, she'll never have the the depth of knowledge of real estate that I have. So, you know, we're we're kind of informal advisors to
30:53 each other. And and that kind of, you know, mutual, you know, board of directors seats, if you will, I find to be particularly good. Um because there you know not not every time frankly do you you know want to be okay you know start the clock running uh while I talk to you about this you know um not everything gets to that stage and so I think we need to have both our our formal advisors and our informal adviserss and then
31:27 >> yeah [clears throat]
31:29 >> you got it Kevin no I was say there's a difference between having a conversation with a with a close friend and someone that's experienced what you're doing and you just need some advice or talk to. There's a difference between that and a mentor, someone that's willing to take you on and walk you through the process. And then, you know, the next step would be a coach, right? Like someone that's actually compensated to walk you through your goals, your your problem set, your structure, how you going to get to the next step, right? So I mean but having those folks those positions identified is so important and it gets you started
32:06 on your journey. You can't just say I want to invest today without having you know the stuff that we talked about to get to that point. You just can't. It's I mean you can but it's your your percentage of success is a lot lower than what it would be if you did the prerequisites. But that structure
32:23 >> one thing I I'll turn over to John or you Kevin. When I think of structure, I think of independence because the more you can make things structured and help your your ability to get to the next phase and and be comfortable and grow that wealth is you become more independent. You don't have to worry about going to the nineto-ive job. You might not have to do that anymore. You could do what you maybe really like to do. Maybe it's go hit golf balls or go work with your your business partners, whatever it is, right? You've got independence now. But having a structure for your personal life and getting
32:58 yourself set up and then getting into things that have the right structure for you as an investor, as a as a business owner, it's just going to make things easier for you and eventually get you to a point where you're independent.
33:11 >> And so
33:11 >> I think that's the key there is that there's
33:15 >> let me just sneak in one remark quickly. Yeah, I think the other key thing about um the the advi you know a structure advisors is the advisors we choose should be willing to work in our idiom and what I mean by that is I have some clients they don't want to know basically I mean they do but but the bottom line is they just handle it Kevin don't bother me handle it yes keep me up keep me up to date but that's it other clients they want me teaching them they want to learn that's part of why I'm
33:51 there and then there there are other there are others so I think we need to each of us needs to understand what is it we want from our our board of directors beyond just the advice that that's part of that overall plan and then are we getting that and and to the extent that we're working at cross purposes I I've worked with lawyers where I finally said you But this is not going to work. I you know here pay your bill off and and you know dose vida you know as we say. So I I think we you know that working
34:28 relationship
34:29 >> uh is is is a key component of this. So Jason I'll shut up.
34:34 >> Yeah I know. I agree. I think there's a qualitative and a quantitative side and you're bringing out the qualitative side where relationship and purity of that relationship, depth of that relationship, depth and breadth of the experience of the people involved, all those things that you talked about is qualitative. And then there's quantitative where you need a specialist or a licensed professional who's uh narrow but very, you know, deep and powerful in what they do. And that's the difference. So then you bring in the coach and the mentor and that and that that partner if you will uh and maybe
35:12 they're just an affiliated person but where they can help you balance it all. And the reason you need that, so I again I'm panning back saying if I'm thinking I'm I'm a 35y old, which I used to be, uh, and I'm making, you know, X dollars and I want to get involved. You guys are like, we're all making this sound, uh, pretty complicated when in reality, I think it's actually uh, we're also now, I think in the last 10 minutes or so, trying to help it seem purposeful, meaningful, and give a why. And I think that's hiding in very simple facts that what there is no one person that has the
35:50 silver bullet single answer to all things for all people. And uh therefore that's also true for the investor. The person who wants to do something with their resources, their time, their money and their intelligence when they want to apply that and invest that into something uh then they have to say well I don't have all the answers either. I might be really bright. I might be great at a lot of things but I don't have all the answers because I haven't gone down that road before. So that's the first realization is I need help. And then what John said is once you put the certain basics in place that help keeps
36:27 coming back to you and gives you confidence, it gives you independence like he talked about. I also hinted at this earlier. I think it does for me and for many of my clients. It gives them a filter, a set trusted filter of how to make decisions because there's this big word out there called opportunity. But actuality, everything that's brought across your desk and across your radar as labeled as opportunity, you should do this doesn't fit everybody. It doesn't fit you. Some do and some don't. And I think the structure of the team of the
37:04 entity design and of the who I am and of the vehicles like we talked about what it is I'm investing in and how I'm doing it and way it goes and how much I'm putting forth all actually helps make you decide not make you it informs you and makes it easier to decide. Uh and so once you have that in place, it takes a little bit of effort, people, time, thought, and choice to put this team and this structure and this board of directors and these entities and all this stuff over time. Takes time to do each one, but the value is continual and
37:40 the certainty of how things are going to go. You can't not certainty of exact results, but certainty of the pattern of what we're going to follow after and the channel that we're in. It narrows it and it makes it a little easier to assess where we are, where we're going, where we came from, how's this working, and then someone goes, "Hey, look at this." And you're like, you look at a few key facts and it's pretty easy to say, "Well, I might chew on this for a little while." Or, "No, this doesn't fit who I am and who we are as investors and what we're after. Thanks so much." It's helpful when you got it all built that way. You guys see what I'm saying? Does
38:17 that make sense?
38:18 >> It does. It does indeed. Gentlemen, we're we're coming up to the end of our time. So, safe rounds, as we say. Yeah.
38:24 >> John, um if I could Yeah, if I could start. Um this is a great episode. I think we as human beings, we flourish when we have structure. That's big picture. Um what I suggest always is when you start out with the right team around you, and that's the professionals that are good at what they do. We talked about them a lot today. accountants, you know, financial advisors, estate planners, lenders, realtors, those folks. That I look at is your vertical. You also have a horizontal structure. And your horizontal structure are the people that you trust in your network. Um, I'll throw out, and I'm not giving
39:00 anybody any solicitation here, but two fantastic books. Um, The Tribe of Millionaires and The One Thing. Those two books to me epitomize what the horizontal portion of that connection is. Having five people in your network, 10 people that you can go to and stand up a business to invest together, look at opportunity together, walk through family uh things together that you enjoy to do, go to baseball games. That's that's the the horizontal structure. The vertical structure we talk about the professionals.
39:33 >> Um investing is um is fun, but you got to do some work. And it starts with making sure you know what your goals are, what you're focused on, who can help you, and then what resources are available for you to go out and to invest. And so, in the next episode, which I'm excited about, we're going to wrap all this together and talk to you more about how moving forward over the next 24 months is really going to be an exciting period for you.
39:59 >> Absolutely. I'm going to parlay on that excitement. Thank you for that. That's a great segue to I think there's a lot of joy that comes from building this team. If you think back to the great times of college, if you experienced that or high school or maybe while your children were young, if you had children or young married, you had all the couples around you, there's a sense of belonging. What happens over age is a narrowing and a weaning of a lot of those friends and proximity and regularity of our relationships. So really what we're talking about gives some of that structure. Like you said, we thrive in structure, but some of the structure we're talking about is relational
40:35 structure as well. And there is that relating, connecting, trust, and qualitative side to it as well as the business side. So, it kind of gives us both things that we as humans are looking for, a way to belong. And and then it gives this release of qualifying. Now, I qualify because I I met all the minimums. So, if I need to go get financing, whether temporary or long-term, I'm going to qualify. I'm going to achieve because the structure and the people in my life have enabled me to do that. That work is paying off and the relationships that you get like you referenced Kevin you have had for a
41:10 long time and it bring deep value to your life. All that's coming from this and it happens to be an investment as well right and you get that. So pretty cool stuff.
41:19 >> It's worth it. So, just a couple of thoughts to wrap up and and and while I I know John, you you embrace the fun of investing, I I I don't think everybody will find that it's fun. Frankly, hopefully what you will find if if not if it's not fun, it's it gives you satisfaction because it's helping you move your life in the direction in which you want to go. So, you know, I I I I someone I know I I used to know would tell me all the
41:55 time, "Oh, you must you must love running, Kevin, because I would run three, four, sometimes five times a week, as much as, you know, six to 10 miles a day." And I said, "Nah, I really don't like running. I like listening to the music when I run. Um, and I like the fact that because I run, I can, you know, eat more and and and I I feel healthy,
42:19 >> right?
42:20 >> I I I I think, you know, we we sometimes need to look beyond just the the fun aspects to really what what is the meaning of this in my life? I think that's [clears throat] that's number my number one uh concluding remark. And and and I think the second one is one that I just lost. Uh uh I
42:43 >> think we got another episode.
42:45 >> I guess we just have [laughter] one.
42:46 >> Yeah, we got another episode.
42:49 >> It'll come back to me. Uh but you know I I encourage you uh all of you watching to to to think about this um to it it's interesting that one of the themes I think that's undergirling all these episodes is that success successful investing really comes down to successful relationships and any anybody can can build successful relationships. It's hard at first. Oh,
43:24 this was the second this was the second issue. It's hard at first, especially if we're not used to doing it. I I saw this a lot with people coming out of the military. In the military, we just naturally network. It's part of the ethos. In civilian life, it's it's not really. We're much more isolated in civilian life. we don't share the same mission and everything is much more um atomized. So it's it's you know you can be in a position financially where you really
44:00 should be investing and and not have that that that foundation of relationships in place,
44:07 >> right?
44:08 >> You can still build it.
44:10 >> You can still build it. You know, in a in an episode of this show that I did several weeks ago now, I was talking about how at at this stage in my life, what I find is the relationships that I'm creating are actually with people who are significantly younger than me. And it's really delightful to be engaged with with people who are in some cases, you know, half my age, so bright, so enthusiastic about their career development, working together. So this to my mind, this is
44:49 this is really what it's what it's all about. Uh, you know, one of the reasons why I want to do this series with John is because I I've been an investor of John's for a lot of years now. And there were times when he calls me and said, "What do you think about this, Kevin?" I'm like,
45:05 >> "Absolutely.
45:06 >> I don't know. You you know more than I do at this point, but you know, when we first met, I I probably knew a lot more than John did. It's been it's been really been a joy to watch him kind of pass me by in you know in in terms of what his company does. So so s I say I would say search for satisfaction um in investing. If you find it fun too, hey, great, fantastic. But but look for the satisfaction. And hopefully what we've done for you today is giving given you some some assistance in finding that
45:42 road to satisfaction. So
45:46 >> wise words, a wise man,
45:50 >> JC, John, thank you so much for joining with me today on this penultimate episode of our minieries. Uh, penultimate. That means second to last.
46:01 >> That's right. [laughter]
46:04 >> I thought I would get some kind of rise out of that. Okay. Well,
46:08 >> okay. Okay. Yeah.
46:10 >> Now owe you each $20.
46:12 >> Old man language. [laughter]
46:17 >> We're having way too much fun.
46:18 >> You know, I could take you out of this miniseries with just a mouse sweep, my friend. [laughter]
46:22 >> That's right. So, um it let's see. Thank you all for joining us. Uh one more episode to go next Friday. Uh new show out at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time, 100 p.m. uh Eastern time and an hour in for Mountain and Central. And we're going to pull it all together for you. And that just leaves me to say, sign off and say, Marie darling, you are my bell. Courage at all times, my friends.