S1 E23 - The Obstacles of an Entrepreneur

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Jeremy Newsom.

Yes, Brittany Turner.

The last thing I am cliffhanging on, as usual, is you're talking about this farm and your cousin Donovan. Yeah, please pick up from there. What else is happening in your life? What happens to this farm you guys have?

Yeah, so we'll backtrack. Cause, yeah, that's pretty much where I left off last time because I love the way we're going through our journeys because we're still about parallel right now. We're just two totally different places. Literally the exact same city. We haven't met yet, which is crazy to me. So weird.

It's crazy.

I was looking at some of the pictures on your wall and I was like, I think I went there. I think I. At that dinner. Like, what? Yeah, it's really crazy stuff.

Anyway, you were at all of my awards dinners.

I know. So yeah, I know so many of the people that you know. It's amazing.

That's so fun.

I love it. What was going on in my life at this point is. So Donovan is my nephew by blood, so he's my oldest sister's second son.

Followed it.

Yeah, he's my nephew. And him and I, he again, he lent me money from his annuity to start trading. And that's kind of where I started bankrolling. Because in order to make money trading, you do have to have money.

It's one of those things to trade.

And you can start, you can start small and grow it. And I've done that. I've grown small accounts and you know, with active trading, options trading, day trading, you can do it. It's not that hard. But to really scale up, you just do need more money. So Dom and I started working pretty closely together. And again, he is just an absolute machine. This guy loves farming. Loves farming. So he wanted on farm. I was like, let's do it. So we started leasing land like I was mentioning to you. And he was growing soybeans, corn, cotton, grain, sorghum, all kinds of other stuff I don't even know how to pronounce. Just a bunch of different commodities, like actual things. And we're selling, we're buying them, and that's where we are now.

So this is where life starts getting really fun. Like super exciting in a bad way.

I was about to say I was Like, I feel like something bad is about to happen.

So while this is going on. So that's when I'm starting my company. Real Life Trading is getting in a really great spot.

Successfully gone through your first lawsuit?

Yeah, going through my first lawsuit. And then still going through it, pretty much. Mediation. Ruin the mediation part. And then my dad passes away.

No.

Right. And so we all knew that was gonna happen. But one of the things. One of the things I was really, really honored and super happy about is, remember, I lost his money.

Yeah.

Well, when he was there in hospice, we were sitting there, and I was talking to him like, well, Dad, I got your money. Got you a check.

Oh, my gosh.

You know what you need? What do you want me to do with it? And so that was about four years, four and a half years to make.

Back that you did it.

100,000.

Oh, my gosh. Thank God.

Yep. And he said, listen, obviously, he always had, like, a funny sense of humor. He's like, I'm for the worms, which is a Shakespeare thing.

Oh, my gosh.

It's a Shakespeare thing.

I know, but still. Too soon, dad.

Too soon, dad. For the worms. He goes, make sure that your mom's taken care of, that she never has any issues with money. And, you know, you guys just work everything out. I was like, all right, make sure that happens. So when that occurs, all my family is there. They're able to spend a week there at the hotel. And so I was at a spot financially, where I was like, we can get everyone taken care of for that week. You guys stay up here. We can do this. And that was really nice. So we got to spend time with a lot of friends and family.

That's nice.

And he was around everyone that loved him when he passed away. I mean, it's like, if you're gonna do it, have everyone there crying and holding hands and hugging and being sad. Cause he's, like, the patriarch of the family.

Oh, my gosh.

And so we go through that, and that's really stressful, and that's really upsetting, obviously. And I'm stressed out. I hate it. I'm annoyed. I'm sad. I'm terrified. All the things. And then a year later.

We, Donovan and I, have grown our businesses pretty well. We have a cardboard recycling company. We brand it all under the company of Newsom's new innovations, nni. And so we have a cardboard recycling company. We have the pecan wholesale company. We have. We're about to buy some convenience stores. We have a recycling company where we have Recycling centers. We have trucks, we have containers. We're going to colleges, apartment complexes, stores, Right. To get there, to get their garbage. And we're doing all this where he's giving me money, I'm trading it, and then I give him the cash flow to go and invest all these things that we're doing. Well, we find this land. This land, it's 16,000 acres in Georgia. He's like, dude, it's for sale. I was like, yeah, how much is he? He's like 10.6 million, which, you know, not that bad.

No, that's a great deal for that many acres.

It's a great deal. I was like, why is it so cheap? You know? And he's like, ah, there's just a lot of, like, swampland. He's like, but we can do. And I honestly, at this exact moment in time, I've totally forgotten. You probably would know. But there is a thing where you can form a entity with the government. It's like an EPA protection that if you promise not to build on a wetland, you actually can get paid 1.2 times the worth of the land that you buy it for if it's a wetland. If you long as you don't build on it for, like, 30 years. Have you heard of this? No, So I forget the exact term. Yeah, but it's the thing.

Bought wetland.

Yeah, more or less. You're protecting wetlands, Like Wetland Delineation act or something like that. 1973 or whatever it is. So he found out about this. He knew all about it. But not all of the land was wetland, right? Some of it was. Some of it wasn't. So a lot of the land was actually farmable. Farmable, yeah. Yeah. You could farm on it. And then you had other land that we could clear cut, sell some of the trees, take that land and build some apartment complexes and do the. Pretty much pull. Brittany Turner. So I was like, that's gonna be epic. So we get all of our money together, all of our liquid net worth, all of our cash, blah, blah, blah, go to the buyer and start talking to this guy. We're like, we're ready to do it, my man. We're about to pull this trigger. And so he's sitting down. Actually don't even remember this guy's name. So he's the seller. He's just a good old Georgia boy. And we're sitting there and we're talking to him. Donovan's in person. I'm on the phone, he on speakerphone. We're all just kind of chatting so I'm still up in Nashville, Tennessee. Donovan lived and grew up in Statesboro. Never moved, was always there. And we're talking to this gentleman on the phone. He's like, gentlemen, there's a problem here. You see, if something happened to either one of you boys, you can't afford this land individually. Which is true.

He's saying this.

Yeah, he was telling us.

He was like, were you asking him to owner finance?

Correct.

Okay.

Yeah. So we're asking him to own their finance. And.

He said that we can't afford the land by ourselves if something happens to us. And we're like, what are you talking about? He's like, well, if you die, he doesn't have the money to cover all the land and all the payments. So, yeah, it's a valid point. And he says, like, you should get keyman insurance. Yeah, I didn't know what key man insurance was until this time. Yeah, I'm dumb up until this point in my life. You're young.

You've never done it before.

Never done it yet. Learning no idea what keyman insurance is. He's like, you should get life insurance policies on each other. And he starts just giving us, like, I'm a multimillionaire and here's all of my knowledge type of story, and we're loving it. We're soaking it up. Yeah, this is so this happens on a Thursday afternoon. And we're just so excited. He's like, yep. So what you need to do is this, this, this insurance. And Jeremy, because with owner finances, we were showing him all of our bank records, all of our tax returns, all of our statements, broker statements. He knows all the business. He's just in it and just loving it and just helping us out. And when he's going through all this, he's also kind of talking and describing, giving us some information, some path. And he's like, you need to create a business entity. Right. So Newsom's new innovations, like, you need to create this where Donovan and Jeremy are all under it and like, you guys are all owners and everything. Because right now, I'm just the money guy. I'm funneling all the time.

Are you handshaking this stuff? Truly redneck.

Yeah, Truly redneck style.

Truly redneck.

Yeah. So again, it's just me and Donovan. Me and Donovan, we're handshaking it, we're high fiving it. No. We're snapping necks and cashing checks.

No. So I know what this all means.

Yeah. Yeah. And.

Saturday, Donovan dies in a boating accident.

No.

Yeah.

What day Was this that you were talking to this guy?

Thursday?

We had all the arrangements, all the plans and everything to get everything signed on a Monday. And the real shitty part is, beyond all the things like all the situational issues and all the transfers and the money and the business and all that, besides all of that, it's just simply the fact that this guy.

Tragically died.

Your friend, from a boating accident, not just your cousin, at this point.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. We're best friends.

Your nephew.

Yours? Yeah, my nephew. But we're talking. We talk every day. We talk every day. Yeah, we talked every day for years, for our whole lives.

I'm so sorry. Oh, my gosh.

And the real, real tough part about that was.

Everything that kind of transpired.

Lost it all. We hadn't fully buttoned up all the details. We hadn't really, really done it yet. And so that was a massive kick in the teeth, not only because, again, he lost his life, but all the things he worked really, really hard for got put into probate and went under his mom's will or his mom's name. Cause he didn't have. He wasn't married. He was only. So I was 28, he was 25 at the time, so.

So his mom got it all.

Yep.

And wouldn't let you continue to work it.

No. Which is understandable. I get it. She was heartbroken and still is. I mean, it's a part of the Newsom family history that's just, like.

Horrible. Because the other tragic issue on all that is dad and Donovan were just. They were. They were the ones that were down there that were holding everything.

Oh, no.

Yeah. So they were holding everything together. They were holding all the family together. They had tons of deals. They had all kinds of stuff I didn't even know about land and all kinds of transactions, and they were wheeling and dealing. I was so proud of them, you know, and at that point in time, that's where a lot of it got put on hold. And I was just. I had to sit back for a long period of time to figure out. I was like, all right, well, what am I going to do? How am I going to rebuild this? How am I going to get back from square one again?

How much money did you lose?

So that was around 1.3 million, right? Yeah. Wow.

And had you made 1.3 million at that point? Yeah, yeah.

Yep. So we. We were in a spot where we were doing quite well. I mean, everything was on the up and up.

Yeah.

Yeah. And it was. It was just like.

I know that feeling. In a different way. It's like, ah, so close.

It is, it is. And it's. It's tragic for other people because you. You need to know that, unfortunately, that something like that's going to happen to whomever and whatever journey. It doesn't even matter what it. Hopefully it's not a family member, but it could be the smallest of things.

In some way, the essence of what happened will happen.

Yeah. In some way.

In some way it can be. The lawsuit I thought would cost me maybe 500,000 ended up costing me 1.3 million.

Yeah.

And I hadn't. That was literally to the penny. Every dime I had ever made and accumulated whatsoever was gone in my situation different, you know, I didn't lose. That's the stuff that matters the most. So it's like, you know, you can rebuild money, you can't rebuild a life.

Yeah.

And that's an interesting thing that today we're going through. You know, Covid, do you just. You can't bring lives back. You can bring economies back, but knowing the balance. So anyway, that. I don't know why that happens. I want to go off of any potential script we ever thought of having.

Yeah.

And I want to know your real thoughts on why do you think that happens?

That's not in the script.

No.

But you know, you mean, why do you. Why do you think that. That that massive challenge is going to face anyone.

The loss of everything you ever had in some way will happen to any great entrepreneur.

Yeah.

I don't know anybody who hasn't gone through it.

I can't think of one person. I mean, off the top of my head, I don't know.

You know, I think it has to be the universe's way of challenging everyone to simply say, how bad do you really want it? Because there's a polarity. There's a ying and a yang. If you. I mean, there's an equal and opposite reaction with every action. So if someone has a massive push and a massive force for good, there's going to be a swing back into this realm. It. It has to happen. Right. Newton's law. Now, it doesn't necessarily always have to be bad. So when you have a phenomenal, phenomenal phenomenal thing, there's going to be that swing back that just will occur.

Yeah. I mean, it's happening to me.

It's actually kind of crazy because it sounds like you and I had the exact same number that was just like.

And it's gone. So you have all of this occurring. I think that's wise. I think it's the universe or God or energies or aliens, whatever you guys are subscribing to, there's going to be this pushback that's like, yep. If you really want it. Sure. You really want it. Because it's going to come with a price. It's going to come with a push. It's going to come with an energy that is going to be hard and devastating. It could be the loss of a friend. Not like their life, but their friendship. All right. That's going to happen in almost every venture. Okay. Family member is going to stop talking to you. That's going to happen. Right. Someone in your family is not going to like you anymore if you become massively successful. So get ready for that.

Oh, yeah. It's part of the deal.

That's unfortunate.

If not, if you have any friends left.

Yeah. As in, like, what I'm talking about. Like, all these people don't talk to me. Right. Like, the whole diamond situation. Because they were mad that the way I handle stress is I just go, I internalize all of it. Well, I used to internalize all of it. And I go, let me figure out how I can get everything back to normal as quick as possible.

Which is a good approach.

Which is a good approach. But they didn't like that I was taking that approach. They didn't like that I was being pushy and I was being overbearing. I was being like, hey, we need to get this buttoned up. We need to get that taken care of.

Right.

Right. He has this safe full of things that I need to go in and get some stuff arranged. And it's just gone. So that's the struggle, and that's the broke to woke aspect. That's the life aspect. That's the entrepreneurial aspect. That's the thing that very few not only podcasts talk about Brittany, but just entrepreneurs and business owners. The E Myth. The book. The E. Myth is incredible at it because it just wraps up saying, get ready for an absolute, hellaciously hard fight. And you better want it so badly because you're gonna. Everyone has a plan till they get punched in the mouth. And you will. You will. And then you're gonna get roundhouse kicked as well by Brittany. Cause she has a kick.

I have a different addition to add to this. I'm completely on board with everything you say. But I had a mentor tell me one time. Cause I had the kick in the mouth, the punch in the mouth, the knife in the mouth. Like, whatever it was, you can have thrown your way I kept having it and I would ask him, I'm like, my intent is to build orphanages to freaking save some dang babies that I haven't even met before. I don't need any of this stuff. This isn't for me. Why do bad things happen to good people? Or why does God allow this to happen? I was so upset and he said something I'll never forget. And it helped me perspective wise, so much that all that happens not to prove to the universe or to God that you want it. It's for you to remember what you've overcome and so you have the courage to face whatever big obstacle is in front of you. To say, to reference, I've been through worse. I can probably overcome this. Even though it's normally the tip of an iceberg of a problem, you at least have this weird gutsiness to think you can overcome that thing. So you keep going. So it's always to build faith inside of you. So it's happening for you to know you have what it takes to keep going and go higher and go higher and go higher. Because the higher you go, the more you can influence, the more people you can help. And it's easier to be trusted with that when you're not going to get shot out of the sky, the first little pebble that gets thrown your way.

So rewind that, folks. Listen to that again. There's a lot of pain through a lot of growth and it's really, really hard. And there's, you know, we knew that this podcast is going to be emotional. So with that, we'll take a quick break. But again, for those who are listening in, for those who are watching, we really appreciate your time and your energy and your consistency going through these entire episodes. We spent a lot of time and Adam, Noah, thank you guys so much for being here as well for helping and all the people who allowed this to come together. We're going to continue this. We're going to continue coming at you with how to build that bridge from Broke to woke. So thanks for listening, guys. We'll see you again soon.

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