Episode 470: I Never Negotiate a Deal I’m Not Willing to Walk Away From with Alex Makanvand

Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind, where we get real world insights on winning from people who have accomplished amazing things. I'm your host, Larry Weidell, and let's get going. I'm talking with Alex McAvan. Hello, Alex.

Hello, Larry. How you doing?

Good, good. How's the weather out there in California?

Just beautiful. Just gorgeous. Gorgeous. 70, 72 degrees. Just gorgeous.

That's unusual for you guys. Usually the weather is so terrible. Yeah. You've lived out in California for how long?

Oh, gosh, I moved to California in 1982. So do the math. 40, 40 years. Yeah.

And so why did you go to California?

Well, I went to school in the Midwest in Missouri.

Right.

University of Missouri. And when I graduated, I was an engineer. I got my bachelor's and master's degrees in civil and then structural engineering. And so that's what everybody did back in the early 80s. You know, you, you went west, young man, and you look for jobs because all the jobs were on the west coast, basically.

Yeah. Especially construction boom and all that. And so you've been in your own business for a long time. How big, how would you describe the scale and scope of your business right now? Obviously, you're a million dollar earner or, you know, to qualify, to get on the rotation here, to be interviewed, but you got a successful business. How would you describe your business to other people in terms of volumes and things that's big to you, you know, that's impressive to you, and it might be impressive to other people?

Well, we have over 1,600 licensed agents in financial services. We're across probably about 20 states now. And we have multiple brokerage firms that are a part of our organization now. And we're licensed in all the different financial products that you can imagine that you could think of. And it's been an incredible journey. But I don't know if it's my personality or if it's a particular type that no matter where you're at, you're always feeling that, man, I'm not big enough and I need to grow and I need to expand and we need to be a lot bigger than this. But we're very excited where we are right now.

And what's the deal about your pool getting in the. On television? Was that your pool?

Oh, yeah, yeah. We, I just sold that house. I bought a house out in Vegas and it was, I don't know. We got a call one day. It was hgtv, I think they said, they said, yeah, we've, we've heard about your Pool. We want to come over and do a thing. And. And they spent, gosh, 10, 12, 14 hours. And I think it became like a five minute segment. You know how that works with video productions. And it was fun, it was a great experience. And yeah, we ended up on top 10 greatest pools of all time with something like, I don't know, but we. It had a. It had a pool, it had a sort of a. What we call the water feature. But then it also had a lazy river. I think that's what did it. It was the lazy river.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so you had your own lazy river. Well, good for you. And so that had, that had to help the sale. When it came time to sell the.

Thing, it was great. But, you know, since I sold it, it's gone up another $2 million in value. So I should have waited one more year. But, you know, shoulda, coulda, woulda, right?

Wow. Jump 2 million in one year.

In one year. Can you believe that? Yeah, I mean, we did really well with it. Actually. We did quite well ourselves, so.

Wow. And so any more homes in Vegas or you still are.

You know, we sold that house. Now we're full time back in.

Yeah, one time. And, you know, you've looked at a couple of places.

Yeah. So we purchased. When we sold the house in Vegas, we bought a place up in Lake Arrowhead, which is right about an hour from. From where we live here in Southern California. So we get the best of both worlds. We get the great summers, we get the snow, the winners. We get all of that out here.

Yeah. Fantastic. And so without the travel, flying back and forth to Colorado, you know, so. Yeah, that's nice. Now talk about your business.

And.

We'Re going to share what you've learned about winning and what winning is to you and how also your family, I mean, you've won in business, you won in your personal life, been able to do, to enjoy life. Not run a rat race, even though it was a rat race in the beginning, but also raise pretty, pretty much a sizable family. You've got, is it four children?

Yeah, we have triplet boys that are 27 years old now. And then we have our daughter that is actually, tomorrow is her birthday. She is getting ready to turn 22. So we have raised, we conceived, delivered and raised four children while we were building our business, basically.

Wow. And I have heard the stories of how bad a husband you were when.

Your.

Wife was left at home raising those kids, but I guess you've compensated in the meantime.

Well, you know, we kind of made A deal. We said, Look, I'll work 10, 12 hours outside the home. You work 24 hours inside the home. I think that's a fair split right there. So.

When guys tell me that you're not a salesman.

Yeah, yeah. You know, when guys tell me, they go, you know, my wife doesn't work, I go, I ask them, do you have children? Yes. Well, you better stop saying that your wife doesn't work. She works harder than you do, buddy.

So, Alex, where did you get your entrepreneurial type experience? I've got the engineering background and training as well. And that does help you when you're building a company because you think in terms of systems, logically, breaking things down, putting them in sequences. That gives you an incredible advantage, which it probably took me 20 years to realize how fortunate I was with that background. But it kind of puts you ahead of the eight ball when it comes to growth, particularly. But it doesn't put. Doesn't help at all when it comes and you're just by yourself and you've got to grind it out step by step from the beginning yourself. So talk about how you got into this thing, what caused you to get excited, how you located what you're going to be doing and all that.

Yeah, you know, you're right. The engineering mind and the scientific mind does help you put systems together. But engineers and scientists and mathematicians are not necessarily known for business builders, necessarily known as entrepreneurs. So thankfully, I had the entrepreneurial spirit in me. And the bug. I was bitten by the bug years ago. I remember When I was 13 or 14 years old, I couldn't wait to go out and get a job. Of course I couldn't because I was so young, but. But I just wanted to go out and make some money and all that. But it was just a complete fluke the way I was sort of pulled in to the business environment. A friend of my dad's called him and said, hey, listen, would you be interested in getting involved? And my dad said, oh, no, it's not for me, but maybe my son. So he called me anyways. I mean, I kind of pursued this. I called the guy up, I asked them where to go, how to get more information, find out all about it. Back then there was no GPSs or there was no computers or Internet. So I took out the old Thomas guide and I got directions, Remember getting directions from somebody, and then just went to an office and I listened to the message that was given about entrepreneurship, about helping families and then becoming wealthy in the process of doing so. And I thought, why not what do.

I have to lose now at this point? How long had you been working, you know, in a regular job situation? And what, you obviously had some frustrations and were hitting your head against the wall for something.

Oh, absolutely. I was in my previous career for a total of about 17 years. And I count the six years of college, you know, four years for, for one degree, two years for another degree, and then 11 years of working. So I kind of look at all that as one, one chunk, right? And it's, it's, it's weird because on my first day at my very first, you know, real job, professional job, I thought to myself, are you kidding? Is this what. I went to school for years? I mean, I knew on that very first day that, that' I was going to end up doing for the rest of my life. Now, the way things worked out. I worked as an engineer for 11 years, but I just knew, I just knew that wasn't for me. I was always, like you said, frustrated. I wasn't happy financially. I thought, oh my gosh, if I'm struggling. I was working, my wife was working, and we were barely making ends meet with two professional salaries, incomes coming in. And I thought, this is not the way I thought it was going to be. So I was always on the lookout. I was always looking to see if there was something else. I remember one time I heard an ad on the radio about there was a job expo or something at the Long Beach Convention Center. So I called my brother, I said, hey, let's go. I grabbed him, threw him in the car, we drove down to Long Beach. I walked around the place for hours, picked up about a thousand brochures, you know, went home, put the brochure bag in the corner, never opened it, never looked at a single one. So, yeah, so I always had that spirit of wanting to do something different.

And so you had to be making good money, though. I mean, you had to. You know, I know you, you would have been successful, you would have got promotions, you would have moved up. I'm sure the company was hurt when you left and they felt like they had a loss. So why couldn't it turn into a satisfactory life for you?

Well, I'll tell you a quick story. When I went to the president of the company where I was working my very last job, and I had a nice conversation with him. I told him I was thinking about leaving because I had started my own business on the side and I was doing it part time for about maybe three or four months. And I very quickly decided to Walk away from the 17 year career that I was talking about. So I sat down with the president, had a very, very, very pleasant chat. And he said, he turns around and said to me, he goes, alex, what can we do? Tell me, tell me, just tell me whatever it takes. What can we do to keep you here? And I looked at him straight in the eyes and I said, well, you know, a piece of the company wouldn't hurt, right? You know, yeah, give me some ownership in the company and then we can talk. No sooner had those words left my mouth that he stood up very abruptly and shook my hand very, very nicely, very kindly. And he said, well, have a great life. See you later.

Yeah. When you have those conversations you need to know going in, you better be ready to walk out the door on your own, because there's something about letting the other side know that you're thinking generally not made up your mind, but you might possible just want to let them know in their mind what they hear is, he's gone. And.

So, as a matter of fact, you just brought up a great negotiating tactic of mine in life in general is I never negotiate a deal that I'm not willing to walk away from.

And talk about how that's played out for you. So how you learned that and how that's worked out for you.

Well, I learned it from not being that way and sort of being mealy mouth and being. And I think it comes through, it shows when you're not coming from a position of strength. And so the other side sees that and so makes the negotiations a lot harder. But I am willing to walk away from a deal that I sit down to negotiate no matter what. And I will walk away from it if it's not something, if I feel like I'm not getting the thing that I'm negotiating for, whether it's at auto dealership or I'm purchasing a property or whatever, however that comes about, I will walk away. And I'm willing to walk away. And I figure, never marry yourself to any one deal because there's always a better deal that's lurking right around the corner.

And what were you. Can you think back and remember what you were trying to buy that when this occurred to you, that I'm learning something here?

Well, one specific time we were at a Lexus dealership and my wife and I wanted. She wanted this car so bad. It was just a beautiful car. And the salesman, you know, he was going back and forth doing his little dance and doing his thing and bringing in the sales manager and the General manager and the. And the janitor and, you know, bringing different people to the table. And so my wife said, oh, you know what? You forgot something in the car. Let's go grab the thing from the car. So we both walked. Got up and started to walk out, not even intending to, really, you know, and the guy ran after us. Okay, okay. Whatever you want. Whatever you want. So that worked out really well.

So you got the deal and you got. Got a lifetime lesson right in the process, huh?

Exactly. Exactly.

And you know, Alex, that's a concept that comes up all the time, is like, you learn how to win by paying attention as you go through life. Just notice what doesn't work and notice what does work and. And do the things that do work and just stop doing the things that don't work, you know?

What a concept. What a concept, right?

What a concept. As my ski instructor buddy from Argentina says, Chino, he says, you see, when you're skiing, he says, you see that when you do that, don't do that. You see, when you go in the turn and you do this kind of thing, don't do that. That's his big instruction. And so there's a lot to be learned by analyzing what's happening to you and say, you know, I just stepped into it, and I didn't have to step. I could have stepped over this way, or I could have said something different, or I could have kept my mouth shut, you know, and so how did you feel as you launched your business? Because you said you. 17 years in prep and you reached the point where time to make a change. How did you feel when you made the launch? And what would you tell people about having the. About getting to that point and then having the guts to follow through? Does it take guts, or does it just take preparation?

Well, maybe in my case, it was more stupidity than anything else, but. But, yeah, that's actually a really good question. You know, I was. I had it up to here with working a job. Honestly, I don't know how people do it. I don't know how they show up day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, decade after decade, how they put up with the disrespect, how they put up with the. The politicking, the backbiting, the. You know, all this stuff that goes on at every kind of job. All the. All the false promises, all the. And so I had had it. I was way overdue. And truth be told, I made the jump way before I was ready. I mean, it was a matter of Two or three months, maybe three or four months after, you know, I got my license in financial services on October 1st of 1993, and I went full time. I walked away from my 17 year career in February of 1994. So that's about five months. Yeah, it is about five months later. And I wasn't financially ready. We had over $52,000 in credit card debt at the time. And I'm not a big spender. I mean, it just happened. That's how life works. I made an attempt at another business and I was trying to finance that business through credit cards, which is probably the dumbest thing I could have done. So, by the way, I had no savings. I had no 401k. My entire life savings was summarized in a blue plastic jar with coins in it. That was literally the only thing I could show for 17 years of, of toiling for somebody else and helping build somebody else's company, somebody else's business. And so whether, you know what, I don't know what it takes, but everybody in my life, everybody said, don't do it. They advise me against it, from parents to brothers to family members to my wife, she'll admit that she was also a strong voice against me making that move. And I figured I was 32 years old, almost 33 years old at that time. I kind of got a little bit of an early start in life. If you do the math. Go work it backwards. You know, I started college kind of a little bit younger and all that. That's, that's, that's a whole other story for a whole, for a different time. But I thought, you know what, it's now or never. I mean, I got, I got. What's the worst thing that could happen? I tried my hand at entrepreneurship, at business. It doesn't work out. I can always go get a job. You know, the thing that people hang on to and they cling on to. It's the thing that I thought, eh, if this doesn't work out, I can always go get one. It's no big deal. Jobs are a dime a dozen. Somebody will hire me. So I don't know if it was, if it was, what did you call it? Courage or whatever it was, it was more. And then I remember right after I did that, right after I did that, I thought to myself, omg, what have I done? You know, how stupid could a guy get? Oh my gosh. I'd lay awake at night in bed, you know, thinking, just staring at the ceiling, thinking, oh my God, you know, because I walked away And I burned the ship. I mean, I literally, I burned the ship, I blew up the bridges, I did all of that. So because I know myself, I didn't want to give myself a way to go back, a means to go back, you know, at that very moment. So, you know, it was touch and go for a while and then. But you know, the thing that people are afraid of is that feeling, that feeling of fear, that feeling of I don't know what to do, you know, I'm not really good at this or. But that was the feeling I needed personally to encourage me, to push me, to get me get my butt out of the hut, as we say. And so that's what got me to work even harder.

Alright, thanks so much, Alex. That wraps up this episode. Consider leaving a rating and review if you like what you heard. In addition, I have a free video for you and it contains my best insights from 20 years of running my own business and also coaching million dollar earners. You'll find it@whitelownwinning.com webinar. Thanks for listening and do it big.