Creating $25 Million in Annual Deal Flow with Kent Clothier

And I'm like, let me help you understand something. That's the way you look.

Okay?

It ain't about the video. That's the way you look, okay? Who cares? They want to give you. They want you to tell them what to do. How much more successful would you be if you had lunch once a week with insanely successful entrepreneurs who share their biggest secrets on how they think and achieve success? Grab your seat at the table because this is Business lunch with Roland Frazier and Ryan Deiss.

Hey, business owners at Scalable, we know there are three key steps to getting your team clear on where they are in relation to your company's goals. The first step is to identify three to five metrics that tell the clearest story on how this team is helping the company hit its growth goals. The second step is to create clear targets so your team can declare in advance what winning looks like. And the third step is to measure these targets on a weekly basis. When your team is forced to interact with the numbers themselves, they begin to truly know their numbers. If you want to see how we track our numbers here at Scalable, you can get a free template@businesslunchpodcast.com dashboard that's businesslunchpodcast.com dashboard.

Want to bring up a good friend of mine, business partner, and I've learned so much from him. I have convinced him to say every so often that he's learned something from me too, which makes me feel better. But brilliant guy. He's started when he was in his twenties, a billion dollar business, a business that grew to a billion dollars and then moved from that into real estate and a whole bunch of other cool things. I am not going to talk and steal his thunder, but I want to introduce my good friend Kent Clothier. And what's cool is Kent is so kind to come and volunteer. He just got done with a giant event in Florida for the real estate space and isn't really even recovered from that yet and has come in to share today.

I'm trying to, but one of the.

Things that we talked about was, was masterminds just a minute ago, how they can be a great source of deal flow and I love all the cool stuff. I would love for you just to tell the story of kind of boardroom, how it started, maybe where it faltered a little bit, how you got clear and focused and what you're doing now with.

Yeah, yeah. So thanks guys for having me here. Listen, man, this Roland means the world to me. As he mentioned, we are business partners, but first and foremost we are very Close friends. He is a mentor to me. I can tell you historically, time and time again, this is the guy that I called.

Right.

And I'm sure you guys will. If you haven't already had that experience, you will certainly have that experience in the future where I kid him all the time. I ask him, how's it feel to walk in the room and always be the smartest guy in the room. I just want to know what it's like.

And we met in a mastermind.

Yeah, we. Absolutely. We met in a mastermind. We were, I guess, part of the original War Room crew. And that's a funny story because when we met in the mastermind, little trip down memory lane here for a second War room back then was a handful of people at best. It was like 25 people. And at the end of each War room, they always had the wicked smart. And every single time, Roland would win it. And it got to be like the running joke. It's like, how many laptops, how many iPads can you get? Okay, we get it. You got just a stack of boxes in here because you just keep winning. And, and. But for me personally, it allowed us to connect to a point. I was living in Florida, he was living out here, that I realized very quickly that connection and being close to Roland was a really big deal to me. Maybe some of you guys have had that experience. So much so that I literally called him and said, hey man, I just want to go to lunch. And we met at the Grand Del Mar right here. And I literally flew all the way across the country from Miami to San Diego to go to lunch with him and then turned around and flew home. That's how important it was to me. And from that, we quickly became fast friends, became business partners, went on our own journey together. And then Roland being Roland, before you knew it, he owned War Room. Imagine that. He was just. Look, as it relates to masterminds, I'll just kind of tell you guys just how powerful that concept really is. As Roland said, I got in the real estate space about 20 years ago. I had built a very large organization before and a grocery arbitrage and been very successful. Got in a run in with my partners and we parted ways. They continue to run that business today. It's still a multi billion dollar company, but I went on my way and after I exited, I started falling into real estate investing and got really good at it. Took what I had learned in my twenties in business and started applying it to an industry that was traditionally very splintered and fractionalized. Nobody really understood how to run it like a big business. And as fate would had it, we turned it into a really big business. Right now we flip about 800 houses a year in 11 different markets. We manage about 8,000 single family homes today. All of it came out of that. And equally what came out of it was the opportunity for me to start teaching people. Guys, I'm a redneck from Memphis, Tennessee, right. I'm nothing special, but so if I could do it, anybody could do it. Started teaching people how to do what I was doing. And that led me into the education space.

Two negotiating things to think about is if anybody ever tells you they're a redneck or nothing special, they're full of shit.

Fair enough. But I will tell you that what happened was one led to two, two led to three, and it just kept going, right? So investing turned into being able to train people and coach people and then software applications and then owning title companies and mortgage companies and all these things that started spinning out of it. And along the way I had experienced war room. I realized how powerful that concept was. I had never been around anything where effectively you get into a room and everybody becomes super vulnerable and says, I need help, right. And show me how to connect some dots. To me that was completely foreign and. But I'd seen the impact of it. And so about 10 years ago I decided I was going to bring that to real estate. And the way I viewed it at the time was, if nobody else is going to do this, I'll do it. And it became an amazing little group. Hundred or so very successful real estate investors.

Do you mind talking a little bit about? Cause I remember I was at that first boardroom, the mastermind's called the boardroom meeting. And you had two other partners and there weren't a lot of people there. And I think that's a kind of a. Seeing where that started and what it's grown into. A cool thing to share just because.

Yeah, yeah, because it's like, I think.

It'S intimidating people think, how do you. I start and get 200 people in?

Yeah, it wasn't like that. I think we probably had 40 maybe in that room. Wasn't a room much larger than this. And I, I can tell you exactly what I did to fill that room. I basically went to a guy that was doing all of my direct mail. And that at the time it was a new concept was I bought these video mailers. You guys may have seen these, but basically it looks like a postcard, but when you open it, a VIDEO starts playing and that entire thing cost me $22, right. So I basically, for $1,000, I mailed out about 50 of these and I had 40 some odd people show up because they were so blown away. Holy. This guy sent a video to me that says, I am hand selecting you to be a part of my network. I want you in this room. I promise you there's going to be other people in this room that will bring value to your life. It wasn't hard, right? It wasn't selling me. I was selling the room. I was selling who I knew I was putting in the room. And for $1,000, I put a bunch of really powerful people in the room. And it was free. And that was free. The first one was free. And then we just. At the event, my entire intention was I'm going to convince these people. At that time, I think it was $15,000 that I will do four of these events just like this for $15,000. And I think we signed up, I think we closed 90% of the room. Something in that range. It was, we were in business, put it to that way, plenty of revenue for us to go and do what we need, what we promised to do. And that was 10 years ago. And then it's grown now since then. It's the better part of, I think it's 229 members now that all pay 30 to 60 grand a year to be in there, you know, taking a couple steps back along that journey. You know, as entrepreneurs, we're all guilty of this. Everything looks like an opportunity. It's really hard to be a good, disciplined CEO and say no to a lot of stuff, especially when you get to a certain level. And I was guilty of that. I was running a lot of things and, and probably running most of them poorly. And the boardroom was certainly one of them. And about, I don't know, two and a half years ago, maybe I remember you and I were meeting at your house. We sat down and I was like, this is all I want to do. I'm literally going to cut away everything. I'm going to go sell the software company, I'm going to go get rid of the education company.

Multimillion dollar business that you just decided to let go.

Correct, correct.

Which, like if you're ever thinking people that you can't acquire multimillion dollar businesses, you could have acquired that one.

I did it.

I just died.

I literally sold it to somebody on terms. And it was a multi million dollar business that at that point people are motivated for a Lot of different reasons. It wasn't that I didn't believe in the business, I just believed in my other businesses more. That's all it was.

And this was taking, I think about 80% of your time.

80% of my time, 20% of my revenue, 20% of my income. And so for me it was just tipping the scales way too much. And so I was like, it's a great business, but it's not the business for me anymore.

I remember we had a whiteboard and we put the whole thing on the board and it was just like, why.

Are we doing this? What the hell are we doing? It was a real eye opening moment and I cut a deal with somebody and they're running it as a successful software company now on terms. Right. I gave them the deal they wanted and great deal for them, better deal for me.

And that was a SaaS company.

That was a SaaS company.

So it was a SaaS company doing multimillions of dollars a year that was able to be sold on terms and it was profitable. So that's pretty cool as far as. Because just to what Dustin was talking about, it's like you can't get people who have SaaS companies because they're expecting these huge valuations. Not all of them.

Yeah.

I can tell you, particularly not the.

Ones that don't come from Silicon Valley.

Here's what you have to, here's what I think you have to appreciate is that you know somebody, you guys were talking before here. If you're not asking the right questions, if you're not having the right conversations, how the hell would you possibly know what's going on in somebody's life? You're. None of us are anywhere near as important as we think we are. Right? Everybody's got their own thing going on all over the world. And in my particular case, I was running a lot of successful businesses. But this particular business just in the portfolio of companies, was not attractive to me anymore. It was just that simple.

Which is also why private equity, family offices, investment banks, those are all good places for you guys to look because they're non performers for them. And their desire to have a return of say 6x or 10x on those businesses might be perfect for you because you can pick up something that can 2x3x4x.

I would equate it to anybody that's in real estate. I would equate it to like a frustrated landlord. Yep, that's what it is. Like a landlord that's owned an income producing property, they own a 60 unit apartment building, they've owned it forever. It makes money, but it's just the juice isn't worth the squeeze. I'm not excited about it because I'm over here working on this 500 unit thing over here. It isn't that this is a bad thing, it's just not the thing for me. And so in cleaning up some of that stuff, what it allowed me to do was really focus on something I'm extremely passionate about, which was working with high level people, being in this mastermind, understanding the real power. The real power. When you get a lot of very highly qualified business owners in a room, it's magic. When you get people in a room and you create an opportunity for them to be vulnerable, create an opportunity for them to have real conversations, create an opportunity for them to really connect. There is so much opportunity that spins out of that that I was just telling Roland we will have 250 members this year and that in addition to paying us for it to be a part, my average member has been with me for four and a half years. So you can just do the math real quick. The cost of acquisition of that customer, that's worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to us in revenue. But even more so than that, when you create a community, they want to invest together, they want to do deals together, they want to if everybody, when you find your tribe, it's really valuable. I can tell you one thing I've really come to appreciate is that we all have a basic human need and when you get right down to it, that we're, we all just want to belong. We're all looking for our tribe, we're all looking for that connectivity and it's the reason we go to events, it's the reason you're in this room right now, by the way. It's the reason why we join Facebook groups or it's the reason we go to church or do there's. We're looking for connection. And so when you provide that connectivity in a structured way, it is extremely powerful because all of that opportunity starts to spin out of it. Right. The deal flow. The funding we'll raise out of that group this year, $25 million. $25 million for us to go as a group, acquire $100 million in real estate.

How are you structuring that as a reg D? Okay, and what's your like a 2.

And 20 or we give them a 4% pref and then it is 80, 20. So they get, the group gets 80. I take 20 on the profit on the Split. And so clearly it's a great deal for me, but it's a great deal for them as well. What that means is that before, before I ever make a dollar, they're getting 4% on their money, period. But then everything that the fund creates in cash flow and profit, equity, et cetera, as we dispose of those properties, they will take that group, those members will get 80% of those profits.

And are you buying those properties for cash or are you buying them leveraged?

No, we lever up.

Okay, so what's the leverage typically?

75%. So we will take. So again, if I have $25 million, that allows it's beauty of real estate, that allows me to go buy $100 million in real estate.

And same thing with businesses. So you. So each year you can acquire $100 million worth of businesses, $100 million in real estate. The money is there. You've got the 25 million down, got 75 million from relatively inexpensive available debt and you get 20% of the profits. And the average return on the 100 million is what, in a five year.

And a five year term. Typically we are an equity multiplier of about two and a half. So we're basically doubling their money and then 50% as well.

So you make 150 in profits effectively off of that. Over a five year period, you pick up roughly 30 million. Let's knock off 5 million for interest, just which is way much. So for every year you're effectively adding $25 million in free money that's coming as a result of the mastermind on the side, in addition to the money that comes from the mastermind.

Yeah. And then not to mention. Yeah, literally getting paid to be cool to people, to. And a lot of the deals we're going into are the deals that are being generated inside the actual group. So now we're not going outside to look for real estate deals, just like you wouldn't be going outside to be going looking. Somebody was talking about it earlier, guys, there's deals here that they're not good for you, but they might be good for the person to your left or to your right. There's so much to happen when you get inside of rooms like this. It's extremely powerful. You just got to, you got to put yourself in the room.

So would you share me? Put you on the spot if I can for two things, because I really love your 4% video that you did, which I've watched a thousand times and still think it's just the best thing ever. And we Happen to have a whiteboard here. So I don't know if you can do it that way or not, but would you do a version of that so you can show people how you call out who your ideal person is?

Sure.

And then after that, I'm going to ask if you would help them because you did such a great job last time. For somebody just starting, what would the message look like roughly on that video letter to get them?

Yeah, I think that. I think the very first, before I get to it, I think the very somebody said earlier, I believe it was you said imposter syndrome.

Right.

Let me be as clear as I can here. Everybody does that. You're not alone. I go through it every day. And I know Roland has those moments. Everybody has those moments. It's completely natural. But I think it's important that you realize that you have a lot of value. And we live in a day and age right now where commanding authority has never been easier. Right. If you can create content, you have these platforms that are all free to you, right. Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, TikTok. Commanding authority, being authority in your marketplace on what you know to be a pain point with your. The people you're trying to work with is very simple. You're going to have to make yourself uncomfortable. You're gonna have to get over the imposter stuff for sure.

Do you have a way of doing that?

I have a couple things that I just remind myself of. I had somebody at my event last week that said something to the effect of, can't I hear you? And I know I want to produce content, but I just don't like the way that I look on video. And I'm like, let me help you understand something. That's the way you look.

Okay?

It ain't about the video. That's the way you look, okay? Who cares? They want to give you. They want you to tell them what to do. That's why you go on these platforms. In many cases, you're going on there, you're engaging with content where somebody is bringing value to. To your life. You have that within you right now. And when you're nervous about it, I would tell you very simply, this is the one thing I repeat to myself over and over and over again in those moments, is that this is where my competition will quit. This is where they'll quit. They'll get in their own head. They'll have an internal conversation, internal dialogue that will keep them from doing something as simple as turning a camera around and recording. If your competition will Quit there. Which they will, by the way. Then how hard is it for you to be great? It's not hard.

Also, on the video thing, like, if you don't like the way you look on video, don't watch it.

Seriously.

I don't watch any of my videos.

Right. I hate the way we all go through it. I can't even tell you how many times I've had conversations with my video team. I'm like, you guys are making me look like an asshole. What are you doing here? Stop. And it's, we all go through this. That's part of that imposter center. It doesn't matter.

That freeze frame is always going to.

Be, oh, I have never. I literally have never had one thumbnail. That was the kind of thumbnail I want.

It's always.

I'm like, why does it stop?

Get a professionally done photograph of yourself that you like and make that your thumbnail. And never watch your damn videos.

Right? But the point of it is, is you can become. Here's what's going to happen. If you go out and let's just say you wanted to start a mastermind or wanted to start a group there, spend a few weeks and get some content out there. Because what's going to happen is as people, as you're inviting people or you're trying to bring people into your world, they are for sure going to do the same thing you do. And they are going to go look at your online Resume, which is LinkedIn, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram. What do you do when you're trying to find out somebody about something? When you're trying to find out something about somebody, you go and look them up on social media. That's what you do. So it's naturally they're going to do the same. So have that content out there that, hey, this is what I specialize in. Back to what you were talking about, the ad is that when I got real serious, I figured out that my superpower, the people I serve the best, are not brand new real estate investors. My day for doing that real estate, those days are over. I have an entire organization, but that doesn't excite me and it doesn't light me up. But I also realized that there is a huge part of the market that is largely ignored. There's tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of dollars is spent every year trying to convince somebody off the street. And they've watched Chip and Joanna Gaines or they've watched Flip this House and let me convince that person they can come into Real estate, that's a massive business, right? But nobody ever shows people how to turn this hustle, this hobby into a real business. Most people, when they come into real estate, and I'm sure this. And again, this is my. I'm walking you down. The thought process I had to go down is that, what's the pain point that I can solve? And the pain point I could solve was I know I'm really good at taking somebody that's hustling, running up and down the street. They don't own a business. They're flipping houses, they're making a million dollars a year. But the business, it isn't a business. They don't have staff, they don't have leverage, they don't have process, they don't have systems. It's them that. Taking that person and turning them into an actual business owner with systems, processes, staff, C suite type people. That's what I'm good at. And so I called it out on a video and I had no problem being polarizing. And it is without a doubt the best performing ad we have ever produced. Such a good ad. And I literally look right at the camera and I basically say, hey, for 95% of you, this video is not for you. If you're brand new to real estate, this video is not for you. Go ahead, just move on. Don't even watch the rest of this video. And I literally hit the camera and move it, right? And then it comes back. I'm like, all right, if you're still here, then you're in that 5%. 1% of you, of that 5 have got this all figured out. You're crushing the game. That remaining four, you're trying to figure out how to get to the next level, right? I'm talking to you. You're the hustlers, you're the big, you're the earners. But you don't know how to run a business. And let me tell you how. If you know, if. Whether or not you know you own a business or not, it's real simple. Just leave, right? And if you leave and the money stops, you don't own a business, baby. You own a job. And if that's you, I can help you. Can show you exactly what it looks like to take that hustle and turn it into a real business. Here's exactly what you need to do to get on a phone call with me and my team and we'll walk you through the process of how to become a part of our world, and we'll turn you into a Business owner. And that is effectively what it said. And it crushes to this day. It crushes to this day because I'm speaking, I'm calling out. I'm doing two things. I'm being divisive and I'm being polarizing. I'm literally calling out the people that I know. This is their pain. I know exactly who you are. And equally they hear me calling out, this is not for beginners. This is not for the just getting started. I can't even talk to you right now. This is who I want in my world. And so they identify with that's me, and that's who I want to be around. Somebody that talks like that, speaks like that. One thing I can tell you, probably some of the best advice I can tell you when it comes to commanding authority is, is be you. Be authentic. One of the most highest resonating emotions frequencies that we have as human beings is we gravitate to authenticity when you're authentic. For years, I'll tell you, I used to go and speak on stages, et cetera, and I would go up there in a coat and tie and I would be all prim and proper and all that kind of stuff. And what I ended up doing was attracting people into my business that weren't attracted to the real me. And then they get behind the curtain and they see me in flip flops and a T shirt and using colorful language, and they're like, what in the hell just happened? And so when I actually went out there and said, look, this is who I am. This is what it's all about for me. And this is who I want to surround myself with. This is the pain points I can solve. These are the people I want to be in my world, I want to work with. I mean that naturally it does. The way I say it all the time is it has 100% close rate. Here's what I mean by that. I'm going out of my way to be as real as I can, not polished at all. Because I know 50% of that audience are going to be attracted to me. And they're going to come right, and they're going to come running. They're going to be like, that's my guy. And 50% are going to be like, dude, that guy is so full of shit. And they're going to run away. Either way I win. Either way, I win. I'm closing 100% that way because I've run people away from me that I are not going to bring value to my life. And I can't bring value to their life. They're the disbelievers. They're all, I don't care. But I have 100% attracted the people that get it. And when you get in a room with a bunch of people around you that get it and understand what you're trying to do and how you're trying to push them ahead. And again, everybody's singing from the same hymnal. It's a very powerful concept when it comes to creating opportunity, creating deal flow. The conversations are very natural in that environment. It is not. It's not transactional, which is part of why somebody. Some of you guys have reservations, right, Is because it feels transactional, man. It should be conversational. It should just be, hey, it's relationships, man. I'm talking to people. You're talking to people. We're figuring out how to help each other get to another place. I got a deal, you've got a deal. Let's figure out a way to do a deal together. And when you get in that environment, man, it's powerful.

And if you're thinking 4%, that's not enough. People think there's about 2 million real estate investors that are out there. So if Kent gets one half of 1% of those people, he still ends up with 400 people in his mastermind, which is 150 more than he's got right now. So it's like, there's plenty of opportunity to capture that tiny little bit. And speaking to them so directly makes a huge difference in how eager they are to come and be a part of your group.

Don't kid yourself. There are other real estate masterminds, and we hear it over and over and over again. This is so different, right? This is like nothing I've ever been around. Like, it's the caliber of people. And by the way, we carefully curate the people that come in the room, which I think is a big deal. Also, you'll get to a certain level to where, especially running a mastermind, you cannot learning some early lessons. You cannot chase the money. You cannot chase the money, because what happens is you will go after the dollar. Oh, I got to get this $25,000 member or this? And you will invite people into the group that are not a good fit, and that is the death of a mastermind. You get people in there, they will just infect the entire thing. It's like a cancer. And so you got to curate it. You have to make sure that the people that you're bringing in there are. We're all on the same page, everybody understands what they're trying to accomplish, etc. But if you take the time and you're patient, you can build an extremely powerful organization where you will never have to go look for money or funding or opportunity ever again.

Hey, business hunch listeners. We're going to get right back to the show, but Roland wanted me to invite you to a brand new training that he's doing on acquiring businesses with no money out of pocket. It's something that he's talked quite a bit about on the show, but he's doing a free training where he's going to walk through the entire process. So if you want to get access to that, go to businesslunchpodcast.com epic that's businesslunchpodcast.com epic and you can get signed up.

Now, will you share a little bit about the model? So you have people now in the mastermind, or the mastermind attracts people that are interested into your orbit and you've got a consulting model where they come, which I'd like for you to talk about and what you charge and then how does that lead to equity? And also the challenge that you and I talked about when you said I don't understand why a lot of these aren't converting to equity. And we had a conversation about how to pre frame people for that. You share that?

Sure. So my. Our core business model at this point is the mastermind and we have two levels in it, which I think is important. The reason why that is important is because just like any group, people will naturally feel like they are outgrowing the group. So people come into masterminds for a couple different reasons or a few different reasons, I should say. A lot of people come into masterminds because they want the tactics. They want something very tangible. You're going to tell me to do this and I go home and I do that. There are people that come in there for the opportunity to partner and work together.

Right.

And then you got people that come in there, they just want the connections, they want to fill their Rolodex and then they want to walk out the door. And we learned a long time ago that we have to give them an opportunity to move up with us. Right. And so as their business grows, as they begin to become bigger and better business owners, they have to have a place to go. So we have what's called our boardroom, which is $30,000 a year, and then we have what's called our billionaire boardroom, which is $60,000 a year. And the difference between the two is that in order for them to get into the billionaire boardroom, they have to be able to document to us that they are, at a minimum, making a net profit every year, $5 million. And then they get full access to the four quarterly meetings, normal meetings, but they also get two other exclusive meetings for those 59 people that are in the billionaire boardroom group. And typically both of those types of meetings, because that level of entrepreneur, it's much more experiential, right? Less tactical. There's some tactical, but it's much more about breaking bread together, being in cool places. Next month, we're taking that group to Belize. We did Vail earlier this year. Next year we'll take them to the Bahamas. We try to get them and their spouses somewhere where it's just more about, hey, this is our little tight little circle. And so naturally, what happens is the board remembers are like, I got to get my business where I can get in a billionaire group, right? Because that's where all the cool kids hang out. And that's really important. And so as they're moving, they don't want to disconnect from us. They want to stay with us because this is their family. And so I think that's important to share that. What has naturally spent out of that. And Roland and I spent a lot of time talking about this over the last few years. Again, I have. I'm a little bit like Roland, but just more real estate focused. I have a unique skill set in that I can help people unlock what's going on and help them to really become good CEOs. Good business owners, owners, good business leaders really change the way they look at the business, unlock opportunities. I was meeting with somebody this week. She came to me. She literally flew here from Qatar, and she had tons of opportunity inside of her business, and she just didn't have a good, logical plan on how to go and do it. And she walked out of my office after a single day and was like, it's exactly how I'm going to go make $20 million before the end of the year. That's a unique. Sometimes we just need. Need some perspective. He does it to me all the time. If I go meet with him, I'll sit there and he'll see something in my business. And it's just like, I'm so close to it, I can't see it. We're all guilty of it. And so I started working with people privately and the way I structured that, and a lot of them are boardroom members, not all of them, a lot of different businesses, they can come and effectively, for six months, they can pay me 50 grand or 60 grand. 50 grand they pay in full. Or for a year, they can pay me 100 grand, 20 grand or 100 grand if they pay it all up front for that, they get one day. They get to come into my office for one day and we game plan. And then every 10 to 14 days, I get on the phone with them and make sure they're executing on exactly what they're supposed to do. It's not a great deal of time. Basically, at any given time, have 10 to 12 people that I'm working with. It's a revenue source for me. More importantly for me, what it's allowed me to do is to get behind the scenes of these businesses and understand what's going on in at least five or six cases right here. Ultimately, we took an equity position in their company. We have a roofing company that we were in about 8 months. We 6 xed their business through private coaching, added in the last few months, added a real estate arm, and then became a 35% owner for no money out, by the way, 35% owner of the entire organization and have private equity now sniffing around, trying to roll them up into another set of companies. The way I. What Roland is referring to, I'm now much more upfront when I tell them that, listen, this is a way to get on the inside with me so that I can really understand your business. And my evil scheme is that hopefully we uncover a way that I can ultimately become a partner with you.

That to me was a really important thing for me to understand because I've been doing that. But Kent called me and said, or we were just talking, and he said, how do so many of them turn into equity deals? Because I don't see that happening as much. I said, do you tell them that in advance? And he said, no, I just tell them we're going to work on their business. This is just add that one little.

Thing, one line, literally. Literally the line.

It's amazing how simple some of those things are.

And by the way, it's a benefit. That was really interesting to me because when you get to a certain place, there are people that want to be in business with you, and to call you a partner is a big deal. And so I just wasn't using it as a benefit, right? I was just playing behind the scenes. And all of a sudden I pushed it out front and said, here's what I'm really trying to do. I'M going to help you regardless. Right. We're going to get. I'm going to show you how to blow up your business. We're going to turn this into a big monster investor. But what I hope happens is that through this journey that we figure out a way that we become equity partners together and that this becomes mutually beneficial all the way down the line. Time again. Now we have people. When are we going to have that discussion?

It is funny, like they chase you.

For it more often than when are we going to have that roofing company I just talked about. That's literally how it came about. Hey, I want to have this discussion now. This is what I'm willing to give you guys. And done the same thing inside of an alarm company, national alarm company, done the same thing inside of several real estate businesses, a direct mail business, which about getting ready to do the same thing inside of a national title company business. There's a lot of, there's a lot of opportunity and I would argue something as simple as that. It's nuance.

Yeah.

It's not, it's not blocking and tackling, it's a sentence.

And just putting a value on that. Because I think it's important for you guys when you're doing consulting to realize that if you're consulting with people that already have stuff going on, it doesn't take much to dramatically move the needle. And so if you're charging 5,000, 10,000, 25, 50, 100, whatever you're charging to get a 10x return on that, which is always my goal minimum for somebody that invests the money to do a consult is not that hard. It's hard if they're not doing anything. But just that nuance for you in the last 12 months, I'll give you.

A really good example of this because I believe I heard it in the room. One of the most powerful things to do you've shared with me over the years and we've had the conversation many times and I by proxy go and share it with my people when I'm coaching them is who owns your customer. Right. So when you're consulting with somebody, I'll tell you, this is a right in the weeds. Just take the roofing company, for instance. This guy's a big roofing company in Phoenix. And this guy, they're literally going out direct to consumer. That's their business.

Right.

And they make a ton of money when it comes to storms that blow through there and all that kind of stuff. Now, the way we 6x their business was that simple. Question. Who owns your customer? Who's actually doing all the heavy lifting for you right now that you just aren't asking the right questions? And suddenly we get them in alignment with Open Door and Offer Pad and some of the hedge funds, people that are taking down hundreds and hundreds of houses a month and that are looking for a roofing company that they can count on over and over. And so his cost of acquisition of a customer goes to zero, but instead of going out and doing 10 roofs a month, he's doing 60 roofs a month, 100 roofs a month.

Right.

And is having to go and buy new trucks and a new facility and a new yard and all this other stuff because of one simple question. And a lot of times your. When you get in rooms like this and you hear things from all the guys that are up here, including, most importantly, Roland, it isn't like you have to go boil the ocean for these guys. You don't have to solve every problem. You just got to look at it through a different lens and really help them to get a little distance from it and ask a different question. And that one question is extremely powerful when you're trying to consult with somebody. I did the exact same thing with the alarm company, by the way. Went in there, and they were going door to door. Who's doing all this heavy lifting for you already? Let's go do a deal with a national home builder, put a deal together, explodes their business, tens of millions of dollars in new profit. Not like I did anything revolutionary. I just. They needed somebody to sit in front of them and ask the right question and open them up to the opportunity and push them to go connect that.

Dot and those questions, by the way. So for in cfe, in the program, in the portal, you have consults that have all those questions already built in. So when you go, you don't even have to know what those questions are, because we do. And we already built the consult for you. And you've got six different ones that are in there that are systematic about walking people through to get the answers to questions like that.

And I guess the point I'm trying to make is I think a lot of times when it comes to consulting, people think. Think they have to have the answer right. It's not that you have to ask the right question. You have to make them find the answer.

The answer is there already.

You got it.

You just have to uncover it.

Yeah. That's your job. Like, you literally sit in front of, like, ask the questions, and their answers will reveal themselves. They're not coming. At least in my experience, they're not coming to me for the answer. They're coming for me to ask the right questions so that they can get the answers. And that is extremely valuable to them because they are, they're real business owners, right? They know if they get the right, you know, the right tactic, they will go and execute and they will go. And then your job as a consultant is to hold them accountable to do that. So this is a very straightforward thing you're doing with these people, but it's extremely valuable because they just don't have somebody in their corner that's making them answer different questions. They're too close to it. Let's give Kent a big hand.

Thank you so much.

Really appreciate it.

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