Transcript

Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback

From Home Service Expert · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 1 h 2 min · 15,016 words · 265 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback", an episode of Home Service Expert published July 14, 2025 (1 h 2 min, about 15,016 words). It mentions 9 people, works and ideas, including Austin Zabic, Zback Group, Space Real Estate, One Roof Investments, John C. Maxwell.

What this episode is about

Austin Zaback, a seasoned real estate entrepreneur and founder of multiple investment firms, shares insights on cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset for success, emphasizing the importance of mentorship and community connections in the industry. His experience as a mentor for new agents highlights strategies for overcoming fears and achieving career growth in real estate.

Key takeaways

  • Real estate pros are flocking to home services—grass is always greener, right? But what about the roots?
  • A successful cash cow doesn't always equate to a sellable business—ask real estate investors after the dairy runs dry.
  • Partnerships in home services could unlock hidden profits—like finding gold in your backyard, if you know where to dig.
  • Crafting a sellable business means dreaming bigger; short-term wins won’t secure your retirement yacht, just the inflatable one.
  • Entrepreneurial identity is tied to daily hustle—but selling could mean trading your oars for a yacht's helm, not losing the boat.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 10:00: Austin Zabic, One Roof Investments, Space Real Estate, Zback Group
  2. – 20:00: Bigger Pockets, Terminex, Gary Keller
  3. – 30:00: Terminex
  4. – 1:00:00: John C. Maxwell

Notable quotes from "Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback"

  • Estate sales and business. He's now in Pory. He was in Scottsdale, but he's he's local here. Founder of Zback Group, president of Space Real Estate, and founder of One Roof…
    about Austin Zabic · at
  • Companies. You mentioned them in the beginning. at One Roof Real One Roof Investment Group is a wholesaling company, right? And we're one of the largest wholesalers in the…
    about One Roof Investments · at
  • Have all that whole book of business that we already refer other home service companies to. So, what we do currently is we partner up with other guys like A1 Garage or whoever…
    about A1 Garage · at
  • Love people that go out and they figure it out. I would tell anybody listening, do not get into wholesale if you're in home service. Stay focused. The one thing by Gary Keller. Agreed.
    about Gary Keller · at
  • Y because certain businesses are getting a lot more. Like our friend Cameron, pest controls got the highest because Terminex went public. Y and now they could pay crazy multiples whereas,.
    about Terminex · at
  • And I don't know where I'm at yet, but I want to be diversified in the way that there's a few guys I know. Bigger Pockets. Yeah. Brandon.
    about Bigger Pockets · at
  • Probably John C. Maxwell. the leadership bible. Okay.
    about John C. Maxwell · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Austin Zabic — Person · Main guest · 1 mention · first at
    Primary interview subject discussing his real-estate businesses (wholesaling + retail team), plans to enter home services (starting with pest control), and lessons on focus, culture, and scaling.
  • Gary Keller — Person · Referenced author/thinker · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced to reinforce focus/priority management (“The ONE Thing”) and staying concentrated on the core business.

Books & papers

  • John C. Maxwell — Book · Referenced work · 2 mentions · first at
    Recommended by Austin Zabic as a must-read for entrepreneurs and visionaries

Companies & orgs

  • Zback Group — Company · Business focus · 1 mention · first at
    Austin Zabic's primary real estate company, mentioned as a cash flow business
    Estate sales and business. He's now in Pory. He was in Scottsdale, but he's he's local here. Founder of Zback Group, president of Space Real Estate, and founder of One Roof…
  • Space Real Estate — Company · Business focus · 1 mention · first at
    Austin Zabic's fast-growing real estate team with hundreds of agents across multiple states
    Founder of One Roof Investments. Zach is a real estate entrepreneur and founder of Zback Group. He's also the president of space, a fast growing real estate team with hundreds…
  • One Roof Investments — Company · Business focus · 1 mention · first at
    Austin Zabic's wholesaling company, one of the largest in the nation
  • A1 Garage — Company · Case study · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a partner in home service referrals, illustrating business collaboration
  • Terminex — Company · Case study · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced as a benchmark in the pest control industry for high multiples
  • Bigger Pockets — Company · Referenced expert · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned in the context of real estate investment strategies and models

Full transcript with timestamps

All right, guys. Welcome back to the home service expert. Today, I got Austin Zabic in the house. Did I say that right?

Zbeck. It's all good. Zback. And uh he's an expert in real estate sales and business. He's now in Pory. He was in Scottsdale, but he's he's local here. Founder of Zback Group, president of Space Real Estate, and founder of One Roof Investments. Zach is a real estate entrepreneur and founder of Zback Group. He's also the president of space, a fast growing real estate team with hundreds of agents across multiple states. Zebach is known for his work as a mentor and educator helping others buy and sell real estate and young agents overcome their fears. He's also the host of a podcast where interviews he interviews high achievers from various industries. It's a pleasure to have you here,

dude. Pleasure to be here, man. I appreciate you having me. It's funny how many people we know. I mean, I guess I just think the world keeps getting smaller. You mentioned Cody Spurber back in the day, the old Clever Investor. I used to go meet up with uh with those guys all the time, but now we're we're doing business together.

So cool. Yeah, Cody was my first mentor that I ever hired in 2014 to to mentor me in wholesaling, you know, and um well, I hired Clever Investor, right? And I didn't know Cody at the time. I got I got a mentor assigned to me. His name is Torston. And um year and a half, two years after me getting into the game, then me and Cody eventually became partners and good buddies and and one thing kind of led to the next. So pretty really small world.

Yeah. I was born here though, too. So I feel like in Arizona, it's even a smaller world.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. If you're born here, you know everybody. Yeah. Yeah. Pace Morby was just in sitting where you're at not that long.

Okay, cool. Yeah, I know Pace real well. I was I was at his house in Montana a few months ago and yeah, great dude. Love Pace.

You know, it's funny. I wanted to talk about this because you said, "Look, I'm getting into the home service niche very soon."

And it's funny that all the people listening are mostly home service people that are come to me and they say, "How do I invest in real estate?"

Sure. And all the software guys that I know, the SAS companies are like, "I'm getting into home service." And it's like, "We all want what we don't have." I mean, look at Cody getting into the flooring stuff. So,

what do you think it is? What's attracting you to home service? Why is it that you've got a very successful real estate investment uh business and now you're looking home service?

So, I own two main real estate companies. You mentioned them in the beginning. You know, at One Roof Real One Roof Investment Group is a is a wholesaling company, right? And we're one of the largest wholesalers in the nation. We wholesale uh nationwide. Um and that company does really well and it's a cash cow, right? But it's not a sellable company, you know, really at the maybe you could figure out some creative way to sell or finance it or some, you know, to somebody, but ultimately it's just a cash flow company, right? We built it for cash flow. It's great at what it does and um and nothing more, nothing less, which is cool, right? Uh Space, which is the retail real estate team that we own, um is one of the largest in the nation.

We're nation, we're in four different uh states right now. And um and so that company will do about 2,000 transactions this year, closings. Um so we have 2,000 clients a year right now that already like, trust, and respect us, buyers and sellers. We already bought or sold for them, represented them, and the first person they call is us for all their home service referrals. So they're asking us, you know, throughout the transaction process, right? Who's a good pest control company?

Is that all is that local? No, that's in four for Texas, Florida, Arizona, California. Okay.

Yep. And so, um, you know, we already have all that whole book of business that we already refer other home service companies to. So, what we do currently is we partner up with other guys like A1 Garage or whoever, right? and we'll create some sort of agreement where we'll say hey you'll be our preferred vendor and for that company for us you know anytime somebody asks us to you know for uh to fix a garage door or whatever we'll refer A1 Garage in return you know then we'll make a deal with you whatever that looks like it's different for every yeah an affiliate deal whatever right and so my whole thing is I want to now obviously I can't do them all I'm only you know we're entrepreneur we got to be careful not to chase too many rabbits at one time but I knew that home services was the future for what we were trying to do because I want to I want to build a company that is sellable, right? Not that I will sell.

Maybe I will, maybe I won't, but I want to at least build a company that I can have the opportunity to sell. And we already have that that book, so why not? You know,

every business I touch will have a five-year plan or less to sell. Yep. That's what we're doing. Yeah. Three to five years,

no matter what. Three years is better. Yep. And so that type of thinking causes a bigger better dream and it allows you to reverse engineer faster and move quicker.

I think a lot of people are like, "Man, I live the greatest lifestyle. I pay for my boat. I pay for this. I pay for the chef. I got the plane on this." And and I'm like, "Yeah, but

the multiple it's it's arbitrage. You're missing the the boat here." And uh I think people think if they sell their business and I'm curious what you think, but a lot of people think they lose their identity like that's their purpose and they act like man I'm just used to going in being the guy and I've got a pretty good easy lifestyle but you know you build a $10 million business at a 12x that's 120 million

and you can still roll equity into that deal. Yeah. And then go three 4x it again pretty easily.

And I always ask this question u if you were going to sell in a year what would you do? and they're like, "Well, I do this, this, this, this. Why don't you just do that now?"

Yeah, totally. Yeah. I mean, look, I I agree and disagree, right? I think maybe it depends on the type of person, but I think that for me at least, and it sounds like probably for you, I I'm just a natural entrepreneur. Like, I I it doesn't matter. Like, I'm not going to retire. Like, I don't see myself just going and hanging out on the beach. Like, I would dude, I would be bored in 48 hours. And my wife can tell you, she's sitting behind the camera. I I can maybe lay on a lawn chair for an hour. And I hate my life. Like, I'm like, we got to go scuba diving. we need to jump out of a helicopter like we got to go do something right and so I I think I am addicted to building companies uh you know providing value to the marketplace that's what we do in America right we're capitalist economy I think it's really cool to take an idea you know and to bring it to the marketplace to provide real value a good product or service

whatever that is and to see the fruit of that labor on the back end and so if I were to sell a company I would just go start another company or I like it would just it would lead to something else like my identity is in the fact that, you know, I it's in other things. It isn't in one said company, if you will, right? You know,

and I think there's a lot of people that try to do that. What Richard Branson does is he says, "I'll never be the CEO." Kind of like Warren Buffett again,

but I'm going to hire the best top down instead of bottom up like your first company where you had to go do all the work.

So, you get the right team, the who, not how, which is Dr. Benjamin's Hardy. It's his book and uh Dan Sullivan. It's get the right people on the bus. let them go do it with your guidance, your connections, your network.

Totally. So valuable. Yeah. You you know this economy I hear good, bad, and indifferent. What do you think is going to happen here in the next year or two?

Yeah, great question. I mean, nobody's got a crystal ball, right? I do, however, think that in the next couple of years, the overall economy is going to look pretty good. Um, it's just my opinion. You know, I I I'm very optimistic actually about the next, you know, three or four years. I think there's a lot of turbulence right now, but I think at at a certain point a lot of that is going to calm down. The markets are going to stabilize and then the real estate market, we just need interest rates to come down. The only X factor when it comes to real estate is that they say for every 1% uh that rates come down, a million new buyers will come into the market on a national level. But I think that, you know, and this is pure speculation, but I think a million sellers will come to the market too because of everybody who's locked in right now, right? So what will that do?

I think initially supply and demand will just cancel each other out is my kind of theory and then over time demand will outpace supply and we'll see appreciation again and again it'll be subm market by subm market right California is going to look different than Arizona which will look different than Atlanta Georgia right

you know for the listeners I know quite a bit about wholesaling and there's a lot of ways to acquire customers you can send them handwritten letters you get door knockers you go to the courthouse and you look for overgrown property you go to hoarders you go to a place for mom you know there's ways to get through to these people that are looking for a cash offer. How do you generate just go through the business model a little bit, what you've learned? Yeah. In the model, and how you acquire leads.

So, I've done it all. You know, great question. I I've done the door knockocking, the cold calling, the texting, the pay-per-click, paper lead. Um, I mean, you name it, right? And, you know, the only thing I haven't done is TV and radio as of yet. Um, for for that company in particular, right? So, I've never dabbled in that. I do eventually want to like I know Doug Hopkins I know you've done I mean like I know you know people who could get the door open for us but here's what I'll say I've spent a lot of money on direct we call that direct to seller marketing right meaning we're going directly to the homeowner to get a property under contract below market value then flip that paperwork right um

you ever take it down yourself or you just Yeah all the time yeah we don't do much lately because

so you do the remodeling and everything we've done a lot and now you're just flipping it to the next

now we just wholesale Doug does yeah yeah because Look, flipping can be really cool. It's a pain in the ass to scale, right? It sure if you want to flip one or two houses at a time, be my guest, right? I've done that. But I've gotten to a point where we had 15 or 20 flips going on at a time. It just doesn't make any sense. We make the same amount of money wholesaling the paperwork that we do on the flip when it's all said and done and the the wholesale deal takes five minutes and we never have to leave our office. So, we like wholesaling better. Um flipping is cool, you know, for some people, right?

Do you have like five or 10 major buyers that you're just feeding? We have a lot of buyers. Yeah. Uh, you know, I would say we have our VIP buyers is what we would call them nationwide. We probably have a thousand like really good buyers that just buy deal after deal after deal. But, you know, I'd say 50% of our deals sell to new buyers every month, too, right? But to answer your question and come full circle really quick for the listener, um, what we do now more than anything is we don't spend a lot of money on marketing anymore. What we do now is we we have really two main ways that we bring in deals. through real estate agents and through other wholesalers where we'll just co-h wholesale, right? It costs zero dollars in marketing. Okay? So, our overhead, like our overhead is minimal and we can operate a profit margin on that company of 55 or 60% when we do that at a high level. And there's

thousands of wholesalers in the market today that don't know how to get a cash buyer. They don't know what the hell they're doing. They stumbled across a deal because they went door knockocking or driving for dollars or whatever the case may be. And they need our help.

They need the list of buyers. They need the list of the thousand good buyers. And we'll just split that deal with them 50/50.

And you started about 12 years, 11, 12 years ago. Yeah. I started wholesaling in 2014. Mhm. Yeah.

How old were you then? 18. Nice. Yeah. Uh-huh. It's a good way to get started. So, I love people that go out and they figure it out. Uh,

I would tell anybody listening, do not get into wholesale if you're in home service. Stay focused. The one thing by Gary Keller. Agreed.

Not saying don't do it, but I'd rather go to a guy like Austin here and say, "Let me become an investor in the business and let me figure out a way." Because,

you know, real estate could be good. We all know Grant Cardone. We all know cash flow is everything. Robert Kiyosaki. Cash flow. Cash flow. Cash flow. I don't necessarily agree with just cash flow because, you know, my deal we did I got a couple hundred million.

Yeah. And the next deal I'll get a billion next year. And not to mention all the other businesses you add up, that's 500 million more.

Yeah. I love cash flow. But you know what the cash flow is when you invest a billion dollars

in a good PE deal? 22% IRRa. That's a billion dollars at 22% IRR is 220 million a year.

Cash flow is great, but like you said, it's hard to find a buyer for that. So you don't get rid of that. You worked hard for the last 11 years to build that. So that's the cash flow to build up these home service companies. And just remember what I told you, figure out the business, analyze the business, find out what they're selling for, find out how you're going to scale it.

Y because certain businesses are getting a lot more. Like our friend Cameron, pest controls got the highest because Terminex went public. Y

and now they could pay crazy multiples whereas, you know, a window company or a front door company is not a demand driven business right?

So you're not going to get as high a multiple. Totally. Yeah. No, I mean I and that's why I'm I'm excited to get into home services. What what if from what you got now a couple thousand clients whatever.

What one gets you excited the most? Which home service? Yeah. Which home service?

I think I'm going to start with pest. Pest control. Yeah. Well, that's what So, I go speak at all these events

and I speak to inspectors. I went out to massive inspector show and all these guys have pest control companies because that's the easiest one to sell.

Yeah. Like they that's how they build their business. Barrier of entry is easy.

Landscaping would be good if it was higherend. And then pool cleaning. Pool cleaning. So, I wanted to do pool cleaning really bad, okay? Cuz I owned a pool company when I was a kid, a little baby pool company, right? But I understand pools at a very high level. I could teach it like with my eyes closed. Like, I get it, right? And um Cameron being the good friend that he is talked me out of it. He he's like, "Listen, pools are great, but you know, you did it at a really small level. Like, I'm telling you, when you scale it, like it becomes very difficult. Technicians are impossible to train. You need repair guys on the road all the like it it was a dip because he owned Pineapple Pools obviously, right? And so, um, the good friend that he is, you know, I I just trusted his kind of thing on that. Now, eventually I might do pools. I own a couple of domains, you know, I could get into the pool industry, but and correct

me if I'm wrong, maybe you know more than I do. There isn't that high of a multiple on the pool company for whatever reason.

I Well, it is it's kind of like landscape pools pool and landscaping are very similar, whereas pest control is your in and out.

Yeah. Uh, and it's like you see nasty nasty stuff. And within within pest control, you could do pigeons, you could do roof rats,

you could decide you're going to do uh bed bugs. Bad bugs is a big one. I I was on a podcast like seven years ago with a guy that had trained dogs to go into hotels and find bed bugs.

So, the the these German shepherds would go, they know exactly what bugs have them, and like the dogs would go in. It's crazy.

Um, what do you think's going to happen? And I I was in you know the uh 707 72 sold. I was talking to we went to dinner

with Greg Hag. Yeah. Greg Greg Guy. And he thinks the real estate market's going to completely change. He's like obviously the buyer agent

commissions have kind of came down. It's the sellers agents that there's new rules coming in. And he's like

I'm just going to be very transparent and free. Mhm. But I'll sell all these other services. Like he'll be the title company. He'll be the inspection company. he'll make all the money out of ancillary things. What is your take on the future of what real estate looks like?

So, we already do a lot of that. You know, I own a title company. I own an insurance company. We own a mortgage company. Um, so we already make money multiple times on every deal. Um, you know, with that being said, I I agree with Greg. You know, I think that look, for your average agent, you're unfortunately the industry of real estate agents here's 1.8 million or whatever there is in in the US right now according to N. The majority of them are not very good at what they do. That's just a it's just the reality of the situation, right? That you know 5% of them are really good and 95% of them kind of suck ultimately, right? And so those are the ones that are struggling to fight for that commission because the law did change and now you have to negotiate. Before the seller's agent would just tell the seller, hey, we're going to pay the if a buyer if a buyer's agent brings us the deal, we're going to

pay him 3%. Are you okay with that? Okay, cool. Sign here. You're going to pay me three. We're going to pay a buyer agent three. If I happen to also be the buyer's agent, I'll get six, right? And it was pre-negotiated. So when when a buyer's agent went on the MLS to find their client a deal, then it was just like you would ask the seller, "Hey, what am I getting paid?" It would be right on the MLS. It would tell you. It'd say 2.5% or 3%. You knew immediately what you were going to make. Now it's not on the MLS anymore. So if you're a buyer's agent, right, you need to call that sellers agent, say, "Hey, if I bring you a buyer, ready, willing, enable buyer, and I write a contract, will your seller pay me a commission?"

And have a verbal conversation. And then you actually have to negotiate that commission and get try to get the seller to pay for it. And the seller can ultimately say no, right? And then if they say no, then you got to go to your buyer and say, "Hey, well, do you want to pay me or do you like or we can't I can't represent you." Like, you know, I'm not I don't work for free type of thing, right? And so you have to be a really good agent to have those conversations. Now, we're really good at it and my team is really good at it. Um, so our, believe it or not, our average commission as a company when N rolled out that lawsuit and it took effect went up, not down. Right? So our, our, our average commission went up by about 0.2%. So 0.20. Um, and you know, that's just a result of us being really good at what we do and being able to have that conversation at a really high level and get those sellers to pay our buyers

agents what they're worth, right? But, you know, the industry as a whole. Yeah, dude. I mean, look, AI technology, I mean, in five or 10 years, and that's why I'm getting into home services ultimately, right? I love the real estate agent um, you know, company that we've built and it's an amazing company, but I'm not naive to the fact that AI is going to redefine the majority of of these types of jobs. And it's not a matter of if, it's just a matter of when, right? And I think every agent watching this should also have a backup plan, right? Hey, spend less than you make and go buy rental properties. like go, you know, if you're making 200 grand a year right now, stop spending 200 grand a year, spend 80 grand a year, spend 60 grand a year. Buy drive an old beat up car so that you can afford to invest and and you know, if something does happen to your job, you're not freaking out on the street.

100%. You know, it's funny. We we're looking at a bunch of real estate deals and I don't know where I'm at yet, but I want to be diversified in the way that uh there there's a few guys I know. Uh Bigger Pockets. Yeah. Brandon.

Brandon. beard bearded brand big red beard or whatever. Uh he and I I went out to do a podcast on to Hawaii.

Yeah. And that's a really interesting model. He has a ton he has a ton of real estate.

I think he's got a couple billion under contract. Yeah. And he gets paid on the you know after a while he's his is all later in the game. But I love that idea of

vacation, right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean are you big into like single family or do you think there's a real big game for multif family?

I think there's a huge game for multif family. I think for me, right, I'm 30 years old, right? So, I have to I have to kind of look at what I what I have built so far. We've mastered the single family game. So much so that I have these two main real estate companies will sell a few thousand houses a year and growing. And I'm hardly even involved, which is what is allowing me the time to go get into home services, right? Because I have such good partners and such a good team that I'm able to kind of venture off and and do more things, which is why I'm doing that. For me right now, it makes more sense for me to get into home services because I can I'll make more money quicker at the age that I'm at and for what we have going on, right? Like the the multif family game would just it's a great game for me, but it's a game that I could get into when I'm 35 or 36 or 37. Like it's not going anywhere, you know? I I'd love

to go try to sell a company first and get put a hundred million or so or whatever in the account and then go and and venture into what that might look like. So, from what you've heard, you've been putting the feelers out there. What do you think your biggest challenges are going to be when it comes to home service?

I mean, you know, hiring. I think we we're really good at at culture, you know, like we have over 500 people between our companies right now. So, like I understand how to build good culture. I understand how to bring the right people in, put them in the right seats. I understand systems and processes. I would just say I would say the mechanics of the industry itself will be the biggest challenge, right? Like learning like I personally am going to go get in a truck and I'm going to go spray, right? Like I'm going to find somebody that will take me and show me, you know, and um because I need to be able to understand it 100%. Every aspect of it that way I can stand at the front of the room and teach the technicians and and really and they can actually respect me, right? So I've literally told my partners I'm like I'm going to disappear for a few months and I'm going to go learn past like I'm going to learn

everything about it right cuz the back end won't be as hard for us. Sure, it'll be difficult, right? Everything, but business is difficult. We're used to that, you know? But in terms of like finding people, putting out ads, like bringing building the truck, you know, wrapping the truck, the decals, getting the product, you know, um, and then building systems and processes, getting the right CRM, putting everybody in Slack, like that stuff's not that difficult for us. So, yeah, I think learning the mechanics of the industry will be the hardest. So, here's a piece of advice and for the listeners out there, what I would do is Cameron knows a lot of the same guys I do, but you find the top bankers.

Yeah. In the industries you're looking at and they've done deals. They've done Terminex deals. They've done the biggest best deals and say, "Look, a lot of these there's information out there to find out if you're on the wrong CRM, you'll take a a 2x multiple less." Yeah. If you're didn't build your your your your models correctly, the like if you did door too, you're worth half as much. Yeah. Versus because the door todoor the the clients turn over quicker.

So I had to go say who sold for the highest multiples y that are public and can I get a look at their balance sheet and income statement. So I got to understand where my cost of goods need to be. I got to understand where my late all these different things.

And that way you could have kind of an architecture. I call it R&D. Rip off and duplicate. Yep.

Just reverse engineer what that is. And there you know what the golden the golden star is, right?

I love that. That's great advice. And and then what I'll also tell you is I pay to play. I've got more consultants. For every 40 podcast I do, I hire a consultant.

And the last guy I hired is about to fire me cuz he's not taking on any more clients. And he said, "I'm done." Uh Dan Martell. Yep.

And he's like, "Tommy, I've never told this story, but I'm actually cropping the video and sending it to people." He goes, "I'm going through this phase of no in my life." And he goes, "This is a $500,000 watch." And I'm not telling you that to brag. He said, "I remind myself who I am with this 30 cent bracelet."

But he said, "It's a $500,000 watch. Do you know why I'm wearing a $500,000, not a $600 or $400,000 watch?

Because a $500,000 an hour is what makes a billion a year." And he goes, "So you're not going to pay me $500,000 an hour. I have a path to get there. And I'm in the stage in my life where I'm saying no to anything that's a distraction.

And as much as I try to help people out, it's not always about money for me. It's about networking, meeting the right people. The network is your net worth.

But it meant a lot to me because I tend to say yes. And if I say yes to you, I'm saying no to my fiance. I'm saying no to my potential kids that are coming hopefully once we get married. Y

and uh I'm saying no to a lot of my family. So truth. Yeah. How do you deal with that?

It's hard, you know? I mean, you you just I think Dan Martell is right on the money, right? You have to get good at saying no at some point, you know? And I think what's interesting about entrepreneurship, and tell me if you agree, when you're first starting out, like for people who are watching who are just starting out as an entrepreneur, you have to say yes to everything, right? And then somewhere along the way, you have to completely 180 and say no to almost everything. And that's actually a difficult transition to make. I don't know if you could pinpoint the exact moment where you had to make that transition, but I can remember where I, you know, because you have to, in the beginning, you just have to say yes to anything that comes your way because like you're just trying to freaking

you need to make a you need to make a living. you need to make payroll. So, you know, but then at a certain point, it's the polar opposite of that. And it's it's actually a hard transition, I would say, more than anything mentally because you're so used to mentally you have to kind of like retrain your brain to be like to to think the opposite way that you've always thought as as you know, a startup entrepreneur. So, I'm at a point now similar to you. You probably say no to slightly more stuff. Obviously, you're older and and more wise and ahead of where I'm at. I'm 30 years old at the end of the day. Um, but I I am embarking on the journey of saying no. And I'm getting pretty good at it. You know, I would say for me right now, the biggest thing I have to say no to is any business opportunity that doesn't vertically integrate with what we're already doing. Like if you really look at every company that we own, right? You

look at from my media company to my two real estate companies to title, mortgage, insurance, and then now, you know, getting into pest control, they all go hand in. They all vertically integrate. They all talk to each other and feed each other, right? You know, if a wholesale deal, somebody doesn't want to take a cash offer, it goes to my retail company, right? If my retail company's out on a listing appointment, they want a cash offer, it goes to my wholesale company, right? Both those companies, we send to our title company, we send to our mortgage, our insurance, right?

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

Well, that's a great thing for the listeners to hear because you know there was a time where I was flipping real estate.

A1 would have grew way faster. It took 18 years to get to this point if I didn't get distracted.

And I said this idea of an entrepreneur, this visionary idea is I could do anything I put my mind to, but it still takes time. Mhm.

takes effort. It takes energy. It takes money. So I I love Essentialism. The one thing those are two books that the listeners should be reading if they want to learn to focus

and and yes, we can make anything work, but you're Robin Peter to pay Paul. Is it's like you got to really do this spreadsheet analysis and say if this thing goes well, how much am I making per hour?

Yeah. And some of the stuff I do, I don't make anything. Like literally, I go speak at an event. Sometimes I don't even charge. Mhm.

But I'm up there meeting people and networking and there's certain people there that I go and intentionally wanting to meet

and those people sometimes turn into consultants. Sometimes they turn into really good friends. So I would say never give up this opportunity to go out and network and meet the people because that's I think the best opportunity that you should be spending your time and be very purposeful in who you're going to meet.

I agree. Yeah. The v especially if you're the visionary of the company, right? Which I assume most of your listeners are. They're probably not the integrator. They're probably the the, you know, the visionary. I mean, obviously, you can be both, but the majority of people are one or the other, right?

No. Yeah. There's a lot of people I know that think they're both. Uh, look, you still lean one way.

Oh, 100%. I've met a lot of people that that read uh you know, F uh what is it? Rocket Fuel.

Yeah. Yo Wickman and uh Mark Wyinners. I had both them both on the podcast. And the deal is

is they're like, "Yeah, I can do both." And I'm like, but trust me, once you get the right integrator, I mean, most of us with ADHD that are visionaries, that are founders are not the guys. We could do it. I've had to go down and build the compensation plans. And shoot, I was in the truck for eight years. And I was forced myself to do it, but I didn't have as much fun.

I need help getting these ideas fulfilled. Yeah. And when you get the right integrator, you start sprinting. And the hardest part, I'm going to tell you this right now, the best advice I could give you in the home service industry, form an EIP, equity incentive program. I'm writing a book on it right now. It's called pay them what they're worth.

And to be able to attract people with a stake in the outcome that are running that say I'm an owner, but let's say you build a business to where it's worth 5 million bucks and then you say, "I'm building this program." That 5 million is yours.

Mhm. And then they get 1% and the business sells for 100 million. They get 950,000.

Got it. That makes sense. So, so it doesn't have to be rolled out the day you start the company.

It doesn't need to be rolled out the same day, and I wouldn't do it the same day. I do it when there's value there for yourself. And the other thing I can tell you what happens with it

is you could recruit way stronger people. Like you could get cameras got to non-compete, but you can start going after people that have made a lot of money and they say, "Wait a minute. You built a great business, but if I come turn a few dials here, I could 10x this business, but it's expensive. You give me a couple hundred grand, but I want to I want an ownership."

Sure. And it's earned. Mhm. So that that's and it works. Every private equity company does this. Every public traded company does stock options.

Y but the home service companies haven't figured this out yet for whatever reason.

And here's the deal. You make a mistake with this. You gave away half your company. It's a really bad thing. And it's not something you play lightly with just handing equity to everybody.

I did it. I probably made a few mistakes, but I'm glad I did it. I've reverse engineered. I whiteboarded doing it versus not doing it.

And it was fun because a lot of people became millionaires. 20 22 people. And hindsight, some of them maybe didn't deserve it. Some of them probably deserve a little more. It's not a perfect It's not a perfect plan, but it's a great plan.

Totally. I I agree. I you know, big advice. You know, you've you founded a lot of companies. What do you think? You talked a little bit about culture, and culture used to be a bad word when I first started. I'm like, these these guys are smoking. They're they're getting in accidents. They're stealing my stuff.

Uh but I didn't have the right infrastructure, and I didn't reward them the right way. and come up with the right compensation programs. What do you think what do you think what makes a culture go well? What what what are the things you've learned in the last 10 years?

Well, it starts from the top, you know. I mean, you you know, as a leader, you have to lead by example. You have to set that example every single day of your life. I really believe that. And eventually, when you're so big, if you're not the guy, then like your leadership team has to be that those people, right? Like it it all starts at the very top, you know? Um and so I think you have to build it that way. And then I think a lot of it is paying people well. I mean, truthfully, right? It's like you said it a little while ago, freaking pay people what they're worth or more than they're worth for that matter, right? Like I've I've actually in a lot of my companies probably overpaid people to be frank with you. I mean, I've probably actually like not paid myself as much money as I could have paid myself or that the company could have just profited because I actually paid people too well. I paid

them above what the market would have dictated that I would have had to pay them, right? They never leave because they're getting paid a lot of money. People can say, "Oh, it's not about the money." But at the end of the day, it's like, I mean, come on. My employees show up to work because if I stop paying them, they're not going to work for me. So, it's clearly about the money. I mean, I get that they also want to Everything else is really important, too, right? Take your executive team to Cabo, buy them dinner, take them to Mastros, you know, have incentives, you know, it it's a it's kind of the collective of of all these different things I think that equal culture in my opin. And I'm sure you would agree.

Yeah, I think that um there's no one word to describe culture, but what I do think is you got to get the whole family on board. You come home from a hard day, you're greasy, you're smelly, it's been a long day, maybe the day didn't go right, and you got your significant other to say, "Look, they treat you perfectly. Today was a tough day, but last week you made a ton of money. They take you on these trips. They take us to a park." Some people are like, "I can't afford to do all the stuff you do." I was like, "Can you afford Bisquick? Can you make pancakes?"

Yeah. Like everybody's got a reason why they can't. And I usually say this in the podcast is I always say like my goals are massive. My dreams are really big. Like my dreams got to be big enough to fit everybody's dream inside.

Y but don't have my dreams. Like why? I'm 42. I've never been married. I don't have any kids yet. I had to sacrifice a lot to get to this level.

And the fact that I didn't get married was because duty calls. Yeah. I mean I'd walk out of a theater on a first date with a chick and say, "I got to go run this call. I'm sorry.

And if they wanted to date me, they'd have to go run calls with me. I mean, that's, you know, over a decade ago. But,

you know, I think what people should do, and this would be a great exercise for you. You're never going to stop. I can see that in you.

But to reverse engineer, just say, "Look mom dad sister brother whoever it is, I got an uncle, I got this grandma I want to help." Figure out who are all the things. What do you want to do for them? What do you need to do for your family? Do you want to set a trust for your kids? All these things. And have a number. That doesn't mean you're over. It just means I was it. People are like, "I'm never going to sell." I'm like, "Well, how do the people in your company win?" How does your family win? Yeah. Like, they're going to watch you work for 10 more years, so you're never going to buy the boat that you promised them you were going to go fishing every summer. You're never going to be able to take them on that trip you promised. And some people have enough cash flow to do some of these things. But if you do an EIP program, that doesn't come to fruition till the company changes control. So, I

think it's selfish to not want to sell. I agree. Yeah, I agree. I agree with everything you said. Even the part where you talk about bringing in the spouse and the significant other of the person. We've actually interviewed people before where we're like, "Hey, we want you to bring your your your husband or your wife to the interview." Like, we want to interview you with your husband and wife in the room. Like, cuz we want to we want to make sure that when you when it it becomes a good fit and we get through this interview and it and it's a win-win that you already have the approval of your significant other. Like, we don't want you to try to go home and convince them and then they're not on board and this that and the other thing. So, I agree with you completely on that as well.

So, it's funny because obviously I just got engaged six months ago, but we've been dating for a long time. She It was overdue. And um Dave Ramsey talks about four things when you get married.

Yep. Guess what the four things are. I'm just curious. You got to make a you take a stab at

I actually am not sure. I don't listen to Dave Ramsey too much. And I don't really listen to him a whole lot because I believe in maximum leverage when it's when it's your business.

Yeah. Yeah. Um I mean, talk about, you know, your finances probably. It's probably it all has to do with like being transparent, I'm sure, about like do you have credit card debt? You know, how much money do we do each of us make? Who's who's doing what in the household? Like come into some sort of agreement, I would imagine.

Well, the money is a big one. Um, how you going to raise your kids if somebody's Mormon, somebody's Catholic?

Sure. Of course. How's that going to come together? The other one, uh, politics.

Yeah. I mean, think about it. If you got a raging left Democrat and a raging right right-winged skin head, you know,

hopefully you would find that out by the first date. Yeah. No, that's a big one. And then the last one is in-laws, believe it or not,

okay? Because an in-law could come in and really change things up with the way you parent with the way what they believe. I mean, you know, I could tell you stories about that, but not I love I love her. I I love my in-laws, but there there I've seen families come apart because

it's just my grandma was pretty tough on my dad. It was my grandma on my mom's side.

It's really rough on my dad, but I think it's So, my COO, an amazing guy, and I don't think he'd care if I shared the story.

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

Yeah. And it's just crazy. It's the most important decision you'll ever make. Totally. I agree completely. Yeah. I I um I Yeah. It's why I, you know, picked the one that I picked.

Yeah. You better say that. She's right here. Um what's the best advice you've ever received and from who and how did it impact your life? One of the pieces that comes to my head immediately is how you do anything is how you do everything, you know? Like brush your teeth like a freaking champion. Make your bed like a champion. Like what do you do? Like, you know, wash your car. Like I'll interview people and I'm like, let's pull your car up. Let's I just on the first interview because I don't want to tell them that in advance. I'm like, I just let's go look at your car. If they have trash and stuff all over their car, dude, they are not a good fit for our organization. I'm telling you that right now. Right. If they got a tidy, clean car, like that's what I'm looking for, you know? So how you do anything is how you do everything. And I think that applies to every aspect of you know when we look at

relationally financially physically emotionally, spiritually, right? How you know go into every single thing that you do and give it your 100%. You know, too many people are walking around planet earth giving 50% here, 20% here. Like they're like they go home, they give their their spouse their leftovers, they go to their their company and they give their employees leftovers. Like they it's just like then why are you doing anything? like just Yeah.

Well, they chose to have that position. Yeah. And and the other thing is they realize a lot of people don't feel

they don't feel right. Their bodies aren't working anymore. And that's just they don't want to go to the doctor. They don't want to exercise. They don't get enough sleep.

They don't want to eat healthy. And that's just when I see people change that piece where they're on the like whether it's u

something to do with your estrogen or testosterone levels or maybe it has something to do with your digestive system, leaky gut. Sure.

But when you get that stuff fixed, especially when you hit 40s and 50s, you find that your time is actually a better effort. Like you like some people are like, "Well, listen, I don't like to work out. Can you go for a walk?" Right?

Here's a quick joke. So, this guy's in this interview. And he goes, "Why don't you uh why don't you give me your worst quality?" And uh he goes, "Well, kind of think of it as probably that I'm too honest."

Mhm. And he goes, "Well, I don't really consider that a bad quality." And he goes, "Well, I don't give a damn what you think." I mean, I say the joke differently, but since we're podcasting,

that's actually funny. Um, so yeah, the advice, how do you decide who you're going to take advice from?

They have to have what you want in whatever area it is that you're trying to get advice from. What I will say on that though, very quickly, is that um, you know, you don't, one, a mentor doesn't have to be a mentor in every area of life. You have to be very careful. I've had a lot of mentors in my life that knew how to make a lot of money, but I would have never gotten fi relationship advice from them, right? They their marriages were or their, you know, they everything it was just garbage, right? their friendships, their their you know um or you know maybe somebody knows how to make a lot of money but uh you know they don't have the same faith that you have. It's like I'm not going to go to you and ask you about scripture from the Bible because like that's just not right. And so I think like I have different mentors in my life that give that feed me different things. So you know I might have a

spiritual mentor, a fin a business mentor, right? I might have you know a physical right a trainer you know. So I think that's important. Too many people they go to their trainer and they get freaking relationship advice and it's like you're talking to a single like you know it's just like you got to make sure that when you get advice from somebody that they have exactly what you want to have. If they don't have what you want, why the hell are you taking advice from them?

No, you're right. And a lot of people like if you're going to go to a trainer, you want them to have the body maybe you would consider having.

Yeah. If if your trainer is 100 pounds overweight, you're probably not going to hire them. I'm sorry. I I like, you know what I mean? Like, you're not Why would I hire that guy? If he knew how to do what he's telling me how to do, why isn't he doing it

right now? It's smart. And when it comes to marital advice, parenting, there there's I always say success leaves clues. I'm not going to read I I will read books on parenting, but the fact is I was with a couple recently, Brenn and Mark. We were in um uh Jackson Hole,

and their kids, they'd run up and give me a hug. They were laughing the whole time. They were very obedient and Brenn would be like, "Don't talk like a baby." And at like to her four-year-old and she'd be like, "Okay, mom. I'm sorry."

And just very respectful. And I'm like, "You guys are going to give me parenting advice because these kids are phenomenal."

Wow. And that's what I mean is like if the kids were crying the whole time and angry and weren't listening and on their iPad the whole time, I'd be like, "Probably not going to listen to these."

Absolutely not. Yeah. No. And you can see it, right? Like that's why I think people are silly when they're like when they get bad advice or something because it's like it's pretty clear whatever whatever person you're trying to get advice from like if they have what you want or not. For the most part, money might be the only one that maybe somebody could fake I guess, you know? Um but other things is pretty hard to fake, right? Like you're either a man of God or you're not. Like it's like if you're at the club every weekend all the time 247 like I'm probably not going to come to you for like spiritual advice.

Like you know it's pretty clear. Money is the one thing where it's like I've you know there you there I don't think you can fake it forever but there are a lot of fakers out there unfortunately people.

Yeah. Where it's just all leverage and credit cards and debt and whatever. So you got to be a little careful I think with the financial one like try to make sure that they have what you want to have. You know because I've seen people that look like they they have what I want but then when I really get under the hood I'm like dude you don't have what I want at all. Like you're you're stressed out. You're like you know you spend every dollar you make like whatever. Right. I think those people are chasing a lifestyle

and once you reach a certain lifestyle it's hard to move back and I see a lot of people their biggest mistake is

the business starts making money and they go hey listen they talk to their wife or husband and they say we deserve

we deserve we've worked hard we deserve and that you got to live below your means for a while it's almost like a snowball you pack it you put it down the hill once it gets big enough you get to go like I've done a lot of nice things the last couple years

but ultimately I I mean, it wasn't that long ago. I was living in a th00and I own the apartment complex, but it was 1,000 square feet.

I watched a video of yours the other day where you said you drove for I don't I don't remember how many years. You can say, but you drove an old an old vehicle

for a long time. It wasn't important to me. And I I knew like, hey, if I put this back into the business and and plus

I didn't know what was going to happen because people do look at you a lot differently and it's it's a good thing and it's a bad thing.

Sure. Because I try to stay super humble. I was in Idaho and we brought my chef and my driver with me

and people were like and it's Idaho and they were like wait what and I'm like it's kind of embarrassing honestly but like they really help us out a lot and this allows me to be way more focused at work allows me like I don't enjoy driving. I don't hate it. I don't cook that well

especially the healthy like cooking with the seed oils and all this stuff. So I got a guy that does it so much better

and he does stuff perfectly and it's so much easier. People are like man it must be easy for you to say. like go back and live my life before you say that. Everybody wants the views, but no one wants to take the hike.

Yeah, dude. When we get awarded for public for the work we did in private, you know, and at the end of the day, any any any public accolade that anybody's ever received that all they're doing is receiving an award for decades of work that they did behind the curtain that nobody ever saw and that they never got an accolade for. So, yeah, people are silly when they say crap like that, right? It's like anybody that's truly successful put in a lot of years behind the freaking curtain where they didn't they never got praised. They never got an accolade ever. Anybody. I don't care who it is. I've never, you know, one

maybe maybe some of the Bitcoin kids maybe. But even then, dude, like then they'll lose their money because their financial thermostat is not where it needs to be. So like there's no such thing as fast money. I really believe that. That's why almost every lottery winner 90% I think they go bankrupt, right? Because remember their financial thermostat was at 100 grand a year or 60 grand a year. They knew everything about 60 grand a year. Now they have 100 million. They don't their thermostat didn't Bob Proctor used to talk a lot about this, right? like you your your finances will just come to match whatever your thermostat is set at, you know. So, um but anyways, yeah.

So, with your podcast, I'll tell you when I started my podcast, now this is the eighth year. And I actually used it. I didn't realize when I was starting it. I felt like I had a lot to say of the mistakes. I didn't want to go in there and say, "God, look what I did." But what happened is is every podcast I'd be able to get like I'd have a problem with HR. I'd go find the number one person in HR in the world. They'd get on the podcast for an hour that they might charge a hundred grand for that. They'd be glad to come on

for free. And I'd get all my questions answered and people listen to the podcast are like, "Dude, you your questions were like when you were at 10 million, it was all the questions I had at 10 million." Yeah.

And then I listened to it and I got to 30 and you were asking the questions at 30 and yes, the technology has changed a little bit, but overall it's the same advice.

What What did What did you start the podcast for? What are some of the biggest takeaways?

Dude, you nailed it, bro. I mean, that's literally why I started it. I start to be frank I started it very selfishly to to do exactly what you just described right it was an excuse to talk to cool people that I wouldn't otherwise be able to talk to right and then it evolved you know and then it became about the other people it became about you know just networking in general providing value to the people but like it didn't start out that you know and I think it kind of goes handinhand with like being an entrepreneur right like every entrepreneur I always tell young people you know you can it's okay to just want to make a lot of money when you're brand new at entrepreneurship because I know for a fact it'll change over time. You know, you see so many people that are like, "Don't do it for that." It's like, "No, dude. You can have a goal of making a lot of money, right?" And I think that goes handinhand with the other thing

too, right? It's like it's okay to be honest and say, "Hey, I did this for a selfish reason, but then it turned in to a selfless act." Yeah. Right. And that's really what it has done for me as well. Now, you know, I bring Dude, I connect so many people. I have people that come on my podcast and I I'm like the connector now or I try to be, right? It's like I'm literally thinking about who do they need to know. And then as soon as we're done filming, I'll send like three group texts. Oh yeah. And I'll be like, "Dude, you got to meet this guy, blah, blah, blah." And I'll just provide value, value, value. And I won't ask for anything in return, right?

And you know, maybe one day, 5, 10 years from now, sure, maybe I will make a phone call and ask for a favor, right? But that's not my intention.

No, it's great. I love that. Connect the I have about five connectors that basically could give me access to anybody. Yeah.

And I use it only when I really, really need it. Mhm. Uh some of them are too big of connectors where they'll send me 20 names and I'm like just give me the top one. Yeah.

Give me I really got the specific need. And um it's very interesting because when you get that that's so true. When you really start to network and take care of people and ask for nothing in return, it comes back full circle. Zig Ziggler said you could have anything you want in life if you help enough people get what they want.

Love that. And it's so it's so real. It is. What's uh what's the most difficult time that you've had to go through in business? There's been a lot of difficult times. Um, you know, I think just all the times over the last 11 or 12 years where, you know, you'll have a great year and you really start to think that you're, you know, making it happen or whatever the case might be and then the next quarter or year or whatever is just garbage, you know, and you go backwards. And the first thing that entrepreneurs do, by the way, is uh they stop paying themselves, right? It's the first thing that I' that comes to my mind. If we had a bad month right now, let's just say hypothetically, the first thing I would do is is not pay myself that month. I wouldn't fire like like you know, I might do that the following month if we if it doesn't improve, right? But the very first thing that I'll do is make is

I'll be the one to suffer before anybody else suffers, right? And I think that's just the natural instinct of a true entrepreneur, right? And so I've had a lot of years like that, you know? It took there was a lot of years where I didn't pay myself a dollar, you know, and I went from like making a ton of money to like zero again. And then you go back to it's like a roller coaster. You know, I think people think success is linear, but it really is not linear at all. Right. We've all seen that meme floating around like the ditches.

Literally the bridges. Yeah. And and that's the reality of being an entrepreneur. So, I don't know, you know, to name one particular instance, I'm not sure. probably getting into bad partnerships and stuff, you know, just it didn't work out and you got to like start from scratch, get rid of your, you know, like divorce your business partner, separate everything, go rebuild it all over again. Like, um, hiring the wrong people. Like I've had a lot of seasons where, you know, you bring in one bad apple and they and then all of a sudden, next thing you know, you got to fire like 20 people because they've contaminated everything,

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

somebody that started with nothing is like, "Hey, what what's the most you can take?"

Literally. Yeah. I uh I wanted to ask you, so with partnerships, I I don't think anything in life is 50/50.

I don't even think marriage is it's it's great if you could get to to somewhat like 49 51, but

sure. I I always think there's there's give and take in a marriage and there's other things that you don't even realize they're going through. And same thing with partnerships, but I think it's all in how you define the operating agreement and how you could wind it back

and there's expectations built into it. And I I don't love lawyers, but they're a necessary evil to do it the right way.

I mean, what do you do now when you look for a partner? I mean, obviously you you probably vet it. you talked with our last partners and and things like that, but how do you make sure you're getting

I mean, look, look, I did a deal with Cody, you know, and and I know he was going to hustle and we've got meetings on marketing. I got my team helping out a lot.

I've not put a ton of effort because quite frankly, I kind of want them to fail. Yeah.

And few things. I don't want them to fail at all, right? But I want them to learn the lessons smaller than I had to learn.

Sure. And when they're ready and for the next level, I'm like, I don't want to pour a tunch of bunch of leads when they can't keep up with the ones they got.

And there's all these things that happen early in business. It's less than a year old. So,

they don't mind that. They fall forward. They get back up. This wasn't a big mistake. They come to me when they're ready. They go, "We're ready for more leads. We're ready to start the TV buys. We're doing this. We're doing this. We're doing this." And I've used every contact I have. That's I've been using my network. When I jump in, give them more time.

It's going to be tough for me because they're going to go, "Well, we don't want to do that." Yeah. And I'm going to say, "Well, how much do you want this business?" I asked I I said, "Do you want a $30 million business? The worth the net worth of the business? Do you want a $300 million business?"

He said, "300." I said, "That's not going to happen overnight." Mhm. We're going to have to crawl a little bit. Then we're going to walk. Then we're going to sprint.

But that type of business is a lot different. 30 million I can get you there in two years.

Yeah. And they do trust me. And I do have a lot of the mistakes they've made. So it's it's one of those things where I was okay moving slower. They don't have these high expectations of me, but I've used the team. I've got a family office with a lot of guys that could do the software side and got the financials and get the reporting and figure out the tax benefits of doing things a certain way.

Sure. That's somebody that the missing thing that you'll probably need if you're like me is the best CFO in the world. If you get the best CFO,

yeah, there's so many crazy things accelerated depreciation things you could do.

100% bonus depreciation's back. It's a beautiful thing. It is a beautiful thing. I'm not in the uh jet. Yep.

Yeah. You know, we've got a what is it? Not netjet, but uh one of set jet or um it's there's a few of them.

Yeah. I forget what it's called, but you know, sentient. Not sentient. It's uh jet links.

Oh, yeah. Mhm. And what I've learned is what I don't want because they always give us these uh light jets. And I'm I'm 6'3. Yeah.

And I'm like, "Okay, we're going to have to get something bigger." And I I by the way the goal is that I bring my friends, my neighbors, the the A1 like my my co-workers I call them instead of employees. I want to bring them with me everywhere.

I want a little Gulf Stream. I do. I think a Gulf Stream. I think in like I mean in a perfect world a G6. Those are about

Yeah. 50 to 60. Mhm. Brand new, which is a lot of money. You can get them used.

Yeah. Probably go used, you know. I'm still You can take the guy out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the guy

100%. And I'm not the kind of guy that I need to post it all. You know, we post some of the stuff, but I told everybody I built this house in Idaho because everyone's going to be there.

Yeah. Family, friends, and my co-workers. It's and business acquaintances like all the time. We didn't build this house for me and Bri. It would have been a third a tenth of the size.

No. You get bored. Yeah. And I'm the type of guy I spent my first seven years kind of

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

Yeah, I'm with you. I hate it. I love company. I love entertaining, too. And if you could, I feel like you should.

Yep. I agree. Yeah. Sh. Yeah. Share. That's why I love having a boat, right? Because it's like a boat is one thing. You get to like see the joy of other people when you bring them on your boat and show them a good time, you know? It's like a cool thing, right? It's like I don't want to be on the boat by myself. I want seven or eight people on the boat that I can show a good time to, you know, like seeing them have fun and surf and whatever the case may be is like why it's like that same concept, right, of having a cool house where you can entertain and have your team over or whatever, you know?

So you what is your goal of this house in Poria? Probably a three to five year house. It's not our forever house, you know, but it's um we were living at the Optima for a little while because we had a different house and then we sold that, moved into the optima thinking it would be temporary. Ended up staying there for like three and a half years. Um and then we were like, "Okay, we're like I I got sick and tired of the Optima. It's beautiful. We were blessed, don't get me wrong." Um definitely the nicest apartment in the state, you know, but uh but we were ready to just like we have a dog and it's just like a pain in the ass after a while, you know. So, uh we got a good deal on this house. We got to, you know, kind of essentially build it almost from the ground up. We got involved when they were like, they'd already poured the foundation and done some of the stuff and then we got involved. We kind of took over the

project, picked everything out, moved some stuff around, you know. Um, but we have a I have a 1,800 foot garage, which is like bigger than anything I've had yet. Yeah.

Um, which is really cool. So, enough for some car lifts and stuff like that. You know, I'm a huge car guy. I love cars. I don't own a lot of cars right now. Um, but I've owned a lot of cars in my life, right? just not at one time. But yeah, so you know, stoked for that. And then obviously we're right by the lake, which will be cool. So we can go entertain. Yeah. Yeah. I have a slip out there and a lift and everything like that. You get smoker and Wi-Fi and it's cool. Yeah.

Oh, it's so fun. Bri had a boat that she bought from her grandpa. We just didn't go to Lake Pleasant enough. So Sam Point, Idaho and Pere Lake is where we're building a boat,

which is really I mean I I'd love to eventually have a lakehouse, you know, in Idaho. Like Celerane, I mean, dude,

Celane's 45 minutes. We spent a lot of time there and everybody's from Paradise Valley. quarter lane like now is it's it's like too expensive like it like the prices just went out of control.

So we we moved 45 minutes to Pere Lake. It's a bigger lake. Uh it's a in my opinion it's a really cool lake. I love going to Celane to go to Gazer which is the golf course.

It's the who's who's in Celane if you want to be seen. The Kardashians, Justin Bieber.

Uh you know there's a lot of famous people there and I don't really care for them. I don't It's not that I don't like them. It's just Mark Wahlberg. That'd be a guy I'd hang out with. He seems to be a genuine person. But

I'm not like the paparazzi. Like, let's go see. Um, a couple more questions and we'll we'll wrap it up. Uh, if you could go back in time and give yourself advice at 20 years old, what would it be?

Believe in yourself probably, you know, just just and and don't be too hard on yourself. You know, believe in yourself. Um, don't beat yourself up. Be give yourself grace. Like, you know what I mean? like be patient. Like work hard, work your ass off. Like be I think there's a difference between being patient and I'm still not good at this, but I still haven't mastered this. My wife can tell you. Um but you know, but I'm better than I was, right? Like I don't think any entrepreneur is patient. Like I don't think those two go hand inand but I think we can learn the idea of patience and we can do our very best, right? But ultimately, you know, things don't happen overnight and you've got to you've got to slow down, enjoy the journey a little bit. Um, it's hard, dude, because guys like us, I mean, I can speak for myself, you know, we tend to just like move the go the field goal post, right? It's like, oh, I'll

celebrate when I get to this thing, you know, and then you immediately get there. The goal immediately changes. You don't celebrate at all. You don't even slow down for 5 seconds to celebrate, right?

You're like, oh, it's and you like kind of beat yourself up over it. It's like what what used to be a goal, now you've achieved that goal. And then in that moment of achieving that goal, I'm actually hard on myself about it typically, right? It's like ah yeah but I could have I should have done better. I it could have been bigger. It could have been more you know. Um so I think that would be my advice you know back then is just like enjoy the journey right because like at the end of the day we could die tomorrow right like we don't know what we're guaranteed to live here you know so you got to enjoy it a little bit. I mean you got to I'm not saying go out and party all the time but like slow down have a beer go do whatever it is that you want that a person wants to do. Go to Australia I don't know but like try to enjoy the journey every so often you know. Yeah, I guess I enjoyed the journey probably too

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

is like not a big fan of like hey let's eat a cheesecake but like do something cool like you got to celebrate the wins. I agree and celebrate the wins with the team too. Mhm.

Um, so what about, you know, this is not a pleasant thought. It talks about Steven Cubby, Seven Habits of Highly Successful People. What What do you want to be known for when at that the last breath, there's people around you are uh hopefully a lot of family and friends are there to celebrate your life.

Uh it's not a fun way to think about things, but it's a great way to reverse engineer who you want to be known for.

I think it's cliche, but impact, right? Like what what was my contribution to the people around me? You know what? What positive impact did I have on everybody at that funeral? You know what I mean? And and uh and I want them to party, by the way. So, they better say

go outside. Nobody wear black party, man. If I if I die tomorrow, I want everybody to party. But, you know, I want them to celebrate my life. But ultimately, I think that I try every single day of my life to to genuinely help people in whatever capacity I possibly can. If somebody calls me and asks me for advice, I'll sit on the phone with them for as long as I have to to make sure that they feel like they got good advice from me. And I just if I interact with my team, my people, you, anybody, you know, I just I want to try to leave a positive impact on people, right? It's all about giving, not getting, you know, and I always ask people like on Christmas morning, which one feels better? You giving the gift or you getting the gift?

And I think everybody can agree which one it is. Well, well, I would say it changed when I turned about 12. Yeah,

cuz I really like getting gifts. Well, I think every kid like you get what I mean. Yeah.

As you get older. And here's the other thing that I've kind of learned is you ever ask somebody, they call you up and they want all this free advice, but they never do the advice. Dan Martell's like,

"How much free advice do you take?" Yeah. I'm like, "No, when I pay, the more I pay,

the better you'll implement." The more I implement, the more I'm like, "I got to do this. I paid a lot to to learn this stuff." And

I love giving free advice. I just find the same people keep coming back for free advice and they never move.

You don't don't let them keep coming back. You got to like you gota have something to say.

Yeah. It's like, "Hey, did you execute on that last advice I gave you?" Like, you almost have to call them on it, right? Yeah.

It's like, you know, cuz you can't do that forever. I mean, at the end of the day, you want to see them win. So, if they're not winning, I think it's our duty as a mentor to be like, "Hey, what the hell, bro?"

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

You know what I mean? The more expensive the tickets, I don't think people understand that. Like, why do you charge? Well, I have a team I need to pay.

Yeah. And the better the team, the better results you're going to get. And by the way, even with my hope service freedom group, I don't take a paycheck. I don't I don't I don't even want to. I want to be able to pay my team more and get it better for everybody that's in it.

Totally. Yeah. I agree. What um if someone wants to reach out to you, Austin, what's the best way to do that?

Any platform. Austin Zback on Instagram. Probably Instagram would be the best way. Yeah.

You can tell we're a different age because mine's Facebook. Facebook's good, too. I'm on YouTube. I'm I'm just at my first and last name on every single platform. There's no weird underscore or anything like that.

Give me one book that's not, you know, a mainstream book that really impacted your life.

Probably John C. Maxwell. Uh the leadership bible. Okay. Yeah. Phenomenal book. You know, I think of that book for any entrepreneur, any any any visionary, anybody trying to build a company. I mean, it literally is like you have like the Bible should be like if if somebody's a person of faith, obviously that's like your number one book, right? And then your number two book should be like the leadership bible. It's a big thick book. And um and there's a lot of value in there. I like John C. Maxwell a lot. He's a really smart dude. And um you know, I mean, obviously they're all good, right? Dale Carnegie is great. Bob Proctctor, you know, Jim Ran, um, you know, Zig Ziggler, Tony Robbins, right? But I mean, you know, I think that's that would be my number one book.

And this is the last question I always ask. Um, we talked about a lot of things and we probably didn't touch on every topic you wanted to hit. So, I want you to leave the audience with the final thoughts. Maybe just go take action or

whatever it might be. Don't be afraid to fail, you know? Don't be afraid to fail, right? Like that's the one thing, man. Like, you got to get out there and execute. We were just talking about executing, right? The people who don't execute are the people who are have analysis paralysis. They overthink. You see people, they go to every seminar. They go to every event. Like I went to a Joe Dispensza event, right? I'm sitting in the you get to know some people. It's like a retreat where you do like meditation and stuff and it's pretty cool. Lewis House was there with me and and or not with me, but he was like in our event and multiple other highle people. And you know, you talk to some of these people and I'm like, "How many of these have you been to?" You know, they're like, "Oh, this is my ninth one." I'm like, "Your ninth one? you didn't learn how to meditate after the first like maybe I

two three I mean like you know what do you mean you're on your ninth one right and so you see these people that they just are always learning and never doing right

it's like dude I would rather you learn nothing and just go freaking try than you learn like I think we're actually at a point in time in our day and age where there's too much information out there it's like turn at some point you got to turn it off and go execute that would be my advice

such good advice Austin it was a pleasure. I I I will say that um I start out all my my conferences going to you guys don't want you to take the best notes ever, but don't put it under your pillow for the note fairy to come. Grant you all your wishes. You got to actually cuz they take really good notes. I've seen their notes and I'm like, how much of this have you applied at the last three events you were at of my events?

So, great advice. Great doing a podcast, man. I appreciate you being here. I really appreciate you having me on. Thank you. Fun, man. Yep.

Thanks, everybody. Oh, by the way, go leave us a review. If you love this podcast, you got to ask. My favorite three letters, ask. If you love it, share it. Leave a review.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback"?

Home Service Expert (Host), Austin Zaback (Guest).

What is "Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback" about?

Austin Zaback, a seasoned real estate entrepreneur and founder of multiple investment firms, shares insights on cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset for success, emphasizing the importance of mentorship and community connections in the industry. His experience as a mentor for new agents highlights strategies for overcoming fears and achieving career growth in real estate.

What is mentioned in this Home Service Expert episode?

9 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Austin Zabic, Zback Group, Space Real Estate, One Roof Investments, John C. Maxwell, A1 Garage. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Unlocking Success: The Entrepreneurial Mindset with Austin Zaback"?

The episode runs 1 h 2 min; the transcript is about 15,016 words in 265 timestamped sections.

More from Home Service Expert

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 24, 2026.