Latest / REL Freedom Podcast / John Knowlton - From Success To Significance

Transcript

John Knowlton - From Success To Significance · REL Freedom Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: My why, I've already said it, but I'll say it again, is to build a family that maintains its identity as a force for good for generations.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, the Knowltons are a people who add value to their community.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I want that to be true, not just while I'm alive, but for generations.
• 0:21
  Mike Swenson: Welcome to the Real Freedom Show.
• 0:22
  Mike Swenson: We inspire you to pursue your passion to gain time and financial freedom through opportunities in real estate.
• 0:28
  Mike Swenson: I'm your host, Mike Swenson.
• 0:29
  Mike Swenson: Let's get some real freedom together.
• 0:39
  Mike Swenson: Hello, everybody.
• 0:40
  Mike Swenson: Welcome to Real Freedom, Real Estate Leverage Freedom, where we talk about different ways that people can build time and financial freedom through opportunities in real estate.
• 0:49
  Mike Swenson: I'm your host, Mike Swenson.
• 0:50
  Mike Swenson: If you want to get started on your real estate investing journey, check out our website, freedom throughrealestate.com.
• 0:57
  Mike Swenson: We have lots of great information on there, articles with the goal to inspire you guys to pursue and take action on something inside of real estate.
• 1:05
  Mike Swenson: Today's guest on our show, I'm really excited to share.
• 1:08
  Mike Swenson: We have John Nolton here, gonna get us to think a little bit bigger and a little bit more long term about your future.
• 1:15
  Mike Swenson: So John actually built a billion-dollar business, sold it, walked away at the age of 51, took a year off in COVID, traveling around in an RV, and really, you know, gained some additional perspective.
• 1:26
  Mike Swenson: And uh, so you were the author of the book Thinking for Success: 52 Stories that upgrade your thinking to boost productivity, problem solving, and relationships.
• 1:35
  Mike Swenson: And really, you're about focusing on thinking about your future and building wealth and getting your family involved, putting together mission, vision, value statements, and inspiring people to think bigger than that.
• 1:46
  Mike Swenson: And then having enough money is not necessarily the finish line, but there's so much more that you can do with it.
• 1:50
  Mike Swenson: So, John, I'm excited to have you on to be able to get us to think differently and to think bigger about our purpose and what we're doing here.
• 1:56
  Mike Swenson: So, thank you so much for being on the show.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, Mike, it's a real pleasure.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: And it's, you know, it's really my hope that this conversation will be a blessing to the listeners and viewers and that people can get a vision for something bigger than just hitting 100% complete on their financial plan.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know, for 20 some years, I worked as a financial planner and and the software that most of the industry uses, you know, uh analyzes is you is your goal complete?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, do you have enough money to hit your retirement goal?
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: And that's 100%.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: And it never goes to 110 or 120.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like 100 is the top.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like you've you've got enough.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: And my challenge with that was I was always frustrated with this, frustrated with the software.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And what I've realized is, you know what?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: My goal is to build a family that lasts as an as an entity, as a force for good for multiple generations, and hitting 100% for me and my wife's spending needs.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's not that's not my goal.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: My goal is a whole lot bigger than that.
• 3:07
  Mike Swenson: So I think about that as well.
• 3:08
  Mike Swenson: I know just from talking with people that help with finances and and management.
• 3:13
  Mike Swenson: You can correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I've kind of heard, you know, the the general thought is um, you know, you you build that nest egg and then you focus on, okay, I take four percent every year until it gets smaller and smaller and smaller.
• 3:25
  Mike Swenson: And then yeah, what happens if you live longer, right?
• 3:27
  Mike Swenson: People are living longer, there's improvements to health, and so you don't want to outlive your money.
• 3:32
  Mike Swenson: And so, yeah, to your point, if somebody is like, hey, I got the 100% and then you live longer, you're kind of stuck.
• 3:37
  Mike Swenson: And for me, what I love about investing in things like real estate is you know, over time, real estate can continue to appreciate it, can continue to go up in value.
• 3:46
  Mike Swenson: And if you have your assets in something that's producing that consistent cash flow, um, your income's not gonna necessarily go down or it's less likely to go down.
• 3:56
  Mike Swenson: And then you don't have to be as worried about am I gonna outlive all that savings that I built?
• 4:01
  Mike Swenson: But yeah, to your point, there's so much more out there.
• 4:03
  Mike Swenson: And for me, it's about changing my family tree, being able to do something for my kids, however involved or not involved they want to be, but it's building something that can last beyond when my wife and I pass away.
• 4:15
  Mike Swenson: So excited to hear what you have to share on that.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Mike, that's really interesting.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: I've been studying families that that last for multiple generations.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that is true about most of these families is they own illiquid assets.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, they own factories and businesses and companies and uh real estate that isn't easy to liquidate, or you can't just call the the stockbroker and say, send me a hundred grand, and then it's just frittered away and dissipated.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: But there's there's a there's an asset or a portfolio of assets that are illiquid and have enduring value.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I still own plenty of stocks, don't worry, it's a you know, it's a good driver, but the real estate and the longer term type assets are in alignment if you have a goal of building a family that lasts longer than just you and your spouse.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: Just a couple of examples.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: There's a there's a family called the Grosvenor family, and their their G1, if you will, their first generation that they trace back to came to England in 1066 with William the Conqueror.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's 970 years ago or something, 60 years ago.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And they were he was granted a little bit of land on the north side of the Thames River, which is now uh a big portion of that land is occupied by the city of London, which is their Wall Street, it's the financial district.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like owning Manhattan as your little family estate, you know.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: So just a really interesting that's a long family.
• 6:00
  Mike Swenson: I'm curious to hear just to kind of start here and set the set the stage.
• 6:04
  Mike Swenson: So talk about building up your business and kind of the the sale piece, and then thinking about what you're working on today, the whys behind it and the hows, just to get people thinking a little bit differently about how they're approaching building wealth and their their goals and business.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I started out as a financial planner or financial advisor in the 90s.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, it was before we had computers on the desk.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was uh it was a phone book, and a phone was like the office equipment, you know, it was smile and dial, wake interrupt people at dinner and try to get them to talk about financial planning or reducing their taxes or whatever, and turned that into a practice, not just a sales call, but a practice, got some staff, uh, transitioned the business model from transactional to advice-based, where you collect fees for advice rather than commissions for transactions.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And um did a did my first deal where I bought out a retiring advisor in 2004 and realized, oh, you can you can get clients one at a time or you can buy them in chunks.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I liked the buying them in chunks piece.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so spent a decade or so figuring out how to do that, how to market to financial advisors, how to talk to them, how to get them earn their trust and and uh get them to consider selling their business to us.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: And and so in 2015, we were managing about 125 million dollars, small little team in an office, and we set a goal of being at a billion and so kept pursuing our MA mergers and acquisitions strategy, and we had a key merger in 2018 with another firm.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: So we had the mergers and acquisition expertise.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: The the other firm, the partner firm, had a really great client service experience and and model and tools to drive that, as well as really good investment management capabilities.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so we merged as a cashless merger so that the MA expertise now had a great platform to pop deals into.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: And over the next few years, uh, we 10x'd that thing.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we went from 125 million in 2015 to a billion and a quarter in 2020.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: That was in five years.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: We 10x'd in five years.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: And um that's a lot of growth and it takes a lot of work.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so in 2020, we had hit my business goal of being at a billion.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: And uh one of my adopted kids uh was had been living in a residential treatment facility and was ready to come home.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: And my wife said, Hey, I'm gonna need some help reintegrating this child into the family.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so I, you know, our operating agreement contemplated the entry and exit of partners.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was the first one to to exercise the option to sell.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: And the the rest of the team bought me out and um took a year off, as you said in the introduction.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: And um, so any case, didn't really need to work for money.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, my my 100% was hit, if you will, on my financial needs analysis, but uh I I can't just sit around.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've been cranking ever since.
• 9:19
  Mike Swenson: You had mentioned about getting your family involved and participating because I know a lot of people, you know, they might run a business or own a business, and the goal is, hey, I'm gonna have my kids run that when I die.
• 9:29
  Mike Swenson: And uh, for a lot of people, like it's not it's not something they're interested in.
• 9:34
  Mike Swenson: And so, you know, like I had a college roommate where as soon as he graduated college, he took over the family business and he runs it.
• 9:40
  Mike Swenson: And I know for me, I've always said, you know, the idea of I'd kind of said it, my kids, it's like they can participate if they want, they don't have to, but it's gonna be something that's a choice for them if if they want to in the future.
• 9:52
  Mike Swenson: And if not, no worries, we're gonna encourage them to do what they want to do.
• 9:55
  Mike Swenson: But for you, it's so much more than that, like having your family involved and participating in their future and and putting together a mission, vision, values, and and being an entity that can accomplish so much more.
• 10:08
  Mike Swenson: I'd love to kind of dive into that side of it and talk about the the why behind that for you and kind of what drove that conversation.
• 10:15
  Mike Swenson: And then we can kind of talk about the fruit from that.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, sure.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's a wonderful place to start.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: So I just want to make a quick comment.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: I I like to distinguish uh wages for work versus profits for ownership.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's possible to be an owner of a business but not work in it.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's possible to work in a business and not own it, or you could do both.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's important to align compensation, your wages for work, and you can have a compensation philosophy about that.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: Are we a you know an entry-level employer?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: Are we a middle of the pack or are we above the average?
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: You can you can set your your parameters around that.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: But if somebody's working in the business, even if they're your kid, uh I think they should be paid.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then if they're an owner, then there's also an element of you know, there's some rewards for owning things.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I just think that's an important distinction.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: I was talking to a guy in Europe uh recently who said that in the the the tradition in Europe is you work for the family business for minimum wage as a as your contribution to the family business, which what do you what do you know?
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: People are really resentful about this.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, it shouldn't be a surprise.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't to me.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: So, any case, but to your question about why so Simon Sinek in his book Start with Why told us to start with why.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, figure out why are we doing what we're doing.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so, my why, I've already said it, but I'll say it again, is to build a family that maintains its identity as a force for good for generations.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, the Knowltons are a people who add value to their community, and I want that to be true, not just while I'm alive, but uh for generations.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the why.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: The what, so I'll come back to the how, which is in the middle.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Why is force for good for generations, the what is stewardship of our family resources, our our family wealth.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: And then the how is the unique piece that I'm bringing to this, I believe is unique.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it's what I call shared governance.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about the standard estate planning model, most people think of, hey, this is mom and dad's money.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna do with it what we want, we'll take a cruise if we want, we'll we'll give it away if we want, we'll do whatever we want with it.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then when we die, we'll split up what's left.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: And the kids get their their money.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there's a few things that are a challenge to me about that.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: The first is uh I plan to live a long time and be real old when I die.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: So my kids wouldn't get access to the funds until it was probably after they could really benefit from it.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: They'll probably have already been quite established in their careers or maybe retired.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_01: Secondly, there's a real risk of dissipation, in other words, of those assets just kind of going poof.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: There's an there's a proverb in in America that some people have heard called shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves in three generations.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: The idea is the first generation builds some wealth, the second generation spends it, the third one loses it, and then you're back to manual labor again, just starting from scratch.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of cultures have a version of that.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: In China, it's rice patty to rice patty, and in Ireland it's potato patch to potato patch, etc.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: And so that idea of just dumping the money on your kids after you're dead, first of all, doesn't prepare them for managing a big chunk of money if it's a big chunk.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um if they have not been used to you know managing millions of dollars, they will have no idea what to do.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: And secondly, it it's a challenge in that they might not have not just the mechanical or the intellectual skills, but they might not have uh learned how to integrate the values that produce such wealth.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: So the values of hard work, of service, of putting others before yourself.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the characteristics of people who build wealth, is that we seek to add value.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: And the the the way God built the world is when you add value, you receive value in return.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so lots of estate planning in the traditional estate planning model, they'll put in uh they'll build trusts and wills with these what they call dead hand control or control from the grave.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, they write very restrictive language about what the beneficiaries have to do in order to receive the benefits.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: But I want to flip that around and start to teach my kids while I'm alive how to manage money.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: How do I think about giving money away?
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: How do I think about philanthropy?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: How do we how do we choose our investments and and set our investment policy statements up and all that?
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: So shared governance is the how we're going to build this family that lasts and maintains its identity as a force for good for generations.
• 15:11
  Mike Swenson: That's great.
• 15:12
  Mike Swenson: I'd love to kind of hear your your wife and and kind of your kids take through this process because it's you know, it's one thing where it's you know, hey, I'm you know, I'm John here, I'm dad, and I'm kind of saying, here's what I want to have happen, kids.
• 15:24
  Mike Swenson: And and as we know, kids sometimes are sometimes they're excited about the things we talk about, sometimes they could care less about the things that we talk about.
• 15:30
  Mike Swenson: Um, so so maybe talk a little bit about getting their buy-in and their input on something like this.
• 15:38
  Mike Swenson: Just curious to hear their reactions and how that's kind of grown over these last couple years.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's a fun story, it's funny to me because my kids tease me mercilessly.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I a couple years ago, I warned them I wanted to have a family meeting about important matters, money stuff.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: And um, I gave them two or three months' notice.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't want to spring it on them.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: We we put it in the calendar over Christmas time and stuff.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: And my oldest daughter, she she says to my wife, is there gonna be a PowerPoint?
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: And Julie said, You know, you know him, of course, you know.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: So what we did, and Julie and I worked on this together is how old was she at the time, your oldest?
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh 26 or seven, something like that.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, she's 28 now.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: We worked on telling the story of our marriage, sort of how faith and finances have been integrated over the last 25 years.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: We've always tithed on every dollar we've made.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we there were a number of times when we felt directed by God to do something that didn't make financial sense, but then there was a whatever the outcome was on that.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh often it was very lucrative to do what God told us to do.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: In one case, we were in deep trouble, and someone else didn't know that we were in trouble, but felt prompted to just give Julie some money when she didn't know how she was going to buy diapers, you know, those kinds of stories.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so we documented all that and and we've told that story to our kids.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then I went to here's our current situation.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I retired.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: Here's how much money we have invested, here's the property we own, here's the bank accounts.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: I've charted my income for the last 28 years, here's John's income, and you know, just laid it all out there, opened the kimono all the way.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: We'd like to invite you into shared governance.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I explained the traditional estate planning model just like I did with you a minute ago, and essentially invited them to join the work of building this family and learning how to manage money and learning to work together to build this family legacy.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: I have four children.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: The oldest two said yes.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the youngest two, I don't think, are quite ready for it.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_01: It feels pretty adult and maybe we're rushing it a little bit.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: So that's okay.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: They've given me permission to ask them once a year if they want to join the work.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: And then I'm I'm happy with that.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 18:14
  Mike Swenson: Yeah.
• 18:14
  Mike Swenson: And how how old are the younger two?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, 20 and 17.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I was willing to have them on board, but yeah, when they're ready.
• 18:24
  Mike Swenson: I've thought a lot, and we've we've had some guests on too, you know, that have talked about, you know, sharing with your kids about money, having those types of conversations and you know, how to approach it.
• 18:34
  Mike Swenson: And so everybody does it differently, but I know for me, I wanted to introduce those types of conversations or even just you know, opportunities working in the business with us, because you know, growing up, both of my parents were W-2 employees, so I didn't have those opportunities.
• 18:50
  Mike Swenson: And so just wanting to slowly introduce them, but but to the point we've kind of talked about, yeah, you want it to be their choice and not something that they have to do, because I just think you see it in in the media and movies and you know, whatever, where it's like, you know, forcing the kids to do the things they don't want to do because dad wants them to, and it's like just because you want that doesn't mean they want that for themselves.
• 19:11
  Mike Swenson: But I also like the idea of all your kids working together, they're gonna have different perspectives, they're gonna have different ideas, and it's it's stewardship of you know, something long-term.
• 19:21
  Mike Swenson: And so, you know, when I had you reach out, it was you know, that's the part that was kind of intriguing to me to hear about is you know how that can happen and and getting the kids on board and and uh you know building something that that's gonna last.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: I've got a a really cool recent example of how they engaged in decision making with us.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: So as soon as they said yes, yes, they'd like to participate in this work, we scheduled a series of meetings, and our board meetings are on Saturday mornings in the eastern time zone from 10 30 to 11 45.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: We found out that an hour and 15 minutes is our sweet spot.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: And one of my kids lives on the West Coast.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so we that's 7 30 in the morning for him.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: So that's our time for board meetings.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: And we've gone through this process of identifying and documenting our family's mission.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: Why are what are we doing here?
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: And our vision.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: If we're successful at our mission, how will the world be different?
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: And our values.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: And our values include two that are sort of the opposite of the same coin.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: One is self-sufficiency.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, we're responsible for supporting ourselves.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: But the other side, other one that's related to it is support.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: We will support each other when it's necessary.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so one of my kids got in trouble.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I was kind of on the horns of a dilemma.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: Do I rush in and help the kid or do I hang back and allow consequences to happen?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it was that thing where you're trying to balance do I save them or do I let them have the outcome that is the result of their choices?
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I realized I have a board I can call.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so I called an emergency meeting, and we had two two of our kids and a fiance on the call, and I laid out the situation and I got their wisdom and insight, and it was so helpful, Mike, to hear from their perspective, you know, wrestling through those consequences versus helping and saving and whatever.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: And um and the it was super helpful for me to hear from them and their perspectives.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: They're wise people.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know they were as smart as they are until I let them talk.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: And then secondly, whatever the decision was that we would take, there's no opportunity for resentment because they helped make the decision.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: So some families, you know, there's one kid that needs more help or is has whatever their personal issues are, and so they either get more attention or they get more time or they get more money or whatever.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: And you hear these stories of that really building up some resentment amongst the other siblings.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think this is a way to get rid of the whole resentment piece because it's not mom and dad sort of monolithically making decisions, but hey, let's decide together.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: Here's the resource, here's the need, what's the appropriate response?
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Together will decide.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: It really is a beautiful thing.
• 22:37
  Mike Swenson: Now, thinking about you know where you're where your kids are at in life right now, obviously they're a little bit older in terms, you know, starting their own journeys and you know, kind of your youngest being 17.
• 22:48
  Mike Swenson: For people that have so, like as an example, my kids are you know, 14, 11, and nine or eight, excuse me, um, thinking about something like that where they are younger, not as well developed, you know, uh emotionally and and and in terms of maturity and thinking about that kind of stuff.
• 23:04
  Mike Swenson: Obviously, there's ways where you can get them excited and and talk about those types of things, but but maybe what what are some thoughts that you have for you know folks that have younger kids or they're not quite to the point where you know they're they're entering the the adulthood stage?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course, we want to be age appropriate in in the ways that we approach our uh our kids and whatever they're ready for.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: I I have a couple of practical suggestions, and and the first one is to have a regular meal together and have intentional conversation.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, sometimes we come home uh from work and say, hey, what's for dinner?
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: But that's the wrong question.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: To me, the important question is what is dinner for?
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, what is what is the purpose?
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: And yes, we need some calories and nutrients, but the real purpose, or I I suggest that we transform the purpose of the meal together is relationship building and values transmission.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so we ask the four questions every time, every dinner.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's actually only two that you have to remember.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: How is your day?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: What do you need?
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have a husband and a wife, or you know, two spouses, they can each ask that.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: There's four questions, and then you can ask the kids.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: Here's what's happening.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: The kids are watching their parents talk to each other, hearing about their day.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: How was your day?
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: You're hearing how did I navigate the day?
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: I had a troublesome conversation with an employee.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna talk about that.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: I had uh a great meeting with a prospect, and I think we're gonna do some work together, and they get to hear about that.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: So your kids are much more is caught than is taught, right?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: So they're catching, how does dad, how does mom make their way in the world?
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: And then they're seeing that they're offering to help each other and they're willing to provide value.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: What do you need tonight from me?
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: What do you need from me?
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_01: How can I help you?
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: Those are critical things.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: That that is an example of what my friend Roger Whitney calls little conversations.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, we have there's all kinds of emotionally charged topics, you know, uh uh money, sex, religion, politics, right?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: All these kinds of things.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: And and sometimes we wait until something's urgent and critical, and then we have this big, huge, scary conversation.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: But if we can get in the habit of having regular little conversations, we sort of let the air out of the balloon slowly instead of you know popping it and having a bit a big explosion.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: So the mealtime is a great time to start imparting your values and how you make your way in the world.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: And then I really think it's important to give kids some money that they're responsible for, you know, and you could call it an allowance or a stipend or their whatever, however you want to call it, but they should probably get some guidance on do they tithe on it, do they give money away, do they save it, do they spend it?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, letting them make decisions with$10 or$20, um, if if they can do that well, well, then maybe they get 50 or 100, you know, those kinds of things.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so that they're they're learning, they're getting values through the little conversations, and they're getting practice with their own money that they get to steward.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: And when they blow it all on something dumb and they don't get any more money until next month, oh, they might cry, but you're gonna make sure they have food and right, the consequences are pretty small, although maybe emotionally challenging for them.
• 26:36
  Mike Swenson: Now, talk a little bit about your process for writing a book.
• 26:40
  Mike Swenson: I always like to ask author or people, you know, the authors that are putting together books, like kind of what's what's the seed?
• 26:46
  Mike Swenson: How did that come together?
• 26:47
  Mike Swenson: And then, you know, kind of how does the the distribution piece work?
• 26:50
  Mike Swenson: Because it's a it's a large undertaking to do that.
• 26:53
  Mike Swenson: And so I just kind of like to hear the backstory of you know how that works and how you put that together and kind of why you put it together.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: My book is called Thinking for Success, and it's 52 stories, so there's 52 short chapters in this book.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: This I didn't set out to write this book, Mike.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: It was really uh a function of desperation because as I was leading teams of people, they would keep coming to me with questions or problems, and I would give them an answer.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: And then it didn't take me long to realize I'm tired of being the guy that gives them all the answers.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I started to teach them principles or theories, and then I realized they didn't always know how to apply the theory to the qu the problem.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then I stumbled on telling a story in a staff meeting, and then people would like engage with that and start to say, Hey, my you know, my uncle did something like that, or whatever the case might be.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I've subsequently learned that uh smart people say stories are cognitively privileged.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, they get priority in our brains much more than theories.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so I began to tell stories intentionally in staff meetings, then we would talk about it and sort of come up with our conclusion.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: What's our takeaway from this story?
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: And people began to apply the stories, use those as guides to their thinking and their behavior.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then I said, geez, these are kind of working good.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: I better write them down or I'm gonna forget them.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: And then at some point, I realized, like 10 years into this, realized I had 40 stories and said, Geez, if I had uh 52, that'd be one a week for a year, etc.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: So I kept writing them and got to something like 70.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh two years ago, said, All right, it's time to land this plane, let's turn this into a book.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I hired an editor to trim it down and you know, make it clean it up, and then um we decided to proceed and and I hired a designer to build a really beautiful cover of the book, and um, so it just launched on January 6th of 2026, and we've done a book launch party and we sold all the books out of the Barnes and Noble in our town, and you know, it was really fun.
• 29:06
  Mike Swenson: Are you looking to get started or scale in real estate investing but don't know your next step?
• 29:11
  Mike Swenson: Are you overwhelmed thinking about finding deals, analyzing deals, doing due diligence, and managing properties on top of it?
• 29:17
  Mike Swenson: Go ahead and push the easy button and invest with us.
• 29:21
  Mike Swenson: Real estate investing is what we do full time.
• 29:23
  Mike Swenson: We've done dozens of deals with hundreds of doors.
• 29:25
  Mike Swenson: We have the knowledge and experience to handpick the best deals that most investors can't find.
• 29:30
  Mike Swenson: We've at large off-market deals all the time where you can hopefully find returns and economies of scale that you just can't find on your own.
• 29:37
  Mike Swenson: The best thing is it's 100% passive to you for less capital than you put down trying to acquire a property on your own.
• 29:44
  Mike Swenson: Don't let this year go by where you don't make the leap, add to your portfolio, or you just sit in analysis by paralysis.
• 29:51
  Mike Swenson: To find out more, visit freedomthroughrealestate.com and click on invest.
• 29:55
  Mike Swenson: You can book a call and learn more there.
• 29:57
  Mike Swenson: So get to scaling your portfolio now with us by your side.
• 30:01
  Mike Swenson: That's freedomthroughrealestate.com and click on invest.
• 30:04
  Mike Swenson: Yeah, I love that idea.
• 30:06
  Mike Swenson: I mean, it's it's cool that um, you know, books are great because it it uh you know plants a seed in you of something to be able to share with others.
• 30:13
  Mike Swenson: And and in a case like this, yeah, there's a lot of great life lessons and applicable things that they can learn.
• 30:18
  Mike Swenson: And so I just love to hear people's stories of kind of how that comes up because I know it's not it's not an easy feat to do.
• 30:23
  Mike Swenson: And so, yeah, it sounds like for you over time it was just germinating there and and growing.
• 30:28
  Mike Swenson: And I love it.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: The hard part, Mike, is when you open the first email back from your editors and see this Red Sea, how they've just murdered all your favorite children that you know were your babies in this story, and they're just like, that was a terrible paragraph and whatever.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: So at first I started to edit the editors, and then I was like, wait a second, I'm paying them.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: Accept changes, accept changes.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, that was a good lesson for me.
• 30:54
  Mike Swenson: So, kind of tell folks here, you know, what what you're doing today and what you're working on, and then how how can folks get a hold of you?
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Mike, my life is full, I'll tell you.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: So um, I'll answer the last question first.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_01: So the book is called Thinking for Success.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: So thinkingforsuccess.com.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: And then the company that my wife and I have built that creates content, including this book, is called Abundant Thought Revolution.com.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're on the socials and YouTube, and you can go to that website as well.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: What I'm doing these days, I've I've been serving Christian CEOs as a C12 leader.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, I would lead a monthly business retreat, day-long business retreat for two different groups in Elkhart, Indiana, and Kalamzu, Michigan.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, that my my season there is wrapping up.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna go to my church as chief of staff to help build systems.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: And um, we're gonna be managing a uh a leadership succession plan over the next few years.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: And and so I'll I'll kind of be behind the scenes making sure everything is in place for that.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: I do a lot of writing.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: I have three different writing blocks each week, um, one on shared governance and and two on some some spiritual work that I'm doing.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: I do real estate as well.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_01: So my son in in Oregon is a general contractor, and so the family buys uh real estate, uh residential real estate that has opportunity for value add, and then he manages those projects and performs some of the work himself, and then the then we sell them and split the profits, and then I do long-term rental real estate here in in my market, and I have a few other things.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: People ask me to to help them sell their businesses and and so I've done a lot of deals, and so I I help people through that process.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I see people seem to call me when they're when their organizations are tense or things aren't working smooth.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, I've got nine people all mad at each other.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Will you come?
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, sure.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_01: Happy to happy to jump into that.
• 32:56
  Mike Swenson: Sounds like a great, great opportunity is there.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, it can't get much worse, right?
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like uh it's like being a pathologist.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: If you're a doctor, what's the worst gonna happen?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_01: The guy's gonna wake up and come back to life, you know?
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: So you go into a mess and it's not gonna get much worse.
• 33:12
  Mike Swenson: Well, John, thank you so much for coming on and sharing kind of your background and your story and what's been uh you know put on your heart to share with others.
• 33:20
  Mike Swenson: And so uh thank you so much for sharing that with people.
• 33:22
  Mike Swenson: Thank you so much for coming on and sharing and excited to see you know where this continue to grow in the future.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: I love it, Mike.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I just hope everybody is able to find a financial and time freedom so that you can do what you were really designed to do.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's success is is walking more and more fully into the purpose for which you were created.