Latest / Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant / John's Dad: The Story of Johnnie Will Smith

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John's Dad: The Story of Johnnie Will Smith · Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome the Money and Wealth with John O'Bryant, a production
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of The Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. We're all
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: role modeling, right, so you know, we model what we see.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: This is this episode is dedicated to my father, Johnny
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: will Smith. Without him, I wouldn't be me. Johnny will Smith,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: the son him, the son of my grandfather RB Smith.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: RB Smith was born in eighteen seventy one in Mississippi,
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: which means, you know, they weren't passing out memos in
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Mississippi in eighteen seventy one. The Civil War was over
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: in eighteen sixty five, they weren't passing out memos saying
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: you're free. So it's at least fifty percent likely that
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: RB Smith was born in the slavery in Mississippi. At
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: the very least. I know he was a sharecropper in
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Mississippi and ultimately the farm that he owned, a small
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: cropper land that he worked in Mississippi was worth seven
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: hundred dollars, you know, as we went into the twentieth century.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: So he worked at land for thirty plus years, well
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: at least twenty years, and you know, ended up with
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: a seven hundred dollars asset that he might not have
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: actually owned because he was a sharecropper, but the legacy
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: of him and self determination led to my father, who
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: was born in Aberdeen, Mississippi, population now about five thousand
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: people and unfortunately declining. There's no industry there. Little town
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: in Mississippi. And by the way, just fun fact here,
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: some of the notable citizens of Aberdeen, Mississippi are James Phelan,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Senior and Junior. James was a member of the Confederate Congress,
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: the folks who are fighting to sustain slavery in the
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds. He was a member of the Confederate Congress Congress,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: and then his son went on to become a member
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: of the US Congress right after that. I can't imagine
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: that there was some kind of a deathbed conversion between
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Senior and Junior is members of Congress. So my guess
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: is that this legacy of Confederate philosophy carried on for
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: quite some time, as both of these folks were members
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: of Congress from Aberdeen. So that was an example of
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: maybe Mississippi not being the most progressive. But my dad
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: left there and because of my grandfather being a sharecropper,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: he became a businessman, and of course I became an entrepreneur. Hello,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: we are all role modeling, right, We're modeling what we see.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: And as an old Southern saying, no matter how much
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: I love you, so my daughter, my son, and my daughter,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: if I don't have wisdom, I can only give you
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: my own ignorance out of love. We passed down bad
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: habits and generation to generation. And you know there's another
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: there's a biblical story fable that basically paraphrases, watch how
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: you live your life, and maybe the only Bible that
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: anybody else reads. So role models matter, right, And I'm
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: an entrepreneur because my dad was a businessman. My dad
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: was a businessman in part because he saw his dad
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: pursuing self determination in the eighteen hundreds. And certainly my
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: great grandfather was a slave, without questioning. So Johnny Smith,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: you know, was a great man. He's passed on to glory,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: but he had challenges, he had drama, he had you know,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: he would shoot himself in the proverbial foot because Massa
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Andrew Jung says that men and women fail for three
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: reasons arrogance, pride, and greed. My daddy was not greedy,
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: but he was full of pride and slightly arrogant. I
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: understand some of it. He was successful, as you know.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: That story goes he met my mother because he was
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: driving his fancy car from Los Angeles where he lived
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: down south. I don't know the exact pathway, but for
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: some reason, he came through East Saint Louis, I guess
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: to visit family, friends, whatever, on his way to Detroit
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: to go buy a new car. Back in the day,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: you bought cars if you were if you were highly
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: successful like that, you wanted to go I guess to
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: the manufacturer and buy it off the showroom floor in
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: the manufacturer. I guess it was a thing, and he
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: would drive the car back to Los Angeles. It was
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: his way of showing his success. So on the way
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: to buy his car and Detroit, he stopped in East
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Saint Louis and he was hit overhead with the love
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: jones of my mother. He saw my mother and lost
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: his mind, and the rest of that story, we say,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: is history. I did a separate podcast on my mother,
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: so you can go listen to that and see how
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: they came together and how their stories grew and then
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: departed from each other. So he met my mother lost
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: his mind. But the good news is they moved to
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: the Los Angeles and they had me little known story.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: My birth certificate has three aliases on it because my
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: dad kept thinking that I wasn't my mother's that he
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: wasn't the father of my mother's child. He thought I
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: was too young. This is who's this little yellow boy?
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: My dad was darker. So who's this yellow boy? Who
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: who you've been hanging out with? This is not my
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: This is not my son. It looks like a Hispanic
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: kid or whatever. Right, And so then my mother wanted
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: to name him, name me Brian Keith after an actor.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: I'm told he's a Who's Brian Keith? I want my name,
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: my son to be named Johnny Smith. There's not a
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: more unimaginative, unimaginative name on the planet than Johnny Smith
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: or John Smith. He wanted me to name John Smith.
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: My mother's like, oh, not old, my dead body, are
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: you naming our kid John Smith? So I had They
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: changed my birth certificate three different times in the hospital
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: the same day. Of course my mother won. Uh, So
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: I ended up being John Bryant. The rest is history,
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: as they say. So my dad went on to own
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: a to start a Semen. Sorry, he already had a
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: cemen contracting business in south central Los Angeles. Again, he
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: was he was a computer. He was a community baller.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: I mean he was successful, highly successful by community famous standards. Right.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: The stories of my dad are legend. He wore these
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: flashy suits with big collars, and he loved his brim
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: and his hats, and he loved his fancy shoes. He
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: looked like he looked like a pet. I mean, I'm
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: just gonna say a classy pet. But he looked like
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: a pip. Uh. Now, listeners, you need to translate, translate
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: what a pep is. I guess he's put you know,
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: leave me a commentat or something out or just ask
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: a black friend. Right. So dad was a slick He
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: was smooth, right, he was a smooth talker. And uh
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: but my dad didn't know what he didn't though, So
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: when my dad was going to go talk to just
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: get money, he'd go. He thought the bank was the branch,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: like he thought that Bank of America or Wells Fargo.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: He thought that entire bank was representative of this branch.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: And he knew the branch manager. And when he was gonna,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: you know, write a check that wouldn't cover that couldn't
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: be covered the money had in the bank. He thought
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: his real credibility was going out of the bank. His
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: time was less valuable than you know, other things. My
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: time is the most valuable thing I have. You give
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: me a choice today between more time and more money.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: As it give me more time, I'll make more money.
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  Speaker 1: But my dad value other things. So he would go
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: down to the bank several times a week to let
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: the branch manager know that he would not be you know,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: he needed him to cover this check. And this is
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: what we did in the community. And this is what
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: he did in the community was of common conversationation floating checks.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Some of you listening who are old enough to know
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: what I'm talking about, understand it was floating checks was
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: a common situation, and that banker, as long as my
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: dad knew the branch manager. It was the personal credibility
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  Speaker 1: he had with that banker that allowed him to feel
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: that he had basically a line of credit. He didn't
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: because he had bank fees. Every time he did that,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: they hit him with a bank fee over his head.
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  Speaker 1: But my dad valued respect over everything. So if a
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: mortgage broker showed up in my neighborhood as an example,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: who was polite and talk and gave my dad respect
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: and consideration and asked him about his family and complimented
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: him on how he was dressing and all this stuff.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: But he was. But what he had to offer for
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: a refinance for the house was a broker, meaning didn't
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: go directly to the financial source. It was through a
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: financial broker, which added additional fee. It was a broker
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: transaction that was let's say fifteen percent interest and fifteen
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  Speaker 1: points meaning one percent, two percent, three percent, fifteen percent
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  Speaker 1: of the loan amount, right, fifteen points fifteen percent interests.
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  Speaker 1: You know, some of these these loans were twenty points
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: twenty percent interest. When you once it got loan, you
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: got the loan, you would blind twenty twenty went to
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: zero zero. But this was common in our neighbor hard
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: money loans. So my my dad would take that loan
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: because the guy was nice to him. Look, but if
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: somebody came along was rude to my dad but had
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: a three percent mortgage, he would send that guy packing. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: I'm just the opposite, right, you can curse me out,
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: you can say everything you want, you can say you're
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: a first cousin of James Felan from Alberdeen, Mississippi. And
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  Speaker 1: you your great great grandfather was part of the Confederacy.
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  Speaker 1: But if you got three percent money, I'm taking it.
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  Speaker 1: Not went out to my self esteem of self worth
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: depends on your acceptance of me, right, Yeah, it's okay.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: If you don't like me, I like me, right or
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: do you respect me and learn to like me, then
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: like me and never respect me. So I went out
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: emotional about money. I'm not emotional about business. Business is
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: just business. But my dad, you know, respect went a
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: long way with my dad. I'll come back to why
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: that's so important in a moment. So my dad was,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: you know, in many ways, not only just a community
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  Speaker 1: success story. He was a bit of a you know,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: original freedom fighter in our family because he served as
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: a deacon on the board of the church. It was
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: a cavalry missionary Baptist church. I can't remember the reverend's
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: name is probably good but his whole family, you know,
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  Speaker 1: owned the church. I mean literally owned the building and
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: it was only like forty members in the pasta. The
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  Speaker 1: pasta was driven up in a limousine. The limousine was
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: longer than the church was wide and my dad was
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: a deacon in the church. And my dad wasn't really
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: feeling all this stuff that the family of the pastor
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: and his family were doing. But he was committed to
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: the gospel, committed to God and and but when he
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: discovered that there was fraud going on with the pastor,
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: he approached him in church and the son of the
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  Speaker 1: now my dad, dad was a big guy. He was
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: a construction guy. You on the construction cement masonry company
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: johnny'son Network. It's a big guy. But you know, he
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: was an older guy. He was shorter, stocky, and the
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: son of the pastor was big and tall, and he
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: clocked my dad to keep my dad from from spilling
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: the beans on the you know, malfeasans going on to
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: the church. He hit my dad and I believe knocked
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: him out. Uh. And that wasn't the that wasn't the
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: last time, because my dad wouldn't give up. You wouldn't
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: give up, wouldn't give in. He was like, no, this
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: is unethical, this is illegal. You can't do this in
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: the house of Lord. So he was going to file
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: formal charges and he was out of a construction site
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: and this son showed up to the construction site. They
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: had a fight. My dad had built it, dug a hole,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: a construction hole for something, and the guy ended up
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: actually pushing my dad in that hole and filling that
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: hole up with sayd up to my dad's neck. He
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: was trying to kill my father, and luckily, you know,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: authorities and people interceded. But but, but by the grace
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: of God, that moment could have been my dad's last.
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: But he just wouldn't He just wouldn't ge give up
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: or wouldn't give in. He fought for justice and not
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: just us, and he and my mother ultimately built a
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: little conglomerate, a little empire in south central LA. They've
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: owned their own home on Santa Barbara Boulevard is now
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Martin the King Boulevard, west of western south side of
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: the street. They owned an eight unit apartment building they
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: owned which they bought for eighteen thousand dollars. I believe
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: it will be worth several million dollars today. We owned
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: a gas station at Veringdon in Normandy, I believe Southeast Corner.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: We owned the scenic contracting business. We owned a nursery
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: business which my mother ran, and I was the first client.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: My mother pimped me. I mean, I mean leverage me
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: as a client to get other clients. I was the
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: marketing agent. Look well, I was treating my son. You
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: need to come and be client too. It was all good,
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: It's fine. My mother, my mother's was brilliant at managing
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: money and building. As my dad was mister outside. She
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: was missed inside. And a relationship is the only time
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: the mass shouldn't work. Two plus two should equal more
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: than four. The two plus who does not make equals six,
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: eight or ten? What are you doing? Right? Yeah? Better together?
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: What are you doing? Uh? So we own all this stuff.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: But when my dad was financially I literate, right, So
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: my dad didn't understand money. He thought that that cash
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: flow was everything. So he go bid on a job.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: And so my dad wasn't dumb. He wasn't too. He
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: was really really smart. Uh. But no one taught us
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: financial literacy. You know. The Freeman's Bank failed, and that's
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: what was supposed to teach free for all enslaved people
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: about money and free enterprise and capitalist economics and opportunity.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: And we never got that memo. That's one of my books,
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: the memo read it I'm for said capitalism. Read that
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: up from nothing, read that, And so he just didn't
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: know what he didn't know, but he thought he knew.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: It's what we don't know that we don't know this
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: killing is, but we think we know. And so my
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: dad confused cash flow with profit. And so somebody would
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: go bid a job before him, for laying a cement driveway.
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: They'd bid, let's say, one thousand dollars. One thousand dollars
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: today would be a bargain for any kind of driveway,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: but it was one thousand dollars back then, and my
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: dad would just go in and bid under him nine
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: hundred dollars. Well, the materials might be nine to twenty five,
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: might be nine to fifty with the twoteriers and labor,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: who knows. My dad just would take a scratch pad
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: and sort of scratch some stuff out, but he'd miss
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: some stuff, but he got the job right. So the
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: more money he made, the broker we got. He'd make
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: a dollar and spend a dollar fifty. He thought, again,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: cash flow is profit? Hello, wrong, And so he started
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: missing payments on the mortgages and missing payments on I
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: remember my dad met people ask me sometimes why is
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: it that I'm not racist? Like, why is it that
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: I'm so comfortable with different races of people? And I
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: would say that it doesn't matter whether your white, black, red, brown,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: or yellow, which is all wants some more. Green is
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: in the color at least in the US of US currency.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: Because at the front door of my house on marton
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: the King Boulevard before that Santa Barbara was the payroll center.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: My dad would open that door on Fridays at five
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: o'clock and meet payroll. And the workers were white, they
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: were black, they were Hispanic, they were Indian workers at
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Native American Indian. They all worked for my dad as
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: day laborers. And some of them were, uh, you know,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: had worked for my dad four years and every Friday,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: no matter what, he met a payroll. Now he might
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: have he wasn't. He didn't think he was broke. He
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: had cash left over it on Friday night to go
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: out to the juke joint or whatever and hang out
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: and we will buy some clothes. But he might not
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: have enough money for the mortgage payment or the car
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: note or whatever, right, but he had enough money that moment,
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: and so he thought he was rich. And he and
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: we were actually broke. But but I had this comfort
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: with race because at an early age, not only did
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: I see bankers in my classroom and teachers who happen
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: to be Caucasian, and we got alan they were decent
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: to me, thank god, h versus my friends growing up
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: who had this experience of white people who would throw
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: them against a patrol car and and pat him down
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: or worse. Uh and so they became resentful of white people.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: That wasn't, thank god, my experience. And then then I
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: had this also, this experience of seeing my dad in
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: a you know, a superior business position, not superior as
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: a human being, superior as in the pecking order of
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: the relationship to these other people who happened to be
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: of other races as he was meeting pyrom and uh
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: So I just remembered that very powerfully in my in
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: my mind, and I was like, shoot, I want to,
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: I want to. I want to write the check. I
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: don't want to cash it, right, I want to be
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: the business owner, right. Uh. And I and my dad
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: used to force me to go to jobs with him,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: se him at contracting jobs. And I mean I remember
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: I used to I hated that. I hated this this
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: was this. This is probably why I was like, I know,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: I got to work for myself. I used to go
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: to these jobs and it was so hot and my
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: dad and my dad's truck had no air conditioning, and
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: literally like my mouth in my face, inside of my face,
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: stick to the side of the glass. You know, it
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: was so hot. And I'd go to sleep and I
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: had to peel my face off the glass. Uh. He'd
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: stay inside talking to somebody for an hour and a half. Uh,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: you know whatever run in his mouth about something, and
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: I got some like gift gift for gap and love
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: for words from him. I'm sure and uh. And then
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: he'd go, we'd go get a job and he and I,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm the boss's son. I wanted to be
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: a supervisor. Nope, So he put me to work with
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: the other workers, uh and doing menial labor, and you know,
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: he would mess with me dig a hole. Then he
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: come back to where he was later fill in the hole.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, I'm done. And I had callouses on
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: my hand right and I'm like, no, no, only cut
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna get going forward is a is a paper
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: cut endorse that check and deposited in the bank. I'm
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: not doing this for the rest of my life. But
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: that's that taught me. Hard work. That taught me that
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: just because you're the boss of sons, you don't you
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: don't get a pass right that everybody's got a hustle.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: There's an old saying about wealth creation. The first generation
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: makes it, second generation spends it, third generation loses it. Right, Well,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: we didn't. We didn't get to three generations because my
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: dad made it but couldn't keep it because he was
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: financially literate, and because he didn't see my mother as
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: a partner with him. He just saw her as his mate,
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: and so she was a financial genius on savings. Please
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: listen to the podcast I did just dedicated to her.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: I'll get it into her story. And you know, he
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: could have made it, kicked it over to her. She
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: could have saved it, invested it, you know, grew it,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: and it would have been a fantastic union. But that's
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: not what happened. And you know, the number one calls
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: for divorce in America, it's money. Number one reason for
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: domestic abuse and households. Uh, it's money, number one reason
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: for heart attacks, stress, number one of the reason for stress.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: It's money, and my mom and dad stressed over money,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: and they broke up over money, and we lost everything.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: We lost our generational wealth, and so we had to
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: start over. My mother had to start over and my dad.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: And then here's the deep part, Now this is really deep.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: My dad owned his own business and again, you know,
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: was self determined, and it clearly was not lazy. It
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: was a hustler by every definition, irrespectful definition of that phrase.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: But my dad died broke. I'm gonna tell you the
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: part of that, the rest part of that story, in
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: a minute. My mother worked an hourly job listening now
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: everybody who was employed somewhere. My mother worked an hourly
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: job at McDonald Doalla's aircraft. And when she passed on,
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: God rest both of their souls. She passed on September tenth,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. I just lost her. Recently, she's been promoted,
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: gone to a better place with a great relationship. Thank god.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: I did the best I could to make her life
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: comfortable and even joyful. But she know she when you
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: look at how much she put in as a down
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: payments to my mother's, my sister, and my brother to
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: buy homes and helping her family members. And there was
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: time she helped me coming up. You know, I'm proud
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: to say I paid her back. I'd have to go
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: to her to her I think, which is twice in
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: my entire life, or for anything. It was monetary, but
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: she you know, you look at their entire net worth,
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: including you know, I'm an executive estate. And when she passed,
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: it was a million dollars accumulated network for somebody making
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: fifteen to eighteen dollars an hour on Can I get
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: an amen? With a high school education? You know I'm
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: talking about so so, So here's my mother worked a
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: regular job. She died with an accumulation network networth of
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: a million dollars, with a you know, an hourly job.
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: She retired from Mcdonaldongan's Aircraft, you know. And my dad
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: owned his own business to the day he died and
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: it was broke. So there you go. You can do
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: well working at a job somewhere, because now that you make,
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: it's about what you keep. Can I get an amen?
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: It's the church of what's happening? Now? What have you
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: done for me lately? So my dad fast forward now
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: the story, I'm you know, I'm older, and I've gone out,
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: gone out and done things and you know, achieved some
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: level of success. I remember my dad, you know, I
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: used to come I would come home and tell him, Oh, Dad,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: you know, my President of United States said my name
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: at a you know, at a ceremony or I'm an
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: appointee for the president United States? And he who is it?
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: That particular time, it was it was a President Reagan
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: or President Bush. I've served Republican and Democratic presidents, and
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: President Bill Clinton's a friend. I've served Obama and so
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: on and so forth. But this was President Reagan, whose
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: wife had mentioned my name, and President George H. W. Bush,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: who had mentioned my name and opened a few doors
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: for me. Then the son President Bush pointed me to
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: a commission or to actually that's more than that, but
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: actually actually have to create financial literacy policy to executive
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: order with the son. But that's another story for another time. Anyway,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: I went to tell my dad and he was he
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: just blew it off. He just he's like, he's a Republican.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: You know, I want to encourage you people like who
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: have children, like if they screw up, say, you know,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: I'm really upset with you. And and you're like, I
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: get away with this, you future lawyer. I'm really frustrated
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: with you, and I'm going to hold you accountable, you
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: future business person, hold you know, hold up their aspirations,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: because this stuff sticks with kids, right, they're modeling what
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: they see. My dad didn't mean me and he harm.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: He was just talking, you know, he was just My
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: dad was partisan, and he was straight up hardcore Democrat.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: I didn't respect it. I mean, I'm able to get
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: it done party. I don't care, you know, don't care
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: what party you from. I want to I want to
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: get it done right. But you know, we had different
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: approaches and we had different experiences. I mean, I had
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: traveled with to work. My dad had never been out
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: of the country, I don't believe. And I had by
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: that time, traveled to I think twenty different countries. I've
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: traveled to one hundred now. So I didn't, you know,
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: hold it against him. But I understand my dad had
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: limited experiences and couldn't help me very much. So I
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: didn't talk to him about anymore after that. What I
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: was doing. I just tried to help him do what
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: he was doing. Well. He had moved into a house
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: that I found out he didn't own, and a young lady,
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: an older lady owned the house and allowed him to
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: stay there, but he had to be your girlfriend. Yes,
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: this is a true story. And so I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: that can't happen. So I'm buying the house, right, But
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: I'm a capitalist, so I'm like, I'm buying this house.
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: But I'm not going to just hear like, have this
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: expense on my balance sheet, I'll buy the house was
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: knocked down three walls, keep one wall up, get plans
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: for a three or four unit apartment building, build three
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: or four units around those three the one remaining wall,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: get permits, get a construction loan, and then let's rent
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: out the three units. You live in the first unit,
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: and let's have a positive experience in what we messed
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: up when my parents bought at eight unit apartment building
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: growing up. So Dad was like cool, and so I
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: bought the house he was in from lady. We got
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: a construction loan from Wells Fargo. And this is why
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: I never hated on Wells Fargo. And Tom was my
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: band's name. I gotta find his name, and I gotta
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: give him credit. Tom at Wells Fargo, because if he had,
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: Thoma Swanson, if he had defaulted on me, I wouldn't
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: be here today because I got this construction loan. My
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: father was in construction. So I said, okay, well I'm
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: gonna let you manage the construction loan. Wrong, I should remember,
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: and I gave my dad, always with a marriage press card,
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: a green card back then he maxed out the green
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: card almost immediately. I remember six thousand dollars. Almost lost
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: my mind and I couldn't pay it, and he couldn't
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: pay it. He didn't know he charged it, and he
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: had mismanaged a contruction loan, and we ended up with
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: a half done project. Luckily for me, at this point
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: in particular, time values were going up, and I went
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: to the banker and I just admitted, Hey, my dad
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: screwed this thing up. I'm responsible for it, but I
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: got to get this building completed. And he refinanced that
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: construction loan. Can you believe that the banker, white banker,
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: Tom Swanson, God bless you man, he refinanced that construction loan.
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: If he hadn't refinanced that construction loan into a new
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: construction loans so I could finish that building. I'd be
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: toe up from the flow up. I'd be broke poor.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: I'd be so poor I couldn't pay attention. I'd be
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: so poor. This is to have a po not the
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: r this pole po. I mean I'd be I had
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: a file bankruptcy, it had been done. It was this
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: was real money. It was you know back and then
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: those days from my six hundred and seventy one thousand dollars,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: I was everything, and I took the you know love now,
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: I took the responsibility. I canceled the credit card my father,
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: and I took the construction loan away from him and
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: had another contractor to manage it. So here's a lesson
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: for you. Don't make emotional decisions. Whatever decision you make emotionally,
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: it is going to be the wrong decision. You can
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: love your family and not do business with them. You
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: can love your family and not put them in a
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: situation where they don't they're not qualify, you're not doing
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: them any favors, you're not doing yourself a favor. And
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: when you go a half for your money, it's going
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: to be drama. Uh So, just don't put yourself in
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: that situation in the first place like, if it's charity,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: go make your money over here and then go give
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: it to somebody if you want to. But don't expect
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: somebody who is financially illiterate. If you know, it's not
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: they're not dumb, and there's not stupid. It's they're not
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: dumb or stupid. It's what they don't know that they
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: don't know. This killing them, but they think they know.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: If I wanted to want some some knowledge about the Bible,
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: go to my father. He was brilliant. He hit the
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: Bible like memorize right. If I want to learn about
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: you know, you know, fashion and styles in the neighborhood,
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: go to him. I wanted to learn about cement masonry, uh,
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: you know, working in you know, hot temperatures outside. There
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: was a whole bunch of things that my dad was
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: really really good at. Could school me on how to
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: float checks, right, But financial literacy is not one of them.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: Project management, business management was not one of them. It's
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: not a knock. It just he didn't know what he
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: didn't know. And you know what, we got to stop
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic in our lives
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: and ship is sinking and we're picking drapes, so you know, yeah,
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: we finished the apartment building and he turned up his
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: nose and me, but he got over it and he
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: lived in that unit and dignity into the day he
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: passed away. And I remember getting a call from Rachel,
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: my chief of staff, Rachel daff, who was like a she.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: He considered her a surrogate darter and true, true, true conversation.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: He actually at least told her he you know, played
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: like he was closer to her than me, because he was.
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: He was knocking on me because I was an independent
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: spirit like him, and I was out running around trying
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: to make the money, so I couldn't be around l
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: as he was spending it. But I was honored to
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: be to take care of him, right, and all of
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: us should want to take care of our parents as
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: they took care of us. But that doesn't mean you're
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: going to agree on everything. So Rachel called me and
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: I had to run home and my dad was on
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: a ventilator at Cedar Sinai Hospital, and I remember, you know,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: I said to the doctor to what do you you know,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: how do you guys feel about playing God? Like we're
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: not playing God? You are if we took your dad
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: off of this machine, he probably will float and pass away.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: You know, in minutes, these machines, millions of dollars with
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: the equipment are keeping him alive. We're not playing god.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: You are. This is your choice. And I had to
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm the youngest in my family, but I
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: had had to step up and have maturity. And I
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: got everybody on the phone and we collectively as a family,
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: said our goodbyes, and we said, look, either his body's
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: given out, he's given up. Our God has called him.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Either his body given out, he's given up, our God
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: has called him. Or we're going to disconnect this equipment
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: and he will somehow come back on his own relation.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: That will be fantastic. But you know, does he want
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: to be in vestable for the rest of his life?
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Is this the way? This is a quality of life
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: he wants? Probably not. And he should have had a will.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: He didn't. By the way, my mother died with a will.
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: She wrote, what everybody listening to this, you need a
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: will so people don't fight when somebody passes on and
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: a will fight because money changes people's mental makeup. I'm
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: sorry that just money changes people. So Luckily here the
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: money was mine, so there was not much of a fight,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: although people did find a way to have an attitude
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: with me. I can't quite figure that out because they
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: weren't anywhere around when Dad was sick. But okay, be gracious,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: but I just can't encourage it enough. To get your
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: affairs in order and get a will, and if you
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: can get a burial plot, and if you can get
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: an insurance policy, because the insurance policy is the cheapest
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: form of generational wealth creation that you can pass on
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: to your children. You don't have much money, don't have
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: to work as a young person twenty thirty forty years old,
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: Go get you a term or whole life insurance policy
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: and name your beneficial and when you and create a will,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: and then you change the will, change the beneficiaries on
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: the insurance policy. So when you pass away, maybe you
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: only made thirty or forty thousand dollars a year, but
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: you could have a half million doile of life insurance policy,
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: and your heirs get the benefits of that, and we're
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: able to reset their life and go buy a house
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: or start a business or whatever, you know, continue the
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: legacy of the family. But my dad didn't do any
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: of that, and I know I had to start from scratch,
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: but we you know, we made the decision to let him,
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: you know, pass on, or to let him float, as
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: they said in the hospital, and I yuess he passed on.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: I don't know why we get upset and want to
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: blame God for death. By the way, you know, we
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: don't know how long we don't live, but we dang
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: shouldn't know we're gonna die, Like, what's the mystery? You know,
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: we salute and we celebrate children coming in this world,
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: but we want to rail at God when elderly people transition.
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: This is the ebb and flow of life. And we're
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: not human beings having a spiritual experience of European profits
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: at that's the European philosopher. Sorry, we're spiritual beings having
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: a human experience. We're not human beings having a spiritual
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: experien is where spiritual beings having a human experience, energy matters,
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: and those people are going to be with you forever.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: My dad's still in me, my mother is still in me,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: and their legacy lives through me. It's just their physical
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: body is falling away. And now I'm trying to give
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: the benefits of their legacy and their lessons to you.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: This is John O'Bryant, and this is a silvil rights
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: movement from the streets to the suites, from civil rights
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: the silvil rights. This is the work of Operation Hope,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: where we are the private banker to the working class
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: and the working middle class and folks with too much
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: month at the end of their money. So you don't
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: have to be like my father and scratch and script
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: and scream and scrimp and make bad decisions like you
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: can do better right where you are, and we can
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: show you how. And we can go to one man
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: black business Issuan. We will show you how to create
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: a proper business with and even an e commerce business
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: at no cost to you. By the way, rainbows only
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: follow storms. This is my rainbow after the storm. And
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: the reason that we have Operation Hope today is in
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: part because of what my dad did for me at
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: the positive and even the so called negatives. You can't
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: grow except through legitimate suffering. Only do legitimate suffering do
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: you grow. I learned many lessons from my dad and
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: I love him forever and ever and ever, and I
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: will try to make him proud, even though I deal
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: with politicians from all sides of the aisle. Love and Light,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: I'm Out, Money and Wealth with John O'Brien is a
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: production of the Black Effect podcast Network. For more podcasts
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: from the Black Effect Podcast Network, visit the iHeartRadio app,
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: Step