September 23, 2025 • 47 mins
Brady Fenn shares how Fenn Rogers went from “tearing up floors” to a trusted luxury custom home builder in the Phoenix area by partnering with the right designers/architects and bidding to the actual spec, not the plan assumptions. He shares hard-won lessons on fixing budget misses, building a dependable subs bench, and using clear expectations and communication to keep clients confident through an imperfect, first-time build.
https://www.fennrogers.com
Show Notes:
00:00 Welcome + what Fenn Rogers builds
02:26 Brady’s path: from tearing up floors to partner
11:18 Designers & architects: moving upmarket the right way
17:08 Budget misses → pivot to spec-driven estimating
30:18 “Chuck in a truck” vs. building a pro subs bench
37:18 Why process feels hard in custom — the imperfect reality
43:13 Set expectations, over-communicate, earn trust
46:30 Closing thoughts & thanks
Find Our Hosts:
Reece Barnes
Matt Calvano
Podcast Produced By:
Motif Media
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to builders budgets andbeers. I'm Rhys Barnes and I
(00:04):
started this podcast to havereal conversations about money
in the building industry, thewins, the mistakes and
everything in between. I believebuilders deserve to feel
confident about their finances,and that starts by hearing from
others who've been through ittoo. This industry can be slow
to change, but the right storiesand the right tools can make
profitability feel possible.
Let's get into it.
(00:34):
All right. Brady, mics are hot.
Let's go. We'rerocking and rolling. Um,
appreciate you coming on, dude.
If you listen to the podcast,you know that I always like to
give the listeners just a littleintro to the guest that's on. So
if you would go ahead and tellthem who, who Brady fan is, and
what Fen Rogers is all about.
(00:55):
Yeah, so Brady Finn partner withhere at Fen Rogers custom homes.
My partner is Jeff Rogers. Hehas been in the business for
probably 4045, years, and I'vebeen with him for coming up on
11 years now. Started workingwith him back in 2014 and I was
(01:20):
a just laborer. Basically atthat time, it was just him. He
was thinking he wanted to bringsomebody else on, and I was
looking for work. I had met himthrough church, and yeah, asked
him if he needed help. And sureenough, and so my first job with
him was tearing up wood floor ona remodel that we were doing,
(01:42):
just great labor, yeah, kind ofjust got me in at the bottom
floor and literally tearing upfloors, and just kind of worked
my way up till we got to thepoint where I could start
managing projects. And theneventually he and I became
partners. A couple years ago,changed the name to Fen Rogers
custom homes. And, yeah,eventually he'll retire, but
(02:05):
definitely not trying to pushhim out by any means. Want him
to stay on as long as he can.
So, yeah, totally. But we'recustom home builders in here in
the Phoenix area, Arizona. Smallcompany we build. You do about
six to 10 projects a year. And,yeah, love it. It's great stuff,
dude.
(02:26):
That's great. That's great.
Okay, so we're, I mean, we'retalking, okay, did you start in
construction?
2014, kind of, so I grew up inconstruction. My dad's a home
builder in a small, small townin southern Arizona, so kind of
grew up with him summers, youknow, again, just kind of grunt
labor. We did our own concreteand framing, so it was a lot of
that type of stuff. And then in2013 I was starting to go to
(02:52):
school for constructionmanagement. I did an internship
with a big commercial contractoron a big project in Tempe,
actually, at ASU, at ArizonaState University, cool and kind
of hated it, just the the speed,the intensity, the it just was
(03:13):
cutthroat. I mean, I just waslike, Man, this is just not I
really like personalrelationships. I like
collaboration, and it's just allseemed like it was numbers and
stress and just intense, anddidn't love it, so had a little
bit of experience there. Butyeah, to answer your question,
I've been, I've been aroundconstruction my whole life.
Got it. And the reason I askedis because, excuse me, the
(03:35):
reason I asked was like, dude,2014 2025, as a laborer to
partner in a very respected homebuilding outfit and one of the
hottest markets in the UnitedStates is pretty insane, I
guess. Like, how did you get thenod with Jeff to like, get this
opportunity, and then for him tobe like, Yeah, I want to partner
(03:58):
with you. Brady. Like, let's dothis.
Yeah. You know, I think when Istarted, he, he was about 60, so
he actually, he's 70 now, so atthe time, I think he saw the
writing on the wall. He Okay,eventually I want someone to
succeed me, you know, maybe buyme out, take this over. This
(04:18):
type of business is hard to justsell outright, you know. And so
I think he saw that a little bitas his succession plan. We had a
little bit of a relationship,like I said, through church. And
so there was kind of some mutualinterest there. And I saw that
too. I didn't necessarily, atthe time, I didn't realize what
(04:40):
it could be, or what it couldlook like. But, you know, I saw
it as an opportunity. At thetime, it was like, yeah, maybe I
could be a project manager, youknow, Superintendent for him, or
something. So I think a coupleyears in, we realized, okay,
like, yeah, this could, thiscould work out now, that being
said, there were times whereyou. Things, I was maybe a
(05:01):
little impatient. Things weren'tmoving as fast as I'd like to
with ownership or things likethat. So there actually was a
period of time where I actuallywent worked for another company
for a couple of months, andrealized the grass wasn't
greener on the other side. Youknow, luckily, called Jeff up
and he took me back. And it waskind of a good, it was a good
(05:23):
experience, I think, for both ofus, just to kind of realize
that, hey, you know, this is,this is something good we have
here. We work together well. Sothen at that point, I was kind
of like, committed, okay, I'mgonna, I'm gonna kind of stay
this out, you know, eventuallytake over, and we got to the
point where, once we became5050, partners, I think it was
(05:47):
really good security for me.
Like, okay, I'm in. This is whatI want to do. I'm staying here.
And then, yeah, now we're to thepoint where he's talking about
retirement, and I have another,another partner that, since
joined us, that's going toessentially buy him out, and he
and I are going to move forward,and Jeff will keep working a
(06:08):
little bit as long as he can.
But he's, he's looking to take astep back here. You know, early
2026, dude.
That's great. That's great. Imean, it's just like, generally,
it sounds like it was built on,like, trust and the opportunity
came from, like, just consistentdelivery. Honestly, that's what
I'm picking up on. Yeah, 100%I mean, Jeff has been a huge
(06:28):
mentor for me. He's been patientwith me. He's given me all the
responsibility and freedom thatI can handle to really kind of
let me grow he's, he's very,yeah, it's just kind of the type
of person he is as a businessowner, very trusting, very much,
like, hey, you know, you do yourjob. I'm not going to
(06:50):
micromanage you. Yeah, honestly,it's been, it's been awesome.
Couldn't ask for a better,better situation, for sure,
dude, that's great. That'sgreat. You had mentioned, like,
once you and Jeff became 5050partners in the business, that
was kind of the like, okay,like, I'm locked in. Like, this
is the opportunity. This is whatI'm going to commit my life to,
(07:12):
for lack of a better term. Like,what about that 5050 really?
Like, gave you that eye openingmoment.
So it really became, it was hugewhen I was having meetings with
either potential clients orarchitects or designers or
places that the work was goingto come from. So Jeff kind of
(07:35):
gave me that ability, you know,to do that. He was kind of, I
think, comfortable and set, youknow, where he was, you know.
But I was kind of younger,ambitious, trying to, like, Hey,
how can we drum up new business?
How can we make new contacts?
How can we get to another level,to the type of homes that we're
going to build? And so I wasdoing a lot of work, just
(07:56):
meeting with people and tryingto drum up business. And when
the company was Jeff Rogers,custom homes, and I was a either
project manager, essentially wasmy title. It just was kind of
hard. It didn't necessarilycarry a lot of weight when I was
in these meetings or trying todrum up business. And so I think
(08:17):
once, once we changed the nameto Finn Rogers, and I could say,
hey, yeah, I'm Brady Fenn. I'mthe owner. I'm, you know, I'm
the partner in the company.
Started to build a reputation,kind of a little bit in the
community with people that, hey,this is, he's, he's going to be
the one to kind of take over thecompany. It just gave me a
little bit more of a presenceand a little bit more validity
(08:38):
in those meetings, you know,that allowed us to, you know,
allowed me to get, try to landjobs and land business that, you
know, that I was tryingto get totally, it was just skin
in the game, really, yeah, therewas, like, a confidence lift,
skin in the game, like, therewas, there was, I think that's,
I think that's probably validfor, like, a lot of people out
(08:58):
here. It's like, when you havethese people, like running the
projects and doing these things,like when you do, when you throw
someone who shows promise, or,you know, you can, you can see,
there's a, there's a win, winopportunity there. Jeff's trying
to retire, like, create asuccession plan. Brandy is
trying to, like, get moreinvolved with the side of the
business. You can unlock a lotof opportunity.
(09:20):
Yeah, it, it was good. It kindof, I mean, I feel like it's
tough because part of it was alittle, like, ego driven of
like, hey, I want my name on thebuilding. I want my name on the
company, you know. And so partof me is like, Oh, does that
really matter? Is that that bigof a deal? But yeah, it kind of
does a little bit. I think it,it definitely has helped. Again,
(09:42):
when I'm trying to meet withpeople that are going to be
sending me jobs or meet withclients, it instills confidence
in them. But it's been reallycool, because I think with our
company, having Jeff involved ishas been huge, because it's
like, okay, he's. Experienced.
He's he's seen everything he'sbeen around. You know, I think
(10:03):
for clients, they see, okay, gotBrady, who's a little bit more
young and ambitious, but thenyou have Jeff, who's this good,
you know, experienced veteran,you know, knows what he's doing.
It just It instills confidence.
Instills trust. I believe in ourclients, beautiful.
I love it. What would you saythat you brought to the business
(10:24):
that Jeff didn't have and viceversa
for each other? Yeah, I thinkcouple of things Jeff, Jeff had
been doing, he started kind ofon the real estate side of
things in the early 2000 90s and2000s and then got into building
spec homes. And then that turnedinto building custom homes. I
(10:48):
think when he was kind ofestablishing himself as a
builder, the working withinterior designers was more of a
pain than it was like helpful tothe job, you know, so he had a
little bit of this negativeattitude towards working with
designers. It was kind of like,man, they're just going to make
(11:09):
things more difficult, orthey're going to slow up the
process. There's going to bechanges or so, I think that was
something that I was able tobring in to the company, is
trying to establishrelationships with these people
that were essentially going togive us better quality jobs,
higher quality jobs. So I thinkestablishing some of those
relationships really has put usin another level of, you know,
(11:35):
the caliber of homes that were,we're building and and he has
since, you know, totally seenthe light. I mean, it's been
years where, since that, youknow, since he had that mindset.
So, you know, it's very much.
Yeah, we love working withinterior designers and the right
architects, because that justmeans we're going to be working
with the right clients.
Totally the way. Okay, so let memake sure. So Jeff was hesitant
(11:58):
on working with these people,because he was like, it would
slow you down. Did I hear that?
Right? Yeah, it was kind of,again, it's like an old school
mentality a little bit. And Iwant to be just like, I can do
it. He does not think this wayanymore. So, yeah, yeah, sure.
But yeah, just very much oflike, you know, because it was,
it was, you know, technology wasdifferent back then, and just
(12:20):
the organization, you know, itwas like, these designers were
more, at least the ones that hehad worked with, you know, they
were just people who were goingto come meet, on site, make
decisions, but then they weregoing to be making changes. They
weren't going to have answers.
You know, that was kind of hisexperience. And so, yeah, he was
pretty much, no, we don't needthem. We can. We can just point
them to our vendors. They can gopick up stuff themselves, and we
(12:41):
can just make the decisions helpthem and not involve somebody
else, for sure. And this, like,just Yeah, again to like, just
echo you being clear about thisis not a knock, yeah. I think
this is, it's good to talkabout. And it's interesting to
hear that. I mean, this waswhat, five years ago, 10 years
ago, probably, like, 767, yearsago. I think, yeah, he, like, I
(13:08):
said he's totally on board thelast probably, yeah, six, six or
so years. I mean, with Yep, no,we, these are our best jobs come
through these people and so,yeah,
I think 100% I think the pointthat I'm seeing here, and I
think that we could, like, diginto a little bit more, is,
like, just generally resistanceto change and and, like, an
(13:32):
overall openness that is missingin this sector, right? Just
construction general and it, Idon't think that construction
would be what it is if youdidn't have guys and gals that
are running this stuff that aresaying, like, we can do it. We
can do it better. Like, it'slike, very much. Like, take it
(13:53):
on ourselves to do it, and wecan do it the right way, and we
can grind ourselves into thefreaking ground, and we can get
this done. And we don't need allthese other people, but I also,
like I hear just time and timeagain, the same story of whether
it's the single owner or apartner or a business has been
really successful for 510, 15years, not being open to these
(14:15):
types of concepts, and then allof a sudden they catch a sniff
of success by doing something alittle bit different. And
they're just like, it changesthe direction and trajectory of
their business. Like it trulytook, it took someone who was a
laborer, Brady fan, to come inand show promise, right, manage
(14:35):
projects, get the job done, andthen all of a sudden you're
like, Dude, I think we can buildsome relationships with these
people, and whether it wasintentional in the sense of,
like, winning better work ornot, it happened. And if it
hadn't been for you Rogersconstruction or whatever it was
before you came, yeah?
Jeff, Rogers Custom Homes, yeah,yeah, would have been a totally
(14:56):
different game. It'd be atotally different game. But, I
mean, like you were saying itdoesn't. Certainly mean that it
would not be successful. It justwould be a different it's just
different, you know, totally.
It's just a different level, adifferent type of home or
product, you know, that wasbeing presented and but not
necessarily, I wouldn't say it'sinferior by any means, you know,
(15:16):
so, but yeah, it's just, andthere's, there's, there were
some growing pains that camealong with that, you know,
trying to figure out thetransition between the
difference okay. Like, yes, wegot these higher caliber jobs,
but we can't just keep doingthings the same way we've been
doing at a lower price point.
It's just not going to it's notgoing to work, you know. So
(15:38):
there are some experiencesthere, for sure?
What were some of those thingslike, generally, like, what
stands out to you?
So, like, a lot of it was on thefinancial side, which, you know,
adaptive for sure, but makingsure that our budgets were up to
par with the design that wasbeing presented. So like, there
(16:01):
were some projects early onwhere we got these, this
interior design packets, youknow, along with this project.
And we kind of like, okay, thisis normally, we budget this for
Trim Carpentry, we budget thisfor paint, we budget this for
cabinets, whatever. And then weget into the design and find
out, Oh, man, these budgets areway off, you know, this design
is way more detailed, and theclient spent good money on this
(16:24):
design, and they're counting onus. Hey, you know, we gave you
this design, you should havepriced it per the design. So
there, there was a few jobswhere we kind of did it just,
you know, how we always did, andputting the budget together
without really digging into thespecifications that were
presented to us, and it, it costus. I mean, we were, we were
(16:45):
kind of in trouble that madefor, you know, lost money on our
end, plus or hard conversationswith the clients. And, hey, we
just, we didn't budget enoughfor this, you know. And that was
we've, we've definitely hadthose. I me personally, I've had
those hard conversations andthey're not fun.
Yeah, well, I can't imagine, um,I think, like, generally, what
(17:08):
was the pivot? Because, I mean,you guys were budgeting. You
were budget. You just didn'ttake into consideration, like,
the the, like, the bigger scope,or the quality and product, or,
like, like,just the amount like so like
cabinetry, for example. Likewhen you get interior design
done and they specify all thedoor styles, the stain, the
(17:30):
hardware, the amount ofcabinets, you know, so it could
be completely different or justway more intense than what is on
your architectural plans. Youknow, you can look at your
architectural plans just from a2d Okay, yeah, there's base
cabinets here, upper cabinetshere, we kind of would look at
it from a square footage. Andalso, like, maybe we're using a
(17:52):
semi custom cabinet shop, orthat's what we're used to. And
then we get this design donethat our semi cabinet guy can't
even do, you know, like, hecan't do it. And so that then
puts us to a different level ofcabinet company that we need to
use that's going to be moreexpensive because it's 100%
custom cabinets. And so that's,like, kind of an example, or
(18:16):
like, you know, Trim Carpentryis another thing we actually
self perform Trim Carpentry. Andso when we looked at that, it
was, you know, on the plans,okay, yeah, this is the square
footage. We'll budget thisamount, you know, for it. But
then you get into the interiordesign, and there's
specifications in every singleroom, you know, there's so many
different things that werespecified in the interior design
(18:39):
that we just didn't account for.
And so those are kind of acouple examples of things that
were missed on our end when wewere putting these budgets
together.
Totally, totally, no. I think, Imean, that's, that's kind of how
the story goes, right? Yeah. Ihave, I have, so I have, like,
(19:00):
two questions. The first being,how did you choose to, like,
what was interesting enough foryou guys to go? We'll call it up
market or into these, like,higher quality products. And
then the second, which I thinkwe could answer more
immediately, is like, how didyou guys decide to bring self
performed carpentry, finishedcarpentry?
And as so the the selfperforming the Trim Carpentry
(19:24):
was pre existing, beaving,before my time, before with
Jeff. So it was this crew ofguys that he had. They're
amazing. They do so much for us.
I mean, honestly, they wewouldn't be where we are without
these guys. They just do so muchfor us. So Jeff had, I'm not
sure exactly where, how he hadfirst met them, but he was able
(19:44):
to keep them busy through, youknow, the recession, the crash,
oh 809, all of that by doingremodels, here and there, just
kind of whatever he could tokeep them busy. And then we've
just always. Companies use them,since we have this crew of guys
that they do, they do all of ourdoors and trims. They build
(20:04):
closets, any type of TrimCarpentry. But then on remodels
that we do, they'll do some ofthe demo, some of the framing.
You know, they just do so muchfor us. So that's where that
started. It's just kind of beena part of our business ever
since I've been around got it sothey've just asked valuable for
(20:25):
us.
Totally I asked because, like,that's the topic that gets
brought up on the podcast quiteoften, is like the strategic
advantage as a builder to bringin other revenue streams or
offerings, right? Some couldcall it like a vertical
integration, right? Yeah. Like,we bring in self performing Trim
(20:46):
Carpentry, carpentry. We bringin, like, we'll buy our own
equipment, and then we'll leaseit to ourselves to use, or we'll
bring in a framing crew, orwhatever, like, whatever. And I
didn't know if your guys'sdecision making was along that
wavelength, or if it sounds likeit was just more like
happenstance.
No, yeah, more happenstance andmore just like for better
(21:07):
quality project from bothmanagement and just quality of
work. So we since we're costplus we actually don't, I mean,
this is probably something weshould look into. And you know,
if you know, if you look intoour finances, this is where it's
like, if you were looking at itfrom a strictly financial point
of view, we should be profitingmore on them, but we just
(21:29):
charge. We just put their costin as a line item, and then our,
you know, our percentage getsadded to that because we're cost
plus on our contracts. So it'sdefinitely not a financial gain.
For us. I mean, I guess it couldbe technically, but not really.
That's not the reasoning.
It's like a bread and buttermoney maker, like, no, what is
(21:52):
the thinking behind that? Like,and it's more so like, when you
say, like, we probably could orshould be doing that, but you
decide to do it, bring it inbasically a cost like, what's
the business decision makingaround that?
I think it just kind of, itallows us to be in the price
point that we're at, maybe alittle bit it's a huge line
(22:17):
item, you know, on the overallcost of the project. But, yeah,
and it's just not somethingwhere we I think it's maybe
would lead to a hardconversation with clients. If
they see that and they're like,Oh, well, you're making you're
charging me cost plus, butyou're also making money on this
line item, they might feel likethey're being double billed a
little bit, sure, sure. So justkind of, yeah, yeah. I think
(22:41):
that's the nature of it. Wedon't necessarily want to get
too greedy and feel like we haveto collect every dollar on
project, but, I mean, it reallyis just more of a they do such
good work, we feel like they'rea representation of us and the
work that we do. So that'sthat's more of the decision
behindit, dude. Value can be driven in
a variety of ways, and it can becollected on in a variety of
(23:06):
ways, right? Like, I don'tnecessarily know if I have a
strong opinion one way or theother. I mean, I certainly talk
to builders that are like, yeah,like, you should be like,
standing up these differentbusinesses and using them as the
general contractor and makingyour markup margin on all of
these people. But I think like,also, like, to your point, is
(23:29):
like, maybe it could also justbe viewed as more of, like, a
competitive edge, right? It'slike, don't bite the hand that
feeds you in this situation,more of a like, these are
reputable guys that we can relyon that are doing killer work
regularly. Like, it's not likewe're losing money on them. And
this is, like a strategic anglethat we can take to win these
(23:50):
jobs and be competitive in themarket 100%
and I mean, and honestly, they,they aren't cheap. I mean,
they're expensive what we paythem, you know, but they're very
qualified, and so if we were toadd a markup on top of what
they're already charging, itdoes get kind of pricey, you
(24:13):
know, a little spicy, yeah,yeah. So cool.
Um, okay, so No, that makes aton of sense. Um, I think the
other question was, is, like,how did you decide to go into
more again, I'm gonna call it upmarket, but we'll just call it,
like a more luxury product. AndI will preface the reason I'm
asking is because I think, likemy world particularly, is, like,
(24:36):
we work with, like, a lot ofreally high end luxury home
builders almost so much in thesense that it's like, it becomes
like the normal, right? It's nodifferent than like, being on
like social media, right? Andyou're in your own little echo
chamber, and you see the sameshit over and over, becomes
normal. Like, that's theexpectation. But you do, you
kind of forget about the builderout there and who, like,
(24:57):
frankly, I appreciate the hellout of we just. Lisa episode,
but it's with a builder down inTupelo, Mississippi, and he's
building a 250,000 to $400,000price point home. Obviously,
that's like what the market canyield. Sure, there's probably
bigger homes being built. Butlike, he's very adamant about
building that product. For hisreason, I'm curious what, and
(25:21):
this is me assuming that, like,the Jeff Rogers custom home
product was, like,significantly, you know, maybe
not lesser in quality, but and,like, luxury than what you guys
are doing now. How did you guysdecide to step up into the
market? What was the driver?
Yeah, soI'll answer that first, that
last part. So the it was, itwasn't that Jeff wasn't doing
luxury products, because he was,but they were, it was more of
(25:43):
like it'd be a one off here orthere, and then there'd be a
lower market that was more oflike the normal, I guess. And so
I don't definitely, don't wantto make it seem like he wasn't
in this. I think even pre crash,pre recession, he was doing very
high end luxury spec homes, andthen the market just changed.
(26:07):
And I think that just changed,shifted his mindset so So to
answer the question, a couple ofthings. I think the market was
going that way. You know, youthink back to 2014 1516, like it
was trending upwards. And then abig part of it for me was it was
at that time, 2014 I became goodfriends with Brad Levitt from
(26:30):
aft. So I've started seeing heand I were just, you know,
playing basketball together. AndI started seeing
who won, who won, who won? Oh,play ball.
Oh, man, put me on the spot.
Yeah, let's do honesty is thebest policy. It's pretty even
(26:51):
back then, I was in really goodbasketball shape, so I think I
had the edge back then. Yeah,the reason is he's, he's about
10 years older than me, and he'sheld it to where I feel like
we're fairly even. Brad's abetter shooter than I am. I'll
give him that for sure. So, andunfortunately, Brad usually
(27:12):
beats me on the golf courseright now too, so it's kind of
got the edge a little bit. Butanyway, so I started seeing
that's, that's really when hegot into social media too, and
posting just these quality,these really cool projects, and
totally, that's when, you know,social media was starting to
(27:34):
grow a little bit, and, youknow, you're seeing things, and
I was wanting to do that. AndI'm just like, man, some of
these projects we're doing, Idon't really want to post them,
you know, they're not veryinterested in that. Great, you
know. And then so it was talkingwith him a lot, and he's like,
man, you gotta start. You gottawork with interior designers.
Like, that's the difference.
Like, that's who you got to getin with her. You got to get in
(27:56):
with the right architects, like,you can do. And that was kind of
my thing too, is like I feltlike we we had the right guys,
or we had the right team inplace to do the quality of of
projects that I wanted to but wejust weren't getting the
clients. We just weren't gettingthe jobs that would allow us to
do that. So that's really whatit was. It was kind of just
(28:19):
social media and just, you know,just me personally wanting to do
projects that I personally wouldlike. And I definitely was
leaning more that way of these,just higher quality luxury
products. Definitely was notfitting for me. You know, I grew
up in a town of southern Arizonawith 5000 people and just, you
(28:40):
know, just not, it's not like Igrew up around it by any means,
but I don't know, just kind ofgravitated towards it, liked it.
And then I think another part ofit was to like higher budgets,
higher quality projects allowedus to work with higher quality
vendors and subcontractors too.
So I just sure all around justwanted a better project, and not
(29:04):
just so much grinding and doingit for as cheap as possible,
because then those those guysthat you have to work with to do
that, it's just not it's notenjoyable.
I mean, I can makes all thesense in the world, I think,
like the the self awareness andthat kind of like inflection
point of creating a productthat, just to be candid, you
(29:27):
weren't super stoked tobroadcast or, like, put your
name on. Like, Dude, I thinkthat's a hell of a takeaway,
which, again, like, I think evengoing back to this guy in
Tupelo, is like, you don't likeall the pride doesn't have to be
in the finishes or the luxury,right? Like you listen, you
listen to you listen the episodewith the builder in Tupelo, and
(29:50):
you're like, damn. Like, thisguy's hyper passionate about
building an entry level home forindividuals, first time home
buyers, people that. Were in,you know, like, trailers, mobile
homes, stuff like that, thatnever thought that they could
get into a custom home or a newbuilt home, right? But I think
that, like, inflection point foryou is interesting, that it
does, like, you have to, youhave to follow your truth,
(30:12):
right? And like, really be awareof who you are to say, am I
going into this for the rightreasons? And like, frankly,
like, what you guys are doing atFen Rogers, like, I don't know
how you could put up a productlike that and not be in it for
the right reason, focusing onthe vendor and subcontract
relation, focusing on the clientexperience. And that's kind of
my next question is, like, it'spretty assumptive as to, like,
(30:35):
the chuck in the truck, youknow, like, guy with his name on
the side of the truck, doingeverything for as cheap as
possible, working with thosesubs and vendors as a grind.
What about it as a grind? Like?
Is it disorganization? Is it thethe quality of work? Is it
having to redo work? Is it like,what is all the what is it that
really, just like drives at thatmarket?
(30:58):
Yeah, for sure. I mean, I thinkthat's it. I think it's the
maybe lack of organization, or,you know, them, they may be a
master at their trade thatthey're doing, but if they're
trying to run the business to,you know, they're just spread
too thin. They're not able to doit. And so, like the guys that
we work with, we still do workwith a lot of owner operator
(31:20):
type subs, but they also havegood guys in place that are able
to do a good job. You know, kindof a good measure for us is
like, do I feel comfortable withthis person meeting with my
client without me being there?
Like, am I? Are they the typethat I would feel comfortable
where, if they were to run intoeach other, if they would have a
(31:41):
meeting, I would feel confidentknow that they would be, you
know, a good representation ofme and my company, and would be
able to hold their own. And so Ihonestly can say that about
pretty much all of our subs andvendors that we work with, like
and we do that a lot, we have alot of trust in our guys, and,
you know, being able to do thatand have meetings, have
(32:02):
discussions. Now, obviously weneed to know all the
informations that's beingdiscussed. But if a client were
to just show up on a job siteunannounced, and they're talking
to my cabinet guy, or my painteror whoever, I'd feel good with
them with that interaction, thatit would instill confidence in
the client. So, but, yeah, Ithink just, you know,
organization being able to hire,you know, for these
(32:24):
subcontractors, having enough,you know, of a fee or a budget
for what they do, to be able tohire good quality people to work
with, and then the materialstoo, just working with higher
quality materials is another,you know, big, another part of
it, forsure, totally, totally, um, when
(32:44):
it comes to, and you talked alittle bit about, like, the
progression of, and again, itsounds like Jeff was, like,
running like, as a very, like,high quality business before,
but for the builders that areout there that are, like,
probably in that, in thatposition to where they're a
remodeler trying to get into newconstruction, or they're in new
construction, but they're tryingto get into more of the luxury
(33:05):
space. You're talking aboutbudget, you're talking about
getting involved with interiordesigners, architects, you're
talking about all that stuff. Isthere anything from a business
standpoint that you would urgethem to consider before stepping
up into landing a client withmore budget that allows you to
get involved with better subsand better material.
(33:26):
Who, yeah, I think just havingyour process as dialed in as
best you can, you know, I talkedabout, kind of our pains that we
went through that was more onthe front end, the budgeting and
the estimating side. So, soreally like digging into all the
specifics and details of plansand everything like that. So I
(33:47):
think on the front end, as muchas you can be better prepared
that way, but then I mean afterthat, it kind of is just going
to take, take a little bit oftrial and error, you know, like
jumping into it ideally, if theperfect situation is, if you
could do a spec home whereyou're, you know, you don't have
a client, you're able to,whether you're partner with an
(34:10):
investor or however it's goingto work. But get into that and
build the level that you want tobe your bread and butter. You
know, build to that level thatyou want, you're wanting to get
to on a custom home side. Imean, that would be ideal, but
that's hard. I mean, it's it'srisky. You got to find the right
deal, and you got to be a littlebold and try to take that
(34:32):
chance. So that's a little bitof what we've done, what we did,
but we also did some smallremodels that we wouldn't
normally do, but, you know,there's been a handful of jobs
that we've done where it's like,hey, just this is just a little
kitchen remodel, or it's abathroom remodel, and they want
(34:53):
to paint their house, butthey're spending, you know,
three quarters of milliondollars on furniture with the
design. So the designer, like,really wants to get the job, but
they want to have the rightcontractor to do this little bit
of work for them. We've donethat, and that's established
relationship with designers thatthey're like, hey, you know,
thank you for doing that. Itallows us to get our foot in the
(35:13):
door to do a project with them,and then so when they get a new
build or a bigger project thatcomes their way, we already have
a little bit of a relationshipthere.
Totally, totally no. And I thinkthat's like, you know, it's, I
think you talk about specking ahouse, right? And that, for
sure, is risk, and there's somuch that goes into it. We did,
(35:34):
yeah, I'm gonna sneeze. Blessyou damn. Did I blow your ears
out on that one? Or not, missedthe mic. You're good. You missed
it, yeah, you're good. Allright, cool, um, you know, we
all we want to sneeze sometimes,yeah, sometimes just gonna
sneeze, you know? Um, no, Ithink. But in terms of, like,
taking that risk on a spechouse, taking that smaller job
(35:56):
with the interior designer, itall like, again, goes back into
relationships. It take it goesback into building a reputation,
like, I get it one thread that Iwant to go into which, again,
like my background, like when Iwas at builder trend, like, ran
their onsite consulting service,one of our customer success
managers over here, DannyMartinez, he was doing the
(36:18):
consulting. I mean, that waslike, truly a standard operating
procedure based business likeyou pay builder trend they go
out, they learn their business,they establish processes and
procedures. Did you do one ofthose? By the way? Is that how
we met? Or did we meet throughadaptive? I can't remember. We
met through adaptive. Yeah,because are you another trend
guy? Are you not a builder trendguy? Or kind of, maybe you're on
(36:39):
question.
We are on the fence. Buildertrend is amazing. I hopefully
don't want to say anything badabout builder trend. We just
have not ever really fully, likecommitted to it, for it to be
valuable for us. So okay, and itjust kind of goes with the way
we run our business, basically.
So yeah,yeah, understood, understand.
(36:59):
And that wasn't, that wasn't,that wasn't the point here. The
point here. I opened that doortrying to take a shot at builder
channel. Yeah, no, no, I'm gonnaclose that door real quick here.
So when it comes to standardoperating procedures, processes,
that's what you had mentioned,is like, have your processes
dialed like you talked aboutestimating and budgeting. I
talked to a lot of buildersabout process. Why is it so
(37:20):
hard? Like, why? Why is it sucha point of conversation? And why
is it it's so simple, but it'slike, what is the challenge of
it?
Because we're building, we'rebuilding custom homes, and it's,
you're building something forthe first time. And so as soon
(37:42):
as you set a schedule or aprocess, it's gonna change. You
know, you're just like, it'sjust, there's such an imperfect
nature to what we're doing. Ifit was, if you were
manufacturing a car or, youknow, I have that conversation
with clients all the time, like,hey, this isn't, this isn't the
same as buying a new car off thelot. You know, that's all you
(38:03):
know, machines and processes. Itgoes through so many checks and
balances and everything. Youknow, this is the first time
this house has ever been built.
This is the first time, andfirst you know you're going to
live in it, and there's going tobe things that you're going to
discover from living there thatwe just, you know, we can't
completely test it out before wehand it over to so I think
that's just part of it. I mean,part of it is just stubbornness,
(38:25):
too, like of, you know, kind of,you got some old dogs in the
construction industry that it'shard to teach new tricks to, and
also, but, but, yeah, I thinkjust the it's just chaos, and we
kind of just get used to, like,figuring it out as you go, you
know, it's like, well, what'sthe point of putting schedule
together? Because the moment,the second we finish the
(38:46):
schedule, it's going to getchanged. Everything's going to
get pushed back and pushed back.
And it's just like, frustrating.
You feel like you're failingbecause you're not sticking to
the schedule, where really it'slike, well, maybe that just is
the way it is. So now that beingsaid, I'm definitely not saying
not to do schedules and havesystems and everything. It's
kind of you have to find thatbalance between trying to create
(39:07):
those things but not beatingyourself up when you're not
sticking to them.
Okay, so it's more so well. Andthat's kind of like where, after
hearing that, and just like,generally having an idea of how
this stuff works. Yeah, is,like, it's probably, don't get
hung up on the I'm not gonna saythe detail. How do you phrase
(39:32):
this point being is, like, it'snot that the schedule is moving.
It's like, what is the processthat is in place to keep the big
stuff updated or like, what'sthe big underlying concept that
we're trying to systematize? Isthat fair? Am I articulating
that? What do youthink? Yeah, yeah, for sure.
It's like, I think for I mean,maybe a simpler way to look at
(39:54):
it is like, progress is kind ofthe main. Thing that you're
wanting to be your process, ifthat makes sense. Like, okay,
if, if so. Like, for example,like, if we have guys working
every day on a job, there'smultiple guys there, they are
(40:14):
working every day, but they're aweek behind a so called schedule
that we have put together. Like,how can you get upset with that?
Like, is that a failure? Are youbehind schedule? Or is that just
how long it takes? You know?
Like, sure. So I think that forus, like, and especially in the
luxury, like, the quality luxurycustom home, you know, it's not
(40:38):
about sticking to a scheduler,like building as fast as you
can. I mean, yes, you do want todo that without sacrificing
quality, because that's how youcan be most profitable. But it's
more so. Just about making surethere's progress, it's moving
along. It's not stagnant. Youknow, there's not nobody at you
know, no one's working. That'sThat's what's frustrating is if
(40:59):
you know you're not organizedwell enough to where you didn't
plan ahead, and then you have acouple of weeks where nothing is
happening at the job. I mean,that's, that's what, that's not
good, for sure. That's theproblem. That's the problem.
So I think that's a pretty solidtakeaway. Is, like, build the
process around progress, andknow that, like, to your point.
(41:20):
Like, just to the to the customnature for the builders out
there that are building again,never building the same floor
plan twice. Everything's custom.
Like, it's probably more soimportant that you are building
the process around progressingthrough the build as best as you
know. But then, like, howreasonable is it to say that if
we scheduled in X number ofweeks or days for tile or
(41:44):
whatever on this type ofproject, are you to go back and
be like we have a process inplace to run a post mortem on
all of our projects andunderstand the slippage on our
schedules, and know that if wehave projects like this, we
document it here, we reflectback in our pre con and develop
from there. Is thatridiculous, um, it is to me. So
(42:08):
I know there's other people,there's other builders, and I
honestly, I look up to peoplethat are more wired that way.
I'm just not wired that way,like that is just not my and
honestly, I wish I was. I amenvious of people who think that
way. They're able to analyzedata and then take that and then
(42:28):
use it and be like, Okay, this,this project was this many
square feet, and it took thetile guys X number of, you know,
days to do it. So then, if wewere to take that and put it
into calculate, into this house,like I just, it's just not my I
just do not think that way. Thatis just not me. So I and I've
accepted that. So, yeah, um, sono, it's not crazy to think. And
(42:52):
I do think there's people, Imean, you see it a lot in
sports, you know, there's a lotof analytics are a huge thing in
totally all the differentsports. And there's, there's
people who get fixated on it,stuck on it, and then there's
other people who just go offmore, off of feel and just, hey,
this, this should be, you know.
(43:13):
So I think the biggest thing forme, though, with the way that
we're wired is we make up, maybewe make up for lack of like,
scheduling or analytics or datathat side of things by
communication with our clientsand setting correct expectations
(43:34):
so sure, communicating and doingbusiness in a way to where they
trust us and they just aren'tsecond guessing or aren't
questioning, hey, you know, isthis how it should be done? They
feel that, if they feel thatthey trust us, I'm setting the
right expectation. Hey, youknow, this is we think the House
(43:55):
is going to take 15 to 18 monthsto build, you know? And we're
staying on track within thatthen, then everything is okay.
It's all just about thatexpectation that's been a big
thing I've been thinking ofprobably the last the last year
or two, is just any anyheadaches or frustrations or any
negativity with clients, is allbecause the right expectation
(44:19):
was not set like expectationsare not being met. And so if we
can do a better job at settingthat meeting that expectation,
keeping them in the loop, havinghard conversations as soon as
possible, not letting themlinger then, then that just
allows for that much better of aproject. For us, it allows us to
(44:42):
not be as dialed in on some ofthe schedules and systems and
stuff like that.
I think that's fair. If thisjust if business in general was
like, this is the right way todo it. Uh, the perfect
businesses in the world wouldexist, and that's just not a
(45:03):
thing. Yeah. So yeah, I thinkthere's room for, uh, for people
to get I think. And that waskind of a part of, like, your
commentary was like, giveyourself some grace, basically,
like, yeah, go ahead. No, no. Ijust was agreeing with you.
That's all, yeah, yeah, yeah. Imean, give yourself some grace.
Understand, it's a fluid motion,like you're building motion.
Like, you're building. You'rebuilding. Another one of our
(45:26):
guests from Austin made thecomment about, like, for God's
sakes, like, you show up to ajob site and you look at the
people that are building yourhouse, that's one thing, but
then you remember that you'rebuilding it outside in the
elements. Like, like,truthfully, anything can go
wrong, dude, you gotta, like,just control the things that you
can control and focuson. I think that's just, I mean,
(45:46):
it all goes into your very firstmeeting with your clients and,
like, setting them up to, like,honestly, tell, hey, this is
gonna suck for the next coupleof years. Like, you're gonna
hate this. I always tellclients, like, the funny thing
is, is, like, you know, youfinish building a house, you go
(46:07):
through the whole process, thearchitecture, the interior
design, you spend millions ofdollars you get there, and then
you finish, and then you lookback, you you know, everything
that you would do differentlythe next time, but you'll never
do it again, because it was sucha painful process. So it just is
the conundrum of it, you know,like and it granted. There,
we've had repeat clients.
(46:29):
There's people who are who enjoyit and go through, go through it
multiple times, but it's justfunny, you know, you have that
conversation all the time. Soit's, it's our job to try to
educate them as best we can,because we've done it before,
but I think it's just all aboutsetting that right expectation.
Totally, totally, dude. I knowthis was great. This is great. I
(46:54):
always enjoy it when I get, whenI get some of your time. I think
what you guys are doing down inPhoenix is awesome. I appreciate
you coming on the show, dude,thanks for joining the wealth of
knowledge. Appreciate it.
Thanks, Reese, of course, we'llsee you. Dude, see it.
Welcome to builders budgets andbeers. I'm Rhys Barnes and I
(00:04):
started this podcast to havereal conversations about money
in the building industry, thewins, the mistakes and
everything in between. I believebuilders deserve to feel
confident about their finances,and that starts by hearing from
others who've been through ittoo. This industry can be slow
to change, but the right storiesand the right tools can make
profitability feel possible.
Let's get into it.
(00:34):
All right. Brady, mics are hot.
Let's go. We'rerocking and rolling. Um,
appreciate you coming on, dude.
If you listen to the podcast,you know that I always like to
give the listeners just a littleintro to the guest that's on. So
if you would go ahead and tellthem who, who Brady fan is, and
what Fen Rogers is all about.
(00:55):
Yeah, so Brady Finn partner withhere at Fen Rogers custom homes.
My partner is Jeff Rogers. Hehas been in the business for
probably 4045, years, and I'vebeen with him for coming up on
11 years now. Started workingwith him back in 2014 and I was
(01:20):
a just laborer. Basically atthat time, it was just him. He
was thinking he wanted to bringsomebody else on, and I was
looking for work. I had met himthrough church, and yeah, asked
him if he needed help. And sureenough, and so my first job with
him was tearing up wood floor ona remodel that we were doing,
(01:42):
just great labor, yeah, kind ofjust got me in at the bottom
floor and literally tearing upfloors, and just kind of worked
my way up till we got to thepoint where I could start
managing projects. And theneventually he and I became
partners. A couple years ago,changed the name to Fen Rogers
custom homes. And, yeah,eventually he'll retire, but
(02:05):
definitely not trying to pushhim out by any means. Want him
to stay on as long as he can.
So, yeah, totally. But we'recustom home builders in here in
the Phoenix area, Arizona. Smallcompany we build. You do about
six to 10 projects a year. And,yeah, love it. It's great stuff,
dude.
(02:26):
That's great. That's great.
Okay, so we're, I mean, we'retalking, okay, did you start in
construction?
2014, kind of, so I grew up inconstruction. My dad's a home
builder in a small, small townin southern Arizona, so kind of
grew up with him summers, youknow, again, just kind of grunt
labor. We did our own concreteand framing, so it was a lot of
that type of stuff. And then in2013 I was starting to go to
(02:52):
school for constructionmanagement. I did an internship
with a big commercial contractoron a big project in Tempe,
actually, at ASU, at ArizonaState University, cool and kind
of hated it, just the the speed,the intensity, the it just was
(03:13):
cutthroat. I mean, I just waslike, Man, this is just not I
really like personalrelationships. I like
collaboration, and it's just allseemed like it was numbers and
stress and just intense, anddidn't love it, so had a little
bit of experience there. Butyeah, to answer your question,
I've been, I've been aroundconstruction my whole life.
Got it. And the reason I askedis because, excuse me, the
(03:35):
reason I asked was like, dude,2014 2025, as a laborer to
partner in a very respected homebuilding outfit and one of the
hottest markets in the UnitedStates is pretty insane, I
guess. Like, how did you get thenod with Jeff to like, get this
opportunity, and then for him tobe like, Yeah, I want to partner
(03:58):
with you. Brady. Like, let's dothis.
Yeah. You know, I think when Istarted, he, he was about 60, so
he actually, he's 70 now, so atthe time, I think he saw the
writing on the wall. He Okay,eventually I want someone to
succeed me, you know, maybe buyme out, take this over. This
(04:18):
type of business is hard to justsell outright, you know. And so
I think he saw that a little bitas his succession plan. We had a
little bit of a relationship,like I said, through church. And
so there was kind of some mutualinterest there. And I saw that
too. I didn't necessarily, atthe time, I didn't realize what
(04:40):
it could be, or what it couldlook like. But, you know, I saw
it as an opportunity. At thetime, it was like, yeah, maybe I
could be a project manager, youknow, Superintendent for him, or
something. So I think a coupleyears in, we realized, okay,
like, yeah, this could, thiscould work out now, that being
said, there were times whereyou. Things, I was maybe a
(05:01):
little impatient. Things weren'tmoving as fast as I'd like to
with ownership or things likethat. So there actually was a
period of time where I actuallywent worked for another company
for a couple of months, andrealized the grass wasn't
greener on the other side. Youknow, luckily, called Jeff up
and he took me back. And it waskind of a good, it was a good
(05:23):
experience, I think, for both ofus, just to kind of realize
that, hey, you know, this is,this is something good we have
here. We work together well. Sothen at that point, I was kind
of like, committed, okay, I'mgonna, I'm gonna kind of stay
this out, you know, eventuallytake over, and we got to the
point where, once we became5050, partners, I think it was
(05:47):
really good security for me.
Like, okay, I'm in. This is whatI want to do. I'm staying here.
And then, yeah, now we're to thepoint where he's talking about
retirement, and I have another,another partner that, since
joined us, that's going toessentially buy him out, and he
and I are going to move forward,and Jeff will keep working a
(06:08):
little bit as long as he can.
But he's, he's looking to take astep back here. You know, early
2026, dude.
That's great. That's great. Imean, it's just like, generally,
it sounds like it was built on,like, trust and the opportunity
came from, like, just consistentdelivery. Honestly, that's what
I'm picking up on. Yeah, 100%I mean, Jeff has been a huge
(06:28):
mentor for me. He's been patientwith me. He's given me all the
responsibility and freedom thatI can handle to really kind of
let me grow he's, he's very,yeah, it's just kind of the type
of person he is as a businessowner, very trusting, very much,
like, hey, you know, you do yourjob. I'm not going to
(06:50):
micromanage you. Yeah, honestly,it's been, it's been awesome.
Couldn't ask for a better,better situation, for sure,
dude, that's great. That'sgreat. You had mentioned, like,
once you and Jeff became 5050partners in the business, that
was kind of the like, okay,like, I'm locked in. Like, this
is the opportunity. This is whatI'm going to commit my life to,
(07:12):
for lack of a better term. Like,what about that 5050 really?
Like, gave you that eye openingmoment.
So it really became, it was hugewhen I was having meetings with
either potential clients orarchitects or designers or
places that the work was goingto come from. So Jeff kind of
(07:35):
gave me that ability, you know,to do that. He was kind of, I
think, comfortable and set, youknow, where he was, you know.
But I was kind of younger,ambitious, trying to, like, Hey,
how can we drum up new business?
How can we make new contacts?
How can we get to another level,to the type of homes that we're
going to build? And so I wasdoing a lot of work, just
(07:56):
meeting with people and tryingto drum up business. And when
the company was Jeff Rogers,custom homes, and I was a either
project manager, essentially wasmy title. It just was kind of
hard. It didn't necessarilycarry a lot of weight when I was
in these meetings or trying todrum up business. And so I think
(08:17):
once, once we changed the nameto Finn Rogers, and I could say,
hey, yeah, I'm Brady Fenn. I'mthe owner. I'm, you know, I'm
the partner in the company.
Started to build a reputation,kind of a little bit in the
community with people that, hey,this is, he's, he's going to be
the one to kind of take over thecompany. It just gave me a
little bit more of a presenceand a little bit more validity
(08:38):
in those meetings, you know,that allowed us to, you know,
allowed me to get, try to landjobs and land business that, you
know, that I was tryingto get totally, it was just skin
in the game, really, yeah, therewas, like, a confidence lift,
skin in the game, like, therewas, there was, I think that's,
I think that's probably validfor, like, a lot of people out
(08:58):
here. It's like, when you havethese people, like running the
projects and doing these things,like when you do, when you throw
someone who shows promise, or,you know, you can, you can see,
there's a, there's a win, winopportunity there. Jeff's trying
to retire, like, create asuccession plan. Brandy is
trying to, like, get moreinvolved with the side of the
business. You can unlock a lotof opportunity.
(09:20):
Yeah, it, it was good. It kindof, I mean, I feel like it's
tough because part of it was alittle, like, ego driven of
like, hey, I want my name on thebuilding. I want my name on the
company, you know. And so partof me is like, Oh, does that
really matter? Is that that bigof a deal? But yeah, it kind of
does a little bit. I think it,it definitely has helped. Again,
(09:42):
when I'm trying to meet withpeople that are going to be
sending me jobs or meet withclients, it instills confidence
in them. But it's been reallycool, because I think with our
company, having Jeff involved ishas been huge, because it's
like, okay, he's. Experienced.
He's he's seen everything he'sbeen around. You know, I think
(10:03):
for clients, they see, okay, gotBrady, who's a little bit more
young and ambitious, but thenyou have Jeff, who's this good,
you know, experienced veteran,you know, knows what he's doing.
It just It instills confidence.
Instills trust. I believe in ourclients, beautiful.
I love it. What would you saythat you brought to the business
(10:24):
that Jeff didn't have and viceversa
for each other? Yeah, I thinkcouple of things Jeff, Jeff had
been doing, he started kind ofon the real estate side of
things in the early 2000 90s and2000s and then got into building
spec homes. And then that turnedinto building custom homes. I
(10:48):
think when he was kind ofestablishing himself as a
builder, the working withinterior designers was more of a
pain than it was like helpful tothe job, you know, so he had a
little bit of this negativeattitude towards working with
designers. It was kind of like,man, they're just going to make
(11:09):
things more difficult, orthey're going to slow up the
process. There's going to bechanges or so, I think that was
something that I was able tobring in to the company, is
trying to establishrelationships with these people
that were essentially going togive us better quality jobs,
higher quality jobs. So I thinkestablishing some of those
relationships really has put usin another level of, you know,
(11:35):
the caliber of homes that were,we're building and and he has
since, you know, totally seenthe light. I mean, it's been
years where, since that, youknow, since he had that mindset.
So, you know, it's very much.
Yeah, we love working withinterior designers and the right
architects, because that justmeans we're going to be working
with the right clients.
Totally the way. Okay, so let memake sure. So Jeff was hesitant
(11:58):
on working with these people,because he was like, it would
slow you down. Did I hear that?
Right? Yeah, it was kind of,again, it's like an old school
mentality a little bit. And Iwant to be just like, I can do
it. He does not think this wayanymore. So, yeah, yeah, sure.
But yeah, just very much oflike, you know, because it was,
it was, you know, technology wasdifferent back then, and just
(12:20):
the organization, you know, itwas like, these designers were
more, at least the ones that hehad worked with, you know, they
were just people who were goingto come meet, on site, make
decisions, but then they weregoing to be making changes. They
weren't going to have answers.
You know, that was kind of hisexperience. And so, yeah, he was
pretty much, no, we don't needthem. We can. We can just point
them to our vendors. They can gopick up stuff themselves, and we
(12:41):
can just make the decisions helpthem and not involve somebody
else, for sure. And this, like,just Yeah, again to like, just
echo you being clear about thisis not a knock, yeah. I think
this is, it's good to talkabout. And it's interesting to
hear that. I mean, this waswhat, five years ago, 10 years
ago, probably, like, 767, yearsago. I think, yeah, he, like, I
(13:08):
said he's totally on board thelast probably, yeah, six, six or
so years. I mean, with Yep, no,we, these are our best jobs come
through these people and so,yeah,
I think 100% I think the pointthat I'm seeing here, and I
think that we could, like, diginto a little bit more, is,
like, just generally resistanceto change and and, like, an
(13:32):
overall openness that is missingin this sector, right? Just
construction general and it, Idon't think that construction
would be what it is if youdidn't have guys and gals that
are running this stuff that aresaying, like, we can do it. We
can do it better. Like, it'slike, very much. Like, take it
(13:53):
on ourselves to do it, and wecan do it the right way, and we
can grind ourselves into thefreaking ground, and we can get
this done. And we don't need allthese other people, but I also,
like I hear just time and timeagain, the same story of whether
it's the single owner or apartner or a business has been
really successful for 510, 15years, not being open to these
(14:15):
types of concepts, and then allof a sudden they catch a sniff
of success by doing something alittle bit different. And
they're just like, it changesthe direction and trajectory of
their business. Like it trulytook, it took someone who was a
laborer, Brady fan, to come inand show promise, right, manage
(14:35):
projects, get the job done, andthen all of a sudden you're
like, Dude, I think we can buildsome relationships with these
people, and whether it wasintentional in the sense of,
like, winning better work ornot, it happened. And if it
hadn't been for you Rogersconstruction or whatever it was
before you came, yeah?
Jeff, Rogers Custom Homes, yeah,yeah, would have been a totally
(14:56):
different game. It'd be atotally different game. But, I
mean, like you were saying itdoesn't. Certainly mean that it
would not be successful. It justwould be a different it's just
different, you know, totally.
It's just a different level, adifferent type of home or
product, you know, that wasbeing presented and but not
necessarily, I wouldn't say it'sinferior by any means, you know,
(15:16):
so, but yeah, it's just, andthere's, there's, there were
some growing pains that camealong with that, you know,
trying to figure out thetransition between the
difference okay. Like, yes, wegot these higher caliber jobs,
but we can't just keep doingthings the same way we've been
doing at a lower price point.
It's just not going to it's notgoing to work, you know. So
(15:38):
there are some experiencesthere, for sure?
What were some of those thingslike, generally, like, what
stands out to you?
So, like, a lot of it was on thefinancial side, which, you know,
adaptive for sure, but makingsure that our budgets were up to
par with the design that wasbeing presented. So like, there
(16:01):
were some projects early onwhere we got these, this
interior design packets, youknow, along with this project.
And we kind of like, okay, thisis normally, we budget this for
Trim Carpentry, we budget thisfor paint, we budget this for
cabinets, whatever. And then weget into the design and find
out, Oh, man, these budgets areway off, you know, this design
is way more detailed, and theclient spent good money on this
(16:24):
design, and they're counting onus. Hey, you know, we gave you
this design, you should havepriced it per the design. So
there, there was a few jobswhere we kind of did it just,
you know, how we always did, andputting the budget together
without really digging into thespecifications that were
presented to us, and it, it costus. I mean, we were, we were
(16:45):
kind of in trouble that madefor, you know, lost money on our
end, plus or hard conversationswith the clients. And, hey, we
just, we didn't budget enoughfor this, you know. And that was
we've, we've definitely hadthose. I me personally, I've had
those hard conversations andthey're not fun.
Yeah, well, I can't imagine, um,I think, like, generally, what
(17:08):
was the pivot? Because, I mean,you guys were budgeting. You
were budget. You just didn'ttake into consideration, like,
the the, like, the bigger scope,or the quality and product, or,
like, like,just the amount like so like
cabinetry, for example. Likewhen you get interior design
done and they specify all thedoor styles, the stain, the
(17:30):
hardware, the amount ofcabinets, you know, so it could
be completely different or justway more intense than what is on
your architectural plans. Youknow, you can look at your
architectural plans just from a2d Okay, yeah, there's base
cabinets here, upper cabinetshere, we kind of would look at
it from a square footage. Andalso, like, maybe we're using a
(17:52):
semi custom cabinet shop, orthat's what we're used to. And
then we get this design donethat our semi cabinet guy can't
even do, you know, like, hecan't do it. And so that then
puts us to a different level ofcabinet company that we need to
use that's going to be moreexpensive because it's 100%
custom cabinets. And so that's,like, kind of an example, or
(18:16):
like, you know, Trim Carpentryis another thing we actually
self perform Trim Carpentry. Andso when we looked at that, it
was, you know, on the plans,okay, yeah, this is the square
footage. We'll budget thisamount, you know, for it. But
then you get into the interiordesign, and there's
specifications in every singleroom, you know, there's so many
different things that werespecified in the interior design
(18:39):
that we just didn't account for.
And so those are kind of acouple examples of things that
were missed on our end when wewere putting these budgets
together.
Totally, totally, no. I think, Imean, that's, that's kind of how
the story goes, right? Yeah. Ihave, I have, so I have, like,
(19:00):
two questions. The first being,how did you choose to, like,
what was interesting enough foryou guys to go? We'll call it up
market or into these, like,higher quality products. And
then the second, which I thinkwe could answer more
immediately, is like, how didyou guys decide to bring self
performed carpentry, finishedcarpentry?
And as so the the selfperforming the Trim Carpentry
(19:24):
was pre existing, beaving,before my time, before with
Jeff. So it was this crew ofguys that he had. They're
amazing. They do so much for us.
I mean, honestly, they wewouldn't be where we are without
these guys. They just do so muchfor us. So Jeff had, I'm not
sure exactly where, how he hadfirst met them, but he was able
(19:44):
to keep them busy through, youknow, the recession, the crash,
oh 809, all of that by doingremodels, here and there, just
kind of whatever he could tokeep them busy. And then we've
just always. Companies use them,since we have this crew of guys
that they do, they do all of ourdoors and trims. They build
(20:04):
closets, any type of TrimCarpentry. But then on remodels
that we do, they'll do some ofthe demo, some of the framing.
You know, they just do so muchfor us. So that's where that
started. It's just kind of beena part of our business ever
since I've been around got it sothey've just asked valuable for
(20:25):
us.
Totally I asked because, like,that's the topic that gets
brought up on the podcast quiteoften, is like the strategic
advantage as a builder to bringin other revenue streams or
offerings, right? Some couldcall it like a vertical
integration, right? Yeah. Like,we bring in self performing Trim
(20:46):
Carpentry, carpentry. We bringin, like, we'll buy our own
equipment, and then we'll leaseit to ourselves to use, or we'll
bring in a framing crew, orwhatever, like, whatever. And I
didn't know if your guys'sdecision making was along that
wavelength, or if it sounds likeit was just more like
happenstance.
No, yeah, more happenstance andmore just like for better
(21:07):
quality project from bothmanagement and just quality of
work. So we since we're costplus we actually don't, I mean,
this is probably something weshould look into. And you know,
if you know, if you look intoour finances, this is where it's
like, if you were looking at itfrom a strictly financial point
of view, we should be profitingmore on them, but we just
(21:29):
charge. We just put their costin as a line item, and then our,
you know, our percentage getsadded to that because we're cost
plus on our contracts. So it'sdefinitely not a financial gain.
For us. I mean, I guess it couldbe technically, but not really.
That's not the reasoning.
It's like a bread and buttermoney maker, like, no, what is
(21:52):
the thinking behind that? Like,and it's more so like, when you
say, like, we probably could orshould be doing that, but you
decide to do it, bring it inbasically a cost like, what's
the business decision makingaround that?
I think it just kind of, itallows us to be in the price
point that we're at, maybe alittle bit it's a huge line
(22:17):
item, you know, on the overallcost of the project. But, yeah,
and it's just not somethingwhere we I think it's maybe
would lead to a hardconversation with clients. If
they see that and they're like,Oh, well, you're making you're
charging me cost plus, butyou're also making money on this
line item, they might feel likethey're being double billed a
little bit, sure, sure. So justkind of, yeah, yeah. I think
(22:41):
that's the nature of it. Wedon't necessarily want to get
too greedy and feel like we haveto collect every dollar on
project, but, I mean, it reallyis just more of a they do such
good work, we feel like they'rea representation of us and the
work that we do. So that'sthat's more of the decision
behindit, dude. Value can be driven in
a variety of ways, and it can becollected on in a variety of
(23:06):
ways, right? Like, I don'tnecessarily know if I have a
strong opinion one way or theother. I mean, I certainly talk
to builders that are like, yeah,like, you should be like,
standing up these differentbusinesses and using them as the
general contractor and makingyour markup margin on all of
these people. But I think like,also, like, to your point, is
(23:29):
like, maybe it could also justbe viewed as more of, like, a
competitive edge, right? It'slike, don't bite the hand that
feeds you in this situation,more of a like, these are
reputable guys that we can relyon that are doing killer work
regularly. Like, it's not likewe're losing money on them. And
this is, like a strategic anglethat we can take to win these
(23:50):
jobs and be competitive in themarket 100%
and I mean, and honestly, they,they aren't cheap. I mean,
they're expensive what we paythem, you know, but they're very
qualified, and so if we were toadd a markup on top of what
they're already charging, itdoes get kind of pricey, you
(24:13):
know, a little spicy, yeah,yeah. So cool.
Um, okay, so No, that makes aton of sense. Um, I think the
other question was, is, like,how did you decide to go into
more again, I'm gonna call it upmarket, but we'll just call it,
like a more luxury product. AndI will preface the reason I'm
asking is because I think, likemy world particularly, is, like,
(24:36):
we work with, like, a lot ofreally high end luxury home
builders almost so much in thesense that it's like, it becomes
like the normal, right? It's nodifferent than like, being on
like social media, right? Andyou're in your own little echo
chamber, and you see the sameshit over and over, becomes
normal. Like, that's theexpectation. But you do, you
kind of forget about the builderout there and who, like,
(24:57):
frankly, I appreciate the hellout of we just. Lisa episode,
but it's with a builder down inTupelo, Mississippi, and he's
building a 250,000 to $400,000price point home. Obviously,
that's like what the market canyield. Sure, there's probably
bigger homes being built. Butlike, he's very adamant about
building that product. For hisreason, I'm curious what, and
(25:21):
this is me assuming that, like,the Jeff Rogers custom home
product was, like,significantly, you know, maybe
not lesser in quality, but and,like, luxury than what you guys
are doing now. How did you guysdecide to step up into the
market? What was the driver?
Yeah, soI'll answer that first, that
last part. So the it was, itwasn't that Jeff wasn't doing
luxury products, because he was,but they were, it was more of
(25:43):
like it'd be a one off here orthere, and then there'd be a
lower market that was more oflike the normal, I guess. And so
I don't definitely, don't wantto make it seem like he wasn't
in this. I think even pre crash,pre recession, he was doing very
high end luxury spec homes, andthen the market just changed.
(26:07):
And I think that just changed,shifted his mindset so So to
answer the question, a couple ofthings. I think the market was
going that way. You know, youthink back to 2014 1516, like it
was trending upwards. And then abig part of it for me was it was
at that time, 2014 I became goodfriends with Brad Levitt from
(26:30):
aft. So I've started seeing heand I were just, you know,
playing basketball together. AndI started seeing
who won, who won, who won? Oh,play ball.
Oh, man, put me on the spot.
Yeah, let's do honesty is thebest policy. It's pretty even
(26:51):
back then, I was in really goodbasketball shape, so I think I
had the edge back then. Yeah,the reason is he's, he's about
10 years older than me, and he'sheld it to where I feel like
we're fairly even. Brad's abetter shooter than I am. I'll
give him that for sure. So, andunfortunately, Brad usually
(27:12):
beats me on the golf courseright now too, so it's kind of
got the edge a little bit. Butanyway, so I started seeing
that's, that's really when hegot into social media too, and
posting just these quality,these really cool projects, and
totally, that's when, you know,social media was starting to
(27:34):
grow a little bit, and, youknow, you're seeing things, and
I was wanting to do that. AndI'm just like, man, some of
these projects we're doing, Idon't really want to post them,
you know, they're not veryinterested in that. Great, you
know. And then so it was talkingwith him a lot, and he's like,
man, you gotta start. You gottawork with interior designers.
Like, that's the difference.
Like, that's who you got to getin with her. You got to get in
(27:56):
with the right architects, like,you can do. And that was kind of
my thing too, is like I feltlike we we had the right guys,
or we had the right team inplace to do the quality of of
projects that I wanted to but wejust weren't getting the
clients. We just weren't gettingthe jobs that would allow us to
do that. So that's really whatit was. It was kind of just
(28:19):
social media and just, you know,just me personally wanting to do
projects that I personally wouldlike. And I definitely was
leaning more that way of these,just higher quality luxury
products. Definitely was notfitting for me. You know, I grew
up in a town of southern Arizonawith 5000 people and just, you
(28:40):
know, just not, it's not like Igrew up around it by any means,
but I don't know, just kind ofgravitated towards it, liked it.
And then I think another part ofit was to like higher budgets,
higher quality projects allowedus to work with higher quality
vendors and subcontractors too.
So I just sure all around justwanted a better project, and not
(29:04):
just so much grinding and doingit for as cheap as possible,
because then those those guysthat you have to work with to do
that, it's just not it's notenjoyable.
I mean, I can makes all thesense in the world, I think,
like the the self awareness andthat kind of like inflection
point of creating a productthat, just to be candid, you
(29:27):
weren't super stoked tobroadcast or, like, put your
name on. Like, Dude, I thinkthat's a hell of a takeaway,
which, again, like, I think evengoing back to this guy in
Tupelo, is like, you don't likeall the pride doesn't have to be
in the finishes or the luxury,right? Like you listen, you
listen to you listen the episodewith the builder in Tupelo, and
(29:50):
you're like, damn. Like, thisguy's hyper passionate about
building an entry level home forindividuals, first time home
buyers, people that. Were in,you know, like, trailers, mobile
homes, stuff like that, thatnever thought that they could
get into a custom home or a newbuilt home, right? But I think
that, like, inflection point foryou is interesting, that it
does, like, you have to, youhave to follow your truth,
(30:12):
right? And like, really be awareof who you are to say, am I
going into this for the rightreasons? And like, frankly,
like, what you guys are doing atFen Rogers, like, I don't know
how you could put up a productlike that and not be in it for
the right reason, focusing onthe vendor and subcontract
relation, focusing on the clientexperience. And that's kind of
my next question is, like, it'spretty assumptive as to, like,
(30:35):
the chuck in the truck, youknow, like, guy with his name on
the side of the truck, doingeverything for as cheap as
possible, working with thosesubs and vendors as a grind.
What about it as a grind? Like?
Is it disorganization? Is it thethe quality of work? Is it
having to redo work? Is it like,what is all the what is it that
really, just like drives at thatmarket?
(30:58):
Yeah, for sure. I mean, I thinkthat's it. I think it's the
maybe lack of organization, or,you know, them, they may be a
master at their trade thatthey're doing, but if they're
trying to run the business to,you know, they're just spread
too thin. They're not able to doit. And so, like the guys that
we work with, we still do workwith a lot of owner operator
(31:20):
type subs, but they also havegood guys in place that are able
to do a good job. You know, kindof a good measure for us is
like, do I feel comfortable withthis person meeting with my
client without me being there?
Like, am I? Are they the typethat I would feel comfortable
where, if they were to run intoeach other, if they would have a
(31:41):
meeting, I would feel confidentknow that they would be, you
know, a good representation ofme and my company, and would be
able to hold their own. And so Ihonestly can say that about
pretty much all of our subs andvendors that we work with, like
and we do that a lot, we have alot of trust in our guys, and,
you know, being able to do thatand have meetings, have
(32:02):
discussions. Now, obviously weneed to know all the
informations that's beingdiscussed. But if a client were
to just show up on a job siteunannounced, and they're talking
to my cabinet guy, or my painteror whoever, I'd feel good with
them with that interaction, thatit would instill confidence in
the client. So, but, yeah, Ithink just, you know,
organization being able to hire,you know, for these
(32:24):
subcontractors, having enough,you know, of a fee or a budget
for what they do, to be able tohire good quality people to work
with, and then the materialstoo, just working with higher
quality materials is another,you know, big, another part of
it, forsure, totally, totally, um, when
(32:44):
it comes to, and you talked alittle bit about, like, the
progression of, and again, itsounds like Jeff was, like,
running like, as a very, like,high quality business before,
but for the builders that areout there that are, like,
probably in that, in thatposition to where they're a
remodeler trying to get into newconstruction, or they're in new
construction, but they're tryingto get into more of the luxury
(33:05):
space. You're talking aboutbudget, you're talking about
getting involved with interiordesigners, architects, you're
talking about all that stuff. Isthere anything from a business
standpoint that you would urgethem to consider before stepping
up into landing a client withmore budget that allows you to
get involved with better subsand better material.
(33:26):
Who, yeah, I think just havingyour process as dialed in as
best you can, you know, I talkedabout, kind of our pains that we
went through that was more onthe front end, the budgeting and
the estimating side. So, soreally like digging into all the
specifics and details of plansand everything like that. So I
(33:47):
think on the front end, as muchas you can be better prepared
that way, but then I mean afterthat, it kind of is just going
to take, take a little bit oftrial and error, you know, like
jumping into it ideally, if theperfect situation is, if you
could do a spec home whereyou're, you know, you don't have
a client, you're able to,whether you're partner with an
(34:10):
investor or however it's goingto work. But get into that and
build the level that you want tobe your bread and butter. You
know, build to that level thatyou want, you're wanting to get
to on a custom home side. Imean, that would be ideal, but
that's hard. I mean, it's it'srisky. You got to find the right
deal, and you got to be a littlebold and try to take that
(34:32):
chance. So that's a little bitof what we've done, what we did,
but we also did some smallremodels that we wouldn't
normally do, but, you know,there's been a handful of jobs
that we've done where it's like,hey, just this is just a little
kitchen remodel, or it's abathroom remodel, and they want
(34:53):
to paint their house, butthey're spending, you know,
three quarters of milliondollars on furniture with the
design. So the designer, like,really wants to get the job, but
they want to have the rightcontractor to do this little bit
of work for them. We've donethat, and that's established
relationship with designers thatthey're like, hey, you know,
thank you for doing that. Itallows us to get our foot in the
(35:13):
door to do a project with them,and then so when they get a new
build or a bigger project thatcomes their way, we already have
a little bit of a relationshipthere.
Totally, totally no. And I thinkthat's like, you know, it's, I
think you talk about specking ahouse, right? And that, for
sure, is risk, and there's somuch that goes into it. We did,
(35:34):
yeah, I'm gonna sneeze. Blessyou damn. Did I blow your ears
out on that one? Or not, missedthe mic. You're good. You missed
it, yeah, you're good. Allright, cool, um, you know, we
all we want to sneeze sometimes,yeah, sometimes just gonna
sneeze, you know? Um, no, Ithink. But in terms of, like,
taking that risk on a spechouse, taking that smaller job
(35:56):
with the interior designer, itall like, again, goes back into
relationships. It take it goesback into building a reputation,
like, I get it one thread that Iwant to go into which, again,
like my background, like when Iwas at builder trend, like, ran
their onsite consulting service,one of our customer success
managers over here, DannyMartinez, he was doing the
(36:18):
consulting. I mean, that waslike, truly a standard operating
procedure based business likeyou pay builder trend they go
out, they learn their business,they establish processes and
procedures. Did you do one ofthose? By the way? Is that how
we met? Or did we meet throughadaptive? I can't remember. We
met through adaptive. Yeah,because are you another trend
guy? Are you not a builder trendguy? Or kind of, maybe you're on
(36:39):
question.
We are on the fence. Buildertrend is amazing. I hopefully
don't want to say anything badabout builder trend. We just
have not ever really fully, likecommitted to it, for it to be
valuable for us. So okay, and itjust kind of goes with the way
we run our business, basically.
So yeah,yeah, understood, understand.
(36:59):
And that wasn't, that wasn't,that wasn't the point here. The
point here. I opened that doortrying to take a shot at builder
channel. Yeah, no, no, I'm gonnaclose that door real quick here.
So when it comes to standardoperating procedures, processes,
that's what you had mentioned,is like, have your processes
dialed like you talked aboutestimating and budgeting. I
talked to a lot of buildersabout process. Why is it so
(37:20):
hard? Like, why? Why is it sucha point of conversation? And why
is it it's so simple, but it'slike, what is the challenge of
it?
Because we're building, we'rebuilding custom homes, and it's,
you're building something forthe first time. And so as soon
(37:42):
as you set a schedule or aprocess, it's gonna change. You
know, you're just like, it'sjust, there's such an imperfect
nature to what we're doing. Ifit was, if you were
manufacturing a car or, youknow, I have that conversation
with clients all the time, like,hey, this isn't, this isn't the
same as buying a new car off thelot. You know, that's all you
(38:03):
know, machines and processes. Itgoes through so many checks and
balances and everything. Youknow, this is the first time
this house has ever been built.
This is the first time, andfirst you know you're going to
live in it, and there's going tobe things that you're going to
discover from living there thatwe just, you know, we can't
completely test it out before wehand it over to so I think
that's just part of it. I mean,part of it is just stubbornness,
(38:25):
too, like of, you know, kind of,you got some old dogs in the
construction industry that it'shard to teach new tricks to, and
also, but, but, yeah, I thinkjust the it's just chaos, and we
kind of just get used to, like,figuring it out as you go, you
know, it's like, well, what'sthe point of putting schedule
together? Because the moment,the second we finish the
(38:46):
schedule, it's going to getchanged. Everything's going to
get pushed back and pushed back.
And it's just like, frustrating.
You feel like you're failingbecause you're not sticking to
the schedule, where really it'slike, well, maybe that just is
the way it is. So now that beingsaid, I'm definitely not saying
not to do schedules and havesystems and everything. It's
kind of you have to find thatbalance between trying to create
(39:07):
those things but not beatingyourself up when you're not
sticking to them.
Okay, so it's more so well. Andthat's kind of like where, after
hearing that, and just like,generally having an idea of how
this stuff works. Yeah, is,like, it's probably, don't get
hung up on the I'm not gonna saythe detail. How do you phrase
(39:32):
this point being is, like, it'snot that the schedule is moving.
It's like, what is the processthat is in place to keep the big
stuff updated or like, what'sthe big underlying concept that
we're trying to systematize? Isthat fair? Am I articulating
that? What do youthink? Yeah, yeah, for sure.
It's like, I think for I mean,maybe a simpler way to look at
(39:54):
it is like, progress is kind ofthe main. Thing that you're
wanting to be your process, ifthat makes sense. Like, okay,
if, if so. Like, for example,like, if we have guys working
every day on a job, there'smultiple guys there, they are
(40:14):
working every day, but they're aweek behind a so called schedule
that we have put together. Like,how can you get upset with that?
Like, is that a failure? Are youbehind schedule? Or is that just
how long it takes? You know?
Like, sure. So I think that forus, like, and especially in the
luxury, like, the quality luxurycustom home, you know, it's not
(40:38):
about sticking to a scheduler,like building as fast as you
can. I mean, yes, you do want todo that without sacrificing
quality, because that's how youcan be most profitable. But it's
more so. Just about making surethere's progress, it's moving
along. It's not stagnant. Youknow, there's not nobody at you
know, no one's working. That'sThat's what's frustrating is if
(40:59):
you know you're not organizedwell enough to where you didn't
plan ahead, and then you have acouple of weeks where nothing is
happening at the job. I mean,that's, that's what, that's not
good, for sure. That's theproblem. That's the problem.
So I think that's a pretty solidtakeaway. Is, like, build the
process around progress, andknow that, like, to your point.
(41:20):
Like, just to the to the customnature for the builders out
there that are building again,never building the same floor
plan twice. Everything's custom.
Like, it's probably more soimportant that you are building
the process around progressingthrough the build as best as you
know. But then, like, howreasonable is it to say that if
we scheduled in X number ofweeks or days for tile or
(41:44):
whatever on this type ofproject, are you to go back and
be like we have a process inplace to run a post mortem on
all of our projects andunderstand the slippage on our
schedules, and know that if wehave projects like this, we
document it here, we reflectback in our pre con and develop
from there. Is thatridiculous, um, it is to me. So
(42:08):
I know there's other people,there's other builders, and I
honestly, I look up to peoplethat are more wired that way.
I'm just not wired that way,like that is just not my and
honestly, I wish I was. I amenvious of people who think that
way. They're able to analyzedata and then take that and then
(42:28):
use it and be like, Okay, this,this project was this many
square feet, and it took thetile guys X number of, you know,
days to do it. So then, if wewere to take that and put it
into calculate, into this house,like I just, it's just not my I
just do not think that way. Thatis just not me. So I and I've
accepted that. So, yeah, um, sono, it's not crazy to think. And
(42:52):
I do think there's people, Imean, you see it a lot in
sports, you know, there's a lotof analytics are a huge thing in
totally all the differentsports. And there's, there's
people who get fixated on it,stuck on it, and then there's
other people who just go offmore, off of feel and just, hey,
this, this should be, you know.
(43:13):
So I think the biggest thing forme, though, with the way that
we're wired is we make up, maybewe make up for lack of like,
scheduling or analytics or datathat side of things by
communication with our clientsand setting correct expectations
(43:34):
so sure, communicating and doingbusiness in a way to where they
trust us and they just aren'tsecond guessing or aren't
questioning, hey, you know, isthis how it should be done? They
feel that, if they feel thatthey trust us, I'm setting the
right expectation. Hey, youknow, this is we think the House
(43:55):
is going to take 15 to 18 monthsto build, you know? And we're
staying on track within thatthen, then everything is okay.
It's all just about thatexpectation that's been a big
thing I've been thinking ofprobably the last the last year
or two, is just any anyheadaches or frustrations or any
negativity with clients, is allbecause the right expectation
(44:19):
was not set like expectationsare not being met. And so if we
can do a better job at settingthat meeting that expectation,
keeping them in the loop, havinghard conversations as soon as
possible, not letting themlinger then, then that just
allows for that much better of aproject. For us, it allows us to
(44:42):
not be as dialed in on some ofthe schedules and systems and
stuff like that.
I think that's fair. If thisjust if business in general was
like, this is the right way todo it. Uh, the perfect
businesses in the world wouldexist, and that's just not a
(45:03):
thing. Yeah. So yeah, I thinkthere's room for, uh, for people
to get I think. And that waskind of a part of, like, your
commentary was like, giveyourself some grace, basically,
like, yeah, go ahead. No, no. Ijust was agreeing with you.
That's all, yeah, yeah, yeah. Imean, give yourself some grace.
Understand, it's a fluid motion,like you're building motion.
Like, you're building. You'rebuilding. Another one of our
(45:26):
guests from Austin made thecomment about, like, for God's
sakes, like, you show up to ajob site and you look at the
people that are building yourhouse, that's one thing, but
then you remember that you'rebuilding it outside in the
elements. Like, like,truthfully, anything can go
wrong, dude, you gotta, like,just control the things that you
can control and focuson. I think that's just, I mean,
(45:46):
it all goes into your very firstmeeting with your clients and,
like, setting them up to, like,honestly, tell, hey, this is
gonna suck for the next coupleof years. Like, you're gonna
hate this. I always tellclients, like, the funny thing
is, is, like, you know, youfinish building a house, you go
(46:07):
through the whole process, thearchitecture, the interior
design, you spend millions ofdollars you get there, and then
you finish, and then you lookback, you you know, everything
that you would do differentlythe next time, but you'll never
do it again, because it was sucha painful process. So it just is
the conundrum of it, you know,like and it granted. There,
we've had repeat clients.
(46:29):
There's people who are who enjoyit and go through, go through it
multiple times, but it's justfunny, you know, you have that
conversation all the time. Soit's, it's our job to try to
educate them as best we can,because we've done it before,
but I think it's just all aboutsetting that right expectation.
Totally, totally, dude. I knowthis was great. This is great. I
(46:54):
always enjoy it when I get, whenI get some of your time. I think
what you guys are doing down inPhoenix is awesome. I appreciate
you coming on the show, dude,thanks for joining the wealth of
knowledge. Appreciate it.
Thanks, Reese, of course, we'llsee you. Dude, see it.
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