Ep. 194 Why Entrepreneurs Are Playing Societal Gambling with Their Money with Nick Savoy

What if everything you've been told about taxes is keeping you from building real wealth? Nick Savoy, founder of SAM727 and self-described 'lifestyle general contractor,' reveals why most entrepreneurs are unknowingly playing what he calls 'societal gambling' with their finances. Through his unique approach as a financial architect, Nick shows how the tax code isn't a rigged system designed to drain your bank account-it's actually a strategic playbook for those who know how to read it.

From the triple tax-free power of HSA accounts that most people overlook to the critical mindset shift every entrepreneur must make (hint: are you an employee or a business owner?), this conversation will change how you think about money, taxes, and financial strategy. Nick breaks down why paying yourself from day one isn't optional, how to bulletproof your business structure before disaster strikes, and the cash flow fundamentals that separate thriving entrepreneurs from those trapped in their own businesses.


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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hello everyone, Welcome to Achieving Success with Olivia Akin. I'm
our host Olivia Akin. Each week we will discuss the
road map of achieving your personal and professional success. We
give you real life stories on growing personally and professionally
to achieve your life and career goals with the help
of some top notch gusts. Today we are speaking with
Nick Savoy. Nick Savoy is the founder of SAM seven

(00:30):
to two seven, our purpose driven consulting firm specializing in holistic
tax strategy, entity strategy, and wealth planning. As a financial
architect and tax strategist, Nick helps business owners transition from
confusion to confidence, serving as what he calls a lifestyle
general contractor, an extensive and objective partner with no hidden

(00:55):
incentives or product biases. With extensive experience in both the
beverage industry and wealth management, Nick has built SAM seven
two seven on christ centered values of integrity and service,
focusing on helping clients save on taxes, build wealth, create legacy,
and live with flexibility. His unique approach goes beyond traditional

(01:17):
tax preparation to help business owners build a blueprint per wealth, freedom,
and legacy that creates a durable and sustainable lifestyle. Nick
has been married to his wife Sarah for twenty years,
is a proud father too, and remains a lifelong Purdue
boiler Maker who believes in the power of thoughtful conversation

(01:38):
to transform financial features. You can find Nick by emailing
him at Nick at san seven two seven Consulting dot com,
or on his LinkedIn by searching Nicholas Savoy, or on
Facebook by searching Nicholas Savoy, or on Instagram at at
Nicholas Dotsvoy. Hello, Nick, it's fantastic having you on the show.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
How are we doing? Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
I'm excited. Let's step right in to start off the show.
Can you tell me what success it means and looks
like to Nick Savoy.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
Yeah, success to me looks like creating an impact to
the point that you attain vololers over time and you're
not really sure why they follow you.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
I love that because you know, I'd laughed at that,
because I'm like, yes, that is what we should all
aim towards, whether it's on social media or in our
bubbles of life in person, because especially in today's age,
where people are like, you can go viral, you just
do X y Z and you can go viral. I'm like, okay,
but what does virality actually mean? Like what impact will

(02:50):
that go? That's just a number metric, like I see
I ask people that. I'm like, okay, so you were
one clip got thousands of views, or you help people
go viral. Sometimes I'll mess with people who say like
I help people go viral and be like okay, and
what are the results with that? And they're like, what
do you mean I got you to go viral? And
I'm like, well, what does someone do with that? And

(03:11):
they're like they're viral? And I'm like, okay, missing and
missing the point.

Speaker 3 (03:18):
You know. It's funny too, because like at the end
of the day, like we never stopped to think of
like why did why do I? Why do I all
of a sudden follow Olivia backing right? We don't ask that, hey,
why are you following me?

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Right?

Speaker 3 (03:29):
And it could be just as simple as like, I
don't know, you have a ratiant personality that's bubbling and
vibrant and you like just sound like someone that I
want in my sphere, right, And it could be just
as simple as that. And it's like, but I do
all this other cool shit, like I do podcasts, and
all this other cool fun stuff like and that's why
you're following that stuff, right, or your goofy or whatever

(03:51):
the case may be, right, So like, and that's changed.

Speaker 2 (03:54):
Over time, right.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
I think we all were trying to driven at some
point to chase money and success of the tall and
the houses and the you know, we'd live vicariously through
celebrities and see all the toys and fun things that
they have over time or the fomo effect, right, But
it's really changed for me over the last several years
of like, I just want to be a cool dude
that cares about others.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
There pours into people just because I'm curious and.

Speaker 3 (04:18):
Attained followers that I don't even know why the heck
are like following me, but like it's cool to like
that they think enough of me that they want to
know what's going on in my world.

Speaker 2 (04:27):
Right, whether they're reaching out, they're staying.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
Afar, they're like, Hey, I just want to check in
and see how you guys are doing, right, But I
think we all want that something to you know, it
feels great. We never we never get those times, very
rarely we get those conversations when someone calls you randomly
out of the blue for after four or five months
and says, hey, Olivia, how's it doing.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
I just want to check in, see how you're doing,
how's business going, how's life going.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
It's like, wait a minute, Like I don't have that
very often, Like you just randomly thought of me on
a Thursday five months later, Like what the heck?

Speaker 2 (04:55):
Why did that happen? Right?

Speaker 1 (04:57):
Yeah? And I was smiling when you said that, because
I try to make an effort that when someone follows
me or friend requests me or LinkedIn or Facebook specifically,
I'm not as good as it on Instagram, but really
those two places, I'll send a message, hey, thanks for

(05:20):
requesting me a friend now, I do think, like for example,
on Facebook and LinkedIn, where you have to add the
person back, I'm very like I will go and look
at their profile. If it's someone who's like I'm a
podcast promoter, and I'm like, you're about to spam the
shit out of everyone in my network and you don't
actually do any like you're clickbaiting people here or you're

(05:44):
gonna buy bots. This is gonna actually hurt someone more
than help someone. I'm like, sure, try, but like if
I go and I like you reach out to me
and you ask to be a friend, and I'm like, oh, Nick,
looks awesome. I'm like yeah, I try to make it
effort and stay on top of it to then send
a personalized message and be like hey, Nick, I'd love

(06:05):
to connect with you. Can you tell me more about
you than like what made you decide to connect? And
sometimes it's like I get the honest thoughts of like
you came up as someone a suggested friend and I
was like, okay, I've gotten the like, oh I did
it because like I do had cool pictures you're doing xyz,

(06:27):
or I see a bunch of stuff around podcasting. I'm
interested in this right And sometimes like for me, I'm
like I love it when they're like get you popped
up like LOCALO, I just said, yeah, why not? And
I'm interested to see your posts, but like I have
no real intention and I'm like great. And then there's
the times where they're like oh, yeah, it's because of

(06:51):
your podcast stuff and I'm trying to learn more in
this and that, and I'm like, awesome, I'm making an
impact in this way. You want to hear this, Let's
have to keep the conversation going.

Speaker 3 (07:01):
That's a validation part that we oftentimes those are the
results right in the validation that we always want.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
But like it's so much more impactful.

Speaker 3 (07:09):
When someone's like, yeah, I'm trying to figure out this
podcasting or marketing play that's different than you, Like I
don't know any space, but I want to learn, right,
And it's like, oh shit, someone actually paying attention like
I am doing, like it is working right, And I
think to your point too, It's also one of those
things that I'm I'm always intrigued.

Speaker 2 (07:25):
I do.

Speaker 3 (07:26):
I'm very SIMI I'm always intrigued as to why someone
connects with me. So if they don't, if they don't
put a personal note, which I think creating a personal
note is critical, right because then we can see genuine
like interest like you reached out. You didn't use the prompt,
you didn't use the AI, you just didn't hit the
send a link, you know, a friend of request button,
like you put a little note in there and said, hey,

(07:46):
let me look look look awesome, like want to connect
like that shows like genuine like I'm I'm gonna pour
more energy in Initially it's worth the thirty seconds to
respond back and figure out like how does this new
relationship work in the ecosystem right of life?

Speaker 1 (08:04):
Yeah? And what I always laugh to is like when
I send those out and then you'll always occasionally it
happens no matter what. I kind of joke, it's some
numbers game. You will get someone who's so aggravated that
you message them like what do you want? Are you
trying to sell me something? And I'm like, I was
just I just may maybe I don't know, maybe down the.

Speaker 2 (08:25):
Road, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (08:27):
And I'm like, okay, I just won't talk to you anymore,
and like we can unfriend each other. I was like,
I really didn't know that I was going to aggravate
you this much by reaching out those I always get too.
I've learned to be like, okay, onto the next, don't
get offended. But that being said too. One thing I
mentioned in your introduction, and we've talked a lot about

(08:52):
it as well, is your mentality around taxes. You should
think about taxes and everything. One thing that I mentioned
in the introductions, you call yourself a lifestyle general contractor,
which is such a unique way to describe what you do.
What inspired you to say I'm going to call myself

(09:13):
a lifestyle general contractor, and how does it change the
way clients think about working with you?

Speaker 3 (09:19):
Yeah, well, I got to give credit where credits due.
A really good friend of mine by the name of
Sean Bean You and I we're talking back in the fall,
and he's he's just an interesting cat, and he goes,
he made the comment one day while we're talking through
business and life and all this stuff, and he goes,
you're not You're not just some financial person. You're a
financial architect. Like you like the puzzle piecing and the

(09:40):
chess matching and creation. And I love puzzles and I
love I don't play chess much, but I like the
idea of chess. My son kicks my butt every time,
so that's probably why we don't play it much, right,
But it really just kind of when he said that,
it really hit me different, and it made me reflect on,
like what does an architect do and what does a
general contractor do? Right, and so a lifestyle general contractor

(10:04):
that kind of morphed into that of like, how do
we dumb this down? Which I don't like saying dumb
this down, but how we dumb this down to a
fifth grade level that Olivia can feel welcomed into a conversation,
positive conversation around money and taxes.

Speaker 2 (10:20):
And the lifestyle tener.

Speaker 3 (10:22):
So when I started looking at reflecting on the general contractor,
I'm like an architecture designed the blueprint and he hands
it off to a general contract and then the general
contractor is generally the project manager that oversees the subs
doing the work right.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
And so that's how all this time it came about.

Speaker 3 (10:42):
Is like one in the financial space, we don't have
a letter, a lot of financial architecture being built, we
don't have blueprints being built before.

Speaker 2 (10:50):
We just jump into the whatts.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
We just jump into the whattz because it's a shiny
new object where you had a friend say, oh you
used to be in that sport or whatever the case mean,
or do is ira or we're with no personal understanding
as to why we should intentionally consider it. It's just
a universal all your friends do it. So it's the
fomo effect, right, And so I think that's really kind
of how that's morphed and I embrace it now.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
Like I was just having lunch today and someone said
what do you do?

Speaker 3 (11:15):
And I'm financial ARCHITECTU and the lifestyle general contract or
business owns, they're like hold on, like what does that mean?

Speaker 2 (11:21):
Right? And so it's catching people off track to be.

Speaker 3 (11:23):
Like tell me more, and I think to go on
the tax side of that question is it's changing mindsets
to say, let's slow down and really reflect on like
try to think through like what is taxes? What's the
purpose of taxes in the US? Like what is the
iris code? Is it truly a riged system where we're

(11:48):
the losers all the time or is there a mutual
benefit there? Like? And what I've really kind of for
me what's helped me process is just through learning, is
it's the rule book to the game here in the
US if we want to win financially, like we have
to embrace the tax code. We have to embrace that. Yes,

(12:09):
there's rules of the game. We made all the rules,
you know.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
And I use the analogy of sports.

Speaker 3 (12:15):
My daughter plays the travel softball, so I'll just use
it from the vile of that from this weekend, my
daughter fielded the ball at first base on the foul line.
Fair right, technically it's fair ball. The uncle was in
a bad position. He called it foul. That should have
been that's a fair to have the out. We had
to figure out a different way to get the out right.
It stinks that the ball hit fair and you're out

(12:36):
should have been out right. They got the gift of
being a foul ball and another opportunity, right, But we
just have to embrace Hey, if it's on the line,
it's in, it's part of the rules, it's in.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
It stinks. You just got to keep moving forward, right.
And so I think that's the mindset.

Speaker 3 (12:50):
We have to take around the IRIS Code and taxes
is the IRIS Code is a rule book of opportunity.
Doesn't mean to love all the rules of all the
things that they've predetermined what we should invest our time
and energy and to move our economic position forward as
a country. But if we look at it from a
mindset for the financial side, not a philosophical belief side,

(13:11):
we're going to get rewarded with a bunch of thank
you notes.

Speaker 1 (13:16):
H And one thing you and I have talked about
multiple times and I think is so important, and you
even brought this up moments ago, is how you look
at taxes and how you understand them. And I think
such a big part of finances in general is there's

(13:36):
this lack of comfortability and which goes and ties into
the lack of understanding. And I'm a big person of
like tell me the why, tell me why this is
the path we should go down, even like I can't
do it myself, right, but like, as long as I
have that baseline understanding, I then can understand it. So

(14:01):
especially with for example, like financial advisors who always pitch me,
I'm like, do you actually understand like what brings?

Speaker 3 (14:10):
Like?

Speaker 1 (14:11):
Why I should be doing this over something else? Why
this is going to help me? Now? What have you
found doing what you do? Has been the biggest or
a few of the biggest misconceptions or lack of knowledge
people have around taxes.

Speaker 3 (14:31):
That I think the biggest one is that it's a
completely rich system and that we're not designed that is
not designed for us as people to win. And that's
entirely not true. Right now, I would preface and say,
if you are just a W two and employee, it
is not designed for you to like, it's not designed
for you to win very well, right, but there are

(14:52):
still anamal opportunities. And I also think the other misconception
is the woe is me mindset of law just got to.

Speaker 2 (14:59):
Pay tax and gosh, darn it. I don't have any options. No, no, no, no.

Speaker 3 (15:04):
We all have control of how much or how little
we pay in taxes.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
We can go and choose to go to.

Speaker 3 (15:11):
If I'm an employee of the podcast, right you hire
me for technical work in the back end or something
of that, and I'm a W two employee, and let's
just say you have benefits and I jump in and
we start and you say, hey, Nick, welcome aboard. Here's
the benefits package.

Speaker 2 (15:26):
Jump in.

Speaker 3 (15:26):
How do you want to do? What do you want
to do for your payroll? You know your tax elections, right,
you're like file zero single, what do you want to do?
We can just stop and say, hey, I want the
least amount of money taking out of my paycheck.

Speaker 2 (15:39):
Now that comes with immense amount of discipline to say.

Speaker 3 (15:45):
Start asking ourselves a question of like, Okay, I'm getting
more of my paycheck my bank account, which is positive,
like we all want more in our bank account. But
I also know that I do have a responsibility pay taxes.
So if I don't take advantage of the opportunit, you're
putting more money in my bank account and repositioning some
of that money elsewhere that the government's going to give
me a blessing or an ada boy, good job you

(16:07):
did that, then I'm going to owe a bunch of
money to the government at the end of the year
because there is that obligation that I do have to
pay my affairs share. But it also then encourage us
to say start thinking through, like, well, what could I
do with this money, even as a WTOTE employee that
the government's going to give me a blessing for doing

(16:27):
a good job and an at a boy of like, hey,
you don't you get to pay us less because you
contributed money into an IRA or a foreln K or
an HSA or a charitable nonation or whatever the case
may be. That does give us some of the benefits
to where you know, we get to feel a little
bit more of the blessings that investors and business owners

(16:48):
get to maximize because really it's catered to those people, right,
not w TWOT employees. But we also have the ability
of controlling more of our money than what we believe
and we don't have to just pay buns to the government.
And I think it's also the we're in the society
of unconscious spending.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
And it's not my fault.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
Yeah, well, even one thing you just said, and one
thing to add to the iris and all these things
is I and I bring this up a lot, and
I've I didn't realize how many people didn't know about
it until I bring it up and they're like, wait,
what's that? And that's an HSA account, a health savings account,
which is pre tax money. They can go directly into it.

(17:35):
I think the cap is nineteen thousand dollars a year.
You can put in some rull over some don't so
like look into that. I'm not trying to give any
money if you're.

Speaker 3 (17:44):
A little high, but it's actually like for a married couple,
it's like eighty four hundred dollars a year.

Speaker 2 (17:47):
You can put it into HSA.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
But your point continue, the point is valid, Like it's
an absolutely love this where you're going yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
And it's like okay, so now that's non tax money
that I can go to take and say, oh I
gotta go do a doctor's appointment, I'm gonna use my
HSA account and I'm gonna pay for that, or I
have to regularly pick up medication that I can pay for.
Some HSA accounts will also let you get eyeglasses, like

(18:14):
as someone who wears glasses, right, and do different things,
therapy appointments, your agency account. So it's like even that aspect,
you have to go like if you're someone who takes medication,
you're gonna have to buy the medication anyway. Right, it's.

Speaker 3 (18:34):
Take that another level, Take that another level, like say
we're super healthy, you're young, you're vibrant, like hopefully not
a ton of medical issues going on.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
Right.

Speaker 3 (18:45):
I love hsas from a simple fact. By the way,
I don't sell them, so do your research. This is
a discrimint, This is a disclaimer. This is educational only, right.
And HSA is triple tax free. It's the only vehicle
that's triple tax free. Money goes in tax free, it
grows tax free, and you can use it for medical

(19:07):
purposes tax free. The real kicker of those types of
those types of accounts really bless those that are in
very thriving lifestyles from a health perspective, because you can
tuck money away for maybe one one a family five
years from now, the money grows tax free, and now
I can use it for that birth down the road

(19:27):
tax free.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
And it's grown tax When in tax free, it grew
tax free.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
And I got to use the tax free or maybe
I'm building up a war chest of money for when
I hit fifty five or sixteen, I choose to just
walk away from active work with active income on a
regular basis. But I'm not to Medicare age yet I
have to go private funding for my healthcare.

Speaker 2 (19:50):
Now, I've just built up a pool of.

Speaker 3 (19:52):
Dollars that I can use towards healthcare in the private
space because I just left a W two job or
whatever the case may be that offered me some or
of you know, coupon or subsidy against healthcare right expenses.
So like there's so much power now, But again it's
we have to we have to stop and say what

(20:12):
can I go do with my money versus have it
just follow into a universal or supense accountant and swipe
away and move and prove and wipe away and be like,
oh crap, I have no money left?

Speaker 2 (20:21):
What was me?

Speaker 1 (20:22):
Mm hmm? And what would you say? So we touched
upon something for the W two people and those individuals. Now,
let's I want to talk about how as an entrepreneur,
right a solo entrepreneur, someone's starring out. Sure, that can
be a crazy time as well. With one thing I

(20:43):
tell people the difference between entrepreneurship and everything else is
entrepreneurship never has a guarantee of exactly like every X
amount of weeks you're gonna make X amount of dollars.
I recently even heard something and I left and I
was like, I told two entrepreneur friends of mine, and
they like, that sounds great. I watched a video WORKU.

(21:04):
I was like, entrepreneurship. He's like, I don't know when
it happened, but entrepreneurship is like the societyal like, okay,
like we'll cheer you. Long form of gambling, like gambling
is not afraid. If people are like, you go the
casino every day, like you might have a problem, right,

(21:26):
But they're like, just like gambling, no money is guaranteed.
You can be working in super long hours and you
know X y Z is happening. They're like, literally, you're gambling.
And he had like a list of five things I
can't remember, all ships up my head and he's like,
but as a society, we go, oh, that's great, you're

(21:46):
an entrepreneur, Like look for you. You're trying to do
this like that would be crazy if it works. And
he's like, it's it's gambling, but in a healthy way.
People look out it is so especially in that point,
like how should we look at creating that financial blue.

Speaker 2 (22:11):
That's a great question, you know.

Speaker 3 (22:12):
And to piggingback on that description, my wife and I
were just having a conversation the other day and she's like,
why are you so like joyful and ecstatic about this
business but at the same time you're you're stressing about money,
like if it's going so damn well, like, where's the
why are we worried about the money? I said, Well,

(22:33):
there's there's this thing. There's this crazy thing called the
business train and the revenue train. They're not on the
same tracks at the same time, and generally it's the
business train is way ahead of the revenue train, but
it's working. Like people get the conversation and and it's different,
you know in this space, like they are my services
and what I do for people in that space is

(22:53):
huge impact, but it also comes with a huge price
tag that they're generally not like comfortable with or used
to because because we've made we've devalued everything and we
commoditize everything to transactional work of here I'm gonna pay
olive you a couple hundred dollars. Are you worth a
couple hundred dollars or is your money worth way more
than a couple of hundred dollars.

Speaker 2 (23:12):
We should probably pay more to keep.

Speaker 3 (23:15):
The value hot, right like and so, but to your
point about for what are some tricks.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
And things for entrepreneurs?

Speaker 3 (23:22):
By the way, I would say two, you know, the
worst place to be from a tax perspective, self employed.
Your taxes are the highest and you take on all
the risks that you just talked about. But how many
people jump into entrepreneurship or a side hustle just to
make a little chat, you know, extra money. They're still

(23:44):
operating at the mindset that they're a w twot employee.
Like we had this conversation and you're in charget me
five hundred bucks. And if you were just working as
a self employed individual.

Speaker 2 (23:54):
Do you think you made five hundred bucks? You didn't
make it.

Speaker 3 (23:58):
You're podcasting business made five hundred dollars, and it probably
cost you something to get all the equipment set up.
So like what did you bring in minus what did
you spend? That's what Olivia makes, right. But so like
for the entrepreneur was just starting out or that just
jumps into side hustle or a hobby that people are like,
I don't want to pay you, and I'm going to
tell you all to share all your information to all

(24:19):
my friends. And now, as I ran into a guy
in landscaping yesterday who jumped into landscaping in covid because
your other job went away, He's like, I didn't intend
to be a business owner, but everybody liked my work,
and now I do brick paper sidewalks and patios, and
I can't keep up with the work that's coming in
because my silly friends and parents said I did great
work and they shared it with too many people, and

(24:41):
now I can't get him ras right. But I think
the one thing that business owners or entrepreneurship entrepreneurs have
to do is they have to immediately stop again. I'm
gonna say stop and pause a lot because I think
that we just got to slow down. That's the biggest
thing at the stop and say wait a minute, am
I an employee or am I a business owner? And
if I'm a business owner, we have to change our

(25:02):
mindset immediately and we have to start thinking through like
what personal expenses were I was I paying that now
should be categorized as a business expense, right, and to
pay yourself immediately. We're not doing this for charity. I

(25:23):
love making charity charitable impact. I want to impact my community,
but not one business owners out there doing this from
a moment of charitable work all the time. And it's
really difficult when the money in the cashload is the
rocky roller coaster and it's like, oh, we might go
through four months of nothing and two months are really good,

(25:44):
and another seventeen months and nothing, and we got to
figure out how to survive and not only survive but thrive.
But if we don't embrace paying ourselves at least ten
dollars or something into our personal bank account from the beginning,
we're going to be trapped as a prisoner in our business.

Speaker 1 (26:00):
Mm hmm. And for me as yeah, it does. And
even for myself, as you were saying that, I was like, well,
I guess I kind of paid myself one thing I did.
When we talk about strategy and money strategy and as
a whole, it's like I was very deliberate when I
started my business. I was not going to take out alone.

(26:22):
I was not gonna like do x y Z. I
was like, I'll give I think I gave myself when
I started, and I I documented it so I could
go back and.

Speaker 2 (26:33):
Story.

Speaker 1 (26:35):
Yeah, I gave myself like twenty five hundred or three
thousand dollars, and I was like, okay to start to
pay Ben, my amazing producer who's family me since day one,
and like, have some things that like I knew I
needed to get before I started, and there was and
like here's one thing. Different things make you put Like

(26:56):
I also created a business account. It makes you put
in something if you don't want. I was like, okay,
well I'll put in twenty five hundred for that, so
then there's no fees and that set up and then
I very like two months in, I was like, okay,
whatever I'm spending has to be able to be covered.
And so by the end of the year, I was

(27:18):
not only covering all bills. I paid myself back that money,
but I was starting to make a little bit of
money then and so you know, then going down that road.
One thing I've always like thought about, even as you
mentioned those rollercoasters, is okay, are all the bills personally

(27:39):
and professionally like the business bills and my personal bills
that I have to live off of, are they all covered?
And that's the baseline, right, Like, as long as in
those low moments, as you're trying to grow, whatever it
might be, can they all be covered without you over
extending yourself financially? And so I've consciously been like, okay,

(28:03):
even if I don't give myself necessarily money, right, and
I get stricter with eating out, all the bills are paid, okay.
And then as I've grown, I put money into things,
and I've been like, Okay, now I'll like, I'm not
a big like, oh just go out and drop money
on things, but I'll be like, oh, like, okay, I

(28:27):
love going out to eat. It's an experience. Yeah, I'm like, okay,
I'm gonna I've actual mind to just go out and
eat this month and like X amount. And that's my
way of like, and I think when and I'd love
to hear your insight on this of like paying yourselves
because like, okay, you have to give yourself a written
check for X amount money. When I heard you say that,

(28:49):
I also hurt, like felt again correct me if I'm wrong.
The mindset of it isn't necessarily writing yourself a check
for X amount of money, but it's the ability need
to live the lifestyle you want, even if it takes
time to get there, right, Like, this money might not
be as good as last, but I'm still able to go,

(29:10):
like how am I going to go out and eat?
And like this stuff I did buy this month from Amazon?
Like you know I want I want X y Z
from Amazon. I could pay for that, right, So, Like,
I don't write myself a personal check of X amount
of money every month, but I have the expenses. I

(29:31):
put money aside for taxes and like that stuff, and
then I'll be like, okay, the rest, you know, keep
some money in the business account and keep that growing.
But then the rest I'm like, okay, what do what
do I want to do with this money?

Speaker 3 (29:43):
Well, in reality, right, that's also true that like you
do do distributions like every now and again right from
the business account to your personal Olivia acting account like,
and that is paying yourself.

Speaker 2 (29:54):
So you're not necessarily right in a check all the time.

Speaker 3 (29:56):
Too, right, But it's getting money, transitioning money and repositioning
money out of the business to your personal and giving
yourself grace and permission to say, hey, you can go
live life a little bit right, you know the first
five you're a couple more things on your entrepreneurship point

(30:17):
of like, hey, what are some tips and tricks for
entrepreneurs just gonna started embrace learning the numbers, money numbers,
like embrace learning your money, learning basic math of money
and cash flow.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
You got to know cash flow. You got to know
money coming in and money going out.

Speaker 3 (30:40):
Because we can't just leave it to professionals like Olivia
and podcasting and say you did this podcast. You said
it was going to give me this many new followers
and this much lead generation and this much this bro,
you still got to go do the work, Like I
can't push it all off to Olivia. I can't go
push it all off to my tax strategist or my
financial advisor, my tax repair or my attorney, Like I

(31:03):
need to know that stuff. And I think that's one
of the biggest challenges for most business owners is we have.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
Not slowed down ourselves to pause.

Speaker 3 (31:12):
And think like, hey, what's working in the business and
what's working on the business. And there's not a lot
of coaching around well, the responsibilities of working in it
and working on it, agreed. And so then we get
in this rat race of just making money, right, and
it's the constant chase of making money because there is
no real floor or safety net, right. And I think
with that we have to give ourselves grace to say, hey,

(31:32):
if you're jumping out and you're gambling and you're trying
to go put yourself out there, you've got to continue
to put yourself out there and it will work. It
will work. It's just not going to work on your timeline.
But if you do good things, you connect with people well,
and you make positive impact and you show value, it'll
come to fruition. It's just not tomorrow or every two

(31:53):
weeks when the other paycheck showed up.

Speaker 2 (31:55):
And so like with all those types.

Speaker 3 (31:57):
Of things, we have to remind ourselves that we are
starting a business and we have to take on a
brand new mindset and we have to slow down and
ask people to say, hey, what is working on the
business mean?

Speaker 2 (32:09):
And not just go make money? M h.

Speaker 1 (32:12):
And it's awesome it does. And what I want to
ask you as well, is you know, what do you
what have you found that entrepreneurs don't think about or
have the knowledge around when it comes to thinking about
their taxes, Like, what is something that always gets like

(32:33):
is not left off the table, but not on the
table that in reality is a tool that we can
all use and should be thinking about.

Speaker 3 (32:41):
Yeah, so I would say the first thing is that
tax planning is one time you're doing their taxes or
worry about their boots as a once a year project.
Like I don't need to worry about my boots until
I got till April. I got till April. I don't
need to worry about the numbers coming in on every month.
I don't need to worry about taxes.

Speaker 2 (32:59):
I got it.

Speaker 3 (33:00):
And then all of a sudden, November December show up
and it's like, seems like we made a lot of
money this year. What's this tax thing gonna look like?
And should I make more money? Should I not make
more money?

Speaker 2 (33:10):
Right?

Speaker 3 (33:11):
So, I just our passive nature and our reactive nature.
And by the way, I would say too like unfortunately,
like the financial industry I am, that creates an environment
where some of the professionals act in a very reactive state.
They don't pause and slows down and say, hey, hold on, Olivia.
This partnership means that we're meeting four to six.

Speaker 2 (33:32):
Times a year.

Speaker 3 (33:32):
And here's why, I'm gonna educate you on why we're
meeting four to six times a year.

Speaker 2 (33:36):
We're not meeting once a year in March.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
And you're just gonna lay all your stuff at my
table and I'm gonna sift through all the documents and
find the one number that I need to put in
this box, like that's not our relationship.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
Oh okay, but we have to. But again we don't
do that very well.

Speaker 3 (33:51):
And just challenge and say, Olivia, this is not a
thirty minute conversation. This is in our conversation, and you'll
understand why we're taking the nextra thirty minutes and I
and it is contrarian, like, yes you're paying me, and
yes you're not.

Speaker 2 (34:04):
Out generating revenue.

Speaker 3 (34:06):
So like theoretically, on the surface, you're losing money.

Speaker 2 (34:09):
But that's why you have employees to do those tasks.
They're the ones that are booking the podcasts.

Speaker 3 (34:16):
You're the one making sure the podcasts show stays marketable,
stays relevant, stays top of mind, stays in the know
and attractive to guess that want their voice heard. That's
your job, right, and it's making sure the bills are
paid and so that the employees are paid and you
can you're paid, right, and we can move forward with

(34:36):
the blessings that we've created and cultivated.

Speaker 2 (34:39):
From a financial perspective.

Speaker 1 (34:41):
Yeah, and what do you think is something? Well you
just went over like we leave off the tables, always
thinking like Okay, I just have to come revisit this
in a year from now. I'm that person that I
know every penny I make, I write it down. I
know each month my total. I actually have a sticky

(35:01):
note as like as the business has grown, like the
highest I've earned, and like what that was, so I
can be like, oh, you know, if we're getting close
to that, it's easy reach. Oh that's the highest. Let's
let's beat that, right, let's see that and that's and
like those remarks too, like on on my desk, like

(35:24):
also show like here are pivotal moments in your business journey,
even if you didn't realize it in the time, where
you've kind of forgotten about, like look at those dates.
Remind yourself of those dates. But what is something like
business owners should be thinking about when it comes to oh,
I should have this resource like an HSA account or

(35:46):
something like that, and this should be part of the
conversation I'm having around taxes and strategy that typically gets
left off the table.

Speaker 3 (35:57):
Yeah, cash flow got to know what the money, money
coming into, money going out is Like that's the first step.
Is we got to get clarity right And we also
also say and lean into pausing to understand or asking people, hey,
what are different types of entity structures? Like I'm a

(36:18):
business now, like what are different types of entity structures
that are out there? And what are the pros and cons?
And and why I love being a financial architect is
I say I'm planning agnostic, Like I'm knowledgeable enough in
the legal space and the entity space that I can
give guidance, but I can't give advice. I can't give
advice in the financial space either. I can't give it

(36:40):
investment advice, but I can give financial positioning and guidance
and pros and cons and sheer education and ultimately give
Olivia or client X options and choices and say how
does the how do these options align with the mission
and the purpose that we're trying to You're trying to
achieve for yourself, your business.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
Your family, your community, on on and on right and so.

Speaker 3 (37:05):
Entity, I think is also one of those critical things
that we have to we don't think about until we're
making money, right, And it's like, oh, I can't worry
about the money. I can't worry about how my business
is instructured until I make revenue. I don't know if
I'm going to be in business tomorrow. I haven't made
ten bucks, Like Olivia hasn't paid me anything yet.

Speaker 2 (37:21):
I've met fourteen hundred people and I've still not made
any money.

Speaker 3 (37:23):
Like, are you sure I should jump into being an
LLC or an escort? And we just don't know, Like
we don't we can find out. We just refuse to
slow down enough and be like, how should I go
about this? You know? I was just talking to a
friend of mine the other day and he's getting ready
to jump into real estate with a buddy of his. Said, Hey,
do you want to partner together on a fiction and
flip property? And I called him about something else and

(37:46):
we just so we just got down in his the
rabbit hole and he was like, I was like, well,
that's interesting, I said, do I have a different question.

Speaker 2 (37:52):
That's I'm a little bit more curious about it. He's like,
what's that.

Speaker 3 (37:54):
I said, have you guys thought about how you're going
to go into the business together?

Speaker 2 (38:02):
And he goes like, what do you mean.

Speaker 3 (38:02):
I said, well, at some point there's gonna be a split,
like hopefully a positive like divorce, right that there's gonna
be a split at some point.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
Maybe you just both decide we're gonna want to do
our own real estate.

Speaker 3 (38:13):
Things like about how are you gonna get into the
pool together and then out of the pool together?

Speaker 2 (38:18):
And he was like, yeah, I'm not sure really figured
that part out.

Speaker 3 (38:22):
I said, maybe maybe we should spend some time thinking through.

Speaker 2 (38:26):
That before we just jump into the what right. And
so I think those are.

Speaker 3 (38:31):
The two things that I would say in answering your
question is we've got to be intentional and understanding your cashulalow.
And it's gonna look ugly, look like we're in a
pile of do and when we can't see through the
forest and we're not gonna make positive you know, we're
not going to generate positive net income or net revenue
out of the thing.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
From them for a little while.

Speaker 3 (38:51):
We really got to be intentional about just understanding the
basics of entity structures that off when we do make
the jump into business ownership. Whatever we created in our
life over the time that we spent building it, it's
stable and protected and it's not up in jeopardy, right,
And I think that's critical from the standpoint that there's

(39:13):
a lot of business owners. There's like, I don't know eighteen,
I don't remember the number it was. There's a crazy
number of people that have started a side hustle since
COVID to make extra cash, right, which means they're making
extra cash as an additional income stream, probably attached.

Speaker 2 (39:33):
To in addition to a W two paycheck.

Speaker 3 (39:36):
And there's out running a business on their name and
they have not even stopped a second to be like.

Speaker 2 (39:43):
Hey, do you know what? Do we know what we
just did? And it's like, what do you mean? What
did we just do?

Speaker 3 (39:49):
We just went from we transferred a house built on
concrete to a deck of cards that all it takes
is one little mistake in the business and the whole
damn things arou mm hmm.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
And even I remember, and you and I have had
this conversation. I am I am very like mindful of
the LLC role and all that when I started my
business immediately like luckily too, I have a business attorney
and accountant, and he immediately was like, we're creating an LLC.

(40:23):
And I remember, fast forward sometime and I understood the
importance of that even before him, because I worked for
big corporations and some like when I was in college
working for like a few friends who owned a business together, right,
and I saw those dynamics. And fast forward a few years.

(40:44):
I opened my second business, which is apparel for the
US Coast Guard, and that really like is a hobby
podcasting and what I'm achieving success made business. I'm like,
maybe one day that'll blow up. That'd be great, right,
But anyway, when I I was thinking about starting that,
I like I was talking to people and I remember

(41:07):
just this this vivid memory just kept popping up in
me because people were like, oh, yeah, I'm pretty sure,
like you could just put that under your other ll
like your other LLC. And my and even my business
attorney when we first talked, was like, we can put
this under that LLC. And I said, I don't want
to do that, and he's like, well, you know what's

(41:28):
going to cost you, Like this be a few hundred
dollars and this is going to be and like you're
just starting out and this and that, and I was like,
I get it, and I said to him, but here's
what I'm why I'm saying that. And I said, I
remember when I worked for a company in college. It
was again two brothers and a friend of theirs, and

(41:50):
they had a business. And I'm not gonna say their
name because I don't want to blow up their spot,
but if you go back and my social media, you'll
figure it out. And they ended up opening a sister
company which was printing shirts because it was a sports company.
Of people in the company and they're like, oh, we
could save money and print the shirts ourselves. We have

(42:11):
the space, blah blah blah. And I remember while I
was working there, they had the business for years. They
had started the sister company, like right before I got there,
I think. And one of the seasons someone and I
completely agree we shouldn't have ran sports that day. Owners

(42:31):
and like the other people in there were like, oh,
that's yeah, we'll be fine. And it was winter and
there was pure ice on the field. Someone ended up
tearing their a cl and they ended up suing and
they sued the company well because the other company was

(42:55):
under that LLC and this and that that visual the
money they were asking for the one company didn't have
all the funds, Well, they got to then tap into
the company that fell under that LLC and that fund.
And so when my business attorney said that to me,
I looked at him and I said, yeah, but I'm

(43:16):
thinking I get it from like a business standpoint, an
LLC standpoint, like it makes sense, I said, but I'm thinking, like,
does this make sense from a financial standpoint? And I
hadn't told him the story yet. I want to see
what he said. And he goes, well, from like the
tax standpoint and all this, and from a protection standpoint,

(43:37):
at some point, we need to move it over to
its own LLC. You don't have to invest that money now,
but we're gonna have to do it if it grows.
And I said, I think we should do it from
the very beginning, and he said, well, he asked me why,
like why I was so strong hadn't doing that, And
I told him the story and he goes, ay, yep,
that happens. You're right, like, let's just create them two
separate things. And I was like, I'd rather pay from

(43:59):
that from day one. Then it is some an weird
thing happens, and now everything can be exact. And I
think not enough to your point and what you're saying,
not enough people think about those things every possible way
that business structure could be paying. You know, the rock

(44:24):
being thrown and the cards falling.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
Look at the end of the day like it's a win.
It's not a it's not an if situation. It's a
matter of when you're going to have an issue, right
And to go back to your gambling reference earlier, we're
playing life gambling, which is totally cool. I'm all about
business owners or people jumping into a business and creating

(44:47):
income for themselves and putting themselves out there.

Speaker 2 (44:50):
It is the greatest.

Speaker 3 (44:51):
Return on investment and seeing you your hard work paying
off with massive rewards even if you fall fall And
by the way, every business owner falls forward at least
two or three freaking times, and he still figures things
out right. But I think the reason that I love that,
and I challenge I want both my kids to be

(45:12):
business owners. I want them to do different things because
it gives you the ability to control as much as possible.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
And create the greatest impact. Is but you're you're playing
this lifestyle gamble.

Speaker 3 (45:24):
Wouldn't you want to bullet proof it somewhere down the
road to make sure that God.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
Forbid and win it.

Speaker 3 (45:31):
Shit happens and you make a mistake, by the way,
we all make mistakes. That when that mistake happens, there's
a stopping wall that says you can out enterpass this
point and we can just cut off that branch of
the tree and create another branch.

Speaker 2 (45:45):
And but we haven't taken the thing down to the
roots and literally.

Speaker 3 (45:49):
Taken the you know, rip the tree out from the ground,
or built it, you know, taking the house down to
the stud and had to rebuild all over again. Like
doesn't that make sense? And I've had a business attorney
stable it's not necessary. I didn't know I was playing
a not necessary game, Like I want to win, and
I want my friends to win, and I want my
partners to win, and I want my community to win.

(46:11):
Like if we're playing to win game, like it takes
thinking strategically, It takes thoughtful, intentional time away from generating revenue.
It takes white space on the calendar to say, you
know what, I probably should talk to my attorney and
let them know that this is happening, or it should
take Hey, I want five meetings a year. I want

(46:32):
the twenty five meetings with my financial professional team, like
my executive team that's not in the business.

Speaker 2 (46:37):
I want them in the know.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
I want to be an intimate I want that to
be an intimate partnership on their world just as much
in my world, because if we don't guess what happens,
we don't know what the hell's going on, and we
feel like we're just spinning in circles and we're on
a treadmill that's even worse than the w Twoter treadmill
because we're a prisoner to the job. We're tied to

(47:00):
the revenue for all ever. And I think that's the
other part of business ownership and entrepreneurs you immediately have
going back to the cash flow thing, is it's life
isn't static, Your business isn't static, and it's got to
be top of mind all the time, like how do
we progress forward? We got to know we're jumping into

(47:23):
a pile of dodoo and we got to swim them
through the mout for a long time before we're going
to get to a place. So you're probably never truly content,
but you're in a position to where you're creating massive
blessings along the way.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
Nick, How could people get in touch with you if
they want't connect with you?

Speaker 2 (47:40):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (47:40):
Uh, email Nick at you know saying seven twenty seven.
Consaulting dot com is probably the easiest. You know. They
can text my phone number seven six five four four
one four zero zero nine to two or look me
up on the pre you know, shared social platforms.

Speaker 2 (48:00):
If you're interested to have a conversation, let's talk.

Speaker 1 (48:03):
I mean, and you're a great person. Talk to your
insight and just the way of looking at it, and
thank you, thank you Nick for all of your insight today.

Speaker 2 (48:12):
I appreciate it. Thank you for the opportunity of.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
Course, and ife of her key takeaways from today's conversation
include create a personal note when to connect to someone.
So when I say that, I mean when we started
talking in the beginning, and Nick talked about achieving success
and getting those followers that just come to you because

(48:37):
they thought you might look cool or this or that.
He brought up creating a personal note of hey, why
did you want to connect? Or when you go to
connect with someone, say hey, you look cool, I'd love
to connect and making sure there's that level of personalization
because you never know where it could lead. And I
love that he brought that up as well as if

(48:59):
you want to win financially, embrace the tax code. And
I think so many of us think of taxes, as
Nick said, as the daunting thing, the thing we just
must do. Let's put it off, Let's not think about
it until the day comes where we don't have a choice.
It's that time of year. Get in the headspace. Whereas

(49:20):
if we embrace it, it can work for us beneficially
through with your W two employee, like we had went
in depth and talked about HSA and just looking at
things differently or on the entrepreneurial side, going hand in
hand with that, something Nick said is think about when

(49:41):
you're creating that second stream of income what impact that
actually has instead of just thinking, oh, this will be
extra money, really understanding what that brings and the things
you could write off, the way money can be allocated.
As well as are you in a employee or business?

(50:01):
And I love that he brought that up, and that
is something I want everyone. I mean to challenge everyone
today to take a moment to think about are you
an employee or are you in business? And if you're
in a business, as Nick said, make sure you are
paying yourself and what that looks like so you're not
in the constant rabbit wheel of that cycle. As well

(50:23):
as embrace learning money and understanding what money is coming
in and what money is going out, and as Nick said,
it's so important to not only understand it and embrace
learning that and understanding your cash flow, but also understanding
and sitting down and taking time to understand it throughout
the year and where it's it's versus waiting Towards the end,

(50:46):
this was a great episode with our top notch guest
next a Boy. Thank you for listening and have a
successful days.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
At a

Speaker 1 (51:12):
POS