November 26, 2024 • 37 mins
Dan and Matt discussed their respective journeys in business and real estate, with Matt sharing his experiences of transitioning from a machine shop worker to a real estate investor and his strategies for managing businesses and generating income. They also discussed the importance of focusing on what can be controlled, not getting distracted by external factors, and the need for good leadership and positive attitude in attracting and retaining employees. Lastly, they explored strategies for overcoming personal and professional challenges, with Matt suggesting a focus on one's strengths and taking a break from problematic situations to reevaluate and refocus.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, welcome back, guys. This is the rebranded five
F Conversation. So Matt and anybody that hasn't listened, The
(00:23):
four F Forum was our previous podcast name where we
talked about faith, family, fitness, and finances and just try
to use that as you know, core values, priorities, to
make decisions and just kind of keep yourself in alignment
with with making decisions and stuff. So took a little break,
we're rebranding, firing this up.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Matt.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
You're going to be one of our very first episodes
we're releasing, but we're going to have that fifth fifth
F theme of freedom. So obviously I met you through
social media and a couple other people that I were
mentors referred me over to you, And yeah, obviously doing
some coaching with you, and you're helping us set up
(01:04):
the whole saling and the whole trying to just build
out the system. So I really want to pull out
from you, you know, just some of the mindset, but
also you know how you build these businesses out to
run without your forty hours a week involvement.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Type of stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
So before we jump into that, though, tell us a
little bit about who you are, what you like what
you do, and yeah, how kind of where how'd you
get to where you're at today?
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Well, you know, I've been in My name is Matt Larson.
I've been in business nineteen years. I was a former
machine shop worker, so I didn't have any business background.
You know. I went to college for one semester and
after that one semester they told me I couldn't come back.
So well that was the end of my college college career.
(01:52):
But basically, you know, I got out of high school,
tried college, went that didn't work. So I ended up
working in a machine shop all the way till I
was thirty years old. And at thirty years old, I
ended up you know, reading the right books and got
into real estate and so it's been kind of a
(02:13):
ride ever since. So I'm forty nine now. I've been
in real estate since I was thirty. So basically, you know,
I started like everybody else did, working at W two
and you know, just learning the business through, you know,
fighting and scratching through it. You know. In two thousand
(02:33):
and five, when I first started, the economy was crazy.
Houses were going up in value like they'd never seen.
And by two thousand and eight we were in the
worst economy since the Depression at that point. In two
thousand and eight, I ended up quitting my job, which
most people thought was crazy, and I went full time
into real estate. And my portfolio in two thousand and
(02:54):
eight had about thirty houses and I had about twenty
thousand in cash at that point, and I quit my job.
I was pretty scared, but I was confident in my skills,
and by twenty thirteen I had built my portfolio up
to four hundred and fifty properties not doors, not doors,
(03:15):
not syndication houses. I owned my own and my cash
reserves had grown to a million dollars in cash. And
so I did really well during the downturn and grew
at a pretty fast pace. And then I sold most
of my houses. I still have about seventy five left,
(03:35):
but I sold most of my houses at the peak.
So I'm a big believer in not holding forever. I
liked to buy and buy loo sell high. So along
the way, you know, I learned a lot about time freedom,
you know, by the time two thousand, you know, so
I started to know five. I hired my first employee
(03:56):
in twoy thirteen. That person is still with me today,
and so by two thousand, I worked really hard, worked
a lot of hours, really, you know, grinding it out.
By I realized that if I wanted to grow, after
I hired that first employee, I realized, okay, light went off.
I just doubled my income in one year and cut
(04:18):
my hours in half. And so at that point I
really started diving deep into having other people work for me.
And so I went down the traditional path, which was
hiring American workers, and that turned out to be a
bad decision. And you know, it was American workers, and
(04:39):
I'm as American as they come. But I also have
a lot of experience with the troubles that I had
with American workers. I don't believe that American workers are
the same people today that they were in the nineteen fifties.
And so I had a lot of people. I had
employees steal from me, I had people not work, make
(05:00):
a lot of mistakes, get me into into having issues
with things. And by the time twenty seventeen had hit,
I had fifty full time employees. We were flipping about
forty to fifty houses a month, and I wasn't really
making any money, which is pretty scary. I mean, I
think twenty seventeen, I made one point eight million net
(05:23):
after taxes, which some of you guys might be thinking
is a lot of money, but it's not when you
consider how many houses that I flipped. You know, you
take four houses a month and do the math on
forty a month times twelve, divide that by one point
eight million, and I didn't really make very much money
per house. And at that point, that's when the light
bulb went off, I need to do something different. And
(05:45):
I had hired a couple of virtual assistants at that point,
and they were my best some of my best employees,
and they were also my cheapest employees. So I made
it my mission. I went to my team early twenty
eighteen and said, hey, every time somebody quits her get
gets fired, I want to replace him with the VA.
(06:07):
And we did that and within within a couple of years.
Took about two two and a half years to completely
replace everybody. But I now have a company that is
fully All my companies are run fully by virtual assistance.
The only boots on the ground employees I have, the
(06:28):
only people that I have working for me are boots
in the ground employees that they're American. The rest of them
virtual assistants, outside of the very first employee that I hired,
which is still she's still with me today and she's
works virtual. She's just not considered a normal virtual assistant
because she lives in the United States. So so basically,
(06:51):
I saved over a million dollars a year out of
my out of my labor costs by going switching from
American to virtual assistance, and I got a better output.
I have fewer mistakes, very few mistakes. I have less
drama by far more productivity. It's just better, better, better.
(07:12):
It checks every box is being better. There's no box
that it's not better. So that's how I run all
my businesses now, how most of my businesses. When I
start a business, I have nine different businesses. When I
start a business, I don't start the business with me
as a factor. I don't start the business as me
as a position on the team. I start the business
(07:35):
with my idea and I hire players that can be
put in each position. I'm not one of the ingredients.
I also want to start a business that I can sell,
and it's tough to sell a business when you're the
main magic inside that business. So yeah, I mean that's
(07:56):
basically you know, you can see this isn't a you know,
for the people that Dan's been to my house, but
people that you know, that's a real lake out there.
That's not like a screening. And I love being I
never leave my house much, very rarely, and I just
really like working from home. I have four dogs, and
(08:19):
that's what I consider like success.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, I love it. Well, I'm backing up a second.
You kind of said you grinded. You know, you put
in the grind, you put in the effort. I like
studying like successful people. Can you just bypass all of
the grind and become successful or is it a necessary
ingredient to just go through the grind?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
You can bypass it if you have cash, because you
can hire the talent that you so in the beginning.
The reason people have to grind and work a lot
of hours is because they're doing all the uh in
that company. But if you were to hire, you know,
(09:06):
if you were to hire those positions, you wouldn't have
to do them. Let me just give an example. Let's
say let's say Bill Gates, one of the richest people
in the world. Let's say he decided to, you know,
sell all his companies and start something new, would he
be grinding. No, No, he wouldn't probably work ten hours
a week, he probably worked, would work less than an
hour a day. He would just hire out all all
(09:28):
the spots. So, yeah, you don't have to grind, But
you know, if it's a new industry and it's a
new idea, you probably still have to grind. Like take
Elon Musk for example, when he started SpaceX and he
started Tesla, he was grinding in those businesses because he
was such a special human being that could have the
(09:50):
mental ability to be able to make those businesses work.
And that's a special thing. He's the only, the only
he's the only non military person in the world that's
ever you know, broken through the atmosphere in a spaceship
and he's he created a car company that you know
in America that there hasn't been a successful car company
(10:12):
in America since like Ford one hundred years. So, you know,
so it took a special human being. But if you're
doing a job that or a business that is something
that's been figured out before, you don't have to grind.
You can hire it out.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Managing people and maybe I got to quit telling myself
the story. But it's hard, right for me? Maybe why
is it so hard for me?
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Maybe, well, because you're the one managing people, so you
know it's not easy managing people. But do you have
to manage people, Well, you're choosing to manage people. You
don't have to. You could hire that position out, You
could hire a manager to manage those people. But managing
people is never easy because people are human beings, and
(11:02):
human beings are just different. They call in sick, they
make mistakes, they take days off, you know, they're they
get sick, you know, they have kids. Whatever. Human beings
are variables, so you know there's always going to be
some challenges managing human beings. You know, But if you
(11:23):
hire the best people, there's fewer challenges. If you hire
the wrong people, there's lots of challenges. But ultimately you
don't have to do any of those things. Let me,
let me give you an example. I have one company
that has a couple hundred employees in it, and I
don't know those people. I don't I don't know who
they are. I don't get emails from them, they don't
(11:43):
have my email. I don't know who they are. I
just know that they work for me, but somebody else
manages them. So that's an example.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
What are your nine businesses if you can just list
them off quick.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
So I have a whole old sailing operation. I have
rental property operation. I have fix and flip business. I
have a dumpster business. I have a skip tracing data company.
I have a virtual assistant business. I have a I
(12:20):
have a blue collar leads business. I have a let's
see what else construction company, and I have a property
management company.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Gotcha and you said you continue to own about seventy
five properties.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yeah, I have about seventy five left. I tried to
sell them all out but didn't. It's pretty hard to
get rid of four hundred and fifty houses at once.
It takes a little bit of time to do that,
and I ran out of time. I was racing the clock.
But twenty twenty two hit interest rates went up in
the market stalled out. So I don't have a reason
it does not sell it at the highest price possible.
(13:03):
I can just wait and then sell them later. It's
no big.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Deal, basically waiting out the market.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, they're just cash blow. It's just capital right now.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Anyway, mindset wise, when you have thirty houses you know,
some people are going to listen to this and be like,
thirty houses, dude, that's that's amazing, That's that's really good.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
That's you know, three to five million dollars right there.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Why why did you not just pour your energy into
paying those off and having thirty paid off houses and
right off into the sunset? Like what what's the mindset
to go to four point fifty and downsize and buy,
you know, start a new business? Like talk a little
bit about maybe your mindset that got you to where
you're at.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Well, when you have thirty houses and you're entering the
greatest real estate environment since the Great Depression, it doesn't
make a lot of sense to pay off houses that
you own. It would be make more sense to go
buy other houses at thirty cents on the dollar and
then watch the market pull them up in value. And
that's what I did. So my thought was, I have
(14:10):
all these properties around me that I can go by
for pennies on the dollar, I'll just do that.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
And that that's not that's not like a thought that
gets taught in college or high school. Like, it's not
it's not the normal thought. Why is there such a
stronghold on like just the societal typical financial advice when
it comes to debt, Like the mindset is, maybe, hey,
the debts still you know an expense, pay that off
(14:40):
and free up the cash flow where you're going thirty
cents in the dollar, multiply into all these properties and
then build, you know, create equity with the timing of
the market. And obviously you're you're talking like it's just
second nature because of the experience in your timeline.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
But talk to those people that maybe have three or
four properties.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And they're just the debt worries them over and over
and over, Like what mindset should they be thinking to
really build wealth in real estate?
Speaker 3 (15:09):
Well, I mean, the reason most people and the reason
colleges and universities and you know, other gurus teach to
get out of debt is because most people can't handle debt.
And if debt works, debt is amazing when it's working
for you. It's terrible when it works against you. And
most people can't handle the debt. And also most people
(15:33):
can't handle income creation very easily either. And the only
reason the only way that you get out of debt
if things go bad is to generate more income, you know,
so you know, there's such a thing that you hear industries,
people say there's good debt and there's bad debt. All
debt is bad given the right scenario. You know, well, no,
(15:55):
my debt on a rental properties, that's good debt. Well, okay,
what if the first of the month rolls around and
your tenant moves out. That is now bad debt, same house,
same mortgage. You labeled one is good, it's actually bad.
So now you're feeding that house until you get it
turned over and get it re rented. So that is
bad debt. But I don't think I think people label
(16:19):
good debt bad debt as a gimmick to get people
bought into certain mindsets. But ultimately, all debt is bad.
But it can be a tool that can grow your wealth.
So you know, more than once during my skyrocketing, you
(16:39):
don't go from thirty houses to four hundred and fifty
and not get beat up a little bit. There are
lots of times within that time frame that I went
backwards one hundred and grand a month. You have a day,
I remember I had a really cold streak in January.
I got four hundred houses and it gets down to
(17:02):
negative sixty, not with windshill, negative sixty without windshill, And
I got that a furnace cannot operate. A furnace only
moves about seventy degrees if you're if you're at negative
ten or seventy, maybe seventy five degrees is all they'll
move the temperature. If you're at negative ten, that furnace
is going to run hard to get to seventy sixty
(17:23):
five seven sixty sixty five degrees. If you're at negative
sixty and it stays like that for a week, that
furnace never gets a break, and that furnace is going
to break down. So you know, I had one day
one week where I had thirteen furnaces go out, you know,
and if it's negative fifty, you don't get to tell
(17:44):
the tenant. Well, you know, let me quote everything out.
I'm gonna get a good deal on these furnaces. Let
me just make you know, wrap yourself up in a
blanket and I'll get back to you when the time
is right. No, you can't do that. You put people
up in hotels. You you call the HVAT guy, he
charges you double and you get it done right. So
(18:06):
so that's you know, you'll have those times, you'll have
houses that pipes break and water shoots everywhere, and you'll
have house fires, and you'll have you know, you don't
get to thirty four hundred and fifty houses without getting
beat up a little bit. So but I have always
had the ability to create money. So I wholesale all
(18:26):
the time, forever I have only the last time I
didn't wholesale a house was in O seven. Every single
month since then, I've wholesale houses lots of houses, and
so I create income, and that income pays for a
lot of stuff. So I have a bad month in
my rental portfolio, which doesn't typically happen right now because
(18:46):
everything just is rented and the market's pretty easy, and
when something goes vacant, it gets re rented quickly. We
have a good system, but the market conditions are good,
and I just have everything filled but back and it
was growth mode. If I'm buying thirty houses a month
for my portfolio, well you always have a hundred houses vacant.
(19:07):
If you're buying thirty houses a month and you buy
this month's thirty and it takes two months to rehab those,
well then you got thirty thirty plus it takes thirty
days to rehab. Well, now you are to fill something.
You got a hundred houses sit in vacant. Those houses
are probably costing me one hundred grand a month, you know,
so so, but I always overcame that because I had
(19:28):
the income side of things. I could wholesale some houses
and make two hundred grand a month. So I think
that most people can't. They have they struggle with the
ability to make income. So guys like Dave Ramsey and
the other people say just stay out of debt. And
(19:49):
the reason they're saying that is because you don't have
the income capability to fix the problem when it arises.
That's the issue.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
So what's what's the steps you would take?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Like if you're if you're talking to that W two
person saving some money on the side, listening to this,
wanting to get into your world a little more where
you got time, freedom and income, Like, what what are
the steps?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Well, I mean, you know, a business will if you're
looking for income, that's one conversation. If you're looking for
if you're looking for long term wealth, that's another conversation.
You know, Uh, people will buy rental properties And I'm like,
why did you why you want to buy rental property
as well. I want I want to I want to land,
(20:39):
my land, the beach, and just like let my properties
work from like that. That's probably not going to happen
because it's not It doesn't work like that. You know,
you know, rental properties are very tight margin business. You
might make, you know, eight percent on your money, ten
percent on your money. It's not a lot. And if
a house goes vacant two months out of one year,
(20:59):
you already broke even on that house. So if I
but if you said, well I need a tax shelter,
well man, you're not going to beat real estate. You
should buy rental properties if you need a tax shelter.
But if you like income, then you should not choose
rental properties. You should choose wholesale. That's a better income machine.
(21:22):
So it depends on the question being asked, is how
I would I would respond to it. But if you
want to if you're watching this right now and you
want time freedom, then you need to create income and
then use some of that income to buy rental properties
and then hold it for the long term and get
some of those tax benefits and then long term benefits
of owning real estate so I like businesses. Businesses pay
(21:47):
you better than real estate. And so one business is
wholesaling houses. That's a business that is not investing. It's
a business is the business of finding wholesale properties price
that somebody will pay you more, so and you get
paid to spread. So so I that's why I own
(22:08):
so many businesses.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I like.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
If I have a rent let me give you an example.
If I have a rental property and that house is
if it rents for a thousand a month, and if
you look at all the houses in the area that
are three bedroom, two bath, and they all rent for
a thousand a month, I'm not going to get up
in the morning and say, you know, I'm want to
raise the rent to two thousand a month because I
need more money. It's not going to happen. Nobody's going
to rent that house for two thousand a month when
(22:34):
the rents are one thousand a month. Now, somebody might say, yeah,
but I could do Airbnb. Okay, I get that. Whether
or not it stays rented and all, that's another story.
But overall, you know, you you if a house rents
for a thousand a month, you're going to get a
thousand you're gonna get nine hundred, you're gonna get eleven hundred.
You're not gonna get much more than that. So there's
(22:55):
not a lot I can do to make more money.
But with a business, I could say, well, wait a minute,
couldn't I increase my marketing and get more leads and
then make more offers and then take those offers and
convert those offers into contracts and then make more money. Well, sure,
if your wholesaling business is making ten thousand a month
(23:16):
because you did one deal, and you increase your marketing,
and maybe now it can do twenty thousand a month,
maybe it can do from twenty to thirty and thirty
to forty. So that business you can scale up. You
can't scale an individual rental property and raise the rent
and get more money. Now, Can it work like that
(23:37):
over time? Absolutely? If you own a rental property today,
in ten years that rental property is rent's going to
be a lot higher. The houses that I own right now,
ten years ago they were renting for five six hundred
dollars a month less, which is a huge increase. And
that's the beauty of real estate. Your rents go up
in value, and so do the value on average of
(23:58):
your houses. But from an income standpoint, it's not great.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Yeah, So the order is focus on income and then
when you have income, take some of that income and
start storing it in real estate for long term wealth.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Right, it's a story, it's a it's a great place
to store your wealth. It's a great tax shelter.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Gotcha, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
So jumping over to freedom, the freedom work, what generically,
what is freedom to.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
You getting up in the morning and doing whatever I want.
If I feel like working today, then I'll work. If
I don't feel like working today, then I don't work.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
M h.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
I don't like to be told what to do. I
don't like to I don't want to have a boss,
you know. So I like to be able to make decisions.
And freedom is the ability to make your own decisions
and do what you want. Now, a lot of people
think that freedom is like vacations. I don't care about vacations.
(25:02):
Once you had like vacation, that's just the thing that
w two people look forward to. That's not what guys
like me and business owners look forward to because we
don't care about that, because we can have a vacation
whenever we want. No that's not something that we look
forward to, like at least I don't like. I don't like. Man,
I just can't wait to plan my vacation. I just
(25:24):
don't care. But so freedom is just making the decisions
that you want to make. And I personally like working.
I enjoy, you know, the thrill of building a business
or growing the business whatever.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
How do you manage the different mindset like you obviously
like you know Amanda or whoever, I don't. I don't
know exactly her mindset, but like, what if she wants
to plan that two week vacation, Like, how do you
How do you become a good employer to attract is
a little different question, I realized. But for you, your
(26:04):
whole freedom and success is built off of systems and people.
How do you become that person that people want to
work for? And yeah, talk about that a little bit.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Well, I mean, you have to be a good leader.
You have to be positive about the future and be
encouraging about what you want to build and just you know,
good leadership. You know, if you're a hard person to
work for and you treat people poorly, they won't people
won't work for you, and they won't respect you. So
(26:38):
you know, in Amanda's case, I don't. She doesn't get
she doesn't have any vacation time. She just takes time
whenever she wants. So she doesn't have like, hey, you
get five weeks of vacation because you've been here to eleven,
twelve years or whatever it is. No, she just takes
time off when she wants to. She'll just, you know,
she'll be like, hey, I'm thinking about taking next week off. Okay, great,
(26:59):
do you have everything covered? Yep? See you later. Have fun.
Don't shut your email off and don't answer any emails.
I mean that's how I do it. Yeah, So don't
make people work weekends. I don't. I don't want people
to work weekends. I don't like. I don't say don't
work weekends and then secretly high five somebody when I
see them answer emails. We don't work weekends, and we
(27:23):
don't work nights. Emails do not come through to my
company on the weekend. And I want people on purpose
to be spending time with their families. So you work
people to death. You know nobody's going to have Your
employees are not going to have the same work ethic
as you. You know they're just not and that's not
what they signed up for. So you know, you you
(27:45):
I expect if I hire somebody, right, I can get
what I need at forty hours a week. If somebody
can't do their job in forty hours, then they hustle
all week. You got you don't have enough people? Well,
I don't believe in overworking people. I want work to
be fun for people. It has to be profitable, but
(28:06):
I want it to be fun and I want them
to be proud of their work. You know.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Yeah, you post a lot on social media. You pride yourself.
I think on engagement rather than like, oh I got
a billion views, but you know more so I might
have a modest amount of views and really good engagement.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
I like that.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Jumping to politics a little bit because we're right right
before the election, right coming right up here, and this
will be released after the official election. But you just
did a post yesterday or today or something about just like, yeah,
that's going on, that's outside of our control. Cast your
(28:50):
vote and get back to work. A little bit like
mindset wise, like just talk about distractions in general, like
how do people overcome all the distractions if they're trying
to increase their income and then build wealth.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Well, I mean, don't stress about the things that you
can't control. You know, I'm not saying don't be involved
in politics, and I'm not saying like you know, some
of the people that love this country the most are
the most They're the most passionate about the elections. They
(29:25):
just love America right or wrong their views, whether their
views aligned with mine or not. You know, I'm not
going to argue with them because I'm not going to
spend their opinion. But those people love America more than
anybody else. But the bottom line is, you know, you
can vote and put your vote in and everybody should vote.
(29:45):
But after the election's done, you know you can make
a decision. If your guy want one or your guy lost.
Doesn't matter because if your guy one get back to work,
they're not going to write you a check and put
it in your bank account. That's going to change. Okay,
So during twenty twenty we got to I didn't get one.
(30:07):
Most people got like a nine hundred dollars stimulus or
whatever that was. That nine hundred doesn't mean anything. That's
nothing like, that's not changing your life. That might pay
a few bills, that might ease up a week's worth
of groceries and gas and electric bill. But it's not
going to change your life. Get back to work and
do the things that you have to do to help
your family. And if your guy did win or lost.
(30:31):
If your guy did lose, you can pout about it
and you can feel bad, but you know what, in
four years we get to do it again. You know,
go go worry about at that point right now, you
got your cards dealt to you play your cards? How
you help?
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Would you say?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
The freedom that we're talking about starts with that freedom
of peace of mind, like just having your mindset right there.
It's like you can worry yourself to death about the
things we can't control. But you know, but that that's
a different type of prison. That's a mental prison, right
you're kind of putting yourself into.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
So yeah, I mean you you can you know, worry
is worry is one of the worst things ever, you know,
I don't know. It's just like it'll destroy your frame
of mind, you know, more than anything, it knocks your confidence.
Worrying just really affects your confidence. And if your confidence,
if your confidence is off five percent, your performance will
(31:29):
be off fifty percent and it might be more than that. So,
you know, worrying doesn't really help anything. I'm not saying
that we all don't worry a little bit. I mean
every human being on the planet probably has some degree
of worry. Some people will have less of a worry
than others, but you know, it doesn't really help, and
(31:50):
most people worry about something that will never happen.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
How do you get out of that funk? If you're
five percent off and it's affecting your fifty percent, Like,
how do you reckon personally? Like how do you how
do you recognize it? And how do you get back
on track?
Speaker 3 (32:04):
Pick something that you're really good at and go do
that thing for a while. It'll change your mind. You know.
Let's say that let's say you have a business and
it's just a couple of things got tripped you up
and it's not working right, but you're really into fitness
and health. Well, then you know, work on your business
during work hours, but then just go dive deep in
(32:24):
your health. Or let's say you're really good at you know,
men's league basketball or bowling, or you know, you're really
good at playing the piano or whatever. Go focus on
something you're good at and you'll feel good about at
the end if you're good. Everybody's good at something. Some
people are good at right and rap songs, you know,
(32:45):
some people are really good at golf, whatever. We're all
good at something. So go focus and go do something
that you're really good at and it'll change your mind.
It'll it'll it'll reprogram and you'll tell yourself, listen, Okay,
I have a bad day over here, but I'm really
good at this thing and that thing is building my confidence.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Kind of wrapping up, heading towards the wrap up here.
How what's what's next for you? You said you're forty nine,
still still still a young in What's what's next? What's
the future look like for for Matt Larson?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Well, the future is not any different now than it
will be in the next probably ten years, you know,
I don't know, five to ten years is all the same.
I'll just keep building the businesses that I have, enjoying
life living on the lake. You know, I don't really
consist like I don't have this vision of retirement because
(33:43):
I feel like I'm kind of retired now even though
I work every day. I just don't have the stresses
that maybe a w two person has. But I'm just
gonna keep doing what I'm doing. Next five years is
not going to be any different. But you know, you
get older and you start little things hurt more, like
(34:05):
this left my left quad's knee right started hurting me
in like a couple of weeks ago, Like every time
I walk up the steps, like man, that hurts. I
gotta work my legs a little bit more, you know.
So you start realizing that, you know, you can't do
the things that you used to do, you know, and
that messes with you a little bit. So But other
(34:26):
than that, I don't have any Like I have a
pretty good lifestyle, you know.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
I love it. Well, we can kind of button it up.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
I appreciate you coming on and yeah, I think I
think I've you know, I've referred a handful of people
just to have a talk with you. Is that still
on the table for a few listeners if they I mean,
especially when it comes to business, But just I've referred
people over that just you know, they got aspirations and
they want to know a game plan or you know,
what's the steps and I might we have our conversation
(34:57):
and I chat, but I'm like, if you really want
to get next level kind of ideas. You know, I
have a free free call with Matt maybe maybe tell
them tell them that.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
And I think I've taken you up on that a
lot of times.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
So yeah, I do a thing. This is one way
I give back to people. Like one of my pet
peeves is like people get successful and then you know,
when a newbie or somebody new to the game ask
them to pick their brain, they blow them off, you know,
and we were all do it one time. So I
(35:30):
don't blow off the newbies that say can I pick
your brain? So I do a free twenty five minute
call for anybody that wants. It doesn't matter if you
want to talk about real estate or anything. I've had
people that you know, wanted they were bartenders and they
were like, how do I make more tips? You know?
And I've talked from you know, lots of business people
(35:51):
call me that I have never heard of their business before,
and I can typically help them grow it. So so
I offer that to people, doesn't cost anything. Thing you can.
You know what I'll do, Dan is I'll get you
my link, my twenty five minute free link, and you
can just if any of your listeners say Hey, can
I jump on a call with Matt. You can share
(36:11):
that link with them.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Yeah, I was gonna put it in the footnotes too,
And if you've got a special one, send it, But
otherwise I'll just use the one I I have that
I use.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
What I'll do, Let me do this, let me let
me create one for you that refers back to I'll
know when somebody signs up, it'll be it'll come for me.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Cool.
Speaker 3 (36:30):
Yeah, conversation with you on that.
Speaker 2 (36:32):
Yeah, no, that'll be great.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
And uh, once again, if you're listening, you know, I
highly recommend it. Even if you're like you know, if
you're in a W two and you got dreams of moving,
you know, adding that side houseolar or whatever. You know, obviously,
if you're in the thick of entrepreneurship and running a
business now, you know, definitely take take Matt up on
(36:54):
a call, and uh, you know, don't come in I
guess and maybe I'm guilty of this sometimes on our calls,
But don't come in telling Matt your life plan. Come
in with some questions like hey, I'm struggling here, what
do you think? And then be quiet and then you
can walk away with some actionable steps that you can
(37:15):
go implement right away, so for sure yep yeah, well,
I appreciate your time, Matt.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Once again,
All right, welcome back, guys. This is the rebranded five
F Conversation. So Matt and anybody that hasn't listened, The
(00:23):
four F Forum was our previous podcast name where we
talked about faith, family, fitness, and finances and just try
to use that as you know, core values, priorities, to
make decisions and just kind of keep yourself in alignment
with with making decisions and stuff. So took a little break,
we're rebranding, firing this up.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Matt.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
You're going to be one of our very first episodes
we're releasing, but we're going to have that fifth fifth
F theme of freedom. So obviously I met you through
social media and a couple other people that I were
mentors referred me over to you, And yeah, obviously doing
some coaching with you, and you're helping us set up
(01:04):
the whole saling and the whole trying to just build
out the system. So I really want to pull out
from you, you know, just some of the mindset, but
also you know how you build these businesses out to
run without your forty hours a week involvement.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Type of stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
So before we jump into that, though, tell us a
little bit about who you are, what you like what
you do, and yeah, how kind of where how'd you
get to where you're at today?
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Well, you know, I've been in My name is Matt Larson.
I've been in business nineteen years. I was a former
machine shop worker, so I didn't have any business background.
You know. I went to college for one semester and
after that one semester they told me I couldn't come back.
So well that was the end of my college college career.
(01:52):
But basically, you know, I got out of high school,
tried college, went that didn't work. So I ended up
working in a machine shop all the way till I
was thirty years old. And at thirty years old, I
ended up you know, reading the right books and got
into real estate and so it's been kind of a
(02:13):
ride ever since. So I'm forty nine now. I've been
in real estate since I was thirty. So basically, you know,
I started like everybody else did, working at W two
and you know, just learning the business through, you know,
fighting and scratching through it. You know. In two thousand
(02:33):
and five, when I first started, the economy was crazy.
Houses were going up in value like they'd never seen.
And by two thousand and eight we were in the
worst economy since the Depression at that point. In two
thousand and eight, I ended up quitting my job, which
most people thought was crazy, and I went full time
into real estate. And my portfolio in two thousand and
(02:54):
eight had about thirty houses and I had about twenty
thousand in cash at that point, and I quit my job.
I was pretty scared, but I was confident in my skills,
and by twenty thirteen I had built my portfolio up
to four hundred and fifty properties not doors, not doors,
(03:15):
not syndication houses. I owned my own and my cash
reserves had grown to a million dollars in cash. And
so I did really well during the downturn and grew
at a pretty fast pace. And then I sold most
of my houses. I still have about seventy five left,
(03:35):
but I sold most of my houses at the peak.
So I'm a big believer in not holding forever. I
liked to buy and buy loo sell high. So along
the way, you know, I learned a lot about time freedom,
you know, by the time two thousand, you know, so
I started to know five. I hired my first employee
(03:56):
in twoy thirteen. That person is still with me today,
and so by two thousand, I worked really hard, worked
a lot of hours, really, you know, grinding it out.
By I realized that if I wanted to grow, after
I hired that first employee, I realized, okay, light went off.
I just doubled my income in one year and cut
(04:18):
my hours in half. And so at that point I
really started diving deep into having other people work for me.
And so I went down the traditional path, which was
hiring American workers, and that turned out to be a
bad decision. And you know, it was American workers, and
(04:39):
I'm as American as they come. But I also have
a lot of experience with the troubles that I had
with American workers. I don't believe that American workers are
the same people today that they were in the nineteen fifties.
And so I had a lot of people. I had
employees steal from me, I had people not work, make
(05:00):
a lot of mistakes, get me into into having issues
with things. And by the time twenty seventeen had hit,
I had fifty full time employees. We were flipping about
forty to fifty houses a month, and I wasn't really
making any money, which is pretty scary. I mean, I
think twenty seventeen, I made one point eight million net
(05:23):
after taxes, which some of you guys might be thinking
is a lot of money, but it's not when you
consider how many houses that I flipped. You know, you
take four houses a month and do the math on
forty a month times twelve, divide that by one point
eight million, and I didn't really make very much money
per house. And at that point, that's when the light
bulb went off, I need to do something different. And
(05:45):
I had hired a couple of virtual assistants at that point,
and they were my best some of my best employees,
and they were also my cheapest employees. So I made
it my mission. I went to my team early twenty
eighteen and said, hey, every time somebody quits her get
gets fired, I want to replace him with the VA.
(06:07):
And we did that and within within a couple of years.
Took about two two and a half years to completely
replace everybody. But I now have a company that is
fully All my companies are run fully by virtual assistance.
The only boots on the ground employees I have, the
(06:28):
only people that I have working for me are boots
in the ground employees that they're American. The rest of them
virtual assistants, outside of the very first employee that I hired,
which is still she's still with me today and she's
works virtual. She's just not considered a normal virtual assistant
because she lives in the United States. So so basically,
(06:51):
I saved over a million dollars a year out of
my out of my labor costs by going switching from
American to virtual assistance, and I got a better output.
I have fewer mistakes, very few mistakes. I have less
drama by far more productivity. It's just better, better, better.
(07:12):
It checks every box is being better. There's no box
that it's not better. So that's how I run all
my businesses now, how most of my businesses. When I
start a business, I have nine different businesses. When I
start a business, I don't start the business with me
as a factor. I don't start the business as me
as a position on the team. I start the business
(07:35):
with my idea and I hire players that can be
put in each position. I'm not one of the ingredients.
I also want to start a business that I can sell,
and it's tough to sell a business when you're the
main magic inside that business. So yeah, I mean that's
(07:56):
basically you know, you can see this isn't a you know,
for the people that Dan's been to my house, but
people that you know, that's a real lake out there.
That's not like a screening. And I love being I
never leave my house much, very rarely, and I just
really like working from home. I have four dogs, and
(08:19):
that's what I consider like success.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, I love it. Well, I'm backing up a second.
You kind of said you grinded. You know, you put
in the grind, you put in the effort. I like
studying like successful people. Can you just bypass all of
the grind and become successful or is it a necessary
ingredient to just go through the grind?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
You can bypass it if you have cash, because you
can hire the talent that you so in the beginning.
The reason people have to grind and work a lot
of hours is because they're doing all the uh in
that company. But if you were to hire, you know,
(09:06):
if you were to hire those positions, you wouldn't have
to do them. Let me just give an example. Let's
say let's say Bill Gates, one of the richest people
in the world. Let's say he decided to, you know,
sell all his companies and start something new, would he
be grinding. No, No, he wouldn't probably work ten hours
a week, he probably worked, would work less than an
hour a day. He would just hire out all all
(09:28):
the spots. So, yeah, you don't have to grind, But
you know, if it's a new industry and it's a
new idea, you probably still have to grind. Like take
Elon Musk for example, when he started SpaceX and he
started Tesla, he was grinding in those businesses because he
was such a special human being that could have the
(09:50):
mental ability to be able to make those businesses work.
And that's a special thing. He's the only, the only
he's the only non military person in the world that's
ever you know, broken through the atmosphere in a spaceship
and he's he created a car company that you know
in America that there hasn't been a successful car company
(10:12):
in America since like Ford one hundred years. So, you know,
so it took a special human being. But if you're
doing a job that or a business that is something
that's been figured out before, you don't have to grind.
You can hire it out.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Managing people and maybe I got to quit telling myself
the story. But it's hard, right for me? Maybe why
is it so hard for me?
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Maybe, well, because you're the one managing people, so you
know it's not easy managing people. But do you have
to manage people, Well, you're choosing to manage people. You
don't have to. You could hire that position out, You
could hire a manager to manage those people. But managing
people is never easy because people are human beings, and
(11:02):
human beings are just different. They call in sick, they
make mistakes, they take days off, you know, they're they
get sick, you know, they have kids. Whatever. Human beings
are variables, so you know there's always going to be
some challenges managing human beings. You know, But if you
(11:23):
hire the best people, there's fewer challenges. If you hire
the wrong people, there's lots of challenges. But ultimately you
don't have to do any of those things. Let me,
let me give you an example. I have one company
that has a couple hundred employees in it, and I
don't know those people. I don't I don't know who
they are. I don't get emails from them, they don't
(11:43):
have my email. I don't know who they are. I
just know that they work for me, but somebody else
manages them. So that's an example.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
What are your nine businesses if you can just list
them off quick.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
So I have a whole old sailing operation. I have
rental property operation. I have fix and flip business. I
have a dumpster business. I have a skip tracing data company.
I have a virtual assistant business. I have a I
(12:20):
have a blue collar leads business. I have a let's
see what else construction company, and I have a property
management company.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Gotcha and you said you continue to own about seventy
five properties.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yeah, I have about seventy five left. I tried to
sell them all out but didn't. It's pretty hard to
get rid of four hundred and fifty houses at once.
It takes a little bit of time to do that,
and I ran out of time. I was racing the clock.
But twenty twenty two hit interest rates went up in
the market stalled out. So I don't have a reason
it does not sell it at the highest price possible.
(13:03):
I can just wait and then sell them later. It's
no big.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Deal, basically waiting out the market.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, they're just cash blow. It's just capital right now.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Anyway, mindset wise, when you have thirty houses you know,
some people are going to listen to this and be like,
thirty houses, dude, that's that's amazing, That's that's really good.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
That's you know, three to five million dollars right there.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Why why did you not just pour your energy into
paying those off and having thirty paid off houses and
right off into the sunset? Like what what's the mindset
to go to four point fifty and downsize and buy,
you know, start a new business? Like talk a little
bit about maybe your mindset that got you to where
you're at.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Well, when you have thirty houses and you're entering the
greatest real estate environment since the Great Depression, it doesn't
make a lot of sense to pay off houses that
you own. It would be make more sense to go
buy other houses at thirty cents on the dollar and
then watch the market pull them up in value. And
that's what I did. So my thought was, I have
(14:10):
all these properties around me that I can go by
for pennies on the dollar, I'll just do that.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
And that that's not that's not like a thought that
gets taught in college or high school. Like, it's not
it's not the normal thought. Why is there such a
stronghold on like just the societal typical financial advice when
it comes to debt, Like the mindset is, maybe, hey,
the debts still you know an expense, pay that off
(14:40):
and free up the cash flow where you're going thirty
cents in the dollar, multiply into all these properties and
then build, you know, create equity with the timing of
the market. And obviously you're you're talking like it's just
second nature because of the experience in your timeline.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
But talk to those people that maybe have three or
four properties.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And they're just the debt worries them over and over
and over, Like what mindset should they be thinking to
really build wealth in real estate?
Speaker 3 (15:09):
Well, I mean, the reason most people and the reason
colleges and universities and you know, other gurus teach to
get out of debt is because most people can't handle debt.
And if debt works, debt is amazing when it's working
for you. It's terrible when it works against you. And
most people can't handle the debt. And also most people
(15:33):
can't handle income creation very easily either. And the only
reason the only way that you get out of debt
if things go bad is to generate more income, you know,
so you know, there's such a thing that you hear industries,
people say there's good debt and there's bad debt. All
debt is bad given the right scenario. You know, well, no,
(15:55):
my debt on a rental properties, that's good debt. Well, okay,
what if the first of the month rolls around and
your tenant moves out. That is now bad debt, same house,
same mortgage. You labeled one is good, it's actually bad.
So now you're feeding that house until you get it
turned over and get it re rented. So that is
bad debt. But I don't think I think people label
(16:19):
good debt bad debt as a gimmick to get people
bought into certain mindsets. But ultimately, all debt is bad.
But it can be a tool that can grow your wealth.
So you know, more than once during my skyrocketing, you
(16:39):
don't go from thirty houses to four hundred and fifty
and not get beat up a little bit. There are
lots of times within that time frame that I went
backwards one hundred and grand a month. You have a day,
I remember I had a really cold streak in January.
I got four hundred houses and it gets down to
(17:02):
negative sixty, not with windshill, negative sixty without windshill, And
I got that a furnace cannot operate. A furnace only
moves about seventy degrees if you're if you're at negative
ten or seventy, maybe seventy five degrees is all they'll
move the temperature. If you're at negative ten, that furnace
is going to run hard to get to seventy sixty
(17:23):
five seven sixty sixty five degrees. If you're at negative
sixty and it stays like that for a week, that
furnace never gets a break, and that furnace is going
to break down. So you know, I had one day
one week where I had thirteen furnaces go out, you know,
and if it's negative fifty, you don't get to tell
(17:44):
the tenant. Well, you know, let me quote everything out.
I'm gonna get a good deal on these furnaces. Let
me just make you know, wrap yourself up in a
blanket and I'll get back to you when the time
is right. No, you can't do that. You put people
up in hotels. You you call the HVAT guy, he
charges you double and you get it done right. So
(18:06):
so that's you know, you'll have those times, you'll have
houses that pipes break and water shoots everywhere, and you'll
have house fires, and you'll have you know, you don't
get to thirty four hundred and fifty houses without getting
beat up a little bit. So but I have always
had the ability to create money. So I wholesale all
(18:26):
the time, forever I have only the last time I
didn't wholesale a house was in O seven. Every single
month since then, I've wholesale houses lots of houses, and
so I create income, and that income pays for a
lot of stuff. So I have a bad month in
my rental portfolio, which doesn't typically happen right now because
(18:46):
everything just is rented and the market's pretty easy, and
when something goes vacant, it gets re rented quickly. We
have a good system, but the market conditions are good,
and I just have everything filled but back and it
was growth mode. If I'm buying thirty houses a month
for my portfolio, well you always have a hundred houses vacant.
(19:07):
If you're buying thirty houses a month and you buy
this month's thirty and it takes two months to rehab those,
well then you got thirty thirty plus it takes thirty
days to rehab. Well, now you are to fill something.
You got a hundred houses sit in vacant. Those houses
are probably costing me one hundred grand a month, you know,
so so, but I always overcame that because I had
(19:28):
the income side of things. I could wholesale some houses
and make two hundred grand a month. So I think
that most people can't. They have they struggle with the
ability to make income. So guys like Dave Ramsey and
the other people say just stay out of debt. And
(19:49):
the reason they're saying that is because you don't have
the income capability to fix the problem when it arises.
That's the issue.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
So what's what's the steps you would take?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Like if you're if you're talking to that W two
person saving some money on the side, listening to this,
wanting to get into your world a little more where
you got time, freedom and income, Like, what what are
the steps?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Well, I mean, you know, a business will if you're
looking for income, that's one conversation. If you're looking for
if you're looking for long term wealth, that's another conversation.
You know, Uh, people will buy rental properties And I'm like,
why did you why you want to buy rental property
as well. I want I want to I want to land,
(20:39):
my land, the beach, and just like let my properties
work from like that. That's probably not going to happen
because it's not It doesn't work like that. You know,
you know, rental properties are very tight margin business. You
might make, you know, eight percent on your money, ten
percent on your money. It's not a lot. And if
a house goes vacant two months out of one year,
(20:59):
you already broke even on that house. So if I
but if you said, well I need a tax shelter,
well man, you're not going to beat real estate. You
should buy rental properties if you need a tax shelter.
But if you like income, then you should not choose
rental properties. You should choose wholesale. That's a better income machine.
(21:22):
So it depends on the question being asked, is how
I would I would respond to it. But if you
want to if you're watching this right now and you
want time freedom, then you need to create income and
then use some of that income to buy rental properties
and then hold it for the long term and get
some of those tax benefits and then long term benefits
of owning real estate so I like businesses. Businesses pay
(21:47):
you better than real estate. And so one business is
wholesaling houses. That's a business that is not investing. It's
a business is the business of finding wholesale properties price
that somebody will pay you more, so and you get
paid to spread. So so I that's why I own
(22:08):
so many businesses.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I like.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
If I have a rent let me give you an example.
If I have a rental property and that house is
if it rents for a thousand a month, and if
you look at all the houses in the area that
are three bedroom, two bath, and they all rent for
a thousand a month, I'm not going to get up
in the morning and say, you know, I'm want to
raise the rent to two thousand a month because I
need more money. It's not going to happen. Nobody's going
to rent that house for two thousand a month when
(22:34):
the rents are one thousand a month. Now, somebody might say, yeah,
but I could do Airbnb. Okay, I get that. Whether
or not it stays rented and all, that's another story.
But overall, you know, you you if a house rents
for a thousand a month, you're going to get a
thousand you're gonna get nine hundred, you're gonna get eleven hundred.
You're not gonna get much more than that. So there's
(22:55):
not a lot I can do to make more money.
But with a business, I could say, well, wait a minute,
couldn't I increase my marketing and get more leads and
then make more offers and then take those offers and
convert those offers into contracts and then make more money. Well, sure,
if your wholesaling business is making ten thousand a month
(23:16):
because you did one deal, and you increase your marketing,
and maybe now it can do twenty thousand a month,
maybe it can do from twenty to thirty and thirty
to forty. So that business you can scale up. You
can't scale an individual rental property and raise the rent
and get more money. Now, Can it work like that
(23:37):
over time? Absolutely? If you own a rental property today,
in ten years that rental property is rent's going to
be a lot higher. The houses that I own right now,
ten years ago they were renting for five six hundred
dollars a month less, which is a huge increase. And
that's the beauty of real estate. Your rents go up
in value, and so do the value on average of
(23:58):
your houses. But from an income standpoint, it's not great.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Yeah, So the order is focus on income and then
when you have income, take some of that income and
start storing it in real estate for long term wealth.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Right, it's a story, it's a it's a great place
to store your wealth. It's a great tax shelter.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Gotcha, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
So jumping over to freedom, the freedom work, what generically,
what is freedom to.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
You getting up in the morning and doing whatever I want.
If I feel like working today, then I'll work. If
I don't feel like working today, then I don't work.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
M h.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
I don't like to be told what to do. I
don't like to I don't want to have a boss,
you know. So I like to be able to make decisions.
And freedom is the ability to make your own decisions
and do what you want. Now, a lot of people
think that freedom is like vacations. I don't care about vacations.
(25:02):
Once you had like vacation, that's just the thing that
w two people look forward to. That's not what guys
like me and business owners look forward to because we
don't care about that, because we can have a vacation
whenever we want. No that's not something that we look
forward to, like at least I don't like. I don't like. Man,
I just can't wait to plan my vacation. I just
(25:24):
don't care. But so freedom is just making the decisions
that you want to make. And I personally like working.
I enjoy, you know, the thrill of building a business
or growing the business whatever.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
How do you manage the different mindset like you obviously
like you know Amanda or whoever, I don't. I don't
know exactly her mindset, but like, what if she wants
to plan that two week vacation, Like, how do you
How do you become a good employer to attract is
a little different question, I realized. But for you, your
(26:04):
whole freedom and success is built off of systems and people.
How do you become that person that people want to
work for? And yeah, talk about that a little bit.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Well, I mean, you have to be a good leader.
You have to be positive about the future and be
encouraging about what you want to build and just you know,
good leadership. You know, if you're a hard person to
work for and you treat people poorly, they won't people
won't work for you, and they won't respect you. So
(26:38):
you know, in Amanda's case, I don't. She doesn't get
she doesn't have any vacation time. She just takes time
whenever she wants. So she doesn't have like, hey, you
get five weeks of vacation because you've been here to eleven,
twelve years or whatever it is. No, she just takes
time off when she wants to. She'll just, you know,
she'll be like, hey, I'm thinking about taking next week off. Okay, great,
(26:59):
do you have everything covered? Yep? See you later. Have fun.
Don't shut your email off and don't answer any emails.
I mean that's how I do it. Yeah, So don't
make people work weekends. I don't. I don't want people
to work weekends. I don't like. I don't say don't
work weekends and then secretly high five somebody when I
see them answer emails. We don't work weekends, and we
(27:23):
don't work nights. Emails do not come through to my
company on the weekend. And I want people on purpose
to be spending time with their families. So you work
people to death. You know nobody's going to have Your
employees are not going to have the same work ethic
as you. You know they're just not and that's not
what they signed up for. So you know, you you
(27:45):
I expect if I hire somebody, right, I can get
what I need at forty hours a week. If somebody
can't do their job in forty hours, then they hustle
all week. You got you don't have enough people? Well,
I don't believe in overworking people. I want work to
be fun for people. It has to be profitable, but
(28:06):
I want it to be fun and I want them
to be proud of their work. You know.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Yeah, you post a lot on social media. You pride yourself.
I think on engagement rather than like, oh I got
a billion views, but you know more so I might
have a modest amount of views and really good engagement.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
I like that.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Jumping to politics a little bit because we're right right
before the election, right coming right up here, and this
will be released after the official election. But you just
did a post yesterday or today or something about just like, yeah,
that's going on, that's outside of our control. Cast your
(28:50):
vote and get back to work. A little bit like
mindset wise, like just talk about distractions in general, like
how do people overcome all the distractions if they're trying
to increase their income and then build wealth.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Well, I mean, don't stress about the things that you
can't control. You know, I'm not saying don't be involved
in politics, and I'm not saying like you know, some
of the people that love this country the most are
the most They're the most passionate about the elections. They
(29:25):
just love America right or wrong their views, whether their
views aligned with mine or not. You know, I'm not
going to argue with them because I'm not going to
spend their opinion. But those people love America more than
anybody else. But the bottom line is, you know, you
can vote and put your vote in and everybody should vote.
(29:45):
But after the election's done, you know you can make
a decision. If your guy want one or your guy lost.
Doesn't matter because if your guy one get back to work,
they're not going to write you a check and put
it in your bank account. That's going to change. Okay,
So during twenty twenty we got to I didn't get one.
(30:07):
Most people got like a nine hundred dollars stimulus or
whatever that was. That nine hundred doesn't mean anything. That's
nothing like, that's not changing your life. That might pay
a few bills, that might ease up a week's worth
of groceries and gas and electric bill. But it's not
going to change your life. Get back to work and
do the things that you have to do to help
your family. And if your guy did win or lost.
(30:31):
If your guy did lose, you can pout about it
and you can feel bad, but you know what, in
four years we get to do it again. You know,
go go worry about at that point right now, you
got your cards dealt to you play your cards? How
you help?
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Would you say?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
The freedom that we're talking about starts with that freedom
of peace of mind, like just having your mindset right there.
It's like you can worry yourself to death about the
things we can't control. But you know, but that that's
a different type of prison. That's a mental prison, right
you're kind of putting yourself into.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
So yeah, I mean you you can you know, worry
is worry is one of the worst things ever, you know,
I don't know. It's just like it'll destroy your frame
of mind, you know, more than anything, it knocks your confidence.
Worrying just really affects your confidence. And if your confidence,
if your confidence is off five percent, your performance will
(31:29):
be off fifty percent and it might be more than that. So,
you know, worrying doesn't really help anything. I'm not saying
that we all don't worry a little bit. I mean
every human being on the planet probably has some degree
of worry. Some people will have less of a worry
than others, but you know, it doesn't really help, and
(31:50):
most people worry about something that will never happen.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
How do you get out of that funk? If you're
five percent off and it's affecting your fifty percent, Like,
how do you reckon personally? Like how do you how
do you recognize it? And how do you get back
on track?
Speaker 3 (32:04):
Pick something that you're really good at and go do
that thing for a while. It'll change your mind. You know.
Let's say that let's say you have a business and
it's just a couple of things got tripped you up
and it's not working right, but you're really into fitness
and health. Well, then you know, work on your business
during work hours, but then just go dive deep in
(32:24):
your health. Or let's say you're really good at you know,
men's league basketball or bowling, or you know, you're really
good at playing the piano or whatever. Go focus on
something you're good at and you'll feel good about at
the end if you're good. Everybody's good at something. Some
people are good at right and rap songs, you know,
(32:45):
some people are really good at golf, whatever. We're all
good at something. So go focus and go do something
that you're really good at and it'll change your mind.
It'll it'll it'll reprogram and you'll tell yourself, listen, Okay,
I have a bad day over here, but I'm really
good at this thing and that thing is building my confidence.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Kind of wrapping up, heading towards the wrap up here.
How what's what's next for you? You said you're forty nine,
still still still a young in What's what's next? What's
the future look like for for Matt Larson?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Well, the future is not any different now than it
will be in the next probably ten years, you know,
I don't know, five to ten years is all the same.
I'll just keep building the businesses that I have, enjoying
life living on the lake. You know, I don't really
consist like I don't have this vision of retirement because
(33:43):
I feel like I'm kind of retired now even though
I work every day. I just don't have the stresses
that maybe a w two person has. But I'm just
gonna keep doing what I'm doing. Next five years is
not going to be any different. But you know, you
get older and you start little things hurt more, like
(34:05):
this left my left quad's knee right started hurting me
in like a couple of weeks ago, Like every time
I walk up the steps, like man, that hurts. I
gotta work my legs a little bit more, you know.
So you start realizing that, you know, you can't do
the things that you used to do, you know, and
that messes with you a little bit. So But other
(34:26):
than that, I don't have any Like I have a
pretty good lifestyle, you know.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
I love it. Well, we can kind of button it up.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
I appreciate you coming on and yeah, I think I
think I've you know, I've referred a handful of people
just to have a talk with you. Is that still
on the table for a few listeners if they I mean,
especially when it comes to business, But just I've referred
people over that just you know, they got aspirations and
they want to know a game plan or you know,
what's the steps and I might we have our conversation
(34:57):
and I chat, but I'm like, if you really want
to get next level kind of ideas. You know, I
have a free free call with Matt maybe maybe tell
them tell them that.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
And I think I've taken you up on that a
lot of times.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
So yeah, I do a thing. This is one way
I give back to people. Like one of my pet
peeves is like people get successful and then you know,
when a newbie or somebody new to the game ask
them to pick their brain, they blow them off, you know,
and we were all do it one time. So I
(35:30):
don't blow off the newbies that say can I pick
your brain? So I do a free twenty five minute
call for anybody that wants. It doesn't matter if you
want to talk about real estate or anything. I've had
people that you know, wanted they were bartenders and they
were like, how do I make more tips? You know?
And I've talked from you know, lots of business people
(35:51):
call me that I have never heard of their business before,
and I can typically help them grow it. So so
I offer that to people, doesn't cost anything. Thing you can.
You know what I'll do, Dan is I'll get you
my link, my twenty five minute free link, and you
can just if any of your listeners say Hey, can
I jump on a call with Matt. You can share
(36:11):
that link with them.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Yeah, I was gonna put it in the footnotes too,
And if you've got a special one, send it, But
otherwise I'll just use the one I I have that
I use.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
What I'll do, Let me do this, let me let
me create one for you that refers back to I'll
know when somebody signs up, it'll be it'll come for me.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Cool.
Speaker 3 (36:30):
Yeah, conversation with you on that.
Speaker 2 (36:32):
Yeah, no, that'll be great.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
And uh, once again, if you're listening, you know, I
highly recommend it. Even if you're like you know, if
you're in a W two and you got dreams of moving,
you know, adding that side houseolar or whatever. You know, obviously,
if you're in the thick of entrepreneurship and running a
business now, you know, definitely take take Matt up on
(36:54):
a call, and uh, you know, don't come in I
guess and maybe I'm guilty of this sometimes on our calls,
But don't come in telling Matt your life plan. Come
in with some questions like hey, I'm struggling here, what
do you think? And then be quiet and then you
can walk away with some actionable steps that you can
(37:15):
go implement right away, so for sure yep yeah, well,
I appreciate your time, Matt.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Once again,
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