Terry Begue - Painting a Better World

0:00Welcome to the Real Power Family Radio Show, brought to you by Family Success Triangle. Where we talk about how we achieved financial freedom in two years, by the time we were 30. If we can do it, so can you. We will bring you the people who can help you achieve financial freedom, time freedom, and location freedom. Learn how we integrated our business, investing and homeschooling into everyday life. Now, here is the Real Power Family, Eric, Lila, Devon, and Ethan. Welcome to the Real Power Family Radio Show, I'm your host, Eric Lohan. We have Lila, Ethan, and Terry Begg. Terry is a, well, he could have been a famous painter. No, not like DaVinci or, you know, those things. This guy paints houses so quickly, he can knock out the entire exterior of a house in just a couple of days with a very small crew.

1:01And he personally painted my own house. What was that like 10 years ago? We live in a log and stone cabin, but we have barn siding. I've never had a, we had to have it painted so many times and now, it still looks like brand new, even though it's been like 10 years. I don't know what he does, what his secrets are, but I guess that's why he wrote an actual program for sure when Williams, some books and had his own podcast. But Lila, tell us some of the cool things that Terry has done over the last four, almost five decades. Well, after painting during summer through high school, Terry soon realized college was not for him. So in 1978, he started big painting and he has never looked back. Terry started his painting business, fresh out of high school with no money, no experience, no connections, and no skills other than his painting armed with nothing more than a pickup truck and a dream. He spent years refining his painting and people skills. Then, at that point, he more than doubled his income in just six months and over the next

2:03year, doubled it again. He's an entrepreneur, international speaker and author and he's passionate about helping entrepreneurs and small business owners who more than anything want to provide a great life for their families. He's here today to teach and inspire you, the listener. Terry, thank you so much for being on the show today. Well, it's great to be here, Lava. Thank you guys for having me. Can you talk a little bit about your early days when you started your painting business? What that was like? Oh my gosh. I'll try to do it without crying. It was just, it was a sorry time for me. Like I said, I hadn't had no money. My wife and I got married when we were really young. We didn't have to. We just wanted to and I was 21. She was 19 and I decided, you know, I couldn't work for anyone. I tried several jobs through high school and the short time I tried college for just a few months, but just nothing seemed to work for me, but what it really was is I just couldn't, I mean, I don't mean it in a disrespectful way, but I couldn't work for a boss. I needed to be in charge. I needed to do my own thing. Sadly, at 21, I looked like I was 14 so people didn't trust me to paint their home and

3:07I was determined to make it work and I literally would go door to door sometimes in good neighborhoods and just ask people if I could do some painting for them. I was that desperate. We were just, you know, it seemed like we were just one paycheck from going under for several years and eventually things kicked in. I got some great ideas that I did in marketing that was kind of out of the normal in the painting industry, but it's what caused everything to change for me and like you'd mentioned, I'd double my income and then double it again shortly after that just because I realized that you find what you make your best money at in whatever industry you're in and then you figure out a way to become known for it and grade at it and that's what happened for me. Yeah, we always say that it doesn't matter how good your product is, if no one knows that that product exists. So in this case, it was your painting, right, and until people knew that your business was there and what it could do for them, obviously that's where the part needed to change. That's why the marketing is so important in starting a business, right, Eric?

4:09It is. Absolutely. I think of another guy Tim worked for us and I think Andrea did about the same thing. She's been on the show over and over. I hire these people and I help them use Pride as principle. I do the marketing more or less. They're working for our companies, so they don't have to worry about that. It's a lot easier. They don't have to deal with collections and bids nearly as much, but really we find what they're the best at and when they can do that and hire a couple of people, they can literally double their income in one year and then double it again the next year. So people that are listening to this, you can do what Harry did too. And unfortunately most people do. They struggle day to day for years trying to figure it out. And once you figure it out, you'll know you have it. I mean, if you've been doing what you've been doing for more than three years and you're not seriously successful, then you need to make some changes in life.

5:09What caused you to, it's not the doubling in income, Terry. It's the actions that you took and the decisions you made to help you get there. What did you focus on? What did you do differently that can help our listeners do the same thing as you? Well, that's a good questionnaire. And let me think for a second. One thing that I changed is painters, they were, if they needed work, they'd run an ad in the newspaper. So this is back before the internet, even when I'd started, it was in the early 80s, actually. And so what I would do is I would go to home and garden shows and no painters did. You know, there'd be basement, water proofers and roofers and all the other businesses that you see at home shows, but there were no painters there. And I set up a display and it was just different and it got things rolling for me. Another thing I did is I went to a newspaper and I offered to buy some ad space. If they would do a story on me and again, nobody was doing anything like this. And a huge two-page story all about my business and a lot of it, I was just basically

6:13winging it because I hadn't proven myself yet. It's just I had some people that would work for me and I decided I'm just going to go for it. And by the end of that summer in the past, I was painting four or five, maybe 10 homes in a year. It was a good year. But as soon as I did those two things, that summer, I painted, I think, 60 homes. In the next year, I painted over 100 homes. Things just went crazy at that point. I had a crew. I was able to multiply my efforts with employees instead of me just trying to hammer out 40 hours a week like I had done for years and years and years. All of a sudden, I times that by four guys and we were knocking out in a rain-free week. We were sometimes painting five houses, sometimes seven. You know, if I could split the crew and do two homes. So that's when everything changed. That what seemed to change, it was stepping out of that. Whatever one else was doing and find something to do that's different. That'll, it'll set you apart from everyone else. It doesn't always have to be even a great thing, just something that's different. I got a lot of other little things I can share with you, but those were the two big things

7:15right off. You know what that reminds me of Terry? Robert Kiyosaki, when he first printed out the rich dad poured out that book. He asked his friend if he could put it at the car wash and his friends like, this is a car wash. There's no books here. And he goes, that's right. There's no competition. So the first rich dad book was sold in a car wash because there was no competition. And you went to a home and garden show because there were no painters there. What I'm learning is you did two major things from my point of view. You found a totally different way to advertise that no one else was doing at great risk because I'm sure those things are expensive to go to. And you had no idea if it was going to pan out and people probably told you you were crazy. Well, no one has ever done anything spectacular without their friends and family thinking they were crazy. And then too, you had to let go of some of the control on higher people. Terry, I have a question for you to go off of what we were talking about.

8:18You did things that were different that almost no one else had done. What caused you to think I should go to these home shows and advertise there or instead of just advertising in the newspaper, actually get them to do a story on me. What, how did you come up with those ideas? I was honestly looking back. I was just desperate. I mean, I was willing to do whatever it took and we were, we wanted to start a family and we literally had no money and bills were piling up and it was just tough and I decided I'm going to do whatever I have to do. And I'm not really sure what did, there was an organization around there still around Colnary, the National Association of the Remodeling Industry and I knew a guy that was in that and the people he worked for had a display at the mall. It was just that, you know, the malls in town here are the local ones and I thought what the heck I'm going to do it and all I had the first time was just like a card table and some business cards and some before and after pictures of homes that I painted and those were horrible.

9:18It was something and but that was the difference is that I was the only one. There was a radio show there and they would do a little 30 second spot for you if you signed up and I was the first one down there and I remember doing that radio spot. I wasn't sure what I was going to talk about but before the mall closed that day, there was five or six people came in to see me and when that whole show was over a week later, I had like 80 or 90 leads to follow up on and that's when everything took off for me. The motivation was really just desperation, I guess, for lack of a better idea. I just tried to find what was working. I was afraid to spend money on newspaper ads. So I asked them if they would do a story on me and they said not until you sign up to do some ads but fortunately they did the story quickly and I got some money coming in where I was able to buy, I think it was eight or ten ads over the next eight or ten weeks. So it was a little bit risky for me but my back was against the wall and I was determined to do whatever it took. If your why is big enough, you will find a way and I was back into a corner where I just somehow

10:23I knew that it was right, the man needed to provide a house when you got married and well, the house I could provide wasn't exactly the house your mother was looking for. It was a broken-down warehouse with no electric and no plumbing and no walls. Yeah, but that's where we started and turn that into our first home because we needed it. I couldn't figure out how to buy a home other than this one that I could get seller financing on because well, the lady that owned it was in way overhead and couldn't do all this. So we as it turns out overpaid for that but he financed us and we learned a lot doing that which has allowed us to do more than a thousand more of those since then. Be everybody out there listening to this. If your back is against the wall, if you feel like you're down on your luck then make your own luck. You are the only one that can change your situation and you do it through conscious effort and drive. We'll be right back. Seven, what was your first investment?

11:24My first investment was in silver and we buy our gold and silver from American Gold Exchange which you can reach them by calling 800-613-932-3 or by visiting AMERgold.com. And right now you can get an Austrian one-ounce silver Philharmonic which is one of the most popular silver coins in both United States and Europe. For as low as $1.99 over-spot price, eagles are under $4 over-spot. Make sure you check out American Gold Exchange at AMERgold.com. Gold has been money for over 6,000 years and with the gold-to-silver ratio of around 100 right now there has never been a better time to buy silver. Welcome back to the Rio Pire family radio show. Today's episode we have our guest Terry Begg and I have a question for you.

12:24We've talked about your painting business, that's a big one. I mean we brought up some of your advertising. Is that all of the different ways that you've advertised or at least in the beginning? Because I know we talked about you advertising at a home show and on the radio and newspaper and stuff. What are some of the other things you've done? Because I'm curious. Did you just after you built up a list of people who wanted to use your product? Did you continue finding new ways to advertise or where do you go from there? During that time I needed to advertise you right. I didn't have my reputation wasn't strong enough and some things that I would do. One thing is I took that big newspaper article and I made like a thousand copies of it and I would just go into nice neighborhoods where I wanted to work and I would use them as flyers and I would just drop them off because I thought if people never seen this or have not seen this article maybe be good information and in there I had my business card and I did other things like if two neighbors you know if neighbors would paint together because sometimes when one person

13:28does their house the other one looks at theirs and said boy my needs done too and I'd give them a deal I'd take like 20% off for both of them if we could do them both at the same time and then we'd probably wash both houses the same day and we'd go right from one to the other. That helped a lot too. Once I started getting some money coming in too I did run some ads but it was always under with the consideration that they would do a story on me later usually I would have to run all the ads first but I found those helped and I did that to three or four different magazines or newspapers not big ones but just small little circulars and those were huge for me and then doing a hundred dollar off coupon little things like that but eventually it got to the point and this was quite a bit of time later I didn't have to advertise anymore it's just that word of mouth which is so strong turned everything around for me it took everything to another level once I got to that. I know wow it's probably been 10 years but you had painted at least one maybe two of our rentals and our own personal home by then it was I had to call you as a good friend

14:35or take you out to lunch and say Terry it's April can you please fit this house into your schedule by the end of the year and you were like all booked up and I guess that's what 40 years of building an impeccable reputation does for you. What are some other that how did you get people and I know you're very stuck that this is mean this is my name and I don't want to you know be negative here in any way and yet Terry is your typical self-employed person the business is Terry and Terry is the business and he hires people you still like to have a lot of control even all these years later don't you. I do it's hard to let go it really it becomes just a part of who you are and we were just out to lunch last week and I said Terry you should let go a little bit you could build a you have these brilliant systems and just train somebody and let them buy your business so that's it's really scary isn't it to let them use your name. It's probably shouldn't be as hard as I

15:41make in it out to be but yeah it is scary I just you know I keep thinking I almost wish I would have called my company ABC painting or instead of my last name but still that is an issue because like I said it just your business becomes a part of who you are. It really does and trust me this is not abnormal I believe that the vast majority I frequently you know single out the middle class but the people that make decisions like that they're kind of doomed to stay in the middle class you can earn a very nice income but if something happens to you how long does the team work without you I mean what if you would have fallen off a ladder or something that was always the drive the big why that I had I have to be able to provide for my wife at first and then we had two boys what happens if I get hurt I can't be there swinging a hammer if I get hurt and so yeah this a lot of people go through this and I want to talk about both sides no matter what you choose there's no wrong answer obviously Terry is doing incredibly well doing it his way and there are also there's

16:43benefits to that and drawbacks I just want everyone to think about both of them especially if you're Ethan's age getting started creating your own contracting company right Ethan right yeah and there's a lot of lessons it's just probably a good thing I should go back and listen to all these people have started up their businesses and see what are some of the mistakes they've made or things they wish they did differently and how can I use that in my business Ethan make sure you have a system for everything I am trying to turn everything over to your brother right now for the brokerage and he is reminding me hey you didn't write a really good system for this or hey the system's not good enough he's literally on me every day about people that own their own job that's the only female on this call right now yes yes systems are very important and there are multiple examples of that but I want to ask Terry Terry what are some of the things you have seen some of the examples of why systems are so important what are things that you've seen in my own business once I

17:43taught these it can run with you on its own if you have the system there I didn't have to be there all the time and I know like Eric said you got to be able to swing that hammer every day I did break my arms several times and couldn't work at all but I was still around but the guys honestly I I took that control thing to the point where they wanted me to leave the job so what I found was stepping away was almost better and I think our relationships were better with my my crew and what you mean that your employees actually like working without the boss staring at them every minute I didn't ever guess that it was so hard to let go but it was a better place to be you know it for them especially but didn't you have some real I mean look at the quality of your work you couldn't have done that as fast as you did all on your own you had to have help and maybe you held them to the standards or whatever but you can only work there's only 168 hours in a week and you had you trained some really spectacular people throughout the last 40 plus years

18:46what advice tell you what we're gonna take a quick break and then I'm going to ask what first how did you first let go and hire somebody and trust them to do some of the work because of the beginning it was just you a pickup truck and a paintbrush how did you finally trust somebody else we'll be right back have you or a loved one been affected by inflation yes we have the product for you hard assets that hold their value like the real power family silk around are available at American gold exchange you can visit American gold exchange at AMERgold.com or by calling 1-800-613-9323 welcome back to the real power family radio show today are guest is Terry big and Terry right before break air gas the question how did you first let go and hire someone trusting them to do some of the work I guess again it comes back to what I said earlier

19:46it became to a necessity there were so many people that wanted me to paint their house in a really short time I mean in a matter of weeks I could already see there's just no way this is I'm gonna be able to keep up and the people I hired had no skill at all they were just friends and friends of friends sort of a thing and but I quickly got three three guys what was easy about it is our system is so simple what we do you know painting is a skill but the way I broke it down it was so simple it was just really we found a way to paint houses with a paint sprayer so really only the guy that was actually doing the spraying and that could be me for a while was the only skilled worker the rest of the guys were just masking windows off and covering things that could be taught real quickly but the bottom line the reason I knew I had to hire people is I had so much work coming in I was almost cringing where I'd come home at the end of the day to play my messages because there are times there would literally be 10 or 15 calls and I wouldn't even know what to tell people in terms of when I could even come out and give them an

20:47estimate so you were cringing because you couldn't pay your bills and didn't know how you were going to make it to the next payday and now you're cringing because you have so much business that was scary at first yeah making that first payroll but yeah and in those early I probably this is terrible and I hope there's no one listening from the IRS but those early years I was so so raw to if so green to what I was doing I didn't have an accountant or anything those first couple weeks those guys if they had 40 hours I wrote them a check you know if they're $10 an hour I wrote them a check for $400 just because that I didn't have time to get set up and but that that first summer I did a lot of learning and got it all together but that was scary at first going from worrying about bill collectors calling to worrying about people wanting their house painted calling and I'll never forget there are some people would say I don't want to get farther down on your list so just put me on your list right now and this is before I even give them an estimate and I would even joke with them and say well I guess I could charge you anything then right is the law I know you'll be fair but yeah that is one thing when you talk to Terry for five minutes

21:52you know he will be fair there's no question about that and I think that is another big boost to any small business is when people get to know like and trust you and it's not just the way you talk you can tell you're a very honest person right from the get go people can probably hear that on here just telling it exactly how it was and that also makes it harder when you put your name on your business hey are they gonna ruin my reputation and my name if I sell this or hire more that's why I've always trained my kids never name a business you know Ethan and sons plumbing then it's you are the business and the business is you and you live into that okay these are really really great last sons and whether you just want to go from working at nine to five to starting a business or from taking a business as a startup and growing it adding employees there is something in here for everybody let's ask Lila who still goes to the office absolutely every day

22:53and works just like Terry why do you do that what questions do you have for Terry I kind of enjoy it I'm like Terry I know that I need to be turning this over to Devon but it's so hard to let go because my first thought is what what do I fill that void with but but I know I need to just like Terry knows Ethan what do you think we can fill the void with flying right I mean that's something if you have the money then yeah flying is a good thing but I mean there's different answers for everyone true some people like golfing that's so boring okay go on Lila well I want to know because Terry did start filling in some of his with different work like you Terry you wrote the book attract and keep customers for life how when did you decide that you needed to write that book well that was around the same time that Sherwin Williams asked me to create a product for selling paint jobs and it was really hard to do and it wasn't successful in the stores it was really hard to transfer over something you buy off a shelf because it's an idea but I did about after

23:57I was done with that I realized I needed to write a book about this and and the whole theme to the book is it isn't so much about your technical skills no matter what you do is you'll see later on is it's about those people skills that's what people were hiring I had it took me a long time to figure that out but that's what the undertones of the book was is work on your people skills first it's almost more important than your technical skills so that goes along with two of my biggest lessons if you get my sales class which is on our website people do business with people that they know like and trust all things being equal now if your prices twice as much maybe not but if you're within 10% of the competitors and they know or trust you more or like you better then they're probably going to choose you because it takes a lot of risk out of things and you roll the whole book explaining how in another analogy you can make a better burger than McDonald's if you can all of these young restaurant owners say hey I can make a way better burger burger than McDonald's

25:00and I said then why aren't you worth billions of dollars why don't you sell a billionaire here because McDonald's has the system people they trust it even I don't personally like McDonald's but you always get exactly the same thing no matter if you're in Europe or you know the South America or the United States you're going to get the same burger so is that what you're saying that you can do the same thing with a service business as McDonald's does with a product business go out there make connections with the people and it is not necessarily about how technically good it is it's about how much you connect and they know like and trust you absolutely that that was the difference I mean I found people even actually straight out told me they they would they would straight out say just get a price to me so it doesn't you're I'm not shopping for the lowest and that's why people aren't looking for the lowest price they're looking for a competitive price but really what they want to do they want to be able to just like what you said no like and trust you

26:00and it does become personal. Ethan do you remember what I taught you what are the three things that make a job great you've got to give them these three things it's not sure what you're referring to on time on time on budget and on quality yeah and at the right quality it's it doesn't have to be the best but it has to be good enough to meet my standards it doesn't have to be the cheapest but it has to be cheap enough and it's got to be done on time if I could just find it anybody that wants to become a billionaire figure out how to get airplane mechanics to do things on time on budget and at the right quality and I will help you franchise you could take over the entire aviation mechanical industry. Okay Lila what questions do you have for Terry next? Well Terry I know you've been doing more of you did speaking for a while as well you're an international speaker and I know that that came about because of the whole Sherwin Williams and attract and keep customers for lifebook correct. Yes it did it was about those again those

27:02people skills and that I forgot to mention this in your intro where did you learn to speak Terry where? Toastmasters. Toastmasters. Did you win a significantly a very high award weren't you the best in the nation? Well not in the nation. It's a contest they do every international speech contest it includes every English speaking country in the world so like 140 countries or so are in this contest it takes seven months and you don't really get to where people notice you until you've won four levels of it and that gets you in the final hundred people in the world out of out of usually somewhere around 40,000 get in the contest and I made that final 103 different times where I got to travel to Malaysia or to Vancouver to be in a different part of the world every year and but what Toastmasters taught me what I think more than public speaking it just taught me how to have confidence in what I'm saying that was the big game changer for me. How much do you think

28:03just speaking helps you in your business and getting clients? It helps a lot but again it's the speaking the confidence is the underlying piece to that is they they can see the confidence in the words that I say and in the voice and I rehearse what I'm going to say with those customers and you say it enough times it starts to almost sound phony so I keep it real relatable and just kind of think about what's going on every day as far as in my life that I can maybe share with them little things like that to make it a little bit personal you know it should be a business but I think there's a little bit of room for that personal touch too. It is so hard you can't rank that in a system that hey you always have to follow the system but you need to do it in a way that fits you and after this break Lila's going to explain how I was such a great leader and I taught her how to lead and it completely backfired because she doesn't have my personality and she cannot lead like a drill sergeant and it made everything way worse we'll be right back.

29:06Brushwood Media Network Every parent wants their kids to be successful and today's world getting them the right knowledge to do this can be a challenge. My husband and I decided to homeschool our kids and give them a financial and real world education rather than making them memorize things they would probably never use. Our results are kids who became financially free before they could drive with no money or credit from us. Now at 16 and 13 they co-host our Real Power Family Radio Show and Devon is in his third year of college. How can you give your kids a head start like this? Check out our book Family Success Triangle which outlines the lessons we taught our kids. We want you to achieve amazing results at any age. Get your copy of Family Success Triangle on Amazon today and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel at Real Power Family and listen to the Real Power Family Radio Show Monday through Friday at 7 a.m. on the Brushwood Media Network. Welcome back to the Real Power Family Radio Show. Before we went to break I believe dad you said we were going to talk about leadership and mom had a story to go along with that.

30:08Oh yeah embarrassing moments for me. Learning how to run a team of people and I the only leader I'd really seen was Eric so I tried to lead the same way he did which is very drill sergeant and military type style which worked great for him in the army and so I tried that and I had the most terrible results I had people quitting they didn't want to work for me it was it was awful and then I went to a class from T. Harvecker called Ultimate Leadership Camp and I got to see people of all these different personalities leading in all these different ways and all of them worked and it just was this mind blowing moment of oh I can lead my way I don't have to lead exactly like the person next to me there's more than one way to be a good leader and that was I mean the skill sets are all the same but the presentation and execution are slightly different if your personality is different and learning that was huge for me Terry did

31:10you run into anything like that in your business as well? The biggest thing for me as far as leadership I did struggle at first too because I wasn't a real pushy kind of a person and I wanted people to do things my way but with the biggest thing my biggest takeaway I would say is not to let emotions get involved in the leadership part and that's what I would do at first and that always backfired of for me so if you if you can take emotions out of the out of the scene all together your far ahead definitely give me an example what exactly do you mean in case the people listening don't understand what do you mean by take emotions out of it? Well if they would do something that would just in my mind be so stupid like I don't know something that would backfire and they got didn't put down a drop cloth or whatever and paint somehow got all over the cement just some crazy little thing I would literally take it personally you know I you know this you know we never work without a drop cloth and I would holler at them and sometimes even embarrass them a little bit in front of the customer and big no no I learned but that that was all part of the learning process

32:13for me but you know there's the right way in the wrong way to lead and and what I found is when I could take emotions out of it it goes a lot smoother yeah I agree with that yeah it is amazing how some of us think that it's just common sense to put down a drop cloth and yet in my one page of painting guidelines I think it's number like one number three and number seven are all put down a drop cloth yeah and and you've still had a couple people forget to do that and get yelled at yeah and I had somebody by a brand new five gallon bucket of paint and the carpeting was installed a couple hours early and a painter got done a day late so he went in and painted the last room like an hour after the brand new carpeting was put in it was not even two hours old and had a five gallon bucket of paint balanced on top of a ladder rather than putting it into a pan and the whole thing fell oh my gosh these things do happen a crazy things you could never think of did we

33:19take our 30 minute break Lila uh yes yes we did we're good Eric you actually taught me a great lesson because you said don't look in the mirror and I think that's one of the big problems you know I you about look at it and go yeah putting down a drop cloth is logical and everybody should know that but you know that that doesn't mean they know that sometimes you have to train at the most basic level beyond what you would think you would have to and you just got to accept that everybody's different they learn differently they're they're they know different things coming into a job so if you're going to lead the team you've you've got to lead in a way that you're understanding that they're coming from a totally different perspective as you and you've got to be able to communicate that clearly and effectively so they can learn the right lessons and do the right things does that sound about right Jerry oh yeah absolutely communication is huge and uh like I said just leaving now the best thing for me what I learned to do is once something would happen where I would start to see get mad and feel I'm going to change how thing my voice is just just walk away for a few

34:19minutes and then come back you know just say to yourself it's going to be okay like you said clearer communication is key oh to go off what you just said my dad frequently says as emotions go up intelligence goes down so being able to walk away for a minute get compose yourself and then come back and make a logical decision whether it's talking to your contractors or whatever it is that applies to all different parts of life you're going to say something bad it seems very likely that you as soon as you get your driver's license in a couple of weeks here will be running a crew you're gonna go out you have already hired somebody ironically he hired like a 24 year old and she drove him around to his jobs because he didn't have a driver's license but yeah it seemed like you're going to need this so make sure you're taking good notes Ethan this is absolutely invaluable information from a guy that is run by any measure of very successful business he started with nothing built his way up and provided a really really nice life for him his wife and children

35:25what other advice that you literally live in the American dream Terry you are not some fortune 500 CEO you're not worth billions of dollars you're just doing it and you're doing it right and you have lived a great life and have a great family what else can you teach our listeners so they can attain what you have oh my gosh I should I wish I had time to think about this a little bit coming back to family a little bit I there were there were times where I spent too much time that to work and I regret that a little bit is you know being careful watching those boundaries as far as you know one one rolls into the other because like I said your business becomes almost who you are but you still got to stay you still got to be able to leave your business at home you know or at work rather and when you come home be there for your family and that was a big part that I took me again a little while to get going on and and figure out and get right but something I if I had to do over I would have figured it out sooner yeah that's the only of those problems

36:28I realized when Devin was a year old so my first son I missed half of his life I was on the road and I was actually speaking and volunteering and then assistant trainer and training and then assistant trainer for peak potentials with Harve and I'm like man I just missed six months under the first year of my kids life and this can't go on and just like that I abruptly changed and realized I'm never gonna miss anything important I'm gonna be here when he says his first word and takes his first step and at every baseball game or wrestling match or whatever they get into and so we all have that problem and it's hard to let go when you're hurting for money at the very beginning and everything you do I mean we were I was so driven you can't believe the hours Terry might remember he knew me right after that but when we're putting in you know 12 16 18 hours every single day of the week and my wife comes home from her job at the vet clinic and immediately

37:31starts painting for me but yeah it's it's difficult to make that balance you need to make that choice like Terry says and the one thing that I can throw in let go of work people too many people bring work home with them let go of it your problems will still be there tomorrow when you're with your family with your family and the way that I could do that is when I was at work I never thought about my family I didn't worry about them I just cut it off when I was at work I focused I got more stuff done quickly and then when I was at home I was a hundred percent at home so maybe that can help some of you but you've got to let go of the worry of work when you're with your family or it's going to drag you down and you got to let go of the worry with your family I'm not saying don't answer the phone if your kid gets sick but don't worry about him get him to the best care or the best babysitter or whatever and then just focus on your job and you can get it done quicker we're going to take our last quick break and then ask Terry what else he thinks we need to learn

38:35and maybe even move into what is it like now that you're contemplating retirement you've got the money to retire you've got you know technically you're at retirement age I mean that's kind of a vague thing but I tried to retire it didn't work for me and when we went to lunch you don't really want to let go you're still kind of having fun painting you don't want to work nearly as hard but you still enjoy what you do so we're going to ask him what is that transition going to look like for him we'll be right back hi this is Eric Woolen from the real power family and best selling author of family success triangle learning how my wife and I became financially free by the time we were only 30 and how we taught these seekers to our kids so they could do the same without any of our money or credit when they were just teenagers pick up a copy of our book family success triangle available on Amazon today and don't forget to tune in to the real power family radio show weekdays at 7 a.m. Eastern on the brushwood median network welcome back to the real power family

39:37radio show today or now we are going to move on to asking our guests Terry not that you're on the later stage of life and around the retirement area where do you think where do you think you're going to go what is your life going to look like or your business specifically where do you think that's going to go because according to Eric you still seem to like doing some painting and stuff like that I do I decided I tried retirement a little bit but I could see right away it's not I'm just not quite ready so I'm trying to take just jobs that I know I can people that I've worked for in the past that I enjoyed working for and just doing the kind of things that I that I enjoy doing like for example I I don't mind inside painting but I hate it when there's a lot of drywall patching and you got a sand and make dust everywhere so so I'm trying to just focus on just the kind of jobs I enjoy doing for the people I enjoy working for and it's a lot better I'll tell you then then taking every job you have to have like in those early years

40:38oh life does get easy and you know what just five more years and life will be much better have you ever looked that's kind of one of our jokes Terry that every five years you look back and my wife said but we're working all this time and we're not getting anywhere I go look at where we were five years ago look at where we were five years before that and it wasn't you know by the 15th year you're like wow what we have had major increases in life quality and standards and time every five years did you ever think of anything like that or it sounds like same kind of conversation my wife and I had because I would always be pushing and always be complaining that we're not you know we just we need to do more have more you know be more everything you know one and more and and she was always the one that would settle me down and say kind of like what you're saying you know we've we've done so much you know we've raised the kids we put them through college and you know they got out of school debt free and and that that's a good place to start

41:40and and that was probably the first time I started looking back and seeing yeah we have created the life that I really wanted and and and sometimes progress is slow but you just have to maybe look at it in terms of years occasionally but kind of the same things what you said okay so I don't want to be totally incongruent here let me get this straight you didn't have a college degree you had a paintbrush and like no skills and nothing going for you other than your drive and you took responsibility and you were trustworthy and you built that into a business good enough to provide a heck of a life for you and your wife and put your kids through college debt free would you do that I mean I'm not saying college is important for some people it is but when we were talking at lunch I think you had a different idea does everybody need to go to college would you encourage everybody out there like you paid for your kids to go to school is that the best thing for everybody absolutely not I mean looking back I my kids were geared to that says that's what

42:45I was we were told them since the time they were little but but what I've learned I've written another book and it has to do with not with college being something people think they have to have but only the I believe I read some some stat like 40% of people with college degrees don't even use them of all of the all the degrees out there they're just they're not even using them in the work that they do I know both of my kids right now they both have my son has a jurist doctorate and neither one of them use their degrees they have great jobs but they didn't need college for either one of them and it isn't necessary I I tried to go to college I lasted about three weeks I'd spend all the time in a class looking out the window thinking this isn't where I need this isn't for me and I dropped it right away that's what we're at right now colleges is is great and it has its purpose and it's great for some things but it isn't necessary if if you if it doesn't fit you I found a lot of people with the the ADHD mindset that the college just doesn't work and and that

43:48was me and I had to figure it out the hard way but but there are there are the ways to make a great living especially in in terms of business ownership thank you for that I have had a lot of people come to me and ask so are you going to college and I will tell them pretty much the same thing I don't see a use in me going to college and especially for my grandparents which I'm not making fun of anyone but I just I don't see a reason in me going to college if I'm working first off I don't know if there's any classes in college that would teach me things like house repair and painting and drywalling and stuff like that but at the same time even if there was I could probably learn a lot more from learning from say people like you or like Andrea who we've had on the show I could learn so much more about painting and especially growing a business like we've been talking about on the show just by talking to you by listening to the show by being on this show I could learn more than going to college and yet this is free I mean apart from hosting the show I'm investment to

44:54listen yes yeah I find it ironic that Terry didn't go to school did incredibly well and then put his kids through school and Lila your dad knew the reason that he did and he did very very like it really well your mom is set up forever even though he passed away early and but he knew his problems every time he got laid off it was because he didn't have a college degree so you got one that you never use correct and what he talked about well my dad was the first person that was family to get his that he became a dentist and I don't know if he's the first one to graduate college but definitely the first doctor in the family everybody was farmers and construction workers and then my mom had a master's and I got my bachelor's and then I was just I've never used it so here I am seeing this from every different angle and I'm not pushing my children to go to school you know both my kids and devins 18 he's already got 60 hours of college credit because he wanted to

45:54get a real estate brokers license he didn't go to school to learn anything he went so he could check the box it says I have 60 hours of credit and then my mom the grandmother that Ethan referred to she's like what do you mean you're not gonna finish college you only have two classes left to get a degree because I didn't want to degree I just wanted to get the 60 hours that I needed to get the license the state requires me to have to do what I want to do in my life think about all of these things for all of our listeners there is no perfect way but you really should consider how much value if you're and I don't even know if Terry's right he says 40% of people don't use the college degree I wonder how many people barely use it I wouldn't be surprised if it's well over 50% that if they'd had four years of on the job training they could be doing the same job they're having without a college degree and that is certainly true and the true and the trades wouldn't you say Terry oh absolutely yeah it's I found it to be successful to me what I realized is just

47:00with all the research I was doing with my book is that if you could just do three things which is one return phone calls right away to keep your promises especially the little ones and three clean up your mess at the end of each day if you could just do those three things you're in the top 10% of contractors you wrote a book on that what's the name of that book again attracting keep customers for life yeah we're going to get a case of those and give one to everybody that works for me including making note make sure we take them out to lunch and do you have these or kind of buy them on Amazon oh I have a few I have a few copies here are they on Amazon as well right now yep it's easy to find them on oh yeah we will definitely buy Terry Begg that's B-E-G-U-E I wish I would have had that 20 years ago when I started this company oh yes okay Ethan you're up question well how about we because that's a very good point that I've heard you complain about multiple times for our contractors let's go over those points a little bit uh what were they

48:04I know it was clean up after yourself and keep your promises or two of them well the first one was return calls right away you don't believe how many people tell me I'm the only painter to call them back I mean I hear that dozens and dozens of times every summer you know wow it amazes me how much happier I am with the country everybody knows if I have a problem it's going to happen Monday morning literally it's Terry called me it's like I know not to bother you or somebody called me today I know not to bother you on Monday morning and it was really quick I was one of my business partners called in but it was incredibly important and we kept it short and sweet Monday is the day that I look at everything that went right and wrong last week I go over all of the invoices I sign pay checks to make sure everybody's getting their money and then I play in the next week that is also the time that I want you to be available if I have a question for you to figure out where I'm gonna have you working or where I want your crew next week it's gonna happen Monday morning so you can plan for the week yourself and just the people not even like Terry says being a

49:07painter and out there working with all these random customers even if you're working for one person figure out when they're making their plans for the week or the month and be available because the ones that answer me are immediately call me back it makes my life so much easier and that makes their life so much easier because if they answer they get first dibs on the best jobs that they might want the most so that can make your life as a not only you much richer but it makes your life as a contractor better all right point number two do what you say right Terry keep your promises keep promises yeah how many times dad have you at least complained about airplane mechanics saying something will either be done for this amount or by this date and they seem to mess up at least one of those every single time and that also goes for the you know other contractors when they're working on rental properties if they could keep their promise and especially keep their do things when they say that they'll be done how much more do we respect them how much more do we want to

50:07use them when they just keep their promises and how many properties if we bought not Terry you also own some investment real estate you're kind of phasing that out I know we bought a handful of from you but it you were building up a nice portfolio at one point in time I found that I got so much better deals because I came in I made the contract simple there were no hidden like oh I can walk away if I find a spider in the closet at some of these people of the stupidest contingencies I try to make it unbelievably easy I've already done my inspections I'm going to give you real money a 500 or a thousand dollars down minimum to buy a house and probably 10 to 50 thousand to buy a larger apartment complex that this is not an O take this and hopefully maybe someday I'll close it let's do it and I everybody knows that if I sign a piece of paper it's going to close and it's going to close on time what so that's been very helpful with me people will take

51:08my offer sometimes even as below other offers because they know I'm certain they have talked to their friends and like yeah Eric says he's going to close they're going to close what are some of the things you did in your painting business that not all painters would do that really made a difference something that that pops out those three were big ones that I just listed but another one that I with that I think set me apart is and I again toast masters helped me a lot with this was having conversations with the customers painters and people in my industry and a lot of the home improvements in service industry they don't like the talk especially to the customer they just do the job so there's no surprises at the end my gosh I would tell my customers and my crew used to get mad at me because sometimes they'd hear all the things I would say and I just make too many promises and make things harder for them but it created an attitude on the job that this is how it's going to be done but one thing that I did is I would over explain everything to my customers I wouldn't just tell them what we're going to do a lot of times I'd explain why we do it

52:09this certain way because it was really different for them to stand back and watch us mask off a whole house you know cover up all the windows in a matter of hours and put huge drop plots on the roof so no overspray gets up on the shingles but but I would explain that to them in my competition I found didn't do that it's even gotten back to me from other contractors who do what I do that they won't even bid jobs that I bid not not necessarily because I'm undercutting their price it's just people hire me because they know what they're going to get and I follow through well because you talk to them and you show them everything that you're doing would you say that it shows that hey you're not trying to hide anything or you know and any say extra charges but you're willing to explain this is how we do it and why we do these things and you essentially build a relationship between you and the customer and you get you get them to know like and trust you as my dad would say yeah it's putting professionalism at a whole nother level it really is because the industry they all seem to work the same way you know I'll call you back when I get a chance and I'm not going to

53:13tell you what we're going to do that day unless you actually ask me but people like it when you go out of your way and make them important make make the customer feel important like they really matter and they're the boss and I even tell them that I say you know that sometimes they'll tell me you don't you know you don't have to call me mr. misses or wherever especially as I get older it almost seems awkward but what I tell them is yeah you're my boss today I said I'm going to treat you with respect and it makes it so regardless if you walk in at 50 and you're painting a 30-year-old house you would call them sir or something like that just because it shows respect at first I would yeah always and I said or would you rather I called you by your first name but I at least get that out of the way for absolutely that's just like it's just some of the I don't think it's really chivalry it's some of the moral or ethical things that we always used to do that kids to nowadays are losing and if they just yeah it's amazing when I work frequently some of these older guys do

54:14that to me and I hire people that are you know 10 15 years older than me and they're all yes sir yes Bob like first off don't call me boss okay we're equals here I might send the paycheck but we got to work together to make this work and some of them are just so ingrained in them that they want to call me sir I'm like you know Eric's fine but it really shows a lot of respect when they first get started to do that and after I see how good they are then I'm like yeah let's just go and certainly not mr. Woolwind I was mr. Woolwind when I was a teacher not that anymore but it all of these things that seem so inconsequential when done time and time again can dramatically improve your life Lila do you have one last question before we end no I just want to thank Terry for sharing the secrets of his success so our listeners can take those secrets and go out and use those things in their own business so they can be more successful and have a better life thank you Terry oh thank you for having me they're just simple little things but

55:17sometimes simple is not always the easiest thing to do but just having that mindset most of the things that make you outrageously successful are simple and they have been around for thousands of years you can even find many of these lessons in religious texts and you can find them in like Aristotle's writings and they're just basic business principles and yet none of them are easy to implement the people that do implement them are the ones that stand out and do so much better I have no more questions for Terry but I do want to thank you very much for being on here and well a lot of the things you may have talked about some of these principles while they may be simple not a lot of people nowadays seem to know them or do them so I think more people if they learn this it can make the world a better place go ahead Terry you want to say something well I just wanted to say thank you so much you guys and that's what I was getting ready to say because of what you guys know and share you're making the world a better place with this show and I'm honored to be a part of it thank you I am so blessed that you are someone I could call a friend I could

56:23call on you anytime for the last couple of decades and you always say how we inspire you and you learn I learn from you every time I talk I love going out to lunch with you spending time with you and it's nice that we can just share all of your knowledge from the last five decades with all the people out there getting started and he noticed how he kind of avoided the retirement thing because he loves it he's gonna have as much trouble letting go as me but that's okay you don't need to turn 60 or 65 or 70 or wherever you think retirement age is and abruptly quit everything and go golfing you can ease out and still stay active because as long as your mind is working you are much more likely to live a lot longer and that's probably better for all of us if you can share your wisdom thank you for taking the time to share your wisdom with us today Terry I have been wanting to get you on here for the last couple of years we finally fitted in now that he's

57:27slowing down at work thanks again and all of our listeners use what you learn from Terry to take your life to where you want it to be and make your world a better place we'll be back tomorrow we hope you enjoyed the real power family radio show brought to you by family success triangle we want you and your family to be financially free so you can go where you want when you want with whomever you want learn how we can help you live the life you've always dreamed of at realpowerfamily.com to hear more subscribe to real power family on youtube until next time go out and make the world a better place make the world a better place